PASSAGE ONE OF THE DAY: After the verdict, Coleman retained attorney Kimberly Gordon as his post-conviction attorney. On August 25, 2022, the day before Coleman was scheduled to be sentenced, Gordon filed a motion for a new trial. The motion contended that the prosecution had failed to disclose exculpatory evidence and that Coleman’s trial defense attorney had provided ineffective assistance of counsel. The motion said that the prosecution had failed to disclose reports from Child Protective Services (CPS) showing that in the past, M.J.J.M. had accused two family members, including her father, of sexually assaulting her.
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PASSAGE TWO OF THE DAY: "The prosecution, the motion said, had failed to disclose that Deputy Yocom had been disciplined previously for making false representations in a search warrant application that resulted in the arrest of an innocent man."
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PASSAGE THREE OF THE DAY: "The motion also said the prosecution had allowed Schouten to testify falsely and made arguments to the jury that were not based on the evidence and misstated the evidence, in particular the argument that Coleman’s DNA was a “match.”
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PASSAGE FOUR OF THE DAY: "The motion included a declaration from Dr. Jennifer L’Hommedieu, an emergency physician for the Madigan Army Medical Center at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Pierce County, Washington. Stankus said she was prepared to testify about numerous inaccuracies and deficiencies in McLeod’s examination of M.M.J.M. and in McLeod’s testimony at the trial. (Heather McLeod, the SANE (Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner) who had examined M.J.J.M. at the hospital when the rape kit was taken, testified that she checked boxes for “no acute physical trauma observed.” McLeod also testified about the neurobiology of memory formation, the rates of delayed reporting by sexual assault victims, and the reasons for delayed reporting. McLeod also testified that she saw petechiae on M.J.J.M’s chest, which McLeod said confirmed M.J.J.M’s testimony that Coleman had choked her during the March 11, 2021 rape.")
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PASSAGE FIVE OF THE DAY: "In March 2023, the defense learned that the prosecution had failed to disclose that Dixon, the DNA analyst, had a prior conviction." "The judge rejected the prosecution argument that failing to disclose Dixon’s prior conviction would not have affected the case. “This was a ‘she said/he said’ case in which the DNA evidence, and the testimony of State’s DNA expert, was crucial,” Judge Lawler said. “This exculpatory evidence would have impacted all five counts, even those to which it did not directly apply. It was used to try to corroborate one of the complainant's allegations, thereby bolstering them all.” The judge said that a new trial was an “insufficient remedy” for the prosecution’s failure to disclose exculpatory evidence. “Here, exculpatory evidence was withheld throughout the entirety of the first trial, sentencing, and litigation of a motion for a new trial,” the judge said. “Evidence was withheld even as the parties litigated the Motion to Dismiss.”
------------------------------------------------
PASSAGE SIX OF THE DAY: "On September 18, 2026, Coleman filed a federal civil-rights lawsuit against Lewis County as well as Dixon, Schouten, Yocom, and other officers “Though the accusation was obviously false—[Coleman] had not raped a teenage girl—law enforcement officers elevated the false accusation into bogus criminal charges,” the lawsuit said. “In so doing, the Defendants wrote false documents, omitted materially exculpatory information, and suppressed evidence of Coleman’s innocence and other favorable information that would have undermined and completely precluded any prosecution.”
GIST: On March 12, 2021, a 16-year-old girl, identified as M.J.J.M., reported that she had been raped by her uncle, 39-year-old Jordan Coleman, in Pe Ell, Washington. She went to the hospital where she was examined by a Sexual Assault Nurse Examiner (SANE), and a rape kit was collected.
M.J.J.M. told a Lewis County sheriff’s deputy that she had been raped on March 11 in Coleman’s home and that he had raped her there on three other occasions in January 2021.
On March 14, 2021, Coleman was arrested. He was charged with one count of second-degree rape for the March 11 attack and four counts of third-degree rape for the other attacks.
Coleman denied raping M.J.J.M. He said that she had stayed with him occasionally when her parents were not getting along. Coleman said that he believed M.J.J.M. was seeking revenge because Coleman had been a witness for the prosecution in the summer of 2020 when 24-year-old Gene Anthony Carlos II was prosecuted for the statutory rape of M.J.J.M., who was then 15.
