July 12
GEORGIA----impending execution
Clemency denied for death row inmate
Georgia's parole board has denied clemency for a death row inmate
scheduled to die by lethal injection tonight for dismembering an attorney
in 1984.
The board release a brief statement today saying it has denied clemency
for 44-year-old Robert Dale Conklin. The board did not say why it denied
Conklin's requst.
Board spokeswoman Kim Patton-Johnson said she could not comment on the
board's decision.
Barring a successful last-minute appeal, Conklin's execution will be
carried out tonight.
Conklin was convicted of stabbing 28-year-old George Crooks to death with
a screwdriver during an altercation in Conklin's Atlanta apartment. The
two were romantically involved.
Conklin says he was fending off an attempted rape at the time of the
attack.
Fulton County District Attorney Paul Howard said last week that he
believes Conklin deserves to be executed, and he said he would oppose
clemency at the hearing, which was closed to the public.
The execution would be Georgia's 3rd this year.
(source: Associated Press)
WASHINGTON:
Convicted killer tries to avoid death----Hearing may be last appeal in
case of 1991 SeaTac murder
A man sentenced to die for torturing and killing a young woman in the
SeaTac area more than 14 years ago now has what may be a final chance to
persuade the courts to spare his life.
Seattle attorneys for Cal Coburn Brown will urge the 9th U.S. Circuit
Court of Appeals this week to keep him from becoming the next man in
Washington to be executed.
Brown has lost each appeal so far in the murder of Holly Washa, a
21-year-old cable-company dispatcher he raped and tortured over 2 days in
May 1991. The 3 federal appeals judges to hear his case Thursday in
Pasadena, Calif., could be his last resort.
Washa's relatives still believe Brown, 47, should die for what her aunt
called "a horrendous crime."
But Brown's attorneys will argue that jurors in his 1993 trial should have
heard more about Brown's apparent mental problems -- and how his manic
behavior can be controlled, to some degree, with medication.
Attorney Suzanne Elliott said Brown had gone off Lithium about a month
before killing Washa and that one psychiatrist later found that he could
have better controlled his behavior had he been taking the drug.
"We are not arguing that this was not a tragic criminal activity on his
part," Elliott said. "The real question here is whether this is an
appropriate case for the death penalty."
She and attorney Gilbert Levy contend that if Brown's trial lawyers had
done more to find mental-health experts and challenge the prosecution's
witnesses on the subject, jurors likely wouldn't have voted to put Brown
to death.
Elliott said the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the death penalty in a
Pennsylvania case just a few weeks ago for strikingly similar reasons.
Yet state Assistant Attorney General John Samson contends that if Brown's
lawyers had delved further into Brown's mental health, it probably would
have backfired -- bolstering King County prosecutors' argument that the
man was simply a sexually sadistic sociopath.
"The simple fact is Brown tortured, raped and murdered Holly because he
enjoyed it," Samson wrote. "The jury still would have sentenced Brown to
death."
The hurdles in federal courts are higher than they used to be for
death-row inmates. Under the Anti-Terrorism and Death Penalty Act of 1996,
federal judges must give the benefit of doubt to the state Supreme Court
-- which twice upheld Brown's death sentence -- and can overturn such
decisions only in extraordinary circumstances.
Samson said Brown's case is the 1st death-penalty appeal in 10 years that
a federal judge has rejected flat-out. Judge John Coughenour ruled in
September that Brown's trial attorneys put "a tremendous amount of energy"
in trying to give jurors reasons to spare Brown's life -- and that added
mental-health testimony probably wouldn't have persuaded them.
"The conviction was constitutional. The death sentence was
constitutional," Samson said. "There is no question that the death
sentence was the appropriate punishment in this case, in light of the
evidence presented at trial."
The court's decision could take months or more than a year. Then either
side could try to get an 11-member panel of 9th Circuit judges or the U.S.
Supreme Court to review the decision, though such appeals aren't often
granted.
Washa's aunt, who said she spoke for her family on the condition that her
name not be used, said she and other relatives vividly remember listening
to Brown's callous and lengthy confession, played on tape during his
trial.
"He laughed about some of the things he did to her, which was horrible, as
far as I'm concerned," she said. "Why he needed to torture her for two or
3 days because he needed money, I don't know."
She said the family wishes the case hadn't dragged on so long, but they'd
been prepared for it to take years.
Brown's family members have separated from him almost entirely, though his
sister, Heidi, hopes his death sentence will be overturned.
She said he left home when she was just 12 and he was 17, a kid who was
intelligent but oddly prone to isolating himself in his room. She said
whatever medication he's taking in prison -- his attorney said he's on
Lithium -- seems helpful; he was much more rational than the last time she
saw him in 1991.
