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Jaw Dropping Police/Prosecutor Scandals - New one in ALA (1 Viewer)

whoknew said:
Alabama Police Department planted evidence on black suspects.

HUNDREDS OF CASES PROSECUTED WITH PLANTED EVIDENCE, MANY WRONGLY CONVICTED STILL IN PRISON

The Alabama Justice Project has obtained documents that reveal a Dothan Police Department’s Internal Affairs investigation was covered up by the district attorney. A group of up to a dozen police officers on a specialized narcotics team were found to have planted drugs and weapons on young black men for years. They were supervised at the time by Lt. Steve Parrish, current Dothan Police Chief, and Sgt. Andy Hughes, current Asst. Director of Homeland Security for the State of Alabama. All of the officers reportedly were members of a Neoconfederate organization that the Southern Poverty Law Center labels “racial extremists.” The group has advocated for blacks to return to Africa, published that the civil rights movement is really a Jewish conspiracy, and that blacks have lower IQ’s . Both Parrish and Hughes held leadership positions in the group and are pictured above holding a confederate battle flag at one of the club’s secret meetings.

--

The group of officers requested they be granted anonymity, and shared hundreds of files from the Internal Affairs Division. They reveal a pattern of criminal behavior from within the highest levels of the Dothan Police Department and the district attorney’s office in the 20th Judicial District of Alabama. Multiple current and former officers have agreed to testify if United States Attorney General Loretta Lynch appoints a special prosecutor from outside the state of Alabama, or before a Congressional hearing. The officers believe that there are currently nearly a thousand wrongful convictions resulting in felonies from the 20th Judicial District that are tied to planted drugs and weapons and question whether a system that allows this can be allowed to continue to operate.
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Holy ####! That is disgusting. New trials will cost millions and probably take a decade or more.
 
McGarnicle said:
whoknew said:
Alabama Police Department planted evidence on black suspects.

HUNDREDS OF CASES PROSECUTED WITH PLANTED EVIDENCE, MANY WRONGLY CONVICTED STILL IN PRISON

The Alabama Justice Project has obtained documents that reveal a Dothan Police Departments Internal Affairs investigation was covered up by the district attorney. A group of up to a dozen police officers on a specialized narcotics team were found to have planted drugs and weapons on young black men for years. They were supervised at the time by Lt. Steve Parrish, current Dothan Police Chief, and Sgt. Andy Hughes, current Asst. Director of Homeland Security for the State of Alabama. All of the officers reportedly were members of a Neoconfederate organization that the Southern Poverty Law Center labels racial extremists. The group has advocated for blacks to return to Africa, published that the civil rights movement is really a Jewish conspiracy, and that blacks have lower IQs . Both Parrish and Hughes held leadership positions in the group and are pictured above holding a confederate battle flag at one of the clubs secret meetings.

--

The group of officers requested they be granted anonymity, and shared hundreds of files from the Internal Affairs Division. They reveal a pattern of criminal behavior from within the highest levels of the Dothan Police Department and the district attorneys office in the 20th Judicial District of Alabama. Multiple current and former officers have agreed to testify if United States Attorney General Loretta Lynch appoints a special prosecutor from outside the state of Alabama, or before a Congressional hearing. The officers believe that there are currently nearly a thousand wrongful convictions resulting in felonies from the 20th Judicial District that are tied to planted drugs and weapons and question whether a system that allows this can be allowed to continue to operate.
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Holy ####! That is disgusting. New trials will cost millions and probably take a decade or more.
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Not to mention the lives ruined.
 
Are civil suits an option here too? If these people are guilty I hope they feel the FULL weight of their consequences.

 
The SPLC is no longer standing by this report (I found from their tweet). Looks like it may be false. My apologies for posting.

 
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Billionaire sex offender's 'sweetheart deal' violated our rights, victims tell fedsNearly eight years after billionaire sex offender Jeffrey Epstein got a "sweetheart deal" from the criminal justice system, a judge is preparing to rule on a rare civil lawsuit against the federal government that alleges prosecutors violated two teen girls' rights as crime victims.

Epstein, now 62, pleaded guilty to state charges in Palm Beach County in July 2008 and admitted he hired local underage girls for erotic massages and sex at his South Florida mansion. He was jailed for 13 months of an 18-month sentence and served a year of house arrest.

The leniency and unusual circumstances of his treatment raised many eyebrows because other sex offenders received much harsher punishments for comparable crimes. The maximum possible punishment for the offenses was 15 years.

Two adult women, who say Epstein sexually abused them when they were minors, filed a federal civil suit against the U.S. Department of Justice in July 2008, alleging federal prosecutors violated their rights as crime victims by not consulting with them before signing an agreement not to prosecute Epstein.

