Those who follow these words already know how convinced I am that Belynda Goff of Green Forest deserves clemency after spending 20 years of a life-without-parole sentence for the 1994 bludgeoning murder of her husband, Stephen.
Her conviction in a case where the presiding judge Tom Keith was determined by the state Supreme Court to have committed a prejudicial violation by visiting alone with the jury during the trial, and where a circuit court judge determined (later overturned) that her defense attorney's performance was ineffective, is filled with questions and the omission of witnesses whose testimony, had it been allowed, would have weighed heavily in favor of her innocence.
I'm thinking, for instance, about the disallowed testimony of Ms. Goff's brother, Chris Lindley, whom Karen Thompson, staff attorney for the Innocence Project of New York, says would have testified that the victim tried recruiting him into an arson-for-hire ring and that a deeply worried Stephen had been threatened with death after Lindley backed out on joining the deal just days before Stephen's death. Ms. Goff's home was burned down a year later.
Then there's Sherri Terrill, who lived above the Goffs--she told police that around 2 a.m. on the morning of Stephen's death, she and her husband heard what sounded like three knocks on the Goffs' door, the door opening, then about five bangs.
And Harold Keith Johnson reported that about 5 a.m. that day, he'd seen a group of young men in a two-tone red and white truck discussing a "bloodbath" in Green Forest. He believed one of the men might have had a baseball bat.
There are other compelling witnesses who never testified.
I've read through transcripts and seen that the judge's son, an insurance agent, attended the trial and afterwards represented Stephen Goff's children from a previous marriage in filing suit against Belynda to retrieve the life insurance money her trial attorney convinced her to apply for so the firm might get paid. That fact, unexplored before the jury, also sure looked bad for her as a possible motive.
Then there is the matter of missing DNA evidence retrieved by a Carroll County deputy under court order after the Innocence Project saw enough amiss in 2012 to take on the woman's case. The deputy traveled to Little Rock specifically to retrieve the fingernails and hair that might have exonerated Goff. He signed the evidence out of the lab but never signed it back into the Carroll County sheriff's office.
Look, my friends, even if Goff is guilty, which I do not remotely believe based on all I've learned about this sad case, this lady has served 20 years for her late husband's murder. In the process she's helped many female inmates better themselves and tried her best to remain uplifting and positive.
Thompson said four of the original jurors and the trial bailiff have joined some 2,000 citizens seeking clemency for this woman.
Goff has adamantly maintained her innocence from day one, even refusing a plea bargain for a lesser sentence at her 1996 trial because she said she would never plead guilty to a crime she didn't commit.
When I think about that choice and the courage and intellectual honesty it took to stand unflinching on her principles, I'm more convinced than ever that she has earned and deserves mercy. And although I've never met or spoken with Ms. Goff, I can only continue to join many others in hoping our parole officials and the governor will decide to grant clemency in this deeply flawed case.
UA adds billion
I wasn't surprised to read the other day that the rapidly swelling University of Arkansas at Fayetteville and its impact on our state and regional economy has come close to doubling in five years from $725 million to $1.2 billion.
The school under the leadership of retiring Chancellor David Gearhart in Fayetteville has been climbing on every front since 2008.
The profound economic effect is according to an analysis by the university's Center for Business and Economic Research at the Sam Walton College of Business. Led by Kathy Deck (the center's leader), the report studied the school's student expenditures, visitor spending, construction, operations and technology transfer, according to a news account on such growth.
The skyrocketing benefits to the state and local economies include some $237 million in one-time construction projects. About $25 million of that was on the Northwest Arkansas campus.
I found it particularly interesting to see that the combined spending by the university's Northwest Arkansas business operations and student spending totaled some $830 million.
And since the state appropriated $174 million (also rounded) to the university in 2014, Deck said the state gets back about $7 for each dollar it expends to maintain the university.
Being neither an economist nor a mathematician, I can't confirm or dispute Deck's numbers. But if they are anywhere close to accurate (which I suspect they are), I'd say that's one heck of a return on investment, wouldn't you?
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Mike Masterson's column appears regularly in the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette. Email him at [email protected].
Editorial on 02/15/2015