The U.S. Supreme Court issued a per curi­am deci­sion on March 7 grant­i­ng a new tri­al to Louisiana death row inmate Michael Wearry as a result of mul­ti­ple acts of mis­con­duct by pros­e­cu­tors in his case. No phys­i­cal evi­dence linked Wearry to the mur­der. His con­vic­tion was based large­ly on the tes­ti­mo­ny of an infor­mant, Sam Scott, who came for­ward two years after the crime with an account that did not match the details of the crime. Scott altered his sto­ry over the course of four dif­fer­ent state­ments, and the tes­ti­mo­ny he gave in court bare­ly resem­bled his orig­i­nal state­ment. Undisclosed police records lat­er revealed that anoth­er inmate had heard Scott say he want­ed to ​“make sure [Wearry] gets the nee­dle cause he jacked over me.” A sec­ond wit­ness against Wearry was offered a reduced sen­tence for an unre­lat­ed con­vic­tion, but pros­e­cu­tors false­ly told the jury that he had ​“no deal on the table” and was tes­ti­fy­ing because the victim’s ​“fam­i­ly deserves to know” what hap­pened. Wearry pre­sent­ed three ali­bi wit­ness­es — his girl­friend, his sis­ter, and his aunt — who cor­rob­o­rat­ed his sto­ry that he had been at a wed­ding 40 miles away when the crime occurred, but his attor­ney failed to fur­ther inves­ti­gate the ali­bi or call as wit­ness­es any of the wed­ding guests who did not have close rela­tion­ships with Wearry. The Court wrote, ​“Beyond doubt, the new­ly revealed evi­dence suf­fices to under­mine con­fi­dence in Wearry’s con­vic­tion. The State’s tri­al evi­dence resem­bles a house of cards, built on the jury cred­it­ing Scott’s account rather than Wearry’s ali­bi.” Justices Alito and Thomas dis­sent­ed, say­ing the case should not have been decid­ed with­out a full hear­ing. Louisiana police and pros­e­cu­tors have been found to have engaged in mis­con­duct in numer­ous death penal­ty cas­es, includ­ing those of all ten of its death-row exonerees: Johnny Ross, Curtis Kyles, Shareef Cousin, Michael Graham, Albert Burrell, John Thompson, Dan Bright, Ryan Matthews, Damon Thibodeaux, and Glenn Ford.

(Wearry v. Cain, No. 14 – 10008) See U.S. Supreme Court and Prosecutorial Misconduct.

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