PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Jung’s order leaves no appeals pending
in the U.S. district court in Tampa. Dailey’s attorneys will likely
appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta.
The 11th Circuit is one of the most conservative federal appeals courts in the country.
In
the meantime, many of Florida’s newspapers have cited our reporting in
calling on DeSantis to intervene. Last week, the Miami Herald published
an extraordinary editorial — by a former prosecutor, no less — called “Don’t let Florida execute James Dailey, Gov. DeSantis. He might be innocent.”
“For
18 years, as the elected state attorney in Duval County, I had the
ultimate responsibility to decide whether to seek the death penalty in
murder cases,” Harry L. Shorstein wrote. “It is with all of this
experience in mind,” he continued, “that I urge Gov. Ron DeSantis to
grant executive clemency to James Dailey and not to execute a man who
was convicted and sentenced to death on the basis of unreliable
jailhouse informant testimony.”
Shorstein
specifically called out prosecutors for relying on Skalnik. “Floridians
have differing views about the death penalty,” he wrote, “But everyone
agrees that if we are to have the death penalty, it must be fair and
reliable. The process in Dailey’s case was neither.” He added, “The risk
of executing an innocent person is real. There is powerful evidence
that Dailey is innocent.” Many other Florida newspapers reprinted another editorial, written by The Daytona Beach News-Journal’s
editorial board, which also called out prosecutors for their reliance
on Skalnik. “It seems clear that the state never had enough real
evidence to convict Dailey, so it turned to lies — lies that have come
undone,” the editorial board wrote. “At the least, DeSantis can ensure
that there's no immediate rush to execute him. But the governor should
go further, and appoint a prosecutor to look at the case again.”
--------------------------------------------------------------
LETTER FROM PAMELA COLLOFF TO HER READERS:
Hi everyone,
Eleven days. Just 11 days from today, James Dailey’s stay of execution will expire.
After 11:59 p.m. on Dec. 30, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis can set a new execution date.
I
want to give you an update on where things stand with the case. In
court, Dailey is left with few options. Last week, he suffered a major
setback when U.S District Judge William F. Jung rejected a request from
Dailey’s attorneys for an indefinite stay so that Dailey could pursue
his innocence claims. “A thorough review shows the state’s trial case
against James Dailey was not strong, but it was sufficient," Jung wrote.
Remarkably, Jung’s 12-page order,
which examined the case history and reviewed the state’s evidence
against Dailey, made no mention of Paul Skalnik, the prolific jailhouse
snitch who claimed that Dailey confessed in jail to fatally stabbing a
14-year-old girl.
|
James
Dailey at Florida State Prison in November. “I never talked to Paul
Skalnik in my life,” he said. (Eli Durst, special to The New York Times
Magazine)
|
|
Jung
did say that jailhouse informant testimony “is often fraught with
problems” and “is too frequent in criminal prosecutions.” But he went on
to explain that he found the testimony of Pablo DeJesus and James
Leitner, the two jailhouse informants who played a lesser role than
Skalnik did in Dailey’s 1987 trial, to be credible.
As I explained in my story,
those two jailhouse informants told the jury of ferrying several
handwritten notes between Dailey and his co-defendant, Jack Pearcy,
before Dailey’s trial. In the notes, Dailey appeared eager to appease
Pearcy, whom prosecutors planned to put on the stand. Jung asserted that
these notes “backed up” the two jailhouse informants’ testimony.
But
the notes offer no proof that the two jailhouse informants ever
overheard Dailey confess “I’m the one that did it” — a claim they only
brought forward after the case’s lead detective came to the jail
looking for information on Dailey and word spread that the case needed a
snitch.
Records I obtained suggest that DeJesus and Leitner had a powerful motive for testifying for the state.
While
reporting my story, I filed more than 50 public records requests in an
effort to find out as much information as I could about Skalnik and the
dozens of cases he was involved in. One request, which I submitted to
the state attorney’s office in Clearwater, asked for any records on
DeJesus and Leitner. In return, I received a hefty stack of papers in
the mail.
