Post by CCADP on Aug 18, 2005 7:05:41 GMT -5
DA may help fund probe into crime lab
Rosenthal says inquiry should wrap up; others say he playing down problems
By STEVE MCVICKER
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
RESOURCES
• Chronicle special section: Full coverage of problems at Houston Police Department's crime lab
• The investigation: What HPD's independent investigator has found
• Lab supervisor's complaints: Letter to the district attorney from one of the lab's highest-ranking analysts, Pauline Louie, detailing a crippling workload. HPD later shut down the lab's toxicology division after she failed a competency test.
• Early concerns: E-mail correspondence between prosecutors about crime lab
HEAR IT NOW
Irma Rios, the new director of HPD's crime lab, discusses:
• Her background and the new job
• What she plans to do in the position
(Some files require Acrobat Reader; audio requires the free RealPlayer.) © HoustonChronicle.com
Harris County District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal said Wednesday that his office may chip in to help solve a financial impasse that has stalled the investigation into problems at the Houston Police Department's crime laboratory and property room.
Although he would not say how much money he is offering, Rosenthal said Wednesday that he has contacted city officials about the possibility of using discretionary funds — such as drug-seizure money — to help underwrite the HPD probe.
Rosenthal acknowledged that he has a "selfish" motive for wanting to get the crime-lab investigation back on track: "I'd like to see it done just to get a resolution to this because I don't feel like there's been the immediacy or the problem that's been painted by y'all and the other media as to how bad things are."
To Houston defense lawyer Troy McKinney, Rosenthal's remarks are indicative of the overall crime-lab problem.
"They continue to take the attitude that any problems are isolated, and only anecdotal, even though there is a tremendous quantity of evidence that the problems are pervasive and continue," McKinney said.
For the past 2 1/2 years, the HPD evidence analysis and storage divisions have been embroiled in a continuing saga of problems that began with the discovery of flawed work in the department's DNA lab. Bad science, decaying facilities and poorly trained analysts led to the closure of the lab in December 2002. Subsequently, two men have been released from prison because of flawed testing, and the integrity of thousands of cases has been questioned.
Troubles surface
Earlier this year, the city of Houston hired Michael Bromwich, a former Justice Department inspector general, to conduct a two-phase probe of the crime lab and property room. During the first phase of his investigation, Bromwich found that two analysts in the crime lab's controlled substances division had fabricated drug-test results in at least four cases.
After discovering deeper problems than expected, Brom-wich notified city officials that the second phase of the investigation would cost more than the $2.2 million originally budgeted for the first year. As of this week, $1 million of the original allocation remains.
Bromwich now projects the total cost of the probe could run as high as $3.9 million. That is not much more than the nearly $3.2 million estimated by the city in its original request for project proposals.
City officials, however, have balked at the cost, putting the investigation on hold for the past six weeks.
"Although I believe that Chief (Harold) Hurtt remains committed to our work, I have no doubt that some people would like to stop the investigation in its tracks because of the fear of additional disclosures," Bromwich said via e-mail to the Houston Chronicle on Wednesday. " I'm certainly hopeful that this very unfortunate, misleading and time-consuming fuss about the cost won't have that result."
At a media briefing Wednesday, Hurtt said he is committed to finding a solution acceptable to both the city and Bromwich.
Bar-coding process
Meanwhile Wednesday, the District Attorney's Office maintained that the defense was informed of all evidence collected in three capital murder cases in which previously misplaced items were recently discovered in HPD's property room — the most recent revelation about missing evidence at the storage facility.
On Tuesday, Hurtt announced that during the process of bar-coding all evidence stored in the property room, about 150 previously unlogged items had been uncovered. Among those items was evidence from three death-penalty cases, including one in which the defendant already has been executed.
The announcement prompted attorneys for two of the convicted killers to say they were not sure they were informed of the relocated evidence at the time of trial.
In the case of death row inmate Robert Campbell, police discovered a cigarette butt that could possibly yield DNA evidence.
Defense attorney Lonnie Knowles said he had no recollection of any cigarette-butt evidence during the trial.
However, Assistant District Attorney Jack Roady said Wednesday that both of Campbell's defense lawyers — Wayne Hill and Knowles — signed affidavits at the time of the trial stating they reviewed the files.
"So, they should have seen it," said Roady.
In 2001, Campbell's appellate attorney, Justin Waggoner, filed a motion to have all of the evidence in the case tested for DNA. On Tuesday, Hurtt said the cigarette butt recently located had never been submitted for testing.
But Roady also produced a court document indicating a number of items in the case, including several cigarette butts, were eventually tested.
Waggoner said the document doesn't prove that the newly found evidence was ever submitted for testing — only that it was separated from the rest of the evidence.
Little confidence in files
Assistant District Attorney Lynn Hardaway said case records indicate that defense attorneys for death row inmate Warren Rivers were given access to the prosecution file. Similarly, in the case of Ponchai Wilkerson, who was executed in 2000, Hardaway said lead prosecutor Roberto Gutierrez assured her that the defense reviewed the DA's file.
McKinney, who represented Wilkerson on appeal, said he has little confidence in the district attorney's so-called open-file policy.
"At this point I get no comfort from that," said McKinney, a former president of the Harris County Criminal Lawyers Association.
"That's their whole pitch with the crime lab — that the defense got to see their file, and that's all they've got. But they don't seem to get sometimes that they are responsible for more than just what's in their files. They are responsible for affirmatively seeking out whatever evidence may be out there that is inconsistent with the defendant's guilt."
