Arizona man is released after 28 years on death row

An Arizona man who spent nearly 28 years on death row wore a “Free Bird” T-shirt and was released Thursday after a judge overturned his conviction on charges that he had sexually assaulted his girlfriend’s 4-year-old daughter abused and murdered.

Last year, the US Supreme Court rejected an offer from the man, Barry Jones, for aid. But his lawyers mediated with prosecutors, who this month agreed that the conviction would be overturned and he would have to plead guilty to a lesser charge.

Mr Jones’ lawyers had argued that he was wrongly convicted because his trial lawyer was ineffective and could not find medical evidence that he was not responsible for the injuries that caused the death of the girl, Rachel Gray.

In a hearing on Thursday, an Arizona Supreme Court judge overturned Mr Jones’ conviction on charges of child molestation, sexual assault and murder, vacating his death sentence.

Under an agreement with prosecutors, Mr Jones, 64, pleaded guilty to a lesser charge, first-degree murder, for failing to seek medical attention for Rachel.

He was sentenced to 25 years – time already served during the nearly three decades he spent behind bars since his arrest on the day Rachel died, May 2, 1994.

Less than 90 minutes after the hearing, Mr. Jones was reunited with his family, including his three children, his attorney, Cary Sandman, said.

“It’s an incredible feeling to be back in the arms of my family after 29 years,” Jones said in a statement Friday. “I am so grateful to my defense team for never giving up on exposing the truth in my case and my family for standing by me through this terrible ordeal.”

Laura Conover, the Pima County attorney whose office prosecuted Mr. Jones in 1995, said in an interview Friday that her office had reviewed “voluminous expert transcripts” from a seven-day hearing of medical experts held in federal court in 2017.

“The idea that Mr. Jones had committed the mortal injury—the evidence was no longer there,” she concluded, adding, “The state’s original theory was flawed.”

“This is just one of countless cases that highlight the weaknesses and misconceptions of the death penalty,” said Ms Conover, who added that she opposes the death penalty. “That’s why we shouldn’t tinker with the machinery of death.”

Mrs. Conover noted the delicate balance in handling Mr. Jones’ case.

“I would acknowledge the road he has traveled,” she said. “Being accused and convicted of an injury he apparently did not commit has cost him dearly. At the same time, these are the heartbreaking cases we face when a 4-year-old is abused and neglected.”

Rachel’s cause of death was determined to be homicide due to a tear in the small intestine resulting from blunt abdominal trauma, court documents show.

Prosecutors alleged that Mr. Jones beat and sexually assaulted her while she was in his care on May 1, 1994. He was found guilty and sentenced to death in July 1995.

In October 2017, a federal judge held the hearing of medical experts and investigators to examine Mr Jones’ claim that he was ineffectively represented at his trial.

The judge concluded in 2018 that Mr Jones’s conviction should be overturned, finding that the police investigation was “colored by a rush to judge and a lack of due diligence”, and that an effective lawyer should bring these errors to the jury’s attention would have brought.

The trial attorney failed to find “significant medical evidence that Rachel’s injuries were not sustained on May 1, 1994,” the judge wrote, and failed to question other physical evidence and eyewitness accounts provided by prosecutors.

Had the attorney properly defended Mr. Jones, “there is a reasonable chance that his jury would not have convicted him of any of the crimes,” the judge wrote. A federal appeals court panel later upheld that finding.

But in May 2022, the Supreme Court ruled against Mr. Jones and another Arizona death row inmate, David Ramirez, in a decision that severely limited inmates’ ability to challenge their convictions in federal court by arguing that their attorneys had been ineffective in state court. procedure.

The 6-to-3 decision split along ideological lines.

Judge Clarence Thomas, writing for the majority, said a federal court considering a habeas corpus petition, or a petition challenging the validity of a prisoner’s conviction or sentence, “should not hold an evidence hearing or otherwise provide evidence may consider outside state court based on ineffective post-conviction assistance from state attorney.”

Justice Sonia Sotomayor disagreed, writing: “Two men whose trial lawyers failed to provide even the bare minimum level of representation required by the Constitution could be executed because forces beyond their control prevented them from defending their constitutional right to counsel. “

Judge Thomas wrote that the “expansive” hearing of evidence in Mr Jones’ case amounted to a “massive re-litigation of Jones’ guilt” that was “clearly not foreseen” under a previous Supreme Court decision in 2012.

Justice Sotomayor responded that the hearing was necessary because Mr Jones’ lawyers were ineffective.

“Instead of forming an inappropriate and ‘massive retrial over Jones’ guilt,’” she wrote, “the court hearing was wide-ranging precisely because the collapse of the adversarial system in Jones’s case was so blatant.”

Mr. Sandman said he was grateful that the Arizona attorney general and Pima County attorney reviewed the case and acknowledged that Mr. Jones “never received a fair trial.”

“We hope Barry can enjoy the rest of his life in peace, surrounded by his family and friends,” said Mr Sandman.