In the evening of September one, nineteen ninety eight, a fight broke out in East Cleveland, Ohio between two large groups of young men. Many were injured, including twenty year old Ricardo Gray, who had been struck in the head with a pipe. When police finally arrived, they also discovered that a young man named James Russell had been fatally shot. Eventually, a narrative developed that Ricardo Gray had returned after the fight to exact revenge, leading to a sentence of twenty
three to life. But this is wrongful conviction. Wrongful conviction has always given voice to innocent people in prison, and now we're expanding that voice to you. Call us at eight three three two o seven four six sixty six and tell us how these stories make you feel and what you've done to help the cause, even if it's something as simple as telling a friend or sharing on social media, and you might just hear yourself in a future episode. Call us A three three two o seven four six sixty six.
Hello, this is a free call from Carl, an inmate at the North Central Correctional Institution. To accept this free call, press zero to refuse this free call, hang up or press one. Thank you for using GTL.
Welcome back to wrongful Conviction and calling in today from an Ohio maximum security facility, we have Ricardo Gray on the line to share his story, another wrongful conviction out of Cuyahoga County, where it appears the only evidence against him was fabricated witness testimony. So we hope to see his release really soon. Ricardo. I'm sorry you're here because of everything you've gone through and are going through. But thank you for joining us here today.
I appreciate you myself.
And joining him. The person who's trying to bring about justice in this case, Kim Krawl, Kim, thank you for taking up this fight.
Yeah, thanks for doing what you do now.
Cleveland, Ohio, of course, is one of the absolute hotbeds of wrongful convictions in this country. But before we get into how Ricardo's case is emblematic of that ongoing tragedy, we want to know a bit about your life before all of this madness took place.
I grew up in Cleveland, Ohio with my mom and my dad. I got an older sister. We're staying on Barlett one hundred and forty third and Barlet. My mother and father they had their own house down there. I had a sweet grandmom. I think that's where I get all my kind from Kashiki. Her clothes off your back is if you needed it. Yeah. My father got incarcerating when I'm I was like fourteen for like seven years. You know, that's when I really needed him in my life.
And then my cousin had got killed two in the same year my father went to jail. He was older, you know, I looked up to him like a brother. His name was y'all real Gray. He went to Kent State University too. I didn't graduate from high school. I dropped out of school when I was in like the eleventh grade. I was in the streets for real. I ain't gonna lie. I was in the streets. I had had a family to take care of. My mama needed me, my baby, mama and my daughter. I mean, I had to take care of them.
And not only did Riccardo Field responsible for his mother, but he had also started his own family with his girlfriend, Denika James.
Yeah, we just had one daughter together, Carriel. You know, we got together high school. We was together for about five years. We stayed in Warreneville Heights, so I wasn't really in the neighborhood no more. For real, Messing with the guys seemed like once I got my life together, they was mad at me for real.
Now. Warrensville Heights was about five miles away from Lacarda's old neighborhood along Bartonell Avenue around East one hundred and forty third Street, and his friends there had a contentious relationship with the guys up on Kinsman Road, about a half a mile away.
We right up the street from each other. We always ended up getting to it with each other about something about nothing for real, but if they make it something. We either playing basketball with each other football, you know. It was just a neighborhood thing, just boys being boys. Growing up, everybody wanted to be hard for real, that's all. I wanted to have a name for they self.
With his new responsibilities, Ricardo had been keeping to himself, raising his daughter, who was not even two years old yet when the crime in question occurred back on September one, nineteen eighty eight.
I just happened to come into a neighborhood one day. You know, they was having a little cookout in the neighborhood, so I just wanted to show the guys it was still love. So it's probably about eight thirty. Somebody come back there and the cookout and say, he just got jumped one of my guys, Mike, it just jumped by one of the Kingsman. God, it ain't that far from where we was at. It's right up the street. It
had to be about ten or fifteen of us. So we'll go up there on one hundred and forty thirty Kinsman Today neighborhood. It had to be about twenty or thirty of them.
So, the police report says, at approximately twenty one hundred hours, a group of approximately sixty mails began to congregate at the parking lot at the corner of East one forty thirty Kinsmen. Trouble had been brewing between a group of juveniles from Bartlett Avenue and the group from Kinsmen. A fight started and for approximately one half hour, he heard random shots and bottles breaking.
You wanted to fight. I got hit with a pole on the right side of my face. Dude knocked me out. I don't even know who would me. That's the crazy part. Well, my God told me, man, once you sail down, I'll picked you up and dragged you to Marquise Dugley car and drove me to the hospital. At the hospital, I made a police report, so I really ain't really know what really happened until I came back and my friends
told me what happened at the lift. You know. They told me that God Benny got the shooting and everybody ran.
A guy named Benny, whose last name didn't surface until many years later, was alleged to have fired into the crowd. Everyone scattered away, and a young man named James D. Russell was dead. Detective Cipo and Kovac arrived after his body had been transported, and they began to get the statements.
We have a statement from Edward McDowell, Edward Harris, Gary Blanchard, and from Deneen joy Smith. Edward Harris reported being outside when the shooting started, but not observing anyone who was doing the shooting. He was just told by neighbors to go in the house. Edward McDowell says he was involved in a fight with the males from Bartlett Avenue when he heard gunshots. At this time, the fight broke up and everybody ran. He didn't see who was doing the shooting.
Gary Blanchard says he went out on his front porch with the blow, interviewed female he lives with, and saw the victim lying face down in the bushes on the side of his residence. Left the poetry and went down to the victim and turned him over and noticed he was bleeding and foaming at the mouth. He then told his wife to call nine one one. Almost immediately police began to arrive. He stated he recognized the male from
the area, but did not know his name. He described as a shooter as having an afro haircut and wearing a white T shirt and blue jeans. He saw this male running toward Kinsmen, and that last piece of information was never disclosed.
So I couldn't never question Blanchard about the guy he's seeing. He identified the same guy at my witnesses identified at my trial, dude with a short afro haircut, blue jeans with a white T shirt on. He said he was the shooter he's seen he run towards Kensmen. But see they never went to the Barlett group and questioned them about what happened. And I didn't know Benny's full name.
Did none of my guys know Benny fool name and they were scared to talk to the police because, you know, snitching people retaliate for that, you know.
So while the Kinsman guys who were initially interviewed omitted the shooter's name, they were at least in agreement with the Bartlet guys that the fight had ended when shots were fired. Only two young men said otherwise, Anthony Mixon and Arthur Jackson, who were interviewed the following day by a new lead detective on the case.
Death, Detective Beaman. He the one that got the statements from Nixon and Jackson, but see Detective Cepo and his partner. They was the first ones to the crime scene, but in the next day they started to change. The statements changed.
So it appears the statements gathered by Sipo and Kovak were ignored and may have been hidden, and Beamon focused on the statements from Mixing and Jackson, who claimed that the shooting happened long after the fight, conveniently, when all the other witnesses were gone and Ricardo Gray had been released from the hospital.
They said, I did and came back on a bike and shot down the street and instruct the victim.
Arthur Jackson says he was walking northbound from Kinsman in company with his friend Mike, last name unknown, and the victim. He then observed a mail he knows by the name of Ricardo Gray riding a mountain bike on his and began shooting at them. He says, as he, Mike, and the victim ran, they separated. The victim ran on the right side of the street and Mike on the left. He reports hearing bullets buzzing by his head while running.
Anthony Mixon claimed that he saw Ricardo ride passed him on a bike, pull out a nine millimeter and fire fourteen rounds of the guys from Kinsman.
And what we now know is that the shooter was from the group that was with both Mixon and Arthur Jackson. And so one, they have an interest in protecting kind of their own boy. But two, they had their own legal issues. They had issues with parole and probation, and they were subject to pressure and threats by police.
Next to you know, I hear it's a warm out for my risk, my family telling me just wait, don't turn myself in. So you know, I'm listening to my family. We get a lawyer ail me to Johnson and when the crazy party is. I asked my lawyer at the time, was there a warrm for my risk? She said no, I didn't know wrong So you know, I went on living. They came and got me. In November. I was at my baby mother house, their mama house, and they came
in there. They kicked the goe in and everything came in there and got me.
