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A Times Editorial
The public deserves a clear look at the misconduct that led to the collapse of the government's case against Steve and Marlene Aisenberg.
© St. Petersburg Times, published August 27, 2001
The federal government should not be able to write a check and walk away from the Aisenberg case. The public, which is paying for the damage, deserves to see how the government botched the job. Serious questions remain about the conduct of police and prosecutors. Public scrutiny is the best hope for preventing that type of misconduct from happening again. The government should open its files in the Aisenberg case.
Prosecutors and police had no qualms about making a public case against Steve and Marlene Aisenberg, who faced charges related to the 1997 disappearance of their 5-month-old daughter, Sabrina. The authorities persuaded a judge -- time and again -- to authorize wiretaps of the Aisenberg home. Investigators taped for 79 days, and used the transcripts to persuade a federal grand jury to indict the Aisenbergs in 1999 on charges of conspiracy and making false statements. "These are serious violations of state and federal law," said the U.S. attorney in Tampa at the time, Charles Wilson, who left afterward to become a federal judge.
But earlier this year, a U.S. magistrate blasted the detectives, saying they misled a judge, acted recklessly and put forth "pure fiction." Magistrate Judge Mark Pizzo said investigators jumped the gun, and he recommended the tapes be thrown out of court. Prosecutors, seeing their case collapse, suddenly dropped the charges. So here's where we stand: No Sabrina, no defendant and no confidence the government can resurrect a successful case.
Let the evidence the prosecutors had collected withstand scrutiny in the court of public opinion. It would be offensive for the government to acknowledge it prosecuted the Aisenbergs in bad faith, then try to close the entire episode with a financial settlement. This case brought national attention, and much of the public has formed an opinion of the couple without the benefit of hard evidence. Opening the records will fill in some gaps. It also will cast a spotlight on the actions of police and prosecutors, giving the public some basis to judge their professionalism and whether the level of suspicion of the couple at the outset was deserved.
An internal Justice Department probe is examining the prosecutors' conduct, and an ongoing state investigation will determine whether the detectives committed a crime. But discipline addresses only one aspect of the fallout in this case. The issue of fairness is not merely a theme in the campaign to clear the Aisenberg name; every citizen has the right to protection from abusive prosecution.
Only a public airing of the case will show what authorities did in the people's name.