Overview
It is impossible to adequately explain everything that has happened in almost eight years since Kimberly, Bradley and Jill Camm were slaughtered in the garage of their Georgetown, Indiana home in the evening of September 28, 2000. That incomprehensible crime shook the entire metropolitan Louisville, Kentucky area. Perhaps equally as earth shattering, however, was the subsequent arrest of David Camm, the husband and father of the slain family, less than 70 hours later.
This overview, as well as a more thorough review of other areas, will hopefully provide the reader with an understanding and appreciation of many things. Chief among those should be the stark realization that there was a rush to judgment and subsequent denial of justice for Kim, Bradley, Jill, David Camm, their families, the community in which they lived, and, of course, those that perpetrated this most heinous of all acts.
In early 2000, David Camm resigned from the Indiana State Police after spending 10 years as a road trooper. He was well respected, had been on the Emergency Rescue Team (ERT) and had been awarded the department's medal of valor for his efforts in risking his life in an effort to try and save the life of a drowning man.
Dave's successful uncle, an American entrepreneur, had built a basement waterproofing business from a one man operation into a successful and well-respected business employing over forty workers. Dave made a positive career change and went to work for his Uncle Sam and quickly became a successful salesman and supervisor, earning in six months almost a year's ISP salary.
On September 28, 2000, Dave had been married to Kimberly for over 11 years and had two beautiful children, Bradley, age seven and Jill, age five. At the time, Kim had a well-paying and highly regarded position as a financial analyst at a major insurance carrier in nearby Louisville, Kentucky, and their two children were happy and well-adjusted children who attended a Christian school in New Albany, Indiana.
On September 28, 2000, after a busy day at work, Dave played basketball at the Georgetown Community Church with ten other players. The one game he didn't play he sat on the baseline talking with a church elder. Dave was at the gym from 6:59PM, when the alarm was disengaged, until the security alarm was set at 9:22PM, when he and the seven other remaining players left. Dave's presence in the gym was accounted for by the other players and the church elder with whom he was talking. He never left the gym.
After he left the basketball games, Dave drove the two and a half miles to his residence and then pulled onto the driveway. The garage door was raised and he was presented with a horrific nightmare that was impossible to comprehend. His wife, missing her pants, lay on the garage floor with a massive head wound with a blood trail streaming from her head. His two children were both in the back seat of the family Bronco.
Dave tried to gauge what had happened and in the confusing course of a few moments had frantically climbed into the two-door Bronco and between the two front seats to the rear seat where his son and daughter were located. He removed his son from the Bronco and laid him on the concrete floor and gave him CPR in an attempt to revive him (Jill had a massive head wound; Brad was shot through the chest), ran into the house to call the State Police, ran across the road to his grandfather's house yelling for his uncle for help and then ran back to the garage.
Less than 70 hours later, David Camm was arrested and charged with the murders of his wife Kim, son Brad, and daughter Jill. The date was October 1, 2000. The probable cause affidavit (pdf) which was the document used to charge Dave was inaccurate, misleading, incomplete, and based in large part upon the false deductions and speculations of the lead detective who significantly relied upon the conclusions provided by a supposed blood stain expert and crime scene re-constructionist.
Robert Stites was that supposed crime scene re-constructionist and was also supposedly a blood expert who was the source of much of the information in the probable cause affidavit. The ISP relied upon Stites for his expert opinion on blood pattern analysis and for his assessment and evaluation of the crime scene. The crux of the arrest warrant was based upon Stites' opinion that eight tiny dots of blood on the lower left front of Camm's T-shirt, known as Area 30, was high velocity, meaning blowback from a gunshot wound. Years later and under oath, Stites admitted that when he rendered his opinion that he hadn't even taken the basic elementary course on blood stain analysis and had never before independently rendered an opinion on blood stains.
Stites further admitted during Camm's second trial that his previous testimony that he was working on his PhD in fluid dynamics wasn't accurate, for he hadn't taken any college courses in the nine years prior to when he first testified. Additionally, his previous testimony under oath in the first Camm trial that he had testified in other venues about blood stains in other cases wasn't accurate either, for he had never done so.
As to being a crime scene re-constructionist, Stites had never before processed a homicide scene. He later admitted that, contrary to the sworn probable cause affidavit, he wasn't a crime scene re-constructionist when he offered his conclusions about the Camm crime scene.
Stites was neither a crime scene re-constructionist nor a blood stain expert, but yet he was allowed free rein at the crime scene and held out by the ISP as a man who had a national reputation and was relied upon for his “expert” opinions and conclusions to support the probable cause affidavit which authorized the arrest of David Camm.
Prosecutor Stanley Faith had taken over the crime scene, according to several investigators. He also had politically appointed investigators who were intimately involved at the crime scene and in later critical interviews. They also were instrumental in helping the crime scene re-construction efforts but yet didn't have any police training or police experience. They collected possibly crucial evidence without maintaining any chain of custody. What they collected, who collected what, and when they collected it and where it was retained was unclear or unknown. Potentially critical evidence was lost and untrained, inexperienced, and politically appointed investigators were intimately involved in the most horrific crime ever to occur in Floyd County, Indiana. (Recently added condoms to the septic system were collected but lost. Kim and David didn't use condoms. A shower curtain which appeared to have blood stains was also collected and lost. The prosecutor's investigators possibly collected them but they didn't have any record. Regardless, no one knew what happened to the evidence. Somebody lost those items, but no one admitted responsibility.)
