Posted on 12/03/2007 7:40:46 AM PST by RDTF
The link in post #32 shows the prosecution acted in very bad faith and the prosecution's story is contrived.
"The brief also states that some of the key testimony asserting that the teenagers were part of a satanic cult -- something they have denied -- was presented by a 'witchcraft expert' with 'a fraudulent Ph.D.' from a school in California that was put out of business by state authorities," The Times' report states."
The DNA evidence linking the step father of one of the victims to the crime came from the foreign shoelaces used to tie the boys up. It was not found on the boys clothes. Also, 7 independent foreinsic scientists claim the missing genitals were taken after death and by animals. ...like turtles, or crawfish.
They are as dumb as Natalie, RD....(chuckle)
Personally, I find this story rather satisfying.
If Natalie Maines hadn’t destroyed the Dixie Chicks, she wouldn’t have the time to get involved with this nonsense.
Good thing her leftwing hubby has a job on Hero’s.
Of all the parents close to the West Memphis 3 case, John Mark Byers has been the most outspoken about the convictions, and some people have claimed that he himself was one of the “real murderers”. In late 2007, Byers announced to the press that he had changed his opinion, and that he now believes that the WM3 are innocent.
“I believe I would be the last person on the face of the earth that people would expect or dream to see say free the West Memphis 3,” said Byers. “From looking at the evidence and the facts that were presented to me, I have no doubt the West Memphis 3 are innocent.”
Byers is writing a book, and a film biography (possibly starring Brad Pitt as Byers) is being considered for production.
Terry Wayne Hobbs becomes major suspect in the case
In 2007, an evaluation of forensic evidence from the crime scene implicated a new suspect. Two hairs were discovered at the crime scene that recent advances in DNA technology have been able to identify. One, described as being beneath the binding of victim Michael Moore, came from Terry Hobbs - the stepfather of the victim, Steven Branch. The other came from David Jacoby, a friend of Mr. Hobbs who Mr. Hobbs had spent time with on the day of the murders. The presence of Mr. Hobbs’ hair alone might be explained by an secondary transfer between stepfather and stepson, but no explanation has been offered for how Mr. Jacoby’s hair would have been present. After considering the known time line of the crime, detective (now police chief) Michael Allen, who investigated the original crime scene in 1994, stated that Mr. Jacoby’s hair “would be hard to explain.”
Mr. Hobbs has a history of sexual offenses and violence. At the age of 24, he was arrested for a sexual assault against an elderly neighbor. Pamela Hobbs, his former wife, holds a Domestic Violence restraining order against him. Mr. Hobbs shot her brother in November, 1994, as the brother tried to rescue his sister from being violently assaulted.
The investigation into Mr. Hobbs is continuing and further developments are expected.
is her husband Adrian Pasdar as lefty as she is? Did he marry her when she was still chuncky chick? Enquiring minds want to know.
LOL. Well, those gals... used to have some good music. I actually listened to them until she went ballistic on the President.
Oh well, their loss of revenue, huh?
When in G-d’s name will a celebrity stand up for a victim of a crime instead of the criminals? The Celebs are infatuated with mass murdering lunatics that worship anything other then G-d. Remember Stanley “Tookie” Williams? A long line of Celebs stood up to defend that scumbag too.
I’ve had some interest in this case for a while now, albeit on the “their guilty” side of the equation.
Just went over to the WM3 site and read the federal case filing and the DNA report from Bode Laboratories of Springfield, Virginia. It’s more then just the hair sample and pretty damning for the prosecutions case.
If nothing else, this evidence should give them a new trial, if not and all out release from prison.
I’d hate to think that the real murders of 3 young boys is still running around free when three innocent people are in prison, one on death row for the crime.
Alice Whitman Leeds, a director at Parents, Families and Friends of Lesbians and Gays
Alice Whitman Leeds of Public Relations in the Public Interest is leading the outcry to release these criminals!
‘LOL. Well, those gals... used to have some good music. I actually listened to them until she went ballistic on the President.
