Dear Friend:
Imagine that you are going about your daily business, maybe walking down the street, keys in hand, and just as you turn the corner you stumble upon a horrible crime, a murder. You happen to be acquainted with the victim, a former schoolmate. What’s more, as the murderer flees you recognize him as your neighbor, Frank, who you always found to be a bit of a shady character and was even rumored to have a criminal record.
Now suppose that after you summon the police for help, you and Frank and a few others are taken to the station for questioning. Inexplicably and beyond comprehension, the police release everyone but you, who they arrest and charge with murder. It turns out, unbeknownst to you, that Frank was a favored confidential informant for the officers assigned to investigate the case and had pointed his finger at you. But Frank is hardly credible. Indeed, he gives a series of facially false, sometimes fantastical, and inconsistent versions of events surrounding the murder, all obvious fabrications intended to shift blame to someone else.
The trial date arrives, and instead of putting Frank on the stand the prosecutor calls one of Franks criminal cohorts, Jack, who was in the vicinity when and where the crime occurred and testifies that he’d seen you kill the victim. You can only sit and listen, visibly upset and utterly flabbergasted, but you continue to hold on to faith in the criminal justice process. Surely the system will protect the innocent.
Finally, it is your turn to put on evidence and your attorney, an experienced litigator, requests that Frank, the very person you had stumbled upon in the murderous act, be called to testify. You have no doubt that once his lies and prior inconsistencies surrounding the murder — all conveniently fabricated to put the crime on you — are heard by the jury, it will see right through the farce and just as assuredly see you exonerated. But the prosecutor also realizes this and, not one to lose so easily, immediately objects. The judge takes up the prosecutor’s cause and rules that your attorney may not question Frank on the stand as to his murder of your schoolmate because he has not been charged and no other evidence has been presented against him and, therefore, the judge continues, his testimony runs the risk of confusing the jury. That jury, never having heard about Frank or his prior falsehoods or motives or opportunity, wrongfully convicts you of murder.
Fortunately, this did not happen to you. But it is precisely what happened to me. Please find out more, including what you might do to help, by going to www.freemarkjordan.com.
Thank you for taking the time to read this letter.
Mongoose Distro 