Sunday, January 31, 2021

Sue Neill-Fraser: Australia: (series part 4): Second section of an enlightening two section series by author/blogger Andrew L. Urban, author of an authoritative book on the Neill-Fraser case (and several others) called 'Murder by the prosecution.'..."The police investigation that led to Neill-Fraser’s arrest was irredeemably flawed, as we reported in Part 1 and it led to a train wreck of a trial that mocks the integrity of the criminal justice system. There is a remedy even now, says a legal academic: “the prosecution should concede that appealable error has occurred and make a joint request with defence counsel that the conviction be set aside … as has been done (before and) in many cases in the UK”.

PUBLISHER'S NOTE: 

BACKGROUND: ”Sue Neill-Fraser was convicted of murdering her partner Bob Chappell on Australia Day 2009, on board their yacht, Four Winds. She has maintained her innocence. She has been granted leave to appeal (in March 2019) after a three year process in which then homeless 15 year old Meaghan Vass admitted she was a witness to the murder and Neill-Fraser was not involved. Vass’ DNA was found on the deck." As per Yahoo News: 2020: "Ten years after being found guilty of murdering her partner Bob Chappell, Hobart grandmother Susan Neill-Fraser's second appeal against her conviction will be heard. Neill-Fraser is serving 23 years' jail for killing Mr Chappell on Australia Day 2009 on the couple's yacht in Hobart. Her legal team argues there is "fresh and compelling" evidence that places then-homeless teenager Meaghan Vass on board the boat the night in question."

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POST: "Sue Neill-Fraser - a wrongful arrest and 11 years later," Part Two, by Author/Blogger Andrew L. Urban on his Blog 'The Wrongful Conviction Report," published on August 22, 2020.

GIST: "The police investigation that led to Neill-Fraser’s arrest was irredeemably flawed, as we reported in Part 1 and it led to a train wreck of a trial that mocks the integrity of the criminal justice system. There is a remedy even now, says a legal academic: “the prosecution should concede that appealable error has occurred and make a joint request with defence counsel that the conviction be set aside … as has been done (before and) in many cases in the UK”. 

That wrongful arrest led to then DPP Tim Ellis SC accepting the police ‘brief of evidence’ and proceeding to trial. The original sin of the arrest without probable cause turned rancid in a trial that broke almost every relevant rule of criminal justice in court. (See ‘inadmissible evidence’ below) We have reported extensively on many of them, not least the prosecution’s speculation about Neill-Fraser’s imagined method of murdering and disposing of Chappell without any evidence to support that scenario – unchallenged by trial judge, now Chief Justice Blow.

misleading evidence:

Extract from the Closing address: 

 MR ELLIS SC:You lowered his body into the dinghy and you took it somewhere into the deeper channels of the Derwent ….


 MR ELLIS SC:… you completed the work and disposed of Mr Chappell’s body by using winches to haul him out and the fire extinguisher and other things. You wrapped him up in some form of doona or cloth or a sail cloth or something with the carpet pieces which were bloody and which you’d removed …..

In his own closing address, defending barrister Gunson SC said to the jury: “Now Mr Ellis at some stage, I think it was in his Opening, said to you that there was Mr Chappell’s blood found in the dinghy.”

A little later came this exchange, jury absent:

CT 1486 HIS HONOUR, COUNSEL, JURY ABSENT– SUBMISSIONS, PRIOR TO SUMMING UP:


MR ELLIS SC: The next point is, it was attributed to me that I said it was Mr Chappell’s blood in the dinghy. Now I don’t believe I did.
MR GUNSON SC: Yes, you did.
MR ELLIS SC: Okay – I don’t know why I’d say it
HIS HONOUR: – Well –
-
MR ELLIS SC: – because I’ve never believed it.
HIS HONOUR: In opening.
MR GUNSON SC: Yeah.
MR ELLIS SC: Oh in opening –
MR GUNSON SC: Yes, in opening.
MR ELLIS SC: Oh okay, I abandon that, if I said it in opening.
HIS HONOUR: All right. Well I’ll do nothing about that point. What’s the next point?

Had Blow J erred? Should he not have recognised that the prosecutor had misled the jury – as well as His Honour. And should he not have done something about ‘that point’?

‘inadmissible’ evidence:

But that wasn’t all, as legal academic Dr Bob Moles of Flinders University has explained: After Sue Neill-Fraser was convicted and had been unsuccessful in her appeal I was asked to have a look at her case. 

Upon reviewing the transcript of her trial it was manifestly obvious that there had been a number of very significant errors in the conduct of her trial. 

For example, a forensic scientist gave evidence to the effect that she had found traces of blood in and about the boat. The test she had used to determine the presence of blood was a “Luminol” test. 

The scientist acknowledged that this was only a preliminary screening test, and she should also have known that it could not have been probative of the existence of blood without a follow-up confirmatory test. She said that confirmatory tests were not done. This means that her assertions about the presence of blood should not have been admitted into evidence. The fact that they were admitted constituted an appealable error, and would, in and of itself provide sufficient grounds upon which the appeal should be allowed. 

‘entirely irrational’:

In addition, the prosecutor stated that the jury could infer from the injuries that Mr Chappell would have had that he must have been attacked by someone known to him and not by a stranger. Apart from being entirely irrational, there was no evidential basis to establish that Mr Chappell had any injuries and if so what their nature was. A prosecutor is not allowed to put submissions to the jury unless the facts upon which they are based has been established by properly admitted evidence. 

The prosecutor also stated that the jury could infer that Mr Chappell had been attacked by someone known to him and not by a stranger because a stranger would not have bothered disposing of his body – he said that would make no sense at all. The only thing here which did not make sense was that submission by the prosecutor. There is no rational basis upon which it could be said that strangers do not bother to dispose of bodies in murder cases. Of course there was at the time the submission was made no evidential basis to establish that there was in fact a body which had been disposed of. 

It is clear to me that such submissions by the prosecutor were in error and would of themselves have provided a sufficient basis upon which an appeal would and should have been allowed. 

The wrongly admitted evidence by the forensic scientist, along with the erroneous submissions by the prosecutor provide a compelling case for the overturning of this conviction. 

a remedy:

The above opinions have been set out in further detail in our research report which is available at http://netk.net.au/Tasmania/Neill-Fraser95.pdf 

It is my view that the prosecution should concede that appealable error has occurred and make a joint request with defence counsel that the conviction be set aside. If that were to be done, as has been done in many cases in the UK, the conviction could be overturned within a week or two. 

