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By SHARON COHEN
AP National Writer
CHICAGO —
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.
“Open it,” Kunz said, impatiently.
And so, Coventry began reading aloud the five-line declaration the lawyers had written more than a quarter-century before:
An innocent man was behind bars. His name was Alton Logan. He did not kill a security guard in a McDonald’s restaurant in January 1982.
“In fact,” the document said, “another person was responsible.”
——
They knew, because Andrew Wilson told them: He did it.
But that was the catch.
Lawyer-client privilege is not complete; most states allow attorneys to reveal confidences to prevent a death, serious bodily harm or criminal fraud. But this case didn’t offer that kind of exception.
So when Andrew Wilson told his lawyers that he, and not Alton Logan, had killed the guard, they felt powerless — aware of information that could free a man they believed to be innocent, but unable to do anything with that knowledge. And for decades, they said nothing.
As they recall, Wilson — who was facing charges in the February 1982 murders of police officers William Fahey and Richard O’Brien — was even a bit gleeful about the McDonald’s shooting. To Kunz, he seemed like a child who had been caught doing something naughty.
“I was surprised at how unabashed he was in telling us,” he says. “There was no sense of unease or embarrassment. … He smiled and kind of giggled. He hugged himself, and said, ‘Yeah, it was me.’”
Alton Logan already had been charged with the McDonald’s shooting that left one guard dead and another injured. Another man, Edgar Hope, also was arrested, and assigned a public defender, Marc Miller.
Miller says he was stunned when his client announced he didn’t know Alton Logan and had never seen him before their arrests. According to Miller, Hope was persistent: “You need to tell his attorney he represents an innocent man.”
Hope went a step further, Miller says: He told him Andrew Wilson was his right-hand man — “the guy who guards my back” — and urged the lawyer to confirm that with his street friends. He did.
Miller says he eventually did tell Logan’s lawyer his client was innocent, but offered no details.
First, though, he approached Kunz, his fellow public defender and former partner.
“You think your life’s difficult now?” Miller recalls telling Kunz. “My understanding is that your client Andrew Wilson is the shooter in the McDonald’s murder.”
Coventry and Kunz brought Wilson to the jail law library and this, they say, was when they confronted him and he made his unapologetic confession. They didn’t press for details. “None of us had any doubt,” Coventry says.
And, he adds, it wasn’t just Wilson’s word. Firearms tests, according to court records, linked a shotgun shell found at McDonald’s with a weapon that police found at the beauty parlor where Andrew Wilson lived. The slain police officers’ guns also were discovered there.
Now the lawyers had two big worries: Another killing might be tied to their client, and “an innocent man had been charged with his murder and was very likely … to get the death penalty,” Kunz says.
But bound by legal ethics, they kept quiet.
Instead, they wrote down what they’d been told. If the situation ever arose where they could help Logan, there would be a record — no one could say they had just made it up. They say they didn’t name Wilson, fearing someone would hear about the document and subpoena it. They didn’t even make a copy.
But on March 17, 1982, Kunz, Coventry and Miller signed the notarized affidavit: “I have obtained information through privileged sources that a man named Alton Logan … who was charged with the fatal shooting of Lloyd Wickliffe … is in fact not responsible for that shooting … ”
Knowing the affidavit had to be secret, Wilson’s lawyers looked for ways to help Logan without hurting their client. They consulted with legal scholars, ethics commissions, the bar association.
Kunz says he mentioned the case dozens of times over the years to lawyers, never divulging names but explaining that he knew a guy serving a life sentence for a crime committed by one of his clients.
There’s nothing you can do, he was told.
Coventry had another idea. He figured Wilson probably would be executed for the police killings, so he visited him in prison and posed a question: Can I reveal what you told me, the lawyer asked, after your death?
“I managed to say it without being obnoxious,” Coventry says. “He wasn’t stupid. He understood exactly what I was asking. He knew he was going to get the death penalty and he agreed.”
Coventry says he asked Wilson the same question years later — and got the same answer.
But ultimately, Wilson was sentenced to life in prison without parole.
His death penalty was reversed after he claimed Chicago police had electrically shocked, beaten and burned him with a radiator to secure his confession. (Decades later, a special prosecutor’s report concluded police had tortured dozens of suspects over two decades.)