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I'm in the county jail trying to put my defense together and everything. I gave him three witnesses names that was there. But I had a speedy trial and they tried me within ninety days, and that wasn't enough time for my lawyer to really investigate my case for real.
It's very hard, especially from neighborhoods like this, to get people to come to testify on your behalf. It's very difficult to get anyone to come forward in situations like this because the police of the ability to put pressure
on everybody. Everybody was there for a fight. Everybody is susceptible to like threats of charges, police intimidation, and so he has three witnesses who come forward who are consistent he was hit with a poll he was rendered unconscious, and he had to be treated at the hospital.
You know, when you get assaulted the hospital, they automatically call the police and they come make a report. So the police report spells my first name wrong, put Richard instead of Ricardo. They used that against me and said I was trying to falsify my name. And you know I got the same address, It got my last name. He just didn't know how to spell my damn name. That's what it all boiled down to. They put it on me. Look, he's gave the wrong name. His named Ricardo.
He gave him the name Richard with the same address and everything. Come on.
Now, regardless of the effort to discredit this alibi evidence, it didn't matter. They had changed the timeline of the shooting to have occurred long after the fight, rendering this alibi mood.
See, they knew I could prove I was hit with a pole during the fight, so it couldn't have been me. See when I couldn't prove that the victim was shot during the fight, and shots was fired doing to fight. I couldn't dispute what they were saying at my trial that I came back.
Yeah.
Anthony Mixon testified that Ricardo Gray road passed him on a bike and pulled out a weapon that appeared to be a nine milimeter and then watched him fire approximately fourteen rounds. Arthur Jackson also testified that Ricardo Gray shot at him and his friends that Gray rode toward them on the bike. Those are really the only two fact witnesses from the state.
See the original investigative report, and two other witnesses indicate that the shots was fired during to fight and everybody ran, so that's why they had to with told that evidence.
It appears that the original police reports from kovac can s pot with the statements confirming the defense timeline of the shooting were either hidden from the defense or Ricardo's attorney neglected to use them to impeach Mixon and Jackson or raise Gary Blanche's original statement.
When he got on the stand, Gary Blanchard testified that when he heard the shots, I was outside when the first ones. That's when I went into the house. While you were in your house, you heard more shots fired. Yes, did you ever see the person who was firing the shots? No, I was in my house with a door closed.
But that's not what he told police on the night of the shooting.
And that's why it would have been crucially important to have this statement that he made to police saying he saw someone running, describe what they looked like, and believed them to be the shooter.
However, Ricardo's alibi witnesses also testified about the alternate timeline and suspect Benny.
My three witnesses, London Heeljanmes Thomas and Sharon Williams, that was there. They witnessed Benny do it, but they didn't know was last name. So you know, the prosecutor told the jury they made this name up. This guy doesn't even exist.
According to the prosecutor, Benny didn't even exist, and Ricardo's witnesses were his friends, the kind of testimony that is routinely discredited for proximity to the defendant, while Mixing and Jackson's testimony went unchallenged.
We're so crazy. Once Offor Jason testified at my trial, they took me back to the county jail and I remember one of the sheriffs said, I knew he.
Was lying, but I guess the jury didn't pick up on what was so obvious to that sheriff. On February eighteenth, nineteen ninety nine, Ricardo was convicted and Judge Nancy McDonald sentenced him to five years for assault, three years for the weapons charge, and fifteen to life for murder, to run consecutively, adding up to a total of twenty three years to life.
If I'd have had all these facts I got now, it ain't no way they would either had a trial against me. You know. Didn't nobody look me in ir, They just found me quilty. Shit broke my soul. That tore me up for a minute.
You have one minute remaining.
