Death Sentence for Killing Baby Upheld Despite New Evidence

The death sentence of a North Carolina man convicted of killing his girlfriend’s newborn daughter was upheld by the Fourth Circuit despite the discovery of recordings of interviews with the mother and her young son that allegedly supported his defense.

The expert medical testimony against John Burr supported the conclusion the jury would have convicted him even if the tapes were made available to him before his trial, the opinion by Judge James Andrew Wynn said, denying his request for habeas corpus relief.

Burr argued that the new tapes showed inconsistencies in the mother’s and son’s testimony.

The state court’s ...