New Analysis Shows Freed Man's DNA On Rape Victim's Sheet

Joseph Lamont Abbitt Freed In 2009; Case Now In DA's Hands

POSTED: 11:12 am EDT October 6, 2010
UPDATED: 12:19 pm EDT October 6, 2010

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WINSTON-SALEM, N.C. -- Additional DNA testing in the case of a man whose 1995 rape conviction was overturned has showed his DNA actually did exist on evidence from the crime scene, Winston-Salem police said Wednesday.Joseph Lamont Abbitt was released from prison last September after DNA testing determined his DNA wasn't present at the crime scene.On Wednesday, police said new technology used to analyze the evidence showed Abbitt's DNA on a flat sheet from one of the victim's beds.The findings have now been turned over to Forsyth County district attorney Jim O'Neil. A call to O'Neil wasn't immediately returned.Police said evidence from the crime scene, including a comforter, two sheets, a pillow case and a wash cloth, was given to the State Bureau of Investigation for hair analysis in October, 2009.The evidence was then turned over to the Forensic Identity Section of Laboratory Corporation of America (LabCorp) in June for more advanced DNA testing. Police said the analysis done by LabCorp turned up new hairs on the comforter, as well as nuclear DNA belonging to Abbitt on the sheet. The LabCorp analysis was completed in July, police said."That is a significant find and a significant change in the course of events," Winston-Salem Police Chief Scott Cunningham said Wednesday morning. Cunningham said police are attempting to contact Abbitt, who remains free.

Joseph Abbitt during an interview with WXII shortly after his release in September, 2009. More

Abbitt was convicted in 1995 in the rape of a 15-year-old girl and her 13-year-old sister.The crime happened early on the morning of May 2, 1991, while the girls’ mother was at a boyfriend’s house for the night, leaving the girls unattended, according to a report from the Forsyth County District Attorney. The two girls were bound and raped at knifepoint.The girls told police they thought the attacker was someone in the neighborhood named "Joseph."Additional investigation revealed that Abbitt had been charged with two prior rapes in the late '80s. The district attorney’s office at the time reduced both charges to misdemeanor assault on a female.Abbitt pleaded guilty to the reduced charges in both cases. The district attorney said the similarity between the two prior rape cases and the 1991 rape led them to Abbitt, who lived two doors down from the victims, as the primary suspect in the later case.When officers attempted to locate Abbitt for arrest and questioning, they learned that the he had fled to Texas, where he was serving time for other crimes.Abbitt didn't testify, but said he had been at work the morning of the attack. His employer couldn't verify that detail. The girls, who had picked Abbitt out of a lineup, identified him as their attacker during the trial in 1991.The jury convicted him of two consecutive life sentences, plus 50 years.The 2009 reanalysis of a vaginal swab taken from the older victim showed DNA from the victim, the victim's boyfriend and from another male who was not Abbitt.Abbitt's case was one of 2,100 cases that had been reanalyzed, but it was the only one to have a conviction overturned as part of the program in conjunction with the Center on Actual Innocence, which spearheaded the reanalysis of the DNA evidence in the cases.Abbitt's release was the second case in five years where a person convicted of a crime in Winston-Salem was exonerated by DNA evidence.Darryl Hunt was freed in 2004 after serving more than 19 years in prison in the death of Deborah Sykes. Sykes, a newspaper copy editor, was raped and murdered in 1984.Abbitt spoke with WXII shortly after his release last year saying he planned to get in touch with the victims."Right now, I think it's best for me to stay away, but my prayers will always be with them," Abbitt said.Abbitt was most recently working with Hunt's Darryl Hunt Project, which helps incarcerated people who have been convicted of crimes they didn't commit. WXII attempted to contact representatives with the group, but was unsuccessful.