Sunday 17 January 2021

Norimichi Kumamoto: Selfless Warrior/Iwao Hakamada: Japan: Update: Major (Welcome) Development: Former Judge Kumamoto, one of the three judges on the panel which sentenced celebrated boxer Iwao Hakamada to death in 1968 (he voted 'not guilty') devoted the rest of his life to saving Hakamada who he believed was innocent. It now appears that Judge Kumamoto's heroic efforts over the decades are paying off. CNN (Reporter Emiko Jozuka) reports that the Japanese Supreme Court has granted a retrial to Hakamada who is now 84-years-old. Iwao Hakamada, known to be the world's longest death-row inmate, has been out of custody, had been released had been released from death row and permitted to return to his home pending the Supreme Court Decision...(Does it get any stranger than this? HL)


QUOTE OF THE DAY: "We were afraid that Hakamada could be redetained at any moment and given the death penalty. But at least now, with the hope of a retrial, we know he is safe," said Kiyomi Tsunagoe, a lawyer on Hakamada's defense team, on Thursday. Tsunagoe added that Hakamada's case will return to the Tokyo High Court for fresh deliberation -- although a retrial is still not guaranteed, and the defense team is now awaiting the high court's response. Tsunagoe said it was unclear when this would come.


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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Hakamada's sister, Hideko Hakamada, has maintained her brother fell victim to "hostage justice," when police allegedly strip suspects of their right to remain silent and coerce them to confess."


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STORY: "Japan's top court gives retrial hope for man who spent almost fifty years on death row," by reporter Emiko Jozuka, published by CNN on December 23, 2020.


GIST: Japan's Supreme Court has overturned a ruling blocking the retrial of an 84-year-old man who spent almost half a century on death row awaiting the hangman's call over the murder of a family of four, his lawyer told CNN Thursday.


Former professional boxer Iwao Hakamada -- declared the world's longest-serving death row inmate by Guinness World Records in 2014 -- was accused of robbery, arson and the murder of his boss, his boss' wife and their two children in 1966. The family was found stabbed to death in their incinerated home in Shizuoka, central Japan.


Hakamada initially admitted to all charges before changing his plea at trial. He was sentenced to death in a 2-1 decision by judges, despite repeatedly alleging that police had fabricated evidence and forced him to confess by beating and threatening him.


In 2014, in a rare reversal for Japan's rigid justice system, the Shizuoka District Court ordered a retrial and freed Hakamada on the grounds of his age and fragile mental state. But four years later, the Tokyo High Court scrapped the request for a retrial, for reasons it would not confirm to CNN.


Hakamada's defense team then appealed to the Supreme Court.


"We were afraid that Hakamada could be redetained at any moment and given the death penalty. But at least now, with the hope of a retrial, we know he is safe," said Kiyomi Tsunagoe, a lawyer on Hakamada's defense team, on Thursday.


Tsunagoe added that Hakamada's case will return to the Tokyo High Court for fresh deliberation -- although a retrial is still not guaranteed, and the defense team is now awaiting the high court's response. Tsunagoe said it was unclear when this would come.


Japan puts far fewer people in prison than most developed countries: 39 per 100,000 people, compared with 655 in the United States and 124 in Spain, according to the World Prison Brief website.


But the country is known to have a rigid criminal justice system, with a 99.9% conviction rate. According to a 2019 report released by the Cabinet Office, 80% of people surveyed also supported the death penalty.


Hakamada's sister, Hideko Hakamada, has maintained her brother fell victim to "hostage justice," when police allegedly strip suspects of their right to remain silent and coerce them to confess.


Hakamada now lives with his sister in Hamamatsu city, Shizuoka prefecture. Though he will likely never return to full mental health, Hideko Hakamada told CNN in March that her brother's condition was improving, and he had lost a limp that he developed while on death row.


Unlike in the US where execution dates are set in advance, death-row prisoners in Japan are executed in secret, with no advance warning given to the inmate, their family or legal representatives, according to Amnesty International.


Prisoners often only learn of their execution hours before it's due to take place. Authorities say this occurs "out of consideration that an advance notice would disturb the inmate's peace of mind and might cause further suffering."


Usually, inmates must be executed within six months of their sentencing hearing. But Tsunogo  says this rarely happens, and many end up waiting years. Capital punishment is usually reserved for those who have committed multiple murders. All executions are carried out by hanging.


The entire story can be read at:


https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/23/asia/japan-hakamada-ruling-death-row-intl-hnk/index.html


Read the original post at the link below: "Kumamoto's  internal struggle over ordering the death of an innocent man was beautifully captured by an anonymous reporter for the U.C.A, News headed, "The  Japanese Judge and the Boxer he condemned to death", published on May 2,  2017 and bearing the sub-heading "After issuing sentences Norimichi Kumamoto became a prisoner of his own conscience."


https://selflesswarriors.blogspot.com/2020/08/


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Monday 11 January 2021

Leomia Banks: 'Selfless Warrior'/Brian Banks. California: A tale of two mothers; Actress Sherri Shepherd explains why she wanted to play the role of Leomia Banks, Brian Bank's mother, in the movie, "Brian Banks,"... I read it (the script) and immediately, Leomia just jumped out of the page because Leomia when you meet her, she says, I didn’t do anything special, I just loved my son. That’s what she says all the time. In the love that you had for your son was the bedrock of him being sane and him being able to keep moving forward when he was incarcerated and the things that she did to show her love for her son. She sold her car, mortgaged her home, she went to see him three and a half hours there and back, she wrote him a letter every day, she was available for every phone call, she basically stopped her life for her son and that fight and her faith just…(trailed off): I called my agent and said I gotta get this script, please give me an audition, I know they don’t want to see me because I make you laugh but please, please let me get in there and audition for this role."


