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Study Finds Thousands of Cases Of
Misconduct by US Prosecutors
 Associated
Press
June 25, 2003
WASHINGTON --
State and local prosecutors stretched, bent or broke
rules so badly in more than 2,000 cases since 1970
that appellate judges dismissed criminal charges,
reversed convictions or reduced sentences, according
to the first national study of prosecutorial
misconduct.
The study,
"Harmful Error," found 223 prosecutors around the
nation who had been cited by judges for two or more
cases of unfair conduct but only two prosecutors who
had been disbarred in the past 33 years for
mishandling of criminal cases. There are about
30,000 local prosecutors in 2,341 jurisdictions.
A product of
three years of research by the Center for Public
Integrity, a private ethics watchdog group, the
study also found 28 cases involving 32 defendants in
which judges concluded that misconduct by
prosecutors contributed to the convictions of
innocent people who were later exonerated. Some of
these innocent defendants had been convicted of
murder, rape or kidnapping; some had been sentenced
to death before exoneration spared them.
Charles Lewis,
executive director of the center, said that by
focusing only on cases in which appellate judges
found misconduct the study presented "an extremely
conservative and undoubtedly understated picture of
the problem." The study also excluded federal
prosecutors.
Astoria, Ore.,
District Attorney Joshua Marquis, a National
District Attorneys Association board member, said
the cases that were cited emerged "from a universe
of millions." The results suggested that the problem
was "episodic, not epidemic" and that prosecutors
"are and should be subject to a high degree of
scrutiny by trial and appellate judges, defendants
and defense lawyers, the press and bar associations
and ultimately the voters," Mr. Marquis added.
Project
director Steve Weinberg, a University of Missouri
journalism professor on leave, said researchers
found and analyzed 11,458 appellate rulings in which
prosecutor misconduct was raised as an issue.
In 2,017
cases, appellate judges found misconduct serious
enough to order dismissal of charges, reversal of
convictions or reduction of sentences. In an
additional 513 cases, at least one judge filing a
separate concurring or dissenting opinion thought
the misconduct warranted reversal. In thousands
more cases, judges labeled prosecutorial behavior
inappropriate but characterized it as "harmless
error" and allowed a conviction to stand or a trial
to continue.
"We are really
talking about misconduct in the cases that went to
trial," Mr. Weinberg told a news conference, noting
that nationally 95% of defendants who are charged
never go to trial. A majority plead guilty without a
trial; some charges are dropped by prosecutors.
"We eliminated
more than 90% of all the criminal cases in the
United States that could harbor misconduct," Mr.
Weinberg said, because "it's much harder to detect
misconduct outside the courtroom, where it's more
invidious." In many of these cases, the report
said, "the prosecutor becomes the judge and the
jury" deciding whether to charge, which charges to
bring and what terms to offer in return for a
pretrial guilty plea. "Usually there is no public
record," Mr. Weinberg said.
Among
prosecutors repeatedly cited by appellate judges
were:
Nels C. Moss
Jr., assistant circuit attorney in St. Louis and
later trial prosecutor in neighboring St. Charles
County in Missouri. In 33 years of trying cases, Mr.
Moss' conduct was formally challenged on appeal in
25 cases. In eight cases, judges reversed
convictions, declared a mistrial or issued some
other ruling against the prosecution. In 17 other
cases, judges found Mr. Moss committed prosecutorial
error but affirmed a conviction or allowed a trial
to continue. Mr. Moss told researchers he was "a
hard-hitting but honest prosecutor" who tried more
than 400 cases, many of them high-profile affairs,
and "obviously those convicted are dissatisfied with
the outcomes."
Carmen Marino,
a prosecutor for 30 years in Cuyahoga County, Ohio,
who had five convictions overturned by the Ohio
Supreme Court.
Dallas County,
Texas, prosecutor Robert E. Whaley, who had six
defendants' convictions reversed between 1974 and
1982.
Hinds County,
Miss., District Attorney Edward Peters, who was
involved in six cases in which judges ruled his
conduct prejudiced defendants.
Nashville,
Tenn., trial prosecutor John Zimmerman. Six former
Tennessee prosecutors filed a friend-of-the-court
brief to the U.S. Supreme Court in July 2002 on
behalf of death row defendant Abu-Ali Abdur Rahman
citing Mr. Zimmerman's misconduct in the case, which
the state Supreme Court had held was harmless
error.
"The most
surprising thing I learned was how much harmless
error can be stretched to uphold a conviction," Mr.
Weinberg said. Those prosecutors who were
disciplined usually received only a reprimand or one
or two months' suspension, he said. "We found many
jurisdictions where prosecutors have bent the rules
for year after year, but no one in the prosecutor's
office pays the price. The defendants pay the
price."
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--
Gerardo and René’s relatives
are still being denied visas
May
26,
2003
THE wives of Gerardo
Hernández Nordelo and René González, two Cuban
political prisoners jailed in the United States for
combating terrorism, have still not received visas
for conjugal visits.
--
It
has a name: fascism
May
22,
2003
THERE are really very
few ways to describe the "special"
conditions reserved for the five Cubans who have
been prisoners of the empire since September 1998.
--
Atlanta
Appeals Court rejects report presented by Eric Luna
of the University of Utah
May
16,
2003
THE U.S. 11th Circuit
Court of Appeals in Atlanta, Georgia, hast just
rejected (May 8) a motion of leave to file a report
in favor of the five Cuban patriots presented by
Professor Eric Luna of the University of Utah,
according to the Antiterrorista.cu website on
Thursday.
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