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State of Louisiana v Kendall Harrison
Steering wheel analyzed in good Samaritan murder
| Crime | On January 25, 2012, good Samaritan Harry Ainsworth tried to stop a man from car-jacking a woman. The assailant shot and killed Mr. Ainsworth. Police charged 17-year-old Kendall Harrison with the crime. |
| Evidence | Investigators collected a steering wheel swab as evidence. |
| DNA | The Louisiana State Police Crime Laboratory generated DNA data from the evidence using the 15-locus Identifiler® kit. |
| Match | In 2012, the laboratory manually interpreted the data and calculated a match statistic between the steering wheel and Kendall Harrison of 73.7 million. Due to updated interpretation protocols, the lab did not present this result at the re-trial. |
| TrueAllele | On the same 15-locus kit data, TrueAllele found that a match between the steering wheel and Kendall Harrison is 123 thousand times more probable than a coincidence. The error rate for this statistic is 1 in 1.59 million. |
| Cybergenetics | In January 2025, TrueAllele’s reliability was challenged in a pre-trial admissibility hearing. On March 12, 2025, the judge ruled that the TrueAllele evidence was admissible. On September 10, 2025, Cybergenetics analyst Jennifer Bracamontes testified before an Orleans Parish jury about the TrueAllele DNA results. |
| Outcome | In December 2014, a non-unanimous jury convicted Mr. Harrison of the murder. The court overturned his conviction and granted him a new trial following the April 2020 US Supreme Court decision regarding non-unanimous jury verdicts. On September 11, 2025, the jury acquitted Mr. Harrison of armed robbery and second-degree murder. |
Media
- New Orleans police arrest 17-year-old in Good Samaritan shooting - CNN
- Man indicted in Jan. Algiers good Samaritan killing - WDSU6 News
- Man convicted in 2012 killing of good Samaritan in Algiers - WDSU6 News
- Two of New Orleans' oldest homicide cases were set for trial on Monday. Only one began - nola.com
- New Orleans man acquitted in retrial of 2012 Good Samaritan murder - Fox 8 WVUE
- Man acquitted in 2012 Algiers murder after 11 years in prison - Fox 8 WVUE