The same probable cause affidavit which relied upon the conclusions of Stites, also claimed that Jill had a recent tear in the vaginal area consistent with sexual intercourse. The inference was deadly. Her father was the one responsible and had violated her. There was absolutely nothing which corroborated any sexual abuse much less anything which supported the contention that Dave was responsible for his little girl's injuries.
The injuries were deemed to be so painful that Jill would have had trouble urinating, and according to one doctor, they would have "hurt like hell" when she urinated. The day of her murder, however, Jill had been active at school, had been energetic at her dance practice, was dressed by her grandmother (Kim's mother), and was running around during Brad's swim practice just hours before her murder. She never said a word about nor exhibited any symptom of any pain. Her autopsy also reflected very little urine in her bladder, indicating that she had urinated not long before her murder.
Indeed, the Chief Medical Examiner in Kentucky who performed the autopsy on little Jill later testified that Jill's injuries were the result of blunt force trauma which had many possible causes. She further stated that her official report didn't even use the term sexual intercourse and at trial stated, "In fact, it doesn't even say sexual abuse, it says trauma."
The horrific allegation that Jill was molested and that Dave was responsible was never to be dropped, however, and carries with it the same odorous and indelible stain that it did when it was first alleged on October 1, 2000.
Nonetheless, the prosecution of David Camm marched forward. He was first convicted in the court of public opinion, greatly aided by the spurious allegation that he had molested his precious daughter and then with the revelations of his previous infidelities while with the ISP. Indeed, during the trial, the prosecutor called several very reluctant women to testify about their relationships with Camm. Their testimony was lurid and sensational but had no bearing on the crimes.
Before and during the trial, prosecutor Faith changed theories three times about when the crime occurred. The first probable cause affidavit alleged that Dave killed his family between 9:15-9:30PM, or after he returned from the basketball games around 9:00PM. At the time that allegation was made, the ten players and the church elder weren't important and had told the truth. It was only after the prosecution changed their theory as to the timing of the murders did the prosecutor refer to those same truthful people as liars.
The second theory proffered by deputy prosecutor Susan Orth in her opening comments to the first jury claimed that after arriving at the gym, Dave snuck out of the basketball games, drove to his home, tried to make a phone call to a customer at 7:19PM, then slaughtered his family, cleaned and manipulated the crime scene, returned to the games, had blood on his shirts and shoes, and continued playing with a calm and carefree manner.
After a phone company billing representative testified that the call actually occurred at 6:19PM, or when Kim, Brad and Jill were still at Brad's swim practice, the prosecution then changed their theory once again. Theory three said that Dave still snuck out of the games, but at some time or another, murdered his family, cleaned and manipulated the crime scene, and returned with a bloody shirt and shoes to the gym. All three theories had him acting alone.
What about the other 11 people present at the games who said he never left and never saw any bloody clothing or change in demeanor? According to prosecutor Faith they were either lying or mistaken about not seeing him leave or return. All 11 of them. Again, of course, they only were liars after the prosecution changed the timing of when the murders occurred.
During the trial testimony of Stites, he testified that after he examined the T-shirt and prior to Camm's arrest, he telephonically spoke with his mentor Rod Englert. In that phone call, Stites described the eight stains in Area 30 as being a result of high velocity. Englert, according to Stites, then told Stites that he was doing a good job. According to Stites, Englert then, over the phone, and without seeing the T-shirt, agreed that the eight tiny stains were high velocity.
Stites testimony was naturally buttressed by the later testimony of Englert who had originally dispatched Stites to the crime scene. The well-known Englert first provided the jury with his personalized tutorial on blood stains. Englert then testified that Stites had based his Camm opinion on high velocity being the cause of the eight tiny stains on a previous case the two had just worked, as well as on "his (Stites) experience and knowledge and having experience in many other cases also."
Terry Laber, the highly-respected blood expert and State of Minnesota forensic laboratory scientist, countered Englert's testimony that the eight tiny stains originated from contact and not from projected blood. The lower portion and hem of Dave's T-shirt had simply come in contact with Jill's bloody hair as he removed Brad from the back seat and then gave him CPR in a desperate attempt to save him. Indeed, if the eight tiny stains were blowback, then one would expect additional blood misting on the shorts that Dave was wearing. There was no blood on his shorts, further indicating that the T-shirt, which was hanging loosely from Dave’s body, was the only garment that came in contact with Jill’s bloody hair.
(It should be noted at this juncture that Blood Stain Pattern Analysis, or BSPA, is not a science. It is simply an opinion rendered by someone who purportedly knows what he or she is talking about. On the other hand, matching fingerprints or DNA profiles is a science and not an opinion. Of the eleven BSPA "experts" who were eventually deposed or testified in the Camm cases, five claimed that the eight tiny blood spots on area 30 of Dave's T-shirt was high velocity misting, or the result of blowback from a bullet striking Jill; five said it was transfer consistent with Dave removing his son from the backseat of the Bronco and his shirt touching his daughter's bloody hair; and one, a former FBI Agent, said he didn't know. The five who claimed that it was high velocity didn't agree with one another as to the basis of their opinions, however, with one person simply claiming that he knew it when he saw it.)
Several key pieces of evidence were either ignored as "artifacts" or not pursued. The most critical "artifact" was a sweatshirt found at the crime scene that bore the hand-printed name of BACKBONE in the collar. That sweatshirt, which also had the DNA of an unknown male and unknown female, as well as the blood of Kim and Bradley Camm, was ignored by the police and prosecution after they failed to connect David Camm to it. Indeed, one of the interrogators of Camm lied when he told Camm that the other basketball players had seen him wearing the sweatshirt the night of the murders. When that lie failed, the prosecution simply claimed that the sweatshirt was part of the crime scene manipulation and didn’t pursue any attempt at finding the true owner.