Lawyers for the women, referred to as Jane Doe 1 and Jane Doe 2, say they were either not informed or were misled into thinking Epstein could face federal prosecution, after he pleaded guilty to two state charges of felony solicitation of prostitution and procuring a minor for prostitution.

After years of legal wrangling between prosecutors and the women's lawyers, U.S. District Judge Kenneth Marra recently said he hopes the case will finally be decided within the next few months, possibly after a non-jury trial in federal court in West Palm Beach.

The civil lawsuit is so uncommon that the possible repercussions are still unclear.

The judge could rule the U.S. Attorney's Office and U.S. Department of Justice either consulted with the women to the extent required by law or that the women were not entitled to the level of consultation or notification their lawyers say they should have received.

Even if the judge rules that federal prosecutors did not adequately consult with the victims, legal experts say the women could not receive monetary damages from the government. And lawyers say there is no chance that Epstein's sentence, which he already served, could be altered or that he could face more criminal charges related to these allegations.

Epstein is suspected of sexually abusing 30 or more young women, courts record show. Now a registered sex offender for life, he has reached confidential financial settlements with many of his alleged victims.

Epstein made his fortune as a money manager and split his time between his Palm Beach mansion, his private Caribbean island Little Saint James, his upper East Side Manhattan home, and residences in Santa Fe, N.M., and Paris.

The case has spawned numerous lawsuits and feverish international media coverage, especially after other young women alleged they were abused by Epstein, Britain's Prince Andrew and well-known lawyer, Alan Dershowitz. Buckingham Palace issued a rare denial and Dershowitz has sued his accuser's lawyers alleging he was defamed after they sued him for defamation.

Former President Bill Clinton and presidential hopeful Donald Trump have also been criticized for socializing with Epstein, though neither was accused of any criminal activity.

The two women are represented by Fort Lauderdale lawyer Bradley Edwards and Paul Cassell, a law professor and former federal judge from Utah who is a nationally known victims' rights advocate.

They want the judge to rule the women's rights, under the federal Crime Victims' Rights Act, were violated. Some of their proposed penalties include invalidating the non-prosecution agreement; forcing prosecutors to meet with them to discuss the case and possible prosecution of Epstein; forcing prosecutors to apologize; and forcing prosecutors to pay financial sanctions and the victims' legal fees. Victims are not entitled to be paid damages, according to court records.

"There is good reason to believe that if the prosecutors had exposed their dealings to scrutiny by Jane Doe #1 and Jane Doe #2, they would not have reached such a sweetheart deal," Edwards wrote in court records.

Prosecutors "wanted the non-prosecution agreement kept from public view because of the intense public criticism that would have resulted from allowing a politically-connected billionaire who had sexually abused more than 30 minor girls to escape from federal prosecution with only a county jail sentence," Edwards also wrote in court filings.

Prosecutors filed court records revealing the federal investigation of Epstein began in 2006 at the request of the Town of Palm Beach police. The non-prosecution agreement was signed in September 2007, nine months before Epstein pleaded guilty to state charges. Among the reasons for the agreement, federal prosecutors wrote, were that Epstein was being prosecuted by the Palm Beach State Attorney's Office and the agreement preserved and protected the victims' rights to get financial restitution from Epstein.

Prosecutors wrote some victims were "hostile" to the prosecution of Epstein and some did not want to be identified by having to go trial.

A letter written in 2011 by former U.S. Attorney Alex Acosta, who headed the office from 2005 to 2009 when the decision was made, said the negotiations were like "a year-long assault" on prosecutors and labeled the defense launched by Epstein's star-studded team of lawyers "more aggressive" than any Acosta and his prosecutors had encountered.

"Our judgment in this case, based on the evidence known at the time, was that it was better to have a billionaire serve time in jail, register as a sex offender and pay his victims restitution than risk a trial with a reduced likelihood of success," Acosta wrote.

Acosta conceded in the letter that the "highly unusual treatment" Epstein received while in jail on the state charges "undermined the purpose of a jail sentence." Convicts sentenced to more than a year are supposed to serve their time in state prison, not a local jail, and Epstein was allowed to leave the jail six days a week during the day to work at his West Palm Beach office for several hours on a work-release program.

State prosecutors said they had concerns about some of the victims' credibility when they made their decision to charge Epstein.

At a recent court hearing, federal prosecutors said — for the first time — they think the two women may have been "complicit" in Epstein's crimes, by receiving payments to recruit other girls for him.

"Your Honor, we believe there's an issue about whether or not Jane Does 1 and 2 may have been complicit in the offenses, if you will … specifically, that they themselves procured additional young women for Mr. Epstein and were paid commissions or referral fees for it," Assistant U.S. Attorney Dexter Lee said, according to a recently filed transcript of the Nov. 23 hearing.

