September 1992 | Damien Echols, age 17, is released from a psychiatric hospital in Little Rock, where he received treatment for major depression. Damien was transferred to the hospital after incidents at a detention center that included sucking blood from the wound of another detainee and threatening to kill his father. He is known to Arkansas officials to have an interest in witchcraft (and is suspected by them of being involved in "Satanism"). |
May 5, 1993 6 P.M.
|
Christopher Byers, Michael Moore, and Stevie Branch are seen riding their bicycles on North Fourteenth Street, heading in the direction of Goodwin. |
May 5, 1993 8 P.M. | John Mark Byers telephones the West Memphis police to report a missing child, eight-year-old Christopher Byers. Ten minutes later, an officer shows up to interview Byers. By 8:30, Byers reported later, he began searching a wooded area where his boy sometimes played, Robin Hood Hills. |
May 5, 1993 9 P.M.
|
Two mothers (Dana Moore and
Pamela Hobbs) call to report that their
eight-year-old sons (Michael Moore and Stevie Edward
Branch) are missing. |
May 5 between
9:30 and 10 P.M. |
Narlene Hollingsworth,
according to what she later tells police, sees Damien
Nichols and another boy (both in muddy plants) walking
near the Blue Beacon, on the edge of Robin Hood
Hills. Prosecutors will later argue that the murders
of the three boys takes place during this time frame. |
May 6, 1994
between 1 and 5 A.M. |
According to Dr. Frank Peretti,
the medical examiner who autopsied the three boys, the
murders most likely took place during this time frame. |
May 6 A.M. |
Gary Gitchell, chief inspector
of the West Memphis police department, announces that
three boys are missing and that he will direct the search
efforts. |
May 6,
1993 1:45 P.M. |
Officials discover the body of
a naked boy in a gully in a wooded area of West Memphis
called Robin Hood Hills. |
May 6,
1993 4 P.M. |
The coroner arrives on the
scene and pronounces the three boys dead. |
May 7, 1993 |
Steve Jones, a juvenile
officer, and Lt. Sudbury question Damien Echols about the
murders, but take no notes of their interview. |
May 8,
1993 |
Detective Bill Durham and
investigator Shane Griffith question Damien Echols and
Jason Baldwin, a friend of Damien's. Damien and
Jason tell them they've never heard of any of the three
boys who were killed. |
May 10,
1993 |
Damien, unaccompanied by a
lawyer, is interviewed at the police station by Lt.
Sudbury and detective Byrn Ridge. He then was
administered a polygraph interview by detective
Durham. According to Ridge's notes, Durham "reported
that Damien had been untruthful, and according to the
polygraph, was involved in the murders." |
May 12, 1993 |
Police question Pam Echols,
Damien's mother. She tells them that on the night of
the murders Damien was home with her, talking on the phone
to two girls who lived in Memphis. |
May 19, 1993 |
Vicki Hutchinson, a private
citizen and volunteer detective conducting her own
investigation of the case, travels with Damien Echols and
Jesse Misskelley (according to what she later tells
police) to an esbat (gathering of witches) in a field
north of Marion, Arkansas, where she sees about ten young
people, with arms and faces painted black, taking off
their clothes "and touching each other." (Misskelley
is a borderline retarded (IQ between 67 and 75) neighbor
of Hutchinson's, who she used to make contact with
Damien.) She asks Damien to take her home, and they leave
Jesse at the esbat/orgy. (This report is highly
questionable, given the fact that Damien didn't have a car
and was never known to have ever driven one.) |
May 27, 1993 |
Police interview Vicki
Hutchinson, who tells them of evidence suggesting that
Damien Echols and Jesse Misskelley were involved in both
cult activities and the murders of the three boys.
