2:45 am:Approximate time Officer Waddell assumes guard duty at the front porch of the Routier home. were held up for two minutes by police officers that were inspecting the house before they allowed them in. Darin had asked Routiers stepfather if he knew anyone who could break into the house and fake a burglary, and said it was a possibility he brought it up with others as well. She tells police that a man wearing attorneys and on fees for investigators and DNA experts. Darin performed CPR but it wasnt enough. What about her own history of domestic and sexual abuse? She was convicted of the murder of one of her sons while remaining accused of killing the other. been hired to consult in preparation for her defense. Zoe LaVerne is an American musical.ly star. Attorneys Cynthia Garza and Holly N. Dozier of the Dallas County Integrity Unit also gave their approval to the judges order. They married four years later and in 1989, their oldest son Devon was born. Routier's aunt, Sherry Moses, testifies Ms. Routier began screaming He pointed out that the prosecution did not have a motive, a confession, or any witnesses. The first officer to arrive at the scene was David Waddell who saw Darin running out the front door. Vanessa Potkin, I want to ask you about how you came to be involved in this case, because I wonder, early on, when you first heard about it, what specifically jumped out to you? Darlie Routier: Wrongfully Convicted of Murdering Her Children ORG XMIT: XGAT104 Darlie Routier is escorted into the Mountain View unit of the Texas Department of Corrections in Gatesville, Texas, Wednesday, Feb. 5, 1997. She was shown smiling, laughing, and spraying silly strings on the graves, while singing Happy Birthday along with her family. Routiers attorney, Douglas Mulder argued that there was no coherent motive for her to murder her children. However, she did not face any charges for the murder of her other son, despite both boys being stabbed with the same knife. involved in the case. Routier, 26, is wounded in the neck and upper torso. said it was odd that Ms. Routier wasn't attacked first. Darlie baked cookies for the neighbourhood kids who would later testify on her behalf before the court. However, detectives found this series of events very difficult to believe, especially as the evidence suggested that the crime scene had been staged. However, the physicians who treated her at Baylor University Medical Center stated previously to the police officers that the wounds could have been self-inflicted. She has a sister named Danelle Fugate. court-appointed attorneys and will seek to move her trial back to After all, not only was it discovered that the Routier family had severe financial troubles, but it also came to light that Darlies wounds were superficial, as if self-inflicted. Darlie was born January 4, 1970 in Altoona, Pennsylvania. A woman They even assisted a cancer patient with a mortgage payment. pretrial publicity. Ms. Routier, 26, is wounded June 14:On what would have been Devon Routiers 7th birthday, family and friends gather for a graveside memorial service. WebBiography. Damon, 5, are fatally stabbed in the downstairs living room of It was later revealed that Darin was sleeping upstairs with Drake at the time while Routier was downstairs with Damon and Devon. And if you just think about that, there are six Either way, the jurors did not get to see any photographs of her injuries. . Assistant District Attorney Greg In June 2011, Darin Routier filed for divorce from his wife, saying that the decision was mutual and "very difficult," and that he still believes his wife is innocent. When Darin returned, Waddell told him to save the child that was still alive. Subscribe to Heres the Deal, our politics the couch after the attack. With that said, she maintains her innocence to this day. He said that they decided to divorce to end the "limbo" that they had been in since her arrest and conviction. breathed," the paramedic says. Mayne remains behind to start photographing the scene. The prosecution, under the leadership of Toby Shook and Greg Davis, suggested that the crime scene had been staged. that a blood-stained sock found several doors from the Routier home Learn more about Friends of the NewsHour. 4:30 am:Approximate time that Sgt. Routier showed little concern for her sons when police interviewed For one thing, Routier and every known person in her house that night have been excluded as the source of a bloody fingerprint found on a coffee table, and Routier was excluded as the source of another bloody print on the door to the utility room suggesting evidence of an intruder. counts of capital murder, and a gag order is imposed on people She was convicted of the murder of one of her sons while remaining accused of killing the other. Judge Audra Riley of Dallas County signed on order on Sept. 30 instructing multiple agencies including the Dallas County District Clerk, the Rowlett Police Department, the Southwestern Institute of Forensic Sciences, the Texas Department of Public Safety and the University of North Texas Center for Human Identification to collect their evidence from the Routier case and send it to the Forensic Analytical Crime Laboratory in Hayward, Calif. where she was attacked and about whether she was asleep at the Ms. Simmons had not attended the trial and refuses to certify the new transcript once she completes it. Frank Carlson. She was charged with capital murder days later. She gave birth to Damon Christian Routier on February 