T<\/span>hirty-six years<\/u> after he first refused to plead guilty to killing his wife, 62-year-old Charles McCrory was given the chance to leave prison and salvage the rest of his life. On one condition: After repeatedly proclaiming his innocence since the spring of 1985, McCrory would have to say that he\u2019d been guilty all along.<\/p>\n The offer came via his lawyer, Mark Loudon-Brown of the Atlanta-based Southern Center for Human Rights, on the eve of an evidentiary hearing in Andalusia, Alabama. As Loudon-Brown told Covington County Circuit Judge Lex Short the next day, Chief Assistant District Attorney Grace Jeter indicated \u201cthat if Mr. McCrory would be willing to admit guilt in this case, she had authority to consent to his release from prison.\u201d<\/p>\n But McCrory said no. \u201cHe does not wish to do that,\u201d Loudon-Brown said. \u201cAnd so I wanted to make sure the record was clear on that.\u201d A few feet away, Jeter remained expressionless. The judge asked if she had any response. \u201cNo, sir,\u201d she said. The hearing would move forward as planned.<\/p>\n It was just after 1 p.m. on April 28, 2021, at the county courthouse in Andalusia, a small city just north of the Florida border. Down a hill behind the courthouse is the old county jail where McCrory was held following his arrest. Listed in the National Register of Historic Places, the decaying brick building stood grimly juxtaposed against a fleet of trucks belonging to the Covington Casket Company, the county\u2019s oldest manufacturer. Covid-19 had brought a boom in business; on the day of the hearing, warehouse workers listened to music while lining caskets with fabric.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Charles and Julie McCrory with their son, Chad.<\/p>\n \nCredit: Courtesy of Larry Grissett<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Souviron, the prosecution\u2019s star witness at McCrory\u2019s trial, has since changed his tune. In a 2019 affidavit, he recanted his testimony.<\/p>\n \u201cAs a forensic odontologist I no longer believe the individualized teeth marks comparison testimony I offered in his case was reliable or proper,\u201d he wrote. \u201cI no longer believe, as I did at the time of trial, that there is a valid scientific basis for concluding that the injury found on the skin of the victim in this case, assuming that the injury is in fact teeth marks, could be \u2018matched\u2019 or otherwise connected to a specific individual, such as Mr. McCrory.\u201d<\/p>\n Rather than exonerate McCrory, however, prosecutors fought back, arguing among other things that because McCrory had challenged Souviron\u2019s testimony in a previous appeal, he was barred from trying again. In December 2020, Short granted an evidentiary hearing to allow both sides to make their case.<\/p>\n It would be a consequential hearing. Over the last decade, bite-mark analysis has been thoroughly debunked as junk forensic science, a subjective pattern-matching practice that has seen dozens of people wrongly convicted. In fact, according to the Innocence Project \u2014 which has been on a mission to banish bite-mark evidence from the courtroom \u2014 McCrory is the last remaining defendant known to have been convicted almost solely on the faulty forensic practice. The expert witnesses\u00a0at McCrory\u2019s evidentiary hearing were dentists who were once true believers but now use their expertise to correct their colleagues\u2019 past mistakes and educate judges about erroneous bite-mark analysis.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Although the science was on their side, McCrory\u2019s lawyers were up against a criminal legal system that often favors finality over accuracy. They would still be fighting an uphill battle against prosecutors, and the courts, to clear their client\u2019s name.<\/p>\n McCrory was not in attendance at the hearing. He was watching remotely from a minimum-security prison 175 miles to the north.\u00a0Before he went to prison, McCrory was a computer whiz who taught classes at the local junior college \u2014 \u201ca geek before it was fashionable to be one,\u201d as one of his trial attorneys put it. McCrory\u2019s son, Chad, recalled his grandmother saying that McCrory once claimed that every household would have a computer one day. \u201cShe was like, \u2018Hey, no way, that\u2019s just crazy,\u2019\u201d Chad said.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n \u201cThe testimony had no value. That testimony convicted an innocent man.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Chad was just 3 years old when his mom was murdered and his dad incarcerated. Now 39, he believes in his father\u2019s innocence, which has left him estranged from his mother\u2019s side of the family. In a blue suit, Chad sat with his wife and aunts on the left side of the courtroom, while his maternal uncle sat on the right, accompanied by his family and the former Covington County district attorney whose office charged McCrory back in 1985.<\/p>\n Loudon-Brown turned things over to Chris Fabricant, director of strategic litigation at the Innocence Project, who has led the legal efforts to extirpate bite-mark evidence. \u201cYour Honor, at the time of Mr. McCrory\u2019s 1985 trial, there had never been a single wrongful conviction attributable to the use of bite-mark evidence,\u201d Fabricant began. The forensic discipline was widely accepted in courtrooms across the country. But \u201cthe Innocence Project has documented 35 wrongful convictions and indictments attributable to the use of bite-mark comparison in criminal trials,\u201d he went on. \u201cAs we stand here today, bite marks are no longer accepted in the scientific community.