© 2014 The Texas Lawbook.
By Natalie Posgate – (October 9) – Lawyers from Carrington Coleman went on a business trip Wednesday, but it was not the typical trek to some corporate office to meet suit-and-tie-clad company executives.
Instead, they piled into a mini-van to a prison in Huntsville to greet and take home their pro bono client and former death row inmate, Manuel Velez, as he officially became a free man.
His legal team drove him 422 miles to his home in Brownsville yesterday to reunite him with his friends and family – which was his first priority once he was no longer behind bars.
Velez was accused of murdering his girlfriend’s 11-month-old son on Oct. 31, 2005 by causing severe head injuries to the baby and was sentenced to death in October 2008 for the wrongful accusation.
His fate turned around shortly after his conviction when he got a new team of lawyers. Carrington, Coleman Sloman & Blumenthal and Colorado law firm Rothgerber Johnson & Lyons decided to represent Velez pro bono for his habeas proceedings as part of the ABA Death Penalty Representation Project.
The lawyers spent nearly six tireless years on the case and proved that Velez deserved a new trial due to ineffective assistance of Velez’s previous counsel. In August they obtained a favorable plea bargain in which Velez was immediately eligible to pursue parole.
Velez’s pro bono lawyers included Carrington Coleman partners Neil Burger and Lyndon Bittle, associate Jenny Smith and at least a dozen others from the firm who have contributed throughout the years. Local counsel included Edmund Cyganiewicz and Reynaldo G. (Trey) Garza, III.
“We’re all incredibly grateful that he is a free man, but we’re also concerned about the system because he was incarcerated for so long as an innocent man,” Burger said this morning on a call from his hotel.
Click here to read The Texas Lawbook’s previous in-depth report of Velez’s journey.
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