Audrey Edmunds Edmunds; Wisconsin: Her decades-old case has inspired new research (by University of Wisconsin Law School Prof. Keith Findley) on Shaken Baby Syndrome convictions, WMTV (Reporter Elizabeth Wadas) reports...“I was at UW hospital for some meeting, and one of the doctors there approached me and said he was very concerned about Audrey’s conviction because he thought some of the testimony provided in that case was erroneous,” recalls Findley. Findley jumped in to represent her. “Everything has to be questioned because it turns out it’s wrong an awful lot of the time,” says Findley. Findley and his students researched and fought the court system for five years, finally arriving at a turning point. The forensic pathologist who testified in Audrey’s trial, Dr. Huntington, decided he may have been wrong. “We reached out to Dr. Huntington, and we said we wanted to talk to him about Audrey Edmunds. And he said ‘oh, Audrey Edmunds. What are we doing to do about Audrey Edmunds?’ He remembered, and he was troubled by the testimony,” says Findley. Findley says after Audrey’s conviction, Dr. Huntington examined another baby with similar injuries and determined those injuries could have been caused by a number of things, not just by being shaken within a few hours. “He said he would no longer testify the way he did. He could no longer be sure there was shaking at at all, and he could no longer say with any certainty as to when whatever happened to her when it happened,” says Findley. After 11 years torn away from her family by a justice system she calls anything but, Audrey’s conviction was overturned by an appellate court, and she was free."

PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "According to the Medill Justice Project at Northwestern University in 2015, prosecutors have used Shaken Baby Syndrome diagnoses to charge at least 3,000 people with abuse or murder.  Our national investigates team has uncovered at least 21 people charged with crimes connected to the diagnosis of Shaken Baby Syndrome who have had their convictions overturned since 2019. Why were most of their charges reversed? Evolving science many experts say proves the diagnosis is unreliable. For decades, traumatic brain injuries in kids could only be explained with blunt force trauma, like car accidents, falls or violently shaking a child. Today new research shows those same injuries can be linked to many illnesses and biological issues like seizures. “While I tell you the science has changed a whole lot, it has, but the medical community’s response has not changed that much,” says Findley. With Audrey as motivation, Findley went on to establish the Center for Integrity in Forensic Sciences, looking at what he calls flawed forensics that produce wrongful convictions. It’s crucial research that will hopefully bring about more justice, crucial research because of someone who knows all too well what it could mean without it."

--------------------------------------------------------------

STORY: "Decades-old case inspires new research on Shaken Baby Syndrome convictions," by Reporter Elizabeth Wadas, published by WMTV on November 17, 2022. (Elizabeth Wadas is the lead reporter for NBC15 Investigates, and she also anchors the 9pm newscast on weekdays.)

SUB-HEADING: "Keith Findley says his work is inspired by Audrey Edmunds, a woman who served 11 years for shaking a baby to death before  a court ordered a new trial."

GIST: "An October morning in Waunakee started with a mother dropping her seven-month-old daughter off at the house of her babysitter. Sadly, that child would not survive the day. Police investigate. They arrest the babysitter who was found guilty of shaking the baby to death and sent her to prison.

This decades-old case has now put forensic science on trial as a University of Wisconsin-Madison law professor hopes his research on the topic helps exonerate those whose convictions have ties to Shaken Baby Syndrome.

Thirty-four-year-old Audrey Edmunds, a pregnant mother of two, cherished her work as an at-home babysitter. “[I] wanted to be a stay at home mom. I lived in a fun neighborhood with a lot of other moms and young kids, and I was really thankful to be able to do that,” says Audrey.

But one day back in 1995, the life she knew would change forever after a 7-month-old baby girl was dropped off for daycare. “I was informed by her mom that she had been fussy throughout the night. She hadn’t taken her bottle. Her mom didn’t tell me she projectile vomited in her car seat that morning.”

Audrey knew something was very wrong when formula started coming out of the child’s nose. Audrey says the baby became unresponsive.

“I frantically ran out with her, holding her upright, screaming at my neighbor to come help. One of my neighbors came and said you’ve got to call 911. And I did.”

But it was too late. Soon after help arrived, the child was gone, pronounced dead.

“Heart wrenching, still to this day,” remembers Audrey.

Months later, Audrey says she got an unexpected phone call from police. She was being accused of shaking the baby to death.

“It was awful. When I first heard the courts were getting involved, I was so overwhelmed and scared. I couldn’t figure out what was wrong and why they could even get involved. I knew what happened. And when they came down with this shaken baby stuff, I had never even heard of that,” said Audrey.

Doctor after doctor took the stand testifying about injuries found on the child’s brain. The conclusion: the only way the baby’s brain could have been damaged in that specific way was by being violently shaken by the last person to care for her.

“It was horrible to sit there and listen to some of those people talk and try to create a monster,” says Audrey.