\u201d<\/p>\n Fabricant emphasized that Souviron himself, one of the field\u2019s founding practitioners, had disavowed his testimony against McCrory. \u201cThere was no science behind what he had to say. The testimony had no value. That testimony convicted an innocent man.\u201d<\/p>\n As Charles McCrory recalled, the day his wife was found murdered started out fairly routine.<\/p>\n It was May 31, 1985, and the Alabama Electric Cooperative, where he worked as information systems manager, had just switched to a 7:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. workday. It only meant coming in half an hour earlier, but he still hadn\u2019t nailed the timing, and that Friday he was running late, meaning he didn\u2019t have time to swing by Hardee\u2019s to pick up a biscuit and a Coke for breakfast.<\/p>\n The same thing had happened the day before. Julie had dropped by his office and agreed to make a run to Hardee\u2019s. As he later recounted, McCrory thought maybe she\u2019d help him out again, so he picked up the phone at his desk and called her.<\/p>\n The couple had recently separated after a decade together. They\u2019d met as students at Andalusia High School. McCrory was 17 and Julie was 14. They dated for five years before getting married. In 1982 they had a son, Chad. But lately they\u2019d been struggling. McCrory was bored; he and Julie had been together so long. Their sex life was great, but he\u2019d been feeling like he needed more. He\u2019d had an affair with a co-worker at the local junior college, though he\u2019d mostly broken that off too.<\/p>\n Still, he and Julie got along well. Although he\u2019d moved out, they still spent plenty of time together. In fact, he\u2019d been over at the house they\u2019d shared on Lori Lane the previous evening. Julie did his laundry. They sat in the den and played with Chad while \u201cHill Street Blues\u201d was on TV, before stealing away to the bedroom to have sex. Julie removed a fabric belt from one of her dresses and loosely tied his wrists to the bedpost; he didn\u2019t object. He left the house with two baskets of freshly folded laundry just after the nightly news came on. He kissed Julie and Chad goodbye and pulled his Ford Bronco out of the driveway with a honk and a wave \u2014 Chad always liked it when he did that.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n But on Friday morning, Julie was not answering the phone. She didn\u2019t have to be at work until 8, so maybe she was in transit to his parents\u2019 house, where McCrory\u2019s mom watched Chad on workdays. McCrory called his mom, who said Julie hadn\u2019t been by yet. At 8 he called her job; Julie wasn\u2019t there.<\/p>\n Fifteen minutes later, McCrory\u2019s mom called back. She was worried. Julie had never been so late to drop off Chad. She told McCrory that his father was going to the house on Lori Lane to check on them. McCrory was worried now too. As he headed out in his Bronco, the two-way radio mounted in the cab crackled with life. McCrory was a longtime volunteer with the city\u2019s rescue squad and served as the crew\u2019s second-in-command. The radio communicated on both rescue squad and Andalusia Police Department channels.<\/p>\n He recognized the voice coming over the radio as that of Jeff Holland, a city fire department employee; they were making a run to Lori Lane. All they knew was that \u201ca woman was down,\u201d McCrory later recalled. He told Holland that he was also en route. McCrory arrived before the squad. He was headed toward the front door when he ran into his dad, who was in a frenzy. Something was \u201cbad wrong\u201d with Julie, he told McCrory.<\/p>\n McCrory went into the house. All the lights were off. Julie was lying prone just inside the entrance. Her pink nightgown was pushed up around her torso. Her head was turned to the side, beaten and bloodied, and her eyes were blackened. She was obviously dead. McCrory rushed out of the house stricken. He asked his dad about Chad and his father said he was OK; he\u2019d found Chad in his bed. The boy was now across the street, where the neighbors were taking care of him.<\/p>\n When the rescue squad arrived, McCrory approached Holland and told him that Julie was dead. Holland checked her for vital signs before calling the police.<\/p>\n Investigators Billy Treadaway and Wade Garrett were the first cops to arrive. Treadaway quickly realized they would need backup. He radioed police dispatch and asked them to call a forensics guy, Charlie Brooks, from the state crime lab about an hour away. Treadaway put crime scene tape around the property and talked to McCrory. \u201cHe said that he hoped that I get the fellow that done it,\u201d Treadaway later testified.<\/p>\n Brooks, Treadaway, and Garrett examined the scene. The house wasn\u2019t immaculate, but it was about what you\u2019d expect with a toddler around. Treadaway didn\u2019t see any signs of a struggle or forced entry, and McCrory\u2019s father said the front door was ajar when he\u2019d arrived. There were no bloody footprints or fingerprints. Two windows in the master bedroom were open, but the investigators disregarded this, according to court records. Instead, as the day warmed up, they closed them and turned on the air conditioning.