A former Ohio police captain who has spent 14 years in prison, largely because of a bite mark found on his ex-wife's blood-soaked body, now has new DNA test results that his attorneys say prove his innocence. <\/p>\n
If a judge agrees, Doug Prade could become the latest of more than a dozen prisoners across the country to be set free after comparisons between their teeth and bite marks found on victims turned out to be wrong. <\/p>\n
An Akron judge, in a ruling that could come as early as October, could exonerate Prade, order a new trial or find that the DNA test isn't strong enough for either. <\/p>\n
\"'I told you I was innocent. Now there's proof,'\" the 66-year-old Prade said after getting the test results back, according to his attorney, Carrie Wood with the Cincinnati-based Ohio Innocence Project. <\/p>\n
Once considered cutting-edge science, bite-mark comparisons have been under fire for more than a decade. Across the country, at least 11 prisoners convicted of rape or murder based largely on bite mark-comparisons were exonerated eight of them with DNA evidence. At least five other men more were proved innocent as they sat in prison awaiting trials. <\/p>\n
Some forensic dentists have renounced the practice altogether, while many say it's still a useful tool if applied properly. <\/p>\n
In Prade's case, a new test has found that male DNA taken from around a bite mark on a lab coat that his ex-wife was wearing when she was killed is not his. <\/p>\n
The test conducted for free by the private DNA Diagnostics Center in Fairfield, Ohio, wasn't widely available at the time of Prade's trial. <\/p>\n
Prade said Thursday that he hopes the results are enough to free him, although he'd be happy with a new trial. <\/p>\n
\"For them to find what I had known all that time was no surprise to me,\" he told The Associated Press in a phone interview from a central Ohio prison. \"I guess it was an epiphany to everyone else 'Hey, this guy was telling the truth.'\" <\/p>\n<\/p>\n
Excerpt from: A former Ohio police captain who has spent 14 years in prison, largely because of a bite mark found on his ex-wife's blood-soaked body, now has new DNA test results that his attorneys say prove his innocence. If a judge agrees, Doug Prade could become the latest of more than a dozen prisoners across the country to be set free after comparisons between their teeth and bite marks found on victims turned out to be wrong. An Akron judge, in a ruling that could come as early as October, could exonerate Prade, order a new trial or find that the DNA test isn't strong enough for either. Continue reading
\nOhio Prisoner Hopes DNA Test Proves Innocence<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"