Murder Verdict Reversed in 1981 Slaying

A federal appeals court on Tuesday reversed the murder conviction of a Lassen County man who has been on death row since 1982, ruling that prosecutors violated his rights by failing to reveal a deal they had made with the key witness.

However, the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals upheld kidnapping, robbery and firearms convictions against Benjamin W. Silva, 52, making it unlikely that he will get out of prison, according to the California attorney general’s office.

The appeals court had overturned Silva’s death sentence three years ago, stating that his attorney provided constitutionally deficient representation at the penalty phase of the trial.

At issue this time was a claim by Silva’s appellate attorneys: That prosecutors had denied Silva due process of law by failing to disclose that the key prosecution witness had been prohibited from undergoing psychiatric testing until after he testified against Silva.

The witness, Norman Thomas, had suffered severe brain damage in a motorcycle accident several years before the trial. The effects of his injuries could have raised questions about his competence as a witness if they had been revealed at trial and could have affected the case’s outcome, the court ruled. The unanimous decision reversed a ruling by a federal trial judge, who had concluded that the prosecution’s conduct was immaterial.

The three-judge panel, which sits in San Francisco, made it clear that it had no sympathy for Silva, but that his constitutional rights had been violated.

“The evidence in this case leaves no doubt that Silva was involved in the sordid conduct that led to the deaths of Kevin Thorpe and Laura Craig,” Judge Betty B. Fletcher wrote for the court.

According to testimony and court records, in January 1981 Silva, Thomas and Joe Shelton used a red light to simulate a police car and stop Thorpe, 21, and Craig, 20, on U.S. Highway 395 near Madeline, a town in the northeast corner of the state.

The three men forced the two college students to drive to Shelton’s property and took their cash and belongings, court records show.

“Thorpe was then chained to a tree while Craig was taken inside a cabin and repeatedly sexually assaulted,” according to an earlier appeals court decision in the case.

The next day, Silva and Shelton killed Thorpe by shooting him at close range with a machine gun. At Silva’s direction, Thomas testified, he dismembered Thorpe’s body.

Several days later Craig was shot twice and left by the side of a road.

A few weeks after being found in possession of a firearm -- a violation of his probation -- Thomas told police about the slayings. In exchange for the evidence he provided, murder charges were dropped and Thomas received an 11-year sentence. Shelton was convicted of killing Thorpe and Craig and received a life sentence.

Silva was convicted of killing Thorpe, but acquitted of Craig’s killing.

In 1988, the California Supreme Court upheld the guilty verdict and death sentence against Silva. The U.S. Supreme Court declined review. Then, new lawyers asked U.S. District Judge Dickran Tevrizian to review the case.

“Unfortunately,” the 9th Circuit said Tuesday, “the reliability of the jury’s verdict as to Silva’s role as the triggerman in Thorpe’s murder was compromised by the Lassen County district attorney’s unscrupulous decision to keep secret the deal he made to prevent an evaluation of the competence of the state’s star witness.”

After Thomas was charged, his defense lawyer contemplated a psychiatric defense because of Thomas’ motorcycle accident. But the agreement with prosecutors put off any testing until after Silva’s trial.

Under the Supreme Court’s landmark 1963 decision in Brady vs. Maryland, a prosecutor is required to provide to the defense any information that might prove exculpatory. Silva’s appellate lawyers asserted that the Brady ruling clearly covered the deal on psychiatric testing. The 9th Circuit agreed.

“When prosecutors betray their solemn obligations and abuse the immense power they hold, the fairness of our entire system of justice is called into doubt and public confidence in it is undermined,” wrote Fletcher, an appointee of President Carter. Judges Sidney R. Thomas and Kim M. Wardlaw, both appointees of President Clinton, joined the opinion.

“The particularly atrocious nature of the crimes with which Silva was charged cannot diminish the prosecutor’s -- and our court’s -- duty to ensure that all persons accused of crimes receive due process of law,” Fletcher wrote.