Prisoner cleared, released after 7 years

DNA evidence was key in a decision to drop charges.
COLUMBUS (AP) -- A prosecutor on Thursday dropped all charges against a man serving a life sentence for murder and rape, freeing the man after serving seven years in a case that turned on DNA evidence on a cigarette butt that had been dropped by another inmate.
"When my wife told me I was coming home today for good, I was just overwhelmed with joy and tears of joy. I was amazed it was so soon. I thought it was going to drag out," Clarence Elkins said in a telephone interview before he was freed from the Mansfield Correctional Institution.
DNA evidence showed that Elkins, 42, could not have committed the crimes, said Bill Canterbury, spokesman for the Summit County prosecutor's office, which tried the case in 1998. Evidence now points toward a man serving a prison sentence for rape in an unrelated case who had spent time just doors down from the victims.
Elkins' wife, Melinda, was preparing for a news conference in Attorney General Jim Petro's Columbus office to announce new evidence in the case when word that the charges had been dropped came through. Her husband called from prison minutes later.
Melinda Elkins had a simple message: "I said, 'Pack your bags; you're coming home, baby.'"
Elkins, who would not have been eligible for parole until 2054, was convicted in the 1998 rape and murder of his mother-in-law, Judith Johnson, 58, and the rape of her then 6-year-old granddaughter.
Focus shifts
The focus of the investigation has turned to Earl Gene Mann, 32, who had a relationship with a woman who lived near one of the victims, Canterbury said.
Mann, who has not been officially linked to the crimes for which Elkins was convicted, is serving a seven-year prison sentence for raping three girls. However, he recently failed five polygraph tests about his role in the crimes, Canterbury said.
Elkins helped secure the DNA sample by retrieving a cigarette butt used by Mann. Elkins' wife came up with the idea to capture the DNA after learning that Mann had been moved to the same cell pod as Clarence Elkins, said his lawyer, Mark Godsey. Mann since has been moved to the Toledo Correctional Institution.
Elkins, who walked out of the prison with his wife at 3:45 p.m., said he is not "hateful" but hopes Mann is punished for the crimes.
"I believe he committed this crime, without a doubt. He should get whatever the law requires and whatever the state requires," Elkins said.
Ohio Innocence Project
Godsey became involved in January 2004, when Melinda Elkins called his Ohio Innocence Project at the University of Cincinnati law school. The project studies reports of wrongful imprisonment.
Petro began looking at the case last summer when the project and a Cincinnati lawmaker contacted him.
The Cincinnati group began collecting DNA evidence from the crime scene, and after Petro's crime lab analyzed the DNA and that of Elkins, they decided he could not have committed the crime, Godsey and Petro said.
"There was a moment pretty quickly, we went, 'Wow!' On the DNA evidence, he was excluded," Petro said.
Sherri Bevan Walsh, the Summit County prosecutor who had been critical of Petro for proclaiming Elkins' innocence two months ago, said she was working on her own investigation of Mann with police in his hometown of Barberton. She said the combination of Mann's admissions and indirect DNA evidence persuaded her to drop the charges.
"What I wanted to do was thoroughly investigate the background of Earl Mann. It becomes stronger evidence," Walsh said. "I could never automatically discount the jury [verdicts] without being very careful."
Elkins said he owed his freedom to the work of his wife, Godsey's group and Petro.
"It's just the final piece of the puzzle for justice here. I'm just so grateful," he said.