Wednesday 8/22 Court Report: bail, discovery, DNA

Addressing a tense courtroom packed with both supporters and police,
Judge Philip Moscone electrified supporters when he announced major
bail reductions for the six bailable defendants in the SF 8 case.

Ray Boudreaux: $ 385,000

Richard Brown: $ 420,000

Hank Jones: $ 600,000

Richard O'Neal: $ 200,000

Harold Taylor: $ 350,000

Francisco Torres: $ 660,000

Moscone noted that "danger to public safety" was not an issue in his
decision, and arrived at the varying amounts based on 1) the
seriousness of allegations against each individual in the Ingleside
charge and the overt acts of the conspiracy charge, and 2) likelihood
of appearance, noting that all the men have had stable residences for
a long time and have strong family and community ties.

Moscone preceded his announcement with the statement that "not
everyone" would be happy with what he was going to do. Following the
bail announcement, scores of police, including Detective Erdelatz
(the SFDP zealot who has pursued the men for three decades) left the
courtroom.

Family members and supporters stated that they expected to be able to
raise the reduced bails. Supporters who wish to discuss offering
their property as collateral towards bail should call for an
explanation of the process: (415) 226-1120.

Problems with discovery compliance

The rest of the morning addressed discovery issues.

Stuart Hanlon, attorney for Herman Bell, summarized a major problem:
Although the prosecution has turned over the equivalent of more than
200,000 pages, the documents are so disorganized it is as if those
pages were strewn on the floor randomly. After months of effort by 20
workers over hundreds of hours, the defense still cannot locate the
documents it needs. In addition, countless portions of the documents,
including contact information for every single witness, have been
blacked out.

Hanlon also argued that the basis of the current prosecution was
supposed to be "new" evidence relating to DNA and ballistics. But
where was the evidence?

DNA

Michael Burt, attorney for Ray Boudreaux, added that the prosecution
denied having DNA reports for over a year, but when reports were
provided a few days ago, it was clear the government had had them
since 2006 - and they were still incomplete. "We need every test that
they have done," Burt said. The defense noted that the partial DNA
reports released by the state recently not only show no matches to
any of the eight, one of them matches the profile of one of the
state's experts, indicating contamination of evidence.

Hanlon added that instead of ballistics reports the prosecution has
given them statements by police. "Declarations don't mean a thing,"
Hanlon asserted. "After 25 years of seeing police lie outright in the
case of Geronimo Pratt, I want to see evidence, not declarations."

Next court date

Moscone ordered the discovery issues to continue on Tuesday, August
28. He will meet with the attorneys alone at 9:30, and the official
court hearing will begin at 1:30. Motions about timeliness and
prosecutorial delay will be filed after discovery is resolved.

_______________________________________________
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Committee for the Defense of Human Rights (CDHR)
PO Box 90221
Pasadena, CA 91109
(415) 226-1120
FreetheSF8 [at] riseup.net