GA - Tara Baker, 23, Athens, 19 Jan 2001 *Arrest 2024*

[concernedcitizen706]

After seeing the first two days of trial, my personal opinion is, it could be that both the boyfriend and the suspect were involved. It's possible the boyfriend paid off the suspect to go clean up the scene. Because there seems to be evidence pointing to both. Now I don't know how these two would know each other and how this happened. That might be something interesting to find out more about.

 

[arielilane]

I know nothing about this case; however, I thought this was an interesting article. Not bad for Court tv as usually need to take them with a grain of salt. just an opinion only

Man standing trial in cold case murder of UGA law student Tara Baker

UPDATE: Edrick Faust is charged in the 2001 cold case murder of University of Georgia law student Tara Louise Baker.

www.courttv.com

A heated moment unfolded in court when defense attorney Ahmad Crews was held in contempt and fined $1,000 after prosecutors objected twice to comments made during opening statements. Crews said the comments were not intended to circumvent the statute, but rather to show Chris Melton’s consciousness of guilt in his conflicting statements. Judge Lisa Lott ruled the remarks violated Georgia’s rape shield law, known as Rule 412, which limits references to an alleged victim’s sexual history without prior court approval. The judge went on to explain that if the defense believes the evidence is relevant, they must file a formal notice and obtain court approval before referencing it before the jury.

 

[concernedcitizen706]

I know nothing about this case; however, I thought this was an interesting article. Not bad for Court tv as usually need to take them with a grain of salt. just an opinion only

Man standing trial in cold case murder of UGA law student Tara Baker

UPDATE: Edrick Faust is charged in the 2001 cold case murder of University of Georgia law student Tara Louise Baker.

www.courttv.com

A heated moment unfolded in court when defense attorney Ahmad Crews was held in contempt and fined $1,000 after prosecutors objected twice to comments made during opening statements. Crews said the comments were not intended to circumvent the statute, but rather to show Chris Melton’s consciousness of guilt in his conflicting statements. Judge Lisa Lott ruled the remarks violated Georgia’s rape shield law, known as Rule 412, which limits references to an alleged victim’s sexual history without prior court approval. The judge went on to explain that if the defense believes the evidence is relevant, they must file a formal notice and obtain court approval before referencing it before the jury.

You have got to watch the trial on Law & order trial channel. It is wild. It's the craziest case I've ever seen because the lack of evidence as well as the screw ups on the prosecution evidence is amazing.

Here's an approximate conversation towards the end of today's trial with one of their star prosecution witnesses.

-----------
My interpretive summary on the prosecution's witness answers on the alibi of the defense alternative suspect Chris Melton, the former boyfriend of Tara Baker. I mean when I'm writing here is not too far off of what actually happened.
--
Prosecution witness, former Athens Police crime analyst, David Griffin says on stand to defense lawyer:

Griffith: I can tell you with certainty that we know from all the evidence that Tara Baker bf Chris Melton was not in Athens Georgia at the time of the crime.

Defense attorney: how did you confirm this?

Griffith: We talked to Chris Melton his high school buddy and his mama and his daddy. And we talked to his mama and daddy for the first time, 4 months after the crime.

Defense attorney: did you get any video or any other evidence or did you go confirm with his employment that he was there?

Griffith: no we did not talk to his employer to confirm his alibi. Because Chris cannot remember his work phone number or remember the address of where he worked. Even though we interviewed him two days after the crime. So we had no way of calling them or going to the workplace. Chris didn't even get any paychecks or show us that he ever got any money from the place he said he worked at

But we all looked at the evidence and we all felt with certainty from all the evidence that Chris was not in Athens. But I can't really remember now what the evidence was, or why we all felt that way. It was too long ago. I just can't remember that far back. But I remember with certainty that we in the police all did feel that Chris wasn't in town. It was a really big feeling that we had. And we all felt that big feeling. I remember that much.

Defense attorney: but Chris Melton and his high school buddy and co-worker Jordy, both said that they were in two different places at different times that morning. How can you trust that alibi?

Griffith: we know with great certainty from all the evidence that Chris was not in Athens

Defense attorney: yeah based on his mama and daddy and best friend right? Do you have anything else?

