Despite the evidence that absolves him of raping a woman

Malkinson has been in detention for 17 years for a crime he did not commit

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The story of Andrew Malkinson, who is still imprisoned for more than 17 years, reflects an example of the injustice that befalls a person because of a crime he did not commit, and his case represents blind justice procedures, judging by evidence, evidence and evidence far from the reality of the crime, and the testimony of witnesses that have not been properly examined. .

When police arrested Andrew Malkinson for the rape of a 33-year-old mother in July 2003, he kept insisting that he was not the one who committed the crime.

The woman was walking on the side of a highway as she was returning home in the early hours of the morning, when a stranger attacked her.

Malkinson, who was 37 at the time, told police that DNA tests would prove his innocence, and he believed he would be quickly released, and instead he was sentenced to life in prison.

17 years later, the evidence Malkinson had been waiting for when he was released on parole, after he had spent most of the past two decades insisting on his innocence, finally emerged.

The story of Malkinson's conviction for rape and the evidence that may eventually clear his name raises questions about the police's handling of the brutal assaults and what may prove to be a shocking error to justice.

His insistence that he was innocent kept him in prison for more than a decade, but he was finally granted parole, on the basis of good behavior, early last month.

No evidence

There was no forensic evidence linking Malkinson to the crime scene.

The victim, a mother of two, selected him in a personal video review and told the court that she was "100% sure" that Malkinson had attacked her, even though his descriptions did not match her original description of the rapist.

Analysis of new DNA of samples taken from the victim and her clothing at the time of the assault indicates that another man, who has not yet been identified, may be responsible.

Newly identified male DNA does not match Malkinson's.

The breakthrough in his case came after it was dealt with by the Appeals Foundation, a charitable and legal foundation that investigates errors of justice.

In addition to the DNA evidence, appeals investigators also found that two main witnesses presented as truthful, during the trial, were previously involved in criminal judgments relating to breach of trust.

The night of the incident

On July 18, 2003, the victim had been drinking for several hours before quarreling with her boyfriend, and she was leaving his parents' home in Atherton, Greater Manchester, and at about 2.30 am she decided to go to her home in Kearsley, six miles away, and at 4.26 am I sent a message. A text to her friend in which she says that a man threatened her and shouted, "Come with me inside the bush, I have a gun aimed at you."

She told that he threatened her after that, grabbed her from behind, grabbed her suffocate, and pressed his thumbs to her neck, she remembered that she had scratched his face before she lost consciousness.

Later, she crawled onto the road, covered in blood, in an attempt to seek help from cars. Her cheekbones were broken, and one of her eyes was swollen, so that she could not open it.

She could not remember whether or not she had been raped, but a medical examination confirmed this.

The suspect is unlucky

Malkinson grew up in Grimsby and left school at the age of 16 to work on the sidewalks.

He met a nineteen-year-old girl and had a son with her.

He was 24 years old when his relationship with his girlfriend collapsed, and he traveled outside Britain to settle in the Netherlands.

In 2003 he returned to Britain after spending 10 years there.

The lifestyle he was leading made it easy for him to pretend he was a loner and a homeless person.

Malkinson's last serious partner before he entered prison was a Dutch woman named Karen Showemaker.

They were together for four years until 1999. She spoke from Holland and described him as a "very calm, nice, friendly" and "simple" man.

They loved to travel together and share a love for the rhythms of reggae music.

Schwittmaker, now 53, is still a friend of Malkinson's, and has always been convinced of his innocence.

Malkinson has never been convicted of any violent crimes before.

One of his mistakes was that he broke a glass plate as a teenager, paid a fine for it, and committed a misdemeanor over his passport when he traveled to Thailand in 2001.

Message from prison

Malkinson wrote a letter from prison, last month, that on the evening of July 18, 2003, the night of the rape, a severe heat wave swept the country, and he had just finished his job as a security guard at Alismir Mall in the Wakden area, and that “after my shift ended I just wanted to sit in front of the TV Then sleep, which is what I did. '

And that night he was with one of his colleagues, who was sleeping on the top floor of the bed.

They had known each other for only a few weeks.

The colleague told the court that he did not remember much about that night.

He said he couldn't be sure if Malkinson had been there all night, because he was asleep at the time.

The house was about one mile off the highway, and in the morning the victim was found.

Wrong procedures to identify the accused

Upon hearing the attacker's description, two of the policemen said they suddenly remembered Malkinson.

A month earlier, they stopped an off-road motorcycle Malkinson was riding with a violation and took his data.

Six days after the rape, Malkinson called the police on an entirely different matter.

