Back: Bridgeman embraces his brother Ronnie, who was also convicted but let out of prison years before him.
Wrongfully convicted murderers.
What do you do with a story like this?I mean how many people especially minorities,have been wrongly jailed due to false testimonies cultivated by the police?These men were on death row.They could so easily have been executed.So how many
lives have been destroyed by testimonies like these?How many families have been destroyed?Remember these men had families,wives,children,aunties ,uncles,mothers and fathers..this cancer goes deeper than you can imagine. A witness tells how detectives manipulated him and made him give false testimony to jail 3 men for the murder they clearly did not commit.2 of the men were finally released from prison 39 years after conviction! I'm sorry those guys could possibly have no life anymore.The last place you wanna be is an American jail if you were convicted of killing a white man! Especially in 1975!
As time goes by,those men will even wish they were back in prison,cos its gonna be a lot coping with the outside world than they thought.
And what is gonna happen to those detectives involved in this miscarriage of justice?I think they should be jailed for the rest of their lives and have all their properties sold so all the money they made since the time of the case at their jobs is recovered and given to the victims.I don't know the procedure,but if i was a victim,that is what i will be pushing for.As per forgiveness,forgive about that fairy tale,that sh*t won't be happening.
The two men who were sentenced to death for a 1975 murder regained their freedom yesterday November 21, after the witness who testified against them recanted his testimony. Ricky Jackson and Wiley Bridgeman, 57 and 60, were convicted of murdering Harry Franks, a businessman in Cleveland, Ohio after Eddie Vernon then a 12-year-old said he saw the murder.
The two along with Bridgeman's brother Ronnie. were sentenced to life imprisonment in 1978 after a Supreme Court ruling. Ronnie Bridgeman was released in 2003 for separate reasons. According to Dailymail reports;
“He was reunited with the other two inmates Friday when they walked free from Cuyahoga County Jail after prosecutors asked that the charges be dismissed.
The dramatic turnaround came after Vernon, now 52, recanted his testimony, saying that police officers coerced him into testifying and gave him details of the case. Changing his account in 2013, he said: 'All the information was fed to me - I don't have any knowledge about what happened at the scene of the crime'
In the initial court hearings, Vernon said he was on a bus with other schoolchildren when he heard gunshots near the a grocery store called Cut-Rite. Other children on the bus have said Vernon would not have been able to see anything from his seat - and he has since admitted that was true.
He now claims detectives talked him into testifying, then said if he claimed he was lying his parents could be put in prison for perjury.
Vernon broke down during a court hearing for Jackson on Tuesday as he described the threats by detectives and the burden of guilt he had carried for so long.”
Third man: Ronnie Bridgeman, who has since changed his name to Kwame Ajamu, was also put on death row for the murders, but was released in 2003
Crime scene: This photograph shows the aftermath of the murder for which the Bridgeman brothers and Wiley were convicted
Victim: The three men were wrongly convicted of murdering Harry Franks, a businessman in Cleveland, Ohio
I'm out! Jackson walks smiling out of the jail after his sentence was quashed. He said he was on 'an emotional high' from being freed
Thankful: Jackson looks to the sky in court after a judge revoked his sentence
Party time: Jackson said his first plan after almost 40 years' incarceration is to have a fish dinner