The Timothy Cole case: arrest and incarcerate Michele Mallin for conspiracy to murder
February 6, 2009 by A.B. Dada
Filed under Government
The story of Michele Mallin starts out heartbreaking. At the age of 20, she was a victim of sexual assault. In 1985, she was a student of Texas Tech University in Lubbock, TX. Mallin was walking to her car on campus, intending to move it to another parking lot. She was approached by a man who asked if she had jumper cables.
In seconds, the man put Mallin into a choke hold and held a knife to her neck. He then forced himself into her car and drove her to the outskirts of town, where he assaulted her sexually. That hour or two of horrid trauma is where I will end the tragic story of Mallin, and turn it into why I believe she became a criminal, and should be charged with conspiracy to murder.
Mallin reported the assault to police, who followed up with an investigation the next day. Police investigators showed Mallin pictures of possible suspects. Mallin picked a picture of Timothy Cole, also a student at Texas Tech. Cole was brought in for a lineup, where Mallin picked him again.
“I was positive,” Mallin now says. “I really thought it was him.” During the investigation, Mallin said that her attacker was a smoker, ”He was smoking the entire time.” Cory Session, Cole’s brother, says his brother was never a smoker due to his asthma. ”He took daily medications [for asthma] when he was younger.”
According to the Innocence Project of Texas, The “Tech rapist” attacked four women in the late 80s other than Mallin. He abducted them in parking lots near campus, just as Mallin was abducted, and drove them to a vacant location, where he would assault them and flee on foot.
At the time of Mallin’s assault, Cole had just returned from spending two years in the Army and wanted to finish college. He had two years of college completed before his stint in the Army, according to his brother. Cole was arrested and charged with Mallin’s rape. Prosecutors offered Cole a plea bargain offer; he would have been exchanged a guilty plea for release and a probation period. Cole refused, and a negligent jury convicted him and imposed a 25-year sentence.
His brother Reggie Session said that the night of his conviction, ”he hugged my mother and he said, ‘Mother, why these people lie on me, why they do this to me?’” ”He said, ‘They know I ain’t done nothing to that girl. I don’t even know that girl. Why they do this to me, mother?’ … He cried in my mother’s arms on the floor.” His other brother Cory says ”He was the sacrificial lamb. To them, my brother was the Tech rapist, there was no backtracking. It was the trial of the decade for Lubbock.”
Ruby Session, Cole’s mother, said “His greatest wish was to be exonerated and completely vindicated.” Cole rejected a parole offer in exchange for pleading guilty. This young, innocent man wanted to prove his innocence.
Cole spent nearly 2 decades in jail, attempting to prove his innocence. Unfortunately, he didn’t make it. At the age of 39, due to heart complications from his harsh asthma, he passed away on December 2, 1999.
During Cole’s trial, his attorney, Mike Brown, tried to point the blame of the assault on another man, Jerry Wayne Johnson. Johnson was a smoker, as attested by Mallin to the police. Prosecutors never thought to inform the jury that Cole’s asthma prevented him from smoking.
Starting in 1995, Johnson decided to come clean with his guilt. Johnson had been in prison since 1985 on two convictions for aggravated sexual assault, but decided after a decade to try to help Cole clear his name. Johnson was willing to submit a DNA sample and a written confession. For 12 years, Johnson wrote to Texas court officials to offer his confession. The court officials ignored him, considering the case closed. Because the statute of limitations on rape had expired, Johnson could not be charged with the Mallin assault. Johnson was serving a 15 year sentence for another assault, plus an additional 99 years for another one he was found guilty of.
Johnson continued his letters to appeal to the court, with one letter landing in the hands of Cole’s family in 2007: ”I have been trying to locate you since 1995 to tell you I wish to confess I did in fact commit the rape Lubbock wrongly convicted you of. It is very possible that through a written confession from me and DNA testing, you can finally have your name cleared of the rape … if this letter reaches you, please contact me by writing so that we can arrange to take the steps to get the process started. Whatever it takes, I will do it.”
