HARRISBURG, Pa, Aug 14: A man convicted in 1982 in the rape and murder of a 15-year-old girl was due to be freed from a Pennsylvania prison thanks to new DNA testing after spending more than three decades behind bars filing repeated appeals proclaiming his innocence. Lewis Fogle, 63, had his conviction yesterday thrown out by Judge David Grine in Indiana, Pennsylvania, and was granted 25,000 dollars bail pending a decision by Indiana County District Attorney Patrick Dougherty on whether to retry him on second-degree murder charges. Dougherty’s decision is due by September 14. Fogle was serving a sentence of life in prison. DNA testing of sperm evidence in the case “excluded Fogle and pointed to an unidentified male” in the 1976 rape and murder of Deann “Kathy” Long, according to the Innocence Project, a group that works to exonerate wrongfully convicted people. Dougherty agreed to the new DNA testing and joined with lawyers from the Innocence Project in asking that the conviction be thrown out. But Dougherty told Reuters he does not believe Fogle is actually innocent of involvement in the conspiracy to rape and murder Long, and will look for other evidence to retry him. “This has been an extremely long journey for Mr. Fogle, who has always maintained his innocence of the 1976 crime,” said David Loftis, managing attorney for the Innocence Project, which is based in New York and Philadelphia. Fogle and three other men were arrested in 1981 after a mental patient, Earl Eugene Elderkin, identified them under hypnosis as possible suspects in the crime. Fogle was tried separately and convicted of second-degree murder based on the testimony of three jailhouse informants, lawyers said. Charges against the other three co-defendants were dropped for lack of evidence or, in one instance, dismissed for a violation of the state’s “speedy trial” rule. Fogle first requested DNA testing of evidence in 2003, court records show, but initial tests did not establish his innocence. Earlier this year, after a second round of DNA testing authorized by the court, technicians were able to identify sperm from pubic hair combings of the victim taken 39 years ago. Dougherty said two of the other three men originally charged with the crime are still alive, and that he will seek DNA samples from them. (AGENCIES)
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