Credit: PA Department of Corrections
A former Bristol Township man incarcerated for the 1990 murder of a woman had his bid for clemency denied.
John Brookins, 56, had his petition for clemency reviewed by the Pennsylvania Board of Pardons – comprised of Lt. Gov. John Fetterman, Attorney General Josh Shapiro, a corrections expert, a psychiatrist, and a victim representative – on Thursday afternoon. On Friday, the board voted 4-1 to deny petition.
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Brookins is serving life in prison for the December 20, 1990 murder of Sheila Ginsberg, 58. She was found dead in her Bristol Township apartment off Bath Road. An investigation revealed she was stabbed to death with scissors. The woman’s body was discovered by her son who flew in from Florida hours later.
Over the years, Brookins has maintained his innocence and blamed Ginsberg’s daughter. He recently has taken up a push to test DNA evidence in the case.
The district attorney’s office has held firm that the conviction is fair.
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Chief Deputy District Attorney Jill Graziano wrote in a letter to the Pennsylvania Board of Pardons recently that Brookins’ fingerprints were found at the crime scene. One bloody fingerprint was reported to be found on the TV remote control near the victim’s body.
On the claim that Ginsberg’s daughter murdered her mother, the district attorney’s office said they have evidence that Ginsberg’s wounds were unlikely to be caused by her daughter, who weighed between 80 to 90 pounds at the time.
In a statement Friday, the district attorney’s office said testing the DNA evidence on a pair of scissors would not change the situation.
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“Simply put, any result of DNA testing of the scissors used to murder Ms. Ginsberg will in no way diminish the overwhelming evidence of Mr. Brookins’ guilt of this heinous crime, and would not prove his innocence. Even if Mr. Brookins’ DNA were not found on the scissors, there are various common-sense explanations for lack of DNA that do not prove his innocence. These include elimination of his DNA from the item either intentionally by him to avoid detection, or unwittingly by another person later handling the scissors, such as when the medical examiner pulled the scissors from Ms. Ginsberg’s body; or due to simple degradation of the DNA due to the passage of time,” the office said.
“The Board of Pardons is not the proper venue for Mr. Brookins to attempt to adjudicate guilt or innocence, the courts of law are,” said Bucks County District Attorney Matt Weintraub. “And every court that has reviewed Mr. Brookins’ innocence claims over the past three decades, including his most recent request for DNA testing, has rejected his ever-changing claims. Our office remains unshaken in our confidence that John Brookins is guilty of the murder of which he was convicted, and that justice has again prevailed.”
Brookins has been a model inmate. While behind bars, he has become a certified yoga instructor and has helped maintain the prison nursery. In November 2018, he married Karen Pollard-Brookins, a childhood friend who he reconnected with while imprisoned.
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The Philadelphia Inquirer reported Craig Cooley, a lawyer for Brookins, worried the case had warning signs that could indicate a wrongful conviction.
“The only manipulation and disinformation in this case is not from John Brookins. It’s from the DA,” he said, according to the newspaper.
Fetterman voted for Brookin’s attempt at clemency, but noted it was because Weintraub refused to have the scissors tested for DNA, the Doylestown Intelligencer reported.
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