Oh well, their loss of revenue, huh?’
Indeed. Like you, my wife and I all enjoyed their music, but once they went stupid, haven’t bought another CD of theirs since.
And I never will.
Its not like country western music couldn’t replace them, as Gretchen Wilson, the Wreckers, Taylor Swift, etc etc etc have demonstrated.
Photographer Grove Pashley, screenwriter Burk Sauls and art director Kathy Bakken decided that people needed a place to learn more information about this case and to help Free the West Memphis Three. They also visit the boys in prison, attend appeals hearings and benefits.
Maybe she was still married to him at the time. Now that she is his ex, she doesn’t feel loyalty to him anymore, and can say what she wants.
:::sarc tag in case it is needed:::
interesting history... but none of it shows in any way that the convicted were guilty of the actual crime.
The clear intent of your post is to imply that anyone that would be concerned that these 3 were railroaded are being led by A. Whitman and that the reason they're doing so is, because they're incapable of thinking on their own.
“Free Hat, Free Hat, Free Hat”
South Park fans will understand ;-)
Davis married Echols in December 1999
Lorri Davis from New York - the inmate she eventually married, Damien Echols
“I’ve known Damien for eight years. I know him very well. And I wish there was some way I could reach out and impart that knowledge about him to everyone, as I have with my friends.
LD: “First of all, I have always been protective of our relationship. Let’s face it, most people who would marry someone on death row - people think there’s something terribly wrong with them.
ML: So talk about how you became involved with an Arkansas inmate on Death Row.
LD: “I grew up in West Virginia, but at the time, I was living in New York City, where I was working for a design firm. And I also worked for the city of New York, in its Department of Cultural Affairs.
“Every year I would go to the New Films, New Directors film series at the Museum of Modern Art. And I saw the screening of Paradise Lost [a 1996 documentary about the West Memphis murders, for which Echols was sentenced to death]. That was before it aired on HBO, or was released to theaters. And, to make a long story short, I became very concerned about Damien and his situation, and about the situation at large.
“I was saddened by the film. I found it hard to watch in many ways, and afterward, I found I couldn’t stop thinking about it.
“I was so struck by the feeling that something was terribly wrong: I knew those three teenagers hadn’t committed those murders. I was left with the feeling that I wanted to learn more, and I was left feeling helpless.”
ML: What was it about Damien, in particular, that affected you?
LD: “I felt a connection to him, like we were kindred spirits of sorts. I don’t especially think that that time in his life [the period of his trial, as shown in the documentary] - let’s put it this way - it was not his shining moment. But for what he was up against, I could see that there was a will there, and a very strong will, and I could identify with that.
“My dad has called me a rebel at heart, and I could see that that was there in him too, and, unfortunately, it was used against him, whereas I have always been protected and safe.
“I reacted to his strength of character. It was also apparent in that film that he was very intelligent, and had a curiosity about life. He wasn’t afraid to speak his mind. That was unfortunate in the circumstances, but I respected him for it.”
ML: How long was it before you contacted him, and how did you feel about doing that?
LD: “It was three weeks or so. At first, it didn’t even occur to me that I could write to him. When I decided to do it, I was very nervous about it.
ML: What did you say? And how did he respond?
LD: “I told him that I had seen the movie, that I believed in his innocence, and that I wanted to learn more. I also told him that I hoped I wasn’t imposing.
“Here I was, this person he didn’t even know, writing to him, and hoping he would write back. It seemed like a breach of his privacy.
“He wrote back, and I could feel the relief in his answer. He couldn’t believe that someone had seen the movie, that finally someone believed in him.
“Later he would have so many people write and say the same thing, but at that point he was amazed that the movie had even been screened.”
ML: Do you still write to each other? And how often, on average?
LD: “We write every day, if we can.”
ML: A lot of celebrities have lent their support.
LD: “We wouldn’t have much celebrity help, or other support, if it weren’t for Grove Pashley, Burk Sauls and Kathy Bakken, who run the WM3.org website.