As attractive as this remedy is, it is unlikely that the DPP would countenance that course of action, given the history of official resistance to any review.

So the appeal court may not hear (or want to hear) the above failures at trial that cast doubt not only on the conviction but on the court itself – their fellows in the legal fraternity. But they should not be allowed to forget what prominent Melbourne barrister Robert Richter QC says about Meaghan Vass’ DNA: it “anchors her to the crime scene”.

There are a number of other active lawyers, barristers, judges past and present who join her family and friends in expressing their deep concerns over Sue Neill-Fraser’s conviction. By contrast, we have not heard from any member of the legal establishment (other than the Tasmanian DPP’s office) speaking out in support of the guilty verdict.

VIRUS FOOTNOTE:
First it was March 24, then it might have been August 17, then November 2, but Sue Neill-Fraser’s last chance to appeal her controversial murder conviction has once again been deferred to a date beyond December 1, after Tasmania last week extended its border closure, due to Victoria’s latest outbreak. Her pro bono legal team reside interstate: instructing lawyer Paul Galbally in Melbourne, barrister Tom Percy QC in Perth. At a directions hearing in July both her team and the DPP agreed that the appeal hearing needs to be held in person, not on video links.

This is an especially disturbing example of the destructive ripple effect of state border closures spreading through every aspect of the community.

The new date for Neill-Fraser’s appeal may be set at the next directions hearing, scheduled for September 28, 2020. (The appeal is now set for March 1, 2021).

The entire post can be read at:

https://wrongfulconvictionsreport.org/2020/08/22/sue-neill-fraser-a-wrongful-arrest-and-11-years-later-part-2-a-remedy/

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;
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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;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD (FOR NOW!): "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions.   They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they’ve exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;

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Sue Neill-Fraser; Australia: (series part 3): First section of an enlightening two section series by author/blogger Andrew L. Urban, author of an authoritative book on the Neill-Fraser case (and several others) called 'Murder by the prosecution.'...August 2009 was unusually wet, windy and warm for Tasmania – and wrongful conviction was in the air. Sue Neill-Fraser’s arrest on Thursday, August 20, 2009 – exactly 11 years ago today – for the murder of her partner Bob Chappell earlier that year, set off a chain reaction towards a miscarriage of justice that is often compared to the infamous, egregious wrongful conviction of Lindy Chamberlain in October 1982 (quashed in 1988) of murdering her baby, Azaria, in August 1980."


PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I have been doing as much as I can to draw attention to Sue-Neill Fraser's rapidly approaching appeal (March 1), because her case has the stench of an ugly miscarriage of justice - meaning that an innocent woman has been  wrongfully in prison for more than twelve  years -  and because of the fascinating forensic (read DNA) issues involved in the case.  I am grateful to Andrew L. Urban  for the light he has shed on the Neill-Fraser case through his book 'Murder by the Prosecution',  Wilkinson Publishing,  and his Blog 'the Wrongful Conviction Report'  (the source of this two part series on the Neill-Fraser case. Filmmaker Eve Ash notes in her commentary  for a petition she has launched (link below), calls the Neill-Fraser case "the biggest wrong in Australian history." When one thinks of  the enormous wrongs that have occurred in Australia's criminal justice system over the years,  many of which I have reported on this Blog (all of which are equally horrific 'wrongs') such as the Lindy Chamberlain-Creighton, Henry Keogh,  Andrew Mallard, Edward Splatt  Darryl Beamish, John Button, Graham Stafford, David Eastman, Derek Bromley and all too many more horrific miscarriages of justice,  this is all the more reason to sign the petition and let Tasmanian Premier  Peter Gutwein and his government know that people all over the world  are watching.

Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog.

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SIGN PETITION HERE:


https://www.change.org/su/p/find-the-truth-investigate-bob-chappell-s-death-call-for-commission-of-inquiry-or-royal-commission/f


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BACKGROUND:”Sue Neill-Fraser was convicted of murdering her partner Bob Chappell on Australia Day 2009, on board their yacht, Four Winds. She has maintained her innocence. She has been granted leave to appeal (in March 2019) after a three year process in which then homeless 15 year old Meaghan Vass admitted she was a witness to the murder and Neill-Fraser was not involved. Vass’ DNA was found on the deck." As per Yahoo News: 2020: "Ten years after being found guilty of murdering her partner Bob Chappell, Hobart grandmother Susan Neill-Fraser's second appeal against her conviction will be heard. Neill-Fraser is serving 23 years' jail for killing Mr Chappell on Australia Day 2009 on the couple's yacht in Hobart. Her legal team argues there is "fresh and compelling" evidence that places then-homeless teenager Meaghan Vass on board the boat the night in question."

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POST: "Sue-Neill Fraser - a wrongful arrest and 11 years later: Part One," by author/Blogger Andrew L. Urban, on author of a highly acclaimed book on the Neill-Fraser case, published on his Blog 'The Wrongful Conviction Report", on August 20, 2020.

GIST: "August 2009 was unusually wet, windy and warm for Tasmania – and wrongful conviction was in the air.  Sue Neill-Fraser’s arrest on Thursday, August 20, 2009 – exactly 11 years ago today – for the murder of her partner Bob Chappell earlier that year, set off a chain reaction towards a miscarriage of justice that is often compared to the infamous, egregious wrongful conviction of Lindy Chamberlain in October 1982 (quashed in 1988) of murdering her baby, Azaria, in August 1980.  

“On this eleventh anniversary, I am once again struck by the injustices that not only befell my mother but also of the memory of Bob,” Sarah Bowles tells wrongfulconvictionsreport
“As her daughter, I am focused on the appalling miscarriage of justice that mum has been a victim of, but I can’t forget that this nightmare started with the murder of Bob. I continue to miss him dearly and each year that passes is another year that Bob’s killer enjoys the freedom that was stolen from Bob. The fixation of the Tasmanian Police on my mother has meant that her freedom too, has been unjustly stolen.

“However, my mother was born with a stoicism which she has instilled in me, and as such, I am determined to focus on the good in humanity. The support we have received from the community over the years has been incredible, and the endless commitment from our legal team is inspiring. We will continue to fight this, for my mother, for Bob and for all the other victims of miscarriages of justice, whose voices have not been heard.”

