Georgetown law program hopes to exonerate man serving life for killing his wife
A Georgetown law program is stepping in to help lead exoneration efforts for an 81-year-old Kansas City, Missouri, man serving life in prison for the 1990 fatal shooting of his wife.
In 1991, Ken Middleton was convicted of first-degree murder and armed criminal action in the shooting death of his wife a year earlier. He was sentenced to life without parole, plus 200 years.
Middleton's son said his father deserves freedom due to alleged prosecutorial misconduct and a local judge ruling two decades ago that vacated his sentence and ordered a new trial based on a series of irregularities that made his original trial unconstitutional. Despite evidence the judge cited in her motion, her ruling was overturned.
Middleton has remained behind bars due to a technicality in Missouri state law that gave jurisdiction in the case to the Missouri Court of Appeals, and not with the Jackson County circuit court, where his case was tried.
However, Middleton has remained behind bars due to a technicality in Missouri state law that gave jurisdiction in the case to the Missouri Court of Appeals, and not with the Jackson County circuit court, where his case was tried.
Middleton said he is innocent and that his wife, Kathy, shot herself by accident while he was sleeping.
This month, Middleton learned his case will be taken up by Georgetown University’s “Making an Exoneree” program.
In January, a team consisting of undergraduates, law school students, faculty and staff will focus on the Middletown case by traveling to Missouri to conduct interviews with Middleton and witnesses, and pouring over legal documents spanning the 34 years since his trial. The team will conclude its work by producing a short documentary to showcase its findings.
“We think the case is very promising and has all the hallmarks of a wrongful conviction,” program co-founder Marc Howard told ABC News.
The Georgetown program represents a consortium of five participating universities and has resulted in 13 prison releases since its launch in 2018. Besides Georgetown, the other partners are New York University, Princeton University, the University of California, Santa Cruz, and Rice University in Houston.
The announcement has given Middleton’s family renewed hope.
“We finally have hope that my father’s innocence will be recognized and justice will prevail,” his son, Cliff Middleton, said in a statement.
Ken Middleton has filed multiple appeals over the years, all of which have been denied.
In September, Jackson County, Missouri, prosecutor Melesa Johnson denied his petition for postconviction relief.
In a letter shared with ABC News, Johnson said that her office does not believe that “there is clear and convincing evidence of a constitutional violation” regarding his original trial.
According to the National Registry of Exonerations, a project jointly operated by the University of California at Irvine, Michigan State University, and the University of Michigan, exonerations nationwide have been steadily rising, from 24 in 1989 to 147 in 2024. Over the last 35 years, 55 people have been exonerated in Missouri.
