Sins & Survivors: A Las Vegas True Crime Podcast - Guilty Until Proven Innocent - Gary Dotson Rewind for DNA Day

Episode Date: April 29, 2025

In honor of DNA day we're talking about the first person to EVER be exonerated by DNA evidence, Gary DotsonImagine you're 20 years old, your whole life ahead of you, and suddenly you're accused of a horrific crime by someone you've never met. You have an airtight alibi, or so you think, friends and family who swear you're innocent, and yet you're convicted and sentenced to decades in prison. Years later, your accuser admits it was all a lie. But the justice system isn't done with you yet.This is the shocking, tumultuous story of Gary Dotson, the first person exonerated by DNA evidence, whose life became a rollercoaster of despair, hope, tragedy, and redemption. https://sinspod.co/76sourceshttps://sinspod.co/76blogDomestic Violence Resourceshttp://sinspod.co/resourcesClick here to become a member of our Patreon!https://sinspod.co/patreonVisit and join our Patreon now and access our ad-free episodes and exclusive bonus content & schwag! Get ad-free access for only $1 a month or ad-free and bonus episodes for $3 a monthApple Podcast Subscriptionshttps://sinspod.co/appleWe're now offering premium membership benefits on Apple Podcast Subscriptions! On your mobile deviceLet us know what you think about the episodehttps://www.buzzsprout.com/twilio/text_messages/2248640/open_sms Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/sins-survivors-a-las-vegas-true-crime-podcast--6173686/support.

To listen ad-free, visit Zinspod.co slash subscribe. Starting at $2.99 a month, you'll also get access to our exclusive bonus content episodes when you join through Patreon or Apple subscriptions. Thanks for supporting the show! Imagine you're 20 years old, your whole life ahead of you, and suddenly you're accused of a horrific crime by someone you've never met. You have an airtight alibi, or so you think, friends and family who swear you're innocent,

and yet you're convicted and sentenced to decades in prison. Years later, your accuser admits it was all a lie, but the justice system isn't done with you yet. This is the shocking, tumultuous story of Gary Dotson, the first person exonerated by DNA evidence, whose life became a rollercoaster of despair, hope, tragedy, and redemption. Hi, and welcome to Sins and Survivors, a Las Vegas true crime podcast where we focus on cases that deal with domestic violence, as well as missing persons and unsolved cases. I'm your host, Sean.

And I'm your co-host, John. This week, we're taking a look back at our most downloaded episode, Guilty Until Proven Innocent, the story of Gary Dotson. April 25th is observed as DNA Day in the U.S. and around the world, and we thought this was the perfect time for a flashback episode on Gary. We dug up a few new articles out of the archives and added a few new interesting details to the story as well. We first learned about Gary Dotson when we were covering the disappearance of his first wife, Camille Dardane Dotson.

They were married for about nine years in the 1980s, and they had one daughter together, named Ashley. Camille disappeared several years after they were divorced and after leaving the Chicago area and moving to Las Vegas. Gary's not suspected in Camille's disappearance, but he was abusive toward Camille and her daughter Ashley, and nothing we cover here excuses that. Camille has been missing for more than 30 years, and you can listen to her story at sinspod.co slash Camille. Gary is 68 years old, born in 1957 in a suburb of Chicago called Country Club Hills, and he grew up with his mom, Barbara, his three sisters, Laura, Debbie, and Gail, and his brother, John. Gary worked at a landscaping company after dropping out of high school,

and he had frequent brushes with the law between 1971 and 1977 for things like truancy and underage drinking. The drinking ended up becoming a problem for him that lasted long into adulthood. I think it's safe to say the defining event of his life occurred in 1977 when, at 20 years old, he was accused of rape by a 16-year-old named Kathleen Crowell, a teenager he had never met before. Kathleen was born in Illinois in 1961 and had a rough childhood. She has said that her mother had mental health and substance abuse problems, mostly alcohol. Her parents were divorced, and she said that she was neglected by both of them. She had two brothers who were 8 and 10 years older than she was, and her mother often had

