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Thread: Jeffrey Havard - Mississippi

  1. #81
    Administrator Aaron's Avatar
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    Pathologist backs off shaken baby ruling in death penalty case

    NATCHEZ — Fifteen years ago, Dr. Steven Hayne told jurors Jeffrey Havard had shaken a 6-month-old baby to death, comparing the injuries to those seen in falls from significant heights.

    On Monday, he backed off that conclusion, testifying that “tremendous G forces can be generated in a short fall. If it’s straight to the head, then it could cause serious injury.”

    The 38-year-old Havard, now on Mississippi’s death row, insists he accidentally dropped the baby, Chloe Madison Britt, and that she hit her head on a toilet.

    Since 2000, at least 11 Mississippians have been convicted in cases involving the shaken baby syndrome, with two of them sitting on death row. Havard is one of them.

    The state Supreme Court has ordered the hearing for Havard to decide if he deserves a new trial because of shifting scientific beliefs on the syndrome.
    In Havard’s 2002 trial, all the doctors concluded that Britt died of the syndrome, and so did Hayne, who performed the autopsy.

    He said the death would be “consistent with a person … violently shaking a child back and forth to produce the injuries … The type of injuries that you can see that parallel these are in motor vehicle crashes, falls from significant heights and the like.”

    In court Monday, Hayne testified that a short fall can cause serious injury.

    He said that the term he would use now would be “abusive head trauma” to describe the injuries to Britt, which he said included bruises on the forehead, scalp, back of head and mouth as well as bleeding between the skull and brain.

    He said he still believed her death was a homicide.

    For decades, physicians believed that a triad of symptoms provided ironclad proof that someone had shaken a child to death, known as shaken baby syndrome.

    But new studies have raised questions about the syndrome. In 2009, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommended the diagnosis of the syndrome be discarded and replaced with "abusive head trauma.”

    Renowned pathologist Dr. Michael Baden of New York testified Monday that the problem with the “abusive head trauma” conclusion is that it’s impossible to tell whether a person accidentally fell down the stairs or someone pushed that person.

    He said he absolutely disagreed with a prosecution expert who testified at the 2002 trial, claiming that Britt’s retinal hemorrhages proved that this baby had been shaken.

    “It’s my opinion that shaking had nothing to do with the death,” he said. “It’s my opinion that all of the injuries are consistent with blunt force impact.”

    The baby’s injuries are consistent with the fall that Havard described, Baden said. “With short falls, you can have fatal injuries.”

    In 2002, the Adams County jury convicted Havard, concluding that he was guilty of killing and sexually abusing Britt, and sentenced him to death.

    The hearing is expected to continue this week, and Circuit Judge Forrest Johnson said he won’t rule until after he receives legal briefs from attorneys.

    He barred testimony on possible sexual assault, saying the state Supreme Court decision centered strictly on the shaken baby syndrome.

    “I have no jurisdiction to go there,” he said.

    During Havard's capital murder trial, doctors, nurses, the sheriff and others told jurors about tears, rips, lacerations and bleeding they saw in the child's anal area.

    "Maybe they were looking at folds and thought they were tears," Hayne told the newspaper. "We were very careful, and we also took sections."

    A rape kit found no semen or foreign DNA, and he examined those sections under a microscope.

    His conclusion? They were no tears, rips or similar injuries to the child's rectum, he told the newspaper. "I would think that would be a definitive evaluation."

    http://www.clarionledger.com/story/n...ion/563830001/
    Don't ask questions, just consume product and then get excited for next products.

    "They will hurt you. They will hurt your grandma, these people. The root cause of this is there's no discipline in the homes, they don't go to school, you know, they live off the government, no personal accountability, and they just beat people up for no reason, and it's disgusting." - Former Hamilton County Prosecutor Joe Deters

  2. #82
    Moderator Ryan's Avatar
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    Opinion

    Judge to decide if Mississippi should put Jeffrey Havard to death for a crime that never happened

    Jeffrey “Jeff” Havard currently sits wrongfully convicted on death row in Mississippi for the sexual assault and murder of his girlfriend’s six-month-old daughter, Chloe Britt. Havard has stated from the beginning that the infant slipped from his arms while lifting her from the tub, causing her head to hit a nearby toilet. There is no evidence whatsoever to support a sexual assault charge. Multiple experts currently support Havard’s claims that Chloe’s death was the result of an accident.

    In May of 2016, the Mississippi Supreme Court ordered an evidentiary hearing for Havard’s case based on defense claims of new evidence due to changes in the science behind Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS). Last week, after nearly 15 years of incarceration on death row, Havard finally had the opportunity to return to the courtroom of Adams County Circuit Court Judge Forrest Johnson, with renewed hope that the truth would finally be heard.

    Judge Johnson presided over Havard’s trial in 2002. The trial was speedy to say the least. Within a matter of two days, the court selected a jury, tried the case, received the jury’s verdict, and sentenced Havard to death. The jury heard from only one expert who testified for the prosecution. Havard asked for an expert of his own but the request was denied by Judge Johnson based on financial restraints of the county. At the time, indigent defendants were expected to rely on the prosecution’s expert if they could not personally afford their own.

    Havard’s 2002 trial was a sham. It is not possible to properly try a death penalty case in two days. To put things into perspective, last week’s evidentiary hearing took three days. The judge listened to testimony from four experts who testified for the defense, and also heard testimony from a pediatrician who testified for the prosecution. Havard’s evidentiary hearing, which was dedicated to a single topic, and provided no immediate decision, took longer than the entire trial which landed Havard on death row in 2002.

    Havard’s evidentiary hearing began on August 14, 2017 and concluded on August 16, 2017. The Adams County Courthouse where the hearing took place is in Natchez, Mississippi, a historic Mississippi River town bordering Louisiana. I was intrigued by the small town feel of Natchez. Entering the courthouse for the first time gave me the sense that I had somehow stepped back in time. The courthouse is listed as the oldest in Mississippi, and is no doubt rich in history. A history which the building now struggles to contain. The public hallways are lined with file cabinets overflowing with paperwork, with cardboard bankers boxes stacked on top which are also being tested to their limits of capacity, as loose paperwork can be seen stacked about.

    The courthouse works as a multi-functional building. The first floor has a clerk’s office where people file in to pay various fees, taxes, and fines. The second floor contains courtrooms and judge’s chambers. Each morning when I arrived, I walked past a line of people waiting to see the clerk, wondering if any of them were aware of the fact, that in the very same building, just up the stairs and down the hall, a man was fighting for his life. It was a stark reminder that people are swallowed up by our justice syste. Once convicted, the incarcerated are all but forgotten by society, minus those close to any case. For some, this may not garner much sympathy for those who are guilty of the crimes they are convicted of, but it certainly provides a painful reality for those who currently sit in cages for crimes they did not commit.

    The Sheriff’s deputies working at the courthouse were courteous and professional throughout the hearing. They went above and beyond to try and accommodate Havard’s family as much as they could. Havard was allowed to shake hands with supporters, and most importantly, he was allowed to hug those closest to him. Human contact is something Havard has not experienced for the past 15 years, so it was no surprise to see the heartfelt display of emotions from those involved.

    The hearing began with instructions from Judge Johnson, laying out the guidelines set by the Mississippi Supreme Court. The high court recognized that the cause of death in Havard’s case warranted review but the high court did not grant the defense’s additional request to review the charge of sexual assault, keeping on par with their previous rulings on past appeals.