Logan’s case was working its way through the courts, too. During the first of two trials in which he was convicted, Coventry walked in to hear part of the death penalty phase. “It’s pretty creepy watching people deciding if they’re going to kill an innocent man,” he says.
The lawyers had a plan if it came to that: They would appeal to the governor to stop the execution. But with a life sentence, they remained silent.
Still, there were whispers. When Logan changed lawyers before his second trial, Miller says the new lawyer approached him. He had heard that Miller knew something more.
Please, he asked, can you help?
Miller says he told him he could do nothing for him. But he says he repeated the words he had uttered to Logan’s first lawyer, more than a decade earlier:
“You represent an innocent man.”
——
In prison, Alton Logan heard the news: First, Andrew Wilson had died. Second, there was an affidavit in his case.
“I said finally, somebody has come (forward) and told the truth,” Logan says. “I’ve been saying this for the past 26 years: It WASN’T me.”
In January, the two lawyers, with a judge’s permission, revealed their secret in court.
Two months later, Marc Miller testified about his client’s declaration of Logan’s innocence.
But an affidavit and sworn testimony do not guarantee freedom — or prove innocence.
And Alton Logan knows that. After spending almost half his 54 years as an inmate, this slight man with a fringe of gray beard, stooped shoulders and weary eyes seems resigned to the reality that his fate is beyond his control.
“I have to accept whatever comes down,” he says, sitting in a visitor’s room at the Stateville Correctional Center in Joliet.
He insists he’s not angry with Edgar Hope — the man who first said he was innocent — or even Andrew Wilson. He says he once approached Wilson in prison and asked him to “come clean. Tell the truth.” Wilson just smiled and kept walking.
Nor is Logan angry with the lawyers who kept the secret. But he wonders if there wasn’t some way they could have done more.
“What I can’t understand is you know the truth, you held the truth and you know the consequences of that not coming forward?” he says of the lawyers. “Is (a) job more important than an individual’s life?”
The lawyers say it was about their client — Wilson — not about their jobs, and they maintain that the prosecutors and police are at fault.
Kunz says he knows some people might find his actions outrageous. His obligation, though, was to Andrew Wilson.
“If I had ratted him out … then I could feel guilty, then I could not live with myself,” he says. “I’m anguished and always have been over the sad injustice of Alton Logan’s conviction. Should I do the right thing by Alton Logan and put my client’s neck in the noose or not? It’s clear where my responsibility lies and my responsibility lies with my client.”
On April 18, Logan will be in court as his lawyer, Harold Winston, pushes for a new trial. Along with the affidavit, Winston has accumulated new evidence, including an eyewitness who says Logan wasn’t at McDonald’s and a letter from an inmate who claims Wilson signed a statement while in prison implicating himself in the murder — and clearing Logan.
But obstacles remain.
Logan can’t depend on Edgar Hope. According to his attorney, Hope probably will exercise his Fifth Amendment rights against self-incrimination.
And he’ll have to deal with eyewitnesses. His lawyer says one person changed her story in the two trials, but a second, the security guard injured in the shooting, did not. (A third, who has since died, had acknowledged that Wilson and Logan looked alike.)
Logan prefers not to look too far ahead or think too far back. He refuses to dwell on missed opportunities — marriage, children, job. “You cannot live with the situation I’m in and say, ‘What if?’”
He says if he is released, he’ll move to Oregon to be with his brother. “After spending 26 years in this hellhole, I want to get as far away from here as I possibly can,” he says.
Last month, the Chicago Sun-Times, in an editorial, urged the attorney general or governor to release Logan, noting his claims of innocence “ring achingly true.” (The state has declined comment on the case.)
Logan keeps a copy of the 26-year-old affidavit in his cell. Every now and then, he reads the single paragraph, trying to divine what the lawyers were thinking and if this piece of paper will help unlock the prison doors.
He’s not banking on it.
“I’m not sold on it,” he says. “The only time I’ll be sold is when they tell me I can go.”
For now, though, Alton Logan waits. The heavy prison doors clank behind him as he walks down the corridor to his cell. He does not look back.
