A man who was wrongfully convicted of murder has been released after spending 26 years on death row.
Eddie Lee Howard was given the death sentence in 1994 after he was wrongfully convicted for the rape and murder of Georgia White, 84, in Columbus, Mississippi.
According to the Innocence Project, Howard’s conviction was pinned ‘almost entirely on now discredited bite mark evidence’
In August last year, the Mississippi Supreme Court said the bite-mark comparisons were not enough to link him to the murder, adding that ‘an individual perpetrator cannot be reliably identified through bite-mark comparison’.
The court wrote: “After reviewing the record, we conclude that Howard’s evidence as to the change in the scientific understanding of the reliability of identification through bite-mark comparisons was almost uncontested.
“Based on this record, we agree with Howard that a forensic dentist would not be permitted to identify Howard as the biter today as Dr. West did at Howard’s trial in 2000.”
Alongside, this lawyers from the Innocence Project were also able to use alibi witnesses and DNA testing of crime scene evidence to prove Howard’s innocence.
Following his release, Howard said: “I want to say many thanks to the many people who are responsible for helping to make my dream of freedom a reality.
