"Lawyers
for an Ivy man who claims he is innocent of a 1969 murder contend the
Virginia attorney general office's opposition is based on argument, not
evidence or expert opinion. Sherman
Brown, 69, is serving life for the Oct. 1, 1969, murder of an Albemarle
County boy. Brown was identified by the child’s mother, who was
stabbed, beaten and apparently raped in the same attack that took her
son’s life. Brown’s lawyers,
including The Innocence Project, filed a petition for a writ of actual
innocence with the Virginia Supreme Court last year citing DNA testing
they said is powerful evidence he did not commit the crime and that the
mother was mistaken. Last
month the Virginia attorney general's office asked the justices to
dismiss the petition, arguing that Brown made self-incriminating
statements, that there were problems with recent DNA testing and that
the material tested may not even be associated with the case. “Brown is not actually innocent of (the boy’s) murder,” contends the state. Brown's
lawyers countered in court papers last week that, "The DNA evidence
proves Mr. Brown's innocence." They said the incriminating statements
cited by the attorney general were made during a parole interview and
"reflect a desire to be paroled rather than a true confession of guilt." "In subsequent parole interviews after parole was denied, Mr. Brown steadfastly denied committing the crime," Brown argues. The
partial male DNA profile identified in what is believed to be a vaginal
swab taken from the mother of the slain boy does not match Brown or the
woman’s husband. The commonwealth's theory of the case was that the boy
was slain to eliminate a witness to the rape of his mother. A
vaginal swab was taken from the mother at the University of Virginia
Hospital emergency room where she was treated after the attack. It was
used to create a microscope slide that was given to the hospital’s
pathology department on Oct. 2, 1969. The slide was discovered in a
Charlottesville-area warehouse in 2015.........In their reply brief
filed Thursday, Brown's lawyers say they have shown a sufficient chain
of custody for the slide which has been kept in a metal file cabinet,
stored for a number of years at the hospital and transferred to a
locked, state-run warehouse. When
the slide was located by an administrative assistant with the
hospital's pathology lab, it was immediately placed in a plastic
container that was closed and later delivered to police. His
lawyers say that although the mother identified Brown, who she said she
had met before, there were problems with her identification that
explain how she could have been mistaken. "No rational jury would credit
her identification over the DNA evidence," wrote his lawyers. They
also said the evidence is old and degraded and it is not surprising the
mother's DNA was not identified on the slide. The DNA profile found on
the slide that is "inconsistent" with the mother does not mean the slide
was not made from her vaginal swab but rather the profile came from the
perpetrator."
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/
