Alan Crotzer to Testify Before Congressional Subcommittee on Indigent Defense

Alan Crotzer to Testify Before Congressional Subcommittee on Indigent Defense
Florida Man Spent 24 Years in Prison for Someone Else’s Crime

On Thursday, June 4, Alan Crotzer will join two other members of the National Committee on the Right to Counsel when he testifies before the Congressional House Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security about the crisis facing indigent defense in America. Mr. Crotzer was wrongfully convicted and served 24 and a half years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit due to a lackluster effort by his court-appointed defense counsel.

Mr. Crotzer was arrested in 1981 in St. Petersburg and charged with several crimes stemming from a double-kidnapping and rape that took place in Tampa. An eyewitness ID from a suggestive photo lineup was the trigger that set in motion a chain of events, from arrest to conviction to incarceration, that Mr. Crotzer said “profoundly affected [his] life in unimaginable ways.” In a prepared statement, he thanked two lawyers from New York, David Menschel and Sam Roberts, who “put their lives on hold” and spent thousands of dollars to prove his innocence with DNA testing. Their performance, he said, stands in stark contrast to that of his appointed counsel.

In his statement, Mr. Crotzer listed the failings of his defense attorney – including ignoring his innocence claim and encouraging him to accept a plea to 25 years, meeting with Mr. Crotzer on only a few occasions before trial, failing to subpoena and interview alibi witnesses, and failing to sever his case from a co-defendant, whose disastrous self-representation at trial likely served to incriminate Mr. Crotzer by association. Mr. Crotzer says this confluence of feckless actions made his wrongful conviction “not only possible, but probable.”

Public defenders’ offices around the country have seen their funding slashed in recent years and faced dire straits even before the current national recession. According to a recent report by the Constitution Project titled Justice Denied, the State of Florida, where Mr. Crotzer was convicted, has seen its county budgets for defense counsel cut by millions of dollars. Some counties have resorted to charging convicts – many of them indigent – special fees to cover the costs of their trials. Several public defenders’ offices in Florida have chosen to outright refuse to take new cases, citing their inability to fulfill their constitutional obligation to provide an adequate defense.

Mr. Crotzer now works with at-risk youth as an Intervention Specialist at the Florida Department of Juvenile Justice and with the Innocence Project of Florida (IPF), where he raises awareness of criminal justice issues. He hopes his testimony will be the beginning of a real interest by Congress in reforming America’s system of indigent defense so that stories like his “will become infrequent, rather than a constant refrain.”

The Innocence Project of Florida is a 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to finding and freeing innocent people from Florida prisons. Alan Crotzer is a member of IPF’s Board of Directors.

The National Committee on the Right to Counsel is a bipartisan committee of independent experts representing all segments of America’s justice system created by the Constitution Project and the National Legal Aid & Defender Association. The Committee examines whether poor defendants are being provided with competent, experienced lawyers who have the necessary resources to defend them, and to create consensus recommendations for any necessary reforms. Their report Justice Denied can be found online at www.tcpjusticedenied.org. Alan Crotzer is a member of the National Committee on the Right to Counsel.

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Information about the Hearing:
Indigent Representation: A Growing National Crisis
House Committee on the Judiciary
Subcommittee on Crime, Terrorism, and Homeland Security
Thursday, June 4, 2009 9:30 AM
2141 Rayburn House Office Building

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Download a PDF of this press release here.

Friday Roundup

The office is abuzz today because William Dillon, our most recent exoneree from November 2008 is visiting. Dillon served 27 years in prison for a murder he didn't commit. Fault eyewitness testimony, fraudulent science, and police misconduct led to his wrongful conviction. But in person, Dillon is as good-hearted and sincere as you could imagine; always remarkable how exonerees show no bitterness, only gratitude and optimism.

Here's what's going on around the Internet:

Matt Kelley of the Innocence Project and Change.org has a blog post about torture and wrongful convictions:

I work at the Innocence Project when I'm not blogging here at change.org, and many of our cases have shown the power of emotional and physical abuse from law enforcement officers to force someone to admit to something they didn't do. About 25% of wrongful convictions overturned by DNA testing have involved a false confession or admission. If one-quarter of information gleaned from torture was false – leading to wrongful arrests and convictions and to costly goose chases – would Dick Cheney still say it was worth it?

