The Reid Scale: Classic Unsolved Murder Cases

[RivkahChaya]

I think Beaman is mainly seeking monetary compensation for his ~15 years in prison so they aren't exactly punitive damages.

In order not to seek punitive damages, he needs a Certificate of Innocence? Does that mean that without it, his only recourse would be a suit against the prosecutor? Does the state of Illinois have some kind of fund for reparations to people wrongly convicted, but only if they are judged actually innocent?

I mean, I guess I could see something like that, because even when a person was convicted due to prosecutorial or judicial error, by the time it came to light, the prosecutor or judge could be dead, and I guess I can see why a Certificate of Innocence would be required, because a lot of people win appeals on technicalities who are probably not innocent, and there was a spate of women pardoned in the late 1990s, in several different states, after serving part of a life sentence, because several governors thought that if the battered women's defense had been available to them, they probably would have been able to use it, and been found "not guilty," but since it is an affirmative defense, they are not innocent, and wouldn't be entitled to recompense from a fund for wrongly convicted people, I wouldn't think.

[sdreid]

I think Beaman is mainly seeking monetary compensation for his ~15 years in prison so they aren't exactly punitive damages.

Recent DNA tests from the crime scene yielded two profiles, neither of whom was Beaman.

Lockmiller's mother has said from the beginning that she thought Beaman was innocent.

[RivkahChaya]

In Illinois, it's called a Certificate of Innocence. Alan Beaman is seeking one but the state is fighting it because it would leave them open for damages.

Alan Beaman. Generally, the police and prosecutor's office are protected from suits based on wrongful conviction if there was no misconduct, but if there really was misconduct on the part of the prosecutor, I'm not sure how a Certificate of Innocence would make a difference one way of another, other than speeding up the proceedings, or causing the state to settle, rather than going to (civil) trial.

Apparently, what the prosecutor(s) did, or neglected to do, rather, was failed to turn over information regarding another suspect to the defense. The prosecution is required to make full disclosure of all potentially exculpating evidence. I haven't been able to find the prosecution's response to the charge, although I have a cousin who works for the prosecutor's office in Chicago, so I might email him. I'm assuming Beaman's trial took place in whatever county Bloomington, IL is in, since that's where the crime was committed.

[RivkahChaya]

I was attempting a "funny" Rivkah...clearly I did not succeed...

All the best

Dave

You'll have to spell it out, because I still don't get it.

[sdreid]

In Illinois, it's called a Certificate of Innocence. Alan Beaman is seeking one but the state is fighting it because it would leave them open for damages.

[Cogidubnus]

I was attempting a "funny" Rivkah...clearly I did not succeed...

All the best

Dave

[RivkahChaya]

It's called a "writ of actual innocence."

ETA: the same thing might be called "election" in the UK, that I don't know.

[Cogidubnus]

Hi Rivkah

There is a process in the US by which someone found "not guilty," or whose charges are dismissed, but still has a cloud over his head, can seek a verdict of actual innocence. I've forgotten what it's called, though.

I believe the term you seek is "Election"

All the best

Dave

[RivkahChaya]

Some still remain the prime "suspect" after they are convicted and their conviction is later overturned.

Or not convicted. OJ Simpson. Lizzie Borden. I remember being about eight years old, and naive, and there was some trial in the news that ended in a surprising "not guilty." I asked my mother if that meant the police had to go back and look for someone else, and my mother said no, as far as the police were concerned, they'd gotten the right person, the jury just didn't convict.

There is a process in the US by which someone found "not guilty," or whose charges are dismissed, but still has a cloud over his head, can seek a verdict of actual innocence. I've forgotten what it's called, though.

[sdreid]

Some still remain the prime "suspect" after they are convicted and their conviction is later overturned.

[sdreid]

I don't expect it to change nor has my view.

[RivkahChaya]

I would prefer a system with a rotating pool of professional jurors with no lawyer say regarding its makeup. In the present form, you get a jury that both sides think is stupid enough to believe their rendition of events. We need something better than that when a defendant's life and/or justice is at stake.

I think that would be a bad idea.

Professional jurors mean that you have people whose livelihoods are at stake, and they may start to worry that, for example, if they participate in too many hung juries, they may lose their jobs, prompting hold-out jurors to vote with the majority to preserve their incomes.

Juries are not as stupid as you might think. I've served on juries, and there was no one stupid. Several people had college degrees. Everyone was employed except for a student, and me, because I was pregnant, and had already stopped working. Everyone worked very hard to return a fair verdict, and was very civic-minded, and polite, even to the jurors who disagreed. In fact, it really was a model of civility, and nothing like any TV show I've seen, but, of course, there was nothing dramatic about it, either. Some people were more intelligent than others, and there was one person who had not finished high school-- but only one. There was also one who was only 19-years-old, but she was actually very mature, and impressed me a lot.

