Pubdate: Tue, 23 Aug 2005 Source: St. Louis Post-Dispatch (MO) Copyright: 2005 St. Louis Post-Dispatch Contact: http://www.stltoday.com/ Details: http://www.mapinc.org/media/418 Author: Peter Shinkle APPEAL MAY HINGE ON CHIEF'S CREDIBILITY A man convicted of possessing crack cocaine claims he was framed by two St. Louis police officers later found to have made false charges in other cases. But federal prosecutors say testimony from another officer present, then-Lt. Col. Joe Mokwa, puts the veracity of the case beyond doubt. Mokwa is now St. Louis chief of police. Sylvester Evans is asking the 8th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in St. Louis to overturn his 1998 conviction and 11-year sentence based on the conduct of the two discredited officers. Officer Reginald A. Williams was convicted in April of obstruction of justice and other crimes for making up bogus crack charges against two men. Prosecutors called him a "rogue cop" who carried out a series of bogus arrests. His sentencing is set for Sept. 16. Officer Timothy H. Moore resigned in 2002 after an internal investigation concluded that he fabricated a bogus charge claiming his ex-wife engaged in lewd sexual conduct outside a Soulard neighborhood bar. The Police Department's effort to fire Moore led to a hearing that raised questions about his conduct. His ex-wife testified in 2003 that she once found cocaine in their home and that he told her it was to "plant" on suspects. Reached by a reporter, Moore declined to comment on his ex-wife's testimony. After Williams was indicted last year, federal prosecutors dropped drug charges against Anthony J. Thompson, who had been convicted in 2000 and sentenced to 14 years. Officials said the only witnesses against him, Moore and Williams, were not reliable. Thompson was released from prison. Evans testified in his trial in 1998 that he never possessed the drugs the two officers swore were found in his home. He claimed the police conspired against him in response to white neighbors who were in a racial conflict with Evans, who is black. Police said that Evans, who had a prior drug conviction, signed a statement admitting the drugs were his. Evans said he signed without understanding it, and only after Mokwa threatened him and other officers struck him and called him by a racial epithet. Mokwa, Moore and Williams denied it. After a jury found Evans guilty, he appealed and lost. Now he is trying to reopen his appeal, claiming that new evidence of the false statements by Williams and Moore support his claim. Evans claims that statements by Moore and Williams in his trial were critical to his conviction. "This was the only testimony directly linking Sylvester Evans to the cocaine base," he wrote in a brief filed on his own behalf. Federal prosecutors say Evans' case is different from Thompson's. That difference is Mokwa, who testified that he found more than 7 of the approximately 9 grams of drugs that police said were in Evans' home, prosecutors said. "Mr. Evans was not convicted solely on the basis of the testimony of the now discredited officers," Assistant U.S. Attorney Sirena Wissler said in a reply to Evans' claims. Noting testimony by Mokwa and another officer, who said he saw a gun in Evans' possession, Wissler wrote, "The government provided substantial credible evidence in addition to the testimony of Williams and Moore." Williams had testified that after Evans was arrested about 3:20 p.m. on March 27, 1998, officers used a battering ram to enter his home in the 7300 block of Vermont Avenue to serve a search warrant. Williams said he went first, to make sure the house was safe. He testified that he later found plastic bags of crack cocaine hidden above the door of a small closet off the kitchen. Moore testified that he searched the basement and found a scale and a small amount of marijuana. Mokwa testified that he searched a chest of drawers in the bedroom, finding "two plastic baggies." One contained a big rock of crack, the other held powdered cocaine, he testified. - --- MAP posted-by: Beth