Lodi to pay $625,000 to man wrongly convicted of rape

Peter Rose, who spent 10 years in prison for a Lodi rape he did not commit, has settled a federal lawsuit against the city, county and state for $1 million, pending the approval of a federal judge.

The money will go into life insurance accounts and will be distributed to Rose and his three children over a number of years �" meaning that it will gather interest and he will ultimately receive more than $520,000 while his children will receive a total of more than $300,000. His attorneys will also get more than $300,000 in fees, according to settlement details that were filed in court Thursday.

"Assuming that the court approves the settlement, we're very satisfied with it," said Rose's attorney, Mark Merin. "These are cutting-edge issues when you talk about liability for the wrongful conviction of an individual."

U.S. District Judge Garland E. Burrell Jr. must approve the settlement because it includes Rose's two children who are minors. The judge could order the amount to be increased.

The city of Lodi, whose officers investigated the 1994 rape of a 13-year-old girl, will pay $625,000. San Joaquin County, whose prosecutors took the case to trial and convicted Rose, will pay $100,000. And the state of California, whose analysts investigated the physical evidence from the crime, will pay $275,000.

Janice Magdich, deputy city attorney for Lodi, said the city is liable for $500,000 �" including roughly $75,000 its attorney fees have cost �" and that its insurers will pay the remainder. The money comes from the city's General Fund but had already been set aside in case it was needed in the Rose case, Magdich said.

Had the case gone to trial, Magdich estimated attorney and expert witness fees would have cost $500,000, regardless of the jury's verdict.

Additionally, Magdich said, there's no telling what kind of award a jury could return: In May a federal jury awarded a $2.25 million to a Virginia man who spent 18 years in prison for a rape and murder he did not commit. And in March, an Oklahoma jury awarded a man $14.5 million for the 14 years he spent in prison after being wrongly convicted of rape.

Many such cases settle before going to trial, some as high as $18 million, Magdich said.

Had Rose's case gone to trial, jurors may have heard him testify about what life is like in prison for those convicted of child rape. Even Magdich, who saw a videotaped interview of Rose after his exoneration, said that "a jury would find him to be very likable and have great sympathy for him."

Rose, now 38, was arrested and charged with the Nov. 29, 1994, rape of a girl who was walking to a school bus stop. The girl was dragged in to an alley behind the 400 block of East Eden Street, and she initially told police that she did not see her attacker.

For three weeks she stuck to the story but then, after suggestions from her aunt and coercion from police, she named Rose, who was acquainted with her aunt.

The officers, Ernie Nies and Matt Foster, had grilled the girl and accused her of lying, and at one point one told her to take off her cross necklace because she didn't deserve to wear it.

A San Joaquin County jury convicted Rose a year later, and he was sentenced to 27 years in state prison.

"The thing that bothers me the most about this case is that he exhausted his appeals ... he got no relief until, fortunately, by happenstance there was a little bit of evidence left that could establish there was a little bit of DNA that did not match him," Merin said. "But for that, he would not have been exonerated."

Rose's had used most of his appeals �" his grandfather had even paid a private appellate attorney in hopes of improving Rose's chances �" when the Innocence Project at Golden Gate University took up the case.

Students and professors tracked down evidence from the victim's underwear and submitted it for new DNA testing that was not available in 1994. Tests showed that semen in the fabric did not match Rose, and prosecutors ultimately agreed that he was not the rapist. Judge Stephen Demetras then declared Rose innocent in February 2005.

That finding allowed Rose to seek compensation of up to $100 per day for the time he spent in prison after his conviction. He was awarded $328,200 in October 2005, and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger signed off on the amount.

In the meantime, Rose's attorneys filed federal lawsuits alleging that his children had been deprived of their father and that his civil rights had been violated by the officers, as well as prosecutor Kevin Mayo and Kathleen Ciula, who originally examined the evidence.

As part of the settlement Mayo, Ciula, Nies and Foster �" who is no longer employed with the city �" will first be dismissed from the case with prejudice, meaning that they will never again be held liable in the case.

"Our opinion is that our officers had probable cause to make the arrest of Mr. Rose," Magdich said. "The technology that ruled him out as a suspect in 2004 did not exist 10 years earlier."

For Merin, it's also a matter of the people involved.

"It's a conjunction of events. It's the little bit of evidence that then gets spun to someone else and becomes more than what it is," Merin said. "And young people are very impressionable ... you put all that together and it's a travesty."

Contact reporter Layla Bohm at layla@lodinews.com.

First published: Saturday, January 6, 2007

Reader Feedback

oh wrote on Jan 11, 2007 9:57 PM:

" Sorry!Pete for what they did to you!But now the Lawyer has rape us all!And is probably a repeat offender!His efforts were probably very minute!100thou!You should sue your first lawyer while you are at it!They are the scum around us!And I know the COPS fabricate stories!It has happened to me in the past thanks to a (X) Wife!Thanks you *^*#$# Cops! "

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Lodi to pay $625,000 to man wrongly convicted of rape

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