PROSECUTION FRAUD IN MAINE

Rep. Ross Paradis, D-Frenchville, has introduced LR 2115, a legislative resolve that urges Attorney General G. Steven Rowe to back a new trial for Dennis Dechaine. This bill is a response to the latest red herring thrown in the path of justice by Rowe's staffers, who claim that the mysterious male DNA found under Sarah Cherry's thumbnail may have come from a dirty crime-laboratory clipper. This tactic is consistent with the state's stubborn position that Dechaine is guilty no matter what the evidence shows.

From day one of this case, tunnel vision, triggered by rumors, has guided the actions of police, prosecutors and the press. Alternate suspects were ignored; evidence was overlooked, lost, and some -- hairs and the rape kit -- incinerated even after an appeal had been filed. Damning police testimony apparently was "juiced up." Crucial evidence was concealed from the jury.

Rowe has appointed a panel to review the his staff's conduct, but its findings will not address guilt or innocence and will have no bearing on Dechaine's motion for a new trial, now postponed until next fall, thanks to the dirty clipper caper.

The job of the Office of the Attorney General is to convict the guilty and protect the innocent, not the reverse. LR 2115 urges Rowe to back a new trial in which all the evidence -- at least, that evidence that his office has not lost or destroyed -- is heard by the jury. Rowe enjoys the best of reputations. He should now live up to his good notices by fulfilling his responsibilities to justice


(Report from here)






CALLOUS JUDGE

A teenage girl apparently tried to kill herself the day after a Melbourne judge ordered her to justify in front of her father - who faces incest charges against her and her brother - why she did not want to testify in his presence. Judge Leo Hart ordered the girl, 16, and her brother, 14, to appear in open court with their father in the dock to explain why they wanted to give evidence televised from outside the courtroom. The girl became distressed and said she was going to be sick under Judge Hart's pre-trial questioning earlier this month in the County Court. Covering her face with her hands so as not to see her father, the girl told Judge Hart she could not breathe because she felt uncomfortable and nervous. The judge earlier told her brother, when he said he felt uncomfortable, that "I can understand uncomfortable, but that's not good enough".

A barrister for the Department of Human Services told Judge Hart before he questioned the girl that she was an "extremely vulnerable young woman" whose mother had committed suicide in 2003. "(She) has a very troubled background and many fraught experiences over the past five years which have led to serial and sustained departmental intervention in relation to her welfare," Dr Ian Freckleton said. The children's request to testify using the remote witness facility was applied for by prosecutor Ian Heath. The request was supported by the defence. Mr Heath said the witnesses felt they could not do "justice" to their evidence in open court while being able to see their father.

Judge Hart responded that "ideally a jury should have a witness right here in front (of) them, where they can see the person in real life, reasonably close up and can not only listen but can watch and see and observe, and so on. "I think in that way a jury is best able to assess the credibility or reliability, or whatever you like, of a witness," he said. He described the use of the remote witness facility as a "second-best practice". Judge Hart asked the girl if she wanted to give evidence from another room, and she replied: "Yes, please." Asked why, she said: "Because I can't do it here." "Why not?" Judge Hart asked, to which she replied: "Because I think I'm going to pass out. I can't do it with all these people in the room. I want to do it by myself."

After she left the courtroom, Judge Hart said that to let the girl give evidence as she wished, "I've got to be satisfied that was all genuine". He said: "I'm not saying it wasn't, but I, of course, can't see her now outside there (the courtroom). "I don't know what she's like normally, I don't know whether this is for the occasion or not. The jury won't have the opportunity to assess all of this if it's done by remote." He reluctantly granted the children's request because he worried that a "repeat performance" - a word he used "without connotation" - by the girl was likely to abort the trial.

She then gave about an hour's evidence, denying a defence suggestion she had made up the allegations, before the court was adjourned. When the trial resumed the next day, Mr Heath said the girl had grabbed the steering wheel of a car being driven to court that morning by a social worker. Judge Hart was concerned there was a "grave risk" the girl would "break down again" and, in her state, to continue with her evidence would add or repeat the stress that caused the car incident. He later discharged the jury without verdict.....

The case comes after the announcement of new Victorian laws to protect sexual abuse victims in court.


(Report from here)


(And don't forget your ration of Wicked Thoughts for today)