Kevin Strickland

Last updated

Kevin Strickland
Born (1959-06-07) June 7, 1959 (age 63) [1]
Known forWrongful murder conviction

Kevin Strickland (born June 7, 1959) is an African-American man who was wrongfully convicted by an all-white jury [2] in 1979 of killing three people in Kansas City, Missouri. No physical evidence linked him to the scene of the crime and the only alleged witness later recanted her testimony that Strickland was involved. [3] [4] Strickland was given a life sentence. [5] In 2021, he garnered national attention after former prosecutors in his case said he was very likely innocent and called for his release. [3]

Contents

Two black men who pled guilty to the murders have said Strickland was not involved, and a fingerprint from the shotgun used in the murders belonged to someone else. [3] [4] Cynthia Douglas, the sole eyewitness to the crime, said detectives pressured her into naming Strickland as a perpetrator. She attempted several times to recant her testimony before her death in 2015. [4]

Numerous legal and political figures called for Strickland's exoneration. In June 2021, the Supreme Court of Missouri denied a petition to have him released. [5] The Governor of Missouri Mike Parson refused to pardon him, saying he did not see his case as a "priority" and was not certain of his innocence. [6] [7] [8] The office of the Missouri Attorney General fought in court to keep him in prison, saying it believed him to be guilty. [9]

On November 23, 2021, Judge James Welsh overturned Strickland's conviction "since it was not based on physical evidence but on eye-witness testimony …, who later recanted her account", and Strickland was released on the same day. He was exonerated after more than 42 years in prison, "making his case the longest confirmed wrongful-conviction case in Missouri’s history". [10] [11]

Crime and trials

On April 25, 1978, in Kansas City, Missouri, three people were killed when a group of assailants ransacked a house. The victims were 22-year-old Sherrie Black, 21-year-old Larry Ingram, and 20-year-old John Walker. [4] Another woman, Cynthia Douglas, Ingram's girlfriend, was shot in the leg non-fatally; she pretended to be dead until the attackers left, at which point she crawled out of the house. [4] [12] All of the victims were tied up and then shot. [12] Strickland, who was then 18 years old, said at the time he was watching television and talking on the phone, and that the next morning police began accusing him of the murders. [13]

Two suspects, Kilm Adkins and Vincent Bell, were later arrested. Bell was a childhood friend of Strickland's, and lived at a house nearby. Police found a fingerprint belonging to Strickland on Bell's car; Strickland says this was because he had driven the car before, but the last time he had seen Adkins and Bell was at 5 or 6 p.m. on the night of the murders. [13] A fingerprint from the shotgun used in the murders belonged to someone other than Strickland who has not yet been identified. [4] Douglas, the only eyewitness, first stated she could not identify other perpetrators (two other guys) but Adkins and Bell. Later, when police arrested Strickland, [14] she picked out him in a police lineup. [15] [13] [16] Douglas later said she was pressured into naming him as one of the perpetrators by detectives on the case, and until her death in 2015 attempted to have her testimony recanted. [4] In 2009, she emailed the Midwest Innocence Project, saying, "I am seeking info on how to help someone that was wrongfully accused. I was the only eyewitness and things were not clear back then, but now I know more and would like to help this person if I can." [13] Douglas said police told her, "Just pick Strickland out of the lineup and we'll be done, it will all go away, you can go on and you don’t have to worry about these guys no more." [12] Adkins and Bell confessed to the murders, but said Strickland was not a participant. [13]

Strickland's first trial ended in a hung jury, with the only black juror refusing to find him guilty. According to Strickland, after the trial, the prosecutor approached his lawyer and said "I'll make sure this doesn't happen next time." [13] Strickland's current lawyer, Tricia Rojo Bushnell of the Midwest Innocence Project, said the prosecutor used each of his peremptory challenges to strike black jurors, resulting in the next trial having an all-white jury. [13]

Strickland was convicted in 1979, one year after being arrested, and sentenced to life imprisonment without the chance of parole for 50 years. [5] [13] Adkins and Bell later cut plea bargains, pled guilty and were sentenced to 20 years, each of them serving less than 10 years. Others were suspected but not charged. [11] [16] Strickland tried to appeal in 1980, but it was dismissed by Supreme Court of Missouri. [17]

