Stupid cop killed, innocent man sentence to death

[CM]

February 15, 2006

On Dec. 26, 2001, police in the small town of Prentiss, Miss., executed a marijuana search warrant on a small duplex.

On one side of the duplex lived Jamie Wilson, described in the search warrant and police affidavit as a "known drug dealer." When police pounded on her door, Wilson answered and surrendered. That, of course, is what you'd expect a small-time marijuana dealer to do.

On the other side of the duplex, 20-year-old Cory Maye had fallen asleep in an easy chair. His 18-month-old daughter lay asleep in the next room. Maye had only recently moved out of his parents' home. He had moved in with his girlfriend, because, he says, he wanted to be a father to his daughter. Maye was uncomfortable in his new home, and had expressed concerns to his mother about the seedy neighborhood surrounding it. Still, he promised to stick it out until after the holidays.

Late that night, Maye said he awoke to a furious pounding on his front door. According to his court testimony, he became frightened for his safety, and for the safety of his daughter. He ran back to the bedroom, where his daughter was asleep on the bed. He retrieved the gun he had for home protection, loaded it, chambered a round, and lay down on the floor next to her, hoping the noises and/or intruders outside would subside.

They didn't. Soon enough, Maye says, the door to Maye's bedroom flew open, and a figure entered from the outside. Scared, Maye fired his gun three times.

The figure was police officer Ron Jones, and one of Maye's bullets struck Jones in the abdomen, killing him. Worse for Maye, Jones also happened to be the son of the town's police chief.

The above is Cory Maye's version of events. As you might guess, the police offered a different account of the raid. They say they repeatedly announced they were police, and asked Maye to open up. They say an anonymous informant had told the investigating officer that there was a "large stash" of marijuana in the apartment Cory Maye shared with his girlfriend. And they say Cory Maye knew that Ron Jones was a police officer when he shot him.

A Mississippi jury believed the police. Last year, Cory Maye was found guilty of capital murder, or the intentional killing of a police officer. The same afternoon, he was sentenced to death. And today he sits on Mississippi's death row.

That Cory Maye is even in prison is an appalling failure of Mississippi's criminal justice system. Police had no reason to be in his home that night, much less to break down his door. His case is just the latest in a series of tragic consequences resulting from the overuse of paramilitary tactics when police serve drug warrants.

But it's the details of Cory Maye's case that make it particularly compelling:

Cory Maye had no prior criminal record. He had no history of violence. Police found one gram of ashen marijuana in Maye's apartment (that's about a sixth of a teabag's worth). There was no "large stash," and Cory Maye was no drug dealer. In fact, Maye's name appeared nowhere on the search warrant, only his address and the phrase "persons unknown."

Then there's the matter of the informant. We'll never know who that informant was, nor will we ever know what kind of corroborating investigation was done before securing the warrant. That's because the entire investigation leading up to the raid was conducted by the same Officer Ron Jones who was killed in the raid.

According to District Attorney Buddy McDonald, Jones kept no notes or documentation of his investigation of the Wilson-Maye duplex; and any investigation he may have done, in the words of McDonald, "died with Officer Jones."

Cory Maye may well have been a recreational pot smoker. But then, possession of a misdemeanor amount of pot doesn't justify an armed home invasion. Cory Maye may also have fired his gun too quickly. But what would you have done? You have no criminal record. You aren't a dangerous person. You have no reason to think police would break into your home in the middle of the night. You awake to find that your home is under attack. The door flies open. Do you wait to see who it is? Or do you defend your family?

Don't think it can't happen. There are dozens of examples of late night "no-knock" drug raids executed on the wrong home, or on people guilty of, at worst, misdemeanor offenses. Any gun owner willing to defend his family from intruders could well be in the same position Cory Maye was in 4 years ago. At the very worst, Maye is guilty of recklessness. It's horrifying to think he could be executed for an error in judgment, an error compounded by volatile circumstances, a frightening assault, and high-stakes drama, none of which were of his making.

But it gets worse. For the last 10 years, Bob Evans has been public defender for the town of Prentiss. Late last year, Evans says he was warned by town officials not to represent Cory Maye in his appeal. Evans ignored the threats, and gave Maye representation. In January of this year, Prentiss made good on its promise, and fired Evans.