Because the judge allowed testimony about Dave's infidelities and because of the molestation allegation, the actual conviction in his first trial was but a mere formality. Jury members acknowledged that the argument about him molesting his little girl was critical to their decision. He was sentenced to 195 years in the Indiana State Prison in March, 2002.
The case was over and many of the parties moved on. Faith, the prosecutor who later claimed that an unexplained sweatshirt at the crime scene bearing the hand printed name of BACKBONE on the collar was "much ado about nothing," used his notoriety to run for office again. His chief deputy, Susan Orth, who claimed that the investigation was "very, very thorough," used the publicity to run for and be elected judge, replacing the retiring judge who presided over the Camm trial.
Sean Clemons was the lead ISP detective who made numerous false assertions or assumptions in the probable cause affidavit:
- the crime scene being manipulated (Kim's shoes were on top of the Bronco)
- the blood of Kim having a foreign substance added to it (it was the natural phenomena of serum separation);
- witnesses claiming that Dave left the basketball game around 9:00PM (rather than at 9:22PM)
- his (erroneous) interpretation of three sounds as gunshots which occurred between 9:15-9:30PM. Clemons testified at length in the trial and was later promoted to Sergeant.
David Camm moved on as well...to the Indiana State Prison in Michigan City, Indiana, where he began serving his sentence in the Protective Custody Unit. He was a former Indiana State Trooper who was at distinct risk of being physically harmed or killed if incarcerated with the general prison population.
Members of Dave's family didn't move on. They stayed true not to their belief that Dave was innocent but their conviction that he was innocent. Family members were present with Dave playing basketball at the church gym when Kim and the children were brutally slaughtered. Those family members as well as the other ball players, many of whom were not relatives, have never wavered that Dave never left the gym. They know that he couldn't have killed his family...he was with them playing basketball.
Sam Lockhart was one of the basketball players who was playing ball on September 28, 2000. Sam is the uncle of Dave and he and his family have expended whatever savings they have accumulated in their lives to seek and secure justice for Dave. Dave's parents, Susie and Don Camm, now in their 70's, have mortgaged practically everything they own in their quest for justice. Dave's brothers and sister and their families, as well as a host of other family members and other individuals have continued to be unwavering in their support of Dave.
After the conviction, Sam and the family secured the appellate services of two attorneys who, after reading the transcript and speaking with witnesses, knew that justice had been denied for Dave. They also reached a startling conclusion that is rare among defense attorneys. Dave not only had been denied justice, but he was also innocent.
Those lawyers used their legal acumen to author an appeal which was eventually heard by the Indiana Court of Appeals. In an opinion handed down on August 10, 2004, the conviction of David Camm was reversed. The reversal was based upon the court noting that Camm's conviction was based in part upon the prosecution painting Dave as a bad character for his previous infidelities. There would be no such “evidence” allowed in any retrial according to the Appellate Court.
As to the argument allowed by the judge that Dave had molested his daughter, the Court also stated that "the trial court will need to carefully consider whether the highly inflammatory nature of this evidence substantially outweighs the probative value of any evidence that Camm molested Jill." In short, the court said that evidence needed to be presented that linked Dave to the injuries of his little girl in order for such an allegation to be made. No such evidence had ever been presented.
That Appellate Court also noted that the basketball players "all agreed that Camm was there the entire time and that even though he sat out at least one game, he did not leave the gym." The court also made a comment rarely seen in such decisions, "(W)e are left with the definite possibility that the jury might have found Camm not guilty of murdering his wife and two children if it had not been exposed to a substantial amount of improperly admitted and unfairly prejudicial evidence..."
Many people think that David Camm's conviction was reversed because of a technicality. It isn't a technicality when false allegations abound. It isn't a technicality when the prosecutor, with the consent of the judge, is allowed to argue that a person committed the heinous crime of molestation without a shred of evidence. The whole process went against the very grain of our system of justice, the basic foundation of which is due process and fundamental fairness.
The new Floyd County prosecutor was Keith Henderson, who was also a former Indiana State Trooper. He took the Appeals Court decision under advisement and then later stated that he had organized a "Fresh Eyes" investigation, also headed by the ISP, to look into the case. There are those who couldn’t understand how the new investigation could be “fresh” and unbiased if the same agency which was involved in the first investigation were also involved in the second investigation. Nonetheless, the ISP began their new investigation on September 3, 2004. Nothing had been done since Dave’s conviction in March, 2002, because, of course, the ISP and the prosecutor had solved the case.
After the "Fresh Eyes" investigated the case for a little over two months, on November 16, 2004, Henderson, who said that almost 20 interviews had been conducted in the new investigation, re-charged Dave with the murders of his wife and children, using a probable cause affidavit sworn to by ISP Detective Gary Gilbert. Twenty interviews was the extent of their new investigation.
Included in that new affidavit was yet the same refuted allegation that a telephone call had been made from the Camm residence at 7:19PM. Detective Gilbert also saw fit to include information from Detective Sam Sarkisian that there had been sexual devices taken from the Camm residence and that “the trauma to Jill Camm's vaginal area is consistent with a sexual device and/or a penis.” Nothing was said about those devices being tested negatively for Jill’s DNA or that the injuries suffered by Jill were the result of non-specific blunt force trauma.
