Missouri attorney general blocks release of woman whose murder conviction was overturned
CHILLICOTHE, Mo. (KCTV) - Nearly a month ago, a Missouri judge ordered that Sandra Hemme be released or retried in the next 30 days.
On Wednesday, it appeared Hemme, whose murder conviction in a 1980 homicide was overturned, would be released from prison in Chillicothe.
But a lawyer from Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey’s office called the prison and interfered with the release questioning if some other old charges should keep her in prison.
Hemme, now 64, has been serving a life sentence at a prison northeast of Kansas City after she was twice convicted of murder in the death of library worker Patricia Jeschke. She is the longest-held wrongly incarcerated woman known in the U.S., according to her legal team at the Innocence Project.
After an extensive review, Judge Ryan Horsman found that Hemme was heavily sedated and in a “malleable mental state” when investigators repeatedly questioned her in a psychiatric hospital. Police ignored evidence pointing to a discredited fellow officer who died in 2015, and the prosecution wasn’t told about FBI results that could have cleared her, so it was never disclosed before her trials.
The prosecutor at her second trial has agreed, four decades later, that nothing linked her to the crime other than her confession, which followed multiple contradictory statements, the judge noted.
The attorney general’s office, which almost always objects to wrongful conviction claims, then asked the appellate court to reconsider, saying the court didn’t give them enough time to argue against her release.
Bailey’s office also argued that Hemme was sentenced decades ago to 12 years for violence in prison, and she would start serving that penalty now. Her attorneys responded Tuesday that keeping her incarcerated any longer would be a “draconian outcome.”
Editor’s Note: This is a breaking news story and will be updated.
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