RALEIGH -- George Goode, a man serving two life sentences for a double-murder conviction that initially put him on death row, has asked for a new trial, citing recent revelations about State Bureau of Investigation crime lab problems.
Diane Savage, the lawyer from Chapel Hill representing him, filed a motion in federal court Wednesday seeking relief.
Goode has been in prison for nearly 18 years, convicted of the 1992 killings of Carnell and Margaret Batten, a Johnston County couple who owned a trailer park. Goode has insisted that he was not responsible for the deaths, that he merely witnessed the crime, paralyzed by fear as two others ended the lives of the couple.
At the center of Goode's motion is Duane Deaver, an SBI agent whose work has been under fire in recent months because of his failure to disclose the results of blood tests that could have been favorable to the defense in many criminal cases.
Last year, a federal judge reprimanded Deaver for misleading testimony at Goode's trial because he led a 1993jury to believe that he found blood, when he had only conducted a preliminary test that indicated the possibility of blood.
Though Goode was initially sentenced to death, a federal judge threw out that sentence last year, citing ineffective counsel. In April, Goode was resentenced to two life terms.
In her court filing this week, Savage cited many problems with the SBI crime lab revealed in an audit released in August and an investigative series by The News & Observer.
"The newly discovered evidence is not only new, but shocking, and could not have been anticipated to support any theory or evidence the defense put forth," Savage said in the motion. "The new evidence is material to the case and strikes at the core of the case against Mr. Goode. ... The newly discovered evidence is so damaging to the State, that, had the evidence been developed by skilled counsel, the jury would likely have a reasonable doubt and would have acquitted Mr. Goode."
