"Cutting to the Core of America's Justice System"

That's what 60 Minutes claims it's doing with its coverage of Alton Logan's case.  But it's hard to see how the story accomplishes that goal; the reporting of Logan's seemingly wrongful conviction focuses almost exclusively on two criminal defense lawyers for another man, Andrew Wilson, who confessed to the crime many years ago.  Indeed, in the television interview, the reporter subjects Wilson's lawyers to some rigorous questioning about why they didn't disclose Wilson's confession at the time of Logan's initial trial.  (For a nice discussion of admissibility issues in the case, see here.)

The problem with the story, which is otherwise a good one, is that it fails to explore the true cause of wrongful convictions.  If the reporters really wanted to "cut to the core of America's justice system," they would have questioned the prosecutor about why he/she focused on Alton Logan in the first place.  They would have questioned the jury, which nearly sentenced Logan to death, and asked them why they found the case against Logan to be so compelling.  And they would have spoken to the three eye witnesses, who all fingered Logan in the crime.  Why were they all wrong?  The answers to these questions would cut to the core of the American justice system, but they received nary a mention on the show. 

So before anyone, including the press or the public, criticizes Wilson's lawyers, ask why the system seems to have failed in Logan's case and why it has failed so regularly in Illinois and elsewhere.

Comments

[Alan Childress]

I totally agree. Everyone seemed to be all OK with the fact that he was wrongly convicted, with no focus on whether other actors were skimping on their jobs while the two lawyers were doing theirs.

Plus I am amazed at the lack of cause and effect logic going on. The lawyers did not find out the info by accident. It was told to them because they were perceived as following an ethics rule of non-disclosure. The people who are outraged seem to think that this one case exists in isolation, as if the lawyers could have come forward with no cost to other like cases. Put another way, had the guilty guy been afraid of confidentiality (a result if some previous case like this had resulted in a public violation to save THAT one person), then guilty guy says nothing to these two lawyers and innocent guy has zero chance of getting out now. The fact that he has a chance now is evidence the system of confidentiality worked, all while -- as you point out -- other parts of the system failed.

The logic of outrage is the same that says Fred Brown lost the NCAA game for Georgetown when he threw the ball to James Worthy. It's focusing on the last few seconds. And forgetting all those points Brown scored in the game.

[Michael Meyerhofer]

With all due respect, I think you're missing the point. Sure, the prosecutors and the cops obviously dropped the ball, as did the jury--but chances are, they at least THOUGHT Logan was guilty. Wilson's lawyers didn't just think Logan was innocent; they KNEW it! And they did nothing.

Perhaps what the lawyers did is not currently illegal, but it is absolutely immoral and contrary to the spirit of law and justice. Imagine that you had to rot in a cell all those years for a crime you didn't commit, just so a couple lawyers who could have saved you but didn't could cash in on their professions. What an outrage!

Incidentally, I highly doubt that in a case like this, Wilson's lawyers actually would have been disbarred for breeching attorney-client privilege, anyway! If they were, they could EASILY have shared their story with the media and been hailed as heroes. Even if they weren't reinstated after public outcry, they could have made a fortune writing a book about their experience and gaining massive celebrity status.

That's why these particular lawyers are being viewed with such disdain, even more so than the morons who put Logan in jail in the first place. And rightly so.

[David Berger]

The issue at stake here is the morality of the requirement that the attorney-client privilege be maintained in a case like this. It appears to me that the exceptions to the privilege are far too narrow. I understand that it is acceptable to violate confidentiality to prevent an illegal act of killing or extreme violence, but not if the killing will be done legally by the state. The guidelines, I believe, permit the violation of confidentiality if the client refuses to pay but not if an innocent party will have his or her life-savings stolen. I have so far written with far greater restraint than I feel. We are dealing here with a system that makes the old joke that the term "legal ethics" is an oxymoron all too telling. By maintaining such guidelines, the legal profession is complicit in perpetrating atrocities and deserves every bit of the withering contempt to which it is often subjected.