Testilying

At a criminal trial of a protestor, a police officer testifed under oath that

[The defendant] put up such a fight at a political protest last summer, the arresting officer recalled, it took four police officers to haul him down the steps of the New York Public Library and across Fifth Avenue.

"We picked him up and we carried him while he squirmed and screamed," the officer, Matthew Wohl, testified in December. "I had one of his legs because he was kicking and refusing to walk on his own."

One problem.  During a recess, the defense lawyer obtained a videotape that contradicted Officer Wohl's sworn testimony.

A videotape shot by a documentary filmmaker showed Mr. Kyne agitated but plainly walking under his own power down the library steps, contradicting the vivid account of Officer Wohl, who was nowhere to be seen in the pictures. Nor was the officer seen taking part in the arrests of four other people at the library against whom he signed complaints.

Will Officer Wohl be prosecuted for committing perjury?  Will the Department of Justice file a criminal complaint against Wohl, whose lies likely led to the defendant's unjust prosecution?  Section 1983 has a criminal analog (18 U.S.C. Sec. 242), though DOJ somehow forgot how to use it.

According to the story, not only are police officers lying, but government lab technicians are destroying evidence.

Last week, [a different defendant] discovered that there were two versions of the same police tape: the one that was to be used as evidence in his trial had been edited at two spots, removing images that showed Mr. Dunlop behaving peacefully. When a volunteer film archivist found a more complete version of the tape and gave it to Mr. Dunlop's lawyer, prosecutors immediately dropped the charges and said that a technician had cut the material by mistake.

So it was a mistake, 'eh?  Anyhow, please read the full story for more "mistakes."

Many thanks to Objective Justice for bringing this story to my attention.