What forensic evidence was tested, analyzed or matched? Nothing. The "Fresh Eyes" investigation didn't conduct any tests or attempt to secure any matches of unknown fingerprints or DNA with known prints or profiles. No one tried to determine the owner of the BACKBONE sweatshirt nor did anyone try to find the answers to the many unanswered questions that lay in the forensic evidence. The forensic evidence was ignored, other than the previously purchased blood spatter opinion of the state's two primary witnesses, the cost of which was borne by Floyd County in the amount of $280,000.
The "Fresh Eyes" didn’t interview any of the basketball players other than Sam Lockhart, who requested a meeting with the new investigators and who literally begged them to attempt to find the owner of the BACKBONE sweatshirt by running a DNA check. The investigators met with other Camm family members and they, too, requested that the police try and find the owner of the BACKBONE sweatshirt and the DNA on it. The “Fresh Eyes” ignored these earnest, simple, and very legitimate requests.
There was a bombshell in the new affidavit, however, and that was the revelation that Dave had confessed to someone. That person turned out to be a prison inmate who was a prolific drug dealer and escape artist. He was a career informant who had also claimed that two other inmates had confessed their murders to him. His story was that Dave said that he had shot and killed Kim in the car as it sat outside the garage. There was no denying that the evidence was that Kim was outside the car and in the garage when she was murdered. That didn't stop the prosecution from using his story, however. A story sold by a serial informant that didn"t comport with the agreed-upon facts was the complete extent of their new evidence prior to David Camm being recharged.
That source of that new information, career criminal James B. Hatton, was later allowed to petition his trial court for a sentence modification after he testified in Camm's second trial. The judge allowed him to also be freed on an ankle bracelet on home detention, pending the resolution of his modification, even though he had served less than six years of a 25 year sentence for methamphetamine production and for escape. Hatton was released from prison and then simply walked away from his home detention in December, 2006. He is currently a fugitive.
The new defense attorneys were, however, successful in having the case transferred from Floyd County to Warrick County, just east of Evansville, where Judge Robert Aylsworth was to be the presiding judge. It was a given that David Camm couldn't get a fair trial in Floyd County. That would hopefully change in Warrick County.
On January 26, 2005, the defense argued in Warrick County that David Camm should be released on bond pending his trial. Much of the argument dealt with the fact that Dave had been convicted on blood stain evidence which the Appellate Court called the "battle of the experts."
In order to agree to such a reduction in bond, from no bond to one of only $20,000, the case had to have been seen as very weak. When the judge ordered Camm released on a $20,000 bond, Prosecutor Henderson and the citizens of Floyd County were shocked and angered.
At that same bond hearing on January 26, 2005, the defense advised the prosecution of the intent to file a motion which would compel them to act on much of the forensic evidence. A critical part of that motion was that the unknown DNA profiles be run through the national DNA database in order to attempt to find the owner of the BACKBONE sweatshirt.
Only when faced with the defense motion to compel testing did the police finally attempt to match the unknown DNA with the national DNA database in February, 2005. They were shocked to find out that the DNA belonged to Charles Darnell Boney, an 11-time convicted felon who had a history of violently attacking and kidnapping women. Boney, known as BACKBONE in prison, was also a shoe freak, having previously attacked women for their shoes. That quickly explained why Kim's shoes had been neatly placed on top of her Bronco at the crime scene. Boney had been released from prison just three months prior to the murders after serving only eight years of a 20 year sentence for two armed robberies and the kidnapping of three women.
Boney had made a startling admission when arrested previously for his assaults on women in order to steal their shoes. He said that he had an escape plan and that plan was to wear a sweatshirt to the scene of the crime and to later remove it so he wouldn't match any possible witness descriptions.
(It was only months later, and after the defense was attempting to possibly link the unknown female DNA found on the sweatshirt with that of Boney’s girlfriend, did the ISP finally match that unknown female DNA with Mala Singh, Boney's girlfriend at the time of the murders. It was mixed with blood from Kim. Rather than pursue the possibility that she was with Boney at the crime scene, however, they used a story (that changed significantly over time) from her that allowed her to retain her freedom.)
An incredible aspect of the sweatshirt and the unknown male DNA was that the first prosecutor, Stan Faith, not only knew about the DNA but claimed that he told the ISP to run it in the national database. The ISP didn't run the DNA and later claimed that the prosecutor didn't tell them about it. As a result, the DNA was ignored for years, both by the initial investigators and by the “Fresh Eyes” investigators until the defense mandated that the DNA profile be run in the database.
Three days after his sweatshirt and DNA was identified, Boney was found to be living in Louisville, less than 25 minutes from the Camm residence. At the time of the murders, he was living with his mother, who later admitted that she had sent him on errands to a nearby meat store which also happened to be owned by Kim's sister and brother-in-law and which Kim and the kids frequented on a routine basis.
Boney was soon interviewed by the police and claimed that he had numerous people who could alibi him for the afternoon and evening of September 28, 2000. The police accepted his story even though the critical alibi witnesses weren't interviewed and even though Boney had failed a stipulated polygraph examination as to his involvement in the murders. The polygraph examiner who administered the polygraph to Boney acknowledged that the "Fresh Eyes" investigators were both surprised and shocked at the results.
