by Richard Moran
The New York Times
Thursday, August 2, 2007
LAST week, Judge Nancy Gertner of the Federal District Court in Boston awarded more than $100 million to four men whom the F.B.I. framed for the 1965 murder of Edward Deegan, a local gangster. It was compensation for the 30 years the men spent behind bars while agents withheld evidence that would have cleared them and put the real killer — a valuable F.B.I. informant, by the name of Vincent Flemmi — in prison.
Most coverage of the story described it as a bizarre exception in the history of law enforcement. Unfortunately, this kind of behavior by those whose sworn duty it is to uphold the law is all too common. In state courts, where most death sentences are handed down, it occurs regularly.
My recently completed study of the 124 exonerations of death row inmates in America from 1973 to 2007 indicated that 80, or about two-thirds, of their so-called wrongful convictions resulted not from good-faith mistakes or errors but from intentional, willful, malicious prosecutions by criminal justice personnel. (There were four cases in which a determination could not be made one way or another.)
Yet too often this behavior is not singled out and identified for what it is. When a prosecutor puts a witness on the stand whom he knows to be lying, or fails to turn over evidence favorable to the defense, or when a police officer manufactures or destroys evidence to further the likelihood of a conviction, then it is deceptive to term these conscious violations of the law — all of which I found in my research — as merely mistakes or errors.
Mistakes are good-faith errors — like taking the wrong exit off the highway, or dialing the wrong telephone number. There is no malice behind them. However, when officers of the court conspire to convict a defendant of first-degree murder and send him to death row, they are doing much more than making an innocent mistake or error. They are breaking the law.
Perhaps this explains why, even when a manifestly innocent man is about to be executed, a prosecutor can be dead set against reopening an old case. Since so many wrongful convictions result from official malicious behavior, prosecutors, policemen, witnesses or even jurors and judges could themselves face jail time for breaking the law in obtaining an unlawful conviction.
Strangely, our misunderstanding of the real cause underlying most wrongful convictions is compounded by the very people who work to uncover them. Although the term “wrongfully convicted” is technically correct, it also has the potential to be misleading. It leads to the false impression that most inmates ended up on death row because of good-faith mistakes or errors committed by an imperfect criminal justice system — not by malicious or unlawful behavior.
For this reason, we need to re-frame the argument and shift our language. If a death sentence is overturned because of malicious behavior, we should call it for what it is: an unlawful conviction, not a wrongful one.
In the interest of fairness, it is important to note that those who are exonerated are not necessarily innocent of the crimes that sent them to death row. They have simply had their death sentences set aside because of errors that led to convictions, usually involving the intentional violation of their constitutional right to a fair and impartial trial. Very seldom does the court go the next step and actually declare them innocent.
In addition, some of these unlawful convictions resulted from criminal justice officials trying to do the right thing. (A police officer, say, plants evidence on a defendant he is convinced is guilty, fearing that the defendant will escape punishment otherwise.) In cases like these, officers or prosecutors have been known to “frame a guilty man.”
The malicious or even well-intentioned manipulation of murder cases by prosecutors and the police underscores why it’s important to discard, once and for all, the nonsense that so-called wrongful convictions can be eliminated by introducing better forensic science into the courtroom.
Even if we limit death sentences to cases in which there is “conclusive scientific evidence” of guilt, as Mitt Romney, the presidential candidate and former governor of Massachusetts has proposed, we will still not eliminate the problem of wrongful convictions. The best trained and most honest forensic scientists can only examine the evidence presented to them; they cannot be expected to determine if that evidence has been planted, switched or withheld from the defense.
The cause of malicious unlawful convictions doesn’t rest solely in the imperfect workings of our criminal justice system — if it did we might be able to remedy most of it. A crucial part of the problem rests in the hearts and souls of those whose job it is to uphold the law. That’s why even the most careful strictures on death penalty cases could fail to prevent the execution of innocent people — and why we would do well to be more vigilant and specific in articulating the causes for overturning an unlawful conviction.
Richard Moran is a professor of sociology and criminology at Mount Holyoke College.
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Thursday, August 2, 2007
Saturday, July 21, 2007
Imagine You're On Death Row...
By Leonard Pitts, Jr.
The Detroit Free Press
Saturday, July 21, 2007
You don't know what it's like and neither do I. But we can imagine.
I've always thought it must feel like being buried alive. Lungs starving, lying in blackness, pounding on the coffin lid with dirt showering down, no one hearing your cries.
Or maybe it's like locked-in syndrome, a condition where you lose muscle control — can't move a finger, turn your head, speak. Your body entombs you. You scream within, but no one hears.
Something like that, I think. Something where you're trapped, claustrophobic, unable to believe what is happening, unable to make anyone hear you. That's how it must feel to be an innocent person on death row as execution day draws close.
Tuesday was Troy Anthony Davis' scheduled execution day, though I have no idea if he is an innocent person. I do know that he was convicted of the 1989 killing of a police officer, Mark Allen MacPhail, in Savannah, Ga. And I know that he was on the scene, a Burger King parking lot, that fateful night.
But I also know that Davis has always maintained his innocence. And that no physical evidence — no gun, no fingerprint, no DNA — ever tied him to the crime. And that he was convicted on the testimony of nine key witnesses. And that seven of them have now recanted.
They lied, they say. They were scared, they were bullied and threatened, and they said what the cops wanted to hear. Of the two witnesses who have not recanted, one is a fellow named Sylvester (Red) Coles; some Witnesses claim he's the one who actually shot MacPhail when the officer tried to break up a parking lot altercation.
Monday, one day before Davis was scheduled to die, the state parole board issued a 90-day stay of execution.
You and I have no idea how that must feel, either, but we can imagine. The buried man gets a sip of air. The paralyzed man moves his toe.
And then back down into the coffin, back down into the tomb of your own skin, back in line to die.
Surely Davis' lawyers have explained to him the 1996 federal law, signed by President Bill Clinton, that is throwing roadblocks in his way. Designed to streamline capital cases, it restricts the introduction of exculpatory evidence once the state appeals process is done. But just as surely, Davis, if he is innocent, must wonder how he could have presented evidence he didn't yet have. And he must wonder, too, how there can be a time limit on truth — especially when a human life is at stake. How can you execute a man when there remain serious questions about his guilt?
That's barbarism, not justice.
What's fascinating is that, though 67% of those polled by Gallup pollsters approve of capital punishment in murder cases (and 51% say it's not imposed often enough), 64% admit it does not deter murder, and 63% believe an innocent person has probably been executed since 2001.
In other words, the system doesn't work, we "know" it doesn't work, yet we want it to continue — and, indeed, expand. What kind of madness is that? It's an intellectual disconnect, a refusal to follow logic to its logical end.
It is, of course, easier to countenance that madness, ignore that refusal, when the issue is abstract, when death row is distant, theoretical and does not involve you.
But what must it feel like when it is not abstract, when it is "you'' sitting there in the cell watching the calendar move inexorably toward the day the state will kill you for something you absolutely did not do? Is there a suspension of belief? Do you tell yourself that surely people will come to' their senses any minute now? Does the air close on you like a coffin lid? Does darkness sit on your chest like a weight?
You and I can only imagine. Some men have no need to try.
LEONARD PITTS JR. is a columnist for the Miami Herald, 1 Herald Plaza, Miami, Fla. 33132. Write to him at lpitts@miamiherald.com.
The Detroit Free Press
Saturday, July 21, 2007
You don't know what it's like and neither do I. But we can imagine.
I've always thought it must feel like being buried alive. Lungs starving, lying in blackness, pounding on the coffin lid with dirt showering down, no one hearing your cries.
Or maybe it's like locked-in syndrome, a condition where you lose muscle control — can't move a finger, turn your head, speak. Your body entombs you. You scream within, but no one hears.
Something like that, I think. Something where you're trapped, claustrophobic, unable to believe what is happening, unable to make anyone hear you. That's how it must feel to be an innocent person on death row as execution day draws close.
Tuesday was Troy Anthony Davis' scheduled execution day, though I have no idea if he is an innocent person. I do know that he was convicted of the 1989 killing of a police officer, Mark Allen MacPhail, in Savannah, Ga. And I know that he was on the scene, a Burger King parking lot, that fateful night.
But I also know that Davis has always maintained his innocence. And that no physical evidence — no gun, no fingerprint, no DNA — ever tied him to the crime. And that he was convicted on the testimony of nine key witnesses. And that seven of them have now recanted.
They lied, they say. They were scared, they were bullied and threatened, and they said what the cops wanted to hear. Of the two witnesses who have not recanted, one is a fellow named Sylvester (Red) Coles; some Witnesses claim he's the one who actually shot MacPhail when the officer tried to break up a parking lot altercation.
Monday, one day before Davis was scheduled to die, the state parole board issued a 90-day stay of execution.
You and I have no idea how that must feel, either, but we can imagine. The buried man gets a sip of air. The paralyzed man moves his toe.
And then back down into the coffin, back down into the tomb of your own skin, back in line to die.
Surely Davis' lawyers have explained to him the 1996 federal law, signed by President Bill Clinton, that is throwing roadblocks in his way. Designed to streamline capital cases, it restricts the introduction of exculpatory evidence once the state appeals process is done. But just as surely, Davis, if he is innocent, must wonder how he could have presented evidence he didn't yet have. And he must wonder, too, how there can be a time limit on truth — especially when a human life is at stake. How can you execute a man when there remain serious questions about his guilt?
That's barbarism, not justice.
What's fascinating is that, though 67% of those polled by Gallup pollsters approve of capital punishment in murder cases (and 51% say it's not imposed often enough), 64% admit it does not deter murder, and 63% believe an innocent person has probably been executed since 2001.
In other words, the system doesn't work, we "know" it doesn't work, yet we want it to continue — and, indeed, expand. What kind of madness is that? It's an intellectual disconnect, a refusal to follow logic to its logical end.
It is, of course, easier to countenance that madness, ignore that refusal, when the issue is abstract, when death row is distant, theoretical and does not involve you.
But what must it feel like when it is not abstract, when it is "you'' sitting there in the cell watching the calendar move inexorably toward the day the state will kill you for something you absolutely did not do? Is there a suspension of belief? Do you tell yourself that surely people will come to' their senses any minute now? Does the air close on you like a coffin lid? Does darkness sit on your chest like a weight?
You and I can only imagine. Some men have no need to try.
LEONARD PITTS JR. is a columnist for the Miami Herald, 1 Herald Plaza, Miami, Fla. 33132. Write to him at lpitts@miamiherald.com.
Tuesday, July 10, 2007
Keys to Success: Seven Pearls for 07/07/07
by Efren 'Tlecoz' Paredes
The following are seven keys to success I employ in my daily life. I thought I would share them in hopes that they may be useful to others as well. I have found them to be very effective.
1. Aggressively pursue knowledge and work to expand our consciousness each day. Ignorance is tantamount to mental incarceration, and choosing ignorance is synonymous with insanity. We are constantly evolving. And, in order to effectuate that process so it achieves its maximum potential, it must be properly fueled. The moment we desist the process of growth and development we commence the process of deterioration.
2. Advocate the value of expression and conveying truth to those around us. It is important to be genuine and candid with people. We perform a disservice to ourselves and others, and arrest people's growth and development, when we lie to them. People may not always be fond of your openness, but they will respect and appreciate it later on. Through our rejection of truth we create illusions and falsities that are counter-productive. We also foster the same in others and perpetuate a cycle that consumes even more people.
3. If people don't support your beliefs and creativity re-evaluate what you are doing or saying. If after careful analysis you still feel strongly about things don't allow others to deter you from pursuing what you deem to be worthy. We are the masters of our destiny and we can never be afraid to forge new paths and exercise our creativity. Attempting to avoid this is akin to escaping freedom. It's also important to know that people judge us based on our convictions. The less serious we take them and more whimsical we are, the less serious people take us as individuals. It demonstrates instability.
4. People should never disrespect themselves by trying to conform their lives to the satisfaction of others. We can never please everyone and should never seek to attempt it. If we spend our lives trying to satisfy others and make them happy we will be stifling our growth process and chasing ephemeral illusions of happiness and success. In the end people will regret having lived their lives for others. No one can tell us what will bring us happiness. It is only conjecture on their part. We each are unique and only we know what is best for us, and how we want our lives to be. No one can live our lives for us. Only we can.
5. People should exude fortitude, courage, and confidence, and never acquiesce to injustice or oppression in any form. We should also never reward people for mistreating us by allowing them to exhibit offensive behaviors towards us. It is essential to combat forces designed to destroy the human spirit and incarcerate people physically, mentally, emotionally, or spiritually. We succumb to defeat when we refuse to challenge it. It isn't the acts themselves that destroy us, it's our acceptance of them that does.
6. We possess within each of us the power to achieve any objective in life we set out to accomplish. We assign a degree of value to all things in life and empower them through our thoughts and feelings. Our perception of each situation determines our response and how it will affect us. It is predicated on our vision, strengths, and weaknesses. Our strongest opposition to success is our refusal to believe in ourselves and boundless potential.
7. If we don't like the results we see in our lives we simply have to change how we arrived to the thoughts that precipitated the trajectory of discontent. Dissatisfaction should always bring about change. We exhibit an addiction to abuse when we accept dissatisfaction in our lives and integrate it into our being. It reflects an acceptance of failure and rejection of success. By doing so we relinquish authority over our lives and bestow it upon others.
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
Sunday, June 3, 2007
Efren Speaks to Lansing Community College Students
On May 16, 2007 Efren spoke to a group of college students from Lansing Community College. The students' professor, a former member of the Michigan Parole Board, three other prisoners, and the warden's administrative assistant where Efren is housed, were also present. The purpose of the discussion was to address issues pertaining to the court system, life in prison, the parole process, and prison releases.
The first letter which appears below is the text from a letter of appreciation written to Efren by the warden's administrative assistant at the prison he is housed. The second letter that follows is the text from a response letter Efren wrote to the warden's administrative assistant.
The letters reflect the positive work Efren does while incarcerated and is a reflection of his continued growth and development.
------------------------------------------------------------------
DATE: May 17, 2007
TO: Paredes 203116
FROM: Ken Ryan, Administrative Assistant
G. Robert Cotton Correctional Facility
SUBJECT: Letter of Appreciation
On May 16, 2007 you participated in a question and answer session with students from Lansing Community College. The purpose of this meeting was to allow the students to gain some insight on life inside prison. You took time out of your day and shared knowledge and personal information with some young adults who were strangers to you. In doing so, you gave them knowledge of not only life inside the prison, but also how it affects the individual doing the time.
I found this interaction very productive. My thoughts were also shared by the students and their instructor (former Parole Board Member Maurice Armstrong).
You are commended for sharing your time and personal information/thoughts for the purpose of helping others. Thank you.
------------------------------------------------------------------
DATE: May 17, 2007
TO: Ken Ryan, Warden's Administrative Asst.
G. Robert Cotton Correctional Facility
FROM: Efren Paredes, Jr.
RE: Letter of Appreciation
I wanted to acknowledge receipt of your letter of commendation and let you know I appreciate you sending it.
I wanted to also thank you for affording me the opportunity to speak to the students. I can provide a unique perspective on life in prison because of the juvenile waiver issue, being incarcerated in adult jails and prisons at age 15, and the wrongful conviction issue I have fought long and hard to overturn for nearly two decades.
My knowledge of this experience and ability to communicate it to others is partly the reason I have been interviewed by organizations, university human rights clinics, and by professionals from across the nation who are currently working to end the imposition of juvenile life without parole sentences in recent years. I have also appeared in national reports which discuss the issue.
It is important to present people with all facets of this experience. The more they learn they better they will comprehend all the dynamics involved. This will provide them a more holistic perspective to draw from and make decisions based upon, rather than be left ill-equipped to only draw from fragments of reality. It would be irresponsible to paint a picture to society that doesn't exist.
I believe the honest and candid discussion will serve the students useful in a number of ways. There is much to be learned from each of our unique experiences and the tribulations we have endured in life. We are each reservoirs of knowledge and experiences which can contribute to the growth and development of others.
I am sending Deputy Barrett a copy of this letter since he referred me to you as a viable candidate to participate in the discussion with the students. Thanks again for the opportunity.
The first letter which appears below is the text from a letter of appreciation written to Efren by the warden's administrative assistant at the prison he is housed. The second letter that follows is the text from a response letter Efren wrote to the warden's administrative assistant.
The letters reflect the positive work Efren does while incarcerated and is a reflection of his continued growth and development.
------------------------------------------------------------------
DATE: May 17, 2007
TO: Paredes 203116
FROM: Ken Ryan, Administrative Assistant
G. Robert Cotton Correctional Facility
SUBJECT: Letter of Appreciation
On May 16, 2007 you participated in a question and answer session with students from Lansing Community College. The purpose of this meeting was to allow the students to gain some insight on life inside prison. You took time out of your day and shared knowledge and personal information with some young adults who were strangers to you. In doing so, you gave them knowledge of not only life inside the prison, but also how it affects the individual doing the time.
I found this interaction very productive. My thoughts were also shared by the students and their instructor (former Parole Board Member Maurice Armstrong).
You are commended for sharing your time and personal information/thoughts for the purpose of helping others. Thank you.
------------------------------------------------------------------
DATE: May 17, 2007
TO: Ken Ryan, Warden's Administrative Asst.
G. Robert Cotton Correctional Facility
FROM: Efren Paredes, Jr.
RE: Letter of Appreciation
I wanted to acknowledge receipt of your letter of commendation and let you know I appreciate you sending it.
I wanted to also thank you for affording me the opportunity to speak to the students. I can provide a unique perspective on life in prison because of the juvenile waiver issue, being incarcerated in adult jails and prisons at age 15, and the wrongful conviction issue I have fought long and hard to overturn for nearly two decades.
My knowledge of this experience and ability to communicate it to others is partly the reason I have been interviewed by organizations, university human rights clinics, and by professionals from across the nation who are currently working to end the imposition of juvenile life without parole sentences in recent years. I have also appeared in national reports which discuss the issue.
It is important to present people with all facets of this experience. The more they learn they better they will comprehend all the dynamics involved. This will provide them a more holistic perspective to draw from and make decisions based upon, rather than be left ill-equipped to only draw from fragments of reality. It would be irresponsible to paint a picture to society that doesn't exist.
I believe the honest and candid discussion will serve the students useful in a number of ways. There is much to be learned from each of our unique experiences and the tribulations we have endured in life. We are each reservoirs of knowledge and experiences which can contribute to the growth and development of others.
I am sending Deputy Barrett a copy of this letter since he referred me to you as a viable candidate to participate in the discussion with the students. Thanks again for the opportunity.
Saturday, May 19, 2007
'Wrong Man' Free after 19 Yrs. - & Real 'Killer' Was Star Witness
New York Post
by Austin Fenner, Jeane Macintosh and Lukas I. Alpert
May 16, 2007
May 16, 2007 -- A man who served 19 years in prison for the rape and murder of his girlfriend's children was set free yesterday after DNA evidence proved that a next-door neighbor - the star prosecution witness - was responsible for the heinous crime.
Walking out of the same New Jersey courthouse where he had been sentenced to life in prison in 1988, Byron Halsey, 46, thanked God as he embraced his family, supporters and the team of lawyers who had worked to have his conviction overturned.
"I want to thank the lord. I want to thank my lord and savior Jesus for keeping me here," he said through tears as he stood beneath the word "Jusice" inscribed in Latin on the facade of the Union County Courthouse. "I'm just thankful."
Although he was happy to be free, Halsey said he would have a hard time getting over what had happened, especially because he had narrowly avoided a death sentence at his sensational trial two decades ago.
"I'm not happy because of what was done to me. It was criminal at best," he said. "I wasn't going to let anyone take my life from me."
His mother, Eloise, hugged her son as he walked out of the courthouse.
"I did not give up on him. I knew he was innocent," she said, overwhelmed by emotion.
Halsey's first glimpse of freedom began when his attorneys - of the New York-based Innocence Project - and Union County prosecutors submitted a joint request asking that his conviction be overturned.
In the legal filing, they explained that new DNA technology allowed them to trace semen found at the scene of the vicious rape and murder to Clifton Hall, 49, who lived next door to Halsey and his girlfriend at a Plainfield, N.J. rooming house.
Hall, who testified against Halsey, was imprisoned for three savage sexual assaults in 1993 and his DNA was on file with New Jersey authorities.
"We can say with scientific certainty that Byron Halsey is innocent. Every piece of physical evidence connects Cliff Hall, not Byron Halsey, to these murders," said Innocence Project attorney Vanessa Potkin. "It has taken more than two decades, but DNA has finally revealed the truth in this case."
Ruling that the new evidence "would probably change the verdict," Superior Court Judge Stuart Peim vacated the verdict and granted Halsey a new trial.
Halsey threw his head back as tears streamed down his face.
Peim then told prosecutors they had until a July 9 hearing to decide whether they would retry Halsey or drop the charges. A spokeswoman for the Union County prosecutor would not discuss what will happen.
Peim allowed Halsey to be released on $55,000 bail - raised by church groups in Plainfield - but ordered that he wear an electronic-monitoring ankle bracelet.
In a statement, the children's mother, Margaret Urquhart, said she had always doubted Halsey was responsible for the crimes.
"I knew Byron loved Tyrone and Tina. It didn't make sense to me that he could have done this. I always had my doubts, but I didn't know what to do about them. I'm thankful that the DNA testing has identified who really did this to my children and that Byron is being released today. I want justice done in this case," she said.
The brutal rape and murder of 8-year-old Tyrone Urquhart and his 7-year-old sister Tina shocked New Jersey.
The two children's beaten and abused bodies were found in the basement of the rooming house in November 1985.
The girl was found under a shelf with her nightgown draped over her head, her underwear stuffed in her mouth and her legs spread. She had been brutally raped on a nearby blue couch, beaten and strangled.
The boy had been sexually assaulted, his face slashed with scissors and a piece of cloth hammered to his skull with long nails. Several cigarette butts were found littered around his body.
It was later determined that the nails piercing his brain caused his death.
Investigators were able to recover evidence of semen from the girl's underwear, the covering of the couch, and from an oral swab of the boy's mouth. More DNA evidence was recovered from the cigarette butts.
At the time, however, DNA technology was not sufficient to provide a match to an individual, and investigators were only able to match Halsey to the semen because he had the same blood type as the culprit.
In the immediate aftermath, investigators aggressively questioned Halsey - who told them he had left the children alone and came home to find them missing.
After hours of questioning, Halsey allegedly confessed to the killings, admitting he "sexually assaulted [Tina] in the basement on the blue couch."
But his attorneys argue the confession was coerced after a 30-hour interrogation during which Halsey - who has a sixth-grade education and suffers from severe learning disabilities - was allowed little sleep.
But influenced by the blood-type evidence, and testimony from Hall - who earlier on the night of the murders had driven Halsey to a friend's house - the jury convicted Halsey in 1988 after five days of deliberation.
The jurors reject the prosecution's plea for the death penalty, and Halsey was sentenced to consecutive life sentences, a decision that elicited jeers in the courtroom.
The judge who handled the original case, William Wertheimer, said, "It gives pause about the death penalty, doesn't it?"
It is the 201st case for the Innocence Project - which works to exonerate the wrongly convicted using DNA technology unavailable until recently - in which a conviction was overturned.
"He's got an uphill battle trying to get his life back in order. He's got his mom, his brother which is going to be a help and he's got us," said David Shephard, president of the Council for the Wrongly Convicted.
He said his group had arranged for an apartment in Newark for Halsey and would help him find a job.
Hall has been imprisoned since 1993 for three brutal sex attacks on women in Plainfield during an 11-month period in 1991 and 1992. ■
by Austin Fenner, Jeane Macintosh and Lukas I. Alpert
May 16, 2007
May 16, 2007 -- A man who served 19 years in prison for the rape and murder of his girlfriend's children was set free yesterday after DNA evidence proved that a next-door neighbor - the star prosecution witness - was responsible for the heinous crime.
Walking out of the same New Jersey courthouse where he had been sentenced to life in prison in 1988, Byron Halsey, 46, thanked God as he embraced his family, supporters and the team of lawyers who had worked to have his conviction overturned.
"I want to thank the lord. I want to thank my lord and savior Jesus for keeping me here," he said through tears as he stood beneath the word "Jusice" inscribed in Latin on the facade of the Union County Courthouse. "I'm just thankful."
Although he was happy to be free, Halsey said he would have a hard time getting over what had happened, especially because he had narrowly avoided a death sentence at his sensational trial two decades ago.
"I'm not happy because of what was done to me. It was criminal at best," he said. "I wasn't going to let anyone take my life from me."
His mother, Eloise, hugged her son as he walked out of the courthouse.
"I did not give up on him. I knew he was innocent," she said, overwhelmed by emotion.
Halsey's first glimpse of freedom began when his attorneys - of the New York-based Innocence Project - and Union County prosecutors submitted a joint request asking that his conviction be overturned.
In the legal filing, they explained that new DNA technology allowed them to trace semen found at the scene of the vicious rape and murder to Clifton Hall, 49, who lived next door to Halsey and his girlfriend at a Plainfield, N.J. rooming house.
Hall, who testified against Halsey, was imprisoned for three savage sexual assaults in 1993 and his DNA was on file with New Jersey authorities.
"We can say with scientific certainty that Byron Halsey is innocent. Every piece of physical evidence connects Cliff Hall, not Byron Halsey, to these murders," said Innocence Project attorney Vanessa Potkin. "It has taken more than two decades, but DNA has finally revealed the truth in this case."
Ruling that the new evidence "would probably change the verdict," Superior Court Judge Stuart Peim vacated the verdict and granted Halsey a new trial.
Halsey threw his head back as tears streamed down his face.
Peim then told prosecutors they had until a July 9 hearing to decide whether they would retry Halsey or drop the charges. A spokeswoman for the Union County prosecutor would not discuss what will happen.
Peim allowed Halsey to be released on $55,000 bail - raised by church groups in Plainfield - but ordered that he wear an electronic-monitoring ankle bracelet.
In a statement, the children's mother, Margaret Urquhart, said she had always doubted Halsey was responsible for the crimes.
"I knew Byron loved Tyrone and Tina. It didn't make sense to me that he could have done this. I always had my doubts, but I didn't know what to do about them. I'm thankful that the DNA testing has identified who really did this to my children and that Byron is being released today. I want justice done in this case," she said.
The brutal rape and murder of 8-year-old Tyrone Urquhart and his 7-year-old sister Tina shocked New Jersey.
The two children's beaten and abused bodies were found in the basement of the rooming house in November 1985.
The girl was found under a shelf with her nightgown draped over her head, her underwear stuffed in her mouth and her legs spread. She had been brutally raped on a nearby blue couch, beaten and strangled.
The boy had been sexually assaulted, his face slashed with scissors and a piece of cloth hammered to his skull with long nails. Several cigarette butts were found littered around his body.
It was later determined that the nails piercing his brain caused his death.
Investigators were able to recover evidence of semen from the girl's underwear, the covering of the couch, and from an oral swab of the boy's mouth. More DNA evidence was recovered from the cigarette butts.
At the time, however, DNA technology was not sufficient to provide a match to an individual, and investigators were only able to match Halsey to the semen because he had the same blood type as the culprit.
In the immediate aftermath, investigators aggressively questioned Halsey - who told them he had left the children alone and came home to find them missing.
After hours of questioning, Halsey allegedly confessed to the killings, admitting he "sexually assaulted [Tina] in the basement on the blue couch."
But his attorneys argue the confession was coerced after a 30-hour interrogation during which Halsey - who has a sixth-grade education and suffers from severe learning disabilities - was allowed little sleep.
But influenced by the blood-type evidence, and testimony from Hall - who earlier on the night of the murders had driven Halsey to a friend's house - the jury convicted Halsey in 1988 after five days of deliberation.
The jurors reject the prosecution's plea for the death penalty, and Halsey was sentenced to consecutive life sentences, a decision that elicited jeers in the courtroom.
The judge who handled the original case, William Wertheimer, said, "It gives pause about the death penalty, doesn't it?"
It is the 201st case for the Innocence Project - which works to exonerate the wrongly convicted using DNA technology unavailable until recently - in which a conviction was overturned.
"He's got an uphill battle trying to get his life back in order. He's got his mom, his brother which is going to be a help and he's got us," said David Shephard, president of the Council for the Wrongly Convicted.
He said his group had arranged for an apartment in Newark for Halsey and would help him find a job.
Hall has been imprisoned since 1993 for three brutal sex attacks on women in Plainfield during an 11-month period in 1991 and 1992. ■
Sunday, May 13, 2007
Juvenile Injustice
The New York Times
Editorial
May 11, 2007
The United States made a disastrous miscalculation when it started automatically trying youthful offenders as adults instead of handling them through the juvenile courts. Prosecutors argued that the policy would get violent predators off the streets and deter further crime. But a new federally backed study shows that juveniles who do time as adults later commit more violent crime than those who are handled through the juvenile courts.
The study, published last month in The American Journal of Preventive Medicine, was produced by the Task Force on Community Preventive Services, an independent research group with close ties to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. After an exhaustive survey of the literature, the group determined that the practice of transferring children into adult courts was counterproductive, actually creating more crime than it cured.
A related and even more disturbing study by Campaign for Youth Justice in Washington finds that the majority of the more than 200,000 children a year who are treated as adults under the law come before the courts for nonviolent offenses that could be easily and more effectively dealt with at the juvenile court level.
Examples include a 17-year-old first-time offender charged with robbery after stealing another student’s gym clothes, and another 17-year-old who violated his probation by stealing a neighbor’s bicycle. Many of these young nonviolent offenders are held in adult prisons for months or even years.
The laws also are not equally applied. Youths of color, who typically go to court with inadequate legal counsel, account for three out of every four young people admitted to adult prison.
With 40 states allowing or requiring youthful offenders to spend at least some time in adult jails, state legislators all across the country are just waking up to the problems this practice creates. Some states now have pending bills that would stop juveniles from being automatically transferred to adult courts or that would allow them to get back into the juvenile system once the adult court was found to be inappropriate for them.
Given the damage being done to young lives all over the country, the bills can’t pass soon enough.■
Editorial
May 11, 2007
The United States made a disastrous miscalculation when it started automatically trying youthful offenders as adults instead of handling them through the juvenile courts. Prosecutors argued that the policy would get violent predators off the streets and deter further crime. But a new federally backed study shows that juveniles who do time as adults later commit more violent crime than those who are handled through the juvenile courts.
The study, published last month in The American Journal of Preventive Medicine, was produced by the Task Force on Community Preventive Services, an independent research group with close ties to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. After an exhaustive survey of the literature, the group determined that the practice of transferring children into adult courts was counterproductive, actually creating more crime than it cured.
A related and even more disturbing study by Campaign for Youth Justice in Washington finds that the majority of the more than 200,000 children a year who are treated as adults under the law come before the courts for nonviolent offenses that could be easily and more effectively dealt with at the juvenile court level.
Examples include a 17-year-old first-time offender charged with robbery after stealing another student’s gym clothes, and another 17-year-old who violated his probation by stealing a neighbor’s bicycle. Many of these young nonviolent offenders are held in adult prisons for months or even years.
The laws also are not equally applied. Youths of color, who typically go to court with inadequate legal counsel, account for three out of every four young people admitted to adult prison.
With 40 states allowing or requiring youthful offenders to spend at least some time in adult jails, state legislators all across the country are just waking up to the problems this practice creates. Some states now have pending bills that would stop juveniles from being automatically transferred to adult courts or that would allow them to get back into the juvenile system once the adult court was found to be inappropriate for them.
Given the damage being done to young lives all over the country, the bills can’t pass soon enough.■
Saturday, April 28, 2007
Straight Talk: Duke Case Shows Justice System's Flaws
By Radley Balko
FOX News
Monday, April 23, 2007
To their great credit, the Duke lacrosse players who were exonerated of rape charges by North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper earlier this month understood that for all the hell they've gone through the past year, what happened to them isn't uncommon.
"There seem to be some flaws in the legal system that should be addressed," Colin Finnerty said, "the fact that in North Carolina there are no recordings of the grand jury, and to establish checks and balances on district attorneys."
Reade Seligmann, who had an iron-clad alibi to counter District Attorney Mike Nifong's accusation but was nonetheless dragged through the mud, added,
"I can't imagine what they do to people who do not have the resources to defend themselves."
There's probably some truth to the accusation that the media's initial interest in this case was driven by media bias and "frat boy" stereotypes. But much of the initial interest also likely was driven by the "man bites dog" nature of this story.
Everything was happening in reverse. Here you had a lower-income black woman making accusations against affluent, white men. You had conservatives and law-and-order types rallying to support the defendants, while civil rights activists and criminal justice advocates were finding common cause with the accuser.
In fact, in some way the extensive media coverage may have helped the Duke players. It brought a new level of scrutiny and transparency to this particular criminal justice outrage and kept the media glare on Nifong's every move.
The same week the Duke players were exonerated, another man was cleared of rape charges as well. James Giles was convicted in 1982 of raping a woman in Dallas County, Texas. Giles served 10 years in prison and 14 as a registered sex offender.
He lost his marriage and contact with much of his family and couldn't travel 10 miles outside his home without first obtaining permission. He was cleared by DNA evidence, with the help of the fantastic organization, the Innocence Project.
Giles isn't alone. He's the 12th man in Dallas County to be exonerated by DNA evidence. There are more than 400 others there waiting for DNA tests, and even the district attorney there believes a large percentage of them may be innocent.
"It's a new day in Dallas," said Dallas County's district attorney, Craig Watkins, after announcing Giles' release. Dallas County has a long history of tough-on-crime prosecutors and indifference to criminal justice protections that may have put hundreds of innocents in prison — or to death.
Referring to the old mentality, Watkins added, "if you sent someone to jail who was possibly innocent, it was a badge of honor."
Watkins' quest to clear the names of the innocent is aided by the fact that Dallas County coincidentally has historically preserved blood samples from cases involving violent crime. Most other jurisdictions across the country only recently began doing that.
It's likely of no coincidence that the one jurisdiction where blood samples have been preserved is also one that's finding a shocking number of convictions of innocent people.
If there's one positive that might come out of the Duke imbroglio, it's that the unusual demographics of the parties involved and alliances it spawned may mean some much-needed new scrutiny of the criminal justice system, and win welcome new advocates for reform.
Nifong is by no means the only overly aggressive prosecutor in this country. And Durham is by no means the only jurisdiction where the wrong people have been wrongly accused. As Seligmann suggested, the only real difference may have been that the Duke players had the resources to fight back. Many others don't.
Examples abound.
A 2002 audit of the crime lab in Houston, Texas, found that experts may have given "false and scientifically unsound" testimony in thousands of criminal cases. Subsequent reports showed that crime lab employees often tailored their tests to fit police theories about how a crime was committed. The city is finishing up a $5.5 million review of 2,300 cases, including death penalty cases.
In 2003, Texas Gov. Rick Perry pardoned 35 mostly black residents of Tulia, Texas, who had been prosecuted for drug crimes based on testimony from undercover police officer Tom Coleman. Coleman, once named Texas "Police Officer of the Year," was found to have manufactured evidence from whole cloth.
Just last month in Maryland, self-styled ballistics expert Joe Kopera committed suicide after it was revealed that he lied about his expertise and training. Kopera had testified in hundreds of criminal trials over 40 years, many of which may need to be reopened.
A 2005 audit found critical errors in the sate of Virginia's crime lab, considered one of the best in the country. The audit found that senior-level experts in the lab were too often persuaded by political pressure to secure convictions. The audit was ordered after the exoneration of Earl Washington Jr., a man who served 17 years on Virginia's death row.
These are merely examples from the last several years, and they're by no means comprehensive. Here's hoping that the most vocal critics of Mike Nifong and the Durham justice system that relentlessly pursued the Duke lacrosse players — many of whom don't generally speak out on criminal justice issues — will see the case as more than just an example of media bias or reverse discrimination.
It's merely one very high-profile example of the flaws and inadequacies in our criminal justice system. And it demonstrates why we need strong protections for the accused and transparency, accountability and oversight of the system that accuses them.■
Radley Balko is a senior editor with Reason magazine. He publishes the weblog, TheAgitator.com.
FOX News
Monday, April 23, 2007
To their great credit, the Duke lacrosse players who were exonerated of rape charges by North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper earlier this month understood that for all the hell they've gone through the past year, what happened to them isn't uncommon.
"There seem to be some flaws in the legal system that should be addressed," Colin Finnerty said, "the fact that in North Carolina there are no recordings of the grand jury, and to establish checks and balances on district attorneys."
Reade Seligmann, who had an iron-clad alibi to counter District Attorney Mike Nifong's accusation but was nonetheless dragged through the mud, added,
"I can't imagine what they do to people who do not have the resources to defend themselves."
There's probably some truth to the accusation that the media's initial interest in this case was driven by media bias and "frat boy" stereotypes. But much of the initial interest also likely was driven by the "man bites dog" nature of this story.
Everything was happening in reverse. Here you had a lower-income black woman making accusations against affluent, white men. You had conservatives and law-and-order types rallying to support the defendants, while civil rights activists and criminal justice advocates were finding common cause with the accuser.
In fact, in some way the extensive media coverage may have helped the Duke players. It brought a new level of scrutiny and transparency to this particular criminal justice outrage and kept the media glare on Nifong's every move.
The same week the Duke players were exonerated, another man was cleared of rape charges as well. James Giles was convicted in 1982 of raping a woman in Dallas County, Texas. Giles served 10 years in prison and 14 as a registered sex offender.
He lost his marriage and contact with much of his family and couldn't travel 10 miles outside his home without first obtaining permission. He was cleared by DNA evidence, with the help of the fantastic organization, the Innocence Project.
Giles isn't alone. He's the 12th man in Dallas County to be exonerated by DNA evidence. There are more than 400 others there waiting for DNA tests, and even the district attorney there believes a large percentage of them may be innocent.
"It's a new day in Dallas," said Dallas County's district attorney, Craig Watkins, after announcing Giles' release. Dallas County has a long history of tough-on-crime prosecutors and indifference to criminal justice protections that may have put hundreds of innocents in prison — or to death.
Referring to the old mentality, Watkins added, "if you sent someone to jail who was possibly innocent, it was a badge of honor."
Watkins' quest to clear the names of the innocent is aided by the fact that Dallas County coincidentally has historically preserved blood samples from cases involving violent crime. Most other jurisdictions across the country only recently began doing that.
It's likely of no coincidence that the one jurisdiction where blood samples have been preserved is also one that's finding a shocking number of convictions of innocent people.
If there's one positive that might come out of the Duke imbroglio, it's that the unusual demographics of the parties involved and alliances it spawned may mean some much-needed new scrutiny of the criminal justice system, and win welcome new advocates for reform.
Nifong is by no means the only overly aggressive prosecutor in this country. And Durham is by no means the only jurisdiction where the wrong people have been wrongly accused. As Seligmann suggested, the only real difference may have been that the Duke players had the resources to fight back. Many others don't.
Examples abound.
A 2002 audit of the crime lab in Houston, Texas, found that experts may have given "false and scientifically unsound" testimony in thousands of criminal cases. Subsequent reports showed that crime lab employees often tailored their tests to fit police theories about how a crime was committed. The city is finishing up a $5.5 million review of 2,300 cases, including death penalty cases.
In 2003, Texas Gov. Rick Perry pardoned 35 mostly black residents of Tulia, Texas, who had been prosecuted for drug crimes based on testimony from undercover police officer Tom Coleman. Coleman, once named Texas "Police Officer of the Year," was found to have manufactured evidence from whole cloth.
Just last month in Maryland, self-styled ballistics expert Joe Kopera committed suicide after it was revealed that he lied about his expertise and training. Kopera had testified in hundreds of criminal trials over 40 years, many of which may need to be reopened.
A 2005 audit found critical errors in the sate of Virginia's crime lab, considered one of the best in the country. The audit found that senior-level experts in the lab were too often persuaded by political pressure to secure convictions. The audit was ordered after the exoneration of Earl Washington Jr., a man who served 17 years on Virginia's death row.
These are merely examples from the last several years, and they're by no means comprehensive. Here's hoping that the most vocal critics of Mike Nifong and the Durham justice system that relentlessly pursued the Duke lacrosse players — many of whom don't generally speak out on criminal justice issues — will see the case as more than just an example of media bias or reverse discrimination.
It's merely one very high-profile example of the flaws and inadequacies in our criminal justice system. And it demonstrates why we need strong protections for the accused and transparency, accountability and oversight of the system that accuses them.■
Radley Balko is a senior editor with Reason magazine. He publishes the weblog, TheAgitator.com.
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