July 20
NORTH CAROLINA:
Lawyers' group seeks inquiry of SBI crime lab
Errors and sloppy procedures in DNA testing in 3 capital murder cases
should prompt an inquiry into the state crime lab, says a group of defense
lawyers.
The group's complaints, filed with the American Society of Crime
Laboratory Directors/ Laboratory Accreditation Board, allege that the
State Bureau of Investigation bungled DNA testing in one case and made
significant mistakes in 2 others.
"It became clear to me that the SBI was making errors in their testing,"
said Diane Savage, who represents the defendant in one of the three cases.
"I'm hoping that ASCLD-LAB will do a thorough investigation and shut down
the lab until they come up with better quality control."
Savage is the chairman of the forensic-science task force of the
criminal-defense section of the N.C. Academy of Trial Lawyers, which has
made the complaints.
Ralph Keaton, the executive director of the accreditation board, confirmed
that the board has received complaints.
SBI Director Robin Pendergraft declined to comment on the specific cases
but defended the lab's work overall.
"If there is any question raised at any time, the SBI goes back and
checks," she said. "Our goal is to be accurate and find the truth. There
is no hidden agenda."
Crime labs across the country have come under scrutiny because forensic
evidence, particularly DNA evidence, carries so much weight with juries.
In May, Keaton's organization found that the Virginia crime lab had
botched DNA testing in the case of Earl Washington, a retarded man who was
on death row for 12 years for a crime for which he was later pardoned.
The lab's audit led Virginia Gov. Mark Warner to order a review of 150
other cases.
North Carolina's SBI crime lab has been accredited by ASCLD-LAB since 1987
and has passed every inspection since then with high marks.
But in December, Catawba County Judge Beverly Beal suppressed DNA evidence
in a murder case against Francisco Laboy because of questions about
accuracy. The state has appealed Beal's ruling.
According to Beal's order, the SBI used up all the blood evidence in the
case in violation of an earlier court order and submitted a report about
Laboy's genetic profile that identified him as a woman.
Laboy, who is charged with murder in the stabbing death of his estranged
wife, Kimberly Laboy, in 2002, has been free on $50,000 bond awaiting
trial since Beal's ruling.
According to a complaint filed by the lawyers' group last month, the SBI
lab mistakenly identified DNA in a Greenville case. Leslie Lincoln is
charged in the stabbing death of her mother, Arlene Lincoln, in March
2002.
In July 2003, the SBI lab found that DNA extracted from bloodstains at the
scene of the slaying matched Leslie Lincoln's DNA.
Lincoln's attorney challenged those results, and in March, LabCorp, a
private laboratory in Research Triangle Park, retested the bloodstains and
found that the DNA matched the victim's.
Lincoln is in jail awaiting trial, and has filed a motion asking the court
to suppress any evidence from the SBI crime lab.
Savage filed another complaint with ASCLD-LAB in September in the case of
George Goode, whom she has represented since 1996. Goode was sentenced to
death in 1993 in the murders of Carnell and Margaret Batten in rural
Johnston County.
The complaint in his case alleges that the state crime lab did not follow
its own procedures when it identified blood on his clothing in 1993.
The complaint alleges that the crime lab compounded that error last year
when it ran DNA testing on the clothes and found the Battens' DNA. Savage
alleges that those tests are meaningless because Goode's clothing was
stored loosely in a large bin with other evidence, including the victims'
bloody clothing, and that it could have been contaminated.
Johnston County Judge Steve Balog ruled last year that the evidence was
not contaminated, a decision that Savage said she plans to appeal.
(source: Associated Press)
OKLAHOMA:
Former soldier executed in 1991 slaying of clerk
In McAlester, A former U.S. soldier and in-prison convert to Islam was
executed Tuesday evening for the 1991 murder of a convenience store clerk.
Michael L. Pennington, 37, who changed his name to Sharieff Sallahdin
while at the Oklahoma State Penitentiary, received a lethal injection and
was pronounced dead at 6:10 p.m., corrections officials said.
The Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals rejected a stay request filed this
past week. The U.S. Supreme Court also declined to stop the execution.
Shortly before 6 p.m., the 5-foot-7 man was strapped to a gurney in the
execution chamber.
Pennington's only comment was, "No statement."
He then mouthed the words "I love you," to 2 family members who witnessed
his execution.
None of the victim's relatives attended the execution.
The former weightlifter and body builder was convicted in 1993 of the
murder of clerk Bradley Thomas Grooms, 20, during a robbery attempt in
Lawton on Oct. 21, 1991.
Pennington, who was stationed at nearby Fort Sill, shot Grooms once in the
back with a sawed-off, 12-gauge shotgun. After killing Grooms, Pennington
fired several times into a cash register and throughout the store.
Despite killing Grooms and using all his ammunition, Pennington left the
store empty-handed when the register failed to open. Police tracked
Pennington to his wife's house in Akron, Ohio, where he was arrested.
The next execution in Oklahoma is scheduled for Aug. 11. Kenneth Eugene
Turrentine, 52, is scheduled to die that day for murdering his girlfriend
during a Tulsa County killing spree.
Turrentine was convicted of the June 4, 1994, slayings of his sister, Avon
Stevenson, his girlfriend, Anita Louise Richardson, and Richardson's
children, Tina L. Pennington, 22, and Martise D. Richardson, 13.
Turrentine shot Stevenson at her home and Richardson and her children at
their residence, both in northeast Tulsa.
In December, a 3-judge panel of the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals
threw out the guilty verdicts and death sentences for the slayings of
Martise Richardson and Pennington, ruling that a judge erred in
instructing the jury.
But the judges allowed Turrentine's conviction and death sentence for the
killing of their mother, Anita Richardson, to stand.
(source: Associated Press)
