DNA links two men in prison to cold case from 1983 that originally sent the wrong man to prison for 37 years

Authored by edition.cnn.com and submitted by Pope_Industries

(CNN) Two men serving life sentences for murder in a Florida prison have been linked to two other murders with the help of newly discovered DNA samples, which led to the exoneration of another man who wrongfully served 37 years in prison for the rape and murder of Barbara Grams in 1983.

Amos Robinson and Abron Scott allegedly raped and murdered 19-year-old Grams, whose beaten body was found behind a dental office in Tampa Heights on August 18, 1983, Hillsborough County State Attorney Andrew Warren said during a news conference Thursday after he was suspended as the state attorney by Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis for his stance against criminalizing abortion providers.

A grand jury indicted Robinson and Scott Thursday for the rape and murder of Linda Lansen, whose beaten body was found in Town and Country in July 1983 in bushes with a gunshot wound to the head, Warren said.

"These two men not only robbed me, but they robbed a 7-year-old little girl of her mother," said Linda Sheffield, Lansen's niece, during Thursday's news conference.

"When they're initially murdered, the shock is there, but 39 years later the shock is no longer there," she said. "But the void stays, and the pain stays and the crying stays. It doesn't go away."

UK-ForSci on August 7th, 2022 at 05:51 UTC »

I went in to read this thinking "there's virtually no way DNA evidence could prove he wasn't involved" and that remains true, it just demonstrates that the others were involved.

However, it looks like his initial conviction was based on absolutely no evidence of any kind other than a tip from a jailhouse snitch. That's insane.

Mikethebest78 on August 7th, 2022 at 02:51 UTC »

That poor man. He will get what less then a million dollars and a letter from the state that says essentially "Yeah bro sorry about that...no hard feelings"

TheManInTheShack on August 7th, 2022 at 00:38 UTC »

I can’t imagine what it must be like to be robbed of 37 years of your life. There is no amount of money nor gesture that can be made to compensate the man who was wrongfully imprisoned for all those years.

And there can be no justice for him because justice requires that what was stolen be returned and there is no way to do that. I imagine that simply to have lasted this long, he must have come to terms with the fact that fair isn’t part of the universe. Bad things happen to good people. Sometimes really bad things.

Still, that would be something he had to accept to survive this long.

This is also why the death penalty needs to be made illegal. Because innocent people are put to death and when that is later discovered, there is no resurrecting them.