Louisiana death row exoneree John Thompson (pic­tured, cen­ter), who was wrong­ly con­vict­ed of two dif­fer­ent New Orleans mur­ders as a result of pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct, has filed a peti­tion with the United States Department of Justice seek­ing an inves­ti­ga­tion of more than 100 cas­es pros­e­cut­ed by for­mer Orleans Parish assis­tant dis­trict attor­ney James Williams. Thompson filed his peti­tion on August 2 under pro­vi­sions of the Law Enforcement Misconduct Statute, which makes it a vio­la­tion of fed­er­al law for police or pros­e­cu­tors to engage in a pat­tern or prac­tice of con­duct that deprives indi­vid­u­als of their con­sti­tu­tion­al rights. Thompson’s peti­tion alleges that Williams ​“gross­ly vio­lat­ed his duty, the pow­er entrust­ed to him and the con­sti­tu­tion­al rights of count­less defen­dants he pros­e­cut­ed,” includ­ing five cas­es in which death sen­tences Williams obtained were lat­er over­turned for offi­cial mis­con­duct. Thompson was wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death in 1985. He was exon­er­at­ed in 2003 after his attor­ney uncov­ered cru­cial blood analy­sis evi­dence that had been improp­er­ly with­held by the Orelans Parish District Attorney’s office. In 2007, a jury award­ed him $14 mil­lion in dam­ages in a suit he filed against the pros­e­cu­tor’s office, but the U.S. Supreme Court over­turned that award by a 5 – 4 vote in 2011, expand­ing the scope of indi­vid­ual pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al immu­ni­ty and find­ing that Thompson had not proven that the dis­trict attorney’s office itself was respon­si­ble for the indi­vid­ual pros­e­cu­tors’ neg­li­gence. In dis­sent, Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg wrote, ​“What hap­pened here … was no momen­tary over­sight, no sin­gle inci­dent of a lone officer’s mis­con­duct. Instead, the evi­dence demon­strat­ed that mis­per­cep­tion and dis­re­gard of Brady’s dis­clo­sure require­ments were per­va­sive in Orleans Parish.” Thompson said his new peti­tion was prompt­ed in part by con­cern for defen­dants who were pros­e­cut­ed by Williams but did not receive a death sen­tence. ​“I was blessed to be on Death Row because it gave me access to attor­neys, who even­tu­al­ly proved my inno­cence,” he said. ​“If I weren’t giv­en a death sen­tence, I’d still be in Angola. My ques­tion is: What hap­pened to the 95 or more men who Williams pros­e­cut­ed but did­n’t get a death sen­tence? Where are they now?” Emily Maw, direc­tor of the Innocence Project New Orleans, said that New Orleans has the high­est exon­er­a­tion rate per capi­ta in the coun­try. Despite that fact, she said, ​“no state enti­ty has tak­en it upon them­selves to iden­ti­fy that this is a problem.”

(J. Lipinski, ​“Death row exoneree files request for fed­er­al inves­ti­ga­tion of Orleans DA’s office,” The Times-Picayune, August 2, 2016.) See Prosecutorial Misconduct.

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