Missouri woman presents her case for innocence. Her lawyers point to cop as suspect

Attorneys for a woman who has been behind bars for 43 years attacked the veracity of her conviction in court this week, shifting evidence of the murder onto a former St. Joseph police officer.

Sandra Hemme was found guilty in the Nov. 12, 1980, killing of Patricia Jeschke, whose nude body was found on the floor of her apartment in eastern St. Joseph. Hemme, who goes by Sandy and is now 63, was sentenced to life.

If Hemme is exonerated, her prison term would mark the longest known wrongful conviction of a woman in U.S. history.

The only evidence linking Hemme, a psychiatric patient at the time, to the murder were her “wildly contradictory” and “factually impossible” statements extracted from detectives, her attorneys have said. No physical evidence or witnesses tied her to the crime.

Last July, Hemme was granted a hearing to present evidence of her innocence after her attorneys filed a 147-page petition laying out their claims.

That hearing began Tuesday in Chillicothe and is expected to conclude Friday. Livingston County Presiding Judge Ryan Horsman will issue a decision in the coming weeks or months.

Hemme, clad in a beige jumpsuit and black-rimmed eyeglasses, listened Wednesday as Steven Fueston, a retired St. Joseph Police Department detective, testified. He recalled several police interviews of Hemme, including questioning her at St. Joseph State Hospital, where she was undergoing mental health treatment.

Fueston said he stopped one of those interviews because “she didn’t seem totally coherent.”

Over eight sessions of questioning, Hemme’s attorneys with the Innocence Project say her story changed from denying any involvement, to implicating a man who turned out to have an airtight alibi and falsely confessing to Jeschke’s murder.

Hemme’s legal team said evidence instead points to Michael Holman, a 22-year-old cop who was investigated for insurance fraud and burglaries, and later went to prison. He died in 2015.

Police practices expert

Policing consultant James Trainum took the stand next. He recounted how he once elicited a false confession early in his career as a homicide detective with the DC Metropolitan Police Department.

He said confessions need to be corroborated as well as examined for contamination, which occurs in many ways, including through details in media reports.

During earlier testimony, the Missouri Attorney General’s Office had pointed out that in one police interview, Hemme led detectives to the victim’s house and had described items in her bedroom.

But during Trainum’s testimony, Hemme’s attorneys showed photos from a St. Joseph Gazette story published the day after Jeschke’s body was discovered. The images included a detective processing the bedroom where she was found. The address of where the homicide occurred was also published.

Trainum said that after several police interviews, reports showed detectives “still had to prompt her, ask her some leading questions.”

Hemme’s statements, he said, also contained factual errors. “They would raise red flags,” Trainum told the court.

He said investigators should not ignore or dismiss evidence that support an alternative suspect or theory.

Holman had been a suspect and was questioned one time. He told investigators he used Jeschke’s credit card after finding a purse in a ditch. His truck was also seen in the area of the murder; the alibi he provided about why he was nearby could not be corroborated. And a pair of gold horseshoe-shaped earrings identified by Jeschke’s father was found in Holman’s possession.

The Missouri Attorney General’s Office said Trainum wanted the court to believe some reports, but not others. It also said that Hemme’s attorneys had not provided all of the existing reports to him, including a report questioning who the earrings belonged to.

Former prosecutor

Judge Patrick Robb was an assistant prosecuting attorney in Buchanan County in 1985, the year Hemme went to trial. He knew that Holman “was connected to the case” and discussed that with Hemme’s trial attorney, Robert Duncan.

Robb, who is now a judge in Buchanan County, said he followed the Brady rule, which requires prosecutors turn over exculpatory or impeaching evidence to the defense. But he also said he did not trust St. Joseph’s police chief at the time, James Robert “Bob” Hayes.

Under Hayes, police elicited a false confession from Melvin Lee Reynolds in a different murder case. Robb advocated for Reynolds’ release and he was freed in 1983.

Sean O’Brien, an attorney for Hemme, asked Robb, “Did you believe Michael Holman was clear of Patricia Jeschke’s homicide?”

“No,” Robb replied.

He went on to say that Hemme’s statements were the cornerstone of the prosecutor’s case and later characterized them as inconsistent.

O’Brien also pointed out that evidence that could have undergone forensic testing with newer technology had been destroyed.

“We could have answered a lot of questions with that,” Robb said.