I what can only be described as the definition of sick and twisted, a Colorado women told everyone that a boy had leukemia and was making the whole story up. In what turned out to be an elaborate plot with no real purpose the women even faked an obituary. Authorities are determining if a law has been broken. Here it the article in the Huffington Post.
Leukemia Hoax May not Violate Law, Prosecutor Says
By ASSOCIATED PRESS
GYPSUM, Colo. -- The story began circulating in October: A boy with
leukemia had moved with his family to spend his final days in the
Colorado mountains. The Eagle Valley High School team in Gypsum drew inspiration from the
tale and dedicated a game to the 9-year-old boy known as Alex. A radio
station took up the cause, and a Facebook page bearing his picture drew
more than 1,000 followers.
However, the story began to unravel when he failed to show up at the
game, and the woman spreading the story said he suffered a seizure and
could not attend. It wasn't long before she said he had died.
She submitted an obituary to local media, but no one could find a death certificate, The Vail Daily ( HTTP://TINYURL.COM/B5DL9JV ) reported.
Police are now calling the story a hoax and investigating whether it violated any laws. "This story just shows the best of human nature and the worst of
human nature," said Holli Snyder, general manager of NRC Broadcasting,
parent company of KSKE, which broadcast the story. Authorities are trying to determine if the 22-year-old woman who
spread the story collected any money from the hoax, Eagle County
District Attorney Mark Hurlbert said Thursday. So far, they haven't found any evidence that she did. "It hinges on whether any money was taken," Hurlbert said about the possibility of charges.
The woman has not been identified by authorities. The photo of the
boy was traced to a Kids Cancer Crusade website and turned out to a
South African boy who is still alive.
People told the newspaper they felt guilty about perpetuating the
hoax but proud about the way the community came together to support a
child and make his final days happy ones. "This story took my heart," said disc jockey Jordon Lyles, who played
songs dedicated to Alex at a fall festival. "We are all just good
people, when it comes right down to it."
Monday, November 19, 2012
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
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
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.
Wednesday, November 7, 2012
Why do we have the electoral college?
As some of you may know I write for 17 newspapers across Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, and Iowa. I author a legal advice article in which people will write in with legal questions. The website is www.newspaperatttorney.com, this question was submitted by three different people so I thought I would also answer it on this blog as well.Q: Why do we have the electoral college for presidential elections?
*First let me preface this by saying its not the type of question I generally answer, it is not exactly a legal question. That being said three different people submitted this question so... I'll do my best.
A: The electoral college was installed for two primary reasons: (1) It was a compromise between very populated states and states without a large population. It was a compromise between big states and small states. It was supposed to keep small states from getting dominated by large states. The idea was to keep candidates from just going to the populous states and leaving out the small states. (2) You have to remember when the system was set up over 200 years ago the political, economic, and well everything was different than it it now. The United States didn't have 20 channels of 24/7 news covering everything and broadcasting it out in HD to your TV, computer, and cell phone. People were worried that some rouge but wealthy, "crazy person" would trick the electorate into voting for them. The founders were worried that the average man wasn't smart enough to vote. They set up the electoral college to act as a buffer between the common man and electing the president. The idea being to save the people from the people.
Tuesday, November 6, 2012
Kansas Lawyer seeks reinstatement after leaking Guantanamo documents
A lawyer that was convicted during a court martial proceeding back in 2007 for leaking secret documents about Guantanamo Bay detainees is trying to get his license to practice law back after what looks like a three year suspension.
Apparently, Mathew Diaz was a Naval officer whom printed off the names of about 500 Guantanamo Bay detainees and sent them to a advocacy group trying to obtain the names of the detainees and provide them legal counsel.
Here is the article in the San Fransisco Chronicle.
Former Navy Lawyer goes before Kansas Supreme Court
By: John Milburn
Apparently, Mathew Diaz was a Naval officer whom printed off the names of about 500 Guantanamo Bay detainees and sent them to a advocacy group trying to obtain the names of the detainees and provide them legal counsel.
