IPTX: Our Client Lydell Grant Has Been Exonerated

Eighteen months after being released from prison, our client Lydell Grant was exonerated last week.

Photo: IPTX

Eighteen months after being released from prison, our client Lydell Grant was exonerated last week.

Lydell was overjoyed at the news, saying “I want to thank IPTX for the time, effort and energy that you guys put into my case. In the years to come I want to be there for IPTX like they were there for me.” Since his release, Lydell has spent his time reconnecting with his family and studying audio engineering at American InterContinental University in Houston.

Lydell’s case is a stark example of how mistaken eyewitnesses and misleading or false expert testimony can lead to a wrongful conviction. In 2012, a jury convicted Lydell and sentenced him to life in prison for of the fatal stabbing of a man outside a Houston bar.

Even though Lydell presented an alibi witness whose testimony showed that he could not have committed the murder, he was convicted largely on the basis of testimony from six eye witnesses.

Read eyewitness expert Dr. Laura Smalarz’s breakdown of how the misidentification in Lydell’s case happened here.

In addition to mistaken eyewitnesses, the Houston Police Department DNA expert at the trial gave false information that the DNA under the victim’s fingernails did not exclude Lydell. IPTX’s Mike Ware and DNA expert Dr. Angie Ambers discuss facts of the case and how DNA eventually cleared Lydell in the most recent report from The International Symposium of Human Identification.

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