them take care of her. Since they were essentially children themselves, they did a horrible job keeping an eye on her. In one story she told, she said that they tied her to a trash can in a park, instead of just babysitting her. Her father, at one point, got engaged, but his fiancé did not want children, and she was extremely nasty to Kathleen and her brothers. Eventually, her father left her in the care of a woman who Kathleen called her aunt for an overnight visit. He called the next day and asked the woman to keep her for a few weeks. Then, he called and asked if she could take Kathleen permanently. Kathleen said

that she went to stay for the night but never ended up leaving. It wasn't much better for her there with her new caretaker who had health problems and used Kathleen as her personal Cinderella, making her do chores around the house and preventing her from being in contact with her mother, brothers, and friends. She was so miserable that she said that she attempted to run away and even attempted suicide on occasion. Finally, and happily for Kathleen, she was sent to live with the aunt's granddaughter and her husband, Bernie and Carol Smith, who Kathleen refers to as her foster family. Kathleen was finally allowed to have a childhood. She did well in school, had many friends, took honors classes, and began to thrive. She even got a job at Long John Silver's at the Mall in Homewood, a suburb of Chicago where she lived. On July 9th, 1977, she finished up working at the restaurant and left around 8.45 p.m. and was heading across the parking lot to

walk home. Her account of what happened to her that night is quite detailed. She said that as she was walking, a car with three men in it approached her, causing her to jump out of the way and fall. Two of the men then got out of the car and threw her in the back seat, with the other one keeping her in the back. According to her account, they tore her clothing and raped her, and after that, they attempted to carve letters into her stomach using a broken bottle. She claims that she fought back, scratching her attacker behind the ear before they pushed her out of the car and threw her clothes out after her, driving off into the night. Her account goes on to say that she then got dressed and started walking home and came across a police officer in his cruiser who stopped to help. She told the officer what happened

in the nearly two-hour ordeal which took place from 8.45 to 10.45 p.m. The officer brought her to a local hospital where she was examined and evidence was gathered, including her underwear that contained a semen sample. They discovered bruising and trauma in her groin area, as well as scratches on her stomach and swelling on her head. Kathleen worked with a police sketch artist for a few days, and on July 15, 1977, she identified Gary Dodson as her attacker from a photo in a mugshot book, and then later identified him in a lineup in the Homewood police station. Gary was arrested and then released on bail. He ended up losing his landscaping job, but in the beginning, no members of his family were very worried because they knew Gary was innocent.

It made sense that no one close to him was very worried because he had a solid alibi for the night of the rape. It was a Saturday night, and Gary had hung out with several friends, drinking beers, watching TV, going to a couple of parties, and even eventually falling asleep in the backseat of the car while his friends went into a party because he was so tired. He had four of his friends corroborate his alibi. They all told the police that they were hanging out at one of their mother's houses until around 9 p.m., and two others stated they drove Gary home between midnight and 1230 a.m. The trial for rape and kidnapping took place in Cook County, Illinois, almost two years later. Throughout the case, Kathleen was seen as credible.

Her story was very detailed, and her injuries seemed to match with the story she told. Not everything was a match, though. In her composite sketch, she didn't mention a mustache. But according to Gary's mother, Barbara, and everyone who knew him, Gary had had his trademark mustache since he was 15 years old. The prosecution called an expert witness named Timothy Dixon from the Illinois Training and Applications Laboratory, who testified that the pubic hairs in Kathleen's underwear were macroscopically similar to Gary's hair and different than Kathleen's. He also testified that according to his analysis, only one in ten men could have been the source of the semen found on Kathleen's underwear, and Gary Dodson was included in that group. That theory was later

debunked, and it was proven that nearly two in three men could have been the source, so this was nowhere near conclusive. As for the defense, they strangely did not object to the transparently false and misleading testimony offered by Dixon, and little was made about the mustache discrepancy. Apparently, per Illinois law, a discrepancy like that can be just overlooked. Additionally, the police never even produced the car in which Kathleen said she had been raped. Her description of the car didn't match any of the cars owned by Gary or the friends he was with that night.

