U.S. court overturns convictions of woman on Arizona death row

[DreamGypsy]

3. To be released from prison, after 22 years, nearing age 50...

Last edited Thu Mar 14, 2013, 09:24 PM - Edit history (1)

The "facts":

On December 2, 1989, James Lynn Styers filed a missing child report, advising police that his roommate's son, Christopher Milke (age 4), had disappeared during their visit to Metrocenter mall. Roger Mark Scott was present with Styers.

On December 3, 1989, Scott admitted during a police interview that he had accompanied Styers the previous day to a desert wash in the area of 99th Avenue and Jomax Road where Styers shot and killed Christopher Milke. Styers agreed to provide Scott with $250 to file a social security claim. Styers believed he would receive some of Christopher's $5,000 life insurance policy. At the conclusion of the interview, Mr. Scott led police to the desert area where they found Christopher Milke's body.

During a police interview, Debra Jean Milke, Christopher Milke's mother, conceded that she had conspired with Styers to have her son killed. She indicated that it would be better to have her son die than grow up like her husband.

Here's the analysis from Arizona death penalty injustice:

Debra Milke’s arrest came on the 3rd of December, 1989 just hours after Eldon’s and she faced not only Noel Levy as prosecutor, but the same team of investigators with Phoenix Detective Armando Saldate acting as senior detective. The similarities do not stop there, however, and her case as Eldon’s leaves one to wonder how an allegedly ethical and skilled prosecutor could depend solely upon the shallow accusations of others, with the questionable testimony used in Debra’s trial certainly leaving doubt as to her guilt.

Not surprisingly, Saldate was the main witness in Debra's case and at trial related the details of a confession that Debra allegedly made to him. In fact, according to Saldate, Debra admitted to having the two co-defendants murder her four year old son to gain five thousand dollars in life insurance. However, there was not a shred of evidence that is above reproof including the confession that came from a completely paraphrased report with the interrogation not recorded, witnessed or signed, despite Saldate’s superiors instructing him to record her interrogation.

What fragments of a life will she be able to recover, at 49 years old, after almost half her life was spent in the Pen under a death sentence?