Exonerated man's lawsuit tossed

[wheezer]

WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court on Monday threw out a lawsuit from a Los Angeles man wrongfully convicted of murder and gave district attorneys a broad shield against being sued even if their management mistakes send an innocent person to prison.

Thomas Goldstein, an ex-Marine convicted of a 1979 shooting in Long Beach, Calif., spent 24 years in prison largely on the word of a heroin addict who worked as a jailhouse informer for police and prosecutors. Ed Fink, the informer, lied on the witness stand when he denied receiving a benefit for testifying for the police, a judge found.

Freed in 2004, Goldstein sued former Los Angeles District Atty. John Van de Kamp and top deputy Curt Livesay, contending they let prosecutors regularly use jailhouse informers and did not take steps to make sure they were telling the truth. In Goldstein's case, the trial prosecutor did not know Fink was lying because other prosecutors in the county district attorney's office did not share information.

In the past, the Supreme Court had granted trial prosecutors absolute immunity in court. In Monday's ruling, the court extended that shield to cover district attorneys and other chief prosecutors for any actions that involve prosecutions and trials.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/nationworld/chi-court-prosecutor_tabjan27,0,532859.story

[packy]

http://www.reason.com/news/show/126125.html

But this complete shield from accountability is especially problematic when we're talking about prosecutors. It's a job that's already plagued by incentive problems. We tend to measure a prosecutor's performance based on how many people he's able to throw in jail, not necessarily by how well he metes out justice.

Rarely, for example, does a prosecutor get public recognition for the cases he doesn't take. So we have people in a position where they have the enormous power to take away someone's freedom, incentives nudging them to err on the side of prosecuting aggressively, and absolute immunity from lawsuits should they overstep their bounds.

It's a recipe for abuse. (Another interesting case at link)

[wheezer]

This is one of those things where I can see both sides. No, I do not want to see a Prosecutor who was truly only doing his job, completely believed the person he sent away was guilty and in no way did anything unethical or deceiving.

On the other hand, I do think prosecutors who hide evidence, lie, or fail to inform the defense, should be prosecuted and sued. That is when this protection needs to not apply. IMO they are no better at that point than those they prosecute.