Location

Defendant(s)

Date of Alleged Crime

Frances Elaine Newton was sentenced to death for the of murders of her husband and two children.  The husband, Adrian Newton, was found shot to death in the family's apartment along with the couple's two children, Alton, 7, and Farrah, 1.  The apartment was located at 6126 West Mount Houston Road, Houston, Texas.  Less than a month before the murders, Frances purchased a $50,000 life insurance policy on Adrian and forged his name to complete the deal.  She also purchased a separate $50,000 policy on Farrah.  At the time of the murders both Frances and Adrian were seeing other people.

Read More by Clicking Here

Richard Wayne Jones was convicted of the abduction and murder of Tammy Livingston.  Around 7:30 p.m. on Feb. 19, 1986 witnesses Ruthie Amato and her two daughters watched as Livingston was abducted from a Michael's store parking lot in Hurst, Texas.  Between 9:20 p.m. and 9:45 p.m. the same night, a witness named Robert Speights heard screams coming from a field at 4600 Randol Mill Road in Fort Worth.  At 11:20 p.m. a fire was reported in the field.  When police responded they found Livingston's body.  She had been stabbed 19 times.

Read More by Clicking Here

Kia Levoy Johnson was sentenced to death for the shooting murder of William Matthew Rains.  Rains, a store clerk was shot during a 2:45 a.m. robbery of a Stop 'N Go convenience store at 3309 Hillcrest Dr. in Balcones Heights, Texas.  The assailant was unable to open the cash register and took it with him.  The details of the crime were captured on video by a store security camera.

Read More by Clicking Here

Byron Christopher Case was convicted of the murder of 18-year-old Anastasia WitbolsFeugen.  He was sentenced to life imprisonment without parole.  On the night of her murder, Anastasia had been with her boyfriend, Justin Bruton, 18, and another couple, Byron Case, 18, and Kelly Moffett, 15.  The four had met at around 8:30 p.m.  According to Byron and Kelly, Anastasia was angry at being picked up three hours late, got into an argument with Justin, and soon left the vehicle at a stoplight.  Anastasia was found shot dead at 3:45 a.m. that night in a nearby cemetery.  The cemetery was adjacent to a presumably bad neighborhood that contained adult book stores.  Justin never talked to the police and less than 48 hours later, he was found shot dead 30 miles away from a self-inflicted gunshot blast to the head.

Read More by Clicking Here

Davis Losada, Jose “Joe” Cardenas, and Jesus “Jesse” Romero were convicted of the rape and murder of 15-year-old Olga Lydia Perales.  Losada and Romero were sentenced to death while Cardenas was given life imprisonment.  Perales had been found Dec. 24, 1984 in the brush on the outskirts of San Benito, Texas.  She had been bludgeoned 10 to 20 times about the head and shoulders and stabbed twice in the chest after her death.   Two weeks later on Jan. 8, Rafael Levya, Jr., age 16, told his probation officer he knew who killed Perales.  Leyra initially stated he had only seen the murder, but he would eventually admit involvement.

Read More by Clicking Here

Robert Nelson Drew was convicted of the murder of 17-year-old Jeffrey Mays.  In Feb. 1983, Mays went traveling with his high school friend, Bee Landrum, in Landrum's 1973 Maverick.  Both were runaways with alcohol and drug problems.  While traveling, the two picked up numerous hitchhikers along the way to obtain gas money.  In Lafayette, LA they picked up Drew, then 23, and a man named Frank.  Mays and Landrum agreed to drive the men thirty miles east to Franklin, LA.  Drew assumed driving duty within 4 blocks of his pick-up point, but got stuck in the mud while crossing a highway median to make a U-turn.  In Franklin, Frank bought pizza and beer for everyone, filled Landrum's car with gas, and gave Drew $65.  Mays and Landrum agreed to take Drew to Houston in exchange for more gas money.

