By Allan Turner
The Houston Chronicle
HOUSTON — Houston lawyers Friday filed a complaint against a former North Texas prosecutor, claiming he lied about cutting a deal with a witness that helped send a possibly innocent Corsicana auto mechanic to his execution.
The complaint against John Jackson was lodged with the State Bar of Texas to spotlight the former prosecutor’s alleged perjury during a 2010 court of inquiry called to review the murder case. Cameron Todd Willingham, 36, was executed in 2004 for the December 1991 murder of his three young children in an arson fire at his Corsicana home.
Neal Mann, a lawyer with Susman Godfrey LLP, said Jackson cut a deal with a jailhouse informer whose testimony was key to Willingham’s conviction, then hid it from the court.
Jackson has denied that he offered special consideration to the informer in return for testimony, but Willingham supporters said they have documentation that Jackson intervened for the man when he later was incarcerated in state prison.
Willingham’s conviction and execution gained international notoriety when three expert reviews questioned the accuracy of state and local arson investigations in the case. Friday’s action marked Willingham supporters’ most recent attempt - over a period of six years - to establish that irregularities occurred in the investigation and prosecution.
Jackson, who later became a state district judge and now is in private law practice, could not be reached for comment Friday.
In 2008, a complaint filed by the New York-based Innocence Project launched a three-year review of the case by the Texas Forensic Science Commission. That body ordered revision of arson-investigation standards in 2011, but stopped short of ruling that arson investigators in the Willingham case had been negligent. The Texas Attorney General’s office stopped further deliberations by ruling the commission had no jurisdiction to take up the case.
An attempt to have Willingham declared innocent by a court of inquiry - the court at which Jackson testified - ended when a higher court ruled the hearing improper. Earlier this year, the Innocence Project asked the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles to recommend a posthumous pardon for Willingham. The board rejected the request in April.
In the Jackson case, the State Bar of Texas will determine if “just cause” exists to pursue further action. If just cause is found, a state district judge or a legal association administrative judge will hear the case. If the complaint is upheld, Jackson could face sanctions up to losing his license to practice law.
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