Lance Shockley, a person on demise row in Missouri, wished gadgets from the crime scene to bear DNA testing to probably show his innocence. The court docket scheduled proceedings on his request — however the date set was for 2 days after his execution.
Patty Prewitt can’t have her DNA examined — and totally clear her identify — as a result of her sentence was commuted and he or she is now not in jail.
And others, together with Lamar McVay, who’s serving 30 years for a theft, can’t even get a solution from the state on his DNA testing request. He is nonetheless awaiting a ruling on a movement he filed in September 2022.
Each state has a legislation permitting individuals who have been convicted to request DNA testing of proof of their circumstances. However in Missouri, courts have made it notably tough to entry that testing, even for these going through imminent execution, a evaluate of circumstances by The Marshall Undertaking – St. Louis discovered.
DNA has performed a task in overturning 560 convictions throughout the nation since 2000, in accordance with the Nationwide Registry of Exonerations. Fourteen had been in Missouri, although there have been no exonerations right here with DNA since 2020.
Lately, some requests for DNA testing in Missouri had been swiftly denied, court docket information present. Judges sat on others for years, with no obvious ruling.
Whereas imprisoned on a homicide case, Patty Prewitt’s DNA testing movement was denied by the courts in 2018. She spent one other six years behind bars earlier than the governor commuted her sentence in 2024.
Now 76, Prewitt nonetheless has the conviction on her file. The legislation solely permits individuals in jail to request DNA testing, so she has no authorized pathway to be exonerated.
“What hurt wouldn’t it be to seek out out [the] reality?” Prewitt mentioned. “That’s what I don’t perceive.”
Prosecutors are inclined to oppose testing, citing the unique proof that led to a conviction and stressing the significance of finality in a case. However advocates say testing can appropriate grave injustices. A number of attorneys declare courts in Missouri have misapplied the legislation by requiring defendants to show their innocence fairly than utilizing a decrease normal of proof for mere testing.
Even after some defendants received permission for a brand new DNA take a look at, the absence of their genetic materials at against the law scene was not all the time sufficient to overturn a verdict — even in a demise sentence. Judges have as a substitute relied on different proof, like eyewitness identification, and emphasised earlier appeals that had been denied.
Dealing with demise
DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is in each particular person’s cells and consists of a novel genetic code. Police can accumulate organic materials containing DNA, resembling blood or pores and skin cells, at against the law scene and examine it to samples taken from a defendant. DNA is commonly used as proof in felony circumstances.
Missouri handed a DNA legislation in 2001, permitting individuals in jail to request testing after they’ve been convicted.
As a way to qualify, a prisoner should present that proof to check nonetheless exists.
In 2022, John Caudill filed a movement for DNA testing on gadgets together with a rape package, the sufferer’s underwear and shirt, and cigarettes. It was denied partly as a result of he couldn’t display that authorities had stored the proof from his 1992 trial. Legislation enforcement businesses usually wouldn’t have to reveal what’s of their property rooms until there’s a court docket order.
Talking not too long ago from a jail in jap Missouri, Caudill expressed frustration that he by no means received a transparent reply from the sheriff’s workplace on what gadgets, if any, had been saved. Now 61, Caudill, who’s serving life with out parole, needs to attempt once more, however doesn’t have a lawyer to assist him receive the data he wants.
In Shockley’s demise penalty case, a choose ordered proof to be preserved, in accordance with court docket paperwork. His authorized workforce by no means received affirmation, however presumed it had been maintained, legal professional Jeremy Weis mentioned.
Shockley was convicted within the 2005 taking pictures of freeway patrolman Sgt. Carl Dewayne Graham Jr. No eyewitness or forensic proof positioned Shockley on the scene.
In June 2025, the Missouri Supreme Courtroom set the Oct. 14 execution date, prompting a way of urgency for his authorized workforce. His attorneys wished items from the shotgun shells and different crime scene gadgets, which had been by no means examined for DNA, to be despatched to a lab. Additionally they wished a cigarette butt that had been examined, however with inconclusive outcomes, to bear extra superior DNA testing.
In court docket paperwork, the Missouri Lawyer Normal’s Workplace fought towards any DNA testing, emphasizing the finality of the case, which “serves each the pursuits of the court docket and the victims.”
In accordance with the statute, Shockley must present that the DNA testing know-how “was not fairly out there” on the time of his 2009 trial.
The request went earlier than Carter County Circuit Decide Kacey Proctor, who dominated that testing on the cigarette confirmed it had been out there for the opposite gadgets. The cigarette couldn’t be retested as a result of the legislation doesn’t permit repeat testing utilizing the identical know-how, he mentioned within the July 2025 order.
Meghan Clement, a forensic DNA professional and marketing consultant on Shockley’s case, mentioned that testing has made important developments prior to now 20 years. Exams are actually way more delicate, permitting extra info to be obtained with much less genetic materials.
“What’s the hurt in doing the testing?” Clement mentioned.
Shockley appealed the denial. The Southern District of the Missouri Courtroom of Appeals scheduled authorized deadlines for Oct. 16 and Oct. 22. His workforce filed a movement to expedite proceedings, saying that with the approaching execution, the “request is made within the curiosity of justice.” It was denied by the appeals court docket.