<\/p>\n Garrett, who previously worked for the Alabama Bureau of Investigation and had been trained as a fingerprint examiner, did not dust the windows for prints. He also failed to print a sliding glass door, and he never went into the bathroom. In fact, even though he remained at the house until early the following morning, Garrett didn\u2019t dust much of anything save for the front doorknob, a pitcher on the kitchen table, a chair that was pulled back from the table, and some fast-food promotional glasses in the sink \u2014 two Snoopy glasses and a Care Bears glass.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n The medical examiner noted one additional injury: Two \u201csemi-lunar\u201d indentations to the back of Julie\u2019s right arm.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n Eventually the investigators made a closer inspection of Julie\u2019s body. Her head had been bashed in and the front of her nightgown was saturated with blood. There were hairs in her left hand and on her chest, which Brooks collected. He noted that a length of pantyhose was tied around her right wrist. There was also a red bandanna on the floor not far from her body.<\/p>\n The investigators searched for a murder weapon to no avail. Although no one inspected the kitchen knives or any other sharp utensils, Treadaway did notice that a fire poker, part of a set of tools in the den, was missing. At some point, Garrett\u2019s attention was called to a footprint outside \u2014 just beyond the McCrorys\u2019 back fence, which abutted the property of a local business, Bullard Excavating. The footprint was photographed.<\/p>\n Around 6 p.m., Brooks and Treadaway drove Julie\u2019s body nearly three hours north to Montgomery, where Dr. Joseph Sapala, a state medical examiner, conducted the autopsy. There were long bruises across the back of Julie\u2019s hand, and her jaw was broken in two places. There were 11 small, rectangular puncture wounds to her chest \u2014 at more than four inches deep, they\u2019d damaged her left lung and pulmonary artery. And then there were the head wounds, which Sapala ultimately determined to be the cause of death. Six were described as \u201cchop wounds,\u201d presumably blows made by a sharp instrument. Another Sapala described as a blunt force injury that fractured Julie\u2019s skull.<\/p>\n Finally, the medical examiner noted one additional injury: Two \u201csemi-lunar\u201d indentations to the back of Julie\u2019s right arm. He placed a penny by the wounds for scale \u2014 together they were no wider than the coin\u2019s diameter \u2014 and an assistant took a photo. Sapala concluded that this was a bite mark.<\/p>\n While Sapala catalogued the many injuries Julie had sustained, his resulting report was cursory. It did not indicate whether her body was in rigor, nor did it mention the degree of lividity \u2014 the gravitational pooling of blood in the body after death \u2014 both of which might have provided at least a general time of death. Instead, in trial testimony, it was Brooks who offered the lay opinion that Julie had been killed sometime in the early morning hours.<\/p>\n Over the next few days, police would question McCrory several times. Each time, he recounted the same story about his relationship with Julie: that he\u2019d been with her in the house Thursday night and that he hadn\u2019t been able to reach her Friday morning. He let police search his Bronco and his apartment, but they found nothing.<\/p>\n Roughly 24 hours after Julie\u2019s body was found, investigators took McCrory to see his dentist, Dr. William King. McCrory had consented to the dentist making a mold of his teeth for casting. King looked at McCrory\u2019s mouth; he didn\u2019t see any cuts or bruising on his lips or gums. McCrory seemed calm, King later testified, but he also noticed that he was shaking.<\/p>\n King, who still practices in Andalusia, remembers taking the molds from McCrory. Law enforcement agents stood by as he worked. \u201cThey didn\u2019t ever leave my sight,\u201d he said. He recalled being shocked when McCrory became a suspect. He was \u201cmild-mannered,\u201d King said, a guy he would never have imagined to be a murderer. \u201cOf course, I\u2019m sure everybody does that when they look back. \u2026 I just wouldn\u2019t have guessed that.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Illustration: Clay Rodery for The Intercept<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n Julie McCrory was buried on June 3 in a graveside service at the Andalusia Memorial Cemetery, just two blocks away from her home. The family could see police parked nearby in unmarked cars. One of them was Andalusia police officer Howard Easley. Afterward, Easley recalled, \u201cI stopped McCrory in his vehicle and asked if he would come with me to the Sheriff\u2019s Department, which he did voluntarily, driving his own vehicle.\u201d<\/p>\n Easley had also responded to the scene the day Julie was found. He recalled being put off by McCrory\u2019s demeanor that morning. He seemed \u201cnonchalant,\u201d Easley said. \u201cNo emotion whatsoever.\u201d Among law enforcement agents, suspicion over McCrory\u2019s bearing quickly hardened into a belief in his guilt. When McCrory\u2019s sister ReNay McCrory Smith visited him in jail the day after his arrest, she remembers the sheriff telling her, \u201cHe\u2019s a murderer, and I don\u2019t have any use for him.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cWhat really put me off with Andalusia at the time is how everybody turned so quick when all this happened,\u201d Smith said. \u201cHere\u2019s a guy that\u2019d been working on the rescue squad as a volunteer all these years. \u2026 And he was an auxiliary policeman as well. And nobody stood up for him and said, \u2018There\u2019s no way this guy could have done this.