WORDS TO HEED: FROM OUR POST ON KEVIN COOPER'S APPLICATION FOR POST-CONVICTION DNA TESTING; CALIFORNIA: (Applicable wherever a state resists DNA testing): "Blogger/extraordinaire Jeff Gamso's blunt, unequivocal, unforgettable message to the powers that be in California: "JUST TEST THE FUCKING DNA." (Oh yes, Gamso raises, as he does in many of his posts, an important philosophical question: This post is headed: "What is truth, said jesting Pilate."...Says Gamso: "So what's the harm? What, exactly, are they scared of? Don't we want the truth?"
https://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2018/06/kevin-cooper-2-california-application.html
----------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------
PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Courts previously denied a previous request for DNA testing in the case. But Payne's lawyers hope subsequent rulings, and the discovery of a new bag of evidence, will revive his efforts to test a wide array of evidence from the crime scene. They point to a 2006 ruling from the Tennessee Supreme Court that expanded access to post-conviction DNA testing. They also say a Florida stabbing with similar facts shows how easily DNA could turn this case on its head. Florida man Clemente Aguirre was was convicted in the stabbing deaths of his neighbors after he discovered the crime scene. Like Payne, Aguirre ran from the scene after touching the weapon and trying to help the victim. Police cited the blood on his clothes and his DNA at the scene as evidence of guilt. A jury agreed, and he was sentenced to death. Twelve years later, in 2018, drops of blood from the scene were tested at the scene. The blood didn't belong to Aguirre or the victims, and ended up pointing investigators to a new suspect. Aguirre was taken off of death row. The same, they argue, could happen for Payne."
-------------------------------------------------------
GIST: "New DNA evidence uncovered more than 30 years after a double murder could exonerate a Tennessee death row inmate months before his execution date, according to a court filing from the Innocence Project.
The national legal group that fights wrongful convictions has partnered with Nashville-based public defenders and other lawyers in an effort to revive the case less than six months before the suspect, Pervis Tyrone Payne, is set to be executed.
In the Wednesday filing, the team of lawyers asked the Shelby County criminal court to order DNA testing on bloody bedsheets that sat hidden from view in an evidence bag since 1987.
Payne, 53, is scheduled to be put to death on Dec. 3. His lawyers hope expedited testing will upend those plans.
"The forensic testing that Mr. Payne seeks can be performed in less than 60 days and is capable of demonstrating what he has consistently maintained for three decades," the filing states. "He is innocent."
Because the case is being revived at the trial court level in Shelby County, local prosecutors will represent the state at this point in the debate over DNA testing.
“We received the defendant’s petition yesterday," Shelby County District Attorney Amy Weirich said Wednesday in a statement. "We are reviewing his allegations and preparing a response.”
Payne was convicted in the 1987 stabbing deaths of Charisse Christopher, 28, and her 2-year-old daughter Lacie. Christopher's 3-year-old son Nicholas survived multiple stab wounds.
The family was found on the kitchen floor soon after the attack. The walls and doors of the room were drenched with blood.
Payne said he came to their apartment building that June afternoon to visit his girlfriend, who lived down the hall. During his 1988 trial, he said he discovered the gruesome crime scene after hearing calls for help through the open door of the apartment.
“I saw the worst thing I ever saw in my life," he said from the stand.
He said he bent down to try to help, getting blood on his clothes and pulling at the knife still lodged in Christopher's throat. When a white police officer arrived, Payne, who is Black, said he panicked and ran, fearing he would be seen as the prime suspect.
"His fears quickly came to fruition," the filing stated. "A police officer spotted Payne as he ran from the building, and he was the sole focus of the investigation from that point on."
Payne's defense team said police remained laser focused on him throughout the investigation, ignoring other suspects with stronger motives.
The lawyers say prosecutors' theory of the case was "not supported by any hard evidence" and relied on the untested supposition that Payne was high on drugs at the time of the killings, despite the fact that he was never tested for drugs at the time.
"Mr. Payne was convicted based on a speculative theory comprised solely of circumstantial evidence," the filing states.
DNA testing was never done to match blood from the kitchen to a potential killer. And police reports from the time said the kitchen was the only crime scene.
Then, on Dec. 20, 2019, when federal public defender Kelley Henry went to Shelby County to review the case materials, she made a remarkable discovery: new evidence "that had been in the State’s possession the whole time."
In the previously unknown evidence bag labelled "Bedroom," Henry found bedsheets, a comforter and a pillow, all soaked in blood. None of that evidence was mentioned in police reports or at trial.
Henry said she was "floored" by the unexpected trove of new evidence. Payne's previous attorneys confirmed they had never seen it.
“It was not like anything I have ever experienced in my entire career," Henry said.
Courts previously denied a previous request for DNA testing in the case.
But Payne's lawyers hope subsequent rulings, and the discovery of a new bag of evidence, will revive his efforts to test a wide array of evidence from the crime scene. They point to a 2006 ruling from the Tennessee Supreme Court that expanded access to post-conviction DNA testing.
They also say a Florida stabbing with similar facts shows how easily DNA could turn this case on its head.
Florida man Clemente Aguirre was was convicted in the stabbing deaths of his neighbors after he discovered the crime scene. Like Payne, Aguirre ran from the scene after touching the weapon and trying to help the victim.
Police cited the blood on his clothes and his DNA at the scene as evidence of guilt. A jury agreed, and he was sentenced to death.
Twelve years later, in 2018, drops of blood from the scene were tested at the scene. The blood didn't belong to Aguirre or the victims, and ended up pointing investigators to a new suspect.
Aguirre was taken off of death row.
The same, they argue, could happen for Payne.
“Police zeroed in on Mr. Payne immediately and never investigated any other suspects," Vanessa Potkin with the Innocence Project said in a statement. "The presence of DNA belonging to someone other than Mr. Payne would support the consistent story that he has told for more than 30 years: he was an innocent bystander who came upon the crime scene.""
The entire story can be read at:
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/charlessmith. Information on "The Charles Smith Blog Award"- and its nomination process - can be found at: http://smithforensic.blogspot.com/2011/05/charles-smith-blog-award-nominations.html Please send any comments or information on other cases and issues of interest to the readers of this blog to: hlevy15@gmail.com. Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog;
-----------------------------------------------------------------
FINAL WORD: (Applicable to all of our wrongful conviction cases): "Whenever there is a wrongful conviction, it exposes errors in our criminal legal system, and we hope that this case — and lessons from it — can prevent future injustices."
Lawyer Radha Natarajan:
Executive Director: New England Innocence Project;
------------------------------------------------------------------