What
I discovered in that stack of papers was that Leitner had reached out,
on multiple occasions, to one of Dailey’s prosecutors, Beverly Andrews,
before Dailey’s trial. Leitner was not shy about asking Andrews for
assistance. Five different times in the months leading up to Dailey’s
trial, from January to May 1987, he wrote to her either to tout his
usefulness to prosecutors or to make the case that he should serve the
minimum amount of time possible in return. In March of that year, for
example, after noting that he had also testified for prosecutors in
Colorado (where he faced additional prison time), he wrote, “I would
hope that both states would award me any concession they can at this
point considering the precarious position I have put myself in for the
benefit of the state.”
Two
of the letters, which also sought leniency for DeJesus, were co-signed
by DeJesus. The two men had good reason to work together; a jailhouse
informant whose testimony appears to be corroborated by another
jailhouse informant looks more credible on the stand, and it is
therefore both more valuable to prosecutors and more likely to be
rewarded.
The
jury in Dailey’s trial, of course, never saw the letters that the
jailhouse informants sent to Andrews or knew of their existence.
Both
men were amply rewarded after testifying against Dailey. DeJesus
received seven years, and Leitner five years, for drug trafficking
charges that normally carried much lengthier penalties — lax sentences
that ran concurrent with prison terms the men already had to serve in
Maryland and Colorado, respectively. The upshot was that they served the
same amount of time as if prosecutors had dropped the Florida charges
altogether.
It is these two men whose testimony Jung found credible. On the subject of Skalnik, he was silent.
Jung’s order leaves no appeals pending
in the U.S. district court in Tampa. Dailey’s attorneys will likely
appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 11th Circuit, in Atlanta.
The 11th Circuit is one of the most conservative federal appeals courts in the country.
In
the meantime, many of Florida’s newspapers have cited our reporting in
calling on DeSantis to intervene. Last week, the Miami Herald published
an extraordinary editorial — by a former prosecutor, no less — called “Don’t let Florida execute James Dailey, Gov. DeSantis. He might be innocent.”
“For
18 years, as the elected state attorney in Duval County, I had the
ultimate responsibility to decide whether to seek the death penalty in
murder cases,” Harry L. Shorstein wrote. “It is with all of this
experience in mind,” he continued, “that I urge Gov. Ron DeSantis to
grant executive clemency to James Dailey and not to execute a man who
was convicted and sentenced to death on the basis of unreliable
jailhouse informant testimony.”
Shorstein
specifically called out prosecutors for relying on Skalnik. “Floridians
have differing views about the death penalty,” he wrote, “But everyone
agrees that if we are to have the death penalty, it must be fair and
reliable. The process in Dailey’s case was neither.” He added, “The risk
of executing an innocent person is real. There is powerful evidence
that Dailey is innocent.”
Many other Florida newspapers reprinted another editorial, written by The Daytona Beach News-Journal’s
editorial board, which also called out prosecutors for their reliance
on Skalnik. “It seems clear that the state never had enough real
evidence to convict Dailey, so it turned to lies — lies that have come
undone,” the editorial board wrote. “At the least, DeSantis can ensure
that there's no immediate rush to execute him. But the governor should
go further, and appoint a prosecutor to look at the case again.”
Dailey’s lawyers are hoping
that DeSantis will grant their client a clemency hearing, which would
allow them to explore critical evidence that the courts have thus far
failed to consider.
Whether or not DeSantis will intervene remains unknown. I promise to keep you updated about what happens after Dec. 30.
Thanks
again for subscribing to the False Witness newsletter. I’ll be taking a
short hiatus next week for the holidays, but I’ll be back with more
updates very soon.
If you like what you’re reading, consider forwarding this email to a friend or encouraging them to sign up here. In the meantime, thanks so much for reading! And have a wonderful holiday.
Best wishes,
Pamela
----------------------------------------------
The entire letter can be read at:
https://mail.google.com/mail/u/0/?tab=wm#search/%22pamela+colloff%22/FMfcgxwGCQZFSmSVVwMcvnmDQfnlhDGX
-----------------------------------------------
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on
the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. 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;
---------------------------------------------------------------
FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful convictions): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it
exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case —
and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices.""
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
https://www.providencejournal.com/news/20191210/da-drops-murder-charge-against-taunton-man-who-served-35-years-for-1979-slaying
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