    The high court’s orders that Havard’s evidentiary hearing could only review the charge of SBS, provided for unique circumstances, because Havard sits on death row solely due to the combination of charges. Without the charge of sexual assault being tacked on, Havard’s case would have never been a death penalty case in the first place. Havard’s lawyers refused to be deterred. The defense made sure throughout the hearing to highlight on the record that there are currently no experts who support the claim of sexual abuse. Every expert who testified, as well as the prosecution’s pediatrician, all stated under oath that there was no evidence of a sexual assault.

    The prosecution’s case in 2002 was built primarily on the testimony provided by Dr. Steven Hayne and the ER staff that was present on the night Chloe died. Hayne conducted the autopsy on the infant. Hayne did not find evidence of sexual assault while conducting the autopsy, even though he was told to look for it. Hayne helped the prosecution when he testified that a contusion in the infant’s anus could have resulted from penetration with an object. Hayne also testified that the death was the result of SBS. Hayne has now retracted those statements.

    There is not one single shred of evidence that Chloe Britt was ever sexually assaulted, by Jeff Havard or by anyone else. The sexual assault allegation was based on observations of the ER staff that the infant’s anus was dilated. The ER staff was not qualified to give an opinion regarding sexual abuse. Every single staff member who provided a statement to police, made the same mistake when misdiagnosing the condition of the infant’s anus. The court furthered the damage when wrongly allowing the ER staff to testify as experts at trial.

    Anal dilation has given rise to suspicion of sexual abuse in other cases, and a clinical study was done to clarify the subject. Researchers found that anal dilation is a common artifact in accidental deaths involving severe brain injury.

    Havard’s defense filed several appeals over the years citing expert evidence that no sexual assault had occurred, but those appeals were all denied. After Havard’s conviction, Mississippi’s post-conviction relief office obtained the services of former Alabama state medical examiner Dr. James Lauridson to review the autopsy findings of Hayne. Lauridson concluded that the evidence failed to confirm that a sexual assault of any kind had taken place. There was no sign of any tears or lacerations in the infant’s anus and it was not out of the ordinary for dilation to occur naturally. Lauridson noted that there was no trace of Havard’s DNA found on or inside the infant. He also noted that a thermometer inserted into the infant’s anus at the emergency room could have caused the small one centimeter bruise noted by Hayne. Lauridson’s report refuted the prosecution’s claim of a sexual assault. Interestingly, Lauridson’s expert opinion had no bearing on appeal.

    After Judge Johnson finished addressing the court, the defense called Dr. Steven Hayne to the stand. Hayne poses many problems for the state of Mississippi. Hayne has a shady past that involves thousands of autopsies, and countless legal cases. Hayne was presented by prosecutors as a primary expert in criminal trials for a period of decades in Mississippi. Investigative journalist Radley Balko has been reporting on Hayne’s questionable conduct for years.

    The SBS issue may open the door for the state of Mississippi to resolve their issues with Hayne in this case, and may explain why the evidentiary hearing was limited to the discussion of SBS. Challenges against the sexual assault charge work to directly attack Hayne’s credibility. If Hayne is fully discredited, that revelation could open a can of worms which could impact countless other cases in Mississippi. If Havard’s innocence is determined based on changes in science, then everyone is off the hook. The State could claim that it was merely following the science available in 2002 when they convicted Havard. No blame for anyone. Simply an advance in science. Of course, those who have closely followed this case may have a far different outlook on who deserves blame.

    Hayne’s history shows that he has been willing to provide testimony favorable to the prosecution regardless of the facts. Havard’s case is no exception. Hayne testified in 2002 that he saw a one-inch contusion in the infant’s anus during autopsy. It was discovered after trial that the contusion was only one centimeter, which is quite different than one inch. Hayne claimed in an affidavit that he misspoke during the trial when providing the measurement. At trial, regardless of the size, Hayne testified that the contusion was most likely the result of penetration of an object. On the surface, Hayne’s description must have sounded a lot like sexual assault to the jury.

    Fast forward to 2014. Hayne stated in a 2014 affidavit that he specifically told prosecutors on more than one occasion prior to trial that he could not support a finding a sexual abuse. This information was withheld from the defense, which is a Brady violation.

    Most shockingly, the defense learned in January of 2014, 12 years after the conviction, that Hayne had looked at tissue sections under a microscope and found definitively that there was no evidence of sexual assault. In a case where suspicion of sexual assault only arose when ER doctors and nurses noticed what they believed to be physical evidence of sexual abuse. Hayne’s microscopic findings were clearly exculpatory, and would have positively shown that the doctors and nurses had misinterpreted what they saw. The state withheld this evidence from the defense as well and failed to tell the doctors and nurses about it before they testified.

    Why didn’t Hayne testify at trail in 2002 that there was no evidence of a sexual assault? Because no one asked him. Prosecutors stood before the court during opening statements and told the jury that Hayne had, “confirmed the nurses and doctors worst fear, that this child had been sexually abused.” The prosecution knew that Hayne had done no such thing; in fact, he had done just the opposite. The prosecution lied to the jury. When Hayne took the stand, they were careful not to ask specific questions about sexual abuse, and Hayne was sure to only respond directly to questions asked. The defense had their hands tied. They could not possibly ask a question they did not know the answer to. If they had asked Hayne if the infant had been sexually assaulted and his answer was anything other than no, they would have instantly buried their client. The prosecution knew the defense would never take the chance. The lies told during opening and closing arguments by the prosecution were left unchallenged, and a wrongful conviction was the result.

    Hayne’s statements in his affidavits which were reiterated during the evidentiary hearing state that he does not support a claim of sexual assault and that he no longer believes that Chloe died by shaking alone. He now believes that impact had to be a factor. Meaning that the infant could have died from a short fall. Hayne bases his current beliefs on changes in science related to SBS. Hayne attempted to save face by saying that he still believes the death was the result of a homicide, but he offered not valid theory to support that belief. Hayne’s demeanor in court was a bit questionable. During breaks, he appeared to wander about, willing to chat with anyone who would provide an ear. At one point, he sat down next to Havard’s stepfather, engaging him with stick figure drawings he had sketched on a pad in an apparent attempt to form new theories.

    After Hayne’s testimony was concluded, the defense called Dr. Michael Baden to the stand. Baden is a physician and board-certified forensic pathologist. Baden is the former Chief Medical Examiner of New York City and is the former chief forensic pathologist for the New York State Police. Baden is well respected worldwide for his work in this field.

    Baden testified that he believed Chloe’s death had nothing to do with shaking. Per Baden, it is no longer accepted in the field of science that shaking alone is enough to cause fatal injury in children. Impact is now considered a requirement to produce fatal injuries, if other factors such as neck or rib injuries are not observed. Baden went on further to say that caution needs to be used to assure that injuries which were once thought to be caused from shaking alone, are not currently being automatically re-categorized as shaking with impact simply to meet the new criteria. In cases of head injuries from short falls, shaking is not required and should be eliminated if there is no supportive evidence of shaking.

    Baden stated that the injuries observed during autopsy were entirely consistent with a blunt force impact which would have resulted from a short fall as described by Havard. Baden stated that the infant had no signs of injury to the neck or ribs, which would have been present had the infant been violently shaken. He went on to say that autopsy findings which are found to be consistent with early statements given from a person who was present show that those statements carry more weight. He said it is difficult to tell a story that later matches up with an autopsy report if you are not telling the truth.

    The ER staff testified at trial in 2002 that retinal hemorrhages were present when Chloe arrived to the ER. The jury was told that retinal hemorrhages could only be caused by shaking. Meaning that the jury was told that the only possible cause of death was SBS.