There were several people who were very hostile to the idea of being on a jury, and they got discharged. There were also a couple of people who clearly lied about their circumstances to get off. There was one person who really was stupid, and didn't understand the concept of the burden of proof being on the prosecution, and the why the defense was not required to put on a case. She was discharged.

You have to get into the jury pool somehow, around here, and that means you either have to register a car, or be registered to vote, and that is going to eliminate most people who genuinely have subpar intelligence. Also, if you actually have something wrong with you, that's an easy way to get off a jury. If you had a head injury, and have memory impairment, or if you were in special ed. all through school for a reading disability, those things will get you dismissed.

Lawyers have only so many peremptory challenges. After that, they have to challenge for cause. "Too smart" is not a cause, and no lawyer is going to waste a peremptory challenge on someone for being smart, and then realize they need it a lot more for the hostile white guy, who isn't actually a member of the Klan. Besides, most lawyers think they are pretty darned smart themselves, and aren't about to give a juror credit for "smarter than me."

The myth of the stupid juror really needs to die, and soon.

[sdreid]

I would prefer a system with a rotating pool of professional jurors with no lawyer say regarding its makeup. In the present form, you get a jury that both sides think is stupid enough to believe their rendition of events. We need something better than that when a defendant's life and/or justice is at stake.

[RivkahChaya]

The problem with the Casey Anthony trial seems to be with charging her with 1st degree murder. That requires proving motive, and planning. The prosecutor failed on both counts. He tried to prove motive based on her behavior after the crime, and you simply aren't allowed to do that. The defense attorney cut him off with objections, then provided lots of witnesses and photographic evidence that Anthony took good care of her daughter while she was alive. Being happy that someone is dead is not evidence that you killed them. You have to use behavior from and facts, or forensics from before the crime was committed as evidence of motive.

Evidence of planning mainly relied on a Google search of "chloroform," which Anthony's mother testified she herself had done, and she was looking for chlorophyll, not chloroform, spelled it wrong, the misused the Google-correct feature. She did the "chloroform" search on her daughter's computer, but she later did a correctly spelled chlorophyll search on her own computer, and the prosecution had not looked at the history of the parents' computer.

Interviewed after the trial, most jurors said they thought there had been an accident, that Anthony had been negligent in not calling 911, and had probably participated in the crime of hiding the body, but she was not guilty of 1st degree murder as defined by statute.

If she'd been charged with negligent homicide, felony child abuse, or manslaughter, she probably would be in prison now.

I think the jury acted correctly, because the fact is that, if they had found her guilty, she might have gotten a directed verdict of "not guilty," which the prosecutor would have gotten reviewed, and the process would have cost the state a lot of money, and in the end she'd still be free. Or she would have been freed on appeal, again, costing the state money.

I don't know why she was charged with 1st degree murder, unless the district attorney bowed to public pressure. Florida has the death penalty, and the special circumstance of killing a child is one where he can ask for it, but only with a 1st degree murder conviction. Maybe he thought that with that in play, she would plea bargain, although, there was a rumor that she wasn't offered one, so I just don't know.

But I agree with the jury verdict.

I'm not very familiar with the Mancini case. The Blake case was weak. He may have done it, or not, but if he did, he covered his tracks pretty well. In the OJ case, the attorneys were clever in getting the bulk of the evidence thrown out on what was essentially a technicality, and ruining the life of Mark Fuhrman while they were at it. They got him to say under oath that he had never said what Americans call the "n-word" (just Google it if you don't know), in the last 10 years, then played a tape of him saying it fairly recently. The tape was an interview with a reporter for a book she was writing, and his use of the n-word involved quoting other police officers, eg: "Yes, they say [n-word] all the time; Sergeant X says [n-word] to a black officer's face." Then, back on the stand, Simpson's attorneys accused Fuhrman of lying when he claimed not to have said the n-word.

Of course, he meant that he had never used it as an epithet, not that he had never said it at all. But they "Greg Bradyed" him, and so in order not to be guilty of the crime of lying under oath, he took the 5th, and answered every question with "I refuse to answer on the grounds that it may incriminate me."

The thing about taking the 5th, is that it has to apply to every question you are asked under oath during a particular proceeding. Fuhrman could not answer the question about evidence gathering, then take the fifth for the questions about the n-word. It was all or nothing. Once he took the 5th regarding the n-word, the judge instructed the jury to disregard all of Fuhrman's prior testimony.

[sdreid]

Blake and OJ were both pre-crime celebrities so maybe that's an element in those examples as well.