Cole’s family contacted the Innocence Project of Texas immediately, who performed a DNA test confirming Johnson was Mallin’s attacker. Johnson was told that Cole passed away in prison in 1999, 8 years earlier. ”A day later, I am still bothered, terribly, by the death revelation. Because, not knowing Mr. Cole at all, I wonder if the wrongful incarceration contributed to his death,” says Johnson. He ”cried and felt double guilty, even though I know the system’s at fault.” ”I am responsible,” he said. “I say I am truly sorry. I’m truly sorry for my pathetic behavior and selfishness.”
Cole’s family worked to clear Cole’s name, with the lying Mallin attempting to help. Her weak excuse, as she states, was that she ”was very traumatized.” She says “I was scared for my life. I tried my hardest to remember what he looked like.” Her admission that she wasn’t sure, but tried, is proof that she is guilty of conspiracy to murder in the death of Timothy Cole.
This lying-under-oath “victim” says ”I’m trying to get his name cleared. It’s the right thing to do.” The right thing to do is to not lie under oath, or lie to the police, or put an innocence man in prison to watch him die a horrible and tragic death. The right thing to do is to turn yourself in, Michele, and go to jail for double the amount of time that innocent Timothy Cole did. You were a victim, but your crime against Cole is much, much worse.
I find sexual assault, or any property assault of an individual, disgusting and attrocious, but nothing is as evil as using the manipulative and powerful thuggery we call the State to do your bidding in revenge. Mallin’s desire for vengeance is as evil as Johnson’s act against her. Johnson assaulted women, Mallin’s words of hatred killed a man.
Let he who wields the sword be sliced by the sword. Let he who spits hate towards innocence have that hate returned to them in justice.
Unfortunately, Cole’s family disagrees with me. Cole’s brother Cory says ”We don’t blame Michele. She’s very gracious.” The woman who lied under oath to let your brother be murdered by the State is not what I call gracious. It is what I call guilty.
Timothy Cole was vindicated, post mortem, by Travis County District Judge Charlie Baird who has rescinded the conviction, allowing the Governor of Texas to clear his name. Sadly, Texas does not have a law that allows for the clearing of a person’s name after death. Texas lawmakers are sitting in their big, expensive offices, trying to produce a pork-laden bill that will offer this power to our mighty masters. Judge Baird is a well known work of thuggery and evil, known to give out unusual sentences and punishments and hand down harsh verdicts and controversial rulings.
A closing by his mother, Ruby Session: “I miss his smile. I miss all of the hugs, and I miss the salutations in the letters that I used to get from him: ‘Just a few lines to my favorite young lady.’ I’ll never hear that again. I got what Timothy wanted. It wasn’t for us, it was for him.”
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A.B. you are a sick individual. As if there hasn’t been enough pain already, you attempt to turn this tragedy of two people into an apparent self serving cause. The mother has forgiven the victim and the victim has shown remorse for making a terrible mistake. Thank God that there are more rational people out there who do believe in forgiveness than disturbed individuals like yourself. No rational human being would expect the victim of a horrendous violent crime be held responsible for the death of her accused attacker. I’m sure your article was aimed at people like me who are fed up with with idiots like you who have nothing better to do than think of bull-s–t like this. I hope you are never the victim of a violent sex crime, but if you are, I would like see how well you do in the process of identifying your attacker. Can you be 100% sure? I think not. I bet you wouldn’t be brave enough to press charges.
Right, I’m sick because I believe that murder is worse than sexual assault.
I’m sick because I believe that enslaving someone for 19 years, half their life, is worse than sexual assault.
Cole went to jail for one reason: Mallin’s LIES. She lied under oath. She deserves the justice of what unjust result SHE caused against Cole. She’s guilty just as Johnson is.
I don’t care how hard it is for someone to pick out their assaulter, they have to do it correctly, not emotionally. If she wasn’t sure, she shouldn’t have picked anyone.
I blame the judge and jury far more than I blame her, though. They’re part of the stacked system.
