PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I have included the National Registry of Exonerations entry in this post - as it provides additional information on the forensic aspects of the case. Of particular (alarming) concern, is the following passage: "In 2009, the Ohio Innocence Project filed a motion for a new trial on behalf of Wheatt and Glover based on scientific advances in gunshot residue testing. The motion noted that the method used in the case to test for residue was known to be subject to false positives from materials other than gunshot residue and the method had been virtually abandoned by the scientific forensic community. Additionally, research showed a high likelihood of contamination from police sources such as being in a police car or a police station. That motion was denied, however, and the ruling was upheld on appeal. Ultimately, lawyers for the Ohio Innocence Project filed a request for reports in the case from the East Cleveland Police Department and, in 2014, obtained reports that had never been disclosed to defense lawyers."
Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog;
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PASSAGE OF THE DAY: "The lawyers also found a letter penned by a Cuyahoga County prosecutor Carmen Marino in 1998 that said “none of the police reports in the case were to be disclosed to defense lawyers for Glover, Wheatt and Johnson,” according to the National Registry of Exonerations project. Upon appeal, a judge ruled: “A review of the evidence firmly supports the conclusion that Carmen Marino maliciously inserted himself into a criminal proceeding, and that he also sought to suppress evidence from the defendants, that he concealed public records from the citizenry, and that he subverted the process of justice.” The findings led to the trio’s 2015 prison release."
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STORY: "Three Men Who Spent Two Decades in Prison for a Murder They Didn’t Commit Just Got $5 Million Each," by reporter Jason Murdock, published by Newsweek on November 18, 2018.
GIST: "Three
East Cleveland men who were wrongly convicted and spent nearly 20 years
in prison for murder were this week awarded $5 million each by a jury
in Ohio. Local media outlet Cleveland.com reported the district
court on Thursday found that two former East Cleveland police
officers—Vincent Johnstone and Michael Perry—had violated the civil
rights of defendants Laurese Glover, 40, Eugene Johnson, 40, and Derrick
Wheatt, 41. According to the news website, Wheatt said he felt
“vindicated” by the trial’s outcome and Glover said it had been “the
next best thing to walking out of the county jail.” The trio alleged
detectives had withheld crucial police documents and also coerced a
teenage witness. Allegations against a third detective, D.J. Miklovich, were dismissed by the judge. The
victim of the 1995 murder was Clifton Hudson Jr., 19. The trio were
sentenced the following year but stressed their innocence. After their
conviction was overturned in 2015 they were released and filed legal
action against Cuyahoga County, police and ex-prosecutors. Earlier
this year, the County settled the case for $4.5 million in total,
Cleveland.com reported. The fresh court hearing kicked off on Tuesday
and was overseen by U.S. District Judge James Gwin. Michael Pasternak, a
lawyer for the three men, claimed the police detectives had conducted
“callous, shoddy and reckless police work.” The officers had denied any
wrongdoing. The witness the officers had allegedly coerced during
their initial investigation in 1995 was 14-year-old girl Tamika Harris,
who initially said the men were involved in the murder but “recanted her
testimony in 2004,” Cleveland.com reported. Willa Hemmons, an attorney
representing the detectives, claimed they had worked “meticulously and
thoroughly.” The imprisoned men—known as the “East Cleveland
Three”—were successfully freed after two decades with help from the
University of Cincinnati’s Ohio Innocence Project (OIP). Its lawyers obtained documents in 2014 shedding new light on the case. They
revealed that the victim and his brother, Derek Bufford, had been
threatened days before the murder and at one point were shot at. The
unearthed documents also revealed that when shown images of Glover,
Johnson and Wheatt the brother had denied (they) were the gunman, according
to analysis of the case published by the University of California. The
lawyers also found a letter penned by a Cuyahoga County prosecutor
Carmen Marino in 1998 that said “none of the police reports in the case
were to be disclosed to defense lawyers for Glover, Wheatt and Johnson,”
according to the National Registry of Exonerations project. Upon
appeal, a judge ruled: “A review of the evidence firmly supports the
conclusion that Carmen Marino maliciously inserted himself into a
criminal proceeding, and that he also sought to suppress evidence from
the defendants, that he concealed public records from the citizenry, and
that he subverted the process of justice.” The findings led to the
trio’s 2015 prison release."
