"Death Row Diary"

Prosecutorial Misconduct; Does immunity invite injustice?

2008-04-07T15:08:00.000-04:00

It has long been recognized that a prosecutor’s duty is to seek justice. In Berger v. United States, 295 U.S. 78 (1935) our Supreme Court declared this mandate recognizing that prosecutors should “prosecute with eagerness and vigor” but may not use “improper methods calculated to produce a wrongful conviction.” If a prosecutor’s misconduct “so reflects the trial with unfairness as to make the resulting conviction a denial of due process” then the conviction might be vacated – but only if the Court finds that the prosecutor’s actions constituted “egregious misconduct.” Darden v. Wainwright, 477 U.S. 168 (1987)

In other words, as long as the reviewing court determines, based upon their own post-conviction subjective interpretation, that the evidence notwithstanding the alleged misconduct is sufficient to support the conviction, a prosecutor’s deliberate misconduct is judicially tolerated, and the conviction cannot be vacated. This is generally called the “harmless error” rule … if the reviewing court determines that the person is probably guilty anyway. Then the “error” of a deliberate prosecutorial misconduct is deemed “harmless.” See, e.g. Cargle v. Mullin, 317 F. 3d 1196 (10th Cir. 2003) (“ A prosecutor’s misconduct will require reversal of a conviction only where the misconduct sufficiently infected the trial so as to make it fundamentally unfair.”); Mason v. Mitchell, 320 F. 3d 604 (6th Cir. 2003) (“The misconduct must be so pronounced and persistent that it permeates the entire atmosphere of the trial”)

Imagine a world where traffic laws said that you must stop at a red light, but another rule is then established by the courts that says that even if you do deliberately run that red light, as long as you don’t hit anyone it’s “harmless error.” What if we change the laws prohibiting drunk driving – but only if you actually hit and kill someone? No harm, no foul … that’s simple enough.

The problem with this perverted logic is that the true harm is not in the result of the deliberate misconduct – but in the misconduct itself. Our constitutional democracy works because we have become a nation of laws that evolve as necessary to protect the rights of all citizens. If we create a system that effectively absolves deliberate prosecutorial misconduct based upon subjective interpretation of actual harm inflicted and not the act of misconduct itself, do we not invite and even encourage prosecution misconduct?

As a civilized society we embrace the concept of law and order. Without laws there can be no “order” as one cannot exist without the other. Now imagine a world where every individual is subject to accountability – except those empowered by the government to enforce those laws. In today’s system with an epidemic of wrongful convictions increasingly undermining confidence in the system as a whole, prosecutional misconduct has become the leading cause of miscarriages of justice.

Even with this epidemic of prosecutional misconduct victimizing innocent men and women with wrongful incarceration and even condemning them to death, prosecutors enjoy “absolute immunity” from judicial accountability. In Imbler v. Pachtman, 424 U.S. 409 (1976) the Supreme Court concluded that prosecutors – even when they deliberately fabricate evidence, present false evidence, and knowingly use perjured testimony, even when they deliberately prosecute someone they know is innocent – are entitled to “absolute immunity” and cannot be held judicially accountable. The Supreme Court concluded, “The ultimate fairness of the system could be weakened” if prosecutors were held accountable in court for even deliberate misconduct.

The majority of prosecutors do exercise self-constraint and do act in good faith. But borrowing from an old adage, it only takes a few bad apples to spoil the whole bunch. Add to that the political consequences that make admitting error, the equivalent of career suicide, and a culture that promotes those who will win at any cost; where the most “successful” prosecutors are those who practice the philosophy that “the ends justify the means” and you have a system that invites injustice, and becomes by its very nature inherently corrupt from within.

The most extreme injustice conceivable is that of an innocent man or woman being wrongfully convicted and condemned to death. Florida by far leads the country in the number of wrongful capital convictions in which innocent men and women were condemned to death only later to be judicially exonerated. But why does Florida wrongfully convict and even condemn so many innocent people?

For one thing, Florida remains the exception to most other states in establishing a means of statutory compensation for those found to have been wrongfully convicted. Most states provide compensation to those found to have been wrongfully convicted … but not Florida Common sense tells you that if the state has to pay substantial amounts of money to compensate those victimized by the system, then inevitably there will be a call to hold those responsible for inflicting the injustice accountable. In Florida at least 24 men and women have been judicially exonerated after being wrongfully convicted and condemned to death – yet not even once has the prosecutor found to have engaged in deliberate misconduct been held accountable.

How can we deny that the absence of accountability is itself an invitation to injustice? If our system can identify the small numbers of specific prosecutors who have reportedly engaged in deliberate misconduct then is there not a moral responsibility to at the very least ensure that these few corrupt individuals never practice law again? If we identify a doctor that has deliberately engaged in malpractice causing injury to his or her patient, do we not take action to strip them of their license to practice? Why would we demand anything less of a person entrusted to represent “We, the people” in a court of law? Is not the deliberate violation or that most sacred test at least as equally contemptible – and intolerable – as a physician deliberately engaging in acts of malpractice that victimizes his patients?

The hypocrisy that presently exists is perpetuated by the system itself. The Florida Supreme Court has repeatedly admonished prosecutors for deliberate misconduct in capital cases, promising that disciplinary actions would follow if that behavior continues, yet not even once has the Court actually taken action. This judicial rhetoric is readily found in case law … In Ruiz v. State, 743 So. 2d 1 (Fla. 1999) the Florida Supreme Court stated that, “ we warned of the dire consequences of such ‘inexcusable prosecutorial overkill.’” citing, Hill v. State, 477 So. 2d 553 (Fla. 1985) “… yet in spite of our admonishment in Hill and despite subsequent warnings that prosecutorial misconduct will be subject to disciplinary proceedings by the Florida Bar, we never-the-less continue to encounter this problem with unacceptable frequency.”

Both Ruiz and Hill were capital cases in which the victimized defendant was sentenced to death; but they’re certainly not the only capital (death sentence) cases in which the Court rhetorically admonished prosecutors for acts of deliberate misconduct. See, e.g. Garcia v, State, 622 So. 2d 1325 (Fla. 1993) (“Once again, we are compelled to reiterate the need for propriety, particularly where the death penalty is involved.”); Nowitzke v. State, 572 So. 2d 1346 (Fla. 1990) (“We are distressed over the lack of propriety and restraint exhibited in the overzealous prosecution of capital cases.”); Garron v. State, 528 So. 2d 353 (Fla. 1988) (“Such violations of the prosecutor’s duty to seek justice and not merely ‘win’ a death case cannot be condoned by this Court.”); andBertolotti v. State, 476 So. 2d 130 (Fla.1985) (“we have recently addressed incidents of prosecutional misconduct, in the face of repeated admonitions against such overreaching, to be grounds for appropriate disciplinary proceedings.”)

All of these cases in which the Florida Supreme Court explicitly recognized acts of prosecutorial misconduct share several things in common … each of these cases the defendant was sentenced to death (several of these defendants have since even been executed) and in each of these cases no actual disciplinary action was taken against the prosecutor found to have engaged in such misconduct.

Two distinct forms of prosecutorial misconduct have accounted for the majority of cases in Florida in which a wrongfully convicted and condemned person was subsequently exonerated by the Courts and released from death row. The first form are acts of prosecutional misconduct in which a prosecutor is subsequently found to have knowingly withheld material evidence of an exculpatory nature from the defense – In many cases evidence that would have proven the person innocent. The second form are acts of overzealous prosecution in which a prosecutor has a wholly circumstantial case of specious nature, yet proceeds to prosecute by simply manipulating the jury into believing the evidence proves guilt beyond reasonable doubt even though the evidence is legally insufficient to support guilt.

The most recent exoneration released from Florida’s death row after almost six years of incarceration is John Ballard. After being convicted and condemned to death without any eyewitnesses, no physical or forensic evidence, and no confession; the Florida Supreme Court concluded that the erroneous conviction was the product of overzealous prosecution; that the prosecutor (Deputy Assistant State Attorney Randall McGruther) improperly stacked circumstantial inference upon inference to convince the jury of Ballard’s guilt even though no credible evidence actually supported guilt. See, Ballard v. State, 923 So 2d 475 (Fla. 2006)

This same prosecutor, Randall McGruther, has a history of unethical overzealous prosecution, especially in wholly circumstantial capital cases – Mr. McGruther was the prosecutor in my own case in which the evidence now shows that the entire wholly circumstantial case of alleged premeditated murder was deliberately fabricated with an intent to have me wrongfully convicted and condemned to death. See, “Southern Injustice: Condemning an Innocent Man.”

Has any disciplinary action ever been pursued against Mr. McGruther? No. In fact, Mr. McGruther is now the top prosecutor in the Twentieth Judicial Circuit States Attorney’s Office, handpicked as “Deputy Assistant State Attorney” by the elected State Attorney Steve Russell himself.

Additionally, that particular state attorney’s office, although comprised of the mostly rural farming counties of Southwest Florida and relatively small in population, has the highest rate of wrongful convictions in capital cases in the entire county. At least five men have been judicially exonerated since 1980 after being wrongfully convicted and condemned to death by that office itself, (Dilbert Tibbs, James Richardson, Bradley Scott, John Landry, and John Ballard), yet to date there has never been an investigation into why that office accounts for such as abnormally high number of wrongful convictions in capital cases.

Capital cases may only reflect a small minority of the collective number of criminal cases prosecuted in this country; but it is these cases that society is asked to impose and extract the most extreme measure of justice. If these examples of injustice, resulting from acts of prosecutorial misconduct, can be found to be what amounts to deliberate policy and practice; then does it not stand to reason that this cancerous corruption of our judicial system exists at an even greater scale in cases that are not subjected to such thorough judicial scrutiny?

Prosecutorial misconduct is a corruption that acts as a cancer upon the very integrity of our judicial system as a whole. This corruption exists only because the judicial system itself is allowing it to exist. When a small group of prosecutors engage in repeated acts of deliberate misconduct resulting in convicting and condemning innocent men and women to death, then those few individual prosecutors become nothing less than state sanctioned killers and it is societies responsibility to insist that these prosecutors who have been found to have engaged in deliberate misconduct never practice law again. If we are not willing to hold them accountable, then we invite the injustice that inevitably results.

Doing Life On Death Row

2008-01-03T11:06:00.001-05:00

There’s a song I recall from many, many moons ago in a life now far, far away ~ the words still haunt me from time to time, and I smile… “Once was the thought inside my head, before I reach 30 I’ll be dead…” At 47 years old now. I’ve spent almost my entire adult life in a solitary cage on Florida’s death row. Doing life on death row isn’t about living at all, but about dying slow, a day at a time. If there’s anything even harder than living alone, it’s got to be dying alone, as I only exist in a very small world where death is the only absolute reality and everything else is just part of that path getting there.

But there’s many kinds of deaths ~ there’s the death of the body and the death of the soul. There’s a point man can reach when even physical death is seen as a blessing, as a means in which to end a nightmare that has no end. I remain alive only because I still have the strength within me to cling desperately to the remnants of hope that pass my way. But perhaps hope is the greatest deception of all ~and the loss of hope the cruelest death. I’ve seen it only too often, men I’ve know for years slowly broken down by the existence in this artificial environment until you can see it in their eyes ~ that dull look that means only one thing… they’ve given up hope and now await the fate of the condemned, a fate that ultimately becomes more of a mercy killing than an execution, as that physical death brings with it the promise of freedom from a fate far worse than death itself.

That’s what doing life on death row really is ~ it’s a fate worse than death. It’s being condemned not merely to death, but the torturous, methodical degradation of one’s humanity in a world designed to first break you down and make you something less than human before they finally strap that broken flesh to a cold chair or gurney and ritualistically terminate your existence. In truth, most of those ultimately executed at the hands of the state have already given up the ghost long before and have embraced death as the end of a long journey through a hell few could begin to imagine.

Hanging On To Hope

Each month all of us receive a slip of paper that advises us of any “gain time” we might have received that previous month. By law, the prison officials are required to do this, as well as provide the prisoners “presumptive release date” recalculated each month to reflect the deduction of any gain time that might have been awarded.

Every prisoner on Florida’s death row has a presumptive release date in the year 9999. That gives me only, 7992 years yet to go before my presently scheduled release and I’m already counting it down one day at a time. I’ve read in the Bible that Methuselah lived to the ripe young age of 969 years and that was thousands of years ago. So, with modern medical breakthroughs extending the average lifespan I figure I’ve got a good shot at it… all I’ve got to do is live to be at least 8,039 years old and then I’ll walk out the front gate a free man.

This is the kind of humorous “hope” that we cling on to. When these slips of paper are passed out each month, inevitably someone on the wing will holler out, “Hallelujah, baby ~ I’m coming home!” or just as often one guy hollering down the row for all to hear, “Pack your sh__, Bubba, they’re throwing you out.” And some laugh.

A lot of us talk about going home and in that stolen moment of fantasy we can see the green, green grass of home. For some, this hopeful fantasy evolves into a form of psychosis and they not only believe they’re soon going home, but know the exact date and when that date approaches they even give away their personal belongings and awake that particular morning and await the guards to escort them to the front gate. Reality is nothing more than what any of us chose to perceive it to be, and in their own little corner of their own little world , that’s their reality and in a way I truly do envy them as I remain trapped in my reality.

Through the years many have gone home, having proven before the courts that they were wrongfully convicted and upon that legal exoneration they won their freedom. There’s been more than I can remember, but knowing that there have been so many is, itself, a form of hope.

About five years ago or better a long time friend of mine, Juan Melendez, known affectionately to us as “Puerto Rican Johnny” was on the floor I was on. Johnny and I had lived in the same area out on the streets and we would often talk about places and even people we both knew. Johnny would show me pictures of the house he grew up in, of his elderly mother, and talk about how when he got out he would return home and take care of his mother.

Just before Christmas back then he got word that the lower state court threw out his convictions, recognizing that the state had illegally withheld exculpatory evidence. Mucho Macho Johnny cried that night and in our own way we all shared a tear with him. In the sixteen years that he lived among us, he became our brother. Then a few weeks after Christmas the warden came up on the floor and told Johnny to get his stuff as they were releasing him that day. Johnny’s cell was down towards the end of the hall and as he passed he spoke to each of us momentarily. As Johnny approached my cell I felt only joy ~ sharing his joy ~ as he told me, “Rum and coke, esso” … remembering our promise to have a drink in the free world . And then he was gone, but a part of each one of us walked out that front gate back into the free world with him.

Hope… yet another four letter word, a mistress that can and gladly will deceive and seduce you with her elusive charms. It’s that whisper of a promise that your time there will come too, that gives a man the strength to keep that hope alive. But when hope fails then that mistress can become the Angel of death as that lost hope becomes nothing more than the desperate last act at the end of the rope. And there are few things more despairing than to watch helplessly as the guards rush into a cell in the middle of the night and can be heard cutting a man down, then moments later passing by your cell with the cold body of someone you knew and lived among for years.

Rotting Away One Day At A Time

While hope is a stolen luxury that brings with it a fragile strength, death continues to be a reality that cannot be denied. For too many of us now doing life on death row this condemnation is about slowly growing old and rotting away until death claims us not at the hands of an executioner, but by “natural causes.”

Although I have now been on death row almost a quarter of a century, there are many who have been here much, much longer. After the Supreme Court threw out the death penalty in Furman v. Georgia (1972) Florida was the first state to rush newly written laws into effect to allow the continued use of capital punishment. Although these new laws didn’t pass constitutional challenge until 1976 in Proffit v. Florida, many of the men still on Florida’s death row today have been here since at least 1974.

When I was charged with the capital murder case that brought me here, I was 22 years old. Recently divorced at the time, I had three young children; my youngest barely a year old. I look in my mirror today and it’s hard to see that young man I once was, as the face looking back is that of a grandfather. My full head of hair is long gone and what hasn’t fallen out is turning gray.

I am not alone. Death by default that’s what it is. Too often when morally corrupt prosecutors know they cannot kill you, they will maliciously drag your case out until you simply die of old age. Under any circumstances living in solitary confinement under the stress of being condemned to death takes its toll upon the physical and mental health of even the strongest men.

Inevitably, we all grow old, and again, death is the only absolute reality. In a way I should consider myself lucky as at least I came to the row while still a young man. There are many more significantly older when they arrived and the years living in a cage were not as easy. For every man executed in the past 30 years, there’s been at least one other slowly rotting away and inevitably dying of old age.

I read recently in the past 10 years alone at least 30 men have died of “natural causes” on Florida’s death row. Some were of old age ~ others of various types of cancer… many I personally knew. With so many here now for well over 25 and even 30 years, death row is growing gray. At the front of each death row floor there is a handicapped cell intended to house the many who are already confined to wheelchairs. More than a few are now over 75 and will almost certainly slowly rot away and die in their cell as even if they lost all their appeals the governor would not sign a death warrant on them as it’s politically incorrect to put an old, physically disabled man to death ~ but it’s perfectly acceptable to, instead, let him rot away until he eventually dies.

In some cases this is actually by intent and purpose. I know at least a few here today who have lost touch with reality and if ever scheduled for execution the courts would be forced to reduce their sentence to life as it’s constitutionally prohibited to execute a person who has become legally insane. It’s also politically unacceptable to recognize their insanity and reduce their sentences to life. So that they can be transferred to a prison psychiatric unit and receive proper care. The solution is to simply ignore them ~ to deliberately let them rot away until they die in that cage. Inevitably they do… they always do.

But nobody cares. When was the last time you saw any newspaper talk about the many on death rows growing old and dying alone? Recently a national debate about the constitutionality of using lethal injection as a means of carrying out executions generated substantial media interest after Angel “Popo” Diaz was allegedly “tortured” to death by a botched execution and witnesses said it took at least 24 minutes to kill him…. 24 minutes.

But what of the many more who are slowly dying in their cells? If prolonging a man’s death for 24 minutes constitutes cruel and unusual punishment, then why can’t it also be argued that allowing a man to slowly rot away in solitary confinement for many decades until he dies is also cruel and unusual? As a presumably civilized society we are ultimately defined by the measure of humanity we show to others and yet nothing personifies that malignant evil within the heart of man than by looking at the inhumanity we so deliberately inflict upon the least of the least ~ and nothing in our contemporary society illustrates this truth better than the deliberate deprivation imposed upon the condemned ~ it’s not enough to want to take our lives, society demands that we must also suffer until we are slowly broken and then ~ for those who are lucky ~ something less than human is put to death.

From Cockroaches & Rodents to Rats & Snakes

When I first came to death row in March of 1984 this was a much different place ~ not only physically, but the mentality was different. At that time Florida’s main death row was at Florida State Prison, long infamous as the end of the line, where prisoners were warehoused when they could not be securely kept elsewhere. Physically, the wings housing death row were comparable to Third World living conditions. In the winter we froze and in the summer we boiled. With “open wings” (the interior of the wings open from the first tier all the way up to the third tier) it was noisy, as a hundred men would be yelling or watching TV or whatever. With no screens on the always broken windows, the wings were quite literally infested with cockroaches, rodents, even snakes, and birds ~ and then there were many wild cats that would come in to feed off the mice and rats.

But as bad as the physical conditions were it was a better place. In 1992 they built and opened a new building designed exclusively to house death row. Soon after the majority of the over 300 condemned were transferred to this “Northeast Unit” of the Union Correctional Institution. As I write this I can look outside the window on the catwalk and in the distance I can see the Florida State Prison ~ so close, and yet so far away.

At “FSP,” as we call it, there was a unity ~ even a “brotherhood” ~ that tied us all together. We lived in close proximity to each other and looked out for each other. If a guard came down and screwed with one of us without cause, he took on the whole wing. Although there were always a few assholes and idiots on both sides of the bars, most of us looked out for each other. Back then you knew the difference between a convict & an inmate and a correctional officer & a guard ~ and there is a world of difference. A convict is a stand up guy whose word is his bond and he knew enough to mind his own business and keep his mouth shut when he didn’t know something for a fact. An inmate was seen as a prison rat; the lowest form of life; worthy of no respect. An inmate was by nature unworthy of respect, he was the kind of guy who would lie, gossip, and backstab even his own best friend; often for no reason at all. Inmates were rare on death row back then.

Equally so, the difference between a corrections officer (known only as an “officer”) and a guard was like night and day. An officer came in to work his eight hours and go home ~ it’s just a job and he wasn’t going to take it personally. An officer had no personal malice towards the prisoners and didn’t go out of his way to provoke anyone. If he came in to do a cell search (“shakedown”) he did it without maliciously destroying your property and didn’t have to prove his manhood by being a jerk. Although avoided as much as possible, officers were respected ~ guards were not.

A guard was commonly referred to as inbred redneck scum, the kind of guy who got the job because he couldn’t work anywhere else. A guard didn’t just work eight hours ~ he lived the job and it ate him away like a cancer until all that was left was a bitter broken man who went out of his way to make everyone else miserable. He has malice in his heart and was looked upon with nothing less than contempt, not only by prisoners, but the officers who respected their job.
In those early years a man was allowed to do his own time. In the early 80’s we had only just began to see politicians begin to campaign on promises to lock up more people and make sure prisoners did “hard time.” Although physically our environment was deplorable, we would all gladly go beck if we could have all our privileges returned. Back then we had packages sent in from family and friends four times a year with personal clothes, shoes, cosmetics, maybe even a decent watch or ring and a nice radio. We were allowed to receive “hobby craft” packages monthly with materials for painting, crocheting, and all sorts of other stuff. All of that is long gone now ~ nothing comes in from the outside world anymore and anything we might get must be bought from the prison store at significantly marked up prices; the profits used to subsidize our incarceration, as the prison system has become a virtual industry with thousands of companies now dependant upon contracts they receive to provide everything from the food we eat to the toilet paper we wipe our asses with. It’s all about politics now.

Death row has changed, in every conceivable way. No longer is a man able to do his own time and mind his own business. A new generation has taken over and even so many of the old timer “convicts” are now nothing more than inmates themselves. Because of this death row has become hard time as now not only do we live in a much more deliberately segregated building with only 14 men on each closed run, but you learn to keep to yourself as the man you call a friend today will only too quickly backstab you tomorrow. Respect means nothing in this new generation. And it’s become a much lonelier place.

Watching the World Slip Away

I see that outside world only through the very limited media I’m allowed… a small TV, which the powers that be have determines necessary to prevent against insanity ~ if I were to go insane, then they could not kill me. A small “walkman” type battery powered radio, that doesn’t pick up any stations, and a few magazines and newspapers.

In my world there are no computers, no cell phones, and none of the electronic conveniences that most people take for granted. In the past 24 years I have not touched dirt or grass as our small fenced yard is nothing more than a concrete pad between two wings. I sometimes wonder if the moon and stars still exist as I haven’t seen the night sky in so many years it becomes hard to even remember it.

The deprivation of material those material things that most people simply take for granted out there in the real world certainly pale in comparison to those things that really do matter; especially in this world ~ those things that once separated make it seem that we are helplessly watching the world slowly slipping away.

It is the nature of prison to alienate a man from those he loves. For most, with very few exceptions, as the years pass the few family and friends that once stood by slowly drift away and move on with their own lives. Through the years I can count on the fingers of a single hand the number of death row prisoners who have had family consistently stand by them. Friends tend to drift away even quicker.

That’s not to say they deliberately abandon those they love at the time they need them most. I’d like to believe that most of our families and friends never intended to abandon any of us, but simply moved on and we became less and less of their lives. I’m personally blessed with a large family but haven’t had any communication at all with most of them for many, many years. Life out there in the real world doesn’t come to a stop just because we are no longer in it and as time takes its toll the distance becomes greater and before you know it you’re no longer part of their lives. That’s just the reality of doing time. Accepting that reality doesn’t make it any easier and many in here do turn cold and bitter as they’re abandoned by those who mean the most.

Most of us learn early on not to count on anyone other than ourselves. Contrary to a popular myth the prison doesn’t provide all our needs ~ at best, it provides only the absolute minimum and even then does so in such a way that encourages ~ if not coerces ~ each prisoner to actually purchase even the basic necessities from the prison store, as with each purchase the prison makes a substantial profit.

Without a friend or two outside willing to help prisoners ~ especially those on death row ~ can become even worse than what might be imagined. At least in general population most prisoners can work a job and “hustle” for what they need through a long established barter system. Death row prisoners are not allowed to work a job and have no means in which to barter ~ our only means of survival with minimal comfort is through the compassion and generosity of those who care about us.

As family and friends tend to drift away we are forced to try and reach out to new friends and establish new ties with that outside world. But there are many who hold nothing but malice in their hearts towards prisoners ~ especially death row prisoners ~ and have exerted political pressure to pass laws that now prohibit prisoners from placing personal ads that might allow them to meet new friends, perhaps even a girlfriend who might want to visit.

Florida is unique in the country in implementing these draconian rules prohibiting prisoners from attempting to meet new friends and the result can be seen ~ more and more. Those of us who have been here the longest are increasingly isolated from the free world; effectively abandoned and left to die alone. More and more I see strong men break down and give up, unwilling to have to beg their neighbors for a simple cup of coffee or bar of soap and slowly retreating into his own world of self consuming bitterness and anger and a fate far worse than death.

When it comes down to it, that’s what doing life on death row is really all about… it’s not about living, but about dying one slow day at a time. It’s about simply existing in a solitary concrete crypt. Increasingly isolated from all that really matters, of being methodically deprived of the most basic elements that make us human ~ companionship, compassion, and hope, as hope itself is dependent upon a reason to live.

As I am increasingly isolated from all that matters, that hope and will to live continues to erode ~ I’m not doing life on death row … I’m simply waiting to make my death final.

Death by Default: killing the condemned when they can’t be executed

2007-05-25T11:28:00.002-04:00

When I was sentenced to death over 24 years ago, in my ignorance I thought my fate might lie in “Old Sparky,” Florida’s then infamous electric chair. I didn’t realize that the reality is that most of those condemned to dearth are not condemned to die at the hands of the state, but slowly rot away in solitaire confinement until they inevitably die of “natural causes.”

Recently several newspapers have reported that in the past decade more men on death row have died of natural causes than of actual executions. According to these published reports at least 29 men have died on Florida’s death row in recent years while waiting their judicially imposed date with death -- a few more have been stabbed by other prisoners and at least one (Frank Valdes) was beaten to death by prison guards. See, Valdes v. Crosby, 450 F. 3d 1231 (11th Cir. 2006).

The truth is that increasingly those sentenced to death are more likely to slowly die of old age than by execution. Although the state sanctioned serial killers (politicians and judges who exploit the death penalty to advance their own pathetic careers) constantly cry about speeding up executions – most of this is rhetoric – the truth is that they actually only want to speed up executions against those they believe they can actually execute… and many of those presently sentenced to death cannot be executed without controversy that would undermine the credibility of the death penalty itself. See, Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied.

That’s the dark secret of the death penalty in America – when the judicial system screws up and sentences someone to death who legally should not have been sentenced to death; then what do you do with him? In Florida, and many other states, it’s become death by default -- killing the condemned when they cannot be executed by simply letting them slowly rot away in a solitary cage until they die of old age, or other convenient “natural cause.”

Earlier today on the wing adjacent to the one I am warehoused on the guards were making their routine rounds when they discovered death row inmate Jack Farrell laying dead in his cell. Preliminary examinations indicate that Jack, a longtime diabetic, died of a massive heart attack. Another dead of “natural causes” after many, many years of waiting for his court ordered death sentence.

Down the hall from me just a few cells away a man I’ve known many years is slowly dying of cancer. Henry Garcia has been locked up almost his whole life. Now well over 50, he has almost nobody other than the friends he has in here. That’s the nature of the beast – as the years pass the condemned become increasingly isolated from the free world. Both family and friends drift away and we find ourselves abandoned and forgotten. See, Doing Life On Death Row.

When Henry was told that he had cancer they also told him that it was decided by the medical department that it was not “cost effective” to treat him – that the prison would not even attempt to fight the cancer, but would only let him die… death by default. Now Henry must face a slow but inevitable death alone in his solitary cage – and somehow this is supposed to be “humane.”

Maybe that’s what bothers me the most… we are supposed to be a Christian society, a society that values compassion and humane treatment, and yet we will deliberately turn a blind eye towards the inhumanities that exist in our own backyard.

Maybe if Henry was a mangy stray dog starving on the street then someone might care enough to show him compassion. Am I the only one that’s bothered by the fact that my friend Henry Garcia has now effectively been thrown out alongside the road and left to die while the world races by?

Equally so, what does it say about our system when we allow a man to simply rot away, deliberately deciding that he is not worth saving? How would any one of us feel if we went to our doctor today and were told that we had cancer – but that the doctor decided it was not “cost effective” to treat us and that we have already been given up for dead? How can we call ourselves a humane and civilized society when bureaucrats, who are more concerned with their budget than the patient’s life, decide the value of any person’s life?

If I had access to a telephone, I would personally call the Florida Department of Corrections appointed secretary Jim McDonough (phone number 850/488-7480) and ask him why prison doctors are refusing to treat Henry Garcia – why they have decided to simply let him die. But death row prisoners in Florida are not allowed to use the phone, so I can’t… I wish I could get others to. (Can you take a hint? The phone number is above or you can email him at secretary@mail.dc.state.fl.us)

You have to excuse my ignorance, but even after spending my entire adult life in a cage in solitary confinement condemned to death for a crime I did not commit, there’s still a part of me that believes that there is good in each of us… that there are still people who are compassionate and do care, even about the welfare of the least of our society. That I’m not the only one who finds it morally offensive that any man should be abandoned and left to die alone. I’ve seen the worst of humanity and lived among the evil incarnate. But I’ve seen men society labeled as monsters show genuine compassion for those they live among while the world outside relentlessly gathers in glorified lynch mobs slobbering at the mouths while screaming for our deaths.

Now I look around me at the world I remain condemned to and I see what society doesn’t want to acknowledge… I see that the malice society has for the lowest of low has reached new heights, as society remains deliberately oblivious to the fact that more and more of those we condemned to death decades ago are rotting away and left to die of “natural causes” when they cannot be killed quick enough by the hands of the State.

And nobody cares. What could be more inhumane than to deliberately confine a man to a cage for decades (many now in excess of 30 years!) and when unable to quickly carry out his execution instead let him slowly rot away until he dies? To be deliberately isolated from the free world, abandoned and forgotten by society and given up for dead as if your life means nothing? Henry Garcia is only one of many others presently condemned to the same fate – death rows across the country have hundreds of condemned men and women perhaps even thousands, who will never actually face execution, but will be left to slowly rot away in their solitary cage until they die. Death by default is America’s new means of carry out the death penalty and this form of execution is administered not in minutes, not in hours, or ever months, or years – but in decades. It is a slow and methodically torturous death that is designed to kill the man’s soul long before the body finally gives up the ghost.

Is this what we, as a self-proclaimed “civilized” society intended? As a matter of moral conscience shouldn’t it bother us that another human being has now been left to die in a such a manner? If these men were dogs, every animal rights group in the country would beat the hates of the prison down to save them – why is it so hard for people to show that same measure of compassion to another human being? As Henry Garcia now slowly dies alone and abandoned by the world beyond, his inevitable death will remain as a commentary on the kind of society we have become – and perhaps that is the greater tragedy.

"Dead Man Walking"

2007-05-20T22:58:00.000-04:00

by Sister Helen Prejean (Vintage Books)

Sister Helen Prejean's book can be considered only as an argument against capital punishment, and on those terms the book has merit for presenting that case passionately and backing its sentiments up with solid data about our criminal justice system. Then, one's feelings about the book are likely to be swayed by one's opinion about that particular issue.

There is much more to this book, however. It addresses themes far wider than our national debate on executions. Sister Helen Prejean has written a gutsy account of lessons she has learned in ministry -- of plunging into unknown territory as a nun, of facing aspects of humanity that confuse her, frighten her, frustrate her -- and persisting in offering her Christ's forgiveness and love to every customer.

Her decision, for instance, to face the families of the victims of homicide, not to convert them but to listen to anything they offer and accept instruction from them, is courageous and moving.

The book will not last because of its political position or because of any special literary merit; it will, I think, survive as a spiritual memoir and, perhaps, as a compelling argument for seeing even our worst offenders as human beings rather than monsters.

The thing that will stay with me about this book is the spare, unflinching, hypnotic tone of the writing. Helen Prejean has a writing style that will not let the reader look away. This is just as true when she is writing lists of facts as it is when she is recounting her personal odyssey. No matter which side of this debate one personally comes down on, her strength as a person is impossible to negate. She is painfully honest, revealing her own human fears and concerns, and recounting her growth as she acknowledges and faces them.

This is a book that is hard to leave and will be difficult to forget.

Reprinted by permission of the author and the Watkins/Loomis Agency

Excerpt from Book

Time To Impeach The Supreme Court

2007-05-11T13:43:00.000-04:00

America has become a nation of brain dead punks – cowards incapable of thinking on their own. Just look around and you will see these yellow-bellied, pink-pantied wannabe’s all around you. And while you’re at it, look in the mirror – there’s another one. It’s no surprise we can’t win a war and even worse, let out elected leaders deliberately deceive us and get us into a war we had no business getting into in the first place. When other countries look at us they see our weakness – and they laugh at us. We are pathetic.

I grew up in the San Francisco Bay area in the late sixties and early seventies at the height of the Vietnam War and can vividly remember how so many stood their ground to protest government when they believed the government was wrong. These were the college kids across America that knew in their hearts that our country was heading in the wrong direction – and they were right. Just look at us today, only a generation later. The same generation that stood its ground against government when they believed in what they were doing has now raised a generation of spineless, self-centered, materialistic spoiled brats who are far more likely to whine when their Ipod batteries run low, than when their Constitutional rights as abrogated by parasitic politicians and conservative judicial activists.

Whatever happened to that generation that stood their ground even when Uncle Sam called out the National Guard and Mayor Daley sent in platoons of armed cops to beat them back at the Democratic Convention in Chicago? I’m not talking about the Height-Ashbury hippies that found peace at the end of a pot pipe, but the idealistic students that marched on Telegraph Avenue at the gates of Berkeley, and countless other colleges and universities across America. These were the educated, the idealistic cream of the crop, America’s future leaders who believed in a cause and were willing to stand their ground to make their voice heard. Where are they today?

I believe in America and I believe in a Constitutional Democracy and it makes me proud to be a citizen of a country that was founded not by rule of government, but by revolution of the people. But that democracy is dead and its battered body, decaying like an abandoned corpse callously thrown out with the trash. The America I believe in no longer exists and in its place is a contemptuous conservative theocracy, a beast that feeds off the individual to give power to this religious dictatorship. Am I the last true American – myself but a man condemned to death by an injustice deliberately perpetuated by the corruption of our judicial system?

I am also a Christian, believing without doubt in the resurrection of Christ as my only hope of salvation, believing in an eternity that can only come through salvation and faith in a God greater than myself. But I must hang my head in shame when I call myself a Christian as I know only too well that the right wing conservative Christians of America are by far the primary cause of the corruption of our Constitutional Democracy… and the cause of its probable if not inevitable death.

