About Zimmermann, Lavine, Zimmermann, & Sampson P.C.

8/15/87 Hous. Chron. 27
1987 WL 5624169

Houston Chronicle
Copyright 1987

Saturday, August 15, 1987

WRAP-UP

Two big wins for attorney Zimmermann

TOM MORAN
Staff

HOUSTON DEFENSE attorney Jack Zimmermann has been on a roll recently.

This week, he won a reversal for David Port, 20, who is serving a 75year prison term in the murder of postal worker Debora Sue Schatz, 23, in 1984.

The 3rd Court of Appeals in Austin ruled that state District Judge I.D. McMaster improperly allowed prosecutors to use Port's oral statements as evidence. Texas law generally allows the use of confessions only if they are in writing or tape recorded or if they lead police to new evidence.

It was Zimmermann's second big win in about two weeks.

Prosecutors in Oklahoma dismissed charges against one of his clients, a Tyler man who had been sentenced to death in three drug-related killings. The man, Clifford Bowen, spent six years in prison - including five on Oklahoma's death row.

Bowen's convictions were reversed because prosecutors withheld information from Bowen's attorneys at his initial trial.

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8/15/87 HSTNCHRON 27

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