The entire story can be read at:
The entire story can be read at:
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/
Read the National Registry of Exonerations entry by author Maurice Possley at the link below: "About 5:30 p.m. on February 10, 1995, 19-year-old Clifton Hudson was shot to death in the middle of the street in the 1700 block of Strathmore Avenue in East Cleveland. Police interviewed 14-year-old Tamika Harris who said she saw a man get out of a black sport utility vehicle and shoot Hudson. The gunman followed the vehicle on foot as it drove around a corner where he jumped back in, she said. Harris said the gunman was a skinny black man wearing a red and blue Tommy Hilfiger down jacket and a black hat. Based on her description, police focused on a black Chevrolet Blazer that was parked in a driveway a few blocks from the shooting. Police kept the vehicle under surveillance and a few hours later, 17-year-old Derrick Wheatt and 16-year-old Laurese Glover were taken into custody when they tried to get into the vehicle. During interviews with detectives, Wheatt and Glover said they were in the Blazer with a friend, 17-year-old Eugene Johnson, and stopped for a stop sign on Strathmore Avenue. They said they saw the gunman walk up behind Hudson and confront him. When Hudson tried to flee, the gunman chased him and shot him. Wheatt said the gunman was slender and wearing a dark blue jacket. Glover said the shooter was wearing a hooded sweatshirt under a blue coat. Johnson recalled the gunman wearing a dark brown jacket. Several hours into the interrogations, police swabbed all three for gunshot residue. A trace evidence analyst from the Cuyahoga County Coroner’s Office found results consistent with gunshot residue on Wheatt’s hands and the left side of his jacket. The interior and exterior of the passenger side of Blazer was found to have lead residue in three areas. No gunshot residue was initially found on Johnson’s hands or clothing, but a month later, a pair of gloves was discovered in Johnson’s jacket. The palm of the left hand glove produced a positive result for residue, the analyst reported. Detectives showed Harris pictures of Johnson, Wheatt and Glover, told her that they had caught those involved in the shooting and asked her to identify the gunman. She selected Johnson, although she had told police she did not see the gunman’s face. Wheatt, Glover and Johnson went to trial in January 1996 in Cuyahoga County Court of Common Pleas. Harris gave a different account to the jury than she had to police. Harris said she did not see anyone get into or out of the Blazer. She said she was hiding by a nearby bridge and saw the gunman walk around from the back of the Blazer and then run into the street firing his pistol. The Blazer sped off and the shooter ran past her, she testified. She admitted she did not see the gunman’s face, but said she was 100 percent certain the gunman was Johnson. The analyst testified about the findings of gunshot residue. Because the residue evidence pointed primarily to Wheatt, the prosecution argued that Wheatt fired first from the passenger seat of the Blazer, which caused the residue to wind up on his hands and jacket, and then passed the gun to Johnson in the back seat. The prosecution claimed to the jury that Johnson got out of the Blazer, went behind it, chased Hudson into the street and shot him. At the close of the prosecution’s evidence, the prosecution offered a plea bargain for Wheatt and Glover in return for their testimony against Johnson. Wheatt was offered probation and Glover was offered dismissal of all charges against him. Both rejected the offers. Two witnesses were called by the defense. Leroy Malone, who lived around the corner from the shooting, said he heard shots and saw someone in a dark jacket run behind the Blazer and up an embankment to railroad tracks. Malone said he knew Wheatt, Glover and Johnson and that the person he saw was not one of them. Eric Reed lived across the street from the shooting. He said he heard shots and went to the window and saw the gunman standing over Hudson. Reed said the gunman was lighter skinned than any of the defendants and that none of the defendants in court was the gunman. On January 17, 1996, Wheatt and Johnson were convicted of murder and using a firearm. They were each sentenced to 18 years to life in prison. Glover was convicted of murder and sentenced to 15 years to life in prison. In 2004, Johnson was granted a new trial after Harris recanted her eyewitness identification of him. Harris testified at a post-conviction hearing that after the police told her they had those involved, she picked Johnson because he was wearing a coat in the photograph that most resembled the coat worn by the gunman. However, in 2005, the Ohio Court of Appeals reinstated the conviction, ruling that Harris’s