Read More by Clicking Here

“Police in Goshen, Indiana persuaded Edgar Garrett that he killed his daughter, Michelle, who had mysteriously disappeared.  During fourteen hours of interrogation, Edgar Garrett gave an increasingly detailed confession describing how he murdered his daughter, whose body had not yet been found.  No independent evidence linked him to the crime or corroborated his confession.  At the same time, his post-admission narrative contradicted all the major facts in the case.  Edgar Garrett confessed to walking into a park with his daughter through new-fallen snow, bludgeoning her with an axe handle at a river's edge, and dumping her body in the river.  However, the police officer who arrived first at the crime scene did not see footprints in the snow-covered field at the entry to the park but, instead, saw tire tracks entering the park, bloody drag marks leading from the tire tracks to the river's edge, and a single set of footprints going to and returning from the river.  Obviously, someone had unloaded Michelle Garrett's body from a vehicle and dragged it to the river, but Edgar Garrett did not own a car and no evidence was ever developed that he had access to one that day.  Michelle Garrett's coat was recovered from the river separately from her body and had no punctures, suggesting that she had been killed indoors and transported to the river bank.”

“Edgar Garrett's confession regurgitated the theory the police held at the time of the interrogation: that his daughter had been clubbed to death.  Weeks later, when Michelle Garrett's body was recovered, police learned that she had been stabbed thirty-four times; that her body showed no evidence of significant head trauma; and that the axe handle Edgar Garrett confessed to club her with showed no traces of her hair or blood.  At trial, the jury acquitted Edgar Garrett.”  – Leo & Ofshe

Robert Hernandez was convicted in 2009 of child abuse charges against a 6-year-old girl and sentenced to 31 years in prison.  Hernandez lived with his girlfriend Tamara Denetclaw.  The alleged victim was Denetclaw's cousin whom the couple had been raising since the child was 2.  The couple raised the child because her mother lived on the streets and couldn't take care of her.  The mother was also legally married to a registered sex offender and there are two registered sex offenders on her side of the family.  When the child was 6 the mother decided she wanted her back.  Since Hernandez and Denetclaw did not have custody, they had to comply.  Many weeks later the mother brought back the child back saying she couldn't take care of her.

At an interview at the Kids Center, a child abuse organization, the child reportedly gave a taped statement that she was abused.  The Center sent the child home with Hernandez.  They later claimed they did not know what else to do.  The Center also told the child's mother what was said, but never mentioned Hernandez.  They later claimed that they did not tell her Hernandez was the abuser because they were afraid the mother would beat Hernandez up.

The Kids Center told the mother they taped a medical evaluation of her child.  They had her sign a paper saying they would not use their child's statement for teaching purposes and that the reason they taped her child was so that her child would not have to testify in court.  However, at Hernandez's trial, the Kids Center claimed that they did not tape the child; that it is not their policy to tape medical evaluations; and that they took notes.  But when asked to see the notes, they said they did not keep them; they shredded them.  The child testified for two days, but never mentioned Hernandez.

The medical examiner said he could not diagnose or confirm any abuse.  Hernandez gave a confession to the alleged charges which he contends was coerced.  A psychologist testified that Hernandez tested in the 95 percentile of being a person who says what people want to hear.  The psychologist was the only trial witness the defense was allowed to call.  The District Attorney, Mike Dugan, was one of the founders of the Kids Center.  Dugan was voted out of office in 2010 and the new DA fired the original prosecutor in the case.  (Source: Relative of Hernandez)  [2/11]

Sheila Bowler was convicted of murdering her late husband's 89-year-old aunt, Florence Jackson.  While Bowler was driving Jackson one night, a tire on her car became deflated and Bowler stopped on Route A259 near Station Road in Winchelsea.  She left Jackson in the car and went to seek help.  She knocked on the door of a residence and met a Mr. Soan, who she vaguely knew, and used his telephone to call for roadside assistance.  When she came back to her car with Mr. and Mrs. Soan, Jackson was missing.  In the search for Jackson that followed, Bowler told others not to look far away, as she did not think Jackson was mobile enough to have wandered very far.  Jackson's body was found the next day 600 yards away in the River Brede.  She had drowned.

