A mug shot of Ronnie Rhodes taken after he was arrested for battery in 1978 is believed to be the photo Bruce Elliott used to connect Rhodes to the killing of Cleother Burrell.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
This autopsy diagram shows the 20 stab wounds to Cleother Burrell the night he was killed, Feb. 2, 1981.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
How the apartment building looked at 630 N. Topeka on the night of the killing.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
The stairway leading to the scene of the crime.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
A month after the killing, the owner of a nearby bar found a knife on the roof. Prosecutors would later claim it was the murder weapon, although none of the witnesses could identify it.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
The knife lay among broken glass and other clutter on the roof of the bar.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
A crime lab report from the Kansas Bureau of Investigation said a trace of human blood was found on the knife but not enough to warrant further testing.
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The Chateau Lounge, a block away from the stabbing, is where the knife was found. Several of the men who had been with Burrell at the apartment before the stabbing ended up there afterwards. Its where police arrested Rhodes that night for causing a disturbance.
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Rhodes said after returning from the bar and finding Burrell's body, he noticed drops of blood on the cuffs of his pants after checking out the injured and dying man. Because he was on parole, Rhodes said he panicked and changed clothes in this vacant apartment.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
The clothes were located in a dresser drawer inside the vacant apartment.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
The dresser where Rhodes' clothes were found.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Rhodes found a change of clothes inside Apt. 8.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Inside Apt. 14, where Cleother Burrell stayed with Bruce Elliott, several men were drinking that night, including Ronnie Rhodes.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Although Elliott claimed he saw Burrell being stabbed in the hallway, most of the blood was on the bed.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Elliott said he threw bloody bedding in the kitchen area of his apartment.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
A broken bed rail indicated a struggle on the bed.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Police found covers still on the bed, and blood had soaked through some areas to the mattress.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Pairs of men's shoes were still by the bed.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Empty liquor bottles were scattered throughout the messy apartment.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Bruce Elliott said he was proud of his bowling trophies he displayed in his apartment.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
A bloody print on the wall at the crime scene.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Scuffs on the foot of the door near the apartment.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Blood spatters on the wall of the apartment
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
A blood print around a heating vent.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
A blood rag wadded on the floor near the dead man.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Rhodes said he broke a bottle over Burrell's head during an argument but didn't stab him.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
The back of the apartment building where the stabbing took place, as it looked on Feb. 2, 1981.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Cars parked at the back of the apartment building on Topeka the night of the stabbing.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
An alley leading from the apartment to the Chateau Lounge, where several of the men left to continue drinking, including Rhodes and Elliott.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
A news crew covers the stabbing.
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/ Wichita Police Dept.
Brandon Garrett, professor of law, University of Virginia, has studied more than 200 cases of people who have been convicted of crimes, then exonerated through DNA evidence. He has been able to identify common threads in the cases.
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University of Virginia Law School
Dallas Co. district attorney Craig Watkins leaves a public hearing of the U.S. Sentencing Commission in Austin, Texas on Thursday, Nov. 19, 2009. Watkins asked the federal commission to consider "smart justice", and not just punishment, when sentencing criminals. (AP Photo/Jack Plunkett)
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Jack Plunkett / AP
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