Posted on 11/25/2001 11:48:39 AM PST by Deadeye Division
Plea deals in gun cases can create fatal results
11/25/01
Mark Rollenhagen and Mike Tobin
Plain Dealer Reporters
Maurice Freeman was among 84 people arraigned before Judge Eileen Gallagher in about two hours on the morning of June 20.
Most of the others were suspected drug addicts, small-time dope dealers and thieves. Freeman was accused of being an armed crack dealer, but in the world of the Cuyahoga County Justice Center, his background wasn't particularly alarming.
His rap sheet included three misdemeanors and a felony conviction for driving a stolen car, but the county's records, which don't track gun criminals, didn't reflect his history of violence and using weapons while committing crimes.
Gallagher set Freeman's bond at $5,000, and the next day he was released from jail. A month later, three people were shot dead, and Freeman was back behind bars, charged with murder in their slayings.
Plea bargains lubricate the justice system, making it possible to resolve thousands of cases a year in the county without trials. But a Plain Dealer review of dozens of court cases found that the deals made involving gun-toting criminals can have tragic consequences.
In Freeman's case, even after he was back in jail for the three killings, the violence continued. A carload of young men seeking revenge for the death of one of the victims rolled into Freeman's neighborhood just north of University Circle and opened fire. Freeman's friends fired back.
When the shootout was over, an innocent child was dead: 12-year-old Warren Culbreath was hit by a stray bullet that tore through the vinyl siding and drywall of his house.
The violence that gripped a few blocks of the Glenville neighborhood of Cleveland this summer will be revisited in two separate murder trials that begin in the Justice Center tomorrow morning: one for Freeman, for one of his three murder charges, and one for Sundiata Langford, Mike Jones and JuJuan Norman, the three men charged in Warren's death.
There is no way to determine how often prosecutors deal away firearms charges because county officials do not track gun crimes or gun criminals. But a sample of cases examined by The Plain Dealer shows that even among the most chronic armed and violent criminals, gun charges have been dealt away or reduced.
In about half of 100 cases involving 44 defendants, the criminals received no additional penalty for possessing or using a gun during their crimes.
The plea bargains and the county's recordkeeping can bury previous gun allegations deep in a paper file or computerized docket, distorting the criminals' histories and the severity of their run-ins with the law.
So in a crowded system, Maurice Freeman remained below the radar.
And he was not alone.
Caseload pressures
Many of the victims of unchecked violence are drug dealers and gangs, but some are innocents like Warren. And one was Cleveland Patrolman Wayne Leon.
Leon's killer, Quisi Bryan, got deals in three gun cases in the mid-1990s. If a three-year gun sentence had been tacked onto the time Bryan spent in prison for a 1994 robbery, he would have been in prison instead of on the streets the day he killed Leon.
Plea bargains are a fact of life in the justice system, especially in Cuyahoga County, where 15,000 new indictments each year force prosecutors to resolve thousands of cases without going to trial.
"It's impossible to give every defendant their day in court," said U.S. Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones, county prosecutor from 1991 until 1999. "The criminal justice system would be turned on its head. Prosecutors who say they don't plea bargain aren't being truthful. But at the same time, no one gave away the farm."
Sometimes the deals are prompted by weak cases and uncooperative victims or witnesses, or a gun turns out to be inoperable and is therefore exempt from a state law requiring mandatory prison time. Prosecutors settle for some prison time or a felony conviction and probation rather than risk losing a case entirely. Pleas can also force defendants to give up their rights to an appeal.
Sometimes prosecutors make a deal to get one criminal to testify against another.
"No case is the same, and supervisors have to look at each set of facts," Tubbs Jones said. "But when you start talking to witnesses, reviewing the forensic evidence, sometimes deals are made."
Big-city prosecutors often deal away gun charges because they are overrun by drug cases, said Daniel Webster, a professor at Johns Hopkins University and co-director of the school's Center on Gun Policy.
"Prosecutors are under tremendous pressure to get their caseloads manageable," Webster said. "And one of the ways they do that is with gun cases."
But pleading away gun cases leads to more crime and violence in the city's worst neighborhoods, he said. "We know the nature of the problem. The problem is when we have guns in high-density crime areas."
