Merged Remember the West Memphis 3?

[Stellafane]

I've read a fair bit about the WM3, and I just don't see how their guilty verdicts could possible stick. For starters, one of the centerpieces of the prosecution's case -- Misskelly's confession -- is almost certainly bogus. For instance, he stated the murders occurred where the bodies were found, but this is virtually impossible since the boys' injuries would have produced copious amounts of blood, yet little was found on the scene. Therefore the boys were in all likelihood killed somewhere else, and their bodies later dumped in the location in which they were found.

For a complete rundown of the questions raised via expert re-examination of the evidence, see http://www.trutv.com/library/crime/notorious_murders/famous/memphis/evidence_11.html.

It seems to me that the cited link above at the very minimum adds up to reasonable doubt, if not complete exoneration.

Further, consider this: According to prosectors, they have a convicted child killer safely behind bars and on death row. And yet they propose to simply let him walk out the door on the spot if he simply mumbles, "yeah, I guess you have some evidence against me" with his fingers crossed? That doesn't even make the remotest sense, not if you really think the person involved is a killer. I mean, WTF?

It's all farce and face-saving at this point, justice left the building long ago. I firmly believe the WM3 are innocent.

 

[Checkmite]

They've been screwed over by the system already, being convicted on the grounds of having too many black t-shirts and liking the wrong sort of books and music. Are you really saying they should have been supremely confident that couldn't happen again?

According to you, the prosecution was certainly convinced it wouldn't happen again, so...

 

[Checkmite]

Pretty easy to make that claim when you're not on death row, huh?

Yeah, I just said that:

I get what you're saying - I know it's easy for me, having never been in that position, to say right now "this is what I would do". Nevertheless, I submit that it's the best I've got at the moment - and sadly, it is now impossible for me to spend half my life in prison to verify it.

 

[Matthew Best]

According to you, the prosecution was certainly convinced it wouldn't happen again, so...

The end of this sentence seems to be missing.

 

[Rolfe]

They were offered a deal which was so much better than their previous situation it pretty much wasn't on the same planet. From death row to freedom in one bound. Guaranteed, with only relatively minor strings attached.

To turn that down in favour of another year or more in jail, with maybe a 95% chance of complete exoneration at the end of it?

Maybe Ceckmite would have gone for the latter option, but I have great difficulty seeing why he can't understand that not everyone would take the same view, even if they were innocent as new-born babes.

Rolfe.

 

[Checkmite]

They were offered a deal which was so much better than their previous situation it pretty much wasn't on the same planet. From death row to freedom in one bound. Guaranteed, with only relatively minor strings attached.

To turn that down in favour of another year or more in jail, with maybe a 95% chance of complete exoneration at the end of it?

Maybe Ceckmite would have gone for the latter option, but I have great difficulty seeing why he can't understand that not everyone would take the same view, even if they were innocent as new-born babes.

Rolfe.

Oh hey, I could see someone taking it, I guess. But the leap to "therefore, they are innocent" based on this isn't one I'm willing to make.

 

[Lamuella]

EDIT: Just realized I was repeating something for the third time. Never mind, apologies.

to make up for it, here are my thoughts about why an innocent person could take a deal like this:

You're innocent, and you've been wrongfully convicted of child murder. The case against you was handled horribly, you didn't have competent defense, evidence that supported your story was ignored or lost. Basically, your entire trial was a giant miscarriage of justice.

You've been locked away for 17 years, fighting against a system that doesn't want you to be anything except a body in a cell or a body in the ground, having to put forward huge efforts against an intractable system for the smallest of results. Slowly but surely you make small progress, but it's hard, and being in prison sucks. You were still a teenager when you got sent there, you spend 23 hours a day in a cell, and the system is waiting for your pleas and appeals to run out so they can stick a needle in your arm and kill you.

Finally, you're making small progress, but it's painfully slow. A court has ruled that a court has to rule on whether you should get a new trial. It's August, and this hearing won't be until November. Lord alone knows how long it would be before the trial took place if this hearing granted you a new trial. Lord alone knows how long it would be until your appeals run out and you get killed, if they don't grant you a new trial.

Someone comes to visit you and tells you that you can get out of jail now, right now, be a free man. All you have to do is enter a guilty plea. You can even say afterwards that you didn't do it and that you were pleading guilty to get out, you just need to plead guilty once. Or, you can go back to your cell on death row. You can keep banging your head against a brick wall until November, seeing four walls and nothing else for 23 hours a day. Then, maybe you'll be granted another trial. And maybe you won't. The system that decides whether you get another trial is the system that sent you down here in the first place.

