I hope Harris gets millions out of this one. Prosecutorial misconduct to be sure.
http://www.dmregister.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050331/SPORTS13/503310395/1003/SPORTS&lead=1
Ex-Cyclone Danny Harris wrongly imprisoned for two months on kidnapping charges
By JOHN WOOD
SPECIAL TO THE REGISTER
March 31, 2005
The series of events that landed Harris, the former Iowa State hurdler, in custody has left him angry at police and prosecutors, confused over how the system failed him repeatedly and feeling powerless as he attempts to reassemble the pieces of his fractured life.
The ordeal started in November, after a 75-year-old Santa Monica woman was kidnapped for the second time in two weeks. The kidnapper, armed with a syringe and screwdriver, removed the victim from her home and demanded money, while threatening to kill her and burn down her house.
The kidnapper also dropped a black cap as he was chased away from the scene at gunpoint by a neighbor. Bloodhounds following the scent of both items ended up at a rehabilitation center for chemical dependency where Harris was living.
Armed with a sketch of the kidnapper, police questioned residents of the facility and eventually were led to Harris, a recovering cocaine addict with nearly a year of sobriety. Investigators then assembled what is called a "six pack," or a photo lineup.
The victim identified three people as possibly the man who had kidnapped her: Harris, along with two other men randomly included in the lineup.
Based on that evidence, a judge issued an arrest warrant, and Harris was taken into custody. Prosecutors levied seven felony charges against Harris, who faced a maximum sentence of life, plus 16 years.
"It was a nightmare," Harris said. "I literally woke up at Santa Monica Jail and pinched myself because I thought it was a dream - but it wasn't."
Veering off course
Harris is the youngest of six children. He was raised in rough-and-tumble Compton and moved to Perris, Calif., to live with his grandmother at age 14 after his mother died from congestive heart failure. His father died of a brain aneurysm when Harris was 3.
A standout track star who set state and national records, Harris earned a scholarship to Iowa State, where he joined the football team as a defensive back and continued to compete on the track. In 1984, at age 18, Harris competed in the Los Angeles Olympics against track great Edwin Moses. He captured the silver medal in the 400-meter hurdles.
Harris continued to run, but in 1988 he tore a hamstring a week before the Olympic Trials. He missed making the team by just 16-hundredths of a second. Shortly afterward, he said he tried free-basing cocaine for the first time.
"When I didn't make the team in '88, that was a crushing blow for me," Harris said.
Though he developed a cocaine addiction quickly, Harris continued competing and held on to his lucrative sponsorships. In 1992, he was poised for another Olympic appearance. Then his addiction started taking its toll. Harris tested positive for cocaine and was disqualified from the Olympics.
He struggled on and off with his addiction, but, after failing a second test in 1996, Harris was banned for life from competing in the Olympics.
After working four years as an insurance adjuster and personal trainer in Des Moines, Harris moved back to California in 2000 and began work as a track coach at Perris High School.
He fell off the wagon again and spent a year, from 2002 to '03, essentially homeless in Long Beach, often sleeping on the unemployment office's steps, using cocaine as regularly as possible, alienating himself from relatives.
Harris contends he never resorted to crime while homeless. He said he worked the occasional odd job, mostly living off of unemployment checks and royalties from training videos he produced in 2000. When he moved in with his family, though, Harris took a ring from one of his sisters so he could sell it to buy cocaine. She responded with what substance-abuse counselors call "tough love."
"Instead of giving me a slap on the wrist, she called the cops," Harris said. "I underestimated how much she loves me. In hindsight, she did me a favor."
Sober in Santa Monica
A judge in January 2004 ordered Harris to complete a rehabilitation program. Harris spent four months at the Salvation Army and three months at a small facility in the Santa Monica Mountains before ending up at the CLARE Foundation in Santa Monica, where he had lived for several months before his arrest.
Harris already had completed his obligation to the courts, but stayed at CLARE voluntarily, and was paying rent while working full-time as a personal trainer earning $80 an hour.
Then came the arrest. Police stopped Harris before dawn on Nov. 10 as he was preparing to ride his bike to work. He was handcuffed and taken to jail.
"A plain-clothes car rolled up on me, and I thought I was going to get shot at first," said Harris, who said more than 10 patrol cars were on scene for the arrest. "I thought, 'What is this all about?' and they wouldn't tell me."
Detectives spoke with Harris for several hours that day and took a saliva swab from him, with the hope that DNA might be recovered from the kidnapper's hat and shirt, according to Santa Monica Police Department Lt. Ray Cooper.
When the DNA tests returned several weeks later, in early December, Harris and his public defender thought they had a clear victory. The hat and shirt both contained the DNA of Alonzo Taylor, a three-strike criminal who had been arrested shortly after the second kidnapping for allegedly trying to steal a car.
Taylor had a history of burglary arrests. In 1991, he was sentenced to three years and four months in prison for first-degree burglary. In 1994, he was sentenced to 12 years for the same offense, according to records from the California Department of Corrections.
