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Ex-NFL player asks Trump to release nephew convicted of murder
Washington Examiner ^ | June 18, 2018

Posted on 06/18/2018 10:18:32 AM PDT by deplorableindc

click here to read article


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To: deplorableindc

Did he get down on his knees?


21 posted on 06/18/2018 10:50:28 AM PDT by bigbob (Trust Sessions. Trust the Plan.)
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To: deplorableindc

Of course, if POTUS doesn’t help this guy, he’ll be endlessly trashed by the NFL....

oh, wait.....


22 posted on 06/18/2018 10:58:34 AM PDT by NEMDF
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To: Delta 21
Thanks for the link. I found his case for clemency unconvincing, he said he wasn't there, backed up by a bunch of his friends who said he was elsewhere. that is kind of expected. And the changing testimony of the key witness doesn't sway me much in that environment, either.

I read the appeals court summary, and they said this about the eyewitness:

"...On September 30, 2000, Otis Graham was fatally shot while driving a truck in the 1300 block of Trinidad Avenue, Northeast. It was not until August 2001, however, that there was a break in the case. On that day, Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) Detective Michael Irving visited Neilly Griffin's home located at 1310 Trinidad Avenue, N.E., while he was investigating an unrelated homicide. At that time, Griffin asked Detective Irving what had happened regarding the killing of the man in the white truck a year earlier. Griffin pointed toward appellant, who was standing across the street, and volunteered to Detective Irving that appellant and James Hill had killed the man in the white truck. When she saw Hill later that day, she pointed him out to Detective Irving as well.

Griffin gave a different account, however, in July of 2002, when a defense investigator, James Hickey, and one of appellant's counsel came to Griffin's home in order to interview her. Griffin told them that she had not seen the shooting, and she signed a statement to that effect. Consistent with that signed statement, Griffin testified at appellant's first trial that she could not identify the shooters. The first trial resulted in a mistrial when the jury deadlocked.

At appellant's second trial, however, Griffin testified that she was in her bedroom at approximately 6:10 a.m. on the morning of September 30, 2000, when she heard gunshots coming from what sounded like two different guns. When she looked out her window, she saw a white pickup truck coming up the street and swerving. She also saw “two guys” who came running into the middle of Trinidad Avenue behind the white pickup truck, shooting at it with their right hands and arms out straight pointing at the truck. From her window, Griffin could see the entire 1300 block of Trinidad Avenue and the intersection of Trinidad and Neal Street. Griffin also testified that she saw “sparks” and “light flashing” from the hands of the two men, although she did not see guns in their hands. The truck crashed across the street from Griffin's window and the two men ran toward it and passed by the front of Griffin's house. As the two men ran by her house she recognized one as “Dee” and the other as “Fats.” She later learned that their real names were James Hill and Marcus Paige, respectively. Griffin then came outside and saw a body slumped over in the driver's seat of the truck. She saw the shooters standing in a nearby alley. When paramedics and police arrived, Griffin explained, she did not speak to them because she did not want to get involved.

Griffin further testified that the statement she gave the defense investigators in July 2002 contained many false statements and that she had signed it so that her name would stay out of the case and she would not have to worry about anyone “finding out or harassing [her] or harassing [her] children.” She also admitted that she did not initially comply with the subpoena to testify at the first trial and then testified falsely at that trial because she felt intimidated and “spooked” by a man sitting in the courtroom who was “shaking and nodding his head and clearing his throat.” Thereafter, at the second trial, she testified about the occurrence, named appellant and “Dee” (referring to Hill) as the shooters, and positively identified appellant in the courtroom.

And then, the other guy (Hill) offered to recant his own testimony, and wrote a letter to a judge saying that his lawyer told him to incriminate Paige and he said that he "was on medications at the time" which caused him to agree.

The fact that the initial trial took place in Washington, D.C. makes it likely he was tried by a majority black jury, and it was deadlocked. So it is unlikely that the jury hung because of racial makeup unless it would have been hung by some jurors who didn't want to convict him regardless of evidence.

All the stuff about witnesses changing their stories and such (even her own son telling investigators he was home with her and said didn't witness the shooting) don't carry that much weight with me. The environment is rife with threats, overt and concealed. It wouldn't surprise me at all that she would change her story after visits from the neighborhood 'inhabitants'.

23 posted on 06/18/2018 11:04:51 AM PDT by rlmorel (Leftists: They believe in the "Invisible Hand" only when it is guided by government.)
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To: deplorableindc

If everyone actually reads the article, you can see how it honestly can be a situation where he was falsely accused.


