The North Carolina State bar has reprimanded two former assistant attorney generals for withholding evidence that could have prevented the wrongful conviction of Alan Gell, who was finally freed from death row in 2004 (pictured). The State Bar panel found that prosecutors David Hoke and Debra Graves failed to turn over evidence to Gell, did not adequately supervise the conduct of their chief investigator for the case, and brought the judicial system into disrepute by their conduct. Hoke and Graves received a written reprimand for their behavior, which the panel found to be unintentional. Gell, who spent nine years in jail and half of those on death row, won a new trial in 2002 on the basis of the withheld evidence. Among the evidence prosecutors failed to disclose were statements of people who saw the victim, Allen Ray Jenkins, alive after Gell had been jailed for vehicle theft and could not have committed the crime, as well as a taped conversation of the state’s star witness saying she had to “make up a story” for police. With the new evidence that had surfaced, Gell’s 2004 retrial ended in a quick acquittal. Hoke continues to serve as the No.2 state administrator in the state court system, and Graves now works as an assistant federal public defender. (News Observer, September 25, 2004). See Innocence.