Murder of Michael Jordan’s father examined by new doctor, raising questions about shocking investigation

EXCLUSIVE: For 25 years, Daniel Green maintained his innocence in the 1993 murder of Michael Jordan’s father.

Now, a new true crime documentary, entitled “Moment of Truth”, is examining the problematic investigation behind James Raymond Jordan’s shocking death in North Carolina at age 56.

The five-part series, directed by Matthew Perniciaro and Clay Johnson also promises to present compelling new information with important court documents and photos of evidence of the case, as well as exclusive interviews and never-before-released trial audio.

“I was living in Raleigh, North Carolina, when the crime happened,” Perniciaro told Fox News. “So it is something that I have been aware of for most of my life … There were so many unanswered questions about this case, that even then, as a young man, I remember elements that did not add up entirely.”

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Jordan is one of the greatest basketball players of all time. He led the Chicago Bulls in six NBA championships. The 58-year-old is now the owner of the NBA’s Charlotte Hornets.

He and his father were known to be incredibly close. A representative for Jordan did not immediately respond to Fox News’s request for comment.

James was killed after stopping on Interstate 95 to take a nap during a trip from Wilmington to Charlotte, The News & Observer reported. According to the shot, his decomposing body was discovered in a South Carolina swamp 11 days later.

“James Jordan was attending a friend’s funeral in Wilmington, North Carolina,” explained Perniciaro. “He was last seen at that funeral and shortly afterwards at a meeting. He left Wilmington, North Carolina, to drive to Charlotte, where the family lived at that time in 1993. And along that trip, he stopped in Shire of Robeson. This is the time when we really started to explore and what potentially happened. “

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Pals Green and Larry Demery, aged 19 and 18 at the time, were arrested and charged with James’s murder. Demery testified at his 1996 trial that Green shot James while he slept in his luxury car, The News & Observer reported. According to the communication channel, Green has always claimed that he helped Demery get rid of James’ body, but that he was not present when James was killed.

Demery received parole in 2020. He is expected to be a free man in 2023. Green is serving a life sentence.

“Larry and Daniel were childhood friends,” Perniciaro shared. “And over the years, Daniel maintains his belief that Larry lied about the events surrounding this crime and about Daniel’s involvement in that crime. But Daniel often said that the two were pawns.”

The documentary explores how young people were possibly pitted against each other and threatened with the death penalty until one of them relented. Demery testified against Green as part of a court settlement.

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Chris Mumma, Green’s lawyer and executive director of the North Carolina Center on Actual Innocence, participated in the documentary. She also went to college with Jordan.

“I got involved in Daniel’s case for the first time because of the blood problem,” she explained. “What was called blood was shown to the jury. I don’t scientifically believe it can be called blood. I don’t think there is any evidence that there was blood in the car. So that was the first problem. But then the more I learned about the case, the more I learned that there were many problems about [it]. “

“There’s the bullet’s trajectory, the missing bullet hole in the shirt, the clear confrontation between Daniel Green and Larry Demery with the death penalty threats being used,” she continued. “There was also the pressure to resolve this case quickly and the tunnel vision of the investigation. There are so many things that didn’t fit the more you discovered. And I think there is still more to discover today. I don’t think we’re anywhere close to the truth of the that happened in this case. “

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In 2017, the Associated Press reported that Green’s lawyers called for a retrial, saying that someone tampered with James’s shirt after his autopsy. The autopsy found no holes in his shirt that corresponded to the gunshot wound in the upper right area of ​​the chest, but a State Investigation Department agent later contradicted it on the witness stand, according to the Robeson County lawyers’ filing. In North Carolina. Block.

The lawsuit that year said the absence of a hole in the right chest area contradicted the prosecutor’s theory that James was lying in his car when he was shot. The suit also described an unusual chain of custody for the shirt. He said that Dr. Joel Sexton, who performed the autopsy, gave it to a police officer who gave it to a civil servant at a company that provided services to funeral homes. Then the employee gave the shirt to the boss, who said he buried it in the yard because of the smell.

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Later, when the police determined that the shirt was a piece of evidence, the garment was exhumed. It was then that an SBI agent reported the presence of a bullet hole in the upper right part of the shirt’s chest. Sexton, however, had written in the autopsy report he searched for and did not find a hole that corresponded to James’s fatal wound. Instead, Sexton wrote that he found three holes near the shirt’s diaper.

“Whenever you have a prominent case, there will be more public pressure to resolve it, whether it comes from your own family, the community or just the pressure from the media,” explained Mumma. “Obviously, with the connection to Michael Jordan, this case has come under tremendous pressure … Unfortunately, the public narrative comes a lot from journalists.”

“… It went from an unidentified John Doe found in the swamp to the identification of James Jordan to the immediate effort to move this case as quickly as possible,” she continued. “And so the two boys were looking at the death penalty. The case actually went much faster than any other case today. So, I definitely think there was pressure to end it.”

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Perniciaro hopes the documentary will clarify how the case continues to perplex people decades later.

“This story was reported by the media, but it was very rarely reported about the human beings involved,” he said. “We want to tell this story, not only with a level of investigative detail that has not been presented, but with a certain degree of humanity. The Jordan family suffered a great loss. You have to be sensitive, understanding and respectful of it at all times. But Daniel and Larry, their lives and the lives of their families changed forever, too. “

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“It is a very worrying reminder that this case occurred almost 30 years ago, and we are still seeing those same things happening today,” he shared. “And if we want real change in our society, we have to tell these stories.”

The Associated Press contributed to this report.