Re-posted by Nicholas Stix
Andre Davis was released in 2012, after serving 32 years in prison for the rape and murder of three-year-old Brianna Stickle. “[DNA] tests revealed that blood and semen found at the scene did not come from Davis.”
Authorities assumed that the rapist-murderer acted alone. Should they have?
What sort of man gets a two-year taste of freedom, after 32 years in stir, and then murders someone? Allegedly, yes. Presumption of innocence, and all that. Well, allegedly/presumptively/whatever, Andre Davis leaves quite the trail of corpses in his wake!
Man exonerated in slaying faces new murder charge
3 days ago
By Associated Press
MSN
CHICAGO (AP) — A Chicago man who served 32 years in prison before DNA evidence overturned his conviction in the 1980 rape and murder of a 3-year-old girl has now been charged with killing a man after a dispute in a dice game.
Andre Davis, 53, was charged with murder Thursday in the October death of 19-year-old Jamal Harmon, whose body was found shot and stabbed in an alley. A judge ordered Davis held without bond.
Prosecutors allege that Davis' nephew shot and wounded Harmon in a dispute over money lost in a dice game, then Davis helped load the man — who was still alive, according to witnesses — into the trunk of a car.
During Thursday's court hearing, Cook County Assistant State's Attorney Robert Mack said witnesses also told investigators that Davis told people he had cut Harmon's throat and intended to dump the body, the Chicago Sun-Times reported.
It was unclear Friday whether Davis had an attorney. He had a public defender at the hearing, but the Cook County Public Defender's Office said Friday that it was no longer representing him. Northwestern University's Center on Wrongful Convictions, which represented him in the previous case, declined to comment on Davis' arrest or whether it would be representing him in the current case.
Davis was freed from prison in 2012, after spending more than three decades behind bars following his conviction — before DNA testing was available — in the 1980 slaying of 3-year-old Brianna Stickle in Rantoul.
In 2004, Davis requested that evidence gathered at the crime scene be tested. The tests revealed that blood and semen found at the scene did not come from Davis.
But it wasn't until March 2012 that an Illinois appellate court ordered that Davis be granted a new trial. A few months later, prosecutors dropped the case against him, and Davis was released from the super maximum security prison in Tamms.
The Center on Wrongful Convictions, which is part of the Bluhm Legal Clinic at Northwestern University's School of Law, represented Davis in that case. The clinic declined to comment Friday on whether one of its attorneys would represent Davis in the current case.
Even if the man was totally innocent from the start, he has that vicious streak inside of him and the propensity for violence as is the case for most negro.
ReplyDeleteAnd this crime DOES make you wonder about the original conviction and then "exoneration".
DNA according to Barry Schiff of the OJ case works well in "exonerating" clients in prison but by golly does not work when OJ's blood was found all over the place. Then DNA does not work.
ReplyDelete