QUOTE OF THE DAY: (Exonerated at last):
 "I thanked them all (the reporters)  for telling my story;  I thanked everybody. I thanked my mom;  I thanked God."
Brian Banks.
"What set me free?...A true story of wrongful conviction, a dream deferred and a man's redemption."
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INTRODUCTION: In 2002, 16-year-old  Brian Banks was on a roll. The  all-American high school football star  had verbally accepted  a four-year scholarship at the University of California, and was viewed by many as on the way to the National Football League.

That roll turned 'South'  - another way of saying it all fell apart - on July 8, 2002, when, as described by the National Registry of Exonerations: "Shortly after 11:00 a.m., the 6-foot-4-inch, 225-pound Banks requested a pass to leave the classroom to use the telephone. On his way down the hall, he saw 15-year-old Wanetta Gibson, whom he had known from middle school, leaving the bathroom.

They got into the elevator and went to a secluded area of the school near a stairwell that was known as a “make-out” spot. About a half hour later, Gibson returned to class, where her teacher criticized her for taking so long.
 
Moments later, Gibson passed a note to a friend saying that she had been raped by Banks and that she was no longer a virgin. At the end of classes, she met her sister to go home and, prodded by her sister, said that Banks had raped her.
 
They went back inside the school and reported what happened to school officials. That night, Banks was arrested at his parents’ home in Artesia, California.

On January 3, 2003, he was charged with two counts of forcible rape and one count of sodomy with a special circumstance of kidnapping and, faced with a potential prison term of 41 years to life,  Banks pleaded no contest and was sentenced to six years in prison. 

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A TALE OF TWO MOTHERS:
 
The first mother is Brian's mother  'Leomia Banks.' The second mother, is Wanetta Gibson's mother 'Wanda Rhodes'. It's hard enough to be a mother in the best of times. But to be the mother of a 16-year-old charged with terrible crimes  which may mark him for life, who is  suddenly taken away from you and locked up in a cage in a prison with dangerous people,  has to be a nightmare - and to be the mother of a 15-year-old girl who has undergone the horror of rape must also be horrific. That's true. But life is often much more complex than our first thoughts. What if Leomia's son Brian protests that he is innocent (in spite of his guilty plea) - and what if Wanetta's mother...(Well, I'll come to her later in this post.)

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THE FIRST MOTHER: LEOMIA BANKS: A 'SELFLESS WARRIOR' (1):  FIRM BELIEF:  Leomia  firmly believed in  Brian's  innocence and let him know that,  time and time again - so he would make it through   his  ordeal  - while the rest of his world dropped him as if he had the plague: Like the other 'Selfless Warriors' in the series, Leomia was an extraordinary person who was ripped out of her ordinary life by an inability  to stand by in the face of a miscarriage of justice -  the wrongful conviction of serious sexual offences of her  innocent 16-year-old son. First of all,  she stood by Brian, a celebrity in the sporting world, at a time when those who had celebrated him and lined up for photos,  unceremoniously dropped him following his arrest. In his own words (From his book, 'What set me free? A True Story of Wrongful Conviction, a Dream Deferred, and a Man Redeemed'): "My own coach, a minister, judged me in the harshest terms possible based on nothing but accusations and rumors and gossip."..."Newspapers and news stations that had sung my praises as a football player, proclaiming to the world that I was the next great football star to emerge from Long Beach Poly—they turned on me. Without proof, without an investigation, without a trial, without anyone listening to what I had to say, they passed judgment. Despite the fact that I was a minor, they put my name in the paper from the start. And then they used my size against me. Based on nothing but an accusation, the school district expelled me. Permanently. They said that I would never be allowed to return to Long Beach City School District, no matter what. That revelation showed up in the newspaper, where my mom had to read it for herself after hearing about it from her friends and our family—before the administration did so much as call her to discuss it, or showed her the courtesy of sending a letter or something, let alone have a hearing to plead our case. “How can they expel me for something I haven’t done? How can they judge me like that?” I asked Mr. Johnson." However, Leomia, a very religious person, who had been raised in Clarksdale, Mississippi, one of twelve kids, had faith in her son, listened to his account of what had happened, accepted it as true, as he knew she would, calmed him down as much as possible, and then set herself on the path of  freeing and exonerating him, so he could continue down the path he had set for himself, no matter how long it would take - and  no matter how much of a sacrifice of her own life she would have to make.   The last time Brian had seen her  was when, out of the blue,  he had been arrested at his home, something so traumatic that the memory of her on her knees screaming as they rushed  him out of his  room and down the stairs,  was burned into his mind. Then, as Brian writes about his first court appearance, while being led into a jury box area off to one side of that beige room, "I looked across the dark wooden tables to the guest box on the other side of that room and I saw my mom, I lost it. I started bawling. “Mom!” I called. “I want to go home. I want to go home!” “Calm down, baby,” my mom called, making a calm-down gesture with both hands, up and down. “I know,” she said. “I know. Shhhh. Shhhh!” I was shaking as I took a seat. I started rocking back and forth. It all came rushing over me. My mom was there with my dad. My dad. What if some part of my father believed I did this? It broke my heart. My mom would never believe it. Never. But what about the rest of my family? Oh God, please, please let this end! I was a mess."