AB, I completely agree with you. This sorry excuse for a human being, Michele Mallin, needs to pay for sending an innocent man to jail to hi death and ruin his and his family’s life. I think Cole’s brother is out of his mind for thinking Michele Mallin is gracious. To me, if someone sent my brother to jail to his death, I would sue her behind and make her pay for the life she has stolen. What she has done is even worse that her being raped.
To Denny, pardon my French, but you are AN ABSOLUTE IDIOT!!! You want to talk about pain!!! How about Cole’s pain!!!??? Let’s see you end up in jail and f%$## up the ass to death by a bunch of predators for you to have an idea of what it is to be confined in prison, having your freedom stolen away from you for a crime you didn’t commit. You are AN ABSOLUTE MORON!!! Do everyone a favor, and shut the f*&^ up.
Whatever hapens when a crime is committed, if you are not sure that the person who attacked you is in front of the line up, you simply do not select anyone on a hint!!! Doing so when you are not sure simply shows that you are only looking for someone, anyone to pay for what happened to you. And this is not justice!!!
AB, you are absolutely right, my friend!!!
That animal, “Michele Mallin”, should pay for what she has done!!!
Mr. Dada,
The irony of the following statement is bone chilling, “Let he who wields the sword be sliced by the sword. Let he who spits hate towards innocence have that hate returned to them in justice.” In this article, you are the only person “who spits hate towards innocence.” If you knew ANYTHING about this case, you would cringe upon reading your own article. I am horrified that anyone would write such a monstrosity. So let me fill you in on the TRUTH, and I am asking you to delete this atrocious article immediately. Michele Mallin suffered the most horrendous crime imaginable. I take it that you, sir, have never been sexually assaulted. You have never faced the horror of another person stealing your body, your innocence, and your soul. Until you are raped, you will never be able to comprehend the hellish nightmare that Mrs. Mallin endured. In a recent interview, Mallin stated that all she could think about during the attack was her parents finding her lifeless, mutilated body in a field. She worried that her parents would not be able to deal with the traumatic experience of losing their daughter. Just like anyone else who has been sexually assaulted, Mallin was in survival mode. All that mattered was getting out of that inconceivable and traumatic situation alive. Mallin could have done like a lot of girls and chosen not to press charges against her attacker. But even at a mere 20 years of age, Mallin was strong and fierce. She refused to allow another woman to experience her pain. Mallin’s only goals in pursuing charges were to ensure that the man who raped her paid for his crime and to ensure that this monster never raped another woman again. The idea that Mallin intentionally sent the wrong man to prison is completely irrational. Mallin wanted Jerry Wayne Johnson to pay for what he did to her. Reading this article makes my blood boil. It is ignorant, insensitive, and outrageous to declare that Mrs. Mallin should be charged with conspiracy to murder. Obviously, anyone who could write such a statement knows nothing about the law, the criminal justice system, or the facts of this case. In Texas, 82% of exonerations have been largely or exclusively due to incorrect eyewitness identifications. The PROCEDURES are flawed. I would suggest reading up on the numerous problems of eyewitness identification procedures to anyone who believes anything stated in this article. Texas is currently reviewing its laws regarding eyewitness identification procedures. Mrs. Mallin has played an enormous role in getting these laws changed. Mallin’s bravery and willingness to tell her story are unprecedented in the state of Texas. She is a hero to all who know the true story. It is a story of suggestive line-up procedures used by the detectives in the case. It is a story of bad police work. It is a story of a prosecutor who hid exculpatory evidence. It is a story of overzealous officials in Lubbock who were determined to pin the “Tech Rapes” on someone. It is a story of an innocent victim, Michele Mallin, who has been victimized over and over and over again. First, by Jerry Wayne Johnson. Next, by Lubbock officials whose pride will not allow them to admit fault and responsibility for this heartbreaking story. And last, by ignorant people who jump to conclusions and make cruel and completely unfounded statements before looking at the facts of the case. Everyone makes mistakes. Some intentional. Some unintentional. Mrs. Mallin made a completely unintentional mistake when she picked Timothy Cole’s picture out of a photo line-up. Mrs. Mallin should be praised for her bravery. Very few people would be willing to come forward in Mallin’s situation. But she did come forward and describe exactly what happened in order to have Mr. Cole’s name cleared, as well as to help the attorneys determine exactly what went wrong in Cole’s case so these problems can be fixed. Mrs. Mallin is not to blame for anything that went wrong in this case. She did her job by reporting a heinous crime and by cooperating with the police in finding the perpetrator. Unfortunately, the detectives and prosecution team did not do their job. This is a tragic story. But believing the words in this article is just as tragic. Please, get the facts straight, and delete this article.