Calls for release

Strickland was the subject of an investigation by The Kansas City Star in September 2020, which prompted prosecutors to review the case. [18] [19] On May 10, 2021, Jackson County prosecutor Jean Peters Baker published a letter saying she believed he was innocent and should be released from prison. [4] Former prosecutors in Strickland's case have said they think he is innocent as well, as have federal prosecutors for the United States District Court for the Western District of Missouri. [4] Mayor of Kansas City Quinton Lucas and more than a dozen state lawmakers, including Andrew McDaniel, the Republican chair to the Missouri House of Representatives' committee overseeing prisons, have sought to have him released. [4] [13]

The Supreme Court of Missouri denied a petition to release Strickland in June 2021. [5] In August 2021, Governor of Missouri Mike Parson refused to pardon him, having previously said that Strickland's case was not a "priority" and that he was not sure of Strickland's innocence. [6] [20] [8] The editorial board of The Washington Post , as well as some prominent Democratic Party figures, negatively contrasted Parson's decision not to pardon Strickland with his choice to pardon Patricia and Mark McCloskey, the couple involved in the June 2020 brandishing weapons against protesters controversy. [8] [21] Assistant attorney general of Missouri, Andrew Clarke, said the attorney general's office believes Strickland to be guilty and thinks he should remain in prison, saying that Strickland had "worked to evade responsibility." [9] In August 2021, the attorney general's office issued Baker a subpoena requiring her to turn over any communication with third parties regarding Strickland. Baker termed that action as harassment. [22]

Hearing leading to exoneration

In November 2021, Baker coordinated a three-day hearing, to present the case for the reversal of Strickland's verdicts. [23] She said, "One of the reasons I'm proud of this system, and one of the reasons I know that it is one of the best systems in the world even when we stand amid a terrible mistake, is because we have built into our system an ability to correct wrongs." "I now trust in you to return just a fraction of what we've all lost, what Mr. Strickland lost, by bringing him home." [23] The last of a dozen witnesses, former Missouri Supreme Court Chief Justice Edward D. Robertson Jr., argued that the preserved subsequent testimony and frequent recantations of her pre-trial interviews and trial testimony by Cynthia Douglas, upon whose word the entire original persuasive evidence of guilt rested, also constituted "the entire case" for the reversals. [23]

Judge James Welsh wrote on November 23, 2021, after Strickland had spent more than 42 years in prison: "Under these unique circumstances, the Court's confidence in Strickland's conviction is so undermined that it cannot stand, and the judgment of conviction must be set aside. The State of Missouri shall immediately discharge Kevin Bernard Strickland from its custody." [11]

Personal life

Strickland was born on June 7, 1959 [1] and is the father of one daughter. [13] Strickland uses a wheelchair and said he had "experienced a couple of heart attacks... I got high blood pressure. My ability to stand is diminished." [13] His father died in 2011. [13] Prior to his exoneration, Strickland said upon his release that he wanted to see the ocean. [13]

Compensation

Though Strickland served the longest prison time wrongfully convicted in Missouri's history, he did not qualify for compensation from the state, because the law allows it only if an exoneration is based on DNA evidence. However the Midwest Innocence Project initiated a fundraising campaign for him through GoFundMe in June 2021, which raised more than $200,000 by the time of his release. [24] If his case qualified for state compensation, the amount could be much more; in other states compensation of over $20 million was paid in similar cases. [25] [26] In few days after his release donations multiplied and the raised amount went over $1 million by more than 14,000 people. [27]

Related Research Articles

Innocence Project, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit legal organization that is committed to exonerating individuals who have been wrongly convicted, through the use of DNA testing and working to reform the criminal justice system to prevent future injustice. The group cites various studies estimating that in the United States between 2.3% and 10% of all prisoners are innocent. The Innocence Project was founded in 1992 by Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld who gained national attention in the mid-1990s as part of the "Dream Team" of lawyers who formed part of the defense in the O. J. Simpson murder case.

