Three Minutes, Three Questions

Author Mara Leveritt

Friday, February 8, 2013

On May 5, 1993, three 8-year-old boys went missing after school in West Memphis. When their bodies were found the next day in a creek in an area known locally as the Robin Hood Hills, the murders garnered national attention.

So did the June 1993 arrest of three teenagers, Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Miss kelley. The men, convicted in 1994, became known as the West Memphis Three.

Mara Leveritt, a longtime journalist, followed the journey of the West Memphis Three until they were released on Aug. 19, 2011, making an agreement that allowed them to plead guilty while maintaining their innocence.

Along the way, Leveritt, who had long believed in the men’s innocence, published “Devil’s Knot: The True Story of the West Memphis Three,” and she is completing “Justice Knot,” a collaboration with Baldwin. She will speak at 1:30 p.m. Wednesday in the Reynolds Room of the Smith-Pendergraft Campus Center at the University of Arkansas in Fort Smith. A question-and-answer session and a book signing will follow.

This week, Leveritt answered three questions for What’s Up!

Q. What’s it been like getting to know the young men whose stories you have followed for so long?

A. I first interviewed Damien Echols in prison, two weeks after his trial, so I’ve known him for many years. I got to know Jason and Jessie better as I was preparing to write “Devil’s Knot,” and I’ve seen all three of them since their release. ... Over the past 18 years, I have seen them as three different individuals, kids who knew each other when they were young but who, like most high school friends or acquaintances, probably would not have remained in touch after they left school. Unlike most of us, however, they didn’t get to make that choice for themselves.

Q. How did the public help free these young men?

A. Thanks to the work of the filmmakers who recorded the trials for HBO’s “Paradise Lost” documentaries, people outside the courtroom got to see the state’s lack of evidence. ... The Internet allowed case documents to be posted online, as here, http://callahan.8k. com/index.html, so that people could check records for themselves, and I hope that my book helped explain the flimsiness of the case, as well. As a result, thousands of people, including some very generous celebrities, sent money to fund new private investigations, scientific testing and legal expertise. ... All those efforts combined to put the men in the legal position that resulted in their strange release.

Q. What is the legacy of this case?

A. The legacy of this case is only beginning to be felt. It is already being studied in law schools and criminal justice classes around the country. Dozens of legal papers have been written on it, and I expect that number to increase. Four documentaries have been released, focusing public attention on the abuses that riddle the case, and I believe that attention will escalate when the feature film of “Devil’s Knot” is released this fall. Jason Baldwin has created a foundation called Proclaim Justice to examine other cases of actual innocence. He has also become an active opponent of the death penalty and of mandatory life sentences for minors. Last December, he and I spoke at the Clinton School of Public Policy about the need for full recording of police interrogations and for cameras to record all trials. Personally, I hope that the legacy of this terrible case will be a judiciary that recognizes the need for greater transparency and accountability, not just in Arkansas, but throughout the United States.