Supreme Court to weigh if framing suspects worse than frivolous lawsuits

Supreme Court to weigh if framing suspects worse than frivolous lawsuits

RawStory.com

Background:

n 1978, Iowa teenagers Curtis McGhee Jr. and Terry Harrington were sentenced to life imprisonment after being convicted of murdering a security guard. After serving more than two decades, both men were released after Harrington obtained "previously undisclosed reports from the Council Bluffs Police Department that pointed to the existence of another suspect for the murder," according to court documents.

The two men claim that in investigating the murder, Pottawattamie County prosecutors had coerced a witness to implicate them, "disregarded obviously false details" of the witness's accounts, "coached" the witness to give an account more consistent with the known facts of the case and then "coerced" other false witness testimony to corroborate that account.

The Issue:

County prosecutors, however, invoked "prosecutorial immunity," a concept University of Iowa College of Law Professor Todd Pettys described to Raw Story as "this notion that no matter what a prosecutor does at trial they can't be sued."

"Prosecutors are easy targets, and the courts believe that if they did not have this rule, prosecutors would have to defend themselves all the time against people who are looking to make their lives miserable," Pettys told Raw Story.

Steve Sanders, the attorney who represents Pottawattamie County, told Raw Story that "the basic proposition is that although this could occasionally mean a prosecutor could commit misconduct and a defendant couldn't sue, it's better to accept that than to subject prosecutors to lawsuits each time they convict someone."

What do you guys think? I understand the need to limit the ability for those charged and tried for various crimes to "harrass" prosecutors. But what about when the prosecutors knowingly and willingly hid, altered, or misrepresented evidence?

Where do you draw the line?

For me, I think these prosecutors should definitely be held accountable. What they did was reprehensible. The message being sent, if they aren't allowed to be sued, is that a prosecutor can do whatever he/she wants during trial in order to convict a suspect even if it means hiding or fabricating evidence. This does, IMO, amount to framing a suspect.

The constitution allows us the right to a fair trial. How can you be expected to receive a fair trial if the prosecutors are knowingly fabricating evidence against you? How can you compete with that. More to the point, don't you have the right to bring charges against a person who has slandered you and cost you 25 years of your life?

If you are pro law and order, you are against the DoJ. The American system has become utterly evil. This is amusing, because the law itself is very good. But it is the reprehensible system built around it that twists and distorts it. This is why I believe that we are way overdue for another revolution. We need to remove these domestic terrorists, and prosecute them. That is exactly what 'terrorists' like George Washington and James Madison have said in print.

Originally posted by Gregarious
If you are pro law and order, you are against the DoJ. The American system has become utterly evil. This is amusing, because the law itself is very good. But it is the reprehensible system built around it that twists and distorts it. This is why I believe that we are way overdue for another revolution. We need to remove these domestic terrorists, and prosecute them. That is exactly what 'terrorists' like George Washington and James Madison have said in print.

I agree 110%!!! The 'law' these days only applies to us peasants. Our 'justice' system is rife with double-standards, waste, corruption, and most ironically of all, injustice.

Under a government which imprisons any unjustly, the true place for a just man is also a prison.--HD Thoreu

[edit on 9/24/2009 by ludaChris]