QUOTE OF THE DAY: "He really has such a good attitude he's such a positive person," Chanen said. Friday marked freedom for Vaughn, but not vindication. Chanen said they'll revisit clemency in four more years and added that the other defendants have open lawsuits in relation to the case. They plan to explore possible actions to get Vaughn financial compensation with this conviction still on his record."
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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "DNA at the scene of the crime was consistent with the confession made by Early that he was the sole person who murdered Holmes. Despite the confession, Vaughn was denied clemency by Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders in 2023."
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STORY: "Charlie Vaughn, who claimed innocence, is released from Arkansas prison after 35 years," by author Chris Banks (KTHV) and Tanya Modersitzky, on January 9. 2026.
SUB-HEADING:"Charlie Vaughn was released from an Arkansas prison 10 years after another man admitted to murdering 81-year-old Myrtle Holmes."
GIST: An Arkansas man was released from prison on Friday after serving more than three decades for a murder that he said he didn't commit.
Charlie Vaughn was released from an Arkansas prison 10 years after another man admitted to murdering 81-year-old Myrtle Holmes in 1988.
Vaughn had been incarcerated since 1991 in connection to the murder, rape, and burglary of Holmes, serving 35 years in prison as a result.
DNA sample testing conducted in 1989 excluded Vaughn as the person who sexually assaulted Holmes.
Despite that, he was charged with murder, rape, and burglary in March of 1990 and immediately jailed.
Vaughn would later confess and plead guilty to first-degree murder in order avoid the threat of a death sentence, despite there being no physical evidence that linked him to the crime.
Fast forward to 2015, another man — Reginald Early — confessed to the murder of Holmes and said that he acted alone.
DNA at the scene of the crime was consistent with the confession made by Early that he was the sole person who murdered Holmes.
Despite the confession, Vaughn was denied clemency by Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders in 2023.
The State of Arkansas ruled this week that the Arkansas Department of Correction release Vaughn, who was being held in the maximum-security unit in Tucker, Arkansas.
Due to an Alford Plea Agreement, Vaughn received a "time served sentence" and will not return to prison following legal proceedings.
For the first time in more than 30 years, Vaughn's attorney Stuart Chanen said that Vaughn is staying at a friend's farm and figuring out what life looks like after prison.
"They're taking Charlie [Vaughn] on to their farm and giving him a place to live. They're going to feed him and so Charlie has a lot of advantages that most prisoners coming out of Tucker Max do not have," Chanen said.
In an email from the prosecutor, Jeff Rogers, he said that "the court imposed a sentence of 429 months which constituted a 'time served' sentence [and that] these events were fully supported by the primary surviving family member of the victim who was present in court for the proceedings."
Despite the challenges that continued to arise over the past three decades, Chanen acknowledged that Vaughn remained hopeful.
"He really has such a good attitude he's such a positive person," Chanen said.
Friday marked freedom for Vaughn, but not vindication. Chanen said they'll revisit clemency in four more years and added that the other defendants have open lawsuits in relation to the case.
They plan to explore possible actions to get Vaughn financial compensation with this conviction still on his record."
The entire story can be read at:
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/120008354894645705/4704913685758792985
———————————————————————————————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;
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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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