Defrosting Cold Cases

The Fox family of Illinois finally has some closure after an imprisoned sex offender was charged with the 2004 murder of 3-year-old Riley Fox, a crime that Riley’s father originally confessed to committing. It’s been a terrible ordeal for the family because even with DNA clearing Kevin in 2005, many people persisted in the belief [...]

Tags: Autopsy, Child Abuse, Crime Labs, Crime Scene, Cruelty, DNA, Evidence, False Confessions, Forensics, Identification, Illinois, Investigations Division, Police, Rape kits, Recording Interrogations, Riley Fox, Unsolved Homicide, Victim

The defense lawyers trying to clear Richard Lapointe of the horrendous 1987 murder of Mrs. Bernice Martin began an attack in court last Friday on a detective who they said secured the mentally disabled man’s questionable confession after a series of suggestive and, at times, threatening interrogations. Much of the testimony Friday focused on a [...]

Tags: Actual Innocence, Autopsy, Crime Labs, Crime Scene, DNA, Evidence, Expert Testimony, Forensics, Identification, Miscarriage of Justice, Police, Prosecutorial Misconduct, Richard A. Lapointe, Unsolved Homicide, Victim, Wrongful Convictions

Karen Lapointe-Martin stands by her ex-husband. She was called to testify yesterday. “Do you recall the day your grandmother died?” Casteleiro asked. “Yes, I do, it was a Sunday,” she responded. She recounted her family’s Sunday routine — go to church, visit with her 88-year-old grandmother, Bernice Martin, then go home for Sunday dinner. That [...]

Tags: Actual Innocence, Arson Detection, Autopsy, Crime Scene, DNA, Evidence, Expert Testimony, Forensics, Identification, Investigations Division, Miscarriage of Justice, Police, Prosecutorial Misconduct, Richard A. Lapointe, Unsolved Homicide, Victim, Wiretaps, Witnesses, Wrongful Convictions

The hearing before Judge John J. Nazzaro is focusing on evidence that Lapointe’s lawyers argue was previously overlooked, including the length of time that Martin’s apartment was burning until the first firefighter came through the front door, a pair of gloves found at the crime scene that contained the DNA of someone other than Lapointe, [...]

Tags: Actual Innocence, Arson Detection, Autopsy, Crime Scene, DNA, Evidence, Expert Testimony, Faulty Evidence, Forensics, Identification, Investigations Division, Miscarriage of Justice, Police, Prosecutorial Misconduct, Richard A. Lapointe, Unsolved Homicide, Victim, Witnesses, Wrongful Convictions

Richard Lapointe could not have killed Bernice Martin. “None of the confessions fit the crime,” Andy Lefebvre, a retired Bloomfield police officer, told Rick Green. He has been following the case and doing his own detective work for years, after his parish priest asked him to look into it. “He should have been examined prior to [...]

Tags: Actual Innocence, Arson Detection, Crime Scene, DNA, Evidence, Expert Testimony, Faulty Evidence, Forensics, Investigations Division, Miscarriage of Justice, Police, Prisons, Prosecutorial Misconduct, Richard A. Lapointe, Unsolved Homicide, Victim, Witnesses, Wrongful Convictions

Superior Court Judge John J. Nazzaro began hearing evidence on Monday. The first witness was Michael Ludlow, a retired Manchester police detective who led the investigation into the killing of Bernice Martin. Martin, the grandmother of Lapointe’s wife, was raped and strangled in her apartment on North Main Street in Manchester the evening of March [...]

Tags: Actual Innocence, Arson Detection, Autopsy, Crime Scene, DNA, Evidence, Expert Testimony, Faulty Evidence, Forensics, Investigations Division, Miscarriage of Justice, Police, Prosecutorial Misconduct, Richard A. Lapointe, Unsolved Homicide, Victim, Wrongful Convictions

Donald Connery, another long time supporter of Richard Lapointe, wrote an article for the Hartford Courant. It is worth reading especially this part: “… the forthrightness of retired Manchester police captain Joseph Brooks. His detectives lured Lapointe to headquarters on false pretenses on July 4, 1989, and got him to agree that he must be guilty. [...]

Tags: Actual Innocence, Arson Detection, Autopsy, Crime Scene, DNA, DNA Database, Evidence, Expert Testimony, Forensics, Identification, Investigations Division, Miscarriage of Justice, Police, Prisons, Prosecutorial Misconduct, Richard A. Lapointe, Unsolved Homicide, Victim, Witnesses, Wrongful Convictions

Rick Green had an interview today with Richard Lapointe. On Monday, a Superior Court judge in Rockville — in response to a ruling in Lapointe’s favor from the state Appellate Court — will take yet another look at this endlessly appealed saga of what is either a wrongful conviction or a very crafty mentally disabled [...]

Tags: Actual Innocence, Arson Detection, Autopsy, Crime Scene, DNA, Evidence, Expert Testimony, Faulty Evidence, Forensics, Identification, Investigations Division, Miscarriage of Justice, Police, Prosecutorial Misconduct, Richard Lapointe, Unsolved Homicide, Victim, Wrongful Convictions

An appeals court Wednesday agreed with a federal jury’s 2007 finding that Will County Police framed Kevin Fox for the rape and murder of his 3-year-old daughter Riley, but reduced the damages awarded to Fox and his wife from $12.2 million to $8 million. The 7th Circuit Court of Appeals chastised the investigators on the [...]

Tags: Actual Innocence, Autopsy, Child Abuse, Crime Scene, Cruelty, DNA, Evidence, Expert Testimony, False Confessions, FBI, Forensics, Illinois, Investigations Division, Miscarriage of Justice, Police, Rape kits, Victim, Videotaping Murder Suspect's Interrogations, Wrongful Convictions

New York Police Commissioner Ray Kelly says his department will start videotaping police interrogations in two precincts as a pilot project this year. Rebecca Brown with the Innocence Project, a public policy group that works to exonerate the wrongfully convicted, says a survey of 238 jurisdictions that videotape interrogations found law enforcement officers prefer it. [...]

Tags: Actual Innocence, Capital Punishment, Evidence, Miscarriage of Justice, New York, Police, Police Interrogations, Victim, Witnesses, Wrongful Convictions