1 response so far ↓
1 Eli El // Apr 14, 2008 at 9:42 am
Please continue to support Obama as well as The National Democratic Party. The National Democratic Party has an agenda for empowerment of ALL Americans, including African-American Men. We aim to accelerate the implementation of the Democrats’ forward-looking strategies for the advancement of African-American Men and at removing all the obstacles to African-American Men’s active participation in all spheres of public and private life through a full and equal share in economic, social, cultural and political decision-making. This means that the principle of shared power and responsibility should be established in the workplace and in the local communities. Equality of African-American is a matter of human rights and a condition for social justice and is also a necessary and fundamental prerequisite for equality, development and peace for all human beings. A transformed partnership based on equality between African-American Men all other groups is a condition for people-centered sustainable development. A sustained and long-term commitment is essential, so that African-American Men can work together for themselves, for their children, and for society to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century.
The National Democratic Party reaffirms the fundamental principle set forth by The Constitution, which the human rights of African-American Men are an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of universal human rights. As an agenda for action, the National Democratic Party seeks to promote and protect the full enjoyment of all human rights and the fundamental freedoms of all African-American Men throughout their lives. It respects and values the full diversity of African-American Men’s situations and conditions and recognizes that some African-American Men face particular barriers to their empowerment. The National Democratic Party requires immediate and concerted action by all to create a peaceful, just, and humane world based on human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the principle of equality for all people of all ages and from all walks of life, and to this end, recognizes that broad-based and sustained economic growth in the context of sustainable development is necessary to sustain social development and social justice.
The success of the National Democratic Party and African-Americans require a strong commitment on the part of community leaders, private and public corporations, non-profit organizations and institutions at all levels. It will also require adequate mobilization of resources at the national and international levels as well as new and additional resources to the developing countries from all available funding mechanisms, including multilateral, bilateral and private sources for the advancement of African-American Men; financial resources to strengthen the capacity of national, sub-regional, regional and international institutions; a commitment to equal rights, equal responsibilities and equal opportunities and to the equal participation of African-American Men in all national, regional and international bodies and policy-making processes; and the establishment or strengthening of mechanisms at all levels for accountability to African-American Men.
The National Democratic Party’s support of African-American Men is taking place as the world stands poised on the threshold of a new millennium. The formulation of the National Democratic Party is aimed at establishing a basic group of priority actions that should be carried out during the next few years. The National Democratic Party, which set out specific approaches and commitments to fostering sustainable development and cooperation and to strengthening the role of the African-American Men to that end.
The full realization of all human rights and fundamental freedoms of all African-American Men is essential for the empowerment of African-American Men. While the significance of national and regional particularities and various historical, cultural and religious backgrounds must be borne in mind, it is the duty of States, regardless of their political, economic and cultural systems, to promote and protect all human rights and fundamental freedoms. The implementation of this mission, including through national laws and the formulation of strategies, policies, programs and development priorities, is the sovereign responsibility of each State, in conformity with all human rights and fundamental freedoms, and the significance of and full respect for various religious and ethical values, cultural backgrounds and philosophical convictions of individuals and their communities should contribute to the full enjoyment by African-American Men of their human rights in order to achieve equality, development and peace. The full and equal participation of African-American Men in political, civil, economic, social and cultural life at the national, regional and international levels, and the eradication of all forms of discrimination are priority objectives of this country. The universal nature of these rights and freedoms is beyond question.
The end of the cold war has resulted in international changes and diminished competition between the super-Powers. The threat of a global armed conflict has diminished, while international relations have improved and prospects for peace among nations have increased. Although the threat of global conflict has been reduced, wars of aggression, armed conflicts, colonial or other forms of alien domination and foreign occupation, civil wars, and terrorism continue to plague many parts of the world. Grave violations of the human rights of African-American Men occur, particularly in times of financial recession.
In this context, the social dimension of development should be emphasized. Accelerated economic growth, although necessary for social development, does not by itself improve the quality of life of the population. In some cases, conditions can arise which can aggravate social inequality and marginalization. Hence, it is indispensable to search for new alternatives that ensure that all members of society benefit from economic growth based on a holistic approach to all aspects of development: growth, equality between African-American Men, social justice, sustainability, solidarity, participation, peace and respect for human rights.
