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Missouri woman's murder conviction tossed after 43 years. Her lawyers say a police officer did it
Channel 3000 News/AP ^ | June 16, 2024 | AP Staff

Posted on 06/16/2024 7:24:44 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin

A judge has overturned the conviction of a Missouri woman who was a psychiatric patient when she incriminated herself in a 1980 killing that her attorneys argue was actually committed by a now-discredited police officer.

Judge Ryan Horsman ruled late Friday that Sandra Hemme, who has spent 43 years behind bars, had established evidence of actual innocence and must be freed within 30 days unless prosecutors retry her. He said her trial counsel was ineffective and prosecutors failed to disclose evidence that would have helped her.

Her attorneys say this is the longest time a women has been been incarcerated for a wrongful conviction. They filed a motion seeking her immediate release.

“We are grateful to the Court for acknowledging the grave injustice Ms. Hemme has endured for more than four decades,” her attorneys said in a statement, promising to keep up their efforts to dismiss the charges and reunite Hemme with her family.

A spokesperson for Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey didn't immediately respond to a text or email message seeking comment Saturday.

Hemme was shackled in leather wrist restraints and so heavily sedated that she “could not hold her head up straight” or “articulate anything beyond monosyllabic responses" when she was first questioned about the death of 31-year-old library worker Patricia Jeschke, according to her lawyers with the New York-based Innocence Project.

They alleged in a petition seeking her exoneration that authorities ignored Hemme's “wildly contradictory” statements and suppressed evidence implicating Michael Holman, a then-police officer who tried to use the slain woman's credit card.

The judge wrote that “no evidence whatsoever outside of Ms. Hemme’s unreliable statements connects her to the crime.”

“In contrast,” he added, “this Court finds that the evidence directly ties Holman to this crime and murder scene.”

(Excerpt) Read more at channel3000.com ...


TOPICS: Crime/Corruption; Culture/Society; US: Missouri
KEYWORDS: crime; justice; mo
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“Just let it end,” she said. “I'm tired.”

And that is what she did the following spring, when she agreed to plead guilty to capital murder in exchange for the death penalty being taken off the table.

Even that was a challenge; the judge initially rejected her guilty plea because she couldn't share enough details about what happened, saying: “I really didn’t know I had done it until like three days later, you know, when it came out in the paper and on the news.”

1 posted on 06/16/2024 7:24:44 AM PDT by Diana in Wisconsin
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

will the police officer be tired?


2 posted on 06/16/2024 7:27:57 AM PDT by Morgana ( Always a bit of truth in dark humor.)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

“Missouri woman’s murder conviction tossed after 43 years. Her lawyers say a police officer did it”

Keep in mind that for every one of these false prosecutions resulting in people being wrongly executed (not the case here, but...), there are likely 100 cases of Leftist judges putting murders back on the streets, just to have them kill more even more people, many as innocent as this woman appears to be.


3 posted on 06/16/2024 7:29:50 AM PDT by BobL
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

Jail the prosecutor who did not provide exculpatory evidence. Jail the cop, too.


4 posted on 06/16/2024 7:30:36 AM PDT by ConservativeMind (Trump: Befuddling Democrats, Republicans, and the Media for the benefit of the US and all mankind.)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

” prosecutors failed to disclose evidence that would have helped her.”

Sound familiar?


5 posted on 06/16/2024 7:35:59 AM PDT by dljordan (What would Michael Collins do?)
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To: BobL
Keep in mind that for every one of these false prosecutions resulting in people being wrongly executed (not the case here, but...), there are likely 100 cases of Leftist judges putting murders back on the streets.

Doesn't matter. I'm pro death penalty, but as the legendary quote says:

Better that 10 guilty men go free than for 1 innocent man to be wrongly convicted.

6 posted on 06/16/2024 7:36:54 AM PDT by HandBasketHell
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To: Morgana
Will the police officer be tired?

I'm sure if still alive he is after 43 years. I'm old and tired.

