David Camm; Indiana; Prosecutor Keith Henderson; Major Development: The News and Tribune reports that County Democratic Chairman Adam Dickey has called for the Republican prosecutor to resign - and to withdraw from from Circuit Court judge race - after an Indiana Supreme Court Disciplinary Commission hearing officer released a report finding that Henderson violated rules of ethics for public attorneys by entering an agreement to co-author a book detailing the David Camm trials..."While the hearing officer did not offer an opinion on the legality of the payments made by Floyd County on claims submitted by Mr. Henderson for his personal legal fees in defending the disciplinary case, it is well past time for him to repay all $27,539.55 of taxpayer funds expended on his behalf," Dickey said in the statement. “It’s time we elected people of high morals that can help rebuild the trust citizens have lost in their government. Mr. Henderson is not that person.” Reporter Elizabeth Depompei;

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: This post is a 'loose end' from one of the most extraordinary case  centered on flawed forensics and prosecutorial skullduggery ever covered by this Blog. It involves a recent finding that Keith Henderson - one of David Camm's prosecutors - violated rules of ethics for public attorneys (a most unusual occurence)  and its aftermath;  I have also provided a previous post and portions of a comprehensive Wikipedia report (a very interesting read)  for background.

Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog;

STORY: "County Democratic Chairman calls for Republican prosecutor to resign," by reporter Elizabeth Depompei, published by The News and Tribune  on August 5, 2016.

SUB-HEADING: "Keith Henderson also called on to withdraw from Circuit Court judge race."

GIST: "The Floyd County Democratic Party chairman has called for Republican Keith Henderson to resign as prosecutor and withdraw from the race for Circuit Court judge. Adam Dickey released a statement Thursday night after an Indiana Supreme Court Disciplinary Commission hearing officer released a report finding that Henderson violated rules of ethics for public attorneys. The alleged misconduct is related to Henderson entering an agreement to co-author a book detailing the David Camm trials. amm was convicted in Floyd County in 2002 on charges that he murdered his wife and two children. He appealed the conviction only to be convicted again in 2006, a verdict that was later overturned. Camm was acquitted in 2013 after a third and final trial. Sometime between the second and third trials is when Henderson signed an agreement with a publisher, but Henderson maintained that he returned any advances received from the publisher and canceled all contracts once the book deal was brought into question. He was removed as prosecutor on the case before the third trial. The Indiana Supreme Court Disciplinary Commission filed charges against Henderson in 2015 and a series of hearings took place in October. On Wednesday, hearing officer David Pippen released his findings in the case. He recommended a "public reprimand" of Henderson "to make clear to all public attorneys that they should not allow personal interests [to] enter into their public representation." The Indiana Supreme Court must now review the findings and hand down a final decision in the matter Dickey, Floyd County Democratic Party Chairman, said people throughout the country are tired of "self-serving politicians" and called for Henderson to resign. "His behavior while in office sets a dangerous precedent and hurts the reputation of our county," Dickey wrote. Dickey also called for Henderson to resign from the race for Circuit Court judge. Henderson is running against Democratic incumbent Circuit Court Judge Terrence Cody. Pippen's findings also address allegations that Henderson was dishonest in requesting county money to pay for his legal fees in the ethics case against him. Pippen said the Disciplinary Commission failed to "present clear and convincing evidence" that Henderson violated any rules related to those funds. "While the hearing officer did not offer an opinion on the legality of the payments made by Floyd County on claims submitted by Mr. Henderson for his personal legal fees in defending the disciplinary case, it is well past time for him to repay all $27,539.55 of taxpayer funds expended on his behalf," Dickey said in the statement. “It’s time we elected people of high morals that can help rebuild the trust citizens have lost in their government. Mr. Henderson is not that person.”"

The entire story can be found at: 

 http://www.newsandtribune.com/news/floyd-county-prosecutor-asked-to-resign-withdraw-candidacy-for-judge/article_0ac9cf50-5b19-11e6-853e-275000d80e5b.html

PUBLISHER'S NOTE:

I have added a search box for content in this blog which now encompasses several thousand posts. The search box is located  near the bottom of the screen just above the list of links. I am confident that this powerful search tool provided by "Blogger" will help our readers and myself get more out of the site. 
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
Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: 
hlevy15@gmail.com;

Harold Levy;
Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog;