In September 2020, Carlos had been sentenced to nearly four years in prison. Coleman’s defense attorney, Thomas Keehan, learned that Coleman had caught M.J.J.M. and Carlos flirting, that Coleman had warned M.J.J.M. about having a relationship with Carlos, and that he had told Carlos about M.J.J.M.’s age and the illegality of any sexual relationship. Jordan had repeatedly helped M.J.J.M.’s parents find her when she ran away to be with Carlos. Coleman had caught M.J.J.M. sneaking out of Carlos’s house and had caught her using Coleman’s iPad to have clandestine communications with Carlos. Coleman’s efforts had led to the prosecution of Carlos after M.J.J.M. learned she was pregnant (she later had a miscarriage). Coleman had assisted law enforcement in their investigation by providing detailed interviews as well as screenshots of M.J.J.M.’s communications with Carlos.
Keehan prepared a report based on interviews with Coleman and family members and others that the defense contended showed that Coleman and M.J.J.M. were not in the same place at the same time during the month of January.
Subsequently, the Lewis County Prosecuting Attorney’s office amended the charges. Coleman remained charged with rape on March 11, 2021, but was charged with four counts of third-degree rape between October 28, 2020 and January 31, 2021.
The trial was scheduled to begin in Lewis County Superior Court on May 17, 2022. On May 12, Keehan and the Lewis County Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Joseph Bassetti appeared for a hearing to confirm that both sides were on track to go to trial. At that time, Bassetti presented a motion seeking to bar any evidence relating to the prosecution of Carlos under the rape shield law, which prohibits a defendant from introducing evidence of a complainant’s past sexual behavior.
Keehan would later concede that he was taken by surprise, and, because he had not done any research on the rape shield statute, he said he had no objection.
A jury was sworn in on May 17, 2022. During his opening statement, Bassetti told the jury that Coleman’s DNA “matched the DNA found in M.J.J.M.’s vagina and in her mouth.”
M.J.J.M. testified that Coleman had dragged her up the stairs of his house and raped her. She said that in the March 11, 2021 attack, he had ejaculated on her face and chest. She said that he kept her locked up in the house, and she could not leave.
Lewis County Sheriff’s Deputy Sam Schouten, who was the lead investigator on the case, was called to testify about the day that Coleman was arrested. During a hearing outside the presence of the jury, Schouten said, “I asked him if there was any truth to the allegation of sexual assault or any kind of sexual interaction. And his words were, ‘No, that’s disgusting. That’s my niece.’”
Schouten said, “And I said, ‘Okay. If there’s no truth to it, would there be’—I don’t remember the exact words, but it was ‘Would there be or why would there be your DNA—or would there be your DNA in her shorts or on her person—or in her clothes or on her person, something to that effect.’”
Coleman replied, “No. It’s disgusting. That’s my niece.”
Schouten said, “So at that point, I explained to Mr. Coleman I was going to ask for two things from him, a recorded statement and a voluntary buccal swab….[H]e asked what a buccal swab was, and I explained to him it’s a DNA swab of the inside of your mouth.”
Moments later, in front of the jury, Bassetti asked Schouten, “[D]id anyone tell [Coleman] or allude that his sperm or DNA was found anywhere prior to that?”
“No,” Schouten replied.
“Thank you,” Bassetti said. “Nothing further.”
Sheriff’s Deputy Andrew Yocom testified that he accompanied Schouten. In his report of the day Coleman was arrested, Yocom had written that at one point Coleman said that because M.J.J.M. had been in his house on multiple occasions, she would have had access to whatever was in the house, such as a “DNA bottle.” However, when Yocom testified, he said that Coleman called it a “sperm bottle,” and that it could have been the source of DNA on M.J.J.M.
Heather McLeod, the SANE who had examined M.J.J.M. at the hospital when the rape kit was taken, testified that she checked boxes for “no acute physical trauma observed.” McLeod also testified about the neurobiology of memory formation, the rates of delayed reporting by sexual assault victims, and the reasons for delayed reporting.
