I'm fully aware of the Brady Rule of Evidence in the U.S. The theory of it is that any exculpatory evidence favorable to the defendant is presented in a court case and not deliberately withheld to sway a jury by trickster prosecution lawyers, and a biased trial judge, as happened in the MacDonald case. The Brady Rule needs to be enforced in American courts. There were Brady violations in the MacDonald case, and no sanctions or punishment for the lawyers involved.
The MacDonald case needs at least one judge who is an extremely competent judge and an eminent barrister with a strong personality, not these rubber stampers from the 4th Circuit in North Carolina, or the Supreme Court, and internet posters with ridiculous indignation, and inaccurate newspaper reports, and books about the case written by a drunken Irish son of a bitch.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychological_projection
A bit of insight into your issues might make for a happier life.
There is more to the MacDonald case than just Helena Stoeckley and Greg Mitchell, which JTF thinks, including Mazerolle and his pals. My own opinion is that if there are any hairs which are foreign, and might clear MacDonald, then the FBI lab and Murtagh will just tamper with those hairs and substitute them for MacDonald hairs. That has happened in the past. Blackburn is a proven fraudster.
There is more to the MacDonald case than just Helena Stoeckley and Greg Mitchell, which JTF thinks, including Mazerolle and his pals. My own opinion is that if there are any hairs which are foreign, and might clear MacDonald, then the FBI lab and Murtagh will just tamper with those hairs and substitute them for MacDonald hairs. That has happened in the past. Blackburn is a proven fraudster.
In reply to BStrong the descendants of Freud are hardly likely to lead to a happier life. Clement Freud the former British MP has been named as a pedophile who had a house near the Madeleine McCann abduction when he was alive. Mathew Freud has been described as a greaser by the Daily Mail . He was formerly married to one of Murdoch's daughters, and he was once an adviser to Tony Blair. Lord Freud was involved in the British policy of cutting public spending by making the unemployed live on air, and denying the disabled social security, until fairly recently when he resigned.
It appears that, once again, you have 'confused' some things. You obviously do not understand chain of custody regarding evidence if you believe the FBI or Murtagh can just waltz into an evidence locker (where they store the evidence) and do whatever they want with it. Not how it works, and as the government gets more tech-savvy, the more cameras there are everywhere. Blackburn's fall to the darkside happened LONG after MacDonald and while in PRIVATE PRACTICE. (And, I might add, unlike Murdering MacDonald, he was MAN ENOUGH to admit his crime.) There were so many eyes on him in 1979 (it was his FIRST murder case) and he was expected by many to LOSE. The fact that there was former Green Beret on the jury was a huge plus for Murdering MacDonald - for the reputation of GBs everywhere, that man was looking for a reason NOT to convict and he failed to find it.
Consequences of DOJ and FBI Failures
The report makes for some disturbing reading. First, the report concluded that the department failed to adequately staff the task force and that the FBI did not treat this as a sufficiently high priority. Second, the task force did not do an adequate job of prioritizing cases involving defendants on death row. It took the FBI almost five years to identify 64 capital cases in which one of these 13 examiners was involved.[15]
By that time, one of the defendants had died of natural causes while awaiting execution. The prosecutor in that case stated that Michael Malone’s testimony, which was determined to have been scientifically inaccurate, exaggerated, and unreliable, was instrumental in obtaining that conviction. Three of the defendants had already been executed, although the examiners in two of those cases did not find any positive link between the defendants and the crimes for which they were convicted and executed, so their involvement in those cases was irrelevant.
That was not the case, however, with respect to the third defendant. In that case, not only did Michael Malone testify for the prosecution and provide evidence that was “overstated” and “without scientific basis,” but the prosecutor informed the IG that but for Malone’s testimony, the defendant would not have been convicted of a capital offense that rendered him eligible for the death penalty.[16] If that doesn’t send a chill up your spine, nothing will.
The department also failed to prioritize its review of other, non-capital cases handled by Michael Malone. Three other defendants whose convictions hinged on Malone’s testimony were completely exonerated. Each of the three had already spent over 21 years behind bars. And several other defendants have had their convictions overturned because of Malone’s testimony.
Of the 7,609 cases that the FBI identified in which one of these 13 examiners had testified, only 338 were sent for review to independent scientists—in many cases, years later—and of those, only 312 were actually reviewed.[17] Moreover, that review consisted of only a “paper review” of the examiner’s work and testimony, not a reexamination of the actual physical evidence from the case. Suffice it to say, this was an inherently limited process.
The report further concluded that the department failed to ensure that prosecutors made appropriate and timely disclosures to counsel for the affected defendants. In some cases, it was affirmatively established that prosecutors had not made timely disclosures or any disclosures at all to defense counsel.