According to Evans, Prentiss Mayor Charlie Dumas told him point blank that he was terminated for representing Cory Maye. In a phone interview, Mayor Dumas confirmed having a conversation with Evans, but declined to go into specifics. Calls to the town's aldermen weren't returned, or were answered with "no comment."

If Evans version of events are true, the firing of Evans stinks. It's the kind of thing public officials do when they have something to hide. And it only adds to the already obvious notion that the town of Prentiss doesn't much care about giving Cory Maye a fair shake at justice.

Cory Maye should unite both liberal death penalty foes and conservative gun rights advocates. If Tookie Wilson's execution bothered you, Maye's should terrify you. And if you're troubled by Waco, you should be outraged by Prentiss.

I think Maye deserves an apology. He certainly doesn't deserve death.

[CM]

Cory Maye
The purpose of this website is to bring the facts of a Mississippi capital murder case to public attention. Cory Maye is on Death Row, sentenced to death by lethal injection for killing a police officer. He claims he did not know the night time intruder was a police officer. Other officers claim they did announce themselves as police before going in. The case is awaiting appeal.

The authors of this web page will accumulate all available factual records and court documents, and put complete unedited copies of them on the this web site. Readers will have a resource by which they can judge for themselves the actual background facts in what appears to be a great miscarriage of justice.

Thanks for spending a few minutes of your day reading about this case.

Details of the Case
Cory Maye shot and killed a police officer when that officer burst into his home on December 26, 2001. Cory lived in one side of a duplex. On the other side was a certain Mr. Jamie Smith. In a surprise midnight raid, the officers stormed Smith's side. A local police officer, Ron Jones, went around to break in the other side of the building, into the other unit of the duplex. And on that side lived Cory Jermaine Maye.

Maye was awakened from sleep by the commotion at the door, went into the bedroom and fired at an intruder. This was after the intruder had broken down the front door and entered the living room, and was coming toward the bedroom. The officer was hit by one .380 caliber bullet in the abdomen. He staggered back out of the apartment and died some hours later.

Search warrants had been procured by the police for the side containing Smith, naming him by name, and for the side containing Maye, listing "unknown occupants". Police statements indicate that Maye and was not the target of the raid. Maye claimed he fired in self defense at intruders fearing for himself and his 18 month old daughter. The man he killed, Officer Ron Jones, was the son of the police chief of Prentiss, Mississippi.

Maye was convicted in 2004 by a jury comprised of ten whites and two blacks. He was sentenced to death by lethal injection.

A rather comprehensive comilation of the story of Cory Maye has been put in the Current Events section of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia.

Why is this case important?
This case is of much interest to the mainstream media because it is related to sensitive political subjects, the drug war and police enforcement tactics during the era of the war on terrorism. Fox News, for example, is too busy with the War on Christmas and Aruba. It's an easy case to misunderstand. Some might think to be "hard on crime" we have to err on the side of giving police the benefit of the doubt, and a wide latitude in their enforcement capabilities. They might conjecture that some level of "civilian causulties" is an inevitable but justifiable side effect of the "War on Drugs".

Anyone who reads about this case will conjecture as to the events, try to visualize them and try, in his or her mind, to guess at how it could have happened. Some will err on the side of the police having been right, and some will add up the facts and err on the side of Maye. I would caution against making a judgement on this case in such a rapid fire fashion.

That sort of snap judgement is what one is led to by filtered, sifted, predigested, and encapsulated information. That typifies much of what the public is fed, often by people with some sort of agenda. If not an agenda, many nonetheless have certain interests in possible outcomes.

Police and the county judicial system in Prentiss have created this situation, because they hold the documents relative to the case. Yet those are public records. And those records should be on the Internet, so that everybody can read them and intelligently reach their own conclusion. Think about it. You don't need the media telling you what is right, and you certainly don't need some grieving police chief in Prentiss, who has lost his son in an unfortunate accident, telling you.

Bad things happen sometimes, and it's largely how we handle them that determines what sense of humanity we exhibit.

"He killed a cop so he must be guilty" may be good enough for the District Attorney who determined to go for capital murder charges. And in the absence of any witnesses for the defense, with a defense attorney who had apparently never had experience with a capital murder case, the DA had an easy job convincing the jury to apply the death penalty.

In the past these type of cases were quietly buried and forgotten after a few years. Let's see if that's good enough for the people that read about and digest this case on the Internet.

www.mayeisinnocent.com/

[WaTcHeR]

I remember this story. Basically you a had a cop that was killed not by a person, but by the "war on drugs."