“And yes, there are many people in the entertainment industry who have helped and supported us. Two who have provided crucial help are Eddie Vedder [of Pearl Jam] and Henry Rollins.
“Eddie has been with us for six years. We simply wouldn’t be where we are without him. And Henry has done a tour - several benefit concerts - and he’s pressed media on the case.
“We are forever grateful to them and to everyone who has helped out. It’s amazing.”
The saddest part about it, is I deleted them off my iTunes/iPod, and gave the CDs to the ARC folks I think. LOL. I also turn off the radio if I hear them being played now.
Paradise Lost documentarians Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky (who both also directed Metallica: Some Kind of Monster) first chronicled the 1994 Arkansas trials and subsequent convictions of three West Memphis teenagers Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin, and Jessie Misskelley – now known as the West Memphis Three. (Baldwin and Misskelley got life. Echols got the death penalty.)
The follow-up, Revelations, revisits West Memphis for Echols’s ill-fated state appeals and also highlights the earliest efforts of a now-worldwide network of WM3 supporters, led in the beginning by three Los Angeles advocates from the film industry: Kathy Bakken, Burk Sauls, and Grove Pashley.
“What struck me was that I kept thinking I was watching a movie with character actors,” recalls former Black Flag singer Henry Rollins. “The things the prosecution were saying, their witnesses, it was all so hopelessly stupid and sad. Justice got a black eye in those trials.”
Rollins is one of an ever-growing list of celebrity WM3 supporters that includes Johnny Depp, Eddie Vedder, Jello Biafra, Winona Ryder, Jack Black, Steve Earle, Trey Parker, and Metallica – to name a few – whose fundraising efforts include concerts, art benefits, and compilation CDs. In 2002, Rollins released Rise Above, a CD of 24 Black Flag songs performed by various artists including Tom Araya (Slayer), Lemmy (Motörhead), Nick Oliveri (Queens of the Stone Age), Corey Taylor (Slipknot), and Ice-T, with all proceeds going to the West Memphis Three defense. The support website wm3.org, which is run out of West L.A., has received more than 3,485,769 visitors as of this writing.
Echols’s current attorney, noted San Francisco defense lawyer Dennis Riordan, was retained in 2004. He says: “The thing that led me to take this case was the startling sense that, in a death penalty case, there just wasn’t any credible evidence that connected him to the crime. You can read the Arkansas State Court opinion and they list everything that was offered against them, and it’s just terrifying that anyone could have been sentenced to death on any one of those six factors. A knife that was serrated? You could go into any home in Arkansas and find a serrated knife.”
According to FBI’s Frazier, who checked the old files, there was a request for an FBI profile on a probable killer – at first they were looking for a “Rambo” type – but it was not completed. “The West Memphis Police Department request for a profile was discontinued based on the fact that arrests had been made,” he says.
In the late ’90s, Echols became a Buddhist, inspired by the teachings of another Arkansas death row inmate, Jusan Frankie Parker, who was executed in August 1998. He meditates – sometimes as much as five hours a day, wrote his autobiography, Almost Home, Volume 1, and has had his poetry published in Porcupine, a literary arts magazine. He estimates he’s read a thousand books.
Echols’s 11-year-old son, Seth, was born during the trial and visits once a year. He’s a fan of rapper 50 Cent. The last time Echols saw Seth he asked, “How can you like a guy who isn’t even smart enough to not get shot?”
The family that stood by Echols during the trial has scattered. His mother calls maybe once a year; his dad remarried about six years ago and has a new family. His son’s mother, Domini, was around for two years after his incarceration and then married someone else.
Huckabee: “I didn’t try to, you know, push anybody’s buttons on it.”
“The truth is that my only action in this case was that I denied a commutation.”
“If I’m that persuasive that I can walk in, a new Republican governor, and persuade Clinton and Tucker appointees to do something that they didn’t want to do - folks, I deserve to be president.”
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