> Kind of interesting article on the state's response to students working
> on IL Innocence Project - the same state where, as Nancy Rudins points
> out "...our governors make our license plates. "
> http://www.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/11/06/lapin.wrongful.conviction/index.h...
> Students who question murder convictions under investigation
> By Nicole Lapin, CNN
> November 6, 2009 9:40 a.m. EST
> Students at Northwestern University's innocence project have been
> investigating the case of Anthony McKinney.
> (CNN) -- It was two-and-a-half days before Illinois Gov. George Ryan was
> to leave office in 2003. I sat in a crowded auditorium in Northwestern
> University's Law School in Chicago, where Ryan was expected to make a
> major announcement on capital punishment.
> "Half, if you will, of the nearly 300 capital cases in Illinois have
> been reversed for a new trial or for some re-sentencing." he said, his
> voice tired but clear.
> Wrongful convictions had been all over the papers around that time --
> the Anthony Porter case, the Ford Heights Four, Rolando Cruz.
> "How in God's name does that happen? In America, how does it happen?"
> Ryan continued. "How many more cases of wrongful conviction have to
> occur before we can all agree that this system in Illinois is broken?"
> On that day, the governor commuted the sentences of all death row
> inmates in the state and credited an unlikely source for helping him
> make his decision: Professor David Protess' undergraduate Investigative
> Journalism class at Northwestern University's Medill School.
> In the previous decade, Medill students had uncovered some of the most
> high-profile wrongful convictions in the city. The class had worked to
> secure the release of 11 innocent prisoners, five of whom were scheduled
> to be executed.
> As a wide-eyed journalism student at Northwestern, I remember feeling
> proud of my classmates, proud of my school and proud of the profession I
> was entering.
> Today, six years later, Protess' class is far from the center of the
> same praise. Presented with evidence in a new case, the state attorney's
> office is questioning the motivations of the messenger -- the class itself.
> The students have raised questions about the murder conviction of
> Anthony McKinney. In response, the state attorney's office issued a
> subpoena for the students' grades, grading criteria, expense reports,
> syllabi and e-mail messages -- mine included.
> Find out more about the Medill Innocence Project
> The year after Gov. Ryan's speech, I signed up for Protess' class. I was
> assigned to the team working on McKinney's case, who was convicted in
> 1978, when he was 18, for shooting a security guard in Harvey, Illinois.
> On the night of September 15, 1978, a white security guard named Donald
> Lundahl was killed at close range by a shotgun blast while sitting in
> his car.
> Later that evening, a police officer noticed McKinney, an
> African-American, running down the street. He was arrested.
> McKinney had no violent criminal history and was not in possession of a
> weapon. He was briefly released after telling police he was watching the
> Muhammed Ali-Leon Spinx heavyweight championship fight when the murder
> took place and was running from "gang-bangers" when the officer saw him.
> Authorities questioned another teenager, who told police that he saw the
> murder, claiming he saw McKinney, from 50 yards away, say, "Your money
> or your life," and shoot Lundahl.
> McKinney was picked up again, and after a second lengthy interrogation,
> he signed a confession, typed by police. During his trial, he recanted
> the confession, and said it was coerced.
> But based on officers' testimony and that of the teenager, McKinney was
> convicted of murder.
> Prosecutors sought the death penalty, but because he had no record,
> McKinney was sentenced to life in prison. Had his sentence been death,
> McKinney would have been executed long before the commutation of death
> row cases in 2003. He would have been dead well before Protess even took
> up his case.
> Since Protess started the course in 1992, his classes have investigated
> about 50 cases.
> Although the ones that are chosen have major red flags, like lack of
> physical evidence, not all convictions are found to be unjustified.
> Of the 50, 11 led to exonerations. Two indicated solid evidence of
> guilt. The rest are under review by the judiciary or were inconclusive,
> Protess said.
> Protess made clear to all of his classes that the coursework was about
> pavement-hitting journalism, the process behind discovering the truth --
> guilt or innocence. I went into the class to learn that process.
