Another case for banning the death penalty

A few days ago, Anthony Graves called his mother and asked what she was cooking for dinner. She asked why he wanted to know. He said, "Because I'm coming home."

Maybe it sounds like an unremarkable exchange. But Anthony Graves had spent 18 years behind bars, 12 of them on death row, for the 1992 murder of an entire family, including four young children, in the Texas town of Somerville. It wasn't until that day, Oct. 27, that the district attorney's office finally accepted what he'd been saying for almost two decades: He is innocent.

So the news that Graves would be home for dinner was the very antithesis of unremarkable. His mother, he told a news conference the next day, couldn't believe it. "I couldn't believe I was saying it," he added.

Graves' release came after his story appeared in Texas Monthly magazine. The article by Pamela Colloff detailed how he was convicted even though no physical evidence tied him to the crime, even though he had no motive to kill six strangers, even though three witnesses testified he was home at the time of the slaughter.

The case against Graves rested entirely on jailhouse denizens who claimed they'd heard him confess and on Robert Carter, who admitted committing the crime, but initially blamed Graves. Carter, executed in 2000, recanted that claim repeatedly, most notably to District Attorney Charles Sebesta the day before Sebesta put him on the stand to testify against Graves. Defense attorneys say Sebesta never shared that exculpatory tidbit with them, even though he was required to do so.

Colloff's story drew outraged media attention, including from yours truly. But the attention that mattered was that of the current DA, Bill Parham, who undertook his own investigation. He was unequivocal in explaining his decision to drop the charges. "There's not a single thing that says Anthony Graves was involved in this case," he said. "There is nothing."

One hopes people who love the death penalty are taking note. So often, their arguments in favor of that barbarous frontier relic seem to take place in some alternate universe where cops never fabricate evidence and judges never make mistakes, where lawyers are never inept and witnesses never commit perjury. So often, they behave as if in this one critical endeavor, unlike in every other endeavor they undertake, human beings somehow get it right every time.

I would not have convicted Anthony Graves of a traffic violation on the sort of evidence Sebesta offered. Yet somehow, a jury in Texas convicted him of murder and sent him off to die.

When you pin them on it, people who love the death penalty often retreat into sophistic nonsense. Don't end the death penalty, someone once told me, just enact safeguards to ensure the innocent are never sentenced to die.

Yeah, right. Show me the safeguard that guarantees perfection.

Those who propose to tinker with the death penalty until it is foolproof remind me of the addict attempting to negotiate with his addiction, desperately proffering minor concessions that will allow him to continue indulging in this thing that is killing him.

But there comes a day when you simply have to kick the habit.

As a nation, we are stubbornly addicted to the death penalty, strung out on exacting retribution and calling it justice. Even though we know innocent men and women have surely died as a result.

Or, like Anthony Graves, been robbed of irreplaceable years. He was 26 when he was arrested. He is 45 now. When he made that call home to his mother, he borrowed his lawyer's cell phone.

The lawyer had to show him how to use it.

LEONARD PITTS JR. is a columnist for the Miami Herald, 1 Herald Plaza, Miami, Fla. 33132. Write to him at lpitts@miamiherald.com .

Federal Legislation to Help States with Public Defense Problems Introduced

By virtually all accounts, Michigan's public defense problem's are bigger than everyone else's.  So it's a cause for hope, at least, that Sen. Patricky Leahy has introduced the Justice for All Reauthorization Act of 2010 to provide assistance to states to carry out their responsibility to provide counsel to indigent criminal defendants in compliance with the 6th Amendment. On the "stick" side of the equation, the proposed legislation gives the Department of Justice authority to sue states that do not properly meet 6th Amendment requirements. 

Here's the bill (PDF).

Supreme Court rules life sentences for some minors is unconstitutional

There are over 300 people in prison in Michigan who sentenced to life without parole for a crime they committed before they were 18 years old. Nearly all were convicted of murder. I am not sure of the logic that they may be less culpable for crimes other than murder but it is ok for them to receive life without parole for murder.

The Supreme Court has ruled that teenagers may not be locked up for life without chance of parole if they haven't killed anyone.

By a 5-4 vote Monday, the court says the Constitution requires that young people serving life sentences must at least be considered for release.

The court ruled in the case of Terrance Graham, who was implicated in armed robberies when he was 16 and 17. Graham, now 22, is in prison in Florida, which holds more than 70 percent of juvenile defendants locked up for life for crimes other than homicide.