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'SELFLESS WARRIOR' (2): SACRIFICE: Leomia made clear to her son that there was nothing she would not do or give up to rescue him from the hell in which he found himself - and she proved that to him every day. Leomia would soon discover that the legal expenses would be enormous - even though that wouldn't  guarantee that he would be well represented. (He never should have been kept in custody, and his trial lawyer should never have convinced him to plead guilty without giving him the opportunity  to  discuss the matter with his mother).  "My mom actually paid for this lawyer by selling her house and selling her car," Brian  says. "Literally giving up everything to pay for this lawyer. And from day one, our lawyer just wanted me to plea out to some form of a deal." When Brian asked his mom how she was going to pay for the lawyer,  she replied,  "Don’t you worry about that. That’s not your problem. All that matters is we get you out of (this)." She visited him frequently to make sure he was being treated well and keep up his moral, paid the high cost of the daily phone calls from the prison, and put her personal life on hold. "My mother is amazing," he would say, adding that he could not say that enough. Leomia  also went out of her way to pave the way for Brian's release on parole after spending  five years behind bars. As Brian tells it: "Once my release date was in sight, she wanted me to have a home to come to, so she told her husband that she needed to move from Wisconsin where she and her husband were living, back to Long Beach. Her husband  agreed it was a good idea. So they set up a plan for her to move back and for him to eventually follow her. She moved back into an apartment complex she had lived in before she moved to Wisconsin, on Ocean Boulevard. That meant that once I was out, once I was on parole, she would be there. I often thought of how life would be without the family support I had, having a home to go to versus homelessness."

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'SELFLESS WARRIOR': (3): STRENGTH AND PURPOSE:  When Brian was being pressured by his lawyer to plead guilty and thereby avoid decades in prison, the following conversation ensued with his mother: "Brian, I just have one question. Did you do it?”No! Mom, you know I didn’t do it!” “Then you don’t take that plea. You fight this. You tell them the truth.” “But they might try me as an adult if I say no.” “Then we’ll take it to trial,” she said. “I could get li(fe)” “Brian. You didn’t do it, and you’re not going to say you did. There is no way you’re putting a felony on your record and giving up your whole life and going to some youth prison till you’re twenty-five years old for something you did not do!"  My mom hugged me and I shook off the tears before we asked our lawyer to come back in. We told her I absolutely would not make any kind of deal that forced me to admit to a crime I hadn’t committed. She did not look happy. Brian makes a comment at this point that goes to the heart of his relationship with Leomia. "There really wasn’t anything more to say after that. We both felt defeated. But having her there that night meant the world to me, and I knew she believed in me and would continue to support me as much as ever. Seeing her stay strong made me feel strong, too. " Ultimately however,  Brian caved in under pressure from his lawyer, who he says did not allow him to discuss the guilty  plea to a crime he did not commit  with his mother,  because, as the lawyer explained,  he was in adult court now.  Worse, instead of being sentenced to probation, as the lawyer assured him would happen, Brian was sentenced to serve five years in jail. (What incompetence! That's enough to make me weep. HL);

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MOTHER NUMBER TWO:  (WANDA RHODES: WANETTA GIBSON'S MOTHER) - THE SENTENCING HEARING:  BOTH MOTHERS WERE IN COURT TO HEAR BRIAN'S FATE:  Brian tells us in his book that he saw Leomia sitting in the front, where she always sat, having never missed a court date - and that  he knew that his mother had brought a bag with his street clothes in it, in case she was allowed to bring me home that very day.  The mood in the courtroom changed very quickly when Wanetta's mother asked to speak. "Tiana’s mother got up and she proceeded to give a long speech about how I took advantage of her daughter, how I stole her virginity, and how I didn’t give her an opportunity to choose when she wanted to lose her virginity, because I’m a monster. She went on and on about how I’d stolen her daughter’s future and destroyed her life. She said she wished that I was facing more than six years. “That isn’t enough time for what he’s done,” she said, looking dead at me. Everything in me wanted to yell right in her face: “I didn’t do it!” I wanted to plead with her, “Ma’am, I promise you, your daughter is lying.” But I couldn’t.  Brian looked back at his mom and his family and friends and everyone was crying, including his dad, who was comforting Leomia, looking stoic, but there were tears streaming down his face, too. "I realized it was my dad’s birthday that day. His birthday, of all days. “I love you guys,” I called out. “I love y’all.” They called back, “We love you, Brian!” The last thing I heard as the courtroom door closed behind me was the sound of my mom’s voice, crying, “No! This can’t be happening. My Brian. No!”

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MOTHER NUMBER TWO: (WANDA RHODES: WANETTA GIBSON'S MOTHER): SHE WASN'T FINISHED YET:

Wanetta Gibson's mother was far from finished. While Brian was locked up, he learned that Wanetta, his accuser,  and her mother,  had filed a lawsuit against the Long Beach city school system, claiming that the school had fostered an "unsafe environment: that allowed Wanetta to get raped" - suing the school for millions of dollars in damages. Brian writes that after months had passed since he had received any news from anyone, he excitedly opened up an envelope immediately hoping that it was from the long-lost appellate lawyer he hadn't heard from for ages. "It wasn't," he informs readers."It was a letter from the Long Beach Civil Court office informing me that attorneys for  (Wanetta Gibson) and the Long Beach City School District were coming to San Luis Obispo in a couple of weeks to depose me as part of the lawsuit.  Wanetta and her mother had filed against the school. According to the  publication 'History Vs. Hollywood,' "The district settled the lawsuit and paid Wanetta $1.5 million. Wanetta and her mother, Wanda Rhodes, reportedly spent the money on at least three cars (an Altima with "great rims," a Suburban and a Dodge), in addition to big-screen TVs and various other items.

