[Freethe SF8] Wednesday 8/22 Court Report: bail, discovery, DNA

[SF-8 case]

Bail Reduced!

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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