The state then executed Shockley by deadly injection on Oct. 14.
Important questions remained unanswered about his case, his lawyer, Weis, mentioned, together with the forensic proof. The end result was unjust, he mentioned.
Lower than a month after Shockley was killed, judges and a clerk with the Southern District mentioned altering court docket procedures for demise penalty circumstances. Now, court docket filings like requests to expedite the method might be reviewed by all the court docket as a substitute of just one choose, in accordance with an inner court docket process doc obtained by The Marshall Undertaking – St. Louis.
Ready in jail
Shockley was one in every of six individuals from 2022 by means of 2025 to petition the courts for post-conviction DNA testing, in accordance with a evaluate of information from the State Judicial Information Committee. None was granted DNA testing, together with two males who by no means obtained a call on their requests, in accordance with the general public docket.
Lamar McVay requested testing for his theft conviction in a movement filed in September 2022 in Pemiscot County. The choose by no means dominated.
“I’m just about upset as a result of they ignored it,” McVay mentioned from a jail in southeast Missouri.
His legal professional, Jennifer Hernandez, mentioned they plan to hunt testing once more utilizing a unique authorized mechanism fairly than the DNA statute.
Ronald Greer, who was sentenced to life with out parole for intercourse crimes and armed felony motion, despatched letters from jail to the court docket clerk after he filed his DNA movement in July 2023 in Pettis County.
“Are you able to please inform me the present standing of my movement and when the choose is likely to be ruling upon such movement,” he wrote in April 2025.
As of January 2026, he was nonetheless ready for a solution.
“You gotta do your job,” Greer mentioned concerning the court docket throughout a name from Crossroads Correctional Middle, about an hour north of Kansas Metropolis.
Like Greer, Patty Prewitt’s case concerned Pettis County. She was convicted of her partner’s 1984 homicide. She maintained her innocence, saying somebody had damaged into their dwelling, shot her husband Invoice and tried to sexually assault her.
In 2017, Prewitt found police nonetheless had items of proof from her case. She requested 10 gadgets be examined, together with the pajamas she was carrying.
A choose denied the testing. Brian Reichart, one in every of her attorneys, mentioned they had been “heartbroken.” He believed they met the statute’s necessities.
In an enchantment, Prewitt argued that the choose utilized a stricter normal for proving innocence to her request for testing, which has a decrease normal.
They misplaced once more.
Six years later, former Gov. Mike Parson commuted Prewitt’s sentence. She had spent 38 years in jail.
Whereas free, Prewitt, who lives within the Kansas Metropolis metro and is selling her guide on her expertise in jail, nonetheless has the conviction on her file. She has to examine in together with her parole officer each three months and may’t go away Missouri with out permission. Sooner or later in February, her daughter had a health care provider’s appointment in Kansas, about quarter-hour away. Prewitt couldn’t go together with her.
Now, there is no such thing as a authorized pathway for Prewitt to request any DNA testing as a result of she is now not in custody.
Most states, together with Colorado and New Hampshire, which modified their legal guidelines in recent times, don’t require somebody in search of testing to be in jail, in accordance with monitoring by the Innocence Undertaking, a nonprofit that works on exonerations.
In different circumstances, prisoners in Missouri have obtained DNA outcomes, nevertheless it has not executed a lot good.
In early 2024, St. Louis County prosecutors sided with Marcellus “Khaliifah” Williams, saying he shouldn’t be put to demise for a 1998 killing in College Metropolis. They retested the DNA on the knife used to homicide Felicia Gayle. Williams’ DNA was not discovered.
Nevertheless, DNA from members of the prosecution workforce who had dealt with the weapon was detected. The proof had been contaminated and was now not dependable.
Williams was executed in September 2024.
DNA from defendants Rodney Lincoln and Anthony Dixon didn’t match the proof of their circumstances. They remained in jail till a governor commuted Lincoln’s sentence, and Dixon was launched on parole.
Rachel Wester, authorized director for the Midwest Innocence Undertaking, mentioned if outcomes help an innocence declare, the one aid below Missouri’s legislation is launch from jail. In different states, together with Kansas and Nebraska, a choose can order a brand new trial primarily based on DNA outcomes.
Fredrico Lowe-Bey doesn’t imagine he’d be discovered responsible if he went to trial right this moment. He was convicted in a St. Louis rape, and requested for testing in 2001. A choose granted it two years later. Outcomes obtained in 2005 excluded him, nevertheless it was not sufficient proof for the choose to imagine he was harmless. Lowe-Bey stays in jail.
Paul Casteleiro, authorized director of Centurion, a nonprofit that recordsdata claims on wrongful convictions, has labored on Lowe-Bey’s case for greater than seven years. They’re now specializing in a sufferer’s description of the perpetrator, which included freckles, a function Lowe-Bey doesn’t have. Casteleiro, who has labored on circumstances in additional than a dozen states, mentioned Missouri is especially hostile to post-conviction aid.
“They merely don’t care that an injustice has been dedicated,” he mentioned.
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