That's Not Nearly All
 |
Fuqua, A. (Director). (2001). Training Day [Motion Picture] |
Orange County of California has recently been strife with scandal. It all seems to stem from the mishandling of evidence. The fruits from that scandal are poisonous to the constitutional rights of many.
Investigations and audits in to Orange County Sheriff's Department (OCSD) exposed gross handling of evidence. OCSD policy required deputies to book in evidence by end of shift. Almost a third of evidence collected between 2016 and 2018 were booked pass deadline. An average of three and a half days went by before evidence was properly submitted. While in limbo, evidence was stored in numerous places like that back of deputies' vehicles and even their homes. It is speculated that more than nine thousand pieces of evidence are unaccounted for.¹
Another Orange County controversy emerged around the same time that the evidence scandal came to light. Orange County District Attorney's Office (OCDA) and OCSD was also investigated by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) Civil Rights Division. The DOJ found that OCDA's and OCSD's custodial informant program violated defendants' constitutional rights. OCSD used under inmates as their own agents to elicit incriminating statements from defendants. That violated a defendant's right to counsel under the Sixth Amendment. OCDA did not share exculpatory evidence about the informants to criminal defendants. In failing to do so OCDA violated the Fourteenth Amendment right to due process of law.²
More scandals from within the scandals have emerged. In 2020, Sheriff employees have been criminally investigated.⁴ In 2021, an Orange County Grand Jury decided an investigation of procedures and safeguards was needed.⁵ In 2022 Ebrahim Baytieh, was fired as prosecutor, is now a judge being questioned for his involvement.⁶ In May of this year, seventeen sheriff deputies faced possible criminal prosecution.
Orange County is just one of the many places that have similar issues of negligence and alleged corruption.⁷
To Make Things Right...
- In what ways OCSD and/or OCDA broke the Exclusionary Rule?
- Were they acting in good-faith or bad-faith?
- Is it reasonable for law enforcement to keep evidence in their home?
- What safeguards could prevent tainting of evidence?
-------------------------------------------------------------
¹Romo, V. (2019, December 8). Evidence Scandal In Orange County Stirs Conflict Within Law Enforcement. Retrieved from National Public Radio: https://www.npr.org/2019/12/08/786135739/evidence-scandal-in-orange-county-stirs-conflict-within-law-enforcement; Romo, V. (2019, December 5). Orange County Sheriff's Dept. Mishandled Evidence; Kept It Quiet For Nearly 2 Years. Retrieved from National Public Radio: https://www.npr.org/2019/12/05/785256290/orange-county-sheriffs-kept-evidence-booking-crisis-secret-for-nearly-two-years.
²U.S. Examines Whether Orange County Violated Defendants’ Rights. (2016, December 15). Retrieved from The New York Times: https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/15/us/orange-county-justice-department.html?searchResultPosition=1; Division, D. o. (2022, October 13). Investigation of the Orange County District Attorney’s Office and the Orange County Sheriff’s Department. Retrieved from Office of Public Affairs Department of Justice: https://www.justice.gov/d9/press-releases/attachments/2022/10/13/orange_county_findings_report_10.13.2022_0.pdf
⁴Gerda, N. (2020, August 7). OC Sheriff Evidence Booking Scandal Expands With 15 More Investigations of Deputies Disclosed. Retrieved from Voice if OC: https://voiceofoc.org/2020/08/oc-sheriff-evidence-booking-scandal-expands-with-15-more-investigations-of-deputies-disclosed/; Bartley, L. (2023, May 6). Judge orders OCSD to turn over confidential files on sergeant accused of eavesdropping. Retrieved from ABC7: https://abc7.com/orange-county-attorney-client-phone-calls-matthew-leflore-investigation-mishandled-evidence/13217166/
⁵Kelly, S. (2021, July 1). Orange County Grand Jury 2020-2021 Report. Retrieved from Orange County Grand Jury: https://ocgrandjury.org/sites/jury/files/2023-06/2020-2021_Grand_Jury_Final_Report_0.pdf
⁶Biesiada, N. (2023, September 7). Could Scores of Convicted Criminals in OC Get New Trials Due to Prosecutors Misconduct? Retrieved from Voice of OC: https://voiceofoc.org/2023/09/could-scores-of-convicted-criminals-in-oc-get-new-trials-due-to-prosecutors-misconduct/
⁷Kelly, J., & Nichols, M. (2020, June 11). TARNISHED BRASS. Retrieved from USA Today: https://www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/investigations/2019/04/24/usa-today-revealing-misconduct-records-police-cops/3223984002/
- Is it reasonable for law enforcement to keep evidence in their home?
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteI was going to mention that Orange County District Attorney Todd Spitzer was sued and lost to the ACLU. They are still waiting for him to release data on the race of the people he charged.
