Terribly flawed drug field tests: C.J. Ciaramella tells us in 'Reason' about a trucker said by the tests as carrying 700 gallons of Meth. It was 'Dieselm.'' (A perfectly legal mixture of diesel and oil)...The sub-heading: "Juan Guzman spent nearly six weeks in jail based on unreliable field tests that have resulted in hundreds of other wrongful arrests."...The case, first reported by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, started when a Pharr police officer noticed three men transferring liquid out of large barrels next to a tanker truck. The officer noticed strange crystallization around the barrels and called in backup. According to the criminal complaint filed against Guzman in federal court, Pharr police officers, firemen, and DEA special agents all tested the liquid in the barrels using drug field tests, and they came back presumptive positive for methamphetamines. The DEA estimated the total haul was 700 gallons of liquid meth with a street value of more than $10 million. The seizure made headlines across the state. "This massive drug seizure impacts way beyond our region where it was headed," Pharr Chief of Police Andy Harvey said in a Facebook post. "This stemmed from a patrol officer's attention to detail when he observed something out of the ordinary and he used our resources to further investigate. This is great policing!" But a DEA crime lab would later invalidate those field test results, leading prosecutors to drop their case against Guzman in late March. Guzman's lawyer told the Star-Telegram he was transporting a mix of diesel and oil. As Reason reported last year, such drug field test kits are manufactured by several different companies and are used by police departments and prison systems across the country."

PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "The case, first reported by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, started when a Pharr police officer noticed three men transferring liquid out of large barrels next to a tanker truck. The officer noticed strange crystallization around the barrels and called in backup. According to the criminal complaint filed against Guzman in federal court, Pharr police officers, firemen, and DEA special agents all tested the liquid in the barrels using drug field tests, and they came back presumptive positive for methamphetamines. The DEA estimated the total haul was 700 gallons of liquid meth with a street value of more than $10 million. The seizure made headlines across the state. "This massive drug seizure impacts way beyond our region where it was headed," Pharr Chief of Police Andy Harvey said in a Facebook post. "This stemmed from a patrol officer's attention to detail when he observed something out of the ordinary and he used our resources to further investigate. This is great policing!" But a DEA crime lab would later invalidate those field test results, leading prosecutors to drop their case against Guzman in late March. Guzman's lawyer told the Star-Telegram he was transporting a mix of diesel and oil." As Reason reported last year, such drug field test kits are manufactured by several different companies and are used by police departments and prison systems across the country."

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STORY: "Faulty Police Field Tests Said This Trucker Was Carrying 700 Gallons of Meth. It Was Dieselm," by C.J. Ciaramella, published by 'Reason' on April 8, 2022. (From 'Reasons' 'Drug War' department. (C.J. Ciaramella is a reporter at Reason. He was previously a politics editor at BuzzFeed, and a reporter for the Washington Free Beacon. His writing has also appeared in Vanity Fair, Vice, The Weekly Standard, High Times, Salon, The Federalist, Pacific Standard, The Washington Post, The Daily Beast, the San Diego Union-Tribune, and Street Sense."

SUB-HEADING: "Juan Guzman spent nearly six weeks in jail based on unreliable field tests that have resulted in hundreds of other wrongful arrests."

GIST: "Police and Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) agents in Pharr, Texas, thought they had intercepted a massive meth smuggling operation this February. 

Juan Carlos Toscano Guzman, a Mexican national, spent nearly six weeks in jail accused of transporting roughly 700 gallons of liquid methamphetamine.

 But it turned out not to be illicit drugs at all, just the result of unreliable drug field tests that have led to hundreds of other wrongful arrests.

The case, first reported by the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, started when a Pharr police officer noticed three men transferring liquid out of large barrels next to a tanker truck. The officer noticed strange crystallization around the barrels and called in backup.

According to the criminal complaint filed against Guzman in federal court, Pharr police officers, firemen, and DEA special agents all tested the liquid in the barrels using drug field tests, and they came back presumptive positive for methamphetamines.

 The DEA estimated the total haul was 700 gallons of liquid meth with a street value of more than $10 million. The seizure made headlines across the state.

"This massive drug seizure impacts way beyond our region where it was headed," Pharr Chief of Police Andy Harvey said in a Facebook post. "This stemmed from a patrol officer's attention to detail when he observed something out of the ordinary and he used our resources to further investigate. This is great policing!"

But a DEA crime lab would later invalidate those field test results, leading prosecutors to drop their case against Guzman in late March. Guzman's lawyer told the Star-Telegram he was transporting a mix of diesel and oil.

As Reason reported last year, such drug field test kits are manufactured by several different companies and are used by police departments and prison systems across the country. 

The test kits use instant color reactions to indicate the presence of certain compounds found in illegal drugs, but those same compounds are also found in dozens of known licit substances.

 And although the tests are fairly simple to use, they're still prone to user error and misinterpretation. 

Because of this, they are generally not admissible as evidence in court, but police still use them to establish probable cause to arrest and jail people. 

This has led to hundreds of known instances of wrongful arrests and even guilty pleas from defendants facing charges for test results that crime labs would later invalidate.

