On September 23, 1982, a 20-year-old woman, identified as T.T., left her job at a law firm in Oklahoma City, Oklahoma and walked to her car. As she reached the car, she was attacked by a man who forced her into the front passenger seat, and then got behind the wheel. He drove away while beating the woman over the head. He also forced her to perform oral sex while he drove.
Eventually, the attacker stopped the car near a ravine in southeast Oklahoma City. He tore off T.T.’s shirt and used it as a blindfold. Before being blindfolded, the victim saw that the man had a knife. The man then raped her vaginally and anally and again forced her to perform oral sex. The victim then bit the attacker’s penis, causing him to scream and drop his knife. She jumped from the car and ran to a nearby home, where police were called.
T.T. was taken to the hospital, where a rape kit was collected and the robe was inventoried as evidence as well.
A police detective organized volunteers at the Rape Crisis Center to telephone area hospitals and physicians in an attempt to learn if any men had received treatment for an injured penis.
That same night, 28-year-old David Bryson went to the hospital seeking medical care for an injury to his penis. After his initial visit, he called the hospital seeking a prescription to treat an infection of the wound. The doctor who wrote this prescription later overheard hospital staff discussing the request from the Oklahoma City Police Department for information on any patient with injuries to his penis. The doctor informed the police that Bryson had been treated for such injuries.
On October 8, 1982, T.T. viewed a photographic lineup that included Bryson. When she identified Bryson as her attacker, the officer administering the lineup told her that the man she had chosen was in custody and had an injury to his penis. Marge White, who had told police that she saw a man hitchhiking near the crime scene on the night of the crime, also viewed the photographic lineup. White identified Bryson as the man she saw hitchhiking.
Bryson was then arrested. He was charged with kidnapping, rape, anal sodomy and oral sodomy.
Bryson went to trial in Oklahoma County District Court in February 1983.
T.T. identified Bryson as her attacker. T.T. said that she believed she was going to be killed, so she bit the attacker on his penis as hard as she could. The attacker dropped the knife. She said she bit him again and then was able to flee. Naked and crying, she managed to get to a nearby home where she was given a robe and police were called.
White testified that she saw Bryson hitchhiking. She said that as she neared him, he lunged out at her and she drove on.
Joyce Gilchrist, a forensic chemist in the Oklahoma City Police Department Crime Lab, testified that hairs found on the T.T.’s body were consistent with Bryson’s head and pubic hairs. Gilchrist testified she “believed each person’s hair was unique and that she could identify the unique characteristics” of the hair.
In addition, semen was identified on swabs from the victim’s body and bathrobe. Gilchrist testified that the blood type of sperm cells in both of these samples matched Bryson’s blood type.
Oklahoma City police officer Ed Johnson described Bryson’s injury as “abrased” and “skinned.”
Bryson testified that he received an injury to his penis when he was having sex with his girlfriend. He said he had asked her to scrape her teeth on his penis in an up-and-down motion.
Bryson’s doctor testified that Bryson’s injury was not comparable to the bite injury described by T.T.
Several witnesses testified that Bryan had been at his father's home at 6:30 p.m. and then went directly to a driving school, which started no later than 7:05 p.m.–during the time when the victim was being abducted and attacked.
On February 10, 1983, the jury convicted Bryson of all four charges. He was sentenced to 85 years in prison.
On appeal, Bryson argued that the officer’s confirmation of the victim’s selection in the photographic lineup influenced her certainty at trial that she had chosen the right person. On August 30, 1985, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals affirmed his convictions and sentence.
In April of 1988, Jim Pearson, Bryson’s attorney, approached Gilchrist about the possibility of performing DNA testing on the forensic evidence in the case. Gilchrist said Pearson would have to get approval of the Oklahoma County District Attorney’s Office. Pearson talked with Barry Albert, the Assistant District Attorney who prosecuted Bryson’s case. Albert said Pearson would have to talk to the District Attorney, Robert Macy, or Pat Morgan, the First Assistant District Attorney. Pearson wrote a letter to Morgan and then talked with Macy. Pearson wanted the evidence tested by Lifecodes, a private DNA testing firm. Macy agreed to the testing by Lifecodes and told Pearson to have Gilchrist ship the evidence to Lifecodes.
Pearson told Gilchrist “to send everything that could be sent for DNA testing.” On June 6, 1998, Gilchrist wrote a note saying that the evidence had been destroyed per standard procedures.
In December 1989, Marlene Cannon, a private investigator hired by Bryson’s father, found the forensic evidence from Bryson’s trial in the office of the Oklahoma County District Court Clerk. In May 1991, Bryson’s new attorney, Jack Pointer, asked the prosecution to be allowed access to the evidence for DNA testing. The request was denied.
On September 7, 1995, Bryson filed an application for post-conviction relief in the Oklahoma County District Court. The application said that Gilchrist’s testimony was a significant factor resulting in his conviction, and that the hair and blood evidence could be subjected to DNA testing that would conclusively prove that Bryson was innocent. The application requested an evidentiary hearing and that the evidence be sent to a DNA lab for analysis. The prosecution opposed the application and on November 20, 1995, the court denied the application.
An appeal was dismissed. Bryson’s father hired attorney Jack Fisher to continue to pursue DNA testing. Fisher called Gilchrist, and she told him the evidence was on the window sill in her office and that she had been directed to destroy it. Fisher told Gilchrist not to destroy it because he wanted to get it tested.
On August 28, 1996, Fisher sent Gilchrist a letter and requested that the evidence be preserved for future DNA testing. On September 6, 1996, Gilchrist wrote a note for the case file that said that based on instructions from the prosecution, “I can ignore this request. The attorney must make any request through the DA’s office.”
As a result, Fisher spoke with Assistant District Attorney Susan Stensaas about DNA testing. Stensaas told him that she “would go to jail before she would allow DNA testing,” according to Fisher.
On September 12, 1996, Fisher filed an application with the district court for access to the forensic evidence for DNA testing at Bryson’s expense.
On October 2, 1996, after a hearing, the application was denied. However, the court ordered that the forensic evidence be preserved. On October 31, 1996, Bryson filed a Petition for a Writ of Mandamus with the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals for an order allowing Bryson access to the forensic evidence for DNA testing.
On. March 4, 1997, the appeals court affirmed the denial of relief. The court concluded that “at this juncture,” Bryson had not established that he was entitled to post-conviction relief. The court stated: “Because Petitioner's application is based upon the results of DNA testing, and the testing has yet to be accomplished, a post-conviction appeal is premature.”
The appeals court also ordered the forensic evidence to be preserved and that it would not preclude the testing from being performed.
On March 28, 1997, a district court judge directed Gilchrist to ship the forensic evidence to Brian Wraxall, a forensic analyst at Serological Research Institute (SERI), a California DNA testing firm.
In a report dated April 22, 1997, Wraxall concluded that the “semen on both vaginal swabs ... could not have originated from David Bryson.” Wraxall also reported that semen on the robe was “consistent with the semen found on the vaginal swabs ...The semen could not have originated from David Bryson.”
After learning of the DNA test results, T.T. had a stroke and died.
On May 5, 1997, Bryson filed another application for post-conviction relief in district court alleging that the DNA evidence was “newly discovered evidence” and the results exonerated him.
The prosecution was allowed to seek further DNA testing. The evidence was sent to LabCorp, another private DNA testing company. On September 3, 1997, Labcorp reported that Bryson was excluded as the source of the semen.
On November 3, 1997, three hair slides were sent to LabCorp for DNA testing at the request of the prosecution. LabCorp was unable to obtain a sufficient amount of DNA to analyze the hair.
On December 30, 1997, a district court judge, without conducting an evidentiary hearing, denied Bryson’s application for post-conviction relief, concluding that the DNA evidence would not have changed the verdict of Bryson’s trial because of the overwhelming evidence of guilt.
Bryson appealed and on February 9, 1999, the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals entered an order remanding the case to the district court for an evidentiary hearing.
