Misconduct by a top Pima County prosecutor prompted...

Misconduct by a top Pima County prosecutor prompted the Arizona Supreme Court to overturn the conviction and death sentence of a Tucson man accused of gunning down three people in the El Grande Market slayings. Justices accused embattled former county prosecutor Kenneth Peasley of soliciting false testimony from a police homicide detective during two murder trials for Andre Lamont Minnitt, 32.
The court ruled that Minnitt's third trial for the killings, conducted by a different county prosecutor, violated the state's double-jeopardy law. The court ruling does not free Minnitt, because he will remain in prison on an unrelated conviction.
The state Supreme Court overturned Minnitt's 1st murder conviction and ordered a new trial. The 2nd trial ended with a hung jury, forcing a mistrial.
According to a court opinion released yesterday, justices said Minnitt's 3rd trial, which ended in a conviction and a death sentence, violated double-jeopardy laws because of alleged false testimony solicited in the previous 2 trials by Peasley.
"The prosecutor, with full knowledge, introduced false testimony in two trials and this seriously damaged the structural integrity of both," Chief Justice Charles E. Jones wrote. "Whether or not the 3rd trial was free from false testimony, falsehoods in the 2 previous trials permeated the process to the extent that fairness in the 3rd trial could not correct the misdeeds of trials 1 and 2." 2 other defendants also were tried for the murders, which were committed June 24, 1992.
One was convicted and remains on death row. The other was acquitted in a retrial. In July, an Arizona Supreme Court hearing officer ruled that Peasley should face a 60-day suspension and a year's probation with a limited caseload for alleged misconduct in the El Grande case.
A state Supreme Court disciplinary committee has yet to issue a formal punishment. Peasley was assigned in April to the civil division of the County Attorney's Office and "is no longer responsible for criminal prosecution," Pima County Attorney Barbara LaWall said.
"I have worked tirelessly to ensure this office acted with integrity and maintained the trust of the public it was created to serve. In this instance, the Arizona Supreme Court has found otherwise, and for that I am embarrassed for the office and personally saddened," LaWall wrote in a statement.
Minnitt will remain in prison to serve a 36-year sentence from an unrelated conviction. Minnitt is serving a 36-year term for robbing Mariano's Pizza on Aug. 26, 1992.
In the El Grande killings, Christopher McCrimmon was acquitted by a jury in 1997 in his 2nd trial after his 1st verdict was reversed because of alleged juror coercion.
The other defendant, Martin Raul Soto-Fong, remains on death row as he appeals the case.
Store manager Fred Gee, 45; his uncle, Huang Ze Wan, 77; and clerk Raymond Arriola, 32, were found shot to death at the store.