On that August day, some seven months after Bob Chappell’s disappearance, detectives Rowe and Sinnitt had gone to Bob and Sue’s West Hobart home. Sue was not at home. As Garry Stannus notes, “Detective Shane Sinnitt had a long association with the case. The two of them waited until Sue arrived shortly after. So too did Detective Inspector Peter Powell, along with other detectives. Peter Powell advised Sue that she was under arrest for the murder of Robert Chappell. He cautioned her. Sue then accompanied detectives Sinnitt, Rowe and Puurand to Sinnitt’s police vehicle. She was taken to the Hobart police station.” (Stannus is an active member of the Sue Neill-Fraser Support Group and a keen observer of the case.)

Peter Powell that same day told the media that “The arrest comes as a result of a long and thorough investigation into the circumstances of Mr Chappell’s disappearance.”

Stannus says, “My records show that police then began to collect witness statements, beyond those they’d already gathered.”

Stannus continues: “Why, after those seven months, had police finally decided to arrest Sue? The most recent piece of information that I have relevant to this question is that on 30 July, 2009, Sue, concerned that police weren’t finding out what had happened to Bob, made a written complaint. Sue had asked for an independent police officer to review the evidence so that they could perhaps get a different perspective on it.

“An assessment and review of the case was conducted. A document was created which related to the issues raised in Sue’s written complaint. This document recommended that the Acting Commissioner of Police note the contents of an earlier briefing and an attached investigation report (which had previously been forwarded to the DPP, to the Commissioner of Police and to Internal Affairs.

“Her complaint was dismissed and a week later she was arrested.

“Once, before her arrest, Sue asked where else they’d looked and according to Stannus, Detective Conroy replied to the effect ‘Well nowhere, we have really only been looking at you all along, you’ve been our only – our main suspect.'”

It is unarguable that Sue Neill-Fraser was arrested without reasonable and probable cause. TasPol had no direct evidence against her (despite their secret surveillance) – but they did have credible evidence pointing away from her. Clearly, that was a bad day for a criminal justice system which then failed Neill-Fraser at every step of the way to her conviction in 2010 and subsequent failed first appeal. It remains a dark stain on Tasmania’s legal conscience, as Neill-Fraser awaits her new appeal currently scheduled to begin on November 2, 2020 – subject to corona virus restrictions. (Put over to March 1, 2012. HL);

TasPol’s actions then and their obstructive behaviour since go a long way to undermine the public’s confidence in them collectively. Some are even saying they no longer feel safe with the police as guardians of the law.

The first factor that should have helped police avoid their tunnel vision-impaired investigation was in the hands of Detective Sergeant Simon Conroy at lunchtime on January 28, 2009, the day immediately after Bob Chappell was found missing from their jointly owned yacht, Four Winds. But they missed it … or refused to see it. The ‘pointer’ took the form of Sue Neill-Fraser’s stat dec, a detailed recounting of her examination of Four Winds in the wake of Bob’s disappearance from the yacht, and her own movements. No reasonable person – policeman or not – would regard it as cause for suspicion or self incriminating; quite the contrary.

“Had Sue in any way been involved in the death of her partner she would not have provided so much detail,” comments Charlie Bezzina, a former detective of 38 years experience (17 of them in homicide). Bezzina, who worked alongside Colin McLaren researching the case for the book Southern Justice (Hachette).

“Without that detail the police would have been none the wiser. Was it a ploy on her behalf, I think not. What she was doing was giving every possible assistance to help police solve the disappearance of her partner.”

The second factor that could have prevented Neill-Fraser’s arrest was evidence that in any other crime investigation – especially murder – would have been regarded as of the utmost value and importance: DNA. But not hers.

Sizeable material containing DNA was found on the deck of Four Winds during forensic examination of what became the crime scene. At first, the DNA database produced no matches. Even so, it was evidence of an unknown party having been on board … at the crime scene, in fact.

But in March 2010, well before the September start of the trial, a match appeared, linking the DNA to then homeless 15 year old Hobart girl, Meaghan Vass. Her DNA had been recorded in connection with an unrelated matter. Police duly questioned Vass, but she lied about her whereabouts and denied having been on Four Winds.

With the DNA issue unresolved (along with some missing evidence), the DPP should not have proceeded to trial, Bezzina says. “It would surely raise an element of doubt in the jury’s mind,” … unless, of course the prosecutor were to dismiss to the DNA; he told the jury: “the whole thing is such a red herring because when you realize that the DNA could have been transferred from someone onto Four Winds … if someone had necessarily acquired some trace of her DNA, some strong sign of her DNA on their footwear before getting on the yacht.”

That red herring has since acquired sharp teeth with which it has bitten the prosecutor on the rebuttal. It would all be laughable if it were not so serious.

Almost exactly a decade after the DNA was matched to Vass, she made the tearful admission on 60 Minutes that it was hers – her vomit – while on deck, witnessing a nasty altercation between an alarmed and surprised Bob Chappell and her two male accomplices in an attempted robbery. The red herring was in reality a red flag.

Eve Ash, who made the probing 2013 documentary into Neill-Fraser’s case, Shadow of Doubt, and co-produced the 2019 documentary series, Undercurrent(Channel 7), is scathing in her criticism of Tasmania’s legal and political establishment for its unprincipled behaviour. She has made the following statement:

Sue Neill-Fraser is now the age Bob was when he was brutally murdered. Imagine if TASPOL had done a thorough investigation at the start, or at least once Meaghan Vass’ DNA was identified at the crime scene a year later. Imagine… the real perpetrators charged and tried, Sue would have mourned Bob, she would have gone through the trial(s) stoically, and she would have picked up the pieces of her life and gone on to enjoy her four young grandchildren, living in her home. So why, since we all know Sue didn’t commit this crime, does she continue to have her life stolen away by an inadequate, outdated justice system?

Now 11 years since her arrest I think of three words, sorely lacking in Tasmania’s leaders over the last years in relation to Sue’s case.  Integrity, Conscience and Values. Is every single politician too scared to speak up and say, “This is very wrong, how can we fix it?” Is it going to damage their career? Is the late Vanessa Goodwin the only hero for bringing in the new Right to Appeal in 2015? Is there so much peer pressure and herd righteousness that no-one will actually stand up and call out this travesty? 