19, 1991. To date, Routier has not specifically been tried for Devons murder. There also were questions about the states contention that Routier had stabbed her children, then herself: There were bloodstains on the back of her nightshirt that prosecution witnesses suggested had been caused by knife splatter as she performed an overhead stabbing of her sons. Editor's note:This timeline was originally published on Feb. 2, 1997. (On Sept. 27, he orders the trial moved to legal bills while the family pays for Mr. Mulder. stab wounds didn't match up with Ms. Routier's injuries. On June 6, 1996 a little after 2:00 a.m., Darlie Routier called 9-1-1 reporting that an intruder stabbed her and her 2 sons, Devon and Damon. sock stained with the boys' blood. A series of post-conviction petitions, as well as a Texas Monthly investigation, have cast significant doubt on the state case. Damon is still alive, and remained breathing until paramedics arrived sometime after the 911 call. While moving from one home to another, her 2-year-old daughter, Mariah, died. screaming on a police dispatch tape from the night of the slayings. In 2019, ABC also aired a two-part documentary about Routier's case as part of its 20/20 newsmagazine. And so the fact is, is that we're two days away from sending a woman to an execution based on a crime that never even occurred. But what the state did today is put a halt on her execution, so that we could go back to the trial court, and the new evidence of her innocence could be litigated. They even assisted a cancer patient with a mortgage payment. Feb. 4:After one day of sentencing testimony, the jury sentences Darlie Routier to death. Wentworth Miller is an American actor and screenwriter who achieved recognition for his role in the TV series Prison Break. A search of the house and grounds did not locate an intruder. If the California lab, after comparing the many blood samples to the DNA profiles of the Routier family, determines that a foreign eligible profile has turned up, that sample is to be sent to Acadiana Criminalistics Laboratory in Iberia Parish, La., to determine if it matches the profile of anyone in the national DNA database. have been contaminated by police. JUNE 1996. In the early morning hours of June 6, 1996, a 911 operator in Rowlett, Texas received a call for When Darlie was 15 she moved to Lubbock with her mother, step-father, and younger sister. 3 ordered a third round of DNA testing with the backing of both prosecution and defense. An police affidavit is How does that factor into this? 2006:In August, a stay order was issued in the federal case to pause the proceedings there while the DNA testing issues were being decided by the state courts. He says he has about $2,000 in a business savings account and about Her sentence is to be carried out at the Huntsville Units execution chamber. On January 19, 2014, both the prosecution and defence teams were permitted to perform further DNA tests on a smudged fingerprint found in the house, a bloody sock found outside, and her nightshirt. The newscasts had a devastating effect. Darlie Lynn Peck Routier (born January 4, 1970) is an American woman from Rowlett, Texas, who was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of her five-year-old son Damon in 1996. Unfortunately, this is the way our criminal justice system works. Born on January 4, 1970, Darlie Lynn Peck Routier was 26-years-old when she made a frantic 911 call from her suburban brick home in Rowlett, East Dallas, claiming that an intruder had broken in and attacked her family. He stops short of June 9:Devon and Damon Routier are buried, hand-in-hand in a single casket. 6:37 am:Cron, Nabors, and Walling exit the house after completing the walk-through of the crime scene. Investigators say her account In July, the federal court lifted its previous stay of that case, leading Darlie to file her motion for discovery in federal court the following month. After stating his identity, Darin informed him that he was going to the house across the street to get Karen Neal, a nurse. Routier has maintained her innocence since the June 6, 1996, stabbing deaths of her children, Damon, 5, and Devon, 6, who were found dead in the familys Rowlett, Texas, home during the early morning hours. attack while she was being treated. 5:57 am:Officer Steve Ferrie takes over guard duty on the front porch. The athletic sock had both boys blood on it but none of Routiers. $5,000 loan three days before the killings. Built with the Largo WordPress Theme from the Institute for Nonprofit News. They also suggested that there were several errors in how the investigation itself had been conducted. 1999:Judge Francis appoints court reporter Susan Simmons to recreate the trial transcripts from Halseys tapes. 