Decision Impacts all of Arkansas’ Wrongfully Convicted Seeking to Prove Innocence by Advanced DNA Testing
(Little Rock, AR-March 22, 2024) The Arkansas Supreme Court today reversed the lower court’s decision that had denied West Memphis 3s Damien Echols’ request to test crime scene evidence using advanced DNA technology. The decision asks the lower court to review its decision and allow for advanced DNA testing to give police detectives, prosecutors and legal advocates the opportunity to discover who the actual murderers are and clear Damien, Jessie Misskelley and Jason Baldwin.
For four years, Echols tried in vain to test remaining crime scene evidence, including the ligatures used to bind the three children as well as hairs found at the crime scene that were linked to one of the boy’s stepfather. The three 8-year-olds were found murdered and left in a drainage ditch in West Memphis, Arkansas, on May 5, 1993.
The legal battle to allow DNA testing using the latest state-of-the-can art M-Vac DNA technology made its way to the Arkansas Supreme Court after years of misleading and unnecessary delays by the Crittenden County prosecutor that prevented the West Memphis 3’s Damien Echols from conducting state-of-the-art DNA testing on the evidence in the murder of three children in 1993. Shockingly, in July 2022, West Memphis Judge Tonya Alexander ruled that Echols did not have the right to test forensic evidence. Essentially claiming that in order to test DNA in seeking innocence, the individual would have to be currently incarcerated.
Damien Echols said, We appreciate the ASC giving this ruling and hope we can now once and for all solve this case, clear our names and find the person responsible for carrying out these horrendous crimes. This is monumental. I’m grateful to my legal team and for everyone who has supported us through the years. After four more years of waiting for justice and the right to test DNA in my case, the Arkansas Court granted us the opportunity to seek justice and find the real killer (s) of three innocent children. Their decision also could provide scores of other wrongfully convicted Arkansans the ability to seek their innocence by offering them the right to test their DNA. It is tragic that at every turn, during the struggle to test crime scene evidence in this case, we were thwarted by local prosecutors, until now.”
In reversing the lower court’s decision, the justices interpreted the Arkansas Statute 16-112-202 to say what was intended law, “Except when direct appeal is available, a person convicted of a crime may make a motion for the performance of . . . DNA testing, or other tests which may become available through advances in technology to demonstrate the person’s actual innocence.”
Damien Echols filed an appeal to the Arkansas Supreme Court to reverse procedural determination of Judge Alexander and to remand the case back to the Circuit Court for a full hearing on the merits of Echols’ request for this new scientific testing using new technology to test certain evidence in the case for DNA results which might establish his innocence and identify the real killer(s
Whether it comes from the courts or the legislature, one thing is certain: there will be no justice in this case until the real murderers are held accountable and the WM3 are exonerated.
Background
After the discovery of new evidence, the three men were released in 2011, after 18 years in prison, and death row for Damien Echols. They were freed after agreeing to an Alford Plea in which they maintained their innocence but remained convicted killers. It was plea deal favorable to the state of Arkansas concerned that an innocence hearing would result in their exoneration.
“Thirteen years ago, I had no choice but to take an Alford plea to get off death row. I needed to fight for my innocence, and that of Jason and Jesse, outside of the prison walls. And that is why I sought to test the evidence in the case to exonerate us and lead to the real killer(s). Once we made inquiries to the West Memphis Police to turn over the evidence in the case for advanced testing, we were told that the evidence disappeared. While the state continues to fight that effort, we were hopeful that the Arkansas Supreme Court would recommend that the Circuit allow DNA testing. Not today,” Echols added.
At the time of the 2011 plea deal, Craighead County Prosecuting Attorney, now Judge, Scott Ellington agreed to evaluate any new evidence that might lead to others in the murder of the three children. In fact, in March 2020, Ellington agreed to allow DNA testing using the new M-Vac technology and contacted the West Memphis PD asking them to turn over crime scene evidence to the defendants. Almost immediately after the request was made and Echols had arranged for DNA laboratory to test the DNA, communication with authorities ceased. They went silent and Echols was forced to seek a court order.
After numerous legal motions filed over a three-year period to obtain the evidence in the murders, and reports from then Prosecutor Keith L. Chrestman and others that the evidence was destroyed, lost, or damaged, the State Court finally ordered the West Memphis Police to allow Echols’ attorney to review the state of the evidence in the case.
What they discovered was a very organized, catalogued, and intact body of evidence.
According to experts, the best possible chance of obtaining any usable DNA from this evidence is to use the M-Vac Wet Vacuum System – a system shown to be able to collect many times more DNA than swabbing. If it isn’t collected, it doesn’t matter how sensitive your test kits and instrumentation are. The M-Vac allows you to combine the most sensitive collection methods with the most sensitive testing methods for the best chance of getting a usable DNA profile.
Jason Baldwin said, “This was a great opportunity for West Memphis, the State of Arkansas, Pam Hicks, the Byers Family and the Moore Family to have definitive proof of who murdered their children. Justice demands all avenues be pursued to identify the murderer(s). From the beginning Jessie, Damien and Jason have cooperated to the best of their ability in the investigations of these murders not limited to providing DNA samples to the WMPD for comparison pre-trial. Pam Hicks and many others also cooperated in this fashion. We have all cooperated so that the identity of the murderer(s) can be discovered.”
Damien Echols is being represented by Stephen Braga, Bracewell LLP, Washington DC; Patrick Benca, Little Rock, Arkansas; and John Elrod and Kerri Kobberman, Conner and Winters, Fayetteville, Arkansas.
Amicus Curiae briefs were filed on behalf of Damien Echols by the Innocence Project,Vanessa Potkin and Mary-Kathryn Smith; the law firm of Barket Epstein, Martin Tankleff, Special Counsel; Perlmutter Center for Legal Justice at Cardozo Law School, Deputy Director Derrick Hamilton; the law firm of Bradley Arant Boult Cummings LLP; Taylor Law Parnters LLP; the Prison and Justice Initiative, Dr. Marc Howard and Dr. Amanda Lewis.