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n \u201cHere\u2019s a guy that\u2019d been working on the rescue squad as a volunteer all these years. \u2026 And nobody stood up for him.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The murder shattered the town\u2019s sense of safety. McCrory\u2019s younger sister, Laura Grissett, who babysat Chad as a teenager, remembered Julie sometimes leaving her car running for half an hour outside when picking him up. \u201cBut after that, you just didn\u2019t do it anymore,\u201d she said. Their father was especially traumatized. \u201cDaddy nailed the windows shut,\u201d Grissett said. \u201cHe\u2019d check under the beds before we were allowed to go in the house because he was terrified.\u201d<\/p>\n The community was still reeling from the murder when, just\u00a0over a month later, another young woman was abducted and raped not far from where Julie had been found. A man named Alton Ainsworth, who worked at Bullard Excavating, was quickly arrested and later pleaded guilty to the crime. Police questioned Ainsworth but never fully investigated him as a possible suspect in Julie\u2019s murder \u2014 even though he was known to wear a red bandanna like the one found near her body.<\/p>\n On the day McCrory was arrested, his dental molds were transported to the state\u2019s head medical examiner in Montgomery, along with photos of the injury Sapala believed to be a bite mark. The medical examiner called Souviron, a\u00a0renowned forensic odontologist, in Coral Gables, Florida.<\/p>\n Souviron, 48, had impressive credentials \u2014 and a knack for getting good press. A style columnist once praised him alongside other \u201cgentlemen of distinction\u201d for a cut that gave his thinning hair \u201ca rugged, touchable look.\u201d\u00a0In the late 1970s, as the burgeoning field of bite-mark analysis caught on nationwide, the Miami Herald published a glowing profile of Souviron titled \u201cThe Dentist as Detective: A Pioneer in Criminology.\u201d But his biggest claim to fame was as a star witness against serial killer Ted Bundy in 1979. Newspapers printed large photos of Souviron holding a wooden pointer while presenting oversize images of Bundy\u2019s teeth to the jury. Souviron enjoyed taking the stand. \u201cIt\u2019s fun, it\u2019s exciting, it\u2019s challenging to have someone cross-examine you,\u201d he told the Herald. \u201cI guess it\u2019s because I feel secure in what I testify to.\u201d<\/p>\n Souviron told the medical examiner that he would review the evidence in Julie McCrory\u2019s murder. On August 14, 1985, a week after receiving the dental models, photographs of Julie\u2019s injuries, and the autopsy report, he sent a letter reporting his findings. Although only one of the 28 photographs \u201cwould be of value in making an actual one to one comparison with the models of Mr. McCrory,\u201d he wrote, he\u2019d found some \u201cunusual phenomena.\u201d McCrory\u2019s upper left lateral incisor was missing, leaving a \u201cseven millimeter space\u201d between the upper left front tooth and his upper left canine. Based on these observations, he concluded, \u201cthe marks in the arm could have been made by the teeth of Mr. Charles McCrory.\u201d<\/p>\n Souviron\u2019s letter contained some key caveats, however. \u201cFirst of all, it is impossible in my opinion, unless very unusual circumstances exist, to make a positive identification from two teeth of a bite mark,\u201d Souviron wrote. What\u2019s more, the photographs appeared to show only two upper teeth, which was odd since the upper jaw is fixed; the lower teeth are the ones that \u201cgrab and hold.\u201d Further, the defense might argue that the injury could have been made by the same instrument that inflicted the puncture wounds on Julie\u2019s chest, Souviron wrote. Ultimately, \u201cif there is [a] substantial amount of additional evidence such as fingerprints, blood, hair, semen, etc.,\u201d then the marks shown in the photos \u201cwould be of some value.\u201d But if the marks were the sole means of identifying the perpetrator, he cautioned, \u201cI feel that this is not in the best interest of justice.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n Despite the gruesome crime scene, no physical evidence had been linked to McCrory.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n In other words, Souviron might be willing to say that the rather ambiguous-looking injury was a bite mark so long as plenty of other evidence implicated McCrory too.<\/p>\n This posed a problem for authorities. Despite the gruesome crime scene, no physical evidence had been linked to McCrory. Investigators never found a murder weapon. The hairs collected from the body belonged only to Julie, and while some of the random fingerprints on the furniture and kitchenware matched McCrory, that was hardly compelling given that he was often at the house on Lori Lane. As for the footprint out back, the pantyhose, and the red bandanna, no one ever figured out where they came from.<\/p>\n Still, police had found a couple of items at the home that might prove useful: a VHS tape and a collection of photographs featuring Julie and her husband in various kinky scenarios. The images were graphic and, to some, shocking. \u201cThere is more than one scene in which the young lady is \u2014 what is considered in bondage,\u201d a defense witness testified at a pretrial hearing on August 21.