November 10, 2009
By Emma Graves Fitzsimmons

CHICAGO — Prosecutors on Tuesday accused former journalism students at Northwestern University of paying a witness to record a video statement to help them prove that a man had been wrongfully convicted of a 1978 murder in a Chicago suburb.

The new accusations shed light on why Cook County prosecutors had subpoenaed the grades, e-mail messages and records of students who investigated the murder conviction for the university’s Medill Innocence Project. The judge at a hearing on Tuesday did not rule on whether the university would have to turn over the documents.

Prosecutors said they wanted to determine whether students believed they would receive better grades if they provided evidence to help exonerate the convict, Anthony McKinney, who is serving a life term in the fatal shooting of a security guard in 1978 in the southern suburb of Harvey, Ill.

Northwestern University and David Protess, the professor who directs the Medill Innocence Project, have denied the assertions and accused prosecutors of starting a “smear campaign” against the students’ work. Professional journalism groups are concerned that the students may have to submit information they gathered during reporting.

The witness, Anthony Drakes, told students in a video interview in 2004 that he was at the murder scene but that Mr. McKinney was not, according to prosecutors and the Medill Innocence Project.

But Mr. Drakes later recanted, prosecutors said in court documents filed Tuesday. He said that “he let the team know he wanted money,” the documents said, and that the students and a private investigator who works with them, Sergio Serritella, gave a cab driver $60 to drive him a short distance. Mr. Drakes said the cab driver gave him change, which the documents said was $40, and he said he used the money to buy crack cocaine.

A cab driver’s handwritten log contained in the documents confirmed Mr. Drakes’s account, saying, “Detective gave me 60 — told me to give him 40.”

“This evidence shows,” the documents said, “that Tony Drakes gave his video statement upon the understanding that he would receive cash if he gave the answers that inculpated himself.” The documents also accused students of paying another witness $50 to $100.

After the hearing, a former student, Evan Benn, who works for The St. Louis Post-Dispatch, said he had given the cab driver $60 because the driver had estimated it would cost at least $50 to take Mr. Drakes where he wanted to go. It was not supposed to be a payment for Mr. Drakes, Mr. Benn said.

Professor Protess said the students never paid for information. He remained adamant about refusing to turn over the requested records and said he would discuss with his family the possibility of jail time.

Professor Protess, who joined Northwestern in 1981, has been working with students to investigate wrongful convictions for more than a decade. The Medill Innocence Project has helped lead to the release of 11 inmates, and an Illinois governor once cited those wrongful convictions in announcing that he was commuting the sentences of everyone on death row.

The project investigated the McKinney case for three years and concluded that he had been wrongly convicted in the Harvey killing.

In their latest filing, prosecutors also asserted that the students were acting as investigators and not as journalists because they did not publish articles while they conducted their work.

The next hearing in the case was set for Jan. 11, at which time the university will have a chance to respond to the prosecutors’ filing before Judge Diane G. Cannon of Cook County Circuit Court schedules oral arguments.

Copyright 2009 The New York Times Company