Mississippi Supreme Court Denies Additional DNA Testing to Death-Row Prisoner

The Mississippi Supreme Court has denied addi­tion­al DNA test­ing to death-row pris­on­er Willie Manning (pic­tured). Manning, who was sen­tenced to death in Oktibbeha County in 1994 and in 1996 for two sep­a­rate crimes, has main­tained his inno­cence of both crimes. He was exon­er­at­ed of the 1996 con­vic­tion in 2015 after police and pros­e­cu­tors unlaw­ful­ly with­held excul­pa­to­ry evi­dence from the defense. 

Manning sought DNA test­ing in the 1994 case to chal­lenge dis­cred­it­ed hair com­par­i­son tes­ti­mo­ny pre­sent­ed by a pros­e­cu­tion expert. After ini­tial DNA tests were incon­clu­sive, the tri­al court in 2020 refused to autho­rize the trans­fer of the evi­dence to a dif­fer­ent lab that was capa­ble of con­duct­ing more sophis­ti­cat­ed test­ing. On June 30, 2022, the Mississippi Supreme Court upheld that rul­ing, hold­ing that ​“Manning has failed to show that a full DNA pro­file, if gained from addi­tion­al test­ing, would have raised a rea­son­able prob­a­bil­i­ty that the tri­er of fact would have come to a different outcome.”

Manning, who is Black, was sen­tenced to death in 1994 for the mur­ders of two white Mississippi State University stu­dents. At tri­al, the State pre­sent­ed tes­ti­mo­ny from an FBI agent stat­ing that hairs found in one of the victim’s vehi­cles was from an African American. The pros­e­cu­tor referred to this tes­ti­mo­ny in his clos­ing argu­ment, say­ing this impli­cat­ed Manning because of his race. The agent also tes­ti­fied regard­ing bal­lis­tics evi­dence recov­ered from the scene. Nearly ten years lat­er, short­ly before Manning was sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed in 2013, the United States Department of Justice said that the FBI agent’s tes­ti­mo­ny at tri­al was seri­ous­ly flawed. Because of this, the Mississippi Supreme Court vot­ed 8 – 1 to delay Manning’s exe­cu­tion and allow DNA test­ing of the phys­i­cal evi­dence from the case.

In August 2014, the Mississippi cir­cuit court entered an agreed order to send new­ly dis­cov­ered phys­i­cal evi­dence to a DNA test­ing facil­i­ty. Over the course of six years, that test­ing facil­i­ty test­ed mul­ti­ple pieces of phys­i­cal evi­dence found at the crime scene, includ­ing a rape kit, fin­ger­nail scrap­ings, and the hairs that the FBI agent tes­ti­fied about at tri­al. The test­ing facil­i­ty said that the tests all pro­duced incon­clu­sive results, but that a dif­fer­ent, more spe­cial­ized facil­i­ty may be able to get con­clu­sive results from the evi­dence with­in three to four months.

The cir­cuit court denied Manning’s motion to allow more time for test­ing and for the trans­fer of evi­dence to the new facil­i­ty. On appeal, the Mississippi Supreme Court agreed with the cir­cuit court that Manning had not shown that the new facil­i­ty would be able to obtain con­clu­sive results, and fur­ther, that if it did obtain con­clu­sive results, that those results would serve to exon­er­ate Manning. Writing for the major­i­ty, Justice Robert Chamberlain said ​“If addi­tion­al test­ing had been grant­ed and anoth­er individual’s DNA pro­file was dis­cov­ered from the crime scene evi­dence, no proof has been shown that it would change the out­come of Manning’s case.”

Manning’s attor­ney, Rob Mink said he is dis­ap­point­ed in the rul­ing, adding that he had hoped the results would exon­er­ate Manning. Mink told the Associated Press that they are ​“con­sid­er­ing right now what options [Manning] has for additional relief.”

In dis­sent, Justice Leslie King, joined by Justice Jim Kitchens, stressed the impor­tance of DNA evi­dence in death penal­ty cas­es. Justice King, who is the only Black jus­tice on the Mississippi Supreme Court, ref­er­enced mul­ti­ple cas­es that showed that ​“DNA test­ing could poten­tial­ly lead to the true per­pe­tra­tor of the crime, even when strong cir­cum­stan­tial evi­dence and direct evi­dence were pre­sent­ed at tri­al.” Justice King also point­ed out that the new facil­i­ty claimed they could con­duct the new test­ing with­in three or four months, which is ​“sure­ly min­i­mal con­sid­er­ing that Manning has been sen­tenced to death” and ​“had spent almost twen­ty years in prison before this Court grant­ed his motion to test the evidence.”

When Manning faced exe­cu­tion for this crime in 2013, Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld of the New York-based Innocence Project strong­ly sup­port­ed the test­ing. In an op-ed in the Clarion Ledger, they argued: ​“While peo­ple can dif­fer on whether the death penal­ty is an appro­pri­ate form of pun­ish­ment, near­ly every­one would agree that it should be used only in those cas­es where we are cer­tain of guilt. DNA test­ing could pro­vide that cer­tain­ty or prove, as Manning insists, that he is innocent.”