Walter Ogrod was convicted of murder in 1992 and coerced into confessing to a crime he didn’t commit. He sat on death row for 20 yrs trying to clear his name. Luckily, he was able to and was released in July.
Walter is just one of many who have been exonerated from death row.
172 people have been found innocent and released from death row since 1973. That’s an average of 3.5 wrongfully convicted people exonerated each year. How many are not being exonerated? How many people are still being unjustly sentenced to death every year?
As we know from stories like Walter Ogrod, the justice system makes mistakes and willfully prosecutes innocent people.
The system is not foolproof. The cost is too high. We need to #EndTheDeathPenalty
He was wrongfully convicted of murdering two federal agents. Prosecutors have admitted that they have no evidence of Leonard's involvement in the killings, and the US Parole Commission determined that his conviction was faulty.
But earlier this year, they denied Leonard's parole.
He is 79 and his health is failing. His next available hearing will be in 2026. It's likely that he won't survive that long.
Why do the feds want Leonard to die in prison?
Because he embarrassed them, repeatedly:
This all started back in 1953, when Congress passed a resolution calling for the termination of all Native reservations, the ending of recognition of Native tribes, and the forced relocation of Natives from their reservations, from their land that was rightfully theirs, to inner city housing projects.
In order to hasten this policy along, the government cut off all commerce and supply of food and other goods to or from the reservations.
The choice the government gave the Natives was clear:
Move, or starve.
(Later court decisions would rule the termination policy illegal, as it blatantly violated the treaties between government & the tribes)
Leonard was an adolescent living on the Turtle Mountain Chippewa reservation during the time of termination, and it led him to become a warrior for the property rights of Natives.
Leonard's first battle with the feds was in 1970, when he and his compatriots took over the abandoned Fort Lawton in Washington State.
Fort Lawton was on surplus federal land which, according to the law, belonged to the Natives once it had been abandoned.
The government came in heavily armed and arrested the Natives, but they had already won. The courts ruled that the takeover was perfectly legal. Fort Lawton is now a Native cultural center.
For those who don't understand what Chevron Deference is, and why SCOTUS ended it, here's the long and short of it:
A family fishing company, Loper Bright Enterprises, was being driven out of business, because they couldn't afford the $700 per day they were being charged by the National Marine Fisheries Service to monitor their company.
The thing is, federal law doesn't authorize NMFS to charge businesses for this. They just decided to start doing it in 2013.
Why did they think they could away with just charging people without any legal authorization?
Because in 1984, in the Chevron decision, the Supreme Court decided that regulatory agencies were the "experts" in their field, and the courts should just defer to their "interpretation" of the law.
So for the past 40 years, federal agencies have been able to "interpret" laws to mean whatever they want, and the courts had to just go with it.
It was called Chevron Deference, and it put bureaucrats in charge of the country.
It's how the OHSA was able to decide that everyone who worked for a large company had to get the jab, or be fired.
No law gave them that authority, they just made it up.
It's how the ATF was able to decide a piece of plastic was a "machine gun".
It's how the NCRS was able to decide that a small puddle was a "protected wetlands".
It's how out-of-control agencies have been able to create rules out of thin air, and force you to comply, and the courts had to simply defer to them, because they were the "experts".
Imagine if your local police could just arrest you, for any reason, and no judge or jury was allowed to determine if you'd actually committed a crime or not. Just off to jail you go.
That's what Chevron Deference was.
It was not only blatantly unconstitutional, it caused immeasurable harm to everyone.
Thankfully, it's now gone.
We haven't even begun to feel the effects of this decision in the courts. It will be used, for years to come, to roll back federal agencies, and we'll all be better of for it.
And that's why politicians and corporate media are freaking out about it.
More to the point, the end of Chevron Deference means the end of this:
Meet the Hernandez family. That's Matt and Tuckey smiling with their beautiful young daughters.
Over the past few months, the Georgia state government has ripped this family apart, because one of their daughters has a medical condition that the court refuses to acknowledge.
This all started when Matt and Tuckey noticed some swelling in the lower legs of Emma, their infant daughter.
They took her to a pediatrician, who did some bloodwork and referred them to the ER. After an x-ray of her legs, the hospital's Child Abuse Physician reported possible child abuse, despite the fact that the bloodwork results indicate a genetic disorder as the reason for her injuries.
@GADFCS authorities seized Emma and placed her with her Aunt and Uncle.
Two weeks later, a case worker visited the Hernandez home and determined that their older daughter, Arya, is obviously happy and well cared for.
The next day, Tuckey was arrested for battery and cruelty to children.
Matt is not allowed to communicate with Tuckey, and Tuckey is not allowed to communicate with Matt or her daughters.
