Another Testimonial--uncensored

Written by an inmate at Wabash Valley Correctional Facility:

"On March 16, 2013, I witnessed the following...

Patrick Bradford (Brad), was out on the prison rec yard, where he saw a crippled guy named Oscar--a Mexican about 5 feet tall--being physically bullied.

You have to understand, one thing you just don't do in prison is get involved in someone else's "beef". You just look away and keep walking, which is what everyone else was doing.

But Brad just walked right up to the guy and asked what his problem was with Oscar. The bully was not little: a white guy almost as tall as Brad and heavier. He had a hard look, with all the tattoos and the skinhead. Most people know Brad can take care of himself, but this a dangerous move no matter who you are. Things got real quiet like they do when something bad is about to break off.

The white guy got mouthy for a minute and then started to walk away. But as he was going, he took a weapon out of his pocket and showed it to Brad, like to intimidate him. The weapon was a padlock on the end of a custom-sewn strap; pretty dangerous. But Brad smiled and told him to be sure to bring that with him if he comes back.

And the guy did come back--after some white gang members sent him back "on a mission". This is where it gets really strange. The guy got to talking really tough, and Brad was as cool as I've ever seen anybody in a situation that dangerous. While the guy was putting on a show for the onlookers, Brad was half-smiling, talking real calm. He was warning the guy that this won't be as easy with somebody who can walk.

The bully was pulling a "check-in-move". He was playing it out in the open, hoping to get in a few good shots with the lock before the guards got there to end the whole thing with pepper spray and take them both to lock-up.

But Brad wasn't afraid of the lock, and he saw the check-in move a mile off. He called him on the check-in move and invited him to a blind spot to finish the business (kind of like a prison double-dog-dare).

This broke the bully for good, and he gave up the show, along with his dignity. You could tell Brad wasn't all the way satisfied with that, but he let it end without a fight.

And then it got stranger. A couple of days later, after the prison officials heard all about it (they always do), they pulled Brad in to ask why he stepped in to defend the little crippled guy. And they leaned on him a little with vague threats to discourage him from doing it again. I don't think he was all the way convinced though.

It's a weird world in here.


Very Anonymous
3/24/13

Instructions to View Oral Arguments Online (3-26)

Live Webcast of Oral Arguments (Glenn Patrick Bradford v. State of Indiana) tomorrow, March 26th, at 10:00 Eastern time, 9:00 AM Central.

Click this link to be directed to the online Oral Arguments archive.http://mycourts.in.gov/arguments/

The link to view the live webcast will be available 2 minutes prior to the start of the arguments. If you can't watch live, the link will be available in the archive two hours later.

PLEASE WATCH THIS AND EDUCATE YOURSELF! 

UPDATE 3-22-13

As noted in the last "Update", the scheduling of oral arguments for a PCR in the Indiana Court of Appeals is "unusual," not to mention the fact that the Order for Oral Argument was issued before the panel judges would customarily even be familiar with the content of the briefs.

But "unusual" may not be the best way to characterize it; perhaps "suspicious" is more appropriate. Restore the Truth has learned that the judicial panel that will decide the case includes none other than Randall Shepard, the very recently retired Chief Justice of the Indiana Supreme Court.

Shepard's retirement in advance of this appeal had been seen as quite fortuitous. Before this, there was little hope of a successful result at the state level. This was not only because of his well-known political ties to Evansville's power-elite. It also had to do with a judicial culture that prevailed in the state under Shepard. This new development calls the whole enterprise for Truth into question again.

In the final years of Shepard's tenure, he began to adopt symbolic projects aimed at defining his legacy as that of a modernizer (his close colleague Carl Heldt being appointed to chair one of them). But this can hardly be an accurate legacy, given that it was under the long reign of Shepard himself that the culture of the Court came to be in such need of modernizing.

This question of the larger culture of the Shepard Court is well-illustrated in the specific legal issues at play in the Bradford case.

Under Shepard, the Supreme Court consistently maintained a backward attitude toward advances in science and whether new scientific methods should be allowed to shed light on past injustices. Following Shepard's rulings, Indiana judges have routinely and obtusely dismissed new advances in scientific methods as "merely cumulative" (on top of the old junk science that resulted in faulty convictions) and "merely impeaching" (eroding the believability of testimony). This practice was less about establishing Truth than protecting the status quo for prosecutors, and it was exactly what Judge Carl Heldt did in denying Patrick Bradford's PCR in Evansville in 2012.