Our Constitutional forefathers knew of the evil of allowing religion to control government. The Constitutional mandate of separation of church and state was never intended to take God out of the country, but rather these founding fathers knew that to allow government to become one with any specific religion would ultimately be the destruction of our Constitutional Democracy. Only by separating religion and government could both survive in a balance that they fought to preserve.

But now the right wing conservative “Christians” control all three branches of our government. The beast has risen and taken control, and its evil tentacles have choked the life out of our democracy. The true “axis of evil” is the corruption of the three branches of government by those fanatically committed to instilling their own theocracy, to allow their own religion to rule our government.

Biblical prophesy speaks of the beast and warns that its power will come through the deception of the believers. The beast’s power comes from controlling those who call themselves Christians and blindly follow their leaders. But would a true man of God lead our nation into a modern day crusade against non-Christians? Think about it… What is the war in Iraq and Afghanistan (and before it’s over, the entire Middle East) really about? We already know the Bush Administration deliberately deceived our country. This past week former CIA Director George Tenet has come forth claiming that the Bush Administration also knew of an impending terrorist attack before 911, but deliberately took no action. Why? (Does anyone really ask?)

Is it really so hard to consider whether this contemporary conservative theocracy might have an insidious agenda? We all know that George W. Bush is nothing more than a puppet and the true power lies with the puppet masters that cower behind the scenes and call the shots. And they do have an agenda… they want America to be legislatively and judicially transformed into a theocratic apartheid – and they are winning!

Which brings us back to America becoming a nation of spineless cowards who today take their Constitutional rights for granted and have long forgotten the sacrifices so many made to preserve our Democracy.

What is it that makes America great? It’s not out government, but our people… it’s our 300 million diverse individuals, each with the inalienable Constitutional right to fundamental freedoms. But these freedoms are being methodically eroded. In today’s America, the individual person has become expendable as this conservative theocracy gives the power to government. How many of us have actually taken a moment to read the original “Bill of Rights,” the very foundation of our Constitutional Democracy? How many of us as parents have ever – even once – sat down with our children and talked about our Constitutional rights? When we do actually read the preamble of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights, we realize that virtually every right articulated in unquestionably intended to give the individual the power to protect against government – not even one of these rights were intended for the government or for the government to have power over at the expense of the individual. Think about that.

We call ourselves the land of the free and yet America today has the highest rate of incarceration in the world. Our prison system has become a virtual industry of government. Equally so the quintessential American Dream is to own our own house, yet the conservation judicial activists on the Supreme Court have decreed that government can take your house and sell it to developers who want to build condo’s – why? Because condo units pay more taxes to the government than a single family home and the individual is expendable for the greater good of government. Where does it say that in the Constitution?

Growing up I watched with awe and reverence as masses of both men and women marched in the streets in anticipation of the 1973 Supreme Court ruling in Roe V. Wade and I believe it was their collective voice that made a difference. Growing up Catholic – even an alter boy at the time – I was indoctrinated to believe that abortion is murder… and maybe it is. But what right do I have to force my belief on another? Our constitution is about individuals’ rights.

Last month for t he first time since Roe v. Wade, the contemporary conservative cabal on our Supreme Court has finally succeeded in compromising Roe v. Wade when by a marginal majority the conservative judicial activists (Roberts, Saclia, Thomas, Alito, and Kennedy) ruled that “partial birth” abortions are unconstitutional. For the first time, since Roe v. Wade this case placed the perceived rights of the unborn fetus over the rights of the women – no exception was made for partial birth abortions necessitated by the health of the mother. Not surprisingly, conservative politicians in many states quickly introduced proposed new laws limiting abortions even further in anticipation of a legal fight in the Courts that they now feel they can win, with the objective of having all abortions ultimately declared illegal. And that will come if up to this court.

What offends me about this “right to life” movement is the blatant hypocrisy – when the Supreme Court conservatives ruled partial-birth abortions to be unconstitutional, they cited to their fundamental belief in the “sanctity of life.” But these very same conservative justices consistently are the ones who also slobber at the mouth like rabid dogs in their zeal to quickly kill condemned prisoners – even the innocent, See, Herrera v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390(1993). In Marsh v. Kansas, Justice Scalia even took the position that the claims of innocent people being wrongfully condemned to death is overblown – that there are very few truly innocent people convicted as the system works. And that although the system is not perfect, a few mistakes are acceptable in the interest of the greater good.

Why does the sanctity of life apply to an unborn child but not to an innocent man wrongfully convictred and condemned to death? Where exactly in the Constitution does it say that an unborn child has any rights? Our constitution says nothing about when, as a matter of law, life begins – this fantasy is created by the Supreme Court Justices to juetify their own agenda and that is the textbook definition of judical activism.

Recent polls show that President Bush’s popularity is about as low as any president’s popularity has ever sunk. Some are calling for the impeachment of President Bush. Which is arguably justified in you believe President Bush deliberately misled Congress and our country to it into a war… which I personally do.

But President Bush’s days are already numbered. Already the campaign for a new President is running. Although he can still inflict great harm to our country such as deliberately escalating Mideast tensions and perhaps even instigating a war with Iran and Syria, that conceivably could quickly evolve into World War III, one way or another in November 2008 we will elect a new President… thank God!

But the greater evil is the legacy he leaves behind. If we are truly tired of being force-fed this conservative hypocritical ideology and what to purge our country of its evil then perhaps the time has come to consider impeaching the conservative justices presently on the Supreme Court. These justices are appointed for life and will be around long after Bush is gone, and unless they too are removed from office this generation will see our Supreme Court transform America into a theocracy ruled by five men. The strength of a democracy is that we have the power to demand their impeachment in Congress – but are there enough people in America still willing to stand up for what they believe in? Or are we truly a nation of cowards, unwilling to confront this evil that threatens our constitutional democracy.

Does DNA Condemn The Innocent??

2007-05-04T15:24:00.000-04:00

This past week the media reported that according to the Innocence Project, the 200th person has now been exonerated by DNA evidence. This sobering milestone was reached when Jerry Miller, a now 48-year old former Army cook was proven innocent by DNA. Evidence from a brutal kidnapping and rape that took place in Chicago in September of 1981 had sent Miller to prison. The victim never identified Miller as her assailant but two parking lot attendants did identify him.

Miller spent 25 years in several Illinois prisons insisting he was innocent before recently being paroled. Through these many years Miller filed numerous appeals challenging the validity of his wrongful convictions; to no avail. With no appeals left, about ten years ago Miller sought out the assistance of the New York based Innocence Project, co-founded in 1992 by renowned attorney Barry Scheck. Agreeing to take the case, Miller was released from prison on parole before the DNA testing was completed. Last week the Cook County Court granted a motion vacating Miller’s convictions and legally exonerating him.

But with all the attention focused on DNA testing, has exoneration by DNA evidence now become the new litmus test for proving innocence? If so, then could it be that DNA is now actually condemning more innocent people than it is exonerating? Through the past 30 years over 125 men and women have been legally exonerated and released from death row; after being found to have been wrongfully convicted and condemned to death. Of that number, only a handful, were exonerated by DNA evidence.

Of the 200 exonerations through DNA evidence, 54 of those were convicted of murder – with less than 10 also wrongfully sentenced to death. Like in the Miller case, the leading cause of the wrongful conviction was mistaken identity, followed closely by faulty scientific evidence. False confessions accounted for only about 25 percent.

There is no question that DNA testing has proven to be a valuable tool in exonerating the innocent. In fact, the very first criminal case in which DNA testing was used in an attempt to prove guilt actually resulted in an unexpected exoneration. The story of how DNA testing came to be utilized in criminal cases begins in Leicestershire, England. In November 1983 a local 15-year old Lynda Mann was raped and strangled to death with her body callously discarded in a field not far from her home. Although the local community searched for the killer, the case went unsolved.

Then almost three years later in August 1986 the body of another 15-year old girl (Dawn Ashworth) was found – she too had been raped and strangled in a manner remarkably similar to Lynda Mann. An investigation led local police to Richard Buckland, a porter at a nearby hospital. Buckland soon confessed to the Ashworth murder, but given the similarities and proximity of the earlier murder of Lynda Mann the police felt that Buckland had to also be responsible for that murder.

Anxious to close the books on both murders the police called upon Alec Jeffries, a professor at Leicestershire University, in England, who while attempting to identify the myoglobin producing gene, which governs the tissues that carry oxygen from the blood to the muscles discovered that DNA is unique to each individual.

The English police thought this new discovery could help them prove that Richard Buckland had also murdered Lynda Mann and Professor Jeffries collected blood samples from Buckland to compare against semen recovered from both of the young victims. The results shocked both Professor Jeffries and the police – contrary to his own confession; Buckland did not commit either murder! The semen taken from both Lynda Mann and Dawn Ashworth undoubtedly did come from the same man – the same man committed both crimes – but it wasn’t Buckland.

With this DNA evidence now able to identify the true killer, the police launched an extensive manhunt, collecting over 5,000 DNA samples from men living around the Leicestershire area – but no match was found, The cases seemed to be destined to remain unsolved and the killer free to kill again until the police unexpectedly received a call from an acquaintance of Ian Kelly, a baker who lived some distance from the area of the crime. He claimed that Kelly had told him that he had provided the DNA sample for a friend and information led the police to Colin Pitchfork . Pitchfork’s DNA was then proven to be a match for the semen found in both victims. Based on this evidence in January 1988 Pitchfork became the first ever person convicted based upon genetic fingerprinting and was then sentenced to life on both murders.

There can be no question that DNA’s genetic fingerprinting has proven to be an invaluable tool in both identifying the guilty and exonerating the innocent. And that those who are committed to fighting for justice by using DNA to exonerate the wrongfully convicted should be commended for their work. Barry Shack and the Innocence Project, as well as the many universities that now have similar projects, have brought hope to countless victims of injustice and have successfully brought justice to at least 200.

But the problem is that the success of of these numerous DNA exonerations have effectively stolen the limelight. Increasingly, because of all the attention on exonerations by DNA evidence, those who cannot prove their innocence by DNA – because it doesn’t exist or was lost by the state in their case – are ignored. Most of the Innocence Projects today will not even accept cases unless there is forensic evidence that can be subjected to DNA testing. Almost without exception, those exonerated by DNA evidence were convicted of sexual assaults, yet these crimes account for only a small percentage of those wrongfully convicted.

Historically most of those exonerated after being wrongfully convicted (and even condemned to death) never had any DNA evidence to prove their innocence – does this make them less innocent? If society and the judicial system place to much dependence upon DNA to prove a person’s innocence, then ultimately this dependence on DNA evidence as the litmus test of innocence will actually condemn far more innocent people that it will exonerate.

It is an unfortunate tragedy that there are very limited resources available to handle the many thousands of cases in which wrongfully convicted and even condemned prisoners allege innocence. Our judicial system generally has proven unwilling to provide legal support to the allegedly innocent and contemporary politics has resulted in Draconian procedural rules that actually make it almost impossible for a wrongfully convicted person to even argue – much less prove – his or her innocence.

Is it really fair that with all the attention on DNA and the vast majority if these limited resources available to the organization dedicated to fighting the injustices of wrongful convictions are now dedicated almost exclusively to cases where DNA evidence is an issue? What about the larger number of prisoners wrongfully convicted that do not have DNA evidence that are being deliberately ignored and forgotten?

Am I the only one troubled by the fact that in the numerous articles I read proclaiming the 200th person exonerated by DNA evidence this past week, not even one article mentioned that DNA exonerations actually account for only a small percentage of the cases in which the wrongfully convicted and condemned were subsequently exonerated and released? That in fact, DNA exonerations are almost exclusively limited to cases involving and alleged sexual assault and that of the now over 125 men and women exonerated and released from death row across the country in recent years, less than ten percent were exonerated by DNA evidence.

It is not my intent to negate the commendable job, Barry Scheck and many other dedicated lawyers associated with these Innocence Projects are doing. These are the hero’s of all those wrongfully convicted. But it is my belief that they have a responsibility to remind the public that DNA exonerations are actually only the more visible tip of the proverbial iceberg and that the greater mass if wrongful convictions cannot be so easily exposed by DNA testing. Without constantly reminding the public of this undeniable truth the greater injustice will be perpetuated by the very individuals so obviously and selflessly devoted to exposing injustice, as the general public becomes fixated on DNA evidence as the litmus test of innocence. As attention becomes increasingly focused on DNA exonerations inevitably overshadowing the significantly greater number of wrongful convictions that cannot be expose by DNA testing, then ultimately DNA will actually condemn far more innocent people than it will exonerate – and that would be the greater injustice.

~Mike~

Obstructing Justice – An Injustice Perpetuated By The Courts

2007-04-22T14:03:00.000-04:00

Justice delayed is justice denied – this seems like a simple and self-evident truth, but in our politically corrupt contemporary judicial system this truth takes on two completely different and conflicting meanings. Those familiar with this blog are already aware of the case of Mike Lambrix, who has now been on Florida’s death row for over 23 years, (See, Condemning An Innocent Man) and his continuous fight to compel the courts to expidite review of his appeals. For over 9 years Lambrix’s now substantiated claim of actual innocence has been pending before the lower state court despite Lambrix’s own aggressive efforts to compel the court to provide timely review and reach a final disposition in his case.

Confronted with the lower court and the state prosecutors consistently obstructing timely review Lambrix petitioned the Florida Supreme Court to compel that lower state court to expedited review, but that court refused to take any action. Lambrix has now filed a petition with the United States Supreme Court arguing that his protected constitutional right to timely review of his capital post conviction appeals has been violated -- but will the Supreme Court intervene and hold the state as equally accountable for unnecessary delays as it so often does in holing death row prisoners who fail to “timely” file their appeals? Or is the Supreme Court’s push to expedite a “finality” in capital cases only applicable when its objective is to carry out an execution – and not applicable when the objective is to expedite justice? (The petition can be read in its entirety here.)

If the courts and politicians are so committed to expediting review of capital post conviction appeals under the pretense of promoting a timely “finality,” then why is it they only want to expedite review when their objective is to carry out executions – and not when the state itself deliberately obstructs timely review of a legitimately pled claim of actual innocence? If this is really about objectively expediting a finality in capital cases, then shouldn’t both the courts and politicians be as equally committed to expediting review when a claim of actual innocence is raised as they are when they seek to expedite an execution?

But again, it’s not about expediting justice – it’s about expediting executions. Think about it… the only time politicians and courts pass laws that they claim are intended to speed up death row appeals is when these laws are imposed exclusively against the condemned prisoner. Not even once has Congress or The Supreme Court ever passed a law that imposes any form of sanctions against the state if and when the state is the party responsible for deliberately delaying timely review.

The public remains conveniently oblivious to the insidious nature of these politically motivated campaigns to expedite review of capital post conviction appeals – what it is really about is devising insidious ways to deliberately circumvent a full and fair review of capital cases. (See, Supreme Court Slams Death Row Appeals.) But when confronted with a timely filed and legitimately pled claim of actual innocence, the politicians and the courts no longer have an interest in pushing for an expedited review as if the wrongfully convicted and condemned person is then exonerated that exoneration undermines their true objective of promoting more executions.

The simple truth is that allowing wrongfully convicted and condemned prisoners to fairly prove their innocence undermines public confidence in the judicial system and erodes public support for the death penalty itself. In recent years over 125 men and women have been judicially exonerated and released from death rows across the county. As the public has become aware of the inherent fallibility of our judicial system support for capital punishment itself has substantially declined.

Incredibly, confronted with this substantial decline, both conservative politicians and the conservative judicial activists on our courts have responded by pushing for even more limitations on death row appeals, especially limiting collateral post conviction appeals – the very type of appeal traditionally used to expose an injustice. By devising disingenuous means in which to effectively procedurally bar condemned prisoners from pursuing these appeals – thus eliminating any means in which to present the evidence necessary to prove their innocence; the embarrassment of having so many wrongful convictions exposed is circumvented.

But is this insidious practice of deliberately circumventing review of a legitimate claim of actual innocence only really painting our judicial system into a corner? Although it can be argued that most of these death row claims of innocence are specious, at best, many of these seemingly specious claims have proven to be substantiated upon full review.

Public confidence in our judicial system is dependent upon the perceived integrity of the courts themselves. Even with a marginal majority of our population still supporting the death penalty, no person of moral conscience supports a system that would inevitably result in executing innocent people. Advocating the execution of a guilty person can be called “justice.” but inevitably executing even one innocent person can only be called murder and in a constitutional democracy advocating the execution of even one innocent person makes murderers out of all of us.

Assume for a moment that a condemned prisoner does develop evidence to substantiate his long pled claim of innocence. Before our society carries out that execution, don’t we have a moral obligation to fully a fairly address that claim of innocence? Equally so, when a condemned prisoner properly presents a legitimately pled claim of actual innocence to the courts, then don’t the courts themselves have a moral obligation to ensure that timely review is provided? If justice delayed is justice denied, then isn’t the ultimate injustice that of deliberately delaying the probably exoneration of an innocent man?

Think about it for a moment… what conceivable purpose does the state (or the courts) have in deliberately obstructing timely review of a legitimate actual innocence claim? Being wrongfully convicted and condemned to death itself is an injustice of such extreme proportion that it can never truly be remedied. Even if the innocent person is ultimately exonerated and released from death row, the actual irreparable injury of being condemned to death; the many years of solitary confinement confronting that unjustified sentence of death; has already been irreversibly inflicted and cannot be undone. ( See, Bowels of the Beast: Condemned to a Fate Worse Than Death).

Lambrix has already been on Florida’s death row well over 23 years, with his substantiated claim of actual innocence based upon exculpatory evidence deliberately concealed by the prosecutor now pending before the lower state court for over 9 years. If Lambrix’s claim has no merit, then why is the lower court and the state deliberately delaying review? Is Lambrix’s case an exception? Or is this deliberate deprivation of timely review of a substantiated claim of actual innocence actually a policy and practice condoned by the courts? Do our courts collaborate with the state to deliberately obstruct and deny timely review in capital cases that present a legitimate claim of actual innocence?

Consider the case of Frank Lee Smith, a poor man convicted of allegedly raping and killing an 8 year old girl in Broward County, Florida. There were no witnesses to the crime, but a witness did allegedly see him leaving the house where the little girl’s body was later found. For many years Smith screamed he was innocent to anyone who would listen—but very few would. After many years on death row the science of DNA testing was introduced into the judicial system and finally Smith had hope of proving his innocence.

In 1991 Smith’s court appointed lawyers filed the necessary legal action to have the evidence recovered at the crime scene tested, only to then have the State of Florida obstruct any DNA testing of that evidence. Smith’s case dragged out in the lower state court for many years when finally --9 years later!-- testing was completed and concluded that Smith actually was innocent – and even identified the true perpetrator.

But the injustice deliberately perpetuated against Frank lee Smith by allowing the state to deliberately obstruct timely review of his claim of innocence could never be remedied and justice could never be served – several moths before the DNA test results finally were released, Frank Lee Smith died of cancer while still on Florida’s death row. (See, Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied.)

By allowing the state to deliberately obstruct and delay timely review Smith’s exoneration was a hollow victory – Smith still died a wrongfully convicted and condemned man.

When our courts effectively collaborate with the state to deliberately obstruct and deny timely review of a legitimately pled claim of actual innocence then our courts themselves become responsible for perpetuating the ultimate injustice against an innocent man. The reality of it is that these same politicians and justices who relentlessly advocate expediting death row appeals under this pretense of promoting a timely “finality” actually only want to expedite executions – not justice.

If the Supreme Court is so willing to protect the states interest in expediting review of capital cases when the objective is to expedite executions, then why won’t the Supreme Court recognize the wrongfully convicted and condemned prisoner’s right to timely review of a legitimately pled claim of actual innocence?

When it comes down to it, our courts have a constitutional responsibility not only to enforce laws intended to punish the guilty but even more so, to protect the innocent from unjustified punishment. When our courts deliberately turn a blind eye when state prosecutors first wrongfully convict and condemn an innocent man, then when evidence of that prosecutorial misconduct is finally exposed, allows the state to deliberately deny timely review, effectively allowing the ultimate injustice to be indefinitely perpetuated against an innocent man, then our courts have failed to carry out their constitutional responsibility.

Equality and fairness are the cornerstones of justice. If our courts are willing to prohibit a condemned prisoner from filing a substantiated claim of innocence because he failed to timely file the claim (See, Herrara V. Collins 506 U.S. 390 (1993)), then equally so – when a condemned prisoner does timely file a legitimate claim of actual innocence and the state obstructs and denies timely review, then equality and fairness demand that the state be procedurally barred from any further defense, and relief summarily granted, as Lambrix now argues in his petition presently pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. To hold otherwise would only encourage the states to obstruct justice and the resulting injustice, would be perpetuated as a result of and by our courts.

(note: comments to this article are invited)

Supreme Court Reviews Southern Injustice

2007-04-15T14:55:00.000-04:00

With corruption and injustice within the judicial system becoming increasingly exposed through unconventional media sources, those want to seek out the truth are increasingly turning to the Internet to get the story. Those already familiar with this blog know of “southerninjustice.com,” a website dedicated to exposing the new face of bigotry and injustice in the south. Southern Injustice especially details the corruption within the 20th Circuit State Attorney’s Office of Southwest Florida, as although relatively small in size this one particular office presently has the highest rate of wrongful convictions in capital cases in the entire country.

Southern Injustice’s efforts to expose the corruption with this particular judicial circuit has only been going for about six months now, but has already drawn in thousands of supporters. Among the repeat visitors to this site is the Florida Supreme Court, which according to “Google Analytics” recently spent three days downloading content relating to information based upon public records regarding the 20th Circuit’s State Attorney’s Office. See, the evidence of these visits here.

Why would the Florida Supreme Court suddenly develop an interest in Southern Injustice and its content? Recently both the Miami Herald and the Ft Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel exposed a dirty, dark secret going on in the courts of South Florida when it was discovered that the state circuit courts in Broward and Dade Counties have been secretly working with prosecutors to fabricate false records to illegally protect “jailhouse snitches” and others. See, “Florida Courts Caught Fabricating Records.”

In Florida, as in most states, it is against the law to conceal court records unless the records are sealed by specific court order upon a showing of cause. The intent of the law is obvious – if court records are not open and available to the public, then public confidence can easily be undermined by projecting an appearance of something to hide. In America, our courts are constitutionally obligated to administer justice openly, not in dark rooms behind closed doors; they are also ethically mandated to be free from even any appearance of impropriety.

According to the investigative reports in the Miami Herald and Ft. Lauderdale Sun-Sentinel, the Broward and Dade County Courts deliberately fabricated records made available to the public while concealing the actual records. After this alleged misconduct was publicly exposed the matter was brought to the attention of the Florida Supreme Court. Immediately chief Justice Lewis promised a full investigation.

Southern Injustice has filed a formal complaint with the Florida Supreme Court concerning court records in the 20th Judicial Circuit. Although circuit court records are computerized or physically available at each county’s courthouse, the records in the capital case of Cary Michael Lambrix are not. Lambrix was tried, convicted, and condemned to death in rural Glades County, Florida in early 1984. When the Clerk of Court in Glades County was contacted, Southern Injustice was advised that all records are kept in Lee County (Ft. Myers). However, the clerk of the Court in Lee County claims that although the records are in Lee County, they do not know where. Both counties use a computerized docketing system, but neither could explain why the current Lambrix case files were not on their computerized system and were not accessible to the public. While they were both aware he had been convicted and condemned to death, they assured Southern Injustice that nothing had been filed on this case since 1992.

Why would the current court records in the Lambrix case be illegally concealed from the public? To understand the motivations of those who do not want these records readily accessible, a brief history of this case helps. The case brought against Lambrix over 24 years ago was wholly circumstantial – there were no eyewitnesses, no physical or forensic evidence, and no confessions. As the local prosecutor Randall McGruther conceded to the jury the entire case was built upon the testimony of Lambrix’s then recently estranged ex-girlfriend Frances Smith (now Frances Ottinger) who conveniently claimed Lambrix had told her he committed this brutal double murder only after she was herself arrested and in unrelated felonies.

Lambrix adamantly insisted that he was innocent and that the state and key witness Smith deliberately fabricated the specious, wholly circumstantial theory of premeditated murder. The jury was not allowed to hear that she actually told the police numerous stories before coming up with the one that conveniently won her immunity from any prosecution. Nor was the jury allowed to know that she failed a state administered polygraph prior to trial. In fact the jury was led to believe that she was not given any deal for her testimony and let her get away with saying under oath she wasn’t given anything for her cooperation. Then Lambrix himself was prohibited from personally testifying, leaving her testimony unchallenged. See, “Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man” Lambrix was convicted and condemned to death and has been on death row now since March 1984.

Throughout these many years Lambrix has remained on death row even coming within hours of actual execution – but still adamantly insisting on his innocence, steadfastly claiming the circumstantial case was deliberately fabricated.

Then on 1998 the only other witness who corroborated key witness Smith’s claim that Lambrix admitted committing these murders stepped forward and admitted under oath her testimony claiming Lambrix told her he had committed this crime was not true. See, “Woman Recants Testimony.”

Hearings were subsequently held at which time this witness testified that both key witness Smith and the State’s investigator coerced her to provide that false testimony against Lambrix. When Lambrix’s own lawyers then looked into these claims, even more evidence was revealed – key witness Smith was actually having a secret affair with the local state attorney’s lead investigator, Robert Daniels, while Lambrix was prosecuted. See, “Witness Admits Affair.”

In fact, records show that investigator Daniels was the very person who swore out the affidavit leading to Lambrix’s arrest, then personally supervised the development of the specious circumstantial evidence used to corroborate key witness Smith’s own testimony. Of course, the jury was not aware of this intimate relationship between the key witness and Investigator Daniels.

As the evidence substantiating Lambrix’s long pled claim of innocence began to accumulate, a funny thing happened – inexplicitly, all the court files in this case were suddenly transferred from Glades County to Lee County (Ft. Myers) and public access prohibited. Could the Florida Supreme Court now be looking into this illegal concealment of public court records? But why would Circuit Court Judge R. Thomas Corbin, who has presided over this case since 1998, remove the files of a capital case and effectively prohibit public access?

To address that question we must go back to the fact that this judicial circuit presently has the highest rate of wrongful convictions in capital cases in the entire country. The prosecutor, Randall McGruther who put Lambrix on death row has a significant history of alleged misconduct that includes sending at least one other subsequently exonerated man to death row. McGruther is now the Chief Assistant State Attorney in that judicial circuit.

In recent months Southern Injustice has investigated Lambrix’s case and obtained public records relevant to that state attorney’s office that exposes a troubling truth. Quite simply, this 20th Judicial Circuit State Attorney’s Office has been, and continues to be, controlled by an inner circle of college classmates and alumni of Florida’s Stetson University… it’s a virtual Southern style “good ole boys” club of college buddies who consistently cover for each other to avoid exposure of alleged and apparently systemic prosecutorial misconduct. See, “Anatomy of a Corrupt Prosecutor.”

But this apparent corruption reaches beyond the local state attorney’s office as review of public records show that this Stetson “good ole boy’s club” also controls the local circuit courts. Again, when looking into the Lambrix case Southern Injustice discovered that although the case is assigned to Circuit Court Judge R. Thomas Corbin, it is actually managed by Senior Staff Attorney Steven A, Hooper and supervised by the Chief Administrative Judge Hugh Cary --both of whom are closely connected to The prosecuotr on Lambrix's case either through having gone to Stetson University Law School or who were originally recruited by and worked with the prosecutor Randall McGruther and elected State Attorney Steve Russell. See, our connection chart here.

As if this was not enough, further review of court records revealed that the Senior Staff Attorney Stephen A. Hooper now controlling this case in Judge Corbin’s Court was previously assigned to Circuit Court Judge Thomas Reese in 1994 when Judge Reese presided over Lambrix’s earlier post conviction appeal arguing his actual innocence, which was “procedurally barred” from review upon the pled merits… apparently, Stephen Hooper’s job is to make sure the Lambrix case is not heard.

Unable to credibly dispute Lambrix’s now substantiated claim of innocence, those responsible for perpetuating this deliberate injustice against Lambrix are now obstructing timely review of Lambrix’s “actual innocence” appeal, which has now been pending before the lower state court for over 9 years. See, “Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied.”

Lambrix has recently filed a petition with the U.S. Supreme Court (Lambrix v. Florida, case #06-9634) in which Lambrix argues that the failure to provide timely review of his pled claim or actual innocence in the lower state court violates his constitutional right to meaningful post conviction appellate review, entitling him to have his convictions automatically vacated. The petition can be read in its entirety here. Also see, Does the Supreme Court Suborn Perjury in Capital Cases?

But with the undisputable influence of the local state attorney’s office corrupting any chance of receiving full and fair review of Lambrix’s pled claim of actual innocence before the lower court, how can there be any hope that justice will prevail in this case? Lambrix has already attempted to compel the Florida Supreme Court to intervene, but they refused to address the petition until after the circuit court’s review.

What this Lambrix case is increasingly exposing is a corruption not simply of a single capital case, but of an entire judicial circuit. Southern Injustice has received letters from numerous other prisoners presently incarcerated after being convicted of crimes within the 20th Judicial Circuit and a pattern of “win by any means necessary” prosecutorial misconduct is indisputably emerging.

Could it be as this corruption is finally now being publicly exposed the Florida Supreme Court is beginning to take notice? Do we dare hope that a formal investigation of the 20th Judicial Circuit’s Stetson University “good ole boy club” may finally be imminent? If you haven’t already read the website www.southerninjustice.com, you should now do so now… has justice in the Deep South really changed?

~Info~

“Does The Supreme Court Suborn Perjury In Capital Cases?”

2007-04-03T19:33:00.000-04:00

Our Judicial system is the very foundation upon which our constitutional democracy stands – yet increasingly that foundation is becoming nothing more than shifting sands so easily manipulated by deliberate deception. The sacred concepts of truth and justice have given way to a system in which lawyers win at any cost. Without truth, there can be no hope for justice, and without justice there can be no hope in sustaining our constitutional democracy.

For several weeks now the headlines across the country have told the story of Attorney General Alberto Gonzales being “under the gun” for acts of misconduct within the Attorney General’s Office. Repeatedly it has been found that the Attorney General’s Office has deliberately deceived both Congress and the public in the matter of why numerous prosecutors were fired.

Confronted with this pattern of deceptions Congress has called for formal hearings to discern the truth only to have President Bush obstruct their proceedings by refusing to cooperate. Once again declaring that he has absolute confidence in a number of his inner circle, Bush blindly stands behind Attorney General Gonzales – just as he did for numerous other appointees when their integrity and competence were publicly questioned. One could even argue that the surest way to predict a soon to be announced resignation by one of Bush’s inner circle is to have Bush publicly declare his confidence in that individual.

The public is becoming increasingly familiar with this song and dance as those we place our trust in are subsequently exposed as corrupt. If our top prosecutors such as Alberto Gonzales will obstruct the truth from being revealed, then what does that say about the integrity of our judicial system itself?

Although the matter concerning Alberto Gonzales is played in the front page of most daily newspapers across the country, a far more insidious example of suborning deception and perjury can be found in a matter pending before the U.S. Supreme Court. Is it possible that our Supreme Court itself actively encourages governmental lawyers to commit perjury and protects these lawyers by granting them absolute immunity from accountability?

What does it say about our American legal system when at the highest levels of our judiciary -- The Supreme Court Justices knowingly turn a blind eye to governmental lawyers who deliberately misrepresent facts with the intent to deceive the Court? The truth is that these state lawyers know that the courts will protect them even when they commit perjury, and that it has come to the point where truth and integrity mean so very little to our Supreme Court that material misrepresentations of for (or in simpler language, deliberate lies) have become a way of life… a way to deliberately circumvent the truth.

Several months ago death sentenced prisoner Michael Lambrix, unable to obtain legal counsel, filed a “pro se” (acting as his own lawyer) petition in the U.S. Supreme Court arguing that the State of Florida has denied him timely review of his pled and substantiated actual innocence claims. See, Lambrix v. Florida, U.S. Ct. Case #06-9634 (The full Petition can be read here) and also please read, “Condemning An Innocent Man” (Full length summary of the Lambrix case from the time of his arrest, through the trial, the appellate process, and finally the new evidence uncovered that substantiates his long pled claim of innocence.)

Mr. Lambrix argues that in January 19998 his state appointed lawyer filed an appeal in the lower state court arguing an actual innocence claim. Now, well over 9 years later that appeal remains pending despite Lambrix’s repeated and even relentless efforts to expedite review and reach a final disposition. At the time in which the Supreme Court aggressively pushes to expedite capital state post conviction proceedings, under what conceivable circumstance could any state post conviction appeal remain pending before a single court for over 9 years?

Quite simply, the evidence supporting Lambrix’s pled claims that the local state attorney’s office deliberately conspired and collaborated with the sole key witness to fabricate the entire wholly circumstantial case brought against Lambrix, is now, so overwhelming that it cannot be denied. See, Southern Injustice: The New face of Bigotry and Injustice in the South. Unable to discredit Lambrix's claims of innocence, the state has instead decided to deliberately perpetuate this injustice by obstructing and denying timely review -- effectively holding the case hostage in the lower state court, refusing to allow it to proceed. See, “Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied.”

Determined to bring an end to this nightmare of injustice, Lambrix filed a petition in the Florida Supreme Court attempting to compel that Court to take the action necessary to force the lower court to expedite review and make a ruling. However, Florida’s Senior Assistant Attorney General Carol Dittmar convinced the Florida Supreme Court that Lambrix was prohibited from petitioning the Court for relief as only the state appointed supervised post conviction counsel could file any action in the case – Lambrix had no right to personally address the Court. The Florida Supreme Court blindly adopted this pathetically disingenuous argument in an unprecedented ruling, refusing to compel the lower state court to provide timely review. See, Florida Supreme Court Says, “No Right To Expedited Review of Actual Innocence Claim.”

Lambrix then initiated the now pending Petition in the U.S. Supreme Court. In a response to this petition submitted by Senior Assistant Attorney General Carol Dittmar, the State of Florida again is attempting to manipulate the Court to circumvent review of the issue of whether a capital post conviction (death-sentenced) prisoner has any enforceable right to reasonably timely review of a pled and substantiated claim of actual innocence Once again Florida’s legal counsel Carol Dittmar has filed an action saturated with deliberate deceptions and factual misrepresentations intended to deceive the Supreme Court. (Both Ms. Dittmar’s response and Mr. Lambrix's reply to that response will be posted in their entirety on this site within the next week.)

Why has our contemporary judicial system become so inherently corrupted that even a capital defendant arguing a substantiated claim of actual innocence cannot even hope that truth and justice will prevail? Because those at the highest levels of our state and federal judiciaries refuse to take any action against these morally and ethically corrupt state prosecutors who repeatedly resort to deliberate misrepresentations and outright lies to defend against claims. See, “Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice?.”