McLeod also testified that she saw petechiae on M.J.J.M’s chest, which McLeod said confirmed M.J.J.M’s testimony that Coleman had choked her during the March 11, 2021 rape.
Brad Dixon, a DNA analyst at the Washington State Police Crime Laboratory testified that prior to the trial, two rounds of DNA testing had been conducted. In the first report, dated April 14, 2021, Dixon stated that no male DNA was found in the swabs of M.J.J.M.’s vagina, mouth and breast. Dixon reported finding DNA from an unidentified third person—neither M.J.J.M. nor Coleman.
Dixon said Bassetti asked him to conduct a further microscopic analysis of swabs taken outside of the vagina and outside of M.J.J.M.’s mouth. In June 2021, Dixon reported finding a single sperm. He said that based on the finding of one sperm, he ran the data through STRmix, software that employs biological modeling and mathematical calculations to assign probabilities to the likelihood that a specific individual’s DNA profile is, or is not, included in a DNA mixture.
Dixon said the software program generated a response that suggested “very strong support” for Coleman’s “inclusion” as a “possible” source of the DNA.
Dixon said the DNA samples were subject to a differential DNA testing process that attempted to separate sperm cell fraction DNA from non-sperm cell fraction DNA, which comes from saliva, skin, or hair. He said the process was not completely efficient. Sometimes cells from non-sperm material still stay in the mixture that purports to be only cells from sperm.
Coleman testified and denied committing the crimes.
During closing argument, Bassetti told the jury that Dixon had testified that “the swabs that match DNA of Jordan Coleman were sperm fractions and they were present both on the perioral, meaning the mouth area swabs, and the vulvar, meaning the outer vaginal swabs of [M.J.J.M.].”
On May 23, 2022, the jury convicted Coleman of one count of second-degree rape and four counts of third-degree rape.
After the verdict, Coleman retained attorney Kimberly Gordon as his post-conviction attorney. On August 25, 2022, the day before Coleman was scheduled to be sentenced, Gordon filed a motion for a new trial.
The motion contended that the prosecution had failed to disclose exculpatory evidence and that Coleman’s trial defense attorney had provided ineffective assistance of counsel.
The motion said that the prosecution had failed to disclose reports from Child Protective Services (CPS) showing that in the past, M.J.J.M. had accused two family members, including her father, of sexually assaulting her. Moreover, the prosecution had failed to disclose that the day after M.J.J.M. reported she had been raped by Coleman, her mother said M.J.J.M. “seemed good” and that M.J.J.M. was “heartbroken” when Carlos was sentenced to prison.
The prosecution, the motion said, had failed to disclose that Deputy Yocom had been disciplined previously for making false representations in a search warrant application that resulted in the arrest of an innocent man.
Other withheld records included an email written by Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Karin Phomma who was the prosecutor assigned to the Carlos statutory rape case. Phomma also was a co-prosecutor of Coleman. The email said that even after Carlos was arrested for statutory rape of M.J.J.M., her attachment to Carlos remained strong. The email showed that M.J.J.M. repeatedly ran away from home and initiated contact with Carlos. In fact, her ongoing contact with Carlos had led to the revocation of his pretrial release. In another email, Phomma had written that M.J.J.M. was unhappy with the prosecution of Carlos and wanted “leniency” for him.
The motion also said the prosecution had allowed Schouten to testify falsely and made arguments to the jury that were not based on the evidence and misstated the evidence, in particular the argument that Coleman’s DNA was a “match.”
In addition, the motion said that the prosecution had stressed that M.J.J.M. had no motive to falsely accuse Coleman, despite the evidence about Coleman’s involvement in the prosecution of Carlos that had been excluded by the trial judge.
The motion said that Keehan, Coleman’s trial attorney, had failed to obtain home security video footage and telephone records that could have contradicted M.J.J.M.’s account. The motion said that Keehan had failed to obtain M.J.J.M.’s social media records.
