This Week in Innocence

There are so many things wrong with this story, it's hard to know where to begin.

Woods was arrested in 2006 on child molestation charges, his case put off nine times ultimately never making it to trial. Eventually, attorney Jennifer Hinkebein Culotta got the case last year, visited Woods in the Clark County jail and she had a lot of questions about the allegations.

"They alleged somebody had placed a 4-foot long weed-eater wire into the penis of a child," said Culotta, of Culotta and Cullota LLP in Jeffersonville, Indiana…

Woods spent two years in jail before he met with a single defense attorney.

"I just thought medically that cannot be physically possible that a weed-eater wire that's not sterilized would stay in a body eight years without any possible medical repercussions," Culotta said of reviewing the case.

After she petitioned for the child's medical reports last year, Culotta discovered an important piece of evidence that occurred one year before Woods was arrested. "In the medical reports, one year prior there had been a CT scan of the pelvis and it's apparent that there was no weed-eater wire there," Culotta said of the findings.

The news was enough to get Woods out of jail just in time for last Christmas. Still the case isn't over yet.

"In this situation we had police officers, prosecuting officers, we had the court system we had defense attorneys, if all those people are not actively investigating the case and working the case properly then you end up like we have with Donald Woods," Culotta said. "An innocent person sitting in jail for two plus years."

Woods is suing.

Comments

[robc]

Despite being local to me I had heard nothing about this case until this link.

Im assuming they pulled 4 ft of weedeater wire out of a 13 year old? Any backstory?

If so, there is still a possible criminal out there, unless the kid did it himself.

[J sub D]

The vengeful ex screams child abuse and the suspect is presumed guilty. Why waste time with an investigation and quaint legal nicities like the right to counsel?

Donald Woods is lucky he wasn't a day care center employee, then he'd be facing a multitude of charges.

There are so many things wrong with this story, it's hard to know where to begin.

A veritable tsunami of legal system incompetence to be sure.

[Art-P.O.G.]

Bizarre. I wonder why the case was put off nine times.

[Jeffersonian]

He turned me into a newt!!

[Tricky Prickears]

Sounds like a violation of his Sixth Amendment rights, for starters.

[Shannon Love]

It unlikely but possible to have something inserted in the urethra for many years without developing an infection. The urethra is topologically outside the body (like the intestines) so the immune system walls it off. I doubt it could be done without causing persistent discomfort and obvious problems urinating.

This case exposes an even grimmer possibility than an adult spending two years in jail. Assuming the child did have a foreign object inserted, then that means that person who did is still free. Since the mother blamed Woods either she did it or she is protecting the person who did. That means the child has been left in the custody of a monster these past two years while the criminal justice system screwed around.

People forget that the presumption of innocence and the rights of the accused not only protect the individual from the power of the state but that they also make the justice system more accurate and more likely to imprison the guilty. When an innocent person is convicted, a guilty person goes free. The slipshod work in this case not only hurt Woods but could have well allowed a very dangerous individual to remain free in the community.

[FrBunny]

FrBunny, Junior Balko League reporter!

[GILMORE]

1.

owwww. Owwwwwwwwww. OWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.

2.

Shannon Love, you know far, far too much about what can and can't be shoved in someone's urethra.

[Fist of Etiquette]

4 feet???

[Art-P.O.G.]

Nice scoop, FrBunny. But I think you'd benefit from taking the LoneWacko approach to pointing out when you've scooped a reason editor:

i.e. "Nice post from Radley. Too bad I already reported on it yesterday. Meanwhile, here's reason's favorite editor shilling for MassiveIllegalImmigration."

[Episiarch]

Either that kid has an inhumanly huge pecker or everyone involved just switched off when they heard "four feet" and "inserted into penis". Or the prosecutor is fucking shitbag who heard "get points for child molestation prosecution". I'm going with the latter. Warty, of course, would be consumed with the former.

[Art-P.O.G.]

I'm still waiting for someone to debunk the weed-eater wire story by beginning with: "as a man who's had a lot of objects inserted into his urethra..."

[the innominate one]

Episiarch, perhaps Warty "switched on", rather than "switched off" if you know what I mean.

like you all aren't into sounding

I know better

[FrBunny]

Even if Balko ran with my link (I'm betting he didn't), I'm happy to be a cog in the indefatigable gadfly justice machine.

[FrBunny]

Now back to the pool and Sam Adams Octoberfest! (odd combination...)

[Alaska]

The prosecution alleged that a weed whacker wire had been inserted into his urethra. However, when the attorney got the child's medical records, a CT scan showed that no wire existed. Thus, it is doubtful that the wire was ever inserted into the child.

This case is horrible from several perspectives. The first is that it took him so long to get an attorney. That should go without saying. But notice that even once he got an attorney, he was not able to get bailed out of jail. This attorney sounds like she knew what she was doing and got the case dismissed against him. If she knew enough to do that, I would infer she knew about bail. So, either the judge denied her bail motion (which I would take as the more likely scenario) or she never made one, most likely because trying to get bail in cases like this is extremely difficult.

It is hard to comprehend just how large an impact incarceration has upon a case. Cases like this show why release on bail should be the norm rather than the exception.

