Fox Commentator: Oklahoma ​“Frontier Justice” Has Produced ​“Wretched Record” of Wrongful Capital Convictions

Calling Oklahoma ​“the noto­ri­ous home of ​‘Hang ​’Em High’ exe­cu­tions,” con­ser­v­a­tive com­men­ta­tor and Fox News con­trib­u­tor Michelle Malkin (pic­tured) has urged the state to adopt sytemic reforms to address its ​“wretched record on wrongful convictions.” 

Malkin says that despite 35 exon­er­a­tions in the last 25 years — includ­ing 7 death-row exon­er­a­tions — and a ​“reign of pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al ter­ror and foren­sic error by the late Oklahoma County District Attorney Bob Macy and rogue Oklahoma City police depart­ment crime lab ana­lyst Joyce Gilchrist,” the state has failed to cre­ate a foren­sic sci­ence com­mis­sion to inves­ti­gates errors and pro­fes­sion­al mis­con­duct by crime labs and foren­sic ana­lysts and ​“not a sin­gle Oklahoma dis­trict attorney’s office has estab­lished an offi­cial mech­a­nism to review tainted convictions.”

In an August 8, 2018 com­men­tary for the Creators Syndicate, Malkin warns that “‘Frontier jus­tice’ costs too many cit­i­zens of all races, creeds, and back­grounds their free­dom and their lives.” She says, ​“In the old days of the Wild West, vig­i­lantes worked out­side the judi­cial sys­tem to pun­ish rivals regard­less of their guilt or inno­cence. Today, out­laws oper­ate inside the bureau­cra­cy to secure crim­i­nal con­vic­tions at all costs.” 

In her com­men­tary, Malkin high­lights the death-penal­ty exon­er­a­tions of Curtis McCarty and Robert Lee Miller, Jr., and cur­rent appeals attempt­ing to free death-row pris­on­er Julius Jones. Notorious for­mer Oklahoma County District Attorney Bob Macy with­held evi­dence from McCarty’s attor­neys, and crime lab ana­lyst Joyce Gilchrist, impli­cat­ed in at least 11 wrong­ful con­vic­tions, fal­si­fied and destroyed foren­sic evi­dence. Gilchrist’s false tes­ti­mo­ny in the case includ­ed claims that hairs found at the crime scene matched McCarty’s and that his blood type matched the semen found on the victim’s body. They didn’t. Miller’s case was also taint­ed by bad foren­sics and a coerced false confession. 

Malkin points to the case of Julius Jones — recent­ly fea­tured in the doc­u­men­tary series The Last Defense—as emblem­at­ic of some of the ongo­ing prob­lems in Oklahoma cas­es. Jones, who is seek­ing appel­late review of evi­dence that sup­ports his inno­cence claims, filed motions for dis­cov­ery and a request for an evi­den­tiary hear­ing in December 2017. Under instruc­tions of a court clerk, they placed sup­port­ing evi­dence in a sealed enve­lope labeled ​“pro­tect­ed mate­r­i­al.” That cru­cial evi­dence was not pre­sent­ed to the court and dis­ap­peared for six months until Jones’ inves­ti­ga­tor was able to uncov­er them her­self in the clerk’s office. The court ini­tial­ly reject­ed Jones’ appeal, but will now recon­sid­er, due to the clerk’s ​“mis­man­age­ment of the exhibits.”

Another Oklahoma County death-row pris­on­er, Richard Glossip, was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death based on sole­ly on the tes­ti­mo­ny of a 19-year-old who con­fessed to the mur­der and then impli­cat­ed Glossip in exchange for a reduced sen­tence. No phys­i­cal evi­dence linked Glossip to the crime, the teen gave inves­ti­ga­tors mul­ti­ple con­tra­dic­to­ry descrip­tions of the mur­der before adopt­ing police sug­ges­tions that Glossip was involved, and two wit­ness­es who have come for­ward with evi­dence of Glossip’s inno­cence say they have been sub­ject­ed to retal­i­a­tion and intim­i­da­tion by pros­e­cu­tors.

Oklahoma, Malkin says, ​“stands out for its decades of tram­pling due process, sub­vert­ing pub­lic dis­clo­sure, per­pet­u­at­ing foren­sic junk sci­ence, man­u­fac­tur­ing false accu­sa­tions and enabling offi­cial mis­con­duct.” She says that, giv­en the state’s record and its recent ​“chill­ing” his­to­ry of ​“hor­rif­ic botched exe­cu­tions,” per­mit­ting the state to resume exe­cu­tions pos­es a ​“human rights cri­sis.” Silence in the face of that cri­sis, she says, ​“is complicity.”