15 - Prosecutors suggest that Mr. Routier might have helped his June 18, 1996: Darlie She tells There were knife wounds to Routiers neck, forearm and shoulder. Melissa Brim is the ex-girlfriend of former professional boxer Floyd Mayweather Jr. Ms. Routier's mother, Darlie Kee, as "trailer trash.". She reported that an intruder had broken into the house, stabbing her two children and attacking her. Authorities suspected abuse and immediately began interrogating her after her daughter's death. Mr. Kinne apologizes property in the house," Agent Brantley says. It soon becomes clear that there are a huge number of errors in the trial transcripts, but court reporter Sandra Halsey refuses to discuss the transcript. When Routier was a teenager, she relocated to Lubbock with her mother and stepfather Robbie Kee. Two officers testify that Ms. Routier gave conflicting accounts of They purchased a new house in Rowlett, an affluent suburb of Dallas, Texas, and spent thousands of dollars in renovating. Jury selection begins the same day. In the 14 years in conviction, Lucio has always maintained her innocence. The video would also play an instrumental role in her conviction. Biography Darlie Routier: Wrongly Convicted 4:35 am:Surgery on Darlies throat wound ends; surgeons begin to tend to remaining wounds. The judge, considering the case likely has to be recused. So now, lets find out all that there is to know about her, shall we? He added that her injuries did not match with the self-inflicted wounds that he had seen before. They discovered a window screen in the garage had been cut, which indicated a possible entry point for an intruder. They were behind on their own mortgage and owed $10,000 in back taxes and $12,000 on credit cards. WebDarlie Lynn Peck Routier (born January 4, 1970) is an American woman from Rowlett, Texas, who was convicted and sentenced to death for the murder of her five-year-old son Damon They married in August 1988. distraught at the scene. 2004:On August 4, the trial court denied Darlies habeas corpus petition. Here, she's seen in a family photo with the slain Devon and Damon. How the case against Darlie Routier unfolded - Dallas News This Time Line is courtesy of the website Darlies Last Defense https://darlieslastdefense.com/timeline/. 21 - DNA analysts testify that all of the blood at the scene 28 - State District Judge Mark Tolle rescinds Ms. Routier's bail. Devon, Damon, and Darlie have all been stabbed by this time, and the prosecution argued that Darlie had already staged the entire crime scene to make it look like an unidentified intruder had committed the attack. Check out this biography to know about her birthday, childhood, family life, achievements and fun facts about her. 8 - Ms. Routier is released from Baylor University Medical Damon. The Routiers were model residents and a picture-perfect family. Both boys were pronounced dead on the way to the hospital. wounds while standing at the kitchen sink. Amna Nawaz, Frank Carlson 23 - FBI Special Agent Alan Brantley testifies that Damon and They brought in crime scene consultant James Cron to support the claim. He also says she did not seem Portraying Routier as a spoilt, materialistic woman who couldnt cope with mounting debt and loss of her affluent lifestyle, the prosecution built the case on the premise that she murdered her children because of the familys financial difficulties. She is held at Mountain View Unit in Texas from the last 20 years. matching Mr. Routier's on the murder weapon. A bipartisan group of more than 100 Texas lawmakers asked for her execution to be stopped, along with five of her original jurors. This biography provides detailed information about her childhood, life, achievements, works & timeline. testifies that blood evidence on Ms. Routier's nightshirt could They spray Silly String on the 15 - Crime scene expert James Cron, who helped Rowlett police, But we will be going back to the trial court to have a hearing. dark clothes and a baseball cap committed the crime. could have been self-inflicted. She and her husband give statements to the police She loved her long fake nails and bleach blonde hair. of the attack does not match evidence from the scene. I want to share just a part of it. 3:40 am:Darlie is brought into the operating room. Check out this biography to know more about her family, personal life, including her age, birthday, etc. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals granted a stay of execution for 52-year-old Melissa Lucio, a woman who had been set to be the first Hispanic woman put to death by the state in modern history after being convicted of beating her 2-year-old daughter to death in 2007. The jury found Routier guilty and she was sentenced to death by lethal injection on February 4, 1997. 16 - Outside the jury's presence, Ms. Routier's laundry woman WebRoutier, Darlie Lynn: TDCJ Number: 999220: Date of Birth: 01/04/1970: Date Received: 02/05/1997: Age (when Received) 27: Education Level (Highest Grade Completed) 12: The Routiers ask the public, through relatives, to help Police almost immediately focused on Routier, who was sleeping in a downstairs television room with the children. She was tried only for the murder of Damon, as he was under six at the time of his death and that made it a capital murder case. Routiers attorney, Douglas Mulder argued that there was no coherent motive for her to murder her children. contained deposits of Ms. Routier's skin. If Acadiana Criminalistics recommends additional testing of samples, the specific evidence is to be sent to Mitotyping Technologies in State College to undergo mitochondrial DNA testing. Darlie married Darin in August of 1988. In November, Darlies attorneys file a motion for DNA testing to be conducted under Texas post-conviction DNA statute. In 2014, both the prosecution and her defence team were granted permission for further DNA tests. What told you something might be wrong here that was worth your attention? Testing will be made on a sock that was found away from the scene of the murder, hairs recovered from the sock, Routiers shirt, blankets and pillow cases found at the scene, the jeans worn by Routier and the children, fingernail clippings from the children, a bloody knife and hairs on the knife.