This is how it breaks down: You have a white red neck cop from Mississippi that gets two "search warrants" from a "snitch." The snitch isn't sure what apartment the drugs might be in, so the snitch says it might be in one of two apartments. Then you have stupid officer Ron Jones, that is willing to risk his life on a "snitch."

I would have done the same, I would have shot and killed every police officer that came through my door! What person wouldn't defend their family? Someone comes into your home, you don't stop shooting until there is no more danger. Cops know this golden rule.

Police chief Jones, sorry to say your son was no hero! He was a casualty of the war on drugs! You lose, end of story!

Now sits on death row a innocent man, who never before this incident had a criminal record. Why is he on death row you ask? Because he is black!

[WaTcHeR]

Here is another story of storm trooper cops in Houston Texas, using the "War on Drugs" to kill an innocent person.


Corrupt Police Officers that have Killed: Officer Lamont E. Tillery, Officer David R. Barrera, Officer Pete A. Herrada, Officer David Perkins, Officer James R. Willis and Officer Darrell H. Strouse


At 1:30 a.m. on July 12, 1998, six members of the Houston Police Department Gang Task Force, after receiving a "bogus drug tip" from an unregistered informant, burst into PEDRO OREGON's apartment, without a warrant, and fatally shot him 12 times from behind."

"The first shot entered the back of his head, the second in the back of his wrist, the third to the back of his shoulder, and the remaining 9 shots were to his back as he lay face down on the floor with his hands in front of him."

"One of the cops, Officer Barrera, fired until his gun was empty, paused to reload, then resumed firing. He is responsible for 24 of the 33 shots fired that night.

The police are now conducting a slander campaign against PEDRO and the OREGON family by claiming, without proof, that PEDRO was a "drug dealer" and "gang member." Not surprising, considering the way they think about all young blacks and latinos, this is a second assassination of PEDRO.

First they killed him with guns, now they are trying to kill his character and turn the victim into a criminal.

The fact is NO drugs were found in the apartment, nor on PEDRO, nor in his body. The cops also maintain that he shot at them, but new evidence indicates that the police never saw him with a weapon. This means they LIED."

"On August 24, the case was referred to a grand jury by District Attorney John B. Holmes with no charges recommended. D.A. Holmes has admitted that it is his policy never to recommend charges against cops. The means that you and I are held at different standards than the police. Instead of indicting these killer cops for murder, the grand jury cleared all of them except one, who received a sham misdemeanor criminal trespass charge. Only after a public outcry were the six officers fired by Chief of Police Bradford. They were fired because people like you had the guts to stand up and voice your outrage."

"The internal police investigation even found that they had violated state and federal laws. Still no charges! This is the major demand of the JUSTICE FOR PEDRO OREGON COALITION (JPOC), that the cops be charged with murder now!" "Just last week, information from a deposition of one of the notorious six officers, David R. Perkins, has shed new light on PEDRO's murder. Police reports state that when the cops entered the apartment, PEDRO bolted from the living room, ran down the hallway and into his bedroom. But in Officer Perkins' deposition, he states that he never saw PEDRO run to the bedroom. He then goes on to say that he never saw PEDRO outside the bedroom at any time. So now they are caught in another lie: The truth is that the cops "kicked in the bedroom door, never identifying themselves as the police.

After Officer Barrera accidentally shot one of his own men, the cops opened fire on PEDRO, an unarmed man, killing him. Officer Perkins even said that he never saw PEDRO with a weapon at any time! ========

Harris County District Attorney John B. Holmes Jr. said that the six Houston police officers involved in a raid in which a man was killed could have been within their rights to shoot him - even if they had no right to be in his home.

"I don't know of any authority at this point that gave them the right to be in that residence," Holmes said. "But that doesn't make the shooting a crime."

Holmes said that because the law [in Texas] does not allow anyone to resist an arrest, even an illegal one, officers had a right to use deadly force against Oregon if he threatened them. A pistol was found at the scene, but police have not yet said if it had been fired. "They do not have to sit still for a citizen pointing a firearm at them, even if they entered unlawfully," Holmes said.

"They were - every one of them - in uniform," he said. "There should not be any reasonable idea in your mind that you are being the victim of a kick burglary."

