RICHMOND - Attorney General Bill Mims said Friday he will challenge the decision by a three-judge panel that determined former Navy SEAL trainee Dusty Turner is innocent of the 1996 murder of a vacationing Georgia college student.
Turner, along with his former SEAL swim buddy Billy Joe Brown, were the last seen with Jennifer Leigh Evans at an Oceanfront nightclub.
Each man blamed the other for killing the student. Both admit they hid her body in a Newport News park to cover up the crime. Separate Virginia Beach juries in 1997 declared each responsible for murder.
Several years ago, Brown signed an affidavit that he alone was the killer and that Turner only helped him cover up the crime. Brown said a conversion to Christianity forced him to confess.
That confession was the basis of Turner's appeal. This week, Turner became the first convicted killer in Virginia declared innocent, without the benefit of DNA.
However, the three-judge panel split 2-1. That, according to Mims, is reason enough for the full appeals court to hear this case.
"I have decided to seek review by the full Court of Appeals in the case of Dustin Turner," Mims wrote in a statement. "The three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals was sharply divided. It is imperative that a case of such significance be decided by the full court."
Turner, along with his former SEAL swim buddy Billy Joe Brown, were the last seen with Jennifer Leigh Evans at an Oceanfront nightclub.
Each man blamed the other for killing the student. Both admit they hid her body in a Newport News park to cover up the crime. Separate Virginia Beach juries in 1997 declared each responsible for murder.
Several years ago, Brown signed an affidavit that he alone was the killer and that Turner only helped him cover up the crime. Brown said a conversion to Christianity forced him to confess.
That confession was the basis of Turner's appeal. This week, Turner became the first convicted killer in Virginia declared innocent, without the benefit of DNA.
However, the three-judge panel split 2-1. That, according to Mims, is reason enough for the full appeals court to hear this case.
"I have decided to seek review by the full Court of Appeals in the case of Dustin Turner," Mims wrote in a statement. "The three-judge panel of the Court of Appeals was sharply divided. It is imperative that a case of such significance be decided by the full court."