Read More by Clicking Here

Maurice Carter was convicted of the attempted murder of Thomas Schadler, an off-duty Benton Harbor police officer.  Schadler was shopping with his wife at the Harbor Wig and Record Shop on East Main Street in Benton Harbor when a man suddenly and without provocation pulled a .22-caliber pistol and shot him six times.  There were twelve eyewitnesses to the crime.

Read More by Clicking Here

“Yusef Abdullahi, Tony Paris, and Stephen Miller [were dubbed by the media as] the Cardiff Three.  Twenty-year-old prostitute Lynette White was murdered on Valentine's Day in 1988 by being stabbed more than 50 times.  Stephen Miller was the boyfriend and pimp of Ms. White.  Miller was coerced into falsely confessing to the murder of Ms. White after 13 continuous hours of being shouted at and threatened by police interrogators.  His false confession implicated his two codefendants who were likewise innocent.  Once he confessed, the police stopped investigating promising leads that may have led to the killer.  The three men were convicted in 1990 and sentence to life in prison.  The convictions of all three codefendants were quashed by England's Court of Appeal in 1992 and they were released after 4 years in custody.”

“Six years after their release journalist Satish Sekar, who had aided in the release of the men, published a book about the case -- ‘Fitted In - The Cardiff Three and the Lynette White Inquiry.’  As a result of the information in the book Ms. White's murder case was re-opened in June 1999.  In 2003 DNA testing of crime scene evidence identified Jeffrey Gafoor [as] Ms. White's murderer.  Gafoor was one of Ms. White's clients.  He pled guilty to her murder in 2003 and was sentenced to life in prison.  In December 2008 three witnesses who gave false evidence at the trial of the Cardiff Three were jailed for 18 months after pleading guilty to perjury.  In March 2009 two more witnesses at the trial were charged with perjury, and 13 police officers involved in the original investigation of the murder were charged with perverting the course of justice for their actions that amounted to framing the three innocent men for the crime.” – FJDB  (Innocent)

San Mateo County, CA

George Franklin

Sept 22, 1969

“In January 1989, Eileen Franklin-Lipsker was playing with her young daughter, Jessica, and as the child turned toward her, a memory of another girl in just such a pose sprang into Franklin-Lipsker's mind. The memory was of her childhood best friend, eight-year-old Susan Nason, being raped and killed by Franklin-Lipsker's father nearly 20 years earlier.”

Read More by Clicking Here

Steven Barnes was convicted in 1989 of the rape, sodomy, and murder of 16-year-old Kimberly Simon.  Barnes was identified near his pickup truck about 6 p.m. on Sept. 18, 1985.  The truck was parked adjacent to Mohawk St. in Whitesboro, NY.  Simon was seen walking along Mohawk St. and was also seen in a pickup truck which was about to enter Mohawk St.  No witness could say with certainty that Barnes and Simon were together, nor could any witness say Barnes had ever met Simon.  The following day Simon's dead body was found near a gravel pit off of Mohawk St.

Forensic testing revealed that hairs found in Barnes's truck were similar to those of Simon, soil samples from his truck were similar to those taken from the place where her body was found, and an imprint in dirt, lifted from the fender of Barnes's truck, was consistent with the fabric of the jeans worn by Simon at the time of her death.  Additionally, Robert Stolo, an inmate at the Oneida County Jail, contended Barnes made an admission of guilt him.  According to Stolo, when he, Barnes, and another inmate were discussing “some girls,” Barnes said, “You mean the one I killed” and then said “I mean the one I am accused of killing.”  Barnes was exonerated of the crime in 2009 after DNA tests proved his innocence.  (People v. Barnes) (IP)  [2/11]

Robert Justin Kaupp was convicted of murder and sentenced to 55 years of imprisonment.  On Jan. 13, 1999, 14-year-old Destiny Thetford disappeared from her home in suburban Houston.  Kaupp, 17, was a close friend of Nicholas Thetford, Destiny's 19-year-old half-brother.  Kaupp went with the family to report Destiny missing.  He later helped pass out flyers in the neighborhood and joined in searches for her.

