The tragedy of wrongful convictions has finally been recognized as a national problem, as President Bush proclaimed in his State of the Union address, “In America we must make doubly sure no person is held to account for a crime he or she did not commit.”

In Maine, making “doubly sure” means a retrial for Dennis Dechaine.

Trial and Error, the organization supporting a retrial for Dennis Dechaine, has often spotlighted evidence proving his innocence. Our slogan, “Restore Maine’s Honor,” reflects another reason for retrial. Maine’s honor has been damaged by this case. Not only did our state government sentence an innocent man to life in prison, the case was handled dishonorably.

By examining the documents and investigation of Dechaine, we have uncovered numerous errors, oversights and misdeeds.

Detectives searching for a barefoot Sarah Cherry, who Dechaine was convicted of killing, didn’t even knock on the neighbor’s door to which small bare footprints (beside a set of large footprints) led them. Such an oversight was especially odd since those detectives were already investigating that neighbor for sexually abusing another 12-year-old girl.

Unknown to Dechaine, the first attorney he consulted, George Carlton, was licensed as a lawyer after seven years as a federal fugitive who’d served time for tax evasion. Dechaine quickly found a better attorney, but why was felon Carlton ever readmitted to the bar? Why, after making statements that prosecutors interpreted as indicating Dechaine’s guilt, were disciplinary charges never lodged against lawyer Carlton? And why did authorities never inform Dechaine or his new attorney of Carlton’s actions?

At the trial, although the prosecutor had blocked evidence concerning another suspect, he told jurors in summarizing the evidence that, “There is no evidence, ladies and gentlemen of the jury, in this case of an alternate perpetrator.”

A police tracking dog found no scent of the victim in Dechaine’s truck, but that fact was never given to the defense nor to the jury.

After Dechaine’s 1992 motion for a new trial was filed, prosecutors destroyed the rape kit and unidentified hairs found on Sarah Cherry’s body, evidence that might have yielded additional DNA evidence. In 2001, this practice was outlawed in Maine.

The state has lost unidentified fingerprints from the door of the house where the victim was abducted, and has lost results of the blood test of Dennis Dechaine performed after his arrest.

When exculpatory 1993-94 DNA test results were released, rather than investigate further, prosecutors demanded the return of the DNA extract.

The Maine Supreme Court upheld that demand, without even mentioning the exculpatory results of the DNA tests.

During those same months, prosecutors obtained a report by former FBI expert Dr. Harold Deadman, which supported the DNA tests performed for Dennis Dechaine by a Boston laboratory. Deadman’s report was concealed and remained secret until 2003, when our Legislature passed Special Law, Chapter 18, which ordered the prosecution’s files be opened.

On or before Sept. 1, 1994, the prosecutor learned that Detective Mark Westrum’s handwritten notes cast serious doubt on his courtroom testimony claiming that Dennis Dechaine made an incriminating statement after his arrest. Westrum changed, “How could I kill her?” to read, “Why did I kill her?” Observing this, prosecutors did nothing.

In 2000, during proceedings in U.S. District Court on Dechaine’s habeas corpus petition, prosecutors successfully argued that significant facts offered to the court indicating Dechaine’s innocence not be considered because they were not offered by a party to the case.

When the book “Human Sacrifice” was published with facts indicating Dechaine’s innocence, no prosecutor contacted the author to explore its findings. Instead, letters were sent to the publisher warning that Dechaine must not profit financially from the book.

In 2004, rather than obeying the Freedom of Access law by making the entire police file available to a Dechaine supporter, the Office of the Attorney General fought compliance via various legal technicalities. The judge decided against access to the police file because Dechaine’s supporter could not specifically describe the report, which the state was concealing, thus forcing an appeal to the Maine Supreme Court.

The appearance of official attempts to block the truth in this case can be avoided by the governor, who should order that access to the State Police documents be immediately provided.

Before the court ruled against opening the entire file, however, the state did finally provide the handwritten notes by state police Detective Alfred Hendsbee, notes which contradict that now-retired detective’s courtroom testimony that Dechaine ever made an alleged incriminating statement.

In light of the state’s actions, I believe Dennis Dechaine deserves a new trial, where a jury would hear all the evidence. Then, there should be a complete, independent investigation of how Dechaine was originally prosecuted.

Morrison Bonpasse is a member of the board of directors of Trial and Error and maintains its Web site at: www.trialanderrordennis.org.