"I obviously would rather he got life in prison, because I think that he
may have mental problems," said Heidi, who did not want her last name
used. "He's always been strange. He's always been off."
She said she spoke with him on his birthday last year, when someone at the
state prison in Walla Walla called and put him on the phone. They talked
briefly. He asked her to write, to send pictures of her family.
She hasn't. She's "still trying to absorb the fact of what he did."
Brown kidnapped Washa on May 23, 1991, from the parking lot of a SeaTac
hotel, where she'd just quit a part-time job. He got her to pull over by
implying something was wrong with her car.
He robbed her and took her to a nearby motel, where prosecutors say he
tied her up, sexually assaulted her repeatedly and shocked her with an
electrical cord. He forced her into the trunk of her car the next night,
cut her throat, then left her car near the airport. Brown then flew to
Palm Springs, got together with a woman he'd met just a week earlier on a
plane and ended up raping, robbing and nearly killing her, too.
Since Washington's death penalty was reinstated in 1981, 4 men have been
executed. All but one chose not to fight for their life in the federal
courts, including the man executed most recently.
James Elledge was given a lethal injection Aug. 28, 2001, for binding,
strangling and stabbing Eloise Fitzner about 3 years earlier in a Lynnwood
church.
Death sentences for 18 men have been overturned, 10 of them by the state
Supreme Court and 8 by the federal courts, according to the Washington
Death Penalty Assistance Center. Brown is 1 of 8 men on Washington's death
row.
(source: Seattle Post-Intelligencer)
KENTUCKY:
2 death row inmates get temporary stays of execution
Death warrants for Thomas Clyde Bowling Jr. and Ralph Baze will not be
issued this summer.
Franklin Circuit Judge Roger Crittenden issued stays for the executions of
both death row inmates for at least 60 days.
On Friday, Crittenden ruled that the states method of execution by lethal
injection was constitutional.
Baze and Bowling sued the state last August, saying the state's lethal
injection procedures violated a prisoners Eighth Amendment right not to be
subjected to cruel and unusual punishment.
Attorneys for Bowling and Baze filed a notice of appeal with the state
Supreme Court on Friday.
But court clerks likely will need several days to officially certify the
voluminous records in the case, attorneys for both sides said. After the
court certifies the records, the 60-day period begins.
Todays ruling could affect Baze more than Bowling. Bowling, who was
convicted for gunning down Tina and Eddie Earley outside their Lexington
dry cleaning business in 1990, already has a stay in effect until
mid-September.
Earlier this year, the state Supreme Court rejected Bowling's claim that
he was mentally retarded and unfit for execution.
But the court gave his attorneys until mid-September to file an appeal
with the U.S. Supreme Court.
Bowling and Baze, who was convicted of killing Powell County Sheriff Steve
Bennett and deputy Arthur Briscoe in a shootout in 1992, have other
appeals pending in state and federal court.
David Smith of the state attorney general's office, said it is difficult
to say - and he would not speculate - when an execution in Kentucky should
take place.
Of the men's sentences Smith said, "I think the families are entitled to
see justice done."
(source: Lexington Herald-Leader)
MISSOURI:
NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund report on Larry Griffin
To: Saul Green, Esquire, Miller, Canfield, Paddock & Stone, P.L.C.,
Detroit, Michigan----Attorney for Walter Moss
From: Samuel R. Gross, Thomas & Mabel Long Professor of Law, University of
Michigan Law School, Ann Arbor, Michigan----Cooperating Attorney, NAACP
Legal Defense and Educational Fund
and
Josiah Thompson -- Thompson Investigations, Bolinas, California
Re: The Murder of Quintin Moss on June 26, 1980, in the City of St. Louis,
Missouri
Date: June 10, 2005
Introduction
Larry Griffin was convicted on June 26, 1981, for the murder of Quintin
Moss 1 year earlier, on June 26, 1980. He was executed on June 21, 1995.
>From the outset, there have been serious doubts about whether Griffin was
really the killer. In 1983, in a dissenting opinion in Griffins appeal
from his conviction, Justice Blackmar of the Missouri Supreme Court
pointed out that "The only eyewitness to the murder had a seriously flawed
background, and his ability to observe and identify the gunman was also
subject to question." State v. Griffin, 662 S.W.2d 854, 860 (1983). That
description was accurate, with a qualification: the only person who
testified at trial that he saw the murder was an extremely flawed witness.
We now know much more about the murder of Quintin Moss. The most important
new direct evidence comes from 2 sources:
- The first police officer at the scene has now said repeatedly on tape
and to a news reporter - that the story told by the supposed eyewitness
was false.
