DALLAS — Dallas County District Attorney John Creuzot issued a statement regarding the latest developments concerning missing digital evidence from the Dallas Police Department, saying it remains a top priority for his office.
Creuzot said his office was notified Dallas police had found a new issue regarding the evidence, that some videos from 2016 through 2021 were removed as part of the normal retention cycle in place at the time. He added that DPD is continuing to coordinate with his office to review these instances and their potential impact.
The DA's office has also requested DPD review all homicide cases filed with them due to ongoing concerns with cases investigated by Detective Christine Ramirez and a separate issue with untagged digital evidence.
Because of this request, Creuzot said his office was notified of at least one case where body-worn camera footage was deleted, and that of the DPD homicide cases already set for trial that have been reviewed, 13 of them have had evidence deleted.
These issues came to light following WFAA reporting the case against Nina Marano, accused of killing Maricella Botello-Valadez, a young woman who disappeared in October 2020 in Deep Ellum. The trial was delayed last month after prosecutors revealed Ramirez had failed to turn over hundreds of pieces of evidence.
Dallas police don't believe any of the videos are exculpatory in nature, meaning it wouldn't have affected the outcome of a case.
"As one could expect, in an office that receives more than 56,000 cases a year, this will put a tremendous strain on our resources and will distract us from the cases that we have from all other Dallas County law enforcement agencies, but, working with Dallas Police, we are going to do our best to get this resolved," Creuzot said in the statement
Creuzot added that, to his knowledge, his office hasn't been notified of any fully-adjudicated cases that have been found to be missing evidence, and that if that is the case, they should be notified immediately.