And of course, his alibi from the night was quite solid. I also want to say here that even though Kathleen said it was a group of three men who had grabbed her, none of Gary's friends or any other accomplices were ever identified or charged in the crime. In the end, Gary was sentenced to two consecutive prison terms of 25 to 50 years. Here's where things start getting really complicated. In March of 1985, Kathleen recanted her rape accusation. In fact, she said that she was never raped at all, that she made it all up. And before I get into this part, just a reminder that Kathleen was only 16 years old when she accused Gary of rape. Kathleen explained that she had had sex with her boyfriend, David Byrne,

and was terrified of being pregnant and being thrown out of her foster family's home, where she was living, which provided her with a sense of stability that she'd never really had before that. She was scared they were going to have a drastic reaction to the news of her being pregnant. So she made up the story, ripped up her clothes, cut herself with a bottle, and then planned to walk home from work and tell her foster parents everything. Her plan never included going to the police or getting the police involved at all. She just planned to lie to her foster parents. Also, she wasn't pregnant, she was just afraid that she might have been. When she was pressed about the description she'd given to police, she said, I didn't identify anyone because I didn't want to identify anyone. In my description of the attacker,

I said he had blonde hair because the boy I actually had been with was blonde. I knew they had taken pubic hair samples for evidence, and I thought, oh boy, he's got to have blonde hair. In my description, I was detailed because the more details you give, the harder it is to pick out a specific person. If you're general, almost anybody can fit the description. She made the sketch up for the sketch artist as they went along. She didn't really think they would find her attacker because he didn't exist. She was caught up in the lie and it just snowballed. When the police brought her a photo of Gary and said something to her like, look again, look real close, she felt compelled to say it was him.

She said she hoped he had a good alibi. This was self-preservation for her. She was terrified her life was over if her lie was discovered. For the two years leading up to the trial, she suppressed her guilt. She called herself manipulative and selfish. Despite knowing her actions were wrong, her fear of consequences led her to maintain the lie during the trial. Her testimony was rehearsed with help from the prosecutor's office, and she was both embarrassed on the witness stand and afraid that she'd be found out. After the trial, Kathleen said

she tried to put the whole thing out of her mind, but couldn't forget how numb she had felt when the verdict was read, nor could she forget how Gary had cried. About a year after the trial ended, Kathleen began dating a guy named David Webb, who was a senior at her high school. After graduating in 1979, she went on to junior college, and then she and David moved to New Hampshire, and in July of 1981, they got married. There is an interesting fact about their wedding that I think really shows that Kathleen had good reason to be concerned about how her foster parents would have treated her if they found out she was having sex at 16, and especially if she had gotten pregnant. When Kathleen and David got married, they were both 20 years old. They invited Kathleen's foster parents to the wedding, of course, but they refused to come. The reason they gave was because Kathleen and David had lived together before getting married. As David and Kathleen built their new life in New Hampshire,

they joined a church, and Kathleen became a born-again Christian, at some point starting to work through her guilt and regrets about her lie about Gary. When she finally confessed to her pastor, Carl Nannini, that the rape had not happened, Carl put her in touch with a lawyer named John McClario. Kathleen said, all I can say is I created a monster of a lie and now I'm trying to make it right. And his life is worth more than my keeping silent. McClario got in touch with the Cook County prosecutors who had no interest in her recantation. After that, they reached out to the press, and they contacted Jim Gibbons, who was a local on-air reporter who was very interested and broke the story on March 22, 1985. Kathleen went on a media