What is even more tragic is that our courts themselves have lost their own moral compass – truth and integrity mean nothing in today’s judicial system. State lawyers such as Senior Assistant Attorney General Carol Dittmar know that they can flagrantly commit perjury before even the highest Court as they know the Court will not even concern itself with discerning the truth, much less take any disciplinary action against corrupt state lawyers who do unethically perjure themselves with complete impunity.

Under the pretense of a “conservative judicial agenda,” today’s courts would rather deliberately put an innocent man to death than expose an injustice. Incredibly, many of these so-called conservatives adopt a philosophy that it is acceptable to execute an innocent man as the Constitution does not protect the innocent from being executed – it only protects the right to a fair trial. See, Blessings of Liberty in the Land of the Free. Unless a factually innocent man (or woman) can show that he was denied a “fair trial” and show it within the statutorily mandated time limits; innocence is irrelevant.

How can anyone have any confidence in such a system? In case after case we see that the corruption of the system itself is the product of corrupt state attorneys who will do anything to win at any cost. See,"The Anatomy of A Corrupt Prosecutor". Truth and integrity are no longer relevant… only winning matters and state prosecutors such as Senior Assistant Attorney General Carol Dittmar knows that the only way to climb that politically controlled career ladder is to do whatever it takes to win – even put innocent men and women to death.

Is our own Supreme Court suborning perjury? Of course they are -- just watch as this case unfolds and you will see that the Supreme Court, even when it is brought to their attention that Ms. Dittmar has flagrantly misrepresenting material facts with the intent to deceive the Court, the Court will not make any attempt to discern the truth. To knowingly turn a blind eye when lawyers commit perjury is to encourage and invite unethical behaviors. By refusing to take action against parties that violate ethical standards; the Supreme Court does induce and suborn perjury.

Justice can never prevail when truth itself becomes irrelevant. In the words of President Abraham Lincoln, “Evil can only prevail when good men choose to do nothing!” There can be no greater within our judicial system than the deliberate disregard of the sacred concepts of truth and justice within our court system… justice can only hope to prevail when truth itself is religiously protected and preserved. The Supreme Court has a moral and ethical obligation to aggressively take action against any party who dares to misrepresent material facts before it – but today’s Supreme Court will do nothing.

When a state attorney general can appear before our Supreme Court and so blatantly defend against a state prisoners substantiated claim of actual innocence by presenting deliberate material misrepresentations intended to intentionally deceive the Court, and be so confident that they can do so with complete impunity, knowing full well that the Court will not take action against a state lawyer; then that itself provides a telling commentary on the integrity of today’s judicial system as a whole.

This is the greater tragedy… this unethical and contemptuous action by Senior Assistant Attorney General Carol Dittmar will be rewarded by the court because the Supreme Court itself has become so corrupt by its own bias against capital (death sentenced) prisoners that truth and justice are irrelevant. But consider this… when the very least of our society can no longer come before our courts with any hope of having truth and justice prevail, then the very soul of our constitutional democracy itself has now been executed at the hands of these conservatives who adhere to the philosophy that it is far better to execute an innocent man than to expose an injustice that might embarrass the judicial system and undermine the public’s confidence.

Don’t these conservative justices get it? The greatest threat to undermining public confidence in the judicial system is not exposing injustices, but eroding the sacred concepts of truth and justice. The integrity of our judicial system is dependent upon the Court’s willingness to protect truth allowing anyone to appear before the court and deliberately deceive the Court with complete impunity is the greatest threat. Eliminate integrity and there can be no justice.

A Laugh A Day Keeps the Executioner Away

2007-04-01T15:09:00.000-04:00

I’ve got some really great new that I’d like to share with those out there who are concerned that many, including myself, may face an unjustified execution at the state’s corrupt hands. We have the power to now effectively abolish the death penalty… honest. All we have to do is truly believe and za-sham, no more executioners.

As many of us know the latest feel-good fad sweeping America is a book by now best-selling author Rhonda Byrne, “The Secret.” Already dear Oprah has devoted two entire shows to this book and sales have gone into the millions as those looking for a quick fix run to their nearest bookstore and buy into this pseudo-scientific babble.

Basically the premise of this latest craze is a contemporary application of the long talked of “Law of Attraction,” which preaches that each of us can miraculously change any circumstance in our life by positive thinking – just ask and believe and it will be. It’s so simple kids can even do it. Then again, the blind and trusting faith of a child helps facilitate this concept.

Myself I think Rhonda Byrne is a genius – but not because she’s now sharing “The Secret” with the masses. Rather, after years as a rather unsuccessful television producer she realized her own true calling… a master thief. Her recent best selling book is really nothing more than glamorized theft of the thoughts and ideas if the renowned and respected Pentecostal minister Norman Vincent Peale, who during the dark days if the American Depression (early 1930’s) ministered to the less fortunate on the streets of New York city. He shared a message of hope and faith to the down trodden and depressed; listing them from their own circumstances.

Many years later Norman Vincent Peale wrote a book called “The Power of Positive Thinking” in which he provided the message that Rhonda Byrne now preaches as if her own. With the donations and profits derived form his inspirational messages Peale established the still open “center for Positive Thinking” about an hour North of New York City. This was and still remains the legacy of a man who was motivated by his selfless desire to help those less fortunate. Yet in just a few months Rhonda Byrne has now shanghaied his message and made millions of dollars with the help of apparently clueless Oprah Winfrey – and how much of that money will be going to help those less fortunate or establish a foundation intended to perpetuate the gift so free given to others.

But what of the message itself? Can there be any truth to this “Secret?” Can in be that all I’ve really got to do to hold the executioner at bay is believe that it won’t happen? Could it really be that simple?

I believe in the power of faith and the perseverance of hope. But I do not and I cannot believe in the American judicial system. If all it takes is believing then perhaps rather than beg so many to simply care enough to help expose my wrongful conviction I should instead stand at my death row cell door clicking my heels together, chanting repeatedly, “there’s no place like home.” That worked for Dorothy as I saw it myself on T.V. So I know it has to be true, right?

But as I read Rhonda Byrne’s twist on Norman Vincent Peale’s inspirational message, even if I could get beyond my belief that she’s stealing an idea that was intended to help those less fortunate and shamelessly exploiting it through mass market sensationalism – all for her own selfish profit, then how do I get over the even greater obstacle in my ability to have faith in this corrupt system? How do I overcome my knowledge of just how inherently corrupt our judicial system is?

Perhaps if I believe strong enough those prosecutors who are perpetuating this injustice against me will miraculously develop a moral conscience and bow their heads in shame and admit that they were wrong. But the problem with that is that these parasitic prosecutors are psychopaths that prey upon those unable to defend against the seemingly infinite resources of the state, targeting those socially and financially disadvantaged for wrongful prosecution – convicting and condemning innocent men and women for no reason but to advance their own careers by maintaining a high conviction rate. See, “Southern Injustice: Exposing the New Face of Bigotry and Injustice in The South.” at (www.southerninjustice.com) and rather than address why these state sanctioned serial killers simply have no conscience. My common sense tells me that you simply cannot appeal to the conscious of a person who by their very nature has no conscience.

What if these state prosecutors who are already personally responsible for innocent people having been wrongfully convicted and condemned to death now miraculously did develop a conscience? Would they admit they were wrong? The fact is that despite over 125 men and women being exonerated and released from death row across the country, I have yet to see even one prosecutor actually admit that maybe – just maybe they were wrong, which brings us back to my belief that these prosecutors are cold blooded psychopathic state sanctioned serial killers not at all unlike a blood crazed rabid dog – and we all watched “Ole Yeller” and know that there’s really only one way to cure a rabid dog.

The problem is there’s virtually no accountability… these prosecutors act with complete impunity, knowing that the judicial system will protect them from being held accountable even if they deliberately coerce witnesses to lie, fabricate evidence and deliberately send an innocent man to death row. See, Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice?

What has to be understood is the corruption that drives these parasites. Most prosecutors actually do follow the law and their own conscience – but it’s the relatively few who are corrupted by the power entrusted in them and rather than seek justice the job becomes a means in which to build their own career… by any means necessary. Not surprisingly when wrongful convictions are exposed a pattern begins to show that it’s the same state attorneys who break the law to wrongfully convict and condemn innocent men and women. That a relatively small group of corrupt state attorneys actually account for an alarming rate of wrongful convictions and yet the judicial system continues to protect them, even promoting them to higher office rather than tar and feather them as it should be. See, "The Anatomy of A Corrupt Prosecutor".

If only it were so simple as to just believe that an injustice could come to and end by believing in the power of positive thought. But then, how much faith could a person out into a message from a person who shamelessly stole the concept from someone who intended only good for it?

The good news is that a few weeks ago I read an article in the USA Today newspaper that I can believe in. (See, USA Today, March 12th, 2007 “A laugh a day may help keep death farther away.”) According to this scientific study conducted at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology having a sense of humor has now been proven to prolong a person’s life. And I’ve now got it in writing, conveniently taped to the space over the door of my death row cell. If the power of positive thought can move mountains and make miracles happen, then just imagine what I can accomplish with the power of a sense of humor! A laugh a day keeps the executioner away – bite me, you slimy bastard! Ha Ha Ha! See, now I know the true “Secret” – all I got to do is stand at my cell door clicking my heels together chanting “There’s no place like home” repeatedly while spontaneously laughing and I can escape the executioner… they can’t kill a crazy man, right? Beam me up, Scotty, the jokes on them. (And now I close with a big smile!)

Supreme Court Slams Death Row Appeals

2007-03-27T12:10:00.000-04:00

On February 20th, 2007 the U.S. Supreme Court issued its long awaited decision in Lawrence v. Florida (case number 05-8820), which raised the question of whether the 1 year statute of limitations for seeking federal habeas relief from a state court judgment is tolled while an “application for state post conviction or other collateral review” is pending. Ina typically marginal 5 to 4 vote, the court decided that the statutorily defined one year limit to initiate a federal habeas following exhaustion of state appellate review is not tolled pending the discretionary review by way of petition for writ of certiorari from a state court denial of a collateral appeal.

Why is this even important? It seems to be just a technical ruling that doesn’t mean much to anyone. But in truth it is a substantial ruling that will immediately effect at least 20 Florida death row prisoners who, because their state appointed post conviction counsel failed to “timely” file their original (first) federal habeas within the statutorily required one year, they are now procedurally barred from pursuing any federal review whatsoever.

The right to pursue Writ of Habeas Corpus is one of the most sacred rights evolving from common law upon which our Constitution itself was conceived. In fact, the U.S. Constitution prohibits suspension of the Writ except in times of war or civil unrest.

However, these conservative justices are splitting hairs. Constitutionally, the power to establish the rules governing habeas corpus belong to Congress, not to the court. With the backlash of the 1996 Oklahoma City bombing and the intent to expedite more executions Congress passed substantial “reforms” on the federal habeas corpus statutes, which severely limits the federal courts jurisdiction to review state court criminal convictions. Among these draconian rules was the rule that allows only one year from the time the state conviction is affirmed on “direct appeal” to file your federal habeas corpus.

This rule is “jurisdictional,” so any failure to file on time subjects the condemned prisoner to a procedural default that prohibits the federal court from hearing the case – they are legally prohibited from reviewing the pled claims of constitutional error, even substantiated claims of actual innocence! See, Blessings of Liberty in the Land of the Free.

In the Lawrence v. Florida case, condemned prisoner Gary Lawrence and many others argued that the failure to timely file their original federal habeas was the fault of the state appointed post conviction counsel and that they did not voluntarily waive their rights. In a (again) technical argument, they claimed that because the law was ambiguous and reasonable counsel may have mistakenly assumed that the time to file continued to be tolled while certiorari review to the U.S. Supreme Court upon denial of state court review of post conviction relief was pursued.

Alternatively, if the time could not be “equitably tolled” due to counsel’s inadvertent error, then death row inmates should be allowed an exemption from procedural bar under the argument that this state appointed and supervised post conviction counsel failed to provide reasonably competent representation.

In an opinion written by none other than ultra-conservative, pro death penalty advocate Justice Clarence Thomas, the Supreme Court slammed the door upon all these condemned prisoners by clearly finding that (and I quote) “Lawrence argues that his counsel’s mistakes in miscalculating the limitations period entitles him to equitable tolling. If credited, this argument would essentially equitably toll limitation periods for every person whose attorney missed a deadline. Attorney miscalculations are simply not sufficient to warrant equitable tolling, particularly in the post conviction context where prisoners have no constitutional right to counsel. e.g. Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U.S. 722, 756-57 (1991)”

“Lawrence argues that his case presents special circumstances because the state courts appointed and supervised his counsel. But a states effort to assist prisoners in post conviction proceedings does not make the state accountable for a prisoners delay. Lawrence has not alleged that the state prevented him from hiring his own attorney or from representing himself. It would be perverse indeed if providing prisoners with post conviction counsel deprived states of the benefit of the AEDPA (Anti Terrorist and Effective Death Penalty Act of 1996) statutes of limitations” (end quote)

Not surprisingly, fellow death penalty advocates and ultra conservative zealots Chief Justice Roberts and Justices Scalia, Alito, and Kennedy sided with Justice Thomas in this draconian decision while four justices (Ginsburg, Stevens, Souter, and Breyer) condemned the marginal majority for their pathetically disingenuous manipulation of constitutional law to simply facilitate their own agenda of expediting executions even at the cost of innocent lives.

But what is even far more troubling is what this opinion does not say, but was in fact raised in a comprehensive “Americus” brief filed by the ACLU – that Lawrence is actually only one of many Florida death row prisoners now being subjected to procedural default and completely deprived of any federal appellate review of their convictions and sentences of death for non reason but the lawyers assigned to represent them failed to timely file their appeals. In fact, this decision will now make at least 20 Florida death row prisoners eligible for execution without any federal reviewing their claims of constitutional error.

For those unfamiliar with the legal system this may not seem to be that big of an issue. But historically many innocent men and women were saved from state execution only because of federal court intervention. By manipulating procedural rules to effectively deny a large number of condemned prisoners federal court review of their convictions – some of whom are attempting to argue actual innocence – the Supreme court has now substantially increased the probability that innocent men and women will be executed.

Another extremely troubling aspect of this decision is that regarding the counsel “appointed and supervised by the state” what Justice Thomas didn’t talk about is the manner in which the post conviction counsel is appointed in Florida.

In all of these cases the post conviction counsel was appointed and supervised by the state controlled agency called “Commission on Capital cases.” This agency is an extension of the Florida State Legislature, created with the intent to find ways to expedite more executions. To accomplish that specific agenda this agency was given statutory power to appoint counsel for death row prisoners.

But anyone bothering to look at who controls this agency would be extremely troubled by the obvious political agenda – take a look at the board of directors that control that agency. For example, when now recently elected Governor “Chaingang Charlie” Crist was then the elected Attorney General for the State of Florida and personally in charge of pushing for executions of condemned prisoners, his own brother Florida Senator Victor Crist was appointed to the board of directors overseeing the appointment of lawyers for death row prisoners. However, nobody challenged this obvious conflict of interest.

Florida knows that they must provide lawyers to condemned prisoners or they cannot execute them. But Florida also knows that, as Justice Thomas has now again said, that all that is required is a lawyer – it does not require a competent, or qualified lawyer. And when the lawyer does fail to provide competent legal representation the condemned prisoner does not have any means to correct that error.

Under this system if a morally corrupt politician wanted to deliberately circumvent the condemned prisoners constitutional right to meaningful appellate review, this could easily be accomplished by simply forming a state controlled office that could deliberately appoint incompetent lawyers to represent death row prisoners, thus reducing the entire post conviction appellate review process to a pretense and expedite the execution of death row prisoners, including those with legitimate claims of innocence.

Wake up America -- this is what is happening in Florida!! See, Legal Representation In Capital Cases – Privilege or Pretense? But nobody is willing to stand up for those condemned. Even though the American Bar Association released a comprehensive report that graphically shows how Florida’s death penalty system is fundamentally flawed last summer, no one has demanded a moratorium on executions until Florida addresses and fixes this corrupt system.

Already Florida leads the country in the number of wrongful convictions in capital cases with a small number of state attorneys accounting for record numbers of innocent men and women being condemned to death. See, “Southern Injustice: Exposing the New Face of Bigotry and Injustice in The South” at (www.southerninjustice.com) and rather than address why Florida has such a high number of wrongful convictions Florida instead is devising ways to deny review of post conviction appeals – by circumventing review of the innocence claims, seeing that they are not heard, and putting the condemned to death without any opportunity to even establish their innocence.

Why aren’t more people concerned about this corruption of justice? As I’ve often quotes in earlier articles –“Evil can only triumph when good men (and women) chose to do nothing.” What have you done to address this matter? I would ask you to now read more at (www.southerninjustice.com) -- only by becoming aware of this evil that exists (See, The Greater Evil".) can we ever hope to purge our judicial system of those who will kill innocent men and women to advance their own political careers. Becoming aware of this corruption is the first step to confronting this evil and as a matter of moral conscience we all owe it to the society we exist in to stand up and confront this evil now.

Justice Department Seeks To Speed Up Executions

2007-03-26T22:41:00.000-04:00

At a time when public support for capital punishment is declining even faster than President Bush’s popularity ratings, a study commissioned by the National Institute of Justice (N.I.J.), which is a branch of the Justice Department itself, has concluded that it takes far too long to carry out executions and that its time for the federal government to find ways to speed these executions up and make executions even more frequent.

This selective study completed by Professors Barry Latzer and James Cauthen at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York allegedly examined 1,676 death sentences in only 14 subjectively hand picked “representative” states involving only sentences imposed between 1992 and 2002. This N.I.J. study was intended to provide a federally sanctioned attack on an earlier comprehensive study done by Professor James Liebman of Columbia University, released in 2000, which concluded that the contemporary death penalty system is “fundamentally flawed.” In that study, Professor Liebman examined all death sentence capital cases from 1973 to 1995 and found that over 60% of all death sentences were overturned on appellate review.

In a desperate attempt to discredit that Liebman study, the present conservative controlled Justice Department attempts to manipulate the results of their own limited study. The N.I.J. study suggests that the Liebman study improperly examined all death sentences imposed since 1973 during a time that the U.S. Supreme Court was still rewriting applicable law governing death penalty cases, thereby resulting in a high rate of reversals. However, The N.I.J. study does not suggest that the Liebman study is inaccurate – it only suggests that by limiting reviews of capital cases to death sentences imposed from 1992 through 2002 the rate of reversals in only those 14 representative states are significantly less than the Liebman study suggests.

However, even in attempting to manipulate the results by selecting a much narrower pool of cases examined, the recent N.I.J. study still concedes that even in these hand picked “representative” cases, at least 26% of the death sentences imposed were subsequently overturned on appellate review, which means that even by this obviously biased study intended to promote faster and more frequent executions, these kill-em-all proponents concede that one out of every four people sentenced to death are wrongfully condemned.

Can you even imagine the trauma inflicted upon those wrongfully condemned to death -- the trauma they must endure because of that unjustified imposition of a sentence of death? See, “Bowels of the Beast: Condemned to a Fate Worse Than Death” at (www.southerninjustice.com/bowels.htm)If the conservative’s own study finds such an alarming rate of improperly imposed sentences of death, then how can any person of moral conscience still express support for the death penalty? Much less continue to advocate expediting executions – to push for faster and more frequent executions means even further limiting of appellate review, which will inevitably result in error not being corrected and innocent men executed.

The only too obvious true intent of this N.I.J. study is revealed in reading its expressed agenda – to find ways to speed up executions on the pretense that by not killing the condemned faster and more frequently, the victims families are traumatized and the states must bear the burden of millions of dollars in costs to unnecessarily house these condemned men and women while the pursue their appeals. But the study does not even mention the infliction of trauma on those one out of four men and women wrongly condemned to death, or their families.

Conveniently, this N.I.J. study does not mention that over 125 men and woman have been judicially exonerated and released from death rows across the country; after being found to have been wrongfully convicted and condemned to death. Nor does it address the fact that the leading cause of wrongful convictions in capital cases is prosecutorial misconduct – in too many cases prosecutors have deliberately concealed evidence that if exposed would have proven the person’s innocence. See,
Condemning An Innocent Man.

By now pushing to expedite executions by even further limiting appellate review it is clearly a pathetically disingenuous attempt to accomplish the conservatives true agenda – further limiting appellate review would mean that substantially fewer wrongful capital convictions will be revealed; that even legitimate claims of actual innocence will be procedurally barred from appellate review. See, Blessings of Liberty in the Land of the Free.

These rabid conservatives are concerned that with the escalating rate of wrongful convictions exposed the public’s confidence in the judicial system will suffer – they would rather have the innocent victims of the ultimate miscarriage of justice murdered by the state, than allow the judicial system and its inherent fallibility to be increasingly exposed.

Additionally, the N.I.J. study fails to recognize that the leading cause of substantial delays in reaching finality in capital cases is the campaign of politically motivated interference with the process itself, which is a direct result of politicians passing one law after another in an attempt to circumvent review. The capital post conviction process itself has become inherently complex, requiring specialized lawyers and lengthy judicial review of complex questions that often revolve around the applicability of statutorily created procedural rules before actual claims of error can even be addressed. It is this insidious political interference as politicians all but openly compete with each other to promote “bills” to expedite executions that cause substantial delays. Adopting even more procedural rules under the pretense of promoting faster executions will, in fact, only slow the process down even further.

If the Justice Department really wants to objectively expedite the finality of capital convictions, then perhaps it’s time to impose restrictions on the politically motivated interference and tell those parasitic politicians systematically engaging in Machiavellian type plots to maliciously circumvent full and fair review to crawl back under their rocks and leave the system alone. Politics and justice do not mix.

Incredibly, even with the alarming rate of wrongful convictions and the unjustified imposition of death sentences subsequently reversed, the Justice Department has yet to commission a study to examine why this error rate is so high and what can be done to reduce making victims of those wrongly convicted and condemned.

Perhaps if the “Justice” Department was truly interested in promoting and preserving justice, it would commission a comprehensive study on the cause of this unconscionably high rate of wrongful capital convictions and find ways to prevent innocent men and women from being sent to death row in the first place, thus restoring the public confidence in the judicial system itself. Certainly there must be someone within the Justice Department to realize that by disingenuously finding ways to cover up wrongful convictions, inevitably the public’s confidence will suffer even more than by simply admitting the present system’s imperfections and constructively trying to find ways to minimize the improper imposition of death sentences in the first place.

The bottom line is that the death penalty is about politicians, not justice. The primary reason that the death penalty continues to be practiced in this country is because politicians exploit it to win votes. Politicians shamelessly exploit the trauma inflicted upon the families of victims under the pretense of pursuing justice knowing full well that if they were truly interested in sparing the victim’s families prolonged trauma and instill a sense of finality in a timely manner, they would abolish the death penalty and replace it with a life sentence with no possibility of parole – as many states that do not have the death penalty already have done. The victim’s families have already suffered an immeasurable trauma – they deserve the expedited finality only abolishing the death penalty can provide, not being dragged through the courts for years reliving that trauma.

But if we truly do want to debate the inherent fundamental flaws within the present death penalty system; then let’s start by looking at the alarming rate of wrongful convictions as illustrated in “Southern Injustice: Exposing the New Face of Bigotry and Injustice in The South” at (www.southerninjustice.com), and take an even closer look at the leading cause for their unconscionably high rate of wrongful capital convictions – politically ambitious prosecutors manipulating the judicial system to unethically win at any cost must be held accountable, especially prosecutors who have a history of repeatedly violating laws to wrongfully convict and condemn innocent men for no other reason but to promote their own political ambitions. See, Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice? and "The Anatomy of A Corrupt Prosecutor".

If the Justice Department wants to actually promote justice, then they should look at and find constructive solutions to actually prevent miscarriages of justice, not use taxpayer money in a desperate attempt to manipulate the system in an obvious and insidious attempt to circumvent the judicial review necessary to exposed the innocence of those being victimized by the ultimate miscarriage of justice. Finding ways to execute innocent men and women before they can prove their innocence is not justice – expediting review in capital cases will only result in innocent men and women being executed -- and in our society, even the possibility of that inevitable result – should be intolerable.

Prosecutor Charged With Sexual Molestation

2007-03-23T10:21:00.000-04:00

It took federal agents in the Justice Department to end a campaign of alleged sexual molestation of inmates by a districts attorney in Franklin County, Alabama. This past month the now former district attorney John Pilati was indicted on federal charges that accused him of sexually molesting young men after they were forced to strip naked for searches at a local detention facility. John Pilati, of Russellville, Alabama will only face four misdemeanor civil rights violations, as the federal authorities do not have jurisdiction to pursue actual sex crimes against him.

Why did the federal agents have to investigate this reign of terror by a prosecutor who considered himself above the law? Because these southern judicial circuits are run by "good ole boy" gangs of corrupt state prosecutors who not only act with complete impunity as career criminals themselves, but remain protected from the law because they are the law in these area’s. Why isn’t former district attorney Pilati facing state charges as a repeat sex offender? Because the local corrupt state officials simply will not charge him. If not for the federal agents coming and pursuing these civil rights charges, this alleged pervert would still be molesting young men.

The real question is why is it that prosecutors are allowed to engage in practices that would easily qualify them as career criminals under state criminal statutes, but state agencies will not pursue investigations against them or hold these corrupt parasites responsible? If those who are responsible for upholding and enforcing our laws are themselves corrupt, then does it not stand to reason that the enforcement of the law itself in these areas will be corrupt?

People out there need to wake up and realize what’s going on. This isn’t about a single prosecutor being a sexual predator, protected by the law as he preys upon victims with complete impunity. This is about widespread corruption in our legal system in which career criminals are being allowed to “enforce” laws against others while engaging in corruption themselves. This is an epidemic in America, especially in the deep South, where long forged "good ole boy" clubs control state attorney’s offices for decades. Please read, “Anatomy of A Corrupt State Attorney.”

If you haven’t already read the website “Southern Injustice; Exposing Bigotry and Injustice in the South” then you should do so – exposing this epidemic of corruption is the only hope of instilling true justice.

~Mike~

Witness To A Botched Execution

2007-03-13T11:26:00.000-04:00

Very rarely does the general public get a chance to witness the events and consequences of an execution, especially of a botched execution, as when a state puts a person to death the process is witnessed by only a few and almost always is so methodically sterilized that other then the resulting death of the intended victim there is nothing to report. Putting a person to death becomes a nonevent.

Recently however, the State of Florida attempted to put Angel Diaz to death by lethal injection on December 13th, 2006, but this “execution” did not go according to plan. Because of this botched execution Florida Governor Charlie Crist issued a moratorium on all further executions in Florida until a state commission can examine the circumstances of that botched execution.

Several other states have followed Florida’s lead in issuing indefinite moratoriums on any further executions until their own lethal injection process can be thoroughly examined. Numerous states are also the subject of pending legal actions directed at challenging that state’s protocol (methods and means) of carrying out lethal injection executions.

The following is an eyewitness account of the December 13th, 2006 botched execution of Angel Diaz. This is now provided verbatim from a transcript of a hearing held December 28th, 2006 in which witness Neil Dupree testified in the case of Corey Duane Hamilton, a death sentenced inmate in Oklahoma, challenging Oklahoma’s own process governing lethal injections. (See, Hamilton v. Jones, case # civ-06-1193F, U.S. Dist Ct., Western Dist. of Oklahoma).

This following testimony provides a graphic portrayal of an execution, witnessed firsthand by a lawyer sitting not more than ten feet away. Although somewhat lengthy, this unprecedented window allows each of us to witness the undeniably barbaric and torturous infliction of slow death of another human being at the hands of the state. Only by making this public can all others now have a view of the true impact and effect of capital punishment.

The following excerpt is quoted directly from the testimony of Neil Dupree, describing what he personally witnessed on December 13th, 2006.

“When you come into the execution viewing area there are several rows of seats. I was seated in the front row. There’s a window that opens up so that you can see into the execution chamber. That window was probably about 3 and a half feet high and 8 to 10 feet wide. I was in the front row on the far left seat.

When the curtains opened up – the curtains opened up promptly at six o’clock, I was able to see Mr. Diaz. He was strapped to a gurney. He had his right arm extended from one of the paddles that came out from the gurney itself. There was a leather strap that was over his forehead. There was a sheet that was covering his body. He still appeared to be wearing a white shirt.

There was a person – if you could picture the gurney, it was lengthwise to us. There was a Department of Correction’s guard at his head, there was another DOC guard next to where his waist would have been, and there was a third DOC guard that was set off by his feet, but further back, probably about 3 to 4 feet from the gurney.

There were two other people I later learned were the warden and the assistant warden. There were two phones that were by those two gentlemen.

…Like I said, I was no more than 6 or 7 feet from Mr. Diaz. I could see the I.V. insertion site in Mr. Diaz’s right arm, where you would bend your elbow, if you normally got blood taken out, you know, for just an annual physical, there was obviously a needle inserted there. It was very heavily taped, as was his right hand. His right hand was palms up and it was strapped to the paddle and it was heavily, heavily taped. And then there was also a leather strap above where the I.V. needle had been inserted into his arm. There was a strap above that.

…I was able to see the tubing running from the I.V. insertion site into some other portion of the room. There was an I.V. tube that ran from his arm – it was taped to the gurney itself and then loosely fell underneath the gurney and then it appeared to go into the wall. There were two I.V. tubes that appeared to be in the back of the wall in what looked like a little port that was, I don’t know, 6 inches by 5 inches.

…At some point in time during the execution procedure I was able to see fluid flowing through the IV tube – it was a sudden rush, but that was further into the procedure. It was well after the procedure initially appeared to start, right then, that’s when it became noticeable to me.”

(Question by Jones’s lawyer) “If you would, please describe for the court… what happened after the curtain was opened and the execution began?”

(Dupree) “As I said, it opened promptly at six o’clock. The warden came forward – a person I later learned to be the warden, and asked Mr. Diaz if he had any last words. Mr. Diaz turned his head towards the audience and spoke in Spanish very briefly. I’m not totally fluent in Spanish; I understood some of what he said. And that was it.

Then the guard that was at his head put the leather restraint across his head, which he held manually. The warden stepped back toward the two phones that were in the corner. And I expected that somebody was going to say something or give some kind of indication the procedure was going to start. I did not hear the warden say anything. I really didn’t notice him make any kind of signal.

I guess their protocol is they turn off the system once the execution starts. Once that occurred, within just a few minutes, I noticed that Mr. Diaz appeared to be mouthing words. I do not know what he was saying; I could not hear him. But he appeared to be speaking to the man that was holding the leather strap over his forehead. He was grimacing, his jaw was clenching, his Adams apple, which was pretty prominent, was bobbing up and down furiously, and he just appeared to be in a lot of pain. His body appeared to be rigid. And, again, he talked for at least a minute and maybe more, but he was obviously trying to communicate something to somebody; again. I just don’t know what he was saying (as they turned off the intercom in the death chamber).

Within a couple of minutes after that, his head started to slowly roll to the right, his right eye closed, his left eye remained open. He just appeared to be, you know, slowly – I don’t know if “going to sleep” is the right word, but he just appeared to slowly be a little bit more relaxed. And then I noticed that his Adam’s apple started bobbing even more furiously, his jaw became clenched again, and then he started gasping of air. And then the gasping for air took a good 10 to 12 minutes, where he was literally gasping.

And the only thing I could liken it to is my father died of lung cancer five years ago and the last minute of his life -- we were there for it, my family was there – and at the last minute, he was doing the same type of gasping, where he really appeared to be almost a fish out of water because he was gasping so heavily for air.

It appeared to me that Mr. Diaz – his body rigid at points in time. And that’s basically my observation through what I saw until I saw the warden go to the phone, there was an open line – there was a black gentleman and a white gentleman. The black gentleman was the assistant warden. And there was an open line on the wall. The warden took the phone, spoke into it, gave the phone back to the black gentleman, turned around, maybe for a moment of two, took the phone again, and then went to another phone and picked up that phone. I don’t know who he was speaking to, obviously. And then he went back to his place, where he was standing originally.

It appeared to me that the DOC personnel were extremely uncomfortable. Clearly something was not going right. Mr. Diaz continued to move, he continued to gasp. And you could see the DOC personnel were kind of – their eyes were going back and forth to each other.

Eventually what happened is that Mr. Diaz – slowly his pallor changed. He was a – being from Puerto Rico, he was more tanned, he appeared to get very grayish, his breathing got more and more shallow, his Adam’s apple stopped bobbing, and then, oddly enough, his right eye, which had been closed, opened during that time, so now both of his eyes were open.

They then had – there was a metal door. The metal door opened and a gentleman – I guess I couldn’t say gentlemen – but a person who was garbed in purple from head to toe, it looked almost that a HAZMAT suit with a beekeeper’s mask, almost, except for – I don’t know if anyone can picture a welder with a little slit for their eyes – it appeared to me to be – that the only thing you could see on this person was his eyes, because it was almost like a welder’s suit, where you have that little part where you can see through the eyes.

That person came in. He shined a light into Mr. Diaz’s eyes, took out a stethoscope and checked his heart rate, and nodded to the warden, went back in. And I thought it was the second person that came out, did the same thing, where they checked his pupils, checked with a stethoscope, and then walked back in the room. At that point in time, the warden came in and announced that Mr. Diaz had, in fact, expired. And that’s what I observed.”

(Question by Defense lawyer) “How long did the execution process take from the time that it began until that time Mr. Diaz was pronounced dead?”

(Answer by Dupree) “From the time he stopped speaking (gave his last words), it would be 34 minutes.” (end of testimony excerpt)

The above is a first hand account of the botched execution or Angel Diaz on December 13th, 2006 at Florida State Prison. Immediately after that prolonged and torturous death, the DOC spokesperson attempted to blame the problems on Diaz’s liver problems, which were proven false, and a deliberately fabricated attempt to cover up the incompetence of those responsible for carrying out the execution. The medical examiner conducting the autopsy on Diaz’s body determined that the I.V. needles inserted into Diaz’s arms had been improperly inserted, completely pushing beyond the veins and into the soft tissue, causing almost foot long chemical burns on each arm, and preventing the lethal chemicals from being properly administered. Thus, Mr. Diaz was slowly tortured to death.

Subsequently the Governor of Florida formed a commission to look into the cause of this botched execution and how it can be avoided in the future. Within the next week or so a new blog will be posted entitled “Why Florida’s Commission Examining Lethal Injection Is A Farce” that will show how politicians have corrupted fair reviews of this botched execution with a predisposition of covering the state. I hope that all of you will come back when it is posted and fully read this expose.

Death Row Inmate Punished for Claiming Innocence

2007-03-12T12:11:00.000-04:00

When does big brother go too far? As recently reported on the blog, see, State Moves to Silence Death Row Inmate’s Claims of Innocence, the State of Florida has recently taken action against death row inmate Mike Lambrix in a clearly unconstitutional attempt to silence Lambrix’s claims of innocence.

