Temujin Kensu has insisted for 34 years that he had nothing to do with the murder of a Michigan college student.Temujin Kensu has lived for 34 years behind the walls of Michigan state prisons. In 1987, he was convicted of the murder of a college student in Port Huron and sentenced to life without parole.“There's not one single shred of evidence that I had anything to do with this crime,” Kensu said.
Kensu’s last shot at freedom lies with the state’s yet untested Conviction Integrity Unit. Modeled after efforts launched by local prosecutors to investigate innocence claims, Michigan’s CIU is one of only a handful of state-run units in the nation. That morning, investigators interviewed Macklem’s family members at the hospital, including Merrill. According to case records, her teenage sister told a detective that she and Merrill thought the murderer had to be a man named John Lamar.
“There were really large red flags in the case against Freeman,” he said. “But they just trudged forward, undeterred, because they had some really undying belief that he’s the guy who did it.” Dating Kensu, Merrill said, was “like living in hell.” She testified that he raped, physically abused and psychologically terrorized her.
While she testified, Cleland displayed photographs of martial arts weapons that belonged to Kensu. No one else would testify about any connection between the men, but jurors would hear witness testimony, and statements made by the prosecutor, that Kensu was rude, arrogant and fancied himself a ninja.“Nobody cared that there was no evidence that I had anything to do with this murder,” he said.That was the major flaw in the prosecution’s case: no physical evidence tied him to the crime.
Kensu said he was burning to take the stand in his own defense, but his trial attorney told him he wasn’t allowed to testify. If he had, he would have told jurors that he was some 400 miles away when Macklem was killed. A martial arts studio owner named John Manelli said Kensu stopped into his studio in Escanaba sometime around 12 p.m. on Nov. 5. The men talked for more than an hour, lamenting about how difficult it was to do karate kicks with jeans on. An instructor also testified she had a conversation with Kensu at the studio, at the same time.
According to testimony, detectives searched for evidence that Kensu hired a plane, including poring through airport and airline records in Escanaba and Port Huron. Escanaba’s airport manager found no records of a flight taking off on Nov. 5, the day Macklem was killed, but also said it was “possible” a plane could take off and leave without logging the flight, according to one detective’s testimony.
Prosecutor Mike Wendling has made it clear for years that he believes the police and past prosecutions are never wrong.
After NBC news coverage, why is there NO judicial review on the Conviction Integrity?
Got to be one of the dumbest juries I've ever heard of.
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How many others are in prison under these circumstances?
Prisons are full of innocent people.....Not.