The Attack:
On December 9, 1995, in the peak Christmas shopping season, Jill Marker, the 33-year old assistant manager of the Silk Plant Forest shop in Winston-Salem, was working alone as closing time approached. The store, which has since gone out of business, was located adjacent to Toys ‘R Us on Silas Creek Parkway near Hanes Mall. At 8:55 pm, Jill was found brutally attacked (probably from a blunt instrument) in a pool of blood and beside some fallen merchandise in the back of the store. The cash register was later found open and $304 were missing, although four one-hundred bills were under the tray, out of view.
The attack occurred between 8:45 pm and 8:55 pm. This was determined from information from the last witness who left prior to the attack and the first witnesses on the scene afterward. The injuries were severe; initially Jill was not expected to survive. The Winston-Salem Police Department assigned the case to a homicide detective, only to reassign the case to a robbery detective (Detective D.R. Williams) two days later, when it was apparent that Jill would survive. When she was attacked, Jill was pregnant with her first child. While still in a coma four months later, Jill gave birth via cesarean section to a boy.
No one else was in the Silk Plant Forest shop with Jill except her attacker (or attackers). Although there was a profuse amount of blood at the scene, analysis tied all samples to Jill. No physical evidence was ever produced implicating anyone in the crime.
The Suspects:
Detective D.R. Williams pursued a number of suspects in the first months following the attack, including Kenneth Lamoureux, a white male in his late forties. Store customers who were in the store about 90 minutes before the attack placed Mr. Lamoureux in the store. Interviews with Jill’s friends and co-workers revealed that Jill had known Mr. Lamoureux from her previous employment at a daycare center where she worked and that Mr. Lamoureux’s children attended. These witnesses reported that Jill complained of Mr. Lamoureux’s unwelcome visits to the store. Jill had become the assistant manager at the Silk Plant Forest after leaving the employ of the daycare center. According to one witness who made a sword affidavit recently (Jill's former supervisor at the daycare center,) minutes before the attack Jill telephoned her "upset and anxious" to say that Mr. Lamoureux "came in, asked her our, and stormed away angrily when she refused." Four months into the investigation, police stopped pursuing Mr. Lamoureux for no apparent reason. The WSPD and the state would later claim that Mr. Lamoureux was ruled out due to an interview with Jill Marker, in which they interpreted Jill to say her assailant was a black male. In fact, that interview with Jill took place on October 31, 1996, six months after Detective Williams had already stopped pursuing Mr. Lamoureux.
Among other suspects was a white man who on May 22, 1996 (with no provocation) walked into a sheriff's office in another county and confessed to the crime, characterizing it as a murder (it was not a murder as Jill survived.). In a taped interrogation, this man later gave Detective Williams a remarkably detailed and largely accurate account of the crime scene. A review of a transcript of the interrogation of this suspect indicates his statements became the fodder for many of the specific details of statements police produced from other witnesses. However, three of these witnesses later claimed under oath they were fed details of their testimony by Detective Williams for attribution to themselves. Regarding this suspect who confessed to a sheriff's office, Detective Williams checked out his story and found the suspect could not have committed the crime because he was confirmed to have been locked up in a psychiatric ward (as would later be learned, across the hall from Kenneth Lamoureux.)
How Kalvin Michael Smith Got Caught Up In This and How Detectives Correctly Ruled Smith Out:
Kalvin Michael Smith (“Michael”, as he is known), a 25-year old African American from Winston-Salem, first became involved in this case some six months after the attack, because “A”, a woman whose house he sometimes stayed at when quarrelling with his girlfriend, and who sought his affection, was distraught when he did not requite her (“A”’s) feelings. On or about June 1, 1996, in a fit of spite, “A” responded to a Crimestoppers appeal for tips about the case claiming that Kalvin Michael Smith admitted to her he was involved in the crime. On July 22, 1996, Michael was arrested and interrogated as a result of “A”’s Crimestoppers’ report. He was brought to Detective Williams at the headquarters of the Winston-Salem Police Department (WSPD). Michael denied any knowledge of the crime and denied ever being in the Silk Plant Forest shop. Michael was asked to take a polygraph test that same day, and without hesitation he agreed to do so. According to Detective Williams' signed and dated documentation of the same day, Michael was scored as truthful in his polygraph examination. Documentation of Michael’s truthful July 22, 1996 polygraph results in a test conducted and scored by Detective Lonnie Maines would be repeated on another report by Detective Williams on November 4, 1996. According to the police files, there was no further active investigation of Michael until after he was arrested on January 24, 1997
In the interim, Detective Williams took one other opportunity to rule out Michael (and others). Michael was included (as were other persons of interest) in a series of four photo line ups presented to Jill on October 31, 1996 after the interview referred to earlier when Jill may have indicated her attacker was a black male. In the course of these four photo line ups, Jill did not identify Michael, although we later learned Michael’s photo was among those shown to her. However, Jill did identify Kenneth Lamoureux in response to a question about identifying someone “who was in the store that day”. This presentation of these photo line ups to Jill in which she failed to identify Michael and identified another individual was never documented as required by WSPD policies in force at the time, and to allow the discovery required by the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case, Brady v. Maryland. Jill’s identification of Mr. Lamoureux also was not documented in Detective Williams’ file. It remains disputed if Michael’s defense counsel ever knew about the existence of this photo line up (it’s important because it undermines the so-called "identification" at trial by Jill and because another suspect, Kenneth Lamoureux, was identified by Jill as being in the store that day.) In any event, what is not disputed is that Michael’s defense counsel never asked for, nor was he given the photos shown in any of the four line-ups, and that he did not know that Michael was ruled out and Mr. Lamoureux was ruled in. And, it’s not disputed the jury never heard about any of this.