"The state has denied him any chance to later demonstrate that he is fit to rejoin society based solely on a nonhomicide crime that he committed while he was a child in the eyes of the law," Justice Anthony Kennedy wrote in his majority opinion. "This the Eighth Amendment does not permit."

Chief Justice John Roberts agreed with Kennedy and the court's four liberal justices about Graham. But Roberts said he does not believe the ruling should extend to all young offenders who are locked up for crimes other than murder.

Suspect in 1984 murder went on 'reign of terror'

Innocence Project identified suspect

A man who is now suspected in a 1984 murder - but who remained free at the time after another man was sent to prison - went on a "reign of terror" shortly after the slaying and beat a man to death seven years later, court records show.

The case shows how devastating a wrongful conviction can be, said Byron Lichstein, an attorney with the Wisconsin Innocence Project.

"There's a public safety aspect to these wrongful convictions," Lichstein said Wednesday. "When there's a wrongful conviction, the person wrongly convicted isn't the only one who suffers."

The Innocence Project, saying it has new DNA evidence and a signed confession, has identified Moses Price Jr. as being responsible for the 1984 murder of Ione Cychosz of Milwaukee.

Cychosz, 62, was a neighbor of Robert Lee Stinson, who spent 23 years in prison after a jury found him guilty of her murder.

Stinson was freed last year when the Innocence Project produced evidence showing that DNA and bite marks found on Cychosz could not have come from Stinson.

Now, the University of Wisconsin Law School program says it has evidence showing that the DNA recovered from Cychosz's clothing belongs to Price, who is serving a 35-year prison sentence for the 1991 murder of a Milwaukee man and other crimes.

Milwaukee County Deputy District Attorney Kent Lovern said his office has a new suspect in Cychosz's murder, but he would not identify the suspect. He said he expects his office will decide before the end of the month whether to file new charges.

It is not known whether police investigated Price as a potential suspect in Cychosz's murder, but it is clear that he went on to rob, assault and kill.

Cychosz's body was found outside of her home on N. 7th St. by a neighbor on the morning of Nov. 3, 1984.

Her clothing and other personal items were scattered around the backyard and, although spermatozoa was found on her body, the number of cells was too few to help identify a suspect, according to court records.

Bite marks on Cychosz became the key evidence. Investigators arrested Stinson and said the marks could have come only from him.

Price remained free.

'Reign of terror'

On Dec. 2, 1984, a month after Cychosz's murder, Price went on a five-hour crime spree that a prosecutor called a "reign of terror."

A woman told police that while she was walking in the 1500 block of W. Hadley St. about 4:30 a.m., she was approached by Price, who pointed a knife at her and threatened to kill her.

Price took $50 from her and raped her on the playground outside of Hopkins Street School, according to a criminal complaint.

Another woman told police that about 9 a.m. that day Price confronted her with a knife at N. Teutonia and W. North avenues and threatened to kill her. He stole two purses, cash, her arthritis medicine and other items, the criminal complaint says.

Authorities said Price also committed four other armed robberies that day. But he was charged only with robbing the two women and with the rape, court records show.

In a plea bargain, the rape charge was dropped, and Price pleaded guilty to the armed two robberies.

At Price's sentencing in January 1985, his attorney said Price gave no explanation for his crimes, but she hoped that, at 24, he would mature, take care of his drinking problem and that "there has to be some light at the end of the tunnel."

Prison sentences

Price was sentenced to eight years in prison.

That same month, a jury found Stinson, then 20, guilty of Cychosz's murder. He was later sentenced to life in prison.

Price didn't speak to the judge, Ralph Gorenstein, during his sentencing.

But court records show that two months later, in March 1985, he wrote Gorenstein, saying "all I was trying to do was have some kind of contact with people and the liquor is what trigger me to have it in such a way, not that I was willfully trying to hurt people or break the law."

After 5 1/2 years in prison, Price was released in the summer of 1990. On Nov. 2, 1991, according to court records, he beat Eddie Hanson to death with a cordless phone and other objects, then set Hanson's north side home on fire, later confessing to the crimes.

At Price's sentencing in March 1992, one of Hanson's sisters, Mary Galway, told Price: "Get Christ in your life, so when you do come out, that you can lean on Christ and you will not have any problems."

This time, Price spoke to the judge, Victor Manian, saying:

"The thing that happened shouldn't have happened, but it wasn't like I'm going there just to kill somebody. We got in an argument, the man threw a phone (at me), we got to fighting. It happened. I'm more sorrier than anybody."