Anthony Porter was a Chicago resident known for having been exonerated in 1999 of the murder in 1982 of two teenagers on the South Side of the city. He was convicted and sentenced to death in 1983, and served 17 years on death row. He was exonerated following introduction of new evidence by Northwestern University professors and students from the Medill School of Journalism as part of their investigation for the school's Innocence Project. Porter's appeals had been repeatedly rejected, including by the US Supreme Court, and he was once 50 hours away from execution.

Wrongful execution is a miscarriage of justice occurring when an innocent person is put to death by capital punishment. Cases of wrongful execution are cited as an argument by opponents of capital punishment, while proponents say that the argument of innocence concerns the credibility of the justice system as a whole and does not solely undermine the use of the death penalty.

This is a list of notable overturned convictions in the United States.

The Norfolk Four are four former United States Navy sailors: Joseph J. Dick Jr., Derek Tice, Danial Williams, and Eric C. Wilson, who were wrongfully convicted of the 1997 rape and murder of Michelle Moore-Bosko while they were stationed at Naval Station Norfolk. They each declared that they had made false confessions, and their convictions are considered highly controversial. A fifth man, Omar Ballard, confessed and pleaded guilty to the crime in 2000, insisting that he had acted alone. He had been in prison since 1998 because of violent attacks on two other women in 1997. He was the only one of the suspects whose DNA matched that collected at the crime scene, and whose confession was consistent with other forensic evidence.

Rolando Cruz is an American man known for having been wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death, along with co-defendant Alejandro Hernandez, for the 1983 kidnapping, rape, and murder of 10-year-old Jeanine Nicarico in DuPage County, Illinois. The police had no substantive physical evidence linking the two men to the crime. Their first trial was jointly in 1987, and their statements were used against each other and a third defendant.

Edward D. "Chip" Robertson Jr. is a former chief justice of the Supreme Court of Missouri. Robertson was 33 years old when then-Governor John Ashcroft appointed him to serve on the court, and he served from 1985 to 1998. His appointment - Ashcroft's first to the high court - led to claims that the non-partisan Missouri Plan for appointing judges was actually a highly partisan process; twenty years later, Robertson would join opposition to Republican efforts to dismantle the system. In 1998 he left the Supreme Court to join a Kansas City firm which led Missouri's lawsuit against tobacco companies.

Centurion is a non-profit organization located in Princeton, New Jersey, with a mission to exonerate innocent individuals who have been wrongly convicted and sentenced to life sentences or death.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Michael Morton (criminal justice)</span>

Michael Morton is an American who was wrongfully convicted in 1987 in a Williamson County, Texas court of the 1986 murder of his wife Christine Morton. He spent nearly 25 years in prison before he was exonerated by DNA evidence which supported his claim of innocence and pointed to the crime being committed by another individual. Morton was released from prison on October 4, 2011, and another man, Mark Alan Norwood, was convicted of the murder in 2013. The prosecutor in the case, Ken Anderson, was convicted of contempt of court for withholding evidence after the judge had ordered its release to the defense.

This is a list of notable overturned convictions in Canada.

The innocent prisoner's dilemma, or parole deal, is a detrimental effect of a legal system in which admission of guilt can result in reduced sentences or early parole. When an innocent person is wrongly convicted of a crime, legal systems which need the individual to admit guilt — as, for example, a prerequisite step leading to parole — punish an innocent person for their integrity, and reward a person lacking in integrity. There have been cases where innocent prisoners were given the choice between freedom, in exchange for claiming guilt, and remaining imprisoned and telling the truth. Individuals have died in prison rather than admit to crimes that they did not commit.