    Baden stated that there are multiple causes of retinal hemorrhages. Any suggestion that retinal hemorrhages are only caused by SBS is false. Baden stated that short falls were a cause of retinal hemorrhages. Everyone who testified after Baden agreed with his assessment, including the pediatrician who testified for the prosecution. Unfortunately, this expert evidence was not available at Havard’s trial, leaving the jury to decide his fate based on unqualified witness testimony.

    Baden told the court that pathologists are more qualified than other specialties to diagnose cause of death. Per Baden, ER doctors and pediatricians specialize in the treatment of living patients. Pathologists have the task of looking beneath the surface of non-living bodies to properly determine cause of death. Evidence exists after death that his not available to doctors who are treating living patients.

    Dr. Janice Ophoven was next to testify for the defense. Ophoven is a pediatric forensic pathologist with over 30 years of clinical, administrative and quality improvement experience. Ophoven is trained in pediatrics and is board certified in pathology and forensic pathology. Ophoven’s practice is focused on understanding child abuse and injury to children.

    Ophoven stated that no evidence exists to show that Chloe’s death was the result of child abuse. She reiterated Baden’s testimony that violent shaking alone was no longer an accepted cause of death in infants. Ophoven told the court that it was a common belief in the scientific world back in 2002 that short falls could not cause fatal injuries in children. She went on to say that the scientific community no longer believes that to be true. She made it clear that there have been significant changes in science regarding infant head injuries and SBS since the time of Havard’s trial. She also refuted the 2002 retinal hemorrhage trial testimony, stating that it is well known in the medical community that retinal hemorrhages can be caused by short falls.

    Ophoven concluded that the infant’s death was the result of a short fall as described by Havard. She also reiterated Baden’s statement that pathologists are more qualified to determine cause of death than ER doctors and pediatricians.

    Dr. Chris Van Ee was the final expert called by the defense. Van Ee holds a Ph.D. in Biomedical Engineering from Duke University and is a licensed Professional Engineer. Van Ee has specific expertise in the analysis and risk assessment of head injury in the infant and adult populations.

    Van Ee testified that a short fall was the most logical scientific reason for the death of Chloe Britt. Van Ee told the court that short falls are now known to cause injuries which were once thought to be caused only by violent shaking. Per Van Ee, a one-foot fall onto a carpeted surface head first has a higher chance of producing a head injury to a child than violent shaking. Van Ee testified that he reviewed photographs of the bathroom in Havard’s trailer and determined that the fall described by Havard could have caused fatal head trauma. Tests conducted by Van Ee using crash-test-dummies, concluded that a short fall from three-feet onto a hard surface such as a porcelain toilet could generate forces similar to a car accident which could lead to the death of a six-month-old infant.

    On the final day of the hearing, the prosecution called Dr. Scott Benton to the stand. Benton is the medical director of the Children’s Justice Center and chief of the division of forensic medicine at the University of Mississippi Medical Center.

    Benton’s qualifications as an expert on issues of infant death were challenged by the defense because Benton is a pediatrician, not a pathologist. Both Baden and Ophoven provided clear reasoning in their testimony as to why pathologists are uniquely qualified to analyze cause of death. Judge Johnson noted the defense objection and said that he would take it into consideration when ruling on the case.

    During questioning, Benton argued that shaking alone could prove fatal for an infant. His testimony ignored current scientific literature which states that shaking alone without other signs of injury is not enough to cause fatal injuries in children.

    Benton also attempted to exaggerate the severity of the small contusions found on the infant’s face, discounting testimony from both Baden and Ophoven who said that the small bruises were likely caused from the fall or during resuscitation attempts in the ER. Per Ophoven, resuscitation attempts are not a gentle process and are often frantic. She described the situations as a time of organized chaos.

    On cross examination, it was discovered that Benton was not contacted by the State to evaluate the case. Benton’s participation was the result of his own eagerness to get involved. Benton contacted Jerry Mitchell from the Clarion Ledger because he had read a single article of Mitchell’s and had determined that the case was a homicide. After an email exchange with Mitchell, Benton’s further inquiries led to his eventual work on behalf of the prosecution.

    It was also discovered on cross examination that the Children’s Justice Center where Benton works is experiencing financial difficulties due to a mismanagement of funds that were received from grants. The medical center now looks to benefit upwards of fifty thousand dollars for Benton’s testimony in this case. Benton told the court that his involvement was in no way an attempt to make money, and that his medical center was seeking private donations to sustain their efforts to care for children.

    In closing, the defense argued that they had met the burden of proof put forth by the Mississippi Supreme Court. The defense was required by the high court to prove that new evidence was available to show that the science behind SBS has changed since the time of Havard’s trial. After hearing from the defense experts who testified, and after witnessing the exhibits entered, which included up to date medical literature, there is no doubt that the requirements for a new trial have been fully satisfied by the defense.

    In a perfect world, we would see prosecutors who were willing to admit past errors. But we live in a far different reality. In our current justice system, the clear majority of prosecutors protect their office relentlessly at all costs. Sadly, the prosecution in this case fits the typical mold. The prosecution’s main argument during closing was not directed at challenging the legitimacy of claims made by the defense. The Prosecution’s argument was that the evidence presented was available at the time of Havard’s trial in 2002, so it should not be allowed.

    Appellate laws are complicated and vary depending on the type of case. In layman’s terms, for purposes of describing the requirements for this case, the current laws state that evidence based requests for new trials can only be made by use of new evidence which was not available at trial. These laws may have good intentions but in the end, they can have a devastating impact on indigent defendants.

    If you are poor and you do not have the means to hire experts at trial, you are in trouble. Once convicted, if there is evidence to exonerate you that was available at the time of your first trial, it is currently inadmissible because it is technically not new. Meaning that details in medical journals that can possibly exonerate defendants that are not found by public defenders, with extremely limited budgets and no expert assistance, cannot be used in future hearings because they were technically available at time of trial. Let that sink in.

    Do these criteria work to assure fair trials? Do these criteria show that prosecutors are working to seek proper justice? Does suppression of exonerating evidence simply because an indigent defendant’s public defender failed to find it in the first trial truly work to seek real justice?

    Now, to be clear, the prosecution’s argument is absurd because new evidence has clearly been proven to have become available after Havard’s trial. Evidence which absolutely meets the current requirements. This is irrefutable. The judge has no reason to disagree based on current law. But I find it disturbing that any state in our country would ever attempt to suppress valid evidence based on the current criteria. Valid evidence should never be suppressed. Our goal should always be to seek the truth.

    The truth in this case shows that the state of Mississippi is trying to put an innocent man to death for a crime that never happened. Current evidence, which goes far beyond the topic of SBS alone, shows that there is no longer any viable case against Jeff Havard. The original theory of the crime has been disproven. There is no evidence to suggest that the death of Chloe Britt was anything other than a tragic accident. If Judge Johnson rules in favor of a new trial, the State will most likely decide not to retry the case due to lack of evidence. Knowing this should give people pause. If justice is truly the goal, why is the state of Mississippi trying so hard to uphold a faulty verdict in a death penalty case?

    A ruling from Judge Johnson is expected to take 60 to 90 days.

    http://wrongfulconvictionnews.com/ju...ever-happened/

  3. #83
    Billinsandiego
    Guest
    I have read most of this thread, however, this might have some up to date information. It's from a site that I really don't agree with 100% of the time, although I do like there stance on gun control:

    This Man Is on Death Row for Killing a 6-Month-Old. But What If We're Wrong About Shaken Baby Syndrome?