Deletehttps://voiceofoc.org/2023/08/orange-county-district-attorney-forced-to-release-racial-data-on-who-gets-prosecuted/
To me it's obvious when a white man shoots up a church full of black people, and the police buy him a cheeseburger. Within that same time period you have black men being killed for selling cigarettes or having a tail light out.
https://abc7.com/dylann-roof-south-carolina-church-shooting-emanuel-african-methodist-episcopal/801013/
After all police in the US started off as slave patrols - poor white people catching slaves for slave owners.
https://nleomf.org/slave-patrols-an-early-form-of-american-policing/
I was in Kensington Market in Toronto, Ontario back in 2017. I stopped by a place called Rasta Pasta. It was/is a Jamaican and Italian fusion joint. I think I had jerked chicken and alfredo. I liked it. I ended up talking to one of the owners/chefs. He said that Canada has the same disparity between police and people of color. He said it is not as fatal as the US. He said he fears for his life whenever he comes to the US to visit his sister. I forget if he said Florida or Georgia. He said he was pulled over for speeding. He said he may have been goin ten over the limit on the interstate. He said an officer placed a shotgun to his head. He also said relations between indigenous people and law enforcement is much worst in Canada.
I also ended up in bar down in little Portugal there. I talked to some old timers who told me the similar things. First time having microwaved muscles. I got lucky, and did not end up regretting that.
I do think the system is generally fair (or as close to fair as we, as a society, have been able to establish so far).
DeleteThat opinion is based on the system itself - as it should operate, not on how it operates in practice.
Obviously, people are flawed, and those who work in the system are no exception. We need to recognize and do more to fix those issues - and if you argued "the practice and application is the system," I can accept that point of view, no question.
I do think the way other social systems are organized are much more problematic than the legal system (e.g., education, healthcare, etc. - which, in turn, has an impact on who may interact more frequently with the criminal justice system).
All that to say, I think we probably agree on way more than we disagree on - and I wanted to share my perspective on what I would have meant by classifying our justice system as "generally fair."
It does come down to the individual. Partly why I stopped being a caseworker was due to having to work with some detectives, who I felt didn't care. Most of them cared. One that I worked with didn't have a day off in a month, and she was up for almost three days when she worked a certain case with me.
DeleteThe criminal justice system is the bottom that simply catches everything that falls through the cracks like healthcare, education, etc. you mentioned.
To judge whether they were acting in good or bad faith is a difficult call to make, but an easy one to assume. For what I know, I would assume bad faith, but I need more evidence to determine. However, it is definitely not okay for evidence to be kept in a personal home. Tainting of evidence could be prevented if all evidence is stored somewhere neutral and only accessible by the Prosecution and/or the Defense under recorded surveillance.
ReplyDeleteThat would make sense. It's like the federal employee leaving their government laptop in their car. Then someone breaks in to that car, takes the laptop, and now I have to check my credit and bank account. Mishandling evidence is worst than that.
DeleteEvidence is supposed to have a chain of custody that logs it from place to place. I am not sure it has a chain of custody duty before being placed into evidence. I didn't read about that. after researching, the chain of custody begins at the crime scene or when possession of the evidence starts. As long as it's logged and bagged, the officer is responsible for it. If evidence is missing or tampered with, it seems to me that criminal law should be proposed to prosecute police officers who don't follow chain of custody best practices. Dida anything come up on this?
ReplyDeleteAwesome question.
DeleteRule 901. Authenticating or Identifying Evidence
(a) In General. To satisfy the requirement of authenticating or identifying an item of evidence, the proponent must produce evidence sufficient to support a finding that the item is what the proponent claims it is.
I did not find a specific requirement on how to satisfy this. I imagine each jurisdiction and agency have their own policies kind of like when it comes to reporting, record keeping, etc. that are different from place to place.
What you said makes sense. In this case the deputies and others went years and thousands of cases before being held accountable.
The problem comes when an individual holds on to it for days or weeks after it was collected. Too much can happen when the evidence has not been properly cataloged, examined, verified, and stored in a secure location. When the proponent has copious opportunity to change an item to whatever the proponent says it is, it can not be authenticated.
First, not turning over exculpatory evidence is a Brady violation and repeatedly not turning over exculpatory evidence should trigger an investigation into the District Attorneys Office. It should also result in convictions being overturned and sanctions on the prosecuting attorneys because it is a pattern of violating the Brady rule.
ReplyDeleteSecond, CHAIN OF CUSTODY, anyone??? Any decent defense attorney should be filing motion after motion to exclude evidence based on chain of custody issues. Arguing tainted evidence can often backfire but if you can show a pattern of failure to follow prompt booking of evidence you shouldn't need to argue it in front of a jury, because a judge should be throwing it out. If not, it is definitely grounds for an appeal.
Third, safeguards for preventing the tainting of evidence are police body cams, dash cams, and promptly booking the evidence into lockup. Good gracious, if they are collecting evidence that means they are making an arrest. After taking the suspect to lockup their next stop should be booking the evidence that they collected, sealed, dated & timed, to lockup and documenting everything. Good officers do not turn off their body cams, take evidence HOME with them, or jeopardize their cases.
It is important to note with the exclusionary rule that although the rationale behind the exclusionary rule is based in constitutional rights, it is a court-created remedy and deterrent, not an independent constitutional right. The purpose of the rule is to deter law enforcement officers from conducting searches or seizures in violation of the Fourth Amendment (Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643 (1961)) and to provide remedies to defendants whose rights have been infringed.
