June 29th, 2011 8:45am
Status Conference after Competency Trial Mis-Trial
There will be a conference on Wednesday, June 29th at 8:45am to discuss next steps for case of william hamilton ayres, alleged psychiatrist, who molested many young boys under the guise of providing psychiatric care.
On June 17th, mistrial was declared in ayres' sham competency trial. The court has set a re-trial date for August 22, 2011, but there is a status conference on Wednesday, at which point this may change.
From discussions in court and in the paper, it seems that they may not go ahead with a re-trial for the competency portion of the case. Even if they do have a trial and determine that he is competent, there seems to be indication that there will be no criminal re-trial, and if he is found incompetent, he may get "outpatient" treatment.
At this point it's looking very much like ayres will walk, even though he's a habitual molester, and has been for many years.
Please read the post and comments immediately below this one for discussion. There is an article in the San Mateo Daily Journal as well: Read More Here
Normally, when people talk about prosecutorial misconduct, they talk about prosecutors who withhold EXCULPATORY evidence that would prove the defendant is innocent.
ReplyDeleteBut in the Dr. William Ayres case, the prosecutor appears to have deliberately withheld INCULPATORY evidence about Ayres' training in Boston that would PROVE Ayres' guilt.
In this bizarro case it was actually Ayres' OWN lawyer who found out that Ayres' statements that he was trained to give genital exams to boys in therapy in Boston were in fact, FALSE and INCULPATORY.
Why didn't the prosecutor present that as evidence? What were the motives behind this? Was it sheer incompetence or a psychological block - or did the DA deliberately throw the case out of fear of lawsuits?
Shouldn't the US Justice Department be investigating?
Here is a partial list of complaints about the prosecutor from several parents of victims and prosecution witnesses:
ReplyDeleteMckowan was:
"haphazard"
"disorganized"
"didn't prep"
"operated at the very last minute."
"didn't treat us as if she was on our side when we were on the witness stand".
"hung us out to dry, didn't come to our defense"
"didn't give a shit about the "victims"
"never contacted the victims after the first trial"
-promised one mother of a victim the day after the first trial ended that she was going to write a letter to her son that night. She never did, and never responded to the several letters the victim wrote to her after the trial, expressing dismay that she had never responded to him.
-told one victim he would "make a bad witness" because he sounded "too technical."
- never responded to one victim's ( who never testified at the trial)s repeated phone calls - at least seven in a year - who wanted his childhood photo that belonged to his elderly father, who kept telling his son that he wanted the keepsake returned.
-while meeting with one important witness the morning of the witness's testimony, the prosecutor "took multiple phone calls from her young granddaughter and proceeded to chat away with her" seemingly unconcerned that the witness was going to testify that morning and needed prepping.
-told witnesses she didn't like to prepare much and just "liked things to flow."
-was "highly unprofessional" and did things like write personal emails to people involved in the case about her turbulent childhood, her estranged son, and even asked one person in an email" Are you partnered?"
-barely prepped one mother of a victim for the trial, but got angry when the mother couldn't remember on the witness stand if her son was nine or ten in a photo , and snapped "Do you even know what year your son was born?" Mother reported that she was humiliated when the jury tittered and felt that the prosecutor was acting more like a defense lawyer
- falsely accused one mother of a victim of feeding confidential information from the DA's office to the Ayres blog and warning her she had evidence of this and was keeping files of this in her office. This turned out to be false. When the mother complained to the prosecutor's supervisor that this false accusation had caused her undue stress, the supervisor promised that Mckowan would call her to apologize. That was ten months ago and the mother has still not heard from the prosecutor.
- fabricated stories about efforts to contact Boston doctors who trained with Ayres and then fabricated more stories to cover the fact that she didn't investigate this key evidence.
- never bothered to check Ayres' resume for the first criminal trial and at the trial, had no idea where Ayres had trained in child psychiatry . Asked one citizen watching the trial to "check Ayres' resume to see if it was accurate" five minutes before she was to cross-examine Ayres for the first time.
- according to jurors from the first trial, didn't "give a rat's ass about the jury selection, rushed through the process and barely asked any questions."
- after the criminal mistrial, snapped at a prosecution witness she had barely prepped and said, " I blame YOU for losing the case."
I am amazed that this is still going on. As a victom of ayres in the early 70's, and having been scheduled to be a witness in the civil suit I am surprised that I was never contacted by the prosecution to testify in this case. Nor was my father who was a pediatrician who had recommended patients to Ayers. I am sure he would not agree that this type of exam was necessary since that would be his job as the adolescents physician.
ReplyDeleteDavid Gross
Thanks for your comments David. Yes, I think we're all a bit stunned that it's still dragging on and on.
ReplyDeleteI think people are too afraid to face the reality of the situation, and spend more time running from it than doing something about it.