Category Archives: Viva!

Former North Carolina Death-Row Prisoner Charles Ray Finch Freed After 43 Years

A North Carolina man wrongly convicted and sentenced to death based upon false forensic testimony and an eyewitness identification manipulated by police misconduct has been freed from prison after 43 years. On May 23, 2019, federal district court judge Terrence Boyle ordered North Carolina to release former death-row prisoner Charles Ray Finch (pictured with his members of his legal team) from custody, five months after a unanimous panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit found Finch “actually innocent” of the murder. Finch, now 81 years old, was freed from Greene Correctional Institution in Maura, North Carolina, that afternoon. Finch’s daughter, Katherine Jones-Bailey, was two years old when he was convicted and sentenced to death. “I knew the miracle was going to happen,” she said about her father’s release. “I just didn’t know when.”

Following the appeals court ruling, Finch’s lawyers from the Duke Wrongful Convictions Clinic filed a motion in federal district court seeking his immediate release. The North Carolina Attorney General’s office joined in the motion. The district court formally overturned Finch’s conviction and gave Wilson County prosecutors 30 days to decide whether to retry him. With no credible evidence of guilt, a retrial is considered unlikely. If charges are not refiled, Finch will become the 166th former U.S. death-row prisoner to have been exonerated since 1973. He will be the second death-sentenced prisoner to have waited more than four decades to be exonerated. In March 2019, Clifford Williams, Jr. was exonerated in Florida 42 years after his wrongful conviction and death sentence. 

Finch was convicted in 1976 of murdering a grocery store clerk during an attempted robbery. He was sentenced to death under the mandatory death-sentencing statute then in effect in North Carolina. A state forensic witness testified at the trial that the victim had died from two shotgun wounds, and a shotgun shell was found in Finch’s car. A store employee who saw the killer flee the scene told police that the killer had been wearing a three-quarter length jacket. An eyewitness later identified Finch in three different lineups. Shortly thereafter, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the sentencing statute and, in 1977, the North Carolina Supreme Court vacated Finch’s death sentence and resentenced him to life in prison.

In 2013, testimony by Dr. John Butts, then North Carolina’s Chief Medical Examiner, revealed that the victim had been killed by a pistol, not a shotgun and North Carolina State Crime Laboratory Special Agent Peter Ware, the forensic scientist manager for the lab’s firearm toolmark section, testified that the bullet found at the scene and the shell found in Finch’s car did not come from the same firearm. Finch also presented testimony that the eyewitness identification procedures had been unduly suggestive. In an interview, Finch told WNCN-TV, “[w]hen I was picked up, they didn’t question me or nothing. They put me there in a line-up. Straight in a line-up. And they put me in a line-up with a black leather coat on.” Chief Deputy Tony Owens claimed that he had put the jacket on another man in the lineup, but photos the defense had discovered showed that Finch was the only person in the three lineups wearing a coat. “That’s one of the highlights at the evidentiary hearing,” said Jim Coleman, Finch’s long-time lawyer and the director of the Duke Wrongful Convictions Clinic. “[W]e were able to expose that [Owens] had lied about the line-up and he had dressed Ray in a coat and he was the only one wearing a coat in the line-up.”

Coleman and the clinic have represented Finch for fifteen years, and Finch was the clinic’s first client. “We have students who work their hearts out on these cases,” Coleman said. “We feel an enormous sense of vindication.”

(Olivia Neeley, Judge orders Finch to be released, The Wilson Times, May 23, 2019; Ken Smith and Matthew Burns, Wrongfully convicted Wilson man freed after four decades in prison, WRAL.com, May 23, 2019; Russ Bowen, Charles Finch speaks with CBS 17 ahead of potential release from prison, WNCN, May 21, 2019. Photo by Zak Dahlheimer, WNCN; provided courtesy of Mr. Dahlheimer and WNCN.) See Innocence and Prosecutorial Misconduct.

