BACKGROUND: (Death Penalty Information Center): '47 years after his death sentence, Florida Court orders DNA testing for Tommy Zeigler': "Nearly 47 years after being convicted of a quadruple murder, Florida death-row prisoner Tommy Zeigler has finally been permitted to independently conduct new DNA testing on evidence he claims will prove his innocence. Circuit Court Judge Patricia L. Strowbridge approved Zeigler’s request for DNA testing in October 2022. As soon as her ruling was finalized in December, more than 100 pieces of previously untested evidence were shipped to a California lab to be tested at Zeigler’s own expense. Florida Attorney General Ashley Moody submitted an emergency appeal to the Florida Supreme Court on January 5, 2023 to stop the testing and return the evidence. The court rejected Moody’s appeal without explanation the same day. In response, Zeigler’s attorney, Terry Hadly wrote in an email to the Tampa Bay Times that “This means that we can proceed expeditiously with the testing. Conceivably, the AG’s office could continue to pursue the appeal, but the ruling is a clear signal that they are not likely to succeed.” Moody’s actions are part of a pattern of fighting DNA testing agreements made by reform prosecutor Monique H. Worrell. In July 2022, the Florida Supreme Court similarly rejected Moody’s motion to block DNA testing authorized in a court-approved agreement between Worrell and Henry Sireci, who has been on death-row for 46 years. Despite the court’s decision in Sireci’s case, which Strowbridge cited in her decision regarding Zeigler, Moody’s office still attempted to fight the agreement in Zeigler’s case. This is the culmination of a long legal process for Zeigler, who made his first DNA testing request in 1994. In 2001, DNA testing on portions of Zeigler’s clothing found no trace of the victims’ blood. Following those results, Zeigler’s lawyers requested access to more evidence and permission to conduct further tests at their own cost in 2003, but their requests were denied. Worrell had previously reviewed Zeigler’s case as part of the new Conviction Integrity Unit created by then-State Attorney Aramis Ayala and urged Ayala to consent to testing. Ayala denied the request, relying on the same erroneous interpretation of a 2001 DNA testing law in Florida as Moody. Like Sireci, Zeigler now has a chance to prove his innocence through DNA testing of evidence including never-before-tested guns, fingernail clippings, and clothes of the victims and the accused."
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PUBLISHER'S NOTE: "WORDS TO HEED: FROM OUR POST ON KEVIN COOPER'S APPLICATION FOR POST-CONVICTION DNA TESTING; CALIFORNIA: (Applicable wherever a state resists DNA testing): "Blogger/extraordinaire Jeff Gamso's blunt, unequivocal, unforgettable message to the powers that be in California: "JUST TEST THE FUCKING DNA." (Oh yes, Gamso raises, as he does in many of his posts, an important philosophical question: This post is headed: "What is truth, said jesting Pilate."...Says Gamso: "So what's the harm? What, exactly, are they scared of? Don't we want the truth?")
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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Former Orange-Osceola prosecutors Jeff Ashton and Aramis Ayala has also fought recent DNA testing for Zeigler. Only current State Attorney Monique Worrell backed Zeigler’s request, saying, “If we ignore potential errors in our criminal legal system, we will never obtain justice.” The prosecutors who fought Zeigler’s quest for new DNA argued that the results wouldn’t make a difference with Moody (now a recently appointed U.S. senator) arguing that the case deserved “finality.” But the Florida Supreme Court was more interested in accuracy than finality and unanimously rejected Moody’s argument, voting to allow the evidence that Ziegler’s legal team says debunks the prosecution’s claims and theories from back in the 1970s."
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COMMENTARY: "The twisted justice of Tommy Zeigler's half century on death row," by Scott Maxwell. published by The Orlando Sentinel, on March 26, 2024. (Scott Maxwell is the Metro Columnist for the Orlando Sentinel. He writes about Central Florida politics and whatever else catches his fancy. Scott particularly enjoys giving readers information they won't get elsewhere and sharing the stories politicians would rather keep secret. Scott came to the Sentinel in 1998 and has penned a column since 2002. He's a married father of two and graduate of the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill who likes travel, exercise and scary movies.)
PHOTO CAPTION: "For half a century, there have been questions about the guilt of Tommy Zeigler, who was convicted of murders that took place in 1975. Now, with new and long-awaited DNA evidence, his legal team wants a judge to intervene. Zeigler is seen here in this 2010 photo. He’s now 79."
