The Palo Alto, California Police Department would like to think that the city’s $75, 000 payment to Jorge Hernandez ended the sad incident in which its investigators’ lies caused him to confess to a terrible crime and allowed the real perpetrator to escape.
Not really. They never admitted to hurting Hernandez, never apologized, and the investigator that bullied him into the confession says the settlement means nothing to her and how she conducts her interrogations.
In a city with more Phds. per square inch than almost anywhere, we’re guarded by people who won’t learn.
Hernandez, 18, was suspected of raping and beating a 94-year-old woman at an assisted care facility near his brother’s home. Police had discovered his brother’s ring at the crime scene, but the brother had lost the ring a year before and had an alibi. The cops figured younger brother Jorge once had access to the ring and believed he failed to show the proper outrage about the allegations when first interviewed. Under the glare of a national news spotlight and confronted with community outrage, they decided that was enough to get serious about Jorge Hernandez.
During an hours-long videotaped interrogation detectives told Hernandez fingerprints, bloody shoes and a videotape directly linked him to the rape. Hernandez, who had no criminal record, repeatedly insisted he would never hurt a woman. However, he conceded his memory of the night of he incident could be faulty because he had been drinking heavily. Spurred on by his admission, the cops kept at him. Finally, Hernandez broke down, apologized to the victim and was booked.
But there was no videotape. There were no fingerprints. There were no bloody shoes. The victim had failed to pick Hernandez’ voice from an audio lineup. Everything the cops said were legal lies aimed at dragging out a confession that would confirm their instincts and enable them hold him until they gathered real physical evidence.
Two months later, DNA testing proved Hernandez was innocent. But even the most precise science available to the legal system wasn’t enough for investigators to admit they were wrong. “He has not yet been exonerated,” said Palo Alto Police Chief Pat Dwyer after Hernandez’ release. “Our investigation is continuing.”
Eddie Joe Lloyd can relate. While being treated in a Michigan mental hospital in 1985 he became interested in the widely reported rape and murder of a young Detroit honor student. Even though he knew nothing about the case, he offered to help investigators. They were more than happy to talk to him. Their plan was simple: The cops would feed Lloyd details about the crime and he would make a taped confession. Somehow the release of Lloyd’s statement would help flush out the real killer. Lloyd went along with the plan and right on to prison. He spent 17 years behind bars before DNA testing proved his innocence.
“I was thoroughly tricked. Inveigled, enticed, tricked,” Lloyd told the New York Times shortly before his release. “Sometimes the pressure on you to sign a statement is not them twisting your arm. It can be psychological and mental.” Why did Jorge Hernandez confess? “I was so confused, so tired,” he told the San Jose Mercury News. “And I trusted them.”
Jorge Hernandez will now go through life having to explain away newspaper headlines linking him to the rape of a 94-year-old woman. Eddie Joe Lloyd wasted almost a third of his life surrounded by real killers rather than getting the treatment he needed. That they were both released is justice of a sort.
But the crime victims could receive no justice at all. How likely is it that, 17 years later, the family of the Detroit murder victim will ever know the truth? And a 94-year-old rape victim and her loved ones must cope with the fact the man who scarred their lives is still on the loose and has a year's head start on the police.
And all because the cops used legal lies.
No comments:
Post a Comment