Does it bother you at all that you’ve made a false accusation of murder? Or is it okay because you’re doing it in the name of “justice”?
OMG thank you for writing this. When I heard the story, I could not believe that no one was saying it like it should be. I must have read 10 sites whoo all think of that woman as a hero.
I am a woman and I have been attacked (and I fought back). I never found my attacker but I know that the police are just trying to get a CONVICTION, so they push you to just pick someone who they think is guilty so they can SOLVE the case.
Good for you for writing the truth. This woman should be INVESTIGATED because she committed a crime by pointing at an INNOCENT man. I feel sorry for that BOY, I do not feel sorry for someone who LIED because she was emotional and wanting to just put someone away.
Cyberwulf:
So what if I made a false accusation of murder? Don’t you see the irony that I did it by NOT going to the police, versus Mallin who DID go to the police, and ended up lying which was the reason that Cole went to jail, where he was unable to treat his asthma and died? If you enslave someone in your basement, and don’t treat their medical needs, and they die, you’re an accomplice to murder, or at least you conspired to murder someone. What is Mallin’s guilt? I don’t believe in the State — so I would not go to the police.
Beth:
Your belief that Mallin’s attack was the most bone-chilling situation for a human being ever is a clueless statement. Cole was in JAIL, a young, innocent man wrongly accused of rape. Do you know what happens to people in jail when they’re charged with rape? They’re attacked by other inmates. Our prison system is a joke — and it’s gross negligence on the inside. When an innocent person goes to jail, they’re punished in a way that few victims can relate to.
Mallin stopped being a victim the moment that she violated truth and justice by lying under oath. There is no excuse for someone with any uncertainty to push for an indictment or a criminal charge, let alone a conviction.
Let’s see the police or the courts release HER testimony from the original Cole trial. I’d love to see what venomous words she spewed at Cole — were they similar to her words against Johnson?
Remember, folks, that Cole’s lawyer KNEW that Johnson committed the rape. Mallin should have inquired with the police about those charges, and looked deeper at Johnson as well. She didn’t. She made a rash, criminal decision to lie.
Yes, the police and prosecutors are also guilty, as is the jury. Sadly, there is no penalty for listening to these thugs and doing the wrong thing, innocent people’s lives be damned.
Lisa_C:
Thanks for your declaration of agreement. I know of other women who have told me they also agree on my attitude that Mallin went from victim to victimizer.
How many people who commit the vile crime of sexual assault were assaulted themselves? It is NEVER right for a victim of any crime to become a victimizer, which is exactly what Mallin did.
Dada: aren’t you calling for Mallin to be arrested and incarcerated (skip the trial, everyone, some blogger said she’s a vengeful bitch and that’s good enough for the justice system) for conspiracy to commit murder? With no proof at all that she acted maliciously?
Where’s your clarion call for Johnson, the one person who knew WITHOUT A DOUBT that Cole was innocent, to be tried for murder? Where do you call him a liar? Or were you just too busy masturbating over the idea of slandering a rape victim (because women always lie, amirite?) to do any of that?
Shit happens :((
Mr. A.B. Dada you’ve got to have faith that Michele Mallin will probably never have a true good night sleep, that some where between the waking hours of daylight and the lucid dreams of the night, she will be reminded that she is and was invovled in the death of an innocent man.