- There was a 2nd victim to the shooting in which Moss was killed, a man
who was shot in his buttock. Although easy to find, he was contacted by
neither defense nor prosecution and did not testify at trial. This victim
states that the supposed eyewitness was not there at the time of the
shooting. More important, he positively states that Larry Griffin - whom
he knew personally - did not do the shooting.
In other words, we now know that the witness who provoked Justice
Blackmars concern in fact lied, while another eyewitness - a victim of the
shooting who still carries a bullet from it in his body - knew all along
that Larry Griffin was innocent, but was ignored.
What this means, of course, is not only that the wrong person was arrested
and convicted but also that the real criminals have never been brought to
justice. We have substantial new information on the identities of the
actual killers of Quintin Moss. However, a more thorough investigation by
appropriate authorities will be necessary to prove their guilt beyond a
reasonable doubt.
I. The Evidence at Trial
Quintin Moss was killed in a drive-by shooting at about 4:25 p.m. on June
26, 1980. Moss, a 19-year old African American drug dealer and alleged
hit-man for a drug ring, was shot on Olive Street near the corner of
Sarah, a notorious block known as "the Stroll." It was a center of
prostitution and drug sales. The residents of the neighborhood were
entirely African American. Even in 1980, many of the buildings in the
immediate area had been boarded up or demolished. In 2005, nothing from
the 1980s is left on that block or on several nearby. New townhouses have
been built on the Stroll. Several witnesses testified at trial, or told us
recently, that shootings at the corner of Sarah and Olive were "common."
In particular, the murder victim Quintin Moss himself had been shot at on
that corner six weeks earlier.
About 6 months before the Moss killing, Larry Griffin's brother, Dennis
Griffin, had been murdered. Dennis, by all accounts a substantial drug
dealer, was several years older than Larry. It was widely believed that
Quintin Moss killed Dennis Griffin. He was arrested for that murder but
released for lack of evidence. It was also common knowledge that there was
a contract out to kill Moss in retaliation for killing Dennis. After the
first incident in which shots were fired at Moss (but missed), police
officers chased down a car with Larry Griffin in it, driven by his nephew
Reggie Griffin, age 19. No weapons were found, so they released both Larry
and Reggie Griffin. Evidence of that earlier shooting and Larry Griffin's
possible connection to it was introduced at Griffin's capital trial. It
was the introduction of this "other-crime" evidence with its weak
connection to the defendant Larry Griffin that was the basis for Justice
Blackmars dissent on appeal.
Quintin Moss was shot from a slow moving car, a 1968 two-door Chevy
Impala, black over blue, that drove south on Sarah and then turned east on
Olive. Moss was on the south side of Olive about ninety feet east of the
corner. By all accounts, there were two shooters: a black man who leaned
out of the front passenger side window and fired a .38 revolver pistol,
and a second black man who shot a carbine from the rear passenger window.
Moss was hit thirteen times and died at the scene. Another black man in
the vicinity, Wallace Conners, was hit in the buttock by one bullet. He
was found about seventy-five feet east of the corner. The car then
continued east on Olive. It was found that night with the murder weapons
in it. Various fingerprints were found in the car but none belonged to
Larry Griffin. A recent traffic ticket of Reggie Griffin's was under a
front seat floor mat.
Larry Griffin, who was 25 in June 1980, was tied to the shooting of
Quintin Moss by 2 witnesses, only one of whom claimed to have seen him at
the scene.
(i) Officer Andre Jones testified that about thirty minutes before the
shooting he saw three black males leave a notorious drug house several
blocks away from the corner of Sarah and Olive. One of the 3 was carrying
a gun that could have been a carbine and another was wearing a distinctive
baseball cap similar to a cap later found in the murder car. From a photo,
Jones identified the third man (with no cap and no gun) as Larry Griffin.
Jones did not know Larry Griffin. He said that he knew when he saw him
that this person "was a Griffin but not Reggie." Jones made mistakes in
his description of the person he photo-IDed as Larry Griffin; for example,
the real Larry Griffin had no facial hair on June 26, 1980. Andre Jones
referred our investigator to the General Counsel of the Police Department,
which declined to permit an interview. Jones did say,
"Personally I have no apprehension in speaking to you about this."
(ii) Robert Fitzgerald was the key witness. Fitzgerald, a white man from
Boston with an extensive criminal record, was in St. Louis under the
Federal Witness Protection Program. He later testified at an organized
crime murder trial back in Boston and was a states witness in other
prosecutions. Judging from news coverage, he developed a reputation as a
snitch who couldn't produce convictions because Boston juries wouldn't
believe him. At Larry Griffin's trial, Fitzgerald testified as follows:
Some of the details that follow are taken from Fitzgeralds testimony at a
pre-trial deposition on April 10, 1981.