GIST: "If you want proof of how perilously flawed death penalty cases can be, look no further than Tommy Zeigler.
Last week, Zeigler’s legal team filed a motion based on new DNA evidence that his attorneys say proves Zeigler is innocent of the quadruple murders for which he was convicted in 1976.
Evidence aside, let’s take a moment to appreciate the timing here — and how spectacularly messed up it is that Zeigler, now 79, had to wait for half a century to get this testing done.
Why? Well, among other reasons, obstinate prosecutors like former Attorney General Ashley Moody were still fighting as recently as two years ago to block the evidence from being collected.
Supreme Court overrules Moody, says death-row’s Zeigler deserves DNA testing | Commentary
Former Orange-Osceola prosecutors Jeff Ashton and Aramis Ayala has also fought recent DNA testing for Zeigler. Only current State Attorney Monique Worrell backed Zeigler’s request, saying, “If we ignore potential errors in our criminal legal system, we will never obtain justice.”
The prosecutors who fought Zeigler’s quest for new DNA argued that the results wouldn’t make a difference with Moody (now a recently appointed U.S. senator) arguing that the case deserved “finality.”
But the Florida Supreme Court was more interested in accuracy than finality and unanimously rejected Moody’s argument, voting to allow the evidence that Ziegler’s legal team says debunks the prosecution’s claims and theories from back in the 1970s.
I’ve written about Zeigler’s case many times through the years and concluded it was flawed beyond reason.
Among the troubling details: The jury in Zeigler’s case never even sentenced him to die. Jurors voted for life in prison. But the judge — whom Zeigler’s attorneys had asked to step off the case because of perceived bias — overruled the jury and ordered his execution. That is incredibly rare. Very few states even allow such a thing, and for good reason.
Just as disturbing and bizarre, at least one juror originally didn’t want to convict Zeigler at all and didn’t vote to do so until after that same judge ordered the bailiff to give her a Valium. Again, that is not normal. The case was also plagued with irregularities and inconsistencies involving witnesses and evidence.
40 years of questions about death-row’s Zeigler show problems with case, death penalty
I make no bones about the fact that I’m opposed to the death penalty for a slew of empirical reasons:
It’s unequally handed down. (People of color are more likely to be sentenced to die. So are men and those who are poor and mentally ill.) It doesn’t deter murder. (Some of the few states and countries still executing their own citizens actually have above-average murder rates.) And most troubling: We know that people have been wrongly sentenced to die again and again. (Florida leads the way with more than 30 overturned convictions and is the only state that allows split, 8-to-4 verdicts.)
I understand that some people still have emotional reasons for favoring the death penalty. But vengeance isn’t the same as justice.
And even if you don’t care about all those proven flaws and inequalities and still support capital punishment, you might consider the words of my former colleague, Charley Reese.
Reese was far more conservative than I and a big supporter of the death penalty. Heck, Charley wanted to bring back firing squads. But even Reese, after studying all of the facts, concluded that the case against Zeigler was proof that “the wheels of justice can crush innocents.”
Reese admitted in a 1992 column that, like many Central Floridians who remembered the grisly murders of Zeigler’s wife and her parents in a Winter Garden furniture store back on Christmas Eve of 1975, he “had always assumed Zeigler was guilty as heck and deserved the death penalty he got.”
Prosecutors argued Zeigler killed his wife, her parents and customer Charlie Mays while Zeigler, who ended up shot in the stomach, claimed Mays was the perpetrator.
So Reese decided to look beyond his assumptions and past his emotions to study the evidence. He even read a book about the killings and argued that anyone who did the same would have their “faith in the justice system rattled.”
Reese concluded that the state’s two-decades-long crusade to execute Zeigler was “as good an argument against the death penalty as you will find.”
Well, the state’s zeal to kill Zeigler has now spanned five decades. And there are still serious questions if not flat-out contradictions.
I’ve long acknowledged that I can’t claim to know for sure what happened that night. But I am sure the case against Zeigler has been fraught with problems from the moment it went to trial.
And if there are still legitimate questions about what happened nearly 50 years ago — questions that even the Supreme Court found valid, even if eager-to-kill prosecutors did not — that tells you most everything you need to know."
The entire commentary can be read at:
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. 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.
SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
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FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "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:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD: "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions. They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they've exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
