Jackson County’s new conviction integrity unit reviews old murder case | Opinion
Jackson County Prosecutor Melesa Johnson has a new conviction integrity unit to review innocence claims brought to her attention, Johnson recently told The Star Editorial Board during a sit-down interview.
While I applaud this development, I must say I was extremely encouraged to find out this week that the prosecutors assigned to that new unit are reviewing the case of Ken Middleton, a Blue Springs man convicted — erroneously, his appellate attorney Kent Gipson contends — of first-degree murder and armed criminal action in the 1990 shooting death of wife Kathy Middleton.
In a statement, Jazzlyn Johnson, a spokeswoman for the prosecutor’s office, said the inquiry is ongoing and no decision has been made in regards to Middleton’s application for review.
“Our office has not yet reached a final decision on Mr. Ken Middleton’s conviction relief application, which is and has been under review by our office’s Conviction Integrity Unit,” Johnson wrote in an email. “We will be communicating directly with his family in the very near future once our review is complete.”
I’ve written about Middleton’s case a few times before. When I think of his legal saga, I am often reminded of this quote attributed to slain civil rights icon Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr: “Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.”
Those words, taken from King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” aptly describes what I feel is a grave injustice being done to Ken Middleton — and I write that with all due respect to Kathy Middleton’s family, who suffered a tremendous loss that I am sure still reverberates more than 35 years later.
In 1991, Ken was sentenced to life in prison without parole with a concurrent sentence of 200 years in Kathy’s death. In 2005, after a two-day evidentiary hearing the year prior, former Jackson County Circuit Judge Edith Messina ruled Ken’s original defense attorney Bob Duncan was ineffective, which violated Ken’s constitutional right to a fair trial.
Duncan was later disbarred after he pleaded guilty in 1992 to federal tax evasion.
Under the U.S. Constitution, the right to a fair trial is afforded to every criminal defendant in this country. Because of Duncan’s ineffectiveness, Ken never received what is guaranteed under the color of law. As a result, his conviction is fundamentally flawed and he should be allowed to present a credible defense in front of a jury of his peers.
Twenty years ago, Messina ordered a new trial but she did not have legal authority to do so, the Missouri Court of Appeals ruled. Procedural issues aside, the merits of Messina’s ruling have never been in doubt, Gipson has repeatedly argued in court documents.
“I don’t know what it is,” Gipson said this week. “It just feels like you are spinning your wheels. There is not much doubt that he didn’t get a fair trial.”
Prosecutor changes stance
In 2021, the Missouri General Assembly enacted a statute that allows local prosecutors to file a motion for erroneously convicted people to prove their innocence in court.
Despite repeated pleas from Gipson and Middleton’s family, former Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker never used the new law — Missouri Statute 547.031 — in Middleton’s case. So far, Melesa Johnson, the current prosecutor in Jackson County, hasn’t either.
When I asked Johnson during the meeting with our board if she intended to look into Middleton’s case, she said that she would consider a review if new evidence came to light. Absent that, Johnson said then, she had no inclination to review it.
But her tune changed this week, and in light of that, I must commend the newly-minted prosecutor.
When she spoke to our Board, Melesa Johnson said she had reviewed correspondence former Jackson County Prosecutor James Kanatzer wrote to Middleton’s family years ago, looked into a website chronicling Middleton’s case and been in correspondence with his family.
“As it pertains to actual innocence, I have not seen anything that compels me to believe that we have a factor of actual innocence in that case,” she said.
Even with evidence — Messina’s decades-old finding of ineffective counsel has never been discredited — that clearly showed Middleton did not receive a fair trial, he has yet to be retried. Because of that fact, it would seem to me that Lady Justice has indeed turned a blind eye to Middleton’s case.
Johnson has the legal tools to remedy this. Middleton deserves the new trial he was granted two decades ago.
Birthday behind bars
Earlier this week, Middleton turned 81. Monday marked his latest birthday behind bars. The same day, Gipson said he filed a habeas corpus petition with the Missouri Court of Appeals, Western District, seeking to vacate Middleton’s life sentence.
In court documents, Gipson argues that the state violated Middleton’s Sixth Amendment right to the counsel of his choice by freezing his assets prior to his initial trial as a condition of his bond.
“During the decades of post-conviction litigation in this case, neither the prosecutors nor the Attorney General’s Office has ever disputed any of the compelling evidence that petitioner has presented to show that he is innocent,” the petition states. “The state also has not disputed the essential facts that prove that his Sixth Amendment rights were violated by the prosecution’s seizure and control of his assets as a condition of his bond. These omissions speak volumes.”
Last year, when DeKalb County Circuit Court Judge Ryan Horsman rejected Ken’s last legal challenge — before his initial trial, then-Jackson County Prosecutor Patrick Peters froze Ken’s assets, therefore violating Ken’s Sixth amendment right to counsel, Gipson argued in court — it marked the latest in a long line of legal setbacks in the court system.
At a rally held Aug. 8 outside the Jackson County Courthouse in downtown Kansas City, more than two dozen people gathered to bring attention to Ken’s case. Most of them wore red T-shirts that read on the front: “Free Ken Middleton.” On the back of those shirts was a website dedicated to Ken’s case — free-kenmiddleton.com.
One supporter gathered signatures imploring Johnson’s conviction integrity unit to review Ken’s case — a very important task that Johnson’s office apparently has undertaken.
This week, Ken’s son, Cliff Middleton, told me Ken remained in good spirits despite repeated failed attempts to free him from prison. For years, Cliff has fought to clear his father’s name and that won’t stop anytime soon, he f said. He added he spoke to Ken the morning of his birthday.
“He’s upbeat about filing our habeas corpus petition today on his 81st birthday,” Cliff wrote in a text message. “He was upbeat about the rally and touched by the outcome of that. As you know, he doesn’t get very good health care in there but he walks daily and keeps himself in good shape. I think it helps keep the stress off of him walking and things so he’s still fighting as hard as ever.”
A very strong argument could be made that Middleton was found guilty at trial and that his conviction should stand. Although I don’t necessarily agree with that sentiment, I understand why any duly elected prosecutor would be hesitant to go to bat for someone convicted of first-degree murder.
But Ken Middleton never got a fair trial, a judge ruled after considering evidence presented in open court. To me, that is a fundamental miscarriage of justice that must be corrected.
My hope is that the Jackson County prosecutor office’s new conviction integrity unit agrees.