For example, Atlanta resident Ju'zema Goldring spent nearly six months in the Fulton County jail in 2015 after police said sand from a stress ball in her purse tested presumptive positive for cocaine. 

She was left in jail for four months after a crime lab concluded that the mysterious powder was sand, not cocaine. A federal jury in Goldring's civil rights lawsuit awarded her $1.5 million earlier this year.

In 2019 in Georgia, a college football quarterback was arrested after bird poop on his car tested positive for cocaine. A Florida man was wrongfully jailed in 2017 after a field test confused his donut glaze with meth.

In 2016, sheriff's deputies in Monroe County, Georgia, arrested Macon resident Dasha Fincher after they found a plastic baggie of blue crystals in her car. 

A NARK II field test of the substance returned a presumptive positive for methamphetamines, and Fincher was charged with trafficking and possession of meth with intent to distribute.

 Fincher sat in jail for three months until a state crime lab determined that the substance was blue cotton candy. 

A follow-up investigation by a Georgia news station found that the NARK II test kit produced 145 false positives in Georgia in 2017.

Last year, more than a dozen Massachusetts attorneys said they were falsely accused of sending drugs to their incarcerated clients, who were then put in solitary confinement for receiving legitimate legal mail. (One way that synthetic opioids are smuggled into prison is by soaking papers in the drug.)

 A class-action lawsuit followed, challenging the Massachusetts Department of Corrections' use of NARK II field tests to detect contraband and punish incarcerated people.

Until police and prisons acknowledge the limitations of these tests, cases like these will keep popping up, and innocent people like Guzman will be deprived of their liberty for doing nothing wrong."

The entire story can be read at:

faulty-police-field-tests-said-this-trucker-was-carrying-700-gallons-of-meth-it-was-diese

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;

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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

---

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;

Thomas James: Florida: Mistaken identification case; The wrong Thomas James might still be in a Florida prison serving a life sentence for murder if Tristam Korten had not published the story in GQ last July which exposed the mistaken identification and paved the way for Jame's recent exoneration. Kudos to GQ for publishing the story - and for giving Korten the opportunity to tell us the inside story of the battle for exoneration in his own words..."James’s journey to this point had been incredible. Even though police never talked to him, he was charged with murder in a 1990 apartment robbery in Miami, because, as he later found out, he had the same name as the suspect they were looking for. It was a simple and cruel error with devastating consequences. James was sentenced to life in prison, where he began to investigate his case, and then exhausted his appeals trying to point out the mistake that had landed him there. From behind bars, he improbably located the namesake suspect the police never found — an extraordinary discovery that helped set into motion the events that would culminate in his release."..."The road to James’ unjust incarceration is complicated … and not. It boils down to a 1990 apartment robbery that left 57-year-old Francis McKinnon dead from a gunshot wound to the head. From there, a Metro-Dade Police detective named Kevin Conley heard from witnesses and the tip line that “Thomas James” was involved. So he went to the records department at headquarters and pulled up a mug shot of a Thomas James. (He later said he didn't remember if there were any other mug shots with the same name.) One witness, who had never met James before, identified him as the shooter. There was no other evidence against him, no fingerprints, footprints, DNA, or ballistics. He met his public defender about three times before trial. I started looking into the case in March of 2020 after speaking with Wilson, who had been a prior street source."

PUBLISHER'S NOTE:This Blog is interested in  false eye-witness identification issues because  wrongful identifications are at the heart of so many DNA-related exonerations in the USA and elsewhere - and because so much scientific research is being conducted with a goal to making the identification process more   transparent and reliable- and less subject to deliberate manipulation.  I have also reported far too many cases over the years - mainly cases lacking DNA evidence (or other forensic evidence pointing to the suspect - where the identification is erroneous - in spite of witness’s certainty that it is true - or where  the police pressure the witness, or rig the identification process in order to make a desired  identification inevitable. 

Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog.

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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "I talked to James, who guided me through his version of events; to witnesses; and eventually to the neighborhood man he was confused with, the other Thomas “Tommy” James, who had a history of robbery.  The other James admitted to me that he was the one police were actually looking for, even though he couldn't have committed the crime because he was in jail at the time, which I confirmed. (Another suspect, who is already in prison on unrelated charges, has been identified by the State’s Attorneys office.)  I went over statements and depositions to identify all the moments in which it was clear witnesses were talking about a different Thomas James.  All the moments police, prosecutors and even the defense attorney missed.  All of those moments that conspired to put a poor black man represented by a harried public defender in prison for life after a trial that lasted two and a half days, with no evidence other than an eyewitness who didn't know Jay but picked him out of a police lineup."

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STORY: "The Tragic Case of the Wrong Thomas James Is Finally Righted," by Tristam Korten, published by GQ, on April 28, 2022.

SUB-HEADING: "After 32 years, a Florida man sentenced to life in prison for murder because he had the same name as another suspect is finally free."

GIST: "Thomas James walked into Miami’s Richard E. Gerstein Justice building shortly after 11 o'clock in the morning yesterday wearing a red inmate uniform, his head shaved smooth. 

