West Memphis Three

Three teenage boys, convicted and charged with the murder of three young boys. A murder which occured in 1993. A murder which they did not commit. They are still in jail to this day. Damien Echols, still awaiting the date of his execution, death by lethal injection.

Damien Echols. Jason Baldwin. Jessie Misskelley Jr.
Three teenage boys. Wore a lot of black. Listened to heavy metal bands. They were typical "emo-before-anyone-knew-what-emo-was." Teenage misfits. The media, the state, the police, they all needed to blame someone.

Jessie Misskelley had a mental handicap. An IQ of 72. He was questioned by police. He was afraid. Threatened and bribed. Not knowing what to do, he confessed to a crime he did not commit, and that these other two boys were involved. Even his confession was not sound. He was asked leading questions, and the ones that were not leading were generally answered wrong. For example, he firstly said it was done at noon, but then once the questioner asked if it was after school finished, he said yes. Then the questioner asked if he did it that night. He said yes they were there at the time it was commited that night. Three different times, he clearly did not know what was going on. When asked what the boys were tied up with, he replied that it was rope, when in actual fact it was shoelaces. He also said (most likely prompted by one of the many rumours) that they three young boys were sodomized, which the medical examiner's findings did not support.

In Jason Baldwin's trial, there was false evidence used against him. A boy who was in jail with him before the trial claimed that Jason had told him that he did commit these murders and torture these children. This was not true. It was known by officials that it was a lie. The counsellor of this particular boy had called up when he heard about it. He told them that all the information the boy was claiming to have been told by Jason had actually been said by the counsellor while telling him what was going on. This boy was being counselled as a part of a drug/alcohol abuse programme. Regardless of the falseness of this boy's statement, he was still allowed to stand in front of the courtroom and give this information to the jury.

Damien Echols. A typical misfit teenager. Loved Metallica, Slayer, U2. In an interveiw in 1996, he stated that: "People assumed that I was guilty and had made up their minds beforehand, simply based on my taste in clothes, music, etc. In a larger city, I would never have even been noticed but I happened to be in a small, conservative, traditional town where I was looked at as a 'freak.'" He was interested in the Wicca religion, interested in witchcraft in a religious sense, not Satanism. He was bipolar, and had attempted suicide. No evidence apart from the false confession of Misskelley linking him to the crime. The prosecution team took things from his life such as his interests in these things which were seemingly obscure to the general public of this community and made these people believe it was Satanism and Echols must have done it because of this. This was not fair evidence. How can liking particular music or being into horror books or being interested in a different religion mean someone would commit such a crime? Does being different and having deep thoughts make a person a murderer?

The minds of the jury were manipulated and their prejudice and ignorance taken advantage of. These three boys, convicted and charged with a murder they did not commit, still suffering the consequences and punishments that they should never have had to face, all because of the ignorance and prejudice of the uneducated public. There is now further evidence to show that these boys were not connected to the murders, and that suggests that it was the step-father of one of the boys.

Jessie Misskelley. Damien Echols. Justin Baldwin.
I BELIEVE IN YOUR INNOCENCE.