Innocence Project of Texas Addresses Lubbock City Council on Wrongful Imprisonment of Tim Cole

The Lubbock City Council and a council chamber full of citizens heard the opinions of a few that oppose the way the City of Lubbock has handled the case of Timothy Cole, a man convicted of a rape he didn’t commit in 1986.

Jeff Blackburn, chief legal counsel for the Innocence Project of Texas, discussed the case in which he represented Cole’s family, resulting in Texas’s first posthumous pardon.

“It may surprise you all to know that I think that the Tim Cole case is not really just a question of criminal justice, I think it’s a question of system failure. And I know that in any situation in our society when a system fails, whether a building collapses, or a bridge falls apart, or a plane goes down, it is incumbent on government, the people who made that system, ran that system to find out what happened…You make the hard choice of figuring out what happened, then make the hard choices of ensuring that it doesn’t happen again” Blackburn said to the council Thursday morning.

Blackburn continued by saying that “The fact of the matter is that the City of Lubbock caused this disaster. Now, it’s not a matter of placing blame, saying someone is evil or wrong, but recognizing first and foremost that the City caused the problem.”

District 4 Lubbock City Councilman Paul Beane mentioned Blackburn’s prior letter to the Council, where he alleged that the Lubbock Police Department had framed Timothy Cole. Blackburn responded “I think the facts are clear that they did.”

IPOT Public Policy Director and brother of Timothy Cole, Cory Session, also addressed the council’s refusal to issue an apology to his family.

“I ask you, don’t stonewall. There is no animosity from me, from my mother, against this city…If you meet my mother, if you take the time to speak with her, you’ll find that you’ll be quite surprised what she is seeking, and it may not hurt you as much as you think it might” Session said.

Lubbock citizen Rick Baumgartner addressed the council on the issue, and their sparse attendance at a community meeting on the issue earlier this month, in which only District 1 Councilman Victor Hernandez attended.

“Mr. Hernandez, I probably disagree with most of what you stand for, but I appreciate you being at that meeting the other night. Why were the rest of you not there? Why didn’t you come? Mr. Hernandez came; he sat down, and listened. At least he came and did that,” Baumgartner opined to the council.

Tim Cole died in prison in 1999, while serving a 25-year prison sentence. Jerry Wayne Johnson confessed to the rape which Cole was jailed for in 1995.