Thread by @TheViewFromLL2

Yesterday, the attorneys at @GaInnocence filed an Extraordinary Motion for a New Trial for Dennis Perry, whose case we covered in Season 3 of @Undisclosedpod.

New DNA testing has matched evidence found at the crime scene with a known suspect.
ajc.com/news/crime--la…

Harold and Thelma Swain were murdered in the entryway of their church in Waverly, GA in 1985. The killer left behind a pair of glasses, with two hairs caught in the hinges.

Dennis Perry was convicted for the murders, even though his DNA did not match the DNA from those hairs.

One of the longstanding suspects in the cases was a man named Erik Sparre, who on multiple occasions had confessed to friends and family to having committed the murders. These confessions were usually conveyed in the forms of threats, and so dismissed by investigators.

As a result, Erik Sparre was never properly investigated, either by original investigators or the cold case investigator who later took the case. And after the close of Season 3 of @Undisclosedpod in 2018, he remained a focus of continued investigations into the case.

Last year, @JoshuaWSharpe began working on the case, and looking into one of the reasons Sparre had been dismissed: an alleged alibi.

Supposedly, Sparre had worked as a grocery store stock clerk from 3pm to 6:40am on the night of the murders, which occurred shortly before 9pm. This story raises some obvious questions, but had allegedly been confirmed by his manager. Though, not until a year after the murders.

But @JoshuaWSharpe found the manager. And as explained in Dennis's EMNT filing, there is a striking divergence between Sparre's *actual* manager from the grocery store, and the manager who is described in the police files as supposedly confirming Sparre's alibi.

Earlier this year, a @GaInnocence investigator was able to obtain a DNA sample from Sparre's mother.

The DNA in this case is not autosomal DNA, it's mitochondrial DNA – and as Sparre shares his mtDNA with his direct maternal line, Sparre's mother's mtDNA is the same as Sparre's.

The mtDNA from Sparre's mother was a match for the mtDNA profile from the two hairs that had been recovered from the glasses dropped in the entry way of Rising Daughter Baptist Church, during the killer's scuffle with Harold Swain.

And yes, Erik Sparre wears glasses.

Dennis Perry remains in prison today.

Despite overwhelming evidence of his innocence, as well as large-scale, deliberate Brady violations by the prosecutors in his case, the State's position has been that Dennis has no right to raise any challenge to his conviction.

Obtaining DNA evidence that has identified the actual killer has not changed the State of Georgia's mind. They believe Dennis Perry should remain in prison still.

Dennis's motion is now pending before the Glynn County Superior Court. I can only hope that it will be heard soon.