West Memphis Three supporters know that Pearl Jam front man Eddie Vedder is on their side, and has been for nearly ten years. Vedder, with a string of best selling albums with Pearl Jam, has also launched several solo efforts, most recently composing the original score to the movie, Into the Wild. The soundtrack has earned nominations for two Golden Globes and a Grammy for the song Guaranteed. Vedder is doing a two week, seven city tour in April with some of the proceeds going to raise money for the Free the West Memphis Three defense fund. Without the help of big name acts like Vedder, the current flurry of legal activity, giving the three their best shot yet at a new trial, would surely not be happening.

Vedder flashes his FTWM3 T-shirt whenever he gets a chance, as he did at a Pearl Jam concert in San Bernardino, CA during the 2000 tour. He even incorporated the cause into the lyrics of the Vedder/Gossard song, Do the Evolution:

Pearl Jam is touring the East Coast in June of this year, doing eleven cities in two weeks. Tickets go on sale in March, and are sure to sell out quickly.

Damien Echols said of Vedder on Larry King Live in December 2007, "Eddie has went [sic] above and beyond the call of duty to me and my wife both. You know, he has been probably the greatest friend a person could have through all of this."

Great friend indeed; his West Coast tour sold out within minutes. Tenclub  - the Pearl Jam private fan club ($20 for membership) has - or had - a $65 starting price for tickets, but e-bay shows prices already up over $400 a pair. Vedder auctioned off five pairs of tickets per show - seventy tickets in all - to benefit the WM3. Each pair of tickets is sold with a one night stay in a "premium" hotel, and "backstage chat" with Eddie.

Pearl Jam, like many rock artists today, have a variety of other causes near to their hearts, including relief for flood victims in Washington State, support of "reproductive freedom", getting out the youth vote, and a variety of environmental causes.

On March 1^st, 2008, the always entertaining Dark Lord Genocyde (DLC) will be interviewing John Mark Byers on his internet radio program. This will be a great opportunity for anyone who is interested to listen to DLC question Mark (get it?) about everything from the agonizing period following Christopher’s death, Mark’s controversial appearances in the two HBO movies, and his time in prison, to his "conversion" to believer in the innocence of the WM3, his relationship with Terry Hobbs, and the upcoming book and movie that he is involved with. Not only will you be able to listen, Mark will be taking questions from listeners via Yahoo Messenger.

This will be a unique opportunity to hear and interact with one of the most outspoken supporters and straight talking individuals on the internet today. Follow the link below, click on the "Dancing Skeletons", and you’ll be right where you need to be on March 1st..

http://www.darksideradio.com/

Air times are:

3:00pm (Pacific)
4:00pm (Mountain)
5:00pm (Central)
6:00pm (EST)

As far as anyone but the Damien Echols legal team knows, the future of the West Memphis Three rides on a single hair. Or two. A single hair found at the crime scene has been touted as being consistent with that of victim Steve Branch’s stepfather, Terry Hobbs. Since the hair is also consistent with 1.5% of the population - which, according to defense team forensic serologist Thomas Fedor, is a "rough match" - it means that approximately 415 other people in West Memphis could be suspects, based on that evidence alone. When other factors are taken into account, such as the classic "means, motive, and opportunity" test, that number is much lower, possibly even as low as one. Another hair found at the scene - both hairs were discovered weeks after the murders - has been similarly identified as possibly belonging to Hobbs family friend and neighbor, David Jacoby. As much as Supporters might wish this to be a smoking gun, however, it is anything but, at least according to Arkansas Attorney General Dustin McDaniel.

"I am growing increasingly frustrated by what I see of a misleading press campaign that suggests there is new DNA evidence that some way exonerates these three boys that a jury found guilty and whose appeals they all lost," McDaniel said. McDaniel says he does not see any evidence that would exonerate the three, and that he finds the confession of Jessie Misskelley, "detailed and compelling." Refusing to be intimidated by the media. McDaniel says, "I’ve seen nothing, at this point, that leads me to believe that Judge (David) Burnett should on the basis of newly discovered scientific evidence grant a new trial." Combined with Arkansas Governor Mike Beebe’s recent statement that he is not considering pardons or clemency for the three, McDaniel’s statement does not bode well for Echols, Baldwin, or Misskelley.