DeleteThere are several exceptions to the exclusionary rule where the costs of exclusion outweigh its deterrent or remedial benefits. For example, the good-faith exception does not trigger the rule because excluding the evidence would not deter police officers from violating the law in the future. Other exceptions include Independent Source Doctrine, Inevitable Discovery Doctrine, Qualified Immunity, and Evidence Admissible for Impeachment.
Evidence admissible for impeachment is when the exclusionary rule does not prevent the government from introducing illegally gathered evidence to “impeach,” or attack the credibility of, defendants’ testimony at trial.
You are thorough. I was gonna throw in some SCOTUS cases. I honestly couldn't find one that directly touched on not booking evidence in a timely matter. That and I felt I wrote too much.
DeleteYou should go to law school. Seriously. I feel that if you were defending a client and lost a case, either your client was definitely guilty or the system and/or someone in the system was corrupt. My tiny experience and point of view says you would be a great guardian ad litem for children.
I think these are really important topics to talk about. We must acknowledge and address the systemic issues and biases within the justice system in order to strive for a more equitable and just system.
ReplyDeleteSome thoughts about your final questions:
1. In what ways OCSD and/or OCDA broke the Exclusionary Rule?
The obvious – failure to follow evidence procedures; timely submission of evidence and infringement on due process regarding custodial informants. Failure to share exculpatory evidence hinders a defendants right to a fair trial.
Anything OCSD or OCDA has touched in past decade is questionable due to this misconduct. Prosecution isn’t enough. What about all the people impacted by this? How will they receive justice?
I think about all the people who are exonerated after spending most of their life in prison because of false testimony, forced confessions, or because someone misplaced crucial evidence.
DeleteHopefully, they have good representatives who are on it.
Wow....storing evidence in cars and homes? My mind races with so many things that can go wrong. Tainted and/or lost evidence is extremely serious and can have a huge impact on lives.
ReplyDeleteThese agencies have the same problems I have with my children: I have created thorough systems to help them know what chores need to be done and what's expected of them and they choose not to follow those systems. :-)
According to the FBI, there are 5 steps for collecting and preserving evidence. If followed, there won't be confusion or possibility of evidence being lost, tainted, or disallowed in court. These are snipped summaries of the steps:
1.) Obtain it legally
2.) Take detailed notes
3.) Identify it accurately
4.) Package, store, and ship it properly
5.) Establish and maintain the chain of custody
The second they take the evidence into their house, they have clearly broken the chain of custody (not reasonable to be kept in homes).
That's awesome you found that.
DeleteThe FBI does a lot of training for LEOs as far as terrorism, mass shootings, human trafficking, etc. A lot of the interviewing techniques that child caseworkers use are from the FBI.
I'm sometimes weary about eating food that other people made in their home kitchen. I can imagine what could happen to a piece of evidence.
Two years seems like a long period of time for the mishandling of evidence to come to light and it makes me wonder if there was a rush of people wanting their cases overturned because of it.
ReplyDeleteI get that it is probably a time bog to handle everything correctly and in a timely fashion, particularly if you are feeling short staffed and overworked, as the trend in this profession has been showing. There are pesky details you have to pay attention to in any profession, and following the rule of managing evidence is critical. Assuming they were acting on good faith, and intended to get around to logging evidence and would log it correctly when they had their next shift, that really doesn't matter. It is just a professional duty to handle evidence with great care, and is critical for it to be done right since so there is potential for so much to ride on it.
I see the exclusionary rule as a check on the system, to make sure everything is done appropriately. If evidence is suppressed due to improper handling, or obtaining it in ways that are contrary to the rule, it can result in a substantial social cost including setting the guilty free or keeping dangerous people on the streets. It appears there is a greater need for securing evidence and logging it accurately. I don't know the exact system and process in place to do so, but if there needs to be a more streamlined system, surely innovators in the field could suggest better methods. Maybe they need an evidence quality control department. There isn't any reason an officer should keep evidence in their home and if the proper chain of custody isn't followed.
I totally agree. From what I could gather, remedying this misconduct is ongoing in OC.
ReplyDeleteI remember getting chewed out for something I didn't do. However, I can only blame myself for getting chewed out - mostly.
After so many flight hours or months, oil samples need to be taken from every gear box and engine on aircraft. Each sample is labeled and then sent off to a lab. One night, I thought I was the only on who took samples. I labeled all my samples. Next day, one my sergeants held up a bag of samples and asked who took em. Without looking at the samples, I said it was me. I got chewed out while my "buddy", who was the one that did not label his samples, sat quiet next to me.
There are times when procedure may be or seem tedious and unwarranted. They're not for the most part. Having the right mixture of cleaner and water prevents illness and chemical burns when it comes to something as minute as washing dishes. Making sure a bolt correctly torqued is prevents a tire coming off on the interstate or having to spend more time and money to replace lug. Obviously following procedures when handling evidence ensures that individuals' rights are not being trampled.