Griffith: I think the best person to confirm Chris Melton's alibi, is to talk to Chris Melton here, and he will tell you where he was. I feel that Chris Melton is the best person to confirm Chris Melton's alibi. That's my professional opinion as an elite criminal analyst with elite FBI training.

 

[arielilane]

Defense attorney Crews said he “just bumped into” a witness at the courthouse, whom he hadn’t been able to locate before trial. Now that he’s found him, he wants to add the witness to his list. Judge said she's not inclined to let him add a late witness. Part of her reasoning is that during jury selection, the complete witness lists were read to jurors to see if they knew anyone. Sounded like defense can bring this up later in their case.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2019791700273901925

 

[arielilane]

Initially posted February 2.

Defense showing pictures of Chris Melton, Tara Baker's boyfriend, hands days after her murder.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2018384281614328256

 

[arielilane]

@concernedcitizen706, thanks for taking the time to write informative summary.

 

[arielilane]

bbm


A police crime analyst who helped investigate the case said it would have been impossible to Melton to give have killed Tara based on where he was at the time. The defense claimed Melton and his co-worker’s alibi wasn’t thoroughly checked out.

Testimony continues on Friday.

Defense attorney says boyfriend killed UGA law student 25 years ago

The defense questioned Tara Baker's roommates about their relationship.

www.wsbtv.com

2/5/2026

 

[arielilane]

Chris Melton said he was so upset about Tara's death that he punched a wall over and over again. This is what his hands looked like. Defense says that's from killing Tara.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2020884770415391185

 

[arielilane]

This is interesting - Justin Hill was an attorney for one of the YSL defendants, has entered a notice of appearance in the Edrick Faust trial. Meaning he's joining the defense team. For those familiar with the YSL trial, Hill is the attorney who said in court, "It's cap, to be honest."

https://twitter.com/x/status/2020976526339313984

 

[arielilane]

Last month, the state offered Edrick Faust life WITH the possibility of parole in exchange for a guilty plea. He didn't take it. For a horrific crime like this, to offer the possibility of parole....that tells me the state knows how weak their case is.

https://twitter.com/x/status/2020980055460151745

 

[concernedcitizen706]

It's so interesting there's like a trial within a trial. I've never seen that before.

 

[concernedcitizen706]

Initially posted February 2.

Defense showing pictures of Chris Melton, Tara Baker's boyfriend, hands days after her murder.

View attachment 642167

https://twitter.com/x/status/2018384281614328256

My feeling is if somebody punches a wall 30 times, that is a person not in tune with his own pain and own well being. And if he doesn't care about his own well-being and pain when he's emotional, I think it's less likely that he can care about somebody else's pain and well-being when he's emotional.

So either way you look at it, whether he lied about that or not, I don't think it's a good look for him.

 

[concernedcitizen706]

So apparently there was one rectal swab, and mistakenly, two oral swabs in the sexual assault kit for Tara Baker. And no vaginal swab. They're supposed to have one of each kind of swab, oral rectal and vaginal, for a sexual assault kit. And they're saying now that one of the oral swabs was actually a vaginal swab and that it was mislabeled by forensics. And the lab could tell later that one of the oral swabs was actually a vaginal swab, because of the contents of the swab, like certain enzymes or whatever. And they figured that out decades later in 2023. Apparently the suspect has DNA hits in the oral and vaginal swabs.

But here's my question. They mistakenly had two labeled oral swabs. How are we to be sure that maybe the person taking the swabs, did not mess up, and put the oral swab they just took into the vagina. Forgetting what they just did. Or vice versa, put the vaginal swab they took, into the mouth, and then labeled it an oral swab.

I mean they screwed it up enough to mislabel it. They couldn't check over their work to see that they were missing a labeled vaginal swab? I mean is that that hard to do, to make sure they have one of each kind of label? There's only three kinds. So right there that's not very professional. And there could have been a reason why they mislabeled it. Because they actually thought it came from the mouth. So maybe they actually put the swab in the mouth mistakenly. So the DNA they thought came from the vaginal area, could have actually come last from the mouth area. I mean that's what they labeled it as, so why are we to think otherwise?

Not only that, but the cases were open and or broken and the tapes were untaped off the packages. The forensics woman testified that she had to repackage them and reseal the tape in 2023.