What happened next will astonish many people. At a press conference on February 28, 2005, Boney was defended by the prosecutors. They claimed that his story about giving the BACKBONE sweatshirt to the Salvation Army after his release from prison had checked out. They insisted that David Camm was still the one who was responsible for the murders of his family. As to an 11-time convicted felon who assaulted women, robbed women, kidnapped women at gunpoint and who threatened to blow their brains out, he was regarded by the prosecutors as simply having his sweatshirt show up at the crime scene through no fault of his own. Nothing was said to the public about Boney’s failed polygraph or the failure to verify his false alibi witnesses.
Deputy prosecutor Steve Owen asked this question at the same press conference, "What do you think? Mr. Boney's going to come out of jail, go to somebody's house in Georgetown, brutally murder three people and say, 'Oh, I think I'll take off my sweatshirt that I got from (the Department Of Corrections) and lay it down here by the blood (boy). Does that make sense to anybody?" Owen said it didn’t make sense to him, but it sure made sense to a lot of people that an enraged, violent person, engaged in a sexual assault of a woman, who then shot and killed her and her two children, just might leave evidence at the scene of a crime. After all, Boney had left his property and fingerprints at previous crime scenes.
The defense tried to get the prosecutors to act and filed a motion for Judge Aylsworth to authorize an arrest warrant for Boney. That failed. Boney's identity and the fact that his sweatshirt had been linked to the crime scene (and prior to the defense being advised that his DNA had been identified) was leaked to the press, presumably by someone in the prosecutor's office, and Boney was in the process of giving an exclusive interview to a Louisville television station.
Boney was found and then quickly interviewed by a retired FBI Agent who was working for the defense. During the videotaped interview of Boney, he was caught in numerous lies and he claimed that nothing more of his would be found at the crime scene, including other DNA or his fingerprints. In fact, he stated that if anything else of his other than his sweatshirt was found at the scene it would be "obvious" that he murdered the family.
Weeks after Boney was first interviewed and when the police took his finger and palm prints, the unknown palm print was finally compared to that of Boney. It was a match. It was therefore "obvious" that he was the murderer. Only the police still thought that David Camm was involved, due to the "compelling" evidence of blood spatter, according to Detective Gilbert. The prosecution and the investigators weren’t giving up on Camm being involved.
The "Fresh Eyes," however, were compelled to arrest Boney. After his arrest and initial interview, he was allowed to be alone for several hours in order to compile a written statement. His assertions quickly changed, however, and at the end of the post-arrest interviews, the investigators told Boney that his story was a "crock of shit."
After that first round of interviews, ISP Detective Myron Wilkerson, a distant relative of the Boney's, found Boney's mother and sister and, according to them, told them that they needed Boney to sign a "conspiracy note." Boney's sister was allowed to meet twice with her brother, including a contact visit, prior to his next interview. It was obvious that the ISP and the prosecutor needed to link Boney and Camm together and they were trying to get Boney to provide information of a "conspiracy" between he and Camm.
It took over 30 hours of interrogations and changing and contradictory stories for Boney to finally provide a story that was the stuff of fairy tales, saying that he only sold a gun to David Camm which was used in the murders. Nothing of what Boney said, including when and how he supposedly met Dave, where he obtained the gun, and other aspects of his story have ever been corroborated. Nothing of what he said could be construed as the two conspiring with one another. Boney put the murders all on Camm.
Parts of the interrogations of Boney are chilling, however. He was told by Wilkerson that he was an "opportunist" whose"best scenario is to be a witness." He was further told that David Camm had an alibi which was "gonna be a problem." Wilkerson told Boney that his goal was to keep Boney alive. Boney was given a stark choice. He could be a witness or face the death penalty. Incriminate Camm or die were his options. He chose the option that kept him alive. It was clear to many that the death penalty was spared in exchange for Boney incriminating Camm.
Another astounding facet to the Boney interviews is the fact that critical parts of Boney's written statement and later his stories were first provided by the authorities. It was Wayne Kessinger, one of Henderson’s investigators, who first suggested to Boney that the gun was “dirty” or “untraceable” and that he might have had it wrapped in his sweatshirt. Boney later incorporated those two aspects with his story that after he bought the untraceable gun, he wrapped it in his sweatshirt prior to giving it to Camm. What else did Boney claim? He said that he first met Dave in July, 2000, at a local park where they were playing full-court basketball. In addition to the ten players there were several others present as onlookers. How many witnesses were found that saw the two together? None. There were no witnesses.
Boney also claimed that he and Dave never spoke on the telephone but met in front of a convenience store immediately adjacent to Karem’s Meat Market owned by Kim's sister. It was there that Dave spoke to him about getting a gun and later where the gun was provided. That's smart. Meet and talk with a convicted felon and obtain a gun in a busy parking lot of a business owned by your sister-in-law where you're well-known. As one might guess, there were no witnesses.
Boney also said that he knew that Dave was a former ISP trooper but that Dave trusted him enough, after ten minutes of conversation, to ask him to find him a gun. That contradicts Boney’s other statements to many others, including the defense investigator, that he would never trust a cop.
Dave agreed to a price of $250, but there was no discussion as to what make, model, caliber or type of gun. Boney claimed that he went to his long-time acquaintance, Larry Gerkin, who lived in Louisville, and purchased a .380. Wayne Kessinger, who spent 30 years with the Louisville Metro Police, was unsuccessful in finding Gerkin, much less identifying him. Gerkin was probably just a quick figment of Boney's imagination. (One should ask why he would lie about the identify of the real source of the gun, however.)