“The records would have demonstrated that M.J.J.M. lied about her social media handles, lied about her use of social media, and hid alarmingly relevant posts that would have been consistent with the defense theory that M.J.J.M. fabricated the allegations out of revenge,” the motion said. “The records would also have been relevant to impeach M.J.J.M…. in this ‘she said/he said’ scenario that involved no other corroborating witnesses.”
Keehan had failed to subpoena CPS records and had failed to oppose the prosecution motion to preclude the evidence of the prosecution of Carlos based on the rape shield law. “The rape shield law cannot be used to exclude relevant evidence,” the motion said.
Had Keehan investigated Coleman’s home, he would have discovered that all the doors have locks that can be manually opened from the inside, contradicting M.J.J.M.’s claim that she was kept locked in the house.
The motion included a declaration from Dr. Jennifer L’Hommedieu, an emergency physician for the Madigan Army Medical Center at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Pierce County, Washington. Stankus said she was prepared to testify about numerous inaccuracies and deficiencies in McLeod’s examination of M.M.J.M. and in McLeod’s testimony at the trial.
The following day, Superior Court Judge James Lawler sentenced Coleman to an indeterminate sentence of up to 23 years and four months in prison. Judge Lawler ordered that Coleman be kept in the Lewis County Jail pending a resolution of the motion for a new trial.
In March 2023, the defense learned that the prosecution had failed to disclose that Dixon, the DNA analyst, had a prior conviction.
On March 27, 2023, the prosecution conceded that Coleman should get a new trial, and his convictions were vacated. Coleman was released to home confinement on March 28, 2023. The retrial was scheduled for September 11, 2023.
On August 28, 2023, Gordon filed a motion to dismiss the case, arguing that the prosecution had continued to withhold exculpatory evidence despite agreeing to a new trial.
On September 20, 2023, Judge Lawler granted the motion and dismissed the case.
“Altogether, the withheld evidence would have assisted the defense in challenging the testimony of nearly every State’s witness,” Judge Lawler said. “This includes the complainant, her mother, the Lewis County Sheriff’s Deputy responsible for investigating and referring the case for prosecution, the Lewis County Sheriff’s Deputy [Yocom], the nurse that examined the complainant, and the Washington State Patrol Crime Laboratory Analyst that served as the State's DNA expert.”
The judge noted that the Carlos prosecution was “on going. As such, exculpatory evidence continued to be created after Mr. Coleman was granted a new trial. The Court finds that, as new records were created, the State also withheld some of these from the defense. The State did so, despite telling the defense that all the records would be provided. The State continued to withhold some records even as it told this Court ‘there have been missteps by the State in this case that have been corrected and are sure to never be repeated[.]’”
The judge rejected the prosecution argument that failing to disclose Dixon’s prior conviction would not have affected the case. “This was a ‘she said/he said’ case in which the DNA evidence, and the testimony of State’s DNA expert, was crucial,” Judge Lawler said. “This exculpatory evidence would have impacted all five counts, even those to which it did not directly apply. It was used to try to corroborate one of the complainant's allegations, thereby bolstering them all.”
The judge said that a new trial was an “insufficient remedy” for the prosecution’s failure to disclose exculpatory evidence.
“Here, exculpatory evidence was withheld throughout the entirety of the first trial, sentencing, and litigation of a motion for a new trial,” the judge said. “Evidence was withheld even as the parties litigated the Motion to Dismiss.”
On September 18, 2026, Coleman filed a federal civil-rights lawsuit against Lewis County as well as Dixon, Schouten, Yocom, and other officers.
“Though the accusation was obviously false—[Coleman] had not raped a teenage girl—law enforcement officers elevated the false accusation into bogus criminal charges,” the lawsuit said. “In so doing, the Defendants wrote false documents, omitted materially exculpatory information, and suppressed evidence of Coleman’s innocence and other favorable information that would have undermined and completely precluded any prosecution.”
The entire post can be read at:
https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/20452
M.J.J.M. told a Lewis County sheriff’s deputy that she had been raped on March 11 in Coleman’s home and that he had raped her there on three other occasions in January 2021.
On March 14, 2021, Coleman was arrested. He was charged with one count of second-degree rape for the March 11 attack and four counts of third-degree rape for the other attacks.
