Idea storage

Thursday, August 11, 2005

Judgment against public defender reversed

Here's an interesting post from "a Public Defender" blawg. According to the story, a man was shot and paralyzed by some cops, who then planted a gun in his hand, getting him convicted for assault. In the aftermath (story doesn't say what happened to the cops, who hopefully were sent to prison), the man successfully sued his public defender for failing to act on knowledge that the officers involved had a pattern of corruption. The award was reversed, however, because of juror misconduct. In fact, apparently one of the jurors had starred in a movie about the scandal and never mentioned it!

The question I have is, who is theoretically most liable for the man's wrongful conviction? Clearly the immediate officers involved but, after that, I think the next most responsible agencies are the police department and the prosecutor. Only if those agencies were non-negligent should a public defender be liable, in my opinion.

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