Mark D. Sells, who continues to maintain he’s innocent while serving 29 years to life in the 2003 murder of Sharid Gantz of Tipp City, is asking a Miami County court to approve DNA testing of the aluminum baseball bat prosecutors said was used in the killing.

An application filed in county Common Pleas Court Friday, April 1, requests post-conviction DNA testing of the baseball bat’s handle.

Testing now available was not in use at the time of Sells’ trial, Donald R. Caster of the Ohio Innocence Project at the University of Cincinnati College of Law wrote in a memorandum supporting the testing.

“Scientific advances since then, however, create a strong likelihood that DNA-testing of the baseball bat used to kill Mr. Gantz would identify the perpetrator,” Caster wrote.

The memorandum specifies the testing of leather tape from the handle of the bat, which was located in a creek and had hair and blood of the victim on the barrel.

County Prosecutor Tony Kendell was an assistant prosecutor during the prosecution of Sells. Kendell said he will file a written response to the request.

“I think it is frivolous and will respond accordingly,” he said.

Caster said in the memorandum that the Sells case meets all requirements for the post-conviction DNA testing including the continued existence of evidence from the crime and a question at trial regarding who was the perpetrator. He also notes that there was “no physical evidence linking Mark to the crime.”

Sells was arrested in January 2003 in the Jan. 5 beating death of Sharid Gantz, 65, inside his home.

Sells at age 20 was convicted by a jury of aggravated murder and aggravated robbery in Common Pleas Court on March 3, 2005, and sentenced the same month to 29 years to life in prison.

Two other young men, 14 and 17 at the time, testified the three smoke marijuana and drank vodka before going to the house so Sells allegedly could get money. The two testified they served as lookouts while Sells went inside and emerged a short time later after they heard yelling.

“Mark Sells has been incarcerated for 12 years for a crime for which he maintains his innocence. Post conviction DNA testing can once and for all conclusively establish whether he attacked Sharid Gantz, or whether, indeed, Mark has been wrongfully convicted of this grave offense,” Caster said.