tour, campaigning hard for Gary's innocence. She spent most of March and April of 1985 sharing her story on TV morning shows and even appearing on Phil Donahue. She gave multiple interviews to newspapers and magazines, and people were definitely talking about the case. On April 24, 1985, Kathleen gave testimony before the U.S. Senate Subcommittee on Juvenile Rape Victims and again apologized and asserted Gary's innocence. She wrote an article in People magazine called Trying to Make It Right, and her photo was on the cover of that issue. The Chicago Sun-Times had a front-page article on the recantation, but the Chicago Tribune, which at the time was known

to be more of a PR outlet for the prosecutor's office, painted Kathleen in a very unfavorable light, casting doubt on the story and characterizing her as unstable. The Tribune and several other news outlets published stories as part of what I would call a smear campaign against her, designed to hurt her credibility, and a lot of the information in those articles came from people close to her. Kathleen's foster mother and father gave interviews to the Tribune casting doubt on her explanations by bringing up things like the timing of her menstrual cycle or the last time she had had sex with her then-boyfriend. Her boyfriend at the time, David Byrne, told the press that they'd had sex many times, and he doubted her claims about her being afraid that it was her first time.

Her foster mother, Carol, said that Kathleen got her period three days after the rape and well before she formally identified Gary, implying that Kathleen wouldn't have had any reason to continue the lie at that point. Later, in the October 1985 issue of Redbook, Carol gave an interview where she told the magazine that she believed that someone did rape Kathleen. We don't know if Gary Dotson is the rapist, she said. We just know that something happened that night. She also said that Kathleen's personality had changed after she recanted her story. She explained that Kathleen had become unfriendly and suddenly started referring to her foster parents by their first names or as her guardians instead of just mom and dad. Carol also said, I could tell by the way she was acting on television that she wasn't shy Kathy anymore. She was becoming a star and thriving on it. She didn't care who she hurt. According to

the Tribune, the detailed timeline Kathleen laid out in the article she wrote for People magazine did not match police records. For example, Kathleen claimed she identified Gary from a photo that police brought to her home, but Carol said that the police never questioned Kathy at the house. Kathleen claimed her testimony during the trial had gone so smoothly because she had studied her statements from the police interviews and practiced with the help of prosecutors, but her foster parents told the press that Kathleen never did that. Carol told Redbook that Kathleen blamed everyone for what had happened, everyone but herself, and said Kathy has a vivid imagination. One of her brothers also disputed some of the stories Kathleen shared to the press about their upbringing. One of the worst examples of how

Kathleen got dragged through the mud came when the Tribune published a claim from a source close to the investigation that Kathleen was unstable and calculating, evasive, and manipulative. That source was later identified as an assistant state attorney who had been involved in the prosecution of Gary Dotson. It seems clear that the Cook County Prosecutor's Office was probably concerned how they'd look if their star witness recanted her testimony. When Gary heard about Kathleen recanting, he immediately requested a new trial, and he was granted an evidentiary hearing,

and he was released on a $100,000 bond. That hearing was set for April 11, 1985. At that point, Gary was excited. His accuser had recanted her accusation, and it seemed clear that he would be set free, so he started making plans for his post-prison life. He even made plans to organize a foundation to help cover legal fees to help all the innocent people in prison. He told the press that he would like to speak to Kathleen once everything was all over to find out why she'd accused him. He said, It's been so long. Why six years later? How could she have held that in for so long? It was the same judge that presided over the new hearing that had presided over his original trial,

Judge Samuels. He determined that Kathleen's testimony at the trial was more credible than her testimony at the evidentiary hearing, and ignored several key inconsistencies in her earlier testimony, including she said her pants got all muddy during the attack, but also said she was raped inside the car. She said she scratched behind the attacker's ear, but no such injury existed on Dotson. And of course, the mustache inconsistency, where she claimed that her attacker was clean-shaven, but Gary had famously had a mustache since age 15. Despite all of that, Samuels revoked his bond and Gary was sent back to prison. When he announced that decision, Gary reportedly slammed his hand down on the table in frustration. If the judge had just ordered a new trial, there's no chance Gary would have been convicted because Kathleen wouldn't have testified against him.

