Framed

Autopsy Games#3

With the first batch of suspects cleared, Eichelberger concentrated on Levon Brooks.

He arrested him for murder and informed Dr. West that he had a prime suspect.

He and another deputy drove Brooks two hours to Hattiesburg, to the West Dental Clinic, where the thirteenth mold was taken.

The next morning, Dr. West called the investigators with the news they were counting on.

In his opinion, Levon Brooks was the only person in the world who could have left the bite marks on the victim.

He wrote: “The dental structures of one Levon Brooks did indeed and without a doubt inflict the bite marks found on the body of Courtney Smith.”

Indeed and without a doubt.

This was a brand-new standard in forensic science and courtroom testimony, one obviously created by Dr. West and one he would use repeatedly in years to come.

Defense lawyers sometimes, but certainly not always, objected to the near-lethal phrase.

Judges—few of whom had any grasp of basic scientific principles, and most with little desire to educate themselves—overruled the objections and let West run with his new standard.

Jurors didn’t know the difference.

On appeal, the Mississippi Supreme Court almost always found a reason to allow it.

Before West, experts at trials were constrained to define their conclusions as within “a reasonable degree”

of medical or scientific certainty.

West was allowed to blatantly opine that there was no doubt about his findings.

The State then had all it needed to indict Levon Brooks for capital murder: (1) the confused and often sensational meanderings of a traumatized five-year-old sister of the victim; (2) a manipulated photo lineup presented to the same child; (3) a polygraph exam Brooks allegedly flunked; and (4) the unequivocal bite mark opinion of Dr. West.

The trial began on January 13, 1992, some sixteen months after the murder.

The prosecution was led by Forrest Allgood, the elected district attorney and a staunch believer in the death penalty.

Though it would be the first time Allgood relied on the tag team of Hayne and West, they would join forces many times in the following years.

Few if any other prosecutors used them as often.

In his opening statement to the jury, Allgood laid out his case.

Since he had no physical evidence other than the bite marks, he relied heavily upon them.

Allgood told the jury: “He left his mark in the form of some teeth marks embedded in her arm.

The State of Mississippi, ladies and gentlemen, is simply going to prove to you that that man is Levon Brooks.”

The State’s first witness was Ashley Smith, now seven years old.

She was as frightened as any child would have been, and the judge didn’t help matters.

He quizzed her first and warned her that if she didn’t tell the truth, she would “go to the devil.”

Scaring the hell out of the child seemed an odd way to begin.

Allgood’s questions were concise, easy to understand and follow, and elicited well-rehearsed answers from Ashley.

Her prior fantasies, inconsistencies, and conflicting stories vanished.

However, on cross-examination, the defense attorney began asking about her initial stories.

What about the different men, black and white, who abducted her sister? What about the getaway in an airplane? And Uncle Tony giving chase with a knife, or was it a gun? And bad men who returned to the house with potato chips, or a sack full of money?

As in her initial interviews, she became confused and quickly lost credibility.

None of it mattered to Allgood, because he had what he wanted.

During his closing argument four days later, he brazenly told the jury: “From start to finish, the little girl has never identified anybody else as being the man who came into her bedroom and took her sister away except the defendant.

Nobody else.”

Dr. Hayne testified that Courtney probably died of freshwater drowning but had bruises to her head and cuts on the inside of her vagina.

No semen was found.

He told the jury that the marks on her wrist were probably made by human teeth, and explained that he had consulted Dr.

Michael West, who agreed.

Hayne then testified that the bite marks were inflicted at the time of death or shortly thereafter.

Thus, the person who bit her was the person who killed her.

Experts who later reviewed the case agreed that the testimony was terribly flawed.

It was virtually impossible to determine (1) the origin of bite marks on a body submerged in water as long as Courtney’s and (2) whether the marks were made before or after her death.

Other unfounded and sensational facts were introduced.

As Hayne was describing the cuts on the victim’s vagina, he told the jury they could have been made by a finger or a penis.

