Current:Home > FinanceMan who served longest wrongful conviction in U.S. history files lawsuit against police -Ascend Wealth Education
Man who served longest wrongful conviction in U.S. history files lawsuit against police
View
Date:2025-04-15 18:52:16
The man who served the longest wrongful conviction in U.S. history is now suing the law enforcement officials whose investigation of a murder nearly 50 years ago led to him spending most of his life in prison.
Attorneys for Glynn Simmons filed a lawsuit in federal court Friday against two former Oklahoma police detectives and their respective departments alleging the two hid evidence that would have proven Simmons' innocence in a 1974 fatal shooting.
A judge ordered Simmons' release from prison last year after he served 48 years for his wrongful conviction in the death of Carolyn Sue Rogers, the clerk of a liquor store Simmons was accused of robbing in Edmond, a city around 15 miles north of Oklahoma City.
Simmons' legal team alleges that retired Oklahoma City detective Claude Shobert and late Edmond detective Sgt. Anthony Garrett hid evidence that would have proven Simmons' innocence during an Edmond liquor store robbery. Convicted of murder in 1975, Simmons has always maintained he did not commit the crime and insisted he was in Louisiana at the time of the shooting, but he spent 48 years in prison until an Oklahoma County judge ordered him released in 2023 and then determined Simmons to be "actually innocent" later that year.
Simmons' lawyers argue that his constitutional rights were violated because investigators withheld a police report showing that eyewitness Belinda Brown — who was also shot in the head but survived — did not actually identify Simmons during a lineup. The attorneys point to Brown's participation in several other lineups and her identification of at least five different individuals as further proof of Simmons' innocence. They also allege that investigators falsified reports to cover up inconsistencies from Brown, who herself told Garrett in early January 1975 that her memories "would get all jumbled up."
"Garrett and Shobert suppressed the fact that they fabricated evidence and manipulated Brown’s identification; they never disclosed this information to (Simmons), his counsel, or the prosecutors," the attorneys wrote in the lawsuit. "(Simmons') arrest was based solely on the evidence suppressed and fabricated by Defendants Garrett and Shobert. There was never any probable cause to suspect (him) of the liquor store robbery and murder."
More:With Glynn Simmons free, is Carolyn Sue Rogers' 1974 murder now a cold case?
The lawsuit was filed Friday in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Oklahoma. Simmons is being represented by attorneys Jon Loevy, Jordan Poole and Elizabeth Wang of Loevy & Loevy, a national civil rights law firm headquartered in Chicago. Simmons also is being represented by Joe Norwood, his Tulsa-based attorney for several years, and John Coyle, of the Oklahoma City-based Coyle Law Firm.
Norwood and Coyle successfully advocated for Simmons' release and formal exoneration in 2023. The attorneys said Simmons needed to be found "actually innocent" in Oklahoma County court in order to begin officially pursuing financial compensation for the decades he spent wrongfully incarcerated.
"He's pursuing whatever a jury will award him, which we are certain, if this case goes to a jury trial, will be much more than $10 million," Wang told The Oklahoman, part of the USA TODAY network, Friday. "Oklahoma City has an ordinance that provided that they're required to indemnify up to $10 million. That's what they're required to do."
Simmons' attorneys argue that the cities of Edmond and Oklahoma City are liable for constitutional violations "by virtue of (their) official policies."
"The Cities failed to promulgate any or adequate rules, regulations, policies or procedures on: the handling, preservation, and disclosure of exculpatory evidence; the writing of police reports and notes of witness statements; the conduct of lineups and identification procedures; and meaningful discipline of officers accused of such unlawful conduct," the lawyers wrote.
More:How much should Oklahomans wrongfully incarcerated be paid? Lawmaker working to raise the amount
When contacted Saturday by The Oklahoman, Shobert, now 79, said he did not know about the lawsuit, but confirmed he worked for the Oklahoma City Police Department from 1968 to 1988. He also said he remembers nothing about the liquor store murder, the related lineups or the Glynn Simmons case.
“If it’s written on paper, then I have to stand by that. I’m not going to change nothing, because I don’t remember nothing,” Shobert said. “At the time, 49 years ago, if I wrote it down, then it’s still the same and nothing’s changing.”
Shobert also said he regularly was tasked with investigating robberies and typically was not assigned homicide work unless homicide investigators “were all tied up,” and even then, he said, it was typically in an assistant role, not as a lead.
“After 49 years, it had to be something really special for me to remember, and since I don’t remember none of it, there’s nothing I can do about it,” Shobert told The Oklahoman.
Spokespeople for Edmond and Oklahoma City said Friday they could not comment on ongoing litigation.
Another man, Don Roberts, also was convicted in 1975 of Rogers' murder, although he said he was in Texas at the time of the crime. He and Simmons both were initially sentenced to death row, before a 1977 U.S. Supreme Court ruling caused their sentences to be modified to life in prison. Roberts was eventually paroled in 2008 but, according to law enforcement, his conviction still stands.
veryGood! (1)
Related
- McConnell absent from Senate on Thursday as he recovers from fall in Capitol
- New York’s Marshes Plagued by Sewage Runoff and Lack of Sediment
- Chet Hanks says he's slayed the ‘monster’: ‘I'm very much at peace’
- Man pleads guilty to bribing a Minnesota juror with a bag of cash in COVID-19-related fraud case
- Hackers hit Rhode Island benefits system in major cyberattack. Personal data could be released soon
- Terrell Davis' lawyer releases video of United plane handcuffing incident, announces plans to sue airline
- Physicality and endurance win the World Series of perhaps the oldest game in North America
- Schumer and Jeffries endorse Kamala Harris for president
- Brianna LaPaglia Reveals The Meaning Behind Her "Chickenfry" Nickname
- Hailee Steinfeld and Buffalo Bills quarterback Josh Allen go Instagram official in Paris
Ranking
- See you latte: Starbucks plans to cut 30% of its menu
- New Zealand reports Canada after drone flown over Olympic soccer practice
- Who plays Lady Deadpool? Fan theories include Blake Lively and (of course) Taylor Swift
- Surprise blast of rock, water and steam sends dozens running for safety in Yellowstone
- B.A. Parker is learning the banjo
- Rash of earthquakes blamed on oil production, including a magnitude 4.9 in Texas
- Biles, Richardson, Osaka comebacks ‘bigger than them.’ They highlight issues facing Black women
- Abortion rights supporters report having enough signatures to qualify for Montana ballot
Recommendation
Angelina Jolie nearly fainted making Maria Callas movie: 'My body wasn’t strong enough'
Olympic gold-medal swimmers were strangers until living kidney donation made them family
Woman pleads guilty to stealing $300K from Alabama church to buy gifts for TikTok content creators
Chinese swimmers saga and other big doping questions entering 2024 Paris Olympics
Trump wants to turn the clock on daylight saving time
Demonstrators stage mass protest against Netanyahu visit and US military aid to Israel
Karlie Kloss Makes Rare Comment About Taylor Swift After Attending Eras Tour
New owner nears purchase of Red Lobster after chain announced bankruptcy and closures