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The Hour of Lynching: vigilante violence against Muslims in India – video

Rakbar, a Muslim dairy farmer, was murdered by a Hindu mob who thought he was taking a cow to be slaughtered for meat. His wife, Asmeena, must undergo an intense iddat (mourning in purdah) and their daughter, Sahila, is forced to abandon school to take care of the household. While the family falls apart, the hate machinery of rightwing Hindu nationalists – politicians and lynch mobs – works overtime to legitimise the killing. Set in a remote village in India, The Hour of Lynching sheds light on a global problem: communities turning on ‘the other’ – sometimes with extreme violence

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More of this please

If your opponent is of choleric temper, seek to irritate him, per Sun Tzu and Tony Soprano:

A day after President Trump had what she described as a “temper tantrum” in a White House meeting on infrastructure that lasted less than five minutes, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Thursday called on his aides to step in.

“I pray for him. I wish his family or his administration staff would have an intervention for the good of the country,” Pelosi told reporters during her weekly press conference on Capitol Hill. “Maybe he wants to take a leave of absence.”

Pelosi suggested Trump abruptly left the meeting because he was “ill prepared” to strike a deal with Democrats on infrastructure.

“He pulled a stunt,” Pelosi said. “He’s a master of distraction.”

The House speaker also suggested Trump was disappointed that she has resisted calls from some members of her caucus to pursue impeachment. Pelosi appeared to endorse the theory that Trump is trying to trap House Democrats by goading them into bringing impeachment charges, expecting to be acquitted by the Republican-controlled Senate. This would allow him to claim vindication heading into his reelection.

“The House Democratic caucus is not on the path to impeachment,” Pelosi said. “That’s where he wants us to be.”

But Pelosi also made clear that Trump’s conduct could lead the House down that path, eventually.

“The president’s behavior in terms of his obstruction of justice, the things that he is doing, it’s very clear — it’s in plain sight,” she said. “It cannot be denied. Ignoring subpoenas. Obstruction of justice. Yes, these could be impeachable offenses.”

She added: “We can walk and chew gum at the same time. I hope he can too.”

Grab ’em by the ego.

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World’s oldest record store bans Morrissey’s music

Time and time again, Morrissey has proudly flaunted his support for the far-right, extremist political party For Britain. Now, he’s paying the price: The oldest record store in the world has banned all of the musician’s releases.

Spillers Records in Cardiff, Wales has officially vowed to no longer carry The Smiths singer’s music. Established way, way back in 1894, the shop serves as the city’s main location for buying concert tickets and has hosted numerous artist signings and in-store performances, including from Sleaford Mods and IDLES in recent months. It also is located just four hours south of Manchester, where Moz grew up.

(Buy Tickets to Morrissey’s Tour With Interpol)

“I’m saddened but ultimately not surprised that Spillers is unable to stock Morrissey’s releases any longer,” record store owner Ashli Todd told Wales Online. “I only wished I’d done it sooner.”

spillers records store bans morrissey Worlds oldest record store bans Morrisseys music

The store ban comes just a few days after For Britain founder and noted anti-Islam activist Anne Marie Waters praised and thanked Morrissey for his relentless support. “Thank you for giving us so much publicity,” she said in a YouTube video, referring to Morrissey’s recent performance on The Tonight Show, which he gave while donning a For Britain pin.

Previously, Moz also publicly mocked the accent of London’s Muslim mayor, Sadiq Khan:

“London is debased. The Mayor of London tells us about ‘Neighborhood policin’ — what is ‘policin’? He tells us London is an ‘amazin’ city. What is ‘amazin?’ This is the Mayor of London! And he cannot talk properly! I saw an interview where he was discussing mental health, and he repeatedly said ‘men’el’… he could not say the words ‘mental health.’ The Mayor of London! Civilisation is over!”

Morrissey is due to release his new covers album, California Son, on Friday, May 24th, though we know where it won’t be sold. Despite the growing controversy surrounding the singer, his summer tour with Interpol is still on.