Coleman denied raping M.J.J.M. He said that she had stayed with him occasionally when her parents were not getting along. Coleman said that he believed M.J.J.M. was seeking revenge because Coleman had been a witness for the prosecution in the summer of 2020 when 24-year-old Gene Anthony Carlos II was prosecuted for the statutory rape of M.J.J.M., who was then 15.
In September 2020, Carlos had been sentenced to nearly four years in prison. Coleman’s defense attorney, Thomas Keehan, learned that Coleman had caught M.J.J.M. and Carlos flirting, that Coleman had warned M.J.J.M. about having a relationship with Carlos, and that he had told Carlos about M.J.J.M.’s age and the illegality of any sexual relationship. Jordan had repeatedly helped M.J.J.M.’s parents find her when she ran away to be with Carlos. Coleman had caught M.J.J.M. sneaking out of Carlos’s house and had caught her using Coleman’s iPad to have clandestine communications with Carlos. Coleman’s efforts had led to the prosecution of Carlos after M.J.J.M. learned she was pregnant (she later had a miscarriage). Coleman had assisted law enforcement in their investigation by providing detailed interviews as well as screenshots of M.J.J.M.’s communications with Carlos.
Keehan prepared a report based on interviews with Coleman and family members and others that the defense contended showed that Coleman and M.J.J.M. were not in the same place at the same time during the month of January.
Subsequently, the Lewis County Prosecuting Attorney’s office amended the charges. Coleman remained charged with rape on March 11, 2021, but was charged with four counts of third-degree rape between October 28, 2020 and January 31, 2021.
The trial was scheduled to begin in Lewis County Superior Court on May 17, 2022. On May 12, Keehan and the Lewis County Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Joseph Bassetti appeared for a hearing to confirm that both sides were on track to go to trial. At that time, Bassetti presented a motion seeking to bar any evidence relating to the prosecution of Carlos under the rape shield law, which prohibits a defendant from introducing evidence of a complainant’s past sexual behavior.
Keehan would later concede that he was taken by surprise, and, because he had not done any research on the rape shield statute, he said he had no objection.
A jury was sworn in on May 17, 2022. During his opening statement, Bassetti told the jury that Coleman’s DNA “matched the DNA found in M.J.J.M.’s vagina and in her mouth.”
M.J.J.M. testified that Coleman had dragged her up the stairs of his house and raped her. She said that in the March 11, 2021 attack, he had ejaculated on her face and chest. She said that he kept her locked up in the house, and she could not leave.
Lewis County Sheriff’s Deputy Sam Schouten, who was the lead investigator on the case, was called to testify about the day that Coleman was arrested. During a hearing outside the presence of the jury, Schouten said, “I asked him if there was any truth to the allegation of sexual assault or any kind of sexual interaction. And his words were, ‘No, that’s disgusting. That’s my niece.’”
Schouten said, “And I said, ‘Okay. If there’s no truth to it, would there be’—I don’t remember the exact words, but it was ‘Would there be or why would there be your DNA—or would there be your DNA in her shorts or on her person—or in her clothes or on her person, something to that effect.’”
Coleman replied, “No. It’s disgusting. That’s my niece.”
Schouten said, “So at that point, I explained to Mr. Coleman I was going to ask for two things from him, a recorded statement and a voluntary buccal swab….[H]e asked what a buccal swab was, and I explained to him it’s a DNA swab of the inside of your mouth.”
Moments later, in front of the jury, Bassetti asked Schouten, “[D]id anyone tell [Coleman] or allude that his sperm or DNA was found anywhere prior to that?”
“No,” Schouten replied.
“Thank you,” Bassetti said. “Nothing further.”
Sheriff’s Deputy Andrew Yocom testified that he accompanied Schouten. In his report of the day Coleman was arrested, Yocom had written that at one point Coleman said that because M.J.J.M. had been in his house on multiple occasions, she would have had access to whatever was in the house, such as a “DNA bottle.” However, when Yocom testified, he said that Coleman called it a “sperm bottle,” and that it could have been the source of DNA on M.J.J.M.
