Thread: Sex-abuse charges dismissed against immigrant granted asylum

Judge dismisses sex-abuse charges
Clerk is unable to find suitable translator in time
By Ernesto Londoño
The Washington Post
Updated: 9:02 a.m. ET July 22, 2007
WASHINGTON - A 7-year-old girl said she had been raped and repeatedly molested over the course of a year. Police in Montgomery County, acting on information from a relative, soon arrested a Liberian immigrant living in Gaithersburg. They marshaled witnesses and DNA evidence to prepare for trial.

What was missing -- for much of the nearly three years that followed -- was an interpreter fluent in the suspect's native language. A judge recently dropped the charges, not because she found that Mahamu Kanneh had been wrongly accused but because repeated delays in the case had, in her view, violated his right to a speedy trial.

"This is one of the most difficult decisions I've had to make in a long time," Katherine D. Savage said from the bench Tuesday, noting that she was mindful of "the gravity of this case and the community's concern about offenses of this type."

Loretta E. Knight, the Circuit Court clerk responsible for finding interpreters, said her office searched exhaustively for a speaker of Vai, a tribal language spoken in West Africa. They contacted the Liberian Embassy, she said, and courts in all but three states. Linguists estimate that 100,000 people speak Vai, mostly in Liberia and Sierra Leone.

In arguing to save the case, Assistant State's Attorney Maura Lynch said that dismissing the indictment "after all the efforts the state has made to accommodate the defendant would be fundamentally unfair."

Appeal under consideration
Prosecutors, who cannot refile the charges against Kanneh, are considering whether to appeal Savage's ruling. Kanneh was granted asylum in the United States, according to State's Attorney John McCarthy. A conviction could have led to deportation proceedings.

His attorney, Theresa Chernosky, declined to comment. Delays were compounded by a dispute about whether Kanneh required an interpreter at all.

In Montgomery and elsewhere, the proliferation of languages resulting from immigration is presenting courts with a novel challenge, legal and linguistics experts say. Rarely, however, does a court have such difficulty finding an interpreter that a criminal case must be dropped.

Court interpreters and linguists say a national database of court interpreters would help quickly locate people fluent in uncommon languages. "The burden of increased requests for rare languages makes it a necessity," said Nataly Kelly, author of a book on interpreting.

Knight said the county spent nearly $1 million on interpreters last year, 10 times the amount it spent in 2000. "It's a constant struggle, and it is extremely expensive," she said.

Frustrating efforts
Kanneh was arrested in August 2004 after witnesses told police that he raped and repeatedly sexually molested the girl, a relative.

In a charging document, Detective Omar Hasan wrote that the girl "attempted to physically stop the behavior from the defendant, but was unsuccessful." Hasan wrote that Kanneh threatened the young girl "with not being able to leave the apartment unless she engaged in sexual behavior with the defendant."

Kanneh spent one night in jail and was released on a $10,000 bond with the restriction that he have no contact with minors. He later waived his right to a speedy trial -- in Maryland, defendants have a right to be tried within 180 days following an indictment -- because the defense wanted time to conduct its own analysis of DNA evidence. That waiver was effective only until the next trial date, Chernosky argued in court.

The trial date was extended repeatedly as the state and the defense argued over whether Kanneh needed an interpreter and whether he understood the legal proceedings. The state noted that Kanneh attended high school and community college in Montgomery and spoke to detectives in English. The defense insisted that he needed an interpreter to fully understand the proceedings.

The matter was resolved after a court-appointed psychiatrist who evaluated Kanneh recommended that an interpreter be appointed. Judges who handled subsequent hearings heeded that advice.

The first interpreter stormed out of the courtroom in tears because she found the facts of the case disturbing. A second interpreter was rejected for faulty work. After calling the Liberian Embassy and exhausting other avenues, the clerk's office contacted the administrator of the state's court interpreter program in Annapolis. He located a third Vai interpreter, but at the last minute, that person had to tend to a family emergency.

‘This delay is just too long’
In recent weeks, court officials had found a suitable interpreter who could have assisted in the trial, but it was too late.

Earlier this month, Chernosky filed a motion seeking to have the indictment dismissed, arguing that Kanneh's right to a speedy trial had been violated. "This delay is just too long," she argued in court. "The reasons for the delay are not the defendant's fault."

With help from the National Association of Judiciary Interpreters and Translators, The Washington Post identified three Vai interpreters Thursday, including one in Gaithersburg. Lionbridge, a company that offers interpretation services, said it could provide Vai speakers on short notice. Knight said her office had been diligent. "It's these rare languages we're struggling with so much," she said.

In court, Savage attributed no blame for the delay. She called the prosecutor's efforts to help locate an interpreter "Herculean" and said the court system had learned from the case. "Time has become the enemy," the judge said.

