Andrew Thomas Ignores Evidence That Courtney Bisbee Was Wrongly Convicted of Child Molestation As Supporters Work to Free Her

"Something ha[s] to be done about this," Thackston says she told Mitchell. "We have a young lady sitting in prison that doesn't need to be there."

Mitchell gave Thackston no indication that the office would investigate. The PI says she felt Mitchell was giving her "the runaround."

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County Attorney Andrew Thomas

Courtesy of Camille Tilley

Courtney Bisbee and her baby, Taylor Lee, at San Diego's SeaWorld in 2000

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Read Courtney Bisbee's Petition for Post Conviction Relief.

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• Courtney Bisbee
• Janette Sloan
• Christopher Kinder
• Trials
• Criminal Trials

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New Times has made a formal public-records request through Thomas' public information officer, Mike Scerbo, to view all Bisbee documents in the county attorney's possession. So far, Scerbo has not complied with this request as required under the Arizona Public Records Law. Nor has the office responded to a request for comment on the case.

Earlier this year, the American Bar Association passed amendments to its model rules of professional conduct, making plain the duties of a prosecutor when faced with new evidence suggesting a wrongful conviction. The ABA says prosecutors have an obligation to disclose new information to the court and to the defense and, if the facts warrant it, open a new investigation.

According to Ed Novak, president of the State Bar of Arizona, the new rules have not yet been adopted in this state and may not be for at least another year. Until that happens, prosecutors cannot be sanctioned by the Bar for neglecting to act in such cases.

But this does not let Thomas off the hook, according to legal experts.

"The prosecutor's job is to do justice, not uphold convictions," explains Stephen Saltzburg, a professor at George Washington University Law School who helped author the ABA's new rules. "And justice means making sure people aren't wrongfully convicted, and if they have been, doing something about it."

Saltzburg noted that most prosecutors already agree with this description of their duties. In fact, the few prosecutors who objected to the passage of the ABA rules did so because they believed a prosecutor's justice-seeking role is already clear.

Former County Attorney Rick Romley could not comment on the specifics of the Bisbee matter, but he heard in the description of it an echo of the Ray Krone debacle.

Krone was twice falsely convicted of a brutal homicide and spent a decade in prison, part of it on Arizona's death row, fighting the charges. In 2002, DNA evidence exonerated Krone, and he was set free ("About Face," Robert Nelson, April 21, 2005). Romley publicly apologized to Krone in a news conference.

"The defense lawyer brought to my attention new evidence," Romley recalls. "We went through it, and actually I had him released from prison and dismissed the charges."

One of the lawyers who helped free Krone was Phoenix attorney Alan Simpson, who has contributed an analysis of Bisbee's case to Ferragut's motion for a new trial. In it, Simpson alleges instances of ineffective counsel on Joel Thompson's part, including the failure to interview certain witnesses, Thompson's lack of objections, and his alleged assertion of a special relationship with Judge Granville.

The new motion contends that the County Attorney's Office withheld evidence from the defense before trial, specifically statements made by Jon Valles' dad, Gene, informing both Detective Kinder and prosecutors that Jon had a reputation for lying, had "problems at school and with the police," and that brothers Jon and Nik were coerced by their mother to make false allegations against Bisbee.

Such pre-trial suppression of evidence, says attorney Ferragut, is a serious violation of Bisbee's constitutional rights and rules governing evidence.

The first things that come to mind in the Courtney Bisbee case are the high-profile prosecutions of teachers who have had affairs with students — such as Mary Kay Letourneau in Washington state (Letourneau had sex with a 13-year-old student when she was 34), Debra Lafave in Florida (Lafave had sex with a 14-year-old while she was 23), or Jennifer Mally, a teacher at Paradise Valley High School (she had sex with a 16-year-old when she was 26).

But there are huge differences. All these women ended up pleading guilty, but Bisbee has always maintained her innocence. Bisbee was a nurse, not a teacher, and Jon Valles did not go to her school. Most importantly, all parties agree that Jon and Bisbee never had sexual intercourse.

Nevertheless, her sentence for the one alleged physical contact has been far harsher than the sentences for all three of these women combined. Letourneau initially received a three-month sentence in 1997, served it, and when she engaged in sex with the boy again, was hit with a sentence of 71/2 years, of which she served about six. In 2005, Lafave got three years of house arrest and seven years of probation.

As for Mally, she served six months in Perryville, where Bisbee is to serve 11 years. Because of the older age of Mally's accuser, her crime carried a less-severe sentence.

(Ironically, e-mails from one of Bisbee's string of lawyers suggest that the County Attorney's Office made a "probation eligible" plea offer to Bisbee at one point, which might have allowed her to avoid prison altogether. Prosecutor Kittredge later removed this possibility, claiming to a Bisbee attorney that the plea offer really had never been on the table. Bisbee's current sentence represents the mandatory minimum for child molestation, plus one year tacked on by Granville.)