Since that article was posted the Florida Deputy of Corrections has formally subjected Lambrix to institutional disciplinary action. Lambrix was charged under a prison rule that prohibits inmates from placing ads soliciting pen pals. This draconian rule was enacted a few years ago under the pretense that the public needs to be protected from prisoners who exploit them for money. Most prisoners do not have any means of earning an income and little if any outside assistance and many do attempt to build friendships with pen pals often met through pen pal ads placed on the Internet. A small percentage of those inmates might have abused these friendships by soliciting money under false pretenses but in most cases the otherwise isolated inmates are simply trying to reach out to the real world and meet a friend willing to help them through their ordeal.

Big brother has taken it upon itself to crown prison officials as the great protector of the public, allowing the Department of Corrections to erect formal rules that prohibit inmates placing ads or otherwise “soliciting” for new pen pals. See, Florida Administrative Code, Chpt. 33-210.101 (9).

If an inmate is found to have placed an ad to solicit pen pals then they are subjected to inter-institutional disciplinary actions in the form of 30 days in “lock up” (disciplinary confinement) and up to six months of mail privilege suspension, during which time they are completely isolated from the outside world, prohibited from receiving or sending out any mail.

This by itself is obviously intended to isolate prisoners from the free world. Think about it – what is the real reason that prison officials would not want inmates to meet new friends? What possible reason would prison officials have to try to even further isolate prisoners from the free world? Is it really about protecting the public from being exploited by prisoners or is it really about trying to minimize contact with the free world so that prison officials will no longer have to worry about being embarrassed when they cross the line and beat an inmate to death?

Is it just a coincidence that this rule did not even exist until after a group of prison guards at Florida State Prison brutally beat death row inmate Frank Valdes to death? How did the media and public find out that inmate Valdes was murdered by prison guards? Inmates wrote there family and friends as well as the media… so eliminate the inmates ability to contact the free world by methodically eliminating their outside contacts and then prison officials can beat and even kill prisoners with complete impunity. Anyone interested in the true motivation of this rule intended to further isolate prisoners should read Valdes v. Crosby, 450 F. 3d 1231 (11th Cir. 2006).

The true insidious motive of this rule is made clear in the action now taken against Lambrix. By creatively applying this rule prison officials – at the request of the state attorneys – have charged Lambrix with violating this rule because Lambrix had a My Space site that dared to publicly advocate his innocence. On February 21st, 2007 Lambrix was brought before the prison disciplinary team at Union Correctional Institution in chains and shackles and faced the kangaroo court.

Lambrix attempted to argue that under no conceivable interpretation was that My Space profile in any way soliciting pen pals. The only intent and purpose of that My Space page was to direct people to his web page “www.southerninjustice.com” that argues his factual innocence by showing how the 20th Circuit State Attorney’s Office deliberately fabricated the entire wholly circumstantial case brought against him.

However, the disciplinary team decided that by merely having a My Space account Lambrix was seeking new friends and thus guilty of violating the prison mail rule. When Lambrix argued that he hadn’t even posted enough information for someone to be able to contact him, the disciplinary team responded by saying that once someone simply sees his name on the My Space profile they can easily log on to the Department of Correction’s own website and find out Lambrix’s contact information. See, FL DOC and click on Offender Search in the menu bar.

In finding Lambrix guilty of the alleged violation the Florida Dept, of Corrections has crossed a clear constitutional line. The true intent and purpose of imposing disciplinary punishment upon Lambrix is clearly to silence him and punish him for publicly claiming his innocence.

If the state can now silence inmates by twisting this rule to circumstances where inmates attempt to publicly claim their innocence and speak out against the system then how will the public know what is really going on within the walls of America’s prison system? The First Amendment protects free speech and prohibits any agent of the state from subjecting any person to punishment for exercising their right to free speech.

Imagine if you were wrongly convicted and condemned to death (See, Condemning An Innocent Man) and your only hope of justice was to reach out to the free world and expose the injustice perpetuated against you by the state – only to then have the sate retaliate and punish you for doing so. Lambrix has now been sentenced to 30 days in disciplinary confinement (“the hole”) and 30 days of complete mail privilege suspension during which time Lambrix will not be able to send out of receive any mail.

Is this the America we are becoming? If something as fundamental and sacred as our constitutional right to free speech and to be protected against governmental retaliation can so easily be stripped from those citizens who most need to exercise that right – the victims of injustices perpetuated by the state – then where will that inevitably leave all of us and what kind of society will we become?

I ask you all to now please take a moment of your time to contact the Secretary of the Florida Dept. of Corrections, James McDonough at the following email and telephone number and ask him to immediately release Lambrix from the hole and this rule itself taken off the books.

Secretary McDonough

secretary@mail.dc.state.fl.us

(850) 488-7480

Remember, the true purpose of this rule is not to protect the public but to isolate prisoners so that the public will not know what is really going on inside America’s prisons. Again, if you have any doubt, you must read the Valdes v. Crosby case and you will see why Florida prison officials are attempting to isolate and silence its prisoners, especially the ones on death row. Please contact Secretary McDonough immediately and express your outrage that any inmate can be punished in this draconian manner and remember the eternal words of President Lincoln ..”All it takes for evil to triumph is for good men to do nothing.”

"Florida Courts Caught Fabricating Records"

2007-03-04T15:10:00.000-05:00

Imagine being charged with a serious crime -- maybe even capital murder. You’re arrested and thrown in jail and placed in a cellblock with a dozen other prisoners. Word gets around what you’re charged with and anyone who has spent even a few weeks locked up knows how the system works.

Whether you’re innocent or not becomes irrelevant. Virtually every county jail in the country is infested with rats – “jailhouse snitches” who are often themselves career criminals and know only too well how to play the system. It’s all about giving up a bigger fish… turning “jailhouse snitch” to get out of your crime and the bigger the crime the other guy is charged with, the better.

Prosecutors not only know how the game is played, but actually encourage it. Prisons are full or inmates convicted at least partially upon jailhouse snitch testimony. Some courts have recognized that this self-serving testimony in which some form of biological toxic waste turns state on another prisoner, claimed “he told me he did it” is inherently unreliable. Clearly the snitch has a reason for turning state – this parasite is not coming forth out of civic duty but because he knows that by becoming a state witness he will be rewarded by the state with a significantly lesser sentence than he would have other wise received – maybe even have the charges against him dropped altogether if he becomes an important witness in a capital case.

Anyone charged with a major crime and thrown in jail to await trial becomes a target. Not surprisingly the use of jailhouse snitches by prosecutors is significantly higher in circuits that have a history of wrongful convictions, where morally and ethically corrupt prosecutors adopt a “win by any means necessary” mentality and encourage county jail inmates to turn snitch on each other. Prosecutors know they can knowingly use false testimony and cannot be charged themselves even if caught as prosecutors are protected by immunity. Please read, “Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice?.

The legal system attempts to protect against wrongful conviction of innocent men and women by establishing rules that require prosecutors to disclose any deals or agreements made to these parasitic jailhouse snitches so that when they do testify the jury will know that they have an interest and substantial incentive to testify against another inmate.

By law, the state must fully disclose all promises or deals made to any witness in exchange for their cooperation to the defense counsel. Thus, when a jailhouse snitch does testify the defendant’s lawyer can then subject the snitch to cross-examination and expose his personal motivations for testifying against another inmate.

As stated, most of these jailhouse snitches are actually career criminals themselves, and they have no problem falsely claiming another inmate confessed to them – it’s not like truth means a lot to a burnt out junky and career criminal out to save his own pathetic butt. If this snitch is actually testifying only because he (or she) stands to personally gain by turning snitch, then certainly the jury needs to know that before they can weigh the credibility of that crucial testimony.

But once again we see that the legal system itself is so inherently corrupt that now it is revealed that the judges themselves are secretly collaborating with state prosecutors to deliberately conceal deals made to snitches in criminal cases, intentionally hiding crucial information from the jury.

In an investigation conducted by the Miami Herald a few months ago, it was discovered that the Miami-Dade and Broward County Courts were working secretly with local prosecutors to fabricate false records to protect snitches. (Please read, “Dockets doctored to shield snitches,” Miami Herald, November 18, 2006). This investigation only looked into court records in Miami-Dade and Broward Counties – but what of Florida’s other 65 counties? If those records are deliberately concealed, then how can it be determined just how widespread this practice is?

Incredibly, the judges and state prosecutors caught collaborating together to fabricate these false records to protect snitches now claim that their conduct is justified as it actually serves a public interest to conceal the truth.

But what of those wrongfully convicted and even condemned to death because of the use of false testimony provided by a jailhouse snitch only because he was secretly awarded a deal for his “cooperation?” The truth is that there are literally hundreds of men and women presently on death row today because of testimony provided by a jailhouse snitch, an experienced criminal – who was rewarded for that testimony with favorable treatment in exchange for his “cooperation.” This favorable treatment has enabled may a career criminal to continue his criminal career and even end up back in jail numerous times to snitch and do it all over again and again.

How can it ever be within the public’s interest for the courts and the prosecutor to secretly collaborate together to conceal the very evidence necessary for exposing the truth and prevent an innocent person from being wrongfully convicted and often even condemned to death? If a jailhouse snitch’s testimony is for all purposes being bought and paid for by the state, then shouldn’t the jury know this so they can consider that when weighing the credibility of that snitches own self-serving testimony before possibly convicting an innocent person?

Consider this, too – almost without exception these parasitic jailhouse snitches are themselves career criminals, knowledgeable in how to manipulate the legal system to their own advantage. They know that by giving the state a bigger fish they will be rewarded with a substantially reduction in their own sentence, or even have their own charges dropped altogether, then are released back on the streets to then continue their own criminal career.

By “playing” the system. These snitches know that they have been granted what amounts to complete immunity to commit more crimes often even violent crimes – as even if arrested again and again they are protected by prosecutors and need only to find another innocent victim to turn upon in the jail to again buy their own freedom. In many cases jailhouse snitches have actually repeated this cycle many times over, which begs the question… how can it ever be in the public’s interest to release a career criminal back on to the streets with what amounts to complete immunity to commit more crimes and continue his own criminal career?

The real tragedy here is that the general public still continues to conveniently ignore the truth… Our contemporary judicial system is inherently corrupt and the corruption comes from within the system itself. Truth and justice no longer matter, as prosecutors today are politicians who climb their career ladders by winning convictions by any means necessary, and ethical constraint is a career liability.

Today’s judicial system accepts and even embraces that it is all right if a few innocent men and women are wrongfully convicted and even condemned to death. But maybe they wouldn’t see it that way if it were them (or their own child) who became a victim of today’s corrupt judicial system.

I would encourage you to fully read the website “Southern Injustice: Exposing Bigotry & Injustice in The South.” Only by recognizing the corruption within the judicial system is there any chance of correcting it.

~Anatomy of a Corrupt Florida Prosecutor~

2007-03-02T22:24:00.000-05:00

It’s a simple enough truth… when you play in the mud; you’re going to get dirty. This truth is especially applicable in the shadowy and often corrupt world of politics. Where money buys influence and favors at a relatively cheap price. Anyone with even minimal political acumen knows how to play the game – when a candidate is running for an elected office that campaign is financed by monetary contributions from those who want that particular individual elected. After they win that particular elected office, the unspoken doctrine of quid pro quo comes into effect… I scratched your back, now you scratch mine. When that same candidate --even elected judges and state attorneys – run for office numerous times with the same contributors consistently funding that campaign, then an obvious bond is forged.

If we truly value the concept that “justice is blind” then the marriage of politics and justice is a contemptuous abomination – an entity of evil that can only and ultimately bear evil fruit. However, in Florida each judicial circuit elects its top state attorney and circuit court judges locally. Thus, each time the same candidate runs for the same “office” they become inherently dependent upon the continuing support of local contributors. Thus, at least theoretically, of course, if a person wanted to corrupt locally elected state attorneys and judges to protect against any prosecution in the future, then they could simply become a generous campaign contributor – and call in the favor when trouble does inevitably arise. That’s how American democracy works – that’s the American way.

The Bible teaches us that “money is the root of all evil” and this truth is especially applicable in the shadowy and corrupt world of politics. Consider the case of the elected State Attorney Steve Russell in the 20th Judicial Circuit of Florida. Steve Russell has worked in that circuit for over 30 years, since graduating from Stetson University and passing the Florida Bar. When previously long-time elected State Attorney Joseph D’Alessandro retired, Russell ran for that job and took office in 2003.

During the 30 years that Steve Russell has worked in the 20th Judicial Circuit State Attorney’s Office (much of the time serving as the top prosecutor), although relatively small and comprised mostly of the rural farming communities of Southwest Florida, that office has established a record of having the highest number of wrongful convictions in capital cases in the entire country. Incredibly, just this one office has sent more innocent men to death row (subsequently released by the courts) than most other entire states, combined.

Steve Russell’s long-time personal friend and Stetson Law School alumnus Randall McGruther has worked alongside Russell for almost 30 years himself. But then a few years ago McGruther screwed up and attempted to go into private practice (which obviously pays more) only to shortly thereafter find himself under investigation for unethical misconduct after a witness in a criminal case alleged that Randy McGruther had attempted to coerce him into signing a false affidavit. Apparently, McGruther didn’t realize that although as a prosecutor he could get away with that, as a private lawyer he is not as protected. See, Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice?

Shortly after these allegations were publicly disclosed, his long time good buddy, Steve Russell, by then the elected State Attorney, abruptly called McGruther back into the flock (birds of a feather…), and even appointed McGruther as his new Chief Assistant State Attorney, making McGruther the top prosecutor in the office! Not surprisingly, shortly after this appointment the allegations of misconduct previously lodged against Randall McGruther conveniently disappeared.

Does that sound just a bit fishy? But it actually only gets better, as a search of public records shows that in recent years McGruther has personally contributed thousands of dollars to Steve Russell’s campaigns… quid pro quo, baby! In fact, these public records show that McGruther has personally contributed well over $4,000 in recent years, with these substantial monetary contributions being made by McGruther while he was going through a contentious divorce and facing allegations of professional misconduct… and all on the salary of a public servant?

Although most of that money went to Steve Russell’s political campaigns, public records also show that McGruther contributed to the campaigns of numerous locally elected Circuit Court Judges, which raises substantial questions of conflict of interest. Money buys influence and in the political world there is no such thing as a free favor. So why was McGruther contributing money to the campaigns of locally elected judges that he knew he would argue cases in front of? If you were a criminal defendant being tried before a judge who was elected to that bench by monetary contributions made by the prosecutor, do you think you’d get a fair trial?

These facts are a matter of public record and cannot be denied. But this is not the end of the story. In 2006 the Florida Supreme Court threw out the capital convictions and death sentences against John Ballard, ordering his immediate release from death row upon the finding that Randall McGruther’s prosecution against Ballard was unfounded… that no credible evidence existed to support the convictions. See, Ballard v. State, 923 So. 2d 475 (Fla. 2006).

This Ballard case is an example of numerous other wholly circumstantial cases prosecuted by the 20th Judicial Circuit State Attorney’s Office that subsequently resulted in the appellate courts throwing the convictions out upon find that no sufficient evidence existed to support the convictions. (I.E. Delbert Tibbs, James Richardson, Bradley Scott, John Landry, john Ballard, etc.) Each of these cases was based upon specious -- and arguably fabricated – circumstantial evidence in which the person was wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death only to be exonerated and released from death row by the Appellate Courts.

In another wholly circumstantial case prosecuted personally by Randall McGruther almost 24 years ago, newly discovered evidence has now come to light that shows that the State Attorney’s Office knowingly collaborated and conspired with a key witness to deliberately convict and condemn Michael Lambrix to death for a capital crime they knew he was innocent of.

In that case, Lambrix was charged with a double murder in a locally sensationalized case in Glades County, Florida in early 1983. There were no eyewitnesses, no physical or forensic evidence, and no confessions. The entire case was built upon the testimony of Lambrix’s estranged ex-girlfriend’s testimony, who conveniently claimed that Lambrix told her he committed these murders, but only after she was charged with a another crime herself.

Lambrix pled not guilty and has consistently maintained his innocence. At trial the jury was not allowed to hear that this witness, Frances Smith-Ottinger, had actually told law enforcement officials numerous conflicting stories and had even failed a state administered polygraph test. Additionally, Lambrix was prohibited from personally testifying and virtually no defense was presented. Lambrix was convicted and condemned to death and has remained on Florida’s death row since March 1984. For a complete account of this case, please read, Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man

In recent years another witness has come forth stating that she was coerced into falsely testifying, Lambrix admitted killing the deceased, at trial by both the key witness and the state attorney’s lead investigator. An investigation into these allegations then revealed that at the same time Lambrix was prosecuted in this capital case, the key witness was engaged in a secret, illicit affair “of a sexual nature” with the State Attorney’s investigator, Robert Daniels – the very person who had sworn out the affidavit initiating the charges against Lambrix, then this same investigator personally supervised the development of the specious circumstantial evidence presented at trial.

Additionally Investigations revealed that the very evidence McGruther presented to the jury to convince them of Lambrix’s guilt was fabricated – and that McGruther knew this evidence was fabricated. More recently evidence has come to light that contrary to the key witness’ testimony at trial, she was given complete immunity from prosecution in exchange for her “cooperation” – all other charges against her were dropped shortly after Lambrix was convicted and condemned to death.

After almost 20 years of methodically stalking Lambrix’s wrongful execution, in 2004 McGruther was disqualified from the case due to the allegations of misconduct. However, no action has been taken against him – and under the protection of elected State Attorney Steve Russell, McGruther remains the top prosecutor in that Circuit.

Incredibly, McGruther now has bigger plans. With the history of alleged misconduct preventing McGruther from running for any publicly elected office, Randy McGruther is now posturing himself for political appointment to the bench. Public records reveal that McGruther became a substantial contributor to the most recent gubernatorial campaign of now governor “Chaingang Charlie” Crist. Once again, McGruther is spending money to manipulate the system. If Randall McGruther is successful in being appointed to the State Appellate Court bench by now Governor Crist, because of McGruther’s substantial contributions to his campaign, then with McGruther politically appointed for “life” without ever having to publicly campaign – his history of unethical misconduct will never have to be publicly debated.

All of these facts are a matter of public record and can easily be confirmed. The questions now is whether the public should allow someone like Randy McGruther to so brazenly manipulate the system to his advantage – do we really want someone like McGruther appointed to this bench for life?

If you have any information about prosecutorial misconduct in cases in the 20th Judicial Circuit (Southwest Florida) especially involving elected state Attorney Steve Russell, Chief Deputy Assistant Randall McGruther, or Assistant Attorney Cynthia Ross please contact us at info@southerninjustice.com or Southern Injustice PO Box 184, Wickliffe, OH 44092-0184.

I would encourage you to fully read the Southern Injustice website and blogs found at http://www.southerninjustice.com/ and contact both Florida Governor Charlie Crist and Florida Attorney General Bill McCullom imploring them to initiate an independent investigation into corruption within the 20th Judicial Circuit State Attorney’s Office at the below phone numbers and email addresses:

Governor Charlie Crist

Executive Office of the Governor
400 S. Monroe Street, The Capitol
Tallahassee, FL 32399-0001

850.488.4441

charlie.crist@myflorida.com

Bill McCullom

Office of Attorney General
The Capitol PL-01
Tallahassee, FL 32399-1050

850.414.3300

bill.mccullom@myfloridia.com

Written Statement of Michael Lambrix, #XXXXXX

2007-02-23T14:28:00.000-05:00

(To be submitted in person to disciplinary team at disciplinary hearing)

On February 9th, 2007 I was informed that I have been written a disciplinary report for alleged violation of “0914 – Mail Violations” because of a personal profile about me on an Internet site called “MySpace.” I would plea “Not Guilty” to this alleged infraction and submit this written statement in my own behalf. Attached to this written statement is a printed copy of the website “Southern Injustice” (located in the Internet at www.southerninjustice.com), which I request be formally placed on the record as evidence along with this instant written statement.

This disciplinary report alleges that the “myspace.com” profile on me violates FAC/DOC § 33-210.101(9), which in relevant part prohibits any form of “ads soliciting pen pals.” The myspace.com profile in question does not in any conceivable form ask for or encourage anyone to correspond with me. This profile exists exclusively to draw attention to my web page “Southern Injustice,” which as shown by the attached printout is solely about my claim of innocence of the crime in which I have been wrongfully convicted and condemned to death. Nothing on the myspace.com profile or this “Southern Injustice” web page in anyway attempts to solicit pen pals.

In fact as is plainly self-evident by the evidence provided, specifically, the printout of the myspace.com profile and the attached printout of the “Southern Injustice” web page, I do not even provide my DOC Inmate Number or address in which to write me. Pursuant to applicable rules governing all incoming mail, unless I provide my DOC Number and institutional address even if a person reading this myspace.com profile wanted to write me, they could not. Nothing in this myspace.com profile, or the referred to web page “Southern Injustice” even suggests that I want anybody to contact, or otherwise correspond with me whatsoever. This clearly is not any form of ad soliciting pen pals thus is clearly not a violation of FAC/DOC Rule 33-210.101(9).

Because this action has been brought against me, in the event that I am unjustifiably subjected to disciplinary punishment even though I clearly am not in violation of FAC/DOC Rule 33-210.101(9), for the purpose of exhausting the necessary administrative remedies relevant to this improper action, I would respectfully submit the following:

(a) I would respectfully submit that this unjustified disciplinary action is clearly motivated by an intent to retaliate against me and subject me to retaliatory disciplinary action because of my attempt to publicize my claim of actual innocence of the crime that I have been wrongfully convicted and condemned to death for. I have a protected Constitutional right to publicly advocate my innocence without being subjected to retaliatory punitive actions by any agent of the State, including the Department of Correction’s employees.

(b) Additionally, I would now move to challenge the Constitutionality of FAC/DOC Rule 33-210.101(9), which prohibits soliciting pen pals, as this rule is clearly unconstitutional as evidenced by this instant disciplinary action. The language of the rule is ambiguous and open to arbitrary and subjective interpretation that allows for the malicious abuse of the rule by individuals motivated to illegally retaliate against individual persons who attempt to exercise their protected right to free speech. This attempt to now expand application of FAC/DOC Rule 33-210.101(9) to the circumstances reflected within this action now establishes that this rule’s true intent is to coerce and intimidate silence of inmates illegally and does not serve any legitimate penological purpose. Thus, for the purpose of exhausting administrative remedies, I do now challenge the Constitutionality of this rule (33-210/101(9) as a defense to this disciplinary action.

In conclusion, I again respectfully reiterate that I plea “Not Guilty” to this clearly unfounded disciplinary report. Under no reasonable interpretation can it be said that I am in any conceivable manner attempting to “solicit pen pals” in violation of FAC/DOC Rule 33-210.101(9). The MySpace profile in question explicitly only seeks friends to join my web page – nothing more – and the web page “Southern Injustice” clearly is focused exclusively upon an attempt to publicly advocate my claim of actual innocence. On neither that myspace.com profile nor the attached “Southern Injustice” web page do I in any conceivable manner ask or encourage anyone to correspond with me and I do not even provide my DOC inmate number or institutional address, so nobody reading this content can use this to contact or write me even if they wanted. I would respectfully request that this disciplinary team find me “not guilty” of this alleged infraction.

Michael Lambrix
Feb 14th, 2007

Copy of Mike's DR

2007-02-20T19:22:00.000-05:00

This is a copy of Mike's two page Disciplinary Report. Please click each page to read.

I will post Mike's written response when I get time to type it in over the next day or so.

State Moves to Silence Death Row Innocence Claim

2007-02-17T17:07:00.000-05:00

What does the State of Florida do when confronted with a case of substantial innocence and a wrongfully convicted death row inmate determined to scream his innocence to anyone who will listen? No longer able to deny the claim, the state simply engages in pathetically disingenuous means to illegally and unconstitutionally silence the victim of such an injustice.

Those familiar with this blog know the story of death row inmate Michael Lambrix, who was wrongfully convicted and condemned to death almost 24 years ago in one of the smallest rural communities of the South. Throughout this time Lambrix has consistently maintained his innocence, insisting that the sole key witness – his own estranged girlfriend at the time – and the local state attorney’s office had collaborated together to deliberately have him wrongfully convicted and condemned to death.

Only in recent years did the evidence finally surface to substantiate Lambrix’s long pled claims. This was a wholly circumstantial case – there were no eyewitnesses, no physical or forensic evidence, and no confessions. The case was built upon the testimony of that one key witness, Frances Smith-Ottinger, who claimed Lambrix told her he committed this capital crime.

In recent years irrefutable evidence was revealed that this key witness was having a secret affair “of a sexual nature” with the local state attorney’s lead investigator, Robert Daniels who was coincidentally the same person who formally initiated the charges against Lambrix and then personally supervised the development of the specious circumstantial evidence used to convict and condemned Lambrix. Subsequently, additional evidence was developed to show that key witness Smith-Ottinger and Investigator Daniels worked together to coerce false testimony and fabricate crucial evidence used to convict and condemn Lambrix. Please read, “Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man.”

With this evidence now exposed, the organization “Southern Injustice” has aggressively pursued exposure of this inconceivable injustice (See, www.southerninjustice.com) primarily through the Internet and media campaigns.

In a desperate and disingenuous attempt to unconstitutionally silence Lambrix, the state of Florida has now compelled prison officials at Union Correctional Institution to initiate formal disciplinary charges against Lambrix, claiming that Lambrix somehow violated prison rules by advocating his case on “My Space” (See, www.myspace.com/lambrix) as a pretense to place Lambrix in disciplinary confinement (“the hole”) for 30 days, and place Lambrix on complete mail suspension for up to 6 months!

This nation was built upon the principle and protection of free speech. What conceivable purpose does the state have to effectively silence a death row inmate’s attempts to publicly proclaim his innocence? Why is the state willing to take such Draconian action? Florida can no longer credibly deny Lambrix’s innocence, so now they are attempting to silence him in a way that should offend every person of conscience.

Your help is desperately needed to address this matter. The state should never have the power to silence any person who dares to speak out against an injustice. Any form of governmental sponsored censorship is a threat to free speech to everyone. Please phone or email the Florida Department of Corrections Secretary and the Union Correctional Institution’s warden immediately to express your outrage in this matter.

Warden Hicks

Hicks.Milton@mail.dc.state.fl.us

(386) 431-2000
FAX: (386) 431-2016

Secretary McDonough

secretary@mail.dc.state.fl.us

(850) 488-7480

Petition Returned for Shortening

2007-02-12T20:09:00.000-05:00

The Petition was returned because it was six pages too long handwritten. Here is a copy of the USSC letter from the clerk.

Florida Supreme Court Rejects DNA Innocence Claim

2007-02-09T10:16:00.000-05:00

In a recent sharply divided opinion by the Florida Supreme Court death row inmate Paul Hildwin was denied relief even though newly discovered DNA evidence now proves that contrary to the state’s claims, he did not rape and kill a 42 year old woman over twenty years ago. See, Hildwin v. State (2006).

At trial the state told the jury that Hildwin has brutally killed Vronzette Cox after raping her, then stole her personal belongings. The main evidence against Hillwin was a pair of semen – encrusted pants, which the state has their own expert witness testified was of a blood type consistent with that of Hildwin. The state’s motive was that Hildwin raped Ms. Cox as she desperately fought for her life, then he beat and strangled her to death before discarding the body in the woods where she was found. There were no eyewitnesses to the crime.

When Hildwin stood trial in the mid 1080’s DNA testing was not available. Hillwin has maintained his innocence of this crime even after almost twenty years on Florida’s death row. For many years Hildwin tried to compel DNA testing of the physical evidence, but it wasn’t until Barry Scheck and The Innocence Project got involved that it appeared that justice would finally be done. The forensic evidence was finally tested and then conclusively proved that the semen the state convinced the jury came from Hildwin simply did not.

With a team of lawyers arguing his case, this newly discovered evidence was formally presented to the Florida Courts. However, although the state made a point of convincing the jury this semen came exclusively from Hildwin at trial, now the state flip–flopped, arguing that the DNA results conclusively showing that the semen could not have come from Hildwin proves nothing – that at best it only proves that he didn’t rape Ms. Cox, but the state argued that this wasn’t prosecuted as a “rape” case – it was only prosecuted as a murder case and since technically Hildwin failed to present any new evidence that he didn’t commit the murder, he was not legally entitled to relief.

By a narrow margin of a 4 to 3 vote in a strongly divided opinion, the Florida Supreme Court agreed with the state’s attorney and denied relief. The three member dissenting opinion, which included Justice Peggy Quince – herself a former deputy assistant attorney general specializing in capital appeals – began by stating, “Justice demands a new trial for Hildwin, one free of the tainted evidence used to convict him of first degree murder, which sentenced him to death.” In their well written dissent the Justices pointed out that Hillwin compelling DNA evidence is comparable to that recently addressed in House v. Bell, 126 S. Ct. 2064 (2006) by the U.S. Supreme Court, in which they ruled in favor of the condemned prisoner. Pointing out that at the very least this semen evidence used to convict Hildwin misled the jury as it now shows it did not come from Hildwin and “yielded a conviction that we can no longer confidently rely upon.”

One would think that when DNA evidence now conclusively establishes that the arguments made by the state to convict and condemn Hildwin were wrong – that the only physical evidence allegedly “proving” Hillwin committed this brutal murder now shows it had to be someone else – that the courts would want to correct this obvious injustice. But once again logic and reason fail to win the day and yet another miscarriage of justice continues to be perpetuated by the State of Florida. See, Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man.

To compound this tragedy of “justice” even further, as Paul Hildwin continues to fight for “justice” in the courts, he must also battle yet another beast – Hillwin has been fighting cancer now for several years. Will justice prevail in time – or will Hildwin become yet another victim of injustice like Frank Lee Smith who was finally exonerated by DNA evidence after 16 years on Florida’s death row – but tragically died of cancer before the evidence finally exonerated him? See, Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied.

With cases like that of Paul Hildwin can any reasonable person have confidence in our courts? With evidence now conclusively proving the state’s theory was wrong, how can any person of conscience still vote to kill this man?

Once again, especially in a state that has a record number of wrongful convictions in capital cases, we must ask ourselves if this is really about justice – or is it just a contemporary twist on the infamous Southern tradition of bigotry and injustice? See, Exposing the New face of Bigotry & Injustice in the South

Top Prosecutor Charged With Misconduct

2007-02-02T19:17:00.000-05:00

Once again we see corruption within the judicial system expressed as yet another elected state attorney is caught unethically manipulating evidence to win a conviction. Mike Nifong, the prosecutor who made national headlines last summer while pursuing rape charges against three Duke University lacrosse players has now been formally charged by the North Carolina State Bar Association with numerous ethics violations, including making misleading and inflammatory statements to the media and deliberately concealing exculpatory evidence.

According to the recently filed Bar complaint, state attorney Nifong’s conduct amounted to “systematic abuse of prosecutorial discretion.” In early January Nifong was removed from the nationally publicized case after a first set of ethics complaints were brought against him. Subsequently, the rape charges lodged against the lacrosse players were dropped when the accuser, a woman hired to “entertain” at a private party, conceded that she was not sure if she even had sex, non-consensual or otherwise, with anyone.

These latest revelations of unethical prosecutorial misconduct in this sensationalized case came out last month when the director of DNA Security, Inc., a private company contracted to process the DNA samples in this alleged rape case, admitted that state attorney Nifong had instructed him to only include actual DNA matches in the report that was released, this deliberately and illegally concealing the fact that the DNA tests conducted actually found no matches to any of the three Duke University players who were charged in the alleged rape, supporting their claim that this crime never happened and was a deliberate fabrication.

Perhaps even more troubling is that – the only reason formal ethical complaints were brought against this particular state attorney was because this was a nationally publicized case. But what of the many cases of prosecutorial misconduct that have actually resulted in innocent men and women being wrongfully convicted and even condemned to death, due to prosecutors deliberate concealment of crucial evidence? In Florida, at least 25 men and women were wrongfully convicted and condemned to death only to later be exonerated by the Courts and released. By far the most common cause of these inconceivable miscarriages of “justice” is prosecutorial misconduct – yet not even once has a Florida prosecutor responsible for unethically convicting and condemning an innocent man been brought up on ethics charges in the Florida Bar.

Every one of us should be extremely concerned about the widespread corruption that plagues the judicial system today. I would encourage you to please fully read the content of “Southern Injustice: The New face of Bigotry & Injustice in the South.”

~ Petition Filed In The U.S. Supreme Court ~ Jan 2007 ~

2007-01-27T20:57:00.000-05:00

*PRESS RELEASE*

Re: Death Row Inmate Asks U. S. Supreme Court to Recognize Constitutional Right to Timely Review of Actual Innocence Claim.

On January 22, 2007 Florida death row inmate Michael Lambrix filed a petition in the United States Supreme Court asking the Court to recognize a Constitutional right to timely review of a claim of actual innocence raised in a state court.

Statutorily forced to represent himself, Lambrix argues that although the Supreme Court has repeatedly addressed the question of whether procedural rules favorable to the state can be strictly enforced to default an appeal raised by a prisoner because it was not timely filed, the Supreme Court has never addressed whether similar procedural defaults can be imposed upon the state when the state is found to have obstructed and denied timely review of a state post conviction appeal.

At 46 years old “Mike” Lambrix has spent almost his entire adult life in solitaire confinement on Florida’s death row. For 24 years now Lambrix has argued his innocence to anyone who would listen, although very few would. Convicted and condemned to death in one of the smallest counties of the South, Lambrix has consistently insisted that the entire wholly circumstantial case of capital murder brought against him was deliberately fabricated with the intent to have him wrongfully convicted and condemned to death.

The case brought against Lambrix in the rural farming community of Glades County, Florida in early 1983 was questionable all along. There were no eyewitnesses, no physical or forensic evidence, and no confessions. The entire wholly circumstantial case was based upon Lambrix’s recently estranged ex-girlfriend's specious claim that he told her he committed these brutal crimes.

At trial, the jury was not allowed to hear that this key witness actually told numerous other stories and even failed a pretrial polygraph test. Then the local trial judge prohibited Lambrix from personally testifying, leaving the state’s case essentially unchallenged. Lambrix was convicted and condemned to death by a Glades County jury in March 1984.

As the years went by Lambrix filed numerous appeals, without success. By late 1988 Lambrix came within hours of execution before receiving a stay in Federal Court. But by 1997 the U. S. Supreme Court, in a marginal and deeply divided 5 to 4 vote, upheld Lambrix’s death sentences.

In early 1998 former state witness Deborah Hanzel came forth and under sworn oath admitted her testimony was false. She claimed the key witness Frances Smith (now Ottinger) and a local state attorney’s investigator coerced her to provide the false testimony that corroborated Smith-Ottinger’s testimony.

An investigation into Hanzel’s claims revealed that this key witness was actually having a secret illicit affair “of a sexual nature” with this state attorney’s lead investigator, Robert Daniels while Lambrix was being prosecuted. Investigator Daniels was the very person who formally initiated these capital charges against Lambrix and then personally supervised the development of the circumstantial evidence used to corroborate Smith-Ottinger’s testimony. Additional investigations now show that, that circumstantial evidence was fabricated.

