Stolen Boy’s Weblog

My heart goes out deeply to Joseph Giacona’s mother. She’s the upstate New York woman who has to sit and watch as her son faces the judicial grind of a place that sometimes, seemingly, has no sense of justice. A place where the innocent are convicted regularly, their lives wrongfully spent behind bars.

Fourteen-year-old Joseph Giacona III

From what I’ve read, and after speaking with those who know what’s going on with this case that tops a very disturbing trend, including Joseph’s mother, I question very much whether Joseph had any part with what went wrong in his father’s house on that dreadful day. Maybe fourteen-year-old Joseph does know what happened. And maybe he’s just sitting tight, paying the price, protecting the person of guilt.

I know that his family, even if they did believe that Joseph murdered his father – which they don’t – would still be fighting just as hard, maybe not for his innocence so much as to force this tragic case into family court where it belongs. Joseph’s mom would want to ensure that Joseph received the medical treatment he would need for rehabilitation, rather than just the punitive-style prison time our convicted do in adult prisons.

Joseph’s family and supporters, of whom there are many, including Brad Lewallen of Justiceforjuveniles.org, have vowed to not give up on Joseph’s case until they can prove what really took place on that tragic day. Whether it is proving that Joseph’s father committed suicide or that someone somehow eliminated the third set of fingerprints from the murder weapon, a family rifle. Joseph’s mom has vowed to “bring that little boy home” before the system destroys him. It would be such a pleasure for all involved to one day be able to stand up in that little Oneida County courtroom and identify the fingerprints of the true killer to those allegedly incompetent investigators who handled the case, and let the world know there is a set of “unidentifiable” prints on that gun.

The toughest obstacle for Joseph may be the Oneida County judicial system itself, one that some believe to be the strangest and most incompetent in this nation. Critics only have to point to the county’s latest exoneree, Steve Barnes, who was just released about 2-3 weeks ago. Like Joseph’s situation portends, Steve lost the best years of his life, locked up for something he did not do. He is 42 now, having spent the last 20 years of his life wrongfully locked up.

DNA EXONERATED THE INNOCENT

DNA has now exonerated 23 innocently convicted persons in New York, with the most recent being Roy Brown and Steve Barnes just this past month in Central NY, out of more than 220 across the country. New York State has an extremely high rate of wrongful convictions, that proves weakness in their imperfect judicial system. Maybe it’s time for all New York prosecutors’ offices to review all the weak, circumstantial only cases right there at home before one more innocent New York man, woman or child gets wrongfully convicted?

Fourteen-year-old Joseph Giacona awaits possible trial on 2nd degree murder charges. If convicted, Joseph faces life in prison, just like Steve Barnes did. It took authorities twenty years to bring Barnes home. How long will it take them to do the same for Joseph? The government and the DA’s office owe it to the public to right these wrongs perpetuated against its citizenry. The People deserve to be educated on the wrongdoing and the mistakes being made in their own court system. The public also needs to speak out and defend these wrongfully charged and convicted individuals. A child’s life rests in their hands. Their own child could be next.

THE INNOCENTS

Joseph’s mother learned about Steve Barnes’ plight from Steve’s mother while at an Innocence Project  seminar. The woman was described as looking tired and frail, and Joseph’s mother saw much of herself in Steve’s mother. These are two women who know nothing about giving up on their children; not before seeing them come home. It appears Steve’s release has begun to open up many doors for Joseph and other wrongfully convicted people.

Just last Friday, a man who ten years ago, at the age of fifteen, was allegedly tricked by the prosecutor to plead guilty and sentenced to five to life in adult court, when, in fact, the case should have been in family court all along. His case has been adjourned until January 21st of 2009 for review and possible release. And, of course, just last week, Roy Brown, another upstate New York exoneree was awarded 2.6 million dollars from the state of NY for his wrongful conviction. With cases like these, it’s not difficult to understand why New York has the highest exoneration rate in the nation.