Centurion Ministries in partnership with the Great North Innocence Project (GNIP) announced today that they have filed a petition for post-conviction relief on behalf of their client Brian K. Pippitt on the grounds of his actual innocence of the murder for which he was convicted. The Minnesota CRU recently completed a two-year investigation into Mr. Pippitt’s conviction. After reviewing thousands of pages of materials and interviewing more than 25 fact and expert witnesses, the CRU recommended Mr. Pippitt be granted post-conviction relief based on his actual innocence. The Aitkin County Attorney’s Office has 20 days to respond to the filing.
Jim Cousins, attorney at Centurion said, “Centurion has been investigating Mr. Pippitt’s case for years. Through that investigation, which included witness interviews, document reviews and expert forensic analysis, we determined that Brian Pippitt is completely innocent of the murder of Evelyn Malin. He was not involved in that crime whatsoever. Everyone who has investigated this case in a responsible and detailed manner has reached the same conclusion, including the Minnesota Attorney General’s Office which conducted an extraordinary and exhaustive investigation, the Great North Innocence Project, and a law school clinic class at Mitchell Hamline Law School.”
Mr. Pippitt is serving a life sentence for the killing of Evelyn Malin. Ms. Malin’s body was discovered in February 1998 at her residence, which attached to the Dollar Lake Store in Aitkin County, Minnesota.
Mr. Pippitt was convicted largely based on testimony from Raymond Misquadace, who told the jury that he was present with Mr. Pippitt and three others as they broke into the store, stole cigarettes and beer, and murdered Ms. Malin. Mr. Misquadace testified as part of a plea deal in which he resolved other outstanding felony charges in return for his testimony. The State bolstered Mr. Misquadace’s story with testimony from a jailhouse informant, Peter Arnoldi, who claimed Mr. Pippitt confided in him about his participation in Ms. Malin’s murder. The Minnesota Bureau of Criminal Apprehension (BCA) also submitted testimony that said Mr. Pippitt and the other men entered Ms. Malin’s residence through the basement window and exited out the front door.
Mr. Misquadace has now admitted to fabricating his confession with the help of police. GNIP and Centurion also learned that Mr. Arnoldi was psychotic at the time of his testimony against Mr. Pippitt, received a secret benefit from prosecutors for his testimony, and now disavows his original testimony, which lacked any credibility to begin with. Finally, forensic evidence supplemented with new forensic analysis thoroughly disproves Mr. Misquadace’s original testimony and supports his recantation. Specifically, new evidence demonstrates that no entry was made through the basement window, no beer or cigarettes were stolen from the store, and the front door (which was the State’s theoretical exit point for the assailants) was locked with a deadbolt that required a key. Additionally, two credible alternative suspects were never fully investigated, nor presented to the jury during Mr. Pippitt’s trial.
The Minnesota CRU’s own independent investigation determined that there is indeed little confidence in Mr. Pippitt’s conviction, that he was denied due process of a fair trial, and that he should be exonerated. No credible evidence exists connecting Mr. Pippitt with Ms. Malin’s murder.
“Mr. Pippitt has been wrongly incarcerated for 25 years. It is an unconscionable injustice that anyone would now block his immediate release,” said Mr. Cousins.
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