Would you be tempted to take the deal?

 

[Schrodinger's Cat]

Oh hey, I could see someone taking it, I guess. But the leap to "therefore, they are innocent" based on this isn't one I'm willing to make.

Wow, checkmite. Just wow. Not one single person claimed that this is what makes them innocent. They only responded to your and CS's claim that them doing this makes you think they are guilty, and in your case, this is the only reason you have given for why you think they are guilty. No one was claiming them taking such a plea in and of itself makes them innocent, only that it certainly is not evidence of their guilt.

Before this thread I didn't really know much about the case myself, but since then I have done quite a bit of reading on it. It really does seem like these men were convicted based on the fact that they liked heavy metal and dark clothes, and due to a confession that was garnered by a 17 year old after being asked leading questions, a confession which directly contradicted the actual evidence at the crime scene. And not minor discrepancies, but major ones.

I really can't see how anyone can look at this case and say that they are guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Man, the 80s was just a messed up time period for "satanic panic" prosecution. Though I didn't know about this case, I have read about day care workers who were convicted and jailed after being accused of horrific, satanic inspired sexual and physical abuse of children...based on nothing more than accusations of toddlers after being asked extremely leading questions, in which interviewers went so far as to tell them they would be rewarded for saying the abuse did happen and were chastised or told they wouldn't be allowed to go home until they said it happened. In addition, these toddlers' testimonies were filled with details that were physically impossible (such as having been taken up in an airplane when they were abused while they were at day care). What the heck was going on in the country back then to make it get so out of control? Where did this "satanic panic" come from?

 

[Rolfe]

The reason they are innocent is the lack of any actual evidence against them. Which even the prosecution seems finally to have realised, or that deal would most certainly not have been on the table.

Rolfe.

 

[mortimer]

The reason they are innocent is the lack of any actual evidence against them. Which even the prosecution seems finally to have realised, or that deal would most certainly not have been on the table.

Rolfe.

Don't think lack of evidence against really mattered much to the prosecution. It certainly didn't in the first trial. It sounds more like a case of some new exculpatory DNA evidence + a couple of cases of possible juror misconduct.

 

[Schrodinger's Cat]

EDIT: Just realized I was repeating something for the third time. Never mind, apologies.

to make up for it, here are my thoughts about why an innocent person could take a deal like this:

You're innocent, and you've been wrongfully convicted of child murder. The case against you was handled horribly, you didn't have competent defense, evidence that supported your story was ignored or lost. Basically, your entire trial was a giant miscarriage of justice.

You've been locked away for 17 years, fighting against a system that doesn't want you to be anything except a body in a cell or a body in the ground, having to put forward huge efforts against an intractable system for the smallest of results. Slowly but surely you make small progress, but it's hard, and being in prison sucks. You were still a teenager when you got sent there, you spend 23 hours a day in a cell, and the system is waiting for your pleas and appeals to run out so they can stick a needle in your arm and kill you.

Finally, you're making small progress, but it's painfully slow. A court has ruled that a court has to rule on whether you should get a new trial. It's August, and this hearing won't be until November. Lord alone knows how long it would be before the trial took place if this hearing granted you a new trial. Lord alone knows how long it would be until your appeals run out and you get killed, if they don't grant you a new trial.

Someone comes to visit you and tells you that you can get out of jail now, right now, be a free man. All you have to do is enter a guilty plea. You can even say afterwards that you didn't do it and that you were pleading guilty to get out, you just need to plead guilty once. Or, you can go back to your cell on death row. You can keep banging your head against a brick wall until November, seeing four walls and nothing else for 23 hours a day. Then, maybe you'll be granted another trial. And maybe you won't. The system that decides whether you get another trial is the system that sent you down here in the first place.

Would you be tempted to take the deal?

I'm reminded of the case of Wendy Maldonado, who along with her oldest son killed her husband Aron.

Wendy had suffered years of horrific and well documented abuse by her husband (as an example, she had to wear dentures because he had knocked out so many of her teeth). Her husband was actually a sadist who got off on torturing his wife. He even wrote and recorded songs about torturing and killing her, and he would role play out scenarios of kiling her - for instance bringing her into the woods and telling her he was going to kill her, strangling her until she was unconcious, etc.