Aaron Hutchinson, Vicki's eight-year-old son, tells police
that he and the three murdered boys often visited Robin
Hood woods together, and that they had at times seen five
men in the woods sitting in a circle, singing songs to the
Devil, and doing "what men and ladies do." |
June 2, 1993 |
Police give Vicki Hutchinson a
polygraph interview, and police report that she was
truthful. |
June 3, 1993 |
Convinced by the polygraph
results that they had their murderers, police question
Jesse Misskelley about the murders. They tell Jesse
there was a $35,000 reward for information leading to
convictions in the case. In a polygraph interview,
Jesse initially denies participating in either Satanic
rituals or the murders. Detective Durham tells
another officer Jesse is "lying his ass off." After hours
of harsh questioning by Gitchell and Ridge, Jesse begins
to tell the officers what they want to hear: that he and
Damien and Jason committed the murders. Officers are
troubled by inconsistencies (such as Jesse saying the
murders occurred in the daytime when they actually
occurred at night, or that they tied up the boys with rope
when the actual murderer used shoelaces) and work to shape
Jesse's story to match the known facts of the case.
Some five hours after picking Jesse up, police begin
taping Jesse's "confession." |
June 3, 1993
9 P.M. |
Authorities appear before a
municipal court judge to request search warrants to search
the homes of Jesse, Damien, and Jason. The warrants
are issued. |
June 3,
1993 10:30 P.M. |
Police arrest Damien, Jason,
and Jesse. They charge each with three counts of
capital murder. |
June 4, 1993
9 A.M. |
Gitchell holds a press
conference to announce the arrests. Asked how
confident he felt about the case, on a one-to-ten scale,
Gitchell says, "Eleven." |
June 7, 1993 |
A state judge appoints lawyers
to represent each of the three defendants. |
June 9, 1993 |
Police interview eight-year-old
Aaron Hutchinson, who now tells them that he witnessed the
actual murders of the three boys. |
August 4,
1993 |
Echols, Baldwin, and Misskelley
attend a pretrial hearing before Judge David Burnett in
Marion, Arkansas. Judge Burnett rules Misskelley
should be tried separately. Later, in other
important ruling, Burnett allows decides that the state
can introduce Misskelley's confession, despite evidence
that it was obtained under coercive circumstances, and
that the defendants could be tried as adults rather than
juveniles. |
September
1993 |
Prosecutor John Fogleman
conducts a series of under-oath interviews with various
potential trial witnesses, including with members of the
defendants' families. |
November 10,
1993 |
Judge Burnett rules that
Misskelley's trial will open in Corning, Arkansas in
January and that the trial of Echols and Baldwin will take
place in Jonesboro, beginning in February. |
November 17,
1993 |
Divers hired by the Arkansas
State Police search a lake behind the trailer where
Baldwin and Echols lived. They find a nine-inch long
knife with a serrated edge in water about 50 feet behind
Jason's trailer. |
December 30,
1993 |
Defense attorney Ron Lax
interviews neighbors of the Hutchinson and is told that
Aaron Hutchinson was at the trailer park at the time of
the murders, not in Robin Hood Hills witnessing the
murders, as he had told police. |
January 18,
1994 |
Jury selection begins in the
Misskelley trial. |
January 26,
1994 |
John Mark Byers is questioned
by police about a knife belonging to him (and that he had
given to documentary film producers). The knife was
found to have blood on it consistent with that of his
stepson, Christopher Byers (as well as John Mark
Byers--even though the two were not biologically related). |
February 5,
1994 |
A jury convicts Misskelley on
one count of first-degree murder and two counts of
second-degree murder. He is sentenced to forty years
in prison. He is sent to a facility in Pine Bluff. |
February 17,
1994 |
After being pressured by prosecutors, and receiving a promise that his girlfriend would be allowed to visit him in jail, Jesse tells prosecutors he will testify against Echols and Baldwin in their upcoming trial. He makes a statement under oath accusing Echols and Baldwin of murdering the three boys. |
February 18,
1994 |
Jesse changes his mind again
and decides that he will not testify in the upcoming
trial. |
February 19,
1994 |
The Echols/Baldwin trial opens
in Jonesboro, Arkansas. Jury selection begins. |
February 28,
1994 |
Opening arguments are presented
in the Echols/Baldwin trial. |
March 17,
1994 |
Jury deliberations begin in the
Echols and Baldwin trial. |
March 18,
1994 |
The jury finds Echols and
Baldwin guilty of capital murder in the deaths of the
three children. |
March 21,
1994 |
In the sentencing phase of the
trial, the jury sentences Jason to life in prison and
Damien to death. The date for Damien's execution is set
for May 5. Jason is incarcerated in the penitentiary
at Pine Bluff, while Damien is sent to death row in the
state's maximum security prison near Varner, Arkansas. |
May 1994 |
Echols, Baldwin, and Misskelley
appeal their convictions. |
February 19,
1996 |
The Arkansas Supreme Court
issues a decision upholding the conviction of Jesse
Misskelley. |
1996 |
The film Paradise Lost: The
Child Murders of Robin Hills Hood premieres.
