THE COMMERCIAL APPEAL
BALDWIN, ECHOLS ASK OVERTURN OF CONVICTION
DUE SEPARATE TRIALS, ARGUE 2 ORDERED TO DIE IN KILLING OF BOYS
Date: TUESDAY, December 3, 1996
Section: Metro
Page: B1
Source: By Joan I. Duffy The Commercial Appeal
Little Rock Bureau
Dateline: LITTLE ROCK
Edition: Final
Correction: CORRECTION from December 4, 1996: Charles Jason Baldwin was sentenced to life in prison without parole in the murders of three 8-year-old boys in West Memphis in 1993. A story Tuesday incorrectly reported Baldwin's sentence.
Lawyers for two West Memphis men sentenced to die for the 1993 mutilation murders of three 8-year-old boys in West Memphis asked the Arkansas Supreme Court Monday to overturn the convictions, saying the two should have been tried separately.
Lawyers for Damien Echols, 21, and Charles Jason Baldwin, 19, also argued the state had insufficient evidence to convict the suspects, most of which was based on an assumption that an affinity for black clothes and heavy metal rock music signaled an involvement in the occult and worship of Satan. Echols was 19 and Baldwin 16 when they were convicted in March 1994.
Written briefs cited 30 points in support of overturning the convictions, including a challenge to the legitimacy of police searches. The defense also suggested evidence had been planted and said police allowed legitimate suspects to slip through their fingers because of authorities' obsession with occult involvement.
The court was expected to hand down a decision before three members who heard Monday's appeal are replaced by newly elected justices.
''You never know how it went,'' Paul Ford, Baldwin's court-appointed lawyer, said after the hearing. ''They asked very good questions of both sides. I can't get a feel for what they're inclined to do.''
Pros. Atty. Brent Davis of Jonesboro, who prosecuted the case, watched from the sidelines as Asst. Atty. Gens. Brent Standridge and Vada Berger defended his case.
Michael Moore, Steven Branch and Christopher Byers were found bound and submerged in a creek in a wooded area near their West Memphis neighborhood a day after they disappeared during a bike ride. A month later, Jessie Lloyd Misskelley implicated himself, Baldwin and Echols - his high school friends - during a police interrogation.
Misskelley, now serving a life sentence for first-degree murder and two 40-year sentences for second-degree convictions, appealed his case claiming police coerced him into make a confession. The high court rejected his appeal in February.
Ford and Val Price, Echols's lawyer, both argued their clients should have had separate trials because of their ''antagonistic defenses'' in which each cast suspicion on the other.
''It was evident that the strategy of the state was to permit the two defendants to try each other,'' Price said in his appeal brief.
Ford said much of the evidence presented in the case applied to one defendant or the other.
''It was hard for the jury to segregate the evidence among the defendants,'' he said. ''Instructions to the jury stating certain evidence applied only to Baldwin or Echols did not remove the prejudice.''
The trial court denied the defendants' motions for severances, but reserved the right to order separate trials if fair play issues dictated or if one defendant testified and the other did not.
Echols did testify, Baldwin did not, but the court did not grant the severance motions, the lawyers said.
Berger said there had been pretrial discussions whether the defense should or shouldn't admit to evidence of cult involvement. ''But when push came to shove at trial, Baldwin and Echols both objected to cult evidence being introduced,'' she said.
Failure to separate the trials kept Baldwin from exploring lines of defense, Ford said.
''Trial strategies are many times antagonistic based upon strengths and weaknesses of each defendant's case,'' he said.
Price argued police illegally searched Echols's home by linking his choice of dress - black pants and T-shirts promoting heavy metal rock bands - to involvement in satanic rituals.
Yet, the lawyer said, there was no evidence to support the theory that the murders were satanic or cult-related.
He argued the apparent obsession of investigators with occult involvement focused attention on Echols because of his dress and musical tastes while possible suspects - including a man seen in bloody clothing acting strangely in a restaurant restroom - slipped away.
Ford claimed Municipal Judge William Rainey improperly instructed Det. Bryn Ridge on what evidence to present in order to justify a nighttime search of Baldwin's home. ''The exchange clearly indicates that Judge Rainey told Det. Ridge what he needed and Det. Ridge went out and got it,'' Ford said.
