On January 14, and almost 30 years after the crime, the Florida Supreme Court crit­i­cized the state for law­less con­duct” and vacat­ed the death sen­tence of Paul Beasley Johnson because the record here is so rife with evi­dence of pre­vi­ous­ly undis­closed pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct that we have no choice but to grant relief.” Because of pop­u­lar sen­ti­ment and the noto­ri­ety of the crime, Governor Charlie Crist signed a death war­rant for Johnson in 2009 even though Johnson’s legal issues were still pend­ing on appeal. The Florida Court said that the gov­er­nor’s action put them in a dif­fi­cult posi­tion. Johnson was found guilty of the mur­der of a Polk County sher­if­f’s deputy and two oth­ers in January of 1981. The state induced Johnson to make incrim­i­nat­ing state­ments to a jail­house infor­mant, then used the tes­ti­mo­ny at his tri­al, even though they knew it was inad­mis­si­ble. Former assis­tant state attor­ney Hardy Pickard, who was the orig­i­nal pros­e­cu­tor in Johnson’s case, was aware that the infor­mant was act­ing on behalf of the sher­if­f’s inves­ti­ga­tor despite the claim that the infor­mant act­ed on his own. Even though the infor­man­t’s tes­ti­mo­ny was ini­tial­ly sup­pressed, Pickard used false tes­ti­mo­ny and mis­lead­ing argu­ment to allow the infor­mant to tes­ti­fy. Commenting on the state’s behav­ior, the Florida Court wrote, It must be empha­sized that in our American legal sys­tem there is no room for such mis­con­duct, no mat­ter how dis­turb­ing a crime may be or how unsym­pa­thet­ic a defen­dant is. Lawlessness by a defen­dant nev­er jus­ti­fies law­less con­duct at trial.”

(C. Jenkins, Court vacates death rul­ings,” St. Petersburg Times, January 14, 2010). See also Arbitrariness.

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