Columnist Jamala-Rogers
The long-awaited report on the Larry Griffin case by Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce revealed no surprises, thereby dashing any hope that the City’s prosecution office can save itself from itself.
In CYA fashion, Joyce’s report upheld Griffin’s conviction and execution, which had been questioned by the University of Michigan Law School and the NAACP Legal Defense Fund (NAACP-LDF).
Joyce said there was no evidence of witness coercion on the part of the Circuit Attorney’s office, that no evidence was compromised or that there was no misconduct by prosecutors. Griffin was “fairly and rightfully convicted,” she said, and therefore fairly and rightfully executed.
It was heartbreaking to console Ms. Mae, Larry’s elderly mother. The Griffin family called the report “yet another blow to our family as well as to the pursuit of truth and justice.”
The background for the Griffin case, and a number of others coming to the fore for re-examination, is the so-called drug war and resulting violence in our neighborhoods. The death of drug dealer Quintin Moss garnered no special attention back in 1980. Moss is the man Griffin was accused of murdering in the deteriorating Gaslight Square district.
Many in the African-American community were so traumatized by the unfettered violence at the time that little attention was paid to how drug dealers were being prosecuted or killed. Unfortunately, there were others, either on the periphery of the crack epidemic or not involved at all, who got caught up in the aggressive, sometimes illegal and unethical, tactics of police and prosecutors.
Several red flags went up for me after reading the report by the Circuit Attorney’s Office Team (CAO Team). I’ll share a few.
Questions were raised about the credibility of some of the witnesses who recanted their statements when interviewed by the investigators from the NAACP-LDF. In a case where most of the key witnesses of the prosecution are criminals, prosecutors try to make these elements credible for their own purposes but try to discredit them when others utilize them for undermining the prosecution’s case.
Are these folks more credible when their butts are in the crosshairs because of pending cases against them or when they have no vested interested in the case and are out of reach of the prosecution’s long arms?
Detective Andre Jones testified in the original trial that he saw Griffin and three others come out of a known drug house carrying a shotgun similar to that used in the murder of Moss. Did Jones stop to accost these dangerous people? No! He chose to go around the block only to find the group had gone when he returned. If you believe, that I will sell you the Eads Bridge.
During the CAO Team’s investigation, they discovered a secret witness, Carl Doe – not an eyewitness to the murder, but a witness to the state’s witness who also didn’t see the actual shooting. Doe is a state witness right now in another crime under investigation by the Circuit Attorney.
The secret weapon trick is frequently used by the prosecution. It reminds me of the rape case of Fredericko Lowe-Bey currently being stalled by the Circuit Attorney’s office. While a DNA test has ruled out Lowe-Bey, the CA’s office tried to come up with a secret lover in this complicated case.
Congressman Wm. Lacy Clay was correct when he brought the NAACP-LDF’s investigation to Jennifer Joyce. He is also correct when he calls for an independent review of death penalty cases. Most prosecuting offices (St. Louis is no exception) have proved they are incapable of pursuing justice and, when mistakes are made, of correcting themselves.
George Peach is the city’s longest-running prosecutor whose imprint on the operations of the CA’s office remains deep. His protégé, Nels Moss, spent half of his 33 prosecuting years under Peach and was fearless in his brand of judicial misconduct. One of the most despicable acts of Peach was that the alias he used as a john was the real name of a defendant in a rape case his office was ruthlessly pursuing. The real Larry Johnson who spent 18 years in prison was exonerated in 2002.
You may recall that Peach stole tens of thousands of dollars in taxpayer’s money to pay for hookers. During this time, he propped himself up as a crime slayer, particularly of pornography and prostitution. When Peach was finally busted soliciting an undercover cop, it was St. Louis County Prosecutor Bob McCullough who attempted to suppress the information. Before his trial, Peach performed a routine act of his office – he destroyed documents and other records to hide his trail.
Circuit Attorney Dee Joyce Hayes is on record threatening one of her assistant prosecutors with termination if she made a statement supporting the stay of condemned inmate Mose Young. Before coming to the CA office, Jane Geiler headed up the Office of the Special Defender where she was privy to the unscrupulous tactics of the CA’s office, such as eliminating black jurors. Because she needed the medical benefits, Geiler was forced to remain silent in the clemency petitions for Mose Young. Young was executed in 2001.
As with other entities with unchecked authority, prosecutors’ abuse becomes an integral part of the system. Check out the Catholic Archdiocese and its complicity in covering up the sexual abuse of children by priests for years. Check out how the Internal Affairs Department always upholds the deeds of its police department.
There are bones in the basements of the prosecutors’ office; there is blood on their hands. As long as they refuse to give up the key to the basements, we will smell the stench and see the destroyed lives but justice will continue to elude us.