Police later learned that Nicholas had a sexual relationship with his half-sister and he and Kaupp were together on the day Destiny disappeared.  On Jan. 26, police questioned Kaupp and gave him a lie detector test which he passed.  Kaupp was cooperative and police let him go.  Nicholas was also questioned and given lie detector tests, which he failed three times.  Eventually Nicholas told police that he was angry that Destiny ended their relationship and that he stabbed her to death and placed her body in a drainage ditch.  He also implicated Kaupp in the stabbing and the hiding of the body.

Police did not seek to obtain a formal arrest warrant for Kaupp, as they did not believe that they had probable cause for one.  Instead, using Nicholas's statements as evidence, they sought a pocket arrest warrant from the district attorney's office, but it was denied.  Nevertheless, police behaved as though they had a warrant and six police cars arrived at Kaupp's home at 3 a.m. on Jan. 27.  After Kaupp's father allowed officers entry, they awoke Kaupp with a flashlight.  A detective identified himself and told Kaupp, “We need to go and talk.”  To which Kaupp replied, “Okay.”  Police then placed handcuffs on Kaupp and led him, shoeless and dressed only in boxer shorts and a T-shirt, out of his house and into a patrol car.  No evidence indicated that Kaupp was told that he was free to decline to go with the officers.

At the police station Kaupp denied any involvement in the victim's disappearance, but 10 or 15 minutes into his interrogation, after being told of the brother's confession, he admitted having some part in the crime.  He did not, however, acknowledge causing the fatal wound or confess to murder, for which he was later indicted.

In 2003 the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that Kaupp's confession had been coerced as it was the product of an illegal arrest.  A Texas Court of Appeals then overturned his conviction.  Since his alleged confession could not be used against him at a retrial, the charges against Kaupp were dropped.  [2/11]

“In 1974, Chol Soo Lee was convicted of the first degree murder of Yip Yee Tak with the use of a firearm and was sentenced to life in prison.  The case was tried in Sacramento after a change of venue from San Francisco.  Prosecutors relied on two eyewitnesses who saw the murder, which took place on a Chinatown street corner in San Francisco on June 3, 1973, and on the testimony of a third witness who saw someone fleeing the scene just after the shooting.  After suggestive procedures were used by police and prosecutors, including hypnotizing one witness, all three witnesses identified Lee in a police line-up.  Based on this eyewitness testimony, Lee was convicted.”

“In 1977, writer K.W. Lee wrote a series of articles that cast doubt on the validity of Lee’s conviction.  The articles garnered significant media coverage of the case and generated a community movement in support of Chol Soo Lee.”

“In October 1977, Lee was charged in San Joaquin County Superior Court with the first degree murder of fellow prisoner, Morrison Needham, which occurred during a prison brawl.  The 1974 murder conviction was alleged as a special circumstance making Lee eligible for the death penalty.  He was convicted and sentenced to death.  Lee maintained that he committed the prison killing in self-defense.”

“In 1978, the Sacramento Superior Court agreed to review the 1974 murder conviction.  At this hearing, lawyers for Lee revealed that an additional witness, Steven Morris, had come forward the day after the shooting and told police that he had seen the murder and that Lee was not the assailant.  The court ruled that this crucial evidence had been withheld from the defense, and overturned Lee’s conviction.  In 1980, the Court of Appeals of California for the 3rd Appellate District affirmed the lower court’s decision.”

