June 30, 2016

“North Carolina’s district attorneys say a proposed rule that would require them to turn over evidence of innocence after a person is convicted is….”

Anyone familiar with the worst practices of  DAs won’t be surprised at the rest of Martha Waggoner’s sentence:

“….unnecessary because prosecutors already believe it should be turned over at any point, including post-conviction.”

Chris Mumma of the N.C. Center on Actual Innocence, herself punished for exposing wrongful prosecutions, wondered why DAs would object to putting their high standard in writing: “If all the rule does is raise confidence in the process, then it’s beneficial.”

A more visceral response appeared on reporter Waggoner’s Facebook page – from exoneree Dwayne Dail:

“If it is unnecessary and they already believe that there is a rule that holds them to that standard, then why haven’t they been doing it?! Why have they argued that they had no obligation to do this? Why wasn’t I told that there was an alternative suspect in MY case, who just so happened to be the true perp? Why did I only find out after years of investigation during my civil suits, after my exoneration, that the actual perp’s name was in their files but was never investigated? I call BS.”

Dail was convicted of raping a 12-year-old Goldsboro girl in 1987. DNA evidence cleared him in 2007.

June 29, 2014

“(The Little Rascals Day Care center) is red brick, with plate glass windows on the front. The two-story structure is located on East Eden Street, amid mostly modest one-family homes, oaks, azaleas and crape myrtles, just a few blocks from the beautiful bay and downtown.

“The neighborhood is quiet now, but as the case unfolded during the last two years, journalists from time to time set upon the area, seeking eyewitnesses to the alleged incidents. Several residents recently told a visitor they had seen none of the alleged acts.

“For some, hindsight is powerful in the wake of the allegations. Lenora Smith, who lives next door to the center, voiced ‘surprise’ at the charges but does remember that ‘a few things I saw were kind of unusual.’

“What?

“Well, Robert Kelly owned a plumbing business, but ‘at times he stayed over there (at the day-care center) a lot,’ she said….

“Some people here admit to being a bit jumpy since the allegations surfaced.

“Debbie Jones said, ‘I get paranoid.’ Extending her hand, palm down, she made it tremble, saying: ‘I’m like this if I’m with my kids in a public place.’

“In a building on the town’s main thoroughfare, South Broad Street, a young boy who looked about 5 years old, bolstered her point. As he walked out of an office into a hall, apparently heading for the bathroom, he looked over his shoulder and said stoically to a woman: ‘If I don’t come back, call the police.’”

– From “Child Abuse Charges at Day-Care Center Divide Formerly Close-Knit Community” by Lee May in the Los Angeles Times (June 8, 1991)

July 20, 2016

“Orr, a former state Supreme Court justice… angered party officials when he told a WRAL TV reporter that the nominee was ‘singularly unqualified to lead this country.’

State GOP Executive Director Dallas Woodhouse said Orr ‘hasn’t been a good Republican for a long time.’

“Orr said, ‘If I’d know there was some oath of loyalty, some code of omerta, where I couldn’t say anything against Trump, I probably wouldn’t have come.’”

– From “One NC delegate leaves GOP convention after criticizing Donald Trump” by Jim Morrill in the Charlotte Observer (July 19)

Orr’s willingness to break from the herd will be tested mightily in his efforts to undertake an external evaluation of the N.C. State Bar, which so eagerly finds ethics violations among innocence project lawyers but almost never among prosecutors….

Footnote: To the surprise of few, the N.C. Conference of District Attorneys supports restrictions on release of police body cameras and dashboard recordings.

Dec. 24, 2012

“Why prosecutors sometimes fight post-conviction evidence so adamantly depends on each case. Some legitimately believe the new evidence is not exonerating.

“But legal scholars looking at the issue suggest that prosecutors’ concerns about their political future and a culture that values winning over justice also come into play. ‘They are attached to their convictions,’ (says Brandon Garrett, a law professor at the University of Virginia), ‘and they don’t want to see their work called into question.’ ”

– From “The Prosecution’s Case Against DNA” in the New York Times Sunday Magazine (Nov. 25, 2011)

“Attached to their convictions,” indeed. Nancy Lamb was so attached that in 1996, after Bob Kelly’s 99-count conviction was overturned, she rummaged around the office and turned up yet another molestation claim – this one from two years before the Little Rascals arrests.

Gerald Beaver, Kelly’s attorney, pointed out that the law requires any report of sexual abuse to be investigated immediately and called police investigator Brenda Toppin, who testified that she had told Lamb about the claim in 1992. Lamb denied any recollection of Toppin’s comment.

“All of this ‘We care about the children’ kind of went down the drain after the conviction,” Beaver said. “It was only when (Kelly) successfully appealed and was no longer pulling 12 consecutive life sentences that the state felt compelled to go out and find this witness.”

As usual, however, time proved no object for prosecutors dedicated to making life miserable for Little Rascals defendants. It would be 1999 before they dropped the final charge against Bob Kelly.