<\/p>\n Although the activities depicted were consensual, prosecutors sought to introduce the tape and photos as evidence against McCrory at trial. The goal was apparently to show that McCrory had deviant sexual proclivities that escalated as he sought further gratification \u2014 or as one prosecutor put it, that \u201cbondage sex\u201d could lead to \u201cstronger and stronger acts of violence.\u201d Although defense attorneys convinced the trial judge not to allow the items into evidence, gossip soon ran rampant throughout the town. Some said Julie\u2019s murder had been the result of some kind of sex ring.<\/p>\n One reporter who covered the trial for the Andalusia Star-News remembers \u201ca lot of rumors, innuendo\u201d surrounding the tape and photographs. In a \u201csmall South Alabama town, you know, deep in the heart of the Bible Belt,\u201d those things didn\u2019t have to make it into court to have an impact.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n A photo taken by Dr. Richard Souviron shows the injury on Julie McCrory\u2019s arm alongside Charles McCrory\u2019s dental mold.<\/p>\n \nPhoto: Courtesy of the Southern Center for Human Rights<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n McCrory\u2019s trial began on October 21, 1985, at the Covington County District Court. It was less than five months after Julie\u2019s murder. Elected District Attorney Grady Lanier was intent on moving forward quickly, even without such key evidence as a murder weapon. \u201cWhen you see the blows that were on the back of her head, you didn\u2019t need a weapon,\u201d he said. \u201cThey spoke for themselves.\u201d Besides, in his experience, convictions were easier to win when a crime was still fresh in a community\u2019s mind.<\/p>\n The courtroom was packed with spectators. Representing McCrory was M.A. \u201cBubba\u201d Marsal, a prominent criminal defense lawyer from Mobile whose high-profile clients included a follower of Charles Manson and a Ku Klux Klan member who\u2019d been sent to death row. Known perhaps for his charisma more than his legal prowess, Marsal was paired with a younger local attorney named Larry Grissett (no relation to McCrory\u2019s sister).<\/p>\n On the state\u2019s side was an unorthodox arrangement: Rather than rely on Lanier to secure the conviction, Julie\u2019s family had hired a local father-son legal team: personal injury attorney Frank Tipler and his son Harvey. While uncommon, hiring a private prosecutor was \u201cnot illegal\u201d in Alabama, a 1988 report in the Montgomery Advertiser found. One lawyer told the paper it was a bad idea. \u201cIf you have the victims hiring a lawyer to prosecute a case, that lawyer will be hell-bent to send the defendant to the penitentiary \u2026 and to drag him through the mud, regardless of the amount of evidence against him.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n \u201cI do not think we can truly have a future until all the past is dead.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The trial transcript does not include opening or closing remarks. But the state\u2019s theory appears to have been that McCrory had grown tired of his marriage and brutally murdered his wife to be free from her. As their first witness, prosecutors called 31-year-old Gloria Wiggins, the former co-worker with whom McCrory had recently had an affair, and asked her to read several letters the two exchanged. But apart from some tortured declarations of love, there was no evidence that McCrory was planning a future with Wiggins. In one letter, he wrote that his wife and son would always be a part of his life.<\/p>\n Rather than point this out, however, Marsal shamed Wiggins for carrying on a relationship with a married man. Most confusingly \u2014 and perhaps most damaging to his client \u2014 Marsal seized on a line from a letter Wiggins wrote shortly before Julie\u2019s murder, asking her \u201cto read it loud so every juror can hear it.\u201d Wiggins read: \u201cI do not think we can truly have a future until all the past is dead.\u201d That line was published in the newspaper the next day.<\/p>\n Next came the investigators. With no physical evidence linking McCrory to the crime, prosecutors emphasized assorted bits of circumstantial evidence, including a question McCrory asked Treadaway, the lead investigator, hours after arriving at the scene: Had Julie died from \u201cthe lick on the back of her head\u201d? Could a person look at Julie\u2019s body lying on the floor and discern that there\u2019d been a \u201click\u201d on the back of her head? Frank Tipler asked Treadaway. \u201cI couldn\u2019t tell,\u201d Treadaway said. \u201cSo whoever asked it had to already know about it, didn\u2019t they?\u201d Tipler said.<\/p>\n On cross-examination, Marsal pointed out that \u201cthis lady was lying on the floor in a pool of blood\u201d and \u201cher head was crushed in, wasn\u2019t it?\u201d Yes, Treadaway said, but \u201cyou couldn\u2019t see the lick on the back of the head. You could just see her head splattered open.\u201d<\/p>\n Treadaway appeared to know shockingly little about the work that had been done to solve the case or consider alternate suspects. He did not go to Bullard Excavating and question anyone about the murder. \u201cI don\u2019t know who talked to them,\u201d he testified. Nor did Treadaway know anything about the footprint found near the fence. As for Alton Ainsworth, the Bullard employee known to wear a red bandanna, \u201cI\u2019ve heard the name,\u201d Treadaway said.