When Darrill Henry was arrested for murder in 2004, his kids were only eight and six years old — his son was just starting elementary school. One of their most cherished memories was seeing their dad’s face when he arrived to pick them up from school.
Just last month, Darrill Jr., now 22 years old, made the drive to Angola penitentiary to pick his dad up and finally bring him home to reunite with his family after spending nearly 16 years in prison for a crime DNA evidence shows he didn’t commit. So this Father’s Day was a powerful one for the Henry family.
Photo of Darrill (center), with his son Darrill Jr. and daughter Daranika in New Orleans in June 2020. Photo by Claire Bangser/Innocence Project.
Based on the new DNA evidence, in March the same judge who presided over Darrill’s trial in 2011 overturned his conviction. The judge set bail in Darrill’s case in the amount of $400,000. Darrill could continue the fight against this wrongful conviction outside of prison — if his family could raise a non-refundable amount of $48,100 to a bondsman.
Even though we now have DNA evidence showing that Darrill is innocent of this crime, the process for full exoneration is a long one.
He was convicted based on flawed eyewitness identifications made by three neighbors who saw the person who actually committed the crime as he left the scene — a man in a red shirt.
Even though police had a picture of Darrill from the day the crime occurred, police used an old picture of Darrill — from a year before, where he had on a red shirt — to show the eyewitnesses. The first eyewitness, who was closest to the crime scene, was presented with a photo lineup where Darrill and the other participants were similarly dressed, and he did not identify Darrill as the perpetrator. But six years later, after the witness was arrested for a series of crimes and facing 139 charges, he claimed to have suddenly recalled that it was Darrill who he had seen flee the crime scene.
After the first witness failed to identify Darrill in the non-suggestive lineup, police showed the other two eyewitnesses a reconfigured line-up in which this time Darrill was the only person wearing a red shirt — the same color of the shirt they said the perpetrator was wearing. One of these witnesses said she would be able to identify the person she saw if he was wearing the exact same clothing he had on at the time of the crime. The other eyewitness identified Darrill from the photo array after seeing his photograph on television. Eyewitness misidentification like this is the leading contributing factor in wrongful convictions proven through DNA testing.
Darrill maintained his innocence from Day One. In fact, on the day of the crime, he was applying for jobs in a different part of town. But his ability to corroborate his alibi at trial was impacted by the loss of witnesses and records due to Hurricane Katrina — which also contributed to an unprecedented seven years of pre-trial detention.
Multiple jurors from Darrill’s trial exhibited clear racial bias. One juror admitted he had experiences, feelings or impressions about African Americans that would make it difficult for him to be fair and impartial, and later said that Darrill just “looked guilty.” Another juror referred to Darrill’s family members who came to court to support him as “thugs.”
Despite the new DNA evidence that excluded Darrill from the crime scene evidence, the District Attorney’s office is appealing the court’s ruling overturning his conviction and ordering a new trial.
We will keep fighting for Darrill to be fully vindicated of these charges.
The Innocence Project exonerates the wrongly convicted through DNA testing and reforms the criminal justice system to prevent future injustice. www.innocenceproject.org