In spite of Kathleen's insistence, and her admission that she had told such an egregious, ugly, detailed lie that landed an innocent man in jail, the question remained both in the justice system and in the court of public opinion. Did Gary actually do this? Was Gary a young, working-class guy who just got very unlucky? Or was he a violent rapist? Was Kathleen a scared virgin or an unstable perjurer? Was Kathleen lying in 1977 or was she lying now in 1985? Also, if she was lying now, what possible motive could she have? Years later, Gary reflected on that April 11th hearing and how he had turned to alcohol to cope. He said he had learned a different way for six years while he was in prison. Drinking relaxed me, made me more open, made me more confident. He said he'd had a six

pack of beer for breakfast the morning of April 11th, the day of the hearing. According to his mom, Barbara, Gary experienced extreme depression after he was ordered back to jail in April of 85. In fact, this depression was so severe that he was contemplating suicide. Barbara told Redbook Magazine that prison authorities announced that Gary was now a celebrity and they needed to protect him from other inmates, but they told me they also needed to protect him from himself. Not everyone agreed with Judge Samuels, and by that point, Gary Dodson was a household name, and many people were debating his guilt. It's clear from the archives that this decision had an immediate backlash, and there was

serious public outcry. 70,000 people signed a petition demanding that the governor of Illinois, James Thompson, release Gary, and calls, faxes, and telegraphs started arriving at the prosecutor's office, and they definitely had an effect. Jim Thompson was eventually swayed by what the people were saying, and he saw Gary Dotson as a way to garner some good publicity. Thompson was dealing with bad press after his administration mishandled a serious Salmonella outbreak, where multiple people died and more than 17,000 got sick. He granted Gary a clemency hearing, and he decided that he would preside over the hearing himself, becoming the first governor to ever do so. It's important to remember that in the mid-80s,

cable TV was growing in popularity but was still pretty young. At that time, CNN was known as the cable news network. Court TV would not exist until 1991. However, the popularity of showing the Klaus von Bulow attempted murder trials on TV had gotten high ratings on network TV like NBC and CBS. People had replaced watching their daytime soap operas with watching the trial footage instead. The whole thing was an absolute media circus, well before cases you've probably heard about or remember, like Casey Anthony or O.J. Simpson. Governor Thompson definitely saw this as his chance to get some good nationwide publicity, but at least one columnist in the Chicago Tribune described him as being the ringmaster of a

media circus. More than 150 reporters, both print and broadcast journalists, covered the hearing. CNN broadcast the hearings live and reached 32 million households nationwide. The local CBS station preempted all of its scheduled programming to do a live broadcast of the hearing. It's reported that Thompson, a former prosecutor, really put on a show in front of the cameras in the crowded hearing room. He grilled witnesses, discussed the evidence, and caused the audience to gasp when he dramatically held up Kathleen's stained underwear. He also tried to cross-examine Gary, making inappropriate jokes about him drinking hooch in prison, and at one point asked if he would be a good boy if he was released. At the end of the three-day hearing, the Illinois Prison Review Board voted unanimously to deny Gary's clemency. However, Thompson just commuted Dotson's sentence as time served, but also made

a point to say that Gary's trial had been fair and the evidence of his guilt was stronger than ever. He did that in an effort to have it both ways, letting Gary out of prison but also avoiding any admission that the justice system in Illinois had gotten it wrong. It wasn't a pardon or an exoneration, just early parole for Gary. May 12, 1985. After serving six years for a kidnapping and rape that never even happened, Gary was finally out of prison. According to the Spokane Chronicle, Gary's face lit up when he walked into his family home. 25 people, friends, and family were there to celebrate with him. His brother John said, I missed him and I love him and I'm glad he's back. A sign on the door of the house said, Gary Dodson is innocent and loved

and welcomed back home by his family and friends. Gary said he just wanted to sit down and relax. His sister Debbie said he was home and he was happy. Kathleen continued her media tour and began making appearances together with Gary. The two were popular guests for sure. The TV stations flew Gary in with specially chartered jets, and the two of them were shuttled around to the studios in limousines. Kathleen apologized on the Today Show to Gary's mother, Barbara, and asked for her forgiveness. Gary and Kathleen also appeared on the Today Show, telling Jane Pauley that he wasn't angry with Kathleen.

