The American city of Baltimore will pay a fine of US$48 million (the equivalent of R$241.6 million, at current exchange rates) to three men who were unjustly convicted of murder when they were teenagers and spent 36 years in prison.
“These are men who went to prison as teenagers and came out as young grandfathers in their 50s,” Baltimore Police Department Chief Legal Counsel Justin Conroy told the city’s Board of Estimates shortly before the decision, which took place last Wednesday (18).
Alfred Chestnut, Ransom Watkins and Andrew Stewart were 16 when they were arrested on Thanksgiving 1983, according to the lawsuit the three filed after their release.
They were accused of the murder of DeWitt Duckett, then 14 years old, who was killed at school allegedly over a jacket. The defendants were convicted of first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison.
But they were found innocent decades later after Chestnut filed a public records request. He discovered new evidence that had been withheld from his lawyers during the trial and contacted the Baltimore Conviction Integrity Unit, which reviewed old convictions.
Investigators “ignored eyewitness and physical evidence that contradicted the narrative, including evidence that pointed to a different suspect. Instead, they shaped the evidence to implicate the plaintiffs – including coercing false testimony from young people,” says the lawsuit, filed by the trio in 2020.
According to the document, the person who actually killed DeWitt has already passed away and was called John Doe.
“On November 25, 2019, three days before Thanksgiving, a judge granted the writ of actual innocence (filed jointly by plaintiffs and the State of Maryland) and ordered his immediate release,” the lawsuit says.
At the time, Baltimore City Attorney Marilyn Mosby said there was “intentional concealment and misrepresentation of exculpatory evidence, evidence that would have shown that this was someone other than these defendants.”
She apologized to the men when they were released and promised to work for reforms for wrongfully convicted people.
The Board of Estimates unanimously approved the fine last Wednesday (18).
CNN sought the defense of the three men, but they declined to comment on the decision.
Baltimore Mayor Brandon Scott said in a statement read at the meeting that settlements like this “speak to grave injustices” against residents and said the families involved deserve compensation.
“Our city is in a position where by 2023 we will literally be paying for police officer misconduct [do Departamento de Polícia de Baltimore] decades ago,” he said.
“This is just part of the price our city must pay to right the wrongs of this terrible history,” he added.
In a statement published in local media, Baltimore City Council President Nick Mosby, who is also chairman of the Board of Estimates, said “our hearts are with Alfred Chestnut, Andrew Stewart, Ransom Watkins and their families.”
“Nothing in this world can make up for the mental and emotional trauma that was caused to these innocent men and their families. No amount of compensation can right the wrongs of 36 years of turmoil and the residual effects on these men, their families and communities,” she added.
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Source: CNN Brasil
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