27 years in prison for a crime he did not commit
Dallas. When Charles Chatman (photo Justin Goode) woke up from his long nightmare, the world had changed. He had never seen a cell phone. He did not know what Internet was. He did not remember how to use a knife to eat. In his cell, the African-American who had been wrongly convicted of rape in 1981 and sentenced to 99 years in prison, watched more than 9800 days slowly go by. For 27 years, the inmate was identified by a number – 324559- rather than by his name. Charles Chatman was freed on January 3 2008 after being exonerated by a DNA test and his name was cleared on February 27. The 47-year old African-American is the 15th DNA exoneree in Dallas County in the last 7 years. The 5-foot-9 man built like a rock, is the symbol of a troubled justice system now under an extensive review. Craig Watkins, the new District Attorney in Dallas County, launched an investigation into 400 closed cases to determine if DNA testing should be granted to the inmates. Mr Chatman was 21 years old when he was was arrested for the rape of 52-year old Madalaine Magin. He was black, she was white. He had an alibi – he helped his sister clean restaurants the night of the crime – but could not prove it. At the time, he was on four years’ probation for a 1978 residential burglary conviction. The rape victim identified him from a photographic lineup and then from a live one. A short time after he turned down the plea bargain, he was convicted to 99 years in prison. “A black man had committed a crime against a white person and all they wanted was the conviction of a black man, he says. They did not care who it was”. In prison, Charles Chatman first claimed he was innocent to whoever would listen to him. On at least three occasions, the parole board denied his release because he refused to apologize or admit to a crime. “They wanted to know my version of the crime and I told them I didn’t have a version, I didn’t do it,” Chatman said. “They thought I was being disrespectful.” ”After a while I just quit telling people I did not do it”, he says without a hint of bitterness in his voice. “I tried to hide that I had been convicted of rape, because when you go to prison as a rapist - and especially if the victim is a child or, as in my case, an older woman -, you are in trouble. And even the thought of this crime disgusted me.” Mr Chatman picked fights. He says he was “not comfortable with the nature of the crime” he had convicted of and let the relationship with his family “fade away”. He stopped returning letters and just had a nephew visiting him. “I am very grateful because he made a lot of sacrifices to come and see”, Mr Chatman says. Things started to change in 2000. A woman started to write to him and to help him with his case. Then, in the spring of 2001, as he was in solitary confinement, he says he had a revelation. “God told me he had another plan for me”, Mr Chatman adds. “The voice told me I was going to get free”. The exoneree recalls he had read a story in the paper “about a guy called Pope”, who had been freed thanks to a DNA testing. “I felt my case fitted the conditions required for such a test”, Mr Chatman recalls. “But I had to apply four times before my motion was granted”. Judge John Creuzot is the man who had determined that Mr Chatman’s request had merit. Sitting in a conference room in his court, the judge says he just had a feeling about Charles Chatman: “There was something about him”, Mr Creuzot says. “You hear a lot of inmates claim that they are innocent. But Mr Chatman had this calm demeanor. That is when I first thought that he maybe was the victim of a real bad tragedy”. The judge says he did what the law required him to do. He appointed a lawyer and when the attorney did not deliver, Mr Creuzot replaced him with Michelle Moore, a public defender with the Innocence Project. Previous DNA tests had been inconclusive and Mr Chatman knew that this last test would destroy little genetic matter left from the crime. “I asked him: “Are you sure you want to do it?””, John Creuzot says. “If the test showed it was him, I told him I would have to communicate the results to the parole board and it would make a future release improbable”. Charles Chatman said he was ready. There was another problem. The inmate could not afford the cost of the test. Judge Creuzot decided to pay for it on his court budget. “I just wanted to get this done”, Mr Creuzot says. “If Mr Chatman was innocent, I did not want to keep him behind bars”. On January 2 2008, the tests confirmed that Mr Chatman could not have committed the rape for which he has served almost 27 years in prison. “He was so shocked, he did not know what to do”, Mr Creuzot says. “I told him he was going to walk out free. I then called the sheriff to tell him I owed Mr Chatman a steak lunch. I ordered the largest piece of meat I could find. But when he sat down to eat his lunch, he had forgotten how to use a fork and a knife. I cad to cut his steak for him”. In Carrollton, a Dallas suburb, Charles Chatman got his license and now spends his days driving his new black truck. He found an apartment and lives thanks to the donations of his family and friends. The scar is still wide open. “When I was set free, I was just apologized to”, Mr Chatman says. “But nobody made sure I had somewhere to go”. Now, he works with the Innocence Project to help others who have been released but have no one to turn to. On April 1, Mr Chatman went with Craig Watkins to ask Dallas County commissioners to fund a DNA evidence review team for two more years. The county agreed to pay more than 800,000 for the salaries of two attorneys, an investigator and a paralegal. Three months after his release from prison, Mr Chatman is still adjusting. “The other day, I met a guy at my local Starbucks”, he says almost shyly. “We started chatting and he told me he had a story in the papers about an inmate who had spent 27 years behind bars for something he had not done. I kind of smiled but I did not tell him I was the guy. I don’t know why”. Dallas / Jean-Cosme Delaloye As Texas incarcerates, Dallas exoneratesHis name is Mike Ware. The man sitting behind his desk on the top floor of the Dallas courthouse, is the head of the district attorney’s conviction integrity unit. The former lawyer was hired last year by Craig Watkins, the Dallas DA, to look at 400 closed cases, where inmates had requested post-conviction DNA testing but did not get any. The law was changed in Texas in 2001 to recognize DNA testing. But it is up to judges to decide if they grant the motions or not. Her name is Michelle Moore. She is a public defender and she works closely with Mike Ware while he is conducting the evidence review. Both Mr Ware and Mrs Moore try to reach an agreement on who could be granted DNA testing. “We are looking at the biogical evidence”, Mr Ware says. “Some of the inmates want us to test the bullets for DNA”. Dallas County has the highest rate of DNA exonerations in the U.S. “There is a real simple explanation”, judge Creuzot says. “The police lab here kept all the samples instead of destroying them after a conviction. It is unusual”. Since he started his new job last Summer, Mike Ware has already looked at a third of the cases. “What we are doing here in Dallas, forces Texas lawmakers to admit that there is a problem with our justice system”, he says. “All the inmates who have been exonerated had one thing in common: they were poor”. Dallas County set an example in Texas that others have been slow to follow. In the Lone Star State, the number of people behind bars has grown by 300% in the last 20 years to reach 172,000 inmates. Texas holds another record: in the last 7 years, 30 people have been exonerated there, according to the Innocence Project. It is more than any other State in the U.S. Democratic lawmakers tried to change the law last year. They wanted to create an Innocence Commission to study where the system went wrong. Judge Creuzot, Mike Ware and Michelle Moore all support the idea. “We have to make sure the system has integrity, even if it is years later”, says Mr Creuzot. Despite this support coming from Dallas County, the Texas parliament let the bill die last year. Rafael Anchia, a Democratic State Representative, plans to try to revive the bill next year. “We want to try to institute the best practices in the State of Texas to prevent innocent people from ending up in jail”, Mr Anchia says. Dallas / J-C De CommentsYou must be logged in to post a comment. |
||
 |
 |
 |