But Shepard's retirement in 2012 seemed to have freed the courts for immediate, startling change. In a groundbreaking decision, the Indiana Court of Appeals, following the lead of more progressive states, bucked decades of Shepard-era anti-science, finally recognizing the corrective value of scientific advances for past cases (Bunch v. Indiana). Just as in the Bradford case, "Bunch" involved new arson science that demonstrated the error of a past conviction. The Shepard-free Supreme Court summarily endorsed the decision (transfer denied).

But the true import of a groundbreaking case concerns how it will be applied to subsequent cases. Given the apparent culture-shift in the post-Shepard court, it was hoped that the new regard for science would prevail. But that hope has fallen into question.

Senior Judge Shepard, his considerable political influence clearly intact, re-emerges at the center of a most unlikely and peculiarly timed coincidence: he now sits on the panel that will decide whether the groundbreaking case for science will be applied in the enlightened spirit in which it was decided, or effectively destroyed. Whether science will be allowed into the cause of Justice, as it was in the Bunch case, or be excluded, as it was for the long years of the Shepard court.

Granted, it is not known for certain what this suspicious turn of events will produce. It is possible that Senior Judge Shepard will adopt the enlightened view that his retirement seems to have liberated. It is possible that he will abandon the flat-earth  anti-science that defined his Court. It is also possible that there are no political motivations afoot in the formation of the judicial panel. Anything is possible.

But there will be no question left after the Appeals Court rules. It will rule either for or against science; for or against progress; for or against Truth.

UPDATE 3-14-13

On February 28, the Indiana Court of Appeals ordered oral arguments to be held on March 26, 2013 at 10:00AM. This is an unusual development in that a.) very few PCR cases go to oral argument and b.) the speed at which the Court is acting is virtually unprecedented.

1.) Arguments will be conducted in the Indiana Court of Appeals courtroom, Statehouse Room 413

2.) The argument is scheduled for webcast at www.IN.gov/judiciary; http://mycourts.in.gov/arguments/

3.) Each side will be allotted 20 minutes for argument, after which the panel of judges will ask questions.

4.) The scheduled panel members are Judges: Riley, Vaidik, and Sr. Judge Shepard

5.) The contact person for the Court is Martin DeAgostino (317) 234-4859


***Please tune into the webcast and share the information.

Oh, What a Tangled Web...

The problem with a lie, as we were all taught as children, is that it will rarely remain just one lie. In a matter of any importance at all, one lie will invariably necessitate another, and then another; and so by exponents, a seemingly simple lie becomes a complex web of deceit.

This has already been well-demonstrated in the case of Patrick Bradford, falsely convicted in 1993 of the murder of Tammy Lohr. It took years to unravel and document that complex web of perjury and deception spun by Prosecutor Stan Levco and detective Guy Minnis. But even now, 20 years later, their lies continue to multiply.

Having learned of a Law and Society class at St. Louis University studying the irregularities of the case, former detective Minnis felt compelled--like a moth to the flame, it would seem--to address the class in person in a futile attempt to salvage his tattered web.

Early reports from the students on the spectacle indicate that Minnis, under cover of selective memory, theatrics, bluster, and wholesale slander of Patrick Bradford (naturally) and of his well-respected family (inexplicably), refused to answer any pertinent questions. Instead, he piled more transparent lies on top of those already exposed. It will take time to parse and research all of Minnis' diatribe, but two example follow:

                                                          Silence of the Lambs

 

 

Aside from slander, Minnis employed mostly unprovable harpoons. For example, he declared that the FBI had worked up a psychological "profile" on Patrick, dubbing him a "narcissistic monster". The problems with this one of Minnis' lies are many:

 

1.) This is not what a "profile" is. The FBI employs psychologically trained criminalists to develop a "profile" on hypothetical perpetrators based on the known characteristics of a given crime.

 

2.) Some attempt at this legitimate profiling was made, as we know from the 1992 deposition of Stanley Ford, but nothing involving a psychological disorder, and certainly nothing inolving Patrick Bradford.

 

3.) Patrick was never the subject of a psychological examination, which would have involved, at least, some kind of interview by a qualified professional. (There was, however, rigorous testing and interviewing during the pre-employment process, which marked Patrick as a stable, and desirable candidate for the EPD.)

 

4.) Minnis had already shown himself fond of the word "narcissist" in his railing email to the class in advance of his appearance. This imaginary FBI profiler sounds a great deal like Minnis himself. At any rate, he misuses the term "narcissistic".

