"Rodriguez's legal saga began in 1987. His trial featured testimony about DNA samples from Rodriguez and another suspect. Jurors were told that a hair found on the victim could have belonged to Rodriguez, and DNA recovered from the rape kit could not have come from the other suspect. Fast forward to 2002, when DNA testing in the Houston police department's crime lab was temporarily suspended after revelations of questionable forensic work and improper protocols. Based on the revelations about the crime lab, Susman partner Mark Wawro, along with Barry Scheck of the Innocence Project, submitted a writ of habeas on Rodriguez's behalf in 2004. A state court judge granted a new trial, and the Harris County D.A. declined to retry Rodriguez." REPORTER ERIN GEIGER SMITH; THOMSON, REUTERS; ---------------------------------------------------------
"Winning a verdict against the government for prosecutorial foul-ups ain't easy. Even in the most egregious cases of misconduct, government officials usually get a pass when they're acting in their official capacity," the Thomson Reuters story by reporter Erin Geiger Smith published on October 28, 2011 under the heading, "Texas judge reinstates $9 million award to wrongfully convicted man," begins.
"But last week, Houston federal judge Vanessa Gilmore reinstated a $9 million verdict against the city in favor of George Rodriguez, who was imprisoned for 17 years for a sexual assault all relevant law enforcement agencies have now admitted he didn't commit," the story continues.
"On July 12 of this year, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit vacated the award in light of the U.S. Supreme Court's March 2011 decision in Connick v. Thompson, which found that a prosecutor's single Brady violation cannot lead to liability for a district attorney's office under the theory that the office failed to train its prosecutors.
But in a 48-page order, Gilmore found that Rodriguez's case was distinguishable from Connick because Rodriguez's lawyers -- at Susman Godfrey and Neufeld Scheck & Brustin -- showed multiple constitutional violations by the crime lab that worked Rodriguez's case. This meant the case involved more than the "single incident" at issue in Connick, Gilmore found. The judge also found that officials were aware of the pattern of violations, and that the jurors who awarded Rodriguez compensation justifiably concluded that Houston routinely offered inadequate supervision or training of criminal investigators.
The Supreme Court received some heavy criticism for its holding in Connick, which tossed a $14 million jury award to John Thompson, who spent 18 years in prison -- 14 of those on death row -- for a crime he didn't commit. Former Justice John Paul Stevens suggested in a May speech to the Equal Justice Initiative that Congress pass legislation allowing the wrongfully convicted to sue. He also said that Justice Antonin Scalia had "either overlooked or chosen to ignore" that a sheriff's action in the case could have been the result of lack of supervision, which might have left Thompson's jury award intact. (The Connick in the SCOTUS caption is Harry Connick, who served as the New Orleans District Attorney for nearly 30 years before retiring in 2002. His son, in a field wholly unrelated to law, is preparing for a turn on Broadway.)
Rodriguez's legal saga began in 1987. His trial featured testimony about DNA samples from Rodriguez and another suspect. Jurors were told that a hair found on the victim could have belonged to Rodriguez, and DNA recovered from the rape kit could not have come from the other suspect.
Fast forward to 2002, when DNA testing in the Houston police department's crime lab was temporarily suspended after revelations of questionable forensic work and improper protocols.
Based on the revelations about the crime lab, Susman partner Mark Wawro, along with Barry Scheck of the Innocence Project, submitted a writ of habeas on Rodriguez's behalf in 2004. A state court judge granted a new trial, and the Harris County D.A. declined to retry Rodriguez.
Two years later, Susman and Scheck's firm, Neufeld Scheck & Brustin, sued the city of Houston on Rodriguez's behalf. A subsequent independent report analyzing the crime lab, authored by Michael Bromwich of Fried, Frank, Harris, Schriver & Jacobson in 2007, found that, during the 1980s and 1990s, the Houston lab's forensic work "fell far below the principles generally accepted in the forensic science community at the time."
The report was used at trial, and in 2009 the jury awarded Rodriguez $5 million in damages; the judge tacked on $530,000 in costs and fees and more than $3 million in costs and attorneys' fees.
The city's appeal of the award was pending at the Fifth Circuit when the Supreme Court issued its opinion in Connick. The appellate court sent the case back down to the trial judge to consider in light of the Court's ruling.
Last week the city filed its intent to appeal the reinstatement of the verdict. Jessica Michan, the press secretary for Houston mayor Annise Parker, said that City Attorney David Feldman is not considering settlement at this time. Feldman is traveling and was unavailable for comment.
Rodriguez's counsel, Alex Kaplan of Susman, said of the city: "They seem content to fight and fight and fight."
http://newsandinsight.thomsonreuters.com/Legal/News/2011/10_-_October/Texas_judge_reinstates_$9_mln_award_to_wrongfully_convicted_man/
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 found at:
http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith
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
Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog; hlevy15@gmail.com;
