Missouri is still keeping innocent woman behind bars. Is prison ignoring judge’s order?
At the behest of Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey’s Office, the Missouri Department of Corrections continues to imprison a woman who was declared innocent and has been incarcerated for more than four decades.
That’s despite an order from a judge and now a ruling from the Missouri Supreme Court.
On Thursday, the high court denied a request to halt Sandra “Sandy” Hemme’s release. Yet she has not been freed. Her attorneys have filed a motion accusing the prison warden of disregarding a lawful order by not releasing her yet.
Hemme’s conviction in a 1980 murder was vacated June 14 by Livingston County Circuit Court Judge Ryan Horsman, who heard evidence about the case during a hearing in January.
On July 9, Horsman ordered Hemme, 64, be released from Chillicothe Correctional Center, about 90 minutes northeast of Kansas City.
However, the Missouri Attorney General’s Office intervened in her release, calling the warden though no stay was in place. The attorney general’s office then filed motions with the Western District Court of Appeals and the Missouri Supreme Court.
The courts struck down those efforts to block her release, including on Thursday morning when the Missouri Supreme Court rejected the attorney general’s latest request.
The legal wrangling in Hemme’s case has kept her behind bars, where she has spent the past 43 years. Her prison term marks the longest known wrongful conviction of a woman in U.S. history, according to information from the National Registry of Exonerations.
Later Thursday, Hemme’s legal team filed a motion to compel Warden Chris McBee to comply with Horsman’s July 9 order, saying McBee was disregarding a lawful order by continuing to incarcerate Hemme.
“The Missouri Supreme Court firmly rejected the Attorney General’s request that the court override Judge Horsman’s release order,” Hemme’s legal team said in a statement. “Ms. Hemme’s family is eager and ready to be reunited with her, and the Department of Corrections should respect and promptly execute Judge Horsman’s July 9th order for Ms. Hemme’s release.”
Her attorneys noted that Hemme’s father was hospitalized with kidney failure and as of Thursday, was receiving palliative care.
“He wants only to see his daughter free in his lifetime, just as Ms. Hemme wants nothing more than to be at her father’s bedside at this time,” the motion to compel said.
Missouri Department of Corrections spokesperson Karen Pojmann said additional legal actions were being taken, and they couldn’t release Hemme until those were resolved. A check of Missouri case records did not show that anything had yet been filed as of 5 p.m. Thursday.
The attorney general’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Murder in St. Joseph
Patricia Jeschke, 31, was found dead on the floor of her St. Joseph apartment in November 1980.
Former St. Joseph police officer Michael Holman was questioned once as a suspect. His truck was seen in the area the day of the murder, his alibi could not be corroborated and he used Jeschke’s credit card, later saying he found it in a purse in a ditch. A pair of gold horseshoe-shaped earrings identified by Jeschke’s father was also found in Holman’s possession.
Holman was never arrested in Jeschke’s death though he was later sent to prison for stealing. He died in 2015.
In Horsman’s June judgment, he wrote that “evidence directly” ties Holman to the murder. The judge also said a report about the earrings was never turned over to Hemme’s defense attorney and three FBI reports on forensic evidence were not disclosed. Information about Holman’s criminal conduct in the months before and after the murder was also withheld.
“The nondisclosure of that evidence resulted in a trial that was fundamentally unfair, resulting in a verdict unworthy of confidence,” Horsman’s order said.
During the police investigation, officers turned their focus to Hemme, who was interviewed several times while she was a psychiatric patient. She was convicted on statements she made to police, though many were contradictory. No forensic evidence linked Hemme to the murder, and she did not have a motive.