“In 1982, Lee was retried for the murder of Tak and was acquitted.  In 1983, the Court of Appeals for the 3rd Appellate District reversed Lee’s conviction and death sentence for the prison murder, citing false testimony of a prison informant and improper jury instructions that were given during the penalty phase of the trial.  Two months later, San Joaquin County Superior Court Judge Peter Seires ordered Lee released.  Prosecutors then moved to retry Lee on the prison killing charge.  Chol Soo Lee, who had served nearly ten years in prison, agreed to plea to a significantly lesser charge that gave him credit for the time served and he was freed from prison.” – DP Focus 

“Before any evidence was heard, many Americans believed that Huey P. Newton, co-founder and ‘minister of defense’ of the Black Panther Party, had murdered a police officer in cold blood.  Others were equally certain that the charge was a trumped-up attempt to crush the militant Black Panther Party.”

Read More by Clicking Here

“[Larry Boone and Arthur Cleveland were] convicted of murder in Bronx County on December 6, 1973.  [Boone's] conviction was reversed on July 15, 1975, because the prosecutor had failed to disclose crucial exculpatory evidence.  On remand, the trial court dismissed all charges because the detective’s notes had been lost and because witnesses favorable to the defense (whose identities were not revealed by the government at the time of trial) were no longer available, and because there was no proof of Boone’s criminal intent other than his mere presence at the scene.  The Court of Claims granted Boone summary judgment on his wrongful imprisonment compensation claim.  He had been sentenced to twenty-five years to life in prison, and had served nearly two years before being released.”

“[Cleveland] was sentenced to twenty years to life in prison.  His conviction was reversed in 1975 on the authority of People v. Boone, on the grounds that the prosecutor had unconstitutionally failed to disclose crucial exculpatory evidence.  The trial court on remand dismissed all charges.  Cleveland had been imprisoned for four and one-half years.” – Inevitable Error  (People v. Boone) (People v. Cleveland)

“Bryan Blake was convicted of second-degree murder in New York County on December 5, 1985.  The conviction was reversed on July 14, 1988, on the grounds that both defendant’s videotaped statement, containing improper remarks by the prosecutor, and photographs of the victim’s body, which were shown to the jury during trial, were unduly prejudicial.  Blake had been sentenced to twenty-five years to life in prison.  The jury which heard the case on retrial acquitted him after ninety minutes of deliberation.  ‘It wasn’t even close,’ said one juror.  Said another: ‘We felt they had no case ... [W]e were surprised it got to the grand jury.  It’s incredible what can happen to people, to be dragged into court with such a little bit of evidence.’  Blake had served over three years on the wrongful conviction.” – Inevitable Error  (People v. Blake)

“A jury convicted Lorenzo Nuñez of murder for supplying rifles used in a gruesome slaying, even though scant evidence showed Nuñez knew of the assailants’ intent.  The 6th District Court of Appeal upheld the conviction, but a federal judge overturned it because the jury was shown a videotape in which police lied to Nuñez about the strength of the evidence.”

Read More by Clicking Here

“Just one month out of prison, Darcius Butler was arrested and then convicted on robbery charges, although the evidence was thin.  Two years later, an appellate panel overturned the conviction because the prosecution twice indicated that Butler was on parole – despite a judge’s order not to do so.”

Read More by Clicking Here

“Daniel Aleman was convicted of carjacking after a judge promised to review evidence of the crime that surfaced during a closed-door juvenile hearing and then said the evidence didn’t help Aleman’s case. The 6th District Court of Appeal reversed the conviction after discovering the judge could not have reviewed the hearing transcript because it did not exist.”

Read More by Clicking Here

“Just before 10 pm on the night of 10 January, 1914, John Morrison, a Salt Lake City, Utah, grocer and a former policeman, was closing his store with his two sons, Arling and Merlin.  Two men wearing red bandannas forced their way into the store.  One of the intruders shouted 'we've got you now', levelled a handgun and shot Morrison.  Arling Morrison grabbed his father's old service revolver and fired two shots at the masked men, who returned fire and fled the scene.  Merlin, the younger child, stayed hidden in the back of the store.”

