Thread by @radleybalko

New from me: Landon Quinn was convicted of two murders based on a single eyewitness. The lone witness saw the killer through the neck hole of a t-shirt. At night. As the killer ran by. While sitting in a truck. Talking on a cell phone.

There’s more ...

washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/…

The witness gave a defense investigator a description of the killer that could not have been Quinn. This was in the public defender file the entire time. The jury never heard about it. Because the public defenders were handling 300 felonies per year...

washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/…

. . . And forgot to follow up. They also never interviewed an alibi witness.

But there’s more.

The eyewitness had also just been caught with 60 kilos of cocaine. The jury never heard about that, either. Instead . . .

washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/…

... the prosecutor told the jury the eyewitness was “a monument to truth.”

4 lower judges opted to give Quinn a new trial. They were reversed by the LA Supreme Court, 6-1.

3 black judges heard Quinn’s petition. All would have ordered a new trial.

washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/…