US Murder convict compensated

Horace Roberts, the man who was wrongfully convicted of murder by a jury on July 16, 1999 for the killing of Terry Cheek, his girl friend and co-worker, filed a feral lawsuit against the Riverside County and the investigators of the murder case, one year after he was released from a California prison on October 3, 2018.

Judge rules 
A senior judge had declared him factually innocent prior to his release and the District Attorney offered a public apology for the wrongful conviction and imprisonment. 

The California Victim Compensation and General Claims board had recommended that Horace receive more than $1m for his wrongful conviction. 

Under the law, wrongfully convicted inmates like Horace can receive $140 per day for everyday they spend incarcerated. Horace would have none of that; he wanted real justice and compensation in full.

Convicted for second degree murder 
Horace was found guilty of second-degree murder and sentenced to 15 years to life in the killing of Terry Cheek, a co-worker he had supervised at Quest Diagnostics and with whom he was having a sexual relation. 

Terry’s body was found by some fishermen four days after she failed to turn up at work; she was found strangled and her body abandoned in the rocks on the shores of Corona Lake in California. She was 32 years old and a mother of two daughters at the time of her death. 

Circumstantial evidence 
Horace’s conviction was based on circumstantial evidence; the inconsistencies of his statements to investigators, the lies he told to cover up the affair, the presence of his truck near the crime scene, a purse in his presence that Terry was thought to have had the night she disappeared and a watch found next to Terry’s body that was alleged to belong to him.

Exoneration 
Horace was to be exonerated nearly 20 years later after DNA evidence showed that he had been wrongfully convicted.

The investigations leading to Horace’s freedom were spearheaded by lawyers from the California Innocence Project who took on the convict’s appeal way back in 2004 and investigated the case for 15 years.

DNA testing of the watch and some rope found at the scene, as well as debris found under Terry’s fingernails turned up the DNA profiles of the son and nephew of Googie Rene Harris Senior, the man she was legally married to.

The new DNA evidence helped link Terry’s estranged husband, Googie Harris Senior, his son, Googie Junior and his nephew Joaquin Leal, to her murder. The technology for such DNA testing was not available at the time of the initial investigations. 

DNA evidence 
This new DNA evidence was not introduced during Horace’s initial trial but was to prove pivotal in securing his release.  The lawyers from the Innocence Project believe that Harris Senior set up his wife’s lover and recruited his son and nephew into the plot. 

Prosecutors believe that Harris Senior conspired with Leal to kill his wife, Terry Cheek, and the motive behind the killing is believed to have been Harris Senior’s jealousy over the relationship between Horace and his estranged wife.

The District Attorney stated that as prosecutors they must always strive to be vigilant and follow the truth. 

Once he learned of the new DNA findings he immediately directed that all charges against Horace be immediately dropped.

Googie Harris Senior and his nephew Joaquin Latee Leal were charged in October 2018, two weeks after the release of Horace. In March 2021 a judge ruled that the two must stand trial on first-degree murder charges.

Preliminary hearing 
Following a preliminary hearing, the judge ruled that there was sufficient evidence to warrant a trial for the duo on the murder count.

Harris’ son, Googie Rene Harris Junior pleaded guilty in 2019 to being an accessory to the murder of Terry Cheek.

The watch found near the scene where Terry’s body was discovered was connected to Harris Junior through the results of DNA testing.

It is believed that the watch was knocked off Harris Junior’s arm when Terry’s body was left at the scene. It is believed the three suspects fabricated evidence to frame Horace.

Framed 
In the lawsuit that Horace filed against Riverside County he alleged that he was framed for the murder and evidence was suppressed and results of investigations were falsified.

To him the investigators ignored all the evidence that pointed to the real killers.

Riverside County opted to settle the lawsuit and paid Horace and his lawyers 11 million dollars to settle the lawsuit. An agreement was signed on 25th May 2021 to that effect and Horace moved to live in South Carolina.  

Since 1989, when DNA was first used in exoneration, at least 2,100 people have been cleared of their convictions in the United States of America, underscoring the fact that the system sometimes gets things wrong.

Much of the rise in exonerations is attributed to organisations such as the California Innocence Project and private organizations dedicated to uncovering and overturning wrongful convictions.

Most of the people exonerated were initially convicted because of official misconduct, such as officers threatening witnesses, analysts falsifying tests or officials withholding evidence that would have cleared the defendant.

On average each person exonerated had spent 10 years behind bars. One inmate was released from prison more than 41 years after being convicted in the murder of a school teacher.

He was convicted based on a hair found at the scene that bore microscopic similarities to his own. In two other cases, the inmates had to wait for 46 and 52 years to be exonerated.  

To be continued  

Dr Sylvester Onzivua
Medicine,  Law & You