Lee told the judge that the law suggests "if someone was complicit in the actual offense that they are not entitled to be a victim and can invoke no rights under the Victim Rights Act."

Jack Goldberger, a Palm Beach County lawyer who was one of several members of Epstein's defense team, told the Sun Sentinel "reasonable prosecutors and reasonable defense lawyers reached an agreement to resolve the Jeffrey Epstein case in the manner it was resolved." He declined to comment on the reasons for the terms of the agreement.

"If Judge Marra rules the U.S. government violated the Crime Victims' Rights Act, it will have no effect on prosecuting Jeffrey Epstein. Due process and double jeopardy would require the agreement, that was reached by the state and federal government, be honored."

Though victims have legal rights to consult with prosecutors, victims "have no right to dictate how the case is resolved" by prosecutors, Goldberger said: "Can he [Epstein] be prosecuted in the future? The answer is really clear — no, it simply can't happen."
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http://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-jeffrey-epstein-victims-civil-20151230-story.html

 
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Sex-abuse victims want to depose feds involved in Jeffrey Epstein dealTwo underage victims of Palm Beach billionaire sex offender Jeffrey Epstein have filed court papers asking to depose top federal officials who were involved in inking the secret deal that saved Epstein from serious federal charges.

FBI agents, current and former federal prosecutors, and Alexander Acosta, the former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Florida, are named in the motion filed by attorneys Brad Edwards and Paul Cassell on behalf of Jane Doe No. 1 and Jane Doe No. 2. The girls were 14 and 13, respectively, at the time of the sex abuse.

The victims filed the motion, in part, because of a new argument Assistant U.S. Attorney Dexter Lee made during a routine status check hearing in November.

Lee said the girls aren’t really victims because they procured other minor girls for Epstein and received money for it so they’re not protected under the federal Crime Victims’ Rights Act.

“Apparently, the government believes that because Epstein pressured some of his young victims into performing sexual acts, those victims themselves were complicit in Epstein’s crimes and, therefore, are barred from seeking relief under the CVRA,” the motion says. “There has never been any public document (or other private document that we have seen) in this or any related case that has ‘accused’ Epstein’s young victims of committing ‘the crime’ that Epstein committed.”

The six witnesses they want to depose are: Acosta, FBI Special Agent E. Nesbitt Kuyrkendall, FBI Special Agent Jason Richards, former First Assistant U.S. Attorney Jeff Sloman, former Assistant U.S. Attorney Matt Menchel and Assistant U.S. Attorney Marie Villafana.

Filed in 2008, the lawsuit says the U.S. Attorney’s Office violated the federal Crime Victim’s Rights Act by failing to confer with the victims before signing a non-prosecution agreement with Epstein in September 2007. The agreement saved Epstein from serious federal charges and extensive prison time. Edwards and Cassell are fighting to overturn the agreement.

Doe 1 and 2 received monetary settlements in civil cases. They are among more than two-dozen underage girls who filed lawsuits or settled claims against Epstein, alleging they were lured to his Palm Beach mansion to give him sexually charged massages and/or sex in exchange for money. Epstein, now 62, pleaded guilty in June 2008 to state charges of soliciting minors for sex. He served 13 months of an 18-month state sentence in a vacant wing at the Palm Beach County Stockade with liberal release privileges.
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http://www.palmbeachdailynews.com/news/news/crime-law/sex-abuse-victims-want-to-depose-feds-involved-in-/npt2N/#sthash.xRAeCy9p.uxfs&st_refDomain=t.co&st_refQuery=/4MXVDDKFl8

 
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Ex-L.A. County Sheriff Lee Baca pleads guilty in jail scandalRetired Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca pleaded guilty Wednesday to lying to federal investigators, a stunning reversal for the longtime law enforcement leader who for years insisted he played no role in the misconduct that tarnished his agency.

Baca’s plea in a downtown courtroom capped a string of prosecutions that began with low-ranking officials and worked up the chain of command.

His former No. 2, Paul Tanaka, is scheduled to stand trial in March on charges that he obstructed a federal investigation into brutality and corruption by sheriff's deputies in the county jails.

In a plea agreement filed in federal court Wednesday morning, Baca admitted that he lied when he told federal authorities that he was unaware that his subordinates planned to approach the FBI agent leading the jail investigation at her home.

Baca agreed not to contest other allegations leveled by federal prosecutors, including that he directed subordinates to approach the agent, stating that they should "do everything but put handcuffs" on her, the agreement said.

