Murder charge against man accused of killing 13-year-old girl dismissed amid litany of procedural and investigatory failures

Shawn Casey Adkins (Mitchell County Sheriff

Shawn Casey Adkins (Mitchell County Sheriff’s Office) and Hailey Dunn (Missing poster)

A 37-year-old man in Texas accused of killing his girlfriend’s 13-year-old daughter in 2010 has been released from jail two years after his arrest, with prosecutors listing a series of procedural and investigatory missteps and claiming that “further investigation is needed” before they can take the case to trial.

Nolan County District Attorney Richard Thompson on Monday filed a motion dismissing charges of murder and tampering with evidence against Shawn Casey Adkins in connection with the death of Colorado City teen Hailey Dunn, court documents reviewed by Law&Crime show. The motion seeks the dismissal of the charges “without prejudice,” meaning that Adkins could be charged with Hailey’s murder a second time.

“Pursuant to the State’s duty to see that justice is done, the prosecution in this case believes that further investigation is needed for the State to proceed to trial,” Nolan wrote in the filing. “To be clear, the prosecution views Shawn Casey Adkins as the primary suspect in the Hailey Dunn murder on or about Dec. 27, 2010, in Mitchell County, Texas. However, additional work must be done before the case can proceed to a jury trial.”

The motion then goes on to provide a litany of errors and omissions that led prosecutors to drop the charges against Adkins. In light of those shortcomings, the state said it provided Adkins with a 16-page “comprehensive Brady notice” which details potentially “exculpatory, impeachment, and mitigating evidence” in the case against him. A Brady notice, also referred to as Brady material or a Brady disclosure, refers to prosecutors being legally obligated to disclose evidence that is favorable to the accused and may harm the state’s case.

First, prosecutors said that during the decade-long investigation into Hailey’s murder, “hundreds of tips, leads, and potential alternate suspects were provided to law enforcement.” While “some” of that information was investigated and cleared, prosecutors said that “many of the tips and leads were not properly vetted, investigated, or cleared,” emphasizing that doing so “is critical in a case such as this that relies exclusively on circumstantial evidence.”

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