<\/p>\n Garrett, the second investigator, testified about the eight fingerprints he took from the scene, all of which matched either Julie or McCrory. But he did not explain why he lifted prints from the Snoopy and Care Bears glasses while ignoring things like the bedroom windows and the back gate. Marsal asked about the footprint Garrett photographed outside the fence. \u201cDid you ever attempt to compare that with any other print or shoe or any of the employees over at Bullard Construction Company?\u201d \u201cNo, sir,\u201d Garrett said.<\/p>\n On the second day of trial, prosecutors called Huey Dewayne Meeks, a 20-year-old with a military haircut who\u2019d been brought back to testify during boot camp with the National Guard. Meeks was staying at his grandfather\u2019s house, diagonal from the McCrory residence, on Friday, May 31. Although it was still dark out when he left for work at 5:15 a.m., Meeks said he noticed McCrory\u2019s Ford Bronco parked outside. He later told his grandfather about it.<\/p>\n On cross-examination, Marsal pointed to a conflicting account Meeks had apparently given police. Didn\u2019t he previously say he might have seen the car on a different day? Meeks admitted that he had. But he reiterated that he saw the Bronco on Friday. His testimony was bolstered by his grandfather, who testified that he too saw the Bronco that morning from his dining room.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n <\/p>\n \u201cYou tell me that\u2019s the guy who did it, and I\u2019ll go into court and say that\u2019s the guy that did it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The last and most important witness for the state was Souviron. Earlier that year he had helped win a death sentence against a Florida man named Robert DuBoise, who insisted on his innocence while on trial for rape and murder. At that trial, defense attorneys confronted<\/a> Souviron with a speech he\u2019d made at a conference of the International Association of Chiefs of Police, in which he told the audience, \u201cYou tell me that\u2019s the guy who did it, and I\u2019ll go into court and say that\u2019s the guy that did it.\u201d Souviron said the remarks had been taken out of context.<\/p>\n Souviron testified that he\u2019d been involved in forensic dentistry since the mid-1960s. \u201cI have had numerous post-graduate courses, but more important I think is the fact that in those days it was a relatively new field and basically I taught most of the courses, and still do,\u201d he said. He estimated that he had testified as an expert in at least 50 cases in up to 14 states. Prosecutors asked for him to be admitted as an expert. \u201cNo problem,\u201d said Marsal.<\/p>\n Despite the letter Souviron had written warning that relying solely on the purported bite mark would not be \u201cin the best interest of justice,\u201d Souviron now said that the models and photographs were \u201cgood, quality evidence.\u201d He documented his technique in a series of photographs, which he presented to the jury.<\/p>\n One showed a close-up of McCrory\u2019s dental molds positioned over an enlarged photo of the alleged bite mark. \u201cThe left cuspid tooth when lined up with the bite fits into that little round puncture wound,\u201d Souviron said. Especially important was the space between the two upper left teeth, which would usually contain another tooth, the lateral incisor. But as Souviron explained, McCrory was missing this tooth \u2014 he had been born without it.<\/p>\n Tipler asked a question that allowed Souviron to explain away the missing lower teeth. \u201cWould you classify them as bite marks or teeth marks?\u201d he asked. \u201cThat\u2019s a good point,\u201d Souviron replied. \u201cThis is not a bite mark. You have just two teeth that show here.\u201d His conclusion: The mark on Julie\u2019s arm \u201cwas the result of the arm being thrust into the teeth rather than the teeth being bitten into the arm.\u201d<\/p>\n Souviron\u2019s thrusting-arm theory appeared to conflict with the conclusions of Sapala, the medical examiner, who\u2019d determined that the blows to Julie\u2019s head came first, followed by the puncture injuries. The latter had been inflicted at or near her time of death, he\u2019d found. If Julie had already suffered a mortal injury, it would have been difficult for her to thrust her arm anywhere.<\/p>\n Still, Souviron\u2019s testimony was persuasive. King, the dentist who made McCrory\u2019s dental molds and testified at trial, remembers being somewhat skeptical of Souviron\u2019s analysis. But he could see how a juror would have found the testimony compelling. \u201cIf I was on the fence,\u201d King said, \u201cand then they threw those big enlargements of the models and the tissue photographs \u2026 and they told you \u2018these match perfectly\u2019 \u2026 it would be enough to sway you to say he\u2019s guilty.\u201d After all, according to Souviron, McCrory\u2019s dentition was unique enough to make the match a near-mathematical certainty. Only 1 percent of the population would be missing a lateral incisor, he testified. \u201cThe percent of the population missing only the upper left lateral incisor is even smaller,\u201d he said. \u201cSo my feeling is that there is a high degree of consistency between this set of teeth and those teeth marks left on the arm of Mrs. McCrory.\u201d<\/p>\n The next day, the jury found McCrory guilty. \u201cYou have anything to say before I adjudge you guilty of murder?\u201d the judge asked.