From Crimestoppers to entreaties in the media, authorities encourage the public to come forward with information about crimes on a regular basis.
Law enforcement bemoans the effects of the ‘no snitch’ culture on investigations and says that, despite what you see on CSI, people are still the number-one solver of crimes.
But sometimes, despite occasional reward money, coming forward with information is a dicey business.
A judge was forced Tuesday to consider a question, with two seemingly opposed rights hanging in the balance: the Constitutional mandate of open court proceedings and the potential safety of confidential informants.
Superior Court Judge R. Allen Baddour Jr. opted for the potential safety of the informants, and what he deemed the integrity of the investigation. Six search warrants related to the slaying of UNC senior Eve Carson will remain sealed for the time being.
Judge Baddour acknowledged the importance of public documents to the justice system, but ruled that going public at this time could jeopardize two confidential informants in the case.
They have already been threatened by people other than the defendants, he wrote, and could be identified and placed at further risk if the warrants are released.
Carson, student body president at UNC, was shot and killed March 5. Demario James Atwater, 21, and Laurence Alvin Lovette Jr., 17, were arrested a week later on murder charges.
It may not be clear how big a role the informants played in the arrest until trial. The investigation continues, according to the ruling – maybe authorities will have a solid case beyond what these two informants have to say about Carson’s slaying. But maybe the informants will have to sit in a witness stand and testify as Atwater and Lovette look on, and it’s highly doubtful at that point they will have a judge’s order to protect their identities.
Unlike federal prosecution, there is no North Carolina Witness Protection Program – as Assistant District Attorney Stormy Ellis, who prosecutes gang members in Durham County, knows all too well. She knows when she speaks with potential witnesses that she can’t guarantee them safety, as much as she wishes she could.
It keeps her up at night and she struggles to balance her professional need for witness testimony with the possibility she may wake up one day with a witness’ blood, in a sense, on her hands.
And these people, sometimes with families, must return to the same neighborhood with full knowledge that retribution comes without warning and knows no forgiveness. And with gangs, the enemy is not subdued with one man’s arrest.
Many impulses underlie the ‘no-snitch’ culture in some communities but without question, fear figures heavily, said Dr. Irv Joyner, a professor at North Carolina Central University Law School.
“They experience, they feel it, they empathize, sympathize, with the people, but there is a higher calling in the minds of many people,” he said. “And that higher calling is, how do I protect my self so I’m not the victim next time?”
So prosecutors and police continue to convince people in communities to come forward. It’s the right thing to do, they say. But in those moments when a witness, maybe a victim, sits in front of a judge and jury and a violent man to tell the truth, he is alone.
“They’re my heroes,” Ellis said. “My witnesses.”
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