Within the hour he was putting on street clothes for the first time in 32 years and walking out into the bright afternoon. Prosecutors had moved to vacate Thomas's 1991 murder conviction following a year-long review of his case. 

That review followed a GQ story I published last July that uncovered evidence showing James was the victim of mistaken identity.

James’s journey to this point had been incredible. Even though police never talked to him, he was charged with murder in a 1990 apartment robbery in Miami, because, as he later found out, he had the same name as the suspect they were looking for. It was a simple and cruel error with devastating consequences. James was sentenced to life in prison, where he began to investigate his case, and then exhausted his appeals trying to point out the mistake that had landed him there. From behind bars, he improbably located the namesake suspect the police never found — an extraordinary discovery that helped set into motion the events that would culminate in his release.

Yet the end to James’ confinement came abruptly and almost anti-climatically. After months and months of investigation, the State Attorney's Office suddenly notified James's lawyer, Natlie Figgers, on Tuesday that they would announce their decision in the case the next day. On Wednesday, after stating “we have determined that Thomas Raynard James is actually innocent,” Deputy Chief Assistant State Attorney Christine Zahralban asked Miami Dade Circuit Court Judge Miguel de la O to “vacate the judgment and allow him to be freed.”

The judge talked a little about how “bittersweet” the moment was for both James, who lost so much of his life, and for the family of the victim, who now don't have justice. Then he granted the state’s motion. “Mr. James, at this time you have no further business in front of this court,” he said. It was over. James's long journey to prove his innocence, which would have broken lesser men, had ended. He was a free man. He stood up to start another journey into a world very different from the one he left.

James would not be going back to prison to collect any of his belongings. Everything important to him he took to court that morning: pictures, notes on a book he wants to write, notes on businesses he wants to start, some legal documents. Three decades stuffed in a blue mesh bag. As he changed out of his jail clothes for the last time at the State Attorney's Office across the street from the courthouse, he was briefly and literally emerging naked into a new world.

His family had brought new threads for him to wear. A gray sweatshirt, a t-shirt with “Versace” on it, dark slacks, new leather tennis shoes. It must have felt good. Back in the day, when James was awaiting trial in a Miami jail, families were allowed to drop off street clothes for inmates to wear. Sammy Wilson, who served time with James, remembers a young man who kept up appearances. James “always dressed fresh,” Wilson told me. “His pants, his shirt, his shoes always matched. He liked that Yankees blue. He was GQ.”

Wilson, a gravel-voiced cynic, played an integral part in helping James, speaking to him regularly throughout his incarceration. He's the one who told me about the case and put me in touch with James, who had been reaching out to media for years with no luck. Wilson was in the courtroom Wednesday for the hearing. “Damndest thing,” he recalled. “When they announce he free, tears came out of my eyes. I didn't even cry when I went to prison. Man, I must be getting soft.”

James didn't cry. After suffering for so long, he is careful not to let his emotions overwhelm him. I know because I've been talking to him for two years now as we shepherded his story into the light, then waited to see if anything would happen. I was not in Miami for the hearing, but I made him tell me in detail his movements that day. Some of that was cover. Given the magnitude of his injustice, the emotionally safe spot for both of us has always been digging for facts. 

Now was no different, except instead of witnesses, it was about the weather.

James stepped from the State Attorney's Office into a bright, sunny Miami afternoon, with a cooling breeze. What were those first moments of freedom like? “It was myriad emotions all at one time,” he said. Was there an overriding one?

“Joy, it gotta be joy. A sigh of relief,” he said. “Everything hasn't sunk in yet, it's been a long time.”

It has. A very long time.

The road to James’ unjust incarceration is complicated … and not. It boils down to a 1990 apartment robbery that left 57-year-old Francis McKinnon dead from a gunshot wound to the head. From there, a Metro-Dade Police detective named Kevin Conley heard from witnesses and the tip line that “Thomas James” was involved.

 So he went to the records department at headquarters and pulled up a mug shot of a Thomas James. (He later said he didn't remember if there were any other mug shots with the same name.) 

One witness, who had never met James before, identified him as the shooter. There was no other evidence against him, no fingerprints, footprints, DNA, or ballistics. He met his public defender about three times before trial.

I started looking into the case in March of 2020 after speaking with Wilson, who had been a prior street source. 

I talked to James, who guided me through his version of events; to witnesses; and eventually to the neighborhood man he was confused with, the other Thomas “Tommy” James, who had a history of robbery. 

The other James admitted to me that he was the one police were actually looking for, even though he couldn't have committed the crime because he was in jail at the time, which I confirmed. (Another suspect, who is already in prison on unrelated charges, has been identified by the State’s Attorneys office.)

 I went over statements and depositions to identify all the moments in which it was clear witnesses were talking about a different Thomas James. 

All the moments police, prosecutors and even the defense attorney missed. 

All of those moments that conspired to put a poor black man represented by a harried public defender in prison for life after a trial that lasted two and a half days, with no evidence other than an eyewitness who didn't know Jay but picked him out of a police lineup.

