Sikeston city contends not responsible in wrongful arrest, conviction case

The City of Sikeston, Missouri, was not responsible for the actions of its former public safety director Drew Juden in the wrongful arrest and conviction of David Robinson, an attorney for the city has argued.

The city, Juden and former detective John Blakely are defendants in a federal civil suit brought by Robinson. Each defendant is represented by a different attorney. Each defendant, however, is asking the judge to dismiss the suit on various grounds.

Robinson and his attorneys filed a lawsuit in March alleging multiple examples of witness intimidation, conspiracy and several direct and indirect actions over a decade leading to the wrongful conviction and incarceration in a Sikeston murder case.

These actions kept Robinson in prison for 17 years before his exoneration, according to the suit filed in federal court.

The lawsuit alleges the Sikeston Department of Public Safety and the individuals broke laws and ethics to frame Robinson. It does not seek a specific dollar amount in damages.

“The Sikeston Police Department, Blakely and Juden constructed a case to convict Robinson and get Robinson off the streets, because they did not like him, even though they possessed information that Robinson did not kill Sheila Box,” the suit alleges. Not only does the lawsuit claim Blakely ignored exculpatory evidence before trial, the police “played an integral role in preventing Robinson’s wrongful conviction from being overturned in 2004 and again in Cole County in 2015 and causing him to continue to be incarcerated for an additional 13 years.”

Juden, a Sikeston police captain at the time of the Box murder in August 2000, was named chief shortly thereafter and, in January 2017, was appointed by then-Gov. Eric Greitens as director of the Missouri Department of Public Safety. Greitens resigned and Juden was forced out by Greitens’ successor, Mike Parson, in August 2018.

Attorney James Martin, representing the city, wrote in a recent court filing, “To impose liability on the city as plaintiff argues for the actions Juden is alleged to have taken in this case would impose liability on municipalities for any action taken by their police department into perpetuity.”

Martin wrote the U.S. Supreme Court has ruled municipal liability applies only when “persistent and widespread discriminatory practices” are “well settled so as to constitute a custom.”

The city also has argued it has sovereign immunity. But attorneys for Robinson said sovereign immunity does not apply because the city has insurance coverage for “police misconduct.”

For Juden’s part, he argues Robinson’s suit seeks to hold him responsible for conduct attributed to Blakely.

The lawsuit, according to Juden’s attorney, argues Juden “should have known” an eyewitness to the murder and another witness who reported he heard Robinson confess to the shooting should not be believed.

But the attorney, Matthew Robinson (no relation to David Robinson) wrote Juden was “not personally involved in the alleged constitutional violations” and “cannot be held individually responsible for those violations.”

Both Blakely and Juden have argued they have “qualified immunity.”

Qualified immunity is a legal doctrine in federal law shielding government officials from being sued for discretionary actions performed within their official capacity unless their actions violated “clearly established” federal law or constitutional rights.

Attorney Peter Dunne, who represents Blakely, wrote qualified immunity “‘provides ample room for mistaken judgments’ by protecting ‘all but the plainly incompetent or those who knowingly violate the law.’”

But Robinson’s attorney, Charles Weiss, responded in a court filing Blakely:

• Paid witness Albert Baker to testify he saw Robinson shoot the victim
• Obtained false jail-cell testimony
• Falsified a probable-cause affidavit to make it look like Robinson did not have an alibi for the night of the murder
• Threatened a witness if he showed up to testify
• Deliberately ignored information a different man was the real murderer
• Intimidated Baker into not recanting his trial testimony at a post-conviction hearing

A Missouri judge appointed to review Robinson’s conviction concluded Blakely lied numerous times during an evidentiary hearing, Weiss wrote in a memorandum to the court.

“Despite all these allegations of misconduct, Blakely has the nerve to argue” he is entitled to qualified immunity, Weiss wrote.

“The case law is clear that a police officer is not entitled to qualified immunity if the officer violated a constitutional right and the violated right was clearly established,” Weiss wrote.

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