You have alternate DNA and new suspects identified in 2017, one admitting she was there, all reported to Tasmania’s leaders. Why didn’t that trigger an investigation into the truth of who really killed Bob Chappell? Instead it triggered a massive investigation into me, Colin McLaren, Jeff Thompson, Charlie Bezzina and my film crew, apart from a smear campaign against Sue’s lawyer at the time, Barbara Etter. Then in 2019 the 60 Minutes confession of the witness who saw what happened, who said Sue was not there, continued to be ignored and pressure continued on our team.

Did our phones have to be tapped, our bank accounts seized and scrutinised, thousands of our phone calls transcribed, my documentary film footage seized, listening devices installed, our lives made into hell? Why, because we sought the truth? This intense campaign to shut us down has cost the Tasmanian public millions of dollars – and not one politician is questioning that. WHY NOT?

Putting aside the personal attack on citizens questioning justice, what about the abhorrent behaviour of politicians, the DPP and police against the freedoms of the press. As investigative journalists and filmmakers, our only sin was to turn over the rocks of justice in Hobart and expose wrongdoing.
Tasmania now has one of the most shocking miscarriages of justice on their hands and they are letting it play out while Sue is slowly losing her golden years locked away, isolated from the world and her loved ones. This is tragic. In the future this case will provide a semester of study for every legal and justice course in the country. You would think it is a case study from 1820 not 2020."

Recommended: The Lindy Tapes, Channel 7 and 7Plus; first aired on Sunday August 16, 2020. On the 40th anniversary of baby Azaria’s disappearance, a major investigation from the 7NEWS Spotlight team unearths the secret police tape recordings never broadcast.

The entire post can be read at:

https://wrongfulconvictionsreport.org/2020/08/20/sue-neill-fraser-a-wrongful-arrest-and-11-years-later-part-1/

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;
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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;
—————————————————————————————————
FINAL, FINAL WORD (FOR NOW!): "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions.   They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they’ve exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
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Saturday, January 30, 2021

Sue Neill-Fraser: Australia: (series: part 2): The petition: Launched by psychologist, film-maker Eve Ash: "This wrongful incarceration needs an Independent Judicial Inquiry or Royal Commission, and a proper search for the truth about what happened to Bob Chappell on Australia Day 2009. We must unearth what went wrong in the police investigation and the highly questionable conviction. It is not enough to say 'the court' will deal with this travesty through an appeal process. It is a slow, painful adversarial process, one that has repeatedly failed Sue."


PUBLISHER'S NOTE: Dear reader. After reading background material  on this petition, I hope that you will affix your signature as well. As filmmaker  Eve Ash, who is spearheading the petition writes: "The longer this shocking injustice goes on, the more outrageous it is. And the more the global community will become aware of the judicial horror that sits in Tasmania. Make right the biggest wrong in Australian criminal history, this century. Enough is enough." So let's remind Tasmanian Premier Peter Gutwein, and his government,  that we are here, wherever we are in the globe, and watching.


Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog.


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SIGN HERE:


https://www.change.org/su/p/find-the-truth-investigate-bob-chappell-s-death-call-for-commission-of-inquiry-or-royal-commission/f


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A MUST: "Meaghan Vass bravely confesses on 'Sixty Minutes' (link below) that she was there on the yacht, she saw Bob repeatedly bashed by her former boyfriend, saw lots of blood, and admitted she vomited - accounting for the large pool of DNA.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHkoS80Ln0w


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PETITION: Sue Neill-Fraser: Spearheaded by film maker Eve Ash; Directed to Tasmanian Premier Peter Gutwein: "Sue Neill-Fraser has suffered injustice beyond imagination, now in her 12th year in jail (of 23 years), convicted of murdering her partner Bob Chappell. Sue is innocent. She has won the right to appeal but remains in jail despite a recent confession of an eye witness who saw who did kill Bob, and it was not Sue. The real murderers are not being investigated."


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PETITION STATEMENT:

"A large volume puddle of DNA at the crime scene, belonged to homeless girl, Meaghan Vass, 15 at the time.  Now, ten years later, Meaghan has bravely confessed on 60 minutes (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHkoS80Ln0w that she was there on the yacht, she saw Bob repeatedly bashed by her former boyfriend, saw lots of blood, and admitted she vomited - accounting for the large pool of DNA.

Bob’s body was never found. It was an entirely circumstantial case: no witnesses, no motive, no weapon, no forensics against Sue, loads of missed suspects including local criminals at the location that night, never investigated. Sue was found guilty despite the 26cm x 21cm patch of DNA found at the crime scene… DNA that proved Meaghan was on the yacht. Other DNA on the yacht remains unidentified. There were others at the crime scene.

The Tasmania Police investigation was deeply flawed, devoid of sound crime scene principles and procedures, and thorough crime scene analysis. The forensics were problematic. Witnesses were mistaken. Some lied, others were never located. Much has been uncovered and is reported in Colin McLaren’s book Southern Justice (https://www.booktopia.com.au/southern-justice-colin-mclaren/prod9780733641756.html and in CH7’s Undercurrent TV series (https://7plus.com.au/undercurrent-real-murder-investigation

Sue was in shock, reacting to the news of Bob missing and the boat sinking. She was confused, inconsistent and her ‘lies’ and ‘cold demeanour’ were unsympathetically considered confirmation of her guilt.

Police tunnel vision began early. A witness with a violent background who had previously threatened Sue and Bob, came forward within a day, hoping to broker a deal for his own pending criminal charges. All he needed to do was say that Sue planned to kill Bob. From that point forward police built their case. Sue never had the benefit of an open-minded investigation.

Highly qualified detectives across Australia are shocked at the inept investigation by police. Eminent legal experts and QCs are alarmed by the case and calling for an Independent Inquiry. CLA (Civil Liberties Australia) have called for a Royal Commission.

Australians should be alarmed:

1.      LARGE VOLUME PUDDLE OF DNA AT THE CRIME SCENE – on the deck of the yacht. It was ignored by police, Sue was awaiting trial. Then when the DNA was identified to Meaghan, a street kid who ran with thieves who broke into yachts, she lied about her whereabouts that night. At that point Sue should have been released from jail and a new investigation commenced. Why was Meaghan never investigated properly, or her associates? Why did the court allow the DNA to be considered a secondary transfer? (walked in from a policeman’s boot) This transfer is impossible, given the size of the DNA puddle.