In March of 2021 I contacted prosecutors and alerted them to what was in the story. In June they opened their investigation.

 It was a long wait from there. Key to keeping attention on the case was Al Singleton, a retired homicide detective with the Miami-Dade Police Department who read my story. 

Singleton was in homicide when McKinnon was killed, but he didn't remember the case, let alone work it. 

A few years ago he had “reluctantly and recently come to the conclusion that we convict a lot more innocent people than we ever imagined,” and he started talking to prosecutors at the State’s Attorney’s Office, only to find they knew nothing about the case or the story.

His outrage grew as he began contacting county officials, police and prosecutors, and found no sense of urgency. 

His masterstroke of disruption was contacting Melba Pearson, a civil rights attorney and prosecutor who ran (and lost) on a justice reform platform in the last State’s Attorney election. 

She was as alarmed as he was and contacted James's attorney about organizing a press conference to put pressure on the prosecutors (Figgers withdrew support for it at the last minute). Pearson rolled on, holding a symposium on the case at Florida International University, generating coverage and a “day of action,” and eventually cooperating with Figgers’ on a streetside rally for James.

The State Attorney's Office seemed to take offense that civil rights advocates might not trust their institution, and pushed back against the perception they were dragging things out. 

Prosecutors released their report the day of James's hearing. 

But to their credit, they did a thorough job. They confirmed the suspect's death, and interviewed the other Thomas “Tommy” James, leading to identification of the last suspect. 

(Tommy told me he didn't know who the shooter was, but I suspected differently).

 There currently is not enough evidence to charge that man in McKinnon's death. The final piece of the puzzle came when the main witness recanted her testimony. She no longer believed it was Thomas James she saw in the apartment that night.

In the end, Pearson and Singleton believe their pressure campaign worked, while State Attorney Katherine Fernandez Rundle maintains her office held its ground against outside pressure, and took the time needed to do a thorough investigation. 

At this point, it's hard to argue with the results. James is free. Justice of sorts is served. 

And although this is beyond bittersweet for James, a terrible wrong has been made right.

On that sunny afternoon of freedom, James's family, his mother Doris, his cousins Santay, Charles and Sankavia, and his legal team whisked him over the causeway straddling Biscayne Bay to the Miami Beach restaurant Yardbird. 

There, surrounded by those who have stayed with him through a terrible journey, he ordered his first meal as a free man – country fried chicken with mashed potatoes and sweet corn."

The entire story can be read at:

https://www.gq.com/story/thomas-james-innocent

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;

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

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;

—————————————————————————————————

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;

Barry Morphew: Colorado: Major Development: Judge grants motion to dismiss without prejudice all charges against Barry Morphew in wife Suzanne's disappearance, in what CBS NEWS Reporters Paul Larosa and Elena Difiore call, "a high-profile case that has already seen numerous and sometimes odd twists and turns over the past two years, including most recently, crucial judicial sanctions" - noting that the dismissal came just nine days before he was to stand trial for the first-degree murder of his wife and mother of their two daughters..."Prosecutors, who can re-file charges in the future, filed a motion to dismiss the indictment minutes before a pre-trial conference on April 19, 2022, with DA Linda Stanley writing they need to investigate further and believe "we are close to discovering the victim's body." Stanley also cited the court's decision to exclude "several key expert witnesses initially endorsed. Without this crucial evidence and without the victim's body, the People cannot move forward at this time in good faith."..."First I want to say that Mr. Morphew not only was presumed innocent and still is presumed innocent, he is innocent," Morphew's attorney, Iris Eytan, said at a press conference after the charges were dropped. In response to the State pointing to the need to find Suzanne's body, she said, "Forever they have stated that they don't need a body — that a body is irrelevant. But you need to know, that in this case, there has been not a single ounce of physical evidence that has been found connecting Mr. Morphew to this … alleged crime." Since Barry Morphew's arrest, his defense attorneys had asked Judge Ramsey Lama, multiple times, to dismiss the charges against him. Over the past several months, they pressed the judge to issue severe sanctions on the prosecution for failing to turn over potentially exculpatory evidence ahead of trial. And the judge imposed damaging sanctions, including barring 11 of their 16 endorsed expert witnesses — among others, experts in DNA, vehicle data and a cell phone data analyst, as punishment for violating discovery rules. In all, the Court excluded 14 of the prosecution's expert witnesses. The judge found that DA Stanley and her team repeatedly missed deadlines and failed to turn over important information, writing, "The People's actions amount to negligent and arguably, reckless disregard" for their discovery obligations."

CBS 48 Hours episode:  "The Suzanne Morphew case: Nothing is what it seems."

https://www.cbs.com/shows/video/xUqHIPwCw6qP_iOaUTuf5LdTfQrbACrM/

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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: (CBS NEWS STORY): "He was arrested and charged with first-degree murder and other crimes in May 2021. Suzanne's body has not been found and prosecutors presume she is dead. Barry eventually pleaded "not guilty." But at the eleventh hour, there was one more twist revealed for the first time publicly at a preliminary hearing to determine if there was enough evidence for probable cause.  Prosecutors admitted at a hearing held in the summer of 2021 that their own forensics team had uncovered DNA evidence that threatened to destroy their case against Barry.  State technicians had found DNA on the glove compartment of Suzanne's car that partially matched an unknown male connected to three unsolved sexual assault cases in three different cities.  Barry Morphew and Jeff Libler were excluded from that DNA sample which meant there was a chance Suzanne had fallen into the hands of a sexual predator. "This DNA discovery is so significant," Gruber said. "All of a sudden, the seemingly implausible becomes more possible."