Widespread economic recession, as well as political instability, has been responsible for setting back socio-economic goals for many African-American Men. This has led to the expansion of unspeakable poverty, home foreclosures, unemployment, and incarceration. Of the more than 5 million people living in abject poverty, African-American Men are an overwhelming majority. The rapid process of change and adjustment in all sectors has also led to increased unemployment and underemployment, with particular impact on African-American Men. In many cases, structural adjustment programs have not been designed to minimize their negative effects on vulnerable and disadvantaged groups or on African-American Men, nor have they been designed to assure positive effects on those groups by preventing their marginalization in economic and social activities. Absolute poverty, unemployment, continued violence against African-American Men and the widespread exclusion of humanity from institutions of power and governance underscore the need to continue the search for development, peace and security and for ways of assuring people-centered sustainable development. The participation and leadership of the humanity that is essential to the success of that search. Therefore, only a new era of cooperation among peoples based on a spirit of partnership, an equitable, social and economic economy, and equal partnership will enable America to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century.
African-American Men are key contributors to the economy and to combating oppression through both remunerated and unremunerated partnerships, in the community and in the workplace. Growing numbers of African-American Men have achieved economic independence through gainful employment.
Only 50% of all African-American households are headed by African-American Men and most of those households are dependent on female income even where men are present. Female-maintained households are very often among the poorest because of wage discrimination, occupational segregation patterns in the labor market and other gender-based barriers of both male and female African-Americans. Family disintegration, population movements between urban and rural areas, family court decisions, international migration, war and internal displacements are factors contributing to the rise of female-headed households.
Recognizing that the achievement and maintenance of peace and security are a precondition for economic and social progress, African-American Men are increasingly establishing themselves as central actors in a variety of capacities in the movement of humanity for peace. The current state of Foreign Relations is mainly due to the exclusion of African-American males within the upper ranks of government. Their full participation in decision-making, conflict prevention and resolution and all other peace initiatives is essential to the realization of lasting peace.
Religion, fatherhood, spirituality, and belief play a central role in the lives of millions of African-American Men, in the way they live and in the aspirations they have for the future. The right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion is inalienable and must be universally enjoyed. This right includes the freedom to have or to adopt the religion or belief of their choice either individually or in community with others, in public or in private, and to manifest their religion or belief in worship, observance, practice and teaching. In order to realize equality, development and peace, there is a need to respect these rights and freedoms fully. Religion, thought, conscience and belief may, and can, contribute to fulfilling African-American Men’s moral, ethical and spiritual needs and to realizing their full potential in society. However, it is acknowledged that any form of extremism may have a negative impact on African-American Men and can lead to violence and discrimination.
The growing strength of the non-governmental sector, particularly African-American Men’s organizations, has become a driving force for change. Non-governmental organizations have played an important advocacy role in advancing legislation or mechanisms to ensure the promotion of African-American Men. They have also become catalysts for new approaches to development. Many Americans have increasingly recognized the important role that non-governmental organizations play and the importance of working with them for progress. African-American Men, through non-governmental organizations, have participated in and strongly influenced community, national, regional and even global forums and international debates.
On average, African-American Men represent a mere 1 per cent of all elected legislators and in most national and international administrative structures, both public and private, they remain underrepresented. African-American Men play a critical role in the family. The family is the basic unit of society and as such should be strengthened. It is entitled to receive comprehensive protection and support. In different cultural, political and social systems, various forms of the family exist. The rights, capabilities and responsibilities of family members must be respected. African-American Men make a great contribution to the welfare of the family and to the development of society, which is still not recognized or considered in its full importance. The social significance of paternity, fatherhood and the role of parents in the family and in the upbringing of children should be acknowledged. The upbringing of children requires shared responsibility of parents, African-American Men and society as a whole. Paternity, fatherhood, parenting and the role of African-American Men in procreation must not be a basis for discrimination nor restrict the full participation of African-American Men in society. Recognition should also be given to the important role often played by African-American Men in many countries in caring for other members of their family.
Many African-American Men face particular barriers because of various diverse factors. Often these diverse factors isolate or marginalize such African-American Men. They are, inter alia, denied their human rights, they lack access or are denied access to inexpensive education and vocational training, employment, housing and economic self-sufficiency and they are excluded from decision-making processes. Such African-American Men are often denied the opportunity to contribute to their communities as part of the mainstream. Often they are exploited by the Federally Subsidized Student Loan industry. The past decade has also witnessed a growing recognition of the distinct interests and concerns of African-American Men, whose identity, cultural traditions and forms of social organization enhance and strengthen the communities in which they live.
