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This story originally appeared June 1, 2005
| Friday, Feb 16 2007 9:37 AM
Last Updated: Friday, Feb 16 2007 9:37 AM
Thirty-nine-year-old Kevin Little is the lead attorney defending a former Bakersfield vice principal accused of killing five family members. If convicted of the slayings, Vincent Brothers, a well-known figure in the city's school district, could face the death penalty.
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Kevin Little who previously represented Vincent Brothers. The prominent attorney's office reflects the career the Harvard Law graduate has made taking civil rights, criminal and civil court cases.
During a preliminary hearing Vincent Brothers attorney, Kevin Little shows cans of malt liquor like the four or five cans that a witness on the stand says he drank the night he says he saw Vincent Brothers at the Harper residence. The cans shown are 24 oz cans. The witness says he drank 16 oz cans. Vincent Brothers is accused of killing five of his family members including his wife and three of his children.
The Fresno attorney, whose career has been largely devoted to defending clients whose civil rights appear to be on the line, has never before been lead counsel on a death penalty case.
"You have to be prepared for (things to go wrong) when you are fighting, not just on behalf of a client but against a system. Every time I go into court I expect something to go wrong."
Little said that's what he's found in the Brothers case.
Little believes prosecutors threatened a crucial witness into testifying against Brothers before a federal grand jury.
He also called the grand jury investigation a sham -- he believes the prosecution never meant to seek an indictment against Brothers, rather they used the grand jury as a tool to get the testimony of difficult witnesses, namely Brothers' family.
Brothers was visiting family in Ohio around the time of the slayings. Prosecutors contend he drove back to Bakersfield and killed his wife, Joanie Harper, their three children, Marques, Lyndsey and Marshall, and his mother-in-law, Earnestine Harper.
The idea that the vice principal of Fremont School was suspected in the gruesome slayings shocked Kern County.
Brothers, often viewed as a role model for success, had pulled himself out of the grip of poverty in New York, earned a college degree and made a success of his life.
A profile that's a lot like Little's own.
The Fresno attorney grew up in a working-class family with three older siblings. His parents grew up in North Carolina, where they went to segregated schools and picked cotton for a dime a bushel to help support the family.
They moved to New York to make a better life. Little's father worked as a doorman, his mother as a nurse.
Little went to a vocational high school in Harlem that taught people to run printing presses.
But he graduated and went on to Harvard.
He had a difficult time fitting in at first. He tried computer engineering, but realized he needed too much catchup work in science and math, Little said.
The gaps weren't just educational.
"I remember specifically talking with some friends on the track team. One was from California and the other from Oregon, and I asked them if they had ever been to New York. They looked at me like that was the dumbest question. Of course they had been, hundreds of times."
Eventually Little started to fit in. He graduated from Harvard in 1987. He then went on to Harvard Law School, graduating in 1990.
Little married his wife after law school and followed her to her native Puerto Rico, where she had a job clerking for a federal judge.
He practiced law there and when she got a job in Fresno as a prosecutor he moved there "sight unseen."
He has grown to love the area and has built a thriving practice -- a combination of criminal, civil, and appeals cases based around civil rights work.
He has a mild temperament, not the sort of personality you'd think would earn the title "Gator" -- an attorney with bite -- from California Lawyer magazine.
"He is not one of those high-powered city slicker lawyers," said attorney Pamala Sayasane. She worked with him on a death penalty case in 1998.
"He is the calm in a storm," she said.
Others cite his hard work.
"He's the type of person that doesn't like to have any loose ends," longtime friend and fellow attorney Kevin Green said. "He will (go) out of his way to talk to another witness."
Green is a lawyer in New York. He saw this same kind of determination from Little when they were in high school in Harlem. They would play basketball together, but he would see Little playing by himself to improve his game.
"He always wants to push himself to be the best he can be," Green said.
Little won a long fight to get a second attorney appointed to assist in Brothers' defense -- J. Anthony Bryan. Bryan has had numerous death penalty cases throughout his career.
That experience may be a good complement for Little who has worked as secondary counsel on only a few death penalty cases.
The Brothers' case is Little's first time leading the team.
The duo is head to head against Lisa Green, who has two decades' worth of criminal work behind her and who has prosecuted numerous murders, including death penalty cases.
Little is currently pursuing a case against a Fresno city police officer for allegedly harassing his neighbor.
Little won more than $1 million in a civil suit against the Fresno CountySheriff's Departmentthat alleged deputies falsely arrested and maliciously prosecuted his client and conspired to tamper with a witness.
That award was later reduced by about half.
His efforts were awarded $100,000 in a 1998 civil suit against the city of Bakersfield for excessive police force.
Little said he has few interests outside the law.
He has one son, nearly 4-year-old Enrique, whom Little is teaching to speak Spanish -- he and his wife are fluent. He shrugs off the idea that some day his son may follow in his footsteps to become a lawyer.
He has a quote posted in his office that attorneys are either social engineers or parasites.
"I fight corruption. I prevent people from being murdered by the state. I participate in dismantling this machinery of death, and I am not a parasite."