Since Beach's executive clemency hearing wrapped up in Deer Lodge earlier this month, board members have slogged through hours of conflicting testimony and hundreds of case documents. Last week, the board's workload was augmented when Beach's defense attorney and the state prosecutors fighting his appeal submitted their own discordant closing arguments, with each side advocating or disputing Beach's claims of innocence in writing.
Given the extraordinary volume of information to consider, board members will not announce a clemency decision any time soon, according to executive director Craig Thomas.
“There won't be any decisions until after the board has a chance to hear public testimony at the second hearing,” Thomas said.
The initial hearing began on June 13 and spanned three days, adjourning just one day shy of the 28th anniversary of Kim Nees' brutal murder in Poplar. Attorneys on both sides called a total of 24 witnesses to address Beach's appeal for executive clemency, which could come in the form of a pardon or commutation of his sentence.
The August hearing will rely solely on character witnesses and comments from the public to either support or oppose the no-parole stipulation of Beach's 100-year prison sentence. Beach's family members, friends and fellow inmates will all have an opportunity to speak at the hearing, tentatively set to take place at the Powell County Courthouse.
Beach has been in prison for more than 23 years for bludgeoning Nees, his high school classmate and neighbor, to death. He was convicted at the age of 22 on the basis of a confession he's since maintained was false and coerced by detectives in Louisiana.
His defense team, which includes a New Jersey advocacy group that works to free wrongly convicted inmates, argues that much of the confession doesn't match key evidence found at the murder scene in Poplar, including Beach's descriptions of what Nees was wearing and how he disposed of the body.
Meanwhile, prosecutors at the Attorney General's Office say the confession corroborates too many accurate details to be false. The confession's credibility has also been upheld all the way to the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
For board members to recommend a pardon, they must agree with Beach that the confession was false and coerced. But to deny parole, they would have to discount compelling new evidence turned up by investigators from the advocacy group, called Centurion Ministries. They would also have to dismiss the testimony of witnesses who say two Poplar women, Sissy Atkinson and Maude Grayhawk, have admitted that it was not Beach who attacked and killed Nees, but a group of vengeful women.
On the final day of the hearing, board chairman Vance Curtiss, who authorized the rare clemency hearing, told Beach that board members were charged with an onerous task. Curtiss said it wasn't easy to make sense of so much extensive testimony from two dozen sources.
“I have not made up my mind at this point in time,” he said to Beach. “Whatever comes out of this hearing, we want you to understand we have taken in a lot of information.”
Beach, who testified at his own hearing, said he only confessed to the murder after an exhausting interrogation. Throughout the interrogation, Beach said, detectives threatened and lied to him until he finally “broke weak.”
“I made the worst mistake of my life,” he said.
But Assistant Attorney General Mike Wellenstein prodded Beach about his testimony, expressing skepticism about the man's claim that he doesn't specifically remember giving the 1983 confession.
“The quality of the evidence Beach presented to the board to support this theory is suspect,” according to the state's closing argument. “In one form or another, since his conviction, Beach has been arguing that his confession was coerced and later added the allegation it was false. Every court that has considered his claim has rejected it.”
However, Beach's attorney leans on testimony that lent credence to a decades-old rumor that a gang of women lured Nees to a clearing along the Poplar River, a spot where locals gathered for drinking parties.
“For nearly one-quarter century, Barry Beach has sat in prison for a murder he did not commit,” Camiel wrote in his closing arguments. “An array of credible new witnesses have now come forward despite their own personal fears and hardships. Each witness came forward separately and independently of each other at great inconvenience and under very stressful conditions. None of these witnesses have received any benefit to themselves. This board would have to disbelieve each and every one of these witnesses in order to make a finding that Barry Beach has not proven his innocence.”
The Board of Pardons and Parole faces an imposing duty as it assesses the lengthy hearing, weighs conflicting testimony and decides whether to believe a convicted murderer. But they'll also consider the pain endured by the victim's family as Beach's case has been scrutinized through the years.
To assist readers with their understanding of the case, the Missoulian has posted several documents on the Missoulian.com Web site. There, readers will find Beach's tape-recorded confession and closing arguments from both sides.
Reporter Tristan Scott can be reached at 523-5264 or at tscott@missoulian.com
Barry Beach documents
Barry Beach's confession, recorded in January 1983 by detectives in Monroe, La.(478KB)
Closing arguments submitted in writing to the Montana Board of Pardons and Parole by Barry Beach's attorney, Peter Camiel(1.36MB)
Closing arguments submitted in writing to the Montana Board of Pardons and Parole by Assistant Attorneys General Mike Wellenstein and Tammy Plubell(98.6KB)
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