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Thread: Ricky Jackson - Ohio

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    Ricky Jackson - Ohio


    Ricky Jackson


    Man who served 39-year prison sentence exonerated

    By KIM PALMER
    REUTERS

    CLEVELAND — A Cleveland judge dropped all charges on Wednesday against a man who has spent 39 years in prison for murder, making him the longest-held U.S. prisoner to be exonerated, an attorney for the Ohio Innocence Project said.

    Ricky Jackson, 57, will walk free on Friday after paperwork is completed, attorney Mark Godsey said.

    Jackson was convicted along with two others for the 1975 murder of Harold Franks, a Cleveland-area money order salesman, after 12-year-old Eddie Vernon testified he saw the attack, according to court documents.

    Vernon, now 53, recanted his testimony and told authorities he had never actually witnessed the crime. There was no other evidence linking Jackson to the killing.

    Attorneys for the Ohio Innocence Project in March filed a motion for a new trial after Vernon told a pastor he was on a school bus at the time of the murder, which other witnesses have confirmed.

    Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Timothy McGinty said in court Tuesday that without an eyewitness there was not much of a case.

    “The state is conceding the obvious,” he said.

    Jackson was exonerated by Cuyahoga County Judge Richard McMonagle on Wednesday.

    Cleveland police did link a .38 revolver and a green convertible seen at the crime scene to another man who was arrested three years later for aggravated murder in connection with a spree of daytime robberies, according to court records. He was never charged in the murder of Franks.

    The two other men convicted with Jackson, brothers Ronnie and Wiley Bridgeman, have also filed for a new trial but those petitions have not been resolved. Ronnie Bridgeman was released in 2003, but his brother remains in prison.

    Jackson was originally sentenced to death but that sentence was vacated due to a paperwork error. The Bridgemans remained on death row until Ohio declared the death penalty unconstitutional in 1978.

    “One of them came within 20 days of execution before Ohio ruled the death penalty unconstitutional,” Godsey said.

    http://www.reviewjournal.com/news/na...nce-exonerated

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    Ricky Jackson, exonerated death row inmate, asked Hillary Clinton this question last night (video)

    By Rachel Dissell
    The Plain Dealer

    CLEVELAND, Ohio – It was at the moment he mentioned his time on death row, and how perilously close he came to being executed, that Ricky Jackson choked up last night while asking Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton to answer for her stance on the death penalty.

    Jackson, who was exonerated 16 months ago after he spent 39 years locked up for a murder he didn't commit, was one of several Ohio voters picked to pose topical questions to Clinton and her opponent, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders.

    Jackson shared a few details of his story with Clinton and then confronted her with his question:

    "In light of that there are documented cases of innocent people who have been executed in our country, I'd like to know how can you still, take your stance on the death penalty, in light of what you know right now." (See all of Jackson's remarks below.)

    Clinton responded by affirming support for "very limited use of it in cases where there has been horrific mass killings."

    Jackson didn't immediately react to her lengthy response, in which Clinton also expressed that she would, "would breathe a sigh of relief if either the Supreme Court or the states, themselves, began to eliminate the death penalty."

    Ohio Innocence Project Director Mark Godsey said CNN producers recently reached out to him to see if he could suggest a person that might be right to ask a question about wrongful convictions.

    "I said, 'yes I do I have the perfect person,'" Godsey said Monday morning.

    Godsey was in the arena with Jackson during the live two-hour televised event that included questions from two hosts and Ohio voters.

    "I was in the room and you really can't pick up the sense of the audience reaction on TV," Gosdey said. "The audience was quiet and could hear pin drop, they were mesmerized."

    Jackson couldn't be immediately reached, though Godsey said he plans to do another interview with CNN and is penning an editorial on Clinton's response for the news network's web site.

    When Jackson was freed in November 2014 along with another man, Wiley Bridgeman, many marveled at his dignified and anger-less response despite the years of injustice he endured.

    Cuyahoga County jurors convicted Jackson, Bridgeman and his brother, Ronnie Bridgeman, who now goes by the name Kwame Ajamu, of killing a money order collector in 1975. The three were convicted on the word of a 12-year-old, Eddie Vernon.

    Vernon initially told police he saw the men flee but decades later admitted he didn't see the shooting or aftermath. He maintained that his testimony was coerced after police officers threatened him.

    Jackson spent years on death row before his sentence was later vacated to a lengthy prison term.

    Since his release, Jackson has continued to speak at events to publicly draw attention to flaws in the criminal justice system that kept him – and others -- in prison wrongfully.

    Jackson, a year ago, was awarded half of at least $1 million as an initial partial payment from the state due to his wrongful incarceration. Court dockets show the state and Jackson's attorneys have negotiated a settlement for additional damages but that amount won't be disclosed until later this month.

    Last year he, and five other exonerated death row inmates, lobbied lawmakers to eliminate the punishment in Ohio.

    "What happened to me happened — you can't change that," said Jackson said, according to a story Advance Ohio published about the effort. "So the best thing that I can do is try to prevent it from happening to somebody else."

    Below is the question as Jackson posed it to Clinton in front of an audience at CNN hosted Democratic town hall at Ohio State University in Columbus Sunday night.

    "As stated I did spend 39 years of my life in prison for a crime, a murder, I didn't commit and it was only through the heroic efforts of the Ohio Innocence Project at the University of Cincinnati that I was ultimately exonerated and able to stand before you today.

    I spent some of those years on death row and, um (chokes up), I came perilously close to my own execution. And in light of that, what I just shared with you, that in light of that there are documented cases of innocent people who have been executed in our country, I'd like to know how can you still, take your stance on the death penalty, in light of what you know right now."

    http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index...ght_video.html

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