Category: Uncategorized

One would think that if the technology exists to help prove a person’s innocence or guilt, it would be used to the fullest extent possible. Then why is it that Alaska has the ability to test DNA samples in the rape conviction of William Osborne, but refuses to do so, despite agreeing that the test could definitively prove Osborne’s innocence?

Peter Neufeld, Co-Director of the Innocence Project, argued before the U.S. Supreme Court that prisoners have a constitutional right to DNA testing that can prove their innocence. Most of the States agree and have laws that provide for such post-conviction testing. Alaska, along with five other states, does not.

In the presentation before the Supreme Court, Justice Breyer asks Kenneth Rosenstein, Assistant Attorney General in Anchorage, Alaska, “In other words, all he has to do is file a new piece of paper tomorrow, and he gets the DNA?”

Rosenstein replies, “Right.” But before Osborne can do that, he has to insist that he’s innocent. According to Rosenstein, “If he doesn’t allege his actual innocence … then this is really an empty exercise, a fishing expedition. He wants to just see what … the evidence says. And that — that is not the way litigation works.”

That’s not the way litigation works. So, they don’t really care whether a man is innocent or guilty, so long as they follow the rules of litigation.

But under Alaska’s laws, even if Osborne does allege is innocence, it’s not enough. He has to be able to prove he’s innocent before he can get the DNA test that will prove his innocence. As Neufeld stated, “They specifically said in the State courts that it is not enough to simply assert one’s innocence; that you actually have to have proofs, facts that demonstrate your innocence before you get to that discovery. It is a Catch-22 situation.”

Remind me not to move to Alaska. It’s a beautiful state, but I don’t trust its laws or its lawyers.

Timothy Cole was convicted for the 1985 rape of a 20-year-old student Michele Mallin and sentenced to 25 years in prison. The victim had picked Cole from a selection of photos presented by police, and then again from a police lineup.

This week a Texas district court judge reversed that conviction, based on DNA evidence and on a confession from another inmate.

Unfortunately, Cole was already dead. He died in prison in 1999.

The real rapist, Jerry Johnson, has been in prison since 1985, serving one life sentence for raping a 15-year-old girl, and a 99-year sentence for another rape. He won’t be charged with raping Mallin; the statute of limitations has already expired.

A construction worker and former Marine from Reno, Nevada, James Michael Biela, had an alibi for the time 19-year-old Brianna Denison was raped and strangled: he was with his girlfriend.

Unfortunately for Biela, his girlfriend denies that he was with her the night Denison disappeared from her friend’s sofa. And Biela’s DNA has been matched to samples obtained from a pair of panties found in a field near Denison’s body, and to a sample taken from the door knob of the home where Denison was staying.

Police first became interested in Biela when an anonymous tip told them that Biela’s girlfriend had found two pairs of thong panties — not her’s — in his truck. After considering the DNA evidence, reports from a number of attacks, and a detailed description given to police by another girl who was also assaulted, investigators believe Biela may be a serial rapist with a panty fetish, leaving the panties or thongs of one victim at the scene of the next victim’s attack.

Biela denies involvement with any of the attacks and has entered a not guilty plea in Washoe County District Court. His trial is tentatively set for February, 2010.

Prosecutors want to drop one of the murder charges against the 8-year-old boy from Arizona I told you about last week.

According to police, the boy confessed to killing his father, Vincent Romero, and his father’s friend, Tim Romans, with a .22-caliber handgun.

This confession came 45 minutes into an interrogation by police with no relatives or legal counsel present, only after the boy initially explained how he found the men dead, and only after police suggest the boy committed the shooting himself by accident. On portions of the video released by the media it sounds like the boy is simply parroting with what the officers are telling him.

Now the Apache County prosecutors want to drop the charge for the murder of the boy’s father. In a one-paragraph motion filed in juvenile court, the prosecutors said that “the state believes the interest of justice will be served by such a dismissal.”

No explanation was given for the decision, and there’s no word yet on the charge for Romans’ murder.

An 8-year-old boy has confessed to police that he shot his father and another man at his rural home in Arizona. However, he made the confession after initially denying any involvement in the events. Only after police questioned him — alone, without a guardian or attorney present — did he admit to the killings.

A defense attorney who later became involved in the case says that the police “became very accusing early on in the interview. … Two officers with guns at their side, it’s very scary for anybody, for sure an 8-year-old kid.”

Undoubtedly the circumstances of the police questioning will play a role in the boy’s defense, leading one to question the wisdom of the authorities in situations like this.