Pimp of the Week: Texas' Slimiest DA John Bradley

Like Richard Nixon at his low point, Governor Rick Perry abruptly removed an underling from office before he could pull the Governor's skeletons out of the closet. Only instead of appointing a brilliant lawyer to take the place of the person he fired, Governor Perry chose our Pimp of the Week, Williamson County District Attorney John Bradley, to derail the investigation.

John Bradley has been pimping Lady Justice for years but in the past few weeks he's taken his exploitation of Justice to a whole new level.

House Committee Exposed to Bradley's Unique View of Justice After he Tries to Stop an Invited Witness from Testifying

As the Houston Chronicle pointed out yesterday and John Bradley admits, the House Committee on Criminal Jurisprudence invited an important witness to testify in their hearing on January 11 - but John Bradley didn't agree so he advised the gentleman to stay home. Of course. When will Texas legislators learn to clear their witness lists with John Bradley before they schedule a hearing? Bradley had the nerve to tell the witness that he would ruin his reputation if he appeared at the hearing. The witness appeared anyway. Could there be a clearer example of "obstruction of Justice?"

Verdict: The witness' reputation: 1, John Bradley's reputation: 0.

Federal Judge Raises Questions About Bradley's Relationship with Lady Justice after Bradley Fights For Five Years to Stop a Simple DNA Test

Most people agree that an accused person should be able to conduct a DNA test on evidence if it might prove he is innocent, especially if he offers to pay for the test. Not John Bradley. Just because Governor Perry recently appointed him to Chair the Texas Forensic Science Commission, the government entity charged with making sure that evidence in court is reliable, that doesn't mean he wants accused people to be able conduct tests in order to prove the truth.

Even though the primary duty of every prosecutor should be to do justice, Bradley fought appeal after appeal in court to make sure that a man who is accused of murder is NOT allowed to test DNA from his case. Bradley argued that "finality" is more important than finding out whether the person is innocent.

After five years of legal battles, the Court of Appeals ruled against Bradley unanimously in January. A federal court berated Bradley in an earlier ruling on the same case, commenting that it “questions (Bradley's) rationale for rejecting the plaintiff's offer to conduct DNA and other testing at their own expense, particularly in light of (his) duties to uphold the Constitution and seek and provide fair and impartial justice.”

Verdict: The man won his DNA test, John Bradley won Pimp of the Week.

Attorney General Has to Stand Up for Justice After Bradley Violates the Open Meetings Act in his First Hearing

As reported by Grits for Breakfast and the Houston Chronicle, District Attorney John Bradley, the person whose job it is to enforce the Texas Open Meetings Act, violated the law in his first meeting when he allowed some public and press into the meeting but excluded others. The Attorney General had to advise them that the District Attorney was wrong. Will Bradley's famous "tough on crime" attitude apply to himself?

Verdict: The excluded people were allowed back in the room, Bradley's credibility flew out the window.

Forensic Science Commissioners Are Dealt an Injustice as Bradley Wastes Their Day and Derailes Their Work

After Bradley tried to hide from the press and public by forcing his fellow Forensic Science Commission members to meet in a far away corner of Texas, we thank the Innocence Project for live webcasting and Grits for Breakfast for live blogging so that we could all watch Bradley's hubris in action. Thanks also to AP and Houston Chronicle for their coverage.

Throughout cyberspace we watched as Bradley insulted his fellow commissioners at every turn. As Grits enumerates, commission members have reason to be upset. Bradley insisted on debating rule after rule for hour after hour. At the same time, he refused to allow commissioners to have the benefit of the most important and time-honored rules, Robert's Rules of Order, which would have allowed commission members to make motions and force votes. He claimed he was running the meeting on "consensus."

After commissioners waited months for Bradley to set the first meeting, drove to far South Texas for the meeting, realized that he would not honor their previous decisions, sat for hours listening to him talk about a ludicrous set of rules and then gave him their vote, he pronounced that the rules are not binding. To top it off, to get some commissioners to vote for his "rules," Bradley promised the rules would not apply to old cases. After the vote he turned to the commissioners and announced that the most important old case, the one that Perry put him there to cover up, will be subject to Bradley's new "rules."

Verdict: John Bradley's ego was always bigger than Texas, now his pimp hat is bigger than Texas.

Williamson County Residents Get an Out-of-Date Version of Lady Justice

Williamson County (just north of Austin), where Bradley is currently the District Attorney, is well known as a place that is tough on crime especially if you do not have White skin. The Austin Chronicle researched the racial breakdown of Bradley's sentences and found that "If You're White, It's All Right" - people of color are treated significantly more harshly in Bradley's courtrooms than folks who have White skin. As his own town newspaper points out, his brand of justice won't last long because Williamson County's demographics are changing. As Roy Minton points out in the story, “You’ve got young people from Round Rock and you’ve got young people from all around that are very different in their attitudes."

Verdict: Beware of Williamson County until John Bradley is gone, especially if you are a person of color.

Texas Prosecutors Get a Taste of Bradley's Flavor of Justice Every Day as Bradley Sits at his Desk Firing Off Freaky Emails on the Taxpayer's Dime

Bradley has posted over 6500 entries on the Texas District and County Attorney Association online forum. By far the loudest prosecutor in the forum, Bradley's posts range from the cynical and snide to the sexually obsessed. Here are a few of his entries:

"Hundreds of New Yorkers have been riding the city's subway trains in their underwear."

"Nudity in combat is the practice of entering combat without clothing and armor."

"For some women, a bad haircut might well be the sort of "serious permanent disfigurement" ... that qualifies for "serious bodily injury.""

"The tobacco smoke enema, an insufflation of tobacco smoke into the rectum by enema, was a medical treatment employed by 18th-century European physicians for resuscitating drowning victims and other purposes."

"A South Carolina man was charged with having sex with a horse after the animal's owner caught the act on videotape, then staked out the stable and caught him at shotgun point, authorities said Wednesday."

Hmmm ... legal mumbo jumbo that we wouldn't understand, right Mr. Bradley?

Verdict: Lady Justice, we're sorry but you have been pimped.