This paper looks into the case of Brian Banks, an American man who was charged with rape in 2002, at the age of 16, and was sent to prison for 6 years. Despite the fact that Banks accepted a plea bargain, he was not guilty of committing a rape; he was proved to be innocent in 2012. In the paper, we will explore which institutions were involved in the trial. We will also investigate one of the key aspects of the case, the negligence of evidence, and see if the plea bargain Banks made helped to serve justice.
The case of Brian Banks that led to his imprisoning was processed in 2003. Banks was charged with “forcible rape, forcible sodomy, and kidnapping” of Wanetta Gibson by the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office (LADA) on January 22, 2003 (California Victim Compensation and Government Claims Board, 2015, p. 2).
The alleged crime was said to happen in a local school in Long Beach, Los Angeles County, CA. The LADA is the institution that is responsible for prosecuting criminals in 78 out of the 88 cities of the county, which includes Long Beach; this is why the LADA worked with the case (Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office n.d.).
Brian Banks was then sentenced to six years in prison. Some years after Banks was released, Wanetta Gibson admitted that she fabricated the story, and Banks’ conviction was reversed; the reversal was accomplished by the Judge of Los Angeles Superior Court, Mark C. Kim, in 2012, after Banks “filed a petition for Writ of Habeas Corpus in the Writ of Habeas Corpus in the California Superior Court” in 2011 (California Innocence Project n.d., para. 4-5). It is within the competence of Superior Courts to consider Habeas Corpus applications, which is why the application was made for, and the decision was made by this court (“Habeas Corpus”, 2014, p. 2).
During the trial in 2003, Brian Banks was facing 41-years to life imprisonment for his crime (which he did not commit). The teenager (Banks was 17 at the time) was offered to accept a number of plea deals, according to which he was to be incarcerated for 25, 18, and 9 years (Myers, 2015, para. 14, 16). He rejected all the three, and was finally offered to accept another bargain and plead guilty to rape, on which condition the rest of the charges would be canceled.
The boy was to be professionally observed and then get either probation or imprisonment of 3 or 6 years. The shocked defendant, being reassured by his lawyer that he would only receive probation or no more than 3 years, accepted the deal; but he ended up being sentenced to 6 years of imprisonment (Myers, 2015, para. 15; California Victim Compensation and Government Claims Board, 2015, p. 9).
A key aspect of the case is the lack of proper investigation and the negligence of evidence. It is highlighted that the defendant and the victim indeed had some intimate contact, but it was entirely consensual (according to Wanetta’s later confession in 2011) and not involved any penetration; the alleged victim never tried to stop the defendant (California Victim Compensation and Government Claims Board, 2015, p.8-9, 11).
Still, the defendant was charged with rape involving penetration and ejaculation. Still, the conducted tests found no defendant’s DNA on the alleged victim, and no traces of violence or compulsion (California Victim Compensation and Government Claims Board, 2015).
Furthermore, Gibson’s testimonies were inconsistent; it is stressed that “the inconsistencies… make it seem as if Wanetta G. had trouble recalling prior versions of the story rather than simply not remembering details” (California Victim Compensation and Government Claims Board, 2015, p. 12). Such negligence led to the unjust incarceration of the defendant; Myers (2015) highlights that another possible reason for this was the color of Banks’ skin (para. 14).
As for the plea bargain, it is difficult to determine whether accepting it was for the better in this case. Clearly, the case was not properly investigated, and, if the defendant hadn’t pleaded guilty, it is possible that the case would have been looked into in more detail. On the other hand, it appears that the probability of the defendant being acquitted was low, for even the results of the DNA test were ignored during the trial. It appears likely that the plea deal was for the better, for Banks spent six years in penitentiary instead of probable 41 or more. But it is hard to say that the bargain served justice; rather, it made the injustice somewhat lesser.
It should also be pointed out that the plea deal offers might have served as an additional reason for the investigators’ negligence. Indeed, why bother to look for evidence, if the defendant is a big, strong, and, importantly, black teenager; he plainly ought to be guilty, and it is possible to simply intimidate him and receive a plea bargain? On the other hand, if such an attitude indeed was the case, there is no guarantee that the court officials would have behaved in any other way if there had been no plea bargain option.
To sum up, it is possible to say that we have seen that Brian Banks was charged with rape by the LADA, and was unjustly sent to prison. A key aspect of the case is the negligence of facts and evidence by the court’s officials. The intimidation coming from them resulted in Banks’ 6-year incarceration, which ruined many of his dreams. It is difficult to tell whether the plea bargain was for the better or for the worse in this case, but, clearly, it did not serve justice, even despite possibly alleviating the injustice.
References
California Innocence Project. (n.d.). Brian Banks.
California Victim Compensation and Government Claims Board. (2015). Notice of decision.
Habeas Corpus. (2014)
Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office. (n.d.) Office overview.
Myers, G. (2015). Brian Banks spent five years in prison after being falsely accused of rape, but now he finally has a career in NFL.