    A controversial medical examiner, exaggerated testimony, and bad forensics branded Jeffrey Havard a rapist and a baby killer.

    By Radley Balko & Tucker Carrington
    reason.com

    Jeffrey Havard's story began the evening of February 21, 2002, when the Mississippi man was keeping an eye on Chloe, the 6-month-old daughter of his girlfriend, Rebecca Britt. According to Havard, Chloe had spit up on her clothes and bedding, so he gave the girl a bath. As he pulled her up out of the tub, she slipped from his grip and fell. As she fell, her head struck the toilet.

    Havard would later say the bump on Chloe's head didn't appear serious, so he dressed her in clean clothes and put her to bed. Not wanting to worry Britt (or perhaps not wanting to anger her), he said nothing about the incident when she returned. When she did get home, Britt checked on the baby, who seemed fine. So she and Havard ate dinner and went about their evening.

    Later that night, Chloe stopped breathing. Havard and Britt rushed her to a hospital. She died shortly thereafter.

    When the emergency room doctors examined Chloe, they discovered that her anus was dilated—which isn't uncommon in infants shortly after death. It's also common in infants who are still alive but have lost brain function. Unfortunately, though, even trained medical staff sometimes mistake it for sexual abuse.

    Medical examiner Steven Hayne performed an autopsy the following evening. In his write-up, he noted a one-centimeter contusion on Chloe's rectum, which he documented in a photograph. The report did not mention any evidence of sexual assault, but Hayne did find symptoms he said were consistent with "shaken baby syndrome."

    Havard didn't admit that he'd dropped Chloe until a video-taped interview two days after her death, which meant his story had changed. That, plus statements E.R. staff made about possible sexual abuse and Hayne's shaken baby diagnosis, were enough for local officials to arrest Havard and charge him with capital murder. The district attorney said he would seek the death penalty.

    * * *

    The concept of shaken baby syndrome has, in fact, come under scrutiny over the last decade. It's obviously true that shaking too hard can kill a fragile newborn—that's not disputed. But prosecutors have become reliant on the idea that if a trio of specific symptoms are found in a dead child, the death could only have been caused by violent shaking. Those symptoms are bleeding at the back of the eye, bleeding in the protective area of the brain, and brain swelling.

    This is a convenient diagnosis, since it provides prosecutors with a method of homicide (shaking), a likely suspect (the last person alone with the child), and intent (it is assumed that babies only die this way after exceptionally violent shaking). Yet new research has shown that falls, blows to the head, and even some illnesses and genetic conditions can cause the same set of symptoms. Many medical and legal authorities have therefore concluded that the trio of symptoms shouldn't be the sole basis of a conviction. Even the doctor who first came up with the theory has now expressed doubts about it.

    In most shaken baby syndrome cases, prosecutors would first file murder charges, then later allow the defendant to plead down to a lesser charge like manslaughter. But sometimes they've gotten a murder conviction.

    In recent years, thanks to increasing doubt around the diagnosis, a number of these shaken baby convictions have been overturned, and many more are under review. A 2015 study by The Washington Post and Northwestern University's Medill Justice Project found more than 2,000 cases in which a defendant was charged with shaking a child. Of those, 200 have either been acquitted, had the charges dropped, or had their convictions overturned. The National Registry of Exonerations lists 14 people convicted because of a shaken baby diagnosis who were later cleared.

    Without DNA testing, however, it can be nearly impossible to overcome faulty forensic testimony—even when, on close examination, it turns out the courts went out of their way not to see problems with the arguments they were accepting.

    * * *

    After Jeffrey Havard was arrested, the court assigned him a public defender. His attorney asked the district court judge for funds to hire his own forensic pathologist, but the judge turned him down, finding that there was no need for a separate pathologist when Hayne was available.

    Hayne has since come under intense scrutiny for taking on improbable workloads and for giving testimony that at times has stretched the bounds of science. In fact, courts have thrown out his testimony in several cases, and he has been barred from doing autopsies for the state of Mississippi. In another shaken baby syndrome trial six years after Havard's conviction—well after the problems with the diagnosis were known—Hayne cited a study that does not appear to exist, and referred to a forensic pathology textbook that says the precise opposite of what he claimed in court. "I don't know how he could have honestly misread it," the textbook's author would later declare.

    Even at the time of Havard's trial, there was good reason for the defense attorney to want a second opinion. In other cases, Hayne had admitted under oath to doing 1,500 or more autopsies each year—nearly five times the absolute maximum recommended by the National Association of Medical Examiners. But the state's courts and prosecutors had been relying on Hayne for 15 years. Havard would have to rely on him, too.

    Though he had no prior history of abusing or molesting children, by the time Havard's trial began 10 months later, word had spread around Adams County, Mississippi, that he was a pedophile and baby killer.

    Studies have shown not only that an eyewitness's memory can change over time, but that memories can be significantly altered with the acquisition of new information. Research supporting the idea of "reconstructive memory" in fact goes all the way back to the 1930s and the work of cognitive psychology pioneer Frederic Bartlett.

    This appears to be what happened in Havard's case, as some witnesses' memories grew considerably more vivid by the time of his trial. Jurors heard the sheriff, the coroner, and the hospital staff describe "tears," "rips," "lacerations," and other injuries to the child's anus. Some claimed to have seen blood. Two nurses said it was the worst example of anal trauma they had ever witnessed. Yet once the infant had been cleaned off, Hayne's autopsy photos showed no rips, tears, lacerations, or similar injuries anywhere on the girl's rectum—only the dilation and small contusion.

    Even the doctor who first came up with shaken baby syndrome has now expressed doubts about it.

    Despite his own photos, and despite the fact that his autopsy notes made no mention of sexual abuse, Hayne played up the bruise at trial. He told the jury that it was an inch long rather than a centimeter, as his report had said. While he conceded that he had found no tears or lacerations, he speculated that rigor mortis (the tightening of muscles after death) could have caused the girl's rectum to close and that this could have hidden any tears or cuts from his view. If he had really believed that, Hayne could have accounted for the possibility in his autopsy and looked more closely. He did neither. When asked what might have caused the small bruise, Hayne volunteered, "penetration of the rectum by an object."

    The examiner also testified that he'd found the symptoms of shaken baby syndrome and could conclude that Chloe had been "violently shaken" to death. To emphasize the point, Hayne and the prosecutor exchanged the phrase "violently shaken" an additional six times.

    The defense attorney wasn't exactly aggressive. The prosecution called 16 witnesses, whose testimonies comprise 261 pages of the trial transcript. Havard's lawyer called a single witness, a nurse at the E.R., whose testimony takes up three pages. The state didn't even bother to cross-examine him.

    It's hardly surprising, then, that the jury convicted Havard and sentenced him to die. The entire trial, deliberation, guilty verdict, sentencing trial, deliberation, and death sentence took two days.

    * * *

    Havard's case was taken up by the Mississippi Office of Capital Post-Conviction Counsel, an institution the state had set up to guarantee that indigent defendants in death penalty cases receive adequate legal representation. That office had funding to hire its own experts, so Havard's new attorneys asked former Alabama state medical examiner James Lauridson to review Hayne's autopsy and trial testimony.

    Lauridson found a number of problems. Most notably, he found no evidence of sexual abuse at all.

    His report pointed to medical literature documenting the fact that the anus often dilates in infants shortly after death, and that this is often mistaken for sexual abuse. It disputed Hayne's contention about rigor mortis and speculated that the E.R. staff likely mistook the exposed lining of the girl's rectum for blood. Lauridson initially had difficulty getting his hands on the slides containing the tissue samples Hayne had taken; when he did receive them, after his initial report had already been submitted, he found nothing to suggest sexual abuse.

