QUESTIONS TO ANSWER
There is tragedy enough surrounding the case of Walter E. Ellis, accused _ with the filing of additional charges last Thursday _ of murdering seven women over 21 years. There is the undeniable tragedy of those deaths but two other aspects beg public attention as well.
One of those deaths, that of Ouithreaun Stokes in 2007, might have been prevented if authorities had properly handled DNA samples taken from Ellis in 2001.
And two other men were charged _ one acquitted, another convicted and forced to serve 13 years _ in two other killings in which Ellis' DNA, police say, was found on the victims.
Ellis has not been charged with those crimes but Chaunte Ott _ serving a life sentence when he was released through the efforts of the Wisconsin Innocence Project _ is now suing the city of Milwaukee, two former police chiefs and several detectives for his arrest. The state Department of Corrections says a DNA sample was taken from Ellis while in Oshkosh Correctional Center in 2001. But the State Crime Laboratory says it never received it. That DNA might have been matched to those earlier victims and Stokes might not have been strangled to death in 2007.
The results of a state investigation under way after the Journal Sentinel reported on this cannot be allowed to sit on a shelf. That investigation should probe whether this was part of a systemic problem. Are other killers out there free?
More questions. Authorities have not added the victims whose deaths were pinned on Ott and an acquitted Curtis McCoy to the charges now against Ellis. We don't presume to know the forensic intricacies, but are those deaths not being attributed to Ellis because his DNA sampling on the victims does not make a reasonable case that he was the killer or because other men were charged? We understand about the burden of proof, but is this merely to avoid admitting error because of pending civil legal action?
If it's the latter, that's unacceptable. The public might expect law enforcement to be perfect given the stakes but the reality is that it just can't be, given human error. Justice demands that society _ in whose interest law enforcement acts _ simply own up when mistakes are made and then fix matters. _ MILWAUKEE JOURNAL SENTINEL.
