Death row inmate granted new trial

ERNEST RIDDLE Death row inmate Ernest Matthew Riddle has been granted a new trial after the S.C. Supreme Court announced Monday it had determined the original trial against Riddle was fundamentally unfair due to prosecutorial misconduct.

The order reversed a lower court's ruling upholding Riddle's conviction.

Riddle was found guilty of murder, burglary and armed robbery in the Aug. 8, 1985, murder of Abby Sue Mullinax and sentenced to death.

There was no physical evidence connecting Riddle to the murder, however the state relied on eyewitness testimony of Riddle's alleged accomplice, his mildly retarded brother Jason, and the testimony of witnesses who overheard comments made by Ernest Riddle following the death of Mullinax.

The guilty verdict was upheld on appeal but the death penalty was reversed only to be returned again during a 1987 re-sentencing proceeding. That death penalty was once again reversed on direct appeal, and again affirmed by a third jury in 1991.

The Supreme Court addressed what it called "grave constitutional violations which occurred during the 1986 guilt phase, and which mandate reversal of the (Post Conviction Relief) order."

All three circuit court proceedings against Riddle were prosecuted by then-solicitor Holman A. Gossett. Riddle's defense attorney in all proceedings was Kenneth Holland.

According to the ruling, there were several inconsistencies between Jason Riddle's original statement and his trial testimony and an undisclosed Jan. 22 statement.

The first trial against Ernest Riddle began Jan. 27, 1987. Five days before the trial began, Jason Riddle gave a second statement to police, which Ernest Riddle contends was not provided to his attorney.

The high court's ruling states that, "among these differences were whether Jason or (Ernest) removed the window fan from the window before entering the home; whether the brothers both went to the bedroom or whether one went to the kitchen and the other to the bedroom; whether the victim's purse was found on a large or small dresser; whether Jason fell before or after he heard the victim getting up, and where he fell; where he was when he saw (Ernest) kill Mrs. Mullinax; what he saw or heard as he left the house; and whether they got $100 or $125.

"The most glaring inconsistency is that in his Jan. 22 statement, Jason claimed that a friend had picked the brothers up after the murder and given them a ride to the barn, whereas in his original statement and in his trial testimony

he maintained the brothers had walked the approximately three miles from the Mullinax home to the barn. Before the commencement of the trial, officers questioned the person Jason identified as having given the brothers a ride, who denied having done so. The state therefore chose not to present any evidence of the brothers having been driven to the barn," the order stated.

The Supreme Court ruling stated that it was difficult to conceive that the brothers would have been able to travel to and from the Mullinax

home between the murder and the time when a witness testified they returned to the home of Tammy Lewis.

"The issue is not why Jason failed to tell the truth: rather, it is why the solicitor, who knew Jason's testimony to be false, failed to correct it," according to the order. "The failure to correct false evidence is as reprehensible as its presentation."

Seventh Circuit Solicitor Trey Gowdy, who was elected to the position in 2000, said his office would seek to once again have Riddle sentenced to death.