The Innocence Project of Texas

This past Thursday, Innocence Project of Texas members met in Houston to elect the organization’s Board of Directors for the 2009-2010 year.  Our new Board members include some of the most successful criminal defense attorneys in the state in addition to exonerees and others dedicated to the cause of exonerating the wrongfully convicted.  The 2009-2010 I.P.O.T. Board Members are:

1. Shirley Baccus-Lobel: A Texas Monthly “Super Lawyer” whose national practice represents individuals charged with federal crimes, complex state offenses, appeals and investigations.  Shirley once worked with the U.S. Department of Justice in Washington, D.C. and as a First Assistant and Criminal Chief at the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of Texas.
2. Jeff Blackburn: A successful criminal defense attorney who is resposible for  securing the release of 35 people convicted as part of the drug sting in Tulia, Texas in 1999.  The State Bar of Texas named him Criminal Defense Lawyer of the Year for 2002-2003 and he has been named a Texas Monthly “Super Lawyer” each year since 2003.
3. Catherine Greene Burnett: Associate Dean of Clinical Studies and Director of the Pro Bono Honors Program at South Texas College of Law in Houston. Prior to joining the faculty at South Texas, Burnett worked as an assistant attorney general and practiced criminal defense for 11 years.
4. Nicole Casarez: An attorney and professor at the University of St. Thomas, where she teaches journalism, media law, public relations and media ethics.  Nicole and her students were largely responsible for an investigation of Anthony Graves’s innocence claim, which ultimately led to a reversal of his death penalty conviction at the 5th Circuit.
5. Alexandra Gauthier: A practicing criminal defense attorney in Austin, Texas.  Gauthier received a J.D. from Ohio State University and earned an undergraduate degree from San Diego State University.  She is member of a team of attorneys responsible for securing the release of Robert Springsteen and Michael Scott, defendants in the infamous “Yogurt Shop” murders, whose guilt was called in to question as a result of DNA testing.
6. Gerry Goldstein: A nationally known defense lawyer and past President of both the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and the Texas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association. He is listed in The Best Lawyers in America and Texas Lawyer’s Legal Legends and has served as an adjunct professor of law at University of Texas School of Law and at St. Mary’s University School of Law.  Goldstein is a fellow in the American College of Trial Lawyers and the International Academy of Trial Lawyers.
7. Bill Habern: One of the founding partners in Habern, O’Neil and Pawgan, the first full-time, full service corrections law firm in the State of Texas.  Habern has practiced in the area of prison and parole law for over 30 years.  Among many notable cases, Habern was part of the defense team that won a U.S. Supreme Court case (Ray v. U.S.) in 1987.  Most recently, Habern won a federal lawsuit that found two top state parole officials violated the constitutional rights of an ex-convict who was denied a required hearing.  Jurors also held the Board of Pardon and Paroles Chairman personally liable for damages and his client’s attorney’s fees.
8. Joyce King: A freelance writer in Dallas and an advocate for the wrongfully convicted. King is the author of Hate Crime: The Story of a Dragging in Jasper, Texas, an acclaimed book on the dragging death of James Byrd in 1998.  King is a former reporter and anchor for a CBS radio affiliate and writes opinion pieces for USA Today, the Christian Science Monitor and the Dallas Morning News.  Her last book was Forgotten Hurricane, about the aftermath of Hurricane Rita in southeast Texas.
9. Peter Lesser: An accomplished criminal defense attorney in Dallas, Texas.  He is a past president-elect of the Dallas County Criminal Bar Association.  Lesser received his J.D. from Southern Methodist University and has been practicing law since 1974.  He has been named as a Texas Monthly “Super Lawyer” since 2003.
10. Jani Maselli: A practicing appellate attorney and an Adjunct Professor of Law, Legal Research and Writing at the University of Houston Law Center.  Maselli is a former staff attorney for Inmate Legal Services in the Texas Department of Criminal Justice and was a staff attorney for the Honorable Charles F. Baird, Texas Court of Criminal Appeals.
11. Gianpaolo Macerola: Founder of the Criminal Justice Project at South Texas College of Law. Macerola teamed up with Attorney Bob Wicoff to help review the Houston Police Department’s Crime Lab errors over the last 20 years.  While at South Texas, the project was able to aid in the release of one such inmate.  He is a member of Macerola and Associates in Houston.
12. Walter Reaves: An accomplished appellate attorney in Waco with over 28 years of experience in post-conviction representation.  Among several notable cases, Reaves represented Calvin Washington, who was wrongfully imprisoned for 15 years and was released in 2001 after Reaves worked to prove his innocence.  He also represented Cameron Todd Willingham on his post-conviction writs and was responsible for securing an expert report that indicated Willingham may have been wrongfully convicted of capital murder.
13. Anthony Robinson: A successful attorney who practices law in Houston, Texas and China. Robinson was wrongfully convicted of rape in 1986 and was exonerated in 2000.  He went on to earn his J.D. from Texas Southern University.
14. Natalie Roetzel: Current Staff Attorney at the Innocence Project of Texas Clinic at the Texas Tech School of Law.  Roetzel received her J.D. from the Texas Wesleyan University School of Law in 2007, where she co-founded the Wesleyan Innocence Project and was a member of the Wesleyan Law Review’s editorial board.
15. Katherine Scardino: A practicing criminal defense and family law attorney in Houston.  She earned her J.D. from the University of Houston law school in 1984.  Among several notable cases, Scardino represented Joe Durrett, who was acquitted of capital murder. She is also an attorney for Anthony Graves, who is facing a re-trial following the reversal of his death penalty capital murder conviction.  Scardino has been named as a Texas Monthly Super Lawyer since 2006 and has appeared frequently on television including the late Johnny Cochran’s Cochran & Company and MSNBC.
16. Cory Session: The current Policy Director for the Innocence Project of Texas.  He graduated from the University of Texas at Austin in 1991 and worked as a legislative aid for Representative Garfield Thompson from 1991 to 1994.  Session is the brother of Timothy Cole, who was posthumously exonerated by I.P.O.T. in 2009.  He testified during the 81^st Texas Legislature and lobbied for innocence-related legislation.  He lives in Fort Worth with his wife and five children and is the owner of Session Properties.
17. Gary Udashen: An experienced trial and appellate attorney in Dallas.  Udashen has over 25 years experience trying cases in both Federal and State courts.  He frequently appears as a speaker at seminars for groups such as State Bar of Texas, Dallas Bar Association and the Texas Criminal Defense Lawyers Association.  He has been named as a Texas Monthly Super Lawyer each year since 2003 and is a frequent contributor to the Voice for the Defense.  In 2008, Udashen was appointed by the Court of Criminal Appeals to serve as a member of the newly formed Criminal Justice Integrity Unit.
18. Bob Wicoff: A criminal defense attorney in Houston since 1983, he has been board certified in criminal law since 1989.  Wicoff served as the co-director of the Houston Police Department Crime Lab Review Panel.  In August, he was chosen as one of three defense attorneys to review all Chapter 64 cases in Harris County.  His practice is limited to post-conviction writs, direct appeals, and DNA litigation.
19. James Woodard: convicted of a murder he did not commit in 1981, James spent 27 years incarcerated. On April 29, 2008 Woodward was released from prison as a result of the joint efforts of the Innocence Project of Texas and the Dallas DA’s office.  Woodard testified during the 81^st legislative session and lobbied in support of innocence-related legislation. Woodard received a pardon from Governor Perry in September 2009.  He lives in Dallas.

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