A-Infos (en) What Direction for the Case of Abner Louima?

[Tom Burghardt <tburghardt@igc.apc.org>]

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     A - I N F O S  N E W S  S E R V I C E
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                        * HAITI PROGRES *
              "Le journal qui offre une alternative"
 
                      * THIS WEEK IN HAITI *
                      February 4 - 10, 1998
                         Vol. 15, No. 46
 
                              * * *
 
     "This Week in Haiti" is the English section of HAITI PROGRES
     newsweekly. For information on other news in French and
     Creole, please contact the paper at (tel) 718-434-8100,
     (fax) 718-434-5551 or e-mail at <haiticom@blythe.org>
 
                              -----
_________________________________________________________________
 
          WHAT DIRECTION FOR THE CASE OF ABNER LOUIMA?
_________________________________________________________________
 
                                *
 
     Will the case of Abner Louima become a landmark in the
history of the struggle against police brutality? Or will it be
depoliticized and reduced to a venal bid for a high cash
settlement?
 
     This is the question which tormented Carl Thomas, Brian
Figeroux and Casilda Roper-Simpson until a tempestuous Jan. 23
meeting where they resigned as Louima's lawyers, citing
"professional and ethical differences" with three other lawyers
on the case: Johnny Cochran, Barry Scheck, and Peter Neufeld. The
latter three became famous in the U.S. as the "dream team" which
successfully defended former football and movie star O.J.
Simpson, who was accused of murdering his wife and another man in
1995.
 
     In an interview with Haiti Progres, Carl Thomas said that
friction began almost immediately between the Cochran's team and
his firm, Louima's original lawyers. It was Thomas's partner,
Figeroux, who rushed to Louima's Coney Island Hospital bed on
Aug. 11 in response to a desperate call from Jonas Louima,
Abner's younger brother. The family had called other attorneys,
including Haitian ones, but they had all wanted cash up front
before they would take the case.
 
     But Figeroux and Thomas, two Trinidadians whom many young
Haitians know from the time a few years ago when they taught
courses at Brooklyn College, immediately took up the case without
concern for money because it concerned police brutality. Thomas
says that after the "dream team" came onto the case in late
September, he and his associates found themselves shouldered
aside. "These were stars coming in, and we were just the locals,"
Thomas said. "After that, it became a difficult process for us to
know what was going on."
 
     Thomas's team initiated a $155 millon suit against New York
City for the alleged beating and torture of Louima at the hands
of 4 policemen after his arrest outside Brooklyn's Rendez-vous
Nightclub last Aug. 9. They saw the event as part of a "long
litany of abuses by the police department" and were preparing to
prosecute it in a way that would highlight the pattern. But,
according to Thomas, this strategy changed when Cochran and his
associates joined Louima's legal team. "I wanted to leave at that
point simply because I felt that those guys were coming from a
different perspective," Thomas said. "They had no basis for
understanding what it meant to be brutalized by the police in
Brooklyn's 70th Precinct. They didn't see what it meant for the
movement, or how it could be important in bringing an end to
police brutality. My fears were borne out throughout my
association with them."
 
     Thomas says that when he and his colleagues tried to address
this problem, Cochran's team "really didn't want to hear what we
had to say, as if they had some ancient Chinese secret about how
to conduct this case."
 
     While Thomas stopped short of accusing Cochran's team of
opportunism, he did expound on how different lawyers approach
police brutality incidents. "In a lot of cases, not just this
case, lawyers tend to focus on the opportunity for a huge
settlement," Thomas said. Trying to remedy police brutality is
seen as "a tangential issue," which, for Thomas, is "putting the
cart before the horse."
 
     Furthermore, "attorneys really can dictate the direction of
the movement [against police brutality] simply because they have
control over these cases. That is a bad thing," Thomas said. "The
movement should have control over the case. Not the legal
aspects, of course, but the direction and focus of the case
should be based on an organic connection to the movement. If
there is no connection, it opens the door for all kinds of deal-
making and conflicts."
 
     Thomas fears that Cochran's team will not take the high road
because their links to the community are not strong enough. "To
have this case, which could be a seminal case, disjointed from
the movement is to suggest a lack of sophisticated understanding
of what needs to happen to bring this insidious plague [of police
brutality] to an end."
 
     However, Peter Neufeld of Cochran's team responded that "the
suggestion that we are more concerned with financial rewards or
keeping the case focus narrow is an expression by someone who is,
frankly, very confused."
 
     He also staunchly defends the reputations of himself and his
colleagues. "Our record as lawyers for social change speaks for
itself," Neufeld said. "Each of us has been involved in civil
rights cases, and in particular police brutality cases, for more
than a decade, indeed longer than the amount of time that the
other lawyers have been practicing in the aggregate." Neufeld and
Scheck both worked for many years as public defenders in the
south Bronx.
 
     He cited numerous cases in New York where he and Scheck have
defended victims of police brutality, as well as Cochran's record
in California. "In each of the cases that we have worked on
involving police brutality, systemic changes were brought about
because we were always concerned with the social and political
issues," he said. "This case [of Louima] is no different."
 
     Neufeld also noted that he and Scheck are co-founders and
co-directors of the "Innocence Project," in which they represent
about 450 prisoners around the country pro bono in efforts to
reopen their cases while they are on death row or serving lengthy
sentences. They try to prove that the prisoners are factually
innocent and that they were unjustly convicted due to systemic
problems in the criminal justice system. "To date, we have
exonerated more than 30 men, about a dozen of whom were on death
row," Neufeld said.
 
     The departure of Thomas, Figeroux and Roper-Simpson comes
just over a week after revelations that Louima, when preparing to
testify before a Grand Jury, could not recall if the policemen
who sodomized him in the stationhouse bathroom said something
like "It's Guiliani time, not Dinkins time," referring to the
present and former mayors of New York City. (see Haiti Progres,
Vol. 15 No. 44, January 21 - 27, 1998).
 
     The Village Voice reported that the supposed retraction, and
questions about damage to Louima's dentures, caused Federal
prosecutors to stop their investigation of the incident. But
Federal prosecutors deny the report.
 
     Also remaining among Louima's lawyers is limousine-loving
Samuel Rubenstein, a personal injury lawyer who was brought into
the case by Louima's uncle, the Rev. Philius Nicolas and his son
Samuel. Thomas's team has clashed openly with Rubenstein, whose
motives they suspect.
 
     Despite their leaving, Thomas says he and his associates
"are not upset. We support Abner Louima in his case and the
eventual prosecution of the police officers."
 
     Likewise, Louima family spokesperson, Samuel Nicolas, told
Haiti Progres that there was no rancor in the split. "We wish
them well and are sorry that they are not on the team," Nicolas
said. "We wish they had stayed."
 
     Clearly responding to community consternation, he also
insisted that the focus of the case has not changed. "Whoever is
on the team, it is a police brutality issue," Nicolas said. "We
still believe that Mr. Cochran is one of the best attorneys in
trying police brutality cases and that this team will represent
Abner to the fullest so that we will see justice."
 
     All articles copyrighted Haiti Progres, Inc. REPRINTS
     ENCOURAGED. Please credit Haiti Progres.
 
                              * * *
 
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        to subscribe e-mail Tom Burghardt <tburghardt@igc.org>
 
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