Woman teacher free after term for rape

Seattle – She has traded the red jail coveralls worn by felons for street clothes and her former cell at the Regional Justice Center for a residence on a street of trim older homes near Seattle's Seward Park. With the end of her 180-day jail sentence for raping a former student whose child she bore, Mary Kay LeTourneau is free. She now begins a court-ordered,
three-year treatment program and must live with the label "sex offender."

Two innocent brothers spend 13 years in prison

The blood of a dead man now has answered the biggest question surrounding a 14 year old rape case.

The Mahal brothers of Alabama, who had served 13 years in prison, were released on bond December 1, 1997 after a judge threw out their 1984 rape convictions. Recent DNA tests proved that neither brother could have contributed semen evidence that was collected in 1983 after Pamela Pope was raped.

Another DNA test now shows that the semen taken from Ms. Pope was from a former lover who died five years ago. Because of the new information, the prosecution plans to retry the brothers and will maintain that one of them raped Ms. Pope but left no semen.

Ms. Pope could not be reached for comment on this latest development in the case. Prosecutor Green said she is in a local hospital undergoing treatment for emotional stress brought on by the hearing.

"We certainly wish that she had come forward with the information about this man in 1983," the Mahal brother's attorney said. "She sat in a courtroom, watching the Mahans being prosecuted, knowing that the semen could have belonged to someone else."

In 1984, DNA testing was not possible. However, there was testimony in the Mahans' trial about the blood type of the semen. State serologist Ms. Faye Ogletree testified in 1984 that the semen had A and H antigens, the same as both Mahans.

"My conclusion from this would be that the Mahal's could not be excluded as the semen donors in this particular case," Ms. Ogletree told the jury in 1984. She went on the testify that only 11 percent of the population carried those antigens.

"Obviously, that will no longer be our contention," Prosecutor Green said of the upcoming trials. Green plans to argue that the semen did not come from Ms. Pope's rapist, but rather that the rapist apparently left no semen.

Prosecution American style! Will the tragedy ever end?