Devil's Knot_ The True Story of the West Memphis Three - Mara Leveritt [163]
One young supporter e-mailed Arkansas’s governor, Mike Huckabee, who is a Republican and a Baptist minister. An aide who identified herself as the governor’s “criminal justice liaison” replied. After noting that the governor could not reopen a case or have any investigation done, the aide continued: “I do want to assure you that DNA testing was done, and that a match was found among the men convicted.” The statement was flagrantly misleading. It could only have referred to the DNA test conducted on blood found on Damien’s pendant necklace, the rough results of which suggested that the blood could have come from Jason Baldwin, Stevie Branch, or 11 percent of the Caucasian population, and it had never been introduced into evidence. Moreover, the aide wrote that the documentary about the case had been a “fictionalized” account and not a documentary. She referred the letter writer to the prosecuting attorney who had handled the case.373
A Forensic Analyst
The conduct of the West Memphis police during the murder investigation had raised enough questions for one of the Web site’s founders that she enrolled in a course in evidence analysis taught by a criminal profiler.374The instructor, Brent Turvey, became intrigued when told about the West Memphis case, and his interest was heightened when he was shown photos and other evidence pertaining to the victims’ autopsies. In 1997 the profiler prepared a report, outlining his own assessment of the case. It raised a number of new questions. He noted in photos of Michael Moore what he called a “directional pattern abrasion” just below the boy’s right shoulder. He wrote that the abrasion did not correspond with any of the evidence collected at the site where the bodies were found, and that it was “inconsistent with any of the naturally occurring elements that exist in that environment.” In one of the photos taken in the woods, he also noted what he believed was a “piece of cloth” in Michael’s right hand. “This is a very critical piece of physical evidence,” he wrote, and he urged that it be found and “fully examined.”
The profiler’s analysis of photos of Stevie Branch was even more disturbing. He noted “the existence of patterned injuries all over this victim’s face that could be bite marks.” He wrote, “Bite mark evidence is very important in a criminal case because it demonstrates behavior and lends itself to individuation. It can reveal to an examiner who committed the act, because bite marks can be as unique as fingerprints.” He recommended that a forensic odontologist, or dentist, review the photographs.
With regard to Christopher Byers, the profiler noted, “The general constellation of wounds to this victim is more advanced, more extensive, more overtly sexually oriented, and includes the use of a knife.” After describing the wounds created by the removal of the boy’s penis, scrotal sac, and testes, he observed, “The nature of this emasculation, as indicated by these wounds, is neither skilled nor practiced. It was a rageful, careless, but purposeful act carried out in anger.” The profiler also looked for evidence of the whipping John Mark Byers said he’d given Christopher before the boy disappeared. He identified three sets of injuries on the body’s buttocks, two of which he concluded were “inconsistent” with marks from a belt. The third set, described in the autopsy report as “five superficial cutting wounds on the left buttock,” were “actually lacerations” that were roughly parallel, and Turvey concluded that they were “most consistent” with a whipping by a belt. He added, “It is further the opinion of this examiner that after having received this set of injuries, which tore