When Charleston police got a call in May 1989 from a detective in Tampa, Florida, it had been two years since two women had been sexually assaulted in Kanawha City.
A woman was raped and her elderly mother beaten in their home in May 1987. Two months later, another woman was raped inside her home. Both women described their attacker as a black man with medium-toned skin.
Police had more than 100 suspects. As part of their investigation, they interviewed black players for the Charleston Wheelers, the city's minor league baseball team, who played in nearby Watt Powell Park.
One of the team's pitchers, Jimmie Gardner, was interviewed in August 1987. He was fingerprinted, and police had found a bloody fingerprint on a vase inside the home of the first victims.
But it wasn't until the Florida detective called - two years later - and mentioned Gardner's name that Charleston police narrowed in on him as their main suspect.
The detective from Tampa - Gardner's hometown - said that a gun Gardner had used in a robbery in Florida had been traced back to Charleston, former Charleston Police Detective Russell Flowers testified to a grand jury, according to a transcript of the proceedings.
Charleston police then compared Gardner's fingerprints to the print left on the vase, according to Flowers' 1989 testimony. They determined the print on the vase was from Gardner's left middle finger, Flowers told grand jurors.
Gardner was charged in the two assaults and returned to Charleston. Several months later, in February 1990, a jury convicted Gardner of first-degree sexual assault, aggravated robbery, breaking and entering and assault during the commission of a felony in connection to the first incident, involving the mother and daughter. The jury acquitted Gardner of all charges in the second attack.
Gardner was sentenced to 33 to 110 years in prison.
The fingerprint evidence was part of prosecutors' case against Gardner, as was DNA evidence presented by since-discredited State Police serologist Fred Zain. Last month, U.S. District Judge Joseph R. Goodwin ruled that Zain's role in the trial, and a circuit judge's failure to hold a hearing on it, was enough to overturn Gardner's conviction. Goodwin ordered that Gardner either be retried or set free within 60 days.
On Friday, prosecutors said they'll try Gardner again. Kanawha Circuit Judge Joanna Tabit set a May 16 date for the new trial.
Even without Zain's testimony, prosecutors said Friday, they're confident that a jury will again convict Gardner of the charges. First assistant Kanawha prosecutor Don Morris brought up the fingerprint evidence that helped convict Gardner 25 years ago.
In his petition for Gardner, attorney Rhett Johnson of the federal Public Defender's Office raised several arguments about that fingerprint evidence.
"First, the timing of the fingerprint comparison is suspect," Johnson wrote, about police not comparing Gardner's fingerprints obtained in 1987 to the print on the vase until two years after the assault.
Johnson wrote there was a discrepancy about which finger was identified and how many prints were submitted for review. He also argued that there is conflicting evidence about whether the "fingerprint was merely found on the bloody vase, or actually found imprinted in blood on the vase."
"The distinction matters a great deal, as it is poor forensic practice to attempt to 'lift' a fingerprint left in a liquid substance like blood. The discrepancy calls into question the validity of [the officer's] ultimate conclusions about the print," Johnson wrote.
The attorney also called into question why there was only one fingerprint found when a victim testified her attacker touched several items in her home.
"I didn't do it," Gardner was recorded saying during an interview with Charleston police, according to previous Gazette-Mail reports. "I have no idea how that fingerprint got inside that house."
In his decision to overturn Gardner's conviction, Goodwin relied solely on the questions about Zain's involvement with the case. He rejected any claims about problems with the bloody fingerprint.
Reach Kate White at kate.white@wvgazettemail.com, 304-348-1723 or follow @KateLWhite on Twitter.