Thursday, November 15, 2012

Man spends 30 Years in Prison for a Murder he didn't commit. Gets Released

Thirty years ago a mentally ill man was arrested for the murder of a 31 year old woman.. The case looked nice and tidy it even had a confession, but that wasn't the case.  It turns out the detectives and police that worked the case coerced the confession, hid fingerprint evidence, and disregarded DNA material that ruled out George Allen.  They fixated on him and put together a false case, that got him convicted.

Imagine spending 30 years in prison for a crime you didn't commit...Now being released into a new world with no work experience, no money, no education, and 30 years of missed opportunities.  Here is the article that tells the terrible story of the wrong conviction and the final correction of the mistake.  Thank God he partnered up with the criminal defense lawyers at the innocence project.

30-Year inmate freed after conviction tossed
KMBC.com

JEFFERSON CITY, Mo. —
An inmate imprisoned nearly three decades for a rape and murder conviction walked free Wednesday after a judge ruled that St. Louis police hid or destroyed evidence that cast doubt on his guilt while misleading the mentally ill man into a false confession.

Wearing loose-fitting, donated clothes and appearing frail, George Allen Jr., 56, grinned as he hugged friends, family and supporters outside the Cole County courthouse moments after a brief hearing before Circuit Judge Daniel Green.  "I have spent 30 years in prison as an innocent man, but I never gave up hope," Allen said, reading from a prepared statement. "I knew some day the truth would come out... Thank God this nightmare has finally ended."

Allen, who suffers from schizophrenia and was blinded in one eye during his lengthy imprisonment, served 29 years of a 95-year sentence - and narrowly avoided the death penalty - in the February 1982 death of 31-year-old Mary Bell. She was attacked and killed in her St. Louis apartment during a blinding February snowstorm. Three witnesses testified that Allen was 10 miles away at his mother's home in University City at the time of Bell's attack during a historic blizzard that crippled the St. Louis region.

On Nov. 2, Green ordered Allen's release in a blistering 75-page ruling that suggested St. Louis police ignored and suppressed numerous pieces of evidence. Among them were blood tests that ruled out Allen as the source of the semen found on Bell's robe and fingerprints rejected by investigators as unusable smudges that not only excluded him but were also used in comparison with other suspects.

There also were questions about the accuracy of testimony by Bell co-worker, who said she called out her friend's name outside the victim's apartment during the attack. Police detectives sent the co-worker to a hypnotist to shore up her account, a session that wasn't disclosed to Allen's previous defense lawyers.

The undisclosed evidence was unearthed within the past two years by lawyers working for and with the Innocence Project, the New York group that has helped free hundreds of wrongfully convicted inmates nationwide, often by relying on more advanced, previously unavailable DNA technology. Several lawyers from the St. Louis firm Bryan Cave also assisted Allen's defense on a pro bono basis.

"He's looking forward to some home cooking by Mom.  His sister was there and he was able to hug and kiss those people for the first time in decades.  There was not a dry eye in the house, I don't think," said Laura O'Sullivan, a local member of the Innocence Project.
Some law students from the University of Missouri-Kansas City attended Wednesday's hearing.
Innocence Project attorney Olga Akselrod said the group plans to request a formal review by St. Louis Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce of all cases handled by now-deceased St. Louis homicide detective Herb Riley and criminologist Joseph Crow, both of whom were singled out for questionable conduct in Green's ruling.

The judge found that Riley steered Allen into falsely confessing after more than 40 denials while overlooking details provided by Allen that didn't match the circumstances of Bell's death. Allen claimed he was threatened and beaten during the interrogation, but the judge doesn't address that allegation.

And a lab report written by Crow contained scratched-out notes describing the blood test results that eliminated Allen as a source.

"We have serious concerns that this case is not an outlier," Akselrod said.

Joyce, who last week declined to again prosecute Allen but cited procedural flaws rather than certainty about Allen's innocence, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. A Joyce spokeswoman said the prosecutor was preparing a written response for release later Wednesday.

Allen's release is not the end of his legal process. The Missouri Attorney General's Office is appealing Green's ruling and opposed his release on his own recognizance, stances that drew sharp criticism from defense lawyers.  "This appeal has just extended the pain and heartache for Mr. Allen and his family," Akselrod said. "They're just wasting the state's resources needlessly."  State prosecutors responded with a written statement provided by a spokeswoman for Attorney General Chris Koster and attributed to deputy attorney general Joe Dandurand.

"The trial judge is the first and only person to have found Mr. Allen to have been prejudiced during his trial," the statement reads. "Numerous judges and courts have affirmed Mr. Allen's convictions in the years following the jury's verdict. "  Dandurand added that the state's appeal is "part of the normal safeguarding process." Should the Western District Court of Appeals uphold Green's ruling, the state won't further pursue the case, he said.

Among those attending Allen's hearing was Josh Kezer, one of the 22 Missouri inmates who have been exonerated over the past two decades. Kezer was released in 2009 after spending more than 15 years in prison for the murder of a southeast Missouri college student. He too was released after a Cole County judge found that prosecutors withheld key evidence from defense attorneys.

Allen was arrested about a month after Bell's attack when police mistook him for a convicted rapist whom he reportedly resembled, in part because both were African-Americans in their 20s with shaved heads. Officers who interviewed Allen before Riley dismissed him as a suspect.

