A Cooley Law School group working to free those wrongly convicted of crimes in Michigan is on the way to its first test.
A Calhoun County judge ordered evidence used to convict Michael Hicks of the 1993 rape and kidnapping of a 19-year-old woman be sent to a California lab for DNA testing. The order, signed Monday, leaves the state paying a lab bill that could cost more than $3,000.
Under a stay issued by the judge, prosecutors have 56 days to appeal the decision before testing must take place.
“I’ve been in the business a long time and I’m troubled when I see these things happen,” said Frank Reynolds, a Lansing defense attorney working on the case. “Nobody wants to think the system kills innocent people, let alone locks them up for life.”
Reynolds serves as vice chairman of Cooley’s Innocence Project Commission, which is leading the charge for testing in the Hicks case with O.J. Simpson “dream team” attorney Barry Scheck and his New York program.
Scheck helped Cooley kick off its program last month with a speech at the law school and asked the project to take over the Hicks case. Since that speech, the school has received nearly 100 requests for help - bringing the number of cases being reviewed by students and attorneys to about 500, said Innocence Project Director Norman Fell, a professor at Cooley.
But of those cases, only those involving untested DNA evidence will be considered for the project.
“Every so often we can find a case that sticks out,” he said.
The Hicks case is the first to test a state law enacted in January that gives those serving time for a felony the chance to petition for a new trial if DNA testing is material to the crime. Inmates must file a petition for testing by Jan. 8, 2006, to be considered.
But Calhoun County Prosecutor John Hallacy is convinced testing isn’t required to prove Hicks’ guilt. The 19-year-old victim was able to give a detailed description of her assailant and brought deputies to Hicks’ front door, he said.
“She said, ‘When I entered the truck I convinced myself that he was not going to get away with this,’” Hallacy, who tried the 1993 case, recounted from the woman’s testimony.
Hicks was convicted of kidnapping the woman and raping her several times before dumping her nude in a ditch.
But the prosecutor, who plans to appeal Monday’s decision, said DNA testing can lay this case to rest and ensure justice is done.
“Our worst nightmares as prosecutors are to have an innocent person in prison at all,” Hicks said. “But when you have the first interpretation of a new law, the whole state is watching what happens and you want to make sure it’s done the right way.”
