"PUBLISHER'S NOTE: 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?")
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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "Zeigler was 30 at the time of the murders. He’s 78 now, and the longest-serving Florida death row inmate, having been housed at Union Correctional Institution for 47 and a half years. In one of the stranger facts in the case, the jury recommended life imprisonment after weighing the evidence, but Judge Maurice Paul, who has since died, sentenced Zeigler to death."
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STORY: "Convicted Florida mass murderer won’t get fingerprint analysis," by Reporter Greg Fox, published by WESH on December 20, 2023. (Greg Fox has been a member of the WESH 2 News team since May 1987 as an anchor and reporter. He is currently the Investigative and Political reporter. In 2022, he was honored to receive an Emmy Award from the National Academy Of Television Arts and Sciences (Suncoast Chapter) in the category of “Continuing Coverage.” The Academy recognized Greg’s investigative reporting, that exposed flaws in the operation of a ride following a fatal accident. It is Greg’s sixth Emmy Award, including a “Silver Circle” for outstanding contributions to the television industry.)
GIST: "During a hearing Wednesday, prosecutors withdrew a motion by the prior Circuit 9 state attorney to add fingerprint analysis to the battery of tests being done in the case of convicted local mass murdered William “Tommy” Zeigler.
DNA testing ordered by the court in December 2022 continues at a California laboratory, with results expected in the new year. Zeigler’s defense team is paying for those tests.
Last May, a judge in Orange County denied a motion by then-State Attorney Monique Worrell.
She re-filed the motion in July with Judge Patricia Strowbridge.
Worrell was later removed from office by Republican Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for her job performance unrelated to the Zeigler case.
When she discussed this during Wednesday’s status hearing, Chief Assistant State Attorney Ryan Williams, who now works for DeSantis’s appointed State Attorney Andrew Bain, withdrew the motion for fingerprint examination.
That leaves the DNA test results as likely the last hope for Zeigler to try and win his freedom from death row, where he was first incarcerated in July 1976.
On Christmas Eve, 1975, Zeigler was found wounded inside his Winter Garden furniture store, along with the bodies of his wife Eunice, his in-laws Perry and Virginia Edwards, and customer Charlie Mays.
The men were bludgeoned, and the women were shot. A jury later determined Zeigler inflicted a minor gunshot wound on himself to try and cover up the murders.
However, his legal team believes the DNA testing, which did not exist in criminal cases until 1987, will prove he could not have committed the crimes.
Zeigler’s attorney, Dennis Tracey, provided no update on the DNA testing during Wednesday’s hearing.
Outside court, Williams indicated that regular updates on the test results have so far shown little reason to overturn Zeigler’s conviction, though Williams provided no further details.
Zeigler was 30 at the time of the murders. He’s 78 now, and the longest-serving Florida death row inmate, having been housed at Union Correctional Institution for 47 and a half years.
In one of the stranger facts in the case, the jury recommended life imprisonment after weighing the evidence, but Judge Maurice Paul, who has since died, sentenced Zeigler to death.
Every state attorney prior to Worrell’s tenure has steadfastly fought every attempt by Zeigler’s defense team to find avenues of innocence.
“I've been fighting all these years for my name. I want my name back. I've done everything in the world that I could to prove my innocence. I didn’t do this,” said Zeigler during an exclusive interview with WESH 2 Investigates last February.
According to one of Zeigler's attorneys, he contracted COVID-19 early in the pandemic, was hospitalized, and nearly died, but recovered and was returned to death row."
The entire story can be read at:
https://www.wesh.com/article/florida-mass-murderer-fingerprint-analysis/46190306
| PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue/resource. 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/120008354894645705/47049136857587929
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;
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YET ANOTHER FINAL WORD:
David Hammond, one of Broadwater's attorneys who sought his exoneration, told the Syracuse Post-Standard, "Sprinkle some junk science onto a faulty identification, and it's the perfect recipe for a wrongful conviction.