The film suggests that Echols, Baldwin, and Misskelley
were wrongfully convicted. A website, wm3.org,
dedicated to securing justice for the Memphis Three is
established. |
December 23,
1996 |
The Arkansas Supreme Court issues a decision upholding the convictions of Damien Echols and Jason Baldwin. |
June 17, 1999 |
Judge Burnett denies a petition
for a new trial, filed under Arkansas Rule 37, for Echols. |
December 1999 |
Damien Echols marries Lorri
Davis, of New York, in a Buddhist ceremony performed at
the prison. |
March 2000 |
The film Paradise Lost 2:
Revelations premieres on HBO. The film
suggests that John Mark Byers was the actual murderer. |
February 2001 |
Edward Mallett, attorney for
Echols, files a writ of error coram nobis in the Arkansas
Supreme Court, arguing that Echols should never been tried
in 1994 because of his mental condition at the time. |
April 2001 |
The Arkansas Supreme Court
rules that Judge Burnett failed to give sufficient
attention to Echols's arguments in his rejection of
Damien's Rule 37 petition. The Supreme Court sends
the case back to Judge Burnett for further consideration
of the issues presented in the petition. |
2002 |
Devil's Knot: The True Story
of the West Memphis Three, a book by Mara Leveritt,
is published. The book strongly suggests a
miscarriage of justice occurred in the Memphis Three
trials. |
October 2003 |
In an interview with an Arkansas
Times reporter, Vicki Hutcheson says that everything
she told the police was a lie, and suggested that the
police warned her that if she did not cooperate in their
investigation that her child would be taken away. |
2007 |
When DNA collected from
evidence collected at the crime scene is tested, none is
found to match the DNA of Echols, Baldwin, or
Misskelley. A hair found in a knot used to tie up
one of the victims is found to be "not inconsistent with"
Terry Hobbs, stepfather to Stevie Branch. John Mark
Byers tells the media that he now believes the three young
men convicted were innocent. At a Little Rock rally,
Dixie Chicks singer Natalie Maines implies Hobbs was
involved in the killing of his son and the other two
boys. |
July 2008 |
Evidence surfaces that Kent
Arnold, the jury foreman in the Echols and Baldwin trial,
discussed the case with an attorney prior to deliberations
and advocated in the jury room for conviction. |
September 10,
2008 |
Judge Burnett denies the
request for a retrial, holding that the DNA evidence
produced by the defendants was inconclusive. |
November 4,
2010 |
The Arkansas Supreme Court
orders a trial court judge to determine whether newly
discovered DNA evidence or evidence of juror misconduct
justifies either a new trial or exoneration of the three
defendants. |
August 19,
2011 |
Echols, Baldwin, and Misskelley
are released from custody following a deal in which the
three men agreed to admit guilt on murder charges (while
still maintaining their innocence) in exchange for their
release without parole. |
2012 |
The film West of Memphis,
produced by Peter Jackson and directed by Amy Berg,
premiers at the Sundance Film Festival. The film
suggests that Terry Hobbs was likely the murderer of the
three boys. A book by Damien Echols, Life After
Death, is published |