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While the reason for this may be reasonable, how many others are in jail, even been executed, because prosecutors are immune from answering, like the rest of us, for their actions? Perhaps it’s time to have their offices wired with cameras and mics like police cars that catch dirty cops in the act. What’s that line about power corrupting?
In July 1977, retired police captain John Schweer was shot and killed while working as a night watchman at an Oldsmobile dealership in Council Bluffs, Iowa. Two teenagers, Curtis McGhee and Terry Harrington, were convicted of the murder based on evidence they allege was knowingly fabricated by prosecutors.
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Now both men are suing the Pottawattamie County prosecutors, claiming they coerced and coached witnesses, fabricated evidence and arrested them without probable cause. But according to federal law supported by numerous legal precedents, prosecutors have immunity for anything they do during a trial. Richter and Hrvol say they were just doing their job.“If a prosecutor knowingly introduces false evidence at trial, that prosecutor is absolutely immune from lawsuit,” explains Stephen Sanders, an attorney representing Richter and Hrvol. The rationale is that if prosecutors could be blamed for errors in a trial, they would become vulnerable targets for any litigious convict with an ax to grind.
“This means that some people who are genuinely wronged by a prosecutor [are not] able to recover,” Sanders concedes.
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Hrvol and Richter cannot be tried for knowingly putting a dishonest witness on the stand. They don’t have to own up to the fact that they presented false evidence or coerced a witness’s testimony. But fortunately for McGhee and Harrington, they did something on which the law is not completely clear — they didn’t just present the evidence at trial, but also helped gather it. In an unusual move, the prosecutors aided detectives by canvassing the neighborhood and interviewing witnesses, and so their actions may not be covered by absolute immunity. That is what the Supreme Court will decide.
[…]The 3-year-old’s mother, Nancy Lopez, 28, was booked into the Clark County Detention Center on seven counts of child endangerment, seven counts of having an unrestrained minor in a vehicle, driving under the influence, driving on a suspended license, having an open container in a vehicle and a headlights violation.
The twins’ mother, Vanessa Ramirez, 19, was booked on seven counts of child endangerment. Lopez was driving the vehicle, which police said was carrying 10 people. According to police, Ramirez was aware that her children were in the car with Lopez. It is unknown if Ramirez also was in the car.
