Both men received life sentences for the crimes that they were convicted of. Logan, left, and Wilson are seen above. Alton Logan has been in prison for 26 years for a murder he said he never committed. Now, lawyers for Wilson who died last year said their client admitted to the crime in 1982. They have come forward with an affidavit they signed that year, declaring Logan was not responsible for the shooting of a McDonald’s security guard in Chicago.
A 26-Year-Old Secret Could Free Inmate
By SHARON COHEN,
AP
CHICAGO (April 12) – For nearly 26 years, the affidavit was sealed in an envelope and stored in a locked box, tucked away with the lawyer’s passport and will. Sometimes he stashed the box in his bedroom closet, other times under his bed.
It stayed there — year after year, decade after decade.
Then, about two years ago, Dale Coventry, the box’s owner, got a call from his former colleague, W. Jamie Kunz. Both were once public defenders. They hadn’t talked in a decade.
“We’re both getting on in years,” Kunz said. “We ought to do something with that affidavit to make sure it’s not wasted in case we both leave this good Earth.”
Coventry assured him it was in a safe place. He found it in the fireproof metal box, but didn’t read it. He didn’t need to. He was reminded of the case every time he heard that a wronged prisoner had been freed.
In January, Kunz called again. This time, he had news: A man both lawyers had represented long ago in the murder of two police officers, Andrew Wilson, had died in prison.
Kunz asked Coventry to get the affidavit.
“It’s in a sealed envelope,” Coventry said.
Here is the full story.
Did the two lawyers do the right thing by keeping quiet knowing that an innocent man is behind bars for 26 years? What would you have done if you were these two lawyers?
I would have put the two lawyers in the same cell with Laugherty and Sloani.
Why did it take them a year after their clients die? That’s ridiculous.
These two lawyers have as much integrity and honesty as Laugherty. These guys give their profession a bad name. Logan should sue both of them. Unbelievable.
Too ridiculous for words! The law shouldallow the innocent to take all of the assets of guilty lawyers!
Ethical lawyers? That’s an oxymoron. I agree that the innocent guy should sue the 2 lawyers.
I know that it’s a horrible thing for the man who served a sentence for a crime he apparently didn’t commit. It’s easy to be angry at the two lawyers, but remember, they were bound by law and the judicial code of ethics to NEVER break the attorney-client privilege and disclose anything revealed to them by a client as long as he lived. Had they done so, they would likely have been disbarred, criminally charged, and the confession would have been inadmissable in court. The real culprit here was the guy who committed the crime and refused to publicly confess so that an innocent man could go free.
The real culprit is an ethical code which allows such an injustice to take place. Logic and common sense must provide for exceptions to the code to be made in extraordinary circumstances such as this one.
If he gets a chance he should kill the both of them. No.
Killing is too good , they deserve to be tortured.
The culprit is the person who uses an ethical code to avoid behaving ethically.
It would be normal in a decent society for the lawyers to go privately to the prosecutors and between honest men who believe in justice, should let out enough information to allow the right thing to be done.
The lawyers, as human beings, are obliged to take some risk. There is a higher duty to be followed.
yall a bunch of dumb monkeys.
why not make an attorney tell the jury every thing his client told him.
any type of fair legal representation requires that a defendant can speak with his attorney confedentialy.
with you jokes as judges even more people would be wrongfully convicted.
yup, agree that the two lawyers, sloanoski and his cohort ecjohnson deserve to be put to jail..
The Judicial system does not work period. The O.J. Simpson murder trial has proved this. He was innocent of two vicious murders (he committed) but guilty of the civil wrongful death lawsuit where more evidence (THE TRUTH) can be told in a court of law. The reality, if youre rich in this country you can buy your way out of prison with the best legal criminals on earth! As far as the innocent man spending 26 years in prison, there is no dollar amount that can be placed on 26 years of lost life in a hell hole of prison. What a travesty of justice!
Everyone is angry about the lawyers. But what about the judges that convicted a person (in life sentence) with him being inocent? How strong was their case? Maybe the fact that was coloured helped them rule this decision?
The lawyers did their job. They could have quited, but they were not suppose to tell what they knew. The jury on the other hand, how and why was convinced about the guilt of an obviously inocent person?
On another note, could cases like this (which are far more frequent than you may think), serve as (one more) argument against death penalty?
you live in a sick society, come to europe.
Yes, there ARE a lot of liers in the US. So what? What if that Afro-American who admitted lied? I read someplace that 1/5 or 1/10 Afro-Americans are behind bars. And no chocolate bars either.
As I understand it, the two lawyers did not ‘know that an innocent man was behind bars’.
All they had was the claim by another man that he had committed the crime.
The lawyers’ behaviour should be assessed in the context of their Code of Professional Practice.
There is no need for all the ranting elsewhere – and I’m not sure what the point of the original post was. Are one or both of Susan/Paul doing a Legal Module at TTU?!
Mere admission is not enough. If the court is unable to prove, based on fresh evidence that Wilson committed the crime, then Logan is still guilty based on the evidence that got him incarcerated in the first place.
Lawyer and Lier…Ain’t that the same thing?
“Lawyer and Lier…Ain’t that the same thing?”
Yes, Court (and some other) Lawyers are Liers by definition, I puke on the profession.
“I’m not sure what the point of the original post was.”
The point was that in Europe/Russia this would not happen, it’s unimaginable. Read between the lines, guys.
NATO should bomb American Lawyers.
Lawyer bashing does not further the cause of justice. We need an Ethics Code which allows for exceptions to be made in the case of extraordinary circumstances. As to the OJ trial, it did show that the adversary system does work for rich people. Now we need to take the next step and see that it works for poor and middle class people as well. The United States has the highest percentage of its population in jail in the world. More lawyers are convicted as criminals that practice criminal law. Lawyers who lie are punished…Bill Clinton was suspended for seven years for his lies.
If lawyers breach code of ethics- they should be sentenced to death.
I made the original point that the lawyers were constrained by the Judicial Code Of Ethics from betraying a client’s confidence. Others have pointed out, and I agree, that there should be a process that allows exceptions in such exceptional cases. I’m no fan of lawyers and think our justice system in the US is seriously flawed, but a client has to have complete confidentiality when speaking to his attorney.
As for some other comments here, one person asked how could an obviously innocent man be convicted. First, it’s extremely unlikely that it WAS obvious he was innocent, or else he wouldn’t have been convicted. Despite possibly being wrong, there was likely significant evidence that he did it.
Second, we don’t know for sure that he didn’t commit this crime… we’re only assuming so since someone else has confessed to it. We don’t know if that confession is legitimate (lots of criminals, and inmates especially, have confessed to crimes they didn’t commit for various reasons). We assume it was a truthful confession and that the guy convicted is innocent, but we simply don’t have enough information to know that for sure.
In Russian and Europe (except England), they hang you and then they give you a trial hahaha!!!!!
To the post “Nato should bomb American lawyers”… NATO doesnt have the guts just like Europe.