Dr. Robert Huntington did the baby’s autopsy. Since Audrey was watching the child during the two hours before her death, a jury found Audrey guilty. A judge sentenced her to 18 years in prison.

“The DA went after blame and not the truth, and that’s the bad thing,” says Audrey.

Keith Findley is a professor at the University of Wisconsin Law School.

“Audrey and her case inspired me to do this,” says Findley.

He’s also the founder of The Wisconsin Innocence Project.

“I’d heard of Shaken Baby Syndrome before, but I had never looked into it. I never had a case involving it, I never had a reason to question it,” says Findley.

Audrey’s case changed not only his thinking, but his career.

“I was at UW hospital for some meeting, and one of the doctors there approached me and said he was very concerned about Audrey’s conviction because he thought some of the testimony provided in that case was erroneous,” recalls Findley.

Findley jumped in to represent her.

“Everything has to be questioned because it turns out it’s wrong an awful lot of the time,” says Findley.

Findley and his students researched and fought the court system for five years, finally arriving at a turning point. The forensic pathologist who testified in Audrey’s trial, Dr. Huntington, decided he may have been wrong.

“We reached out to Dr. Huntington, and we said we wanted to talk to him about Audrey Edmunds. And he said ‘oh, Audrey Edmunds. What are we doing to do about Audrey Edmunds?’ He remembered, and he was troubled by the testimony,” says Findley.

Findley says after Audrey’s conviction, Dr. Huntington examined another baby with similar injuries and determined those injuries could have been caused by a number of things, not just by being shaken within a few hours.

“He said he would no longer testify the way he did. He could no longer be sure there was shaking at at all, and he could no longer say with any certainty as to when whatever happened to her when it happened,” says Findley.

After 11 years torn away from her family by a justice system she calls anything but, Audrey’s conviction was overturned by an appellate court, and she was free.

“Just to hear that word, it still gives me goosebumps,” says Audrey.

Audrey’s friends braved a snow storm to come pick her up that day to make sure she had a ride home back to her kids.

“It was so awesome to be out, to be driving, to be free. Oh man, I can’t tell you it was wonderful. All those years, all those things I thought about that I just waited to do that it was finally, finally coming to fruition. When I called my daughters that night they were so, so happy,” remembers Audrey.

“Don’t look for blame, look for truth.”

Audrey Edmunds

Findley says more people deserve the freedom Audrey felt that day, people who have been wrongly convicted of Shaken Baby Syndrome, some in Wisconsin.

“There are still people behind bars, there are still people being put behind bars,” says Findley.

And others like Audrey are getting out, too.

According to the Medill Justice Project at Northwestern University in 2015, prosecutors have used Shaken Baby Syndrome diagnoses to charge at least 3,000 people with abuse or murder. 

Our national investigates team has uncovered at least 21 people charged with crimes connected to the diagnosis of Shaken Baby Syndrome who have had their convictions overturned since 2019. Why were most of their charges reversed? Evolving science many experts say proves the diagnosis is unreliable.

For decades, traumatic brain injuries in kids could only be explained with blunt force trauma, like car accidents, falls or violently shaking a child. Today new research shows those same injuries can be linked to many illnesses and biological issues like seizures.

“While I tell you the science has changed a whole lot, it has, but the medical community’s response has not changed that much,” says Findley

With Audrey as motivation, Findley went on to establish the Center for Integrity in Forensic Sciences, looking at what he calls flawed forensics that produce wrongful convictions. It’s crucial research that will hopefully bring about more justice, crucial research because of someone who knows all too well what it could mean without it.

“Don’t look for blame, look for truth,” says Audrey."

The entire story can be read at:

https://www.nbc15.com/2022/11/18/uw-professor-works-exonerate-those-wrongfully-convicted-charges-tied-shaken-baby-syndrome/

-----------------------------------------------------------

PASSAGE OF THE DAY: National Registry of Exonerations):

"In 1999 Edmunds’s appeal was denied, as were two subsequent petitions for a new trial.  In 2001, she was denied parole despite model behavior, because the parole board found her unrepentant.  In 2003 the Wisconsin Innocence Project took on her case.  By then, new medical research had cast serious doubt on the legitimacy of Shaken Baby Syndrome.  Many experts argued that it is physically impossible for such severe brain damage to be caused by shaking alone, without visible injuries to the skull or spine. There was also increasing evidence that other injuries, including short falls and the lingering effects of birth trauma, can produce the diagnostic “triad” of symptoms that is said to prove SBS.  And there was mounting evidence that an infant who is suffering from these symptoms would not necessarily become unresponsive right away. These new findings prompted the forensic pathologist who had conducted Natalie’s autopsy, Dr. Robert Huntington III, to doubt his earlier testimony.  At an evidentiary hearing in 2007, Dr. Huntington testified that he no longer believed that it was clear that Natalie died shortly after being injured. Five other doctors testified on Edmunds’s behalf, and said that neither the cause nor the timing of the injuries that caused Natalie’s death could be determined from the available evidence – but the trial court judge denied the motion for a new trial.  However, on January 31, 2008, the Wisconsin 4th District Court of Appeals overturned the conviction in light of the new scientific evidence about SBS, and ordered a new trial. Edmunds was released on bond on February 6, 2008, and on July 11 of that year the prosecution dismissed the charges.