Read More by Clicking Here

“Louis Nasir was once arrested for commission of a crime as the result of mistaken identification.  Although no charges were brought his picture was taken and found its way into the ‘mug book.’  Several years later in May of 1965, a bandit wearing wraparound sunglasses and a straw hat held up a credit union in Warren and escaped with almost $5,000.00.  There were three witnesses, the manager, an employee named Dimples Anderson and a credit union customer.  On the afternoon of the robbery the manager and Dimples were unable to select anyone from a mug book and were unable to select anyone from a lineup in which Louis Nasir was not present.  The day after the robbery the manager and the employee picked Nasir from a mug book and also picked him in a one-man ‘show-up’ from behind a one-way glass.  On the following Monday all three witnesses picked Nasir from a lineup that did not appear unfair in itself from the record, absent any prior suggestion in the one-man photo show-up or any suggestion that may have occurred in the use of photographs.”

“Nasir was tried for robbery and the sole issue was identification.  Despite the testimony of six witnesses who said they saw Nasir at work the day of the robbery, the jury believed the identification testimony of the credit union manager, Dimples Anderson and the customer and returned a verdict of guilty.  Nasir was sentenced to serve 7 to 20 years in prison.”

“The court-appointed attorney who was to prosecute the appeal was convinced of Nasir’s innocence and enlisted the aid of the two detectives who helped convict Nasir.  Working together, the three men found the man who confessed to being an accomplice to the crime.  The real robber, who resembled Nasir, had been shot to death in February, 1966.  A friend of the dead man, who was serving time in Jackson, corroborated the story by revealing that the crime had been admitted to him before the death of the real culprit.^*”

“An hour after Nasir took lie detector tests he was freed on bond pending a new trial and the charges were dismissed on motion of the prosecutor.  Nasir had spent 375 days in prison.” – P v A

*The credit union customer turned out to be involved in the robbery and admitted his perjured testimony.  However, this witness had no impact or contact with the other two witnesses who made their ‘positive’ and unshakable identifications 3 times before the customer was even available to view a lineup.

“On November 23, 1937, three men held up a clothing store in Hamtramck.  The owner was shot and killed.  The owner’s daughter, who was 21 years old at the time, went to the assistance of her father and was slugged with a revolver by one of the robbers.  Charles Clark was later identified by the girl in a lineup as the man who shot her father.  One of the other defendants implicated Clark in an initial statement, but he and two others said at the trial later that Clark had no part in it.  Clark’s landlady testified that he was home all that day.  Nevertheless, Clark was convicted primarily on the identification testimony of the young woman and was sentenced to life imprisonment.”

“Clark tried for a new trial several times over the 30 years imprisonment, but it was denied each time.  Partly because Clark was an exemplary prisoner he was offered parole by the prison authorities and later was offered a pardon and commutation of sentence, but he turned these down because acceptance of such terms would have been a tacit admission of guilt.  At one point in a quest for a new trial he was offered the opportunity to plead to a lesser charge, the sentence of which would have freed him immediately.  Again he refused.”

“Finally in 1968 the case was assigned to the Legal Aid & Defenders Association of Detroit.  The attorneys researched early transcripts and discovered that the victim’s daughter, the sole identifying witness, had originally said that she could not identify Clark as one of the bandits.  In an affidavit in support of the motion for a new trial the witness revealed that after she said she could not identify the defendant, the Hamtramck detectives had pointed Clark out as the guilty man before the lineup.  Clark was granted a new trial in 1968 and the case was dismissed on motion of the prosecutor.” – P v A

In 1972 the Michigan legislature awarded Clark $10,000 for his 30 years of wrongful imprisonment.  (MJ)  [1/11]