Judge: Free or retry ex-Panther in 1972 stabbing

[2 articles]

Judge: Free or retry ex-Panther in 1972 stabbing

http://ap.google.com/article/ALeqM5gath4w-3DpIiMlWbenW2RmQXWJwAD93E3DB00

By JANET McCONNAUGHEY
9/26/08

NEW ORLEANS (AP) ­ Louisiana has 120 days to dismiss charges or retry
a former Black Panther whose conviction was overturned in a prison
guard's 1972 death, a federal judge said Friday.

U.S. District Judge James Brady's three-sentence order made final his
decision to strike down the murder conviction of Albert Woodfox
because of mistakes made by one of his former trial lawyers.

Woodfox was held in solitary confinement at the Louisiana State
Penitentiary at Angola for 36 years and is one of the former Panthers
known as the "Angola Three." He and another inmate were convicted of
stabbing guard Brent Miller on April 17, 1972.

State Attorney General James Caldwell said he will ask the 5th U.S.
Circuit Court of Appeal to uphold Woodfox's conviction, and appeal
again if they refuse.

"We respectfully but vehemently disagree with the judge's ruling ...
If this ruling is upheld, we will with no question retry Albert
Woodfox. We will take it as high as we need to go," he said in release.

Woodfox's attorneys said they will ask Caldwell to drop charges
immediately against him and the other inmate convicted of the stabbing.

If there is to be a retrial, Woodfox's attorneys said, he should be
released on bail.

"The state has already stolen nearly four decades of Albert Woodfox's
life," attorney Nick Trenticosta said. "The injustice in this case is
unfathomable. How can Louisiana continue to imprison a 61 year old
man after a federal judge has ruled that he shouldn't have been
convicted in the first place?"

Woodfox, 61, Herman Wallace, 66, and Robert King all spent decades in
solitary at Angola. Wallace was also convicted of stabbing Miller,
while King was convicted of killing a fellow inmate in 1973 and
released in 2001.

Brady's ruling in July overturned the conviction from Woodfox's
second trial, in 1988.

He approved the recommendation of a magistrate who found Woodfox's
lawyer should have objected when a prosecutor testified that a key
witness was believable. The attorney also should have objected to the
inclusion of testimony from witnesses who had died after his original
trial, the judge and magistrate found.

Woodfox was in solitary confinement at the Angola prison from 1972
until this year, when he was moved into a maximum-security dormitory
with other inmates.

He and Miller, who will be 67 in October, said they were targeted
because they helped establish a prison chapter of the Black Panther Party.

Woodfox's attorneys say no physical evidence tied either man to the
killing, and the convictions were based largely on statements from a
rapist who was promised help getting a pardon if he testified against
Woodfox and Miller.

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Ex-Panther's attorney to state: Drop murder charge

http://www.katc.com/Global/story.asp?S=9080304

[September 2008]

NEW ORLEANS -- Attorneys for a former Black Panther who spent 36
years in solitary confinement say prosecutors should drop a charge
that accuses him of killing a prison guard in 1972, or at least let
him out on bond until his third trial.

Albert Woodfox, 61, is one of the inmates called the "Angola Three" _
former Black Panthers who spent decades in isolation in the Louisiana
State Penitentiary at Angola.

He was elated when told Thursday night that U.S. District Judge James
Brady had signed a final order overturning the conviction and
ordering the state either to drop the murder charge against him or
retry him within 120 days, attorney Nick Trenticosta said.

"I said, 'Albert, you sound like you're drunk,'" Trenticosta
recounted during a telephone news conference. "He said, 'I am drunk
on justice.'"

Attorney General Buddy Caldwell filed a notice of appeal Friday and
said he opposed bond for Woodfox, whom he called a dangerous man who
should not be released from prison.

"It is my belief that, considering his propensity and history of
violence, that he should remain incarcerated because there is no
final decision overturning his conviction at this point," Caldwell said.

If higher courts uphold Brady's decision, Caldwell said, he probably
will push for a retrial. He said that, based on evidence available,
he might change his mind. But, he said, "Based on what I've seen
right now, I think the case should be retried."

Caldwell's first assistant, John Sinquefield, prosecuted Woodfox in
1973 as an assistant district attorney and was called as a witness
during the 1988 retrial.

"Any fair-minded prosecutor, any fair-minded lawyer can look at this
case today and look at this case in 1974 and say Albert Woodfox
should not be tried for the case because there's no evidence of his
guilt," Trenticosta said.

He said Woodfox is not dangerous because he was innocent all along.
He also is in poor health after 36 years in a 6-by-9-foot cell with
poor food and little chance to exercise, Trenticosta said.

"The state wants to play for time here, knowing that a 61-year-old
man is failing in health. I think it's cruel," he said.

Brady's ruling in July overturned the conviction from Woodfox's
second trial, in 1988. He found that Woodfox's lawyer should have
objected to Sinquefield's testimony that a key witness was
believable, and to inclusion of testimony from witnesses who had died
after the 1973 trial.

Trenticosta, co-counsel Chris Aberle of Mandeville, and state Rep.
Cedric Richmond, chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, said
Caldwell has refused to meet with them to discuss Woodfox's case
since Brady reversed the conviction in early July.

"None of this wrongdoing and misconduct that leads us where we are
today happened under Buddy Caldwell's watch," Richmond said. He said
they wanted "to remind the attorney general that this was not his
doing, but that he was in a position to right a wrong."

Woodfox, 61, Herman Wallace, 66, and Robert King were the "Angola Three."

Wallace and Woodfox were convicted of stabbing guard Brent Miller.
King, convicted of killing a fellow inmate in 1973, was released in
2001 after his conviction was reversed.

Woodfox's attorneys say no physical evidence tied either him or
Wallace to Miller's death on April 17, 1972. They say the convictions
were based largely on statements from a rapist who was promised help
getting a pardon if he testified against Woodfox and Miller.

Woodfox and Wallace said they were targeted because they helped
establish a prison chapter of the Black Panther Party.

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