What's more, Taylor in an earlier burglary had used a syringe as his weapon, as was done in the Santa Monica kidnappings, according to Matt Huey, the public defender who represented Harris.
The two men also share similar physical characteristics, which lawyers suggested might explain why Harris was identified in the photographic lineup.
Taylor stands 6 feet 4 inches and weighs 218 pounds. Harris is 6-1 and 200 pounds, Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department records show. Both men are black.
Fight of his life
Despite the emergence of a new suspect, prosecutors refused to drop the charges against Harris.
Deputy District Attorneys Kelly Fritz and Scott Millington said that although the DNA evidence suggested Taylor was the kidnapper, he might have been conspiring with Harris.
Prosecutors said evidence was collected from Harris' room that linked him to the kidnappings. The evidence included a pair of white sneakers, a screwdriver and a set of commemorative coins. The victim said her attacker had threatened her with a screwdriver, had taken a set of coins and was wearing white tennis shoes.
Huey criticized the supporting evidence cited by prosecutors. Most people have screwdrivers, he said, adding that Harris was a personal trainer and naturally would own white sneakers. As for the coins, Huey said they belonged to one of four other people sharing Harris' living space, adding the coin set did not match the one that was taken from the victim's home.
It was later found Taylor did not live at CLARE or know Harris.
"At the end of the day, there was absolutely nothing," Huey said. "It's like walking into your house and scooping up everything, and trying to connect it to a robbery. You could have money lying on your dresser, and they could say, 'That money belongs to the victim, and this is the fruit of your robbery.' They were coming up with whatever they could."
Still, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Katherine Mader refused to dismiss the case, or reduce Harris' $1.44 million bail. She cited as her reasons the possibility that Harris might have been working as an accomplice with Taylor, and the positive eyewitness identifications. Though the victim picked three men as possibly the kidnapper from the photographic lineup, two other witnesses had chosen only Harris.
Harris was shattered by the judge's refusal.
In the courtroom, two of Harris' sisters sobbed quietly, saying they couldn't stand to see their brother in a jail-issued jumpsuit, hands bound.
"He didn't do this," said Wanda Burns, a 41-year-old nursing assistant and Harris' sister. "Danny was clean. He was good. Everyone was proud of him."
On Jan. 5, two days before the preliminary hearing was set to begin, two live police lineups were conducted at the county jail in downtown Los Angeles. In one, Harris stood with five other inmates. In the other, Taylor stood with five different inmates.
The victim singled out Taylor.
An apology
Two days later the charges were dismissed against Harris. Judge Mader apologized to Harris, saying innocent people sometimes get trapped in the legal system.
"I know you've been in for a while - and I apologize on behalf of the court system for having you in for this length of time," Mader said at the Jan. 7 hearing.
Harris turned to a group of family and friends sitting in the courtroom, smiled and mouthed the words, "I'm coming home."
Rather than blame prosecutors or police, Huey faulted the identification process used by investigators. He argued there is too much room for error in photo lineups.
"He is and always was innocent," Huey said outside the courtroom, after the charges were dropped. "It highlights the problem with the photo identification, because when these witnesses got the chance to actually see these people live, the correct person was identified and the innocent person was excluded."
Asked if any explanation had been offered for how the police hounds ended up at the CLARE Foundation, Huey replied, "Not that I'm aware of - and it's awfully hard to cross examine a dog."
Santa Monica Police Chief James T. Butts Jr. defended the work done by his department, saying officers were thorough and their police work followed the book.
One day at a time
Harris now rents a room in a sober-living apartment complex. He rode his mountain bike to a nearby diner to share his story, recalling the events of the last few months over a tuna melt and a glass of lemonade.
In spending two months in custody, Harris said, "My whole life was turned upside down. My job was gone. My apartment was gone. My things were taken . . . I'm in the process now of putting it back together."
Harris says he is at a loss for strength, and for patience. For help, he meets regularly with a support group for recovering addicts, and he speaks often with his sisters and his addiction sponsor. In the last 10 years, Harris said he has been sober for more than a year four different times.
This time, he wants to make it permanent.
He also hopes to get therapy for the abuses he suffered in jail. His incarceration placed Harris among some of the most violent criminals in L.A.
"I was beat up, tied up and really just singled out because I'm not a gangster or a thug," he said. "I don't carry myself like that, and I certainly don't talk like that. I'm just different."
Harris said he is considering taking legal action for the way he was treated by the system and by other inmates. Still, he realizes that success in a civil courtroom would only do so much for him.
Harris also realizes he must work through his anger. Had Taylor's DNA not been in the police database, Harris thinks he still would be in custody.
"I'm not a violent person, but God, I have never been so angry in my life as I am now," Harris said. "It's really hard . . . For a person like myself, it's a great excuse to go and get high, and that's not something I want to do."
Like many recovering addicts, Harris approaches life one day at a time.
"I don't know, I don't even look out beyond this week," he said. "Sometimes I wake up and I feel like I could do anything.
"I think I'm a long way from being well from this experience - scars heal, though."