For background see the earlier post   of this Blog (October 22, 2015) at the link below: "Floyd County Prosecutor Keith Henderson took the stand Wednesday to fight for his career and law license. Today is expected to be the last day of testimony. Henderson’s colleagues and fellow Indiana prosecutors were first on the stand. Melvin Wilhelm is Franklin County’s Prosecuting Attorney, and one of the most senior prosecutors in the state. He said Henderson is one of the most ethical prosecutors he knows. On the other hand, Stacie Uliana, the defense attorney for David Camm -- a man who was twice convicted, and finally acquitted of the murders of his wife and children -- argued that Henderson caused irreparable harm to the justice system in Floyd County. "The harm of having two interests: one, your personal interest and making money, and another, the interest of justice for representing the state and doing what’s right," Uliana said. "You can’t have them both."......... In a complaint filed in March of 2015, the Indiana Supreme Court Disciplinary Commission accused Henderson of "professional misconduct" for allegedly violating portions of the Indiana Rules of Professional Conduct by securing a deal to write a book about the Camm case after Camm's second trial, while the case was still in the appeals process.  Henderson says there was never an actual book contract during the Camm trial, only a "literary agreement."......... Henderson is also accused of violating ethics rules by using $27,500 in taxpayer money for his personal attorney to fight claims about the book deal. After today's testimony concludes, the hearing officer will submit a report to the Indiana Supreme Court, which could take a few months to make a decision."