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THE TIDE BEGINS TO  CHANGE: REVELATIONS FROM A POLICE FILE:

About a week after receiving the lawyer's letter requiring him to be deposed in the prison, Brian received his police file in the mail, containing  police reports, transcripts, evaluations, and above all  DNA results which he says he had never been allowed to see going all the way back to his arrest in 2002. To his astonishment he learned that there was, in fact, male DNA present—but that DNA wasn’t his.  It wasn’t a match. It belonged to somebody else.  The wheels started spinning in his mind. "Was she raped by someone else,"  he writes.  "Did she have sex with somebody else and then try to cover it up by blaming me? Was she being abused by somebody or something? Wait. Why does it even matter? It wasn’t mine. The DNA wasn’t mine! How is that not 100 percent proof that I didn’t rape her? How did that not come out in court? Why didn’t my attorney tell me, or tell my mom, or tell the judge or anybody? Why? My heart was pounding. Didn’t the district attorney have that report, too? Why would he have moved forward with the case knowing that  (Wanetta)  had somebody else’s DNA on her underwear on the same day I supposedly raped her in that stairwell? The evidence, the only physical evidence they had, pointed to the fact that they had the wrong guy. I was fuming. Who was liable for this? The DA should be. She had this information the entire time and did nothing with it. The judge, too, for overlooking the facts. And my attorney: she should face consequences for she misrepresented me. I stuffed the paperwork under my mattress again and did my best to calm down. It took me the rest of that day and night to recenter myself. The next time I was alone for a long stretch of time, I read the rest of the files and discovered that pretty much everyone, every step of the way, came at my case with a presumption of guilt based on (Wanetta's) initial story and, most important, how her story seemed to be corroborated by the sexual assault nurse’s report. The assumption of guilt played directly into the fitness hearing evaluation claims ever showed. The files also contained some transcripts of video interviews of Tiana in which her story changed again, getting a little more violent and a lot less believable every time she told it. All somebody had to do was go to the school and take a look at the hallway full of open classroom doors to realize there was no way I was “forcing her” and “dragging her” from that elevator without somebody noticing. If one person had done that, just one person, I thought, I might not be sitting in this cage right now. But I kept coming back to the DNA. The DNA evidence was rock solid. No room for error. No room for interpretation. No room for “maybes” or “yeah, but, what-ifs”? No “he said, she said” at all. Facts. Concrete facts. It should have been case closed." Stunned by these disclosures, Brian got the addresses of  all of the Innocence Projects in California. Before long he began to realise that even though these disclosures would be helpful on an appeal, he needed a proverbial 'smoking gun.' Wanetta would have to retract her statement and admit that all of her allegations were untrue. "In other words, they needed Wanetta Gibson to admit that she made the whole thing up. I knew that wasn’t going to happen."

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THE SMOKING GUN: As a prime athlete Brian Banks would not give up - even though at this point the game seemed unwinnable. In mid-2006,  after spending much of his prison time studying wrongful convictions,  he drafted a notice of appeal containing three grounds:  ineffective counsel; newly discovered evidence (which was, in fact, the DNA, which  he  argued was “new” because it was never entered into evidence during his  2002 proceedings); and perjury, based on  Wanetta's inconsistent statements. Although, as a rule,  prisoner's appeals are usually rejected. In 2007, Brian's appeal was accepted by the California Court of Appeal. But before the appeal could be held,  an utterly stunning event occurred which had Brian's mind spinning again. "And that's when the world stood still," Brian writes. "You have 1 new friend request,” the message said. “From (Wanetta Gibson).” I slammed my laptop shut and slid it across the bed and went reeling back like I’d just seen the devil itself..."My mind abruptly diverted to another thought: the California Innocence Project, and their response to my request for representation. The only way to make a case for my exoneration was if the “the witness were to recant her statement.”..."I had to play this right. I couldn’t be sloppy. She knew. She knew what she did all this time and now she contacts me to “hang out”?...A friend of mine put me in touch with a private investigator, and I told him, “I want to meet this girl, and I need everything recorded just in case I’m being set up or she’s planning to try to say something else happened that didn’t really happen.” “Well,” he said, “why don’t you just do it here at my office? I’ve got some camera stuff that we could set up and we can go from there.” I told her I’d lost my life, and she told me about all the money she spent..." Did Brian rape you?” “You want me to say it now?” she said. “Well, yeah, you know, I just want to know.” “No, he didn’t rape me,” she said. Do not react. Stay cool. Stay cool. “Well, did he kidnap you?” “No,” she said. “He didn’t kidnap me.” “So what happened?” “Well, we were just being young and curious, and one thing led to another. And then all these adults got involved, and it just got worse, worse, and worse.” When she finally left, when we were sure she’d exited the building, then we celebrated. The PI and his wife started yelling and screaming inside his office. He was super pumped, this being one of his first investigative cases, and he knew it was a big one. He grabbed the pen camera he’d picked up in a spy store, rushed it over to his computer, injected it into the USB slot, and began the downloading process...."We made multiple copies of the footage on CDs and flash drives, and I took a couple of them with me. There was no one else I trusted with this footage. At home I grabbed my laptop and began searching for help. I had done the impossible. I captured absolute proof of my innocence. A recantation from the accuser herself. I knew that what had to be done next, only an attorney could do. So I began searching. A name on the list stood out to me: Cofounder and director of the California Innocence Project Justin Brooks."

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THE END GAME: Before getting hold of Justin Brooks, Brian first had to calm down his mother, who had well-grounded fears that the authorities would revoke his parole because he had unlawfully communicated with the complainant. Leomia's views about the criminal justice system had clearly evolved since her son had been caught in its clutches. Experience tends to do that. Especially very bad experience..."I just don't know," she kept saying. She had seen too much go the other way. She had gone to court too many times thinking I was about to be freed, and instead seen me locked away for longer and longer periods of time. In spite of these representations, the decision was made to proceed - accompanied by a massive media campaign  to get the public on side. As set out - with some fascinating details - by National Registry of Exoneration author Maurice Possley in his account of the 'end game': 

"Banks served five years in prison and then was released on parole with an ankle monitor. He was required to register as a sex offender.
 
