Thanks to the work of a legal team led by MAIP Board Member Barry Pollack, a New York man who spent seventeen years behind bars for a murder he did not commit was exonerated last week.

Despite the lack of any forensic evidence, Fernando Bermudez was convicted of the 1991 shooting of then sixteen-year-old Raymond Blount outside a New York City nightclub.  Blount was shot on the street shortly after punching another teenager, Efraim Lopez, in the Marc Ballroom near Manhattan’s Union Square.  Lopez testified at trial as a cooperating witness, implicating Bermudez as the shooter.

In the years after Bermudez was convicted, all five eyewitnesses against him, Lopez and four eyewitnesses who had testified at trial identifying Bermudez as the shooter, recanted their testimony.  Three of those witnesses reiterated that their trial testimony was inaccurate in a hearing this September.  Other eyewitnesses at that hearing also testified that Bermudez was not the person who shot Mr. Blount.  At the hearing, significant evidence was also presented implicating another individual, a drug dealer who was a friend of Lopez, as the murderer.
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The Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project will be holding a legal clinic at Matthews Memorial Baptist Church in Southeast Washington DC on Thursday November 12, 2009 at 6:30 PM.

The clinic will feature speeches from two local men who were wrongfully convicted and then later released, Aaron Michael Howard and Leslie Vass. We will then be breaking into intake sessions where those interested in our help can tell us about their case or their loved ones and MAIP can begin the process of evaluating their case.

What: Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project's first ever legal clinic

When: Thursday November 12, 2009 at 6:30 PM

Where: Matthews Memorial Baptist Church 2616 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd SE

Who: Anyone who wants to know more about MAIP or wants help with the case of someone they know. MAIP exonerees, Board members, staff members and law student volunteers will also be attending.

What to bring: Knowledge of the case to the best of your ability. If you have any legal docs we would be more than happy to take them.

Click here to see the information flier for MAIP's first Innocence Clinic

MAIP Client David Wayne Boyce is serving two life sentences for the 1990 murder of his roommate, Timothy Kurt Askew, 35, at the Econo Lodge motel in Newport News, Virginia.  Police and prosecutors claimed that Mr. Boyce, a young man with no criminal history, stabbed Mr. Askew repeatedly, killing him and then robbing him.  There was no physical evidence or eyewitness testimony that linked Mr. Boyce to this crime.  Mr. Boyce has maintained his innocence since his initial arrest.

Mr. Boyce was convicted largely based on the testimony of a jailhouse informant Herman Preston Elkins, a self-confessed mentally ill repeat offender.  In 2004, Mr. Elkins called Mr. Boyce’s counsel and recanted his trial testimony against Mr. Boyce.  He claimed he was coerced by the Newport News Police prior to Mr. Boyce’s trial.  Also in 2004, DNA evidence positively excluded Mr. Boyce from the physical evidence found at the crime scene.

MAIP attorneys and investigators have been working on Mr. Boyce’s case with lawyers from Howrey LLP and Hunton & Williams LLP since 2005, when they filed a petition for writ of habeas corpus in response to Mr. Elkins’ unsolicited phone call.  The petition has not yet been decided but is expected to move forward with the recent appointment of a new judge – Norfolk Circuit Court Judge John R. Doyle III.

In addition to asserting his innocence, Mr. Boyce’s team contends that the police and prosecutors violated the Constitution by withholding potentially crucial evidence from his counsel prior to trial, including: 1) Mr. Elkins’ history of mental illness and long-standing relationship with the police department, 2) a memo showing that another person had confessed to the crime, 3) reports that exclude Mr. Boyce’s fingerprints from those found at the crime scene, and 4) a photograph of Mr. Boyce taken the day of the murder that contradicts an alleged identification of the murderer.

Mr. Boyce’s team believes that this withheld evidence would have changed the outcome of Mr. Boyce’s trial.  Mr. Boyce’s attorneys are hopeful that the judge will find that the prosecution had a duty to turn over this evidence prior to trial, grant the petition for habeas corpus and order a new trial for Mr. Boyce after 19 years in prison.          

Click here to read a story in the Newport News Daily Press about the Boyce case.   

Click here to learn more about how "snitch" testimony can lead to wrongful convictions.

For three years, undergraduate journalism students at the Medill Innocence Project uncovered overwhelming evidence indicating that a Chicago man who has been in prison for murder for 28 years is completely innocent of the crime.  Instead of focusing on Anthony McKinney’s innocence, the Cook County, IL. Prosecutor’s office has instead turned its attention on the student investigators, issuing subpoenas that include demands for the class syllabus and student grades.

Nine different teams of investigators worked on McKinney’s case from 2003 to 2006.  At the end of their investigation, the students concluded that the then-18-year-old resident of the Harvey area of Chicago could not have been involved in the 1978 murder of security guard Donald Lundahl. Among their findings was a confession from a man who was present when his cousin shot and killed Lundahl, confirming that McKinney was not there.  In addition, the students were able to prove McKinney’s alibi and disprove the statements of two eyewitnesses who now claim they only identified McKinney after being beaten by police officers and could not have been present to see the crime occur.