He was just angry and frustrated with the system. They were on ABC's Good Morning America and on the CBS Morning News show. In a particularly infamous and inappropriate incident on CBS, Phyllis George ended her interview of Kathleen and Gary by asking them to shake hands. They both offered a weak handshake and then Phyllis asked, how about a hug? Kathleen and Gary were shocked and they declined. Phyllis later said she didn't mean to offend anyone. According to a 1985 Time magazine article, this entire ordeal and the way it was portrayed during the tour of the morning shows had become a charade. Under the surface were so many unresolved issues such as whether or not Kathleen would be charged with perjury and what that might mean for

other rape victims who are afraid to come forward for fear of not being believed. But also, Time magazine was critical of Thompson. He could have pardoned Gary as governor, but in the end, the result of the hearing was that Gary was effectively just on parole, not declared innocent, and there was still doubt hanging over him. In fact, a former cellmate of his claimed that Gary at one point confessed to having sex with Kathleen that night at a party, but that cellmate failed the lie detector test, which was just another bizarre tabloid element of this case. Gary was getting offers on turning his life story into a movie. That's how big this whole media circus was. This is definitely some early true crime history. Kathleen even wrote a book called Forgive Me about her life and the accusation

and donated all of the proceeds from the book to Gary, about $17,500 or what would be $52,000 in 2025. Gloria Allred, who many may know from representing victims in high-profile lawsuits, such as those against Anthony Weiner and R. Kelly, had concerns that Kathleen's recantation would have lasting negative effects on victims being believed in rape cases. She said that she hoped the case does not demoralize rape victims who feel they may not be believed. The Me Too movement wouldn't happen until 35 years later. And in the meantime, the justice system and the court of public opinion still struggles with issues such as victim blaming and believing accusers in rape cases and in domestic violence cases, too. Gary met the woman who would become his first wife, Camille Dardanes, during his clemency hearings.

Camille was following the trial and hearings, as a lot of Americans were, and was interested in meeting Gary, so she came to the hearings and gave him a white flower. They started dating once Gary was paroled. Their relationship progressed quickly, and Gary proposed to Camille in September of 1985. He cooked Camille a lobster dinner and proposed with champagne and a diamond ring. Camille said that she never had any doubts about Gary or his innocence. Along with everything else Gary did, this engagement was huge national news. There was a blurb about it in Time magazine. Gary and Camille were celebrities. They appeared together on Good Morning America.

Life was going great for both of them. They used the money that Kathleen had given Gary from the book sales to start their new life together. They each bought a car, they rented an apartment, they bought new furniture, and they eloped to Las Vegas in 1985. However, Gary was struggling with life after prison. He was drinking heavily, and he was still a convicted felon. He was out of work and struggled to find a job, while living with the stigma of his conviction and the doubt over his innocence, dealing with being thrown into the limelight and gaining

semi-celebrity status. In the mid-to- late 1980s, there were quite a few news articles about the couple, their romance, and their future plans. Gary's life was the subject of water-cooler conversations and probably Thanksgiving table conflicts. In our research, we found negative articles about Gary with titles such as Born to Lose and editorials about his life where he was characterized as a dropout and a loser. There were also some really nasty editorials written about Gary where people offered the opinion that he should have his genitals removed or that he should be sent to the chair. Can you imagine what the Reddit threads or comment sections would be like if this happened today? All of that put pressure on Gary and his relationship with Camille. Gary said,