Here is the article in the San Fransisco Chronicle.
Former Navy Lawyer goes before Kansas Supreme Court
By: John Milburn
TOPEKA,
Kan. (AP) — A former Navy lawyer who was convicted during a court
martial in 2007 for mailing secret information about Guantanamo Bay
detainees is seeking to get his law license reinstated in Kansas. Attorneys for Matthew Diaz will argue on Thursday before the Kansas Supreme Court to accept a recommendation from the Office of Judicial Administration
to suspend his law license for three years effective 2008. Because of
the timeline, Diaz would be reinstated with the Kansas bar.
The disciplinary hearing panel said Diaz warranted "significant discipline" for his actions, which included the act of printing and sending classified information and sending it to an unauthorized person.
"The respondent (Diaz) mailed the card the day before he left the island so as to reduce his chance of facing consequences for his actions," the hearing panel noted in its filing with the Kansas Supreme Court.
However, disciplinary administrator Stan Hazlett sought for the panel to recommend disbarring Diaz.
Diaz, who was a lieutenant commander in the Navy, is currently living in New York. He earned his law degree in 1994 from Washburn University in Topeka and was admitted to practice law in Kansas.
He is represented by Wichita attorney Jack Focht who argues that Diaz by virtue of his court martial, discharge from the Navy and prison term had been punished enough for his actions. Focht argues that Diaz was torn between what he believed was his ethical duty to see that the accused terrorists received legal counsel and his duties as a military officer to obey orders. Prosecutors say Diaz went to his office in January 2005 and used his classified computer to log onto a classified military network and access a database with detainee information. They say he printed information that included the names of 550 detainees, their nationalities, the interrogators assigned to them and intelligence sources and methods.
Diaz then cut the document into 39 sheets that he placed inside a card with a big heart and a Chihuahua on its front and mailed it to Barbara Olshansky, they say. At the time, Olshansky worked for the Center for Constitutional Rights, a nonprofit legal group that was suing the federal government to obtain the names of detainees because the U.S. Supreme Court had ruled they had the right to challenge their detention. She turned the document over to federal authorities, and they traced it to Diaz. According to court documents, Diaz sent the list of names on the day before he was to leave Guantanamo, knowing that if he was no longer on the island he would not have to answer for his actions.
Diaz's attorneys noted that their client had strong feelings toward prisoner rights. When he was 16 years old, his father, who was a nurse, was convicted in Southern California for multiple counts of murder for injecting patients with a lethal dose of Lidocaine. His father was sentenced to death but died of natural causes in prison in 2010.
The disciplinary hearing panel said Diaz warranted "significant discipline" for his actions, which included the act of printing and sending classified information and sending it to an unauthorized person.
"The respondent (Diaz) mailed the card the day before he left the island so as to reduce his chance of facing consequences for his actions," the hearing panel noted in its filing with the Kansas Supreme Court.
However, disciplinary administrator Stan Hazlett sought for the panel to recommend disbarring Diaz.
Diaz, who was a lieutenant commander in the Navy, is currently living in New York. He earned his law degree in 1994 from Washburn University in Topeka and was admitted to practice law in Kansas.
He is represented by Wichita attorney Jack Focht who argues that Diaz by virtue of his court martial, discharge from the Navy and prison term had been punished enough for his actions. Focht argues that Diaz was torn between what he believed was his ethical duty to see that the accused terrorists received legal counsel and his duties as a military officer to obey orders. Prosecutors say Diaz went to his office in January 2005 and used his classified computer to log onto a classified military network and access a database with detainee information. They say he printed information that included the names of 550 detainees, their nationalities, the interrogators assigned to them and intelligence sources and methods.
Diaz then cut the document into 39 sheets that he placed inside a card with a big heart and a Chihuahua on its front and mailed it to Barbara Olshansky, they say. At the time, Olshansky worked for the Center for Constitutional Rights, a nonprofit legal group that was suing the federal government to obtain the names of detainees because the U.S. Supreme Court had ruled they had the right to challenge their detention. She turned the document over to federal authorities, and they traced it to Diaz. According to court documents, Diaz sent the list of names on the day before he was to leave Guantanamo, knowing that if he was no longer on the island he would not have to answer for his actions.
