Executed, January 31, 2002

Mr. Gerald Garrett
Chairman, Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles
Price Daniel, Sr. Building
209 W. 14th Street, Suite 500
Austin, Texas 78701

Re: Randal Hafdahl

Dear Chairman Garrett:

On behalf of the American Civil Liberties Union, we urge you to stay the execution of Randal Hafdahl, currently scheduled for January 31, 2002 and to commute his death sentence to life imprisonment without parole. Such relief is merited by the circumstances of Mr. Hafdahl's case. First, Mr. Hafdahl did not possess the requisite intent to kill a police officer necessary to sentence him to death. Second, the prosecution relied heavily on the testimony of a pathologist who notoriously took the side of the government's case regardless of the evidence. Third, the prosecution based its claim that Mr. Hafdahl had a motive for killing the officer on an alleged kidnapping crime that he did not commit. Finally, Mr. Hafdahl did not have the benefit of effective assistance of counsel.

To obtain a capital conviction and death sentence against Mr. Hafdahl, the prosecution needed to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Mr. Hafdahl knew that the victim was a police officer when he "intentionally and knowingly caused the victim's death". This is a fact that Mr. Hafdahl has steadfastly denied. We believe that confidence in the reliability of this conviction and death sentence is greatly undermined by questionable prosecution tactics that bore directly on this key question in Mr. Hafdahl's case.

First, the prosecution's case for capital murder relied heavily on the testimony of Dr. Ralph Erdman who by reputation was known for skewing his testimony to fit the government's theory of the case. Dr. Erdman has admitted that his findings and testimony over the years were influenced by the result that the government was seeking in particular cases. Notably, Dr. Erdman has since been stripped of his license to practice pathology, prosecuted and imprisoned for violating parole.

Second, to prove that Mr. Hafdahl possessed the requisite intent for capital murder, the prosecution argued that he had committed a kidnapping which gave him a motive for the killing for killing a police officer. However, there is no evidence to support this claim. In fact, a signed statement by the accuser names two other men as the kidnappers.

The problems of Dr. Erdman's questionable testimony and the prosecutions unsubstantiated claim that Mr. Erdman was guilty of another crime were compounded by the fact that he did not have competent representation at trial. His lawyer spent a total of twenty hours preparing to defend a client facing a capital murder charge. Mr. Hafdahl tried unsuccessfully to fire this lawyer because he failed not only lacked experience in capital murder trials, but he apparently lacked the interest and motivation to mount a even a minimally adequate case in his clients defense the case because he was too busy with other cases to assist Mr. Hafdahl. Counsel only spent a total of twenty hours preparing to defend Mr. Hafdahl on his capital murder charge.

Under the United States Constitution, Mr. Hafdahl had the right a fair trial including the right to counsel and that counsel would perform his duties at an objective standard of reasonableness. In this case, Mr. Hafdahl's counsel performed far below the objective reasonable standard, failing to do basic preparation that would have allowed the defendant to discredit the evidence the prosecution presented. In this case when the prosecution evidence appears to be so faulty, that failure has runs the risk of proving fatal to Mr. Hafdahl.

In the interest of justice, we respectfully submit that Mr. Hafdahl's conviction and death sentence lacks the requisite reliability for a death sentence to be appropriate. Given the irrevocable nature of this punishment we urge you recommend that his death sentence be commuted to life.

Sincerely,

Diann Rust-Tierney
ACLU Capital Punishment Project

Will Harrell
ACLU of Texas

Bart T. East*
Pro Bono Counsel
Squire, Sanders & Dempsey LLP

* Admitted to practice in New Jersey. Admittance to the District of Columbia Bar pending.