Holmes said Texas law at one time had recognized a person's right to resist an unlawful arrest. But since the mid-1970s, the law had required that everyone submit to arrest, even in their homes. The only exception, Holmes said, is the right to defend yourself against unreasonable force, such as being beaten.
========

A grand jury no-billed all the officers except for indicting one on a charge of misdemeanor criminal trespass.

"We feel the evidence is clear," said Toylean Johnson of the Justice for Pedro Oregon Coalition.

The protesters' anger was fanned by a Houston Chronicle story Thursday that Officer David R. Barrera fired 24 of the 33 rounds discharged during the raid.

HPD Chief C.O. Bradford fired all six officers on grounds that they violated the law as well as procedures.

The protesters included Susan Hartnett, whose son Derek Jason Kaesman, 25, was shot 14 times in a hail of gunfire after leading Houston police on a chase Oct. 25.
"We have returned to the wild West where the posse acts as judge, jury and executioner, said Hartnett, who accused the police of murdering her son.

Another adding her voice was Janie Torres, whose brother Joe Campos Torres was beaten by Houston police in 1977 and drowned after falling or being pushed into Buffalo Bayou.

"Everyone else in this city who (commits) a crime is expected to pay for that crime," said Torres. "This (Oregon's killing) is murder."

The officers involved in Oregon's shooting were "cold-blooded murdering cowards," Torres said. "We did not ask for this and we do not deserve this."

Noel "Skip" Allen, whose son Travis, 17, was shot to death by Bellaire police in 1995, called the lack of a felony indictment in Oregon's killing "typical of the good old boy justice in Texas."

"Police brutality is not a thing of color," said Allen. "We have police out there who have no business being in uniform."

[WaTcHeR]

04/30/2006 - A man's life hangs in the balance. Whose judgment do you trust, twelve duly appointed jurors or one lone blogger?

Normally, I'd say "the jury," but in the case of Cory Maye things may not be what they seem.

Cory Maye is a 25-year-old Mississippian on death row. He was convicted of murdering a police officer during a raid on his Prentiss, Mississippi duplex apartment in 2001. He pleaded self-defense, but the jury impounded for the case in neighboring Marion County didn't buy his plea, and the judge sent him away to be executed instead.

It's not certain he will die by lethal injection, though, since he is preparing to petition for a new trial. But it is certain that officer Ron W. Jones is dead. Though the officer wore a bulletproof vest, one of the three bullets that Maye fired in the dark hit below the vest; that bullet proved fatal.

Cory Maye has expressed his sorrow at the shooting, and his respect for the officer he shot. But he does not consider himself a murderer, and he feels the injustice. "We as citizens sit back and say well this would never happen to me," Cory wrote a supporter. "But truth be told it's happened before and if we don't take a stand it's gonna continue to happen."

Maye's prospect for a second trial is not the result of his own writing, however. Had not a certain blogger picked up the story and publicized the case, Maye would lack not only a Wikipedia entry, but any hope of exoneration. The blogger's name is Radley Balko, and his blog is The Agitator — which is certainly named in the blogosphere spirit. Before Balko's blogwork, Maye was just another black man on death row.

Now he's widely believed to be something more than that: another American victim of racism and outrageous abuse of police power.

Obviously, Balko's posts on The Agitator have agitated a significant portion of the blogosphere, with bloggers from across the political spectrum coming to Maye's side in the case.

Why?

Well, it's not just because Balko's no ordinary blogger, being an employee of the Cato Institute and a columnist for Fox News and all. Mainly it's because the facts almost scream out for themselves. The case has a distinct odor.

First, there's the issue of self-defense. According to Maye's testimony, he was awakened from sleep when someone burst into his apartment by forcing open the back door. Maye fired three times when that someone entered. Then he heard screams of "Police!" and laid down his gun.

At trial, the police said they had shouted their identity before entering. Also at trial, one officer admitted he couldn't hear much of anything that happened outside from inside the apartment.

It turns out that Mr. Maye wasn't even named on the warrant. His neighbor in the duplex, Jamie Smith, was. The police claim to have legally obtained permission to search both apartments, but since Maye wasn't named on the warrant it is obvious that the police work here was spotty at best. Maye was probably not even on the police's radar — he and his girlfriend and their daughter had moved in not long before. Since Smith had been captured before Officer Jones entered Maye's apartment, there's no reason to believe that Jones shouted anything — after all, the subject of the search warrant had already been nabbed. There's also reason to believe that Ron Jones entered Maye's apartment thinking it was an alternate door to Smith's; nighttime raids can be confusing.

