Jailhouse informants
The integrity of our system of justice is being destroyed by the use of jailhouse snitches. When a prosecutor has no evidence in a case, but proceeds with the prosecution anyway, using testimony that is suspect and that is bought with the threat of prosecution and the promise of freedom, we cannot rely on the outcomes of trials. We cannot rely on juries to recognize the lying witnesses and discount them, when juries trust prosecutors not to put lying witnesses on the stand.
A witness who has nothing to hide, nothing to lose, and nothing to gain, who has real information for the jury, makes a case. I cannot complain if a prosecutor uses a witness who has pending charges, if the testimony is reliable and checks out. But when a witness comes forward only to obtain a deal for himself on his pending charges, and all attempts at corroboration fail, there is a problem.
If a witness fails a polygraph on the subject of his testimony, and a prosecutor puts him on the stand anyway, there is a problem. When prosecutors troll the jails the week before trial, looking for new jailhouse snitches that are almost certainly going to be lying in exchange for a deal, there is a problem. There is a problem with the witnesses, there is a problem with any prosecutor who engages in these tactics, and there is a problem with the integrity of our courts.
And, as is a matter of public record in a recent murder trial in Horry County, what do we do when the police threaten a witness, tell him what to say, and then obtain a statement from him? Prove it you say? What about when 1) the interview is recorded and 2) the witness recants on the witness stand and tells the jury and the court how the police attempted to force him to lie on the witness stand?
I am disgusted.
We need reform in when and how we use the testimony of "informants" in our courts. We cannot trust the prosecutors to seek the truth and to adequately corroborate testimony before they call a witness to the stand, therefore we need legislation or court rules to ensure that we are not convicting persons based on perjury, and that testimony against criminal defendants is not for sale in the jailhouses.
Earlier this year, California passed a law requiring corroboration of testimony by jailhouse informants before it would be admissible in court. To bring us closer to ensuring reliability of verdicts in criminal cases, we need to consider similar measures. Whether it is done by legislation or whether it is done by pre-trial hearings to determine the reliability of such testimony, we need to recognize this problem and find a way of dealing with it.
