Snitching

Criminal Informant Law, Policy, and Research

Innocence

States take a fresh look at snitching

by

Here’s an op-ed I wrote for The Crime Report chronicling the latest wave of state legislative reform.  Some highlights:

–       Texaspassed comprehensive reform requiring prosecutors to track and disclose their informants’ criminal history, past testimony, and benefits.  The New York Times called it “the most comprehensive effort yet to rein in the dangers of transactional snitching.” 
–       Andrew’s Law in North Dakota prohibits campus police from using students as informants.  State police may only use informants with a written agreement.  Of particular note, Andrew’s Law bans the use of child informants under the age of 16, one of very few states to do so.
–       Illinois came very close to re-instituting reliability hearings.  The state previously required them in capital cases: now that Illinois no longer has the death penalty this bill will require pretrial hearings for all jailhouse informants.
–       Montana’s Senate Bill 249 introduced comprehensive legislation that would require, among other things, electronic recording of informant statements, greater prosecutorial disclosure, pretrial reliability hearings, and cautionary jury instructions.

–       Washington recently considered two bills. One from 2016 would have required pretrial reliability hearings in all informant cases.  The other would have required enhanced prosecutorial disclosure.  Barry Scheck, founder and director of the Innocence Project, wrote that the Washington legislation was a “key advance” and that it represented an opportunity to “ensure that the strongest protections are in place for the innocent.”

California informant bill passes out of committee

by

A bill that would improve recordkeeping and disclosure regarding jailhouse informants just passed out of the California Legislature’s Public Safety Committee.  The bill would also cap certain informants benefits.  Bill here and ACLU press release here.

I testified in support of the bill along with Bruce Lisker, who was wrongfully convicted of murder at age 17 based on jailhouse informant testimony, and spent 26 years in prison before he was exonerated.  Here is Mr. Lisker’s testimony from today’s hearing:

“Honorable Assembly Persons, my name is Bruce Lisker.  I am here to urge a YES vote on AB359.  On March 10, 1983 my teenage world became a nightmare. I discovered my mother beaten, stabbed and left for dead on the floor of our Sherman Oaks home. It wasn’t long before a corrupt LAPD detective was, unbelievably, arresting ME for the attack.  I was cast into the notorious “Snitch Tank” at L.A. County Jail, where I met a vile creature known as Robert Hughes, a morally bankrupt jailhouse informant with an extensive rap sheet and one overriding mission – to get out of jail.

After conning me into innocent conversation, Hughes told police I’d confessed to him. I was the fourth target of his lies inside of 18 months.  Police fed him cigarettes and food, flew him in private LAPD aircraft – and my prosecutor got him sprung from prison months early.

Hughes’ lies, and the criminal justice system that encourages them, cost me more than twenty-six years of freedom and youth I can never get back.  Had AB359 been the law of the land, my lawyer would have known that Hughes had a lengthy history of severe mental health issues, including documented psychotic breaks.

He was given inducements to investigate and testify against me, had unrecorded interviews with police about the case, and undue influence rewarded his lies with the thing he coveted most, his freedom.  All this was hidden or misrepresented by police and prosecutors.

Evidence is clear – jailhouse informant testimony is a leading causes of wrongful conviction in America.  As demonstrated by the recent outrage in Orange County, and investigations in at least five other California counties, this problem persists.  Please vote YES on AB359. Society deserves no less.”

Washington Post zeroes in on jailhouse snitches in capital cases

by

The Washington Post just ran this story entitled “Va. murder trial may become part of national debate on jail informants.”  The story exposes the use of four questionable jailhouse informants in a Virginia death penalty case, and connects those issues to the Orange County scandal, another high profile informant debacle in Washington D.C., and reform efforts around the county. From the story:

“When a Virginia man faces a possible death sentence in a murder trial later this year, his fate may rest on the testimony of four jailhouse informants, two of whom were initially found mentally incompetent to stand trial in their own cases. 

The case of Joaquin S. Rams could soon become part of a growing national backlash over the government’s use of testimony from “snitches” — inmates who offer information against other inmates in exchange for lighter sentences or other benefits — to obtain convictions, sparked by a significant number of wrongful convictions attributed to false informant testimony.”

Reliability hearings in Washington state

by

The Washington State House and Senate are considering bills that would institute pretrial reliability hearings in which judges would evaluate informant witnesses for unreliability before those informants could testify in front of juries. The House version would mandate the hearings; the Senate version gives judges discretion over whether to hold them or not.  News coverage from the Associated Press here.

Reliability hearings are one of many important tools available to combat unreliable informants and avoid wrongful conviction, including corroboration requirements, stronger and earlier discovery requirements, jury instructions, and limits on when and how informants can be used.  The Washington legislation thus represents an important first step.  It is motivated in part by the wrongful convictions of three young Washington residents several years ago who were convicted based on the testimony of a highly unreliable compensated informant.

Detroit jailhouse snitch ring

by

Add Detroit to the list of known jailhouse informant scandals.  This story–Ring of Snitches: How Detroit Police Slapped False Murder Convictions on Young Black Men–details how during the 1990s, numerous informants obtained “lenient sentences as well as food, drugs, sex and special privileges from detectives in the Detroit Police Department’s homicide division in return for making statements against dozens of prisoners eventually convicted of murder.”  The story is eerily reminiscent of the Los Angeles debacle, as well the ongoing scandal in Orange County.