In March 1980, Fitzgerald had been relocated to St. Louis as a federally
protected witness. On June 26 he was living in a motel. Around noon he and
an African American friend, "Carl," drove off in Fitzgeralds car (a 73
Oldsmobile Delta 88) to take Carl's 4-year- old 'baby' daughter to Carl's
mother to babysit. It was a hot day and the cars air conditioner exhausted
the battery. The car coasted to a stop on Olive east of Sarah around 12:30
p.m. He was stuck near that corner for over 4 hours. Carl and a friend
(another black man) took the battery to be recharged, leaving Fitzgerald
alone on the street with the 4-year-old African American girl for several
hours. While they were gone, Fitzgerald took the girl across the street a
couple of times to get soda and/or popsicles at a liquor store. At the
store, he said a few words to the guy who later got shot in the butt
(Conners). He noticed Quintin Moss and noticed that Moss was selling
drugs. Carl and friend returned with the battery just before the shooting.
They had the hood up installing the battery when the bullets started
flying. The two of them jumped under the car and Carl yelled, "Get my
baby!" Fitzgerald threw himself over the little girl who was playing near
the rear of the car.
Then he looked up at the windshield and front passenger-side window of the
car moving toward him. He got a good view of a black man with a pistol
leaning out the front passenger seat and firing a handgun. He could not
identify the person shooting from the back passenger seat or the driver
except to say that they were black males. As the car left, he memorized
its license plate. Fitzgerald went to Moss and was trying to take his
pulse or administer first aid when the first police officer arrived. He
told this officer that he could identify the shooter and gave the officer
the license plate number of the murder car. Then, at Carl's urging, they
left immediately in his now-operable car. But the cops sent a cruiser
after him, stopped the car, and took him back to the scene. Fitzgerald
gave Carl his car, went back to the scene in the cruiser. Homicide
detectives drove him downtown to headquarters where he identified Larry
Griffin from a photo array. Later, while being driven back to his motel by
another officer, he identified the murder car where it had been spotted.
He left town for Florida a week later, but let the authorities knew how to
reach him.
In a federal habeas corpus hearing in 1993 (Griffin v. Delo, No. 88-1074
C(2), United States District Court for the Eastern District of Missouri)
Fitzgerald changed his story in two critical respects: First, he testified
that instead of picking Griffins picture from a photo array,
".... a detective came over to me and mentioned to me that 'We happen to
know who did it, and threw me a photograph and - Q. Just one photograph?
A. Yes, I believe that's what happened."
That single photograph had Larry Griffins name on the back and Fitzgerald
picked it. Second, Fitzgerald testified that when he later saw Larry
Griffin in court he was not sure it was the man he had seen shooting but
testifies that he identified him anyway because he knew that he was the
same Larry Griffin whose name was on the photograph. Fitzgeralds 1993
testimony could explain why, despite his innocence, Larry Griffin was
charged with the murder of Quintin Moss: It made sense that a Griffin
(some Griffin) was involved in the shooting; Officer Jones thought he
recognized Larry Griffins photograph; the police (in some manner,
intentionally or inadvertently) directed Fitzgeralds attention to Larry
Griffins picture; and Fitzgerald, for reasons of his own, identified that
picture.
In addition to his extensive record of convictions and prison terms, by
June 1980 Fitzgerald had several felony fraud charges pending against him
in St. Louis. He admitted that he had used illegal drugs, including heroin
and speed. He testified at trial that he was arrested soon after he
returned to St. Louis from Florida in October 1980, "to meet his fianc"
and that he was in custody from then through Larry Griffins trial. In
fact, as he admitted in the federal habeas corpus, he received weekend
furloughs while he was being held at the St. Louis County Workhouse at
Gumbo, which he spent at motels with his girlfriend. Indeed, it appears
from witnesses that we have since talked to that Fitzgerald was not in
physical custody when he testified and may have been at liberty for
additional periods of time before trial. He was sentenced and formally
released the day Larry Griffin was convicted.
Other than Fitzgerald's testimony, no evidence at trial - no other witness
and no physical evidence - placed Larry Griffin at the scene of this crime
or in the car from which the shots were fired.
II. Our Investigation
A. Larry Griffins innocence
We have interviewed 3 eyewitnesses to the shooting on June 26, 1980, and
its aftermath:
(I) Patricia Moss Mason, Quintins sister, testified for the prosecution at
trial that she saw her brother dead at the scene of the shooting. Although
never asked at trial about it, she also witnessed the shooting itself a
point corroborated both by her sister Sherry Moss and her mother Missouria
Moss with whom she spoke immediately after the shooting. We interviewed
Patricia Mason in Birmingham, Alabama. She had been back and forth to the
corner of Olive and Sarah a couple of times that afternoon. At the time of
the shooting, she was walking toward her brother at the corner. She
remembers seeing Wallace Conners at the scene and remembers visiting
Conners in the hospital later that day. She was too far from the shooting
to get a clear view of the shooters, but she is very clear on one critical
point: There was no white man nearby before the killing or attending to
Quintin Moss when the police arrived. In fact she insists that other than
the emergency personnel, nobody bent over Quintin Moss after he was shot.