Monday, November 12, 2012

Mother Participated in letting Two Daughters get Raped


At the Sedgwick County Courthouse in Wichita, James Lamont Brown was led away Friday after he was convicted of numerous felonies in attacks on two girls from Kansas City, Kan. Sentencing in the case has been set for Jan. 10.This is one of the strangest and just all around sickening displays of disregard for the safety of one's children I have seen.  It turns out that the mother of these young girls was not only turning a blind eye to the rapes of her two young daughters she was actually helping the man.  Some of the quotes are just completely ridiculous.  Here is the article in the Kansas City Star.  Then followed up by another update from the Star.

KCK firls testify in rape, human trafficking trial.

By: Hurst Laviana

A Kansas City, Kan., woman described to a Sedgwick County jury Wednesday how she made repeated trips to Wichita with her young teenage daughters so a Wichita man could have sex with them in an east Wichita motel room.  “Who rented the room?” Deputy District Attorney Marc Bennett asked.

“Sometimes I did, sometimes he did,” the mother said.  “The lights were on?” Bennett asked. “Correct.”  “You could see what he was doing to your girls?”  “Correct. I’d tell him to stop but he wouldn’t. He told me he’s the head of the household, and he wanted things to go the way he wanted them to go.”

The testimony came in the trial of James Lamont Brown, 49, who is facing multiple counts of rape and aggravated human trafficking for crimes that allegedly occurred from April 2010 through June 2011. The girls, now 14 and 15 years old, both testified Wednesday that Brown had sex with them on at least five weekend trips they made to Wichita with their mother in 2010 and 2011.  The younger sister said they followed the same routine every time after checking into the Econo Lodge at 8302 E. Kellogg.
“He would take off his clothes. Mom would take off her clothes, and they would have sex,” the girl said. “And then he would come to me.”

The mother, who is not being named to protect the identity of her daughters, has pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated human trafficking and is facing a sentence of life without parole for 25 years.
Seconds after defense lawyer Mark Sevart finished cross-examining the older girl, Brown startled the courtroom by announcing, “Objection. I’ve got a list of questions.”  After the jury was excused, Brown told District Judge Greg Waller that he had prepared a list of questions he wanted to ask the girl, but that his lawyer, Sevart, refused to ask them. Waller asked why the questions hadn’t been given to Sevart earlier. Sevart said that his client had refused to meet with him when he tried to visit him several times in jail. Waller refused a request by Brown that he be allowed to represent himself for the duration of the trial.

After the jury returned, the mother said that Brown wanted to get both of her daughters pregnant so he could expand the size of his family. She didn’t have a clear answer when Bennett asked why she allowed the abuse to happen.  “Why didn’t you turn around in Emporia and go home?” Bennett asked at one point. “I should have, but I didn’t,” she said.

The prosecution is scheduled to rest its case Thursday.

Wichita Man Found Guilty of Raping two KCK girls

By Hurst Laviana

A Sedgwick County jury on Friday convicted a Wichita man of 17 of 20 felony charges that accused him of raping two Kansas City, Kan., girls after their mother checked them into a Wichita hotel so the man could have sex with them.  Prosecutors said police became involved after the younger girl mentioned the abuse to a woman who was braiding her hair.

The defendant, James Lamont Brown, 49, showed no emotion as District Judge Greg Waller read the verdicts shortly after 4:30 p.m. Friday. Waller set sentencing for Jan. 10.  Because of his extensive criminal record, Brown would face a mandatory sentence of life without parole even if convicted of only one of the 20 charges.  Brown was charged with 10 counts each of rape and aggravated human trafficking for having sex with the girls, who are now 14 and 15, in 2010 and 2011. Some of the charges cover a time when the girls were 11 and 12 years old.

The girls’ mother, who is not being named to protect the identity of her daughters, pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated human trafficking and is facing a sentence of life without parole for 25 years.  She testified this week that on at least five occasions she sat on a motel bed and watched as Brown had sex with her daughters. Both girls also testified that Brown had sex with them on multiple occasions.  Brown denied the allegations when he testified Thursday in his own behalf.

At the outset of the trial, Deputy District Attorney Marc Bennett said the rapes occurred after the mother drove the girls to the same hotel. He said the rapes always occurred in rooms with two beds. The mother and one daughter would typically sit on one bed, he said, while Brown had sex with the other daughter on the other bed. He said the girls often cried during the rapes.  “Sometimes he would stop if they cried loud enough,” Bennett said. “Other times he wouldn’t.”  The younger sister testified that they followed the same routine every time after checking into the motel.  “He would take off his clothes. Mom would take off her clothes, and they would have sex,” the girl said. “And then he would come to me.”

The mother testified that Brown, whom she identified as a cousin, wanted to get both of her daughters pregnant so he could expand the size of his family.  At one point, Bennett asked the mother if she could see what Brown was doing to the girls.  “Correct. I’d tell him to stop, but he wouldn’t. He told me he’s the head of the household, and he wanted things to go the way he wanted them to go.”

She didn’t have a clear answer when Bennett asked why she allowed the abuse to happen.  “Why didn’t you turn around in Emporia and go home?” Bennett asked.  “I should have, but I didn’t,” she said.

Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/11/09/3909666/human-trafficking-defendant-guilty.html#storylink=cpy




Read more here: http://www.kansascity.com/2012/11/07/3905769/girls-testify-in-rape-human-trafficking.html#storylink=cpy