Texas raises its exoneree compensation from $50,000 to $80,000 per year of wrongful incarceration. Exonerees will also receive 120 hours of paid tuition "at a career center or public college." They now compensate their exonerees more generously than any other state. Of course, simple money can't make up for lost years of a person's life. It can only serve to help them get back on their feet after years of being completely divorced from mainstream society.

Connecticut House of Representatives votes to repeal the death penalty by an impressive margin: 90-56.

Finally, the DailyKos features an early-morning publicity and fundraising drive for the Innocence Project in New York.

William Dillon to Speak at Rotary Club Event in West Palm Beach, Florida

William Dillon to Speak at Rotary Club Event in West Palm Beach, Florida
Mr. Dillon Spent 27 Years in Prison Before DNA Testing Proved His Innocence

William Dillon, who was wrongfully convicted of a 1981 murder and served 27 years behind bars before DNA evidence demonstrated his innocence, will be speaking at a Rotary Club event in Wellington, Florida, on Thursday, April 30. In November 2008, The Innocence Project of Florida (IPF) worked to obtain DNA testing that proved Mr. Dillon’s innocence. Since his exoneration, Mr. Dillon has become an advocate for criminal justice reforms and has spoken on previous occasions about the harrowing experience of serving out his wrongful incarceration.

“Mr. Dillon is being awfully brave by sharing his story with other people,” said Seth Miller, Esq., Executive Director of IPF. “You can see when he speaks that it’s not easy for him. It is a traumatizing experience to be locked up for so long for something you know you didn’t do.”

When DNA testing showed that Mr. Dillon could not have contributed the DNA found on a crucial piece of physical evidence, his murder conviction was overturned. One month later, the State announced they would drop the charges against Mr. Dillon. Mr. Dillon’s 27 years in prison equals the longest time served before a DNA exoneration.

IPF worked with Mr. Dillon’s public defender, Michael Pirollo, Esq., to obtain DNA testing. Ms. Montle, a Staff Attorney for IPF who worked on Mr. Dillon’s case, will be joining him at the event.

“I’m really proud of Bill for coming out and doing something like this,” said Ms. Montle. “He knows how important it is to reform the system to prevent wrongful convictions from happening. Since he was released, he has been tirelessly working to help solve this tragic problem in America’s criminal justice system.”

The Innocence Project of Florida (IPF) is a 501(c)(3) organization dedicated to finding and freeing innocent people in Florida prisons.

Visit IPF's Website by clicking here; sign up to volunteer by clicking here; contribute to our work by clicking here.

Download the press release by clicking here.

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More Information About the Event:

April 30th, 6:30 PM

Binks Forest Golf Club
400 Binks Forest Dr
Wellington, FL

Timothy Cole Exonerated in Texas

When Governor Bill Richardson abolished the death penalty in New Mexico, he called it the most difficult decision of his political career.

Now, Judge Charlie Baird in Texas has handed down a decision he has called "the most important of my judicial career." Timothy Cole was convicted in 1985 for the rape of Michelle Mallin and sentenced to 25 years in prison. Cole died in prison in 1999 for a crime that DNA evidence has since proven he didn't commit, and yesterday he was officially posthumously exonerated in Texas. Judge Baird's decision is available here.

Judge Baird said, unequivocally, "the evidence is crystal clear that Timothy Cole died in prison an innocent man, and I find to a 100 percent moral, legal, and factual certainty that he did not commit the crime of which he was convicted." Judge Baird also went on to fault police misconduct, including the deliberate misrepresentation and suppression of evidence for Cole's innocence during the investigation.

