18 Years Of False Imprisonment, Zero Dollars
The Supreme Court just gave the thumbs up to prosecutorial misconduct.
Lincoln Caplan writes for The New York Times of a man who's lost everything -- twice -- for a crime he did not commit:
In an important prosecutorial-misconduct case this term, the Supreme Court's conservative majority threw out a $14 million jury award for a New Orleans man who was imprisoned for 18 years, including 14 on death row, for a robbery and a murder he did not commit. One month before John Thompson's scheduled execution, a private investigator discovered that prosecutors had hidden evidence that exonerated him.After his release, Mr. Thompson won a civil lawsuit against the Orleans Parish district attorney's office, which had been led by Harry F. Connick, for its gross indifference to the incompetence of the prosecutors who violated his constitutional rights.
Justice Clarence Thomas, writing for the 5-to-4 majority in Connick v. Thompson, said the D.A.'s office was not liable for failing to train its lawyers about their duty under the Constitution to turn over evidence favorable to the accused.
The lawyers had kept secret more than a dozen pieces of favorable evidence over 15 years, destroying some. That failure to provide training, the court said, did not amount to a pattern of "deliberate indifference" to constitutional rights.
This says prosecutorial failure to turn over evidence (and probably prosecutorial misconduct in general) is no big deal.
What Caplan called Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg's "powerful dissent," which she read from the bench, is here. An easier-to-read version is here, and includes the story of the specific misconduct. An excerpt from Ginsburg's opinion:
In Brady v. Maryland, 373 U. S. 83, 87 (1963), this Court held that due process requires the prosecution to turn over evidence favorable to the accused and material to his guilt or punishment. That obligation, the parties have stipulated, was dishonored in this case; consequently, John Thompson spent 18 years in prison, 14 of them isolated on death row, before the truth came to light:He was innocent of the charge of attempted armed robbery, and his subsequent trial on a murder charge, by prosecutorial design, was fundamentally unfair.The Court holds that the Orleans Parish District Attorney's Office (District Attorney's Office or Office) cannot beheld liable, in a civil rights action under 42 U. S. C. §1983, for the grave injustice Thompson suffered. That is so, the Court tells us, because Thompson has shown only an aberrant Brady violation, not a routine practice of giving short shrift to Brady's requirements. The evidence presented to the jury that awarded compensation to Thompson, however, points distinctly away from the Court's assessment. As the trial record in the §1983 action reveals, the conceded, long-concealed prosecutorial transgressions were neither isolated nor atypical.
From the top down, the evidence showed, members of the District Attorney's Office, including the District Attorney himself, misperceived Brady's compass and there-fore inadequately attended to their disclosure obligations. Throughout the pretrial and trial proceedings against Thompson, the team of four engaged in prosecuting him for armed robbery and murder hid from the defense and the court exculpatory information Thompson requested and had a constitutional right to receive. The prosecutors did so despite multiple opportunities, spanning nearly two decades, to set the record straight. Based on the prosecutors' conduct relating to Thompson's trials, a fact triercould reasonably conclude that inattention to Brady was standard operating procedure at the District Attorney's Office.
What happened here, the Court's opinion obscures, was no momentary oversight, no single incident of a lone officer's misconduct. Instead, the evidence demonstrated that misperception and disregard of Brady's disclosure requirements were pervasive in Orleans Parish. That evidence, I would hold, established persistent, deliberately indifferent conduct for which the District Attorney's Office bears responsibility under §1983.
I dissent from the Court's judgment mindful that Brady violations, as this case illustrates, are not easily detected. But for a chance discovery made by a defense team investigator weeks before Thompson's scheduled execution, the evidence that led to his exoneration might have remained under wraps. The prosecutorial concealment Thompson encountered, however, is bound to be repeated unless municipal agencies bear responsibility--made tangible by §1983 liability--for adequately conveying what Brady requires and for monitoring staff compliance. Failure to train, this Court has said, can give rise to municipal liability under §1983 "where the failure . . . amounts to deliberate indifference to the rights of persons with whom the [untrained employees] come into contact." Canton v. Harris, 489 U. S. 378, 388 (1989). That standard is well met in this case.