It is also not disputed that "A" made the first crimestoppers call implicating Michael in the Silk Plant Forest case on or about June 1, 1996. Michael learned it was "A" who made that call because after the incident she told him it was she. In the days soon before January 24, 2007, Michael had already returned to his on-again/off-again girlfriend, “V”. But, Michael was cheating on “V”, with another woman, "B", whom he had recently met. “V” had been aware of the entire episode caused 7 months earlier by “A” implicating Michael in the Silk Plant Forest case via a Crimestopers report. The reason "V" knew about it, is because Michael had told “V” about it, in the vein of (paraphrasing): “Look what “A” did to cause me lots of grief”. But, “V” was not aware that Michael was cheating on her with “B” until one day when she saw Michael in "B"'s car after he accepted a ride from her. Suspecting that Michael was cheating on her, “V” went to “B”’s house one day soon thereafter and happened to find Michael and “B” together talking. In a fit of anger, “V” confronted “B” and vandalized property on “B”’s front porch and smashed the window on “B”’s car. “B” reported the incident to police and had “V”charged, and that made “V” even more enraged. So, “V” decided to employ the same tactic that she knew “A” had employed seven months earlier and that caused Michael much grief: “V” called police to implicate Michael in the Silk Plant Forest crime. As a result, Detective Williams came by “V”’s house to speak with Michael. Michael was not home, but upon returning, Michael saw Detective Williams’ business card shoved in the door and Michael telephoned Detective Williams. Michael knew Detective Williams from his previous encounter with him, and knew that Detective Williams believed him to be innocent from the polygraph that Michael had passed. But Michael did not know what this latest inquiry from Detective Williams was about, and Michael did not know that “V” had implicated him, emulating “A”’s tactic. On the telephone, Detective Williams encouraged Michael to come to police headquarters and to bring “V” with him. Michael immediately agreed and suggested to the girlfriend that they take a bus to police headquarters. On the way, Smith bought a 40 ounce beer, as was his daily habit.
How Detectives Built a False Case against Smith:
Once at police headquarters, Michael and “V” were separated and subjected to hours of interrogation in isolation. Detective Williams revealed to Michael that "V” had called in this accusation (Michael had also learned that day that “V” was pregnant with his child). According to Michael’s sworn and cross examined testimony, Detective Williams’ made threats and inducements telling Michael that both he and “V” would be immediately charged if he did not make a statement, but that they would be released if he made one. Michael did not need to implicate himself in the crime. He just needed to write a statement that he witnessed the crime. Michael complied and began to write by his own hand, a one-page statement that he witnessed the attack (not that he committed the attack). From the first day, and consistently to the current day, including under oath and in cross-examination, Michael has maintained that the statement he wrote that day was written with the line-by-line coaching of Detective Williams (no one else was in the room). Michael thought he would outsmart the detective and render the statement ridiculous by including obvious implausibilities. One example is Michael wrote that following witnessing the attack, he walked to specific location, which would have him walking across town twice (comprising a total walk of over 13 miles). Strikingly, a key detail of the actual attack was incorrect in Michael’s statement, the location inside the store where the attack took place (which was actually the back of the store). Detective Williams later had Michael fill out a one paragraph addition to the statement where this important detail was amended.
January 24, 1997 began the incarceration of Kalvin Michael Smith, from which he has never since enjoyed one day of freedom. It also began Detective Williams’ process of creating the case to prosecute Michael. Because there were no eyewitnesses and no physical evidence, the case could not be prosecuted as it existed at the time of Michael’s arrest. Detective Williams “investigation” in preparation for a trial took most of 1997, as the trial began on December 1 of that year. At trial, four witnesses testified against Michael. In addition to ""A" (the woman who had failed to win Michael’s affection and thus reported him via Crimestoppers), the jury heard from two witnesses who have later recanted and testified under oath that Detective Williams coerced them to lie against Michael and that Detective Williams fed them their stories. At Michael’s trial, the state also presented Jill Marker to identify Michael in court, an identification which the trial judge later described as “equivocal.” In their deliberations, the jury had difficulty reaching a decision and asked to see a video of Jill Marker’s equivocal identification in court. The judge denied the request. After two days, the jury asked for a transcript of one the witnesses who has since recanted, calling this request “critical”. The judge agreed and provided the jury the transcript of this witness’ testimony. Less than one hour later, the jury returned with a verdict against Michael of guilty on both counts: assault with a deadly weapon inflicting serious injury with intent to kill; and armed robbery. Michael was sentenced to 28 years, 11-months incarceration.
