Mark Woodworth crossed a very big hurdle when a Missouri judge urged recently that his conviction be set aside, but the State of Missouri wants him to remain behind bars at the Crossroads Correctional Center in Cameron where he is presently incarcerated.
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Woodworth was appealing a life sentence he received a decade ago for the 1990 murder of 41-year-old Cathy Robertson, his neighbor in rural Chillicothe, and for the shooting of her husband, Lyndel, who survived the attack.
Mark Woodworth’s father Claude and Lyndel Robertson were farming partners. Mark Woodworth was 16 at the time. He was twice convicted of the slaying, in 1995 and in 1999 following an appeal.
A Special Master assigned to the case, Jerry Oxenhandler (Boone County Circuit Judge, for the Missouri Supreme Court), ruled in favor of Woodworth’s release due to multiple "conflicts of interest" in prior trial processes. Oxenhandler said "a manifest injustice" had been done Woodworth and that no jury would have convicted him had there been a balanced investigation.
The state of Missouri through the Missouri Attorney General’s office had 30 days to review the decision and file a reply as to why Mark Woodworth should not be released. The state filed its objections to Oxenhandler’s ruling, legally known as exceptions, on the final day of its 30-day deadline to respond.
The judge can now choose whether to amend his report based on the state’s concerns or take no action. The next step in the case would be a hearing before Missouri’s high court.
Oxenhandler determined state prosecutors failed to provide Woodworth’s attorneys with copies of letters between a Livingston County judge, state and local prosecutors and Lyndel Robertson, that could cast doubt on Woodworth’s guilt.
One of the letters not turned over by state prosecutors described how Lyndel Robertson "was adamant that we charge another young man." That letter was written by the local prosecutor at the time, Doug Roberts, who said he didn’t have solid evidence to charge Woodworth and asked to be removed from the case because of pressure from the judge and Lyndel Robertson to file charges.
From his hospital bed after the shooting, Robertson initially identified his oldest daughter’s abusive ex-boyfriend as the likely shooter, according to court records. But he later testified that he only named that man, who denied involvement, as a possible suspect.
Woodworth’s attorney, Bob Ramsey, criticized the state’s response as more akin to a "public relations firm’s press release" than a legally sound argument. The response doesn’t address Oxenhandler’s concerns about the private investigator who oversaw the murder investigation, he said.
"Here are representatives of the highest law enforcement agency of the state … and they don’t appear to be troubled by any of that in the least," Ramsey said. "Their duty isn’t just to the victims. Their duty is to see that justice has been done."
Woodworth sought a temporary release after Oxenhandler ruled on May 1 that state prosecutors failed to turn over key evidence to Woodworth’s lawyers and overlooked numerous conflicts of interest among prosecutors, judges and law enforcement members. But the high court denied without explanation Woodworth’s bail request, one day after the state Attorney General’s Office filed its legal brief opposing his release.