'Crashing the system,' crime lab follies, and a route off death row

Here are a few odds and ends for you that didn't make it into their own, full Grits posts but still merit readers' attention:

'New doubts arise in case surrounding 1985 murder'
Brandi Grissom at the Texas Tribune examines the possibility that a man recently convicted of a gruesome 1985 murder in a prominent Austin cold case may be innocent and gives voice to calls for DNA testing. The defense has posited a theory that Mark Norwood, the man accused of killing Michael Morton's wife Christine as well as another Austin woman, was responsible for the murders and asked for any DNA evidence from the scene to be tested to see if it matched him or anyone else in the CODIS database. The Travis County prosecutor in the case, incidentally, is Mark Pryor who blogs at DA Confidential.

'Crime is down and so is the cost of fighting it' 
So says the Texas Public Policy Foundation's Marc Levin in a recent Houston Chronicle op ed.

Walker commissioners may bypass voters on jail building
In Huntsville, Walker County Commissioners are considering building a new jail with certificates of obligation so they don't have to go to the voters for approval. Readers may recall that Harris County voters rejected a new jail several years ago and Smith County voters said "no" three times before persistence finally paid off for Tyler jail builders. So I understand why they'd want to bypass the voters. But they shouldn't.

Retrials provide route off death row
Brian Rogers at the Houston Chronicle has a story on the recent upsurge of retrials ordered in Harris County death penalty cases because of flawed jury instructions, most of which resulted in life sentences. Said my ol' college pal Danalynn Recer, "We structure the plea in a way that there's not ever going to be parole."

Crime Lab Follies: Empire State edition
Having written recently about the shortcomings of crime lab accreditation, Grits was interested to see this item from Paul Kennedy at The Defense Rests describing the meltdown in oversight at the Nassau County (Long Island) crime lab in New York, which was closed in 2011 "due to grave concerns about the integrity of testing being performed at the lab," according to a massive but revealing report on the subject the NY Office of Inspector General. More from Kennedy on lab accreditation here.

'Crashing the system'?
Michelle Alexander recently had an op ed in the New York Times calling for defendants to organize and choose en masse to take their cases to trial in order to "crash the system," declaring that when a friend mentioned the idea she was so stunned she found herself "speechless." She asks: “What would happen if we organized thousands, even hundreds of thousands, of people charged with crimes to refuse to play the game, to refuse to plea out? What if they all insisted on their Sixth Amendment right to trial? Couldn’t we bring the whole system to a halt just like that?” The short answer is that if you were able to organize hundreds of thousands of people you could change the laws at the Legislature and wouldn't need to crash the system! So organize them, already, if it's that easy! See a prosecutor's reaction to the suggestion. MORE: See a biting response from A Public Defender.