Chronicle staffer Tim Fleck contributed to this report.
steve.mcvicker@chron.com
Rosenthal says inquiry should wrap up; others say he playing down problems
By STEVE MCVICKER
Copyright 2005 Houston Chronicle
RESOURCES
• Chronicle special section: Full coverage of problems at Houston Police Department's crime lab
• The investigation: What HPD's independent investigator has found
• Lab supervisor's complaints: Letter to the district attorney from one of the lab's highest-ranking analysts, Pauline Louie, detailing a crippling workload. HPD later shut down the lab's toxicology division after she failed a competency test.
• Early concerns: E-mail correspondence between prosecutors about crime lab
HEAR IT NOW
Irma Rios, the new director of HPD's crime lab, discusses:
• Her background and the new job
• What she plans to do in the position
(Some files require Acrobat Reader; audio requires the free RealPlayer.) © HoustonChronicle.com
Harris County District Attorney Chuck Rosenthal said Wednesday that his office may chip in to help solve a financial impasse that has stalled the investigation into problems at the Houston Police Department's crime laboratory and property room.
Although he would not say how much money he is offering, Rosenthal said Wednesday that he has contacted city officials about the possibility of using discretionary funds — such as drug-seizure money — to help underwrite the HPD probe.
Rosenthal acknowledged that he has a "selfish" motive for wanting to get the crime-lab investigation back on track: "I'd like to see it done just to get a resolution to this because I don't feel like there's been the immediacy or the problem that's been painted by y'all and the other media as to how bad things are."
To Houston defense lawyer Troy McKinney, Rosenthal's remarks are indicative of the overall crime-lab problem.
"They continue to take the attitude that any problems are isolated, and only anecdotal, even though there is a tremendous quantity of evidence that the problems are pervasive and continue," McKinney said.
For the past 2 1/2 years, the HPD evidence analysis and storage divisions have been embroiled in a continuing saga of problems that began with the discovery of flawed work in the department's DNA lab. Bad science, decaying facilities and poorly trained analysts led to the closure of the lab in December 2002. Subsequently, two men have been released from prison because of flawed testing, and the integrity of thousands of cases has been questioned.
Troubles surface
Earlier this year, the city of Houston hired Michael Bromwich, a former Justice Department inspector general, to conduct a two-phase probe of the crime lab and property room. During the first phase of his investigation, Bromwich found that two analysts in the crime lab's controlled substances division had fabricated drug-test results in at least four cases.
After discovering deeper problems than expected, Brom-wich notified city officials that the second phase of the investigation would cost more than the $2.2 million originally budgeted for the first year. As of this week, $1 million of the original allocation remains.
Bromwich now projects the total cost of the probe could run as high as $3.9 million. That is not much more than the nearly $3.2 million estimated by the city in its original request for project proposals.
City officials, however, have balked at the cost, putting the investigation on hold for the past six weeks.
"Although I believe that Chief (Harold) Hurtt remains committed to our work, I have no doubt that some people would like to stop the investigation in its tracks because of the fear of additional disclosures," Bromwich said via e-mail to the Houston Chronicle on Wednesday. " I'm certainly hopeful that this very unfortunate, misleading and time-consuming fuss about the cost won't have that result."
At a media briefing Wednesday, Hurtt said he is committed to finding a solution acceptable to both the city and Bromwich.
Bar-coding process
Meanwhile Wednesday, the District Attorney's Office maintained that the defense was informed of all evidence collected in three capital murder cases in which previously misplaced items were recently discovered in HPD's property room — the most recent revelation about missing evidence at the storage facility.
On Tuesday, Hurtt announced that during the process of bar-coding all evidence stored in the property room, about 150 previously unlogged items had been uncovered. Among those items was evidence from three death-penalty cases, including one in which the defendant already has been executed.
The announcement prompted attorneys for two of the convicted killers to say they were not sure they were informed of the relocated evidence at the time of trial.
In the case of death row inmate Robert Campbell, police discovered a cigarette butt that could possibly yield DNA evidence.
Defense attorney Lonnie Knowles said he had no recollection of any cigarette-butt evidence during the trial.
However, Assistant District Attorney Jack Roady said Wednesday that both of Campbell's defense lawyers — Wayne Hill and Knowles — signed affidavits at the time of the trial stating they reviewed the files.
"So, they should have seen it," said Roady.
In 2001, Campbell's appellate attorney, Justin Waggoner, filed a motion to have all of the evidence in the case tested for DNA. On Tuesday, Hurtt said the cigarette butt recently located had never been submitted for testing.
But Roady also produced a court document indicating a number of items in the case, including several cigarette butts, were eventually tested.
Waggoner said the document doesn't prove that the newly found evidence was ever submitted for testing — only that it was separated from the rest of the evidence.
Little confidence in files
Assistant District Attorney Lynn Hardaway said case records indicate that defense attorneys for death row inmate Warren Rivers were given access to the prosecution file. Similarly, in the case of Ponchai Wilkerson, who was executed in 2000, Hardaway said lead prosecutor Roberto Gutierrez assured her that the defense reviewed the DA's file.
McKinney, who represented Wilkerson on appeal, said he has little confidence in the district attorney's so-called open-file policy.
"At this point I get no comfort from that," said McKinney, a former president of the Harris County Criminal Lawyers Association.
"That's their whole pitch with the crime lab — that the defense got to see their file, and that's all they've got. But they don't seem to get sometimes that they are responsible for more than just what's in their files. They are responsible for affirmatively seeking out whatever evidence may be out there that is inconsistent with the defendant's guilt."
Chronicle staffer Tim Fleck contributed to this report.
steve.mcvicker@chron.com