For over 9 years now Lambrix’s collective claims substantiating his actual innocence argument has been pending before the lower state trial court in Ft. Myers, Florida. Although Lambrix has consistently attempted to compel timely review, his efforts have equally consistently been thwarted by the state. In the Petition now filed with the Supreme Court, Lambrix is arguing that just as the Court has strictly enforced procedural rules prohibiting review of appeals deemed “untimely” when favorable to the state, the Court must now enforce equally severe consequences upon the state for failing to provide timely review – Lambrix argues that constitutional law now requires the Court to recognize that the failure to provide timely review of Lambrix’s pled actual innocence claims requires the Court to now impose a procedural default upon the state and summarily vacate Lambrix’s capital convictions and sentences of death.

The full Petition can be read here

This case is featured on: www.southerninjustice.com (See, “Condemning an Innocent Man to Death.”)

For more information, please contact

Southern Injustice
P.O. Box 184
Wickliffe, OH 44092-0184

or send an email to mike@southerninjustice.com

Is Florida's Death Penalty on its last leg?

2007-01-07T08:03:00.000-05:00

Back in 1972 the US Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty in America was "cruel and unusual" because it was arbitrarily imposed and thus unconstitutional. The court laid down the law and said that although capital punishment itself was not per se unconstitutional if the individual states wanted to use the death penalty, it must be imposed fairly, with reasonable consistency. Forman v.. Georgia, 408 U.S. 238 (1972) This ruling affectively vacated all death sentences then pending at the time and the individual states quickly began rewriting their death penalty laws in a rush to comply with the Supreme Court ruling.

Florida was the first state to pass its new laws re-enacting the death penalty. Within months these new laws, supposedly designed to "narrow" the imposition of the death penalty by establishing specific statutory aggravating circumstances that must be found to exist before any defendant can be condemned to death, and soon men began filling the cells on Florida's death row. That was over 33 years ago - many of those then sentenced to death then still remain locked away in solitary confinement even after all these years. (Jacob Dougan, Gary Alvord, William Ecledge, Raymond Merks, etc) (See also "Justice Delayed is Justice Denied")

Through the years many challenges have been pursued seeking to overturn the death penalty, but none have been successful. Recently, presumably because of the increasing high number of exonerations of those wrongfully convicted and condemned to death, (See 'Southern Injustice: Condemning an Innocent man'), support for the death penalty has consistently been following. A report issued by the Justice Department this month (December 2006)found that increasingly in recent years juries are not willing to impose the death penalty. Consistently, studies have shown that if given the choice of imposing the death penalty or imposing a sentence of life without parole, jurors will choose life without parole.

But Florida is a "red" state in which conservative republicans control the branches of state government by campaigning on get-tough-on-crime issues. In November 2006 the state elected republican "Chain gang Charlie" Crist as Governor and "Mad Dog" Mc Follum as Attorney General - both of whom build their political careers with their rabid support for the death penalty and undoubtedly will continue to do so.

However, the continued validity of Florida's death penalty is presently being challenged on numerous fronts and there is reason to believe that within the foreseeable future Florida's death penalty will be declared unconstitutional. If this happens, then all those presently under sentence of death will have their sentences reduced to "life" - many of those currently condemned to die will theoretically even be immediately eligible for parole, although it is unlikely parole would be granted.

There are presently three major constitutional challenges pending before the Courts that if successful, any one of them can affectively abolish the death penalty in Florida. The one issue that has received the most public attention this past year is whether the form of execution (lethal injection) constitutes "cruel and unusual punishment" because of the manner in which it is administered.

This argument is based upon claims that the chemicals used to sedate the condemned may wear off before the second chemical is used to paralyze the inmate and the third one to cause death by cardiac arrest. Imagine if you can - being administered a drug that renders you incapable of expressing pain, then another drug that virtually burns your veins as it flows through your body and so for a prolonged period of time you're subjected to a physical pain equal to having acid poured into your guts eating its very out. Would that not be a form of excruciating torture that as a matter of moral conscience would offend any civilized society?

In 2005, the issue was raised in the case of Clarence Hill, a Florida inmate then under a death warrant and was litigated all the way up to the U.S. Supreme Court See, Hill v. McDonough, 126 S.Ct. 2096 (2006) only to be remanded back to the lower federal court where the issue was disingenuously circumvented by finding that it was "untimely" raised and thus procedurally barred from review upon the merits. Shortly after that cowardly ruling Clarence Hill was executed. Subsequently, only a month later Florida executed decorated Vietnam veteran Arthur Rutherford, also by lethal injection. (See Another Day, Another Death)

This month brought about the Christmas sacrifice, the execution of Angel Diaz a Puerto Rican native who spoke little English yet was compelled to represent himself at trial - a pathetic pretense of justice that left many knowledgeable about his case questioning whether he was even guilty of the crime.The Puerto Rican government called upon Florida Governor Jeb Bush to grant Diaz a clemency but these pleas were ignored. Diaz lawyers attempted to again have both the Florida and Federal Courts grant a stay of execution until it could be determined whether Florida's method of administering lethal injection were adequate to ensure the condemned prisoner would not suffer a prolonged barbarically torturous death - but again these pleas for judicial review of the issue were denied without addressing the merits of the claims.

At 6:00 PM on Wednesday December 13, 2006 Angel Diaz lay strapped to a gurney at Florida State Prison. As witnesses watched from behind a glass wall, the warden gave the final instruction to administer that lethal cocktail of drugs. But it quickly became evident that something had gone wrong, horribly wrong. It then took 34 minutes before Angel Diaz was finally pronounced death....34 minutes to torturously inflict death upon a possibly innocent man as he lay helplessly strapped to a gurney.

True to the inherent nature of government, immediately after this obviously botched execution was carried out the Dept. of Corrections spokesperson attempted to claim that the administration of drugs proved temporarily inadequate to inflict quick death due to Angel Diaz pre existing liver problems. However in the days that followed pieces of the real truth began leaking out to the media...the prison had used unqualified medical technicians to insert the IV needle and administer the lethal drugs.The needle had been pushed through the vein into the soft tissue and so the drugs were not injected directly into the vein. He should have been unconscious after five minutes and dead within 15. Instead, he struggled and grimaced for 34 minutes while a second dose of lethal drugs was administered, again incorrectly. The county medical examiner who performed an autopsy after the execution found 12-inch chemical burns on the interior of both his arms.

On Friday December 15, 2006 Florida Governor Jeb Bush announced that he would immediately convene a commission to look into this execution and whether lethal injection itself was being administered without the infliction of cruel and unusual punishment. Governor Bush declared that no more executions would be carried out in Florida until this issue was resolved. Additionally, lawyers for other death row prisoners are now preparing court challenges which will focus on Angel Diaz botched execution as proof that Florida's means of administering the death penalty by way of lethal injection is unconstitutional.

To those knowledgeable of Florida's death penalty system these latest challenges must seem like deja vu...it has only been a few years since Florida faced similar issues concerning the use of the electric chair. In may of 1990 Jesse Tafero was strapped into Florida's "Old Sparky". Witnesses watched in horror. As the electricity ripped through his body flames could be seen coming from his head. Although separated by a glass wall the witnesses were soon overwhelmed by the smell of burning flesh as a cloud of smoke hung over the room. Subsequently a campaign to end the use of the electric chair began but prison officials conveniently determined that Tafero's horrific execution was an isolated incident caused by the use of a synthetic sponge and could easily be remedied by going back to using only natural sponges in the headgear used to fasten the electric wires to the head of the prisoner.

But then it happened again....and again. Clearly the use of the electric chair was on it's last leg. The final execution by electrocution in Florida was the death of Allen "Tiny" Davis, a rather large man who also literally caught fire in front of the witnesses. No longer could Florida defend the use of the electric chair without risking having Florida's death penalty itself declared unconstitutional. At the time Florida did not have any alternative to the electric chair, if the courts found this method to be unconstitutional it would effectively vacate all existing death sentences. Like rabid dogs, hungry for more blood the conservative politicians in Florida called for an alternative to "Old Sparky" so that if the Courts did declare death by the electric chair unconstitutional no death sentences would be vacated. This politically inspired Machiavellian plot brought up statutory provisions adopting the use of lethal injection in Florida, and let it down the path to where it is today. But with both the use of the electric chair and now the use of lethal injection both now constitutionally questionable - and no other viable alternatives available to carry out executions in Florida - will Florida's death penalty now itself be declared unconstitutional? As this issue is now aggressively pursued through the Courts, at least two other major constitutional challenges are working their way through the Courts, either of which may very well end the use of the death penalty in Florida.

Recently in Coday v. State (Florida Supreme Court opinion released October 26 2006) at least three of the seven members expressed their opinion that Florida's death penalty is unconstitutional. In a concurring opinion, former Chief Justice Pariente spoke of how the Florida Supreme Court had previously instructed the state legislature to address Florida's capital sentencing scheme as Florida is now the only state that does not require a jury to impose a death sentence by unanimous vote, or even require jurors to identify the specific aggravating circumstances used to justify their recommendations of imposition of death. In State v.. Steele, 921 So. 2d 538 (Fla. 2005), the Florida Supreme Court explicitly admonished the Florida legislature that if it did not immediately modify Florida's capital sentencing scheme to conform with the requirements that a sentence of death must be imposed only by unanimous jury vote, then in light of Ring v. Arizona, 536 U.S. 584 (2002) Florida's death penalty itself may soon be declared unconstitutional.

Subsequently, the Florida legislature did take up the issue - and with the conservative republican legislators leading the way, voted not to change Florida's capital sentencing scheme thus making the deliberate decision to allow Florida to remain the only state that allow a person to be sentenced to death without an unanimous jury vote - and leaving Florida open to having its entire death penalty declared to be unconstitutional. (See "Don't preach pro-life while practicing pro-death"). In light of this refusal to correct this constitutional infirmity in the state legislature, legal challenges, filed by condemned prisoners are now working their way up through the courts arguing that Florida's death penalty is unconstitutional. If successful, this decision will inevitably result in vacating all present death sentences in Florida.

Last, but not by no means least, yet another significant constitutional challenge to Florida's death penalty was initiated following the recent release of a comprehensive report by the American Bar Association that found Florida's death penalty system to be fundamentally flawed. This challenge is in form of an argument that the ABA report establishes the necessary new evidence to open the door to challenge the constitutionality of Florida's dysfunctional death penalty system. Because of politically created and judicially enforced procedural rules, such as challenge to an individual death sentence that has previously been affirmed on appellate review can only come if "new evidence" can be developed that allow the claim to be timely raised. For this reason most of those currently sentenced to death cannot initiate a challenge to the constitutionality of the death penalty based upon recently empirical studies that question the validity of the manner in which that penalty has been previously imposed. However if that condemned prisoner can convince the courts that this comprehensive study constitutes newly discovered evidence that previously could not have been discovered, then a new appeal can be initiated. Alternatively under Florida law if any court does subsequently issue a ruling declaring Florida's death penalty to be unconstitutional in a manner that is considered to be a fundamental change of law, then that ruling can be retroactively applied to extend relief to all death sentenced prisoners.

The argument raised in context of this recently comprehensive ABA report is that in light of the individual and collective deficiencies Florida's present death penalty system is unconstitutional for the same reason the US Supreme Court had previously declared the death penalty itself was unconstitutional in Forman v Georgia that Florida's death penalty is arbitrary and capricious, and unnecessarily invites imposition of the death penalty when that most extreme punishment is not constitutionally appropriate.

As recognized in the comprehensive report Florida presently leads the country in the number of men and women wrongfully convicted and condemned to death. Since Florida reinstated the death penalty at least 22 men and women condemned to death have subsequently been exonerated. Additionally of the over 650 men and women originally sentenced to death in Florida since 1974, at least half subsequently had their sentences reduced when the courts found that the sentence of death was imposed improperly.

With an error rate so high one would think that as a matter of moral conscience government officials in Florida would follow Illinois' lead and impose a moratorium to study the system, identify its faults and integrate necessary reforms. But Florida won't. Even with the documented cases in which the actual execution itself was obviously botched Florida has refused to take the initiative to correct problems.

With the Florida Supreme Court advising the Florida legislature to address the capital sentencing scheme due to clear constitutional problems the legislature refused to do so. And when the American Bar Association issued its own report following a comprehensive study that identified the fundamental flaws in Florida's death penalty, the State refused to impose a moratorium until adequate corrections could be made. Collectively, the result is clear - Florida's death penalty should be declared unconstitutional and abolished permanently. With such a well documented history politically motivated corruption that has created an inherently unfair system, as a matter of moral conscience Florida should not be allowed to impose the death penalty as such a politically corrupted system simply cannot be trusted with carrying out this ultimate punishment that itself has no place in a civilized society.

Regardless of whether one philosophically supports the death penalty or not it is that element of moral conscience that whatever measure of justice might be administered, it is administered in a fundamentally fair and humane way, and with the compassion and constraint of a civilized society. To condemn a man to death is in itself a conscious decision to deliberately take a human life. Although it is convenient to justify capital punishment by blindly adopting that "eye for an eye"mentality it is not and cannot be that superficial or simplistic. The punishment is by its very nature absolutely irreversible - once carried out it cannot be undone. To tolerate a system that has proven not only its inherent imperfection, but its unwillingness to correct identifiable imperfections is to advocate imposing this ultimate punishment upon the absolutely innocent, to make victims of the innocent under the pretense of administrating "justice". Even if we are morally certain of guilt, to tolerate a process that inflicts that punishment in a torturous and barbaric manner makes barbarians out of all of us.

Whether Florida's death penalty is on its last leg or not remains to be seen. But knowing what we do know about Florida's death penalty system as a matter of conscience we individually - or as a collective society - continue to tolerate a system so fundamentally flawed? If Florida's death penalty survives these latest challenges then what will that say about us as a supposedly civilized society?

Condemned Man Tortured to Death in Florida

2007-01-05T11:34:00.000-05:00

Have you ever asked yourself what it is that makes us a “civilized society?” Just what does the word “civilized” mean? According to Webster’s New World Dictionary it means “to bring or to come out of a primitive or savage condition to a high level of social organization and of cultural and scientific development.” But where do we draw the line between what is “civilized” and what is not? Who decides where that line is drawn? Do we as individuals get to choose or should a society – especially a democratic society – establish some minimal definition that must be applied to all society.

Here in America we are a Constitutional Democracy. As such, our Constitution establishes specific fundamental rights that protect the individual from excessive governmental actions, which include the right to be protected against the infliction of cruel and unusual punishment. Recently, this particular right became the focus of national media attention when Florida botched the execution of Angel Diaz on Wednesday December 13th, 2006.

Diaz was convicted on a capital murder charge under questionable circumstances. A native of Puerto Rico, Diaz barely spoke any English. The evidence that led to the capital charges was at best barely even minimal. There were no eyewitnesses, no physical or forensic evidence that he committed any crime, and no confession. Diaz has consistently protested his innocence and other than relying on the jury’s verdict the state never presented any further evidence of his alleged guilt.

At trial, even though he was barely able to speak English, Diaz was effectively forced to represent himself. As is all too common in capital cases Diaz was originally appointed a lawyer who was not capable of providing competent representation. Upon realizing this lawyer was incompetent Diaz asked the trial judge to appoint a new lawyer – but the judge refused. Unwilling to go to trial with an incompetent lawyer Diaz then exercised his right to represent himself – an obviously fatal mistake as Diaz had no training in law and unable to speak or understand English the entire trial was rendered a pretense and Diaz was quickly convicted and condemned to death.

Through the years his appeals were denied. By last year all state and federal appeals were fully exhausted and Diaz became death warrant eligible. Shortly before Thanksgiving Florida Governor Jeb Bush signed an active death warrant on Diaz, scheduling his execution for Wednesday December 13th, 2006 – a timely Christmas sacrifice.

According to numerous eyewitness accounts of the execution of Angel Diaz, these witnesses watched from not more than ten feet away as Diaz “grimaced in pain before dying 34 minutes after receiving the first dose of chemicals.” (Ron Word “Man Executed for Miami Bar Slaying takes 34 Minutes to Die” Gainesville Sun December 14, 2006) and that “it looked like Diaz was in a lot of pain … he was gasping for air 11 minutes.” (Executed Man Takes 34 Minutes To Die” St. Petersburg Times, December 14, 2006)

Immediately following this execution a Dept. of Corrections spokesperson told the media that the unusually prolonged execution was the result of Mr. Diaz having kidney problems that interfered with the lethal drugs administered. This quickly proved to be a deliberately fabricated lie intended to cover up incompetence.

By Friday December 15th, 2006 Governor Jeb Bush announced an immediate moratorium on all further executions until a commission could look into the Diaz execution and determine whether lethal injection is cruel and unusual punishment.

Slowly pieces of the truth were revealed – Diaz did not have any kidney problems. Rather, the prison personnel responsible for inserting the needle into Diaz’s arm into which that lethal dose of chemicals would then be injected failed to insert the needle into the vein itself. The dept. of Corrections refuses to say whether a qualified physician participated in preparing Diaz for execution and the identities of all those involved are confidential, protected from being identified by law.

As a result of the improper insertion of the needle actually penetrated into the soft tissue of Diaz’s arm rather then the vein and when the three drugs were then pumped into his still conscious body he was not rendered unconscious. He visibly struggled for an extended period of time before an unprecedented second dose of drugs was then pumped into him.

A subsequent medical autopsy revealed that Mr. Diaz suffered almost foot long chemical burns on both arms where the drugs were pumped in. Knowing that Mr. Diaz was still conscious during that time, there can be no question that Mr. Diaz suffered a prolonged and excruciating painful death – that Mr. Diaz was quite literally physically tortured to death.

In the days that followed even pro-death penalty politicians were appalled by what happened and publicly supported a moratorium until it could be determined what went wring. Both present Florida Governor Jeb Bush and current State Attorney General (soon to be governor) Charlie Crist declared that this matter must be looked into and resolved before any more executions would be carried out.

But what bothered me was when many of the “average citizens” were asked about this botched execution they said in their opinion the condemned man should suffer and that execution should not be “humane.” On a local Jacksonville television station one particular man said that we as a society should deliberately make the condemned suffer the most painful death possible as that is what “punishment” is for and it would send a stronger message to deter others from committing similar crimes.

As a Christian and as a member of a presumably “civilized society” I’ve got a problem with those opinions – I think it says a lot about the kind of person they are that they would advocate the deliberate infliction of torture upon another human being. To paraphrase Nietzsche, when one deals with monsters regularly the greatest threat is not the monster itself, but of becoming the monster.

It is too easy to simply say that a condemned man should experience as much pain as can possibly be inflicted under the mentality that these “killers” has no problem inflicting pain upon their victims. If these people see these condemned killers as monsters because of what they did, then doesn’t deliberately advocating the same thing upon them make these people no less of a monster? Is that the kind of society we want to be?

Many of those who do advocate the deliberate infliction of torture upon the condemned even dare call themselves “Christians” and attempt to justify their sickness by quoting the Old Testament phrase “an eye for an eye” law. Wasn’t the point of Jesus’ sacrifice to bring about a new Biblical law of love and forgiveness, of “turning the other cheek,” and showing compassion to those who are even our enemies? We can’t have it both ways – that same Old Testament book of law demands that those committing adultery be taken out in public and stoned to death. If we as a society want to live by Old Testament law, then let’s commit to the whole law and not just parts of it we find convenient to justify our own sickness.

Recently I read an excellent book written by a lawyer who was once a strong supporter of the death penalty. Now a catholic lay minister he spent years studying Old Testament law as it applies to contemporary Christian society in respect to the death penalty. I would strongly recommend this book to anyone who remains confused about the application of Old Testament “eye for an eye” law in a contemporary Christian society. The book is titled “The Biblical Truth About America’s Death Penalty” by Dale Recinella.

As long as we have the death penalty it is inevitable that innocent people will be condemned to death even executed. See, Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man. In Florida over 22 men and women have already been exonerated and released from death row after being wrongfully convicted and condemned to death.

For those who want to advocate physical torture as part of the punishment of death, do they also believe that the Old Testament law – the same chapter that preaches and eye for an eye – that demands that those responsible for convicting and innocent man should themselves be out to death? Maybe if we start subjecting prosecutors, who are responsible for wrongfully convicting and condemning innocent people, to slow torturous deaths then the integrity of the judicial system would be protected. See, Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice?

As a civilized society we demand accountability against those who violate our laws. But equally so, as a matter of social conscience and as an example to the world itself we also demand society refrains from the unnecessary infliction or cruel and unusual punishment. Those who would advocate anything less becomes nothing less than monsters themselves… that’s the difference between a civilized society and uncivilized individuals.

December 5th, 2006 Hearing Transcripts

2007-01-01T13:21:00.000-05:00

The December 5th, 2006 hearing transcripts can be read and download HERE in pdf format.

Christmas In A Cage – Death Row Holiday

2006-12-19T11:36:00.000-05:00

Growing up in a large family Christmas was always celebrated in the traditional Norman Rockwell style with many brothers and sisters both older and younger than myself, the excitement and anticipation of Christmas began immediately after Thanksgiving, when dear old dad would pull out all the holiday lights from the cardboard boxes concealed in the attic and spread them out across the floor as us kids would compete with each other to find any burnt out bulbs that needed replacing. Once that task was completed, it would be an honor to hold the long strands of lights as dad balanced precariously on a ladder nailing them along the roof overhangs, then as if by magic seemingly always just at the right moment as darkness began we would all gather to watch as they came to life. In that moment of unified silence the Spirit of Christmas became one with us.

Then would come the tree. Never but never an artificial tree, not in our house. Even in the years when there would barely be enough money for food, there was always a large freshly cut evergreen tree, with the scent of pine filling the room. Boxes of beautiful antique ornaments handed down through the generations would be carefully unwrapped and meticulously placed in just the right spot with rows of tiny flashing multicolored lights accented by a million strands of silver and gold tinsel, almost each strand carefully dropped over the boughs by us kids leaving the lower part of the tree with significantly more than the harder to reach upper branches, but no body even complained.

This majestic Christmas tree would always be up no later than the first week of December and then brightly wrapped boxes would begin to appear beneath the tree. That was the Christmas tease that has tormented children through the ages… What could possibly be in these beautiful boxes? Of course, children being children, we would all find a way to ever so very carefully steal a peek in that one of two particular box with our name only to almost without exception discover that the box contained nothing more than clothes. Silly kids – we already knew that only Santa Claus brought the good stuff and that wouldn’t happen until Christmas Eve.

Each Christmas Eve all of us kids would be herded off to bed early and given a stern warning that soon Santa Claus would be near and he’d know for sure if we weren’t sleeping. Of course we couldn’t sleep but each of us in our own way did our very best to pretend to as we each fantasized about what Santa might leave us. The hours would pass slowly – very, very slowly – until the early morning hours when dad would open the bedroom doors, releasing us from our rooms with the excited announcement that Santa had come and we would all rush into the living room and stand in awe at the piles and piles of presents that had been left beneath the tree.

With so many kids all anxious to rip open these gifts, controlling the chaos was the first priority. With the barely contained excitement of a child himself, dad would reign over the distribution of the presents, picking one box at a time and loudly calling off the name of each. In that large circle all our eyes would be gleaming in silent anticipation as we each awaited our name to be called. Then quickly pouncing forward when it was, to claim our gift and retreat behind the lines to rip it open. Soon enough the living room would be overcome with haphazardly discarded boxes and wrappings but nobody seems to really notice.

No matter what each of us received in that moment of time it became our entire world. Of course there would be the obligatory clothes, which were inevitably piled neatly to the side, to be collected later. Although we seldom got the toys we really wanted – apparently Santa Claus had a cash flow problem and couldn’t afford the most popular toys – what we got quickly made us forget about what we thought we wanted and the joy of receiving those gifts overcame any disappointment.

Looking back, I can’t recall even being disappointed at not receiving what I thought I wanted, as what I got always seemed to be even better. That’s why I knew even long after other kids my age gave up that Santa had to be real; dad couldn’t possibly afford all those wonderful presents. Only too many years later did I realize how much he would willingly sacrifice each year to make Christmas special, working long hours at the steel plant and even pawning off his few prized possession as nothing was ever allowed to break the sanctity of Christmas.

Soon after all the gifts were unwrapped we would be forced to set them aside and retreat back into our rooms to dress in our Sunday best then pile in the station wagon for a drive to the Christmas service. Even the thought of resisting this ritual seemed silly – marching into church as a family each Christmas morning was as much a part of Christmas as Christmas itself even of we didn’t fully understand the spiritual implications of Christmas at that time. But even as the priest administered the solemn sermon, already our thoughts were on the fest that would soon follow.

Within a few hours we were home again. The Christmas Spirit filled the house with a joyous mood as Christmas carols played endlessly on the record player and our attention turned from the gifts we already received to plots of pilfering the table piled high with cakes and candies laid out for guests that might drop by. With military precision us kids would band together and recon the living room then slowly sneak our way towards that table and careful not to let our presence be known, our little heads would pop up quickly as our hands reached for that morsel of sweet goodness and then a quick retreat would be made.

As all the dishes of cookies, candies, and cakes would slowly disappear the smell of Christmas dinner would fill the house. Without exception Christmas dinner would be provided with abundance in the traditional style with all the trimmings and the family would gather around the expanded table and eat. This was the one meal when no matter how dysfunctional the family was the rest if the year, we were truly family for that one meal. But then it would too soon be over and that one special day became only a memory.

These memories continue to be my Christmas and have become my ritual. Merle Haggard once sung a song about a man turning 21 in prison doing life without parole. My own ballad would not be that much different. I’ve never had another Christmas since leaving home. At 46 years old, this is now my twenty-sixth Christmas in a cage; the past 23 Christmas’ have been spent condemned to death in a cage on death row.

It is the Christmas of the past that remains my Christmas of the present. Being condemned to death I am not allowed to celebrate Christmas in any traditional sense. In the early years I would anxiously await the Christmas cards from family and friends, then hang each upon my cell wall and share the Spirit of Christmas with the few who chose to remember me. But as the years slowly passed the cards became fewer and fewer, even most of my brothers and sisters have now long forgotten me and given me up as dead. Although I remain blessed by a few special friends who make a point of sharing their Christmas Spirit with me, the friends too slowly drift away and become fewer and fewer.

Many years ago when I first came to death row we were allowed to celebrate Christmas and it was something we looked forward to. Each December we would be allowed to receive two packages from the outside world containing various necessities such as winter clothes, a pair of shoes, cosmetics and toiletries, and even a nice watch or ring. Then the Christmas meal would be traditional style, real turkey with all the trimmings and various pieces of cakes and pies. But then conservative politicians found out about the “special treatment” given to prisoners at holidays and made political careers by campaigning against these things. One by one every holiday privilege was eliminated and out of vindictive malice and spite the Spirit of Christmas was banned from prisons.

Where I once proudly displayed the few cards I’d receive on my otherwise barren grayish beige wall, I am now prohibited from doing so. Up until a few years ago I had a photo of a beautiful Christmas tree I’d tape to my back wall above my sink until one Christmas Eve a guard made an issue of it. I was ordered to remove it, but refused. A few hours later as I was taking a shower that guard went into my cell and removed that picture – ripping it into small pieces then throwing it into my toilet. That one small semblance of Christmas I so cherished was lost forever as that Spirit of Christmas was overcome by malice and spite.

Now each Christmas becomes more depressing as I become even more isolated from that world outside. Too often my thoughts now turn to my own kids and grandkids and wishing I could spend just one Christmas with them. All my own children are now grown, but I can only imagine the joy on my grandson’s face as he anxiously rips open the brightly wrapped box containing the small gift a friend so generously sent in my name.

Then I think of all the others here and in prisons across the country who like me can only think of Christmas’ past, as the Christmas of both present and future no longer even hold the hope of what the true Spirit of Christmas is about. I remain blessed by the few cards I will receive, but know that many others around me won’t get a card at all. There will be no Christmas sweets and treats. There will only be the same cold, barren walls and the sound of silence as each of us retreat into our own dreams of what once was and most likely will never be again.

So, this Christmas I ask you to remember what the true Spirit of Christmas really is as we gather to celebrate the birth of a men condemned to death for our sins, that through His condemnation each of us equally were given the gift of Hope. If those of us who claim to be Christian cannot actually be Christians on Christmas, then when can we be?

What would Jesus do of He were to celebrate Christmas today? I’d like to think that He would reach out to the lowest of the low and share hope with those condemned to death; that in the true Spirit of Christmas, in the true Spirit of Christ. Especially those condemned would not be forgotten.

To both friend and stranger equally the same, I say… Merry Christmas!!!

Blessings of Liberty In The Land of The Free

2006-12-16T10:53:00.000-05:00

In America, land of the free, we take certain liberties for granted. Our Constitution itself explicitly declares that, “we, the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice and insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and ensure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish the Constitution for the United States of America.”

Those are some pretty strong words coming from a band of revolutionary insurgents, our Constitutional forefathers. But have you ever thought about what the same group of men (sorry, women had no rights back then – that’s why they specifically said every man is created equal, not women!) might write today if they had to do it all over again? What might they write if they lived in our contemporary society?

Historically speaking, this band of brethren were especially concerned with protecting the individual person against the power of government, and to “secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity.”

Could they have envisioned that this “Land of Liberty” would one day evolve into a country that incarcerates more of its citizens in jails and prisons than any other country in the world? Recent studies released by the U.S. Department of Justice (Now, that’s an oxymoron – run by morons!) show that right now there are over two million men and women incarcerated today – and well over seven million citizens presently under judicially imposed restraint. That means that almost one of every 40 people in this country live under actual judicial restraint. (Read, ”Death Row Tea Party”)

Our constitutional forefathers knew firsthand what oppression by an unfair government was. Clearly, their intent was to protect people from the excessive use of power of government. So, what would these fine men say today upon realizing that in recent years our own Supreme Court has declared that prosecutors are legally immune from accountability even if they deliberately convict and condemn an innocent man with fabricated evidence? (Read, Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice?)

Think about this for a minute – here in America where “truth and justice” supposedly serve as the very foundation of our judicial system, a prosecutor is legally immune from civil accountability even if he is caught red-handed fabricating evidence and coercing false testimony with deliberate intent to send an innocent man to death row. As if that itself is not outrageous enough, this same Supreme Court then declared in Herrara v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390 (1993) that the Constitution does not prohibit the execution of an innocent person…it is constitutionally permissible to allow a state to put an innocent man to death, as long as he was given a “fair trial.”

Of course, if a person is convicted and condemned to death, there is a presumption that legal representation will be provided, right? Well, actually that’s wrong. The Supreme Court has also declared that those sentenced to death are not entitled to legal counsel. See, Murray v. Giarratano, 492 U.S. 1 (1989).

Most states have subsequently recognized that they cannot execute a person unless they are technically represented by a lawyer, so the states have taken it upon themselves to establish state funded quasi public defender offices to represent the condemned. But these state funded and thus state controlled offices more often provide nothing but the pretense) of representation and serve only the purpose of actually facilitating the execution. (Read, ”Legal Representation In Capital Cases – Privilege or Pretense?”)

Our esteemed Constitutional forefathers also placed great value on the concept of fundamental fairness in dealing with government and thus incorporated into The Bill of Rights the right to “due process,” which traditionally prohibits the government from engaging in unfair practices – sounds like a good things to me.

But then reality comes along and kicks our butt again. Under contemporary Constitutional law “due process” is defined by what process is due under definition and application of current statutory provisions.

What this means is that politicians who campaign for office by promising to push for more executions can pass current laws that substantially limit the right to review of a conviction. Take for example the “great” (puke!) State of Texas, which by far executes more men and women than any other government in the free world. Because of politically inspired and manufactured procedural rules governing appellate review of a capital conviction and sentence of death, appeals based upon newly discovered evidence – even if conclusively establishing a persons factual innocence – cannot be raised any later than 30-days after the conviction becomes final.

Let me put this in perspective – assume for a moment that you have been wrongfully convicted and condemned to death for a crime you know you are innocent of, but because of the incompetence of your state provided lawyer you couldn’t prove it. They now schedule your execution date. Suddenly God himself and a counsel of twelve archangels miraculously appear before the Texas Courts and declare unequivocally that you are innocent.

Sorry Bubba – in Texas not even the sworn “eyewitness” testimony of God himself can stop that execution, as under present Texas law (as well as many other states) politicians have created statutory laws stripping the courts of jurisdiction to even hear new evidence once the conviction becomes “final” after initial appeal.

I often smile at the unintended ignorance of people only vaguely familiar with our legal system – people who like Mary Poppins live in a fairytale world and remain conveniently clueless at how inherently corrupt our judicial system has become. Too many times I have heard (or read) these sheep say things that prove their ignorance. Most of the time they even mean well – they just don’t know any better.

For almost 24 years now I have suffered under an injustice few people can even begin to imagine. In early 1983 I was indicted and subsequently tried and convicted and condemned to death for a double homicide I know I am innocent of, a capital case of alleged premeditated murder that I know was deliberately fabricated by a single key witness and the local state attorney’s office. (Read, Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man)

Several years ago evidence came to light supporting my long pled claim that this entire case – the entire theory of events – was deliberately fabricated with the intent to have me wrongfully convicted. By the states own admission, there were no eyewitnesses, no physical or forensic evidence, and no confession. The entire wholly circumstantial case was based upon my then ex girlfriends claim that I told her I killed these two people by premeditated intent; her testimony was corroborated by her own cousin’s girlfriend, Deborah Hanzel, and the state attorney’s lead investigator, Robert Daniels.

In 1998 Hanzel admitted her testimony was false. Subsequently, in a letter to the judge (Circuit Court Judge R. Thomas Corbin) she explained at length how both key witness Frances Smith-Ottinger and the state attorney’s lead investigator, Robert Daniels, has coerced her to provide that false testimony. (See, ”Affidavit of Deborah Hanzel”)

When a hearing was held on this new evidence it was revealed that in fact, at the time the case was brought, this key witness (Smith-Ottinger) and the local state attorney’s lead investigator, Robert Daniels, were actually having a secret personal relationship “of a sexual nature,” which of course they never previous disclosed.

To put this into perspective, this case was out of one of the smallest rural farming communities in the south. (Glades County, Florida) The office that prosecuted this case now has the highest rate of wrongful convictions of any state attorney’s office in the entire country. (Twentieth Judicial Circuit of Florida) So far, at least five men have been wrongfully convicted and condemned to death by this office only to subsequently be exonerated and released from death row. ( Delbert Tibbs, James Richardson, Bradley Scott, John Landry, and John Ballard)

After the evidence was revealed finally substantiated my long pled claim that the evidence used to convict and condemn me was deliberately fabricated – just as I always said it was, (of course, I didn’t know my ex grilfriend was sleeping with the states lead investigator the very person who initiated these charges against me and personally supervised the development (fabrication?) of the circumstantial evidence used to convict me!), then suddenly the local circuit court and the state put the brakes on and have methodically obstructed progress of my case. ( Read, Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied.)

I now remain on Florida’s death row despite the fact that the evidence has been readily available for years to prove my innocence. One of the millions incarcerated here in the “land of the free,” one of the many innocent victims of a legal system that has become so inherently corrupted by lynch mob politicians and politically corrupt judges.