Reviewing the case, I've little reason to doubt Maye's story. Awakened in the night by someone storming into your house, what would you do?

Of course Maye shot the intruder.

As is his right.

Police, when rushing into homes, take their lives into their own hands. No-knock raids are dramatic, and years of television shows portraying criminals rushing to flush drugs down toilets have prepared us to accept such horrendous erosion of civil liberties. One's home is supposed to be secure from such outrageous violence. That's one reason for constitutional protections against unreasonable search and seizure. And that's one reason we have a right to bear arms. But with the drug war, many Americans have come to accept, albeit reluctantly, quite a lot of reductions in their liberties. And quite a lot of violence.

Jones was the officer who got the original tip that one Jamie Smith was selling marijuana from his apartment. He handed over the tip to the narcotics squad, and was then let in on the bust. Unfortunately, he is unable to testify, so we cannot now clear up what he knew about Smith or what he suspected of the inhabitant of the other apartment in the duplex, if anything.

But, from police reports and testimony, Jamie Smith is said to have been found with a huge quantity of marijuana in his apartment (you can only flush so much — especially with these confounded low-flush toilets mandated by Congress).

But we also learn that Jamie Smith was never charged with this crime.

Further, Jamie Smith is nowhere to be found. He was not a witness in the trial. In fact, he's disappeared, and does not seem to be on any wanted list.

The odor you smell? Not burnt weed. That, friends, is the stench of a cover-up.

But the missing target of the original search is just the tip of the fiery cinder block. It gets worse. The original public defender, Rhonda Cooper, mounted a pathetic case. Several jurors interviewed afterwards admitted that dislike of Ms. Cooper's closing statement, with her use of a threat of hellfire, was a deciding factor in turning against Maye, as was their belief that Maye was "spoiled" by his mother and grandmother. Understandably, Maye's family fired Ms. Cooper.

Bob Evans, public defender for the town of Prentiss, was warned by town officials not to represent Maye in his appeal. Evans didn't obey, and he got fired . . . by the town. Evans relates that Mayor Charlie Dumas told him that representing Maye was the reason. Evans is now Maye's private attorney.

I don't have space to tell you how much weirder it gets, though in all honesty I should mention that while Maye himself had a clean rap sheet (free even of misdemeanor charges), the .38 he used had been reported as stolen a year earlier. He said a friend had given it to him.

The main point remains, however. Maye was not guilty of Smith's crimes. It's quite possible that he was guilty of nothing more than defending himself and his daughter.

So Maye looks innocent to Balko, and to bloggers across the Net.

But in Mississippi?

Well, Maye is a black man. Jones was a white officer. And Jones was also the son of Prentiss's chief of police.

The conclusions almost draw themselves.

[WaTcHeR]

Great News!

09.22.2006 - POPLARVILLE — A judge on Thursday threw out the death sentence of a Prentiss man convicted of killing a cop in a 2001 drug raid and handed Cory Maye a second chance of avoiding lethal injection.

After a two-day hearing in Pearl River County Circuit Court, Judge Michael Eubanks ruled that Maye's trial attorney, Rhonda Cooper of Jackson, did not represent her client adequately during the penalty phase of Maye's 2003 trial.

Eubanks overturned the sentence, ordered a new sentencing hearing and said he would rule on the other matters raised by Maye's new defense team later.

"Thank you, Jesus," one of Maye's relatives said as another clapped at the news.

"We think he will get a fair trial this time and get someone competent this time (as an attorney)," said Joyce Coleman of Prentiss, Maye's aunt. "We pray God will grant him the freedom he deserves."

After the hearing, District Attorney Buddy McDonald said Eubanks "puts a lot of thought into his decisions."

"We're waiting to see what the remainder of his decision will be on the guilt phase."

Eubanks said Cooper provided adequate counsel during the trial. But, he said, by her own admission during closing arguments, she was tired and, therefore, did not provide competent counsel during the sentencing phase. He said she did not call more relevant people as mitigating witnesses.

Cooper could not be reached Thursday night, but in a story before the hearing, she said she did not want to discuss the case.

Maye's case has attracted attention throughout the country. On the Internet, bloggers have turned it into a cause celebre.

The trial was moved from Jefferson Davis County to Marion County.

