Dirty secrets and sweet deals
The dirty secret is how much of the system rests on evidence given by the guilty in exchange for a reduced punishment ...
Martorano’s case, a reward. Those deals remain secret unless they go to trial. And since 95 percent of cases never do, the public never really knows how most justice is actually dispensed, according to Alexandra Natapoff, professor at Loyola Law School and author of “Snitching.”
“What we have is sort of a black market of guilt and information that runs underneath the transparent and accountable justice system,” Natapoff said. he Whitey Bulger trial was The vast majority of cases end in a supposed to be about the plea deal, so most crimes in America long arm of justice holding are resolved not by judges and juries, a bad guy accountable, after but by prosecutors who decide behind all these years. But last closed doors which party gets treated week, it showcased just the opposite: a as innocent and which gets treated as bad guy walking free. guilty, based on who is willing to talk.
The prosecution’s star witness, Don’t get me wrong. There is nothJohnny Martorano, an admitted muring inherently bad about turning little derer of 20 people, spent only 12 years fish against big fish. Informants save in prison. Because he decided to cooptime and money, and get convictions erate, the feds put roughly $6,000 into that wouldn’t have been possible othhis prison bank account over those erwise. Forgiving the little guy is worth years. After his release, Uncle Sam it, if that’s what’s required in order to gave him $20,000 in “start-up” funds, bring down a bigger evil. But too often, andlethimkeepsome$200,000worth the system doesn’t work like it should. of ill-gotten gains. Sometimes it’s the big fish that tells
On the witness stand, Martorano on the little fish: Jorge Luis Sandoval, looked like a frowning sack of potatoes who ran a massive methamphetamine as Henry Brennan, Bulger’s lawyer, trafficking ring in San Francisco, ratquestioned him. ted out his own foot soldiers. And
“Your partner now is the federal sometimes the little fish gets stiffer government, isn’t it Mr. Martorano?” punishment than the big fish: Stepha
That extraordinary moment pulled nie George, caught with half a kilo of back the curtain on the everyday cocaine in her attic in Pensacola, Fla., machinery of criminal justice, the part was sentenced to life in prison because we rarely get to see. The dirty secret is she had no information to trade. Her how much of the system rests on eviformer boyfriend, the drug dealer who dence given by the guilty in exchange hid it there, only got 15 years. for a reduced punishment — or, in Sometimes people looking for leni-
Tency make up information out of whole cloth.
At least 68 death row inmates have been exonerated and released from prison after convictions based on the testimony of witnesses who had an incentive to lie, according to Rob Warden, director of Northwestern University’s Center onWrongful Convictions.
“That’s almost half of all death row exonerations since the death penalty was restored,” he said. “Most of this testimony is ‘Hey, he confessed to me. I was in jail with him.’” The concept of getting rewarded for blaming a crime on someone else is nothing new. But the heavy reliance on informants is relatively recent. According to Ethan Brown, author of “Snitch,” the practice exploded in the 1980s, after the passage of tough drug laws that established severe mandatory minimum sentences, but offered dramatic reductions for cooperation.
Whitey, of course, is the classic cautionary tale of a snitch gone wrong. It took a particularly tenacious federal judge to uncover the fact that Whitey was an FBI informant, even as he committed murder and other crimes. The case sparked congressional hearings and new Justice Department regulations.
But last week, it was hard to see what had really changed. The government got in bed with Martorano so it could use him against Whitey. Is that so terribly different from using Whitey against the Mafia?