Myth or fact: Revisiting Rosenthal's detective-as-attorney gambit
The Chronicle's resident plagiarist Rick Casey couldn't resist piling on Chuck Rosenthal in today's newspaper. In the column, he presents an interesting 1986 story about Rosenthal as fact:
I do wonder what was his first clue that his judgment was impaired.
Was it in 1986 when he sent undercover cops to pose as defense lawyers to question jail inmates about drug offenses?
The allegations from 1986 were recently reported by Mike Tolson in a Chron recap of Rosenthal's career:
In 1986, for example, his tactics as a prosecutor were questioned when he was accused of sending two undercover police officers posing as defense lawyers into the city jail to talk with a defendant there on cocaine charges. The alleged trick was an attempt to learn more about a reported kidnapping. Even Holmes questioned whether his assistant, one of two prosecutors assigned to the case, had pushed the envelope on what was appropriate.
"The question is whether there was a breach in a privileged communication between lawyer and client," Holmes said at the time. "You are on dangerous ground when you do that."
Note that Tolson reported that the matter was alleged to have happened -- even though Casey reported it in his column as fact.
Tolson seems to have "borrowed" heavily from a 2003 story by now-departed Chronicle reporter Steve McVicker (who may shed further light on the matter in a forthcoming Texas Monthly article on Rosenthal):
In 1986, Rosenthal's tactics as a prosecutor came under fire when he was accused of sending two undercover police officers posing as defense lawyers into the city jail to talk with a defendant in a drug case. The suspect, Miguel Cortez, had been arrested on cocaine charges after police received a tip about an alleged abduction. Rosenthal was one of two prosecutors assigned to the case.
The alleged trick was an attempt to learn more about the reported kidnapping. Even Holmes questioned whether his assistant had pushed prosecutorial ethics to the limits.
"The question is whether there was a breach in a privileged communication between lawyer and client," Holmes said at the time. "You are on dangerous ground when you do that."
Cortez's attorney was considerably more critical, both then and now.
"I thought it showed poor judgment," Dan Gerson recalled. "I thought it showed a willingness to cross the ethical line, and that Rosenthal believes that the end justifies the means."
Gerson said he filed a complaint against Rosenthal with the State Bar, but no action was ever taken.
That would seem to indicate that the matter of sending detectives into jail posing as attorneys was never confirmed as fact.
Finally, let's turn back to 1986, when another familiar Chron reporter (Rad Sallee) reported on the allegations:
The attorney for one of 10 men arrested Tuesday night on cocaine charges after police received a tip about an alleged abduction and torturing says two Houston officers, acting on prosecutors' advice, posed as lawyers to trick the suspect and his common-law wife.
If Miguel Cortez and Bridget Sparrow are telling the truth, and if prosecutors Terry Wilson and Chuck Rosenthal authorized the ruse, any evidence gained from them would be inadmissible in court, defense attorney Dan Gerson said.
[snip]
Gerson said Officer U.P. Hernandez and an Officer Garcia posed as attorneys to speak to Cortez in City Jail Wednesday. (Gerson did not know Garcia's first name, and others with HPD did not know such an officer.)
[b]Gerson said the two also talked with Sparrow Wednesday night at the home of a friend who apparently was a police informant.[/b]
"The friend had told her these were really top-notch attorneys," Gerson said. "The `attorneys' told her they wanted her to give them $20,000 to post bonds for Miguel." No bond had been set, since no charges had been filed at that time, Gerson said.
He said the officers also told Sparrow that "immigration was asking questions" about Cortez.
"They wanted to know where she was going to get (the money), and even wanted to follow her to where she was going to get it," Gerson said. "She didn't have the money, and felt uncomfortable with them and called me."
[b]Wilson and Rosenthal could not be reached, but District Attorney John B. Holmes Jr. said Rosenthal told him the officers posed only as attorneys for the informant.[/b]
"The facts as I understand them is that they (the police) had been using a snitch who is a friend of the dope dealers," Holmes said. "The thinking was that if they (the suspects) were going to tell anyone where their stash was, it would probably be this snitch."
If the officers only pretended to be the informant's lawyer, Holmes said, no attorney-client privilege was established and they were "just a prop" for the deception.
I couldn't find any other related stories in the Chronicle archives on this matter. It seems pretty clear that Rosenthal did send detectives to pose as attorneys with someone not in custody, in the hopes that it would set off a chain of events that would lead investigators to the money stash. But it doesn't seem as clear that Rosenthal sent the detectives in to pose as attorneys for a jailed inmate (in which case, Casey shouldn't have reported it as fact, but as an allegation).
Are there any blawggers or longtime Houstonians who remember this incident and can shed further light on it? If so, please leave us a comment or send me an email (publiustx-at-gmail.com) that I can append to the post.
Posted by Kevin Whited @ 02/17/08 01:56 PM | Print |
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