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Friday 12 April 2013

The Angola 3: a tragedy in the Louisiana judicial system

http://www.thehullabaloo.com/views/article_1644e6b0-a2f0-11e2-affa-001a4bcf6878.html
Posted: Thursday, April 11, 2013 4:39 pm
Brendan Lyman
For 41 years, Albert Woodfox and Herman Wallace have been wrongly detained in solitary confinement, the majority of that time spent in the infamous Angola Prison. April 17 will mark the anniversary of one of America’s great injustices. And yet, just four days later, more than 7,000 spectators will visit the site of the injustice for entertainment at the Angola Rodeo.
On the heels of a successful education campaign last spring, human rights groups launched a petition asking Attorney General Caldwell to respect the district court’s ruling. In one month, an Amnesty International petition gained close to 16,000 signatures, including those of Tulane students.
Held in cells that Woodfox described as “maybe four or five steps for the length and about three steps for the width”, the Angola 3 have spent much of their collective 100 years in these cells for 23 hours a day. This treatment qualifies as cruel and unusual punishment, but, in the tradition of Louisiana’s judicial system, the story of the Angola 3 is wrought with injustice.
On April 17, 1972, prison guard Brent Miller was murdered. Woodfox and Wallace were charged without a single piece of physical evidence. The two men, along with the third member of the Angola 3, Robert King, were placed in solitary confinement despite the absence of legal reason.
In the years since their conviction, it has become apparent that not only was there no physical evidence, but the main state’s witness, fellow prisoner Hezekiah Brown, lied on the stand to receive perks, including freedom in exchange for his testimony.
In 2001, after 29 years in solitary confinement, Robert King became the only freed member of the Angola 3. This was after pleading guilty to conspiracy charges of an in-prison murder in which, again, no physical evidence existed.
Citing problems in the original trial, Louisiana retried Woodfox in 1998. He was convicted again.
In 2008, a U.S. District Court ruled that Woodfox had been denied the right to adequate counsel and should be freed or retried. The state appealed and won.
Once again, Louisiana faced problems. In February of this year, U.S. District Court Judge James Brady found serious discrimination in the jury pool for the trial and called to retry or release Woodfox.
In response to the 16,000 signature petition, the attorney general drafted an email and had his office individually respond to every signature.
The official email is one more example of the gross injustice in the Angola 3 case. Attorney General Caldwell references crimes that Woodfox and Wallace were never charged with, and supplies information that has been ruled inaccurate and misleading. The email should come as no surprise, however, as Caldwell has used language in the past, implying he has a personal vendetta against the Angola 3.
Louisiana’s prison industrial complex is alive and strong, but too often we lose sight of the individual cases that make it such a tragedy. The Angola 3 case represents a small amount of the injustice in Louisiana. Attorney General Caldwell should heed the repeated calls from the U.S. District Court and human rights groups to fairly try and release Woodfox and Wallace. The citizens of Louisiana deserve a functional justice system. As long as the injustice persists, it’s clear that King, and countless others, won’t rest until his friends and comrades are freed.
Brendan Lyman is a sophomore in the Newcomb-Tulane College. He can be reached for comment at blyman@tulane.edu
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