Perhaps most tragic is that, since 1995, four years before Cole died in prison from complications from asthma, Jerry Johnson had been admitting his guilt for the rape of Michelle Mallin. From Judge Baird's decision:

Worse, however, was the attitude of the courts to [the actual rapist Jerry] Johnson’s claim of guilt. As early as 1995- four years before Tim Cole died- Johnson tried to clear Tim Cole and admit to the rape of Michelle Mallin. His letters were ignored, set aside, and thrown away until one was received by the family of Tim Cole and the Innocence Project of Texas.

You can read more about Timothy Cole's exoneration at Grits for Breakfast, Lubbock Online, or the Houston Chronicle.

We're glad that this sad story is coming to an end – that the family of Timothy Cole is receiving some sort of justice in the clearing of their son's name. We hope the criminal justice system can look to Timothy's case and ask itself, "What can be done to make sure this never happens again?"

Visit IPF's Website by clicking here; sign up to volunteer by clicking here; contribute to our work by clicking here.

Innocence Project of Florida helps free 7 wrongly convicted men

Allow us to give ourselves a pat on the back this morning as we received some coverage in the Orlando Sentinel this morning, a paper with a hefty circulation of 230,000 people. The article is located here.

"Depending on whether you talk to people who are prosecution-oriented or defense-oriented, you're going to get widely divergent numbers," said Michael Seigel, a University of Florida law professor. "The criminal justice system does a pretty good job; there isn't widespread error. But there is error ... one person who is innocent and is in jail is one too many."

That's where the Innocence Project of Florida comes in. Since its creation, it has helped exonerate seven men who, among them, were incarcerated for 144 years.

And a good quote from our Executive Director, who points out a mistake in a common way of understanding our place in the process:

"When we exonerate someone, people say the system worked. The system did not work; the system failed," said Seth Miller, who directs the Innocence Project from Tallahassee. "These folks have been exonerated not because of the system but in spite of the system."

If "the system worked," we wouldn't have a reason for being. We exist to right the wrongs that get committed by the system – even when they are no one's fault – and to help to fix the system to prevent wrongful convictions from taking place.

Visit IPF's Website by clicking here; sign up to volunteer by clicking here; contribute to our work by clicking here.

Eyewitness identification in the news

Sam Sommers is a psychologist at Tufts University in Massachusetts. Today on his blog on Psychology Today, he relates an anecdote about eyewitness IDs, told through an encounter with one of his students:

Not long ago, I had a meeting with an undergraduate from a large lecture course. It was the first time I had spoken with her outside of class, and she asked me what type of research I conduct. When I told her, she responded by saying that my work reminded her of a presentation she sat through during freshman orientation–a presentation concerning psychological perspectives on diversity conducted by two faculty members. From that point forward, our conversation took a surprising turn:

Me: "Right, I was one of those presenters."
Student: "No, there was a Black professor and a White professor, but the White guy was someone else."
Me: "Actually, that was me. Professor Maddox and I conduct diversity workshops, including that one at freshman orientation."
Student: "It was Professor Maddox, but the White professor was another guy."

That's all well and good, but imagine if a conviction had hung in the balance in this case, and that an eyewitness' memory was the only evidence against a suspect that the state could muster. Sommers quickly makes the same realization about the consequences of relying on eyewitness testimony.

Indeed, in the legal domain there are few types of evidence that a jury finds more persuasive than the eyewitness who can take the stand and point directly at the defendant while stating, "absolutely, that's the man I saw." But I just returned from the annual convention of the American Psychology-Law Society, where research presentation after research presentation demonstrated how surprisingly inaccurate and malleable eyewitness evidence can be. And the consequences for crime suspects as well as victims are far greater than the marginal ego blow suffered by the unrecognized professor who learns that he apparently nothing more than an average-looking, generic White guy.

The Innocence Project claims that in over 75% cases of wrongful conviction, mistaken eyewitness testimony is involved. In several of our cases, it was the only evidence against a suspect.

The issue has found its way back into the mainstream with the release of the book Picking Cotton, written by Jennifer Thompson and Ronald Cotton. Thompson, a rape victim, picked Cotton out of a lineup and testified against him at trial, leading to 11 years of wrongful incarceration. Since Cotton's exoneration, the two have reconciled and bonded. 60 Minutes also covered the release of the book in a piece recently, including interviews with Thompson and Cotton.