> During the two quarters I took the course, I lived the McKinney case. My
> team and I spent nights and weekends doing things I never told my family
> or friends because they wouldn't believe me. Some times it was a matter
> of staking out a source's house or going to smoky, seedy bars to fish
> for information on the decades-old case.
> Those times, a professional private investigator and another team member
> would be in the car listening for the words "winter wedding" -- the
> "safe word" we were supposed say into the cell phones in our pockets if
> something dangerous ever went down. (It never did.)
> Unlike other Medill classes, this course was hands-on, gritty and raw. I
> gained more practical skills in those months than in all of my other
> college courses combined. The experience prepared me to do the work I
> have done professionally and will continue to do throughout my career.
> In our investigation, we reenacted the crime scene and determined it was
> impossible to discern any words spoken or shouted from 50 yards away.
> Later, we tracked down the then-teenage witness who said he saw McKinney
> that night. The man recanted his testimony on videotape, and told us
> police beat him.
> We also found a fire department document that indicated the paramedics
> were called to the police station during McKinney's interrogation,
> raising the question of whether he was roughed up during his
> interrogation as he said he was.
> We interviewed the "gang-bangers" who chased him that night. They
> acknowledged they chased him after the Ali fight because they were angry
> he had damaged their car earlier.
> Finally, we identified alternate suspects, one of whom stated on
> videotape that he was there when the murder was committed -- and that
> McKinney wasn't.
> After I graduated, the investigation continued. Once Protess felt there
> was enough evidence, after nine teams of student reporters had worked on
> the case, the information was shared with the Center on Wrongful
> Convictions at Northwestern's Law School and McKinney's legal team.
> The audio and videotaped interviews, affidavits and other on-the-record
> interview transcripts we worked on also were presented to the district
> attorney's office. Last year, the new evidence was submitted to the Cook
> County Circuit Court in an effort to exonerate McKinney.
> I am still haunted by the case. I am still haunted by my visit to see
> McKinney in prison -- the gentle face of a man who still has hope after
> so many years.
> A spokeswoman for the prosecutor's office, Sally Daly, told me that we,
> as students, were "conducting these interviews for a grade in this class."
> She went on to say the "request for the grades goes to explore any
> possible bias, interest or motive."
> The claim is that we, as students, were motivated to get witnesses to
> play into a preconceived thesis of innocence in order to get good
> grades. I think I speak for my fellow alums when I say this class was
> never about grades.
> It has always been about searching for truth and justice for people
> whose cases didn't get due diligence from a bogged-down system. This was
> about journalism in its purest and most passionate form.
> For years, the class has been a check on the work of police and other
> law enforcement officials. Protess has seen and dealt with his fair
> share of heat for more than a decade, but never anything like this
> attempt to investigate the investigator.
> Northwestern is not complying with the request for documents. A court
> hearing on November 10 will decide if the subpoena will stand. While we
> were students at the time, we "took reporting to the Nth degree," as the
> dean of the school told The Chicago Tribune. We functioned as
> journalists and should be protected by reporter's privilege laws.
> About 50 similar programs across the country are watching to see what
> precedent could be set if the state is entitled to these materials. Will
> programs like Northwestern's continue if the volunteers are worried
> about attorneys' fees to handle requests for documents?
> Recently, Judge H. Lee Sarokin, the federal judge who famously freed
> Ruben "Hurricane" Carter on a murder conviction that proved to be
> unfounded, wrote in support of all former members of "Team McKinney."
> "If a reporter hopes to win a Pulitzer or an investigator for the
> defense hopes to obtain further business," he wrote, "how can those
> motives possibly be relevant to the evidence obtained?"
> The focus should be on the evidence, not grades. Student information is
> irrelevant to Anthony McKinney's case. Being forced to hand over private
> information will not only compromise the integrity of the program, but
> create a chilling effect on free speech and investigative reporting.
> I recently went back and watched Gov. Ryan's speech on YouTube. I got
> the same chill I did watching it in person that day. I can only hope
> that a new generation of students has the opportunity to feel that, too.
this.
The students were clearly focusing on exonerating data. Would they
...
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