Tim Miller and Rick Bell, supervisors in the office of county Prosecutor William Mason, said improved computer software that Mason wants to buy would help them better track gun criminals.
"It's not difficult to have a [database] field that says, 'GUN,' " Bell said.
The computer printouts and other paperwork that prosecutors and the court's bond commissioner now rely on to decide how large of a bond to ask for can be misleading.
An obscured past
Looking at a printout of Maurice Freeman's criminal record before this summer, Bell said recently: "There's no bells or whistles going off in my head."
The printout showed Freeman had once been charged with felonious assault but it didn't show that a gun was involved.
There also was no mention of Benjamin McDougall.
On the night of March 28, 1997, McDougall and his friends went to a house party on Itasca Ave. They were leaving when Maurice Freeman arrived.
Freeman picked a fight with the younger teens and then ran to a car and, according to trial testimony, asked Alfred Holly for a gun. Shots were fired from two guns - a 9mm and .25-caliber.
Freeman's nephew Brian Howard later testified that he saw McDougall "fly in the air" when a bullet pierced his back.
McDougall ran behind an apartment building and collapsed. The next morning a neighbor looked out her window and saw him lying in the grass. He had bled to death.
Freeman, then 18, was arrested a few days later as a murder suspect.
Homicide detectives interviewed him twice, and eventually he insisted that Holly killed McDougall.
Freeman was charged with two counts of felonious assault that accused him of shooting at two other youths. Because prosecutors said Freeman had a gun, the charges carried a mandatory three-year prison sentence in addition to a sentence for assault. Holly was charged with murder.
Freeman testified against Holly, and prosecutors dropped the gun charges, which could have put him in prison until at least 2002. He pleaded guilty to aggravated menacing and was sentenced to six months in County Jail.
A place of hope
The shooting went largely unnoticed a few blocks away, where young families were moving into newly built homes that were part of an effort to revive Glenville.
Just north of Case Western Reserve University and the museums of University Circle, the neighborhood had been in decline for decades before city officials offered tax abatements and encouraged banks to write mortgages in the area.
Among the couples attracted to the new homes were letter carrier John Knight and Lisa Culbreath, a food service worker at Collinwood High School. They bought a new house on E. 120th St. near Moulton Ave. The location was perfect: across the street from Mary M. Bethune Elementary School, where their sons, John Knight Jr. and Warren Culbreath, would attend classes.
A few months after the Knights and Culbreaths moved into their new home in the summer of 1998, Freeman was back on the streets. He hung out with a group of young men who in the early 1990s became known as the "Rockland" street gang because they sold rocks of crack cocaine along Ashbury Ave.
Knight and Culbreath knew the history but believed the neighborhood was making a comeback. They didn't know Maurice Freeman.
On the couple's first Christmas Eve in the new house, Rayshawn Moore, a friend of Freeman's, was shot once in the head a couple of blocks away, at E. 123rd St. and Superior Ave. Freeman drove Moore to Mt. Sinai Hospital, but he died minutes later. Freeman was questioned by homicide detectives, but no charges were filed. The case remains unsolved.
The next fall, two men were walking on Superior Ave. when a car that police say was driven by Freeman pulled alongside them. A man in the passenger seat pointed a gun and said, "Don't run now."
The men ran, and Freeman's passenger started shooting. One of the bullets hit one of the men in the leg.
A few minutes later, police saw Freeman's car at E. 120th St. and Moulton Ave. - just a few doors north of Warren Culbreath's house. When Freeman realized he was being followed by police, he stopped the car and ran.
Freeman was arrested, but the gunman escaped.
A month later, police chased Freeman down E. 120th St. again. This time, his car jumped the curb and uprooted trees and shrubs in a yard a few houses south of Warren's.
He was arrested on charges of possessing a stolen car and punching a police officer. In April 2000, Freeman was sentenced to six months in prison for the stolen car and assault.
This year, he was in trouble again. In March, police found him in an abandoned house on E. 123rd St., behind Warren's. Freeman had several rocks of crack cocaine and two handguns and was sent back to prison for two more months for violating parole.
He had finished serving his prison term when he was arraigned on June 20 by Gallagher on gun and drug charges stemming from the March arrest. He pleaded not guilty and the next day walked out of jail after posting the $5,000 bond.
