People we’ve helped exonerate
Darren Price
Darren Price was officially exonerated on January 17, 2025, for a crime he did not commit.
Case history
On the night of November 10, 2001, a woman named Kimberly Lambert was carjacked outside a shopping plaza in Memphis. Her attacker had hidden in the back of her SUV, held a knife to her throat, and forced her to drive to a dark residential street before demanding money and trying to stab her. She fought back fiercely, wrested the knife away, and escaped. She described her attacker as a young to middle-aged Black man with a light complexion, wearing a white t-shirt, blue jeans, and a ball cap.
Two days later, a patrol officer flagged a man who had been admitted to a Memphis hospital in the early morning hours of November 11 — hours after the attack — with broken ribs and other serious injuries. Based on nothing more than than a description of the perpetrator’s smell, Sergeant Ralph Peperone drove to the hospital, looked at Darren Price in the trauma intensive care unit, and returned to his office to build a photo lineup around him. He used his own viewing of Price as the basis for the lineup — not Lambert’s description of her attacker. When Lambert viewed it, she identified Price.
Fingerprints lifted from Lambert’s car did not match Darren. A black t-shirt found in the rear storage area of the vehicle — left behind by the actual attacker — was not tested. Darren had an alibi: at the time of the crime, he was on Baltic Street near his home when he was arrested by police. Hours later, after Jarrett was released on bond, Jarrett and another man tracked Darren down and beat him severely, believing he had tipped off police. That’s how he ended up in the hospital.
His defense attorney didn’t believe him. Rather than investigate the alibi, the attorney concluded his client was lying — based on a miscommunication about who had been arrested that night. As a result, Darren took the witness stand and testified in a narrative, without his own lawyer asking him a single question. The alibi witnesses who could have corroborated his account were never called.
On January 30, 2003, the jury convicted Darren Price of attempted first-degree murder, especially aggravated kidnapping, and aggravated robbery. He was sentenced to 49 years in prison.
Darren never stopped insisting he was innocent.
When we started reviewing Darren's case, it was pretty clear there was more to the story. With the help of investigator Marc Caudel, TIP pounded the pavement, tracked down witnesses, and got to the truth of the matter. This case demonstrates what can be uncovered after a fact-intensive, detailed investigation."
Jessica Van Dyke Legal Director
Building the case for innocence
Tennessee Innocence Project took on Darren’s case and immediately recognized what the original investigation had missed: there were people who had been there the night of the crime, and no one had ever seriously looked for them.
In 2021, TIP filed a motion for DNA testing and fingerprint analysis. The motion was denied in February 2022. TIP pressed forward. In March 2022, TIP attorneys filed a petition for a writ of error coram nobis to vacate Darren’s convictions. In September 2022, Shelby County District Attorney Steve Mulroy agreed to allow the DNA and fingerprint testing.
The results were significant. DNA testing of the black t-shirt found in the rear storage area of Lambert’s SUV, the shirt she testified was not hers and had not been in the car before the attack, identified a male DNA profile that excluded Darren as the source. The attacker had left biological evidence at the scene. It didn’t belong to Darren Price.
At the same time, TIP investigator Marc Caudel tracked down the alibi witnesses who had never been called at trial. Darrell Jarrett, whose arrest on the night of the crime formed the backbone of Darren’s alibi, testified at the hearing. He confirmed that he was arrested at approximately 9:45 p.m. — around the same time Lambert was being attacked — and that Darren was there with him. Keiver Mitchell, the man who helped assault Darren after Jarrett was released on bond, also testified, corroborating both the alibi and the beating that explained Darren’s injuries. Two additional witnesses, Kevin Franklin and Monica Eddings, testified that they were present when Jarrett was arrested and that Darren was there.
The witnesses had existed all along. They simply had never been found — because the attorney assigned to protect Darren had decided, on the basis of a misunderstanding, that his client was lying.
Exoneration
On November 22, 2024, Shelby County Circuit Court Judge James Jones Jr. granted TIP’s petition, vacated Darren’s convictions, and ordered a new trial. “This Court finds the newly discovered evidence of the DNA results and the testimony of the four alibi witnesses is overwhelming in favor of Price,” the judge ruled.
On January 17, 2025, the prosecution dismissed all charges. Darren Price was a free and innocent man — fully exonerated, his record clear.
The TIP legal team commented on the day the charges were dropped: “Today is a powerful reminder of what we can achieve when we remain committed to seeking justice. Darren’s exoneration exemplifies the mission of Tennessee Innocence Project: to seek justice, uncover truth, and restore lives.”
Darren had spent years in prison and years more on parole, carrying a conviction for something he did not do. He can now rebuild his life without that weight — no longer labeled a convicted felon for a crime the evidence always said he didn’t commit.
Today is a powerful reminder of what we can achieve when we remain committed to seeking justice. Darren’s exoneration exemplifies the mission of the Tennessee Innocence Project: to seek justice, uncover truth, and restore lives. This milestone serves as both a celebration of Darren’s newfound freedom and a call to action for systemic change to prevent further injustices.
Jason Gichner Executive Director
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