I was living a nightmare I couldn't escape. I was sick and tired of trying to prove I was innocent, so I crawled into a shell, and then I didn't know how to get out of it. They ended up blowing through the money from Kathleen, got evicted, and had to move in with Gary's mom, Barbara, who was still living in that same Chicago suburb. In January of 1987, Camille and Gary's daughter, Ashley, was born. On August 2nd, 1987, Gary and Camille got into a serious physical fight. It was a Sunday afternoon and they took Ashley to the beach to have a picnic and they drank a six pack of beer. They then went to hang out with some friends and that evening Camille was driving the car home and the two of them got

into an argument. Camille stopped the car in the middle of the street. Gary hit Camille as she tried to get out of the car and then grabbed Ashley and ran away down the street. While Camille was chasing him, she saw a police car drive by and flagged it down. She told the officer that Gary was drunk and that he had threatened to kill their baby and that he had beaten her and ran off with Ashley. Thankfully, Gary was found sitting in an alley nearby with Ashley, who was fine. John and I want to stress again that there's no excuse for Gary's behavior, but he was struggling with financial problems, unemployment, alcohol abuse, possibly depression, and dealing with a traumatic experience of being wrongfully incarcerated. Gary was arrested and charged with domestic battery, which was particularly serious

for him because if he violated his parole, he would be sent back to prison to complete his sentence of 25 to 50 years. He was held without bail before his hearing, which was set for August 27th. At the hearing, Gary testified, I said I'd kill the kid before I let Camille take her away, and he admitted to drinking a lot that night. Camille didn't testify against him, saying that she didn't want him to go to jail for what had happened. Even without Camille's testimony, the parole board revoked Gary's parole on September 4, 1987, and the remaining 16 years of his sentence was reinstated. On December 24, 1987, Governor Thompson decided to release Gary again for what he called one last chance. Remember, as governor, a pardon was always an option.

I find that interesting, too. I think we read that Camille had asked the governor to let him out since it was Christmas. But just a few days later, it was reported in the news that Camille told Gary that when he got home that day, she wanted a separation. Yes, and on December 26, 1987, Gary was arrested again and charged with two misdemeanors when he got into a fight while drunk with employees of a sandwich shop. It was his sixth arrest since he had been let out on parole in 1985. Luckily for Gary, the two employees decided to drop the charges against him, and they didn't say why, but Gary's attorney said that he was pushed over the edge and began drinking when Camille said she was planning to divorce him. Even though the charges were dropped, Gary being drunk was a violation of his parole.

The Illinois Department of Corrections placed a parole hold on Gary to keep him in jail while the Prisoner Review Board hearing was planned on February 17, 1988. It turned out that Gary didn't call his parole officer on December 24, though, like he was supposed to, and the board found him guilty of a technical parole violation, and he was ordered to return to jail for six months. And luckily, he was not ordered to complete his full sentence of 25 to 50 years. In August of 1988, near the end of this six-month sentence, Gary was involuntarily transferred into a state-run treatment facility for alcohol and substance use disorders. While he was serving his time for the parole violation, his attorney,

Thomas Breen, was hard at work trying to finally prove Gary's innocence. He'd read about a new DNA testing technology that was being compared to the uniqueness of fingerprints. And on January 7th, 1988, Breen's petition for access to Kathleen's underwear for DNA testing was granted. The AG's office had no objection, and due to a jurisdictional issue, the final decision was to be made by, who else? Governor Thompson. Based on Thompson's order, the semen underwent that new type of testing known as PCR, polymerase chain reaction testing. The DNA pulled from the evidence was tested against blood samples provided by Gary and Kathleen's high school boyfriend at the time, David Byrne. On August 15th, 1988, Edward Blake, a forensic scientist in California, notified the

governor, the prosecutors, and Gary's attorney that PCR testing had positively excluded Gary and positively included David as the source of the semen. The next day, Breen requested that Governor Thompson grant Gary unconditional clemency based on actual innocence, but for some unknown reason, Governor Thompson decided he wasn't ready to do that. At the time, Gary was in the alcohol treatment program, and Thompson stated he wanted assurances that the test results were accurate, and he wanted the Prisoner Review Board to weigh in on the decision. After nine months of both Gary and his attorney waiting for the board to make a decision, Gary's attorney went to the media with the results and filed a new petition for post-conviction