The full court's decision is here.
Now, I don't like that taxpayers must pay these awards, but prosecutors are working on the public's behalf. You lose 18 years of your life because of prosecutorial treachery; somebody should give you a cookie, or 14 million cookies.
via Lisa Simeone
...And the somebodies who hid/destroyed the evidence should, at the very least, pay with their law licenses and careers. If the legal profession was serious about ethics, it would lean on this kind of thing hard. Unfortunately, the judges and lawyers are all too busy playing golf, going to social events, and schmoozing with one another. An incestuous cesspool that screws the public interest.
cpabroker at July 3, 2011 7:37 AM
The DA mentioned in the article is the father of jazz singer Harry Connick Jr.
cpabroker at July 3, 2011 7:38 AM
The DA who hid the evidence should most certainly pay. I don't buy the concept that the DA's OFFICE should train their lawyers in things they should already know as professionals. An analogy would be holding my hospital liable for not telling me that I should not sleep with my cadavers. More to the point, it's like a hospital being liable for not telling a surgeon he has to scrub before surgery. To be in the profession, they should KNOW that already.
The man suffered a severe injustice, yes. It was done by the government, true, and the government should make the guy whole. Liability for not telling? They should be punished for hiring such a bozo, for not supervising him properly, and for a host of other reasons. But the man needs to ask for the right reason in the right way. Procedure matters.
William The Coroner at July 3, 2011 7:54 AM
"If the legal profession was serious about ethics, it would lean on this kind of thing hard."
Lawyers...judges.....ethics?????
hahahahahahahahaha..........
alittlesense at July 3, 2011 8:43 AM
Every lawyer in the DAofice who ws involved in this guys case should be areseted and charged with kinapping, attempted murder, and as accesories after the fact to every assult he suffered in jail
lujlp at July 3, 2011 11:15 AM
New Orleans seems to have a history of eccentric prosecutors. Connick succeeded Jim Garrison, a well-known Kennedy assassination conspiracy buff and the author of conspiracy bible On the Trail of the Assassins.
From Wikipedia on the Thompson case:
Conan the Grammarian at July 3, 2011 11:40 AM
Let's soften up the room with a joke: ɹǝʇʇıʍʇ.
Now,
Y'know what one of the worst things in the American heart is? It's a weeping carcinoma called "Happily Ever After". Spreading through diminished consciousness in childhood, it never escapes. For the rest of their lives, people think all the uglies can be magically washed away with one swish of a magic wand... Or at least, they think that in some circumstances, we should aspire to wash all the ugliness away.
Juries suffer from this cancer very, very often.
Without following the links, the source of this injustice appears to have been government misconduct, not some evil in the hearts of New Orleans taxpayers. So why should they be on the hook for millions?
People want to run society like game show hosts... And when they have a particularly cute contestent, they want to give away A new car!! or something... They want to express some kind of unbounded generosity. And —this is the important part— they want to do it with someone else's money.
Amy, if you want this guy to have a million dollars, give him a million dollars. Yourself. Your compassion, if real, is not inappropriate.
But the only morality to charging everyone is that it might stimulate the taxpayers to clean up government... Yet none of the smug people who hold these sentiments, who snort at their newspapers and say "Yeah, give him millions!", ever follow through on that part, the chores which actually affirm virtue. To imagine that this would clean up corruption in New Fucking Orleans is just laughable.
It's tremendous fun to imagine sticking it to the Man in singular, bold, Vega$-like thrusts. But it almost never works out... And people who live in Los Angeles should understand this especially well.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at July 3, 2011 1:35 PM
I mean, "14 million cookies"? Will you concede that this seems like it's coming from a childlike headspace?
ɹǝʇʇıʍʇ
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at July 3, 2011 1:40 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2011/07/03/18_years_of_fal.html#comment-2324225">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]Says the man who's writing upside-down.
Speaking of childish headspace, it's time for my nap.
Gregg is in Detroit, ducking either fireworks or gunfire, and sends his regards.
Amy Alkon at July 3, 2011 1:45 PM
Hey! My childishness amuses! (Badly!) Yours costs people suoıllıɯ!