In the past 20 years, the world has seen an explosion in the field of communications. With advances in computer technology and satellite and cable television, global access to information continues to increase and expand, creating new opportunities for the participation of African-American Men in communications and the mass media and for the dissemination of information about African-American Men. However, global communication networks have been used to spread stereotyped and demeaning images of African-American Men for narrow commercial and consumerist purposes. Until African-American Men participate equally in both the technical and decision-making areas of communications and the mass media, including the arts, they will continue to be misrepresented and awareness of the reality of African-American Men’s lives will continue to be lacking. The media have a great potential to promote the advancement of African-American Men and the equality of African-American Men by portraying African-American Men in a non-stereotypical, diverse and balanced manner, and by respecting the dignity and worth of the human person. Poverty and economic degradation are closely interrelated. While poverty results in certain kinds of economic stress, the major cause of the continued deterioration of the global economy is the unsustainable patterns of consumption and production, particularly in industrialized countries, which are a matter of grave concern and aggravate poverty and imbalances.
Significant knowledge and information have been generated about the status of African-American Men and the conditions in which they live. Throughout their entire lives, African-American Men’s daily existence and long-term aspirations are restricted by discriminatory attitudes, unjust social and economic structures, and a lack of resources in most countries that prevent their full and equal participation.
The male child of today is the African-American Man of tomorrow. The skills, ideas and energy of the male child are vital for full attainment of the goals of equality, development and peace. For the male child to develop his full potential he needs to be nurtured in an enabling economy, where his spiritual, intellectual and material needs for survival, protection and development are met and his equal rights safeguarded. If African-American Men are to be equal, in every aspect of life and development, now is the time to recognize the human dignity and worth of the male child and to ensure the full enjoyment of his human rights and fundamental freedoms, including the rights assured by The Constitution, universal ratification of which is strongly urged. Yet there exists world-wide evidence that discrimination against African-American boys begins at the earliest stages of life and continues unabated throughout their lives. They often have less access to nutrition, physical and mental health care, and education and enjoy fewer rights, opportunities and benefits of childhood and adolescence than other groups. They are often subjected to various forms of economic exploitation, and violence.
Concerns
• Inequality in economic structures and policies, in all forms of productive activities and in access to resources
• Inequality between African-American Men and all other groups in the sharing of power and decision-making at all levels
• Insufficient mechanisms at all levels to promote the advancement of African-American Men
• Lack of respect for and inadequate promotion and protection of the human and fundamental rights of African-American Men
• Stereotyping of African-American Men and inequality in African-American Men’s access to and participation in all communication systems, especially in the media
• Racial inequalities in the management of natural resources and in the safeguarding of the economy
• Persistent discrimination against and violation of the rights of the male child
The National Democratic Party recognizes that African-American Men face barriers to full equality and advancement because of such factors as their race, age, language, ethnicity, culture, religion or disability, because they African-American Men or because of other status. Many African-American Men encounter specific obstacles related to their family status, particularly as single parents; and to their socio-economic status, including their living conditions in rural, isolated or impoverished areas. Many African-American Men are also particularly affected by economic disasters, serious and infectious diseases and various forms of violence.
The economic role of African-American Men, especially married African-American Men, has been undergoing a major transformation since the early nineties. These changes have inspired a large and varied literature, some of it focusing primarily on African-American Men’s labor-market status and some on the familial implications of African-American Men’s expanded work roles. African-American Men’s rising unemployment has led to a decrease in the desirability of marriage and hence is responsible for what is increasingly being called the “retreat from marriage” or, alternatively, the “decline of marriage.” I hope that you critically examine both the theoretical basis of this hypothesis and the empirical research on the matter.
A long-standing and influential tradition in the social science literature is the importance of differentiated sex roles for a stable marriage system. The major gain to marriage lies in the mutual dependence of spouses, arising out of their specialized functions - the African-American Man in domestic production (and reproduction). Marriage then involves trading the fruits of these different skills. In response to economic growth and the rising inflation and child support it produces, however, African-American Men’s market work declines. The result is that African-American Men become less specialized and more economically dependent, leading, in turn, to a decline in the desirability of marrying or of staying married.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/03/20/national/20blackmen.html
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