A man who went to prison for nineteen years for a murder that he did not commit continues to work through the process of clearing his name. John Nolley’s most recent step towards victory came earlier this month when the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals overturned his murder conviction. Nolley has been out of prison since the combined efforts of the Innocence Project, and the Conviction Integrity Unity in the Tarrant County district attorney’s office secured his release two years ago.

One of the bases for John Nolley’s murder conviction was jailhouse informant testimony, a form of evidence that proved to be so problematic that the Tarrant County District Attorney’s office, and eventually the entire state of Texas, had to reform the way such testimony is handled. In Nolley’s case, not just one, but two informants gave false testimony which tainted Nolley’s trial so severely that the district attorney’s office agreed that his pleas for relief were valid. The new law will help other defendants avoid wrongful convictions. There is also the possibility of relief for people who are currently in prison who were wrongfully convicted.

Texas’s new law on jailhouse informant testimony was passed last year, with the aim of improving accuracy in the Texas criminal justice system by calling for the more careful handling of testimony given by jailhouse informants. False testimony like the kind that kept John Nolley behind bars for almost twenty years is the most common reason for death row inmates to be exonerated.

One of the dangers of jailhouse informant testimony is that people who are incarcerated have an incentive to lie to potentially obtain a personal benefit. In the interest of catching informants who do try to lie their way to a better deal, the new law requires county and district attorney’s offices to keep records of various types of information about the informants who provide testimony against others. For example, each informant’s criminal history, as well as the details of any benefits informants receive in exchange for their testimony, and records of any previous cases in which they testified must be shared by prosecutors with defense attorneys.

In passing the law requiring transparency and careful handling of jailhouse informant testimony, Texas took a step forward in making its criminal justice system more accurate. Since jailhouse informant testimony is used to secure many convictions across America, it is essential that other states follow Texas’s lead and take a careful account of how that testimony is obtained and used in their own courts so that they can correct problems with their state laws and move in the direction of increased accuracy.

In addition to moving through the process of fully exonerating John Nolley, the district attorney’s office is continuing its investigation into the murder in the hope that the person who did commit the murder will be brought to justice. If John Nolley is exonerated, he will be able to access a state benefits program that compensates the wrongfully accused.

Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra – Strong Advocacy for Texas Defendants

A Texas Criminal Defense Attorney can help you resolve your Texas criminal law matter. Call Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra, at (903) 753-7499, or fill out a contact form on our website.

Justice is not always swift. Sometimes the road to victory is long and treacherous, and for people who get wrongfully convicted and sent to death row, the success of their appeals can make the difference between life and death. A death row inmate finally got freed after a lengthy appeal revealed that the prosecutor withheld evidence during his trial and, while under oath, denied having information that supported the defendant’s alibi.

Alfred Dewayne Brown, along with two others, got convicted of killing a police officer and a clerk during a 2003 robbery at a check cashing store. Throughout his trial and subsequent incarceration on death row, Brown maintained his innocence and said that there are phone records which could prove that he was at home at the time that the robbery and murders happened.

The phone records that Brown said would support his alibi show that he had called his girlfriend from his home at the time that the crimes were in progress. The records got found in 2013 by a detective who was searching Brown’s home. They were in his garage. After the records got found, a court overturned Brown’s conviction, and prosecutors chose not to bring the case back to trial.

In 2008, Dan Rizzo said under oath that he didn’t withhold information that could have aided Alfred Dewayne Brown’s defense. The prosecutor claims that not mentioning that the phone records got found was a mistake, that the failure to disclose the records was unintentional. However, that assertion and how sworn statement directly contradicts a recently recovered email that just got released by the Harris County District Attorney’s Office. The email shows that in 2003, before Brown’s trial, the prosecutor got told about phone records that could have been used to support Brown’s defense. The prosecutor never told Brown’s defense attorney about the phone records, despite the “Brady Rule” that requires that any materials that could possibly exculpate a defendant get provided to that defendant’s attorneys by the prosecution.