Price is serving a 35-year prison sentence for the Hanson homicide and related crimes.

He is eligible for parole in 2017, according to the state Department of Corrections.

***

Timeline

Nov. 3, 1984: Ione Cychosz is found dead by a neighbor in a backyard area near her Milwaukee home.

Dec. 2, 1984: A woman told police that while she was walking in the 1500 block of W. Hadley St. about 4:30 a.m. she was approached by Moses Price Jr., who pointed a knife at her and threatened to kill her. Price took $50 from her and raped her on the playground outside of Hopkins Street School. Another woman told police that about 9 a.m. Price robbed her with a knife at N. Teutonia and W. North avenues and threatened to kill her.

January 1985: Price is sentenced after pleading guilty to the two armed robbery charges in exchange for the rape charge being dropped.

The same month, Robert Lee Stinson is found guilty by a jury in Cychosz's murder. He is later sentenced to life in prison.

March 24, 1985: In a letter to the judge who sentenced him for the December 1984 crimes, Price said he thinks he committed the crimes because "all I was trying to do was have some kind of contact with people and the liquor is what trigger me to have it in such a way, not that I was willfully trying to hurt people or break the law."

Summer 1990: Price is released from prison.

Nov. 2, 1991: Eddie Hanson, 50, is found dead by a firefighter who was battling a blaze at Hanson's home, on N. 27th St.

March 9, 1992: Having previously pleaded guilty to first-degree reckless homicide, arson and theft, Price is sentenced to 35 years in prison.

January 2009: Stinson is released from prison after the Wisconsin Innocence Project presents DNA and bite-mark evidence excluding him as a suspect in Cychosz's murder.

July: District attorney's office announces it won't put Stinson on trial again in Cychosz's murder.

May: Innocence Project announces that new DNA evidence from Cychosz's clothing matches Price and that Price has signed a confession admitting that he killed her.

True Perpetrator on Cooley Innocence Project Case Sentenced

This is Ken Wyniemko. He was exonerated by the Cooley Innocence Project (where I work) in 2003. This is the often forgotten problem with wrongful convictions. It allows the true criminal to be free and continue to commit crimes. Gonser was not sentenced for the rape that Ken served time for because the statute of limitations had run and he could no longer be charged. If the police and prosecutor had not fabricated evidence to frame Ken they may have kept looking for the true perpetrator and find Gonser years ago.

Man who was wrongly imprisoned faces real rape suspect

Every day of the nine-plus years Kenneth Wyniemko sat behind bars for a rape he didn’t commit, he imagined the real culprit running free — and laughing at him.

“You don’t seem to be laughing now,” said Wyniemko, his voice shaky, as he turned to address for the first time the man who DNA evidence now indicates committed the 1994 assault.

Today, that man — 42-year-old Craig Gonser— was sentenced to 10-25 years in prison for an unrelated sex crime. By the time DNA evidence linked him to the 1994 rape for which Wyniemko had been convicted, the statute of limitations had expired, making it impossible for Macomb County prosecutors to charge him.

But prosecutors described the case in their efforts to have Gonser locked up for longer for being a longtime sexual deviant.

Speaking to the court, Gonser maintained his innocence despite Michigan State Police putting the odds of the DNA match not being correct in the quadrillions to one. He, like Wyniemko, was wrongly convicted, he said.

“All who desire to live godly will suffer,” he said in a prepared statement directed to “fellow Christians worldwide” that acknowledged previous misdeeds but denied the 1994 rape, as well as his most recent indecent exposure convictions.

“I am wrongly accused and wrongfully convicted,” he said. “I ask and plead for leniency.”

Circuit Judge David Viviano gave him none, describing Gonser’s rap sheet of crimes as “bizarre and disgusting” as he sentenced Gonser to more than double the 51-month minimum he faced. The deviation was allowed, in part, because Gonser pleaded no contest to being a sexual deviant, which allows latitude for heftier sentences.

Macomb County Assistant Prosecutor Michael Servitto said Gonser had a history of sex-related convictions dating back to 1992 that included masturbating in parking lots in front of women, groping women’s butts and masturbating in front of his 20-month-old daughter.

The most serious incident was the 1994 assault of a 28-year-old Clinton Township woman, who was repeatedly assaulted at razor point by a stranger who broke into her home. Wyniemko, incorrectly identified by the traumatized victim, was convicted and sentenced to 40-60 years in prison.