2.      Obvious suspects, there at the time, were ignored, including two criminals, one with a small yacht anchored right next to the Four Winds. A resident overlooking the bay saw a weather beaten man, 50ish, reddish hair - in a zodiac dinghy the night of the murder, near to the Four Winds. Remarkably, police turned this rugged male description to match the description of Sue!

3.      Police claim Sue was on the water that night in a dinghy. She was not. A man came forward stating he was on the water that night, at that time, and witnesses verified this. The man has long flowing hair and slender build. Police ignored this, sticking to their flawed and uncorroborated ‘fact’ against Sue.

4.      There was also a GREY dinghy at the crime scene, seen by 4 people, one who described a grey lee cloth on it, not followed up by police. (Sue had a new bright white dinghy with blue stripes and no lee cloth.)

5.      Why did the DPP tell the jury Sue cleaned up the crime with latex gloves? Three gloves were found – one with a police officer’s DNA, another with Bob’s son’s DNA – Tim Chappell, and the third with mixed unidentified DNA, found on the saloon floor.

6.      The Forensic Log presented at trial had key exhibits skipped/deleted. Where are the exhibits like the blue towel found near the Vass DNA, and vomit rags that were supposed to be sent to toxicology? Why were these items, and a hair on the bloody steps, never tested?

7.      Two key exhibits were offered at trial: Sue’s dinghy found abandoned at the water’s edge and her red jacket found abandoned on the fence of a nearby home. Yet there were no blood results to Sue or Bob or anyone in her dinghy. And no forensics, blood or any evidence on her jacket. How could she kill Bob (which would cause massive traces of blood) without ANY transfer of evidence to the key exhibits against her?

8.      Sue was not involved in the disappearance of another man, who was 35 years later found to have suicided, so why did the DPP mention it at trial?

9.      The DPP invented murder weapons – a wrench and screwdriver - then placed them in the hands of Sue, at trial. No such weapons existed. The DPP misled the Jury, despite no body, by saying:

"She's walking backwards and forwards and delivers blow - a blow or blows, or maybe stabs him with a screwdriver, I don't know, he doesn't look round, and so the body doesn't have any marks of what you'd expect if someone had come down there, a stranger, intent on doing him harm, the body I suggest would have marks consistent only with being delivered by someone who he knew to be there, who he knew and expected to be behind him."

10.  Sue could not have winched the body as described in court. She has a bad lower back injury and was reported as lacking strength to use the winch.

11.  A witness who reported seeing the yacht and Bob, alive at 5pm, was looking at the wrong yacht, wrong (yellow) dinghy, and wrong man.

12.  A witness thought she saw Bob and Sue arguing on the foreshore – turns out to be the day before and Bob's sister. Not Sue.

13.  A supposed cut on Sue’s thumb ‘emerged’ weeks later but was never photographed or investigated despite supposed police concern day 1 of the investigation.

14.  Police told the court that there were no thefts from yachts, or break and enters leading up to the night of Bob’s killing. Yet there were thieves breaking into boats along the Derwent.

15.  The violent background of the star witness who came forward with a story about Sue’s 'plots to kill' Bob, and her brother, was never told to the court, nor were the threats by him and animosity towards Sue and Bob.

*** There is more to be alarmed about ***

This wrongful incarceration needs an Independent Judicial Inquiry or Royal Commission, and a proper search for the truth about what happened to Bob Chappell on Australia Day 2009. We must unearth what went wrong in the police investigation and the highly questionable conviction. It is not enough to say 'the court' will deal with this travesty through an appeal process. It is a slow, painful adversarial process, one that has repeatedly failed Sue.

Compassion and Tasmanian government leaders must intervene. This is not a political issue, and it is time for Tasmanian leaders to see it as a bi-partisan issue. Sue must be given back her life! She lost her partner, her home, her reputation, her livelihood. She missed caring for her dying mother. Now wheelchair bound, Sue is in need of sharing her remaining years with her daughters and 4 grandchildren. The Tasmanian leaders must recognize the grave errors made in this extraordinary case and allow Sue to go home, NOW, not hide behind “it’s before the courts”.

The longer this shocking injustice goes on, the more outrageous it is. And the more the global community will become aware of the judicial horror that sits in Tasmania.

Make right the biggest wrong in Australian criminal history, this century. Enough is enough."

The entire petition  can be accessed and signed at the link below: (More than 22,000 signatures thus far.)

https://www.change.org/p/find-the-truth-investigate-bob-chappell-s-death-call-for-commission-of-inquiry-or-royal-commission?recruiter=149491035&utm_source=share_petition&utm_medium=facebook&utm_campaign=psf_combo_share_initial&utm_term=share_petition&recruited_by_id=35a8bfe0-3651-11e4-bc9f-b33f24dba640&utm_content=fht-1240275-en-au%3Av12

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;
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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;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD (FOR NOW!): "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions.   They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they’ve exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
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Friday, January 29, 2021

Bernard Howard: Michigan: False confession plus jailhouse informant = wrongful conviction, 25 years in prison - and a judge who, on December 17, 2020 said, on exonerating him: “You have been given back what has been taken from you. You understand, more than everyone…how precious our time is and what we choose to do with that time. I recognize you have every right to be angry. But you have already lost so much to that, I hope you find peace. I hope you find solace. And I hope you find comfort in knowing that the label of murderer is gone and replaced with exonerated.”...“You did not gain your freedom on a technicality,” Judge Bazzi said. “You gained your freedom because you were innocent.”