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QUOTE OF THE DAY: "At the press conference outside court, Eytan made it clear her opinion that her client should never have been charged.  "These charges were false from the beginning … The prosecution was manufacturing a murder case," she said.  "You've seen shows called 'Making a Murderer?' That's what was happening here in this courtroom … They absolutely dismissed this case at this point because they knew they were going to lose this trial and Mr. Morphew was going to be acquitted and exonerated.” "Barry Morphew loves Suzanne Morphew," Eytan said. "He loves her and he misses her and he wants to know where Suzanne Morphew is.  It's a big question mark … Definitely there was not any evidence, even close to convicting him of murder of his wife."

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STORY: "Judge grants motion to dismiss charges against Barry Morphew in wife Suzanne's disappearance," by Reporters Paul Larosa and Elena Difiore, published by CBS News on April 21, 2022.

PHOTO CAPTION: Barry Morphew, alongside his daughters, walks out of the Fremont County Courthouse in Colorado, a free man after all charges against him are dismissed on April 19, 2022.

GIST: "In a high-profile case that has already seen numerous and sometimes odd twists and turns over the past two years, including most recently, crucial judicial sanctions, a judge agreed to dismiss all charges against Barry Morphew, without prejudice, just nine days before he was to stand trial for the first-degree murder of his wife and mother of their two daughters, Suzanne Morphew. 

Prosecutors, who can re-file charges in the future, filed a motion to dismiss the indictment minutes before a pre-trial conference on April 19, 2022, with DA Linda Stanley writing they need to investigate further and believe "we are close to discovering the victim's body."  Stanley also cited the court's decision to exclude "several key expert witnesses initially endorsed.  Without this crucial evidence and without the victim's body, the People cannot move forward at this time in good faith."

"First I want to say that Mr. Morphew not only was presumed innocent and still is presumed innocent, he is innocent," Morphew's attorney, Iris Eytan, said at a press conference after the charges were dropped.  In response to the State pointing to the need to find Suzanne's body, she said, "Forever they have stated that they don't need a body — that a body is irrelevant.  But you need to know, that in this case, there has been not a single ounce of physical evidence that has been found connecting Mr. Morphew to this … alleged crime."

Since Barry Morphew's arrest, his defense attorneys had asked Judge Ramsey Lama, multiple times, to dismiss the charges against him. Over the past several months, they pressed the judge to issue severe sanctions on the prosecution for failing to turn over potentially exculpatory evidence ahead of trial.  And the judge imposed damaging sanctions, including barring 11 of their 16 endorsed expert witnesses — among others, experts in DNA, vehicle data and a cell phone data analyst, as punishment for violating discovery rules. In all, the Court excluded 14 of the prosecution's expert witnesses.  The judge found that DA Stanley and her team repeatedly missed deadlines and failed to turn over important information, writing, "The People's actions amount to negligent and arguably, reckless disregard" for their discovery obligations.

In earlier filings, prosecutors said that the Court did not find willful misconduct associated with any discovery violations, noting "ultimately the sanctions imposed greatly damage the People's case, tantamount to dismissal, for late disclosures that were not greatly prejudicial, but rather technical in nature."

When Suzanne Morphew, a Colorado mother of two girls, vanished on Mother's Day in May 2020, authorities wondered if she'd been abducted or if her husband Barry — whom she had threatened to divorce — might have killed her.

Investigators never expected the case would have so many bizarre twists and turns and eventually involve a chipmunk alibi, a tranquilizer gun, a "talking" truck, mystery DNA and a spy pen right out of a James Bond film.

"This case is incredibly unique," says Aya Gruber, a law professor at the University of Colorado at Boulder. "When you started to dig a little bit deeper, nothing is what it seems.”

Gruber studied thousands of pages of public documents from the prosecutor, investigators and defense attorneys.

Suzanne was reported missing on May 10, 2020. She'd been alone that day because her daughters, Macy, 16, and Mallory, 20, were off on a church-sponsored camping trip and planned to return home later that Mother's Day.

At the same time, Barry Morphew told investigators he had left the home early in the morning to drive to a job site some three hours away. He said the last time he saw his wife of 25 years was when she was sleeping in their bed. 

After Suzanne was officially reported missing by a neighbor, investigators began to examine Barry's story. Friends and relatives told investigators that the marriage was troubled, and agents found a deleted text from Suzanne to Barry on his phone that read: "I'm done. I could care less what you're up to and have been for years. We just need to figure this out civilly.”

But 10 days after Suzanne disappeared, agents were pulled in a different direction when they found a so-called spy pen belonging to Suzanne. The spy pen has a long battery life and is designed to look and write like an ordinary pen.

