The investigation of one of America’s oldest cold cases is now under investigation.
A special prosecutor has been appointed to investigate if authorities coerced a false conviction for the 1957 killing of 7-year-old Maria Elizabeth Ridulph, CNN reported Monday.
An order signed last week by Robbin Stuckert, the chief judge in Dekalb County, Ill., opened a probe primarily into whether a Seattle cop committed perjury in the murder trial of Jack Daniel McCullough.
McCollough was convicted in 2012 for the kidnapping and murder of Ridulph, who disappeared from a street corner in Sycamore in December 1957. Her skeletal remains were found in a wooded area nearly five months later.
The case remained cold for decades until the arrest in 2011 of McCollough, a military veteran who was questioned in the initial investigation and later retired to Seattle. He was convicted in 2012, supposedly bringing an end at last to the case, and sent to serve a life sentence.
But further investigation by attorneys led a judge to believe McCollough could not have committed the crime, because he was more than 40 miles away from the scene when it happened. McCollough was released from prison and had his charges dropped in April 2016.
The new examination will mostly look into whether Seattle Police Detective Irene Lau committed perjury in her testimony against McCollough.
Lau said in the trial that McCollough spoke of the 7-year-old like he was “deeply, deeply in love with her,” and called the slain girl “stunningly beautiful.”
But a video of the questioning, obtained by McCollough’s son-in-law through a public records request, showed that he never said those statements, according to CNN.
The probe will also examine if police and prosecutors deliberately concealed that 78-minute tape. Lau acknowledged in a police report that video existed, but a prosecutor later claimed there was no footage, and the prosecution never turned over a video.
The Seattle Police Department did not comment on the new probe.
McCullough, 77, has asked Illinois circuit court Judge William Brady to declare him innocent. He has a court hearing set for April.
