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 |  Subject: Star Chamber: Charges Are Dropped, and Identity of Accuser, Shrouded by City, Is Sought  Tue Sep 30, 2014 9:02 pm | |
| For five years, Kenneth Creighton was held in jail, suspected of involvement in the killing of a bystander outside a bodega in the Bronx.
In 2012, the charges were dropped. Mr. Creighton was released from Rikers Island. He has since filed a lawsuit against New York City for false arrest and malicious prosecution, and has sought the name of his accuser — a man who told the police that he saw Mr. Creighton hand a gun to his brother, Dior, who was charged in the shooting.
Criminal defendants, generally, have the right to know and confront their accusers. But when the accuser happens to be a confidential witness, the calculus can be more complicated.
Thus far, despite one judge’s ruling against them, lawyers for the city have resisted identifying the witness.
The city says the informant, who is cited in documents as male, “strenuously objects” to having his name revealed because he has known Mr. Creighton “for a very long time” and also knows the Creighton family. The informant “maintains a relationship” with Mr. Creighton and his family, the city says, and believes Mr. Creighton has “no idea” that he helped the police and that he testified before the grand jury.
“The informant fears that he would be in physical danger of retaliation if the plaintiff knew his identity,” the city said in a court filing seeking to keep the informant’s identity secret.
In the court system, the parties to a lawsuit have broad rights to gather evidence, a process called discovery, including information about probable witnesses against them. Initially, when the city refused to divulge the informant’s name, Mr. Creighton’s lawyers objected. A magistrate judge, Debra Freeman of the Federal District Court in Manhattan, then ordered that the lawyers be given the name on an “attorney’s eyes only” basis, meaning that they could not tell their client.
In April, after further arguments, Judge Freeman ruled that the name should also be given to Mr. Creighton, an order the city has appealed to Judge Paul G. Gardephe, also of Federal District Court. The order has been stayed pending his decision.
Mr. Creighton’s lawyers have said in court papers that not being able to reveal the informant’s name to their client has hamstrung them in their case. They cannot discuss the informant with their client, or what motives he might have had for incriminating him, nor can they question other people about the informant, because that would reveal his identity.
And, because the informant still has dealings with Mr. Creighton and his family, who are all unaware of his role in the case, the informant is the “equivalent of a legal spy,” Mr. Creighton’s lawyers, Michael Jaffe and Richard Gross, said in court papers.
“At the end of the day,” Mr. Jaffe said in an interview, “a person who has spent five years at Rikers Island wrongly accused should have every right and every opportunity to be able to pursue a case on their own behalf and confront their accuser.”
The city’s Law Department and the Bronx district attorney’s office declined to comment for this article. In court papers, the city has argued that “the public interest” in keeping the informant’s identity secret “is substantial,” and has asked Judge Gardephe to reverse Judge Freeman’s ruling.
More: http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/01/nyregion/charges-are-dropped-and-the-secret-identity-of-an-accuser-is-sought.html?_r=0 |
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