RICHMOND, Va. (WRIC) — The attorney for two men serving life in prison despite being acquitted of murdering a Virginia police officer told an appeals court they were “framed” and that authorities did not share evidence pointing to another suspect when investigating the case more than 20 years ago.
Terrence Richardson and Ferrone Claiborne claimed fear of facing the death penalty in the 1998 killing of Waverly police officer Allen W. Gibson led them to plead guilty to lesser charges to avoid trial in state court.
Prosecutors brought the case to federal court, where a judge sentenced them to life after the jury found them guilty of drug crimes but acquitted them in the murder of Gibson. The judge took their guilty pleas in Sussex County Circuit Court into consideration when giving them life sentences.
Questions over how the investigation was handled led to a push to clear Richardson and Claiborne from their state convictions.
Jarrett Adams, the attorney for Richardson and Claiborne, filed a petition for a writ of actual innocence in the Virginia Court of Appeals on behalf of Richardson to vacate his involuntary manslaughter conviction in state court.
The effort was backed by former Virginia Attorney General Mark Herring, but the commonwealth reversed its support for Richardson’s innocence plea after Attorney General Jason Miyares took office. Adams said Herring’s office reviewed Richardson’s case for nine months and Miyares’ office sent a letter to the court reversing the state’s position on Feb. 4, three weeks after he was sworn into office.
After going back and forth with opposing court filings, Adams and attorneys in Miyares’ office presented their arguments in front of a three-judge panel Friday.
A plea for innocence
“On Saturday, April 25, 1998, a single shot rang out in a wooded area in the Waverly Village Apartments in Waverly, Virginia. That bullet would go on to tragically take the life of officer Allen Gibson while in the line of duty,” Adams told the court. “But as this record clearly supports, there were two more victims that day.”
Adams argued that three pieces of evidence would meet the standard for the appeals court to certify the petition for a writ of actual innocence based on nonbiological evidence, which requires a petitioner to present new evidence that was unknown or unavailable to them initially.
Adams said the suspect descriptions from the only eye witness in the case, a 9-year-old girl, did not match Richardson or Claiborne and that investigators knew about her hours after Gibson was shot.
“She was taken to the home of a Sussex County sheriff where she was, in no other way to explain, interrogated,” he told the panel.
The witness told authorities that she saw a suspect with dreadlocks run from the scene and Gibson had also told a state trooper who arrived at the scene after he was shot that one of the suspects had dreadlocks, Adams said Friday. He told the panel that Richardson and Claiborne did not have dreadlocks at the time.
Judge Junius P. Fulton III asked Adams whether the commonwealth and Richardson and Claiborne’s defense attorney knew about the witness and if a subpoena had been issued for her. He said the child was subpoenaed and they were aware of her by name only, but that only investigators knew what she said she saw.
Adams said the investigator hired by Richardson and Claiborne’s defense attorney could not get in contact with her, but that authorities “deliberately and intentionally gave her little relevance.”
The other piece of evidence that Adams presented was the photo lineup where the witness pointed out another man, adding that it wasn’t just a “random” man but the brother of a woman who lived in the apartments and who gave evidence against Richardson and Claiborne.
Adams said the photo lineup was not provided during the case and added that a person who made a tip call into the Sussex Sheriff’s Office after Gibson’s killing said Claiborne and Richardson were innocent and identified the other suspect pointed out by the witness.
“At what point does the death of an officer not be investigated seriously enough to where everyone mentioned, everyone who can be a viable suspect, is brought in and polled. Where is the record of this man who has been identified throughout from the very beginning,” Adams said. “There is none.”
The AG’s office presents its argument
States attorneys disputed Adams’ argument, stating that the witness was known to Richardson and Claiborne’s defense attorney and that he told the attorney general’s office that prosecutors informed him of what the child was planning on sharing.
“Mr. Richardson is asking the court today to ignore his presumptively valid guilty plea and instead consider the assumed, historical and factual accuracy of statements made by a 9-year-old child who was a commonwealth’s witness against Mr. Richardson in 1999 and who cannot be located in the present day,” Brandon Wrobleski, special assistant to the attorney general for investigations, told the court.
Wrobleski added that there is no evidence showing that the witness pointed out the potential other suspect named by Adams, and the panel indicated that the photos presented by Adams only showed “the silhouette” of the people in the lineup.
Judge Randolph A. Beales asked Wrobleski about Adams saying that the officer who showed the photo array identified the man named as a potential suspect.
“Your honor, I am drawing a blank into where in the record that specific information is contained,” Wrobleski said. “But what the record does indicate is that multiple officers who were alleged to be present for these photo lineups gave markedly inconsistent statements about whether they were even there for the photo lineup.”
Judge Fulton then asks about Adams’ claims that authorities withheld evidence during the investigation and claims of police misconduct.
“I don’t think there is evidence of withholding of evidence or prosecutorial or police misconduct that’s on this record,” Wrobleski said. “Even if there were, the court cannot consider those legal claims in the actual innocence context.”
Wrobleski said the killing of Gibson sparked a “firestorm” in the town of Waverly and several rumors about the case.
“The commonwealth will certain not contest that there were a lot of irregularities in the investigation, but Terrence Richardson was not forced to plead guilty,” he said. “He was not forced to admit that he was the man with dreads who shot officer Gibson. But he did.”
What comes next?
A decision from the court could take up to three months, according to Richardson’s attorneys.
“I feel good, I feel real good,” Annie Westbrook, Richardson’s mother, told 8News after Friday’s hearing. “It’s been 25 years. I just want to see him free, see him come home.”
The court could grant Richardson’s request or deny his petition. The court could also order an evidentiary hearing for more facts to be discovered in the case.
This story is developing. Check back for updates.