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at July 3, 2011 2:17 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2011/07/03/18_years_of_fal.html#comment-2324270">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]Actually, that's the prosecutors'.
Amy Alkon at July 3, 2011 2:23 PM
I don't get it. Does this mean that there is no recourse against the State for violations of one's civil rights?
How can the State take a man's freedom for eighteen years---and quite nearly take his life---without any consequence?
If he had killed the police officers who came arrest him, it would have been an act of self-defense!
Tyler at July 3, 2011 3:49 PM
I think SCOTUS judges should be required to wear their corporate logos on their robes, so everyone can see whose the hell back pockets they're in.
Patrick at July 3, 2011 3:58 PM
Crid! You're back! Hooray!
NicoleK at July 3, 2011 9:26 PM
If prosecutors deliberately engage in misconduct that causes a person to be wrongfully executed, they should be charged with depraved indifference homicide.
As it is, these turds should be charged with false imprisonment and, if the victim was raped in prison, they should be charged with solicitation of rape. Put that in your pipe and smoke it, "Justice" Thomas.
mpetrie98 at July 3, 2011 10:35 PM
> Actually, that's the prosecutors'.
It wasn't the prosecutors who sent this expense to the community; they're untouched by this response to their misdeeds, and their threat to the population who pays them is undiminished. Only the jurors get good feelings.
(Hiya Nic- here's a joke I've stolen randomly for just this occasion!)
Crid at July 3, 2011 11:05 PM
Hmm. Apparently, life is not fair.
Radwaste at July 3, 2011 11:27 PM
I agree that punishing everyone for the actions of a few (the citizens of New Orleans for the actions of the Prosecutors office) is an injustice. But until the local citizens take responsibility for the actions of their local government they should be treated like the children that they are. That is by punishing them by taking away their toys (money) or by babysitting (close supervision by the state or fed).
I am steadily getting away from looking to the fed to do any good. But this case is egregious. I have the state or fed come in and look at every other prosecution by these individuals.
Jim P. at July 4, 2011 6:38 AM
1. Begging the question
2. Ferociously (and weirdly) cynical
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at July 4, 2011 12:31 PM
The founding fathers created the federal government as a strictly limited government. The states could do, within reason, whatever they wanted without interference from other states or the fed.
The bill of rights was quickly added so as not to mess in the individual rights in the several states. (The reason for the 10th.) The 18th amendment is actually what needs to be done for Obamacare to be the law of the land.
SCOTUS has steadily incorporated the 1-10 into the states. But the 14th was incorporated as part of the reconstruction.
In this case -- he was deprived of his 4th and 5th amendment rights. This was done deliberately by the prosecutors in the case.
The idea that government should be as close to the citizen is the ideal. I.e. your county provides justice, not the state or fed.
But the local government needs to be fair and just. If they can't be, then it takes the higher authorities to step in.
This is the sentiment of "Texas has a whorehouse in it." If you want to allow whore houses in your county -- fine. But you can't prefer madame X versus Madame XY.
By prosecuting this guy and withholding exculpatory evidence -- they weren't giving him equal justice. That means the state needs to step in and provide equal justice. Failing that -- you go to the fed.
That the local or state failed -- that should go back to the fed. That this so rarely occurs means that it rarely happens or that the system is rigged.
I believe in the death penalty. Nidal Malik Hasan should be put down like the rabid dog that he is. Scott Peterson is questionable but a probable. Ryan Widmer needs a serious look, but is too questionable. But in all these cases -- you are pretty sure the prosecutor acted without malice.
In this case the guy came within a short time of being killed -- due to deliberate prosecutorial misconduct. Any difference from an accusation of rape? Lets just kill the fucker?
Jim P. at July 4, 2011 9:09 PM
For those that are concerned about the tax dollars that he would receive in a lawsuit. What difference would it make? We have supported him for 18 years on tax money. Had he been given a fair trial, been found innocent, and released, he could have had a job and contributed to society for the last 18 years. Should the tax payers be held responsible twice? No, but district attorneys are elected positions. Do something about it.
Renee at July 5, 2011 8:56 AM
Leave a comment