Thus, during this holiday season I will sit here in my cage condemned to death for a crime I am innocent of and reflect upon these “Blessings of Liberty” here in the “land of the free.” And I will ask you to say a silent prayer for the mothers and fathers, sons and daughters, wives and husbands and children of the millions of imprisoned souls who cannot be home with their loved ones and especially for those many who remain unjustly imprisoned by a system so inherently corrupt and cannot be with their loved ones.

Perhaps now I will write Santa Claus a letter asking him to send me some justice, but then again, I have no chimney so I guess I’m out of luck.

~Mike~

~ Angel Nieves Diaz' Execution Scheduled Tonight 6 pm~

2006-12-13T14:37:00.000-05:00

Everyone has recanted. Fingerprints were not clear. There were no eyewitnesses and even the shooter says Diaz is an innocent man, but the Florida Killing machine chugs on anyway!!!!!

"Putting someone to death on the word of a jailhouse snitch is un-American," said Greenburg, director of the Florida Innocence Initiative.

Read more HERE

UPDATE: Diaz, 55, was pronounced dead at 6:36 p.m., just minutes after an executioner injected a cocktail of lethal chemicals into IV tubes leading into his arm My condolences to his family & friends.

:( Gov.-elect Charlie Crist expects to continue signing death warrants at a similar pace to Gov. Jeb Bush, who signed the black-bordered documents resulting in 20 executions, the most of any governor since the state resumed capital punishment in 1979. :(

:( "I support the death penalty," said Crist, who earned the moniker "Chain Gang Charlie" for his support of inmate chain gangs while in the Legislature. "It's a solemn task, but I believe in it, so I will sign them and review that process as the transition moves forward." :(

Crist told The Associated Press he will be as deliberative as his predecessor.

:( ~Kimy~

Don't Preach Pro-life While Actually Practicing Pro-death

2006-12-09T14:43:00.000-05:00

Don’t Preach Pro-life While Actually Practicing Pro-death

As I write this its is Friday December 1st –World Aids Day. In my death row cell I just watched the ABC World News, which did a story about how some of the country’s leading conservative evangelical religious leaders are very upset because Illinois Senator Barack Obama was invited to be a guest speaker at a conservative church. Collectively these religious leaders signed a “letter of protest,” which they collectively released to the media, protesting Senator Obama’s appearance as they felt his “pro-choice” views on abortion conflicted with the conservative Christian “pro-life” agenda.

Although condemned to death, I have earned a degree in Christian Theology – and even certification in evangelical teaching – and the Bible I am familiar with has one particular scriptural passage (Matthew 7:5, NIV) that says. “You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother's eye.” These words are attributed directly to Jesus.

This is why I’ve come to hold such contempt for the conservative right and their so-called “moral majority.” They are all too often a bunch of self-righteous hypocrites. These same conservative “Christians” who call abortion “murder” will slobber at the mouth like rabid dogs when preaching their support for capital punishment. If we want to preach about the “sanctity of life” then it has to encompass all life, not just the lives we choose to find worthy. We are not God.

Consistent studies have shown that it’s actually the so-called “liberals.” The “pro-choice” segment of our society that opposes capital punishment while the strongest support for the death penalty comes from these hypocrites who dare label them selves “pro-life!” But this is a no brainer… how can you dare to call yourself “pro-life” of you support the deliberate death of any person? Murder is Murder.

With a growing epidemic of wrongful convictions now being exposed because of the use of DNA evidence and already over 130 documented cases of wrongfully convicted innocent men and women condemned to death, there no longer is any question that innocent men and women are being sentenced to death. See, ”Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man.” So, advocating the death penalty means advocating the execution if innocent men and women.

Please tell me – how can anyone who calls them self “pro-life” also support the death penalty? By supporting the death penalty you support a system that will inevitably, by deliberate design, murder an innocent victim. We can’t have it both ways – if this is truly about the practicing the sanctity of life and protecting the innocent from being put to death, then those who call themselves pro-life must just as zealously oppose the death penalty, protecting the innocent from being put to death.

The simple truth is that nobody respects a hypocrite – so don’t preach pro-life while actually practicing pro-death.

~Mike~

Mary Poppins Does Death Row

2006-12-09T13:05:00.000-05:00

I recently had the pleasure of a brief debate with a woman (who I will now call ”Mary Poppins”) in the My Space U.S. Politics Forum. After reading my earlier blog, ”Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied” as well as my posted commentary of how the Florida Supreme Court summarily denied my petition arguing a constitutional right to expedited review of my actual innocence claims (See, Florida Supreme Court Says, “No Right To Expedited Review of Actual Innocence Claim,”) and how I am now forced to seek review by the U.S. Supreme Court without the benefit of legal representation.

This individual responded by saying, “I smell fish” – that if my case was that strong I should have no problem finding pro bono legal counsel (a lawyer willing to take my case at no charge) and since no lawyers are beating down the prison gates to represent me my claims can’t possibly be credible.

Of coarse in all her infinite wisdom my new friend Mary Poppins still could not and did not provide the name of even one qualified lawyer who might be interested in taking on a capital case. Apparently she is so disillusioned that she actually thinks that lawyers do take on capital cases “pro bono” all the time. It must be nice to still be able to live in a fairytale world of sugar and spice and everything nice.

But I don’t blame her at all… her ignorance is only too common. People out there just don’t have a clue and they really do think that everyone on death row has quality legal representation and that there are swarms of lawyers out there lining up at the prison gates wanting to take on death row cases.

The reality of it is that there are very few lawyers willing to take on capital post conviction cases -- much less lawyers who are actually qualified to take on a capital case. As the U.S. Supreme Court has repeatedly recognized, capital (death sentenced) post conviction appellate proceedings have evolved into one of the most inherently complex areas of law. Very few lawyers have the experience, training, and competency to handle representing capital cases.

Look at it like this – the practice of law is a lot like the practice of medicine. Both have specialized fields of practice that require specialized training and experience. Capital post conviction litigation today is like the brain surgery of law. Very few lawyers are trained in this area as it is incredibly demanding and pays very little. Over the years of attempts to expedite executions politicians have passed all sorts of procedural rules lawyers must navigate and if even one procedural rule is not strictly adhered to then the entire appeal is thrown out.

In a perfect world there would be lawyers willing to step up and volunteer to represent death sentenced prisoners “pro bono,” especially in cases where a substantiated claim of actual innocence is made. But wake up Mary Poppins, we don’t live in a perfect world.

Since I was sentenced to death in 1984 about 20 men and women have been released from Florida’s death row after being found to have been wrongfully convicted and innocent of their alleged crime. I personally knew most of these people and I don’t know of even one of these cases in which a lawyer stepped up to volunteer “pro bono" to represent them -- not even one.

So, the next time someone wants to question the validity of my actual innocence claims by arguing that if I had a legitimate claim of innocence then I’d have lawyers lining up around the block wanting to take my case, I would appreciate it very much if you would provide a list of lawyers you think are so willing to step up to the plate as I would really like to know who they are.

Until then I’m stuck with the reality that these lawyers simply do not exist. For that reason I must represent myself in this soon to be filed petition in the U.S. Supreme Court, hoping that they will at least read it. If the U.S. Supreme Court does actually accept review of the question of law I am presenting (whether there is a constitutional right to timely review of an actual innocence in the state courts), then I will be able to request the appointment of legal counsel. But for now I am forced to represent myself in this matter as no qualified lawyers are willing to step up to the plate. Of coarse, if Mary Poppins really wanted to help she’d just loan me her umbrella and I’d simply fly away or at least share whatever it is she’s so obviously on.

~Mike~

Death-row inmate appears in court

2006-12-06T17:51:00.000-05:00

Death-row inmate appears in court

~Ft Myers News-Press ~December 6th, 2006~ Article about Mike's recent hearing.

Death Row Turkey Seeks Pardon

2006-12-05T22:44:00.000-05:00

They did it again – it’s become a Thanksgiving ritual. The media converges upon the White House and with the cameras rolling the President stands before a turkey and formally announces that the turkey has been spared by Presidential Pardon and that because of this act of compassion that turkey will now live out its days on a quiet farm and enjoy a good life.

Every television station in the country will air that piece about the turkey receiving a Presidential Pardon. I’ve watched this ritual myself every year for more years than I can hope to even remember. The truth is that I don’t recall even a single year they didn’t go through this ritual.

But does anyone even stop to think about the pretense of all this? Although that particular turkey is presumably pardoned, tens of millions of others will still meet their fate as Thanksgiving dinner. Although the President pardons this one turkey; his family, their friends, and himself will still gather around the table only hours later and eat the traditional Thanksgiving turkey dinner.

Like those millions of turkeys that meet their fate on Thanksgiving Day, I too am condemned to death. There’s been a few times in my life when I’ve been called a “turkey” as that was common back in the day. Maybe it’s time that I formally declare myself a turkey… maybe then I too will at least have a chance to also be granted a pardon.

What I do know is that my innocence itself certainly isn’t enough. For almost nine years now I’ve had a Substantiated claim of actual innocence before the courts (See, ”Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man”) but innocence doesn’t matter. When the state can no longer contest your claim of innocence they just stop the case from proceeding any further by deliberately delaying review of that claim. They can drag it out until you eventually die of “natural causes” on death row and then declare the issue moot. (See, ”Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied”)

Here in Florida the equivalent to a Presidential Pardon is the “clemency process.” Like the President, each year Florida’s elected Governor will make a public show of granting clemency to a condemned turkey. That lucky turkey will then live out its days on a nice farm out in the country.

Sadly, not even one condemned person in Florida has received clemency since 1983. I personally have had a clemency petition pending before the Governor since 1998. It hasn’t been formally denied – but I have no doubt that it would never be granted. People simply don’t get clemency in Florida – that discretional privilege is reserved exclusively for turkeys.

The fact is that since 1983 when that last condemned prisoner in Florida was granted clemency over 20 condemned prisoners have been exonerated and released from death row because of innocence… but not even one of these innocent men and women were granted clemency. In every case the state fought tooth and nail to prevent their release, deliberately dragging the case out for many years. Although Florida leads the country in the number of wrongfully convicted people sent to death row, the state has never admitted error in any case… not even when the evidence conclusively proved innocence.

Clearly, legal innocence is not enough for a wrongfully convicted and condemned person to get a pardon. If you really want a pardon, especially from someone whose name is Bush, your only real shot is to be a turkey. In the years that our current President Bush was Governor of Texas, he presided over about 150 executions; he has granted only one pardon to a condemned prisoner – and that was to self confessed serial killer Henry Lee Lucas. In the eight years his little brother Jeb Bush has been Governor of Florida he has not granted even one clemency – except of course to the turkey each year at Thanksgiving.

So, maybe I really do need to declare myself a turkey and only then petition the governor for clemency – maybe then I might even actually have a chance. Perhaps I too can then live out the rest of my days on a quiet farm in the country. Perhaps then too the media will find my story news worthy. I should be so lucky. But then again, I really should have been a turkey.

~ Still Alive From Death Row ~ Update Nov. 2006~

2006-12-02T10:16:00.001-05:00

Hello… Can anyone hear me? Is there life out there? Here I am again, still alive from death row in Florida. For my faithful readers I submit another monthly update. I also want to acknowledge some special friends and family. With the holiday season now upon us this time of year can be especially lonely here in solitaire confinement. This is the time of year that family means the most.

This month my grandson Aden Michael turned two years old and I found out around January 15th I will be the proud grandfather of another grandson – cool! I hope to also see my daughter Jennifer, but it’s my oldest son Daniel Brian that I too often turn my thoughts to during the holidays. In the Bible it tells us about celebrating the homecoming of the prodigal son – Daniel Brian is my prodigal son, the son that by fate and circumstance I do not know. Although in recent years I’ve tried to reach out to him my attempts have met with failure. So, I’d like to send a message to him… wherever you might be, know this – you are always in my heart and I pray the time will come when you want to give me a chance to know you. If you do happen to read this, please write as nothing would mean more to me.

What a month it has been. Democrats took control of congress while here in Florida the Republicans held their ground by retaining control of both the State Legislature and the Governor’s Office. It’s got to be the water…why else would voters in Florida elect “Chain Gang Charlie” Crist as Governor and ”Mad Dog” Mc Collom as Attorney General?

I’d like to say that after over 23 years of living in a cage condemned to death there’s a light at the end of the tunnel but there isn’t. Recently someone told me to “keep the faith” as it’s always the darkest just before the dawn. Maybe so, but when dawn does finally break will my fate take a turn for the better – or worse?

After a long period of delays, the lower court (State Circuit Court) in Ft. Myers has finally scheduled a hearing in my case for “final oral arguments.” This will be an important hearing, as both sides will now be required to personally present their arguments on all the evidence and issues before the court. Of course, the issue that will be the focus of this argument will be the evidence supporting my actual innocence.

Over the past almost nine years the lower court has conducted sporadic hearings allowing only bits and pieces of the wealth of evidence supporting my claim of innocence in at a time. I believe this was deliberately done as a means in which to limit the public’s perception of the collective picture.

This upcoming hearing will, for the first time, allow all the evidence to be fully argued in open court. Although I will not be allowed to personally attend (I will be allowed to listen to the arguments by telephonic conferencing) anyone who may want to can personally attend this hearing as it is open to the public. If you would like to attend, this hearing (Lambrix v, State) will be held before Judge R. Thomas Corbin in hearing room #2 at the Lee County Justice Center (county courthouse) at 1700 Monroe Street, Ft. Myers, Florida; the hearing is scheduled to begin at 10:00 a.m.on December 5th, 2006.

It is my hope that those interested in my case and able to attend will do so as a physical show of support can make all the difference. It is also my hope that members of the media will want to attend so that, for the first time, they can hear all the evidence argued in open court, evidence that collectively will show how, by deliberate design and intent, the state fabricated this case of alleged premeditated murder against me – deliberately having me convicted and condemned to death for a crime I am innocent of – a theory or events that simply never happened.

Anyone concerned about the corruption within the system; anyone concerned about the why and how innocent men and women are deliberately convicted and condemned to death in spite of innocence should attend this “final oral argument.”

For those not yet familiar with the factual circumstances of my case, I would like to encourage you to fully read the previously posted articles. For your convenience, I have listed these articles below, along with a brief summary of each, so you can easily click the link to them.

Again, I would like to express my gratitude to all of those who are committed to remaining vigilant in their concern for the injustices that are perpetuated against innocent victims of unethical, overzealous prosecutors. Without your continuous concern and willingness to speak out against the established system these injustices would go unnoticed. I know from experience how important hope is – without knowing that people out there do care there is no hope. Just knowing that there are people out there who are willing to listen and are concerned about those wrongfully convicted and condemned to death makes all the difference.

Please click on these links to the full length case summary and articles and read them now… publicly exposing an injustice is the first step to having justice served.

Introduction (a brief summary of the case as well as the circumstances that first allowed this injustice to take place and why it continues to drag out.)

Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man (Full length summary of my case from time of arrest, through the trial, the appellate process, and finally the new evidence uncovered that substantiates my long pled claim of innocence.)

Florida Supreme Court Says, “No Right To Expedited Review of Actual Innocence Claim.” (The Florida Supreme Court recently told me I had no right to a quicker review of my actual innocence claim even though it has already been pending in the Judge Corbin’s lower court more that 8 years.)

Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied (Article discussing the corruption of a judicial system that will push to expedite the execution of the guilty – but will deliberately obstruct and procrastinate review of a claim of innocence.)

Condemned by The Perfect Storm (Article discussing the elements that work together to make it more likely to be condemned to death – and why innocence itself becomes irrelevant – if you’re some like me and not O.J. Simpson.)

Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice? (Although prosecutorial misconduct is the leading cause of innocent people being convicted and condemned to death, the question remains – does failure to hold prosecutors accountable for deliberate acts of misconduct result in wrongful convictions only encourage such misconduct?)

Legal Representation In Capital Cases – Privilege or Pretense? (Once wrongfully convicted and condemned to death exposing and correcting this injustice is entirely dependent upon competent legal representation. But no legal right to competent representation exits and a pretense of representation works to distract exposure of legitimate innocence claims.)

About Mike (Full length biography of Mike Lambrix from birth to death row in Florida.)

A Day in Life Under Death (Essay about a day on death row, written by Mike to allow the reader to see what an average day on death row is like.)

A Condemned Man's Perspective of "The Innocent Man" (Review of John Grisham’s recently released book “The Innocent Man” by a death row prisoner.)

Countdown To An Execution (Mike’s own death row account of the recent execution of Danny Rolling.)

Happy Holidays! ~Mike~

Visit to Death Row

2006-11-30T12:14:00.000-05:00

We were on our way to America, my friend Dini, her son Michiel and I. To America, a country I had never thought about visiting before, as I didn't think I would be interested in seeing the country. But we weren't going there to go sightseeing or travelling around, but to visit our friends on Death Row in Florida.

The days preceding our departure had been hectic and chaotic, packing the right clothes, making arrangements for the kids, flying from Greece to Holland to see my mom for one evening and then leaving for Schiphol the following early morning, together with Dini and Michiel.

After a long flight we landed in Atlanta with a delay due to bad weather. Because of the delay we missed our flight to Jacksonville and by the time we finally reached our motel, it was the middle of the night.

The next day, jetlagged and groggy, we drove around the area. I had been told that this part wasn't the most beautiful part of Florida, but I was enchanted with its greenness and the overwhelming forests. Coming from Greece, I had expected Florida, which has about the same temperature as Greece, to be dry like my country. But it was lush and green and somehow very tranquil and peaceful. In some ways the pastures and the greenness reminded me of my native country Holland.

There was not much traffic on the road and while we were driving around, watching the landscape passing by, still musing about the similarities between this area and the part of Holland where I grew up, suddenly grey buildings appeared surrounded by wired fences. First the Florida State Prison and then the Union Correctional Institution. I then realized that any pretence of peacefulness, all similarities with my native country, ended here.

The next day we arrived early at the prison for our visits to begin. First we had to go through the security checks. Both Dini and Michiel had visited the prison several times before to see their friend William, but for me it was the first time and I still needed to be registered. To my surprise, the guards were rather nice and helpful. When I didn't know my height and weight in American measurements, the female guard wrote down her own height and weight as we were of similar body structure. She also apologized for having to pat me down.

After we were finished with the security checks we walked through a fenced passageway to the building where the visiting room was. The fencing went across the top of the passageway, so it looked like a tunnel with rolls of razor wire around it. On the way we passed the building for general population. The gardens around it were nicely kept; there were trees and a fountain with benches around it, very peaceful. Prisoners could take their visitors outside for a walk or sit on the benches under a tree and have lunch together. Squirrels scampered freely around in the trees and some cats were walking about.

Death Row prisoners receive their visitors in the 'visitor’s park'. A room filled with metal tables built into the floor with metal stools around it. As soon as we entered the room, we were assigned a table where we had to wait for our friends to arrive. There were about 25 tables in the room. On one side of the room there were small windows and on the other side there were vending machines and a counter where we could buy coffee, drinks and snacks. Also on that side there were the inmate bathrooms, an inmate search room, visitor bathroom, and a long glass wall, where we could see the “non-contact visitor” booths. One by one the prisoners arrived, dressed in bright orange shirts, they all looked around until they discovered their visitor and then they smiled.

I was a bit nervous as, even though Mike and I had been writing for 1.5 years, we had yet to meet in person. But once he arrived, I knew I shouldn’t have worried. Mike was easy to be with and talk to, especially as he was very talkative himself.

I was struck how everything seemed so normal. This could have been any visiting room, anywhere. There was a feel of happiness in the room. Most of the men were cheerful, happy to be out of their small cells for a while. The men did not look like 'the worst of the worst' to me, and I did not have the feeling I was surrounded by monsters, as they are often portrayed to be by the media. It was hard to realize that perhaps in some time to come, some of these men would not be here anymore, but would have been killed by the State of Florida. Coming from overseas, the thought of putting a healthy human to death is certainly surreal. This country with its ultra conservative ideas about abortions and euthanasia, happily executes its own citizens. I can't help wondering what is being preached in the many churches I saw everywhere.

Sitting there with Mike at a table, I wanted to ask him, “How is it possible that you somehow have risen above your surroundings to be the man that you are today, so different from the irresponsible youth you once were? Where did you find the strength to overcome the injustices done to you, the inhumane and indifferent treatment, and the agonizing experience of facing your own death? How did you keep your sanity, day after day, year after year, locked up in a cage for almost 24 years now? How does it feel being rejected by society and in some cases by friends and family, as well? And yet here you are, intelligent, opinionated, thoughtful, widely read, with a great sense of humour, a pleasure to be with. How did you manage?”. But I did not ask all this, as it was a day to be happy, to laugh and talk and to enjoy each other’s company.

Some of the other men were visited by their children, parents, and wives; they spent their time talking, walking about, eating together, playing table games, some were praying while holding each others hands, and reading the Bible. Several times one of the guards paced up and down between the tables. At every visit the men were being counted. All of them had to leave their tables and line up against the wall while the guards counted them. The men were cooperative; not wanting to cause any trouble, there was no way that they were going to jeopardize this precious time with their visitors. But I wondered why this was necessary, since I had not seen any obvious escape routes. The guards did not seem overly tough though, some were nice and willing to talk, treating the men in a respectful manner.

The rest of the visiting days were spent in a similar way but with the additional pressure that the countdown had started. We have had the privilege of sharing some of our respective life experiences, anchoring our friendship, and developing a sincere relationship; which enriches our lives now.

Inevitably, the end of the visit arrived, and after a last hug, we separated, in the firm belief that we will meet again.

Geesje

Executing A Stranger

2006-11-28T10:00:00.000-05:00

The other day I ran into an old friend that I hadn’t seen in at least ten years. Back then he was my cell neighbor for several years here on death row. We are both about the same age and had come to death row about the same time – Class of ’84. After a few moments of bantering back and forth, he commented on how much I had changed since he last saw me … that got me to thinking about just how much I really had changed since I last saw him – how much we all change through the years.

I’ve been on death row 23 years. When I was originally charged in this case I was only 22 years old. Now at the ripe age of 45, I’m a grandfather. It’s been a long journey and like any journey each step – each stumble – has changed me in an infinite number of small ways that add up to completely transforming the person I once was into who I am today.

I’m not the only person who has spent an entire lifetime in solitary confinement condemned to death. Here in Florida I know some who have been living under a sentence of death for 32 years – or better. Most people out there haven’t even given any thought to how death rows across the country have become multi-million dollar geriatric units, indefinitely housing those who slowly grow old while awaiting theor fate. Here in Florida more men on death row die of natural caused than of executions as old age sets in. We the condemned are more likely to die of cancer, heart disease, or other ailments common to aging than we are to die from execution; yet the state still spends millions upon millions of dollars pursuing our deaths.

The question I want to confront today is this … when it takes at least ten years, and often even twenty or thirty years to carry out a court imposed sentence of death, is the person we’re executing really the same person we originally sentenced to death? Or are we executing a stranger?

How many of us can say we are the same person today that we were ten years ago? How about twenty years ago? What about thirty years ago? Many of those sentenced to death committed their alleged crime when they were relatively young and immature. Almost without exception they were under the influence of drugs or alcohol – or both. That single act of violence led to their condemnation. Assuming for the moment that our judicial system is perfect and everyone condemned to death is in fact guilty, can we really say that person we condemned then; is the same person we want to execute today?

The fundamental truth here is that we all change. Most of us become better people as we age – more mature and responsible. I’ve seen men come to death row twenty years ago consumed by hate and anger, only to find faith and hope in the most unexpected environment and become a new person.

Myself, I too was once consumed by anger at being wrongfully convicted and condemned to death for a crime I know I am innocent of. (See, Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man). In the early years that anger was my strength. I wasn’t just sentenced to die; I was condemned to slowly rot away in solitary confinement one eternal day at a time. (See, A Day in Life Under Death). Believing in my innocence actually mattered, I pushed to expedite review in a desperate attempt to end this nightmare, (see, Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied); only to have my appeals up held out of spite by actions attributable to the state.

Although my impatience at ending the injustice remains, I know I’ve changed. Though I still must deal with frustration, I am no longer consumed by anger. When I came to death row, I had little education or even will to be educated. Since I’ve been imprisoned I got my G.E.D. and with it a sense of accomplishment. I searched my soul for spiritual meaning and found myself. (See, "To See The Soul -- A Search Of Self"). I began taking correspondence courses and earned a degree in Christian Theology, which gave me even greater confidence in who I was – and who I could yet become.

I have a faded photo of me taken a few weeks before I was arrested on these charges. That photo reminds me of who I was. When I look in the mirror today I see the person I’ve since become. I am not the same person sentenced to death so many years ago.

So, now I ask you this – Are you the same person you were so many years ago? In your younger and more irresponsible days have you ever made a mistake you came to regret? If we all recognize that each of us does change as the years pass, then doesn’t it stand to reason that we also have to admit that the person we seek to execute today, over 20 years or more later, is not the same person we sentenced to death so long ago – that when it comes down to it, aren’t we really executing a stranger?

Please Help Mike

2006-11-24T14:53:00.000-05:00

Dear Readers,

I would like every one of you to send a letter to Judge Corbin, urging the Judge to provide review and end this injustice of delaying my case. Please use the sample letter I have provided for you here. You may alter it to your liking and then send it to the address, which you can find in the letter.

I thank you very much for your time, help and effort.

~ Mike ~

Judge R. Thomas Corbin
Lee County Justice Center
1700 Monroe Street
Ft. Myers, FL 33901

November 24, 2006

Dear Judge Corbin,

With this letter I would like to bring the case of Michael Lambrix to your attention.

To my astonishment the case of Mr, Lambrix has been before the 20th Judicial Circuit Court in Ft. Myers for almost nine years.

If the state courts can thoroughly review an original post conviction appeal, challenging the convictions and death sentences within 32 days in order to sign a warrant, then why does it take almost a full decade to provide review of a claim of actual innocence in the same courts?

In my opinion justice should be swift and decisive, regardless if it is a claim of innocence or affirming a conviction. Justice by definition should never drag its feet, even when none of the options favor the State. Justice delayed is justice denied.

I urge you respectfully to end this injustice, to expedite review on Mr. Lambrix’s case as soon as possible and end the prolonged uncertainty of his fate.

Sincerely Yours,

Ask Mike A Question

2006-11-23T14:58:00.000-05:00

If you have any questions about Mike's case, prison in Florida, capital punishment, or anything else you would like to know from Mike please feel free to ask him here.

ASK MIKE HERE
The questions will be forwarded to Mike and he will personally respond to your questions and the answers will be posted for here right here so please check back regularly.

Please be aware that due to mail, institutional, as well as court delays -- this could take a little while.

I invite you to browse through the rest of the Southern Injustice Blog while you wait and familiarize yourself with all the injustices Mike has been forced to suffer from the court system deliberately designed by political ambitions to make it almost impossible for a wrongflly accused prisoner to exonerate themselves.

~Kimy~

Zero Tolerance For Executing The Innocent

2006-11-21T11:54:00.000-05:00

A few years ago our federal government adopted a “zero tolerance” policy towards the possession of illegal drugs. These laws allow our government to board a private vessel and conduct a search for illegal drugs. If even so much as a single joint (one marijuana cigarette) is found on board then the government can immediately seize the vessel. In recent years, our government has seized boats and yachts worth millions of dollars; even when there was no proof that the owner knew that someone else had even brought the illegal drugs on board.

The courts have consistently upheld the governments right to seize these boats as this “zero tolerance” policy promotes a greater good by deterring other from using their own vessels as means in which to transport illegal drugs. Because of the “War on Drugs” it became a government priority to adopt this zero intolerance as a means in which to reduce the trafficking of illegal drugs and the damage they do to our society.

If we as a society find it necessary to adopt a zero tolerance policy on drugs because of a belief that these drugs have a damaging effect on our society, then why don’t we have a similar zero tolerance policy on conduct that undermines and damages the integrity of our judicial system itself?

Think about it… if illegal drugs are such an evil upon the moral fabric of our society that we will give our government the power to seize our homes, vehicles, boats – our private property and even impose mandatory life sentences for the mere possession of even small amounts of illegal drugs, then why are we not even more intolerant of an even greater evil that plagues our society?

The evil I speak of is the wrongful convictions and even condemnation of innocent men and women; all too often by deliberate acts of prosecutorial misconduct. What could undermine the moral fabric of our society more than to allow our judicial system to become so inherently corrupt from within its own ranks that even the innocence of any person becomes irrelevant?

How many people in our society today are aware that our United States Supreme Court has ruled that even the factual innocence or a person is not sufficient to stop the state from executing that person? That our Constitution does not prohibit executing an innocent man as long as he was given a “fair trial?” Even if our Constitution does not specifically protect against executing the innocent, as a matter of moral conscience shouldn’t we as a society be morally offended that our courts would find it acceptable? Shouldn’t we as a society insist on the adoption of a zero tolerance policy towards executing the innocent?

What could be more destructive to the integrity of our judicial system than to find that we have executed an innocent person? If public confidence is our judiciary is undermined, then can it ever truly be restored?

I believe the time has come to demand the adoption of a zero tolerance policy towards the execution of innocent men and women. When we as a society carry out the deliberate execution of even one person then we all become murderers. We can convict and condemn a million guilty men, but when we cross the line and by deliberate design and intent, convict and condemn then execute even one innocent man or woman; we all become murderers. Even the possibility of executing even one innocent person should be morally offensive; that as a collective society we should be repulsed – but in fact, very few express concern.

In fact, the truth is that as a society we have become tolerant of wrongful convictions and the causes for them. In recent years we have seen almost 150 men and women released from death row after being wrongfully convicted and condemned. Although this only shows those wrongfully sentenced to death, there are quite literally thousands more who suffered similar injustices we don’t hear about because they remain imprisoned with no means in which to prove their innocence.

As a matter of moral conscience this should bother us; not only those who are labeled as “bleeding heart liberal” because they dare to recognize our judicial system is imperfect and advocate change. But even the most conservative citizens should be bothered by a system that not only has such a high rate of wrongful convictions, but a system that has evolved to the point where politically manufactured procedural rules have been created that make it almost impossible for an innocent person to even prove their innocence.

This dirty secret our judiciary does not want the common public to know – the execution of an innocent person in today’s system is now inevitable. They know this, but they don’t want you to know.

Why is this? Because in the past 20 years political interests have forced the courts – even the U.S. Supreme Court itself – to adopt procedural rules that severely limit appellate review of claims of error. In an overzealous effort to expedite the execution of the guilty we have equally advocated expediting the execution of the innocent. As the procedural protections against wrongful convictions are systematically dismantled and appellate review “streamlined” with every elimination of these procedural protections we increase the probability of executing an innocent person.

In recent years as more and more “reforms” are adopted to eliminate review of criminal convictions in the interest of promoting quicker executions, that probability of executing an innocent person substantially increases. The simple truth is that if our courts become unwilling to even hear a persons evidence supporting a claim of innocence, then how do we know if the claim of innocence is valid?

What is especially troubling about this recent political push to eliminate full review of claims of procedural error and even actual innocence is that with the relatively recent use of DNA testing we are finding that there is an extremely high rate of wrongful convictions. Not everyone who claims to be innocent is actually innocent, but as a matter if moral conscience, shouldn’t we as a society at least recognize that we have a moral obligation to ensure to the fullest extent possible that those we do convict and condemn, are in fact guilty?

If we can give our government the power to impose a zero tolerance policy on drugs, then shouldn’t we also insist that our government and especially our judiciary adopt and practice a zero tolerance policy on wrongful convictions and the inevitable execution of innocent men and women? Isn’t it time that our elected politicians and appointed judges recognize that the inevitable execution of even one innocent person will ultimately and irreparably undermine the confidence our society has in the system as a whole? The only way to protect the integrity of our system itself is to adopt a zero tolerance policy towards the imprisonment and/or execution of innocent men and women by recognizing that any claim of actual innocence supported by competent evidence must be fully and fairly reviewed by the courts without imposition of procedural rules that today prohibit the review of such claims.

The time has come for all people of moral conscience to call upon both elected politicians and appointed judges to recognize that a legitimate claim of innocence should not and cannot be denied review because of procedural rules create to promote expedited finality of legitimate convictions. Only by insisting that all supported claims of actual innocence be fully and fairly reviewed can we minimize the inevitable probability of executing innocent people. That is the “zero tolerance policy” we need.

~Mike~

Hill's View

2006-11-20T21:08:00.000-05:00

This is an extremely accurate depiction of a death row cell here in Florida. This was draw by Clarence Hill better know to us here on the row as Brother Razzaq Muhammed. He was killed by the State of Florida on September 20th, 2006.

The detail is amazing in this drawing right down to the grills on the back of the cell (no they are not windows) to the caging they welded over the bars for "our" protection and "security reasons" a few years ago. This is the view you would have from standing on the outside looking into Hill's cell.

Please click on the picture to see it in a bigger size it truly is an amazing detail work of art.

“If I Did It”

2006-11-15T18:47:00.000-05:00

O.J. Simpson will spill the beans about the killings involving his estranged wife and Ron Goldman in the release of his book, "If I Did It."

O.J. Simpson, the former actor and NFL running back, is set to talk about "how he would have" killed his ex-wife and her friend.

O.J. Simpson, a 59-year-old acquitted double murderer, will appear in two 1-hour FOX television network specials on Nov. 27 and 29, followed by the Nov. 30 release of his book, If I Did It, according to the New York Daily News.

SO FOX IS GIVING O.J. Simpson two hours at the end of the key November sweep period to mull over what he would do if he were to commit murder. The title of the show is "O.J. Simpson: If I Did It, Here's How It Happened."

That's what I call a November sweep stunt--something that would no doubt bring high ratings and much interest, but I would rather see them focus on some real issues like... why more than 122 people have walked off of death row after being wrongfully convicted and how many more innocent men are still rotting on death row or worse yet, been killed by the state or died in jail as their innocence claims went unheard.

Perhaps if they would have had O.J.’s dream team they would being writing their “If I did it" stories too instead of being Condemned by The Perfect Storm like Mike Lambrix, who has been on Florida’s death row for 23 years now for a crime he didn’t commit.

”Let me ask you this… where would O.J. Simpson be today if he stood trial for the exact same crime in a small southern county and didn’t have the money to hire his “dream team” defense lawyers? That’s the undeniable truth – almost without exception. Those on death row are not condemned because of the particular crime they stood trial for, but because they were unable to defend against the resources available to the state… it is the lack of capital that makes you eligible for capital punishment.”— Michael Lambrix

O.J. said he would get all that back, "in spades" and Simpson must feel he is close to drawing that flush. Sadly, the story is quite different for the average man who cannot even get his claims of actual innocence heard even years after the discovery of exonerating evidence. See, Florida Supreme Court Says, “No Right To Expedited Review of Actual Innocence Claim.”

Why even our very own U.S. Supreme Court has said, “that the Constitution does not prohibit the execution of a person who is actually innocent.” Herrera v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390 (1993).”

