| Updated: 8/19/2011 4:42 pm |
Published: 8/19/2011 4:41 pm |
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) - Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel says he didn't make the decision to approve a plea deal that freed three men convicted in deaths of three Cub Scouts.
But he says he respects Prosecuting Attorney Scott Ellington's deal to accept guilty pleas from Damien Echols, Jason Baldwin and Jessie Misskelley. The men were freed Friday.
McDaniel says in a statement he still believes Echols, Baldwin and Misskelley are guilty, and he was ready to help Ellington continue the prosecution of the men.
But McDaniel says Ellington knows the case better than anyone else and reached a deal that maintains murder convictions for the trio, known as the "West Memphis Three."
Ellington has said it would have been "practically impossible" to try the men again almost 20 years after the killings.
(Copyright 2011 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