(ii) Michael Ruggeri. Patrolman Michael Ruggeri, now retired, was the 1st
officer on the scene. He wrote the first police incident report, a 3-page
hand-written document that makes no mention of any white man attending to
Quintin Moss when he arrived. At trial, he testified consistently with
Fitzgerald: (1) that Fitzgerald was at the scene taking Moss's pulse when
Ruggeri arrived; (2) that there was a car nearby (3) that he later saw
Fitzgerald in a car (he said it was a Buick) in the company of a black man
and a child; (4) that Fitzgerald drove off and was then stopped and
brought back to the scene.
We have interviewed Ruggeri several times, each time on audiotape or
videotape. The most recent and detailed interview was conducted in the
company of a highly respected news reporter. Ruggeri consistently says
that there was no white man near Quintin Moss when he arrived, no car
parked near the curb, and no young black girl nearby. Ruggeri denies that
Fitzgerald gave him the license plate number of the car from which the
shots were fired, or told him that he could identify any of the shooters;
at trial Ruggeri was not asked whether Fitzgerald told him those things.
In his most recent interview with the reporter present, Ruggeri stressed
that he saw no car in proximity to the downed victims. He pointed out that
over the eight years he patrolled that district he had never seen a car
parked at that location. As first on the scene with no backup, he would
have seen any car parked at that location as a potential threat. He would
have noted it and proceeded cautiously. The same would apply to finding an
individual bending over the victim. Ruggeri pointed out that such an
individual might be a shooter administering a coup de grace. For these
reasons, Ruggeri is certain there was no car parked where Fitzgerald said
his car was parked and that no one was bending over the body when he
pulled up at the scene. Ruggeri recalls going to Moss and finding him
unconscious. Then he turned to Conners who was writhing on the sidewalk.
He got a general description of the car as a late sixties Chevy with 2
black shooters. He put this out via his radio and then turned back towards
Moss.
Ruggeri estimated that he turned back towards Moss 3 to 4 minutes after he
arrived on the scene. At that point he saw a thin white male trying to
take Mosss pulse and yelling for an ambulance. Moss lost bowel and bladder
control and Ruggeri told the white guy that Moss wouldn't need an
ambulance. Ruggeri recalled that his take at the time was that the white
guy had wandered up from the Methadone Clinic at Olive and Vandeventer.
Ruggeri was familiar with the adrenalin rush which witnesses to a shooting
exhibit. He said the white guy exhibited none of this. As Ruggeri put it,
"The pucker factor wasnt there." He thinks the white guy might have seen
the shooting, but only from a distance.
Other emergency units were arriving. Ruggeris sergeant arrived and took
command of the scene. Ruggeri told him of the white guy trying to get a
pulse and the sergeant told him to get the white guy and hold him at the
scene for Homicide. The white guy was now several hundred feet east of the
shooting scene walking east on Olive. Ruggeri went up to him on foot and
told him to come back to the scene. The white guy told Ruggeri, "I didn't
see nothin'." Ruggeri took him back to the scene and later drove him
downtown to police headquarters and turned him over to Homicide. Ruggeri
didn't see the white guy with any companions; didn't see him in any car;
doesn't remember any children with him. Ruggeri pointed out that had any
young child been close to the murder and the fusillade of bullets she
would have been screaming her head off when Ruggeri arrived at the scene.
At his most recent and extensive interview Ruggeri was shown a transcript
of his testimony at trial. He read it carefully and expressed surprise. He
said he did not remember testifying in that manner and cannot understand
why he would have done so. He states unequivocally that the testimony was
incorrect and that his current description of events is accurate.
Ruggeris description is confirmed in part by Sergeant Anthony Pona (now
retired) who arrived at the scene shortly after Ruggeri, and later that
night spotted the murder car parked on the street. Pona is certain that
Officer Ruggeri did not receive any information on the license plate
number of the car at the scene of the shooting. If Ruggeri had received
that information the license plate number would have been written on the
first page of Ruggeri's hand-written police report, and put out
immediately over the police radio - which didnt happen. Pona is sure,
based both on his recollection of the event and on his reading of the
police reports, that the license plate number was obtained later, by the
homicide detectives.
