Maryland?s highest court twice rebuked the Baltimore City Circuit Court on Tuesday, saying Baltimore was too restrictive in how it handles post-conviction DNA testing.
James Thompson, 47, and James Owens, 41, are seeking to have their 1988 Baltimore City murder convictions overturned because of new DNA evidence their lawyers say exonerates them. The Maryland Court of Appeals ruled that Thompson can use the new evidence in his defense.
“He can now use the test result that exonerated him,” said Thompson?s lawyer, Suzanne Drouet, an assistant public defender with the Innocence Project, a nonprofit legal clinic that attempts to exonerate wrongly convicted inmates through DNA testing. Baltimore City Circuit Court Judge Kaye Allison “had set such onerous conditions on the testing, it would have made it difficult for Mr. Thompson to prove his innocence,” Drouet said. “If the judge?s ruling stood, we would not have been able to use this test result.”
Owens and Thompson were convicted in 1988 of the Aug. 2, 1987, murder of Colleen Williar in the upstairs bedroom of her Baltimore home. At Owens? Feb. 29, 1988, trial, Thompson confessed to burglarizing Williar?s home and watching as Owens beat, raped, stabbed and strangled the victim.
But defense attorneys now say new DNA results exclude Thompson and Owens as the originators of the sperm found on Williar?s body, and a blood stain on Thompson?s pants came from a man ? not Williar. But prosecutors have adamantly denied that the new tests mean the men are innocent of the crime.
Magaret Burns, the city state?s attorney spokeswoman, has called the new evidence “trivial,” and said it does not outweigh Thompson?s murder confession and other physical evidence. George Burns, another one of Thompson?s attorneys, said city prosecutors have been tough on allowing DNA evidence.
“Most prosecutors allow you to do DNA testing if you want to,” he said. “The city has generally not allowed DNA testing.”
In another decision about post-conviction DNA testing Tuesday, the Court of Appeals also decided against a Baltimore City Circuit Court decision to disallow new DNA testing sought by George Blake, who was convicted in 1982 of rape.
Baltimore police say no evidence remains for Blake?s case, but Maryland?s high court ruled that the judge must determine that for herself instead of taking the police department?s word for it.
“This ruling gives my client a fair consideration of his petition,” said Blake?s attorney, Michael Malloy.
Assistant Attorney General Shannon Avery, who represented the city circuit court in both cases, did not return phone calls.