Then, on February 28, 2011, Gibson sent a message to Banks on Facebook, asking him to become an online friend. Banks did not accept the offer, but instead messaged back asking if she would meet with him. Banks also contacted the California Innocence Project again.
 
Gibson agreed to meet and during a video-taped interview admitted that there was no rape. She and Banks had kissed, hugged and fondled, but had not engaged in sex, she said. She was afraid of coming forward, she said, because of the thought her family might have to give back the $750,000 they received in the lawsuit.
 
On August 15, 2011, the California Innocence Project filed a petition for a state writ of habeas corpus, seeking to vacate Banks’ conviction.
 
The petition said that two years after Gibson said she was raped, she confessed to the classmate to whom she had passed the note that she had not been raped, but made up the accusation because she did not want her mother to know she was sexually active.
 
The petition also said that Gibson stated that when she was preparing for her deposition in the civil lawsuit, she told her attorney that she had not been raped and that she and Banks were “just playing.” According to the petition, when Gibson expressed her concern, the lawyer said, “Don’t say nothing. Like don’t talk at all. Let them do what they gonna do.”

On May 24, 2012, the conviction was set aside and the charges against Banks, 26, were dismissed at the request of Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Brentford Ferreira.
 
In 2013, the Long Beach Unified School District won a $2.6 million default judgment against Gibson."  

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COMMENTARY: Actress Sherri Shepherd, who played Leomia in the movie 'Brian Banks',  had this to say about Leomia  in an  interview  with 'The Knocturnal.'..."I read it (the script) and immediately, Leomia just jumped out of the page because Leomia when you meet her, she says. "I didn’t do anything special, I just loved my son."..."That’s what she says all the time," Shepherd continues. "In the love that you had for your son was the bedrock of him being sane and him being able to keep moving forward when he was incarcerated and the things that she did to show her love for her son. She sold her car, mortgaged her home, she went to see him three and a half hours there and back, she wrote him a letter every day, she was available for every phone call, she basically stopped her life for her son and that fight and her faith just…(trailed off): I called my agent and said I gotta get this script, please give me an audition, I know they don’t want to see me because I make you laugh but please, please let me get in there and audition for this role." As a rule, 'Selfless Warriors' don't tend to see themselves as doing anything special. I, however, as publisher of this Blog, can beg to differ. In my books, Leomia was a giant of a human being who, unsparingly  gave her son the tools he would need to survive an experience that could otherwise destroy not just his career, but his life, by giving him love,  and by believing in him, at a time in the 'me too era' when far too many people were far too willing to presume guilt, and to convict on the mere allegation, throwing the need for evidence to the wind. Leomia also gave him the tool of religion as a framework for living his life. As Brian wrote: "My mom encouraged me to go to church while I was in Juvenile Hall, and I did. I went to the chapel on Sundays. I went to Bible study. I took a Bible back into my cell, and I read it. I started reading it all the time. My mom was real happy about that, and she sent me notes suggesting verses to read. “I try to read Psalms 91 every morning and every night,” she told me. So I read Psalms 91." Leomia Banks teaches us that there are many ways of being a 'Selfless Warrior.' Like being a warm, loving mother who would stop  at nothing to vindicate her wrongly convicted son,  even if it meant putting her own life on hold.

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NATIONAL REGISTRY OF EXONERATIONS ENTRY: (MAURICE POSSLEY);

"On July 8, 2002, 16-year-old Brian Banks, a blossoming football star at Polytechnic High School in Long Beach, California, was attending summer school and anticipating his senior season on the football team. He had verbally accepted a four-year scholarship to play football at the University of Southern California.
 
Shortly after 11:00 a.m., the 6-foot-4-inch, 225-pound Banks requested a pass to leave the classroom to use the telephone. On his way down the hall, he saw 15-year-old Wanetta Gibson, whom he had known from middle school, leaving the bathroom.
 
They got into the elevator and went to a secluded area of the school near a stairwell that was known as a “make-out” spot. About a half hour later, Gibson returned to class, where her teacher criticized her for taking so long.
 
Moments later, Gibson passed a note to a friend saying that she had been raped by Banks and that she was no longer a virgin. At the end of classes, she met her sister to go home and, prodded by her sister, said that Banks had raped her.
 
They went back inside the school and reported what happened to school officials. That night, Banks was arrested at his parents’ home in Artesia, California.
 
He turned 17 on July 24, 2002.
 
On January 3, 2003, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office charged him with two counts of forcible rape and one count of sodomy with a special circumstance of kidnapping.
 
Facing a potential prison term of 41 years to life, Banks pleaded no contest on July 8, 2003. He was sentenced to six years in prison.
 
In 2006, Banks filed a petition for a state writ of habeas corpus, contending that there was no evidence that a rape had occurred—no biological evidence that could be tested for DNA was found. The petition argued that he had received inadequate legal assistance because his lawyer had not sought to present this evidence. The petition was denied as vague.
 
He sought help from the California Innocence Project at California Western School of Law in San Diego, but was told there was no evidence of innocence.
 
In the meantime, Gibson’s family filed a lawsuit against the Long Beach Unified School District alleging inadequate security. The suit was settled for $1.5 million, split evenly between the family and their attorney.
 
Banks served five years in prison and then was released on parole with an ankle monitor. He was required to register as a sex offender.
 
Then, on February 28, 2011, Gibson sent a message to Banks on Facebook, asking him to become an online friend. Banks did not accept the offer, but instead messaged back asking if she would meet with him. Banks also contacted the California Innocence Project again.
 
