Gary Dotson

Gary Dotson is an American man who was the first person in the world to be exonerated of a criminal conviction by DNA evidence. In May 1979, he was found guilty and sentenced to 25 to 50 years' imprisonment for rape, and another 25 to 50 years for aggravated kidnapping, the terms to be served concurrently. This conviction was upheld by the appellate court in 1981. In 1985, the accusing witness recanted her testimony, which had been the main evidence against Dotson. He was not exonerated or pardoned at that time but, due to popular belief that he was a victim of a false rape accusation, Dotson went through a series of paroles and re-incarcerations until DNA evidence proved his innocence in 1988. Dotson was subsequently cleared of his conviction.

Alleged crime

Sixteen-year-old Cathleen Crowell, who feared she had become pregnant after having consensual sex with her boyfriend, made a rape allegation as a plausible explanation to tell her foster parents. Crowell admitted her fabrication was based on a scene from a 1974 novel, "Sweet Savage Love". On the night of July 9, 1977, a police officer happened upon her standing beside a road not far from the shopping mall in the Chicago suburb of Homewood, where she worked in a Long John Silver's seafood restaurant. Her clothing was dirt-stained and in disarray.

Crowell tearfully told the officer that, as she walked across the mall parking lot after work, a car with three young men in it darted toward her. Two of the men jumped out, grabbed her, and threw her into the backseat. One of them climbed in beside her, and the other joined the driver in the front. The man in the back tore her clothes, raped her, and scratched several letters onto her stomach with a broken beer bottle.

Crowell was taken to the South Suburban Hospital, where a rape examination was performed. It had not occurred to her that police would pursue her case. Police made her make a composite sketch, and Crowell says they pressured her to pick 20 year old Gary Dotson from a mug book, pointing out how much his mug shot resembled the sketch. Dotson was arrested even though he then had a mustache that he could not have grown in the five days since the alleged incident and had no sign of the scratches Crowell claimed she inflicted on her assailant. Crowell identified Dotson as her rapist at trial in July 1979 and he was convicted. The trial also featured false and misleading forensic evidence. The prosecutions forensic expert, who claimed to be doing graduate research at the University of California at Berkeley, had in fact only attended a two day course there. He testified that he had detected type B blood antigens in swabs taken as evidence and that type B comprised only 10% of the population. Dotson was type B so the implication was clear. However, he failed to mention that Crowell herself was type B which made the testimony irrelevant. It was also claimed pubic hair evidence "matched" Dotson although there was no test at the time capable of matching hairs with a source. It would come to light later that the hairs were not even similar to Dotsons. Alibi testimony from four of Dotson's friends that placed him in another part of city at the time of the rape was dismissed by the prosecutor who claimed the fact that there were no inconsistencies in their testimony "proved" they were lying.

Another inconsistency in the case did not come to light until after the victim's recantation in 1985 when Dotson's new lawyer retained a forensic seriologist to look at the trial evidence. Although Crowell claimed she was raped several hours before the hospital examined her, the original forensic testing of the swabs taken in fact indicated the sexual encounter had occurred at least a day earlier.

Recantation

In early 1985, the now Ms. Cathleen Crowell Webb told her New Hampshire pastor that she was riddled with guilt because she had sent an innocent man to prison. On her behalf, the pastor contacted a Wisconsin lawyer who tried to resolve the matter. The lawyer first contacted the Cook County State's Attorneys Office but found the prosecutors unresponsive. Dotson sought post-judgment relief based on Ms. Crowell Webb’s recantation, but the trial court found her recantation to be unbelievable and refused to free him. The lawyer next contacted the media (leading to the infamous "How about a hug?" moment on the "CBS Morning Show"). [http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,957001,00.html] The resulting public sympathy caused the original trial judge to release Dotson on $100,000 bond pending a hearing one week later. At that hearing, the same judge rejected new evidence discrediting the forensic evidence given at the trial, called the recantation less credible than the original testimony and sent Dotson back to prison. Dotson's attorney petitioned the Governor of Illinois, James R. Thompson, for clemency on April 19. The Governor denied clemency but accommodated the popular view that Dotson was innocent by commuting his sentence to time served. This put Dotson on parole, which meant that he could be returned to prison without a trial.

In 1985 Crowell co-wrote a book about the incident called "Forgive Me" and gave Dotson more than $17,000 in proceeds from its sale.

On August 2, 1987, Dotson was arrested on a domestic violence charge against his live-in girlfriend and mother of his child after she told police that he had slapped her. He was ordered held without bond on August 27, and — even though the girlfriend refused to cooperate and charges were dropped — Dotson's parole was revoked and his full remaining sentence of 16 years was reinstated. On Christmas Eve 1987, the Governor gave Dotson one last parole. The next day Dotson went with friends to the Zig Zag Lounge in Calumet City where he ordered a sandwich, but objected when it came topped with peppers, which he had not ordered so refused to pay. The waitress called police and claimed he threw "an unknown object" at her and he was arrested and charged with theft, battery, and disorderly conduct. The Department of Corrections put a parole hold on him to prevent his release and scheduled a Prisoner Review Board hearing for February 17th. A few days later, the criminal charges were voluntarily dropped by the State's Attorney's Office after witnesses cast doubt on the waitress's version and she refused to testify under oath. Although the criminal charges had been dropped the scheduled February 17 Prisoner Review Board went ahead and revoked the parole because Dotson had been late calling his parole officer. He was released after his six-month technical parole violation had been served.

Exoneration

On August 15, 1988, the governor and prosecutors were notified that DNA testing had positively excluded Dotson and positively included Crowell's then-boyfriend, David Bierne, as the source of the semen stain but the governor stated he would not act without receiving a recommendation from the Prisoner Review Board who then failed to consider it. The media took up Dodsons case and in May 1989 his lawyer filed a new petition for post-conviction relief which was accepted for hearing on August 14 1989. The Prosecutors publicly vowed to oppose the petition but later joined the judge in dismissing the original conviction and dropping all charges at the August 14 hearing.

Dotson's accuser, Cathleen Crowell Webb, died on May 15th 2008 from cancer. [ [http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-webb-obit-web-may21,0,6000708.story Cathleen Crowell Webb dies at 46] Chicago Tribune May 20, 2008]

References

External links

* [http://www.law.northwestern.edu/depts/clinic/wrongful/exonerations/Dotson.htm Dotson: Exonerated: Center on Wrongful Convictions: Northwestern Law]
* [http://www.law.northwestern.edu/wrongfulconvictions/exonerations/ilDotsonSummary.html Northwestern University School of Law: The rape that wasn't — the first DNA exoneration in Illinois: Summary]
* Books: Forgive Me (ISBN 0-8007-1462-8)
* [http://web.archive.org/web/20060820113503/http://crimtrac.gov.au/dnahistory.htm CrimeTrac DNA History archived site from August 20, 2006. Link to original site is dead]