Prosecutors accused Baca in court records of lying about his involvement in hiding a jail inmate from FBI investigators. Baca, they alleged, ordered the inmate to be isolated, putting Tanaka in charge of executing the plan.

In addition, Baca falsely claimed he was unaware that some of his subordinates had interrupted and ended an interview FBI agents were conducting with the inmate, who was working as a federal informant, prosecutors alleged in the court documents.

...
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http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-ex-l-a-county-sheriff-baca-jail-scandal-20160210-story.html

 
This is so frustrating. I don't get why more people don't care about this stuff.

Years after the Las Vegas crime lab wanted to replace faulty police drug kits, they are still used in thousands of convictions.

At the outset of the 1990s, the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department began making thousands of arrests every year using inexpensive test kits meant to detect illegal drugs. Officers simply had to drop suspected cocaine or methamphetamine — taken from someone’s pocket or the floorboards of their car — into a pouch of chemicals and watch for telltale changes in colors. Known as “field tests,” police embraced them as essential in busting drug users and dealers. Local judges became sold on the kits’ usefulness and prosecutors relied on them to quickly secure guilty pleas — hundreds upon hundreds, year after year.

ll along, though, police and prosecutors knew the tests were vulnerable to error, and by 2010, the police department’s crime lab wanted to abandon its kits for methamphetamine and cocaine. In a 2014 report that Las Vegas police submitted to the U.S. Department of Justice under the terms of a federal grant, the lab detailed how the kits produced false positives. Legal substances sometimes create the same colors as illegal drugs. Officers conducting the tests, lab officials acknowledged, misinterpreted results. New technology was available — and clearly needed to protect against wrongful convictions.

Yet to this day, the kits remain in everyday use in Las Vegas. In 2015, the police department made some 5,000 arrests for drug offenses, and the local courts churned out 4,600 drug convictions, nearly three-quarters of them relying on field test results, according to an analysis of police and court data. Indeed, the department has expanded the use of the kits, adding heroin to the list of illegal drugs the tests can be used to detect.

...

What is clear is that even as they continue to employ field tests to secure arrests and gain convictions, neither the Las Vegas Metropolitan Police Department nor the Clark County district attorney’s office has informed local judges of the long-standing knowledge of their unreliability. And neither has taken any additional steps to prevent mistakes.

 
ProPublica goes deep into the disciplinary records of the city of Elkhart’s supervising police officers. Summary: 28/34 have been disciplined, 15/34 suspended, 7/34 involved in fatal shootings.

Meanwhile the city’s mayor (whose son is a sergeant on the force and involved in a recent brutality case) has shifted oversight from a civilian review board to one composed only of police officers.

 
D_House said:
ProPublica goes deep into the disciplinary records of the city of Elkhart’s supervising police officers. Summary: 28/34 have been disciplined, 15/34 suspended, 7/34 involved in fatal shootings.

Meanwhile the city’s mayor (whose son is a sergeant on the force and involved in a recent brutality case) has shifted oversight from a civilian review board to one composed only of police officers.
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Let me guess...they investigated themselves and found they did nothing wrong.

 
>>As the panel opinion acknowledges, the lack of clearly established law at the time of the incident compels the conclusion that the City Officers are entitled to qualified immunity.<<

- In their public capacity or individual capacity? Obviously the city and its insurers shouldn’t take the brunt of that. But cops stealing under color of their authority is the most 4thamendemendiest ever.

 
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SaintsInDome2006 said:
Hm, I didn’t claim it was the holding. Certainly the result in terms of civil recourse, no?
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I gotta read the opinion again but I believe there’s a footnote which details the other civil causes if action.  

Look, I’m not saying I completely agree with the opinion. But the opinion does not say that the police can steal without limit during a search. They can be fired or otherwise reprimanded, criminally charged, sued under other theories. They just can be sued under the theory that they breached the 4th amendment. 

 
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Zow said:
I gotta read the opinion again but I believe there’s a footnote which details the other civil causes if action.  

Look, I’m not saying I completely agree with the agree. But the opinion does not say that the police can steal without limit during a search. They can be fired or otherwise reprimanded, criminally charged, sued under other theories. They just can be sued under the theory that they breached the 4th amendment. 
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Zow, no pun but I’ll cop to frequently exercising literary liberties.

 
SaintsInDome2006 said:
>>As the panel opinion acknowledges, the lack of clearly established law at the time of the incident compels the conclusion that the City Officers are entitled to qualified immunity.<<

- In their public capacity or individual capacity? Obviously the city and its insurers shouldn’t take the brunt of that. But cops stealing under color of their authority is the most 4thamendemendiest ever.
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I agree with your last sentence and, again, I’m not saying I agree with the holding. 

 
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