New laws crack down on jail informants
A movement to put jailhouse informants under a more powerful microscope before they testify is gaining traction across the country, a byproduct of new DNA testing technology that has exonerated dozens of people wrongly locked up based on informants’ lies.
Several states have moved to toughen regulations on the use of such informants, whose credibility has always been an issue because they’re motived to get their sentences reduced.
The new rules include requiring pretrial hearings on whether prisoners’ testimony should be allowed and forcing prosecutors to disclose any deals with informants as well as their history of testifying in other cases.
In Connecticut, Democratic Gov. Ned Lamont signed a wide-ranging bill in July that will create the nation’s first statewide system to track the use of jailhouse informants, including any benefits offered in exchange for their testimony.
“We’re really seeing the issue gain momentum around the country,” said Rebecca Brown, policy director for the New Yorkbased Innocence Project, which works to exonerate the wrongly convicted. “Jailhouse informant testimony is one of the leading factors in wrongful convictions.”
Of the 365 people exonerated nationwide by DNA evidence, nearly one in five were convicted based in part on lying informants, according to the Innocence Project.
Federal court rulings and the Constitution do require prosecutors to turn over certain information about witnesses, including exculpatory evidence favorable to the defense. But civil liberties advocates say new laws are needed to specify exactly what kind of information must be disclosed including key details about informants.
While prosecutors agree that there needs to be skepticism about jailhouse informants, they say such witnesses offer crucial, truthful information that helps bring perpetrators to justice in many cases. Some worry that new informant laws take witness credibility determinations out of the hands of juries and leave it to judges to decide before cases even go to trial.
Fellow inmates were key in bringing down Connecticut serial killer William Howell, who is serving a life sentence for killing seven people in 2003. One of Howell’s cellmates, convicted killer of four Jonathan Mills, told authorities that Howell talked about the killings and where he buried the victims. It’s not clear whether Mills, also serving life in prison, received any benefits for providing the information.