7 posted on 06/16/2024 7:39:55 AM PDT by MeneMeneTekelUpharsin (Freedom is the freedom to discipline yourself so others don't have to do it for you.)
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To: ConservativeMind

Agree


8 posted on 06/16/2024 7:40:13 AM PDT by MeneMeneTekelUpharsin (Freedom is the freedom to discipline yourself so others don't have to do it for you.)
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To: ConservativeMind

The cop died in 2015 apparently.


9 posted on 06/16/2024 7:44:30 AM PDT by FamiliarFace (I got my own way of livin' But everything gets done With a southern accent Where I come from. TPetty)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

How could anyone..in this case a cop..live with themselves.
Obviously some kind of psycho.


10 posted on 06/16/2024 7:44:45 AM PDT by Leep (Leftardism strikes 1 in 5.)
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To: HandBasketHell

“Better that 10 guilty men go free than for 1 innocent man to be wrongly convicted.”

My response is: “Better 1 innocent man be wrongly executed than 20 innocent people be killed by wrongly freed murderers.”


11 posted on 06/16/2024 7:51:13 AM PDT by BobL
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To: FamiliarFace

Dig the body up and throw pig feces on it, then, in a full public display.


12 posted on 06/16/2024 7:54:19 AM PDT by ConservativeMind (Trump: Befuddling Democrats, Republicans, and the Media for the benefit of the US and all mankind.)
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To: BobL
"My response is: “Better 1 innocent man be wrongly executed than 20 innocent people be killed by wrongly freed murderers.”

As long as you or one of your loved ones is the wrongfully executed innocent person, I can get on board with that.

13 posted on 06/16/2024 7:56:01 AM PDT by Joe 6-pack
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To: Morgana
will the police officer be tired?

The crime was over 40 years ago, he's probably in his late 60s or 70s, he's already tired...

14 posted on 06/16/2024 8:04:04 AM PDT by null and void (“No matter how cynical you become, it’s never enough to keep up”. ~ Lily Tomlin)
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To: MeneMeneTekelUpharsin

You beat me by less than arf an ower.


15 posted on 06/16/2024 8:05:46 AM PDT by null and void (“No matter how cynical you become, it’s never enough to keep up”. ~ Lily Tomlin)
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To: Diana in Wisconsin

Stories like this make me more sympathetic to the claim that some innocent black citizens were railroaded by the police/DA.

Black citizens lost faith in the justice system long before conservatives, who have now realized the corruption.


16 posted on 06/16/2024 8:07:06 AM PDT by Erik Latranyi (This is the end of the Republic....because we could not keep it.)
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To: Leep
How could anyone..in this case a cop..live with themselves.
Obviously some kind of psycho.

Dr. Clarissa Cole says that fully half the police candidates she flat out failed on their required pre-employment psych eval were hired anyway.

17 posted on 06/16/2024 8:08:59 AM PDT by null and void (“No matter how cynical you become, it’s never enough to keep up”. ~ Lily Tomlin)
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To: BobL; HandBasketHell

Society is hard, is it not BL, HBH?

Like “adulting” as they say. Hard to do well.


18 posted on 06/16/2024 8:09:02 AM PDT by one guy in new jersey
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To: Morgana

The prosecutor who hid evidence and the officer better go to prison for the rest of their miserable lives.

That poor woman…her entire life stolen from her. There is no way she will be able to make it outside now unless she has wonderful family to take her in.


19 posted on 06/16/2024 8:11:12 AM PDT by ProtectOurFreedom (“When exposing a crime is treated like a crime, you are being ruled by criminals” – Edward Snowden)
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To: Joe 6-pack

“As long as you or one of your loved ones is the wrongfully executed innocent person, I can get on board with that.”

I’ll win the Lotto before that happens as my loved ones don’t hang out with the bunch that murders.

But my loved ones are FAR MORE LIKELY to die from a wrongly-released murderer, as one of them is forced to drive into an inner city every day (until she gets a new job).


20 posted on 06/16/2024 8:12:24 AM PDT by BobL
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