Here, right, I'm still in this damn place, man, But I got all the facts to prove what the hell going on, and I'm still in here. They sent me strike to Lucasville, twenty years old. Man, with all these killers and racists. That's all they was doing, was racist dudes down there. Man, I did have to do five years down there before I could go to a close camp. I'm locked down twenty three hours a day. I was
mentally fucked up off that shit. Man. My father died of cancer like five years after he got out of jail. But my father hadn't been through the system, so he know how everything he's going. So I didn't really have nobody helping me on my case no more. Once he died, I had to contend on my sister and my Mamay, and they had lives to live their damnse So while I was sitting here fighting in my case, you know, I taught myself how to read and write for I got my ged, taught myself out to look up cases,
and taught myself out of tight. I don't know how to file a whole brief and everything.
While Ricardo did have a pellet counsel, it never hurts to learn the law and advocate for yourself, and he got his first break just a few years after his conviction.
I had an investigator, Fine Jackson, and he voted as the David.
He says three years ago, when I testified for the state against Riccardo Gray for the state, my testimony was not completely true. I did not see Ricardo with a gun, nor did I see him shooting a gun at any time during the fight, And when the shooting started, I began to run like everyone else did. I talked to the police at night, and I told them I would come down to talk to them about the case. Before I talked to the police, some of the Kinsman boys
told me to say Ricardo was a shooter. I did because they made me feel like they would do something to me if I did not say Ricardo was a shooter. Arthur Jackson Senior made this statement of my own free will dated May of two thousand and two.
With the investigator. Gave it to my attorney at the time. My attorney was Paul Massino, and then Massino he went to go talk to Mix and personally hisself because Anthony Mix and mistake. Whenness he was in jail for murdering his girlfriend.
He comes forward to say, my name is Anthony Mixon. At Ricardo Grey's trial, I testified that Ricardo Gray was on a bike shooting a gun. This testimony is not correct. The person shooting the gun was Benny, a dark skinned, skinny black man with an afro haircut. He has wide eyes and a real small head. I was pressured by the detectives to say that Ricardo Gray was there. I was on parole and they told me that if I didn't say it was Ricardo Gray, I would go back
to prison. Arthur Jackson was about ten houses or more away and could not see who was shooting or who was shot. I have tried to tell my story, but nobody would listen. This is true, Anthony Mixon, August fourteenth, two thousand and two.
So then I have both of them. And then Masino filed a motion for a new trial under newly discover evidence. They stalled me out for about three years. That was in two thousand and six. Man they came up with some bogus ruling saying that this was the same evidence I used a trial.
Even though the defenses danced at trial was that Mixing and Jackson were lying. Ricardo most definitely did not have Mixing and Jackson's recantations a trial, and critically their testimony was the only evidence against him.
So Nanthy McDonald had a very long career as a sitting judge. She was known, I think wildly by the defense community as being someone who had a pensiont for injustice. But we know just in the last few years there have been many wrongful convictions that have come out of her courtroom. Now, of course, when juries and prosecutors are involved. You can't shoulder the entire responsibility of wrongful convictions on
a judge. But when we look at the number of years it's taken these folks to prove their innocence, that can be directly attributed to her, because she has denied every single filing in front of her, no matter how compelling, like Ricardo's those filings are. We know that we're all Sailor's cases out of her courtroom, Isaiah Andrews, who spent one of the longest periods of wrongful incarceration in the
history of the United States. We have other cases just like Ricardo's that represent very serious, very obvious innocence claims that have just been denied and denied for decades, and it's because they were constantly put back in front of the same judge, Nancy McDonald.
You know, one would think that just one judge couldn't and shouldn't have that much power. There are other courts to appeal to.
Every effort you make to reopen your case based on new evidence, whether it's newly discovered because a witness just came forward, or because the state withheld it, or because of ineffective assistance of counsel, of your trial council. All of those are raised in the trial court. I bet if you were to go through her entire decades long term on the bench, she didn't grant a single one.
She didn't even grant a hearing on one. I mean, we had cases where like the shooter came forward and she was like, man, now, all of.
A sudden, he's not credible anymore.