Gibson agreed to meet and during a video-taped interview admitted that there was no rape. She and Banks had kissed, hugged and fondled, but had not engaged in sex, she said. She was afraid of coming forward, she said, because of the thought her family might have to give back the $750,000 they received in the lawsuit.
 
On August 15, 2011, the California Innocence Project filed a petition for a state writ of habeas corpus, seeking to vacate Banks’ conviction.
 
The petition said that two years after Gibson said she was raped, she confessed to the classmate to whom she had passed the note that she had not been raped, but made up the accusation because she did not want her mother to know she was sexually active.
 
The petition also said that Gibson stated that when she was preparing for her deposition in the civil lawsuit, she told her attorney that she had not been raped and that she and Banks were “just playing.” According to the petition, when Gibson expressed her concern, the lawyer said, “Don’t say nothing. Like don’t talk at all. Let them do what they gonna do.”

On May 24, 2012, the conviction was set aside and the charges against Banks, 26, were dismissed at the request of Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Brentford Ferreira.
 
In 2013, the Long Beach Unified School District won a $2.6 million default judgment against Gibson. In June 2015, the state of California awarded Banks $142,000 in compensation."

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CHRONOLOGY: (From National Registry of Exonerations entry)'

July 8, 2002: Alleged rape/kidnapping;

July 24, 2002:  Turns 17:

January 3, 2003:  Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office charged him with two counts of forcible rape and one count of sodomy with a special circumstance of kidnapping.
 
July 8, 2003: Facing a potential prison term of 41 years to life, Banks pleaded no contest.  He was sentenced to six years in prison.
 
2006"  Banks filed a petition for a state writ of habeas corpus, contending that there was no evidence that a rape had occurred—no biological evidence that could be tested for DNA was found. The petition argued that he had received inadequate legal assistance because his lawyer had not sought to present this evidence. The petition was denied as vague.

February 28, 2011, Gibson sent a message to Banks on Facebook, asking him to become an online friend. Banks did not accept the offer, but instead messaged back asking if she would meet with him. Banks also contacted the California Innocence Project again.

August 15, 2011:  California Innocence Project filed a petition for a state writ of habeas corpus, seeking to vacate Banks’ conviction. The petition said that two years after Gibson said she was raped, she confessed to the classmate to whom she had passed the note that she had not been raped, but made up the accusation because she did not want her mother to know she was sexually active. The petition also said that Gibson stated that when she was preparing for her deposition in the civil lawsuit, she told her attorney that she had not been raped and that she and Banks were “just playing.” According to the petition, when Gibson expressed her concern, the lawyer said, “Don’t say nothing. Like don’t talk at all. Let them do what they gonna do.”

May 24, 2012: Conviction was set aside and the charges against Banks, 26, were dismissed at the request of Los Angeles Deputy District Attorney Brentford Ferreira.
 
2013: Long Beach Unified School District won a $2.6 million default judgment against Gibson. 

June 2015: California awarded Banks $142,000 in compensation.
  
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READING MATERIALS:

The Knockturnal:


History VS Hollywood:


National Registry of Exonerations:


Autobiography: "Brian Banks: What set me free?" The story that inspired the major motion picture 'Brian Banks.' A true story of wrongful conviction, a dream deferred and a man's redemption. (Amazon);


Missoula: "Rape and the justice system in a small town" by Jon Krakauer, published by Random House: 

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Sunday 3 January 2021

Selfless Warrior Maurice Gagnon/Lianne Thibeault: "Maurice Gagnon wasn't just a whistleblower...It was more like he was playing an ear-shattering horn in his battle to expose the evil machinations of Charles Smith (and his backers in the Chief Coroner's office in Toronto) who turned the tragic accidental death of his beloved 11-month-old grandson Nicholas into murder, saying his daughter Lianne, Nicholas's mother, was responsible for her son's death and, even though the police had closed their investigation for want of evidence, Smith did his best to have Liannes's newborn baby seized from her and handed over to the child protection authorities. (Yes, 'evil' machinations. I use the word advisedly, because Smith declared war on this wonderful family, which had suffered a terrible loss, and deserved sympathy rather than the threat of being prosecuted for murder and the seizure of a new-born baby. He put them through hell. That, in my books, is 'evil'.) Maurice persisted, in the face of obfuscations and duplicitous acts, hounding the authorities with brilliantly researched, meticulously worded complaints, which invariably became public (as did the no-comment, evasive, or equivocal responses, or passing the bucks, until Smith and his powerful backers, were exposed, the public became outraged, a public inquiry was ordered, and the powerful backers, the former chief coroner (James Young) and his former deputy chief coroner (Jim Cairns), allowed their medical licenses to lapse with the result that they could no longer be subjected to professional discipline hearings. All this because of one man - a man who would not rest who would not rest until the police and prosecutors backed off their outrageous, utterly unfounded murder investigation, until his new grand-daughter was removed from the grasp of the children's aid authorities, until those responsible for the attack on his family had been brought to account, and until all the other people who had been wronged by Charles Smith had achieved justice. And that's just the start."


QUOTE OF THE DAY: "My father got justice for his daughter,  but in the process he found out about all these other people that had suffered a similar fate with doctor Smith,  and  he was  having none of it. He was a lion seeking justice not only for his family, but for everybody that was wronged. Lianne believes that without her parents love and support, she would likely have ended, "where the the police and   the Crown wanted me to be." And that's a sobering thought, indeed. 