recantation did not overcome the gunshot residue evidence. In 2009, the Ohio Innocence Project filed a motion for a new trial on behalf of Wheatt and Glover based on scientific advances in gunshot residue testing. The motion noted that the method used in the case to test for residue was known to be subject to false positives from materials other than gunshot residue and the method had been virtually abandoned by the scientific forensic community. Additionally, research showed a high likelihood of contamination from police sources such as being in a police car or a police station. That motion was denied, however, and the ruling was upheld on appeal. Ultimately, lawyers for the Ohio Innocence Project filed a request for reports in the case from the East Cleveland Police Department and, in 2014, obtained reports that had never been disclosed to defense lawyers. The reports revealed that two brothers, Garry and Dante Petty, saw the shooting and said the gunman came from a post office parking lot, not the Blazer. Dante Petty said the gunman was a brother of a classmate—not Wheatt, Johnson or Glover, the reports said. Moreover, the reports showed that Hudson and his brother, Derek Bufford, had both been threatened days before the murder and that shots had been fired at Bufford from a gray Chevrolet Cavalier. The reports revealed that police had shown the photographs of Wheatt, Glover and Johnson to Bufford and he said none of them was the person who shot at him. The lawyers also discovered a letter written in 1998—two years after the three were convicted—by Carmen Marino, then a prosecutor in the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor’s Office. The letter was sent to the East Cleveland Police Department and said that none of the police reports in the case were to be disclosed to defense lawyers for Glover, Wheatt and Johnson. Instead, Marino directed that the reports be sent to the prosecution’s office. In March 2015, after a hearing on a motion to vacate the convictions based on the failure of the prosecution to disclose the evidence, Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Nancy Margaret Russo granted the motion and ordered a new trial. “As a whole, the (reports) effectively impeach the testimony of the state’s main identification witness Ms. Harris; provide an alternate identification of the shooter; remove the Blazer as a link to the shooter; destroy the state’s two-shooter theory of the case; and expose that other persons (definitely not the defendants) were physically threatening both Clifton Hudson and Derek Bufford in the days leading up to the shooting,” the judge ruled. The judge also said, “A review of the evidence firmly supports the conclusion that Carmen Marino maliciously inserted himself into a criminal proceeding, and that he also sought to suppress evidence from the defendants, that he concealed public records from the citizenry, and that he subverted the process of justice.” Wheatt, Glover and Johnson were released on bond on March 26, 2015—20 years after their initial arrest. The prosecution appealed Judge Russo’s ruling, but in May 2016, the Ohio Court of Appeals upheld the new trial order. On August 15, 2016, the prosecution dismissed the charges. In February 2017, Wheatt and Glover filed a federal lawsuit seeking damages. Johnson filed a similar lawsuit in March 2017. Cuyahoga County settled in February 2018 for $1.5 million each to Wheatt, Glover and Johnson. In November 2018, a jury awarded each man $5 million in damages from East Cleveland.
http://www.law.umich.edu/special/exoneration/Pages/casedetail.aspx?caseid=4967
Read the "Intelligencer" editorial at the link below: "Last week, a jury in East Cleveland awarded each of the three $5 million in damages for being incarcerated wrongly. We hear of wrongful imprisonment cases on a regular basis. What we do not hear of is law enforcement officers and prosecutors responsible being punished for their misdeeds. Police and prosecutors are supposed to ensure justice is done — not just to pin crimes on people so cases can be cleared. Justice requires that all involved be open about all the evidence involved. In all likelihood, payment of the $15 million will close the case. It should not. If credible allegations of police and prosecutorial misconduct — crimes — have been made, they should be investigated thoroughly. And if that probe turns up evidence, those responsible for sending Glover, Johnson and Wheatt to prison should be prosecuted and, perhaps, sent to jail themselves."
http://www.theintelligencer.net/opinion/editorials/2018/11/ensuring-real-justice-is-done-2/
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: I am monitoring this case/issue. Keep your eye on the Charles Smith Blog for reports on developments. The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at: http://www.thestar.com/topic/