The Illinois Innocence Project, a member of the national Innocence Project network, is a non-profit legal organization that works to exonerate wrongfully convicted people and reform the criminal justice system to prevent future injustice.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">California Innocence Project</span> American legal non-profit founded 1999

The California Innocence Project is a non-profit based at California Western School of Law in San Diego, California, United States, which provides pro bono legal services to individuals who maintain their factual innocence of crime(s) for which they have been convicted. It is an independent chapter of the Innocence Project. Its mission is to exonerate wrongly convicted inmates through the use of DNA and other evidences.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ryan W. Ferguson</span> Wrongfully convicted American (born 1984)

Ryan W. Ferguson is an American man who spent nearly 10 years in prison after being wrongfully convicted of a 2001 murder in his hometown of Columbia, Missouri. At the time of the murder, Ferguson was a 17-year-old high-school student.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Investigating Innocence</span>

Investigating Innocence is a nonprofit wrongful conviction advocacy organization that provides criminal defense investigations for inmates in the United States. Investigating Innocence was founded in 2013 by private investigator Bill Clutter to assist nationwide Innocence Project groups in investigating innocence claims. "Once we have a case that meets our criteria, we'll put private investigators to work on it. A lot of these cases need investigators," said Kelly Thompson, executive director of Investigating Innocence. Prior to his work on Investigating Innocence, Clutter was one of the founders of the Illinois Innocence Project. Investigating Innocence also has a board composed of exonerees that reviews incoming cases.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Louis N. Scarcella</span> American retired detective

Louis N. Scarcella is a retired detective from the New York City Police Department (NYPD) who initially came to prominence during the "crack epidemic" of the 1980s and 1990s, earning frequent commendations before many convictions resulting from his investigations were overturned during his retirement. As a member of the Brooklyn North Homicide Squad, he and his longtime partner Stephen Chmil built a reputation for obtaining convictions in difficult cases. Since 2013, Scarcella has received extensive and sustained publicity for multiple allegations of investigative misconduct that resulted in false testimony against crime suspects, meaning that innocent parties could have served long prison terms and guilty individuals could have gone free because of wrongful procedures.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Alissa Bjerkhoel</span> American wrongful conviction advocate

Alissa Leanne Bjerkhoel is an American litigation coordinator at the California Innocence Project (CIP), a law school clinic that investigates cases of factual innocence while training law students. Bjerkhoel was born in Truckee, California, and later graduated from California Western School of Law (CWSL) after previously obtaining a B.A. degree She has been an attorney with CIP since 2008. Bjerkhoel has served as counsel for CIP on numerous criminal cases, and achieved the legal exoneration of a number of convicted prisoners. Bjerkhoel serves as CIP's in-house DNA expert and also serves as a panel attorney with the nonprofit law firms Appellate Defenders, Inc. (ADI) and Sixth District Appellate Program (SDAP). She is a member of the American Academy of Forensic Sciences. Bjerkhoel has won a number of awards.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jabbar Collins</span> American man

Jabbar Collins is an American man who served 16 years for a crime he did not commit. He was convicted of second-degree murder following the February 1994 death of Orthodox rabbi Abraham Pollack in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The 20-year-old Collins, who lived in a nearby housing project, was arrested and charged with the murder. In March 1995, he was sentenced by a jury to 34-years-to-life in prison, sixteen of which he served.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bill Clutter</span> American wrongful conviction advocate

Bill Clutter is an American private investigator, wrongful conviction advocate, and author. He is the co-founder of the Illinois Innocence Project and founder of the national wrongful conviction organization Investigating Innocence. His work on the Donaldson v. Central Illinois Public Service Company case led him to write the book Coal Tar: How Corrupt Politics and Corporate Greed Are Killing America's Children, which is the story of an epidemic of neuroblastoma in Taylorville, IL caused by exposure to coal tar.