Gallagher said recently that she would have set a higher bond if she had known more about Freeman's background with guns and violence. Judges, who can arraign up to 150 people in one morning, are concerned they don't know enough about the accused criminals standing before them, she said.
"Obviously the system we have isn't working properly," Gallagher said.
Back on the streets
It didn't take long for some people to learn that Freeman - known as "Rece" - was back on street.
Kecia Harmon told police she was walking home from work on July 14 when Freeman and three other men stopped her. She said that Freeman was angry because Harmon's boyfriend had told a bail bondsman where to find his nephew.
Freeman was the first to jump her, Harmon told police. The other three men joined in, punching and kicking Harmon for five minutes, breaking her nose, cutting her face and putting her in the hospital.
Two days later, prosecutors say, Freeman shot Alfonso Amos, 29, while they were in Amos' car. Freeman allegedly pushed Amos from the car on E. 115th St. near Beulah Ave. and drove off.
Bleeding and asking strangers to hold his hand, Amos identified Maurice Freeman as the man who shot him, police said. A few hours later, Amos died.
Freeman was charged in all three deaths (he goes on trial tomorrow for Amos' slaying) and later with beating Harmon. But the violence did not end with Freeman's arrest at a house on E. 83rd St. near Superior Ave. on July 25. Johnson's friends sought revenge.
After dark on Aug. 15, some of the young men from Eddy Rd. got guns and drove to Freeman's neighborhood, Johnson's relatives say. They came across a group of young men sitting on a porch on Kelton Ave., around the corner from Warren Culbreath's house.
They opened fire and sped around the corner to E. 120th St. As they raced past Warren's house, their targets shot back.
Warren, who had been clowning with his sister on their front porch, ran inside. He was scrambling up the steps to the second floor - probably heading for his bedroom - when the bullet ripped through the walls of his parents' dream house.
Contact Mark Rollenhagen at:
mrollenhagen@plaind.com, 216-999-6326
Contact Mike Tobin at:
mtobin@plaind.com, 216-999-4141
They got what they asked for, I Mean it is illegal to own a gun in Cleveland.
11/25/01
were combined and one was reduced to "attempted" carrying of a concealed weapon. He was sentenced to two years of probation.
A year later, Bryan shoved a gun into Freddie Belcher's side and robbed him. Prosecutors dismissed a gun charge that would have sent Bryan to prison for three years in addition to any sentence for the robbery. Instead, he pleaded guilty to attempted robbery and served 3½ years. Nineteen months after being released from prison, Bryan shot Leon in the face after the officer approached him at the gas station near E. 40th St. and Community College Ave.
Bryan was convicted of aggravated murder and sentenced to death. Leon is survived by his wife and three small children.
NATHANIEL HILL
Age: 27
Last address: 1000 block of E. 74th St., Cleveland.
Princess Williams used to while away the summer nights sitting on the porch of her Collinwood home, waving to neighbors.
All that changed Feb. 18, when Nathaniel Hill and two other men burst into her house, threw her to the ground and put a gun to her head.
The men bound Williams' hands and feet with cord, then pulled down Williams' pants and threatened to rape her with the handle of a dust pan. They asked her where her son was and ransacked the house, looking for money and drugs.
"I knew I was going to die then and there because I only had $15 and a credit card," Williams said.
The trio left without shooting her, and Hill was eventually arrested. He was sentenced to 12 years in prison on robbery and gun charges, but Williams, 50, wonders why he was on the street in the first place.
Though Hill was arrested with a loaded gun three times between 1997 and 1998, he never served more than a few months in jail because of a series of plea deals and dismissals.
DAKUS COLLINS
Age: 28
Last address: 3800 block of E. 142nd St., Cleveland.
In 1993, Dakus Collins used a .380-caliber Glock pistol to rob two people of $400 and clothes. Two years later, he robbed 19-year-old Anthony Reglus and shot him in the leg. Nine days later, Reglus and Collins argued over gambling debts and Collins shot Reglus again, this time killing him.
The two robbery cases were combined, most of the charges were reduced, and the firearm charges were dropped. Collins was sentenced to five years in prison.