On the night of Aron's killing, not only had multiple neighbors heard him screaming that he was going to kill his wife, multiple neighbors called 911 to tell the police they heard him screaming he was about to kill his wife.

Afterwards, Wendy and her son were given the option of going to trial for murder (with a mandatory life sentence), or pleading guilty to a lesser charge which itself had a mandatory minimum of 10 years. They pled guilty.

Everyone involved in this woman's case told her to go to trial. Even the prison officials at the jail she was being held told her there was no jury in the world that would convict her. The judge presiding over her case himself said this was the worst case of domestic abuse he had ever seen and he did not feel this woman should be in jail, but as she had plead guilty to a charge with a mandatory minimum, his hands were tied and he had no choice but to sentence her.

Wendy acknowledged that everyone advising her begged her to go to trial, that there was no way she would be found guilty. But she stated that her crappy life experiences had simply left her with no faith in humanity or the goodness of people, and that she would not risk her and her son spending the rest of their lives in prison. She just had no hope left in her life, so she pled guilty and took the deal.

When you've had a really horrible life, it's very hard to have hope even when a positive outcome seems like a "sure thing."

 

[Ladewig]

Was the Alford deal offered on the condition that all three must agree to it? If so then adopting the noble stance of saying "I would never accept such a deal," becomes a bit trickier as other people's freedom would depend on your response.

 

[Schrodinger's Cat]

Was the Alford deal offered on the condition that all three must agree to it? If so then adopting the noble stance of saying "I would never accept such a deal," becomes a bit trickier as other people's freedom would depend on your response.

From what I gather that is the case, because one of the accused (I believe Baldwin) not on death row initially refused to take the deal, but the attorneys for Echols (who was on death row) pleaded with him to reconsider because of Echols, and Baldwin later stated that this is the only reason he took the deal. That if it had just been himself, he wouldn't have pled out because he would not plead guilty to a crime he didn't commit. He was willing to take the risk for himself but not his friend. That makes me think they all had to make the deal or else Echols could have just got out by making the deal himself and Baldwin's actions wouldn't have mattered. But maybe someone with a little more detailed info could weigh in on this.

 

[Checkmite]

Wow, checkmite. Just wow. Not one single person claimed that this is what makes them innocent. They only responded to your and CS's claim that them doing this makes you think they are guilty, and in your case, this is the only reason you have given for why you think they are guilty.

Oh - well yeah, that's all I mentioned so I do see the problem. There's also being convicted by a jury. Now granted, sometimes juries wrongly convict; but a judge didn't throw out this case and another jury never reversed the verdict. So, they were convicted, then released from jail on a guilty plea. That's a whole lot of "guilty" flying around.

ETA: This wasn't a satanic-panic case. This was, what, '95? '96?

 

[Rolfe]

Don't think lack of evidence against really mattered much to the prosecution. It certainly didn't in the first trial. It sounds more like a case of some new exculpatory DNA evidence + a couple of cases of possible juror misconduct.

Yes, that's true. I was overlooking that part.

I'm not sure what Checkmite thinks of that. We seem to be back at, oh well a court convicted them back then, so they must be guilty.

Rolfe.

 

[Checkmite]

I tend to think the same of all jury convictions unless convinced otherwise. Alleged "exculpatory" DNA evidence and "possible" (what does that mean to you?) jury misconduct are nice rumors but they need to make it in front of a judge or jury to be properly reviewed and considered. As these people just signed away their right to have this evidence heard, it remains just rumor and practically ceases to matter. As I've said before, every convicted murderer's supporters know of some key witness, or some crucial piece of disallowed evidence, or some "possible" misconduct that would "absolutely have exonerated their guy beyond question".

 

[mortimer]

I tend to think the same of all jury convictions unless convinced otherwise.

Fair enough. I'm not sure anyone here is going spend the time to try and convince you (I'm certainly not), but if you are interested, there is a lot of case information out there, as well as a couple of books and a couple of HBO documentaries. I would recommend Devil's Knot by Mara Leveritt for some good background information about the case.

 

[mortimer]

And just saw that Fox News is doing a segment on them coming up in a few minutes.

 

[lionking]

Checkmite,

have you read anything substantial or watched any documentaries about this case?

 

[Buckaroo]

I'm more than a little concerned about the safety of the WM3 now that they're out, considering that there are plenty of nutjobs in the world, some of whom I suspect wouldn't limit their expression of anger to posting at JREF.

Edited by Loss Leader: 

Edited in accordance with Rule 0.