According to the IG, this process “devalued the liberty of and collateral consequences potentially suffered by the defendants in these cases whose convictions may have been supported by unreliable FBI Lab analysis or testimony.”[18] Absolutely! The department’s failure to examine all of these cases in a thorough and timely manner or to provide proper guidance to prosecutors displayed a shocking indifference that only perpetuated and exacerbated this injustice.
Perhaps embarrassed by this report, the FBI has now picked up the pace, and what have they discovered? Of the 28 examiners in the FBI Laboratory’s microscopic hair comparison unit, 26 of them overstated forensic matches in ways that favored the prosecution in over 95 percent of the trials that have been reviewed.[19] Thirty-two of those defendants were sentenced to death, and 14 have been executed or died in prison. Many others have been exonerated.
The FBI has also acknowledged that until 2012, its hair examiners lacked written standards defining scientifically appropriate ways of explaining the results of forensic tests in court. I would add that many state examiners received their training from these same FBI examiners, and the FBI still has another 1,200 cases to review.
With respect to all of these examples, how could this have been allowed to happen in so many cases over such a long period of time? These scientists didn’t operate in a vacuum. Whether such problems occur as a result of improper training, inadequate oversight, or a lack of peer review of testing procedures and results, it is inexcusable.
Conclusion
Scientific evidence can be very powerful evidence. When properly employed, it can be a prosecutor’s ace in the hole.
But when forensics experts tamper with or fabricate evidence, utilize shoddy testing procedures, testify about areas outside their expertise, overstate the value of their testimony, or present unsupportable scientific conclusions in order to obtain a conviction, this will not only likely lead to an injustice in the particular case; it will also hasten the arrival of the day when judges and jurors no longer trust the government’s experts. That would be a dark day indeed, and if it happens, the government will have only itself to blame.
—John G. Malcolm is Director of and Ed Gilbertson and Sherry Lindberg Gilbertson Senior Legal Fellow in the Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies at The Heritage Foundation. These remarks were originally presented as part of a panel discussion on “Prosecutors Run Amok?” at the 2016 Federalist Society National Convention.
It would be funny if five people (one unborn) weren't slaughtered. You will libel anyone who does not agree with your point of view and will grasp at any ludicrous theory to support it. You are willing to believe anything but the proven facts: that a father hit his 5 year old hard enough to leave brain fluid leaking on the master bedroom floor; that he beat and stabbed his pregnant wife (the woman he'd promised to love, honor and cherish) to death, breaking both her arms in the process and then coldly went into his 2 year old's bedroom, placed her on his lap, and as she vainly tried to defend herself, stabbed her front and back. He then called an operator and said "some people" were attacked by: "some people". This is the piece of work that you choose to defend?
You decide according to the evidence without fear or favor. You don't decide that Jeff MacDonald seemed arrogant at his April 1970 interview, or that there was no blood on the suitcase. That's very weak evidence, like Stombaugh of the FBI saying he only said it could be, and the same with the threads, and that Colette was supposed to have hit MacDonald with a hairbrush. Or that the Army CID thought Colette murdered one of the little girls. It's no good saying I lack credibility. I speak only as to facts, and not to opinions, like the MacMurderer crowd. You are all opinions and appearances and emotions. You are too emotional, and a lousy detective.
I don't know who the Green Beret on the jury was, but for all you know he might have been mixed up in the Army CID and CIA drug smuggling at Fort Bragg. The foreman of the jury was definitely biased.
The former MacDonald lawyer Harvey Silverglate was concerned that Jeff MacDonald would be cheated by forensic fraud at the FBI lab, and by Murtagh and Blackburn in the MacDonald appeals. In the end Judge Fox issued a piece of paper ruling that any tampering with the forensic evidence should be videotaped, which was then totally ignored. That's not the rule of law, or what should happen. Like the Brady violations it is not enforced.
The matter is discussed at a 2016 website:
I did decide without fear or favor. I've cited facts. My above post is nothing but fact. Including the part about what you've chosen to do: defend a male human being not deserving of the label "man".
You have NEVER cited evidence in the case that applies to innocence. In fact, I've yet to see you cite evidence at all, only random internet postings that often apply to UK cases, and have nothing to do with this specific case. You have never given valid evidence and this may be the first time you've actually responded directly to a post and what had I posted? A description of what your "hero" did that night. It wasn't emotion, it's the legal reality of what he did, written in non-legal jargon.
Jeffrey MacDonald is a coward who won't admit his guilt. A faithless husband (by his own admission), a liar (his marital vows, his testimony), and a murderer. The facts back me.
I am STILL trying to figure out WHY the defense claims they expected Helena to testify that she was at the scene, when she denied such presence when Bernie Segal tried to bully her into admitting she was involved.