    None of these opinions mattered for Havard's direct appeal. In a 2006 ruling, the Mississippi Supreme Court delivered a brutal one-two punch. The justices first upheld the trial judge's decision to deny Havard funds to hire his own forensic pathologist, finding that the defense attorneys had failed to show why an independent medical examiner was necessary. They then explained that because Lauridson's affidavit wasn't submitted during the original trial, they were barred from considering it. Thus, the court unanimously upheld Havard's conviction and death sentence.

    Havard's first post-conviction appeal came two years later. In these proceedings, a defendant has more leeway to introduce new evidence, but the bar to be granted a new trial is also set much higher.

    This time, the court had to at least consider Lauridson's affidavit. And it did—but not all that carefully. In his majority opinion, Justice George Carlson wrote that Lauridson "opined in his affidavit 'that there is a possibility that Chloe Madison Britt was not sexually assaulted.'" Carlson then wrote, "Taking this statement to its logical conclusion, this leaves open the possibility that she was."

    In reality, the phrase "there is a possibility," which Carlson put in quotes, doesn't appear anywhere in Lauridson's affidavit. What the examiner actually wrote was: "The conclusions that Chloe Britt suffered sexual abuse are not supported by objective evidence and are wrong." He did add that he couldn't definitively say there were no signs of sexual abuse, because that would require examination of Hayne's tissue slides—and at the time of his original report, he still didn't have access to them. When he finally saw the slides, however, he was much more conclusive, writing that there was "no histological evidence of contusion or laceration" on the child's colon or anus and that "these findings further strengthen the conclusions of my report."

    Nonetheless, Justice Carlson mischaracterized Lauridson's report throughout his opinion. It was arguably a more forceful brief for the state than those submitted by the prosecutors themselves. By an 8–1 vote, Havard's appeal was denied and his conviction and sentence were upheld.

    * * *

    In late 2011, Havard's attorneys asked for a new trial. In the intervening years, Hayne had carefully changed his opinion: "Based upon the autopsy evidence available regarding the death of Chloe Britt," the medical examiner wrote in a declaration for Havard's lawyers, "I cannot include or exclude to a reasonable degree of medical certainty that she was sexually assaulted." He also acknowledged that a dilated anus is not in itself evidence of sexual abuse.

    Even here, Hayne was hard to pin down, managing to reframe his trial testimony without directly contradicting it. He now claimed that he had never explicitly said Chloe was sexually assaulted—he'd merely said her injuries were consistent with that possibility, then speculated that one method of assault could have been "penetration of the rectum by an object." That wasn't entirely wrong, though the "penetration" line had to have been pretty damning for Havard. The prosecutor did do most of the heavy lifting to advance the assault narrative, often by citing the observations of the E.R. staff, sheriff, and coroner. For most of his testimony, Hayne merely acquiesced, even though he knew he'd found no biological material from Havard on or in the child, and even though the only anal trauma he'd seen was the small bruise.

    A credible and conscientious medical examiner should have said at trial what Hayne said in his declaration a decade later. A credible and conscientious medical examiner wouldn't have allowed his own testimony to be used by a prosecutor to mislead a jury, even if that testimony wasn't technically false. But Hayne wasn't a credible and conscientious medical examiner.

    The Mississippi Supreme Court again denied Havard relief. Justice Carlson again wrote the opinion.

    Since Hayne hadn't explicitly testified at trial that Chloe had been sexually abused, Carlson argued, his 2012 declaration stating he had found no evidence of abuse wasn't really new evidence. Of course, in his 2008 opinion, Carlson had described Lauridson's conclusion that the dilated anus was not indicative of sexual abuse as "contrary to that of Dr. Hayne." Hayne may not have said the dilation was caused by sexual assault, in other words—but his testimony was so suggestive of it that even Carlson at the time seemed to think it was Hayne's position.

    It took Havard's original jury less than two days to deliberate, convict him based on flawed evidence, hear arguments regarding the appropriate punishment, deliberate again, and sentence him to death. It took 13 years for the courts to admit that a small portion of the evidence might have been scientifically unsound.

    In two rulings handed down just four years apart, the same state Supreme Court justice had found that Hayne's testimony supported the jury's finding of sexual assault and that Hayne never explicitly testified that a sexual assault had taken place.

    Absurdly, Carlson additionally claimed that the examiner's 2012 declaration wasn't new evidence because it was "duplicative" of the Lauridson affidavit that the court had dismissed in 2008. Between the two opinions, then, he managed to assert that Lauridson's affidavit contradicted Hayne's trial testimony; that there was no substantial difference between Hayne's trial testimony and his updated declaration; and yet that Hayne's updated declaration duplicated Lauridson's affidavit.

    Logically, these three things can't possibly all be true. Two affidavits can't be both duplicative of and contrary to one another. But Carlson stated exactly that, and so did his fellow justices. For the third time, Mississippi's Supreme Court denied Havard's petition.

    * * *

    Over the next several years, the state's case against Havard continued to deteriorate. Two more forensic pathologists reviewed the case and wrote scathing reports deriding Hayne's work, as did an engineer who had studied the mechanics of shaken baby syndrome. By 2013, Havard's situation had also attracted popular attention. The Jackson Clarion-Ledger and the Huffington Post had both published articles about him, and a website and Facebook page maintained by Havard's friends and family were generating outrage over his conviction.

    Meanwhile, Hayne was garnering less-welcome attention. His testimony in several other cases had been criticized by fellow forensic pathologists. In 2008, he was effectively fired as the de facto medical examiner of Mississippi—partially in response to a 2006 investigation in Reason by Balko, a co-author of this piece. State officials including Attorney General Jim Hood were soon facing calls to review Hayne's work, although they steadfastly resisted.

    Havard's attorneys were also pursuing his claims in federal court during this period. In August 2013, Hood's office filed a motion to seal that case—to prohibit the public from seeing any further filings or proceedings. The state claimed the motion was sparked by a Facebook post from one of Havard's lawyers, who had complained that Mississippi didn't "want to be bothered by actually responding to his claims of innocence." But the state's brief itself revealed the real motivation: Havard's case "had become a public spectacle."

    Hood said his office had received letters from Havard's supporters and expressed concern that the letters were similarly worded, which he claimed showed the authors had all gotten their information from the same source. Why this was a grave matter isn't exactly clear. There's nothing inherently wrong with citizens petitioning their elected officials. In the end, not only did the federal court reject the attorney general's motion but the motion itself became a news story, fueling speculation that the state had something to hide.

    In 2014, Hayne appeared to walk back his trial testimony even further. In an interview with the Clarion-Ledger, he said he'd never believed Chloe Britt had been sexually assaulted. The following July, he filed another affidavit with Havard's trial attorneys, this time claiming he had explicitly told prosecutors on more than one occasion that he could not support such a finding. Havard's attorneys said this information was never turned over to them.

    Someone wasn't telling the truth. At Havard's trial, the prosecutor had informed jurors that Hayne would "testify for you about his findings and about how he confirmed the nurses' and doctors' worst fears—this child had been abused and the child had been penetrated." Now, all this time later, Hayne was claiming he'd told prosecutors precisely the opposite.

    If true, that would be a major violation on the part of the state. Hayne's statement would have been exculpatory information, and prosecutors would have been obligated to share it with the defense. Hayne was the only medical examiner to testify, and the alleged sexual assault was a major part of the state's case and the aggravating factor that allowed Mississippi to seek the death penalty.

