by Edward Humes
33. From the author’s interviews with Rex Martin and former Bakersfield Police Chief Robert Patterson.
34. Marie Gates, interviews with the author.
35. Ibid.
APPENDIX A
WRONGFUL PROSECUTIONS IN KERN COUNTY
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Molestations Rings
Kniffen-McCuan April 1982–August 1996
10
10
4
0
0
Comments
The first of the molestation “ring” cases that swept the nation in the eighties; virtually all were based on incredible, sometimes disprovable allegations generally unsupported by physical evidence. Denials and recantations by “victims” were ignored and disbelieved, but the wildest allegations were accepted as fact by the police and prosecutors. After fourteen years, all four defendants were exonerated and set free because prosecutors, police, and social workers coerced children into making false accusations. Case also relied on discredited medical testimony. One of several Kern County cases to become models of how not to investigate child abuse.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Hubbard February 1984–August 1995
3
3
3
1
1
Comments
One defendant freed after four years because of illegal interrogations by the sheriff, another after ten years because authorities coerced children into making false accusations. The third defendant—a lone molester who had nothing to do with any ring—remains in prison.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Nokes June 1984–January 1987
10–20
7
32
0
0
Comments
First molestation-ring case to produce satanic-ritual abuse allegations. Prosecutors hid evidence, coerced witnesses, refused to allow medical exams of victims. After defendants spend two years in jail, five hundred charges dismissed in wake of report on investigative and prosecutorial errors.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Satanic case 1984–1986
85–150
183
0
0
0
Comments
Year-long probe into ritual abuse created hysteria despite no evidence and much to disprove case. Children coerced, crucial information kept hidden by prosecutors, and Kern County ended up excoriated by grand jury, and state attorney general. Case became another example of how not to investigate child abuse.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Pitts June 1984–September 1990
9
9
7
0
0
Comments
Massive prison sentences overturned after five years because of gross prosecutorial misconduct.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Stoll June 1984–July 1998 (ongoing)
4
4
4
2
2
Comments
Two in “ring” granted new trials because favorable psychological testimony was barred from first trials. Kern County declined to retry them, as same concerns about coerced testimony, bogus medical evidence infect this case. Other two defendants failed to preserve appeal, remain in prison; habeas hearing pending for one.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Wong August 1984–July 1985
5
5
34
0
0
Comments
Coerced testimony and disprovable satanic allegations lead to dismissals.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Cox October 1984–July 1998 (ongoing)
8
8
7
5
4
Comments
Some charges dismissed, two defendants set free. Most of “ring” remain in prison despite recantations of victims and concerns about coercion and erroneous medical evidence. Habeas hearing pending on government perjury and hidden evidence.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Forsythe January 1985–1986
8
8
75
0
0
Comments
Allegations of ring that preyed on sixteen children dismissed in wake of other ring-case revelations about coercion.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Other ring-era molestation cases, 1983–1986
32
12
2
0
0
Comments
Twenty-one children removed from parents. Allegations later disproven.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Other Cases
Stallion Springs (drug) 1991–1992
4
4
4
0
0
Comments
Illegal search by Kern County Sheriff led to dismissal of case.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Offord Rollins (murder) 1992–1996
1
1
1
0
0
Comments
Track star’s murder conviction overturned because of jury misconduct, prosecutorial misconduct, and judicial errors.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Flody Gore (murder) 1992–1994
1
1
1
0
1
Comments
Double murderer given new trial because prosecutor exluded Hispanic jurors. Retried and convicted.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Sergio Venegas (rape) 1992–1998
1
1
1
0
0
Comments
Rape conviction and sixty-five-year sentence overturned because prosecution DNA evidence overstated likelihood of guilt.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Charles Tomlin (murder) 1978–1994
1
1
1
0
0
Comments
Freed after sixteen years because of defense attorney incompetence a
nd prosecutor’s reliance on faulty and illegal eyewitness identification.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Encarnacion Barrientos (murder) 1995–July 1998 (ongoing)
1
1
1
0
1
Comments
Prosecutor introduces improper hearsay testimony that impugns defendant, requiring new trial.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Rosales Meza (murder) 1993–1994
1
1
0
0
0
Comments
Detective (John Soliz, investigated Pat Dunn) arrests wrong man, neglects to check fingerprint evidence.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Christopher Ridge (auto theft) 1995
1
1
1
0
0
Comments
Conviction overturned because prosecution relied upon evidence from illegal search.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Carl Hogan (murder) 1978–1994
1
1
1
09
—
Comments
Double-murder conviction reversed because sheriff’s detectives coerced a confession. Retried and convicted again. Died in prison with new appeal planned.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Michael Denney (murder) 1980–1986
1
1
1
0
1
Comments
Robbery-murder conviction overturned because confession obtained by sheriff’s department through threats, coercion, and after ignoring suspect’s demands for attorney.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Melvin Hayes (drug) 1984–1988
1
1
1
0
0
Comments
Eight-year prison term overturned when sheriff’s department improperly attempts to use defendant to bust his own attorney, then reneges on deal when defendant can’t deliver.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Calvin Howard (grand theft) 1983–1984
1
1
1
0
0
Comments
Four-year prison term overturned because prosecutors introduced evidence obtained through illegal search.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Jarnail Singh Jaspal (murder) 1984–1991
1
1
1
0
0
Comments
Life sentence overturned because prosecutor and judge introduced improper evidence suggesting that the defendant’s decision to exercise his right to remain silent at an extradition hearing proved his “consciousness of guilt.”