Staff researcher Meg Smith contributed to this report.

© 2007 The Washington Post Company
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/19892811/

The state noted that Kanneh attended high school and community college in Montgomery and spoke to detectives in English.

Another travesty....this is the way they operate...claim they can't speak English. Since they knew he could, it's ridiculous to throw out the case. It's impossible for me to wrap my mind around this insanity. Does it violate some sorta right to have to speak in ANY language even though you understand English. I guess he has carte blance to do anything he wants since he will not be tried.

Well......an American speaking Spanish isn't the same as a one from Mexico.....or so they say. The Mexican children here couldn't "understand" teachers brought here from Spain or high school Seniors that were in their 4th year of Spanish just reading story books.

Even in English some of the legal mumbo-jumbo isn't "understood" even when you know the words they are saying.

I mean this is getting a tad tiresome.....that's why we speak ONE common language here. It's just another excuse they are using to get out of things. How many "dialects" are we expected to know anyway? I read one story where one guy from Mexico spoke one of the obscure native languages and got out because they couldn't find someone to speak it. Maybe I'll learn Klingon or something and play stupid.......

It is true and it certainly points out the need for some really thought on our immigration policies.

My husband learned Spanish (Mexican) from Mexicans when he was a child in the Rio Grande Valley. He speaks it fluently, but he speaks a more proper Mexican than is spoken today. When he speaks to a young Mexican today, they always become very polite and quiet. Then they will say, "You speak Spanish just like my father or like my grandfather." The younger crowd speaks a Spanish with a lot more English mixed in and a lot more slang.

Some of the illegals that come are actually Indians and my husband speaks to them as much through sign language as actual spoken language.

In our small town the kids had to take 2 years of Spanish. It was textbook Spanish, conjugating verbs, etc. They wasted a period a day for 2 years. None of them could even hold a simple conversation with someone who speaks Spanish.

That's the same as it is with my husband, Trixie. His family originated in Spain and settled here from Mexico in the early 1900's. They are all fluent in Castilian spanish which is what is spoken in Spain and is the pure form. That's the formal version and is also used to speak with elders and those you don't know.

The informal version is Latin American Spanish which is a mish mash from different regions.

While he does know the other, having picked it up from friends and neighbors growing up, he won't use it. Of course the primary language of the family was English but when speaking Spanish, if the kids used the Latin American version, they got slapped for it. The family felt that it was disrespectful, improper, uneducated, and lower class.

The Mexicans in our neighborhood don't understand quite a bit of what he says, and our kids ,who have been taught Castilian, don't understand Latin American Spanish.

One neighbor had told my husband he needed to learn to "speak the language" and my husband flat out told him "No, you all need to learn how to speak English. This isn't Mexico and we speak English here"

Prosecutor Appeals After Judge Drops Rape Charges Against Liberian Over Lack of Interpreter
Monday , July 23, 2007

ROCKVILLE, Md. —

The prosecutor in the case of a Liberian native charged with repeatedly raping and molesting a 7-year-old girl said Monday that he is filing an appeal of a controversial judge's ruling that dismissed all charges because an interpreter who spoke the suspect's rare West African dialect could not be found.

Montgomery County State's Attorney John McCarthy called the ruling last Tuesday by Judge Katherine Savage "improper," adding that his office has "requested that an appeal be taken to reverse the court's order."

Savage ruled on July 17 that Mahamu Kanneh, a Liberian who received asylum in the U.S. and attended high school and community college here, was denied a speedy trial after three years awaiting a court-appointed interpreter who could speak the tribal language of Vai. Linguists estimate that only 100,000 people speak Vai.

Savage called her decision one of the most difficult she's had to make in a long time, especially since she was aware of "the gravity of this case and the community's concern about offenses of this type."

Det. Omar Hasan wrote in the charging document that the victim "attempted to physically stop the behavior from the defendant, but was unsuccessful," the Washington Post reported. Kanneh threatened the young girl "with not being able to leave the apartment unless she engaged in sexual behavior with the defendant," Hasan wrote in his report.

McCarthy charged the delays cited in Savage's order to dismiss the "result of the court locating a qualified interpreter," and not the fault of the prosecutor.

"The fact is on four separate occasions this court provided Vai interpreters," McCarthy said, adding that one of the interpreters had agreed to participate in further proceedings.

Court records, meanwhile, show that an interpreter was "sworn" by a Maryland court on the same day Savage dismissed the case, FOXNews.com has learned.

Loretta Knight, a clerk with the court system in Montgomery County, Md., claimed she had been unable to find an interpreter to stay on the case, even after an exhaustive search that included the Liberian Embassy and courts in 47 states.

But a look at the court docket for July 17, the day the case was dismissed, shows the entry "Interpreter sworn.â€