    It's hard not to wonder: If Hayne really knew all along that the state had persuaded a jury to convict someone of an assault he never believed happened, why did he wait 13 years—and until three other forensic pathologists had filed affidavits for Havard's defense—before speaking up?

    * * *

    In April 2015, Havard finally caught a break. Justice Carlson had retired, and the Mississippi Supreme Court gave Havard's lawyers permission to request an evidentiary hearing on the scientific validity of shaken baby syndrome.

    The court still rejected Havard's challenge to the allegations of sexual abuse. The ruling wasn't an exoneration, and it wasn't a new trial. It was a three-paragraph order allowing Havard to ask a trial court judge to hold a hearing about the soundness of the evidence that had been used against him. It was a modest win, but it at least put his execution on hold.

    In June 2016, a circuit court judge granted his request. If Havard could convince the court that shaken baby syndrome is not a scientifically reliable diagnosis, he would finally get a new trial.

    That hearing occurred in August 2017. Hayne testified that he no longer believed in the shaken baby diagnosis. The renowned forensic pathologist Michael Baden also testified for Havard's defense, saying he didn't believe Chloe Britt had been shaken. In keeping with the state supreme court's ruling, the judge refused to allow any testimony casting doubt on the alleged sexual assault.

    It took Havard's original jury less than two days to deliberate, convict him based on flawed evidence, hear arguments regarding the appropriate punishment, deliberate again, and sentence him to death. It took 13 years for the courts to admit that a small portion of the evidence might have been scientifically unsound. It took another 14 months for the trial court judge to agree to hold a hearing on the matter, and 14 months more until the hearing itself. As of press time, the judge had yet to issue a decision.

    It's often said that the wheels of justice grind slowly. That isn't always true. When it comes to convicting people, they can move swiftly indeed. It's when the system needs to correct an injustice—to admit and address its mistakes—that the gears tend to sputter to a halt.

    For now, Jeffrey Havard remains on death row.

    https://reason.com/archives/2018/02/...nded-him-a-rap

  4. #84
    Senior Member CnCP Legend Mike's Avatar
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    After 16 years, Jeffrey Havard is off Mississippi's death row

    By Jerry Mitchell
    The Mississippi Clarion-Ledger

    Jeffrey Havard has spent nearly 16 years behind bars on Mississippi’s death row for a crime the state’s then-pathologist didn’t believe took place.

    On Friday, Adams County Circuit Judge Forrest A. Johnson ordered Havard off death row after questions arose regarding whether 6-month-old Chloe Madison Britt actually died of shaken baby syndrome.

    "While the evidence presented by the (defense) is not sufficient to undermine this Court's confidence in the conviction," Johnson wrote, "there is a cautious disturbance in confidence of the sentence, even if slight."

    Johnson vacated the death sentence and ordered a new sentencing hearing for Havard before a jury, which would decide between the death penalty and a life without parole.

    "With all due respect, we think the court got it wrong," said defense lawyer Graham Carner, who is representing Havard with Mark Jicka. "We are disappointed, but we are not done."

    Carner said he wants a jury to hear all of the evidence in the case "and not evidence that is unquestionably false and based on bad science. We have been fighting for Jeffrey for 10 years, and we will continue to do so."

    Havard has spent most of his adult life behind bars and will celebrate his 40th birthday in November.

    At the 2002 trial, the state’s then-pathologist Dr. Steven Hayne testified that Chloe died of shaken baby syndrome, comparing it to a motor vehicle crash or a fall from a significant height.

    But Hayne later backed off that conclusion, telling the Clarion Ledger there was “growing evidence” his shaken baby diagnosis was “probably not correct” because shaking alone couldn’t generate enough force to cause such injuries.

    After questions were raised about the case, the state Supreme Court in 2014 gave Havard permission to seek an evidentiary hearing.

    For decades, shaken baby syndrome was widely accepted, diagnosed through a triad of symptoms: subdural bleeding (blood collecting between the brain and the skull), retinal bleeding (bleeding in the back of the eye) and brain swelling.

    In the years since, medical belief that these symptoms provided ironclad proof of homicide began to crumble after a series of studies began to raise doubts.

    In 2009, the American Academy of Pediatrics recommended that the syndrome diagnosis be discarded and replaced with “abusive head trauma.”

    At the request of the Clarion Ledger, New York pathologist Dr. Michael Baden studied the autopsy report and other materials in Britt’s death.

    He found no support for the shaken baby conclusion, pointing to a lack of neck or chest injuries or spine or rib fractures that suggest such abusive shaking.

    At a hearing last year, Hayne testified that the term he would use now would be “abusive head trauma” to describe the injuries to Chloe, which he said included bruises on the forehead, scalp, back of head and mouth as well as bleeding between the skull and brain.

    He said he still believed her death was a homicide — and Johnson came to the same conclusion in his ruling Friday.

    The judge cited Havard's initial statement to authorities that he didn't know what happened to Britt.

    The morning after Chloe's death, Havard told authorities that he dropped the baby accidentally after getting her out of the bathtub and that she hit her head on the porcelain toilet.

    Hayne acknowledged that “tremendous G forces can be generated in a short fall. If it’s straight to the head, then it could cause serious injury.”

    Baden testified that the problem with the “abusive head trauma” conclusion is that it’s impossible to tell whether a person accidentally fell down the stairs or someone pushed that person.

    He said he disagreed with a prosecution expert from the 2002 trial who claimed Britt’s retinal hemorrhages proved that this baby had been shaken.

    “It’s my opinion that shaking had nothing to do with the death,” Baden said. “It’s my opinion that all of the injuries are consistent with blunt force impact.”

    The baby's injuries are consistent with the fall that Havard described, Baden said. “With short falls, you can have fatal injuries.”

    Last year’s hearing did not include a discussion about evidence about the alleged sexual abuse, the underlying felony, which qualified the case for the death penalty.

    “I didn’t think there was a sexual assault,” Hayne told the Clarion Ledger. “I didn’t see any evidence of sexual assault.”

    At trial, several emergency room nurses and doctors testified there was unquestionable evidence of sexual assault, saying they saw tears and rips in the child’s anus.

    “Maybe they were looking at folds and thought they were tears,” Hayne told the Clarion Ledger. “We were very careful, and we also took sections.”

    A rape kit also found no semen or foreign DNA, and he examined those sections under a microscope.

    He said the anal contusion he did could have been consistent with the child passing a harder stool.

    But jurors never heard that evidence, and they convicted Havard of capital murder.

    Baden said when doctors overstate the case, such as with shaken baby syndrome, “innocent people can get convicted.”

    https://www.clarionledger.com/story/...ow/1296190002/

  5. #85
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    State decides not to seek death penalty in resentencing of 2002 capital murder case

    Monday morning, District Attorney Ronnie Harper announced that the state would no longer seek the death penalty against Jeffery Havard, who had his 2002 death sentence recently overturned.

    In September, Sixth District Circuit Court Judge Forrest “Al” Johnson ordered Havard’s death sentence vacated after the Mississippi Supreme County ordered a hearing to determine if a new trial was needed due to changes in medical beliefs surrounding shaken baby syndrome.

    An Adams County jury convicted Havard of capital murder and sentenced him to death in 2002 for the death of his girlfriend’s 6-month-old-child. Havard had been on death row for 15 years until Johnson vacated the sentence.

