The Briefing Room
General Category => National/Breaking News => Topic started by: libertybele on September 12, 2022, 04:08:24 pm
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Navy veteran exonerated, released from prison after serving nearly 30 years for a murder he didn't commit
In 1994, Herman Williams, now 58, was convicted by an Illinois court for the murder of his ex-wife. Last week, Williams’ conviction was vacated by agreement of the Lake County state’s attorney’s office, which dismissed all charges against him.
According to the Illinois Innocence Project, which worked to overturn Williams’ conviction, the Lake County state’s attorney’s office acknowledged that Williams’ conviction “was based on scientifically unsupported forensic pathology testimony regarding the victim’s time of death, that the prosecution hid favorable evidence at his original trial, and that the detective who claimed Mr. Williams confessed is now known to have engaged in a pattern of misconduct, including securing false confessions and claiming suspects made admissions of guilt in other innocence cases.”
Williams’ ex-wife, Penny Williams, was found in a pond several days after disappearing. She died from blunt force trauma and defensive wounds.
After Penny Williams went missing, local police and the Lake County Major Crimes Task Force focused on Herman Williams — a Navy chief petty officer at the time — as the only possible suspect, ignoring other leads in the case, according to the Innocence Project. Herman Williams was arrested, convicted of first-degree murder, and sentenced to life in prison without parole.
Advanced DNA testing was not available at the time of Williams’ conviction. In 2021, new DNA testing revealed evidence that showed Williams did not commit the murder.
The Innocence Project also found other errors in the state’s prosecution of the case. For example, at trial, the state presented testimony from an expert who had compared soil from the crime scene area to soil from Williams’ truck wheel and told the jury that the soils matched. “A 2021 review of the soil comparison in this case found it to have been rife with errors and unreliability,” according to the organization.....................
https://www.theblaze.com/news/navy-veteran-exonerated-30-years-prison
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Sounds like he has a heck of a lawsuit.