Thursday, July 21, 2016

Beatrice Six: Nebraska; Civil rights lawsuit suit; Part One; Major Development; Tom Winslow, Ada JoAnn Taylor, Debra Shelden. Kathy Gonzalez, James Dean; Joseph E. White; Beatrice Six win millions in civil rights claims, but 'no amount of money' will replace years lost, one family says..."A former Gage County, Nebraska, prosecutor decided against running DNA tests in 1989 to help resolve unanswered questions in the cold-case killing of a Beatrice grandmother. One reason? The $350 lab fees were deemed too expensive. A federal court jury on Wednesday slammed Gage County with a $28 million verdict for a reckless investigation that sent the wrong people to prison for the 1985 rape and homicide of Helen Wilson."


STORY:  "Beatrice Six win millions in civil rights claims, but 'no amount of money' will replace years lost, one family says," by reporter Joe Duggan, published by the World-Herald an July 15, 2016.

GIST: A former Gage County, Nebraska, prosecutor decided against running DNA tests in 1989 to help resolve unanswered questions in the cold-case killing of a Beatrice grandmother. One reason? The $350 lab fees were deemed too expensive. A federal court jury on Wednesday slammed Gage County with a $28 million verdict for a reckless investigation that sent the wrong people to prison for the 1985 rape and homicide of Helen Wilson. DNA testing in 2008 cleared the six people who collectively spent more than 70 years locked up. In 1989, investigators relied heavily on confessions from three suspects with histories of mental illness, two of whom told authorities that their memories came from dreams and nightmares. And investigators proceeded with the prosecutions even though none of the six perfectly matched the perpetrator’s blood or could be conclusively tied to his semen..........The case stemmed from the 1985 rape and homicide of 68-year-old Helen Wilson in her apartment near downtown Beatrice. In 1989, a jury convicted White of first-degree murder, and his co-defendants either pleaded guilty or no contest to reduced charges. White won a long legal fight for DNA testing on preserved crime scene evidence in 2008. The results overturned White’s conviction, and a subsequent multiagency task force investigation prompted official pardons for the five others. The tests also identified the killer as Bruce Allen Smith, a onetime Beatrice resident who died in 1992 in Oklahoma. Smith emerged as a suspect in 1985, but a mistake on a blood test led investigators to rule him out. Sheriff Jerry DeWitt and Deputies Burt Searcey and Wayne Price also were named as defendants in the case. DeWitt, who died in 2012, was represented by his estate. Jurors were asked to decide if the investigators from the Gage County Sheriff’s Office were reckless, if they manufactured false evidence or if they engaged in a conspiracy. The jury found in favor of the plaintiffs on some of the reckless-investigation and false-evidence claims, but on none of the conspiracy claims. Gage County was held liable, as were Searcey and Price, both of whom remain employed by the Sheriff’s Office. However, DeWitt’s estate was not found liable. Richard Smith, the former county attorney who decided against running DNA tests in 1989, was not a defendant because the law grants absolute immunity to prosecutors. The six plaintiffs accused the investigators of coercing false confessions and ignoring forensic evidence that proved they were not the perpetrators. The investigators argued that the three cooperating suspects were represented by legal counsel, that they made statements to investigators voluntarily and that they swore under oath that they were being truthful. Lawyer Herb Friedman, who represented plaintiff Dean, said Wednesday’s verdict reinforced that police need to seek the truth, not just arrests and convictions. “This type of conduct simply isn’t going to be accepted. That was the strong message the jury sent today,” Friedman said."
The entire story can be found at:

http://www.omaha.com/news/nebraska/beatrice-six-win-millions-in-civil-rights-claims-in-wrongful/article_cfb0beb4-3fc6-11e6-b40a-c78b5ad1ca04.html

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The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at:

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Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at:

http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html

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