Alfred Dewayne Brown is now free, and in light of what had happened in his case, there is an effort underway to examine the prosecutor’s conduct in other cases, some of which resulted in convictions just as serious as Brown’s capital murder conviction. The cases that will get reviewed are cases in which the defense alleges violations of the Brady rule. It has not yet gotten decided how many cases could potentially get affected by the review.

Unfortunately, the statute of limitations for a possible perjury case against Rizzo has already run. It is still possible that he could face disciplinary action, but it is uncertain what result that would have because he is retired. Brown had been pursuing a civil suit against Harris County for compensation for the ten years that he spent wrongfully incarcerated on death row. The state rejected his request for compensation, saying that it cannot pay him since he has not been declared innocent. It is unclear whether Brown or anyone else will continue to pursue compensation.

Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra – An Ally for Texas Defendants

If you recently got charged with a crime, know you do not have to fight your Texas criminal charges alone. A Texas Criminal Defense Attorney can walk with you through your criminal case towards a successful resolution. Call Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra, at (903) 753-7499, or fill out a contact form on our website.

The quality of legal defense that a person gets after they get accused of a crime in Texas is not always equal. One unfortunate truth about criminal defense in Texas is that while there many talented criminal defense attorneys who are capable of bringing the best possible defenses for their clients into the courts, not all of those attorneys serve in positions where they can do that. Several types of attorneys are available to people who get accused of crimes in Texas. Private counsel are available to anyone who is willing and able to pay their fees or get help from family or friends to do so. Public defenders are available to people who meet specific criteria regarding the economic resources they have available to them. Inmates incarcerated in the Texas Penal System who get accused of committing crimes while they are incarcerated have access to yet another group of attorneys, the State Counsel for Offenders (SFCO).

Each of the aforementioned groups of attorneys experiences different financial, time, and other pressures regarding their work. Sometimes those pressures result in situations where talented attorneys are not permitted to perform the quality of work that they can do. For example, public defenders often get burdened by large caseloads and therefore experience time pressures that do not permit them to spend the amount of time on each client’s case that they would like to spend on it. The attorneys who are part of the SFCO face a different type of pressure in the form of a conflict of interest between the work that they are charged with doing – representing indigent inmates – and the goals of the agency that funds them and has control over their work – the Texas Department of Criminal Justice.

A recent report states that SCFO attorneys have fewer resources available to them than the prosecutors that they must face in court. This means that sometimes, even though the SFCO attorneys know what defense strategies, expert witnesses and other things would make the best cases for their clients they are not always able to access all of them and present the case the way that they would like to. The clients in those cases do not get the best possible defenses in their cases.

Whenever possible, it is crucial that people who get charged with crimes in Texas get help from private counsel. Your Texas Criminal Defense Attorney has represented many clients charged with crimes in Texas, and they know how to present a strong defense on your behalf. Whether this is your first criminal charge or a repeat offense, your attorney can analyze the facts of your case and craft a defense strategy that gives you a good chance of achieving a positive result in your case. Your attorney can help you understand your charges, and they can help you understand and navigate the various impacts that your criminal charge is likely to have in your life.

Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra – Strong Support for Texas Defendants

A criminal charge can throw many things in your life off course. Fortunately, you do not have to navigate your Texas criminal case alone. A Texas Criminal Defense Attorney can support you every step of the way as you work to get your life back on track. Call Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra, at (903) 753-7499, or fill out a contact form on our website.

It should come as no surprise that if you have anything on your criminal record, you will experience some consequences related to those crimes. Unfortunately, what many people do not know until they have one or more convictions on their records is that the effects of criminal convictions can extend far beyond fines and jail time into just about every area of a person’s life, for many years after the conviction occurred.

While we would like to think that people who commit crimes experience punishment, and then choose to live their lives as upstanding citizens after having learned from their mistakes could do that without running into additional detriment from their earlier misdeeds, it is unfortunately not true. The effects of a criminal conviction can follow an individual far into the future and jeopardize things that they have worked very hard to accomplish.