David Protess, the Director of the Medill Innocence Project, directed the McKinney case to attorneys at the Center for Wrongful Convictions.  Protess’ students have conducted investigations that have led to eleven exonerations and both MAIP Executive Director Shawn Armbrust and Program Assistant Daniel Satin previously worked for the Medill Innocence Project (though not on the McKinney case.)

In November, the Center for Wrongful Conviction attorneys filed a request for a new trial based on the evidence the students had uncovered.  In June, the prosecutors subpoenaed students’ investigative memos, internal e-mails and notes from witness interviews, along with their grades and class syllabi.  

Barry Scheck, Co-director of the Innocence Project, said he has never seen prosecutors demand student grades from any of the other members in the nearly two decade history of the Innocence Network

“Every time the government starts attacking the messenger as opposed to the message, it can have a chilling effect,” Scheck said.

Attorneys from Northwestern say that the subpoena breaks federal laws regarding privacy for students and for journalists.

"I don't think it's any of the state's business to know the state of mind of my students," Protess said. "Prosecutors should be more concerned with the wrongful conviction of Anthony McKinney than with my students' grades."

While Protess and the attorneys involved continue to fight for McKinney’s freedom and the right of the students to maintain their privacy, MAIP hopes the prosecutors will focus on the overwhelming evidence of McKinney’s innocence instead of trying to question the intentions of the students involved.           

Click here to read more about the McKinney case.

Click here to read coverage of the Medill Innocence Project’s fight to maintain its privacy in the Chicago Tribune and the New York Times.

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Thanks in large part to the work of the Innocence Project of Texas, a Dallas man was pardoned by Texas Gov. Rick Perry Wednesday, nearly thirty years after he was wrongfully accused of of raping and killing his girlfriend.

James Lee Woodard was originally released from prison in April 2008 after a DNA-retesting program run by the new Dallas District Attorney cleared him of the 1980 murder of  Beverly Ann Jones. He had spent 27 years behind bars for a crime he consistently denied doing. DNA testing was unavailable at the time of the crime. On Wednesday, the Governor officially cleared his name.

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As part of our efforts to connect with more people interested in the work we do, the Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project recently joined Facebook Causes.

Our causes page features multimedia about our work and about exonerees from around the country. It also will have up to date news about MAIP events and legal developments.

Continue your support for MAIP by joining our cause .

In the five weeks since he was granted a conditional pardon and released from prison, Derek Tice began to start his life over. After twelve years in prison, the Navy veteran landed a construction job and got his first cell phone and e-mail address. On Monday, the member of the group known as the Norfolk Four received a phone call that will change his life forever.

U.S. District Judge Richard L. Williams vacated Tice's conviction for the 1997 rape and murder of Michelle Moore-Bosko, on the grounds of ineffective assistance of counsel. In doing so, Judge Williams granted the habeas corpus petition filed by Tice's attorneys, including MAIP Board Member Des Hogan.

Tice was released from prison in August along with Danial Williams and Joseph Dick after VA Gov. Timothy Kaine granted the men a conditional pardon . While the pardon released the men from prison, it did not establish their innocence for the crimes.

The men confessed to the crimes during high-pressure interrogations. In the brief, Tice's attorneys argued that his trial attorney should have tried to keep jurors from hearing his confession on the grounds that police continued to question him after he had invoked his right to remain silent. The federal judge agreed with that statement.

"Had counsel pursued such a motion, there is a reasonable probability that Tice would not have been convicted," Williams wrote. 

A fifth man, Omar Ballard, has confessed to the crimes and is currently incarcerated for killing Moore-Bosko.  All of the DNA and forensic evidence from the crime scene match him, his confession is the only one that accurately describes the crime scene and he has continually said that he acted alone in the crime.

Tice told the Associated Press that he was "flabbergasted" by the news and that "hopefully this is one more step to get my life back, and get back to where I was before all this happened." He added that he will continue to fight to help Dick, Williams and Eric Wilson, completely clear their names of the crime.

To read the Judge's ruling that exonerated Derek Tice, click here.

Five years ago, Cameron Todd Willingham was executed for setting the fire that killed his three young daughters. Now, a fire expert hired by the state that sentenced him to death has concluded that Willingham was incapable of committing arson.

In a report to the Texas Forensic Science Commission released last week, the International Association of Fire Saftety Science ruled out the possibility of arson as the cause of the fire that killed 2-year-old Amber and 1-year-old twins Karmon and Kameron on Dec. 23, 1991, in their Corsicana home. A number of other experts have concluded that no arson took place; some of this evidence had come up in the months before Willingham was executed.

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After DNA tests proved that six Virginians had been convicted of crimes they had not committed, then-Virginia Governor Warner ordered a comprehensive review of old criminal cases that still had untested biological evidence. And last year, Governor Kaine signed a bill that required the state to identify pro bono lawyers who can notify people when testable biological evidence is found that may be able to prove their innocence.

The Mid-Atlantic Innocence Project is working with the Virginia Crime Commission to present a series of brown bag trainings for attorneys interested in participating in this program. Click here for more information including times and locations. Contact John Hardenbergh at jhardenbergh@exonerate.org to RSVP for a training session.