Angela Corey and assistant prosecutor Bernie de la Rionda
She’s being criticized all over for losing the prosecution of George Zimmerman for killing Trayvon Martin, and problems continue to mount for prosecutor Angela Corey. We covered the news that she fired the whistleblower employee , Ben Kruibdos, who revealed that she was unlawfully suppressing evidence on this blog a few days ago when the news broke. As I predicted, a whistleblower lawsuit against Ms. Corey’s office has been announced by Mr. Kruibdos’ attorney. In a bit of delicious irony, the attorney Mr. Kruibdos has retained is himself a former employee of Ms. Corey, who resigned last year due to disagreements with the way she ran the office.
Mr. White was subpoenaed to testify at the hearing for sanctions, and it got pretty contentious when he was examined by prosecutor Bernie de la Rionda, his former boss at the SAO. So, basically Angela Corey’s State Attorney’s Office is kind of a shitshow. Defense attorney Don West was called to the stand during that hearing, alleging under oath that they had caught de la Rionda “hiding the information.” The judge reserved ruling on the discovery violations at that time, saying they would be better handled after the trial.
Now that the trial is concluded, the Defense team is pushing for the issue to be revisited. Mark O’Mara went so far as to tell Reuters, “This is not acceptable, and is not going to be tolerated in any case that I’m involved in.” He continued, “They are a disgrace to my profession.” That’s the kind of harsh rhetoric that is more likely to come from his co-counsel on the case. Mr. O’Mara’s demeanor has consistently been more low-key, but the alleged violations have really riled him up. And rightly so, if the allegations are true, that the State Attorney’s office deliberately suppressed Brady information, that is a serious breach of the public trust and the right of the Defendant to a fair trial. It will be interesting to continue watching the fireworks.
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