(iii) Wallace Conners is the second victim of the shooting on Olive near
Sarah on June 26, 1980. He was shot in the buttock and still carries the
slug in his body. According to a police report, he left the hospital
within a couple of days and couldn't be found at the address he gave an
aunt's house. He did not testify at trial nor in any post-conviction
proceeding. He now lives in Los Angeles. He had not talked about the
shooting to any attorney or police officer or investigator on any side of
the case from when he left the hospital in St. Louis in June 1980 until
our investigator first interviewed him in July of 2004.
The police incident reports state that both at the scene and later at the
hospital Conners was unable to identify any of the shooters. He told us
that he doesn't remember being asked, but he was injured and probably
medicated. In any event, it is true that he couldn't identify the
shooters: He didn't recognize them.
Conners left St. Louis soon after the shooting because he didn't want to
be killed. He was afraid that whoever shot him and killed Moss might think
it was safest to kill Conners as well. He went to Texas, where, in January
of 1981, he was arrested for grand larceny. He was tried as a habitual
criminal because of his criminal record from Missouri, and sentenced to
life imprisonment in August 1981. In fact, he was innocent of that crime.
His conviction was reversed by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals in
November 1984, and a distinguished Houston lawyer (later a judge) was
appointed to represent him on re-trial. His new lawyer investigated the
case for the first time and located witnesses who conclusively proved
Conners innocence; in September of 1985 he was acquitted by a judge in a
bench trial and released. Conners has never lived in St. Louis since 1980.
He has been back for short family visits, but by 1985, when he first
returned, the conviction of Larry Griffin was an event in the distant past
and never came to his attention.
Needless to say, Conners remembers the shooting well. He had been on the
block all day and had chatted with Quintin Moss, an acquaintance but not a
friend of his. He confirms that he saw Patricia Moss at the scene and
later at the hospital. Like Patricia Moss and Michael Ruggeri, Conners
says there was no white man stuck on that corner for hours (certainly not
with a four-year-old black girl) and that no white man came up to Moss
before the police arrived. Conners is certain there was no car parked just
east of the shooting. If there had been, he points out, he would have run
to it for cover instead of running west, toward the corner of Sarah, and
getting shot on the way.
Conners was standing about fifteen feet directly across from the car from
which shots were fired with the windows open. He looked at all three
occupants and got a very clear view of the pistol shooter in the front
passenger seat who was leaning out of the window. This was the shooter
Robert Fitzgerald identified as Larry Griffin. Conners does not know who
that man was; he did not recognize him. However, Conners is absolutely
certain that man was not Larry Griffin, and that Larry was not in the car
at all.
Conners, now 52, was a year or so older than Larry Griffin and a friend of
Larry's older brother, Dennis. He was 27 in June 1980, and had known Larry
for years, not intimately but well. Conners had only recently been
released from nearly seven years in prison, and most of the guys on the
Stroll were new to him. But Larry Griffin was one of his old crowd; he
would have recognized him instantly. He gave us a good description of the
pistol shooter in the front passenger seat. He doesn't know who it was but
he is certain it was not Larry Griffin. In fact, he talked to Larry
Griffin briefly about the shooting a couple of days later. This was after
he left the hospital but before he left St. Louis.
Although Conners was out of state at the time of Larry Griffin's trial in
June of 1981, it would not have been hard for the prosecution or defense
to locate him and bring him back to testify. At that time, Conners was in
county jail in Houston, Texas, awaiting trial on the larceny charges for
which he was ultimately exonerated in 1985. He could have been located by
routine inquiries. In fact, his presence in custody in Houston must have
been known to at least some members of the St. Louis Metropolitan Police
Force because on June 22, 1981 - the very day that Larry Griffin's trial
began - the Harris County District Attorney's Office applied for a
subpoena to bring St. Louis City Police Officer Merle McClain to Houston
to testify in Conners trial in Houston. Officer McClain actually testified
in Conners trial in July 1981.
(iv) Robert Fitzgerald himself died on August 24, 2004, in Florida, of
lung cancer and cirrhosis, before we could interview him.
B. The identities of the actual killers
(i) Ronnie Thomas-Bey (aka Ronnie Lee Thomas, aka Ricky Thomas) was the
registered owner of the car from which Quintin Moss was killed. Several
days after the shooting Thomas-Bey was arrested as an accessory before the
fact, but released for lack of evidence. As far as we know, Ronnie
Thomas-Bey was not suspected of being one of the 3 men in the car at the
scene of the murder, and his picture was not presented to witnesses for
possible identification.
In 1991, Thomas-Bey was indicted as one of thirteen defendants in a
federal RICO prosecution of various people associated with the St. Louis
Moorish Science Temple, United States vs. Jerry Lewis Bey, et al, No.
