In an unpublished opinion by a unanimous court, the Florida Supreme Court has held that a death sentence does not have a constitutional right to timely review of a substantiated actual innocence claim. In January 1998 – almost 9 years ago – Mike Lambrix initiated an actual innocence claim in the lower court in Florida. See, “Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man.” After many years of deliberate procrastination by the state and lower court Lambrix filed a petition with the Florida Supreme Court arguing that deprivation of timely review without delay violated his constitutional right to due process. This is what Mike had to say about it…
Last Thursday the Florida Supreme Court denied my motion for rehearing in that habeas case i spoke about in “Justice Delayed is Justice Denied.” Of coarse the did not issue any formal opinion beyond “Motion for rehearing is denied!” I am not surprised – those justices didn’t take the time to address the issue on the merits as it’s all about politics, not justice -- and although it’s politically popular to expedite a capital case when they want to kill someone it’s not when it’s merely a case of actual innocence.
So, now I will file a petition for Writ of Certiorari ti the U.S. Supreme Court asking them to address the issue and I am hoping they will. I will have to represent myself on this, but I have no problem with that, as I am confident I can present a convincing legal argument. But in all honesty I don’t expect the U.S. Supreme Court to be anymore receptive as the whole system is totally corrupt – the courts and the politicians conspire together to come up with Time limitations to use against us when the objective is to kill us, but they won’t do the same thing to compel the lower court and the state to provide timely review when the objective is to prevent a person from proving their innocence.
I also have instructed my lawyers to now formally amend my pending post conviction motion to include this claim in that action. The Florida Supreme Court deliberately circumvented addressing the question of whether a death sentenced person has a constitutional right to timely review without unnecessary delay when arguing actual innocence by summarily denying my petition upon the finding that it was an unauthorized pro se motion – that since I had appointed counsel in the lower court I could not pursue a petition on my own.
Because of that ruling they’ve essentially said that it must be raised by my presently appointed counsel even though Florida Statutes prohibit them from doing so. But I want to make sure the issue is unquestionably preserved si I will instruct my lawyer to formally raise it.
I am just so disgusted in how completely corrupt this system is. But I don’t really blame the courts – I blame the people… “We, the people” who refuse to see just how inherently corrupt the judicial system has become. Don’t they get it? If someone sentenced to death cannot get fair review – if our system will deny justice in the most extreme cases—the how can the average person out there have any confidence that if and when they or someone they love find themselves caught up in the system, they’ll get “justice?”
People out there need to care about how politically corrupt our judicial system has become because it does effect all of us, not only the unfortunate soul victimized by the system today as tomorrow is may very well be their own family member. As I’ve said before, “evil can only prevail when good people choose to do nothing” and it’s those who choose to do nothing that are ultimately responsible for what the system has become.
~Mike~
