But today, 23-year-old Davontae Sanford walks out of Ionia State Prison a free man.
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Sanford was 14 blind in one eye and barely able to read or write when he was charged with killing four people at a drug den in his neighborhood in 2007.
It was a light blue, specked with white clouds and fading jet streams.
In the middle of trial, Sanford, 15, pleads guilty to second-degree murder and is sentenced to at least 39 years in prison. He would have been 53 on his earliest release date in 2046, most of his life behind him by that time.
February 2012: Judge Brian Sullivan says Sanford can’t withdraw his guilty plea. She was in the process of asking for his case to be dismissed when the ruling came.
He confessed to the 15 September 2007 killings after two days of interrogations without a lawyer present.
The Michigan Innocence Clinic and other groups that work to overturn wrongful convictions had appealed the conviction, arguing that Smothers’ confession matched the details of what happened in the murders, while Sanford’s did not. Smothers said on multiple occasions that Davontae Sanford had nothing to do with the killings. Valerie Newman, an assistant defender with the State Appellate Defender Office, said Sanford’s claims had “all the hallmarks of a false confession”.
State police reinvestigated the case and found that a deputy who originally gave sworn testimony that Sanford drew an accurate diagram of the crime scene, later contradicted that testimony, the prosecutor’s office’s statement said.
“This called into question Tolbert’s credibility in the case”, Worthy concluded.
Worthy refused to take questions from reporters until a news conference Thursday.
Worthy’s office is now reviewing the investigation to determine whether Tolbert, a longtime Detroit police officer and deputy chief who later worked as the chief of police in Flint from 2013 to February 2016, will be charged with perjury.
MI state assistant public defender Valerie Newman said Tuesday that, “Justice was not done (initially), but justice was done today”, adding that Sanford’s family “of course are thrilled”.
(Michigan Department of Corrections via AP). However, the then-teen still spent a total of nine years incarcerated.
His final prison meal was “chili-mac”, said Gautz.
Sanford, 23, emerged from a prison in Ionia in western MI. Others played basketball or jogged around the track lined with guard towers and surrounded by imposing, pointed and electrified fences. His brother carried his belongings in a plastic sack.
As Sanford got in the rear, passenger seat of the royal blue Ford Fusion, he and his brother could be seen still smiling in the backseat and talking.
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“There’s a tremendous cost when an investigation shuts down and minds close”, said Moran, whose staff and students have a long list of victories.
