A former St Louis prosecutor has admitted she knowingly changed the course of an investigation by helping whitewash the crimes of a police detective.

Twenty-eight-year-old Bliss Barber Worrell has pleaded guilty to a “misprision of a felony”; the term refers to assisting someone in covering up an offence.

The police detective she was representing had beaten up a man who was in handcuffs – not only this, the officer shoved a pistol down his victim’s throat.




She filed a phony charge against the arrestee; Worrell had a close friendship with the officer involved.

Ultimately, it is US District Judge Henry Autrey who will decide the outcome of the charge, which carries a possible sentence of up to 3 years in prison.

However, prosecutors and attornies have agreed to suggest 18 months on probation for her.

Justice Department’s Civil Rights prosecutor Fara Gold testified in court, stating that Worrell has agreed to assist with the inquiry and provide an honest account against anyone else who was involved.

Judge Autrey says he is disappointed in the young lawyer, who according to him made a rather abhorrent decision. He added that she had tainted a very respectable profession and office.

He was not the only one let down by Worrell’s disturbing choice to favor a friend over the truth. Her former manager Circuit Attorney Jennifer Joyce said she had not experienced anything worse in her 20 year career.

Joyce also added that some of the disgraced attorney’s colleagues had been aware of what she had done – they too have left the office.



 “They were all gone as soon as we figured out what they did or failed to do.”

Worrell admits that she heard from the police officer on the night of the incident, he later mentioned to her that he had thrown his victim against a wall, physically assaulted him, threw a chair at him as well as thrusting a handgun down his throat.

The victim has originally been taken into custody by a different cop.

She also confesses that she helped the arresting officer, a novice, file an incorrect report stating that the man had resisted arrest.

In the report the injuries described are quite different to what the police detective as well as the arresting officer told her.




The police detective met her for a run on the evening of the day she had filed the false charges. He told her that the junior officer was quite upset because it was the first time he had to lie for a colleague.

If Worrell is convicted of felony she may have her law license revoked.