Error allows Mobile murder defendant to bail out before seeing judge on new arrest

By Brendan Kirby

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    MOBILE, Alabama (WALA) — A man out on bond on a murder charge was able to get out on bail after a new arrest this month despite rules that should have held him until he appeared before a judge.

The day after Michael Lee Lambert’s arrest this month, the Mobile County District Attorney’s Office asked a judge to revoke his bond in the murder case. By then, though, Lambert already was out of jail and he failed to appear for a bond revocation hearing on Tuesday.

“At this point, we don’t know where he is,” Mobile County District Attorney Keith Blackwood said.

Police initially arrested Lambert, 20, in July 2021, charging him with the shooting death of Jamartez Tucker in May of that year. Lambert had been free on a $100,000 bond.

On Feb. 1, according to court records, Mobile police officers spotted a car Lambert was in at a church parking lot. At first officers thought the car was going to sop but then the driver took off and led officers on a chase that ended in Prichard, according to court records.

Police charged the Mobile man with a pair of misdemeanors, fleeing and eluding, and second-degree possession of marijuana. The jail booked him at 10:07 p.m., and he posted a $1,000 bond less than two hours later. That should not have happened, Blackwood told FOX10 News.

“There is a flag process in place at the jail and, you know, we don’t have control over that,” he said. “This happened in the middle of the night.”

That process is known as the “Graddick Rule,” named for former Mobile County Presiding Circuit Charles Graddick, who implemented it. Jailers are supposed to be alerted if someone already out on bond is booked on a new charge so they can keep the defendant locked up until a judge reviews the case.

According to the Mobile County Sheriff’s, it is up to the arresting officer to notify the jail. That did not happen in this case, according to a copy of the intake form provided the Mobile County Sheriff’s Office.

Cpl. Katrina Frazier told FOX10 News that a check, run by the arresting officer, failed to turn up Lambert’s bond status.

“We are reviewing our protocols to ensure that we perform our due diligence in verifying such information in the future,” she wrote in an email.

Lambert’s attorney, Jeff Deen, said he had no indication that his client would not be at Tuesday’s hearing.

“I don’t know why he didn’t show up,” he said. “He may have had car problems.”

Deen said it is “fundamental” in the American system of justice that everyone is presumed innocent and entitled to a bond. He said the judge can evaluate the prosecution’s latest request based on the new arrest but must give the defendant a chance to respond. He said the country fought the Revolutionary War for the rights now enshrined in the Bill of Rights that protects citizens accused of crimes.

“He got arrested for a couple of misdemeanors, that he may or may not have done. … The judge can look at it and make a reasoned decision on whether he should be locked up,” he said. “But we need to have something other than just a howling mob saying, ‘Lock him up. Lock him up. Throw away the key.’ That’s not how it works.”

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