"As with most Supreme Court decisions, the outcome affects not just a single man — the innocent John Thompson, who lost 18 years of his life with no recompense — but our entire society. The decision will make it difficult to bring incompetent or even corrupt prosecutors to justice.
The Innocence Project of New Orleans reviewed Connick's 28 years in office and concluded he gave the city a "legacy" of suppressing evidence."
ANN MCFETTER'S: SCRIPPS HOWARD NEWS SERVICE; THE VENTURA COUNTY STAR;
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BACKGROUND: The case concerning a prisoner's exoneration is Connick v. Thompson, 09-571, which arose from a $14 million jury award in favor of a former inmate who was freed after prosecutorial misconduct came to light. The former inmate, John Thompson, sued officials in the district attorney's office in New Orleans, saying they had not trained prosecutors to turn over exculpatory evidence. A prosecutor there failed to give Mr. Thompson's lawyers a report showing that blood at a crime scene was not his. Mr. Thompson spent 18 years in prison, 14 in solitary confinement. He once came within weeks of being executed.
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"Sometimes there is such an egregious miscarriage of justice at the highest levels that your blood boils and you yield to despair," the column by Anne McFetter's published in the Ventura County Star on April 1, 2011 begins, under the heading, "The U.S. Supreme Court's Horrid Decision."
"Such is a new Supreme Court decision," the column continues.
"Imagine being in prison for 18 years — 14 of them in solitary confinement awaiting execution — for a crime you did not commit.
Imagine, after all that time, that new evidence was found that exonerated you, and a new trial found you innocent.
Imagine that it came to light that for years prosecutors in the district attorney's office deliberately withheld that evidence, and that a federal appeals court ruled that you were entitled to $14 million in damages.
Imagine if the prosecutors then sued you, and the Supreme Court ruled against you, saying you don't get a dime because you hadn't proved a pattern of "deliberate indifference" by the prosecutors.
That is exactly what happened to John Thompson, who was convicted of an armed robbery and then a murder, neither of which he committed.
Prosecutors in the New Orleans district attorney's office, led by Harry Connick Sr. (father of the entertainer), failed for years to disclose a bloodstained swath of fabric that proved Thompson was innocent.
The Supreme Court acknowledged that prosecutors misbehaved but ruled 5 to 4 that the city of New Orleans (prosecutors may not personally be sued for misconduct) was not liable for damages because Thompson did not prove Connick's failure to train lawyers in evidence law was a pattern.
Justice Clarence Thomas, writing for the majority, concluded that failing to train prosecutors against suppressing evidence does not mean a city purposefully is violating the Constitution.
Justice Ruth Ginsberg wrote the dissenting opinion for the four justices who said Thompson deserved the money. She felt so strongly she read her dissent.
She said, "What happened here ... was no momentary oversight, no single incident of a lone officer's misconduct. Instead, the evidence demonstrated that misperception and disregard of (the definitive case Brady v. Maryland) disclosure requirements were pervasive in Orleans Parish (which) established persistent, deliberately indifferent conduct for which the District Attorney's office bears responsibility...."
What the five justices decided means that a major safeguard to hold prosecutors accountable for misconduct has been stricken, even if they admit their misconduct.
Ginsberg noted that not all law schools teach case law that requires prosecutors to turn over exculpatory evidence. Such questions are rarely asked on the Louisiana bar exam. She wrote that Connick never trained his lawyers to make certain they were abiding by the law. Connick, who left office in 2003, reportedly gave awards to prosecutors based on their conviction rates.
Connick, who himself was indicted for suppressing evidence, misstated the law during the current case. Ginsberg wrote that his tenure "created a tinderbox in Orleans Parish in which Brady violations were nigh inevitable. And when they did occur, Connick insisted there was no need to change anything, and opposed efforts to hold prosecutors accountable on the ground that doing so would make his job more difficult."
As with most Supreme Court decisions, the outcome affects not just a single man — the innocent John Thompson, who lost 18 years of his life with no recompense — but our entire society. The decision will make it difficult to bring incompetent or even corrupt prosecutors to justice.
The Innocence Project of New Orleans reviewed Connick's 28 years in office and concluded he gave the city a "legacy" of suppressing evidence.
The project said 36 men convicted in Orleans Parish during Connick's tenure alleged prosecutorial misconduct. Nineteen have since had their sentences overturned or reduced as a result.
John Thompson, stunned by the Supreme Court's decision, says he intends to spend his life working to help wrongly convicted inmates. He has founded Resurrection After Exoneration.
Sadly, he will not have the financial resources that the lower courts rightly concluded the city of New Orleans should have paid to help him pursue his goal."
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The editorial can be found at:
http://www.vcstar.com/news/2011/apr/01/editorial-us-supreme-courts-horrid-decision/
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PUBLISHER'S NOTE: 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 accessed at:
http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith
For a breakdown of some of the cases, issues and controversies this Blog is currently following, please turn to:
http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=120008354894645705&postID=8369513443994476774
Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog; hlevy15@gmail.com;
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