More than 100 pieces of DNA evidence integral to a rape and manslaughter appeal in Washington County are likely missing, attorneys allege in a recent court filing. The evidence, ranging from a sexual assault kit to fingernail scrapings and strips of masking tape, is tied to the 2002 killing of a 6-year-old girl in Greenville.

If the evidence is lost, attorneys Jacob Howard and Adnan Sultan argue, their client King Young Brown Jr. should have his charges dismissed and his convictions vacated.

Brown is incarcerated in the Marshall County Correctional Facility and serving two consecutive sentences — 30 years for rape and 20 for manslaughter. He was convicted in 2005 of raping and killing the child whom the attorneys refer to as R.W. in their motion. 

It was a day Gloria Brown, King Brown Jr.’s mother, remembers well. She said her life before that day was different. Her son was 15, and had never been arrested before. He will turn 39 in prison next month.

“I may not be behind bars, but I feel like I’m doing the time with him,” Gloria Brown told Mississippi Today.

For many years after the little girl’s death, the family of R.W. held a block party in her honor at H.T. Crosby Park, where she was last seen alive. Addie Cannon, R.W.’s aunt, misses her niece.

Cannon believes the state has the right man behind bars. 

“She was just a little shy child,” Cannon recalled. “I will always remember the way she said, ‘Hey auntie, come give me a hug.’”

Brown Jr.’s attorneys are appealing his convictions and hope a new analysis of the evidence will help to clear their client’s name. They write that as recently as Aug. 29, 2023, the Washington County Circuit Clerk’s Office in Greenville had the evidence. 

On Sept. 16, Washington County Circuit Court Judge Richard A. Smith ordered Circuit Clerk Barbara Esters-Parker to ship the evidence within 30 days to Bode Technology, a Virginia-based company that provides forensic DNA analysis, including newer methods such as Touch DNA and Y-STR testing. Smith’s order also required Esters-Parker to email a copy of the shipping receipt.

But in a Nov. 6 court filing, Howard and Sultan allege that Esters-Parker can’t account for the evidence or the other exhibits.

“More than thirty (30) days have passed since the Court issued its Order and the Clerk has failed to ship the specified biological evidence to Bode Technology,” the attorneys wrote.

Esters-Parker and Deputy Clerk Cynthia Lakes declined to comment because of pending litigation.

If the evidence is not located, the attorneys argued, the court should vacate Brown Jr.’s convictions and drop the related charges, the attorneys wrote. 

On April 21, 2002, R.W. was found dead in a garbage bin that belonged to her grandmother’s neighbors — Brown Jr.  and his family. Brown Jr. was tried three times for the crimes. The first two trials resulted in hung juries. At the third trial, after over 13 hours of deliberation, a jury found Brown Jr. guilty of rape and manslaughter. 

“We remain hopeful that Mr. Brown will have the opportunity to establish his innocence through the DNA testing ordered by the circuit court,” said Sultan, an attorney at The Innocence Project who focuses on securing DNA testing for post-conviction cases and overturning wrongful convictions. Howard, senior counsel for the Mississippi office of the MacArthur Justice Center, also focuses on wrongful convictions.

Modern DNA testing

In their motion, Howard and Sultan said, “Law enforcement collected a wealth of biological evidence in this case that has never been subjected to DNA testing or that can be re-tested using more advanced technology.”

None of the hairs collected from Brown Jr.’s home that underwent microscopic comparison were linked to Webster or her “material relatives” the attorneys wrote. “The results of this testing were never presented to a jury.”

The prosecution’s case against Brown Jr. hinged on the testimony of a hair follicle expert who compared microscopic hairs found at the Brown home to those of the victim, the court filing reads.

There is also controversy over the accuracy of microscopic hair comparison. In 2016, then-FBI Director James Comey wrote in a letter that FBI examiners made statements about the analysis that “went beyond the limits of science,” putting “more weight on a hair comparison than scientifically appropriate.”

In 1999, a Justice Department task force found that 96% of 150 cases involving microscopic hair analysis had flaws. In 2009, the National Academy of Science announced that microscopic hair analysis had “no scientific support.” After Innocence Project co-founder Peter Neufeld asked the FBI to review cases in which microscopic hair analysis had been used in evidence, the FBI established that every member of the agency’s 28-person hair and fiber unit had given flawed testimony in the 268 convictions that were reviewed. 

“In several cases in which microscopic hair comparison evidence was introduced, defendants were later exonerated by DNA after being convicted,” Comey wrote. “We want to make sure there aren’t other innocent people in jail based on our work.”

In R.W.’s case, the state did not submit for modern DNA analysis of any of the DNA evidence nor did prosecutors present it to a jury.

The analyst who inspected the fingernail scrapings from R.W.’s killing in 2005 conceded it was difficult then to make an accurate identification of the perpetrator given the capabilities of technology at that time. Modern DNA testing doesn’t require as large of a DNA sample to get a result. 

Some DNA testing was not used at Brown Jr.’s trial because the defense received the results too late to review them and get an expert in court, according to Howard’s and Sultan’s recent motion.

Earlier this year, on April 8, Assistant District Attorney Austin Frye  responded to a motion for post-conviction DNA testing by listing evidence he said was already presented to the jury including Brown Jr.’s fingerprints on both the outer ring of the garbage bag and garbage bags at his home, and DNA analysis results that proved Brown Jr.’s hairs matched those found in the inner and outer garbage bags of where R.W. was found. He also touted the results of microscopic hair comparison, and he said further DNA testing would not exonerate Brown Jr.

Frye did not address the issue that none of the hairs the state submitted from Brown Jr.’s home matched the victim or any of her material relatives. Frye could not be reached for comment by the time of publication.

Sultan and Howard explained that it would make logical sense that Brown Jr.’s hairs and fingerprints would be found in a garbage bin he along with his family used regularly.

A “wealth” of biological evidence suitable for modern DNA testing became available after Brown Jr.’s 2005 trial, said Huma Nasir, an expert the defense team retained who is a director at a private DNA analysis lab in Oklahoma City.

Howard and Sultan’s Nov. 6 motion asks the Washington County Circuit Court for a hearing to determine the chain of custody of the evidence and to have the circuit clerk and deputy clerk testify under oath.

A 2009 Mississippi law mandates preservation of all biological evidence in criminal cases with the court instructed to “impose appropriate remedies” and “order appropriate sanctions” in the case of violation. The law was amended in 2011 to clarify that when biological evidence needed to be destroyed, the incarcerated and their attorney should be notified along with other interested parties.

“Innocent people mistakenly convicted of the serious crimes for which biological evidence is probative cannot prove their innocence if such evidence is not accessible for testing in appropriate circumstances,” read the 2009 law.

Two decades of difficult memories

When R.W.’s killing made headlines in 2002, both the victim’s family and that of the accused were thrust into the media spotlight. The two families had been next-door neighbors for more than two decades.

For Gloria Brown, King Young Brown Jr.’s mother, the news of potentially missing evidence felt like a blow. She hopes that he will win his appeal. She and his stepfather say they were with Brown Jr. the night R.W. was killed. 

“I felt that it was the end for me, and didn’t feel like I’d survive it,” Gloria Brown said of her son’s trials and convictions. “But I had a lot of family support that helped me. I didn’t think I’d be able to be this strong.”

She says it was hard to watch the police search her home after the murder. Her late husband, King Brown Sr., was a well-respected city councilman in Greenville and known as a peacekeeper during contentious council meetings. She wasn’t accustomed to the scrutiny.

The recent motion about the missing evidence has also dredged up difficult memories for Cannon, R.W.’s aunt. She still remembers the mints that her sister, R.W.’s mother, would bring from Sonic Drive-In. Her niece loved them. Cannon also still remembers the scream she believes was hers on the night R.W. disappeared. 

Cannon remembers the shock of identifying her niece’s body over two decades ago. She is wary of the defense’s push to vacate King Young Brown Jr.’s conviction if the evidence is not located. 

“When my sister passed, that’s when it really took a big toll on me because I know that’s [the killing of R.W.] why she was sick,” Cannon said of R.W.’s other aunt. “And it’s still terrible, just the idea of him thinking that he needs to get out. You don’t need to be in the free world if you can do a child like that. You don’t need to be here.”

Correction 11/24/25: This story has been updated to reflect that attorneys for King Young Brown Jr. want the Washington County Circuit Court to dismiss the charges against him and vacate his convictions if the DNA evidence collected in the case cannot be located.