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;
Wednesday, February 9, 2022
Michael Politte: Missouri: Bulletin: Significant Development: The Missouri prisoner who says he’s innocent, is paroled, The Kansas City Star, (Reporter Luke Nozicka) reports. In court filings, Politte’s attorneys argued he was convicted based in part on discredited fire investigation techniques and an incompetent new public defender at trial. The jurors who convicted Politte have raised concerns about their decision in recent years. Two believe he is innocent and should be freed to correct “this wrong,” while others have said he deserves a new trial based on evidence they never heard. One of the jurors, Linda Dickerson-Bell, of Bonne Terre, in an affidavit said she learned through an MTV documentary series, which featured Politte’s case, that there was not gasoline on his shoes. She called that evidence the “nail in the coffin” for her at trial. “ After learning about the new evidence, my guilt has only grown,” she wrote. “I now firmly believe ... that we made a terrible mistake.”
PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Now that he has been granted parole, he will be released April 23 from the Jefferson City Correctional Center. “But this is not the end. Justice for the Politte family demands Mike’s exoneration and we will continue to litigate in court to overturn his conviction,” his lawyers with the MacArthur Justice Center, the Midwest Innocence Project and Langdon & Emison said in a statement. “His release on parole means he can now continue this fight from home with his sisters.”
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STORY: "Mike Politte, MO prisoner who says he's innocent, is paroled," The Kansas City Star, (Reporter Luke Nozicka) reports, on February 8, 2022.
GIST: "A Missouri man who maintains he was wrongly convicted of murdering his mother more than 20 years ago has been granted parole, his attorneys said Tuesday evening.
Michael Politte, now 37, was convicted of second-degree murder in 2002, four years after he found Rita Politte’s body burning on the floor of their Hopewell home in eastern Missouri, his lawyers have said.
He was 14 when she died.
Politte and his sisters maintained he is innocent.
Now that he has been granted parole, he will be released April 23 from the Jefferson City Correctional Center.
“But this is not the end. Justice for the Politte family demands Mike’s exoneration and we will continue to litigate in court to overturn his conviction,” his lawyers with the MacArthur Justice Center, the Midwest Innocence Project and Langdon & Emison said in a statement. “His release on parole means he can now continue this fight from home with his sisters.”
In court filings, Politte’s attorneys argued he was convicted based in part on discredited fire investigation techniques and an incompetent new public defender at trial.
The jurors who convicted Politte have raised concerns about their decision in recent years.
Two believe he is innocent and should be freed to correct “this wrong,” while others have said he deserves a new trial based on evidence they never heard.
One of the jurors, Linda Dickerson-Bell, of Bonne Terre, in an affidavit said she learned through an MTV documentary series, which featured Politte’s case, that there was not gasoline on his shoes. She called that evidence the “nail in the coffin” for her at trial. “
After learning about the new evidence, my guilt has only grown,” she wrote. “I now firmly believe ... that we made a terrible mistake.”
The entire story van be read at:
SEE BREAKDOWN OF SOME OF THE ON-GOING INTERNATIONAL CASES (OUTSIDE OF THE CONTINENTAL USA) THAT I AM FOLLOWING ON THIS BLOG, AT THE LINK BELOW: HL:
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: "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;
