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July 29, 2010 |
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Most Effective Lawyers: Criminal Justice Finalists
Winning a man’s freedom after 39 years in Florida prison called highlight of career
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| December 07, 2009 |
By: Review staff |
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Ben Kuehne and Susan Dmitrovsky, Law Offices of Ben Kuehne and Michael Hursey, Michael Hursey P.A.
The weather was dreary and the rain coming down in sheets when Barney E. Brown was released from prison after 39 years behind bars. He danced in the rain and later told his legal team it was the best day of his life.
“This is really why we are in criminal law,” said Susan Dmitrovsky, one of three attorneys who worked for Brown’s release in September 2008. “This is the kind of case which is really the highlight of my career. I don’t know what else compares to it in my 15-plus years in practice.”
Brown was the longest-serving prisoner exonerated in the United States.
Miami attorney Ben Kuehne tapped Dmitrovsky in his firm to help him track down evidence that could exonerate Brown. Hursey, a solo practitioner from Fort Lauderdale, had been on the case for nearly a decade, trying to get a judge to hear his client’s actual innocence claim.
“The Barney Brown case was an extensive undertaking by a team of lawyers who worked several years,” Kuehne said. “It was time-consuming, torturous sometimes but ultimately the most satisfying case for any lawyer.”
Brown was sentenced to life in prison in 1970 when he was a 14-year-old black youth in the rape and robbery of a white woman. The victim said she could not identify Brown as her attacker, but police went forward with the case after an interrogation in which one of Brown’s eyes was permanently damaged.
This was the “Miam-uh” of old, and an all-white jury convicted Brown as an adult. State prosecutors sought the death penalty, but the jury spared Brown’s life by a 7-5 vote.
Kuehne and team were asked by the Florida Innocence Project to take on Brown’s cause. The three lawyers first focused on trying to find DNA evidence that could be used to gain Brown’s freedom, but physical evidence was scant. Eventually, the team found some handwritten notes that showed Brown had been found not guilty in a juvenile bench trial before being tried as an adult.
“It’s not glamorous, but it shows the kind of dedication to detail, of leaving no stone unturned,” Kuehne said.
The U.S. Supreme Court has since found that trying a juvenile in adult court after an acquittal constitutes double jeopardy. It is currently set to review life sentences of juveniles for nonhomicide crimes. Most of those inmates were convicted in Florida.
Kuehne not only praised his fellow attorneys, but Miami-Dade Circuit Judge Antonio Marin and the county clerk’s office. Clerks were critical in helping the attorneys track down documents in musty courthouse basements, and Marin took the time to look at the case that had meandered for years in front of other jurists.
Kuehne is facing his own criminal prosecution right now, accused of money laundering for vetting legal fees for convicted drug kingpin Fabio Ochoa. Several key charges have been dismissed in the courts. The case is still pending.
Kuehne said the Barney Brown case is “why lawyers fight every day for justice. It’s very validating and certainly indicative of what lawyers can do.”
These days, Brown works in Kuehne’s office as a legal intern. He had to learn what it was like to enter a courthouse through the front door and be able to leave a free man. He has been asked to give speeches throughout the country about his experience.
“Barney is still getting his sea legs,” Dmitrovsky said.
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