ST. LOUIS — The St. Louis Circuit Attorney’s Office announced it filed a motion this week to free Lamar Johnson, a man found guilty of murder over nearly 30 years ago, a crime the prosecutor’s office said he did not commit.
The office of St. Louis Circuit Attorney Kim Gardner released the following statement on Wednesday: “We are hopeful that the court will hear our motion and correct this manifest injustice on behalf of Mr. Johnson to strengthen the integrity of our criminal justice system.â€
Johnson was convicted in 1995 of first-degree murder in the 1994 death of Marcus Boyd in Dutchtown. Johnson’s case attracted nationwide support and debate from legal scholars.
Last year, the Missouri Supreme Court ruled Gardner did not have the authority to move for a new trial, prompting state legislators to pass a law that allows prosecutors to file a motion to vacate the sentences of people they believe have been wrongfully convicted.
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Gardner filed the motion to vacate Johnson’s sentence under the new law, which had a one-year anniversary on Sunday. About a dozen supporters gathered at the courthouse on Monday calling on Gardner to file the motion.
The Midwest Innocence Project filed a habeas corpus petition in July 2021 in Cole County, where he is incarcerated, seeking his release on grounds he is being imprisoned unjustly.
The Circuit Attorney’s Conviction Integrity Unit outlined misconduct of the lead detective into Johnson’s conviction in a 67-page report in 2019.
Missouri Attorney General Eric Schmitt has also worked to block Johnson’s release, filing motions questioning the validity of the recanted witness statement and claiming procedural errors in Johnson’s defense.
In November, a judge freed Kevin Strickland, who spent more than 40 years in prison for one count of capital murder and two counts of second-degree murder, under the same law via the same motion.
The main witness in Strickland’s case also recanted her story, and noted she felt pressured by police to wrongly identify Strickland as a murderer.
After he was released, Strickland told reporters he wasn’t necessarily angry, but that the criminal justice system “needs to be torn down and redone.â€