Most people out there in the real world – especially those who support the death penalty – are conveniently ignorant of how the system works and the people of power who do know how it works have deliberately designed it so individual prosecutors can become nothing less than state sanctioned killers. Pretty strong words for officials who are supposed to be seeking truth and justice, but if the glove fits…

Death Row Tea Party

2006-11-14T10:57:00.000-05:00

It’s Election Day and I’m pissed. For the last couple of months I’ve had to put up with listening to all these political ads on the T.V. and radio. This has been an especially nasty Election Year, as the mudslinging has gotten worse with each election. Today’s politicians don’t campaign on the issues but rather run for office by convincing potential voters that the person running against them is corrupt – but they’re all corrupt.

What really gets me though, is that I’m one of millions of American citizens that are legally prohibited from voting. Think about it for just a minute … the one defining act that led to our so-called Constitutional Democracy, that one act of defiance against the crown that brought our forefathers down the path of independence was the Boston Tea Party.
For those of us who smoked just a little too much dope during our high school years, that’s when a small group of insurgents decided they were tired of the English imposing high taxes on the American Colonies and decided to dress up like “savages” (American Natives) and jump on a ship in the Boston Harbor and destroy the tea shipped from England by dumping it into the salt water.

Today we call them patriots, true revolutionaries, and the forefathers of our freedoms. But in their day the ruling government at the time labeled them “insurgents” and charged them with treason.

That one principle was branded into our history – we are a country conceived upon the principle that “taxation without representation” is intolerable, a Constitutional Democracy that mandates that power of government is given only by majority vote and every person is entitled, as an “inalienable” right to equality as reflected in that vote.

But that entire premise is a work of fiction, a freaking fairytale. The truth is that millions of American citizens are legally prohibited from voting. Today the United States incarcerates more of its citizens in jails and prisons than any other country in the world. Add to that the millions more people convicted of crimes that are not imprisoned and you’re talking about approximately 7.5 million American citizens that are not allowed to vote.

Why would we care about that? I mean, certainly these damned “criminals” brought it upon themselves and their own acts resulted in the forfeiture of their right to vote. That’s what they want you to think. In fact, they don’t want you to think – they want to tell you what to think -- the last thing they want you to actually do is think for yourself.

Me, I actually like to think for myself, sometimes it scares the hell out of me, but I like it. What I’m thinking today is that it’s really pissing me off that I’m not allowed to vote. Although I’m imprisoned I pay my taxes in what I must buy. I’m sure that there are millions of “convicted felons” in the free world today that are paying a lot of taxes --billions per year – yet they are not allowed to vote … “taxation without representation!”

Well. I’ve got an idea, maybe it’s time we stood up as a group and demand our right to vote. These elections affect us too. In fact, electing those into office probably directly affect us even more than the average citizen.

So, here is my idea … from now on when Election Day comes around let’s our voice heard. Not a single voice, but a collective voice. How many are ready to stand up and be heard? Why not organize a “Million Convict March” on the White House every Election Day and as we gather in the National Mall, let each of us throw a single teabag into the reflecting pool as a symbol of protest. Each teabag by itself will be insignificant, just as each voice by itself will never be heard. But a million teabags will stain the water and be noticed. If these politicians want to deny such a huge percentage of American citizens their “inalienable” right to vote, yet continue to tax us, then let’s stand up and be counted.

Today I am ready to be declared an insurgent. Today I’m ready to stand up and be counted – today I begin my protest even if I am in solitary confinement on death row … today – Election Day – I am having a Death Row Tea Party and will now gather what tea I have and will ceremoniously dump them into my toilet and every election day from here on out I will continue to dump teabags into my toilet. Will my voice be heard? No, it won’t. But at least I’ll know I did something -- can the millions of other who are denied the right to vote in elections that will affect their lives say the same?

Recent American Bar Association Report on Florida's Death Penalty

2006-11-13T12:45:00.000-05:00

It's a troubling fact that 22 death row inmates have been exonerated since the death penalty was reinstated in 1973 - more than any other state in the nation. The ABA report notes that "During that same time, Florida executed sixty death-row inmates. Therefore, the proportion exonerated exceeds thirty percent of the number executed."

While it doesn't advocate or take any position for or against the death penalty, the ABA's research found a number of serious deficiencies. Here is a brief summary of their extensive report:

Florida Leads the Nation in Death-Row Exonerations: Combined, these death-row exonerees served approximately 150 years in prison before being released.

Inadequate Compensation for Conflict Trial Counsel in Death Penalty Cases: The statutory fee cap [..] and the failure to regularly provide for partial payments have the potential to dissuade the most experienced and qualified attorneys from taking capital cases and may preclude those attorneys who do take these cases from having the funds necessary to present a vigorous defense.

Lack of Qualified and Properly Monitored Capital Collateral Registry Counsel: Registry attorneys, who are being appointed with greater frequency to capital collateral cases since the closure of the Capital Collateral Regional Counsel Office in the Northern Region of Florida, need only minimal trial and appellate experience to qualify for appointment and are not adequately monitored.

Inadequate Compensation for Capital Collateral Registry Attorneys: In at least some instances, registry attorneys handling capital collateral cases are not fully compensated at a rate that is commensurate with the provision of high quality legal representation.

Significant Capital Juror Confusion: Death sentences resulting from juror confusion or mistake are not tolerable, but research establishes that many Florida capital jurors do not understand their role and responsibilities when deciding whether to impose a death sentence.

Lack of Unanimity in Jury’s Sentencing Decision in Capital Cases: The Florida Supreme Court recently noted that “Florida is now the only state in the country that allows a jury to find that aggravators exist and to recommend a sentence of death by a mere majority vote.” Additionally, a recent study found that Florida’s practice of permitting capital sentencing recommendations by a majority vote reduces the jury’s deliberation time and thus may diminish the thoroughness of the deliberations.

The Practice of Judicial Override: Between 1972 and 1999, 166 of the 857 first-time death sentences imposed (or 19.4 percent) involved a judicial override of a jury’s recommendation of life imprisonment or life imprisonment without the possibility of parole. [..] Florida law still authorizes the practice.

Lack of Transparency in the Clemency Process: Full and proper use of the clemency process is essential to guaranteeing fairness in the administration of the death penalty. Given the ambiguities and confidentiality surrounding Florida’s clemency decision-making process and the fact that clemency has not been granted to a death-sentenced inmate since 1983, it is difficult to conclude that Florida’s clemency process is adequate.

Racial Disparities in Florida’s Capital Sentencing: [A] criminal defendant in a capital case is, other things being equal, 3.4 times more likely to receive the death penalty if the victim is white than if the victim is African-American.

Geographic Disparities in Florida’s Capital Sentencing: The cause of these geographic disparities is unclear, but one possible variable is the charging decision. Research in other states indicates that charging practices vary from prosecutor to prosecutor and few of the prosecutor offices in Florida that we contacted have written polices governing the charging decision. Research also suggests that some capital charging decisions in Florida are influenced by racial factors.

Death Sentences Imposed on People with Severe Mental Disability: The State of Florida has a significant number of people with severe mental disabilities on death row, some of whom were disabled at the time of the offense and others of whom became seriously ill after conviction and sentence.

In assessing Florida's system, the team measured state law, procedure and practices against protocols developed by the ABA to evaluate death-penalty jurisprudence. Its findings are troubling. It found "the state did not comply with 23 protocols, partially complied with 36, and fully complied with only eight." The team was unable to assess compliance with 25 protocols because the records do not exist or were not easily obtainable.

Florida is not alone among Southern states with broken death penalty systems. The ABA's study of the death penalty in Alabama and Georgia reveals similar problems.

Affidavit of Deborah Hanzel

2006-11-12T09:02:00.000-05:00

Anti Death Penalty Links

2006-11-11T21:20:00.000-05:00

Stop Capital Punishment Now!

Abolish the Death Penalty

F.D.R.A.G.

Capital Defense Weekly

againstdeathrows

The Central Pennsylvania Abolitionist

If you want your URL added please click HERE. We encourage reciprocal links.

Florida Supreme Court Says, “No Right To Expedited Review of Actual Innocence Claim.”

2006-11-07T10:23:00.000-05:00

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~

~Case Update~ November 1, 2006

2006-11-01T12:48:00.000-05:00

Each date an update will be posted so that those who wish to follow my case can stay up with the latest progress and any new developments. This month I gave birth to this new blog. Like a new parent giving birth to a child this event brought with it a lot of anxiety and uncertainty. I would welcome any comments and suggestions on how I can make this even better. Please bear with me as I learn to walk in this new world.

Several people have told me that my blog entries are too long; however, let me explain that my objective is to post thought provoking articles on this blog so that those with the attention span greater than that of a mushroom can read a bit about both my case and the death penalty system from the perspective of someone who is actually condemned to death. I want to provoke thought not only on my own injustice but on the corrupt system as a whole. This isn’t about just me – I am not the only victim of injustice trapped within the system. By promoting awareness of why the system has convicted and condemned so many innocent people – and why so many innocent people remain trapped within the system, I hope to make a difference.

Once I have posted the longer articles, then I will attempt to focus on shorter weekly submissions as well as a monthly update. But I will remain hopeful that those who really want to know how the death penalty system works will want to read the full length articles previously posted. (Please see the menu links on the sidebar)

I am encouraged by the comments I have received so far, and I am inspired by the potential of this format to reach out into the world via cyberspace and give people a look from the inside out. But I need your help. I remain in a physical cage and am completely dependent upon the generosity and even sacrifice of a very few friends. A few letters to those in power to do the right thing in my case will not make a difference – we must make them take notice that this is not simply a whisper, but a collective scream for them to do the right thing. I need those who are willing to help to write physical letters to this Judge and remind him that Justice delayed is justice denied – it’s time to do the right thing!

This month saw only one development in the progress of my case. On October 23, 2006 the Judge, R. Thomas Corbin, sent a letter to all parties advising us that he has scheduled a telephonic hearing for October 24th, 2006 but apparently the clerk of the court “forgot” to mail that order out – how convenient! Judge Corbin then said, “the court is looking to rescheduling the oral argument (telephonic hearing) by separate order.” Of course, no separate order actually rescheduling this hearing has yet been provided. (Gee, what a surprise!)

This is indicative of the pattern of deliberate procrastination that has plagued my case for many years – why my claim of actual innocence has effectively been held hostage by this lower trial court for almost nine years now, and why my case will continue to drag on indefinitely unless I can generate outside support and an effective letter campaign encouraging Judge Corbin to expedite review and provide a final disposition. My wrongful conviction and condemnation itself pales in comparison to the psychological trauma of being condemned to solitary confinement and the prolonged uncertainly of my fate.

If you have not yet read the posted articles “Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man” and “Justice Delayed is Justice Denied” then please take the time to read them now and please, please, please ask others to look at this site too!

As I have written before, it is said that evil only prevails when good men (and women) choose to do nothing. One person alone is a whisper easily ignored. But many by standing together our individual whispers will grow into a collective scream that cannot be ignored. What will you choose to do? Please write a physical letter to Judge Corbin and let him know that Justice Delayed is Justice Denied. The strength that keeps me going is knowing I am not alone and forgotten so please also write me so I’ll know my voice is being heard.

Thank all of you for caring enough to read this blog.

Judge R. Thomas Corbin
Lee County Justice Center
1700 Monroe Street
Ft. Myers, FL 33901

Michael Lambrix # 482053
Union Correctional Institution
7819 N.W. 228th St (P-dorm)
Raiford, FL 32026-4400

"Countdown To An Execution"

2006-10-31T11:38:00.000-05:00

There is something uniquely surreal about sitting in a death row cell watching your television as virtually every local station out of Jacksonville and Gainesville all cover the “Countdown To An Execution” live from outside the prison.

It’s a circus of its own peculiar morbid design but fortunately seldom seen. The parade of pretty people in front of their camera’s telling the story of the soon to be killed killer doesn’t come in droves except when someone of special status is to be executed.

Today it is the infamous Danny Rolling, a pathetic man in his own right who had pled guilty to five murders in the Gainesville area a dozen years ago. That entitled him to being labeled a “serial killer” and those killing not only defined his life but also will now define his meticulously and deliberately inflicted death.

What does that say about us? Have we really come that far from the days when we gathered outside local county courthouses to watch a public hanging in the town square? Or even a midnight lynching at an old oak tree?

Thanks top the media the ritual of execution is now carried to out living rooms. The bleached blonde reporters will walk you through it, all competing with each other to provide a graphic description of the moments leading up to that execution and as the clock ticks down they will hold your attention by telling you to watch the backdoor of the wing housing the death chamber as once the execution has been carried a prison employee will appear at that door and wave a towel, a white towel, signifying that the execution has now been carried out. For long moments the viewer will watch in silent anticipation, waiting for that sign yet another person has been put to death.

Although disgusted by the pathetic circus, I watch too. I had a personal connection as I knew Danny Rolling – I lived in close proximity to him for many years. Perhaps I knew him netter than any of them now congregated at the prison to watch him die. I never knew him as a killer – I knew him as a fellow inmate. I didn’t judge him by acts of momentary violence against innocent victims, but by years of interaction, seeing him as a person with obvious mental issues and personality flaws. In my world we all have issues –I’ve been on death row now for so long that my issues have developed issues of their own.

Did I mention that I’m disgusted by the spectacle the media is making of this? How can we not be disgusted by the organized and intentional celebration of the death of another human being? What does it say about us as a society when we gather around to watch another man being deliberately put to death?

After the circus is over will any of his victims be brought back to life? What exactly is accomplished by putting the man to death? Certainly by now we know that these so called serial killers feed off public attention, so doesn’t all this attention only inspire other pathetic losers to gain their own fame by killing even more? Is it just a coincidence that the increase in the number of “serial killers” corresponds directly with the increase of the public attention we provide them? Take away their spotlight and what motivation will be left? By making a media circus of Danny Rolling’s execution today. How many more innocent people will die at the hands of other serial killers out to gain their fame?

Here’s another thought… when was the last time you saw these swarms of media trucks gather outside a prison to cover the release of an innocent man? Since we cranked up the killing machine in recent years there’s been over 130 men and women exonerated and released from death row after being wrongfully convicted and condemned to death. When was the last time you saw the media gather at the gates of a prison to cover the release of an innocent man? In 23 years I’ve never seen it – not even once.

We accept serial killers are “sick,” but are we not as equally sick by wanting to watch them be methodically put to death? As we celebrate their death aren’t we doing the same thing we’ve condemned them to death for? How many of us have ever shown the same level of interest in advocating the release of an innocent man as we do in advocating the death of a presumably guilty man?

Today “We the people” put Danny Rolling to death and many celebrated by participating in the media circus that covered every detail. But where will these people be tomorrow when yet another innocent man walks out of prison alone and already forgotten? What does that say about us? Every circus has its clowns – today “We the people” became the clowns.

Did you hear of how he actually sang a Christian gospel song as his final statement? It's hard to deal with the freaking circus they make of it -- it's all so one sided as the media competes to come up with the best sound bite to graphically portray the death of a "monster." Even if we were to assume that he was a monster, maybe we should ask what it was or who created that monster? And what is the difference between him stalking his victims and those who make careers out stalking the death of condemned men and women? Are not both ultimately defined by the end result -- they brought about, by deliberate design and intent, the death of another human being.

When "we, the people" killed Danny Rolling it only made monsters out of all of us as we ultimately did the very same things we condemned him to death for. Only we made our victim suffer under the threat of inevitable death for years and being in solitary confinement awaiting the uncertainty of your fate really is a lot like having a gun held to your head.

Just so you don't get too comfortable with that, with each new appeal you build up the hope of a reprieve as if the gun might just be lifted, but instead the courts deny you -- as if they're recocking the gun and pulling the trigger like a game of Russian roulette. When they pull the trigger at the end of that next appeal, will that be the round that kills you? Or will it be the next one?

It's really the prolonged uncertainty that describes why capital punishment is "cruel and unusual" as if that Constitutional concept even has any meaning in our contemporary society.

Condemned by The Perfect Storm

2006-10-31T11:36:00.000-05:00

A few years ago there was a movie called “The Perfect Storm” that told of the tragedy of lives lost in the North Atlantic when several powerful storms systems coincidently came together, resulting in many deaths and many more lives changed forever.

How many of us have watched that movie and thought about events in our own lives that were (and are) an anthology of that event? Can circumstances coincidently come together in our own lives that forever, often tragically, change – or even predestine – our own fate? Can we look back upon this confluence of circumstances and see now that we were helplessly swept along in fates current until finally tossed ashore, our own lives victim of a perfect storm?

I’ve given that a lot of thought as I personally struggle with the “why” of me spending the last 23 years in solitary confinement condemned to death and have concluded that I am not on death row for any crime I allegedly committed but rather that I am condemned by the perfect storm, and that even my innocence simply doesn’t matter. See, “Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man.” rather, the elements that subsequently led to my present fate formed long before any crime allegedly occurred. When those preexisting elements in my life collided with contemporary circumstances these collective elements formed a perfect storm that sealed my fate and led me to death row.

Each year there are many thousands of murders in America. According to my World Almanac, in 1983 (the year my alleged crime took place) there were 19,310 homicides in the United States, but less than 100 men and women sentenced to death. Why did so few end up on death row -- why me? In 1972 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the death penalty was unconstitutional (illegal) because it was “arbitrary and capricious” and ordered the states to rewrite their statutes to provide better guidance – but has anything really changed?

Simply question… why me? About the same time my capital crime was allegedly committed in rural Glades County, Florida a rich young man about my age was charged with what was called “the worst mass murder in Collier County history.” This man’s guilt (and stupidity) was never a question… he loaded the family vehicle up with explosives, then lured his entire immediate family into the vehicle and blew them up. The motive was clear – he wanted the entire family fortune for himself. Both cases were prosecuted by the same state attorney’s office at the same time. So, why did I get death, and he got life?

Of the thousand of men and women presently on death row there are an equal number of individual paths that brought the condemned here. But there is also an undeniable common journey, consistent contributing factors that have nothing to do with the alleged crime and as you objectively look beneath the surface an undeniable truth becomes self evident – we do not sentence people to death because of the particular nature of their alleged crime… rather, the fact is that we, as a society, decide who will live and who will die based upon who they are and their (in)ability to defend against the infinite resources of the state.

Let me ask you this… where would O.J. Simpson be today if he stood trial for the exact same crime in a small southern county and didn’t have the money to hire his “dream team” defense lawyers? That’s the undeniable truth – almost without exception. Those on death row are not condemned because of the particular crime they stood trial for, but because they were unable to defend against the resources available to the state… it is the lack of capital that makes you eligible for capital punishment.

Without the ability to defend against a capital murder charge, even your innocence becomes irrelevant. Of the approximately 130 men and women who have been legal exonerated and released from death row in past years, not even one of them came from wealth and privilege – and not even one had a “dream team” defense. Coincidence?

Before I came to prison I was completely ignorant of out legal system. To be honest, I never even gave it any thought. If someone had asked me back then if I supported the death penalty I probably would have immediately thought of Ted Bundy, as back then that’s all the news talked about and I would have said “Hell, yes!!” as that is the image I associated the death penalty with… that is the image prosecutors and politicians want all of us to see when we think about the death penalty.

Is Ted Bundy the archetypical image of the condemned man? Is his case emblematic of the average capital case that leads a man to death row? No, it is not! But the politicians and prosecutors do not want you to know that – they do not want you to think about the true portrait of those condemned to die.

Having become familiar with the reality of the system and its inherent prejudices against those least capable of defending against the formidable resources of the state, I now realize and accept that factors that eventually led me to be condemned to death, the elements of the storm that subsequently collided together with force and fury to create that “perfect storm,” began to form long before any alleged crime ever took place. In truth, the capital crime I allegedly committed was one of the least significant factors in determining my fate.

Like most of the others on death row the elements of my own storm began brewing the day I was born…. By being born, I was condemned to die. How’s that for irony? Bt far, the most significant factor that eventually led to me being condemned to death was simply being born into the family fate blessed me with.

Almost without exception (virtually none that I personally know of) those condemned to death share a common background. This will begin by being born into a dysfunctional family environment then being raised in extremely abusive surroundings. As the child of fate grows, this will predictably evolve into truancy, inevitable substance abuse (alcohol/drugs) at an early age and relatively small scrapes with the law.

Before any capital crime is allegedly committed that person is already a candidate to be condemned to death. Consistently my fellow lumpenproletariats (just call me “Lumpy” for short) share common traits… dysfunctional family, abusive childhood, lack of formal education, and serious psychological issues. The truth is, we were born to die.

Then comes the second storm front… the alleged crime. Often this crime will take place in a relatively rural county in the south. The case will be locally sensationalized so that before any jury is ever seated the redneck community has already formed a legally sanctioned lynch mob screaming for vengeance. A local hero will step up to the plate – the local politically ambitious and pathetically overzealous prosecutor – and will promise the good town folk that justice will be done. At that point even innocence becomes irrelevant, see “Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man” and such novel concepts of truth and justice are quickly forgotten, See, “Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice? ”

Last, but by no means least, comes the final element, that fatal front that collides with force and fury against the proceeding two elements and that that perfect storm is formed. This is reflected when a lawyer is assigned to represent that person. While the state will have relatively infinite resources to prosecute the case and the power of the “good government” behind them, the soon to be condemned will be assigned a relatively inexperienced lawyer already out gunned and overwhelmed. Any defense is quickly becomes a pretense and a verdict of guilty is assured. Again, just look at the O.J. Simpson case and so many others like it. In America, the crime you stand accused of is a distant second to your ability to generate resources necessary to defend against it.. Those condemned to die are not condemned to death for the crime they allegedly committed but because of their inability to defend against it.

All of these elements came together in my case. I’ve long ago accepted that my innocence is simply irrelevant as I am condemned to death for who I am, not what I allegedly did. I am condemned by the perfect storm.

An Open Letter To Journalists

2006-10-29T09:56:00.000-05:00

Dear Journalist,

Have you ever dreamed of winning a Pulitzer? Very rarely will the opportunity come along – if you’re lucky, maybe once in a career. Would you recognize that opportunity if it did?

As you may be aware last month the American Bar Association released an in depth report following a comprehensive five year study of Florida’s death penalty system, concluding it is “fundamentally flawed” and calling for a moratorium until adequate reforms can be adopted. Among the substantial deficiencies highlighted in this study is the fact that Florida – by far – leads the country in the number of men and women exonerated and released from death row after being wrongfully convicted and condemned to death. (At least 25 since 1972)

Are you aware that the 20th Judicial Circuit of Florida (Southwest Florida; Lee, Collier, Charlotte, Hendry, and Glades Counties) leads the entire country in the number of wrongful capital convictions? Why does a relatively small states attorney’s office account for so many? (Albert Tibbs, James Richardson, Bradley Scott, John Lundry, John Ballard). Although that fact by itself is troubling, I believe that what is even more troubling is that nobody is even asking why? All of those wrongful convictions were the result of deliberate, overzealous prosecutorial misconduct, yet nobody has ever questioned the policy and practice of that states attorney’s office…Why?

I realize that there’s a common perception that everyone on death row is screaming they’re innocent, but with Florida’s record it stands to reason some of them are telling the truth!

I have been on death row since march 1984 after being convicted and condemned to two capital murders in rural Glades County, Florida. The entire case brought against me was wholly circumstantial… there were no eyewitnesses, no physical or forensic evidence, and no confessions. Although no defense was presented and I was prohibited from testifying myself, the first ended in a hung jury – but a second trial resulted in my convictions.

I have always adamantly entire “theory” of premeditated murder brought against me was deliberately fabricated by the states sole key witness (my ex girlfriend, Francis Smith) and the local states attorney’s office. A few years ago my long pled (but seldom heard) claim of innocence was finally substantiated when a state witness (Deborah Hanzel) unexpectedly admitted that her trial testimony was false. Under oath she subsequently testified that she was deliberately coerced to provide that false testimony by the states key witness (Smith) and the state attorneys own lead investigator, Robert Daniels.

A subsequent investigation into her claims revealed even more startling information concealed by the state… the key witness (Smith) was actually engaged in a personal relationship “of a sexual nature” with the local state attorney’s lead investigator (Daniels) while this case was brought against me. Investigator Daniels was in fact the very person who swore out the affidavit initialing these capital charges against me and then personally developed the circumstantial evidence use to corroborate the key witnesses story and convict me! Independent experts subsequently concluded this evidence was deliberately fabricated.

With the evidence now substantiating my long pled claim of actual innocence the local court and the state have mutually adopted a different strategy to prevent exposure of this already inconceivable injustice – my case would simply now be held hostage by the lower court and the review deliberately procrastinated. My case has now been before the 20th Judicial Circuit Court in Ft. Myers (Judge R. Thomas Corbin) since January 1988 – almost nine years!

To put this into perspective, in late 1988 when a “death warrant” was signed upon me, scheduling my imminent execution, I was assigned a lawyer to file my original post conviction appeal. This process, the time it was filed in that lower trial court to the time it was “fully reviewed” and denied by both the lower court and the Florida Supreme Court, took 32 days!

I ask you this… if the state finds it necessary to expedite review of a capital case when their intended objective is to execute a person, then doesn’t the basic concept of fundamental fairness (not to mention moral conscience!) demand that review of a substantial claim of actual innocence also be equally expedited? If our judicial system finds it necessary to rush to kill a person, then shouldn’t they also find it necessary to at least timely review, without unnecessary delay, a substantiated claim of actual innocence? What could possibly perpetuate a greater injustice than to deliberately procrastinate review of a substantiated claim of actual innocence for many years?

Justice delayed is justice denied! I ask that you help expose this injustice. Please read my case summary entitled “Southern Injustice: Condemning An Innocent Man” and article “Justice Delayed is Justice Denied” at my blog found at www.lambrix.blogspot.com

It is said that, “evil can only prevail when good men choose to do nothing…” What choice will you make? If you have any questions my present lawyer is William Hennis, CCRC Litigation Director, and he can be reached in Ft. Lauderdale at (954) 713-1284, or you can email me at michaellambrix@hotmail.com (it would be forwarded)

Thank you for your time and I pray you will help expose this injustice.

Most Sincerely,
~Michael Lambrix~

Another Day; Another Dead

2006-10-25T13:17:00.000-04:00

You’d think by now I’d have grown accustomed to the ritual I’ve seen played out only too many times. Since I’ve been on death row there’s been many – too many – people put to death. But it never seems to get any easier. Through these many years I have lived in close proximity to those taken out and killed. I come to know them as a friend, even a brother, as when you do live in such close proximity you can’t help but get to know that person in the next cell only too well.

Today, Arthur Rutherford was put to death, executed by the state for the crime he allegedly committed. I‘ve always known him by Dennis, and I’ll always remember him by Dennis. I’ll remember the long conversations we had around the solid concrete wall that separated our cells, often late at night when neither of us could sleep. He was a simple man, proud to be a “county boy” and what you saw was pretty what you got without any pomp or pretense. He could ramble on for hours talking about how barely an adult he went into the Marines and fought for his country in Vietnam. He’d talk of the friends that never made it home, those lost in a war that never made any sense – but it did to him as it was a simple issue... he served his country when they called him to duty, and was proud to do it.

Other times he could and would often talk for hours about his kids. Often while talking he would make small toys for his daughters out of yarn we would get in hobby-craft packages. I complimented him on a little turtle he made once and a few days later he sent me one just like it for my daughter. He did never had much money so I wouldn’t have asked but then I didn’t need to because that was just Dennis.

It’s been almost a year since the Governor had signed his death warrant and sent him back to Florida State Prison where they carry out executions, He was originally scheduled to be executed on January 21, 2005 but at the very last minute the U.S. Supreme Court granted a stay of execution to consider the question of whether the method in which lethal injection administered in Florida is unconstitutionally cruel and unusual.

As I understand it, they actually had him strapped to the gurney with the needle in his arm before he was granted that stay. I watched a local television station covering the anticipated execution “live” from outside the prison on my own television. They talked with is daughters and I was surprised that they were all grown. As they stood outside the prison on that cold winter day they had to ask the television crew if their father had gotten a stay as it was already after 6:00pm – the designated time executions are carried out – and they didn’t know.

Nobody spoke of his children huddled outside the prison waiting to hear whether their father was dead. The families of the condemned are the forgotten victims in all of this and seldom is their voice ever heard. What crime did they commit? What did they ever do to deserve that torment they are deliberately put through?

Today they lost their father. Is society now somehow safer than it would have been if Dennis were simply allowed to live out the rest of his life in a maximum-security prison? What good was actually accomplished by putting Dennis to death?

Today, we as a society choose to deliberately kill a man. Although convicted of murder, that is not who he was… that is a simple tragic event, an isolated act, and not the sum of his total life. Dennis was more than that, Dennis was a simple country boy not unlike many of us, and proud of it. He was equally proud to serve his country honorably when called to duty; sacrificing so much of himself in a war most of us still can’t make sense of. He came home a troubled young man but still committed himself to being a responsible husband and father. He was a Christian and believed in the power or forgiveness even when other refused to show mercy and compassion towards him.

Tonight the cellblock is much quieter than it usually is as many others around me that also actually know Dennis silently mourn the loss of a friend. In my own silence, I pray for his children who once again had to gather outside the prison and wait for what must have seemed like an eternity to learn whether their father lived or died. Tonight the lost their father and that’s something none of us should forget. When we pray for the victims, let’s remember all the victims.

Justice Delayed Is Justice Denied

2006-10-24T14:19:00.000-04:00

Which is the greater injustice? Delaying the execution of a guilty person or delaying the exoneration of an innocent person? Politicians and judges all but openly compete with each other to invent and advocate establishing procedural rules to expedite review of capital cases when the intended objective is to expedite executions – but have you ever heard of a judge or politician advocating expedited review of a capital case for the purpose of determining whether an innocent person might have been wrongfully convicted and condemned to death?

If justice delayed is justice denied, then does it not stand to reason that this arguably self evident truth would apply with substantially greater force when the delays in question serve to, by deliberate design and intent, obstruct and impede the timely review of a substantiated claim of actual innocence?

Why is it that those wrongfully convicted and condemned to death often languish under this most extreme miscarriage of justice for decades before they can have their evidence heard and be judicially exonerated? Often this is because the evidence that does substantiate a claim of actual innocence is deliberately concealed for many years before being fortuitously discovered. But once discovered,
shouldn’t the judicial system adopt a policy and practice of expediting appellate review of that pled claim of actual innocence for the purpose of bringing a timely end to the claimed injustice?

The simple truth is that both the state and the courts want to expedite review when the objective is to speed up executions. Politically, that is a popular thing to do. But it is not in the states or courts interest to expedite review of a claim of actual innocence as the resulting exoneration embarrasses the system and undermines public confidence of the system as a whole. By delaying review and obstructing the ability to develop and present the evidence necessary to substantiate a claim of actual innocence that politically unpopular issue of actual innocence may even be rendered “moot” if the wrongfully condemned man simply dies of “natural causes” before his or her claim can be heard.

Consider the case of Frank Lee Smith, convicted and condemned to death in 1986 for the brutal rape and murder of an eight-year old girl in Broward County, Florida. Frank Smith insisted he was innocent, claiming a case of mistaken identity. In 1992 his lawyers discovered evidence that another man responsible for numerous other similar crimes in that area was also responsible for Smith’s alleged crime. The lawyers petitioned the local court for an order to compel the state to turn over forensic evidence held in their exclusive custody for DNA testing as such testing was not available when Smith was originally tried and convicted.

The Broward County State Attorney’s Office contested this motion and then methodically obstructed disclosure of this forensic evidence. However, Smith’s lawyers persisted and the evidence was finally tested – the DNA results conclusively confirmed that Frank Smith was completely innocent of the rape and murder he was convicted and condemned to death for committing. This exoneration came almost a year too late to help Frank Smith as months before that evidence was finally revealed Frank died of cancer while still on death row.

Frank Lee Smith spent a total of 16 years on death row even though the state had the evidence proving his innocence in their possession all along. Why would the state deliberately obstruct a person’s ability to establish their innocence? Isn’t the long recognized rule that a prosecutors first responsibility is to seek justice --not win at any cost? Smith’s case is not an isolated example of the Broward County State Attorney’s Office refusing to turn over DNA evidence that proved a wrongfully convicted person was innocent. See, Long v. Satz, 181 F. 3d 1271 (11th Cir. 1999) (prosecutor given immunity from civil action even though evidence established prosecutordeliberately concealed DNA evidence that would have proven man innocent.)

In March 1984 I was convicted and condemned to death for a double homicide in Glades County, Florida. I pled not guilty and have always and consistently maintained that the entire circumstantial case of alleged premeditated murder brought against me was deliberately fabricated.

By the states own admission the entire case was built upon the testimony of one witness – my ex-girlfriend – who herself readily admitted that she did not actually witness me commit and crime. There were no eyewitnesses, no physical or forensic evidence. And no confession to support this specious theory of alleged premeditated murder. The case went to trial in the small rural farming community of Glades County. The first trial ended in a “hung jury” but a retrial several months later resulted in a conviction and sentence of death. See, ”Southern Injustice: Condemning an Innocent Man”.

These convictions were affirmed by both the state and federal courts without any court ever addressing the sufficiency of the evidence or my pled claim of actual innocence. In 1988 I had a “death warrant” signed on me and came within hours of being executed before the Federal Court granted a stay of execution; that appeal was subsequently heard by the Supreme Court, but in a 5 to 4 decision, the Court ruled that although I was unquestionably illegally sentenced to death I could not be granted relief because my lawyers failed to properly file the appeals. See, Lambrix v, State, 520 U.S. 518 (1997). See also, "A Parody of Justice", by Martin Dyckman; St. Petersburg Times August 31st, 1997.

As I prepared to move back to “Death Watch” and again face execution a state witness unexpectedly admitted that her trial testimony was not true. Under sworn oath she told of how key witness Francis Smith and the states attorney’s lead investigator coerced her into providing that crucial false testimony. See, "Woman Recants Testimony in Murder Case".

It took almost five years before an evidentiary hearing was finally held. At that time the key witness also testified not surprisingly denying she coerced the witness to falsely testify. But then it was unexpectedly revealed for the first time ever that while I was being prosecuted, this key witness and the state attorney’s own lead investigator (Robert Daniels) – the very person who swore out the warrant for my arrest and was responsible for developing all the circumstantial evidence used to corroborate the key witness’ testimony – was actually having a secret personal relationship “of a sexual nature” with the key witness. See, "Witness Admits Affair With Investigator".

Subsequent to this discovery my state provided lawyers retained numerous independent “experts” in the field of homicide investigation and autopsies to determine whether this investigators relationship with the key witness tainted the development of the circumstantial evidence used to convict and condemn me. Without exception these experts concluded that the evidence was at the very least manipulated to favor the state, and crucial evidence was fabricated.

The presently pending appeal arguing and substantiating my actual innocence was filed in the lower state court in January 1998 – almost 9 years ago – and remains pending. With a copious wealth of evidence now substantiating my claim of innocence, why would the lower court and the state deliberately procrastinate review of my pled claim of actual innocence?