After claiming that he sold Dave one gun on the afternoon of the murders, which was delivered in the same Karem's parking lot, Boney claimed that he followed Dave to his house. For 15 or more minutes, he followed Dave home, but he couldn't remember the vehicle that Dave was driving, thinking that it was a LeSabre. Dave, of course, drove a white pickup truck. Boney did recall, in the span only seeing Kim’s Bronco for mere moments, that her car had an FOP sticker on the license. Boney then said that he was outside the garage next to his car when Kim and the kids pulled into the driveway. He said he then heard three pops and Dave walked outside the garage and confronted him.
Incredibly, Boney also claimed that Dave then tried to kill him but that the gun jammed. Boney said Dave then ran into the house from the garage, presumably, according to Boney, to get another gun to kill him. Dave, a former SWAT member, panicked when a gun jammed and ran away was Boney's story. Ask any law enforcement officer, or better yet, a SWAT member, how long it takes to remove a jam in a semi-automatic handgun. Mere seconds will be the answer.
Rather than fleeing the scene after Camm tried to kill him, Boney then said he followed behind Camm and walked into the garage. He said that he then tripped over Kim's shoes and that he leaned down, picked them up and placed them neatly on top of the car. He then leaned into the vehicle and looked to see what was inside because of "curiosity." That's when his palm print was deposited on the door jamb, as he was looking in at Jill and Brad.
It was only then that he decided that it was time to leave. As he was driving away, however, he saw in his rear-view mirror a woman in a vehicle that looked like a state owned Crown Victoria. Boney was trying to incriminate a female trooper associate of Dave's. She had previously been eliminated as a suspect because when the crimes had occurred, she was with friends eating a late dinner. (The new investigators suggested that she take a polygraph as to her possible involvement. She passed the polygraph.)
Boney's story is not supported by any witnesses, any records, any documents, or any other corroboration at all. It is his unsupported story, fostered by the need to have him incriminate David Camm, which he finally provided. The story is that of a person who knew he had to incriminate David Camm in order to escape the death penalty, which he did. His stories were labeled by the police investigators as a "crock of shit" and as a "story of convenience" but they finally had him incriminating Camm.
After several interviews the police finally had Boney incriminating Camm. What happened next? Prosecutor Henderson dropped the charges against Dave which were pending in Warrick County. For a little over an hour the Camm and Lockhart families thought that justice finally had been achieved. They didn't know that Henderson had already drafted another new probable cause affidavit, the third one, against Dave.
On March 9, 2005, David Camm was, for the third time, charged with the murder of his family. This was the prosecution's fourth theory. Lead "Fresh Eyes" investigator Gary Gilbert swore under oath that Dave not only committed the murders but that he and Boney conspired with one another to commit murder. Boney didn't provide any "evidence" of such a conspiracy. There were no witnesses, no documents, no records, and no connection whatsoever between the two.
The new affidavit also alleged that Dave's brother, Danny Camm, had forged Kim's signature on a life insurance policy which had been obtained only months before the murders. That affidavit didn't say anything about Kim being the one responsible for the family's financial affairs and also the one responsible for securing life insurance. Indeed, when she obtained the new life insurance, through Danny, most of the increases were on Dave, who had lost his group policy after leaving the ISP.
The allegation of fraud by Danny Camm was later dropped. In a bond hearing in June, 2005, Detective Gilbert said that he had been told by someone that Danny Camm had forged Kim's signature but that the information wasn't correct. Detective Gilbert had sworn, under oath, to the authenticity of that allegation and then simply dismissed it months later.
The third affidavit also followed in the same manner as the two preceding it. Pertinent parts of the story were left out. For example, there was no mention of the ever-changing, inconsistent and contradictory stories told by Boney. Neither did the affidavit tell of Boney's violent criminal background other than to simply note that he had been released from the Indiana State Prison (not accurate) in June, 2000 for armed robbery. Nothing was said about his previous convictions for assaulting women for their shoes, his threats to shoot women in the head or his armed abduction of three women.
The new charges now afforded Henderson the ability to charge David Camm, which he did, in Floyd County. Only a few months before, Henderson had agreed with the defense argument that Dave couldn't get a fair trial in Floyd County and had been intimately involved in selecting Warrick County as the new venue for the second Camm trial. Henderson was now claiming that there wouldn't be a problem in securing a fair trial in Floyd County.
The defense team refused to recognize that the old venue of Floyd County was legitimate and subsequently filed a Writ of Mandamus with the Indiana Supreme Court challenging the change of venue. Such writs are rarely heard by the Supreme Court (less than 2%) but it did agree to hear the arguments in the Camm case. Three months passed but the Supreme Court, in a unanimous 5-0 ruling, ordered Dave's trial back to Warrick County. During those three months the prosecutor refused to provide discovery to the Camm defense team.
In the months leading up to the second trial the defense team continued to interview many possible witnesses and develop promising leads. One witness, Victor Nugent, was found by the defense in mid-March, 2005. Nugent was a co-worker of Boney’s at Anderson Woods in Louisville who also missed work, as did Boney, on the evening of September 28, 2000. Nugent lied repeatedly to the defense and then later to the “Fresh Eyes” investigators about the source of a gun that he reluctantly admitted selling to Boney. Nugent claimed that the gun was a .38 revolver that he simply found in a tire in a van that he had purchased.
Nugent denied selling a .380 to Boney, although other co-workers heard Nugent complaining that Boney hadn’t paid him for a gun he had sold to him. One of those co-workers saw Boney with a semi-automatic in his backpack at work near the same time of Nugent's complaint.