While in the Aunt and Uncle's care, Emma developed a rash on her feet.
The state took Emma from them and sent her to the hospital, where she was put on a feeding tube and given other treatments without any of the family's knowledge or consent.
Emma and Arya were then placed with a foster parent.
At their first visitation, Matt noted that both Emma and Arya had signs of neglect, including cold, mottled skin and discoloration on one of Emma's legs.
The foster parent dismissed his concerns, and DFCS had no interest in hearing them either.
After months of fighting to get copies of Emma's medical records, including from when he first took her to the ER, DFCS finally gave them to him.
Two months later at their first court hearing, medical experts testified that Emma has either neonatal rickets or osteogenesis imperfecta, both of which are medical disorders which cause the types of injuries she has, and that there is no sign of physical abuse.
The judge refused to admit their testimony, choosing instead to rely on the hospital's Child Abuse Physician, who brought no paperwork and did not appear to understand these disorders.
While this hearing is going on, Emma and Arya are transported to a visitation center to meet with Matt. But Matt's in court, and obviously couldn't be in two places at once. The state either messed up their visitation schedule, or intentionally scheduled it so he wouldn't be there. Arya was devastated.
With each visit, Matt sees Arya become more and more withdrawn and depressed, and Emma become more injured and sickly.
During one of the visits, when the case worker came into the room, Arya got scared and ran behind Matt. The caseworker accuses Arya of being racist, and smiles throughout the interaction, clearly enjoying the fear she's causing.
And just last week, Matt found out that his visitations are being cut in half, and they are moving Emma and Arya to a new foster family, instead of back to their Aunt and Uncle.
This case was brought to our attention by the Williams family, who was in temporary custody of Emma and Arya when their foster mother went on vacation. After seeing how much these girls want to go home, the Williams began to investigate, and discovered the horrific tragedy that the state is putting the Hernandez family through.
Despite their own policies, and despite the fact that the caseworker's report states that reunification is the goal of this case, the state of Georgia has refused to acknowledge Emma's medical condition, choosing instead to assume that she's being abused, and continues to prosecute Tuckey and persecute the entire family.
We hoped that these officials would do the right thing, but they seem to be hell-bent on destroying the Hernandez family.
We are going to reunite this family, and here's how you can help:
Email the officials I've listed in the next post in this thread, and tell them to acknowledge Emma's condition, return Emma and Arya to their parents, and drop all charges. And be RESPECTFUL, don't give these people a chance to act like the victims here. You know how much government officials love to make it about them, don't give them that opportunity.
And be sure to repost this, so as many people as possible can help us reunite the Hernandez family in time for the holidays.
OK, here are the officials involved and their emails. Again, be respectful. Don't give them a chance to pretend to be the victims:
Candace Broce - Head of DFCS
candace.broce@dhs.ga.gov
Penny A. Penn - District Attorney
No email listed - Phone: (770) 781-2125
Caroline Yi - Assistant District Attorney
cyi@forsythco.com
Sarah Eller - Investigator w/ DFCS
sarah.eller@dhs.ga.gov
Mackenzie McCray - Case Worker
mackenzie.mccray@dhs.ga.gov
Nikki Cannon - Case Worker Supervisor
nikki.cannon@dhs.ga.gov
Cara Bowen - Forsyth County Director
No email listed - Phone: 770-781-6717
Latisha Flesher - Regional Director
No email listed - Phone: 770-532-5361
Every day, @YATPOfficial fights for people like the Hernandez family to get the respect they deserve.
A police officer lied to Porter and told him he put someone in a hospital, and he killed himself.
Back in May of 2018, Porter got into a minor fender bender with another vehicle. No one was hurt.
Whether he didn't know what happened, or he was scared, for whatever reason he drove away.
Officer Matthew Kerby of the @SeattlePD was tasked with finding Porter.
In the body cam footage of the incident, Kerby says he's going to lie to find him. "It's a lie, but it's fun" he says.
Kerby tells Porter's friend that Porter "was involved in a hit-and-run earlier and left a woman in critical condition" and that "she might not survive."
CPS workers took their newborn child, and put her in foster care, where her health is declining, because they used a midwife's services instead of a pediatrician's.
Temecia gave birth to their third child, Mila, at home. They used the services of Dr. Edinbyrd, a certified midwife.
After Mila was born, Rodney and Temecia took her to a pediatrician for a newborn checkup.
The pediatrician told them that Mila had some jaundice, and recommended treatment.
Rodney and Temecia had their midwife, Dr. Edinbyrd, performed the treatment.
Because they didn't use the pediatrician's services, the pediatrician contacted CPS.