Erskine Johnson

a case of prosecutorial misconduct and racism

THE CRIME

On the morning of October 2, 1983, a white storeowner was shot and killed by a black man while tending the cash register at his Memphis supermarket. It was a Sunday morning and there were at least ten people in the store who witnessed the attempted robbery and shooting. Witnesses said that two black men and a black woman entered the store. The woman and one of the men held the store security guard at gunpoint while the main perpetrator approached one of the cash registers and demanded money. The victim, store-owner Joe Belenchia, was working the cash register. The car used in the crime had been stolen from a rental car agency at the St. Louis, Missouri airport. Concluding that the perpetrators were from St. Louis, the police immediately began investigating suspects from that area.

THE PROSECUTION'S CASE AGAINST ERSKINE

Eyewitness Testimony: None of the more than ten eyewitnesses to the crime could positively identify Erskine as a perpetrator of this robbery/homicide. At trial, the state did call one eyewitness, Tommy Perkins, who testified that Erskine kind of looked like the shooter. Mr. Perkins said that he was not more than 80 percent sure of his identification. Mr. Perkins even admitted to the jury that the police repeatedly showed him photographs of Erskine and told him that this person had been caught The prosecution presented another eyewitness, David Johnson, who saw the shooting at close range and was able to describe in detail the shooter's actions and words. David Johnson testified that he did not recognize Erskine as the shooter.

Immunity in Exchange for Testimony: The prosecutor made a deal with two witnesses - Elizabeth Starks and Dennis Williams - in exchange for their testimony. Basically, the government promised never to charge either of these individuals for their involvement in the Belenchia robbery/homicide if they testified against Erskine.

A Last Minute Witness: Seeking to shore up its weak case, the prosecution called a surprise witness, Beverly Batts. Ms. Batts was a convicted felon who had a history of committing perjury and lying to police. Ms. Batts testified that Erskine told her that he had committed a murder in the state of Tennessee. Since trial, Erskine's new lawyers have developed significant evidence suggesting that her testimony was not credible and that police participated in the fabrication of her testimony. Ms. Batts also now admits that the police promised to erase her own criminal record if she testified against Erskine.

Physical Evidence: The prosecution claimed that they were able to match one of the palmprints lifted from the getaway car to Erskine. But, according to the police's own report, they did not lift any prints from the area of the car where they claim to have found Erskine's palmprint. It is also suspicious that the police did not make this "match" until months after they began looking at Erskine as a suspect and months after they had access to his print file.

THE CASE PRESENTED BY ERSKINE'S DEFENSE LAWYER

A Compelling Alibi: In 1983, the year the crime occurred, Erskine was living in St. Louis, Mo. - the city where he was born and raised. St. Louis is more than 300 miles from Memphis.

As mentioned above, the crime occurred in the early morning of Sunday, October 2nd.The evening before the crime, Saturday evening, Erskine and his brothers and sisters threw a big surprise party for their mother's birthday at their mother's home in St. Louis.

Prior to trial, the family provided Erskine's defense lawyer with a list of more than twenty people who were at the birthday party and could testify that Erskine was there. Erskine's lawyer failed to interview many of these witnesses and only called six to testify at trial. Those who testified all swore that Erskine was at his mother's birthday party in St. Louis until after midnight on Saturday night. Some of the witnesses also testified to seeing Erskine in St. Louis at various points during the day on Sunday. Additionally, a man who was helping Erskine with some yardwork testified that he saw Erskine at his St. Louis home at the very hour the crime was taking place hundreds of miles away in Memphis.

EXCULPATORY EVIDENCE WITHHELD FROM THE DEFENSE AT THE TIME OF TRIAL

In every criminal trial, the prosecution has a constitutional obligation to turn over all exculpatory evidence to the defense. In other words, the prosecution must turn over any information in the police files that points to the defendant's innocence or that may be helpful to the defense. In violation of this constitutional mandate, the prosecution in Erskine's case withheld a shocking amount of exculpatory evidence from the defense. Deprived of this evidence pointing to an entirely different group of suspects, Erskine was certainly denied a fair trial. Consider –

Two Eyewitnesses Identified Someone Else – Michael Brown; The getaway car - a maroon station wagon - is linked the Michael Brown and Charles Keller; The Memphis police discovered that the Michael Brown, Eric Brown, and Charles Keller had a history of stealing rental cars from the Hertz agency at the St. Louis airport.

Other evidence found in the stolen maroon station wagon linked the vehicle to the Browns.
In the maroon station wagon, police found a lottery ticket purchased in Chicago and a receipt from the Dixie Trucker's Home in McLean, Illinois purchased a mere six days before the Belenchia shooting. The stolen station wagon had been driven 10,000 miles in the three months between the time it was stolen from the Hertz rental agency in St. Louis and the time of the Belenchia homicide. This significant accumulation of mileage in a short period of time is consistent with the Browns having driven the car on prostitution excursions to Chicago.

THE TAINT OF RACISM

An All-White Jury: Erskine was convicted by an all-white jury in a city with a majority black population. In Tennessee, both the prosecution and the defense are allowed to exclude a certain number of jurors without explanation through the use of peremptory strikes. In Erskine's case, the prosecution used their peremptory strikes to eliminate all potential black jurors.