BALDWIN, ECHOLS ASK OVERTURN OF CONVICTION
DUE SEPARATE TRIALS, ARGUE 2 ORDERED TO DIE IN KILLING OF BOYS
Date: TUESDAY, December 3, 1996
Section: Metro
Page: B1
Source: By Joan I. Duffy The Commercial Appeal
Little Rock Bureau
Dateline: LITTLE ROCK
Edition: Final
Correction: CORRECTION from December 4, 1996: Charles Jason Baldwin was sentenced to life in prison without parole in the murders of three 8-year-old boys in West Memphis in 1993. A story Tuesday incorrectly reported Baldwin's sentence.
Lawyers for two West Memphis men sentenced to die for the 1993 mutilation murders of three 8-year-old boys in West Memphis asked the Arkansas Supreme Court Monday to overturn the convictions, saying the two should have been tried separately.
Lawyers for Damien Echols, 21, and Charles Jason Baldwin, 19, also argued the state had insufficient evidence to convict the suspects, most of which was based on an assumption that an affinity for black clothes and heavy metal rock music signaled an involvement in the occult and worship of Satan. Echols was 19 and Baldwin 16 when they were convicted in March 1994.
Written briefs cited 30 points in support of overturning the convictions, including a challenge to the legitimacy of police searches. The defense also suggested evidence had been planted and said police allowed legitimate suspects to slip through their fingers because of authorities' obsession with occult involvement.
The court was expected to hand down a decision before three members who heard Monday's appeal are replaced by newly elected justices.
''You never know how it went,'' Paul Ford, Baldwin's court-appointed lawyer, said after the hearing. ''They asked very good questions of both sides. I can't get a feel for what they're inclined to do.''
Pros. Atty. Brent Davis of Jonesboro, who prosecuted the case, watched from the sidelines as Asst. Atty. Gens. Brent Standridge and Vada Berger defended his case.
Michael Moore, Steven Branch and Christopher Byers were found bound and submerged in a creek in a wooded area near their West Memphis neighborhood a day after they disappeared during a bike ride. A month later, Jessie Lloyd Misskelley implicated himself, Baldwin and Echols - his high school friends - during a police interrogation.
Misskelley, now serving a life sentence for first-degree murder and two 40-year sentences for second-degree convictions, appealed his case claiming police coerced him into make a confession. The high court rejected his appeal in February.
Ford and Val Price, Echols's lawyer, both argued their clients should have had separate trials because of their ''antagonistic defenses'' in which each cast suspicion on the other.
''It was evident that the strategy of the state was to permit the two defendants to try each other,'' Price said in his appeal brief.
Ford said much of the evidence presented in the case applied to one defendant or the other.
''It was hard for the jury to segregate the evidence among the defendants,'' he said. ''Instructions to the jury stating certain evidence applied only to Baldwin or Echols did not remove the prejudice.''
The trial court denied the defendants' motions for severances, but reserved the right to order separate trials if fair play issues dictated or if one defendant testified and the other did not.
Echols did testify, Baldwin did not, but the court did not grant the severance motions, the lawyers said.
Berger said there had been pretrial discussions whether the defense should or shouldn't admit to evidence of cult involvement. ''But when push came to shove at trial, Baldwin and Echols both objected to cult evidence being introduced,'' she said.
Failure to separate the trials kept Baldwin from exploring lines of defense, Ford said.
''Trial strategies are many times antagonistic based upon strengths and weaknesses of each defendant's case,'' he said.
Price argued police illegally searched Echols's home by linking his choice of dress - black pants and T-shirts promoting heavy metal rock bands - to involvement in satanic rituals.
Yet, the lawyer said, there was no evidence to support the theory that the murders were satanic or cult-related.
He argued the apparent obsession of investigators with occult involvement focused attention on Echols because of his dress and musical tastes while possible suspects - including a man seen in bloody clothing acting strangely in a restaurant restroom - slipped away.
Ford claimed Municipal Judge William Rainey improperly instructed Det. Bryn Ridge on what evidence to present in order to justify a nighttime search of Baldwin's home. ''The exchange clearly indicates that Judge Rainey told Det. Ridge what he needed and Det. Ridge went out and got it,'' Ford said.
