Bellicose Prosecutors Quietly Dismiss Charges

By TChris, Section Innocence Cases
Posted on Sat Feb 07, 2009 at 04:49:00 PM EST
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The grapes are sour in the McLean County (Illinois) State's Attorney's Office but life is sweet for Alan Beaman. As TalkLeft discussed last summer, the Illinois Supreme Court vacated Beaman's 1995 murder conviction after concluding that the prosecution withheld evidence of his innocence. At the time, blustering prosecutors vowed to bring Beaman to trial again.

On January 29, prosecutors quietly filed a motion to dismiss all charges.

"After ignoring our phone calls and messages [the State's Attorney's Office] handed us a motion indicating they were dismissing the indictment," Jeff Urdangen, Beaman's defense lawyer for the last 12 years, said. "We are elated that Alan no longer has the cloud of a wrongful prosecution over his head."

The prosecutor, refusing to rule out Beaman as a suspect, said only that the case remained under investigation and that "all options for future prosecutions remain available." Those options being: (1) prosecute the innocent guy again; (2) try to prosecute the guy implicated by the concealed evidence despite repeated prosecutorial claims that Beaman is the murderer; or (3) never close the investigation and hope the public forgets what happened. The smart money is on option (3).

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Bellicose Prosecutors Quietly Dismiss Charges | 3 comments (3 topical)

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The McLean Co. DA sounds like my dog. (none / 0) (#1)
by Donald from Hawaii on Sat Feb 07, 2009 at 05:30:30 PM EST

Both have this need to have that last and final bark, especially when they know they now have to shut up. So much for contrition, dignity and grace. What an a$$.

Frankly, I've long been a proponent of enacting statutory criminal sanctions against those prosecutors who willfully suppress exculpatory evidence and / or manufacture falsehood in order to gain a conviction of a defendant they have good reason to otherwise believe may well be innocent.

Such prosecutors purposefully and maliciously misuse the power of the state, not as an instument of justice, but as a weapon wielded with an intent to cause harm, by depriving that defendant of due process (perjury and contempt of court), liberty (first degree kidnapping), property (first degree theft) and placing him or her in harm's way (first degree reckless endangerment). And if such egregious behavior occurs in capital cases, you can add a charge of attempted first degree murder.

Alas, as of now, in most jurisdictions one can only pursue such legal miscreants through their respective state bar's office of disciplinary counsel.

Look at how lightly former Durham County, NC District Attorney Mike Nifong was punished for his very serious transgressions in that infamous Duke University Lacrosse case. Sure, he lost his license and had to spend a short time in jail for contempt of court, but that was the least authorities could do. He ruined the lives and reputations of three young men -- and by extension, their families, teammates and their coach, who was wrongfully and summarily terminated by Duke University for a case that finally amounted to nothing more than tabloid fodder and wholesale fiction, all fueled by one man's misplaced ambition and towering ego.

Prosecutors file motion to dismiss and (none / 0) (#2)
by oculus on Sat Feb 07, 2009 at 07:29:04 PM EST

serve sd, motion on defense counsel. Doesn't sound all that secretive to me.

nothing (none / 0) (#3)
by cpinva on Sun Feb 08, 2009 at 05:08:15 AM EST

Doesn't sound all that secretive to me.

nothing in this thread, the article or the comments here suggest it was.