Of interest, KCBD TV station in Lubbock, Texas just performed an experiment of their own in which they staged a purse-snatching and then had students try to pick the perpetrator out of a lineup. Only 8% of them were successful. Again, imagine that only a handful of students – or one witness – had been present, and then the burden rested on him to pick the perpetrator out of a lineup...

The Innocence Project in New York suggests these policy reforms to undercut the problem of unreliable eyewitness identifications:

• Blind administration: Research and experience have shown that the risk of misidentification is sharply reduced if the police officer administering a photo or live lineup is not aware of who the suspect is.
  
• Lineup composition: "Fillers” (the non-suspects included in a lineup) should resemble the eyewitness' description of the perpetrator. The suspect should not stand out (for example, he should not be the only member of his race in the lineup, or the only one with facial hair). Eyewitnesses should not view multiple lineups with the same suspect.
  
• Instructions: The person viewing a lineup should be told that the perpetrator may not be in the lineup and that the investigation will continue regardless of the lineup result. They should also be told not to look to the administrator for guidance.
  
• Confidence statements: Immediately following the lineup procedure, the eyewitness should provide a statement, in his own words, articulating his the level of confidence in the identification.
  
• Recording: Identification procedures should be videotaped whenever possible – this protects innocent suspects from any misconduct by the lineup administrator, and it helps the prosecution by showing a jury that the procedure was legitimate.

You can read our page on eyewitness identification here.

Bill Dillon speaks publicly in Melbourne, Florida

On Saturday night, William Dillon spoke to a crowd at the Space Coast Progressive Alliance's "Audacity of Hope" event at the Florida Institution of Technology. Florida Today covered the event.

"Many years, I waited for something to happen," he said. "I wrote anyone I could; anybody that I thought would listen, and I got no replies. Nobody was listening."

He cited the manipulation of witnesses, the lack of DNA testing at the time and unreliable sources for his conviction and credited the Innocence Project of Florida for his freedom.

You can read about William Dillon's case on our website here.


The Innocence Project of Florida's Assistant Director, Toni Shrewsbury (right) was in attendance.

Update: Some coverage in the blog of John Simpson, an attendant at the Progressive Celebration event:

[Bill Dillon is] tall, maybe six-two, and speaks clearly and plainly in a laconic voice of his experiences behind bars and in the courtroom, of his life in general. His speech is marked by candor, not rancor. He does not appear to be bitter. He’s adapted readily to the use of cell phones, devices which didn’t exist (except in crazy inventors’ feverish imaginations) when he went in. At a restaurant or among a crowd of people, he’s always looking around, alert, amazed. That he can find his way around Brevard County, where he still lives, is another source of constant surprise: whole neighborhoods have sprung up in his absence; new shopping malls exist where, a quarter-century ago, the wind blew across empty fields and marshes.

What he’s been through (and how well he went through it) boggles the mind. That he’s nowhere near the first — and certainly not the last — to have gone through it feels, well, impossible.

Visit IPF's Website here; sign up to volunteer here; contribute to our work here.

Wrongfully incarcerated, recently exonerated Brevard resident William Dillon to address public for the first time this Saturday

Brevard resident William Dillon, who served over 27 years for a crime he did not commit, will make his first address to the public since his exoneration in November 2008, joining the Innocence Project of Florida (IPF) on stage at the Gleason Center, Florida Tech campus, 6:00pm, Saturday, March 7, 2009 at the 5th Annual Progressive Celebration hosted by the Space Coast Progressive Alliance and co-sponsored by WFIT 89.5FM.

Dillon will join IPF Assistant Director Toni Shrewsbury during an award ceremony recognizing the work that IPF has done since their inception in 2003, resulting in the release of ten wrongfully incarcerated Floridians who, through DNA testing, were proven factually innocent of the crimes for which they were convicted. In addition to obtaining the freedom of these individuals, IPF's work has resulted in widespread recognition of the need to reform the state criminal justice system, where fundamental problems have been identified in the areas of eyewitness identification, false confessions, evidence preservation, crime lab oversight, access to DNA testing, and exoneree compensation. IPF has received over 2000 inquiries/requests for assistance in proving the innocence of individuals currently incarcerated.

