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March 30, 2009

"Mortal Justice" takes a swipe at criminal justice system

By DELANIA TRIGG, Register Staff Writer

Suspects don’t give false confessions, right?

Don’t be so sure.

Jeanette Popp and Wanda Evan’s “Mortal Justice” may give even hard-core law and order advocates a fresh perspective on the Texas criminal justice system.

The first part of this true crime story centers on the murder of 20-year-old Austin Pizza Hut manager Nancy DePriest on a sunny November morning in 1988.

The reader is given few details about the man who robbed, raped and killed the attractive young mother.

The writers walk us through “The Pizza Hut murder” lacing their prose with poignant details about the victim who was found shot in the head, floating in a flooded back room of the restaurant, naked expect for her socks.

Sadly, DePriest was still breathing when she was found and lived for hours before her husband signed the documents required to remove her from life support.

At first, the case seemed straightforward.

Police soon set their sights on a couple of suspects — Christopher Ochoa and Richard Danziger.

Both were young.

Danziger was 20.

Ochoa was just 19.

Both had ties to the Pizza Hut where DePriest worked.

Both entered the restaurant shortly after the murder and behaved strangely according to witnesses.

Ochoa even confessed to the crime and implicated his some-time roommate Danziger in the horrible business.

The two were tried, convicted and sent to prison.

There’s just one problem.

Both were innocent.

Popp, who is DePriest’s mother, and Evans, a journalist and true crime writer, devote the rest of the book to explaining how police coerced the inexperienced Ochoa into making a false confession and detailing the damage done to both Ochoa and Danziger while they were in prison.

Danziger’s case is especially tragic. He was brutally beaten by a fellow inmate who reportedly mistook Danziger for another prisoner.

The attack left him with irreversible brain damage, seizures, severe cognitive impairment and memory loss.

At times, “Mortal Justice” isn’t easy to read.

No one wants to think cops terrify, threaten and lie to suspects in order to force confessions and close their cases, but in this instance, that is exactly what happened.

“Mortal Justice” is about vindication for many of the people devastated by the murder including Popp who gave up her job at a convenience store to battle the death penalty full-time and become an advocate for the Innocence Project.

Along the way, officials could have righted the wrong done to Danziger and Ochoa many times, but no one seemed willing to take another look at the case.

Even after the real killer wrote a lengthy confession and mailed copies of it to several agencies including Austin PD and then-governor George W. Bush, the case remained closed.

“Mortal Justice” made me rethink my stance on the death penalty and on justice in general.

The book is well worth reading, but be prepared to squirm as the police, district attorney, defense and even the accused blunder through an investigation and murder trial that is worse than anything Russian author Franz Kafka might have dreamed for his ill-fated characters.

As writer Gloria Steinem said, “Law and justice are not always the same.”

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    Don’t be so sure.

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