BACKGROUNDER: "Jailhouse informants have probably been around for as long as there have been jails and inmates willing to trade information for a favor or two — including more privileges or a shorter sentence. “Incentivized informants” is the legal term of art, but too often they also have “a strong incentive to lie,” said Michelle Feldman, state campaigns director for the Innocence Project. That explains why, according to the project’s figures, 16 percent of DNA exonerations involved false testimony by informants. Broader studies of wrongful convictions put the figure as high as 46 percent. Innocent people have spent decades in prison while the guilty remained free, and often the victims of those informants never see justice either — a lose-lose-lose for the criminal justice system."
Boston Globe Editorial:  February 15, 2020.
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PUBLISHER'S NOTE: (Jailhouse informants): "In response to  the stunning number of exonerations  enabled by DNA evidence,  one of the most common explanations has been that all too often police and prosecutors  are tempted to use devious, dangerous techniques in the absence of  scientific evidence which can neatly provide a conviction. (A wrongful conviction at that. HL);  One of these techniques - in addition to obtaining false statements or ' rigging'  the identification processes  (or both) - is by secretly ‘buying’  the evidence of prison informants, commonly referred to as ‘jailhouse informants’ or ’snitches.’    Top-notch investigative journalists Pamela Colloff and Mike White  have dived deeply into the  dangers posed by jailhouse snitches - from the USA  and New Zealand. Their  work has been evidenced by multiple posts on this Blog."
Harold Levy: Publisher: The Charles Smith Blog.

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PUBLISHER'S  NOTE:  (Falser confessions): This Blog is interested in false confessions because of the disturbing number of exonerations in the USA, Canada and multiple other jurisdictions throughout the world, where, in the absence of incriminating forensic evidence the conviction is based on self-incrimination – and because of the growing body of  scientific research showing how vulnerable suspects (especially young suspects)  are to widely used interrogation methods  such as  the notorious ‘Reid Technique.’ As  all too many of this Blog's post have shown, I also recognize that pressure for false confessions can take many forms, up to and including physical violence, even physical and mental torture.

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Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog:

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PASSAGE OF THE DAY:  "During cross-examination, Twilley said that 40 to 50 different inmates had confessed their crimes to him. Twilley insisted that the sentence reduction was not part of any deal with the prosecution. “I’m resting on the moral principles I have,” Twilley said. “And the moral principles I have don’t make me feel good when somebody brags on killing somebody.” Twilley admitted that he previously had pled guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to 12 to 25 years in prison. He said that his sentence had been reduced so that he ultimately would be released after serving seven and a half years. In fact, the sentence reduction had occurred months earlier. On July 29, 1994, about a week after Twilley claimed that Howard and his co-defendants had admitted involvement in the triple murder, Twilley appeared in the chambers of Judge John Shamo. Judge Shamo had imposed the original sentence of 12 to 25 years plus two years for a felony firearm conviction. Judge Shamo agreed to cut Twilley’s sentence but sealed the transcript of the hearing. Years later, when the transcript was unsealed, it showed that Detroit Police Sgt. Dale Collins testified that Twilley had testified in numerous homicide cases. Collins was asked: “Isn’t it true that without—one case recently, that he [Twilley] was the main witness? And without him, that you would not have been able to proceed on that case?” “That is correct,” Collins said. He added that Twilley had helped in “at least 20” cases. Judge Shamo said he was going to reduce Twilley’s sentence. “For all the cooperation and work he’s done, I should do this and I will do this,” the judge said."

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POST: National Registry of Exonerations entry  on Bernard Howard,  recently entered on The Registry site at the link below on  Jan. 23, 2021.
GIST: "On the morning of July 16, 1994, the bodies of three people were found fatally shot in a narrow hallway of a home in the 5200 block of Eastlawn Avenue in Detroit, Michigan. Police said the shooting was drug related.

Twenty-six-year-old Marcus Averitte, who sold marijuana from the home, and his 16-year-old girlfriend, Reshay Winston, were both shot with a shotgun and a handgun. Averitte had 18 separate entrance wounds and was shot 10 times. The third victim, 22-year-old John Thornton, who resided in the residence sporadically and helped Averitte sell marijuana, was shot at least 10 times as well.

A safe in which Averitte kept his money and marijuana was found in the hallway. The safe was open and blood was spattered inside, indicating it had been opened and emptied before the shooting began.

Less than a week later, police had three men under arrest—21-year-old Ladon Salisbury, 19-year-old Ken McMullen, and 18-year-old Bernard Howard. Detectives said that McMullen and Howard had admitted participating in the crime, though they each denied firing any shots. Police said they were led to Howard because they were informed the shooters included someone known as “Snoop Dog.” Some of Howard’s friends called him “Snoop” because his hair resembled that of the rap artist.

In February 1995, all three went to trial in Wayne County Recorder’s Court. Two juries were selected—one to hear the evidence against Salisbury and the other to hear the evidence against McMullen and Howard.

There were no eyewitnesses to the crime. One witness, Darmetia Bolden, testified that she came to the house around 1 a.m. and purchased marijuana. She said she saw three men on the front porch. She identified Salisbury as one and said she recognized the voice of another as that of McMullen. She said she did not see the face of the third man.

Another witness who lived nearby testified that she heard multiple gunshots. When she looked out, she said, she saw three men run from the house to a blue and white van that screeched away, spinning its tires such that smoke was visible under the streetlights. 

Police said that they located the van parked in front of Salisbury’s home and a search of the residence turned up a nine-millimeter Glock semi-automatic pistol. A police firearms expert testified that he analyzed more than a dozen shell casings and about a dozen recovered slugs. He concluded that 28 casings and 4 of the slugs “were identified as having been fired [from] that particular Glock.” Because the Glock had a 17-shot magazine, the prosecutor, Thomas Trzcinski, argued that the gunman had emptied the magazine, reloaded, and continued firing.

The prosecution presented statements signed by McMullen and Howard. McMullen’s statement said on July 15, 1994, he was playing basketball in front of Averitte’s house when Salisbury, whom he knew as “Val,” started talking about robbing Averitte. McMullen occasionally helped sell marijuana at the house and Averitte considered him an “uncle,” so Salisbury said he would be able to get them inside the house.

In the statement, McMullen said he went to Averitte’s home and was on the front porch when Salisbury and Howard pulled up in the blue and white van. McMullen said that he was there when Darmetia Bolden purchased marijuana. After she left, he, Salisbury and Bolden went inside. 

He said that Salisbury went to the bathroom. When he came out, he had a gun in his hand and he ordered Averitte, Thornton and Winston to lie on the floor. McMullen said that Howard also had a gun out. Salisbury got the safe, opened it, and took out about $700 and a pound of marijuana, the statement said. Salisbury “shot Marcus first, then Bernard shot John and then Val and Bernard shot Reshay,” the statement said.

Salisbury and Howard then moved a television, a video cassette recorder, and a stereo to the front door. Salisbury then backed up his van to the front door, and he and Howard loaded the electronics into the van, the statement said. 

