Attorney Amy McIntire quoted in Nola.com article

New Orleans Gang Members Seek to Overturn High-Profile Racketeering Convictions

BY: JOHN SIMERMAN | NOLA.COM | FEB. 6, 2022

39’ers case (an excerpt from the article)

Defense attorneys have claimed the government can’t prove that several killings were tied to the gangs’ goals, but Judge Edith Jones didn’t sound too eager earlier this month to parse the motives behind the dozen murders attributed to defendants in the 39’ers case.

“I’m thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, they go around and kill each other and then they have big parties where they flash thousands and thousands of dollars in cash,” Jones, an appointee of President Ronald Reagan, said at the Jan. 4 hearing. “What more do you need to draw a reasonable inference that they’re all in it together?”

At the center of appeals in that case is a piece of evidence defense attorneys never received.  

In a March 2016 letter written to an Orleans Parish prosecutor, informant Washington “Big Wash” McCaskill claimed that gang leaders Darryl “Breezy” Franklin and Gregory “Rabbit” Stewart, the government’s star witnesses, had served them up a sham case.

McCaskill, a top enforcer with the notoriously bloody Central City gang “3NG”, admitted his role in eight killings before he started cooperating with the government in several cases.

“Our Federal case is all made up lies,” McCaskill wrote. “Darryl Franklin and Rabbit lied about a lot of things. You think anyone care. No because their(sic) prejudice toward us.”

Prosecutors blamed the 39’ers for a dozen murders and myriad drug and gun crimes, including the 2010 killing of bounce rapper Renetta “Magnolia Shorty” Lowe in a barrage of gunfire.

McCaskill’s letter to Assistant District Attorney Alex Calenda was hiding in plain sight. Calenda had submitted it as evidence in the 2016 state racketeering trial of feared “3NG” gang leader Kentrell Hickerson, in which McCaskill also testified.

Attorney Amy McIntire, who represents defendant Damian Barnes in the 39’ers case, didn’t allege foul play, but she noted that the feds built their case largely on the accounts of Franklin and Stewart, supported by ballistics evidence. McCaskill’s missing letter was specific to the federal case and “would have been the single most important piece of evidence at our trial,” McIntire argued.

To read the full article, click here

 

About Amy McIntire

As a partner in the Civil Litigation and Labor and Employment practice groups, Amy is experienced in all phases of litigation, including assisting in the inception of mass and multi-district litigation, coordinating and conducting nationwide discovery, briefing and arguing procedural and dispositive motions, conducting and defending depositions of plaintiffs, corporate witnesses, and expert witnesses, preparing lay and expert witnesses for trial, and ultimately preparing and taking cases to trial as first- and second-chair trial attorney.  Her successful experience has earned her a reputation as a trusted advisor to clients of all sizes, both locally and nationally.