An evidentiary hearing was held over two days in March and April 1999. Gilchrist testified that when she did her testing in 1982 and when she testified in court, she determined that the source of the semen on the robe was type B and that the donor of the semen on the vaginal swabs also was type B. She said that the person who committed the offense was a B secretor. She also testified that she was unable to exclude Bryson as a source of the hairs. Testimony was also presented that T.T. had sex with her fiancé at 6:15 a.m. on the day of the crime. Gilchrist testified that the fiancé could not be excluded.
On March 31, 1999, a judge in district court denied Bryson’s application, declaring that the evidence at trial, despite the DNA test results, was overwhelming.
Bryson appealed again. On August 13, 1999, the appeals court reversed the district court’s order. The court said, “(w)e find the DNA evidence does, in fact create a reasonable probability of changing the outcome of this trial. DNA testing by two separate entities conclusively eliminates Petitioner, as well as the victim’s fiancé.” The court vacated Bryson’s convictions and ordered a new trial.
On August 27, 1999, United States Senior District Judge Ralph G. Thompson issued a memorandum opinion in an unrelated murder case. Judge Thompson found Gilchrist’s trial testimony to be “without question, untrue” and to be “at least, misleading.” Judge Thompson noted that Gilchrist had been criticized in other opinions of the Oklahoma Court of Criminal Appeals for her testimony and conduct, including the cases of Curtis McCarty, Robert Miller, and Jeffrey Todd Pierce, all of whom eventually would be exonerated.
As a result of the opinion, Gilchrist’s supervisor, Byron Boshell, was asked to conduct an investigation on the impact of the court rulings on the forensic laboratory.
On October 15, 1999, Bryson was released after posting a $100,000 bond, which was later reduced to $40,000.
Ultimately, two forensic chemists for the Oklahoma City Police Department examined the hairs in Bryson’s case. They failed to find similarities between the crime scene hairs and Bryson’s hairs. They recommended that the Bryson hairs be thoroughly inspected by an outside analyst.
FBI special agent Douglas Deedrick conducted a review of eight cases handled by Gilchrist from 1982 to 1991, including Bryson’s case. On April 4, 2001, Deerick reported that Bryson’s pubic hair “does not exhibit the same microscopic characteristics as the known pubic hairs of the suspect or victim.”
Although Deedrick conducted a review of eight cases, only five of those cases had prepared glass microscope slides that could be re-examined. Deedrick said that all five cases had either errors in identification or interpretation.
Deedrick also criticized Gilchrist's trial testimony in the Bryson case when she said, “I would think it would be impossible not to be able to distinguish hairs from two different individuals if that’s what you’re saying.” Deedrick said that Gilchrist implied that the hairs are “unique” to an individual, and misrepresented the science of hair comparisons.
On August 21, 2001, an Oklahoma City Departmental Review Board convened to review evidence and facts relating to Gilchrist. The hearing lasted 14 days. On September 21, 2001, the board recommended that Gilchrist be fired for engaging in casework analysis that was flawed and improperly documented, including her work in the Bryson case. The board said it could find “little or no evidence that Joyce Gilchrist is able to properly conduct hair analysis.”
On September 25, 2001, Gilchrist was fired.
In March of 2002, an agreement was reached between Bryson’s lawyer and the prosecution to conduct DNA testing of the remaining evidence, which included hair, swabbings from T.T.’s mouth, a torn fingernail, a hair root and a torn fingernail.
The evidence was sent to Wraxall at SERI, who tested it in March 2003. On March 6, 2003, Wraxall concluded that none of the evidence examined showed the presence of any DNA from Bryson.
On May 16, 2003, the prosecution filed a motion to dismiss Bryson’s case.
On June 24, 2003, the case was dismissed.
Bryson filed a federal civil-rights lawsuit seeking damages against District Attorney Robert Macy and Gilchrist. He settled for an undisclosed amount against Macy and for $16.5 million against Gilchrist, although his attorney said it was unlikely that Bryson would collect anything from her. Bryson also was awarded $100,000 in state compensation.
Bryson died in May 2013.
– Maurice Possley
Posting Date: 08-29-2011
Last Update Date: 07-15-2026
