Colorado Connections to the Texas Polygamy Case
A Colorado Springs woman, Rozita Swinton, has been named as a "person of interest" in the Texas Polygamy Sect case. Her phone number was linked to calls made to report abuse at the compound. And Aspen resident and attorney Gerry Goldstein, whose law office is in San Antonio, is now lead counsel for the sect which is challenging the raids on the compound.
Aspen attorney and constitutional gladiator Gerry Goldstein has defended Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega, outlaw journalist Hunter S. Thompson and National Organization of the Reform of Marijuana Laws founder Keith Stroup. Now he can add a secretive polygamist sect with a penchant for pioneer-style dress to his peculiar client list. Goldstein, 64, recently signed on as lead counsel to the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints, whose 1,700-acre compound was raided by authorities in Texas earlier this month after they received phone calls from someone who claimed to be a teenage girl whose 50-year-old husband beat and raped her. Police are investigating whether the call was a hoax, possibly engineered by a woman in Colorado Springs with a history of making false reports to law enforcement.
Wherever Hunter Thompson is, I'm sure he's smiling and congratulating the Fundamentalist Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints for its excellent choice of counsel.
Comments
Submitted by ohwilleke (not verified) on Thu, 2008-04-24 12:17.
The 4th Amendment issues in the Texas polygamy case are really quite interesting.
A warrant was issued, so the issue is whether there was probable cause to issue the warrant. A call from a lying informant that police believe to be credible and that a reasonable police officer would find credible would establish probable cause, even if the basis of the warrant is a lie. Probable cause is evaluated from the position of a reasonable person in the position of the officer requesting the warrant.
Moreover, if the warrant is valid, then the evidence of criminal conduct discovered as the fruit of the searches under those warrants and arrests with a basis in evidence recovered pursuant to the warrants is valid if the items taken were without the scope of the warrant.
Bottom line: I'm not aware of any law that says the criminal or child abuse/neglect are impacted in any way by the fact that the informant story that was a basis for the raids was actually false.
The fact that someone telling a lie can break the Gordian knot holding together the wall of silence which provides 4th Amendment protection to your castle is certainly interesting.
A person giving a false report could certainly face criminal charges, but if there really were crimes being committed at the scene of a similar type, a judge might view that as a mitigating fact at sentencing or a prosecutor might decide to drop the charges.
One supposes that the victims of the raid could also bring a civil lawsuit against the person making the false charges. But, to have damages in a false reporting civil lawsuit by the polygamists against the false reporter, I would think that one would have to show that one was innocent. If a false tip catches you for a crime much like the one the false tip attributed to you, it is hard to see your damages. And, the false tipster might be judgment proof.
