BELL COUNTY, Texas — A judge ruled the Bell County District Attorney's Office violated the Michael Morton Act before declaring a mistrial in the case of a man charged with a felony count of injury to a child.
Brett Pritchard, an attorney for Demeterious Woods, who was accused of hitting a child "with a belt, a rope or a stick" in 2022, said the DA's Office failed to turn over several pieces of evidence until just days before Woods' trial was set to start.
According to the Bell County online docket portal, Bell County Judge Wade Faulkner declared a mistrial in Woods' case on Aug. 29 after determining the District Attorney's office did not disclose a piece of evidence to the defense in a timely manner, which they are required to do under the Michael Morton Act, named after a man who was wrongfully convicted due to prosecutors withholding evidence in Williamson County.
The evidence in question was reportedly a 17-page police report filed by the Nolanville Police Department recapping an interview of the alleged victim's mother with Child Protective Services.
In the interview, the mother reportedly admits to striking the alleged victim with a switch and a belt "and offering her opinion that her mother may have coached the alleged victim to make certain statements implicating Woods."
According to the docket entry, the officer uploaded the report on May 30, 2023 to a portal the District Attorney's Office has for reports, documents, video and other electronic information. The records show the officer uploaded the report to a case number assigned to the alleged victim's mother, not to the case number for Woods.
According to the Texas Code of Criminal Procedure Article 39.14, it is the State's duty to disclose evidence provided by law enforcement to the Defense.
Faulkner ruled because the DA's office didn't disclose the police report to the defense until the Friday before the trial (approximately 16 months after the report was made and 14 months after the DA's office had the report) they were in violation of Article 39.14, also known as the Michael Morton Act. As such, the report and the filing officer's testimony had to be excluded from evidence, leading Faulkner to declare a mistrial.
Bell County District Attorney Henry Garza said the report had simply been attached to a different case.
"The fact of the matter is that a report by the Nolanville police officer was not discovered by the trial attorney until the week before the start of the trial and he promptly provided that report, copies of pictures and the Child protective services report to opposing counsel," Garza wrote in a statement to 6 News.
Pritchard however, alleges this was not an isolated incident.
"In the last felony case our firm tried in Bell County in front of Judge Steve Duskie just a few months ago, we had a previously requested but never provided CPS file delivered to us for the first time three days into trial," Pritchard wrote in a statement to 6 News.
In Woods' case, Pritchard stated they requested an unredacted copy of the records on Woods from the Department of Family and Protective Services months before the trial, and only received it a few days before the trial began.
In addition to the Nolanville Police report, the file reportedly contained "hundreds of pages of documents", including pictures, witness statements, and recordings.
The docket entry shows the DA's office first issued a subpoena for the CPS records on March 19, 2024, then again on July 25.
On August 14 the CPS records had still not been turned over to the DA's office. The docket shows the DA's office asked for a continuance in the trial that was supposed to begin Aug. 19.
The docket shows the "defense counsel indicated they did not need the CPS records.," but the court granted the continuance and set the trial for Aug. 26.
The DA's office issued a third subpoena for the CPS records on Aug. 14. They received them on Aug. 21. According to the docket, the DA's office notified the defense they had received the records "but because of some difficulties in reading the files, the Defense was not able to view them until on or about Aug. 23."
Assistant District Attorney Brendan Guy argued to the court that the DA's Office had worked as "diligently as possible" to get a copy of the file and that the defense had enough time to review all the newly released evidence.
However, Pritchard said the DA's Office was still sending the defense team photographs they had never seen even as arguments were underway in the trial. Over Guy's objection, Faulkner ruled the photos would be excluded from the evidence.
According to Pritchard, the officer who filed the report took the stand at the trial and said he submitted the report, which Pritchard said contained the statements from the mother of the victim, in May of 2023.
A staffer from the DA's Office reportedly testified that the document was received by the office and stored in a way the Assistant DA assigned to Woods' case "would not have likely seen". The staffer also reportedly testified that the office had "destroyed or erased" the only copy of the report ten or thirty days after receiving it on the grounds that their office policy is to do so if the document does not get attached to a case their agency is actively prosecuting.
Assistant District Attorney Debbie Garrett also reportedly confirmed this testimony on the stand, according to Pritchard, admitting that the DA's Office did receive and review the police report, did not place it in Woods' file and later permanently deleted their only copy.
"When Judge Falkner was confronted with not one, not two, but three distinct motions by the defense to dismiss the case for various discovery violations, in the end he could only bring himself to declare a mistrial," Pritchard wrote in a statement to 6 News.
"Based on our own conversations with other attorneys practicing in the area, we know that we have only scratched the surface regarding this ongoing issue, and that a similar story could be told by many others," Pritchard said.
Garza said in his statement, "There are active cases pending concerning Mr. Woods, we intend to proceed at a later date on the cases and will reserve the remainder of the comments for the courtroom."
Pritchard's full statement to 6 News can be read at this link.
In response to Pritchard's claims, Garza said, "we take issue with several points that he mentions and have a different perspective of what and how this matter came to be an issue in the case. Regardless of Mr. Pritchard's perspective or my office's perspective the one perspective that should be looked at is the Judge's perspective of the events and are controlling."
Pritchard said his firm intends to obtain a transcript of the proceedings and make them available.
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