Columnist Mike Brummett said back in December 2007, "Beebe is too much the cautious man to free these three until and unless the argument becomes even more compelling. But Beebe also is the kind of man who would do the right thing eventually. I cannot imagine that he would let Echols get put to death. Commuting the death sentence would seem to be the least, the very least, the state ought to do. Then we could argue about whether he and the others ought to be in jail at all." (Read the entire article here)

For Supporters, clemency would spare the life of Damien Echols, but would do nothing to "Free the West Memphis Three." Inmates moved off death row tend to drop out of the public eye rather quickly. If the celebrity endorsements dry up, what will happen to the defense fund administered by Echols’s wife, Lorri Davis? Without the defense fund, or unless, as Brummett says, the "argument becomes even more compelling", Echols, Baldwin, and Misskelley will become just three more indigent inmates whose legal appeals will have been exhausted.

The following article was written by Mark's sister Beth. Here she provides an older sibling's perspective of the man everyone thinks they know, but few actually do.

The year was 1957, I was almost 6 years old, and a new baby was coming into our family. Thinking back on this, I really don't remember "expecting" a baby - he just came! You see, my mom didn't talk about "those things". I'm sure I was married and expecting my first child before I heard her use the word "pregnant". I'm a teacher now and today a kindergarten student could explain the process - but not then, not in our house and not in 1957.

As the baby of the family, I wasn't so sure about this new brother. I had a big brother; who needs two? Eventually my sister and I grew used to him, and even enjoyed the times we could "dress him up". We had the real Baby Alive and just didn't know it. The only problem was that before long he grew up and that meant getting into our things!

There's a saying, You can't choose your relatives and I'm thankful that is true, because if choosing were an option, John Mark may not have been my brother. Let's see, the process may have been something like this:

Please read the list of the available babies and their futures and choose the baby boy you would like to have for a brother.

Available: A little boy, John Mark:

1. Will be born March 8, 1957, weighing 3lbs. 15oz., 23 inches long (whoa!, sounds long and skinny to me)

2. Will be a major pest, always blaming you for the messes in the house (hmmm, could I just get a puppy?)

3. In his teenage years he will manage to wreck a few cars and will begin experimenting with drugs. (oh no, I don't think this one is for me)

4. He will marry and experience problems, but don't worry this is just the beginning of trouble. (Whew, I think I'm right about checking "no")

5. He will remarry and have two step sons, adopting the youngest who will be murdered at the age of 8 (How horrible!!! No way I want to go through this!)

6. After the murder of his son, he will plunge further into the world of drugs, he will agree not once but twice to subject himself to the media/films so that not only you but the entire world will know about him but most will believe he's the murderer! (WHY am I still reading about this one? Who would want this? Certainly not me . . .)

Let me keep looking.

But in reality there is no checklist and I didn't get to check "no". Thank goodness! Look at what I would have missed. I would have missed having a brother who loved his family and wanted so much to do right that he never stopped fighting to survive, even when he made every bad decision a person could make. Most people only know Mark from film or book, but that's not Mark, not the Mark I grew up with and love. That's just the man who hit the very bottom, lost all, and was so addicted to drugs that he saw no hope.

I would have missed seeing that man come from the very end of his life to struggle and live - to fight his way (often literally) out of a living Hell - to the man he is today. That struggle is far from over, but the brother I've always known is coming back. Like many others, I will never forget May 5, 1993. I can remember in vivid detail where I was when I received the news on May 6th, how I felt, and the drive to West Memphis not knowing what to say or do. As all the families know (and anyone that has lost a child) there are no words. Christopher has been described by many writers as mischievous, hyperactive, and sometimes disobedient, but I will always remember him as that little guy who used to sit on my living room rug and draw. He would always say, "Do you know what this is?". Sometimes I didn't, and that's when he'd giggle; that's the wonderful innocence of children. That's what was taken away that tragic and unforgettable day.

If I could have checked "no", I could have missed the bad things in Mark's life and I could have avoided watching someone I love self-destruct but then I would have missed knowing Mark, the real Mark who loves his family, fights fiercely to protect them and understands about forgiveness. If you want to know Mark, you need look only at his heart.

Untying the Knot: John Mark Byers and the West Memphis Child Murders, the new book on the case that many are calling the crime of century, is nearing completion, and more details will be available soon. The book chronicles the life of Mark Byers, arguably the most controversial character in a case steeped in disagreement and debate. Long regarded as the chief alternate suspect in the eyes of the public, Mark continues to spark as much contention today as he did back in the days when he was shooting pumpkins and burning mock graves to vent his anger against the three men he was sure murdered his son. "People have tried to take me out", he said to the cameras in Revelations: Paradise Lost 2, "but I’m still here, Jessie, Jason, Damien. Those names ring in my ears daily. And I still hate you." More recently, however, his words and actions are angering those who have maintained that the so-called West Memphis Three belong in prison and that two juries in 1994 convicted the right people. So what has changed?

