At Dewey’s trial in 1996, the prosecution relied on the DNA results from testing the blood on Dewey’s shirt, emphasizing that the profile was consistent with the victim’s blood. The prosecution also emphasized Dewey’s suspicious actions during the initial stages of the investigation. Dewey continued to assert that the blood on his shirt was his own blood, not the victim’s, and he argued that the real perpetrator was the person who left semen on the blanket and male DNA under the victim’s fingernails. The prosecutors countered this by arguing that there must have been a second perpetrator who assisted Dewey in committing the crime.
The jury found Dewey guilty of first-degree murder and sexual assault. He was given a life sentence with no possibility of parole. At his sentencing hearing, Dewey warned the judge, ‘There is still a killer out there.’
Dewey’s conviction was affirmed in his initial appeals. The Innocence Project began working on Dewey’s case in 2007 when Dewey and his appointed post-conviction counsel, Danyel Joffe, reached out to the Innocence Project for assistance. In late 2009, Joffe and the Innocence Project discovered that Forensic Analytical Sciences retained DNA extracts from the pretrial DNA testing of the blood on Dewey’s shirt. FAS re-tested this evidence using more advanced methods, and this testing definitively excluded the victim as a source of the blood on Dewey’s shirt. Furthermore, the DNA from the semen from the blanket matched the DNA from the victim’s fingernail scrapings, neither of which matched Dewey.
The Innocence Project and Joffe brought this evidence to the attention of the Colorado Attorney General’s Justice Review Project — a grant-funded organization tasked with reviewing cases in which DNA evidence could lead to exonerations. The project agreed to retest several additional items of evidence at the Colorado Bureau of Investigation laboratory. This testing confirmed the results from FAS and developed a DNA profile suitable for comparison to the CODIS DNA databank. The comparison yielded a ‘hit’ to another man in the database.
That man was already serving a life sentence for a 1989 home invasion rape and murder in Fort Collins. After an extensive investigation by the Mesa County Prosecutor, the Colorado Attorney General, the Mesa County Sheriff’s Department, and the Colorado Bureau of Investigation, concluded that Dewey was innocent and that the actual perpetrator was the man whose semen and DNA was left at the crime scene.
On April 30, 2012, Joffe, the Innocence Project, and the Mesa County District Attorney’s Office jointly filed a motion to vacate Dewey’s conviction. The Court granted the motion and declared Dewey innocent. That same day, the Court issued an arrest warrant for the actual perpetrator. Innocence Project online article
DEWILD, DANIEL: Evil Twins TV -
Identical twins Daniel and David DeWild were inseparable as children. But as adults they find themselves connected by something sinister. The Twins vowed to take a dark secret to their grave until a shocking betrayal turns one twin against another. Evil Twins s2e7: Mile High Monsters, Discovery 2015
The victim is Edgewater resident Heather DeWild, a thirty-year-old mother, who went missing six weeks earlier. ibid.
DHILLON, TRIMAAN: Trevor McDonald TV - Murdered By: My Stalker TV - Faking It: Tears of a Crime TV - Britain’s Most Evil Killers TV - The Murder of Alice Ruggles: The Social Media Murders TV -
‘Alice! Alice! Oh my God, she’s dead, she’s dead!’ Trevor McDonald, An Hour to Catch a Killer, ITV 2017
On the evening of October 12th 2016, 24-year-old Alice Ruggles is discovered by her flatmate at home in Gateshead; she has suffered a serious wound to the neck. At 7.30 p.m. Alice is pronounced dead. ibid.
We follow homicide detectives during their ‘golden hour’. ibid.
20:00 search for ex-boyfriend [Trimaan Dhillon]. ibid.
A positive test for Alice’s blood will prove Dhillon’s guilt beyond all reasonable doubt. ibid.
12 October 2016: My flatmate’s covered in blood in the bathroom … Oh my God! Murdered By s1e1: My Stalker: The Killing of Alice Ruggles, Maxine’s 999 call, Channel 5 2018
‘I’m not intending to kill you.’ ibid. stalker boyfriend
Newcastle the evening of 12 October 2016: The prime suspect is Alice’s ex-boyfriend, 25-years-old soldier Trimaan Dhillon. ibid.
In 2017 the police recorded a record number of 8,364 cases of stalking. ibid.
October 2016: Police are called to an emergency at a house in Gateshead, near Newcastle. When police arrived they found 24-year-old Alice Ruggles had been murdered in her own home. Faking It: Tears of a Crime s6e2: Trimaan Dhillon
She met a soldier on active service. His name, Trimaan Dhillon. ibid.
‘He would bombard her with messages on her answer machine.’ ibid. journalist
We know that four indicators that when you put those together his denial here is a confession. ibid. Cliff
‘A previous girlfriend had been forced to take out a restraining order against him.’ ibid. journalist
On October 12th 2016 24-year-old Alice Ruggles left work with a colleague who drove her home to her apartment in Gateshead in Newcastle. She would never be seen alive again. When Alice arrived home from work someone was waiting for her: her ex-boyfriend Trimaan Harry Dhillon, a man she had rejected. Britain’s Most Evil Killers s6e2: Trimaan Harry Dhillon, Sky Crime 2021
‘Hi there, I just need a bit of advice really. I split up with my boyfriend about three months ago. He’s been sending me a lot of messages even though I’ve asked him not to contact me. I know that he’s hacked into my Facebook and also my phone … The Murder of Alice Ruggles: The Social Media murders, ITV 2023
Gateshead 13th October 2016: Police have launched a murder investigation after the body of a Leicestershire woman was discovered in Gateshead. ibid. news
An act of utter barbarism. ibid.
We just didn’t realise the danger she was in. ibid. dad
He inserted himself physically into her life. ibid. friend
I can’t just turn her off in my head. ibid. Harry to rozzer
DIALLO, AMADOU: Trial by Media: 41 Shots TV -
Amadou Diallo, 1999: This was a police slaughter. Trial by Media s1e3: 41 Shots, civil rights commentator, Netflix 2020
41 gun shots at an unarmed West African immigrant. ibid. television news
This is the second protest in three days in New York City. ibid.
This is the worst form of police brutality that I have ever seen or heard of. ibid. Reverend Al Sharpton
A troubling venue change. ibid. newspaper headline