Karla Brown
Karla Brown was murdered in her Wood River, Illinois home days before her wedding. A bite mark on her body was key evidence. John Prante was convicted but later exonerated.
On June 21, 1978, twenty-two-year-old Karla Brown was found murdered in the basement of her home in Wood River, Illinois, just days before her planned wedding. She had been beaten, bitten, and drowned in a barrel of water.
The case initially went cold. In 1982, a forensic odontologist matched a bite mark found on Karla's body to John Prante, a neighbor. Prante was convicted of murder in 1983 based primarily on the bite mark evidence and sentenced to 75 years.
However, bite mark analysis has since been widely discredited by the scientific community as unreliable. In 2019, Prante's conviction was overturned after a review found the bite mark evidence was junk science.
Prante was released after serving over 36 years in prison. The case remains technically unsolved, as the prosecution's primary evidence was invalidated.
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