Dangerous trends--prosecutorial misconduct in America

April 10, 12:43 AMColumbia Conservative ExaminerAnthony G. Martin

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Let's suppose you were on trial for a crime you did not commit.  Traditionally in the U.S., most citizens could take at least some comfort in knowing that although the prosecution has the task of presenting evidence against you, there would be an unspoken assumption that in order to guard the state's integrity the District Attorney would engage in a meticulous search for truth, even if that truth led to your acquittal.

However, today we are seeing a dangerously disturbing trend in America which indicates the citizens can no longer make that assumption.

Prosecutorial misconduct is on the rise and has been widely reported in some of the most publicized cases in the nation.

Most recently, former Senator Ted Stevens of Alaska was charged and convicted of corruption, leading to his defeat at the polls last November, only to find that the prosecution engaged in blatant misconduct that directly effected the outcome of the case.

The result was that the U.S. Justice Department was forced to make the extremely embarrassing decision to drop all charges against Stevens, and the Judge in the case threw out Stevens' conviction after which he issued a scathing indictment against the manner in which the case was handled by an obviously corrupt prosecutor's office.

All too often decisions are made by prosecutors across the country to 'go after' certain individuals for less than honorable motives.  More often than not these motives involve political or monetary gain.  Many times they involve nothing but pure retaliation on ideological grounds.

According to a report issued by one of the most respected journalists-reporters in the nation today, Mike McCarville of The McCarville Report, these instances of prosecutorial misdeeds are becoming a major issue across the country:

The Senator Ted Stevens case in Alaska is only the latest example, one in which Judge Emmet Sullivan threw out Stevens’ conviction and launched a criminal contempt investigation against a half-dozen federal prosecutors, calling their actions “shocking and disturbing.”

McCarville further cites the legal definition of 'prosecutorial misconduct' as, 'Failing to disclose evidence that might tend to exonerate the defendant.'

One of the most egregious cases of prosecutorial misconduct occurred when Durham, North Carolina District Attorney Mike Nifong falsely charged 3 Duke University students with rape in order to increase his chances of winning an election.  In that case an investigation ensued by the North Carolina Attorney-General's office, which resulted in Nifong's being removed from the case and suspended from office.

Nifong then stood trial and was found guilty.  The 3 students were declared innocent of the charges, but not before suffering almost irreversible harm to their reputations.

If the Nifong-Duke University fiasco is only 'the tip of the iceberg,' as McCarville says in his report, then ordinary citizens leading ordinary lives in any town in America have reason to believe that anyone, anywhere could be subject to wrongful prosecution at the hands of corrupt state's attorneys.

This is not the foundation upon which a viable criminal justice system is built.

For more stimulating commentary, please visit my blog, updated daily, at The Liberty Sphere.