Dillon's 27 years in jail represent the longest time served by any of the 232 individuals exonerated nationwide as a result of DNA test results. Dillon was exonerated when his innocence of a 1981 murder was proved by DNA evidence that came as a result of a 2007 motion filed by IPF and attorney Mike Pirolo. Dillon was subsequently released November 18, 2008.

The state's case against Dillon was based largely on the testimony of an admitted perjurer who had a sexual liaison with the case's lead investigator during the investigation, a fraudulent dog scent expert, a partially blind eyewitness and an individual whose own charges in a rape case were dropped in exchange for his testimony, which included numerous details at odds with known facts in the case.

Both Dillon and Shrewsbury will be joining Progressive Celebration attendees at a pre-event reception greeting Bob Edgar, President and CEO of Common Cause, a 400,000 member nonprofit, nonpartisan citizen lobby for reforms that make government at all levels more open, honest, and accountable, and re-engages citizens with civic responsibility. Edgar will then keynote the celebration with a talk addressing the challenges facing the Obama administration in meeting its promises for education, health care and energy policy. Edgar will specifically address key reforms that have taken hold in other states and how such reforms can be pursued in Florida. Celebration attendees will have the opportunity to question Edgar about Fair Districting, public campaign financing, and other fundamental reforms directed toward government accountability and the campaign/election process. Edgar's talk will follow a live music performance by Evan Greer, RiotFolk musician, performing original songs of citizen empowerment, sustainability and social justice. Concerned citizens of all ages are invited and urged to attend.

Doors open at 6pm to the event, which benefits both WFIT 89.5FM, a public radio station serving South Brevard and Indian River County, and the Space Coast Progressive Alliance, a local grassroots citizen lobby for progressive public policies.

Tickets are available from WFIT 89.5FM (321-674-8950 or www.wfit.org).

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Event Info
5th Annual Progressive Celebration
an evening of inspiration and information
hosted by Space Coast Progressive Alliance
co-sponsored by WFIT 89.5 FM

Saturday, March 7, 2009 on campus, Florida Institute of Technology, 150 W University Blvd, Melbourne FL 32901

5-6:30pm - Pre-event Party, Meet & Greet Reception in Hartley Room, Student Union Building. Limited attendance, tickets required.
6:00pm - Doors open at Gleason Performing Arts Center for Progressive Celebration
6:15pm - Live Music with Evan Greer, RiotFolk Music Collective
7:00pm - Welcome and Award Presentation to Innocence Project of Florida, followed by keynote speech by Bob Edgar, President & CEO of Common Cause
Presentation title: "The Audacity of Hope vs. Pay-to-Play Politics: Obama's Challenge
8:45pm - Edgar book signing, progressive information tabling, music resumes

Tickets available from WFIT (online at wfit.org or call 321-674-8950)
$20 advance / $25 at the door, if available
$10 students
$60 tickets

MEDIA welcome with press credentials/identity.

MORE EVENT INFO HERE

CONTACTS
ALL AVAILABLE FOR INTERVIEW

Innocence Project of Florida Assistant Director Toni Shrewsbury: 850-561-6767 or tshrewsbury@floridainnocence.org

Common Cause: Mary Boyle, VP Communications, via Mike Surrusco 202-736-5788 or msurrusco@commoncause.org, or John Briscoe, VP Development, 202-841-4507 or jbriscoe@commoncause.org

Common Cause Florida: Alex Chavez, 941-706-1877 or 941-737-1447, achavez@commoncause.org

Evan Greer, RiotFolk Musician: respectyourmama@gmail.com or evangreer@gmail.com or 978-852-6457

Local event co-chair: Cammie Donaldson, 321-917-1960 or cammiedonaldson@earthlink.net
Local event co-chair & pre-event reception chair: Susan Martin, 321-773-1276 or zulu2@cfl.rr.