References

  1. 1 2 Jones, Kaci (June 7, 2021). "Missouri lawmakers urge Gov. Parson to pardon Kansas City inmate deemed innocent". WDAF-TV . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  2. ↑ Nozicka, Luke (June 8, 2021). "Kevin Strickland was convicted by all-white jury. That was by design, his lawyers say". The Kansas City Star.
  3. 1 2 3 Yang, Shelly; Wooldridge, James (September 25, 2020). "40 years behind bars, man insists he is innocent, and so do others". The Kansas City Star . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  4. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 "Prosecutors: Missouri man wrongly convicted of triple murder". Associated Press . May 10, 2021. Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  5. 1 2 3 4 Martin, Luke X. (June 2, 2021). "Missouri Supreme Court Will Not Consider Kevin Strickland's Innocence Case". KCUR-FM . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  6. 1 2 "Parson indicates Kevin Strickland pardon won't be 'a priority'". St. Louis Post-Dispatch . June 9, 2021. Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  7. ↑ Medina, Dave (June 23, 2021). "Missouri Gov. Mike Parson on Kevin Strickland: 'I don't know whether he's innocent or not'". KSHB-TV . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  8. 1 2 3 Nozicka, Luke; Kuang, Jeanne (August 4, 2021). "'Peak irony': Dems decry Parson's McCloskeys pardon as Kevin Strickland sits behind bars". The Kansas City Star . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  9. 1 2 "Missouri attorney general: Strickland is guilty of 3 murders". Associated Press . July 12, 2021. Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  10. ↑ Jones, Zoe Christen (November 23, 2021). "Kevin Strickland exonerated in triple murder case after more than 40 years in prison". CBS News . Retrieved November 25, 2021.
  11. 1 2 3 Bella, Timothy (November 24, 2021). "Kevin Strickland exonerated after 43 years in one of the longest wrongful-conviction cases in U.S. history". The Washington Post . Retrieved November 24, 2021.
  12. 1 2 3 Ricono, Angie (May 10, 2021). "Jailed Kansas City man innocent after 43 years, prosecutor and legal team says". KCTV . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  13. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 Davis, Linsey; Schwartz-Lavares, Ashley; Abdul-Hakim, Gabriella; Yang, Allie; Amiel, Andrea; Frost, Meredith; Tienabeso, Seni (June 11, 2021). "Prosecutor says man was wrongfully imprisoned for decades, yet he remains behind bars". ABC News . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  14. ↑ "The record is unclear as to why and how Strickland became a suspect"... In: State of Missouri v. Kevin Strickland (Case No. 16CR79000361 Div. 18)
  15. ↑ "Strickland was one of the four individuals participating in the lineup. Police asked Douglas to identify Strickland, as opposed to asking her to identify the perpetrator with the shotgun." In: State of Missouri v. Kevin Strickland (Case No. 16CR79000361 Div. 18)
  16. 1 2 State of Missouri v. Kevin Strickland (Case No. 16CR79000361 Div. 18) (In 16th Circuit Court of Jackson County, Missouri at Kansas City, August 28, 2021.)
  17. ↑ State v. Strickland (Appellant), 609 S.W.2d 392 (1980), No. 61528. (Supreme Court of Missouri, 1981)
  18. ↑ Nozicka, Luke (September 27, 2020). "Kevin Strickland is serving life for 1978 murders. The guilty men, only witness said he's innocent". The Kansas City Star . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  19. ↑ Connor, Tracy (May 10, 2021). "He's Been Jailed for 43 Years. Now Prosecutors Say He's Innocent". The Daily Beast . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  20. ↑ Medina, Dave (June 23, 2021). "Missouri Gov. Mike Parson on Kevin Strickland: 'I don't know whether he's innocent or not'". KSHB-TV . Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  21. ↑ "Missouri's governor uses his pardon power — but not for two innocent Black men in prison". The Washington Post . August 5, 2021. Retrieved August 15, 2021.
  22. ↑ Martin, Luke X. (August 18, 2021). "How The Legal Battle In Missouri Over Kevin Strickland's Exoneration Became Political". KCUR-FM . Retrieved August 19, 2021.
  23. 1 2 3 Kevin Strickland's fate in judge's hands Baker urges him to right a 'terrible mistake', Kansas City Star , Luke Nozicka, November 10, 2021. Retrieved November 11, 2020.
  24. ↑ "Kevin Strickland GoFundMe Raises Over $200K After He Is Exonerated". Newsweek . November 24, 2021.
  25. ↑ "California man who spent 39 years in prison gets $21 million for wrongful conviction". Reuters. February 24, 2019. Retrieved November 24, 2021.
  26. ↑ "Jury Awards $27 Million To Massachusetts Man Wrongfully Convicted Of Murder". Morning Edition . NPR. October 2, 2019. Retrieved November 24, 2021.
  27. ↑ "Thousands of people have raised more than $1 million for a man who served 43 years in prison for a crime he didn't commit". CNN. November 25, 2021. Retrieved November 26, 2021.
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.