Barbara LaWall Testifies about the Regional DPS Lab... for the Defense!

The position of County Attorney is a very demanding one, requiring an astute political sensibility. The County Attorney must meet the high standards of ethical behavior required of a prosecuting authority and negotiate a legal minefield where any slip could have grave consequences for both those of accused of crimes and the victims of crime, all while being essentially a political animal who is answerable to the local electorate. A good County Attorney requires the ability to see every issue from multiple perspectives and to be very prudent about one's political choices. The County Attorney must understand the legal and ethical ramifications of every political act he or she takes to effectively lead the office.

Barbara LaWall has been laudably and rightly pressing the state legislature to fund a new Department of Public Safety Southern Arizona Regional Crime Lab for some time now. The existing facility is an over-crowded, retrofitted stop-gap rather than a purpose-built facility, and presents several environmental, work-place safety, and, most importantly, evidence integrity issues that could impact the work of police forces and prosecutors throughout southern Arizona.

Lobbying of the state legislature by a County Attorney on behalf of the southern Arizona law-enforcement community and DPS is one of those inherently political acts that requires great foresight and sound judgment of the legal and ethical consequences. The political benefits of giving one's law-enforcement community constituents the tools they need is obvious. So is the publics' support for forensic evidence processing that reduces errors and promotes catching more criminals. What might not be obvious is the potential down-side of a County Attorney advocating for this needed improvement.

Well, when you are asking for millions for a new facility, you might want to show how many problems there are with the current facility. To do that you might want to give specific examples of how the existing facility undermines law-enforcement's mission. That's well and fine. But now imagine you want to get the most political mileage possible out of your advocacy - you want to be seen championing improving the quality of law-enforcement facilities in the community. You might want to make - I don't know - a video of yourself personally making an appeal for help and narrating personally the problems with the DPS regional lab. Sounds like a great idea, no?

Well, actually, no. You see, in personally denigrating the operations of an working facility that is processing forensic evidence for cases that your office is currently prosecuting, you have put yourself in the tricky legal position of publicly throwing doubt on the results of the lab your office uses to lock people up. Well, Barbara LaWall did opt to appear personally in an 11 minute DPS-sponsored video discussing all of the many problems with the existing facility that would warrant a multi-million dollar investment by the State. She did opt to narrate the entire sequence. UPDATE: Amelia Cramer, LaWall's Chief Civil Deputy points out that it is not LaWall narrating. It is someone who sounds quite a bit like her. My mistake. She did let her political instincts carry her away without putting on her legal and ethical hat to check that what she was doing politically wouldn't harm her office's work.

The result is that the defense bar are using her own words as evidence to undermine the work of the DPS lab, and even petitioning to have LaWall appear as an expert in their cases on the problems at the lab. So far, two county judges have dismissed such efforts, saying that there are other witnesses without a conflict available to testify. Attorneys of the defense bar are unlikely to let this issue go, however. That's just not how my peeps roll...

For the first time, in its entirety, online, for everyone to view and judge for themselves, is Barbara LaWall's video lobbying for a new DPS lab that has lately been the subject of news reports:

Comments

[Rex]

"So far, two county judges have dismissed such efforts, saying that there are other witnesses without a conflict available to testify."

The excerpt from your post above says all that needs to be said, Michael. To take a shot at Barbara on this is cheap and trivial. Were she not to advocate stongly for the new crime lab in every manner available to her, her likely primary opponent (who you're supporting, based on an earlier post) and any general election opponent would be all over her. Her work in supporting the lab is essential in order to win over the Legislature and get the thing built. Kudos to Barbara for her advocacy...and major plaudits to the the two judges you mention for not politicizing this issue...as you are attempting to do.

[azw88]

Rex, she could have pushed for the new lab without making it appear that the current lab was incompetent.

[mbryanaz]

So I'm politicizing a political act? That makes a lot of sense.

The point is that every case that has forensics from the DPS lab now includes the defense asking the criminologist whether he or she is aware of Barbara LaWall's comments that the DPS lab has evidence integrity problems. Even a layperson can see that this might be damaging to the State's case, but apparently LaWall didn't. This is about judgment, not politics.

[Rex]

It is about politics when your objectivity is in question, Michael. This is an election year and you have made your sentiments clear with regard to the County Attorney's race. Had this post appeared on another site where the blogger had not already indicated his support for Lawall's primary opponent, it would have more relevance and credibility.

[mbryanaz]

Either there is some defense of her actions, or there isn't. If there is, I'm certainly not hearing it from Rex.

My political opinion has no more bearing on what LaWall did and said than does the so-called "Bush Derangement Syndrome," with which Bush's partisans paint his detractors, have on his critics' substantive criticisms of his Presidency. It seems to me you are taking the last resort available in attacking the messenger, rather than dealing with the substance of the message.

If you are unwilling to criticize LaWall even when she's clearly messed up, maybe it's you who are blinded by sentiment and whose relevance and credibility is questionable. I want a County Attorney who doesn't make blunders like this one. That's my 'bias'.

[Amelia Cramer]

It should be noted that the criticism of Barbara LaWall asserted above is inaccurate. It states that she narrated an 11-minute video discussing problems with the existing crime lab. However, the voice in the video narrating problems with the existing crime lab is not that of Barbara LaWall. The only portion of the video narrated by Barbara LaWall is the brief portion at the beginning where her image is shown speaking, suggesting that we need a state-of-the-art crime lab.

[Rex]

My defense of her actions is right in my first post. There is no "potential down-side of a County Attorney advocating for this needed improvement" as Michael asserts. LaWall is showing foresight and leadership. The stunts that the two defense lawyers tried to pull in the trials Michael cites were not allowed by the judges in those cases, nor do I think similar motions will be ruled in order in the future because they constitute cheap gamesmanship, just like this post. Moreover, you read what Amelia Cramer writes above and find out that Michael mischaracterized Barbara's role in the video. How does this contribute to a serious dialogue about the proper role of the County Attorney in lobbying for a much-needed facility?

[Michael Bryan]

Corrected. And it was a mistake on my part, not a mischaracterization.

[American Chauvinist]

I laughed at how the New DPS site has now been Blamed on BUSH!! HA: HA : HA: HA!

Its Bushs fault the Bridge Collapsed even though (1) ONE BILLION Dollars was on deposit to fix it?

On and On!

I do NOT support Bush but as I saw The Democratic Party in Survivors Stress Syndrom with BUSH and everything that is wrong is BUSH ; We as a Party lost our fundamental's that WON us Elections; NOT just voting AGAINST BUSH!