On Jan. 23, 2004, a Marion County jury sentenced Maye to die by lethal injection for fatally wounding Prentiss police officer Ron Jones during the drug raid.

Maye, now 25, who had no previous criminal record, testified that he had fallen asleep in the chair when officers raided his duplex the day after Christmas 2001 in search of drugs.

Law enforcement officers first raided the apartment of Jamie Smith, 21, who lived on the other side of the duplex. They found drugs and arrested him. He since has skipped out on bond and has not been found.

Officers testified at Maye's trial that they saw a light turned on inside Maye's duplex, knocked on his door and announced themselves but got no answer. They said Maye was standing when he fired on Jones.

But Maye testified at his trial that he didn't hear police announce themselves, he grabbed his .380-caliber pistol and was on the floor when he fired upward in self-defense. He had been watching his 18-month-old daughter while his wife worked a late shift.

Authorities found only remnants from a marijuana cigarette in Maye's duplex.

"The record is shockingly thin on what Mr. Maye is convicted," defense lawyer Abram Pafford of Washington, D.C., said in arguments to Eubanks.

Defense lawyers also said Maye was poorly represented by his trial lawyer. For instance, they said, Cooper failed to object to the racial makeup of the jury - 10 white and two black Mississippians. Cooper only called two defense witnesses during the sentencing phase - Maye's mother and grandmother - without preparing them.

"She committed error after error after error," defense lawyer Jessica Gabel of San Francisco told Eubanks. "Her performance sent him to death row."

Legal experts say motions for new trials are rarely granted. But it also is rare for a judge to hold a full-blown hearing for such a motion.

Pafford told Eubanks there is reasonable doubt that Maye, in the dark, could identify Jones as an officer.

Rankin County pathologist Steven Haynes' testimony about the downward angle of the fatal bullet was "knowingly distorted" by prosecutors, Pafford said, making it seem as if Maye lied about firing from the floor.

But McDonald, in his closing arguments before Eubanks, said, "The real issue is when (Maye) shot officer Jones did he know he was a law enforcement officer. What angle the bullet came from doesn't change the fact he killed him."

Defense lawyer Ben Varina of Washington, D.C., in his closing arguments, said defense attorneys tracked down the unknown confidential informant through the seven-digit number Jones had written on his palm - which turned out to be the phone number for Randy Gentry.

Varina said Jones had misrepresented what he was told by Gentry, who testified at the hearing that he never went inside Maye's duplex. The search warrant says Gentry saw marijuana inside Maye's duplex.

For that reason, Varina said, Maye is ineligible for the death penalty because Jones acted outside his "official capacity."

"The indictment should be dismissed on that basis," he said. "It's an inescapable conclusion the court should reach."

But McDonald said the search warrant shows Jones relied on "various sources," not just Gentry. And Gentry, McDonald said, "may not have told the truth to officer Jones." He said the memory of Gentry, a longtime drug user, may have been affected.

Earlier in the day, defense attorneys sought to question prosecutors' claim that Maye was standing when he fired his gun.

In Maye's trial, Hayne testified the bullet that killed Jones traveled at a 20-degree downward angle.

Defense witness Jack Daniel, a pathologist from Richmond, Va., testified there was no way to determine what the bullet's angle solely by examining the wounds in Jones' body. You would have to know the position of the body, the elevation of the gun and the distance between the muzzle of the gun and the body, Daniel said.

For example, he said, if the victim were leaning forward at a 40-degree angle, most likely in a running position, the bullet could actually be traveling at a 20-degree upward angle.

"I don't believe Dr. Hayne had a reliable basis to place the location of the shooter," Daniel testified.

McDonald read portions of Hayne's testimony that shows the pathologist never pinpointed Maye's or Jones' positions.

"Is it possible (Maye) was standing when he shot (Jones)?" McDonald asked.

"It's possible," Daniel replied. "There are a great number of positions that could fit the findings."

In addition to Daniel's testimony, crime scene expert Larry McCann of Manassas, Va., testified Wednesday that there is evidence to support Maye's version of events.

www.clarionledger.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20060922/NEWS/609220382/1001/news

[WaTcHeR]

Here is a worthless snitch, that doesn't deserve to be alive!

Meet Randy Gentry, Confidential Informant

09.22.2006 - Mr. Randy Gentry testified today at Cory Maye's hearing. He's the confidential informant whose tip led to the raid. He's also been the CI in several other drug busts in and around Prentiss, Mississippi.