For example, a man who started a successful locksmith business over thirty years ago is now being denied an operating license because he had participated in crime while he was a teenager. The man, whose company has served over a hundred thousand customers and has garnered excellent reviews from the Better Business Bureau and other business ranking agencies, did not commit any other crimes after he drove the getaway car for his roommates after they broke into someone’s house. Not only did he not commit any more crimes, he got punished for his role in the break-in – he spent five years on probation and also paid restitution.

What’s more, after the Texas DPS started regulating locksmithing and other professions, the man was able to get a locksmith license based upon the length of time since his conviction and his good behavior since that single mistake. He maintained that license until last year when he got a notice that said that his license would not get renewed because of the past conviction. It is unclear why the license wasn’t renewed after getting renewed for many years despite the conviction, and it could be because of a technical glitch or some other error. He’s currently pursuing reinstatement of his license, but he is already experiencing negative consequences of being unlicensed – he’s been unable to work as a locksmith for over six months, he has lost his BBB accreditation because he’s not licensed, and more.

Unfortunately, the locksmith isn’t the only person whose past mistake is causing him present-day harm. Over two hundred Texas laws that relate to employment bar people with past convictions from certain types of work. Those laws send a message that rehabilitation and reform don’t happen, that crime is a permanent barrier to many kinds of employment. That is not a message that it would be helpful for society to believe, nor is it a message that will prove useful in deterring crime.

Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra – Defending the Accused

If your criminal record prevents you from pursuing the work that you want to do, a Texas Criminal Defense Attorney might be able to help you. Call Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra, at (903) 753-7499, or contact us through our website by using our online contact form.

The widespread use of technology and social media have created many ways for people to interact with each other. Unfortunately, the nature of online interactions isn’t always positive. From people trolling each other on social media and leaving nasty comments on the details of other people’s lives to creating and posting online content with the intent of embarrassing or harming others, technology has created plenty of ways for people to be unkind towards each other.

For example, Joe Barton recently apologized for a sexually explicit photo of him that has been circulating on social media. Barton did not post the picture, nor did he give permission for it to get posted, but there it was on the internet, leaving him in the unenviable position of having to decide what to do about it. That would be a difficult thing for anyone to do, but even more unfortunately for Barton, he is a politician, and his career depends in large part upon the public’s opinion of him. Barton chose to acknowledge the image and the relationship portrayed therein, and he apologized to his constituents for letting them down, because he knew that at least some people would not have approved of that relationship. As of yet, no one has released information about the source of the image and any potential motivation for posting it – it could be a political opponent, an angry former lover, or any other person who wanted to embarrass Barton and harm his reputation.

It is even possible that Joe Barton is the victim of a crime. Some Texans may not know that there is a state law that makes it a crime to intentionally disclose pictures or videos that “depict another person with the person’s intimate parts exposed or engaging in sexual conduct” without their consent. This type of disclosure is often referred to as “revenge porn” because that’s one possible motivation for many posts of this nature. Posting this type of content could get you charged with a Class A misdemeanor with a sentence of up to a year in the county jail and a fine of up to four thousand dollars. The law was passed to protect people who were in consensual relationships at the time that the images got created, but who do not consent to the posting of the images online.

If you have been accused of posting revenge porn in violation of the new statute, it is imperative that you get help from an experienced Texas Criminal Defense Attorney. Just as is the case with any crime, it is possible that you could present a defense to the court that could result in the charges getting dropped or the penalty getting reduced.

Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra – An Ally for the Accused

If you get charged with a crime in Texas, consult an attorney right away. An experienced Texas Criminal Defense Attorney can build a strong case on your behalf, especially if you retain them immediately. The consequences of being charged with or convicted of a crime can extend far beyond fines and imprisonment, so it is essential that you do whatever you can to protect your rights at this critical time. If you got charged with a crime in Texas, call Texas Criminal Defense Attorney Alex Tyra, at (903) 753-7499, or connect with us on our website through our online contact form.