Morales' PI Pleds Guilty

Former criminal defense investigator accused of forging statements from jurors, witnesses and others in death penalty cases pleaded guilty to four charges Monday and accepted a five-year prison sentence.

Kathleen Culhane, 40, said outside a Sacramento courtroom that she filed incorrect documents on behalf of five condemned inmates because she believes that capital punishment is wrong.

"I believe that the death penalty is illegal," she said. "It is barbaric and an atrocity. Any acts I committed are out of a firm belief against the state killing these people."

Culhane, who had worked on death penalty appeals since 1999, will likely go to prison in August when she is formally sentenced.

A prosecutor said Culhane's feelings on capital punishment were irrelevant and said filing false documents is "about as serious as it gets."

"It doesn't matter whether you're for or against the death penalty, you have to play by the rules," said Michael Farrell, senior assistant attorney general in state Attorney General Jerry Brown's office.

Culhane was charged in February with 45 criminal charges involving 23 declarations she filed with courts and the governor's office from 2002 to 2006. In the plea bargain with Brown's office, she admitted to one count of perjury, two counts of forgery and one count of filing a false document. Authorities say Culhane made up stories and forged the signatures of witnesses and jurors to benefit clients' appeals.

The first allegations against her came to light in February 2006 when lawyers for Death Row inmate Michael Morales of Stockton withdrew declarations from five jurors and a witness supporting his petition for clemency from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The statements quoted the witness as saying police had browbeaten her into testifying falsely against Morales, and quoted the jurors as saying they favored clemency or would not object to it. An attorney general's investigator said all of them denied signing the documents or ever being contacted by anyone working on Morales' behalf.

Morales lost his bid for clemency from the governor but later won a stay of execution from a federal judge in a lawsuit over the state's lethal injection procedures. That case is ongoing.

Culhane worked as an investigator for the state-funded Habeas Corpus Resource Center in San Francisco and later in private practice. As an investigator, Culhane's job was to locate and interview witnesses and jurors who participated in death penalty cases, and obtain signed declarations favorable to the inmates' legal defense and pleas for clemency.

The center withdrew about 100 declarations she submitted and cooperated with prosecutors.

In addition to Morales, the condemned inmates Culhane worked for and submitted false documents for are Vicente Figueroa Benavides, Christian Monterroso, Jose Guerra and Richard Clark, according to Farrell.

Farrell said attorneys for the condemned inmates are redoing Culhane's work, which will add considerable time to the appeals process.

Culhane's attorney, Stuart Hanlon, called the five-year sentence -- she could get out in 2 years and 8 months if she behaves in prison and earns good-time credits -- a "very stiff consequence."

Hanlon noted that Culhane has always worked to help others, spending seven years in El Salvador helping war refugees before beginning her work on death penalty cases.

"She has taken responsibility for what she did," he said.