 -----------------------------------------------------------

National Registry of Exonerations:  (Entry by Alexandra Gross; published on June 2, 2018; Contributing factor: False of misleading forensic evidence.) "On October 16, 1995 Cindy Beard left her 7 month-old daughter Natalie at the home of Audrey Edmunds, a stay-at-home mother in Waunakee, Wisconsin, who often babysat for neighborhood families.  As Beard mentioned to Edmunds, Natalie was fussy that morning and took only half of her bottle, but otherwise she seemed normal.  Edmunds left Natalie with a bottle in the bedroom, and when she returned about a half hour later the baby seemed to be choking and was unresponsive.  Edmunds ran to her neighbor’s house and called 911.  When police and paramedics arrived, they found the baby with fixed and dilated pupils, taking short breaths.  Soon afterwards she stopped breathing and never regained consciousness.  

 

An autopsy revealed extensive brain damage, and a forensic pathologist determined the cause of death to be Shaken Baby Syndrome. The term Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS), which was later coined to describe a condition first articulated in 1971, is said to describe a situation in which an infant is shaken so hard that the brain rotates inside the skull, causing severe and potentially deadly brain injury, but often without any external signs of harm.  SBS is said to involve a tell-tale “triad” of symptoms – brain swelling, brain hemorrhaging and retinal hemorrhaging – which, when present in an infant who has no outward signs of abuse, definitively indicate that the child has been violently shaken. According to received medical wisdom in 1995, no other injuries or pathologies could cause these three symptoms to occur at the same time, and – because it was believed that a victim of SBS became unresponsive immediately – the last person to have physical care of the baby must have caused the injuries.  

 

On March 19, 1996, Edmunds was charged with first-degree reckless homicide. She turned herself in on March 21, 1996, swearing she was innocent.  At her trial, several medical experts testified for the prosecution and said that Natalie ’s death was a hallmark case of SBS, and that given the severity of her injuries, Natalie must have died very soon after the harm was inflicted. Natalie’s medical record included dozens of trips to the doctor, and several days before her death her parents had taken her in for lethargy, irritability and vomiting, which can indicate brain injury. 

 

The prosecution argued that this history was irrelevant because Natalie had clearly been shaken to death, which meant that Edmunds must be guilty. The defense could find just one expert, a pediatric neurologist, to testify that the injuries could have been caused earlier, before Natalie was in Edmunds’s care.  Numerous friends and neighbors testified to Edmunds good character, patience, and skill with children, but the jury was not convinced. On November 26, 1996, Edmunds was convicted and sentenced to 18 years.  

 

In 1999 Edmunds’s appeal was denied, as were two subsequent petitions for a new trial.  In 2001, she was denied parole despite model behavior, because the parole board found her unrepentant. 

 

In 2003 the Wisconsin Innocence Project took on her case.  By then, new medical research had cast serious doubt on the legitimacy of Shaken Baby Syndrome.  Many experts argued that it is physically impossible for such severe brain damage to be caused by shaking alone, without visible injuries to the skull or spine. There was also increasing evidence that other injuries, including short falls and the lingering effects of birth trauma, can produce the diagnostic “triad” of symptoms that is said to prove SBS.  And there was mounting evidence that an infant who is suffering from these symptoms would not necessarily become unresponsive right away.

 

These new findings prompted the forensic pathologist who had conducted Natalie’s autopsy, Dr. Robert Huntington III, to doubt his earlier testimony.  At an evidentiary hearing in 2007, Dr. Huntington testified that he no longer believed that it was clear that Natalie died shortly after being injured. Five other doctors testified on Edmunds’s behalf, and said that neither the cause nor the timing of the injuries that caused Natalie’s death could be determined from the available evidence – but the trial court judge denied the motion for a new trial.  However, on January 31, 2008, the Wisconsin 4th District Court of Appeals overturned the conviction in light of the new scientific evidence about SBS, and ordered a new trial. Edmunds was released on bond on February 6, 2008, and on July 11 of that year the prosecution dismissed the charges.

 

In 2012, Edmunds released a memoir of her ordeal: It Happened to Audrey: A Terrifying Journey from Loving Mum to Accused Baby Killer.""

 

-----------------------------------------------------------

PUBLISHER'S NOTE:  I am monitoring this case/issue/resurce. 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;

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:

https://www.blogger.com/blog/post/edit/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985

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: "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;

----------------------------------------------------------