And holy hell. You couldn't cast a better villain. He's a 51-year old guy with white hair pulled back into a ponytail, a long, white beard, and wears glasses in dark round frames. He's illiterate (or, in his words, he "aint much with words"), and according to the district attorney (who wants to undermine Mr. Gentry's credibility now that we're post-trial, and his story his damaging to the prosecution), he's something of a "doper" himself.

Before I indulge you with the transcript of Mr. Gentry's rant on lead counsel Bob Evans' answering machine from a couple of weeks ago, let's recap the set-up:

The defense team had just found Mr. Gentry through a private investigator. He agreed to meet with the investigator and Bob Evans, and there was some talk about covering his gas fare to the meeting. But Mr. Gentry soon realized the investigator was working for the defense, and clammed up. He missed two scheduled meetings with the defense team the next day (they'd later discover that he had gone to the sheriff's department to "turn himself in.")

At that, Bob Evans called and informed Mr. Gentry that he could either testify voluntarily, or be compelled to testify in court. It's at that point that Mr. Gentry left the following message on Evans' machine:

Answering Machine:

Wednesday, 8:38 a.m.

Gentry:

Yeah, this is Mr. Randy Gentry. Hey, I got to thinkin' about my friend. I got yo' message this morning, Bob. Y'all -- y'all threaten me all you want to and everything. I don't like fuckin' niggers from jump street but call me or whatever and I'll -- but the day I burn five cents on gas to help that fuckin' cocksucker Cory Maye get out of jail is going to be a hell of a damn day. But -- uh -- if you want ot talk to me like a fuckin' white man, you talk. But don't threaten me on bullshit. Get your NAACP motherfuckers -- I don't give a fuck -- niggers, bro, fuck niggers! But I'll tell you what. That's a good friend of mine they killed, buddy. I'll -- I'll tell you anything. I'll -- I'll be honest with you as fuckin' gum (?) street. But I don't like no motherfucker talkin' shit to me or about my friends. Alright, well look here. Call me today and look here. Y'all buy my fuckin' gas, the NAACP buy my fuckin' gas I'll come talk to y'all or whatever. But look here. I'm -- I'm a poor-ass motherfucker too, bro. Call me. You got my fuckin' number. Don't piss me fuckin' off.

This is the "reliable," "trustworthy" informant who made the raid on Mary Street possible. He's also likely put quite a few other black folks in jail over the last few years.

I'll have more on the charming Mr. Gentry later. The guy is the antonym of "credible witness." As noted in the Clarion-Ledger article linked below, Gentry's own brother's testimony directly contradicts just about everything he said today (his brother's testimony actually jibes somewhat with the search warrants, though in the small ways it differs, it helps Cory Maye's case -- more on that later, too).

But I'm thinking the colorful passage above ought to suffice for now.

Oh, and I haven't the slightest idea where the NAACP came from. I guess if a black man has a lawyer, it must be either the ACLU or the NAACP.

www.theagitator.com/archives/027052.php#027052

[WaTcHeR]

Let us not forget who the real murderer of Officer Ron Jones is. That would be the Judge that signed the "warrant," from the information of the unreliable snitch Mr. Randy Gentry.

[NJ]

One less stupid cop in this world!

[jason]

www.whencrackerscrumble.com/heyman.htm
Check it out some good stuff

[MM]

Officer Ron Jones was a dumbass, now he's a dead dumbass!

[md4j]

watcher said:

I remember this story. Basically you a had a cop that was killed not by a person, but by the "war on drugs."

This is how it breaks down: You have a white red neck cop from Mississippi that gets two "search warrants" from a "snitch." The snitch isn't sure what apartment the drugs might be in, so the snitch says it might be in one of two apartments. Then you have stupid officer Ron Jones, that is willing to risk his life on a "snitch."

I would have done the same, I would have shot and killed every police officer that came through my door! What person wouldn't defend their family? Someone comes into your home, you don't stop shooting until there is no more danger. Cops know this golden rule.

Police chief Jones, sorry to say your son was no hero! He was a casualty of the war on drugs! You lose, end of story!

Now sits on death row a innocent man, who never before this incident had a criminal record. Why is he on death row you ask? Because he is black!

Yeah. He absolutely couldn't be in jail because he killed someone. That's impossible, it's only because he's black.