Terron Chavis awaits hearing to prove his innocence

The Crime

On March 5, 2004, a woman was nursing her five-week-old daughter when she heard a knock at the front door. A man asked about cutting lumber from the adjacent property, then displayed a gun and forced his way in.

The victim said that the man retrieved a knife from the kitchen and ordered her to go to the bedroom. There, the assailant forced the victim to engage in oral sex and unprotected vaginal intercourse, followed by intercourse using a condom. Afterwards, the assailant asked for all of the victim’s money. The victim replied that she only had $25, so the assailant forced her to drive herself, her baby, and the assailant to an ATM to withdraw more money. The assailant was still armed with both the gun and knife and remained in the car with the baby when the victim sent to the ATM. After telling the victim to swear that she would not tell anyone what happened, the assailant left. Hours later, the victim called her husband, who then called the police.

When the police arrived, they took a statement from the victim and searched the house as well as the surrounding area. The victim was later taken to the hospital for a sexual assault evaluation. During the examination, three hours after police were initially called, the victim provided another statement with details not included in the initial report, including the important fact that she recognized her rapist as a friend of step-daughter’s. She also added that when the assailant first entered the house, he put on plastic, food service gloves which he wore throughout the assault. The victim also said that when she and the assailant struggled after returning to the house, the assailant cut his pinky finger with the knife and she could see blood inside the glove. Finally, the victim described the assailant as being a black male, 5’7”-5’8” and about 120 pounds, noting that he was not much bigger than her.

Terron was a 6’1” and 155-pound high school football player. When law enforcement came to his house and asked him to come to the station, he agreed to go, but said he had to return his dog to his grandfather’s house first. While doing so, the dog nipped Terron’s pinky finger. Terron recalled the deputy saying, “he got you, didn’t he?” This comment was later confirmed at trial.

Terron was taken to the police station and questioned by law enforcement. Detectives held up a video cassette and told Terron that they had him on video at the ATM. Terron denied any involvement and insisted that he had not even left the neighborhood that day, and certainly had not raped and robbed anyone. Nevertheless, law enforcement arrested Terron and charged him with rape, robbery, kidnapping, and breaking and entering. As part of the arrest, Terron provided blood, hair, and saliva samples.

Three days later, a pair of plastic gloves with blood inside was discovered in a ditch in the front of the victim’s home. The victim’s husband claimed that he let their dog out and the dog immediately went to the ditch. The husband followed the dog and saw the gloves lying on top of the grass. He called law enforcement, and detectives came and collected the gloves. The ditch where the gloves were discovered was part of the area that law enforcement previously searched with scent dogs on the day of the crime.

Evidence Collected

Law enforcement collected various items from in and around the victim’s home, including the bed sheet and pillowcases, and eventually the plastic gloves. Law enforcement also collected a rape kit from the victim. No physical evidence from inside the victim’s home matched to Terron. However, the blood inside the plastic gloves was DNA tested and found to match to Terron’s DNA.

Trial

Before trial, the State made several plea offers, including one that would have resulted in only a ten-year prison sentence. Terron refused each offer, saying that he could not plead guilty to something he did not do. At trial, the State’s case rested largely on the victim’s testimony and the DNA match to the bloody glove. Terron was found guilty of rape, armed robbery, kidnapping, and breaking and entering, and sentenced to between thirty-five and forty-six years in prison.

Postconviction

In 2011, Terron applied to have some of the evidence DNA tested using new, more sensitive methods than were available at the time of the initial investigation. A judge ordered that DNA testing be performed on the bed sheet, pillowcases, and victim’s rape kit. Testing on the bed sheet and pillow cases revealed a DNA mixture from which Terron was excluded. However, inexplicably, the rape kit was not tested.

Subsequently, Terron sought advanced DNA testing on the blood in the gloves. It was discovered that after the trial, despite a court order requiring that the gloves be preserved, the gloves had been destroyed both in violation of the order and statutory law.

In 2022, the Center had the rape kit analyzed using sensitive DNA testing that specificially identifies male DNA skin cells. Despite the fact that there was allegedly unprotected vaginal penetration, the testing found no male DNA in the rape kit.

In 2023, the results of the testing on the bed sheet and pillowcases as well as the recept rape kit testing were presented at a hearing. Although Terron was excluded from the bed sheet and pillowcase mixture and no male DNA was found in the rape kid, the judge determined the results were “unfavorable” and dismissed Terron’s claim. That decision is being appealed.

Fortunately, there were other claims supporting Terron’s innocence, and the Center has also filed a postconviction motion on his behalf raising claims relating to favorable information that was not disclosed by the State, ineffective representation by his trial attorney, and the State’s unlawful destruction of critical evidence. An evidentiary hearing on those claims in scheduled for September 2024.