Heather McLeod, the SANE who had examined M.J.J.M. at the hospital when the rape kit was taken, testified that she checked boxes for “no acute physical trauma observed.” McLeod also testified about the neurobiology of memory formation, the rates of delayed reporting by sexual assault victims, and the reasons for delayed reporting.
McLeod also testified that she saw petechiae on M.J.J.M’s chest, which McLeod said confirmed M.J.J.M’s testimony that Coleman had choked her during the March 11, 2021 rape.
Brad Dixon, a DNA analyst at the Washington State Police Crime Laboratory testified that prior to the trial, two rounds of DNA testing had been conducted. In the first report, dated April 14, 2021, Dixon stated that no male DNA was found in the swabs of M.J.J.M.’s vagina, mouth and breast. Dixon reported finding DNA from an unidentified third person—neither M.J.J.M. nor Coleman.
Dixon said Bassetti asked him to conduct a further microscopic analysis of swabs taken outside of the vagina and outside of M.J.J.M.’s mouth. In June 2021, Dixon reported finding a single sperm. He said that based on the finding of one sperm, he ran the data through STRmix, software that employs biological modeling and mathematical calculations to assign probabilities to the likelihood that a specific individual’s DNA profile is, or is not, included in a DNA mixture.
Dixon said the software program generated a response that suggested “very strong support” for Coleman’s “inclusion” as a “possible” source of the DNA.
Dixon said the DNA samples were subject to a differential DNA testing process that attempted to separate sperm cell fraction DNA from non-sperm cell fraction DNA, which comes from saliva, skin, or hair. He said the process was not completely efficient. Sometimes cells from non-sperm material still stay in the mixture that purports to be only cells from sperm.
Coleman testified and denied committing the crimes.
During closing argument, Bassetti told the jury that Dixon had testified that “the swabs that match DNA of Jordan Coleman were sperm fractions and they were present both on the perioral, meaning the mouth area swabs, and the vulvar, meaning the outer vaginal swabs of [M.J.J.M.].”
On May 23, 2022, the jury convicted Coleman of one count of second-degree rape and four counts of third-degree rape.
After the verdict, Coleman retained attorney Kimberly Gordon as his post-conviction attorney. On August 25, 2022, the day before Coleman was scheduled to be sentenced, Gordon filed a motion for a new trial.
The motion contended that the prosecution had failed to disclose exculpatory evidence and that Coleman’s trial defense attorney had provided ineffective assistance of counsel.
The motion said that the prosecution had failed to disclose reports from Child Protective Services (CPS) showing that in the past, M.J.J.M. had accused two family members, including her father, of sexually assaulting her. Moreover, the prosecution had failed to disclose that the day after M.J.J.M. reported she had been raped by Coleman, her mother said M.J.J.M. “seemed good” and that M.J.J.M. was “heartbroken” when Carlos was sentenced to prison.
The prosecution, the motion said, had failed to disclose that Deputy Yocom had been disciplined previously for making false representations in a search warrant application that resulted in the arrest of an innocent man.
Other withheld records included an email written by Deputy Prosecuting Attorney Karin Phomma who was the prosecutor assigned to the Carlos statutory rape case. Phomma also was a co-prosecutor of Coleman. The email said that even after Carlos was arrested for statutory rape of M.J.J.M., her attachment to Carlos remained strong. The email showed that M.J.J.M. repeatedly ran away from home and initiated contact with Carlos. In fact, her ongoing contact with Carlos had led to the revocation of his pretrial release. In another email, Phomma had written that M.J.J.M. was unhappy with the prosecution of Carlos and wanted “leniency” for him.
The motion also said the prosecution had allowed Schouten to testify falsely and made arguments to the jury that were not based on the evidence and misstated the evidence, in particular the argument that Coleman’s DNA was a “match.”
In addition, the motion said that the prosecution had stressed that M.J.J.M. had no motive to falsely accuse Coleman, despite the evidence about Coleman’s involvement in the prosecution of Carlos that had been excluded by the trial judge.