 http://smithforensic.blogspot.ca/2015/10/bulletin-indiana-floyd-county.html

See the comprehensive Wikipedia account - with its extraordinary details of flawed forensics - at the link below: "David Ray Camm (born March 23, 1964) is a former state trooper who was acquitted and released in 2013 after his third trial on charges of murdering his wife, Kimberly, and children, Brad, 7, and Jill, 5, at their Georgetown, Indiana home on September 28, 2000. He had been found guilty in two earlier trials, but these verdicts were overturned on appeal. Camm now works as a case coordinator for a non-profit wrongful conviction advocacy organization called Investigating Innocence that provides criminal defense investigations for inmates. Camm became a suspect because of an interpretation of bloodstain patterns on his clothing as well as a number of leads and pieces of evidence that were later found to be unreliable or outright false. He was tried and found guilty of the murders. In 2004 the conviction was overturned on the grounds that testimony about his marital infidelity had been prejudicial. In 2005, forensic evidence identified a career criminal named Charles Boney as having been at the crime scene. Boney's modus operandi in previous crimes showed similarities to aspects of the murders. Boney had a history of stalking and attacking women, often stealing their shoes; Kim's shoes had been removed and placed neatly on the vehicle and she had a series of bruises and abrasions to her feet. The prosecution was widely criticized for the failure to find Boney prior to the first trial. They told the defense team in 2001 that the DNA had been run through CODIS and returned no matches. It was later discovered that Boney's DNA was entered into the system prior to the murders and would have returned a match if it had been run.^[1] Boney gave a number of conflicting confessions, but eventually accused Camm of the murders, claiming he witnessed Camm shoot his family while he was at the home selling Camm a handgun. Camm was charged along with Boney as a co-conspirator, Boney was tried first and separately. Boney was convicted of the murders and sentenced to 225 years in prison. In 2006, Camm was found guilty on the murder charges at his retrial. Camm appealed, and the verdict was overturned on the grounds that the prosecution at the second trial had accused Camm of sexually molesting his 5-year-old daughter Jill, without producing evidence for the allegation.^[2] Boney testified against Camm for the first time at the third trial, although his credibility was called into question when he was unable to describe the car Camm drove and also incorrectly described Camm's clothing on the night of the murder. Evidence was presented that Charles Boney's DNA was found on Kim's panties, her shirt, her broken off fingernail, and Jill's shirt, suggesting he physically attacked the family himself. Defense witnesses also testified that prosecution assertions about the stains were not widely accepted by others in the field of bloodstain analysis. It was also discovered that the blood spatter analyst whose analysis had triggered the arrest had falsified his credentials and did not work in the field of bloodstain pattern analysis at all. He had previously testified that he was a professor at Portland State University; it was discovered that he had no affiliation with the university. He testified in the third trial that he had perjured himself during the first two. Dr. Robert Shaler, who served on a committee for The National Academy of Sciences to evaluate forensic methods, testified that blood spatter pattern analysis was found to be unreliable in their studies. Another expert demonstrated that the pattern could be produced through transfer. The defense presented suspicious behavior on the part of Boney, such as visiting the graves of the victims, speaking on the phone to the prosecutors office on 33 occasions in the two week period before his arrest, and hiring Stan Faith, the prosecutor as his defense attorney and discussing the case with him prior to becoming a suspect. They also presented a number of instances of alleged misconduct by the police and prosecutors in the case. Camm was acquitted and freed after 13 years in prison.^[3] The case was covered extensively by the media in the southern Indiana and the Louisville, Kentucky area, as well as by national news programs including Nancy Grace, 48 hours, and Dateline. The case is noted for the extensive allegations of prosecutorial misconduct, including witness tampering, evidence tampering, perjury and an overall shoddy investigation and has been detailed in numerous forensic textbooks..........Blood spatter: The heavy reliance on blood spatter evidence in this case was widely criticized. In his review of the case, former federal prosecutor Kent Wicker said "Blood spatter evidence has come under a lot of criticism in the past few years. In 2009 The National Academy of Sciences issued a report criticizing the scientific foundation of that." The report released by The National Academy of Sciences calls for more standardization within a number of forensic fields including blood spatter analysis. The report highlights the ability of blood spatter analysts to overstate the reliability of their methods in the court room.^[58] Dr. Robert Shaler, Founding Director of the Penn State Forensic Science Program, decried blood spatter analysis as unreliable in the Camm case. "The problem in this case is the number of stains are minimal," he said. "I think you're really on the edge of reliability." Dr. Shaler said blood stain pattern analysis as a science is "essentially guesswork". The problem with blood spatter analysis is that "you do not have the supporting underlying science" to back up your conclusions. All of the blood spatter analysts involved in the case from the start (aside from Rob Stites) have been "experts" in the traditional sense. The problem is "We have two opinions in this case. That, in essence, is a 50 percent error rate." An unacceptable level of reliability in a court case when the perception of guilt beyond a reasonable doubt is what is required.^[59] Evidence of misconduct regarding the blood spatter was uncovered when in the third trial, crime scene photographer Rob Stites testified for the defense, admitting he had perjured himself in the first two trials. Stites' assertion that the spots on David Camm's shirt were HVIS was the cornerstone of the probable cause affidavit that led to Camm's arrest and his testimony at the first two trials helped the prosecution win Camm's convictions. He had previously testified that he was an expert blood spatter pattern analyst and a professor at Portland State University who was in the process of attaining a Ph.D. — credentials which were fabrications.^[60] He asserts that Floyd County prosecutor Stan Faith helped create those fraudulent credentials. During the third trial, he outlined how he was sent to the crime scene by Rod Englert to photograph and take notes. Despite having no formal training in the field nor any work experience as a crime scene analyst, his notes ended up being used in the probable cause affidavit with him being listed as a "crime scene reconstructionist", a title that did not apply to him. The defense pointed out several aspects of Stites' notes that were later proven to be false including "HVIS" on the garage door, later proven to be a petroleum based-product and not blood. Stites' opinion that there was a clean up at the crime scene involving bleach was also incorrect. The confusion came from the unfamiliar look of the blood after the serum had separated from the blood cells. Regarding his actions, he commented, "It was a dumb thing...In hindsight, I would have kept my mouth shut." Stites was not charged with perjury for his testimony in the previous two trials.^[8][13]Criticism of the prosecution: A number of legal experts have criticized the way the case was handled. Thomas Schornhorst, a professor emeritus of the Indiana University School of Law, said the case has been overturned repeatedly because they have pushed the envelope with other evidence fearing that they would not get a conviction on bloodstain evidence alone.