But it has one extra feature: it is voice-activated and records conversations. Suzanne had acquired it, she told a friend, because she suspected Barry was having an affair and she hoped to use the pen to gather evidence. But the plan backfired.

Investigators listened to what the pen had recorded and, although there was no evidence of Barry having an affair, they say they heard "intimate" conversations between Suzanne and someone named Jeff.

It was another twist in a case filled with them.

Without knowing who Jeff was or his location when Suzanne went missing, they could not eliminate him as a person or interest. It took FBI agents six months before they uncovered his identity: Jeff Libler, a man both Suzanne and Barry knew from their Alexandria, Indiana, high school. Jeff and Suzanne had had a one-time fling after graduation, and she'd reached out to him in 2018 after the Morphews moved to Colorado with a Facebook message that read simply: "Howdy stranger."

"And from that moment they had talked almost every single day nonstop," said Ashley Franco, a reporter for KKTV, the CBS affiliate in Colorado Springs, who has covered the story from the beginning.

That was enough to ignite a nearly two-year love affair. Jeff had a wife and six children. He lived in Michigan and claimed to be there with his family on the day Suzanne vanished.

Agents eventually discovered the lovers had spoken to each other for dozens of hours, often communicating via secret accounts on WhatsApp and LinkedIn. Jeff also admitted that they met for romantic rendezvous in New Orleans, Florida, Texas, Michigan and Indiana.

After Suzanne disappeared in May 2020, Jeff did not contact authorities. Instead, agents say, he deleted the accounts where he had communicated with Suzanne.

"What he did was delete all his social media accounts that he had used to communicate with Suzanne," says Gruber. "He's got a lot to lose if revelations of this affair come out."

Jeff reportedly told agents he did not want to tarnish Suzanne's memory, but he also told them he worried that he'd lose his wife, children and job. He also worried he might be considered a suspect. "He asks the agents, 'Am I a target?'" says Gruber.

After agents confronted him, he did cooperate, providing a sample of his DNA and passwords to the deleted accounts. Investigators eventually were able to retrace the couple's steps and recovered texts by tapping into the iCloud accounts of Jeff and Suzanne.

Jeff was able to provide receipts for a home goods store he'd visited in Michigan on the day Suzanne vanished and he was eventually cleared.

Investigators still had their suspicions about Barry Morphew. They never uncovered any evidence that he was having an affair, but investigators found his actions on that Mother's Day weekend to be suspicious.

They asked Barry why his phone seemed to be pinging all around his house on the day before Mother's Day and he told them he must have been out shooting chipmunks, which he said were a constant nuisance at the house.

It was perhaps the world's first chipmunk alibi, but Barry stood by it, saying he'd shot 85 chipmunks in the two years he owned that Colorado house.

"And then that confession to shooting chipmunks becomes a major piece of incriminating evidence against him," says Gruber.

Van Sant asked why. "Because [agents are] saying, 'Well, you know, now he's admitting to having run around the house. And this is a ridiculous explanation, so it must be the explanation of a guilty person,'" says Gruber.

What's more, there was no evidence of any chipmunk shootings around the house and neighbors did not recall hearing any type of disturbance during that period of time.

Cases sometimes turn on the smallest of things and, in this case, agents seized upon just such a small item.

Agents had found a small clear plastic cap in the family's dryer that they believed was from a syringe used to inject chemicals into a tranquilizer dart. Barry acknowledged he knew how to inject chemicals into a dart and that he'd shot many deer for trophies and so he could get their antlers. His garage was filled with deer heads and a pile of antlers. However, there was no working tranquilizer gun found in the home and authorities say Barry's DNA was not on that plastic cap.

Even so, investigators developed a theory that Barry had shot Suzanne with a tranquilizer gun and then chased her around the house before she passed out. They found a door frame that was broken and suspected there had been a confrontation.

Agents also tapped into a new investigative tool called digital vehicle forensics. They pulled data from his Ford truck's many computers and got the truck to "talk" to them. They learned that when Barry said he was sleeping, the truck's doors were opening and closing.

He was arrested and charged with first-degree murder and other crimes in May 2021. Suzanne's body has not been found and prosecutors presume she is dead. Barry eventually pleaded "not guilty."

But at the eleventh hour, there was one more twist revealed for the first time publicly at a preliminary hearing to determine if there was enough evidence for probable cause. 

Prosecutors admitted at a hearing held in the summer of 2021 that their own forensics team had uncovered DNA evidence that threatened to destroy their case against Barry.

 State technicians had found DNA on the glove compartment of Suzanne's car that partially matched an unknown male connected to three unsolved sexual assault cases in three different cities. 

Barry Morphew and Jeff Libler were excluded from that DNA sample which meant there was a chance Suzanne had fallen into the hands of a sexual predator. "This DNA discovery is so significant," Gruber said. "All of a sudden, the seemingly implausible becomes more possible."

