The Trials of Eroy Brown

“Criminal Law and Criminal Justice,” a web based magazine from Rutgers law school, has posted a review.

Here is an excerpt from the review:

Yet, Berryhill lends an air of humanity to the prison officials, too. He portrays Warden Pack, one of Brown’s alleged victims, somewhat sympathetically; recounting the day of Pack’s death, Berryhill notes that he was close to retirement, reminding the reader that Pack’s demise was not inevitable (no matter whose fault it was), and that “[a] Texas warden was always on call[,]” assuring the reader unfamiliar with prison life -– particularly prison life in Texas -– that he knows nothing about the world Pack lived in. Similarly, depicting the killing of Billy Moore (the other white prison official), Berryhill describes Moore’s brother running, falling to the ground, and hugging his lifeless brother as he shouts and cries out. It’s harder to hate someone who is loved.

Berryhill engages the reader by employing pop culture references relevant to Brown’s case: Nixon’s resignation, Vietnam, Dr. King’s speeches (one of Brown’s lawyers told the jury, “No lie can live forever”) and assassination, and folk singer Pete Seeger’s visit to the prison, to name a handful. He effectively identifies the obvious parallels between African slavery in the U.S. and the Texas prison system, and, employing that backdrop, potently casts Brown’s legal battle as the trial of a black field slave against his white master, with the black house slaves testifying against him.

I’m not sure about the phrase “pop culture,” is right, but the point is well intended. The writer disagrees with my contention early in the book that Brown’s acquittal signaled the end of Jim Crow justice, and he makes a good point that Texas has a ways to go.

The chair of the Texas Parole Board, Rissie Owens, has rejected Brown’s request that someone other than former prison officials hear his case for parole.

Bill Habern, Brown’s parole attorney, and the lawyer who helped defend him in two of his murder trials for drowning a Texas warden in 1981, told the Austin American Statesman’s Mike Ward that he expects Brown will not be paroled this year.

One of his hearing officers will be a former Texas prison warden, Tony Garcia. A second, Pamela Freeman, is a former Texas correctional officer. Owens wrote of them:

“These individuals have and continue to perform their duties and responsibilities with the utmost respect and appreciation for each individual case they are charged with reviewing to make a release decision determination,” Owens wrote.

“Their backgrounds have never been called into question to date and I do not anticipate such in the future.”

Habern doubts they can be fair.

“How can you be a disinterested voting parole panel member if you’re an ex-warden or an ex-corrections officer in the same system, at a prison in the same town where the incident took place?” Habern said.

“How that can that not affect your consideration of this case?”

Although 35 of 36 jurors acquitted Brown of murder by reason of self-defense, Texas prison officials have continued to regard Wallace Pack and Billy Moore as heroes. The Pack unit  near Navasota was named after Wallace Pack. Brown testified that Pack pulled a revolver and threatened to splatter his brains all over the road. A stone monument at Ellis prison declares that the two officials’ “devotion to duty, service to Texas and courage will always stand as our guide and standard.”

The host of The Prison Show, David Babb has invited Michael Berryhill and Bill Habern to discuss the case of Eroy Brown, who has spent the past 27 years in prison for a convenience store robbery and has been steadily denied parole since 1994. Habern believes that the state won’t a parole Brown because he was acquitted of murdering two prison officials in 1981 by reason of self defense. His successful defense exposed the brutality at the hear of the prison system that was being exposed by the federal lawsuit, Ruiz, et al v. Estelle. Babb notes:

Brown’s case highlights a long-standing issue with Texas’ parole system: a reluctance to parole longtime offenders with high-profile cases, even those who soon will be freed anyway, and those with serious and costly health problems.  Author Michael Berryhill, who wrote The Trials of Eroy Brown and Attorney Bill Habern will be in to discuss the case, the book and the issue. Tune in!

The Prison Story was the subject of a NPR story on All Things Considered recently.

