Supreme Court case could impact Masters' suit

FORT COLLINS - A case being decided by the U.S. Supreme Court might determine whether Tim Masters will be permitted to continue his lawsuit against the prosecutors who put him in prison.

The nation's highest court last week heard oral arguments in the case of an Iowa man who served 25 years in prison after being convicted of murder.

New evidence ultimately set him free, and now he's suing the prosecutors who presented the case against him, arguing they fabricated evidence against him and ignored other suspects.

In that case, the prosecutors' attorney is arguing even if they made up evidence, they can't be sued because of laws giving prosecutors "absolute immunity" for their actions in the courtroom.

Sound familiar? It does to Masters.

Masters was accused, tried and convicted of the 1987 death of Peggy Hettrick in Fort Collins.

In 2008, an outside judge overturned Masters' conviction based on new DNA evidence pointing toward another suspect initially cleared by police. Hettrick's death is now under investigation by the Colorado Attorney General's Office.

After being freed, Masters filed a federal civil rights lawsuit against the police and prosecutors who presented the case against him to a jury. He argues they knew he was innocent but conspired to manufacture a conviction by withholding or ignoring pieces of evidence pointing toward other suspects.

Masters was in court this summer when attorneys for former prosecutors Jolene Blair and Terry Gilmore argued their clients are protected from being sued by a concept called "absolute immunity." In that concept, prosecutors cannot be sued for anything they do in the courtroom.

It's meant to ensure prosecutors don't have to worry about being deluged with lawsuits by defendants unhappy with the process, even if they're found innocent.

"Prosecutors shouldn't worry, as a matter of policy, that every time someone is found not guilty, that they are going to be sued. But this decision extends that concept to the breaking point," said Masters' attorney, David Lane.

During the Supreme Court hearing Wednesday, justices' questions explored whether Americans have a freestanding right not to be framed by police or prosecutors. That case is Pottawattamie County v. McGhee.

In both the Iowa case and the Masters case, attorneys for the prosecutors argued making up evidence does not itself harm a defendant - only the use of it does. And any prosecutor using that evidence, they then argued, cannot be held liable because of absolute immunity.

Masters said he struggles to understand how that's fair. Masters' suit targets the actions of police and prosecutors before he was arrested and brought to trial.

"All of the rest of us are held accountable for our actions," Masters said. "We're not allowed to lie, cheat or steal. It's not doing your job to manufacture evidence."

Lane said the Supreme Court case could mean the end of the road for Masters' suit against Blair and Gilmore, who are now both Larimer County District Court judges. His suit against the police would likely continue because officers receive a lesser level of immunity for their actions.

"If it goes bad for us in the Supreme Court, there's a good chance the DAs get tossed out in the Tim Masters case," Lane said.

Blair and Gilmore, along with the other defendants named in Masters' suit, have repeatedly declined to comment because they are being sued.

Written by Trevor Hughes, Fort Collins Coloradoan.