Turner V. Billy Joe Brown

Former Navy Seal trainee Dustin Turner has lost a last-ditch for freedom in the Virginia court system. Turner is a young man who made a mistake, but does that mean that he should spend the rest of his life in prison for a crime that he didn’t commit? No, he shouldn’t spend his life in prison because he didn’t commit the crime. Turner was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Turner, 36, has been behind bars 20 years. He had petitioned for release on the basis of a post-conviction confession by his co-defendant and seal “swim buddy” Billy Joe Brown, that he alone is responsible for the murder. Turner would have been the first person to get a murder conviction overturned under a 2004 Virginia law allowing consideration of new non-biological evidence of innocence after sentencing. His only remaining chance for release would be a pardon from the governor. Turner has been turned down once, by then-Gov. Mark Warner in 2005.

Turner was sentenced to 82 years and Brown 72 years-Both essentially life terms, since Virginia has abolished parole. Evans was choked to death in Turner’s car outside the Bayou. At the time, Turner and Brown each blamed the other for the murder, and prosecutors conceded that they couldn’t prove which man was the killer. Turner has maintained his innocence from the beginning, saying he was guilty only of being an accessory after the fact-punishable by no more than one year in jail-because he helped Brown dispose of the body and cover up the