Missouri Only Allows People on Death Row to Bring Innocence Claims - And Its Attorney General Doesn't Want to Change That

Even after a judge had ordered to free Sandra “Sandy” Hemme, officials from the Missouri Attorney General’s office — known for aggressively opposing exonerations — fought to keep her imprisoned. The office is also fighting changes in state law that would allow state prisoners to bring innocence claims in Missouri, which is unique in that it only allows direct innocence claims for those serving a death sentence, News From the States reports, in a piece published in partnership with The Kansas City Star and The Marshall Project. The state of Missouri could change the death penalty requirement legislatively or through the Missouri Supreme Court – but that changes is also opposed by the state attorney general’s office.

Hemme, now 65, spent 43 years in prison for a crime she said she didn’t commit — the 1980 murder of a woman in St. Joseph, about an hour north of Kansas City. In June 2024, a judge agreed that she was innocent. No physical evidence ever connected Hemme to the crime. Investigators concluded that an officer on the police force was likely responsible for the murder. Sean O’Brien, a Kansas City-based attorney who represented Hemme alongside Innocence Project attorneys, called her case “a failure of everything,” including the St. Joseph police steering the investigation away from one of their own. But because of the state’s stance that only those on death row can bring innocence claims before a court, Hemme’s attorneys successfully alleged constitutional violations — including that police hid evidence of the officer as a better suspect and that her previous attorneys were ineffective.