PDF: Blackwood ruling
A young man serving a 22-year prison sentence for facilitation of murder and attempted robbery has been granted a new trial after it was revealed that his defense attorney might have led him to incriminate himself.
According to court documents, local defense attorney Robin Flores told defendant Jason Labron Rogers, 35, to talk to police for a third time only to “save” him from the previous statements he had made. Mr. Flores, however, never investigated the circumstances of the case and had no promise of immunity from prosecutors, documents say.
Without such a promise of immunity or some sort of other deal on the table, defense attorneys rarely allow their clients to continue talking to the police about their involvement in a particular crime.
“This Court cannot fathom why (Mr. Flores) chose to arrange a meeting with law enforcement wherein his client made damaging admissions without securing an immunity agreement … or at least the ubiquitous promise from law enforcement that a good word (would) be said to (prosecutors),” special Hamilton County Criminal Court Judge Jon Kerry Blackwood stated in his written decision to grant a new trial.
Defense attorney Hilary Hodgkins, who now is representing Mr. Rogers, said the mistakes made in the case were “apparent” when she started working on his appeal.
Ms. Hodgkins argued for the new trial at a hearing in December. Judge Blackwood ruled in Mr. Rogers’ favor on Jan. 11.
It is very rare for convicts to receive new trials, according to Ms. Hodgkins and other defense attorneys.
Mr. Flores said Friday that he is glad Mr. Rogers will get a new trial.
“If I made a mistake, I made a mistake. No one is perfect. That is what the justice system is for,” Mr. Flores said.
Judge Blackwood ruled that, among other “numerous instances of ineffectiveness raised” that might have prejudiced Mr. Rogers during the trial, Mr. Flores’ arrangement of the third interview with police was “the most important” in his decision to give the defendant a second chance.
Mr. Rogers is serving time for the Oct. 24, 2003, death of Paul Neff at his home in East Ridge.
Mr. Neff died after being beaten and robbed of his prescription painkillers. Almost immediately, investigators targeted Mr. Rogers and co-defendant Paul Newsom as suspects, interviewing each of them twice within a week of the killing.
Mr. Rogers never implicated himself in the first two interviews, but documents indicate the third interview arranged by Mr. Flores seemed to seal his fate.
It was then that Mr. Rogers admitted to knowing that a robbery was going to take place, that he was to be the lookout for Mr. Newsom, that he hit the victim with a broom and that he received morphine pills as a result of the robbery.
According to court documents, Mr. Flores said he arranged the interview hoping to make the case easier on his client because of the belief that Mr. Rogers “had hung himself” in prior statements. He told Mr. Rogers that, if he “told the truth,” he likely would only get eight years in prison.
It was unclear, however, if Mr. Flores ever read Mr. Roger’s prior statements, court documents indicate. Prosecutors also never offered a plea deal until three months later and did not guarantee a shorter prison sentence, documents say.