The defense also located a friend of Nugent's who said that Nugent admitted to him that he did sell a .380 to Boney. That information was provided to the “Fresh Eyes” investigators but they said that they didn’t read much of the discovery provided to them by the defense. They dismissed Nugent as insignificant and didn’t pursue him as the source of the weapon.
The prosecution was approached by the mother of yet another inmate who wanted to help them. He also claimed that Dave also confessed to him that he had murdered his wife and children. The second inmate, Jeremy Bullock, claimed that Dave told him that he played basketball very hard while he was at the gym so that he would be noticed by the other players but that he left in the middle of the games. Does that make any sense? If someone is playing hard and then goes missing, wouldn't he be missed all the more? How does that account for the fact that the one game he did sit out it was with a church elder and that the two spoke during the entire time Dave didn't play ball?
Bullock, who confessed at age 16 to planning and then murdering his drug dealer, also said that Dave said that he committed the murders because Kim was leaving him. Was there evidence of that? There is no such evidence and on the contrary, Kim and Dave were talking about buying a bigger house with a swimming pool which would be closer to the kids' school. The two were making more money than they ever had and Dave's new job was not only affording him more money but also a better schedule to be with his family.
The prosecution was relying on two prison informants to buttress their case. David Camm, who has never wavered in the fact that he didn't kill his family, supposedly picked two inmates, at random, to confess that he killed his family. Those two informants were able to testify, however, thus allowing the jury to hear that Dave was incarcerated with two felons in the Indiana State Prison. Allowing the jury to hear that Dave was incarcerated meant that they therefore knew that he had been previously convicted. That was as important as the two stories.
Remember also that each one of the informants came forward and told of Dave's "confessions" prior to Boney's DNA being matched to the BACKBONE sweatshirt. What did the two informants say about Dave's co-conspirator? Nothing. Their stories didn't involve anyone who supposedly helped Dave. The fact that the inmates' stories didn't comport with the prosecution's theory that Dave and Boney acted together didn't stop the prosecution from using them at trial.
The defense found and interviewed several other inmates who were incarcerated with Dave and the two informants. Those other inmates, who had not been interviewed by the police or prosecution, refuted the claims of the two informants that Dave had confessed. Hatton was a well-known informant who wasn't trusted, not only by other inmates, but by police officers who knew him well. Bullock had bragged that he hated cops and was going to lie against Camm.
Prior to Camm’s trial, at least two other inmates in the Floyd County jail also attempted to gain favor with the prosecution in exchange for their stories. One inmate was telling other inmates that the prosecution needed someone to connect Boney and Camm together and that they would get a good deal if they did so. Their stories were so jumbled that they weren't used but only after the defense found other witnesses who told of their plans to sell their testimony in exchange for reduced sentences.
Hatton and Bullock, however, both benefited after their testimony for the state. As noted, Hatton, after his release on house arrest, fled and he is now a fugitive. Bullock was allowed to move from the prison at Michigan City to the Pendleton Reformatory where his family, residing nearby, could visit him more frequently.
During the second trial, which began on January 9, 2006, the judge refused to allow the defense to use Dave's 6th Amendment right to present evidence that Charles Boney was responsible for the murders. Boney's confession to the defense investigator as well as another confession, "I've got three (murders) under my belt" wasn't allowed, nor was any of his improbable story of being at the crime scene and looking into the car out of "curiosity" sake. His placement of the shoes on top of the car along with the rest of his story wasn't allowed.
Boney's criminal signature, his foot and shoe fetish, his violence towards women, his “escape plan” using a sweatshirt, and the fact that he was given a clear alternative to the death penalty in return for him incriminating David Camm was not allowed.
The judge, upon a motion filed by the defense, was required by law to dismiss the conspiracy charge against Dave because there was absolutely no evidence submitted by the prosecution that there had been any such conspiracy. The prosecutors never placed any witness on the stand that ever placed Boney with David Camm. The only "witness" was Charles Boney. The judge acquitted Dave of the conspiracy charge, but only after effectively apologizing to the prosecution for doing so.
During the second trial, there were a total of eight experts who testified about the blood on Area 30 of Dave's T-shirt which contained the blood of his daughter. The four prosecution experts all came to the same conclusion that the eight tiny drops of blood in Area 30 was deposited as a result of high velocity impact spray (HVIS) but they couldn't agree as to what made the blood on the shirt HVIS.
The State’s prime expert, Rodney Englert admitted during cross-examination that he didn't know that blood wasn't on the periodic table of elements. He also claimed that a basic knowledge of chemistry, physics, and blood viscosity wasn’t important when it came to identifying the source of blood stains.
Rod Englert, however, is admired by many as an individual who does a great sales job with juries. It was Englert, another crime scene re-constructionist, who claimed that Dave was squatted down in front of Jill in the backseat of the Bronco when he shot and killed her and Brad. The basis of that testimony stemmed from Englert’s assertion that blood on the back of Dave’s T-shirt was the result of contact with the rear of the front passenger seat which had been deposited there by high velocity misting. Englert had never proffered that opinion before, not in the first trial or in his depositions. That was new testimony. None of the other seven experts thought that the stain on the rear of the shirt was high velocity blood that was transferred to the shirt, but rather they all considered it to be a simple transfer of blood. Rod Englert was able to testify to something that seven others could not.