    Johnson declined to order a new trial for Havard but did order a new sentencing hearing for a jury to determine if Havard should receive the death penalty or life in prison without the chance of parole.

    Monday morning, Harper announced the state’s decision during a status hearing in Johnson’s courtroom.

    “From the day of the court’s ruling setting aside the sentencing, we have had an opportunity to review the files,” Harper said. “It was a long time ago.”

    Harper said the passage of time has made it difficult to find out what evidence, if any, might be available and what witnesses might be available.

    “I don’t believe we can recreate the case to the point where I can adequately present the evidence as it would be necessary,” Harper said. “I have come to the conclusion that I don’t believe we can seek the death penalty.”

    Representatives for the Attorney General Jim Hood said the state defers to and agrees with the district attorney.

    Johnson recessed the hearing and said the court would set a date for sentencing after he has had a chance to review sentencing options.

    Johnson told Havard that as of Monday, the threat of the death penalty is no longer.

    “Mr. Havard, ever what happens from here on out, you need to thank these attorneys. They have saved your life whatever happens with this,” Johnson said. “I don’t know what will happen with this and obviously there are rights to appeal … but as of right now you no longer have the threat of the death penalty against you.”

    Havard’s family members who were in attendance said although they are happy that Havard is no longer on death row, the case is not over.

    “Jeffery didn’t get a fair trial to begin with,” Havard’s sister Tiffany Britt said. “This is not enough. If he would go back to trial and a jury would hear everything the verdict would be different.”

    Havard’s mother Cheryl Harrel said the family is not content with the results of Monday’s hearing. The family wants to appeal and get Havard a new trial.

    “This is a small step,” Harrell said. “This is not the end.”

    https://www.natchezdemocrat.com/2018...l-murder-case/

  6. #86
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    Inmate risks death sentence with appeal: 'All I want to do is to be able to tell the jury my story.'

    NATCHEZ — Jeffrey Havard became angry when he was removed from Mississippi’s death row in September, nearly 16 years after he entered.

    His initial reaction to the court tossing out his death sentence was “worse than doing nothing at all,” Havard said in an interview inside the Adams County Jail. “I would rather die, taking my chances on death row and go down being executed, fighting for my innocence, than to just be thrown into prison, life without parole, and waste away.”

    His lawyers plan to appeal the judge’s decision to the state Supreme Court, opening the door for justices to reimpose the death penalty.

    So why would anyone risk that?

    “All I want to do is to be able to tell the jury my story,” Havard said. “I haven’t gotten a chance to do that.”

    She noticed that Chloe wasn't breathing

    It was the night of Feb. 21, 2002, and 6-month-old Chloe Madison Britt was crying.

    Her mother, Rebecca, was gone, buying something from the store.

    Havard said he thought Chloe had soiled her diaper, discovering instead she had spit up.

    He decided to give her a bath, and after she was done, he pulled her out.

    As he reached for a towel, she was wiggling and fell from his grasp, hitting the toilet, he said.

    He returned her to his arms, gave her a little shake and spoke to her, he said. “Chloe, are you OK?”

    She started crying, he said. “I held her in my arms and made sure she was OK. I dried her off, and she quit crying. I thought she was OK.”

    When Rebecca returned minutes later, she checked on Chloe, he said. “That eased my mind, and I didn’t say anything.”

    He said he gave Rebecca money to rent a movie for them to watch.

    When she returned, she noticed that Chloe wasn’t breathing and began to scream, starting CPR on her daughter.

    Havard, who was in the bathroom, said Rebecca yelled out for him to go to his grandparents down the road.

    He said he replied, “No, let’s get in the car and go to the hospital.”

    At Natchez Community Hospital’s emergency room, medical personnel scrambled to revive Chloe, who wasn’t breathing and had no pulse.

    At 10:04 p.m., they got their first ray of hope. Chloe’s blue skin began to turn pink.

    They could see bruises on her forehead and the front of her thighs. A nurse removed her diaper to take her temperature and said, "Look at this."

    They noticed the baby's rectum was dilated and called police.

    Not long after, they lost her pulse. Her face swelled; so did her brain. By 10:50 p.m., doctors declared her dead.

    'You're going to be executed for this'

    By the time that declaration took place, Havard was already in the back of a squad car.

    At about 3 a.m., deputies led him from the jail to the interrogation room.

    It was here, for the first time, that he learned Chloe was dead.

    “And before I can even react, (the deputy) said, ‘And she’s been raped,’” he recalled.

    The news stunned Havard.

    “Son,” he said the deputy told him, “she’s been ripped from end to end. You tell us right f---ing now what you did to her, and maybe that will keep the needle out of your arm up there in Parchman. You’re going to be executed for this.”

    The words shocked Havard.

    “That scared the hell out of me,” he recalled. “I was scared to say I dropped her at that point.”

    The next day, a hospital conducted a DNA test on him, hoping to link him to the sexual assault.

    When he returned to the jail, authorities handed him with papers that explained his arrest.

    He said his head spun as he read the words, accusing him of sexual battery and shaking Chloe to death.

    When he saw the words “subdural hemorrhage,” he said he realized that accidentally dropping her on the head may have caused her death.

    He shared his story with deputies, who pressed him repeatedly on the allegations of rape.

    He said he wanted to be helpful and tried to think of what might explain this, but they continued to believe he had sexually assaulted Chloe.

    “It was the perfect storm,” he recalled. “It still is.”

    'Absolute low point of evil and human depravity'

    In December 2002, Havard went on trial for capital murder.

    A parade of witnesses — doctors, nurses, the sheriff and others — described an anal dilation the size of a quarter, along with tears, rips, lacerations and bleeding they said they saw in the child’s anal area.

    Then-state pathologist Dr. Steven Hayne told jurors that Havard had shaken the baby to death, comparing the injuries to those seen in car crashes and falls from significant heights.

    No defense experts testified because Judge Johnson wouldn’t permit their hiring.

    He told defense lawyers they could question Hayne about the death. They didn’t bother.

    Jurors never heard from Havard, either, because his court-appointed lawyers advised him not to testify.

    After 40 minutes of deliberation, jurors convicted Havard, who professed his innocence when he was sentenced, and recommended the death penalty.

    Circuit Judge Forrest Johnson told him, “Just when you think that you have seen everything and that you have seen or heard of the absolute low point of evil and human depravity, someone like you comes along and shows us a new low in human behavior."

    Havard received a sentence of death by lethal injection.

    Scientists discredit shaken baby syndrome

    In the years that followed the trial, scientists have discredited shaken baby syndrome.

    In 2001, Minnesota pathologist Dr. John Plunkett conducted a groundbreaking study, examining Consumer Product Safety Commission reports involving falls from playground equipment. He concluded short-distance falls are capable of producing the triad of symptoms previously identified as shaken baby syndrome.

    "It's clear that low velocity, even a 2- or 3-foot fall can cause serious and fatal brain injury," he told The Clarion-Ledger. "If people had paid attention to the science, it would not have been a mystery."

    The Clarion Ledger questioned Hayne about the changing science. He backed off his shaken baby conclusion, acknowledging the injuries could have come from a short fall.

    He cited a 1979 study measuring the falls of children. "You can generate tremendous G forces in a short distance when you hit a very hard surface," he said.

    Sexual assault was the underlying felony charge against Havard that enabled authorities to pursue the death penalty against him.

    Authorities believed sexual assault because of the anal dilation, but a 1996 study found anal dilation was common among children who died, especially those who suffered brain damage.

    Hayne told the Clarion Ledger that he informed prosecutors he didn’t see any evidence of sexual assault.