The motion said that Keehan, Coleman’s trial attorney, had failed to obtain home security video footage and telephone records that could have contradicted M.J.J.M.’s account. The motion said that Keehan had failed to obtain M.J.J.M.’s social media records.
“The records would have demonstrated that M.J.J.M. lied about her social media handles, lied about her use of social media, and hid alarmingly relevant posts that would have been consistent with the defense theory that M.J.J.M. fabricated the allegations out of revenge,” the motion said. “The records would also have been relevant to impeach M.J.J.M…. in this ‘she said/he said’ scenario that involved no other corroborating witnesses.”
Keehan had failed to subpoena CPS records and had failed to oppose the prosecution motion to preclude the evidence of the prosecution of Carlos based on the rape shield law. “The rape shield law cannot be used to exclude relevant evidence,” the motion said.
Had Keehan investigated Coleman’s home, he would have discovered that all the doors have locks that can be manually opened from the inside, contradicting M.J.J.M.’s claim that she was kept locked in the house.
The motion included a declaration from Dr. Jennifer L’Hommedieu, an emergency physician for the Madigan Army Medical Center at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Pierce County, Washington. Stankus said she was prepared to testify about numerous inaccuracies and deficiencies in McLeod’s examination of M.M.J.M. and in McLeod’s testimony at the trial.
The following day, Superior Court Judge James Lawler sentenced Coleman to an indeterminate sentence of up to 23 years and four months in prison. Judge Lawler ordered that Coleman be kept in the Lewis County Jail pending a resolution of the motion for a new trial.
In March 2023, the defense learned that the prosecution had failed to disclose that Dixon, the DNA analyst, had a prior conviction.
On March 27, 2023, the prosecution conceded that Coleman should get a new trial, and his convictions were vacated. Coleman was released to home confinement on March 28, 2023. The retrial was scheduled for September 11, 2023.
On August 28, 2023, Gordon filed a motion to dismiss the case, arguing that the prosecution had continued to withhold exculpatory evidence despite agreeing to a new trial.
On September 20, 2023, Judge Lawler granted the motion and dismissed the case.
“Altogether, the withheld evidence would have assisted the defense in challenging the testimony of nearly every State’s witness,” Judge Lawler said. “This includes the complainant, her mother, the Lewis County Sheriff’s Deputy responsible for investigating and referring the case for prosecution, the Lewis County Sheriff’s Deputy [Yocom], the nurse that examined the complainant, and the Washington State Patrol Crime Laboratory Analyst that served as the State's DNA expert.”
The judge noted that the Carlos prosecution was “on going. As such, exculpatory evidence continued to be created after Mr. Coleman was granted a new trial. The Court finds that, as new records were created, the State also withheld some of these from the defense. The State did so, despite telling the defense that all the records would be provided. The State continued to withhold some records even as it told this Court ‘there have been missteps by the State in this case that have been corrected and are sure to never be repeated[.]’”
The judge rejected the prosecution argument that failing to disclose Dixon’s prior conviction would not have affected the case. “This was a ‘she said/he said’ case in which the DNA evidence, and the testimony of State’s DNA expert, was crucial,” Judge Lawler said. “This exculpatory evidence would have impacted all five counts, even those to which it did not directly apply. It was used to try to corroborate one of the complainant's allegations, thereby bolstering them all.”
The judge said that a new trial was an “insufficient remedy” for the prosecution’s failure to disclose exculpatory evidence.
“Here, exculpatory evidence was withheld throughout the entirety of the first trial, sentencing, and litigation of a motion for a new trial,” the judge said. “Evidence was withheld even as the parties litigated the Motion to Dismiss.”
On September 18, 2026, Coleman filed a federal civil-rights lawsuit against Lewis County as well as Dixon, Schouten, Yocom, and other officers.
“Though the accusation was obviously false—[Coleman] had not raped a teenage girl—law enforcement officers elevated the false accusation into bogus criminal charges,” the lawsuit said. “In so doing, the Defendants wrote false documents, omitted materially exculpatory information, and suppressed evidence of Coleman’s innocence and other favorable information that would have undermined and completely precluded any prosecution.”
The entire post can be read at:
https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/20452
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. 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. 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;
