http:\/\/www.newsobserver.com\/news\/local\/article64064432.html<\/p>\n
MARCH 4, 2016 3:59 PM<\/p>\n
Howard Dudley\u2019s new life: restaurants, cellphones and a cemetery visit<\/strong><\/p>\n \u2018Awesome, awesome, awesome\u2019<\/p>\n Dudley was freed by a judge Wednesday<\/p>\n Awaiting a prosecutor\u2019s decision<\/p>\n BY JOSEPH NEFF<\/p>\n jneff@newsobserver.com<\/p>\n KINSTON<\/p>\n After spending 23 years in prison, Howard Dudley rendered a verdict on his first 48 hours of freedom.<\/p>\n \u201cAwesome, awesome, awesome,\u201d he said in a telephone interview. One could hear Dudley\u2019s smile over the telephone.<\/p>\n On Wednesday, a judge threw out Dudley\u2019s 1992 conviction, saying he had no confidence in the trial in which the Kinston man was convicted of sexually assaulting his 9-year-old daughter.<\/p>\n So much has changed during the 23 years Dudley spent in prison. He\u2019s relearning how to order in restaurants. He thinks he\u2019s mastered the art of dialing a cellphone and is ready to get one of his own. He\u2019s been shopping with family for clothes, dining at the Golden Corral and visiting the cemetery where his wife and mother are buried.<\/p>\n He looks forward to meeting soon with his daughter, Amy Moore, whose false testimony as a 9-year-old at the 1992 trial sent him to prison. Moore, who struggles with mental retardation and several other mental health issues, testified this week that the allegations were a lie. Dudley testified that he loved his daughter and forgave her.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m ready,\u201d Dudley said. \u201cI would like to go out with my mother-in-law and see Amy.\u201d<\/p>\n Dudley was the subject of a 2005 News & Observer series, Caught in a Lie, which chronicled the problems with his case. The series prompted lawyers at Duke\u2019s Clinic on Wrongful Convictions to take up his case. They succeeded in winning his freedom Wednesday.<\/p>\n Since then, Dudley has enjoyed some basic pleasures.<\/p>\n \u201cIt felt good to cut the lights out and sleep in the dark in a real bed,\u201d Dudley said.<\/p>\n What is the status of Dudley\u2019s case?<\/strong><\/p>\n Superior Court Judge Doug Parsons vacated Dudley\u2019s conviction. Dudley is still charged with a crime. District Attorney Matthew Delbridge can make one of three decisions: appeal Parsons\u2019 decision; retry Dudley; or dismiss the charges.<\/p>\n Pursuing an appeal or retrial faces huge obstacles. Under direct questioning by the judge, Moore testified that she lied and that her father had never raped or touched her inappropriately. Dismissal seems the likeliest next step.<\/p>\n Delbridge did not return phone calls for comment Friday.<\/p>\n What is Howard Dudley\u2019s next step?<\/strong><\/p>\n Once charges are dismissed, Dudley will seek a pardon of innocence from Gov. Pat McCrory, according to Theresa Newman, one of Dudley\u2019s lawyers. Parsons\u2019 order strongly supports a pardon, she said.<\/p>\n A pardon of innocence would allow Dudley to collect $50,000 for each year he spent wrongfully imprisoned, up to a maximum of $750,000.<\/p>\n The money pales in importance next to the pardon itself, Newman said: \u201cThe most important thing to Howard is the Dudley family name and his honor.\u201d<\/p>\n Other exonerees, like Greg Taylor, Dwayne Dail and Alan Gell, have received substantial settlements after filing lawsuits. Can Dudley file a similar lawsuit?<\/strong><\/p>\n Newman said such a lawsuit would be difficult to win. The false allegations were brought by Dudley\u2019s daughter. Dudley won\u2019t sue her.<\/p>\n Parsons ruled that Nick Harvey, Dudley\u2019s trial lawyer, did not provide adequate legal representation, but the statute of limitations has run its course and Dudley wouldn\u2019t sue the lawyer anyway. Prosecutors did not hand over favorable evidence at trial, evidence that ultimately freed Dudley. But the prosecutors did not have the evidence in their files. Further cutting off that avenue is the fact that prosecutors enjoy absolute immunity for their official acts.<\/p>\n The Kinston Police Department could be the target of a lawsuit, but the police would likely put all the blame on the performance of Dudley\u2019s trial lawyer.<\/p>\n \u201cIt seems to be a bit of a long shot,\u201d said Spencer Parris, one of Dudley\u2019s lawyers who has filed similar lawsuits in the past.<\/p>\n Parsons, in his ruling, said the injustice was a failure of the entire system.<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m not blaming any individual; from the District Attorney\u2019s Office, certainly not; police department, Social Services, or Mr. Harvey,\u201d Parsons said. \u201cOur system of justice failed Mr. Dudley, period.\u201d\u200b<\/p>\n Why did it take so long?<\/strong><\/p>\n The News & Observer wrote about Dudley\u2019s case in 2005. Duke\u2019s Wrongful Conviction Clinic accepted the case in 2008. Newman, one of the clinic\u2019s lawyers, said Dudley\u2019s case was extremely complicated. It did not involve DNA, and the main task was to prove a crime did not occur. The clinic and its law students reinvestigated the entire case and developed the expert evidence on Amy Moore\u2019s mental state and why her recantation was more believable than her original testimony.<\/p>\n And the lawyers had to get over a very high hurdle: Dudley had already gone to court three times to try to overturn his conviction. Prosecutors argued he did not deserve another bite at the apple.<\/p>\n \u201cWhen it\u2019s your client\u2019s last chance, it has to be an A+ job,\u201d Newman said. \u201cIt has to be perfect.\u201d<\/p>\n Duke filed its motion in 2013. In 2015, a judge ordered a hearing with evidence and testimony. That hearing took place this week, and Dudley walked free.<\/p>\n Does the system need fixing?<\/strong><\/p>\n Parsons pointed out in his ruling that reforms have changed the system since 1992. Changes in state law mandate that defendants receive all the evidence in the possession of police and prosecutors. The office of Indigent Defense Services, established after Dudley\u2019s conviction, would appoint an experienced lawyer to a case involving a life sentence. Dudley\u2019s lawyer was a rookie with a year of law practice under his belt. Police and social workers have overhauled and improved the practice of interviewing children about allegations of sexual abuse.<\/p>\n Still, Newman said it would be helpful for the justice system to examine what went wrong, in a similar way that the aviation industry learns from investigations into plane crashes by the National Transportation Safety Board.<\/p>\n \u201cIt would be good to put Howard Dudley\u2019s case on the table so everyone can talk about it,\u201d Newman said.<\/p>\n Have any public officials apologized to Dudley?<\/strong><\/p>\n No.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" http:\/\/www.newsobserver.com\/news\/local\/article64064432.html MARCH 4, 2016 3:59 PM Howard Dudley\u2019s new life: restaurants, cellphones and a cemetery visit \u2018Awesome, awesome, awesome\u2019 Dudley was freed by a judge Wednesday Awaiting a prosecutor\u2019s decision BY JOSEPH NEFF jneff@newsobserver.com KINSTON After spending 23 years in prison, Howard Dudley rendered a verdict on his first 48 hours of freedom. \u201cAwesome, awesome, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2014","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-textcache"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2014","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2014"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2014\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2015,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2014\/revisions\/2015"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2014"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2014"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.littlerascalsdaycarecase.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2014"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}