Two years later, while sitting in prison, Collins was charged with aggravated murder for the death of Reglus. Again, the firearms charge was deleted and Collins pleaded guilty to less serious charges. He was sentenced to 6½ years in prison - to be served concurrently with the time from the earlier robberies.
In total, Collins had 10 gun charges dropped.
Collins "just killed him, and it was like nobody cared," said Michael Reglus, Anthony's uncle.
Collins will be released from prison in 2003.
MAURICE FREEMAN
Age: 23
Last address: 1100 block of E. 74th St., Cleveland.
James Gilmer was shaken last summer when he heard that Maurice Freeman had been charged in the killings of three people in two days.
"I was surprised that he was not in jail," Gilmer said.
Freeman was one of the initial suspects in the killing of Gilmer's stepson, Benjamin McDougall, in 1997. Freeman provoked the fight that led to the shooting but blamed the killing on a friend and testified against him.
In an agreement with prosecutors, Freeman pleaded guilty to aggravated menacing, a misdemeanor, and was sentenced to six months in jail.
Last spring, after Freeman served a six-month prison term for driving a stolen car and assaulting a police officer, police found him with rocks of crack cocaine and a loaded 9 mm handgun.
He was sent back to prison for 60 days for violating his parole. On June 20, Freeman was arraigned on new drug and gun charges stemming from the spring arrest and walked out of the County Jail after posting $5,000 bail.
A month later, police say, Freeman killed Kenneth Johnson and Starr Hudson. Two days later, they say, he killed Alfonso Amos.
The problem is when we have criminals in high-density crime areas. Guess what happens when you don't go after the criminals, and outlaw guns instead? What you see here.
Prosecutors do plea bargaining with any kind of felony. Don't believe me? Talk to any assistant DA - or visit any courtroom where such plea deals are made for a day.
As a court-appointed lawyer, I once got a woman facing 55 years - most for felony forgery, rest for dozens of bad checks - down to three years probation on misdemeanors; that was despite an extensive prior record. I also got a guy facing 30 years for crippling an innocent man he beat with a chair leg in a gang attack down to 10 years - also despite an extensive prior felony record.
It's not about guns - but about a criminal-justice system in meltdown. Plea bargaining does let DAs clear dockets by the end of the day - but it very soon has them facing the same guys back again. Plea bargaining is worse than worthless.
(A) Gun control in Cleveland does not reduce criminal behavior, because the criminal element does not abide the laws. That's what makes them criminals.
(B)The revolving door criminal justice system, in it's socialist wisdom, is a failure, except for expanding government, and keeping lawyers busy.
God Bless America!
How proud you must be.
Tell me, did these fine, upstanding, misunderstood people go on to victimize any other citizens when they should have been in jail?
And they ask my why I don't like lawyers.
Is that so difficult to figure out?
On the one hand, I'd like to get your name/number in case I ever need to kill or maim someone, and don't want to do a lot of time.
On the other hand, since it's unlikely I'll ever do anything like that unless I'm legally defending myself, I think I'll just hope you get hit by a truck, and never practice law again.
Why not send them to the one of these remote Islands (personally, I prefer the Aleutians) and give them full sentences? In a couple of years, the load will be off the court systems except for newbies. Surely there is room on some of these remote Islands for thousands of these criminals to serve full and complete sentences! 100,000? 1,000,000? Who knows? Who cares? Maybe a few will die in prison of old age or disease (or cold, or bugs)?
Let's open up a new "Devils Island" and watch the crime rate plummet in Cleveland and everywhere else in America!
MARK A SITY
http://www.logic101.net/
Are you proud of these accomplishments?
--Boris
I call this the "Coventry approach", due to a story by Robert Heinlein.
My solution is similar: take 100,000 square miles of Dakota Badlands or lease a similar patch of British Columbia. Surround it with a triple electrified "death fence" and patrols with armed guards and dogs. Anyone escaping will be shot on sight.
Anyone who is convicted of a felony gets a one-way trip to "Coventry"; a survival pack, a parka, and a hearty shove out of an airplane with a parachute. Every sentence is a life sentence without possibility of parole.
Break the social compact...adios.
It's humane, and the anti-death-penalty types should love it. It's cheap.
BTW, Heinlein's protagonist (who got sentenced to Coventry for punching somebody in the nose) found the society that had evolved there was very orderly and polite...
--Boris
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