World’s oldest record store bans Morrissey’s music
Lake Schatz

Those who missed MMR vaccine should see GP, says Public Health England

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‘Measles can kill,’ warn experts, who suggest getting the jab before going on holiday to Europe

Anyone who has not been vaccinated or who has a child who missed a dose of the MMR vaccine should see their GP about catching up in the light of widespread measles outbreaks in Europe, Public Health England is warning.

PHE is particularly concerned about families and students who are likely to travel to Europe as the summer approaches, which is when cases of measles rose in the UK last year. Experts warn that measles is not a trivial disease. It can kill those with weak immune systems, while complications can include meningitis, encephalitis and eye damage.

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Karl Rove and a Pitch for a Nationwide 5G Network Tailored to Trump’s 2020 Campaign

likely to give Russia a back door to every connection

Halpern-Rivada5G.jpg

Sue Halpern writes on an insurgent telecommunications company Rivada, chaired by Declan Ganley, with funding from Peter Thiel and Karl Rove, and its play to monetize the Defense Department’s unused radio spectrum, to bring 5G cellular services to rural America.

Canadian Border Agents Also Routinely Demanding Passwords From Travelers And Searching Their Devices

In sad but unsurprising news, Canada is no better than the US when it comes to ignoring its citizens’ rights at the border. The Canada Border Security Agency (CBSA) has also been given the green light to perform invasive, warrantless searches of people’s devices at the border. And, like its US counterpart, it seems to be using this power frequently.

The CBSA said that between November 2017 and March 2019, 19,515 travellers had their digital devices examined, which represents 0.015 per cent of all cross-border travellers during that period.

Whether or not these numbers are on the rise is still a mystery. The CBSA only began tracking this statistic in late 2017 after Canada’s privacy commissioner opened an investigation into this practice. Concerns were raised about the CBSA’s searches, which involved cloning devices for later examination and seizing devices if travelers refused to hand over passwords.

Unfortunately for the CBSA, it searched the wrong person’s device. A legal challenge is being raised by someone well-equipped to raise legal challenges, as CBC News reports.

“The policy’s outrageous,” said Toronto business lawyer, Nick Wright. “I think that it’s a breach of our constitutional rights.”

His thoughts follow a personal experience. After landing at Toronto’s Pearson Airport on April 10, he said the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) flagged him for an additional inspection — for no stated reason.

Wright had just returned from a four-month trip to Guatemala and Colombia where he studied Spanish and worked remotely. He took no issue when a border services officer searched his bags, but drew the line when the officer demanded his passwords to also search his phone and laptop.

Wright refused, telling the officer both devices contained confidential information protected by solicitor-client privilege.

The end result was CBSA agents confiscating Wright’s phone and laptop with the assurance they would be sent to a government lab in order to have their password protection cracked. Replacing them cost Wright $3,000.

Wright claims this is a violation of Canada’s charter of rights. Canadian courts, like those in the US, have decided no involuntary sacrifice of rights is too great when national security is on the line. The CBSA, for its part, has greeted the tech future by pretending it’s still 1975, and that searching a phone is no different than searching a briefcase or the trunk of a car.

For all of that, this is probably the right time to challenge this custom of customs officials. The nation’s top court has already drawn a distinction between briefcases and cellphones, saying the latter contains vast amounts of information that “touches a person’s biological core.” And at least one provincial court has declared Canadians’ rights are not null and void simply because they’re at a border crossing.

The CBSA’s statement to CBC News says these suspicionless searches that can result in the indefinite seizure of citizens’ devices are “reasonable and necessary” to keep Canada secure. But they seem to be neither. There’s nothing “reasonable” about invasive searches completely divorced from articulable suspicion. That’s the very definition of “unreasonable.” And as for necessity, all the CBSA has to offer is that 38% of its 19,000+ device searches “uncovered evidence of customs-related offences.” This means most searches don’t recover any evidence of anything and that things like undeclared goods are somehow threatening to the country’s security.

It’s time for border agencies to stop pretending the only way to secure a nation is to discard its citizens’ rights. And it’s time for courts to stop deferring to national security mantras and stick up for the rights they — and the rest of the government — are supposed to be protecting.

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