    A rape kit found no semen or foreign DNA, and he examined those sections under a microscope.

    His conclusion? There were no tears, rips or similar injuries to the child’s rectum, he said. “I would think that would be a definitive evaluation.”

    In 2015, the state Supreme Court ordered a new hearing for Havard, citing the shifting science on shaken baby syndrome, but justices wouldn’t allow the judge to consider evidence that no sexual assault took place.

    Havard vows to keep fighting: 'The truth is the truth'

    At that August 2017 hearing, Hayne and four other experts concluded that Chloe did not die of shaken baby syndrome.

    Hayne and another prosecution expert still believed her death was a homicide.

    Renowned pathologist Dr. Michael Baden of New York City disputed that conclusion, saying the baby’s injuries were consistent with the fall Havard described. “With short falls,” he said, “you can have fatal injuries.”

    After three days of testimony and hundreds of pages of briefs, Judge Johnson wrote an order that took up less than five pages.

    Despite the new evidence on shaken baby syndrome, Johnson concluded that Havard was just as guilty, citing the testimony of Hayne and Dr. Scott Benton, chief of the division of forensic medicine at the University of Mississippi’s Medical Center.

    But the judge tossed out the death sentence, concluding that while the evidence was “not sufficient to undermine this Court’s confidence in the conviction, there is a cautious disturbance in confidence of the sentence of death, even if slight.”

    That conclusion baffled Havard. “If I’m just as guilty as I was before, what disturbs my death sentence?” he asked.

    And if there is indeed doubt, he asked, wouldn’t that affect his conviction?

    His resentencing is set for Nov. 19, where he is expected to receive a life without parole sentence. (District Attorney Ronnie Harper told the judge that his office won't seek the death penalty.)

    Havard's appeal of the judge's order, however, opens the door for him to possibly receive the death penalty.

    For 16 years now, he said he has felt like he was underwater.

    Since 2012, he feels he has been rising up in that water, more and more evidence reflecting his innocence, he said. “Now I’m within an inch or two of the surface.”

    But instead of breaking through, the judge’s order has blocked his way, he said.

    He vows to keep fighting. “If it takes a week, if it takes 10 months, if it takes 10 years, the truth is the truth,” he said. “I want the truth to come out.”

    https://www.clarionledger.com/story/...ng/1857877002/
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  7. #87
    Senior Member CnCP Legend CharlesMartel's Avatar
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    Havard: Being off death row not enough; new trial warranted

    By Ben Hillyer
    Natchez Democrat

    NATCHEZ — A man convicted of capital murder in the death of a 6-month-old girl in 2002 is not content with being taken off of death row, where he has resided for 16 years.

    Just days after the State of Mississippi decided to drop its pursuit of the death penalty in his case, Jeffrey Havard maintains his innocence and wants a new trial.

    In a recording shared by Havard’s family, Havard questioned Sixth Circuit District Attorney Ronnie Harper’s decision not to pursue the death penalty again after a judge ruled earlier this month that Havard should receive a new sentence after a supreme court ruling that caused the judge to reconsider the case.

    “Remember this DA told the media and jury back in 2002 that if any case deserved the death penalty it was this one,” Havard said. “Back then (the DA) also told the media and jury that the evidence against me was the most overwhelming he had seen.”

    In the recording, Havard read from a statement he prepared after the state announced its decision to drop pursuit of the death penalty. Havard is currently housed in the Adams County Jail awaiting sentencing scheduled for Nov. 19.

    Harper told the court on Nov. 6 that the passage of time has made it difficult to find out what evidence, if any, might be available and what witnesses might be available.

    Havard said Harper’s statement was confusing to him in light of forensic evidence that was used in his trial.

    “If any evidence, especially forensics is obtained it should hold forever, unless of course it never existed and/or has evolved in my favor,” Havard said. “As far as the witnesses go, to my knowledge, every one of the witnesses are in the area still. Therefore in the interest of justice, they all should be ready and willing to testify as before unless there is a problem.”

    In September, Sixth District Circuit Court Judge Forrest “Al” Johnson ordered Havard’s death sentence vacated after the Mississippi Supreme Court ordered a hearing to determine if a new trial was needed due to changes in medical beliefs surrounding shaken baby syndrome.

    Johnson declined to order a new trial for Havard but did order a new sentencing hearing for a jury to determine if Havard should receive the death penalty or life in prison without the chance of parole.

    On Nov. 19, Johnson will sentence Havard for a second time in the case.

    Havard said on the recording he believes much of the evidence has been “tainted” and “disproved” by forensic science and objective arguments.

    Havard said the state got the jury to believe that there was an intentional and abusive death that occurred while committing sexual battery on his girlfriend’s 6-month-old daughter Chloe Britt.

    “During the discovery process material facts came to light by my experts and the state’s experts that in fact the sexual battery never occurred, thus proving my innocence there,” Havard said. “But the state fought to keep this issue closed and the trial court agreed to close this issue and kept these material facts from being considered.”

    “This was highly unfair, because this was the difference between guilty and not guilty in my case. The state argued it was the motive why the death occurred at all,” Havard said.

    The court closed the very thing that will determine his innocence or guilt, Havard said.

    “After considering all of this, I know I have shown that I deserve a new trial,” Havard said. “The fact that the DA has essentially said he doesn’t believe he could present this case again, that in and of itself shows there would be a different outcome by a new jury.

    “How could anyone be alright with someone being incarcerated when so-called overwhelming evidence from before doesn’t exist anymore?”

    When asked about Havard’s criticisms of the DA’s office and the court, Harper said it would not be appropriate to talk about a pending case awaiting sentencing.

    Attempts to reach Havard’s lawyers were unsuccessful.

    https://www.natchezdemocrat.com/2018...ial-warranted/
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  8. #88
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    Adams Co. man accused of killing baby in 2002 sentenced to life in prison

    Jeffrey Havard will spend life in prison without parole.

    By Morgan Howard and Patrice Clark
    WLBT

    ADAMS COUNTY, MS (WLBT) - A man convicted of capital murder for killing a 6-month-old in 2002 has been re-sentenced in Adams County.

    Jeffery Havard was initially sentenced to death for the rape and murder of Chloe Britt, the daughter of his then girlfriend, a crime he says he did not commit.

    He remained on death row for 16 years. His sentence was overturned this year.

    “It is relief that I won’t be executed, but it is not justice,” said Havard.

    Havard has always claimed he was innocent, saying he accidentally dropped the child and it was a tragic accident. Due to several issues with the case, the main issue being the concept of shaken baby syndrome—which has come under scrutiny over the past few years—the death penalty was vacated for Havard.

    “The court, based on information that was provided to them by scientific developments, they just thought it would be proper to send it back for an evidentiary hearing to see if those developments in the science might affect the outcome of the case," said District Attorney Ronnie Harper. “And Judge Johnson heard the case and made the decision to set aside the sentencing, but confirmed the conviction.”

    Havard’s attorneys say although he is off death row, the fight continues.

    “There has been a miscarriage of justice here, and while we have gotten partial relief, we are looking for full relief,” said Defense Attorney Graham Carner.

    “I am innocent, and I am going to appeal this,” said Havard.

    “I can’t imagine any case that I’ve ever ever tried where the defendant was convicted and didn’t say he was not guilty," said Harper. “So, no I’m not surprised that he’s even saying that, but I am satisfied based on my recollection of the trial and the evidence we had that he is guilty.”

    Havard will spend life in prison without parole.

    http://www.wlbt.com/2018/12/17/adams...es-sentencing/

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