relief on May 3rd, 1989. On August 14th, 1989, a hearing was held and the judge ruled the DNA testing results were admissible. The prosecution admitted the error in Gary's conviction and joined Gary's defense attorney, Thomas Breen, in his motion to vacate the conviction. All charges were dropped and the conviction was dismissed. Gary was exonerated of the rape and kidnapping charge and was free from the challenges of parole that were always hanging over his head. Twelve years after Gary was arrested and four years after Kathleen had first recanted her accusation, Gary smiled at his brothers and

sisters and they jokingly pinched his arm so Gary would know he wasn't dreaming. Gary said, it's over. It's really over. According to a People Magazine article published in August of 1989, shortly after his exoneration, Gary was working as a part-time construction worker, planning to start college that fall, and interested in starting a career in counseling. In August of 1989, Gary's wife, Camille, formally filed for divorce. She mentioned Gary's violent and ungovernable temper, but things were not over between them. In September of 1989, Gary was arrested at Camille's home for trespassing. According to the Cook County Sheriff, she had given him a key to her apartment because they were working on repairing their relationship.

It's not clear what happened between them, but at some point, Camille asked for the key back and Gary refused. Camille traveled to Las Vegas, presumably to visit her mother and prepare for her eventual move. When she came back to her apartment, she found Gary there and he refused to leave, so she had him arrested for trespassing. He posted bail, and on October 6, 1989, the charges were dismissed against Gary because Camille was nine minutes late to the hearing. Gary moved with Ashley to Las Vegas, but disappeared without a trace in September of 1994. Gary's lawyers filed for a full pardon from the new governor, George Ryan, which was finally granted in 2002. On August 25, 2003, the Illinois Court of Claims awarded Gary $120,000 for his wrongful conviction after his

full pardon. At that time, Gary was living in the south suburbs of Chicago, but he was unemployed because of a disability requiring a hip replacement. Kathleen passed away in 2008 at the age of only 46 after a six-year battle with cancer, leaving behind her husband and their four children. At the time of her death, Gary was reported to be living a quiet life in the Chicago suburbs, trying to stay under the radar and wanting to put this all behind him. Gary's exoneration paved the way for all future DNA being able to exonerate the wrongfully accused. It's the new standard for establishing guilt or innocence, as well as being crucial in identifying criminals as well. In recognition of DNA Day, we want to just take a moment to mention that according to the

Innocence Project, as of April 2025, 614 wrongly convicted people have been exonerated since Gary was, based on DNA evidence. Thank you all for joining us as we took another look at Gary's story. It's a piece of true crime history that we think doesn't get discussed enough. We also want to remind you about Camille, Gary's first wife, who has been missing since 1994. And if you haven't yet listened to Camille's story, please visit sinnspod.co slash Camille and be sure to join the Find Camille Facebook page and support her family who is still searching for answers. Thank you as always for listening, and remember what happens here, happens everywhere. To be continued... Remember to like and follow us on Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, and Threads at Sins and Survivors.

If you're enjoying the podcast, please leave us a review on your podcast platform of choice. You can contact us at questions at sinsandsurvivors.com. If you or someone you know is affected by domestic violence or needs support, please reach out to local resources or the National Domestic Violence Hotline. A list of resources is available on our website, sinsandsurvivors.com. Sins and Survivors, a Las Vegas true crime podcast, is research written and produced by your hosts, Sean and John. The information shared in this podcast is accurate at the time of recording. If you have questions, concerns, or corrections, please email us.

Links to source material for this episode can be found on our website, sinsandsurvivors.com. The views and opinions expressed in this podcast are solely those of the podcast creators, hosts, and their guests. All individuals are innocent until proven guilty. This content does not constitute legal advice. Listeners are encouraged to consult with legal professionals for guidance.