Out of nowhere, Allgood asked, “What about a broom handle?”

A broom handle?

No one had yet mentioned a broom handle.

None had been found at the crime scene.

No report mentioned one.

There had been no hint of one anywhere in the investigation.

But Allgood pulled one out of thin air and Hayne was quick to agree that, yes, the injuries could have been caused by a broom handle.

The defense objected to the sudden inclusion of such a sensational detail, but the judge allowed it anyway.

The jury was left with the horrifying image of Levon Brooks raping the child with a broom handle.

Since no semen was found, perhaps he didn’t use his penis.

Therefore, he had to use something else.

Why not a broom handle?

That awful image was solidified when Allgood, in his closing argument, reminded the jury of the totally fictitious broom handle.

Dr. West took the stand on the fourth day of the trial and spent the first thirty minutes convincing the judge and jury that he was one of the country’s leading experts in forensic odontology.

He described himself as a “senior crime scene analyst”

and boasted of an appearance on the Phil Donahue television show.

He claimed to have testified as an expert in thirteen states, then clicked off all thirteen to impress everyone.

His thick résumé was clear proof of the breadth and depth of his knowledge.

It listed dozens of articles he had written and published on bite mark analysis.

However, few if any had been peer-reviewed by experts and scientists.

West claimed to have close associations with Scotland Yard, the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, and law enforcement agencies all over the world, including “Israeli intelligence.”

He ran through a list of the places he had lectured, including China, and ending, as always, with the “FBI Academy in Quantico, Virginia.”

The defense offered a half-hearted inquiry into his credentials but the judge waved him through.

Since Dr. West had been qualified as an expert and allowed to testify in so many other jurisdictions, then certainly he must know his stuff.

Surely some other judge back there had taken the time to research his qualifications.

Dr. West was off and running.

Allgood began by confronting his biggest problem: The body had been embalmed before West got to it.

No problem at all.

By the time West finished his explanation, he had convinced the jury that the embalming actually helped preserve the skin and somehow, miraculously, made it easier to match the bite marks to Levon Brooks.

He then wowed the jury with his analysis of Levon’s teeth.

Using enlarged photographs and plaster molds, he carefully and methodically explained how he made his identification.

He used words like fractures, bevels , cutting edges, L-shaped curves, facets, and a scalloped-out area with a sharp edge .

He explained the differences in human skin and how it varies on the body.

Different teeth leave different indentions on different skin.

Oddly enough, his plaster molds of Levon’s teeth were for some reason insufficient.

He needed more detail, so just before the trial he visited Brooks in Noxubee County Jail and convinced him to open his mouth.

When he did, Dr. West pressed in a wad of Silly Putty—the actual toy.

He extracted it, looked it over, and claimed it provided greater detail of Brooks’s upper incisors than the plaster molds.

Dr. West explained that the bite marks on Courtney’s wrist were tiny, barely noticeable, and could not be seen by the average person.

Fortunately, at least for the prosecution, West had an answer.

He had developed and pioneered an investigative technique that would save the day.

By using a pair of yellow goggles and a certain brand of ultraviolet light, West claimed he could see and find injuries and indentations that were otherwise invisible.

He named his procedure the “West Phenomenon.”

Using it, he could find clues missed by all other investigators.

After describing his work and analysis, and impressing the jury with his expertise, vocabulary, experience, folksiness, and even, at times, humility, West was ready for the knockout punch.

He offered the ultimate opinion that the bite marks on Courtney’s wrist were “indeed and without a doubt”

made by Levon Brooks.

The defense did not object.

The judge said nothing.

The State offered no other credible evidence.

No one from the crime lab testified because there was no biological evidence linking Brooks to the crime.

The jury chose to believe the experts, Hayne and West, over the alibi witnesses who placed Brooks in the nightclub where he was working at the time of the abduction.

After five days of testimony and arguments by the lawyers, Levon Brooks was found guilty of capital murder.

Two days later the jury sentenced him to life without parole, and he was taken to the State’s infamous prison at Parchman.