No one escapes, there will be retribution one way or the other. Just think, Judge Charlie Baird and the Texas state prosecutors and their cronies, the members of the jury that convicted poor Mr.Cole, they may be clients of Madoff or investors of Enron. :)) Romans 12:19
Michelle Mallin was a rape victim and survivor. She is absolutely no hero. Absolutely no hero. Her faulty identification of Mr. Cole as the attack result in the conviction and incarceration of Mr.cole. At the time she claimed she was sure he was the attacker. Now she claims she was manipulated?! She also claimed her attacker chain-smoked through out the attack yet Mr.Cole was not a smoker. The prosector, police/detctives were very cavalier with the need for justice to be done (deutronomy 19:15-20). The exoneration of Mr. Cole hinges on the clearance by DNA, and the real perp’s confession -no on Michelle Mallin’s change of heart about the matter. It is bad that she was raped. Also many of those incarcerated endure rape and other horrors in prison. Imagine enduring that when you are innocent!
I think instead of hate, which is all some of this talk is, people should do what they can to prevent something like this from happening again. The girl did what she did, what she thought was right at the time, probably with some help from the law enforcement authorties investigating the crime of rape that did happen. I have worked in the prison system for over 18 years now, and I know that there are innocent people in jail, no matter the safeguards in place these things happen. As long it is human beings are running ANY justice system these things will happen. Honor Mr. Cole by ensuring these types of situations are rare and a day when they may become things that we only read about.
You have to be kidding me what an a–hole, just another cry for wolf. To put an innocent man in prison when the man who did it was at their finger tips. From the sound of things, I dont think it would have mattered who was in that line up. Mr. Cole’s # was up and I think she just did’nt want to look stupid. Well, I hope you look stupid behind bars Mrs. Mallin. And to the Cole family- may God be with you. Don’t stop until justice is done. An Innocent man was sent to prison. You need to get a lawyer and sue this system & the person who wrongly accused an innocent man to vindicate his memory. I WOULD!!!!!
I was at Tech when this happened. I feel sorry for Michelle Mallin in the fact that she was put through such a horrific act. On the other I hope she carries the guilt of letting an innocent man rot in jail an die there to her grave. I agree with you Dada, she should be investigated and if it is found that the Lubbock DA and the police department coerced her into identifying the wrong man, then she should all be sent to jail. Why did the Lubbock DA do nothing after Johnson confessed. F*** every one of them. Let them all go to jail and suffer through that. Instead she will probably wind up on Oprah and get a book deal.
Denny you couldn’t be more wrong, you say
“I hope you are never the victim of a violent sex crime, but if you are, I would like see how well you do in the process of identifying your attacker. Can you be 100% sure? I think not. I bet you wouldn’t be brave enough to press charges.”
The point is she wasn’t 100 percent sure but she chose to say it was him anyway, and brave enough to press charges, well look where her bravery got her, the conviction of an innocent man. If you don’t know than say you don’t know, don’t just say the guy on the left because you can’t remember, she is disgusting, I hope she has to go to jail someday. It’s always innocent little white girl, WELL SHE’S NOT THE INNOCENT ONE HE IS, SHE SHOULD BE IN JAIL FOR OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE. And you, what a fool and coward you are for taking her side, it is because of people like you that men get wrongly convicted, HE’S THE VICTIM NOT HER. SHE’S A LYING HAS BEEN VICTIM. HER TWO HOURS OF BEING VICTIMIZED VS. HIS 20 YEARS AND YOU GO TO HER SIDE, YOU PIECE OF S#$T.
Mistakes happen. Sounds like Ms. Mallin made a mistake. Unfortunately it can’t be righted. Life goes on.
When I first heard the story about Tim Cole, it may me want to write about it. So I contacted the Innocence Project of Texas, Tim Cole’s mother and family, researched the original transcripts and police investigative reports, conducted numerous interviews. Out of this came my forthcoming book titled A PLEA FOR JUSTICE: The Timothy Cole Story, published by Eakin Press, and set for release about May 01, 2010. For more information, go to http://www.timothybriancole.com
My thanks to this blog for keeping this issue in front of the American public.