<\/p>\n \u201cNo, sir,\u201d McCrory said. \u201cOther than I just did not do it.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Illustration: Clay Rodery for The Intercept<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n It was mid-afternoon when Dr. Adam Freeman was called to testify at McCrory\u2019s evidentiary hearing in April 2021. Freeman was once a true believer in bite-mark evidence and a powerful figure within the American Board of Forensic Odontology<\/a>, or ABFO, the group that certifies forensic dentists. But that had changed. Now he would be testifying for the defense \u2014 and criticizing Souviron, a former mentor.<\/p>\n For Freeman, the journey to Andalusia began on September 11, 2001. He runs a successful dental practice in Westport, Connecticut. Many of his patients commute to New York City for work, and several were killed in the attack on the World Trade Center, including one he considered a good friend. Afterward, first responders \u2014 including medical examiners and forensic dentists \u2014 combed through the rubble to identify victims. The remains of Freeman\u2019s friend were eventually sent home in 13 separate body bags.<\/p>\n He came away from the tragedy wanting to do more. He knew disasters were inevitable. As a dentist, he felt that he could play a valuable role by helping identify victims through dental remains. \u201cIf you look at the human experience, I can think of nothing less humanized than to die and \u2026 have no identity at death,\u201d he said. \u201cSort of as my tribute to our patients that were lost, I started to get involved in the forensic field.\u201d<\/p>\n Freeman took a course in forensic pathology, where he met the president of the ABFO, who had run the dental identification unit after the Oklahoma City bombing and worked on the ground after 9\/11. Freeman aspired to do the same kind of work; ambitious, with a robust ego, he was determined to become certified by the ABFO, a long and expensive process, and become one of its most elite experts. Before long he was being mentored by some of the field\u2019s most celebrated practitioners, including Dr. David Senn, who had created a fiefdom training forensic dentists at the University of Texas at San Antonio, as well as Souviron, one of Freeman\u2019s earliest champions.<\/p>\n While Freeman originally wanted to do dental identifications, he was quickly drawn into another aspect of the field: bite-mark analysis, or the practice of determining whether a patterned injury on a victim is the result of a bite and can be matched to the dentition of a suspected biter. Looking at images of alleged bite marks, Freeman didn\u2019t always see what his mentors were seeing, but he would listen as they discussed their cases. \u201cYou would sit with these guys at dinner \u2026 and they would not only talk about it, but then they would be like, \u2018And look, here\u2019s my badge,\u2019\u201d he recalled. \u201c\u2018I\u2019m so good at this the police department or the coroner\u2019s office gave me a badge because I\u2019m helping protect society from these predators.\u2019 And \u2026 at first blush, you\u2019re like, \u2018Hey, I want to be one of those \u2014 I want to be the guy that helps do that.\u2019\u201d In 2009, Freeman earned his certification.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n \u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b\u2584\u200b<\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n That same year, however, bite-mark analysis was hit with the first\u00a0of\u00a0a series of high-profile blows. The National Academy of Sciences published a landmark<\/a> study of forensic practices<\/a> that called into question the scientific validity and reliability of nearly every discipline used to convict people and send them to prison. The majority, it found, lacked any scientific underpinning. The authors were especially rough on bite-mark matching. \u201cAlthough the majority of forensic odontologists are satisfied that bite marks can demonstrate sufficient detail for positive identification,\u201d the report read, \u201cno scientific studies support this assessment.\u201d<\/p>\n Bite-mark analysis rests on a two-pronged foundation. First, that human dentition is unique, like DNA, and second, that skin is a suitable substrate to accurately record that uniqueness. There is no science to back either assertion. In fact, research into the practice has generally revealed the opposite<\/a>: that human dentition isn\u2019t unique and that skin \u2014 as malleable as it is \u2014 is a poor medium for preserving an accurate record of injury, all of which renders bite-mark analysis a random and purely subjective practice.<\/p>\n Freeman was rattled by the National Academy of Sciences report. But the reaction of many of his colleagues, including Senn and Souviron, was downright hostile. Over the next decade, they would lash out at their growing number of critics, even attempting to oust one of their own, a California dentist named C. Michael Bowers. Bowers had been ringing the alarm over bite-mark analysis since the late \u201990s. After the National Academy of Sciences report echoed his concerns, veteran members of the ABFO concocted a\u00a0dubious ethics complaint about Bowers, which they filed with the American Academy of Forensic Sciences \u2014 the nation\u2019s preeminent umbrella organization for forensic practitioners. The attempt to destroy Bowers\u2019s credibility failed, leading to a public meltdown in 2015, when a furious Souviron confronted the academy\u2019s then-president, Victor Weedn, over the complaint\u2019s dismissal: \u201cDon\u2019t you have any balls?