Judge Patrick Murphy was candid in his assessment of the case, saying it could go either way before a jury. He found enough probable cause to put it over for trial but ordered that Barry be released on $500,000 bond, observing that he thought there was not "a fair likelihood" that Barry would be convicted by a jury. Barry entered a plea of not guilty to the charges.

Barry Morphew raised the bond money and is free awaiting trial.  Judge Murphy disqualified himself because of a potential conflict of interest involving a witness, and Judge Ramsey Lama was appointed in January 2022.  Morphew's trial, which was moved from Chaffee to Fremont County, Colorado, was scheduled to begin on April 28. 

Then, on April 19, Stanley and her team filed the motion to drop all charges, without prejudice, until they gather more evidence.  But Morphew's attorney, Iris Eytan, argued that the case should be dismissed with prejudice so that it cannot be refiled.  The court dismissed the charges without prejudice.

At the press conference outside court, Eytan made it clear her opinion that her client should never have been charged. 

"These charges were false from the beginning … The prosecution was manufacturing a murder case," she said.  "You've seen shows called 'Making a Murderer?' That's what was happening here in this courtroom … They absolutely dismissed this case at this point because they knew they were going to lose this trial and Mr. Morphew was going to be acquitted and exonerated.”

"Barry Morphew loves Suzanne Morphew," Eytan said. "He loves her and he misses her and he wants to know where Suzanne Morphew is.  It's a big question mark … Definitely there was not any evidence, even close to convicting him of murder of his wife."

As investigators continue searching for Suzanne Morphew's body, focusing on a "remote and mountainous region nearby the Morphew residence," as the DA wrote in her motion, waiting for five feet of snow to melt before they can safely excavate the area, Barry Morphew, alongside his daughters, walked out of the Fremont County courthouse a free man. With all charges against him dropped, his bond is lifted, his GPS ankle monitor removed, and his passport returned.  And about 1,000 people who had been summoned to appear for jury selection are released.""

The entire story can be read at:    

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/barry-morphew-murder-charges-dismissed-suzanne-disappearance/

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;

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

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;

—————————————————————————————————

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;

Andrew Malkinson: UK: April 27: Freed after 17 years in prison after a fresh DNA breakthrough in the case, Andrew Malkinson is still locked in limbo, The Sunday Times (Social Affairs Reporter Emily Dugan) reports..."Appeal, the miscarriage of justice charity and law practice representing him, has made several requests to the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) for a full investigation into GMP’s (Greater Manchester Police) handling of the case. But so far the IOPC has insisted it can be investigated locally only by GMP itself."

BACKGROUND: (From 'Times' Social Affairs Reporter Emily Dugan, April 25, 2021. "I spent 17 years in jail but DNA provers the real killer os still at large."..."A man who spent 17 years in prison for rape and maintained his innocence is a step closer to clearing his name after a fresh DNA breakthrough in his case. Andrew Malkinson was convicted of raping a 33-year-old mother left for dead on a Manchester roadside in the middle of the night in July 2003. There was never any forensic evidence against him and his conviction depended on an identity parade and testimony from witnesses whose criminal pasts were hidden from the court. Malkinson, 55, who was 37 when he went to jail, was released from prison last December for good behaviour. He was locked up for ten years beyond his tariff because he refused to admit to the crime. Greater Manchester police (GMP) have now admitted that they misled the court by presenting two key witnesses, a couple, as honest. In fact, they had 16 convictions for 38 offences between them. They claimed they were able to identify Malkinson having seen him on a dark street in the middle of the night. Despite this, GMP continue to spend public money fighting Malkinson’s lawyers in the courts to prevent more information being revealed about the witnesses and their interaction with police. The couple came forward to say they were witnesses shortly after police put out a call to their sources, raising the possibility that they were police informants. “I’ve always known I’m innocent ... I’ve waited a long time for the science to catch up and finally it has,” Malkinson said. He added: “It’s a terrible position to be in when it’s your word against someone else’s, because you just look guilty by the mere fact you’ve been accused ... A year in prison is not like a year outside it. Every day drags and it’s just psychologically demanding.” Last week a High Court judge ruled that there had been an “arguable error in law” over GMP’s refusal to disclose more information about the witnesses and granted permission for a judicial review. Malkinson’s last serious girlfriend, a Dutchwoman called Karin Schuitemaker, has always insisted it was impossible that Malkinson could have committed the crime. They were together for four years until 1999 and while he was in prison she wrote to officials in the UK begging for the case to be looked at again. She said: “From the beginning I didn’t have any doubts at all. It didn’t fit him in any way. Nothing fitted his personality. He’s a very gentle person ... a pacifist.” Last year The Sunday Times revealed that fresh forensic analysis found male DNA on samples taken from the victim and her clothing that did not match Malkinson’s. To prove his innocence, however, his lawyers needed to eliminate the possibility that the DNA might belong to the victim’s boyfriend at the time. Now fresh samples taken from the boyfriend by GMP have revealed he is not a match. Malkinson’s lawyers say the development proves the woman’s attacker must be at large and that Malkinson’s conviction is a grave miscarriage of justice. A spokeswoman for GMP said: “As a formal complaint has been registered with our professional standards branch in relation to the actions of officers at the time of Mr Malkinson’s trial, it would be inappropriate to comment further at this time. We will of course co-operate with any further review of this case which may be conducted by the Criminal Cases Review Commission.”

