"THE ONLY FORENSIC LINK CAME FROM HAIRS FOUND ON A BLANKET DISCOVERED AT ROSS' HOME, WHICH WERE SAID TO MATCH HAIRS TAKEN FROM THE VICTIM. GOVERNMENT ANALYST CHARLES PRICE, A CHEMIST BY OCCUPATION AND NOT A FORENSIC EXPERT, GAVE EVIDENCE THAT THE HAIRS "WERE DERIVED FROM THE SCALP OF ONE AND THE SAME PERSON". BUT AFTER THE HAIR SAMPLES WERE REDISCOVERED IN LONG-FORGOTTEN ARCHIVES BY METHODICAL RESEARCHER-TURNED-AUTHOR KEVIN MORGAN IN 1995, HE PUSHED FOR THEM TO BE RETESTED. MR MORGAN HAS SINCE WRITTEN A BOOK BASED ON THE CASE CALLED GUN ALLEY: MURDER, LIES AND FAILURE OF JUSTICE. THREE YEARS LATER, A MICROSCOPIC EXAMINATION BY DR BENTLEY ATCHISON, OF THE VICTORIAN INSTITUTE OF FORENSIC MEDICINE, SHOWED THE HAIRS WERE NOT FROM THE SAME SCALP. A SECOND TEST BY AUSTRALIAN FEDERAL POLICE FORENSIC EXPERT DR JAMES ROBERTSON, A WORLD AUTHORITY ON HAIR IDENTIFICATION, CONFIRMED THAT PRICE'S CONCLUSION WAS WRONG."
"THE AGE;" Wikipedia informs us that: "The Age is a liberal broadsheet daily newspaper, which has been published in Melbourne, Australia since 1854."
PHOTO LEFT: COLIN ROSS; PHOTO RIGHT: CAMERON TODD WILLINGHAM;
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PUBLISHER'S NOTE: While visiting the Old Melbourne Jail, in Melbourne Australia, earlier this year I was astounded to learn about some of the compelling similarities between the wrongful convictions of Colin Ross, an Aussie executed 24 April, 1922, and Cameron Todd Willingham, a Texan executed on February 17, 2004 - though separated by more than eighty years half a century in time and located at opposite ends of the Globe. Both men were were sent to their deaths on the basis of junk science; both men's convictions were assured by self-serving cellmate or unsavoury convict evidence, and both men vehemently cried out their innocence to their last breath. The one glaring difference is that the Victorian Government granted a posthumous pardon to Colin Ross on 27 May 2008, in what is believed to be an Australian legal first. The government of Texas appears to be doing everything can to deny Cameron Todd's innocence, avoid accountability for his wrongful conviction and impede his exoneration.
BACKGROUND: COLIN ROSS: "Hawthorn schoolgirl Alma Tirtschke was raped and strangled while in the city running errands for her mother. Her naked body was found by a bottle gatherer in Gun Alley, off Little Collins Street, on December 31, 1921. Ross, who ran a nearby wine bar, was arrested at his Maidstone home on January 12. After a short trial and two failed appeals, he was executed 115 days after the murder. Prosecutors claimed that Ross, 28, lured Alma into his wine saloon in the Eastern Arcade in Bourke Street, took her into a small room off the main bar, then plied her with alcohol before he raped and strangled her. The court was told Ross then put her body in a nearby laneway, where it was found the next morning. However, Ross was able to produce alibi witnesses who said they saw him at work and on the tram heading home at the time of the murder. The key evidence against him was given by two contradictory and unreliable "witnesses" — prostitute Ivy Matthews and career thief Sydney John Harding, who claimed Ross independently "confessed" to the murder. But the petition of mercy says the prosecution failed to tell the court that Harding was a known and repeated perjurer. The Crown was aware that his military record included convictions for making a false statement to a superior officer and giving false sworn answers on his attestation papers. The only forensic link came from hairs found on a blanket discovered at Ross' home, which were said to match hairs taken from the victim. Government analyst Charles Price, a chemist by occupation and not a forensic expert, gave evidence that the hairs "were derived from the scalp of one and the same person". But after the hair samples were rediscovered in long-forgotten archives by methodical researcher-turned-author Kevin Morgan in 1995, he pushed for them to be retested. Mr Morgan has since written a book based on the case called Gun Alley: Murder, Lies and Failure of Justice. Three years later, a microscopic examination by Dr Bentley Atchison, of the Victorian Institute of Forensic Medicine, showed the hairs were not from the same scalp. A second test by Australian Federal Police forensic expert Dr James Robertson, a world authority on hair identification, confirmed that Price's conclusion was wrong. (The information for this background comes from the Australian newspaper "The Age"); Although some legal experts viewed the pardon as tantamount to exoneration the fact remains that Ross was never formally acquitted. The Australian Broadcasting Network quoted a member of the victim's family who contended that a pardon was not good enough because "A pardon means, 'I am forgiving you for something you have done'. Shouldn't it rather be an exoneration, which means, 'I accept you didn't do this in the first place'?" But Victorian Premier John Brumby told ABC that the pardon does come close to exonerating Colin Ross because "Science in particular has proven beyond reasonable doubt that he could not have committed that crime." ABC went on to say that "The Premier says the case shows how far forensic technology has come - and it reinforces the decision to formally abolish the death penalty in Victoria in 1975."
TOMORROW: THE AUSTRALIAN CONNECTION: PART TWO: COLIN ROSS CASE: JUDGE REFUSED FURTHER EXAMINATION OF NEW KIND OF FORENSIC EVIDENCE BY MORE QUALIFIED EXPERT
Harold Levy...hlevy15@gmail.com;