Lianne Thibeault: 

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INTRODUCTION: Maurice Gagnon wasn't just a whistleblower...It was more like he was playing an ear-shattering horn in his battle to expose the  evil machinations of  Charles Smith (and his backers in the Chief Coroner's office in Toronto) who turned the tragic  accidental death of his beloved 11-month-old grandson  Nicholas into murder, saying his daughter  Lianne, Nicholas's mother, was responsible for her son's  death and, even though the police had closed their investigation for want of any evidence, Smith  did his best to have Lianne's newborn baby seized from her and handed over to the child protection authorities.  (Yes, 'evil'  machinations. I use the word  advisedly, because Smith declared war on this wonderful family, which had suffered a terrible loss, and deserved sympathy rather than the threat of being subjected to a murder prosecution and the seizure of a newborn baby. He put them through hell.  That, in my books, is 'evil'.) Maurice persisted, in the face of obfuscations and duplicitous acts, hounding the authorities with brilliantly researched, meticulously worded complaints, which invariably became public (as did the no-comment, evasive, or equivocal responses, or passing the bucks,  until Smith and his powerful backers  were exposed, the public became outraged, a public inquiry was ordered,  and the powerful backers the former  Chief Coroner (James Young) and his former deputy chief coroner  (Jim Cairns) allowed their medical licenses to lapse with the result that they could no longer be subjected to professional discipline hearings. All this  because of one man - a man who would not rest until the police and prosecutors backed off their outrageous, utterly unfounded murder investigation, until his new grand-daughter was removed from the grasp of the children's aid authorities, until those responsible for the attack on his family had been brought to account, and until all the other people who had been wronged by Charles Smith had achieved justice. And that's just the start.

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CONCISE CHRONOLOGY: (I have used information from a story by Sudbury Star reporter Carol Mulligan published on June 11, 2005, in compiling this concise chronology. I have placed a link to the entire story in the 'Reading Materials' section below.) 

November 30, 1995): 11-month-old Nicholas dies.  (A local  coroner classifies his death  as sudden and unexplainable after the infant crawled under a sewing table, bumped his head and stopped breathing. Nicholas' mother, Lianne, a single mom at the time, and Nicholas, were living with his grandparents, Maurice and Angela.)

May, 1997:  Almost 18 months after Nicholas had died and two days before her bridal shower — the  police visit Lianne  and tell her that her son’s death was being treated as a homicide and she was a suspect. She is subjected to brutal interrogation and a variety of intrusive investigative techniques aimed at extracting a confession. Lianne  never was charged criminally, but it would take almost 18 months, $120,000 of her parents’ retirement savings, the exhumation of Nicholas’s tiny body and a battle in family court to end  her ordeal.)...In his report on the public inquiry, Justice Stephen Goudge notes that during the course of the child protection proceedings, "The Gagnon family retained a respected euro-pathologist , Dr,. William Halliday,  to provide an opinion on the case.  Like S.M's (pseudonym)  family (another Smith case), Ms. Gagnon's parents drained their savings  to mount a defence for their daughter."

1998: Lianne had married Pierre in 1997. In 1998  Lianne gives  birth to daughter Nicole, now 7.  Smith who had learned of Lianne's pregnancy tells Children's Aid officials, in Lianne's words,  “that I killed one child and chances are I would do it again.” As a result, Nicole had to be given up into the custody of Gagnon and his wife after her birth and Lianne  could only visit her during CAS-supervised visits. Nicole was eight weeks when Thibeault got a date in family court. She was allowed to live with her daughter at her parent's house,  but wasn’t to be left alone with the baby. By that time, Gagnon had backed the chief coroner’s office into a corner and it had called for a second opinion on Smith’s findings in Nicholas’ death. A child abuse authority from the United States concluded there was no indication of foul play in Nicholas’s death and called Smith irresponsible, say Gagnon and his daughter. 

1999: March 25:  Children's Aid Society withdraws  the protection application;

2005: Per  reporter Carol Mulligan: June 11, 2005:   "Maurice Gagnon is calling for a public inquiry into the system that accused his daughter of murdering her baby, based on no evidence — only the opinion of a Toronto pathologist whose work is now in question.  (Maurice Gagnon's relentless battle on behalf of his daughter  is believed to have played a significant role in the decision of James Young's successor, Dr. Barry McLellan, to order a review of 40 autopsies performed by Smith,  at Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children, since 1991 in what were thought to be child homicide cases or criminally suspicious deaths of children and to the Ontario government's decision to order a public inquiry into Smith's cases.)

2008: September 30: Justice Stephen Goudge releases  his report.

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MAURICE GAGNON'S NEMESIS: DISGRACED PATHOLOGIST CHARLES SMITH:

Smith's despicable role is well described by Sudbury Star reporter in his story headed: "The face of the innocent: A father's extraordinary love and fierce protection of his daughter," published on Feb. 1. 2008.

"In the hours following the tragedy, Lianne was interviewed by a Sudbury Regional Police officer and provided a detailed statement of what had happened," this portion of the story begins.

"On Dec. 1, the day following Nicholas's death, an autopsy was performed by Sudbury pathologist Dr. T.C. Chen," it continues.

Chen concluded the cause of death was consistent with Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. Later, upon further review by Chen and Sudbury coroner Dr. James Deacon, the official cause of death was revised to Sudden Unexplained Death. 

Neither the autopsy results nor the police intervention provided any cause to suspect Nicholas's death was anything but an accidental, unexplained tragedy. In fact, the city's chief of police - a Gagnon family friend - offered his support following the death and attended the boy's funeral.

At that point, the Gagnons would have rightly assumed they would be left to their grief and the daunting prospect of rebuilding their lives. That is precisely what occurred until mid-1997, when the family was visited by a nightmare more shocking and disturbing than the tragic loss of Nicholas.


More than 18 months after Nicholas's death, the Gagnon family would become victims of the catastrophically flawed work of Dr. Charles Smith, an ill-trained, error-prone pathologist who undeservedly attained status as a pre-eminent specialist in the field of forensic pediatric pathology.