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Marie Haven/George Curtis (murder) 1998
2
2
0
0
0
Comments
In a case investigated by Sheriff’s Detective John Soliz, the principal investigator in the Dunn case, two prison guards, Marie Haven and George Curtis, are charged with the murder of Haven’s ex-husband for insurance money. As in the Dunn case, this prosecution relied upon an informant with severe credibility problems (witness, for example, admitted on the stand that she lied in this and other cases). In another parallel to the Dunn case, Soliz said that he suspected Haven because she began asking about insurance money shortly after the murder, trying to get $10,000. Soliz disregarded the fact that the family needed the money to pay for the funeral. After 100 days in jail, both defendants were released with all charges dropped for lack of evidence, their jobs and homes lost.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Pat Dunn (murder) 1992–July 1998 (ongoing)
1
1
1
1
1
Comments
Evidence that would discredit key witness never given to defense; other crucial information never disclosed. Initial appeals lost, new habeas plea pending.
Case
Suspected1
Charged
Convicted
Upheld
Remain in Prison
Ring totals:
174–249
846
397
88
7
Total nonring cases:
19
19
16
1
3
GRAND TOTAL
193–269
103
55
9
10
* * *
1. Suspects include individuals who were actively investigated and/or arrested.
2. Two of these pleaded guilty to a single count in exchange for the dismissal of over a hundred felonies and no jail time.
3. Referred by sheriff’s department to district attorney for prosecution, but never formally indicted.
4. Defendants allowed to plead to greatly reduced charges.
5. Defendants allowed to plead to greatly reduced charges.
6. Includes ten parents who were accused of molestation in civil proceedings that led to removal of their children, but not criminal prosecution.
7. Twelve of these defendants were convicted of minor charges resulting in no incarceration after they agreed to plead guilty in exchange for the dismissal of hundreds of counts against them.
8. Does not include minor charges that led to no jail time and therefore were never appealed.
9. Granted new trial; retried and convicted.
APPENDIX B
THE TOLL OF MISCONDUCT
What follows is a sampling of major felony cases arising since 1900 in which prosecutorial and investigative misconduct or negligence led to unjust prosecution, false arrest or wrongful conviction. (Bakersfield and Kern County cases are excluded.) Culled from news articles, appellate opinions and reports of the Justice Department, Congress and the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington, D.C., they represent only a small fraction of such cases. A comprehensive accounting of wrongful convictions linked to official misconduct is not possible, as there is no agency in the country (or at any state level) that monitors ethical and legal violations by prosecutors and police. News articles detail only the most sensational cases, and appellate opinions do not include the vast majority of cases that are never appealed—such as those that end in pleas or dismissals. The extent of the problem, then, is not known. What is known, however, is that during that nine-year span, thirty-eight men and women who had been sentenced to death were found to have been convicted as a result of some sort of official misconduct. Of those thirty-eight, thirty-five were subsequently exonerated and released—innocents
nearly executed for crimes they did not commit. Some came within hours of execution.
1990
Clarence Brandley is released after a decade on Texas’ death row. Official misconduct in his case occurred at every level, from police officers who threatened witnesses who could attest to Brandley’s innocence, to a trial judge and prosecutor who held secret meetings to rehearse objections and rulings, to prosecutors who destroyed evidence proving Brandley’s innocence, to a state attorney general who lied about results of a critical witness’s lie-detector test. The only reason for Brandley’s arrest: the victim of murder and rape had been a white schoolgirl and the likely perpetrator was one of the five janitors at her school, only one of whom—Brandley—was black. The detective who arrested Brandley told him, “Since you’re the nigger, you’re elected.” He came within days of being executed before a last-ditch appeals ruling saved him. All charges were subsequently dropped. A federal judge who examined the case later wrote: “In the thirty years this court has presided over matters in the judicial system, no case has presented a more shocking scenario of the effects of racial prejudice, perjured testimony, witness intimidation, an investigation the outcome of which was predetermined, and public officials who, for whatever motives, lost sight of what is right and just.”
Charges in a much-publicized federal effort in Hollywood to crack down on payola in the music industry are dismissed against Joseph Isgro, once the nation’s largest independent record promoter. The federal judge making the ruling criticized prosecutors for withholding evidence of Isgro’s innocence and lying about it in court. The Justice Department, while admitting the misconduct and reprimanding the prosecutor, nevertheless appealed the dismissal based on a legal technicality and won. The charges were thus reinstated, not because of an absence of serious misconduct, but because the U.S. Supreme Court created new limits on the ability of judges to dismiss cases as punishment of prosecutors for misdeeds. Six years later, after government prosecutors spent another $10 million going after Isgro and he was ruined by legal bills, the charges were dismissed for good because the government had violated his right to a speedy trial.
In one of many rulings that deem grave instances of prosecutorial misconduct “harmless error,” murder convictions against Norman Wayne Willhoite and Philip James Syzemore of Sacramento, California, are upheld even though a prosecutor misrepresented the generous plea bargain he gave to an alleged accomplice in the case in order to gain his crucial cooperation. Jurors who decided to believe this witness never knew he had been promised freedom in exchange for his damning testimony. A concurring opinion in the federal appeals-court case—which upheld the conviction—stated, “The prosecutor wanted to deprive the jury and the defendants of information to which they would ordinarily be entitled, i.e., information reflecting on the credibility of a key prosecution witness . . . . This is inconsistent with a system of justice that expects integrity from prosecutors, not cheap tricks designed to skirt clear responsibilities.” Nevertheless, the convictions stand, a demonstration of prosecutorial power and the reluctance of the justice system to overturn guilty verdicts, even when tainted by official misconduct.