91-1CR(6), United States District Court, Eastern District of Missouri (the
"Moorish Science Temple case"). In December of that year Thomas-Bey became
a cooperating witness for the Government, and in 1993 he testified at the
Moorish Science Temple trial as Government witness. As a cooperating
witness, Thomas-Bey pled guilty to various RICO violations in federal
court in 1993; he also pled guilty to three counts of murder in Missouri
state court in 1993 and was sentenced to 3 terms of life imprisonment,
which he is now serving in federal custody under the Federal Witness
Protections Program. Thomas-Bey was given federal immunity for numerous
other murders in which he was involved.
On December 1, 1995, Thomas-Bey was deposed in State v. Jerry Lewis-Bey
and Gerald Hopkins-Bey, Circuit Court of St. Louis City, State of
Missouri, 94-1366, a state-court prosecution of some the defendants who
had already been convicted in federal court in the Moorish Science Temple
case. He was asked about his role in the murder of Quintin Moss, and
testified under oath that he was present in the car from which Moss was
shot - his own car - but did not himself shoot Moss. As best he could
recall, they weren't looking for Moss at the time but for a "guy called
Black, something at the time, because I was trying to help Reggie
[Griffin]...."
"Q. Was Larry Griffin present when he [Quintin Moss] was killed?
A. No.
Q. Are you sure?
A. No, Im not."
Thomas-Bey went on to explain that he couldnt remember for sure who was
there because the drive-by shooting of Quintin Moss "was just an
insignificant incident....you have got to understand something, you are
talking about over 20 years of incidents, information and Im doing my
best. He also testified that "a lot of times I wasn't in possession of
[my] car. Reggie would have it," that he and Reggie were close, and that
Reggie Griffin (but not Larry) worked with Thomas-Bey in the same drug
ring.
(ii) The other 2 killers - in addition to Ronnie Thomas-Bey - appear to be
Reggie Griffin, Larry Griffins nephew, and Ronnie ("Hump") Parker, a
drug-dealing associate of Reggie Griffin and Ronnie Thomas-Bey. Both
Reggie Griffin and Ronnie Parker are serving sentences of life
imprisonment without the possibility of parole in Missouri state prisons.
Reggie Griffin was 19 on June 20, 1980 - 6 years younger than his uncle
Larry, and more than 7 years younger than Wallace Conners, who didnt know
him. Both Reggie Griffin and Ronnie Parker had worked in the drug trade
with Larry Griffins older brother Dennis, and both were closely associated
with Ronnie Thomas-Bey. By contrast, we have heard from several sources
that Larry Griffin was not a member of that drug ring, and Ronnie
Thomas-Beys deposition testimony is consistent.
Jerry Lewis-Bey, the lead defendant in the Moorish Science Temple case,
was the Minister of the St. Louis Moorish Science Temple since 1980. The
Moorish Science Temple trial in 1991 included extensive evidence that
Ronnie Thomas-Bey had worked as a hit man for Jerry Lewis-Bey through most
of the 1980s. We interviewed Lewis-Bey in July 2004 at the Federal
Correctional facility in Edgefield, South Carolina, where he is serving a
sentence of life imprisonment without the possibility of parole for his
convictions in the Moorish Science Temple case.
Lewis-Bey told us that he went to Montreal in June 1980 to attend the
Sugar Ray Leonard/Roberto Duran prize fight. Upon his return, he learned
that his cousin, Ronnie Thomas-Bey, had been arrested and then released
for a drive-by shooting. When he ran into Thomas-Bey, Lewis-Bey asked him
about the shooting. Thomas-Bey replied that he, Reggie Griffin and Ronnie
Parker had been riding around in Thomas-Beys car and happened to spot
Quintin Moss selling drugs at the corner of Sarah and Olive Streets.
Thomas-Bey turned over driving duties to Parker because he wanted to do
some of the shooting. The guns were in the car as a matter of course.
Reggie Griffin was in the back seat, Thomas-Bey in the right front
passenger seat and Parker driving when the killing occurred. Lewis-Bey
stated that this version of the killings was "gospel," that everyone "back
then knew that this was the way it went down."
Lewis-Bey told us that Thomas-Bey said nothing about a white man being at
the scene of the Moss murder. He offered his opinion that if Thomas-Bey,
Reggie Griffin and Parker had seen a white man at or near the scene of the
Moss murder, they would have killed him too.