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Space Coast Progressive Alliance (SCPA) is a Florida nonprofit corporation supported by membership dues, donations, and event ticket sales. Nonpartisan by strongly progressive and politically active, SCPA encourages citizen engagement in the political process and seeks to advance progressive public policy at the local, state and national level. Click here to visit their website.

Those cleared by DNA tests struggle to be free

Media coverage of exonerations is usually pretty good. There are newspaper articles, television clips, interviews and most often an editorial or two about the horrors of wrongful incarceration. But what happens after the cameras stop rolling and the reporters move on to new stories?

As the following USA TODAY story by Kevin Johnson points out, for many exonerees, the nightmare of their wrongful incarceration doesn't end when they walk out of prison.

ST. LOUIS — Johnny Briscoe thought his nightmare was over in the summer of 2006 when, after 23 years of proclaiming his innocence, he finally walked out of a Missouri prison.

DNA evidence lifted from a cigarette butt should have stripped away any doubt that another man — not Briscoe — had raped and robbed a woman in her suburban St. Louis apartment on Oct. 21, 1982. Yet Briscoe's exoneration, featured by national news organizations, did not fully free him from the persistent doubts of acquaintances and family members about his innocence, or from the emotional scars seared by more than two decades in prison.

That's one of the problems. There will always be people who wonder, or worse who insist, despite DNA evidence to the contrary, that the exonerated person was guilty. Thankfully, these misguided individuals are few, but their affect on an innocent person who has spent decades in prison can be devastating.

Nearly 90% of the 227 people cleared by DNA evidence since 1989 were convicted of some of the most heinous sex crimes, according to the Innocence Project, which helps inmates prove their innocence through DNA testing. DNA — present in blood, semen and body cells — can be particularly useful in solving sex crimes and often is the most definitive way of determining innocence.

Yet not even DNA washes away the lasting stigma that shadows once-convicted sex offenders who are cleared by genetic testing, and the criminal justice system that wrongly jailed them offers little help. Briscoe's plight is part of a silent struggle for a rising number of exonerees. After high-profile releases from prison, they often fend for themselves.

Add to the stigma a financial wall that most exonerees encounter as soon as they are released.

Most states did not account for the exonerated when officials started re-entry programs for the hundreds of thousands of offenders released in the U.S. each year. Most are ineligible for basic benefits, such as counseling and job training, that states give guilty offenders when they re-enter society.

So exonerees have no money (almost all are indigent by the time they’re released) and no job. They have no place to live, no driver’s license, and sadly, by the time they get out, some have no family or friends. From an exoneree's talk in 2003:

Financially I was broke. No family. Occupationally I was 44 years old. Nobody was going to hire me. Nothing was available when I walked out of prison. Absolutely nothing.

The transition is never easy. And for those without an intact supportive family, it can be lonely as well as stressful.

At least in Florida we are fortunate to have a full-time social worker on staff to help our exonerees with their transition. (The paperwork alone can be daunting.) Our social worker coordinates an array of transitional services to meet their immediate and long-term needs including medical, psychological, and social support; occupational training and assistance; housing assistance; family support; and education.

And although we do have a compensation law on the books in Florida, it can still take one to two years to receive payment, if the individual even qualifies. (Florida's law prohibits compensation for any exoneree who has a previous felony conviction, or a conviction incurred while wrongfully incarcerated.) Most of Florida's exonerees would not be eligible under the bill as it now stands. Their only recourse has been, and continues to be, seeking compensation through a personal claims bill, a long and arduous process whose outcome is entirely dependent on the whim (and political makeup) of that particular legislative session.

So, in 2007 we established the Exoneree Emergency Fund to provide financial assistance for basic necessities during their transition. The fund, which is entirely dependent on contributions from the public, helps our clients buy groceries and gas, pay bills, purchase clothes for work, and secure job training. Each individual's needs vary, as does the length of time they require assistance, but we are thankful that, so far, we've received enough contributions to enable the Fund to continue.

Read the complete article.

Visit IPF's Website here; sign up to volunteer here; contribute to our work here. (If you want your donation to go directly to the Exoneree Emergency Fund, please include a note with that request.)