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/i-served-17-years-in-jail-but-dna-proves-real-rapist-is-still-at-large-0rcjmrwfz

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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: (The Times April 3, 2022 story)..."Malkinson still has to have regular meetings with probation officers, but these days they are more empathetic. “[Mine] is quite understanding, she keeps asking me how my case is going,” he said. “Of course I say, ‘Very slowly’. I’m waiting and waiting and waiting.” Emily Bolton, Malkinson’s solicitor and the director of Appeal, said: “We hope the CCRC will do the right thing and send Andy’s case to the Court of Appeal so he has the chance to clear his name.” The CCRC said it would review the submissions sent by Appeal last week and decide whether they justify further investigation. A CCRC spokesman said: “Mr Malkinson’s case remains under review at the CCRC. No decision has been taken yet on whether or not the case will be referred to the Court of Appeal. The case remains at the investigation stage, with active lines of inquiry being carried out.”

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STORY:  Freed after 17 years in prison — but Andrew Malkinson is still locked in limbo," by Social Affairs Correspondent Emily Dugan, published by The Times on April 3, 2022.

SUB-HEADING: "A man jailed for a rape he denies committing says he is suffering psychological torture because he can't clear his name or get a job."

GIST: "When Andrew Malkinson finally walked out of prison in December 2020, he hugged his mum, Trish, and told her: “It’s all over.”

Seventeen years earlier he had been convicted of the rape of a woman left for dead by a stranger in Salford, though no DNA evidence put him at the scene. He kept insisting on his innocence for the duration of his sentence — and as a result spent a decade longer behind bars. But his hopes of wiping the slate clean have long since been dashed. Since leaving, his life has been in limbo.

Malkinson, 56, who lives in a small flat in a seaside town, has applied for job after job. On one occasion he was due to be interviewed for therole of a postman but it went nowhere after they learnt of his conviction. Eventually he was given a position in a food factory, spending all day on his feet, despite his age and increasing ill health.

“The job I’m doing at the moment is really physically demanding. I’m not young any more. I’m having troubles with my sciatica and it’s really full-on, but it’s all I can get,” he said. “I am struggling to find my place in society — the suffering doesn’t end when you walk out of the prison gates. Living out here with a crime this monstrous as my calling card is more psychological torture.”

It is not just employers who are horrified. “If I am meeting someone who knows about my situation, sitting at a table for coffee, and another person comes up and is introduced to me, the first thing in my head is: ‘When do I tell them, so they won’t feel betrayed later?’ ”

New evidence, including DNA that points to another unknown suspect and revelations about witnesses, was sent to the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) last year. Nearly 11 months have gone by and the CCRC still has not decided if it warrants a referral back to the Court of Appeal. A further tranche of evidence relating to disclosure failures by Greater Manchester police in its handling of the criminal investigation was sent to the CCRC on Thursday.

“It’s frustrating and it’s mentally exhausting . . . because you think, ‘I wonder what is required for them to move with speed?’ ” Malkinson said. “If new DNA evidence isn’t sufficient, what is?”

Appeal, the miscarriage of justice charity and law practice representing him, has made several requests to the Independent Office for Police Conduct (IOPC) for a full investigation into GMP’s handling of the case. But so far the IOPC has insisted it can be investigated locally only by GMP itself

A force spokeswoman said: “GMP has appointed a senior officer to undertake a review of the case in response to representations made by Mr Malkinson’s legal representatives. GMP is assisting and co-operating with the CCRC.”

Malkinson still has to have regular meetings with probation officers, but these days they are more empathetic. “[Mine] is quite understanding, she keeps asking me how my case is going,” he said. “Of course I say, ‘Very slowly’. I’m waiting and waiting and waiting.”

Emily Bolton, Malkinson’s solicitor and the director of Appeal, said: “We hope the CCRC will do the right thing and send Andy’s case to the Court of Appeal so he has the chance to clear his name.”

The CCRC said it would review the submissions sent by Appeal last week and decide whether they justify further investigation.

A CCRC spokesman said: “Mr Malkinson’s case remains under review at the CCRC. No decision has been taken yet on whether or not the case will be referred to the Court of Appeal. The case remains at the investigation stage, with active lines of inquiry being carried out.”

An IOPC spokesman said: “After carefully considering the available information, we determined that an investigation was required . . . As GMP was at that time in the advanced stages of investigating further allegations made by the same complainant, we directed the force to carry out a local investigation.” 

Malkinson said: “I feel so far behind in life. I am 56, I should have at least equity in a home, and a pension.

“I bought £300 worth of shares with my wages a couple of months ago but last week I had to sell them to meet my bills, which include a long-term payment plan to an energy company. One step forward, two steps back.""

The entire story can be read at:

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/freed-after-17-years-in-prison-but-andrew-malkinson-is-still-locked-in-limbo-z0xj3lc7f

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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;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

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;

—————————————————————————————————

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;