He had fallen out with a family he resided with before, and said he was under threat.

His lawyers noted on appeal that filing a complaint with the police indicated that he was a person abiding by the law.

That evening, Malkinson contemplated returning to the Netherlands, but ended up flying to Grimsby to see his mother.

By that time, the police were looking for him in relation to the rape.

On August 2, he was arrested.

After his arrest, the victim and presumptive witness were brought in to watch a video tape that police showed in front of them late at night.

They were taken - the victim and the witness - together, in violation of the defendant's queue procedures.

The witness was a woman who said she saw a man matching the description of the attacker while she was in the car with her partner at 4.30am, the time the assault was supposed to have happened.

The victim chose Malkinson, but the witness initially chose another man.

After leaving the room with a police officer, she changed her mind and chose Malkinson instead.

The partner of the witness who was driving the car was not summoned to identify the attacker until six months later.

And who chose Malkinson.

Malkinson wrote from his prison: "At first I thought that I would be released quickly. I never imagined that I would be mistakenly recognized by the complainant, but when I was accused, I felt as if the ground split and swallowed me."

He was charged and appeared in court in 2004.

In summarizing the ruling, Court Judge Michael Henschel noted that many names were presented to the police during the investigation, and that some of them "were never tracked, including one who was previously convicted of rape."

The jury at Crown Court, in Manchester, took two days to deliberate, and convicted Malkinson, a 10 to 2 vote, of rape and strangulation with intent to rape.

Malkinson, 37, at the time, told police that DNA tests would prove his innocence, and he believed he would be released quickly, and instead he was sentenced to life in prison.

Inconsistencies in the victim's statements

The victim told the police that the last thing she remembered was a "deep scratch" on the attacker's right cheek with her left hand, shortly before she lost consciousness.

And when Malkinson went to work the next day, he had no scratches.

The victim described the attacker as being about five feet and eight inches tall, two inches longer than herself.

Malkinson is five feet 11 inches tall.

She said the rapist spoke a native Bolton accent with "an accent of something else," but Malkinson grew up in Grimsby, about 100 miles on the East Coast, and has spent the previous decade overseas.

The attacker, who was said to be well dressed, took off his shirt during the attack.

When the victim gave a description of him, she said he had no chest hair.

Nor did she mention the tattoo.

However, Malkinson had chest hair and prominent tattoos on his forearms.

None of the clothes described by the victim were found on property searches of Malkinson, who was usually wearing shorts and T-shirts.

Were the witnesses informing the police?

During the trial, the judge made it clear that the prosecution's entire case was pending the testimony of witnesses, and confirmed that the witnesses were honest.

However, evidence uncovered by the appeal after the Greater Manchester Police threatened legal action, it appears that the couple who claimed to have been able to identify Malkinson on a dark street in the early hours had long criminal records that were not informed by the jury.

The couple had 16 convictions for 38 crimes.

A further investigation into police records uncovered by Malkinson's legal team is that the couple came forward to claim they were witnesses, hours after the police began calling their sources to help with the case.

The court did not discuss the possibility that the witnesses were police informants eager to help.

Malkinson attempted several times to overturn the conviction, and an appeals court considered his case, but rejected it.

DNA penetration

Malkinson's attorneys requested new forensic tests on case documents to see if there was DNA from other potential suspects, but they were frustrated by the police, who acknowledged that key evidence items, including the victim's jacket, bra, and upholstery were "done." Removed; in other words the evidence has been destroyed.

However, new tests were run on DNA samples from the victim's nail snippets of her left hand, the hand she used to scratch her attacker.

DNA was also found in samples taken from her neck at the time of the attack.

None of these samples matched Malkinson.

And a DNA sample of an unidentified male was actually found on the top of her jacket in 2003, which doesn't match Malkinson either.

The Criminal Case Review Board rejected Malkinson's case twice.

But now with the new DNA evidence and doubts about witnesses emerging, he is ready to file a new request for his case to be returned to the appeals court.

However, Malkinson was released, the week before last, from North Sea Camp Prison in Lincolnshire, but he is still convicted of this sexual crime, and he will be released on strict conditions, and he must sleep in a hostel on bail, and check in every lunchtime.

For the first time in 17 years, he spent Christmas with his mother, Tricia.

She used to write to him every week and talk on the phone, she said: “Every day I have a living nightmare because I still cannot believe this has happened to him.

I am serving this sentence with Andrew ».

"We ask the police to help overturn this conviction, because the wrong person is in prison for this rape, while the person who did so is free," said Emily Bolton, the lawyer who founded the Abel Foundation and represents Malkinson.

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