The victim in the case was prepared to testify to bolster prosecutors’ sexual deviancy case, Viviano said. She did not attend today’s hearing. It’s the policy of the Free Press not to identify victims of sex assaults.

In 1994, she told police that the rapist wore a stocking over his head, so she had only seen the bottom half of his face. After prodding, she identified Wyniemko in a lineup.

“I can only imagine how awful it must be to be physically and sexually violated by another person,” said Viviano, adding that part of the reason he allowed Gonser’s no contest plea was to avoid “making her relive this terrible ordeal again.” She would have had to testify to buttress the sexual deviancy argument.

Wyniemko, 58, won a $3.7-million settlement from Clinton Township. He was released from prison in 2003 with the help of the Innocence Project at the Thomas M. Cooley Law School, which pushed for the DNA testing.

He said he waited 16 years to finally speak to the real culprit. His hands and voice quivering, he told Gonser that he believed the stress of his incarceration caused his father’s death while he was imprisoned.

“Each and every day that you’re in prison, I want you to think of my father,” he said.

Gonser’s lawyer, James Simasko, said the DNA evidence had been corrupted in its nine years in storage.

After Gonser was led away in shackles — headed to prison to wear the same uniform Wyniemko had donned for nearly a decade — Wyniemko said he felt “10 pounds lighter.”

“It’s been a long time coming,” he said. “I’ll sleep better tonight.”

Improve justice (or at least the system that purports to provide it)

In July 1976, Freddie Peacock was arrested for raping a woman near her apartment building in Rochester, N.Y.

During the attack, the victim was knocked to the ground, hitting her head on the concrete. She didn't see her attacker before hitting her head. She was dragged to the side of a nearby house and raped. When the perpetrator fled, she went to her apartment building and asked the building superintendent to call the police.

Peacock, who was 27 at the time, lived in the same apartment building as the victim, and the victim identified him as the perpetrator. Peacock initially denied any involvement in the crime, but police claim he ultimately confessed.

Peacock told the detective handling the case that he had severe mental illness and had been hospitalized for it several times. In his alleged confession, Peacock could not tell officers where, when or how the victim was raped.

Nevertheless, he was tried, convicted and sentenced to up to 20 years in prison.

Three weeks ago, 33 years after his conviction, Peacock, who is now 60, was exonerated.

In 2002, Peacock contacted the Innocence Project, which is affiliated with the Cardozo School of Law. Researchers at the project determined through DNA testing of bodily fluids in underwear the victim wore that night that Peacock could not have been the attacker.

Peacock is the 250th person exonerated through DNA testing in the U.S.

According to the Innocence Project:

• The top three states for DNA exonerations are Texas with 40, Illinois with 29, and New York with 25.
• 76 percent of the wrongful convictions involved eyewitness misidentification;
• 50 percent involved improper forensic science;
• 27 percent relied on a false confession, admission or guilty plea.
• 70 percent of the 250 people exonerated are people of color (60 percent are black; nearly 9 percent are Latino; 29 percent are white).

"These DNA exonerations show us how the criminal justice system is flawed and how it can be fixed," said Peter Neufeld, co-director of the Innocence Project. "DNA exonerations have helped transform the criminal justice system, leading to reforms in virtually every state, but there is still a great deal of work to do to make our system of justice more fair, accurate and reliable."

In the last several years, state and federal policy makers have begun using the lessons of DNA exonerations to prevent wrongful convictions.

For example:

• Several dozen states and cities have reformed how lineups and other eyewitness identification procedures are conducted to reduce the possibility of errors. Legislation is pending in nine states plus Washington, D.C., to improve eyewitness procedures.
• Improper forensic science, which includes everything from forensic disciplines that lack a scientific basis to outright misconduct, was the focus of an unprecedented National Academy of Sciences report in 2009 that called on Congress to create the federal capacity to stimulate scientific research and set national standards.
• More than 500 jurisdictions now record interrogations, which can help prevent false confessions or admissions. Seventeen states and Washington, D.C., mandate the recording of at least some interrogations, and legislation to require or improve such recording is pending in 13 states.

Since his release from prison, Peacock has relied on the support of his family and church community in the Rochester area. He continues treatment for mental illness.

"I never gave up hope that this day would come," he said on Feb. 4. "When the truth is all you have, you learn to hang onto it. I am grateful to my family and everyone who has supported me over the years. I am looking forward to moving on with my life, now that my name is finally cleared."