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May 16, 2024 |  By: Debra Chandler Landis - Missouri Independent

Missouri attorney general opposes St. Louis prosecutor’s push to free Christopher Dunn

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By Debra Chandler Landis - Missouri Independent

Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey will oppose efforts by St. Louis Circuit Attorney Gabe Gore to vacate the murder conviction of Christopher Dunn, who Gore believes has spent 33 years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit.

In February, St.  Louis Circuit Attorney Gabe Gore announced he filed a motion with the court to vacate Dunn’s murder conviction in the 1991 fatal shooting of 15-year-old Ricco Rogers. When making the announcement, Gore said the evidence shows Dunn, a 54-year-old St. Louis native serving a life sentence without parole, is innocent of the murder for which he was convicted.

“The eyewitness recantations alone are enough to show clear and convincing evidence of actual innocence in this case,” Gore said. “Justice requires that Christopher Dunn’s murder conviction be vacated.”

Bailey disagrees, and according to Gore’s office, plans to oppose the motion to vacate Dunn’s conviction. A pre-trial conference is scheduled for May 16, and three lawyers with the Missouri Attorney General’s Office are listed as attorneys for the defendant, which in this case, is the state of Missouri.

A spokesperson for the attorney general’s office declined comment.

It’s part of a long track record for the attorney general’s office to oppose efforts to overturn convictions. Most recently, the state tried to stop St. Louis prosecutors from vacating the conviction of Lamar Johnson, though their efforts were unsuccessful, and Johnson was freed in early 2023.

Injustice Watch, a Chicago-based nonprofit journalism organization that examines issues of equity and justice in the court system, found that the Missouri attorney general’s office has opposed calls for relief in nearly every wrongful conviction case that came before it and has been vacated since 2000.

That includes 27 cases in which the office fought to uphold convictions for prisoners who were eventually exonerated. In roughly half of those cases, the office continued arguing that the originally guilty convictions should stand.

Dunn was convicted in 1991 of first-degree murder, first-degree assault and armed criminal action. He received a life sentence without the possibility of parole. The case against Dunn rested on the testimony of two eyewitnesses — a 12-year-old and a 14-year-old, both of whom later recanted.

Last year, Gore appointed Booker Shaw as a special assistant circuit attorney working on a pro-bono basis to assist him in the review of court transcripts, case exhibits and rulings, and advise him whether the filing of a motion to vacate the conviction was appropriate.

Shaw is the former chief judge of the Missouri Court of Appeals and served as a judge in the 22nd Judicial Circuit Court from 1983 to 2002,

Circuit Judge William Hickle said in 2020 that while he believed a current jury would not find Dunn guilty, he could not set him free because of Missouri law that restricts innocence claims to death penalty inmates. In 2021, a new state law took effect that allows prosecutors to file petitions when they believe an innocent person is imprisoned.

The hearing in Dunn’s innocence case is set to begin May 20 before St. Louis Judge Jason Sengheiser.

In the Dunn case, Gore is essentially saying the prosecutor’s office “made a mistake. Help me correct this mistake,” said Michael Wolff, professor and dean emeritus of the Saint Louis University School of Law and a retired judge and chief justice of the Missouri Supreme Court.

In contrast, Wolff said attorneys general in Missouri over recent decades have shown “interest in the finality of judgments juries make” in their oppositions to vacating convictions despite evidence showing individuals were wrongfully convicted.

The 2021 Missouri law says, in part, that a court will grant the motion of the prosecuting or circuit attorney to vacate or set aside a judgment “where the court finds that there is clear and convincing evidence of actual innocence or constitutional error at the original trial or plea that undermines the confidence in the judgment.’’

In considering the motion, the law says the court “shall take into consideration the evidence presented at the original trial or plea; the evidence presented at any direct appeal or post-conviction proceedings, including state or federal habeas actions; and the information and evidence presented at the hearing on the motion.”

The Midwest Innocence Project is representing Dunn.