\u201d Souviron demanded. (Weedn said that Souviron later apologized for the outburst.)<\/p>\n That same year brought more trouble for the ABFO \u2014 and this time Freeman, now president of the organization, would be in the middle of it. In an attempt to impose standards for practitioners, Freeman and a colleague designed a \u201cconstruct validity study\u201d focused on the first question forensic dentists should ask: Is this a bite mark? This might seem absurdly basic, but bite-mark analysis rarely starts with ground truth \u2014 a victim in a homicide case can\u2019t tell you that they were bitten, so whether any given injury is actually a bite mark is often unknown.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n A box-opening injury that board-certified odontologists mistakenly identified as a bite mark.<\/p>\n \nCredit: Courtesy of the Southern Center for Human Rights<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \u201cI thought this was going to be super easy,\u201d Freeman said. He and his colleague asked board-certified members to submit images of patterned injuries they\u2019d encountered in real casework. They posted 100 examples online and invited colleagues to review them, including one image they knew for certain was not a bite mark: It was a photo submitted by an odontologist who had injured himself while opening boxes.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n \u201cWe can\u2019t get this basic piece right, and there are people who have been put to death in Texas based on bite marks.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n The dentists\u2019 answers were all over the place. Sixty percent of the respondents identified the box-opening injury as a bite mark. Freeman was shocked. \u201cThe research starts coming in and \u2026 for me, it was just so seminal. It was like, wait a second,\u201d he recalled. \u201cWe can\u2019t get this basic piece right, and there are people who have been put to death<\/a> in Texas based on bite marks.\u201d<\/p>\n Freeman was slated to present the results at the 2015 academy conference. But the results were so dismal that the researchers decided to give veteran ABFO members, like Senn, a heads up. According to Freeman, Senn asked him to rerun the study using just the answers supplied by an elite group of veterans, including himself. Freeman agreed \u2014 and the results were worse. Then Senn asked him to hold the research altogether. Freeman was adamant that they couldn\u2019t. \u201cAnd therein lies my downfall,\u201d he said.\u00a0Senn did not respond to The Intercept\u2019s requests for comment.<\/p>\n Like Bowers before him, Freeman soon found himself the subject of a questionable ethics complaint; it also failed. But it was a turning point for Freeman. He\u2019d seen the truth, he said: Bite-mark analysis was bunk, and he worried about the people it had sent to prison. In 2020, Freeman penned his official resignation from the ABFO. \u201cIn my opinion, we have an absolute duty, and ethical obligation to correct our past mistakes,\u201d he wrote. \u201cDiplomates have participated in far too many wrongful convictions resulting in hundreds of years of wrongfully convicted people in prison.\u201d<\/p>\n In his testimony at McCrory\u2019s hearing, Freeman did not mince words: Souviron had gotten it wrong back at trial. There was no scientific basis for his presumption that the two marks found on Julie\u2019s arm were made by teeth, nor for his conclusion that McCrory\u2019s supposedly unique dentition had made the marks.<\/p>\n And it turns out that Souviron now agrees. \u201cI no longer believe, as I did at the time of trial, that there is a valid scientific basis for concluding that the injury found on the skin of the victim \u2026 could be \u2018matched\u2019 or otherwise connected to a specific individual, such as Mr. McCrory,\u201d Souviron wrote in his 2019 recantation. \u201cI therefore renounce that testimony.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"McCrory-family\"\/](\"https:\/\/theintercept.imgix.net\/wp-uploads\/sites\/1\/2022\/03\/theintercept-McCrory-family-tone.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&q=90&w=540&h=770\")
<\/p>\nWoman Down<\/h2>\n
![](\"https:\/\/theintercept.imgix.net\/static\/placeholder_1_1.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&q=90\")
<\/div>\nRelated<\/h2>\n
![\"Illustration\"\/](\"https:\/\/theintercept.imgix.net\/wp-uploads\/sites\/1\/2022\/03\/theintercept-bitemark_arrest-1.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&q=90&w=1024&h=680\")
<\/p>\nEverybody Turned So Quick<\/h2>\n
![\"A](\"https:\/\/theintercept.imgix.net\/wp-uploads\/sites\/1\/2022\/03\/theintercept-bitemark-evidence-11.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&q=90&w=1024&h=805\")
<\/p>\nThis Set of Teeth<\/h2>\n
![\"Illustration\"\/](\"https:\/\/theintercept.imgix.net\/wp-uploads\/sites\/1\/2022\/03\/theintercept-bitemark_forensic-2.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&q=90&w=1024&h=680\")
<\/p>\nHour of Reckoning<\/h2>\n
<\/div>\nRelated<\/h2>\n
![\"photo](\"https:\/\/theintercept.imgix.net\/wp-uploads\/sites\/1\/2022\/03\/theintercept-bitemark-evidence-.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&q=90&w=1024&h=805\")
<\/p>\nTheir Own Junk Science<\/h2>\n
![\"theintercept-bitemark_judge-3\"\/](\"https:\/\/theintercept.imgix.net\/wp-uploads\/sites\/1\/2022\/03\/theintercept-bitemark_judge-3.jpg?auto=compress%2Cformat&q=90&w=1024&h=680\")
<\/p>\n