In an unusual move, Eroy Brown’s parole lawyer, Bill Habern has asked the Texas Board of Pardons and Parole to change the membership of Brown’s parole panel. The board had appointed a former Texas warden and a former correctional officer to hear Brown’s case for parole after serving more than 25 years for a convenience store robbery in 1985. Brown maintains that the real reason he has been denied parole is because he was acquitted of killing two prison officials in 1981 by reason of self defense.  Austin American Statesman reporter Mike Ward published a story this morning:

Paroles are approved or denied by voting panels of three members each. The panel considering Brown’s case includes two former Texas corrections employees, including a retired warden.

After the Wednesday story was published, the Statesman received several calls from current and former prison employees criticizing the coverage and Brown’s bid for early release. Habern said the criticism underscores his concern about a continuing animus against Brown inside the prison system, even though most employees at the time of the deaths are long gone.

“The Texas prison system has long refused to accept the fact Mr. Brown has been found not guilty by 35 out of 36 jury panel members during the highly publicized trials and re-trials related to the deceased prison employees,” Habern said in his letter to Owens.

“The closer the past relationship of the voting panel members to employees of the agency, the more hesitant they could be to consider all available options when voting Mr. Brown’s case.”

Habern made the text of his letter public. It said, in part:

…we do not object to any other persons who vote parole cases so long as such persons do not have prior TDCJ employment experience nor are currently married to someone who has or had prior employment experience with the TDCJ umbrella entities. We are acutely aware that those selected to make up the Brown Panel face the potential of extremely negative reactions from their old friends and social contacts who are employees of the Texas prison system, especially if they were to vote in a favorable manner. The closer the past relationship of the voting panel members to employees of the agency, the more hesitant they could be to consider all available options when voting Mr. Brown’s case. For panel members to seriously give favorable consideration to Mr. Brown’s potential parole, and if parole were granted, the voters will have to continue to socialize and/or professionally interact with these TDCJ employees who, as we have seen even today in the wake of the Austin article, continue to express serious bias and prejudice against Mr. Brown. Such an element incorporated into the mix of considerations when voting a case would result in an unfairness we would hope that the Board of Pardons and Paroles would wish to avoid.

.

Mike Ward of the Austin-American Statesman just published a storyabout Eroy Brown’s possibility for parole.

Brown’s parole attorney, Bill Habern, who was also one of his defense attorneys when Brown was acquitted of killing two high ranking prison officials in the 1980s, has found Brown a halfway house in Los Angeles if he is paroled.

Sister Teresa Groth said Tuesday that Brown has been accepted into the Partnership for Re-Entry Program, an initiative that caters mostly to “lifers” like Brown. Since it opened in 2002, the program, which is affiliated with the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Los Angeles, has a 100 percent success rate for participants not going back to prison, Groth said.

“He’ll be going into a program where he’ll be supervised. He won’t be coming back to Texas. He’ll be in an area where he has relatives and some friends. What could be better than that?” Habern said.

“It seems like that would be much better than squeezing another three or four years out of him and then dumping him out on a street in South Carolina.”

Ward recounts Brown’s testimony in his story and points out that of  the two  commissioners who will vote on Brown’s parole, one is a former TDCJ warden and the other is a former correctional officer. I would not bet that they would contravene the the prison system’s story, that Brown’s acquittal by reason of self defense was a miscarriage of justice.  In 2017, Brown will get a mandatory release if he doesn’t win parole sooner. He has been eligible since 1994.

Maggie Galehouse, books editor for the Houston Chronicle wrote:

We are encouraged to buy local and regional in grocery stores and farmers’ markets.

Why not buy books with the same philosophy — to support Texas authors, stories and presses?

The Trials of Eroy Brown was on the list of twenty books Galehouse chose.

Chronicle story

Here is a link to the excerpts published by the Texas Observer. I hope my readers will consider subscribing to this important magazine, a bastion of investigative reporting for more than fifty years.

And many thanks to friends and readers who turned out Sunday for the book signing at Brazos Bookstore.

Eroy Brown’s lawyers for his first two trials, from left to right, Bill Habern, Tim Sloan and Craig Washington (far right), joined author Michael Berryhill for his presentation at the Texas Book Festival, Sunday, October 22.