McMullen said he was “just standing in the front room” and had no gun. According to the statement, Howard fired a shotgun twice, and Salisbury fired his Glock about eight times. The statement said the shooting occurred about 1:20 a.m. on Saturday, July 16, 1994.

The prosecution also presented a typewritten statement that Detective Monica Childs said she took from Howard. Childs testified that she typed the questions and then typed Howard’s answers. According to this statement, Howard said that late Saturday night, July 16, he was sitting on the front porch at Averitte’s house with Salisbury and McMullen when McMullen said that he and Salisbury were going to rob Averitte. McMullen asked him to stand by the door and let them know if anyone was coming. He said he followed them inside and watched as Salisbury and Ken ordered the victims onto the floor. After Salisbury got the safe open and took the money and marijuana, “Ken set the weed on the floor and started telling Val, ‘Let’s kill them. Let’s kill them.’”

According to the statement, Val then shot Averitte and McMullen shot Winston. Salisbury had a shotgun and McMullen had a nine-millimeter pistol. 

“I didn’t see John get killed because I ran out the door,” Howard’s statement said. He said that as he was running away, he saw a van pull up, driven by someone else—possibly Winston’s former boyfriend.

The shooting, according to this account, took place late at night on Saturday, July 16 or early on Sunday morning, July 17th. This contradicted the evidence since the bodies were discovered on the morning of the 16th. A handwritten statement added to the typewritten document said, “I ran to Duck’s house and went home Sunday morning, 9:30 a.m.”

The prosecution also called Joe Twilley, who testified that he was in the Detroit police station lockup when Salisbury, McMullen, and Howard were in custody. Twilley testified that Salisbury had admitted to the shooting and implicated McMullen and Howard. Twilley also said that McMullen and Howard admitted involvement.

Just a month earlier, Twilley had testified in the murder trial of Ramon Ward, who would be convicted and later exonerated in February 2020. Twilley said that Ward had admitted committing a double murder. 

Trzcinski asked Twilley, “Are you getting anything out of this in any fashion?”

“No,” Twilley replied.

During cross-examination, Twilley said that 40 to 50 different inmates had confessed their crimes to him. Twilley insisted that the sentence reduction was not part of any deal with the prosecution. “I’m resting on the moral principles I have,” Twilley said. “And the moral principles I have don’t make me feel good when somebody brags on killing somebody.”

Twilley admitted that he previously had pled guilty to second-degree murder and was sentenced to 12 to 25 years in prison. He said that his sentence had been reduced so that he ultimately would be released after serving seven and a half years.

In fact, the sentence reduction had occurred months earlier. On July 29, 1994, about a week after Twilley claimed that Howard and his co-defendants had admitted involvement in the triple murder, Twilley appeared in the chambers of Judge John Shamo.

Judge Shamo had imposed the original sentence of 12 to 25 years plus two years for a felony firearm conviction. Judge Shamo agreed to cut Twilley’s sentence but sealed the transcript of the hearing. Years later, when the transcript was unsealed, it showed that Detroit Police Sgt. Dale Collins testified that Twilley had testified in numerous homicide cases.

Collins was asked: “Isn’t it true that without—one case recently, that he [Twilley] was the main witness? And without him, that you would not have been able to proceed on that case?”

“That is correct,” Collins said. He added that Twilley had helped in “at least 20” cases.

Judge Shamo said he was going to reduce Twilley’s sentence. “For all the cooperation and work he’s done, I should do this and I will do this,” the judge said.

Salisbury, Howard, and McMullen all testified and denied involvement in the shooting. They also denied making any admissions to Twilley.

McMullen and Howard said their confessions were false and that detectives had threatened to physically harm them unless they confessed.

Howard said that when he insisted he was not involved, Detective Stephen Myles threatened to “fuck him up” unless he confessed. Several hours later, Howard said, Detective Childs gave him a typed statement. Howard said that Childs told him that McMullen had implicated him and that he would be convicted of murder unless he gave a statement. Howard said that she told him that if he signed the statement she had, he would be released after he signed it. Howard denied making the statements that were attributed to him in the typed statement and said he signed it without reading it. He would later say that he was functionally illiterate and could not read.

Howard testified that in fact he had spent the Thursday, Friday, and Saturday—July 14, 15, and 16—at the home of Tyiesha Washington playing cards with Jamil “Duck” Spencer and others.

Spencer testified that he and Howard spent the night of Friday July 15 and early morning hours of July 16—when the prosecution said the shooting occurred—playing cards with others at the home of Tyiesha Washington before going to Spencer’s home for the night.

Myles and other detectives testified and denied threatening either McMullen or Howard during their interrogations. 

On March 30, 1995, the two juries convicted Howard, Salisbury, and McMullen of three counts of first-degree murder, armed robbery, and illegal use of a firearm to commit a felony. Each man was sentenced to life in prison without parole.

Years later, defendants began filing motions claiming that Twilley and others had falsely claimed that they had confessed to crimes while they were in the Detroit police station lockup. The defendants claimed that Twilley and others were given special privileges, including conjugal visits from girlfriends, marijuana and alcohol, as well as reduced charges and sentences for cooperating. 

The defendants unearthed memos from the Wayne County Prosecutor’s office that documented how the prosecution knew of the unreliable nature of jailhouse informants but continued to allow them to testify. In February 1995—just as Howard’s case was going to trial—Robert Agacinski, then deputy chief of the Wayne County Prosecutor’s office, had written a memorandum expressing concern about the use of jailhouse informants. He noted that police were exceeding their authority and violating office policy by promising leniency to the informants without the approval or even the knowledge of the prosecution. The internal memo noted that “the snitches do lie about overhearing confessions and fabricate admissions in order to obtain police favors or obtain the deals promised.”

Agacinski provided specific accounts of men being transferred to the ninth floor of 1300 Beaubien and fabricating false “confessions.” Agacinski named informants, including Twilley. He stated that these men had claimed to obtain “confessions” in several cases that he was aware of, including a case that he had personally prosecuted.

