A new phrase has been added to my vocabulary: nolle prosequi, Latin for “unwilling to pursue.”
The District Attorney said nolle prosequi about David Bonds’ case last week. Bonds was accused of killing Dinerral Shavers. I never knew Dinerral, but I was disturbed by news of his murder, which I wrote about in December.
The official line is that the prosecution couldn’t make their case because the young witness is being prevented from testifying by her mother. But it’s surely more complicated than that. Ken Foster says “no one felt it was their responsibility to get a conviction.”
That got me thinking about L— H—’s case. L— was accused of killing a young boy near our home in 2004. I wrote about his case in February. Yesterday I checked Docket Master, and sure enough, nolle prosequi.
03/22/2007 LONDONC
>DEFENDANT, L— H— APPEARED WITHOUT COUNSEL FOR PRE-TRIAL CONFERENCE
>FOR COUNT 1 RS 14 30 FIRST DEGREE MURDER NOLLE PROSEQUI.
>RELEASE ISSUED.
>CASE CLOSED, THIS DEFENDANT.
After three years in prison, L— has been released into a city that’s been devastated by disaster. How strange that must be. The murder rate in New Orleans is higher than when L— went into prison. In fact, it’s higher than anywhere else in this nation. Much higher.
Postscript: Natasha Robin of Fox 8 interviewed me yesterday about a recent string of violent incidents. I told her I am not an expert on violent crime, but she said she wanted to get “the voice of the people.” They shot some footage of me distributing flyers for a community BBQ. I wasn’t able to catch the news so I don’t know how it played.
I heard a phone interview on Channel 4 with the mother who stated the child was depressed and cried everyday because she was the only one testifying. I don’t blame the mom for not letting her testify when, from past evidence, the police are unable to protect witnesses.
I know I watch to much “Crime TV”, but shouldn’t the police & the DA’s office use more than just witness testimony to make cases? What about balistics, prints, motive and such [I am not talking about the fancy CSI stuff either]– shouldn’t that kind of investigation count for something?
Frank, follow the link to Ken Foster’s write up. They never did a ballistics test.
Yup, no ballistics test! Lazy third world cops!
Damn. Damn. Damn!
” no one felt it was their responsibility to get a conviction. The DA’s office would only do the minimum with what the detective gave them. The detective would only do the minimum as far as getting statements and investigating leads. ” WTF!!! Would it take the death of a family member of Mr. Jordon’s or of Chief Thomas [GODDESS fobid] to get SOMEBODY to do their job? Christ. No wonder the folks in this town arm up & take the law into their own hands [and drive up the murder rate even higher].
Perhaps there should be out of town examiners brought into the DA’s office & staff should all get every 6 month reviews & fireings if the conviction rate is too messed up or filled with these “no human involved killings/non-prosicutuions” [that is not what they ARE, just what the DA’s office seems to THINK they are…] Hells Bells, it can’t cost THAT much to do some balistics tests and write up some reports or even examine a few sites for money, drugs and/or motive.
They should hire the actors from The Wire, they’re pretty good.
I hate Eddie Jordan. But in the “mixed blessings” category, at least he’s not still the US Attorney. Where would the corruption investigations be if he were the one we had to pursue them?
[…] case against Dinneral Shavers’ murderer, David Bonds was dropped as Bart Everson told us in Nolle Prosequi. You can read all about David Bonds in Docket Master, in Case Dismissed, Ken Foster tells us that […]
every time i come on this stupid ass blog site you always sayin something bout luther h. they have way more crazy people in N.O. that killed for the fun of it…. i know the real story behind that if u relly want to it
Yes, I would like to know the “real story.” Lay it on me.
[…] in New Orleans he was assigned a public defender from New Jersey. Finally his case was dropped, nolle prosequi, and he was released after three years in […]