Man jailed for 28 years because his neighbor dreamt he r@ped her
A man imprisoned for 28 years after a woman said she dreamed that he raped her could be freed after a Denver judge overturned his conviction, saying he would likely be acquitted at a new trial because someone else confessed to the crime.
Clarence Moses-EL was convicted in 1988 and sentenced to 48 years in prison for raping and assaulting a woman when she returned home from a night of drinking. When police initially asked who attacked her, she named the man who later confessed
More than a day after the assault, while in the hospital, the woman identified Moses-EL as her attacker, saying his face came to her in a dream.
Moses-EL has long claimed he was innocent. But his efforts to appeal his conviction were unsuccessful, in part because Denver police threw away DNA evidence from the attack. Police destroyed body swabs and the victim’s clothing despite a judge’s order to preserve it for testing that could have confirmed Moses-EL’s guilt or innocence.
The case inspired legislation requiring the preservation of DNA evidence in major felony cases for a defendant’s lifetime. Lawmakers also took the rare step of sponsoring a bill ordering a new trial for Moses-EL, but it was scrapped after then-Gov. Bill Ritter, a former prosecutor, threatened to veto it.
His break came in December 2013 when another man, L.C. Jackson, sent him a letter in prison saying he couldn’t believe Moses-EL was accused of raping the woman because he “had s3rx” with her at the same time that night.
Moses-EL had exhausted all appeals of his conviction until 2012 when another inmate wrote him a letter, saying he had consensual sex with the woman and then had beaten her.
Defense lawyers argued that the new evidence combined with shifting stories from the victim, who initially identified three different men as the culprit before testifying that Moses-EL’s name came to her in a dream, merited overturning his conviction.
In addition, DNA evidence that might have cleared Moses-EL was mistakenly destroyed by Denver Police, the defense said.
Denver District Court Judge Kandace Gerdes agreed to set aside the conviction last year, ruling that “the newly discovered evidence and the totality of the circumstances is sufficient on salient points to allow a jury to probably return a verdict of acquittal.”
The Denver District Attorney’s Office decided to retry Moses-EL, who was free on bond, despite an outcry from some in the community that they were prosecuting a factually innocent man.
Prosecutors said at the time of Gerdes’ reversal that the original jury believed the victim’s testimony enough to convict Moses-EL, and that the dream identification was just some of the evidence amassed against him.
They also said the other inmate’s confession was fabricated and was later retracted. That inmate refused to testify at the retrial.
Denver prosecutor Bonnie Benedetti said in a statement that prosecutors believed that they put the right man on trial.
“It was the right thing to allow a jury – not public opinion – to make the decision in this case,” she said.
One of Moses-EL’s attorneys, Eric Klein, told Reuters that while his client was adjusting to life on the outside while on bond awaiting trial, he “wasn’t free until today.”
“The (victim’s) dream turned into a 29-year nightmare for Mr. Moses-EL,” Klein said.
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