If I were a juror, I would think there's just too much reasonable doubt here. The only real evidence is some forensic evidence. That forensics evidence is very light. No hairs of his anywhere. No fingerprints. No DNA from seminal fluid. The only DNA evidence is some saliva or sweat on swabs. But they mislabeled the swabs. And if the labs were so inefficient to mislabel just three types of labels, there's no guarantee they were not cross-contaminated as well as mislabeled. Also the swab packages were found cracked and open. When I really don't think they should have been. The packages didn't break themselves. If somebody broke the packages, they should have notated that somewhere. And then fixed them. And that also should have been notated too somewhere. To have broken and tampered with evidence packages, without any notation explaining it, is a little bit strange in my book.

If I were a juror I would vote not guilty, due to lack of proper evidence.

 

[concernedcitizen706]

I got to be honest here. In my honest opinion someone in law enforcement is framing Edric Faust. I kind of felt that before this trial, due to certain things I know. But after hearing the evidence in this trial, I really now think that. The fact that the two swabs are mislabeled and packages opened, without any documentation about it, I think highly confirms my suspicions. I do believe somebody high up in law enforcement with access to the forensics, tampered with the packages. Because the packages didn't break open by themselves. And I do believe it's possible they could add an oral sample from Edric Faust onto the swabs. They chose him because of his crime nearby right afterwards. He fit the criteria. Actually I even kind of thought that before the trial. And I didn't even know about the unsealed swabs. But now that I know about the unsealing, I definitely think that could have happened. Why would that person do that? To conceal his involvement with this crime. Either direct or indirect involvement.

 

[concernedcitizen706]

The end of yesterday's trial was pretty wild too. They had this GBI woman called Liz Bingham, who was one of the main agents who restarted the case a couple years ago. And that was some crazy testimony.

She and another agent called up Chris Melton, the ex-boyfriend of Tara, for another interview.

They wanted him to change his story that the last time he saw Tara was 10 days before her death. Because they needed something to explain away why Chris Melton's DNA was found in Tara Baker. In addition his DNA was found in her anal region, and he always said that he and she never had that kind of sexual intercourse. They needed a more recent date for Chris, because they knew DNA in the system could only last for I think 5 days.

So they asked Chris over 10 times to change his date to a sooner date, and they told him the date. But he wouldn't do it. Because he had stuck to that date for over 23 years. So finally they said to him, if you change this date to an earlier date, nothing will happen to you and we will just tell you to go on your way. And then he finally changed it to an earlier date.

And the defense attorney was like, why didn't you ever suspect Chris Melton? Because he was the one who had his DNA there. And the GBI woman was like, well it's right that they had those kinds of relationships with Tara since he was her boyfriend. Even though we had heard testimony from the roommates that seems like they had kind of been on the outs for a couple weeks. As in not spending time together. And the defense attorney was like, you're aware that she was brutally sexual assaulted, because she had severe bruises in her anal regions, right? And the only DNA found there was Chris Melton's? He was like, is that part of normal relationships? The gbi woman didn't say anything.

And the defense attorney said again, why didn't you suspect Chris Melton? The gbi woman said well because Chris Melton had a rock solid alibi. And the defense attorney was like, did you see our testimony in trial about the alibi of Chris Melton,? The gbi woman did not say anything.

Because if you go back to all the testimony on Chris Melton's alibi, no one in the police checked it. They did not make one phone call they did not see a video, they did not ask a receptionist. The only one backing up his story is his buddy from high school, his co-worker. But even his coworker had big differences with the story. The gbi explained it away like well everybody's off a few minutes. But it was not just off for a few minutes of differences, it was off by hours. There were huge differences in their story of what happened that morning. And the police did not find that concerning I guess. To them that was a rock solid alibi.

Chris Melton has two known confirmed sightings and that is at a bank, between like 9:05 and 9:10 am. And at a truck shop at around 10:00 a.m.. Both in Loganville. But other than that, nothing is confirmed, for those morning hours.

So this gbi woman said with a almost semi straight face, because she did seem to have a little smile on her face a lot of the time, that Chris Melton was right to have his DNA there even though he claimed for years he didn't see Tara for 10 days. And that he had a rock solid alibi, even though police never bothered to even call anybody to check his alibi.

Complete ridiculousness.