News (Media Awareness Project) - US TX: Editorial: Tulia Convictions Just Weren't Supportable |
| Title: | US TX: Editorial: Tulia Convictions Just Weren't Supportable |
| Published On: | 2003-04-03 |
| Source: | Dallas Morning News (TX) |
| Fetched On: | 2008-08-26 22:51:06 |
Road To Justice
TULIA CONVICTIONS JUST WEREN'T SUPPORTABLE
The road to securing justice in the matter of the infamous July 1999 Tulia
drug sting has been long and circuitous, but we are halfway there. It was a
major step when the judge who had been assigned to preside over evidentiary
hearings declared this week that what passed for "evidence" in the felony
convictions of 38 people - almost all of them black - didn't pass the smell
test. And that is being generous.
State District Judge Ron Chapman did not mince words in saying that he
thought Tom Coleman - the lone and unsupervised detective on the 18-month
undercover operation and someone with a history of using racial slurs - was
"not a credible witness." That determination led Judge Chapman to recommend
that the defendants' convictions be overturned and that new trials be ordered.
That is what Judge Chapman seems ready to report to his colleagues on the
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the body that appointed the retired Dallas
judge to oversee the hearings in the first place. It is the state appeals
court that has the last say in whether to overturn the convictions and
grant new trials.
There may be no point in giving prosecutors another bite at the apple,
since the folks in Swisher County wisely have said they won't refile
charges. No one, it seems, relishes the thought of putting Mr. Coleman back
on the witness stand.
Coming as they did four long years after the convictions, Judge Chapman's
words must have sounded like sweet music to family and friends of the four
men whose convictions were at the center of the hearings. They were, no
doubt, also a relief to the other 34 defendants who may now get another
shot at something that they were entitled to all along and should have
never been denied in the first place: due process under law.
That is not too much to ask. And it can come to pass if the Texas Court of
Criminal Appeals does the right thing, and accepts Judge Chapman's
recommendation. These convictions were unreliable from the beginning, and
they must not stand.
TULIA CONVICTIONS JUST WEREN'T SUPPORTABLE
The road to securing justice in the matter of the infamous July 1999 Tulia
drug sting has been long and circuitous, but we are halfway there. It was a
major step when the judge who had been assigned to preside over evidentiary
hearings declared this week that what passed for "evidence" in the felony
convictions of 38 people - almost all of them black - didn't pass the smell
test. And that is being generous.
State District Judge Ron Chapman did not mince words in saying that he
thought Tom Coleman - the lone and unsupervised detective on the 18-month
undercover operation and someone with a history of using racial slurs - was
"not a credible witness." That determination led Judge Chapman to recommend
that the defendants' convictions be overturned and that new trials be ordered.
That is what Judge Chapman seems ready to report to his colleagues on the
Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, the body that appointed the retired Dallas
judge to oversee the hearings in the first place. It is the state appeals
court that has the last say in whether to overturn the convictions and
grant new trials.
There may be no point in giving prosecutors another bite at the apple,
since the folks in Swisher County wisely have said they won't refile
charges. No one, it seems, relishes the thought of putting Mr. Coleman back
on the witness stand.
Coming as they did four long years after the convictions, Judge Chapman's
words must have sounded like sweet music to family and friends of the four
men whose convictions were at the center of the hearings. They were, no
doubt, also a relief to the other 34 defendants who may now get another
shot at something that they were entitled to all along and should have
never been denied in the first place: due process under law.
That is not too much to ask. And it can come to pass if the Texas Court of
Criminal Appeals does the right thing, and accepts Judge Chapman's
recommendation. These convictions were unreliable from the beginning, and
they must not stand.
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