Agacinski noted that in Twilley’s case, the police asked the prosecutor’s office for a reduction in Mr. Twilley’s sentence in a murder case. When the prosecutor’s office refused, the police went to the court anyway, spoke to the judge in chambers, and Twilley’s sentence was then reduced. Agacinski pointed to the obvious problem of relying on a prisoner who has been made a promise in exchange for obtaining a “confession,” and stated the conviction must be automatically reversed if the promise was not disclosed to the defense.

The memo specifically mentioned how prisoners were transferred to the 9th floor detention area at police headquarters—where Twilley was housed—and police were fabricating false confessions. A second memo was written in March—during Howard’s trial—by another prosecutor who also detailed concerns about the failure to disclose deals and promises, noting that doing so would require reversals of convictions.

In 2013, after his state appeals had been denied, Howard filed a petition for relief from judgment. The petition was based in part on a 2012 affidavit from a prisoner, Jonathan Hewitt-El who said that police approached him, Twilley, and others to falsely incriminate others in police custody. Hewitt-El said that he had initially agreed to do so in three murder cases, but then backed out and refused to testify. The petition also accused Howard’s trial defense lawyer of providing an inadequate legal defense by failing to call Tyiesha Washington as an alibi witness.

The petition was denied.

Howard filed a motion for reconsideration based on a 2013 affidavit from Agacinski, who was no longer a prosecutor, saying that defense attorneys had reported that some prisoners, including Twilley, were intentionally used as informants and that Twilley’s sentence was reduced due to his cooperation. The petition noted that Twilley had denied at Howard’s trial that he was receiving any benefits because of his cooperation. At the time Twilley claimed that Howard, McMullen, and Salisbury admitted their involvement to him, Twilley had previously been convicted of second degree murder in an arson case. Ultimately, Twilley’s 12-to-25-year prison sentence had been reduced so that he was released after serving about seven and a half years.

However, the motion for reconsideration was denied. In 2015, Howard filed a federal petition for a writ of habeas corpus seeking to overturn his conviction. The petition was denied as untimely filed.

By that time, Claudia Whitman, the director of the National Capital Crime Assistance Network, was investigating the wrongful conviction claim of Lacino Hamilton, who had been convicted of murder and sentenced to 52 to 82 years in prison based on testimony from another informant who was in the Detroit police station lockup. In September 2020, Hamilton was exonerated based on DNA testing and released. 

In 2017, Whitman began examining Howard’s case and in 2018, she helped Howard get his case information to the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Conviction Integrity Unit (CIU). During the CIU examination of the case, Howard took a polygraph examination. The examiner concluded that Howard was truthful when he denied any involvement in the triple murder.

The CIU investigation by assistant Wayne County prosecutor Carole Stanyar and investigator Pat Little concluded that Howard’s statement conflicted with evidence about who shot the victims and the weapons used, as well as the day the crime occurred. Moreover, there was evidence that another man, also known as Snoop Dog, had threatened to kill Averitte prior to the shootings. In addition, Twilley’s testimony about McMullen’s alleged confession no longer satisfied Michigan criminal statutes which require that such evidence be supported by corroborating evidence indicating its trustworthiness.

At the request of the CIU, attorney Beth Greenberg Morrow agreed to represent Howard pro bono and in 2020, filed a successive petition for relief from judgment. The petition noted how the case of Ramon Ward—who was exonerated in February 2020—was similar to Howard’s case. 

“Like Mr. Ward’s case, no physical evidence and no eyewitness testimony placed Howard at this crime scene,” the petition said. “Like Mr. Ward’s case, the only other evidence—an alleged confession to a [Detroit Police] homicide detective which borrowed extensively from the Twilley crime scene content – was immediately disavowed by a borderline illiterate Howard, who believed that he could go home if he signed the statement, and who handwrote after the typed statement, ‘I ran to Duck’s house [and] went home Sunday morning,’ in an apparent attempt to solidify an alibi to these crimes.”

On November 12, 2020, Howard was released from prison. 

On December 17, 2020, Valerie Newman, head of the CIU, and Morrow presented a joint order to vacate Howard’s convictions and to dismiss the charges. Newman said that Stanyar “unraveled everything that had happened…with all three co-defendants…and took a look at Mr. Howard’s confession, which proved to be inaccurate in many, many significant respects which led us to conclude that it was, in fact, a false confession. He did not know many of the important details of the crime.”

Newman said that the confession “appears to be something that the police stitched together through information from the jail house informants and then presented to Mr. Howard, who, at the time, was only 18 years old and basically illiterate.” She said the confession was “presented as, you know, sign this so you can get out of here.”

Newman noted that a witness had said the third man was short and that Howard was 6 feet 3 inches tall. 

She said, “Our entire team concluded that…there was significant evidence that showed Mr. Howard did not commit, participate, have any knowledge [and] he was not involved in this crime in any way, shape or manner.”

Morrow praised the work of the CIU and also the work of Whitman, who “supported Bernard through this investigation. She has supported him emotionally, physically and financially. Bernard’s case is the seventh case in which she has been involved that…led to release. Six of these have been in Michigan.”

“Today is a great day for justice and a great day for Mr. Howard,” Morrow said. “Mr. Howard has always been an innocent man.”

Howard said, “I’d just like to thank the prosecution’s office and everybody involved in the office for all the work that they did, [be]cause without them, I wouldn’t be sitting here right now. I’m very appreciative and thankful and I’m just overwhelmed.”

Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Mariam Bazzi granted the order, and praised the prosecution, the defense, and Whitman for their efforts. She told Howard: “You have been given back what has been taken from you. You understand, more than everyone…how precious our time is and what we choose to do with that time. I recognize you have every right to be angry. But you have already lost so much to that, I hope you find peace. I hope you find solace. And I hope you find comfort in knowing that the label of murderer is gone and replaced with exonerated.”

“You did not gain your freedom on a technicality,” Judge Bazzi said. “You gained your freedom because you were innocent.” 

The entire entry can be read at

https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Pages/casedetail.aspx?caseid=5891

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;

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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;
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FINAL, FINAL WORD (FOR NOW!): "Since its inception, the Innocence Project has pushed the criminal legal system to confront and correct the laws and policies that cause and contribute to wrongful convictions.   They never shied away from the hard cases — the ones involving eyewitness identifications, confessions, and bite marks. Instead, in the course of presenting scientific evidence of innocence, they’ve exposed the unreliability of evidence that was, for centuries, deemed untouchable." So true!
Christina Swarns: Executive Director: The Innocence Project;
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