Charles "C.J." Rice, a Philadelphia exoneree freed this year after his case received national attention, is suing the city and Philadelphia police over his wrongful conviction.
The big picture: Rice, 30, is one of more than four dozen people exonerated in Philadelphia since 2016, per the federal lawsuit filed last month.
- Many of the convictions were overturned because of allegations of police misconduct.
Driving the news: Rice is suing for the "tremendous damage" he suffered while imprisoned for 12 years, including physical injuries and emotional distress.
- He claims his constitutional rights were violated and his future was "derailed" after he was arrested for attempted murder as a teenager in 2011, per the suit.
- He's seeking an unspecified amount in damages and punitive action against the officers, some of whom have since retired.
The other side: The city and police department declined Axios' requests for comment.
Context: Police said Rice and co-defendant Tyler Linder were involved in a retaliatory shooting in Point Breeze in 2011, three weeks after Rice was shot and seriously wounded.
- Witnesses couldn't initially identify the shooters but said they ran away from the scene.
- Rice's lawsuit says police used suggestive tactics that eventually led witnesses to wrongly identify Rice and Linder as the shooters.
- Rice was convicted at trial and sentenced to 30-60 years. Linder was acquitted after surveillance footage established his "airtight alibi," per the suit.
The latest: A judge overturned Rice's conviction last year, finding that he did not have adequate counsel at trial.
- Prosecutors dropped charges to retry Rice in court, acknowledging there wasn't much evidence linking him to the crime.
- The conviction's overturning came after CNN's Jake Tapper wrote a story for The Atlantic that detailed a lack of physical evidence against Rice and his inability to carry out the crime.
- Plus, his attorney's trial strategy proved to be "dangerously incompetent," Tapper wrote.
Between the lines: Tapper's father, Theodore, was a South Philly physician who had known Rice since he was a child.
- He had testified at Rice's trial that Rice would've been unable to run from the scene because his abdomen was wounded from the prior shooting. Doing so likely would've ripped his sutures.
- Rice had also said that he was at his godmother's house when the shooting occurred.
Yes, but: Detectives refused to interview one of Rice's family members who could've established his alibi, which "short-circuited the process," per the lawsuit.
- Later at trial, Rice's attorney failed to subpoena phone records that could've supported his alibi, Tapper wrote.
- The attorney, who died in 2019, also didn't set interviews for prosecutors to meet with Rice's alibi witness. That was problematic at trial, when the prosecutor undermined the witness's credibility by pointing out they were making the claims for the first time while testifying.
Rice's lawsuit also accuses police of several missteps that tainted witness identification of the suspects.
Zoom out: Philadelphia has paid millions of dollars to settle police misconduct claims dating back decades .
- A 1977 Inquirer investigation found homicide detectives had routinely beaten, threatened, intimidated, coerced, and disregarded suspects' constitutional rights during interrogations.
- Philadelphia created a separate Internal Accountability Office to get misconduct in check, but it was disbanded in 2005 after releasing reports sharply critical of police's refusal to enact reforms. The city now has the Citizens Police Oversight Commission , which was created in 2022.
What they're saying: Rice's attorneys didn't respond to Axios' request for comment, but attorney Jon Loevey told Tapper during a recent CNN segment that police "manufactured this case. It's inexcusable and indefensible."
- After being released from prison, Rice completed a paralegal program at Georgetown University. He told Tapper he'd like to get his law degree.
Local News
Comments / 0