Yeah, he's not credible now. But then you get more evidence of his credibility and she's like, Eh, that's not new. You've been saying you're innocent for years, so that's no longer a new theory of your case, Like it's wild. And so, while there are a lot of factors that lead to wrongful convictions, the police, juries lowering their standard of beyond reasonable doubt, judges and of course prosecutors overzealz prosecutors who care more about winning than justice, and lazy
defense attorneys. All of those things contribute to wrongful convictions. But the one thing that maintains wrongful convictions are trial judges who don't give meaningful consideration to these claims, because then when it goes to the court of appeals, they give deference to the trial court. The trial judge sat on the trial. They're the ones looking at this now. We're going to give difference their decision. We don't sit in judgment of their decision unless it's arbitrary or absurd,
which is a very high standard. And when you have someone like her who's been on the bench in a political climate for decades, they're not calling her arbitrary and absurd. They're affirming every single one of her crappy decisions. And we know they're crappy because so many of these men have now been exonerated, and we can literally attribute hundreds and hundreds of years of wrongful conviction to her unwillingness to consider these claims from her bench.
Even though finding new evidence appeared to be feudal with Judge McDonald. Ricardo caught another break.
I found Denny last name. That's when my god Quincy, but I called him Q. I was in Lucas Wheel waiting. Quincy told me he was in Toledo with Benny and his last name is Karen Ben. He told Q that I was in jail for some he did. That's how I got his full name. At the time, my lawyer was Brett Burner, So I got my I told him my appel attorney felt the mixing again and Mixing identify by Benny Kerr as a shooter. I file another emotion for a new trial. They deny it, talking about my lawyer.
Ain't give a time frame and when I discovered the new evidence, so they shot that down.
Another break in the case came from a four year request along the way, someone on his legal team did a Freedom of Information Act request but did not realize what they had discovered until moving on from the case and returning Ricardo's files.
So then when they send me my paperwork, I go through all my file dam I see the original investigator reporting here, Gary Blanchard police report and Edward McDowell police report. I'm like, man, I'm looking at it, like man, this all the stuff to prove Ryan commit this crime. I never got this stuff in my trial, So bam I end up filing the motion myself. That had to be Like in twenty fourteen.
These police reports undermined Mixing and Jackson and the state's timeline of the shooting while validating Ricardo's alibi if the shooting ended the fight, like these witnesses in the alibi witness has said then Ricardo's police report from the hospital was checkmate. This appears to be a major Brady violation.
So it's important to know some of the context of what was going in Ohio in terms of the way criminal trials were handled at that time. We didn't have open discovery, so there's no way of knowing what actually was and was not shared with defense other than presuming that if a defense attorney had the information, they would have used it. Now, when Ricardo goes on to file all these things, he's saying, we obviously didn't have it, because he would have used it if we had it.
But the court says that without some affirmative proof that it was not turned over, he cannot meet his burden. Now, there is law in Ohio which contradicts those holdings, but there are holdings that support that perspective also, and so what the state is arguing is that you can't prove that it wasn't turned over because all we used to do back then is the defense attorney would meet with
the prosecutor. The prosecutor would have have the police reports, not share them or show them, but summarize what was said in them and so there's no way to prove or disprove what might have been said in some back room handing these things back and forth. It's a system that disfavors the truth because how do you prove the absence of an occurrence.
Well, if it wasn't Brady, then it's sure as hell was an effective assistance of counsel. Nevertheless, Ricardo caught another break in twenty twenty when another witness came forward, Derek James, who said that he told police about ben Kerr in the night of the shooting. But what good was any of it if it had to pass to Judge McDonald first.
This is awful, but for years we were just waiting for her to leave the bench, which we knew she would not do on her own. It took an act of God to save our clients from her ongoing reign of injustice. She died a few years ago, which the result is finally clients whose wrongful convictions arose out of her courtroom can get fair consideration.
Unfortunately, Riccardo did not benefit. She passed in twenty twenty one, after he had already used up to Derek James affid David So to recap all the evidence that this judge denied him on the initial interviews with McDowell and Blanchard, discrediting the state's timeline of the crime, the description of Benny Kern, all of which corroborated his alibi defense. Multiple people identified Benny Kern along the way, not to mention recantations from the only material witnesses in this case.
