Opinion ID: 1461840
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Detective Brown's false testimony.

Text: Detective Johnny St. Valentine Brown, Jr., also known by his nickname of Jehru, has long been a familiar figure to judges, attorneys and jurors involved in the trials of drug prosecutions in the District of Columbia. See, e.g., Edward D. Sargent, Flamboyant Narcotics Expert is Key Witness in Drug Cases, WASHINGTON POST, May 6, 1983, at C1. At the trial of the present case, Brown claimed that he had testified on over 4000 occasions in [an] expert capacity in some 26 jurisdictions throughout the country. Judge Stanley Sporkin wrote of Brown in United States v. Jones, 84 F.Supp.2d 124, 126 (D.D.C. 1999), as follows: A police officer for over twenty years, Brown has testified in numerous cases as a narcotics expert. While most of his testimony has been on behalf of the government, on a few occasions he has even testified for the defense. Detective Brown has been a witness before this Court on numerous occasions. He is charismatic and his testimony has generally been well received by juries. At various times, Brown has claimed to possess a Ph.D and other degrees in pharmacology, see, e.g., id. at 124, and to be a Board certified pharmacist. See, e.g., United States v. Williams, 77 F.Supp.2d 109, 111 (D.D.C.1999) ( Williams I ), aff'd, Williams II, supra note 3. In the present case, as noted by the trial judge, supra page 631, Brown testified under oath that he was a Board-certified pharmacist and that he had dispensed narcotics per prescription. In July 1999, two years after Whitley's convictions in this case, Detective Brown suddenly resigned from the MPD after his truthfulness had been called into question. See Bill Miller, Accused of Perjury, Police Expert Resigns, WASHINGTON POST, July 23, 1999, at B1. According to Miller's article, Detective Brown had testified in a deposition in a civil suit that he had received a Ph.D degree in pharmacology from Howard University, as well as a bachelor's degree and a master's degree in the same discipline. The article further reported that the University had searched its records but had been unable to verify Brown's claim, and that Brown had resigned from the police force. The report in the Washington Post precipitated a number of collateral attacks on convictions in cases in which Detective Brown had testified as an expert for the prosecution. See, e.g., Jones, supra, 84 F.Supp.2d at 125. Whitley's case is the first such collateral attack to reach this court. Seven weeks after the publication of Miller's article, Whitley filed a motion for a new trial, pursuant to Super. Ct.Crim. R. 33 and D.C.Code § 23-110 (2001), on the basis of newly-discovered evidence. Whitley presented the article to the court as an attachment to his motion. Whitley relied on evidence, not previously available, that Detective Brown had lied at trial about his credentials, and he claimed that Brown's false testimony played a fundamental role in persuading the jury of Mr. Whitley's guilt of PWID as opposed to mere possession. In its response to Whitley's motion, the government stated that it was still investigating the claim that Detective Brown had falsely represented his academic credentials. The government argued, however, that even assuming Detective Brown's testimony that he was a board-certified pharmacist to be false, the defendant still was not entitled to a new trial, inter alia, because, according to the government, Detective Brown's formal credentials are a de minimis part of his overall expertise, and... being a pharmacist is irrelevant to knowing how cocaine is distributed on the streets of the District. (Internal quotation marks omitted.) On February 10, 2000, while Whitley's motion for a new trial was pending, Detective Brown entered a plea of guilty to eight counts of perjury. As the trial judge disclosed in her written order, Brown admitted that he did not have a pharmacology degree or a license to practice pharmacy.. . . In many cases, although not in this one, [he] has lied about earning a degree from Howard University.