DENVER — Denver is getting half a million dollars to investigate cold cases.
A special unit in the district attorney's office will look at cases where DNA could be the key to finding a suspect. Some money from the federal grant could also be used to review convictions in which the convicted person claims innocence.
"It is a sense of relief to know the person who did it has been convicted and will be punished," District Attorney Beth McCann said.
McCann wants her office to solve more cold cases like the killing of Rita Desjardine in 1994. Desjardine was 36 years old when someone found her body in a Denver motel room. The case remained unsolved until a break came in 2018, when the Denver Police Department's Crime Lab got a lead connecting Steven Cumberbatch to DNA evidence at the scene.
Cumberbatch was extradited from Virginia to Colorado to face charges in 2021. A jury found him guilty in June 2023.
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"In the Cumberbatch case, there was a handprint of blood on a bedspread," McCann said. "They had taken a sample of that blood and the handprint as well."
The grant will help pay for one of the cold case attorneys in the DA's office, and for scientists at the Denver Police Crime Lab to work overtime.
The DA's office has received funding for this work before, but for the first time, they can use the grant for cases already closed.
"We have a conviction review unit now, and if someone claims they are innocent and there is the potential for DNA testing, that might be an area where we would reach into this grant," she said.
The Conviction Review Unit is made up of an attorney, an investigator, and interns who work with an applicant’s defense counsel to investigate the applicant’s claims and, where appropriate, to support the applicant’s request for relief.
Most of the office's focus with the grant money will be on solving cold cases, and giving answers to families after decades of waiting.
"Relief knowing that we know what happened," McCann said. "We know this person has been identified."
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