DNA in the Kennedy Brewer Case

Let's start with what DNA is.

DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is a hereditary material in humans and almost all other organisms.

Nearly every cell in a person's body has the same DNA.

DNA is usually found in the cell's nucleus but another small amount can be found in the cell's mitochondria.

DNA Composition

DNA is a double helix formation, similar to a winding staircase.

The "steps" of the staircase consist of nitrogenous bases that pair with each other.

Adenine pairs with thymine, cytosine pairs with guanine. They don't pair with other nitrogenous bonds unless it is RNA.

RNA, ribonucleic acid, is a vital asset to protein synthesis. In this case, a nitrogenous bond called uracil replaces thymine, bonding with adenine.

The pattern of these nitrogenous bases in DNA are what identifies a person. This is what helps forensic scientists in a case.

Waiting for Trial

Brewer was arrested and after three long years, the trial began in 1995.

The prosecution theorized that Kennedy had raped Christine in the Jackson household, killed her, then carried her body the creek.

There was a semen sample of , but it was deemed insufficient for DNA testing. [This is not where the DNA comes in.]

Skin and hair

In What Parts of the Body is it Found?

DNA

Body Fluids:

• Blood
• Saliva
• Sweat
• Urine
• Semen or vaginal secretions

STR

The human genome is full of repeated DNA sequences. These repeated sequences come in various sizes and are classified according to the length of the repeat units, the number of connected repeat units, and/or the overall length of the repeat region. This is called STR.

DNA Typing

DNA typing is a procedure where DNA is extracted from a biological sample obtained from an individual to be analyzed.

The steps for DNA typing are:

• Extraction
• PCR amplification
• Automated DNA analysis
• Statistical analyses of matching DNA profiles

The medical examiner who did the autopsy, Steven Hayne, testified that he found several bite marks on the victim's body( or what he thought were bite marks). Hayne had called in Dr. Michael West, a forensic odontologist, to analyze the marks.

A total of 19 marks were found on the girl's body that West insisted were only inflicted by Brewer's two front teeth. This, of course, wasn't scientifically validated and West later made history by being the first member to ever be suspended from the American Board of Forensic Odontology.

The court still used his testimony, despite the questionable information that he provided.

How DNA Helps in a Case

The Innocence Project Comes in

Later on, during preparations for Brewer’s retrial, the Innocence Project asked the Mississippi Attorney General’s office to intervene in the investigation of the case. DNA testing during this investigation led to the implication of another man as the real perpetrator.

Analyzation of the Body

The unidentified DNA profile discovered in 2001 matched to Justin Albert Johnson, one of the original suspects. Johnson then confessed to Christine Jackson’s murder as well as to an identical crime—the murder of Courtney Smith committed in September 1990 also in Noxubee County. Johnson assured the investigators that he acted alone in both crimes.

Levon Brooks

The Final Decree

On February 15, 2008, charges against Kennedy Brewer were dropped and he was exonerated.

New Discoveries

In 2001, advanced DNA testing was conducted on semen recovered in 1992 from the victim’s body. The tests produced results excluding Brewer as a possible perpetrator and revealed an unknown male profile. The prosecution conducted further testing on two of Brewer’s friends, who were also excluded. Y-STR testing also excluded many of Brewer’s relatives. No subsequent effort was made to identify the real perpetrator.

In response to this trivial at best testimony, the defense introduced Dr. Richard Souviron, a licensed dentist who declared that the marks on the victim's body weren't human bite marks, but bug bites from being in the water for so long.

Richard even argued that it would be impossible to leave repeated bite mark impressions with only the top two teeth.

Despite all the viable reasons to believe Brewer was innocent, he was convicted of capital murder and sexual battery on March 24, 1995 and was sentenced to death.

The Start

In the start of the Kennedy Brewer case, DNA was not used.

In the early morning of May 3, 1992, Christine Jackson( age of three) was raped and murdered. Brewer was there, babysitting Christine and his biological children with Gloria Jackson, his girlfriend.

Two days later, Christine's body was found in a creek about 500 yards from her home. Brewer was, and quite reasonably, suspected since he was home that night and the house showed no sign of forced entry.

However, there was a broken window near where the child was sleeping that could have given an intruder a way to access the inside of the house.

In 1992, Kennedy Brewer was arrested and wrongly convicted of killing his girlfriend's three-year-old daughter. After waiting in jail for three years for a trial to begin, Brewer was convicted of capital murder and sent to Mississippi's death row. Later on DNA revealed that he was innocent. How?

The following year, Brewer’s conviction was lifted, and he was moved from death row to pre-trial detention.

The prosecution intended to retry Brewer for capital murder, but for a full five years the case was not moved to trial. Due to conflicts of interest in the Noxubee County District Attorney’s office in 2007, Ben Creekmore, the District Attorney of Oxford, Mississippi, was appointed Special Prosecutor in the Brewer case. Creekmore decided not to seek the death penalty and agreed not to oppose bail.

Brewer was released in August 2007 while a new trial was pending.

After

In 2009, Brewer filed a civil lawsuit against West and Haynes for $18 million dollars. That lawsuit was dismissed in 2014 after a judge ruled that West and Haynes were immune from damages. The Fifth Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals upheld the dismissal in 2017.

The state of Mississippi paid Brewer $500,000 in compensation.

DNA in the Kennedy Brewer Case

Sources

• https://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Pages/casedetail.aspx?caseid=3047 ( The National Registry of Exonerations)
• https://www.innocenceproject.org/cases/
• http://www.forensicdnacenter.com/dna-ystr.html
• www.dnaforensic.org
• education.seattlepi.com

DNA

by Tarah Dorisca