

DAVID BURNETT

Could be interesting. State Sen. David Burnett of Osceola, the judge in the West Memphis 3 case, who was decisively overruled in a landmark Arkansas Supreme Court ruling, is going to talk at length on the case tonight on KAIT-8 in Jonesboro.

Burnett has not fared well in documentaries of the case and more are on the way. So you wouldn’t expect him to say at this point that he’s reconsidered and regrets some of his evidentiary rulings or to express relief that a man wasn’t executed in such a flawed case. No, you wouldn’t expect that.

KAIT says he’ll talk at 10 on the case, the defendants and the recent developments.


There’s this great irony, though. You could argue that the WM3 owe their freedom to David Burnett. He allowed documentary filmmakers in court for the first trials. The absurdity of those proceedings — and the crusade on which filmmakers then embarked — were critical elements in the long battle that led to their release from prison 18 years after the slayings of three West Memphis children.

To date, he’s commented only briefly and then to say the WM3 remain murderers because the plea deal that released them required them to admit guilt and accept conviction, even as they professed innocence.


Pre-spin from Lonnie Soury, a spokesman for Damien Echols and for Arkansas Take Action, the group that has worked in the interest of WM3 freedom and exoneration: