Judge orders bond release for murder defendant in bite-mark evidence case

A judge late Thursday, July 16, ordered a $250,000 security bond that allows for the release of a 61-year-old murder defendant who had a 1991 conviction tossed out because of discredited bite-mark evidence.

Robert Wallace Lyons will be free from custody for the first time since his 1989 arrest in connection with the death of 24-year-old Lori Stabenow, found lifeless in a downtown Eugene motel where both she and Lyons had been staying.

Lane County jurors in 1990 heard testimony about bite marks on Stabenow’s body matching the bite of Lyons, a type of analysis now listed among “discredited forensic science disciplines” under a state law that took effect this year and directly led to Lyons having his 1991 conviction vacated.

Janis Puracal, executive director and an attorney for the Portland-based Forensic Justice Project, provided the judge’s order Thursday night to Lookout Eugene-Springfield. The document has a time stamp of 5:15 p.m. Thursday and was provided Thursday evening to attorneys, Puracal said.

Charges remain in place against Lyons, with attorneys at a Wednesday pre-trial release court hearing offering opposing views on the remaining evidence in the case. Deputy District Attorney Matthew Wojcik accused defense attorneys of “mischaracterizing” the importance of the bite-mark analysis, also known as odontology, in the case against Lyons.

“The defense is characterizing the odontology as the main evidence in this case, which is absolutely not true,” Wojcik said Wednesday.

Defense attorney Caitlin Plummer argued that evidence such as two hairs from a person with the same “gene type” as Lyons that were found on Stabenow’s body could be explained by “consensual physical contact between Mr. Lyons and Ms. Stabenow” during a night of drinking.

State law says when a person has been charged with murder, “release shall be denied when the proof is evident or the presumption strong that the person is guilty.”

In his 13-page ruling Thursday, Lane County Circuit Court Judge Jay McAlpin wrote: “Because there is no direct evidence of Mr. Lyons’ guilt and the circumstantial evidence presented at the release hearing does not strongly indicate Mr. Lyons’ guilt, the state has failed to meet its burden” under the law.

Before being released, Lyons must provide $25,000, or 10% of the bond amount. McAlpin also ordered electronic home monitoring for Lyons, who must reside at an address proposed as part of a reentry plan presented by defense attorneys. 

Plummer said Wednesday that Lyons has “community support,” and documents submitted to the court refer to support from the nonprofit Oregon Justice Network.

“Mr. Lyons from the very beginning has maintained his innocence,” Plummer said. “He has done so for 37 years. He has been very consistent.”

‘Important context’

McAlpin described three crime lab reports, two from 1990 and and one from 2011, as establishing that a “large amount of physical evidence,” including human hair and blood, was collected from the crime scene.

Among the evidence presented was “conclusive evidence that Mr. Lyons’ DNA was found on Ms. Stabenow’s fingernail,” McAlpin wrote. 

But McAlpin also considered testimony from Lyon’s 1990 trial, which defense attorneys provided excerpts from as part of Wednesday’s court hearing.

McAlpin wrote that there is “strong direct evidence that Mr. Lyons and Ms. Stabenow had consensual physical contact at some point prior to the murder. And that physical contact included some degree of closeness and intimacy.”

“The uncontroverted evidence at the original trial was that Ms. Stabenow sat on Mr. Lyons’ lap and gave him a ‘quick kiss,’” McAlpin wrote. “This direct evidence gives important context to the only circumstantial evidence that the state presented at the release hearing.”

Circumstantial evidence requires some reasoning to draw a conclusion, unlike direct evidence such as a confession or possibly eyewitness statements or video images.

Unclear evidence

According to court documents from years earlier, investigators found evidence Stabenow had been fatally strangled and sexually assaulted, and police found Lyons’ wallet beneath her bed.

But while Wojcik, in the court hearing, referred to Lyons’ wallet being found beneath the bed, McAlpin said in his order that the evidence provided to him failed to make that clear.

McAlpin wrote that a “hand-drawn diagram of the crime scene” had the word “wallet” written in parenthesis, but no evidence provided tied the item to Lyons. Another piece of evidence provided “lists the items collected from around the bed.” The list did not include a wallet, although it did include “a small credit card-sized plastic pouch,” McAlpin wrote.

The judge concluded that “there is no evidence in either exhibit that ties that item or items to Mr. Lyons.”

Referring to crime lab reports by how they were numbered as exhibits for Wednesday’s hearing, McAlpin wrote that “neither Exhibit 2 nor Exhibit 3 described the process by which it was determined that a couple of public hairs among the many collected were ‘similar and consistent’ with Mr. Lyons.”

McAlpin also said other statements in the reports could not be fully understood.

“Similarly, the evidence that the bite mark swab showed a ‘Type A substance’ and that Mr. Lyons is ‘major blood group A and a secretor’ seems like it might be important information. But the state did not present any evidence or testimony to the court to explain what those words mean, or how important or unimportant those facts are,” McAlpin wrote.

During Wednesday’s hearing, Plummer argued that a dentist who created a model from Lyons’ teeth placed it on the bite marks found on Stabenow’s body, thereby contaminating the collection of saliva.

McAlpin wrote that it was “possible that some of Mr. Lyons’ saliva was transferred from the impression to the model.”

He added: “It is possible, based on the crime scene log, that the model of Mr. Lyons’ teeth was place on the bite marks prior to the swab samples being collected from the bite marks, thereby contaminating the swabs.”

“The entirety of the state’s evidence that was presented at the release hearing is: Mr. Lyons’ DNA on Ms. Stabenow’s fingernail, some hairs that may or may not belong to Mr. Lyons’ and saliva that also may or may not be Mr. Lyons’ saliva,” McAlpin wrote.

He added: “The court has already discussed the state’s failure to present testimony to explain the scientific evidence it submitted but it is worth highlighting that in this murder case in a release hearing in which the state bares the burden of proof and the only evidence potentially connecting the defendant to the crime is scientific in nature, the state presented scientific conclusions with no supporting or supplemental testimony.”

Public safety risk

McAlpin wrote that in addition to evidence of Lyons’ guilt, he also considered any danger posed by his release. As with evidence of guilty, the state must also provide a “factual basis” for denying release, McAlpin wrote.

“In this case, the only evidence the state submitted regarding Mr. Lyons’ danger of physical violence or sexual victimization are the seven photos of Ms. Stabenow’s body,” McAlpin wrote, calling the photos “shocking.”

“Even nearly forty years later, any feeling person should feel shock and horror when faced with Ms. Stabenow’s murder and sympathy for the impact this crime had on her friends and family,” McAlpin wrote.

But while the photos “present clear and convincing evidence that the person who committed this crime is a danger to the community,” McAlpin wrote, “the evidence presented by the state in this hearing does not establish by clear and convincing evidence that the person who committed this offense is Mr. Lyons.”