[Episiarch]

Bunny, you are a hell of a lush, aren't you. And innominate, no one wants to hear about your perverted fetishes. Wait, yes I do. Scratch that.

[Xeones]

Hit'n'Run: Come for the travesties of justice, stay for the sexual perversions you've never heard of before.

[$]

FEET?

There's no one involved who didn't always know it was all bullshit.

No one.

[BakedPenguin]

I know this is a serious case, and I definitely feel for the poor guy railroaded here.

But the title of the post made me think of the Innocence Report from the Homer Bad Man episode.

[BakedPenguin]

...no one wants to hear about your perverted fetishes. Wait, yes I do. Scratch that.

At the college I work at, I noticed an article titled "The Use of Nueroleptics in the Treatment of Paraphilias." I noted the authors' names, because now I think I know who you and SugarFree really are.

[Mike]

Uh, I'm afraid there was a 42-inch wire in the kid's bladder. That part wasn't made up.

http://www.news-tribune.net/local/local_story_247191336.html

[Nipplemancer]

Orange County Sheriff Deputy hands taser to Disney Cop who then shoots another Disney Cop.
"The actions of an Orange County deputy sheriff are under administrative review today after reports he handed his stun gun to an employee at Walt Disney World's Epcot, who shocked a fellow worker, a department spokesman said."

[Shannon Love]

Gilmore,

Shannon Love, you know far, far too much about what can and can't be shoved in someone's urethra.

I was originally educated to be a biologist and I still keep my hand in the game so speak. In addition, I concentrated on neurophysiology and cognition so I know rather a lot about things crazy people do.

For example, there is a sexual fetish in which people insert objects in their urethra. Schizophrenics sometimes insert wires and similar objects trying to find and remove foreign objects their delusions tell them are there.

Since the child did in fact have four feet of weed eater line coiled in his bladder, I suppose the possibility exist that he did himself owing to mental illness. It might be a variant of "cutter" syndrome in which deeply depressed people cut or otherwise inflict pain on themselves just to experience some other sensation than the depression. More likely I think, the mother did it to punish him. Inserting something inside a child's body fits a feminine psychopathology more than that of a sexually abusive male.

[Episiarch]

At the college I work at, I noticed an article titled "The Use of Nueroleptics in the Treatment of Paraphilias." I noted the authors' names, because now I think I know who you and SugarFree really are.

Those are also fake names. I would have thought you'd have realized that Hugh Jass and I.P. Knightley didn't pass the smell test.

[Zoology Saturday]

Attacking cassowaries charge and kick, sometimes jumping on top of the victim. Unlike emus, which reputedly kick backwards, cassowaries can kick in a forward and downward direction. They may also peck, barge or head-butt. The commonest injuries they cause in humans are puncture wounds, lacerations and bone fractures. Serious injuries resulting from cassowary attacks are most likely to occur if the person is crouching or is lying or has fallen on the ground. When confronted with a charging cassowary it is clearly unwise to crouch or turn one's back on the bird. Claims that jogging incites cassowaries to attack (supposedly because the sound of running feet imitates a foot-stamping rival cassowary) do not withstand scrutiny as walking people have been attacked more frequently than joggers.

Cassowaries will also kick or peck at doors and windows, sometime breaking panes of glass or screen panels. In these cases they are presumably attacking a reflection which they perceive as another cassowary. They will also kick or chase cars, again because they appear to associate the human occupants with food. Cassowaries dislike dogs and will attack them without provocation, presumably because feral dogs and dingos often prey on cassowaries. Between June 1996 and February 1997, six cassowaries were killed by dogs in the Cairns area and, of 35 cassowary attacks recorded by Kofron on dogs, 29 were in self-defence. Cassowaries also dislike cats. Attacks on horses and cows have also been recorded and C. casuarius is anecdotally credited with having killed small horses (C. Walker pers. comm.). These attacks were presumably territorial in motive.

[The More You Know]

Cassowaries can handle up to twenty eight feet of coiled trimmer string in their bladders!

And Knowledge is Power!

[Drugs are bad, m\'kay?]

Weed-killer.

And at "four feet" that shows they also stunt your growth.

[johnl]

So what was in there and how did it get out? Was the first scan just wrong?

[Tulpa]

Since this is a Balko thread, this is marginally on-topic...

BOISE, Idaho - When police officer Darryll Dowell is on patrol in the southwestern Idaho city of Nampa, he'll pull up at a stoplight and usually start casing the vehicle. Nowadays, his eyes will also focus on the driver's arms, as he tries to search for a plump, bouncy vein.

"I was looking at people's arms and hands, thinking, 'I could draw from that,'" Dowell said.

It's all part of training he and a select cadre of officers in Idaho and Texas have received in recent months to draw blood from those suspected of drunken or drugged driving. The federal program's aim is to determine if blood draws by cops can be an effective tool against drunk drivers and aid in their prosecution.

If the results seem promising after a year or two, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration will encourage police nationwide to undergo similar training.

[Officer Dracula]

Sweet!

[Bob Smith]

A veritable tsunami of legal system incompetence to be sure.

Incompetence? Heck no, this was sexism pure and simple. Do you really think a mother would get so little benefit of the doubt?

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