In 1988 when the governor signed my death warrant and formally scheduled my execution a lawyer was assigned to represent me on my first post conviction appeal. It took exactly 32 days for both the lower court and the Florida Supreme Court to completely review and deny that entire original post conviction appeal.

If the state courts can thoroughly review an original post conviction appeal challenging the convictions and death sentences on only 32 days when they intend to execute a person, then why is it taking almost a full decade to provide review of a claim of actual innocence in the same courts?

At the risk of redundancy, I ask again…Which is the greater injustice? Delaying the execution of a guilty person, or delaying the exoneration of an innocent person? If the sate courts can expedite review pf my post conviction appeal when they wanted to execute me, then why can’t they expedite review of my substantiated claim of actual innocence?

Will my fate be similar to that of Frank Lee Smith – will the state deliberately obstruct review until I too die of “natural causes.” Thus, rendering my claim of actual innocence moot? I was 22 years old when charged with this case in early 1983 – I am now 46 years old and have spent most of my life in solitary confinement condemned to death in spite of my innocence.

What is the difference between deliberately executing an innocent man and deliberately procrastinating review of a substantiated claim of innocence until the person dies on death row conveniently rendering the issue moot?

Although I have only a 9th grade formal education and am not formally trained in law, I believe that under both the Florida and U.S. Constitutions I do have a fundamental constitutional right to timely review without unnecessary delay of my pled claim of actual innocence.

Incredibly, the state has advocated and imposed procedural rules that require capital appeals to be filed within specific periods of time. If a death sentenced prisoner fails to meet these strictly enforced time limitations, then he or she is forever “procedurally barred” from pursuing those post conviction claims, even if the evidence proves actual innocence. See, Herrara v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390 (1993).

However, there are no rules that prohibit the state from obstructing or procrastinating review of a capital case that argues actual innocence. Why do politicians and judges push for a plethora of procedural rules designed to expedite the review of capital conviction appeals for the purpose of expediting executions -- but not even one rule that requires expedited review of a substantiated claim of innocence?

After too many years of attempting to compel the lower state court to expedite review of my claim of actual innocence I personally initiated a “Petition for Writ of Mandamas, alternatively habeas Corpus’ in the Florida Supreme Court arguing that the lower courts failure to provide “timely” review of my actual innocence appeal effectively deprived me of my state constitutional right to meaningful review “without delay.” See, Florida Constitution, Article I, Sec. 13 (explicitly recognizing that writ of habeas corpus “shall be grantable of right … returnable without delay”); Article I, Sec. 21 (“the courts shall be open to every person … and justice shall be administered without denial or delay”), thus now entitling we to relief from these wrongful convictions.

Being that I am barely able to afford a simple cup of coffee – much less hire a lawyer willing to represent me in this action, I was compelled to file this action with the Florida Supreme Court “pro se,” which means on my own without a lawyer. However, on August 3, 2006 the court summarily dismissed this case upon a finding that it was “an unauthorized pro se filing.” See, Lambrix v. State, Fla S. Ct. Case No. SC06-0038. I immediately filed a “motion for rehearing” arguing that I must be allowed to pursue the case in pro se capacity as I cannot afford a lawyer, nor has a lawyer been appointed to represent me in this matter. This now remains pending.

Justice Delayed is Justice Denied, but without competent legal representation willing to zealously advocate not only my now substantiated claim of actual innocence, but also take the action necessary to expedite review, justice will continue to be denied. I am presently represented by a state funded and statutorily limited state agency (the “Capital Collateral Regional Counsel”) in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida – but this office is chronically under funded and unwilling to publicly advocate my claim of actual innocence. These are competent and committed lawyers, but by deliberate design and intent they are statutorily constrained from publicly advocating a claim of actual innocence or pursuing the necessary action to expedite review.

I remain condemned to a fate worse than death, -- I am condemned to slowly rot away while the state and the lower court procrastinate review until I too perhaps die of “natural causes” and my claim of actual innocence is rendered “moot.”

"After Innocence" Movie Review

2006-10-23T16:14:00.000-04:00

"AFTER INNOCENCE tells the dramatic and compelling story of the exonerated - innocent men wrongfully imprisoned for decades and then released after DNA evidence proved their innocence. The film focuses on the gripping story of seven men and their emotional journey back into society and efforts to rebuild their lives. Included are a police officer, an army sergeant and a young father sent to prison and even death row for decades for crimes they did not commit."

"The film raises basic questions about human rights and society's moral obligation to the innocent and places a spotlight on the flaws in our criminal justice system that lead to wrongful conviction of the innocent. The film features exonerees Dennis Maher of Lowell, MA; Calvin Willis of Shreveport, LA; Scott Hornoff of Providence, RI; Wilton Dedge of Cocoa Beach, FL; Vincent Moto of Philadelphia, PA; Nick Yarris of Philadelphia, PA; and Herman Atkins of Los Angeles, CA." Source

Perhaps it all started with Harrison Ford's role as "The Fugitive" in 1993. Or perhaps it's because in recent years almost 400 inmates have been proven innocent and released from prison after being convicted of crimes they didn't commit.

Whatever the reason, the idea that America's criminal justice system is insufferably flawed is steadily gaining traction in the public mind.

But what's been largely missing from the media's love affair with innocence is the soul behind this sensational story: the fact that behind each exonerated prisoner is a person with a life and a family beyond prison bars. The tragedy of post-conviction exoneration isn't just what it reveals about the grim state of our legal system, but the fact that after being released, many exonerees receive little more than an apology: no compensation, education, job training or emotional counseling. They're expected, instead, to walk away smiling from cells they didn't deserve to inhabit in the first place, grateful for the chance to re-enter old lives that, for many, feel as outdated as an ill-fitting high school sweater.

It's this struggle -- not just to readjust to life post-exoneration, but to win state compensation for wasted years -- that Los Angeles filmmaker Jessica Sanders attempts to capture in her powerful new documentary, "After Innocence," which premiered to wide acclaim at last January's Sundance Film Festival and premiered on Showtime October 19th.

"Wrongful conviction can happen to anyone," Sanders reminds us.

Read the New York Times Review of the moive HERE

Introduction

2006-10-23T15:46:00.000-04:00

Have you read the recently released book “The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice In A Small Town” by renowned author John Grisham? Or perhaps you have recently seen the movie “After Innocence” by filmmaker Jessica Sanders. In them we learn about true life stories of men wrongfully convicted and condemned to death, stories that have become only too familiar as more and more men and women are being exonerated and released from death row after proving their innocence.

However, the vast majority of these stories are never heard. Most of the victims of the ultimate miscarriages of justice simply do not have a voice on the outside willing to tell their stories. Almost without exception the story is never told until after their release and they must languish for years – even decades – in solitary confinement condemned to death for a crime they didn’t commit.

At 46 years old Mike Lambrix has now spent most of his entire life on death row for a crime he is innocent of. When he was 22 years old, then a recently divorced father of three young children, Mike was charged and then indited on two counts of alleged permeditated capital murder.

This is a case of ”Southern Injustice” of an inconceivable magnitude – a theory of events deliberately fabricated by a single “key witness” (Francis Smith) and corroborated by two witnesses that callaborated with her. There were no eyewitnesses, no physical or frorensic evidence, and no confession. The entire case was based upon the testimoney of Mike’s ex-girlfriend and supported by her own cousin’s girlfriend and the local state attorney’s lead investigator.

Mike has consistently maintained his innocence, insisting that the entire theory of alleged premeditated murder was deliberately fabricated by his ex-girlfriend and the local state attorney’s office. BUT nobody would listen, not even when Mike was within hours of actual execution. Why would they fabricate the case?

In 1998 that question began to be answered when the only witness corroberating Smith’s story came forth and admitted her testimony was false. (See, Woman Recants Testimony in Murder Case.) At a subsequent hearing she then testified under oath that Mike’s ex-girlfriend and the states attorney’s lead investigator (Robert Daniels) had coerrced her to testify falsely and that contrary to her testimony Mike never told her he killed anyone.

That evidence opened the door to further hearings and even more startling evidence was revealed supporting Mike’s long pled claims that these witnesses conspired to have him wrongfully convicted. In April 2004 key witness Smith was compelled to appear in court. At that time it was revealed – for the first time ever – that while this case was prosecuted against Mike, Smith was engaged in a personal relationship “of a sexual nayure” with the state attorney’s lead investigator (Daniels) – the very person who had initiated the formal charges against Mike and was then responsible for developing the specious circumstantial evidence used to corroberate Smith’s fabricated claim of premeditated capital murder. (See, Witness Admits Affair With Investigator.)

With the motive to fabricate this case now exposed, investigations were conducted that led to a wealth of additional evidence showing, how the local state attorney’s office deliberately manipulated the wholly circumstantial evidence and even the autopsy reports to support their fabricated theory of capital premeditated murder; with the deliberate design and intent of having Mike wrongfully convicted and condemned to death.

How could this happen? We’ve all heard stories of how the legal system works in the “Deep South.” Mike’s case was prosecuted in the Twentieth Judicial Circuit of Florida; which is comprised mostly of Southwest Florida’s rural farming area. Although relatively small in population, this judicial circuit has the highest rate of wrongful convictions in capital (death sentenced) cases in the country.

The Prosecutor in Mike’s case, Randall McGruther (now Chief Deputy State Attorney) himself has a history of overzealous prosecution and allegedly coercing false testimony. Recently, the Florida Supreme Court exonerated and ordered the release of death row inmate John Ballard after finding that McGruther subjectively interpreted and manipulated the circumstantial evidence used to improperly convict and condemn him. See, Ballard v. State, 923 So. 2d 475 (Fla. 2006)

Justice delayed is justice denied. Mike’s claim of actual innocence, and the wealth of evidence that now substantiates that claim, has been pending before the lower state court for almost 9 years! Mike’s only hope of expediting a finality to this inconceivable injustice deliberately perpetuated against him is to generate outside support and public review. A full summary of the case is on this blog and entitled ”Southern Injustice: Condemning an Innocent Man.” Please take the time to read this true story and help end this injustice. Without immediate and effective outside support, the state will continue to prolong this injustice indefinitely. Your support can make a difference – evil can only prevail when good men choose to do nothing.

A Condemned Man's Perspective of "The Innocent Man"

2006-10-21T12:53:00.000-04:00

When I grow up I am going to be a pretty white boy of wealth and privilege, a hometown hero that inevitably falls from grace. I am going to bestow upon myself all the opportunities to do anything I want with my life. Then I am going to blow it. But really, don’t blame me as there’s a balance to everything and as good as it may get I am still going to be handicapped by mental illness that leads to substance abuse, which leads to death row for a crime I didn’t commit.

In the recently released book “The Innocent man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town” renowned best selling author John Grisham tells the true life story of Ron Williamson, “ a once promising ballplayer who spent 11 years on Oklahoma’s death row for rape and murder he did not commit.” It’s a tragic story of injustice that needs to be told -- and needs to be read – and I applaud John Grisham for the excellent job he did.

But here’s the kicker … would John Grisham had written this book if Williamson was actually more emblematic of the average man wrongfully convicted and condemned to death? Even as much as I command Grisham for the outstanding job he did in exposing just how easy it is to end up on death row for a crime you didn’t commit, I’m afraid I must confess that “The Innocent Man” is not another “to Kill a Mockingbird.”

Then again, it shouldn’t be. Maybe it’s there that we did confront the truth that anyone -- even someone of privilege and opportunity – can be wrongfully convicted and condemned to death in spite of innocence. Maybe it’s time that the average person out there presently ignorant of how the judicial system really works gets a peek into the reality of our legal system. This book provides that look.

Most people out there in the real world – especially those who support the death penalty – are conveniently ignorant of how the system works. What Grisham’s book does not adequately impress upon the reader is this… as tragic as the Williamson story is, Ron Williamson is a very lucky man. I’m sorry that he had to experience such an injustice and that his life ended way too soon. But he is still a very lucky man as if he was truly the “average” innocent man on death row this story would have never been told and Williamson would probably have died on death row.

John Grisham wrote the Williamson story most likely because he could personally empathize with Ron Williamson. Both grew up in small towns of the quintessential American Midwest. They both came from strict Christian homes and played baseball at their local little league. Both had supportive families with a real future that surely included the classic American coming of age ritual of going to the prom and graduating high school and then on to college. Could it be that what this book is really about is John Grisham saw himself in Ron Williamson and realized that with all the privileges and opportunities the “average” small town boy had, it still didn’t take much to wrongfully convict him and send him to death row.

But by the grace of God go I… Ron Williamson was a blessed man. Of the 25 men and women exonerated in Florida after being wrongfully convicted and condemned to death, only one was exonerated by DNA evidence. Frank Smith died on death row of cancer before that DNA evidence could clear him. As a poor Afro-American man with a troubled past and a long history of mental illness, his story will never be memorialized in a bestseller.

Juan Melendez (“Johnny”) spent 18 years on Florida’s death row before being exonerated. He was for a time my cell neighbor and always a friend. As a poor Hispanic migrant worker his story won’t be memorialized. Like most of the condemned, he never had any outside support. When the day came for his release he didn’t even have a pair of shoes – I gave him my own shoes so that he wouldn’t walk back into the free world barefoot.

For over 23 years now I’ve argued my own innocence to anyone who would listen – and very few were ever willing to listen. Although a wealth of evidence substantiating my innocence has been pending before the lower state court for almost 9 years now, I remain here. Although some may say I am a pretty white boy, unlike Williamson as a means of necessity I left home at 15. To say that I had an abusive childhood and dysfunctional family would be an understatement. In 1988 when I came within hours of execution and the prison arranged a “final visit” with family – nobody came. I don’t have family or friends willing to advocate my cause. With only a 9th grade formal education all too often I am forced to represent myself in court. In the past 8 years I’ve had 9 different lawyers as consistently these lawyers abruptly resign from the low paid state agency responsible for representing death row prisoners to take a better job, abruptly abandoning my case.

My case is not the exception, but the rule. Without the outside support and the committed legal representation Ron Williamson had, he would have just been another nobody and regardless of evidence of actual innocence, he probably would have died on death row. John Grisham/s book is an excellent expose of a corrupt judicial system – but Ron Williams was not the average death row inmate – Williamson was a lucky man.

A Day in the Life Under Death by Mike

2006-10-20T14:06:00.000-04:00

What a pathetic sight I must be as I attempt to squint here at the very edge of my steel bunk seemingly transfixed by the way the slivers if sunlight slowly steal their way across my cold concrete floor on a journey that will soon enough lead up to my evening ritual. With a cup of coffee in my one hand I sip at the bitter taste as I patiently wait for that moment when the distant descending sun will stretch these slivers of light their fullest length allowing me to then see the sun itself as there, so far beyond the three sets of bars that separate me from that narrow dusty window I can look outside across the barren field where the infamous “Raiford Rock” once stood for more years than anyone I know can even remember, but now an empty field where not even weeds will grow as if even the hope of life itself has long been abandoned.

At a distance beyond that condemned piece of ground I can see a row of tall Grandfather Oak trees running along a road that leads to the front gate of Union Correctional Institution on the main prison compound. Just beyond those stately trees stands the simple brick structure of the prison chapel with its traditional towering white steeples reaching towards the heavens.

Soon the sun will set beyond that distant horizon directly behind this chapel and that horizon will ever so very slowly explode into a kaleidoscope of brilliant colors of fiery reds, pastel oranges, and accents of yellow before slowly surrendering into darker groups as far as I can see in either direction and but for a brief second that fading light will perfectly silhouette that distant chapel cradled in the branches of those trees as a portrait of tranquility trapped between the two worlds of night and day.

It is at that moment of each day that each day itself is defined for me, that moment of comfort and private communion that renews my physical strengths if but only by the knowledge that I’ve survived yet another day. Soon that stealthy light will be consumed and swallowed by the distant horizon and I will rise from where I now squint and face yet another of what has already been far to many long and cold nights in my solitaire cage relentlessly haunted by the demons of what once was and what might have been – and even more by the thoughts of what may very will never be.

Just as my hopes and dreams live with the light of each day, my fears and regrets come with the cold loneliness of each night as when the small world around me grows silent I am reminded of just how alone and abandoned I truly am. As the many years have slowly passed too often sleep would never come, perhaps my way of holding on to today for fear of having to confront yet another tomorrow, until I finally surrendered to a dependency on antidepressant tranquilizers that each night induced an involuntary sleep as without that temporary refuge of unconsciousness one day would become the next and too quickly overwhelm me.

It has been a long and difficult journey. A few photos hang on my wall to remind me of the generation that has now passed me by. There’s the photo of me taken just before my arrest in early 1983, a young man with a whole life still ahead. A photo of my now long divorced ex-wife holding our daughter on the day we brought her home from the hospital, now faded and tattered at the edges; and then, the more recent photo of me holding my grandson in the death row visiting park. My children were so young when I was first imprisoned – and now I am a grandfather: a generation has passed.

Each day has a beginning and an end and yet it is the end of the day that I look to, to define my beginning. As each day begins I will awake from the sound of the chow cart coming through the steel door and moving down the wing towards my cell. Reluctantly I will stretch and then half stagger towards the combination sink and toilet a short step away. The cold water brings me to life as I blindly reach to the wall for my towel. As I dry off, I incoherently voice a vile thought towards this new day and then walk the few steps to the front of my cell to receive the tray of bland, cold food I’ve actually become accustomed to.

My cell has no table or chair and to eat I must precariously balance the plastic food try on my lap while sitting on the steel footlocker that holds all of my worldly possessions. We are allowed only a plastic spoon to eat with but then eating cold oatmeal or grits with a plastic spoon is not that difficult and few foods we are served would require more than that.

After I eat my breakfast I will turn my small black and white T.V. on and listen to the morning news as I read through old newspapers or magazines that are passed down the line and shared. Although we are allowed to receive magazine subscriptions, few of us can afford to so what any of us receive are most often shared and passed down the cellblock.

The magazines not only keep me informed on what’s happening in the real world but also provide pictures of the rapidly changing world beyond us in full color. It’s funny how you never really think about it, but in my world the system methodically attempts to deny us any color. The walls around me are cold and gray – not really gray as they are actually a light tone of beige with brown trim and the bars flat black. But in my mind I still see only grey… cold, cold, colorless gray.

The state provides a T.V. donated by various religious organizations – but prison rules prohibit color televisions and allow only a small black and white one, as well as a small “walkman” type radio. Reception on both is often, at best, bad but it brings in the sound of the real world even if the colors are prohibited. I smile when I think of that as at times a particular song will play on the radio and someone will holler out, and as others quickly tune into that station a number of men will simultaneously break out singing along; because all radios must be operated with headphones, the song itself is not heard – only the broken voices of the men; each singing along but not necessarily in tune. In stolen moments like that we each in our solitaire cell become one.

The hours pass by mid-morning the cellblock begins to come alive. Down the hall I can hear a couple of guys calling out chess moves and I momentarily follow the game. Closer to me tow others exchange trivial conversation around a concrete wall that separates them and at the far end I can hear one of the “bugs,” those of us so-called because we – or I should say he – has lost touch with reality and will spend the day talking and yelling to himself, or imaginary others.

As the morning passes and noon approaches I again hear the metallic clang of the food cart and wash my hands to eat. Soon enough the cart is at my cell and I silently accept my tray, most often some form of mystery meat or breaded “fish” complimented with half cooked rice and watery beans. Whether or not the particular food served that day is different from the day before remains debatable. as the bland food all tastes the same, if one can tell the taste at all.

Then the long afternoon passes and if it is not my floors day to go to the outdoor recreation yard -- an enclosed concrete pad with high fences topped by shiny razor wire – I will pass the day reading a book if I have a book worth reading, or writing a letter. If we go out to “rec” we are allowed two hours each time, but no more than a maximum of four hours each week, to play basketball or volleyball, or just to talk to other guys on the floor without the concrete and bars separating us.

By late afternoon the guards change shifts and as the new shift comes on we prepare to shave and shower. As simple as showering may be, it becomes a humiliating and even painful experience in this world as each time we leave our cells we must first be handcuffed behind the back and then escorted to a small shower cell at the very front of the wing. Once securely locked in that shower cell the handcuffs are removed and a quick shower is taken before the guards replace the cuffs and escort us back, one at a time. Cheap plastic disposable razors are passed out just before we shower and collected and counted immediately after.

As evening approaches it is time to eat again, yet it’s just another meal very much the same as that fed at lunch. There is little variety in the food we eat as the menu repeats itself weekly – for years at a time. If I happen to forget what day it is, I’m quickly reminded by what we are served at breakfast. I eat what I can but even after so many years I’m unable to eat most of what is served. That which I do not eat I feed to my cellmate Johnny Coe Mode, that being the toilet and believe me, he eats well and is apparently even grateful, as he’s never complained.

My time with my ritualistic sunsets varies and is at times broken by the evening meal. For now I am fortunate that I am in a cell with this view as most of the cells look out over the concrete rec yard and to the adjacent wing beyond. But even then I would look out if for no other reason than to watch the birds on the yard.

We all engage in our rituals this time of day as the cellblock becomes abnormally quiet while we anxiously await the days mail run, each of us hoping to get a letter from someone we love. And after the mail runs it remains silent – the few who got mail quietly read that cherished letter while those who did not retreat into a depressed silence that can last for hours –even days. Even as uplifting as it is to receive even one letter, it’s the despair of not receiving any at all that overwhelms you.

The evening turns to night and most of us withdraw to watch television, the electronic pacifier that helps us maintain our relative sanity as God forbid that we should lose touch with reality and become mentally incompetent as if deemed to be incompetent we cannot be executed. The televisions are not a luxury provided for our comfort but a necessity provided to maintain our sanity so that we can ultimately be executed.

That tranquility of my evening ritual marks my day, both beginning and end. Another day has run its monotonous course and my cage has become my refuge as I even become accustomed to this small, solitary world. My world is deliberately structured to methodically institutionalize me and intellectually I know that. I accept that the deliberate degradation and humiliation are intended to ever so slowly erode away my identity and even humanity so that by the time I do reach that fate that awaits me I am reduced to something inhumane and unworthy of comparison. By breaking me completely when the time comes to face that fate I am programmed to surrender passively, even welcoming my fate as a means of finally escaping a fate even worse than death itself… the fate of slowly rotting away in solitaire confinement as that fate stalks you relentlessly.

This was my day today and will be my day again for all of my tomorrows. In my own mind I chase the ghosts of the past to acquire the strength to survive the future, as the only life I know is the life I once had. In the world I’ve been condemned to I am neither allowed to live or die and it’s that existence without the ability to exist that is my worse fate of all.

Legal Representation In Capital Cases – Privilege or Pretense?

2006-10-18T12:48:00.000-04:00

If you think about it, maybe Shakespeare had a point when he said, “the first thing we need to do is kill all the lawyers.” (Hamlet, act II) The evidence is now overwhelming and the verdict is clear – lawyers are getting in the way of carrying out more executions. Then there’s that damned “Constitution” – Were those guys drunk when they got together and drew up the “Bill of Rights?”

We can’t kill the lawyers as we already know they’re a lot like cockroaches – if you kill one, ten more will show up to feed off the carcass. And if it takes a group of drunken men to dream up the Bill of Rights, theoretically protecting every citizen equally against the formidable force of government, then that’s the strongest argument I have heard yet against prohibition.

So, here’s an idea … let’s elect morally corrupt lawyers to political office and every election year they can compete with each other to come up with ingenious ways to just circumvent the inconvenience of Constitutional protections extended to those already convicted and condemned to death; those political parasites that concoct the most insidious means in which to circumvent the Constitutional concept of “due process” and “equal protection” can then be rewarded by being elected to office.

Is this proposition really that absurd? Has it not become an American tradition to campaign for political office on hate and malignancy? The easiest target; of course, is the lowest-of-low – the lumpenproletariats of our own society, those least able to defend against the infinite resources of government and most likely to inflame the lynch mob mentality as when all else fails – especially when you cannot run on issues of substance and matter – one sure way to win votes is to foam at the mouth like a rabid dog, intoxicated by its own blood lust, while screaming to the mobs that gather that you will push for “quicker executions and kill those monsters.” That is the nature of the beast; the southern way to win political office.

Recently, the American Bar Association has called for a moratorium on the death penalty in Florida (See, DEATH PENALTY: Florida Death Penalty System Criticized ) after recognizing that Florida has the highest rate of wrongfully convicted and condemned men and women in the country as since the reinstatement of the death penalty almost 30 years ago, twenty-two death row inmates have been exonerated from death row in Florida. This means that one out of every forty men and women convicted and condemned to death in Florida were wrongfully convicted. Some might agree that, that’s not such a big deal – that, that’s an acceptable error rate when you consider the greater good of aggressively prosecuting murderers. But, what if our government erected roadblocks and began to randomly execute one out of every forty drivers under the pretense of deterring drunk drivers?

The American Bar Association also found that in Florida legal counsel assigned to represent capital defendants in often complex and lengthy trials are inadequately compensated as the state law limits compensation at only $3500 per case and that there is little oversight of “registry” lawyers assigned to represent those sentenced to death in their complex post conviction appeals.

This brings us back to where we began … if we can’t kill the lawyers then clearly the next best thing is to devise means in which to reader them incapable of providing effective and meaningful representation.

Although these morally corrupt parasitic politicians that pathetically prey upon the lowest of the low are vile creatures devoid of conscience, they are by no means stupid. Most are in fact former lawyers … they know that if they do not provide lawyers to those condemned to death they cannot carry out executions. But they have both the intelligence and power to deliberately manipulate this need for representation by concocting politically motivated and manufactured procedural rules that intentionally obstruct the ability of appointed counsel to actually represent the condemned prisoner. Thus, establishing a system of representation that, by deliberate design and intent, promotes the appointment of inexperienced and incompetent lawyers. By which, they successfully circumvent the inconvenience of lengthy post conviction appeals by simply eliminating the ability to present claims of alleged error (including actual innocence) and effectively reducing this presumed privilege of legal representation to nothing but a pretense.

Very few people who support the death penalty are aware that the Supreme Court has unequivocally stated that the Constitution does not prohibit the execution of a person who is actually innocent. Herrera v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390 (1993). That the Constitution only guarantees a “fair trial” and that as long as the person received a fair trial – that being defined as a trial in which no substantial Constitutional errors occurred – even if unquestionably factually innocent, the state could still carry out the execution.

In McFarland v. Scott, 512 U.S. 849 (1994) the Supreme Court recognized that capital post conviction appeals are inherently complex and that without competent legal representation a death sentenced prisoner presumably could not meaningfully pursue the review of claims of Constitutional error affecting the trial. But the same Supreme Court has also made it clear that there is no constitutional right to legal representation in capital post conviction proceedings. Murray v. Giarratano, 492 U.S. 1 (1989)

Without reasonably competent post conviction representation a person under sentence of death – especially when placed and kept in solitary confinement, with most often a minimal education and disabling mental issues – cannot even hope to have the alleged claims of constitutional error necessary to establish the deprivation of a “fair trial” presented to the courts. In Herrera v. Collins the Supreme Court clearly stated that failure to properly and timely present any claims of Constitutional error – including actual innocence – will result in the claims being procedurally barred from review.

Thus, there is no question that without competent post conviction representation those sentenced to death will not be able to present the claims necessary to determine whether they were deprived of a fair trail, or even present newly discovered evidence of actual innocence. Once a failure to properly or timely present such claims occurs, the courts are prohibited from reviewing the case again. See, Herrera, See also, Coleman v. Thompson, 501 U.S. 722 (1991)

Is the American Bar being unreasonable when they’ve recently called for a moratorium on the death penalty in Florida in part because of Florida’s refusal to establish adequate safeguards to ensure that those under sentence of death receive reasonable competent representation? Why should anyone even care if those convicted and condemned to death even receive competent legal representation?

In Florida the state created and funded an office specifically to provide post conviction representation to death row inmates. But since its inception in 1985 as the “Capital Collateral Representation” the office has been inadequately funded. See, Spalding v. Duggar, 526 So. 2d 71 (Fla. 1988); Arbelaez v. Butterworth, 738 So. 2d 326 (Fla. 1999). Without adequate funding the lawyers assigned to provide post conviction representation cannot investigate, develop, and present legitimate claims of constitutional error – including developing evidence necessary to establish the condemned persons actual innocence.

Prosecutorial misconduct has become one of the leading causes of capital convictions being vacated upon appellate review. Repeatedly prosecutors are found to have deliberately concealed exculpatory evidence that if disclosed would have questioned the defendant’s guilt. See, Floyd v. State, 902 So. 2d 775 (Fla. 2005); Mordenti v. State, 894 So. 2d 161 (Fla. 2004); Cordona v. State, 826 So. 2d 968 (Fla. 2002); Rogers v. State, 782 So. 2d 373 (Fla. 2001) But, as recognized in Herrera v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390 (1993) if the lawyers assigned to represent the condemned prisoner do not “timely” develop and present that undiscovered evidence – even if that evidence absolutely establishes the prisoner’s actually innocence – the courts are prohibited from reviewing the claim or providing relief.

Politicians in Florida have consistently obstructed the state funded capital post conviction lawyers from providing meaningful representation. By establishing statutory provisions governing these lawyers, see, Florida Statutes, Chapter 27.701-712 (1998), the elected legislature has assumed control over them; as about half of those presently under a sentence of death in Florida are represented by privately contracted “registry” counsel in their post conviction proceedings. See, In Re Rules of Criminal Procedure, etc, 719 So. 2d 869 (Fla. 1998) even though there is a wide spread acknowledgement that those “registry” lawyers are not qualified to provide such representation. See, e.g. Jan Pudlow, “Justice Rips Shoddy Work of Private Capital Case Lawyers,” The Florida Bar News, March 1, 2005, (quoting Florida Supreme Court Justice Raoul Cantero, appearing before the Florida Senate Committee on Justice on February 16, 2005 “I think some of the worst lawyering I’ve seen is from some of the registry counsel … it seems to me some registry counsel have little or no experience in death penalty cases”), see also, Death Appeals Not Quite Dead, http://www.fadp.org/news/bizrev_5_20.html April 30, 2003 (reviewing history of problems with inexperienced “registry” lawyers in capital cases)

How does Florida respond to this problem of incompetent post conviction representation in capital cases? When adopting “minimal standards” applicable to appointment of lawyers in capital cases, the Florida Supreme Court specifically excluded lawyers appointed in post conviction proceedings, declining to adopt even a minimal standard of competency and experience. See, In Re Amendments to Florida Rules of Criminal Procedure, 820 So. 2d 185, 188 (Fla. 2002)

Further, in cases in which a death sentenced prisoner attempts to argue that his right to a meaningful opportunity to present post conviction claims –including actual innocence – was denied due to the incompetence of assigned legal counsel the Florida Supreme Court has consistently refused to provide subsequent review of these “procedurally barred” claims. Finding that, although legal counsel is provided, there is no constitutional right to “effective” post conviction counsel: therefore, if such counsel does fail to provide competent representation the resulting default cannot be grounds for an exemption to statutorily created procedural rules. See, e.g. Kobal v. State, 901 So. 2d 766, 777-778 (Fla. 2005) (explaining that recognizing exemption to procedural ruled based upon ineffective post conviction representation would open the “floodgates” to more appeals, and concluding that, “As recognized by both this Court and the United States Supreme Court,” defendants have no constitutional right to representation in capital post conviction proceedings.”); Waterhouse v. State, 792 So. 2d 1176, 1193 (Fla. 2001) (“This Court has repeatedly held that ineffective assistance of post conviction counsel is not a cognizable claim.”); Lambrix v. State, 698 So. 2d 247, 248 (Fla. 1996)(“claims of ineffective assistance of post conviction counsel do not present a valid basis for relief.”)

Whether one supports the death penalty or not, we as a society have a moral responsibility to ensure that it is carried out in a fair manner. Once a person has been condemned to death the post conviction review process is inherently complex and without competent legal representation those wrongfully convicted and condemned to death have no meaningful opportunity to develop the evidence necessary to prove their innocence. The system has become inherently corrupt by politicians who advocate expediting executions at the expense of necessary safeguards to protect against executing innocent victims, and the courts unwilling to establish judicial protections to ensure competent legal representation is provided. As a result, the presumed “privilege” of capital post conviction representation has been reduced to a pathetic pretense of representation and the inevitable result of that pretense will be that innocent people will be executed because of the deprivations of any meaningful opportunity to prove their innocence.

Hearing Excerpt Compelling Claim VI ~July 19-20, 2006 ~

2006-10-16T22:45:00.000-04:00

These are the excerpts from the July 2006 hearing where Mike was forced to intervene on his own behalf and compel the court to address Claim VI and allow for a full and fair hearing of all the evidence not just the narrow issue of the sexual affair between Smith-Ottinger, the states key witness and Robert Daniels, The state attorneys own lead investigator. He has to do this because his lawyers did not agressivly pursue these even though he expressly asked them too.

Please click to enlarge

Prosecutorial Misconduct: Does Immunity Invite Injustice?

2006-10-16T17:05:00.000-04:00

The Greater Evil

2006-10-11T18:28:00.000-04:00

Earlier today I had a visit with the lay minister of the local Catholic Church. I enjoy talking to him as with his previous career as a lawyer he easily grasps the legal context of what is going on. Today we had a long debate about Justice Scalia’s recent opinion in Marsh v. Kansas, in which Scalia took the position that the claims of the innocent people being wrongfully condemned to death is overblown – that there are very few truly innocent people convicted as the system works. And that although the system is not perfect, the few mistakes are acceptable in the interest of the greater good.

Yeah __ I’ll bet he’d have a totally different opinion if he was the one wrongfully convicted and had to deal with a court system that increasingly erects procedural rules to prevent the claims of innocence from even being heard.

It is because of people like Justice Scalia that I’ve come to despise the Right Wing Conservative Movement. They live in their own small world where they never have to worry about becoming a victim of the very practices they advocate and then say that those who do fall victim to the system they’ve created are an acceptable collateral consequence for the greater good of accomplishing their own agenda. But just where does one draw the line as to what is considered “acceptable?” How many must be sacrificed before they can find it intolerable?

People like Scalia are so far removed from the reality of the world that they incapable of empathizing with those who do fall victim. To me, that’s the greater evil that exists today – that absence of moral conscience that allows those who do support such a system to see even the few wrongfully convicted as an acceptable sacrifice for their own greater good. And as they dare preach morality, they refuse to see why it’s morally wrong to allow such a system to exist without at least trying to prevent the injustices that do exist.

One must ask, at what point does a presumably civilized society become compromised by the cancer we allow to exist not out of necessity, but out of political will? Sure, there are a relatively small number of monsters out there that perhaps nothing less than killing would protect society from – but those true “monsters” only rarely get the death penalty. The reality of it is that the overwhelming majority of people condemned to death, get death, not because of the particular nature of there crime, but because of their inability to defend against the formidable resources of the state. It’s those unfortunate enough to get represented by incompetent lawyers typically appointed by the court.

~Attribution~Daryl Cagle, MSNBC.com