John Mark Byers has lived through the murder of his eight-year-old son Christopher and two other boys, the unexplained death of his wife Melissa three years later, spent fourteen years as a suspect in the public eye, and a hellish fifteen months in the Arkansas Department of Corrections. But a startling series of new developments - including the discovery of DNA evidence pointing to another victim’s stepfather - has turned Mark Byers into a staunch advocate for the release of the convicted killers, dubbed the West Memphis Three by their supporters. Jason Baldwin, Damien Echols, and Jessie Misskelley, Jr. have spent fifteen years in prison for a crime that Mark Byers no longer believes they committed. "It's the worst nightmare you could ever imagine", Byers said recently on Larry King Live. "I know the nightmare that the three in prison feel to be wrongly accused." He also told Johnny Dodd at People, "I was fooled for fourteen years. But now I know that an injustice was dealt upon these boys by the State of Arkansas."

When asked by Jason Miles of WMC-TV in Memphis, "Do you think [Steve Branch’s stepfather] Terry Hobbs killed your son and the two other boys?", there was only a slight hesitation in his response: "In my opinion", Byers said, "I do. If it takes the last breath in my body, [seeing Terry Hobbs in jail] that’s my goal." Regarding the convicted men - notably Echols, who sits on death row in the Varner Supermax prison in Grady, Arkansas, Byers says, "I want him to know I’m here for him."

During his interview for Larry King Live, Echols said of Byers, "I appreciate everything he’s been expressing lately. I’ve heard him make comments like that several times on different local news stations and I’ve heard people repeat that to me. And I really, really do appreciate that. It means a great deal."

Byers and Echols, once fierce adversaries, are now united in the fight to save Echols’s life. They have joined forces with a cadre of celebrity supporters - Winona Ryder, Johnny Depp, Jack Black, Natalie Maines, Eddie Vedder (Pearl Jam), and Margaret Cho, to name a few - who have raised hundreds of thousands of dollars to fund a technological showdown with the State of Arkansas that promises to rival the O.J. Simpson and Sam Sheppard trials in drama and visibility. Forensic experts Dr. Michael Baden (O.J. Simpson), Dr. Vincent Di Maio (Scott Peterson), and former FBI profiler John Douglas (Mindhunter, Inside the Mind of the BTK Killer), have supplied the Echols defense team with enough horsepower to file a writ in federal court to have the conviction of Damien Echols overturned, or to grant a new trial. Echols’s attorneys have declared that they will be ready to file with the state courts by the middle of February, a step that was mandated by U.S. District Judge William R. Wilson, Jr., after which a hearing in federal court is expected in late spring.

Others are less enthusiastic about Byers’s change of heart. Amanda Hobbs, 19, daughter of Terry and Pam Hobbs, and the younger sister of victim Stevie Branch, thinks Byers is a hypocrite. "It makes me sick, it really does. It’s just crazy, you know? It’s like Mark Byers has been in these shoes for fourteen years and now he wants to try to put my father in those shoes?" Byers remains unmoved. "I personally believe it was a punishment crime that got out of hand."

But Terry Hobbs is still not considered a suspect by the West Memphis Police Department, though according to a CNN news story, WMPD Chief Bob Paudert says, "If they have DNA evidence that would give evidence that these three did not commit that crime, I would want to see it absolutely. I’m the first to say that if they have evidence to free those three I would support it 100 percent." The state prosecutor’s office has so far issued a "no comment" to reporters seeking information on the case.

Hobbs himself is stung by the accusations. "It’s hard as a parent to live with the loss of your home, of your wife, your family and then to have your friends and neighbors look at you and think, ‘Is there something else there?’ That hurts," he said.

But Mark Byers is haunted by the way he has felt for the last fifteen years. "I needed to hate somebody at that time in my life and I was blinded by rage, and anger, and grief", he told Miles, referring to a time not too long ago when he had no reason to believe anything other than what the state of Arkansas told him during the 1994 criminal trials. The new evidence has convinced him otherwise. Only time will tell what this uniting of the strangest of bedfellows will bring.