It was Smith's would-be expertise and disastrous conclusions that would result in the murder accusation against Lianne Gagnon and inflict new horrors on a family that struggled so long to cope with the loss of a child.

The full weight of state resources would be brought to bear against Lianne, as authorities attempted - often with dubious methods - to prove ultimately scurrilous allegations.

In addition to the murder accusation, the Gagnon family would endure the disinterment of their beloved Nicholas, the seizure from the casket of a mother's goodbye letter to her child, a wiretap sting operation and a decision to apprehend Lianne's second child at birth.

It would be the type of grievous, unrelenting investigation that would be inflicted on parents and caregivers in many child-death cases during Charles Smith's notorious reign as top dog of forensic pediatric pathology in Ontario.

Several of those cases resulted in wrongful convictions, imprisonment of parents or caregivers, as well as children being apprehended - sometimes permanently - from their parents.

One might well have expected Lianne Gagnon to suffer a similar fate, given the magnitude of the case built against her and the zealousness with which it was prosecuted by authorities.

Instead, Lianne ultimately was vindicated in what would later be revealed as a story of a father's extraordinary love and fierce protection of his daughter; and his subsequent crusade to bring down a powerful authority figure who inflicted tremendous misery on so many."

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SELFLESS WARRIOR (1): (A very potent weapon):  One of this 'Selfless Warrior's  most potent weapons  was the knowledge he acquired while serving as a senior official in the Ontario government.  Lianne explained to me in an interview that years of government service had taught her dad  how to access channels that otherwise would be unavailable to most people. Maurice also knew that rather than approaching the government in a state of rage (which would get him nowhere),  it would be more productive to cast his complaints  in a manner that required the official,  be it the provincial Ombudsman, the Coroner's Council, or the province's solicitor general, for example,  to respond - or face a lot of tough questions, which Maurice was very capable of drafting. While I was at the Toronto Star, scarcely a day went by  when I didn't open up an envelope form Maurice with the latest complaint, and the documents which would be attached.  They often became the subject of a front page story the very next day. Justice Stephen Goudge, who  conducted the public inquiry, was also impressed. In his report,   Justice Goudge reports that during and after the child protection proceedings, "Ms. Gagnon's father, Maurice Gagnon,  tried to alert  the OCCO (Ontario Chief Coroner's Office)  and others of his concerns about  the conduct of Dr. Smith and Dr. Cairns. He filed complaint after complaint, with many institutions."  (Justice Goudge then lists many of these complaints including one to the governing body of the medical profession in Ontario which slams Smith for bringing his young son to the disinterment of Nicholas's remains which had been ordered by the government, and concludes: "Mr. Gagnon was consistent. His letters were well researched and well reasoned. Given what is now known, many of his concerns about  Dr. Smith, Dr. Cairns and the OCCO were legitimate. Unfortunately, those in the  senior positions at the OCCO did not listen."

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SELFLESS WARRIOR ( 2): A grateful daughter's perspective:  In an interview, Lianne Thibeault  said the definition of  a 'Selfless Warrior,' developed by the Blog, fit Maurice Gagnon "to a 'T." "That's exactly what happened," she commented. "He was ripped out of his ordinary life, and it turned both of my parents' lives upside down." The financial burden was heavy - supporting her through crisis, hiring an expert, retiring early so the Children's Aid officials would allow his newborn grand-daughter to live with him and Lianne's mother Angie, pending the family court's ultimate decision. (The officials expected Maurice and Angie to be home 24/7 to look after the baby). Lianne would occasionally get a glimpse of the financial pressure on Maurice when he would quip that the lawyers would charge $100.00 just to pick up the phone. However, Maurice kept costs down by doing voluminous research  (the legwork) himself -  the research which eventually  led to the dropping of the police investigation, the defeat of the Children's Aid Society, and  the establishment of the public inquiry,  which was applauded by Justice Goudge  and led to his extraordinary victory over the police, prosecutors and Children's Aid officials. It also led to Maurice's determination to keep going - even after his own nightmarish entanglements with the state were resolved -  to help out other parents and caregivers who had been put through hell by Smith and his backers. Per Lianne: "My father got justice for his daughter but in the process he found out about all these other people that had suffered a similar fate with doctor Smith and  he was  having none of it. He was a 'lion' seeking justice not only for his family, but for everybody that was wronged."  Lianne believes that without her parents' love and support, she would likely have ended up "where the the police and   the Crown wanted me to be." And that's a sobering thought, indeed.  

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COMMENTARY: During the course of our interview, Lianne stresses the 'stoic' role that her mother Angela played during the course of the family's awful experience - managing to be  'stoic', a mountain of strength and support,  through all the grief and emotional distress. Lianne  considers both of her parents as 'Selfless Warriors'. I couldn't agree more. And,  by the way, message to Maurice:   I really miss all your phone calls and the almost daily deliveries in the newsroom. Bravo!

Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog.

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READING MATERIALS: 

Death in the family: John Chipman: (Penguin);

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.ca/books/228817/death-in-the-family-by-john-chipman/9780385680844

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Jane O'Hara: McLeans Magazine: "Dead Wrong."

https://archive.macleans.ca/article/2001/5/14/dead-wrong

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The Current: (Transcript):

https://www.cbc.ca/radio/thecurrent/the-current-for-january-12-2017-1.3932086/january-12-2017-full-episode-transcript-1.3933194#segment2

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Denis St. Pierre article:

https://www.fixcas.com/cgi-bin/go.py?2008a.Gagnon

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Carol Mulligan story:

http://www.ottawamenscentre.com/news/20040611_sudbury.htm

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Thanks as always to Kyra Jolliet,  my sharp-eyed daughter/editor,  for her much appreciated assistance on this Blog.  HL.

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