And so all of those things together not only entirely undermind the states claim, but present a meaningful case for who the actual wrong doer is. And really he should have had a hearing in two thousand and two when these initial affidavids came forward, but his judge denied him. The Court of Appeals just constantly affirms what the trial judge does, and the fact that he remains in prison. So when this case came to me, it's exactly where
it is right now. All of this has been filed, and here we are, twenty one years later from those affidavids, with an insurmountable amount of evidence supporting his innocence. And really, if I'm being honest, no proceed door to get into court for meaningful consideration. And so here we are thinking artfully and creatively about how do we get that door open so that we can do the right thing for this innocent person. We have done it before this office,
and we will do it again. We will find a way to get this man back in court because that's what justice requires, but we are up against a substantial mountain of procedural hurdles and procedural default.
To help facilitate that, we're going to link Kim's instagram in the episode description. If anyone listening has information about this case, it could be the key to getting them back into court without Judge McDonald, So please reach out to her and help bring Ricardo home. We're also going to be linking a petition to help raise awareness about this horrible injustice, so please take a moment and join
us sign it. And with that, now we're going to go to my favorite part of the show we called closing arguments, and it's where I thank you again for being here. Now I'm going to turn my microphone off and kick back in my chair and just listen to anything else you have to share with me in our amazing audience. So, Kim, when don't we start with you and then Ricardo, do you take us off into the sunset.
At the end, of the day. What we're looking for is to give Ricardo a chance at a fair trial, due process. We have no doubt he would be acquitted when presented with that opportunity, But he hasn't even had the chance to have his fair trial, his fair day in court yet. So I think Ricardo Gray's case is one of the most obvious claims of innocence we've ever seen. There was very little evidence to support a conviction to begin with, and all of it, every ounce of it,
has been overturned. But the problem with his case is that it really highlights the failures of the criminal justice system to correct itself in every incident. And so is one of those examples of where the criminal justice system has the tools to convict, but not the tools to
overturn conviction. And so not only is this an opportunity to look meaningfully at his case, but at the rules of procedural default that keep people innocent, people like Ricardo Gray prison for ten twenty thirty years before having a chance to even have a hearing, to have their day in court, or to present their claims in a way
that the merits of their claims are considered. And so you know, when listening to stories like this, it's important that we not only consider how we can help Ricardo Gray, but how we can expect more of the system and demand that judges, that people we elect to be in positions to make these choices give consideration or be held accountable, and that when you get that jury summons, that you don't think, oh, I don't want to be a jur but you think, this is my chance to hold the
government accountable to its very high standard and to participate in preventing wrongful convictions. Because that is the most minimal way we all get to participate and to change the system. And it would have made all the difference a lifetime of difference to Ricardo Gray if he had a jury who held the state to that very high standard. To begin with, I'm.
Ready to go home. Man, I'm tired. I'm sickly tired, but so strong.
Man.
I need help, man, it's killing me. I'm trying not to start crying with around all these dudes in here. Man, I can't show no sign of weakness in here. I'm here with lyons. Oh yeah, I just need some help, man, to show what the hell really going on here? Man? I got all the facts. I just need help, man, to get me the hell out of here. Man. I need to get hold of my daughter.
Man.
I missed twenty years of my daughter life. Man. I wasn't able to raise my daughter. Man. That's what fuck with me the most.
Man.
I ain't been able to I ain't been there with my family. I was really just miss raising my daughter. Man. That was the key part of everything. We've been through a lot, through this whole thing. Man, It's just time to go. Man, twenty six years, it's just out of control. They wrong, and they know they're wrong, and they willing to keep me in here until I put it on the wall of what's really going on. If I don't put it on the wall what's going on, they not
gonna do nothing. Man. So I need help, you know. Appreciate you good day man for real.
Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one week early by subscribing to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I want to thank our production team, Connor Hall and Kathleen Fink, as well as my fellow executive producers Jeff Kempler, Kevin Wartis and Jeff Clyburn. The music in this production was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated
composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us across all social media platforms at Lava for Good and at Wrongful Conviction. You can also follow me on Instagram at it's Jason Flamm. Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number one