^[16] Law professor Shawn Boyne highlighted the Camm trials as an example of the problems within the American justice system. Boyne stated that the judges in these trials allowed the prosecutors to present "specious claims of motive designed to paint the defendant with a broad stroke of guilt and moral condemnation and overcome a lack of physical evidence." Boyne stated "the state overreached and that overreaching did not serve the cause of justice."^[61] Louisville defense attorney Steve Romines criticized the prosecution's decision to change the theory of the crime numerous times instead of dropping the charges: "The problem is, in the first trial, David Camm's the shooter and acted alone. The second trial, David Camm's the shooter and Boney aided and abetted him. And now in this trial, Charles Boney is the shooter and David Camm aided and abetted him. In three trials, with the same proof, they've had three different theories", adding "Proof doesn't change. If you have proof beyond a reasonable doubt, you argue the same thing throughout. You don't have to constantly shift your theory to fit your proof."^[45] Camm's defense team has long been critical of their inability to present evidence of Charles Boney's involvement, particularly when the prosecution was allowed to speculate about Camm's motives. Despite Boney's history of stalking and armed violence against women, his past crimes were ruled inadmissible.^[62]Errors in evidence collection: By the third trial, the backbone of the defense's case was the evidence of police and prosecutorial misconduct in the case. The defense argued that the investigation was riddled by critical mistakes, both in the collection of evidence and the investigation of Boney as a suspect. The sweatshirt found at the crime scene revealed Charles Boney's DNA, his girlfriend's DNA, his prison nickname, and his department of corrections number.^[63] Kim Camm's shoes were also lined up on the top of the vehicle; Boney has a long history of fetish driven assaults that included the theft of shoes. It is unclear how the investigative team missed these pieces of evidence during the initial investigation. The defense team was told that the evidence had been thoroughly investigated.^[64]Errors in the investigation of Charles Boney: The defense argued that the police should have also taken notice when Boney's story went through so many revisions. They noted that many details of his story were first suggested by police detectives in recorded interviews, notably the detail regarding the gun wrapped in the sweatshirt. Other details of his story were changed following discussions with detectives who pointed out the discrepancies.^[19][27] Defense witness Dr. Kim Rossmo, a criminal justice professor at Texas State University, testified that Boney was never investigated properly and that his claims were never independently verified. Instead of treating Boney like a suspect, "They treated him as an anomaly to their theory, that somehow had to be explained away", adding, "I think there were six different confessions from Mr. Boney. I don't think Boney ever told the truth about what happened... he's only telling the police enough to get around the last particular contradiction." He testified that the majority of the oversights during the investigation were caused by confirmation bias: a tendency to believe information that confirms your preconceived notions and place less weight on information that doesn't. Rossmo argued that the police were swayed by the early misleading evidence and came to the conclusion that Camm was guilty before any of the forensic evidence was examined. He believes this phenomenon caused the investigators to ignore the DNA on the sweatshirt and when Boney was finally identified, they downplayed the significance and attempted to make it fit within their established theory of the crime.^[65][66] Ultimately, the jurors in the third trial believed the defense's criticisms of the investigation: "They tried to make the evidence fit their theory of the case," a juror said in interview.^[1]Lead defense attorney Richard Kammen accused police of feeding Boney a false story designed to implicate Camm and coercing him to testify against Camm by playing on his fear of racial prejudice within the criminal justice system by telling him that a black man accused of killing a white family would get the death penalty if he didn't cooperate. During interrogations, he was reminded on several occasions of the likelihood of getting the death penalty on the basis of his race and that the best way to avoid the death penalty was to testify against David Camm.^[6][19][67] The defense cited a suspicious series of undocumented and unrecorded phone calls — 33 in all — between Boney and the Floyd County Prosecutor's office in the two-week span between his DNA being identified and his arrest.^[68][69]Evidence tampering allegations: Another allegation that surfaced involved a distant relative of Charles Boney named Myron Wilkerson. Wilkerson was a police officer but was not assigned to the case. He met with Boney privately at the station following his arrest. Two months later, it was learned that Wilkerson had removed Kim Camm's phone from the evidence room without signing it out and took it to his residence. When it was recovered, the phone was completely void of fingerprints. Wilkerson was never charged with evidence tampering.^[70][71] Witness tampering allegations: In addition to testimony by Rob Stites alleging subornation of perjury, several other allegations of witness tampering surfaced during the case. Lynn Scamahorn, a DNA analyst from the Indiana State Police claimed that during the first trial former Floyd County Prosecutor Stan Faith threatened her when she refused to perjure herself that she found Camm's DNA on Charles Boney's sweatshirt.^[72] Fingerprint analyst John Singleton reported a similar encounter. He claims Faith wanted him to "shade the truth" while testifying regarding the then unidentified palm print on Kim Camm's Bronco later determined to belong to Charles Boney.^[73] The defense also accused the state of witness tampering and presenting false and misleading testimony regarding the molestation allegations. During the first trial, the prosecution alleged that the injuries Jill sustained happened during the attack, as testified to by the state medical examiner. During the second trial, they altered their timeline to implicate Camm instead of Boney on the basis of testimony by a single witness who changed their theory at the last minute. "Dr. Spivack, before in her deposition, told us that the injuries occurred near the time of death due to the painful nature of them. Today, on the stand, she backtracked to fit the state's theory." said Defense attorney Stacy Uliana.^[74] Following the verdict, the jurors explained that they made their decision largely on the molestation allegations, specifically, the testimony of Spivack, who testified that the child was molested several hours prior to her death instead of during the attack.^[75] DNA analyst Lynn Scamahorn also claimed the prosecutor also attempted to get her to commit perjury by testifying that lab results indicate the comforter from the master bedroom in the Camm household contained vaginal secretions or saliva from Jill to help bolster their claims that Jill had been molested; no such test exists.^[76] The fraudulent testimony of Rob Stites and the attempted coercion of Lynne Scamahorne were featured in a forensic textbook called Forensic Fraud: Evaluating Law Enforcement and Forensic Science Cultures in the Context of Examiner Misconduct.^."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Camm

PUBLISHER'S NOTE:

I have added a search box for content in this blog which now encompasses several thousand posts. The search box is located  near the bottom of the screen just above the list of links. I am confident that this powerful search tool provided by "Blogger" will help our readers and myself get more out of the site.   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

Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to:  hlevy15@gmail.com;  Harold Levy;  Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog;