{"id":1640,"date":"2016-01-16T23:26:24","date_gmt":"2016-01-16T23:26:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/?p=1640"},"modified":"2016-07-03T19:41:49","modified_gmt":"2016-07-03T19:41:49","slug":"mumma-victimized-by-prosecutors-perverse-priorities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/?p=1640","title":{"rendered":"Mumma victimized by prosecutor&#8217;s perverse priorities"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure id=\"attachment_1639\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-1639\" style=\"width: 200px\" class=\"wp-caption alignright\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-1639\" src=\"http:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/160116Sledge.jpg\" alt=\"Joseph Sledge\" width=\"200\" height=\"200\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/160116Sledge.jpg 533w, https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/160116Sledge-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/160116Sledge-300x300.jpg 300w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 200px) 100vw, 200px\" \/><figcaption id=\"caption-attachment-1639\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Joseph Sledge<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\">Jan. 16, 2016<\/p>\n<p>\u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/www.newsobserver.com\/news\/local\/crime\/article10230734.html\" target=\"_blank\">Joseph Sledge<\/a>\u00a0spent 37 years in prison for a crime he didn\u2019t commit. At his trial, the state paid a lying snitch to testify against him. While he was in prison, (<a href=\"http:\/\/nccadp.org\/2016\/chris-mumma-state-bar\/\" target=\"_blank\">Jon David<\/a>,\u00a0the latest Bladen County district attorney) opposed the DNA testing that would eventually prove Sledge\u2019s innocence. And when\u00a0the long-delayed tests showed Sledge wasn\u2019t the culprit, the state waited another two years to release him from prison.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cNow that Sledge is finally free, the only person being punished is the lawyer who fought to prove his innocence,\u00a0Chris Mumma. On Thursday, the State Bar found that Mumma <a href=\"http:\/\/www.charlotteobserver.com\/news\/local\/crime\/article54743530.html\" target=\"_blank\">violated professional ethics<\/a>\u00a0by testing a water bottle for DNA without permission from its owner \u2013 all in an attempt to gain an innocent man his freedom\u00a0against long odds. (The test of the water bottle was inconclusive and had no impact on the final outcome.)&#8230;.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIn all the cases where Mumma has freed innocent people, no prosecutor has ever faced charges&#8230;.Instead, the State Bar\u00a0sent a message that lawyers who expose the system\u2019s misdeeds could be subject to retribution&#8230;.\u201d<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: right;\"><em>\u2013 From \u201c<a href=\"http:\/\/nccadp.org\/2016\/chris-mumma-state-bar\/\" target=\"_blank\">Let\u2019s punish lawyers who put innocent people in prison, instead of those who free them<\/a>\u201d\u00a0by Kristin Collins at NC Coalition for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (Jan. 15)<\/em><\/p>\n<p>Three years ago I took DA David at his word <a href=\"http:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/?p=892\">when he promised<\/a>:<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI really see us as sharing the goal of making sure (Sledge\u2019s) conviction rests on credible and substantial evidence. I\u2019m going to go\u00a0where the truth leads in this matter.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>I was na\u00efve. As it turned out, David\u2019s true passion wasn\u2019t for exonerating\u00a0an innocent man but for punishing his lawyer.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-1707\" src=\"http:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/LRDCC20.jpg\" alt=\"LRDCC20\" width=\"132\" height=\"20\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Jan. 16, 2016 \u201cJoseph Sledge\u00a0spent 37 years in prison for a crime he didn\u2019t commit. At his trial, the state paid a lying snitch to testify against him. While he was in prison, (Jon David,\u00a0the latest Bladen County district attorney) opposed the DNA testing that would eventually prove Sledge\u2019s innocence. And when\u00a0the long-delayed tests showed [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1640","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blog"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1640","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1640"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1640\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2338,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1640\/revisions\/2338"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1640"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1640"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1640"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}