24 posted on 06/18/2018 11:09:41 AM PDT by time4good
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Comment #25 Removed by Moderator

To: deplorableindc

It’s suppose to be for non violent offenders.

Sorry


26 posted on 06/18/2018 11:21:07 AM PDT by Enlightened1
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To: time4good

I think it is good to keep that in mind that he may have been unjustly imprisoned, but it is also true that if you go deeper than the sympathetic article and read UNITED STATES vs. PAIGE, the “falsely accused” doesn’t sound so convincing.

If you accept that she changed her story three times, once when it happened, once when it went to retrial, and once when it went to appeal, and you recognize that kind of neighborhood would have people who not only threaten you and your children, but have a documented history of following through, that fact that her story changes is not surprising at all.

And then his friends who all swear he was with them, and his fellow defendant saying he was on medication at the time and forced into it by his lawyer...

I think it is also wise to consider he might well be guilty. He hung out with a bad crowd. There are consequences to that, and one of them is that you could be swept up in their doings.


27 posted on 06/18/2018 11:27:21 AM PDT by rlmorel (Leftists: They believe in the "Invisible Hand" only when it is guided by government.)
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To: deplorableindc
Well...Trump DID ask. Doesn't mean he's going to do it though.
28 posted on 06/18/2018 11:34:14 AM PDT by DoodleDawg
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To: deplorableindc

OK, I missed that. My mistake.


29 posted on 06/18/2018 12:07:41 PM PDT by Kozak (DIVERSITY+PROXIMITY=CONFLICT)
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To: rlmorel

“she changed her story three times”

So which version was true?

IMO - if the testimony of this witness was the only evidence used to convict a man “presumed to be innocent”, then justice was not served.


30 posted on 06/18/2018 12:10:17 PM PDT by jonno (Having an opinion is not the same as having the answer...)
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To: yesthatjallen

Only promise President Trump made was to look into their request. But I know what you are saying, and I agree they would try to make something of it. But it won’t go very far. At least it shouldn’t.


31 posted on 06/18/2018 12:27:47 PM PDT by Robert DeLong
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To: jonno
She initially didn't want to get involved and said so when initially interviewed because she was concerned about her safety. Then after about a year, she was being interviewed about another murder, and she said she knew who committed the murder the year before and pointed them out. Then, presumably, after a visit from the local youths, she recanted her story: "...Griffin further testified that the statement she gave the defense investigators in July 2002 contained many false statements and that she had signed it so that her name would stay out of the case and she would not have to worry about anyone “finding out or harassing [her] or harassing [her] children.” She also admitted that she did not initially comply with the subpoena to testify at the first trial and then testified falsely at that trial because she felt intimidated and “spooked” by a man sitting in the courtroom who was “shaking and nodding his head and clearing his throat.” Thereafter, at the second trial, she testified about the occurrence, named appellant and “Dee” (referring to Hill) as the shooters, and positively identified appellant in the courtroom..."

To me, the fact that the jury deadlocked WITHOUT her input states that the eyewitness testimony was not the only thing they were going on.

I am inclined to think that it was her detailed testimony that was accurate, and that the other recantations were done out of fear for her safety.

Like I said, if he is in prison as an innocent man, he bears responsibility to a degree for the company he kept. I am sure he knew who committed that murder if he didn't.

32 posted on 06/18/2018 12:38:34 PM PDT by rlmorel (Leftists: They believe in the "Invisible Hand" only when it is guided by government.)
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To: deplorableindc

Good. On examination, the request can be denied and Trump can receive an opinion of making fair judgements about pardons


33 posted on 06/18/2018 12:40:18 PM PDT by bert ((K.E. N.P. N.C. +12 ..... Greetings Jacques. The revolution is coming))
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To: mplc51

“Kellen Winslow Jr is in jail facing 5 elderly rape accounts.”

How is that related? Am I missing something?


34 posted on 06/18/2018 1:03:59 PM PDT by unlearner (A war is coming.)
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To: deplorableindc

35 posted on 06/21/2018 12:27:38 PM PDT by Excuse_My_Bellicosity (Liberalism is a social disease.)
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To: dfwgator

Just a scumbag looking for the weakest people he can to victimize. He should get life in front of a firing squad.


36 posted on 06/21/2018 12:28:51 PM PDT by Excuse_My_Bellicosity (Liberalism is a social disease.)
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