Entries tagged with “Dr. Michael West”
Jul 06, 2026
Louisiana Supreme Court Affirms Lower Court’s Vacatur and Factual Innocence Finding for Former Death-Sentenced Man, Jimmie Duncan
On June 29, 2026, the Louisiana Supreme Court affirmed a lower court’s decision finding Jimmie Duncan factually innocent and vacating his first-degree murder conviction and death sentence. Mr. Duncan was sentenced to death for the 1993 death of his girlfriend’s toddler, Haley Oliveaux, largely based on faulty bite mark evidence. In April 2025, Louisiana District Court Judge Alvin Sharp held that expert testimony presented during an evidentiary hearing demonstrated the bite mark analysis used…
Apr 28, 2025
Louisiana Judge Sets Aside Jimmie Duncan’s Conviction and Death Sentence Based on “No Longer Valid” Bite Mark Evidence
On April 24, 2025, Louisiana District Court Judge Alvin Sharp set aside Jimmie Duncan’s first-degree murder conviction and death sentence. Mr. Duncan was sentenced to death for the 1993 death of his girlfriend’s toddler largely based on faulty bite mark evidence. Judge Sharp, in a decision that came after a September 2024 evidentiary hearing, held that expert testimony presented during this hearing demonstrated the bite mark analysis used against Mr. Duncan is “no longer valid” and “not…
Issues
Sep 30, 2021
Sherwood Brown Exonerated in Mississippi, 186th Death-Row Exoneration Since 1973
Sherwood Brown has been exonerated of the charges that sent him to death row in Mississippi in 1995 for a triple murder he did not commit. On August 24, 2021, DeSoto County Circuit Court Judge Jimmy McClure granted a prosecution motion to dismiss charges against Brown (pictured after his release), who was released later that day after having spent 26 years on the state’s death row or facing the prospects of a capital retrial. “We are extremely thankful to see Sherwood walk out of prison a free…
Issues
Sep 01, 2020
Mississippi Supreme Court Grants New Trial to Eddie Howard, Sentenced to Death by Junk Bite-Mark Evidence
The Mississippi Supreme Court has granted a new trial to death-row prisoner Eddie Lee Howard, Jr. (pictured), finding that the combination of scientifically invalid bite-mark evidence used to convict him and new DNA evidence entitled him to a new trial in the 1992 murder and alleged rape of an 84-year-old white woman. In an 8 – 1 decision on August 27, 2020, the court held that the discredited forensic testimony, “along with new DNA testing and the paucity of other evidence linking Howard to the…