The four defense blood experts testified that the eight blood stains on Area 30 were a result of transfer or contact with blood from Jill. Those experts were Bart Epstein, the former forensic chief of the Minnesota State Crime Laboratory; Paulette Sutton, the Assistant Director of Forensic Services at the Regional Forensic Center in Memphis, Tennessee; Paul Kish, textbook author and recognized blood expert who was on the Executive Board of the FBI’s Scientific Working Group on Blood Stain Pattern Analysis (SWGSTAIN); and Stuart James, a forensic scientist, former chief toxicologist, clinical chemist, SWGSTAIN member, and author of textbooks on blood stains.
The jury was greatly aided, however, in their deliberations by what Judge Aylsworth allowed the prosecution to argue in their final argument. The judge ruled that the prosecution could argue that Jill was molested by her father. Incredibly enough, the Judge said that he couldn't prevent the prosecution from making such an argument, stating, "I don't believe it's my prerogative to restrict the argument as to any matters of evidence or in evidence, and I'll let you argue those as you please, and the jury can determine whether or not it has any merit."
The judge, whose job is to make definitive determinations on whether it is permissible to even admit certain "evidence," completely ignored, in the opinion of many people, the Court of Appeals ruling. He even contradicted his previous rulings during the trial. The prosecution was allowed to argue that Dave molested his child even though not one scintilla of evidence existed that he had done so.
Later, in another ruling after the trial, Judge Aylsworth also acknowledged that, "the evidence allowed to be admitted at trial did not in and of itself indicate such propensities (molestation) on the part of the defendant, or the existence at least on the surface of anything other than a natural father and daughter relationship between the defendant and his daughter."
To put it mildly, that's illogical. The judge said that Dave and Jill had a natural father and daughter relationship but there could have been something that wasn't “on the surface.” A judge who is supposed to ensure that fundamental fairness and due process are the foundations of his court allowed allegations of molestation without any evidence. An allegation, without any evidence whatsoever, was allowed to be argued as fact.
The judge justified his decision by claiming that both sides had the opportunity to litigate the "existence of and time of molestation" but ignored the Appellate Court's strict warning to "carefully consider whether the highly inflammatory nature of this evidence substantially outweighs the probative value of any evidence that Camm molested Jill." Many of the courtroom observers also thought that the judge also ignored the testimony of the pathologist who conducted Jill's autopsy who said that the injuries were non-specific and could have resulted from a myriad of other reasons other than molestation.
(On February 11, 2008, the Indiana Attorney General filed a response to the appeal filed by Camm's attorneys after his second conviction. In that response, the Attorney General acknowledged that the State had presented no evidence that David Camm was the source of the genitalia injuries suffered by Jill, yet still argued that it was permissible to allege that he molested his daughter. )
Judge Aylsworth refused to admit the two confessions of Charles Boney and refused to allow the defense to introduce other critical evidence against Boney, including his flunked polygraph, his criminal signature, and his ever-changing and totally unbelievable stories, yet he allowed prosecutor Henderson to claim that Dave not only molested Jill but that Kim had confronted Dave about that and was going to leave him. There was absolutely no evidence whatsoever or any confrontation or that Kim was going to leave Dave.
With the final words that Henderson uttered to the jury, he was able to have the most poisonous words that the jury heard prior to their being given their instructions from the judge. Those final words, "molested his daughter" tainted every other aspect of the trial and were instrumental in the jury finding Dave guilty.
Robert Crowell, the jury foreman, was later quoted as saying, "I think there are a number of things that were strong, but that timeline, I think, on the molestation is critical," he said. "We were convinced that what happened to Jill could not have happened anytime after 7:30 PM that night." Crowell further added, "If it had been only the impact spatter, I think we would have had a much longer discussion."
There was no evidence whatsoever of any molestation by Dave, but the jury came to that conclusion. The harsh words of Prosecutor Henderson resonated in the jury room and the need to have proof beyond a reasonable doubt vanished with the allegation that Dave had molested his precious little daughter. That heinous allegation trumped 11 eyewitnesses and simple common sense.
The jury later recommended a sentence of life without parole and less than a month after the guilty verdicts, Judge Aylsworth sentenced Dave to that mandatory life sentence.
In obtaining the two convictions, the police and prosecutors relied upon an expert who wasn't, ignored mountains of evidence, came up with four different theories of when and how David Camm committed murder, labeled 11 eyewitnesses as mistaken or liars, publicly supported a kidnapper and armed robber, relied upon drug dealers/murderers for witnesses, dismissed the possible source of the murder weapon, and spent literally millions of dollars in public funds.
The prosecutor, whose claims of a conspiracy between Boney and Camm secured headlines and lead stories, nonetheless fought vigorously to prevent any of Boney's statements or confessions from being allowed in the Camm trial. Sadly, the State of Indiana obtained two convictions through character assassination, speculation, and the failure of a judge to allow the defense to present critical evidence.
The two trials and two appeals, in addition to the cost of the experts and other associated costs have, to date, cost the taxpayers of Floyd County over $2 million. That doesn't include the costs associated with conducting the investigation and prosecution of the most investigated crime ever by the Indiana State Police. It also, of course, doesn't include the enormous costs, financial and emotional, borne by the families of the slain. Many people, after learning of the events that have occurred in this case, have righteously asked the question, "What aren't you telling me?" This website will hopefully answer that question and more. Many will rightfully have a difficult time believing that this monumental injustice occurred and that it is still being perpetuated by the State of Indiana. They will fail to comprehend why David Camm was convicted of a crime he didn't commit.
David Camm is currently imprisoned at the Pendleton, Indiana Reformatory and his family, supporters and defense team are still seeking justice for him and his slain family.
|