Justice System Failure:
In 1998, Michael’s appeal of his conviction was denied. In 1999, while in prison he filed a motion for appropriate relief (M.A.R.) without the benefit of an attorney. That M.A.R. was denied.
Role of the Duke University Law School Innocence Project:
In 2003, the Duke University Law School Innocence Project (Duke) began investigating Michael’s case. After a year of investigation, Duke became convinced what Michael has been saying was completely factual: that Michael had no involvement whatsoever in this crime, and that he was not at the scene of the Silk Plant Forest on the evening of the crime.
Role of the Winston-Salem Journal:
In November, 2004, the Winston-Salem Journal published an extraordinary five-part investigative series about the case. Among the many revelations, the Journal quoted Detective Williams as saying he intentionally did not document certain evidence to avoid the defense having it, and that he did so based on the advice of one of the assistant district attorneys prosecuting the case: “There’s a lot of investigative work you do that you don’t put on paper because you open yourself up to the defense bringing it up in court to take it off Kalvin,” Williams said. He said he even told Eric Saunders, Keith’s top prosecutor, that he had reams of information that he never included in his reports. “I told him I could write a whole other book on it,” Williams said. “He said, ‘Well, you know and I know that the only thing you’re doing is giving it away to the defense.’ (Source: Winston-Salem Journal, Part 3 of the five-part series on the Silk Plant Forest case. November 23, 2004.
Role of Concerned Citizens of Winston-Salem:
A 2007 internal police department review concluded that Detective Williams "failed to document several aspects of the case according to department policy".
Detective Williams refused to be interviewed for that report. However, that review was later withdrawn by the Winston-Salem city manager when he discovered (after the review’s release) that one of its co-authors had supervised the first 11 months of the Silk Plant Forest case investigation in 1995 and 1996. A subsequent review indicated that this co-author had made clear his earlier involvement to the WSPD chief of police on five separate occasions, but was assigned to initiate and continue with the review anyway.
In March, 2008, under pressure from local citizens concerned that public safety may be at risk and justice may have miscarried, the Winston-Salem city council set up an independent, comprehensive fact finding review of the case, under the supervision of nine citizens the city council appointed. In December, 2008, Detective Williams refused a subpoena by the Winston-Salem city council issued at the committee's request (the committee does not have subpoena power.)
More Justice System Failures:
On April 29, 2008, a revised M.A.R. was filed on Michael's behalf by David Pishko of Pishko, Elliot, Morgan serving Michael pro bono. The M.A.R. was written in conjunction with Duke. January 5, 2009, the M.A.R was heard in Forsyth County (Winston-Salem) Superior Court. On January 8, 2009, the motion was denied. An petition for certiorari (the first step in the appeal) was filed.
On September 11, 2009, the North Carolina Court of Appeals summarily declared in an unsigned, anonymous ruling that Michael’s petition for certiorari was denied. In effect, Michael was shut out of the state Court of Appeals with no hearing and no explanation, and no judge would put his or her name to the decision.
The Winston-Salem Journal reported this way on September 15, 2009: "I was speechless that they decided the matter so quickly," said Jim Coleman, a law professor who heads the Innocence Project at Duke University Law School, which has been investigating the case since 2003.
"We filed a 100-page petition with a 486-page attachment. The state filed a 100-page opposition. Basically, they denied it within a week. That's pretty extraordinary given the complexity of the issues that had been raised in the case."
More Action From Concerned Winston-Salem Citizens:
The comprehensive fact-finding Silk Plant Forest Citizens Review Committee continues its work, with a final report due to the city council in June 30, 2009. In a preliminary report issued on March 17, 2009, the committee found that "there is no credible evidence that Kalvin Michael Smith was at the scene" of the Silk Plant Forest at the night in question, and that they have "no confidence in the investigation" conducted by police.
Limited Release of Report of the Independent Review:
On September 16, 2009, the city of Winston-Salem released a redacted version of the Silk Plant Forest Citizens Committee “Final Report.” The report repeated a resolution voted on by the committee (7 in favor, 2 opposed.) that read: “ … we are aware of no credible evidence that Kalvin Michael Smith was at the location of the Silk Plant Forest Store in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, on December, 9, 1995, at or about the time that the crime for which he was charged and committed.” (Page 40.)
Further, in a statement that was unanimously approved, the Committee wrote, “… the Committee does not have confidence in the investigation, the information in question, or the result of the investigation.” (page 5)
In a letter included in the report, the Committee chair summarized by writing, ‘In my judgment, this critical piece of testimony by Williams (regarding handwritten changes to a typewritten supplement report) is incredible and, given the crimestoppers (sic) report, --------- redacted ------, I tend to believe that the changes to the supplement report were a fictionalization of what really happened.” (page 42)
Copyright © 2009 Kalvin Michael Smith Truth Committee, Winston-Salem, NC (All Rights Reserved).
Calvin Smith Calvin Michael Smith Kalvin Smith Silk Plant Forest
