THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, November 10, 1995 TAG: 9511100001
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A18 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Editorial
LENGTH: Medium: 58 lines
It's frustrating but it's understandable that a witness who's been threatened with retaliation would refuse to testify in court. It's just as frustrating, and a lot less understandable, that the powers-that-be in Portsmouth aren't moving heaven, Earth and the city's criminal-justice system to make every possible effort they can to reduce witness intimidation.
Gloria Branton, whose nephew was murdered in front of dozens of witnesses, chased down enough of them to uncover a suspect. But, Virginian-Pilot staff writer Angelita Plemmer reported Monday, not one witness would testify in court. This is the rule, not the exception, in some neighborhoods of Portsmouth: Six out of 10 murderers in Portsmouth - and Portsmouth has already exceeded the number of murders in 1994 - go free, largely because defendants threaten prospective witnesses.
Why this happens is no mystery: Parts of Portsmouth are afflicted with a drug culture so virulent that residents risk their lives just walking the streets, much less taking the witness stand.
Why this intimidation continues is no mystery, either. Portsmouth does not have enough police to saturate crime-ridden communities. Whether crime-ridden communities, if given more police, would cooperate to the extent necessary is a question. This is an area in which teenagers out in the predawn hours block off roads and hold up motorists like modern-day highwaymen - one more indication of a lawless culture police alone can't overcome.
Portsmouth is also a city where defendants have ample time to intimidate witnesses. Why? Because of inordinate delays between arrest and trial. Because of some judges' reluctance to set and enforce high bail. Because of the failure to provide separate waiting areas for defendants and witnesses. Because of a high rate of dismissals that mean the defendant walks outside the courtroom alongside the witnesses against him. Some of these flaws can be quickly fixed, if citizens insist.
Portsmouth Commonwealth's Attorney Martin Bullock suggests several remedies: To certify charges against a defendant, use special grand juries, which hear testimony in secret, instead of testimony from witnesses in a public pretrial hearing. Transfer as many violent cases as possible to the federal system, where bail is higher, trials quicker and sentences harsher. ``You get arrested'' in the federal system, says police Chief Dennis A. Mook, ``and you don't get out.''
Other remedies require action at the state level: Intimidating a witness is currently only a misdemeanor, and harder than it should be to prove. This is an item for the General Assembly, along with a good hard look at obstruction-of-justice statutes and bond law.
Meantime, Portsmouth is stressed financially, educationally, sometimes racially and politically. But it's hard to see how the city's public officials, court officials and its citizenry can afford not to rally to the support of Mr. Bullock, Chief Mook and the families that, like Gloria Branton's, want justice done. by CNB