Lamont Griffin, a nephew of Larry Griffins and cousin of Reggie Griffins,
was interviewed last August at Crossroads Correctional Center in Cameron,
Missouri, where he is serving a sentence of life imprisonment without the
possibility of parole for an unrelated murder. Lamont Griffin was shown a
portion of a report of the interview with Lewis-Bey that included
Lewis-Bey's description of the shooting of Quintin Moss and his statement
that it was "gospel." Lamont Griffin read that portion of the report, was
silent for a moment, and then said "That's about the truth for me." A few
minutes later he confirmed again that Ronnie Parker was the third occupant
of the car in addition to Reggie Griffin and Ronnie Thomas-Bey. We have
heard the same story from several other sources as well, some of them
confidential. The only difference is that some report that Ronnie
Thomas-Bey was driving rather than shooting (as Thomas-Bey himself said in
his deposition in State v. Jerry Lewis-Bey, et al.) and that Ronnie Parker
was the pistol shooter in the front passenger seat.
We have interviewed both Ronnie Parker and Reggie Griffin. Parker was
interviewed first, at the Missouri State penitentiary in Jefferson City
where he is serving a term of life imprisonment without the possibility of
parole. Parker did not admit participation in the Moss/Conners shooting;
but when told that we had heard that the three men in the car were Ronnie
Thomas-Bey, Reggie Griffin and himself, Parker said that when he spoke to
the lawyer and investigator who handled Larry Griffins habeas corpus
petition he told them "that what they had to do was to get Reggie on the
phone and get the feds to put Ronnie [Thomas-Bey] on the phone and let the
three of us talk about it." Later, toward the end of the interview, Parker
said more than once: "You go talk to Reggie and then come back to me.
Thats how we'll do it." We did talk to Reggie Griffin, at the Crossroads
Correctional Center, where he too is serving a term of life imprisonment
without the possibility of parole. Reggie Griffin denied any personal
knowledge of this crime. Toward the end of the interview he said: "Even if
I was there, I wouldnt walk into a mother-fuckin capital murder case." We
then returned to see Parker after the interview with Reggie Griffin and
reported Reggies position. Parker seemed disturbed by this and finally
said: "Look, what I'm gonna do is write Reggie a letter and then I'm gonna
write to you. You can then see if you want to come see me again." We have
not heard back from Parker. At Larry Griffins federal habeas corpus
hearing in 1993 (Griffin v. Delo, supra) a witness named Kerry Caldwell -
like Ronnie Thomas-Bey, a government witness in the Moorish Science Temple
case - presented a different story of the shooting of Moss and Conners.
Caldwell testified that he had been a member of Dennis Griffins drug gang;
that on June 26, 1980, he spotted Quintin Moss on the street and called an
associate to come kill him; and that in response 3 members of the gang
arrived in Ronnie Thomas-Bey's car and shot Moss, an event Caldwell said
he witnessed. He identified the driver as Humphrey Scott (who died in
1986), the man shooting from back seat as Darryl Smith (who died in 1990),
and the man shooting from the front passenger seat as Ronnie Parker. Judge
Filippine of the Eastern District of Missouri did not believe Caldwell's
testimony for a variety of reasons, including that Caldwell had immunity
for the crime and was a friend of the Griffins - and that his testimony
was inconsistent with Robert Fitzgerald's (e.g., Caldwell did not see a
white man near the Moss after the shooting). We do not believe that
Caldwell's story is accurate; it contradicts a consistent description of
the Moss/Conners shooting that we have heard from many sources. It may
well be that Caldwell lied, as Judge Filippine found. It is also possible
that Caldwell was mistaken. He testified that he never actually talked to
Darryl Smith, the confederate he called, but only left voice messages on
Smiths pager. When Ronnie Thomas-Bey's car showed up with blazing guns,
Caldwell might have assumed it was in response to his call when in fact
(as Thomas-Bey himself testified) the encounter was accidental. If so, it
makes sense that the one person Caldwell identified correctly was Ronnie
Parker - the front-seat passenger who was leaning out of the window, and
therefore the only 1 of the 3 Caldwell could have actually seen if he were
present, as he said, in his own car.
At the habeas corpus proceeding in 1993, Griffin's attorneys presented an
affidavit from Robert Dwyer, a DEA agent. In his affidavit Dwyer stated
that in December of 1990 or January of 1991, when Dwyer was a St. Louis
City Police homicide detective on loan to the United States Attorney's
office, Caldwell discussed the Moss murder with Dwyer as part of
Caldwell's cooperation agreement with the United States Attorney. We
talked to Agent Dwyer, and he confirmed Caldwell had told him that Larry
Griffin was not present at the Moss shooting. Dwyer added that if Caldwell
had claimed that Larry Griffin had no role at all in the Moss killing he,
Dwyer, would have remembered it and challenged it as "bullshit."
Apparently Dwyer believed that Larry Griffin was not present at the scene,
but must have had some role in the murder nonetheless. Of course, Larry
Griffin was convicted solely on the basis of evidence that he was present
and fired shots, and there was no evidence whatever that anyone who was
not present had any role in the shooting.
(source: St. Louis Today)