Diaz's attorneys noted that their client had strong feelings toward prisoner rights. When he was 16 years old, his father, who was a nurse, was convicted in Southern California for multiple counts of murder for injecting patients with a lethal dose of Lidocaine. His father was sentenced to death but died of natural causes in prison in 2010.
Tuesday, October 30, 2012
Serologist may be charged with faking results on Rape Kits!
When the police are trying to build a case against someone they need evidence to do so. Sometimes a case warrants the use of DNA testing to tie a suspect to a particular crime. This type of evidence is particularly useful in cases of rape. So much so that laboratories have made a "kit" to use when a doctor examines a suspected victim of a rape. These "kits" are then sent to a laboratory and tested for DNA evidence. This is all a generally common practice and can be useful, so long as it is done with integrity...and that is where this jerk steps in.What if the person who was paid to perform the DNA tests wasn't trustworthy? Turns out that a person in Texas has been doing just that. Falsifying reports based on DNA evidence and that doesn't exist. Who knows how many innocent people this person has helped the police put in jail? ...or how many guilty ones they have let go free?
The Tarrant County District Attorney's office needs to find a way to prosecute this individual.
Here is the article about what is happening to this fraud.
Attorney seeks release of documents on serologist who falsified reports
By: Yamil Berard,
FORT WORTH -- A prominent Fort Worth criminal defense attorney is seeking additional information on a county serologist, who was disciplined by the state's top forensic board for professional misconduct but was not prosecuted. The serologist, who resigned in March after a supervisor discovered that he had fabricated test results for two unopened rape kits, may have "committed a crime" in the lab of the medical examiner's office, attorney Mark Daniel said. He "knowingly falsified forensic laboratory results," Daniel said, and could be subject to a third-degree felony, such as making a false entry in a government record.
Tarrant County District Attorney Joe Shannon's office said it hasn't pursued an indictment because no one has asked it to. "No defense attorney nor anyone else has presented a proposed criminal case to this office," spokeswoman Melody McDonald said. "If that is done, we will be happy to take a look." The Tarrant County medical examiner's office reported the incident to the Texas Forensic Science Commission after the false reports were discovered. The serologist was immediately suspended and soon resigned. It was later discovered that results of several rape kits had been falsified without testing. Such misconduct is called "drylabbing."
Several weeks ago, Daniel submitted a request under the Texas Public Information Act to the medical examiner's office for the serologist's disciplinary records and any documents that may have been referred to the district attorney's office. The medical examiner's office has asked the Texas attorney general's office to rule on whether the items can be disclosed to the public. At an Oct. 5 meeting of the Texas Forensic Science Commission, member Arthur Eisenberg, an internationally recognized DNA expert at the University of North Texas Health Science Center in Fort Worth, said it appeared the serologist had been "lazy." Earlier, lab officials told the commission that the serologist had made the false tests because he was distracted by personal problems and that it was not the result of intentional misconduct.
Daniel took issue with that. "I have never known a distraction in one's personal life to cause anyone to falsify a forensic laboratory result," he said. Eisenberg said that Shannon's office "had elected not to file suit," and that what the medical examiner's lab management had been doing was satisfactory.
Monday, October 29, 2012
Employers must give paid time off for voting purposes
Here is how it works. In Missouri, if you work 9-5 and the polling place is open from 7-7 then you can either ask your employer to come in one hour late or leave one hour early. The employer has to give you the time off or they will be in violation of the law and subject to the penalty of a "class four election offense."
In Kansas, say you are a nurse and work a 12 hour shift (7am-7pm) and the polls are open from (7am-7pm) then you can ask your employer to leave two hours early or come in two hours late. The employer who denies you this request if timely requested is subject to the criminal penalties of a misdemeanor.
Remember you must give your employer notice that you intend to use this time.
So now you have no excuse to get out and Vote!
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