 

In fact, this lie is not new. At least one witness reported that, during the investigation, Minnis used this story to influence her as he interviewed her. He told her he had gone to the FBI Headquarters "like in Silence of the Lambs," where profilers told him Patrick is a "pretty scary guy".

 

Nothing was beneath him then; nothing has changed.

 

                                                           The Trouble with Soot

 

Another of Minnis' new/old lies involves actual evidence: physical evidence. He claimed that no soot was found on Patrick's uniform (indicating that Patrick's account of entering the house and observing the fire at the bedroom door was fabricated). This lie has its own set of problems:

 

1.) No such test was done. The FBI report on the testing of the uniform proves that. How was it determined that there was no soot on a black uniform? (On the other hand, the FBI did test for blood and gasoline...and there was none!).

 

2.) As Minnis knows very well, the presence of soot WAS reported by witnesses.

        a. Officer Robert Weaver testified that he saw what he believed was soot on Patrick's face and smelled smoke (which is merely airborne soot) on his uniform (1042).

 

        b. Officer Ryan Rizen testified to the identical description of soot on Patrick's face (and light coloration on the knees of his uniform, consistent with Patrick's account of crawling in on the carpet). (1009, 21-22).

 

            Unlike the honest Officer Weaver, Rizen was very reluctant to confirm the soot, but he was compelled to do so by his prior deposition. He was clearly influenced before trial by Minnis/Levco.

 

3.) The trial record starkly demonstrates that Prosecutor Levco, too, was wishing that the evidence of the soot would just go away. His attempt to make that happen must be read to be believed.

 

From Levco's closing argument:

 

"I didn't hear anybody say that they smelled smoke, I think maybe Officer Weaver did but certainly if he did he was the only one; didn't smell smoke on his uniform and there wasn't anybody--Ryan Rizen said there was something about the uniform knees that was different, but you saw the uniform and nobody else said that (4063).

 

Like the Jedi mind trick, irresistible to the weak-minded.

 

How far will it go? How much more ridiculous will the lies become? Even now that the web has been irreversibly dismantled, Minnis continues to spin!



Thou Doth Protest Too Much

It is no secret that Patrick Bradford has had the support of his family (both biological and in-laws) and friends from the very beginning. Their support of him and belief in his innocence has never wavered. To rational thinking individuals, this is a sign of character. His family, who would know him better than anyone else, continues to vocalize their support for him and attest to his innate goodness of spirit.

Yet, former Detective Guy Minnis does not see it quite that way. When a Law and Society class at St. Louis University studying the Bradford case decided to email Minnis for his perspective, they received a fiery and demeaning response about Bradford's character. He didn't stop there. He intends to drive the 3 hours on Nov. 28th, possibly with the entire "team" in tow (Levco, Storey, et al.) to try and persuade this group of students that their support of Bradford is misplaced. This is certainly reason enough to take pause and question his motivations. And there is more.

Not only does he intend to speak to the class, his correspondence with the professor of that class indicated that he had been following the student/class blog and other social media outlets where the case was objectively dissected with the help of Bradford's daughter Amy. In Minnis' fiery onslaught against Bradford's character he suggests primarily: that he (Patrick) is a narcissist and manipulator who, by manipulating his family has done almost as much harm to them as by murdering Tammy *Not in those kind of words. And much more.*

This sort of response reveals a lot about Det. Minnis. Is he so blind that he cannot see the flashing lights? Family support is not indicative of manipulation. The accusation that Patrick Bradford has been skillfully manipulating his entire extended family for 20 years from behind the walls of his prison cell is nothing short of ridiculous. It is very clear to (most) people that Patrick has the support of his family because he was unjustly accused and convicted of a heinous crime that they believe him incapable of committing--not simply because of his good nature but because the facts support his innocence.

Minnis' determination to defend his position--particularly to a group of college kids in Missouri-- 20 years later tells a startling truth about his conscience. Not only can he not put this conviction to bed, he feels the need to do some damage control. Methinks he doth protest too much! What Minnis should consider is this: The truth can't be buried or explained away. It is here to stay and so is Bradford's support.

 

UPDATE

The Indiana Court of Appeals has granted the Attorney General a final extension to file its Brief of Appelee. The new deadline is Nov. 15, 2012. Following that, Public Defender Hope Fey will have until Dec. 3 to file a Reply Brief, but may request one further extension. After the Reply Brief is filed, the pleadings will be closed. The Court of Appeals will have an undetermined amount of time to make a decision.