{"id":3160,"date":"2017-06-02T12:27:41","date_gmt":"2017-06-02T16:27:41","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspirationreport\/?p=3160"},"modified":"2017-06-02T12:30:56","modified_gmt":"2017-06-02T16:30:56","slug":"man-cleared-charges-24-years-holds-no-grudge","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspirationreport\/2017\/06\/man-cleared-charges-24-years-holds-no-grudge.html","title":{"rendered":"Man Released from Prison After 24 Years Holds No Grudge"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Shaurn-Thomas-WPVI\"<\/a>After 24 years, Shaurn Thomas is finally free.<\/p>\n

Thomas claimed for over 16 years that he did not kill a popular Philadelphia businessman in a street robbery. He was 16 then, and said he had been at a juvenile court proceeding for trying to steal a motorcycle when the daylight murder occurred. But the courts weren\u2019t buying it, and Thomas lost appeal after appeal. Convicted almost completely on the testimony of a co-defendant, he was sentenced to life without parole.<\/p>\n

In 2009, Thomas sent a letter to the newly formed Pennsylvania Innocence Project. A lawyer named James Figorski, who had spent 25 years as a Philadelphia police officer, happened to be the one who opened it. He knew how the city\u2019s juvenile system worked, and he sensed something wasn\u2019t right.<\/p>\n

For the next eight years, Figorski volunteered countless hours investigating Thomas\u2019s case, along with Innocence Project legal director Marissa Bluestine
\nLast year the two began meeting with the Philadelphia district attorney\u2019s Conviction Review Unit. The prosecutors began to agree; Thomas was almost certainly innocent.<\/p>\n

Last month, prosecutors moved to vacate Thomas\u2019s murder conviction, and he was released from prison after nearly 24 years behind bars. That night, Thomas had his first meal outside of prison with family and his fianc\u00e9e. He chose the seafood combination at Red Lobster, his lawyers said. He also tried using a cell phone for the first time.<\/p>\n

\u201cI feel wonderful, a free man. I can\u2019t feel no better. Hey man, just got to believe in God, and have the right legal team, and keep fighting,\u201d Shaurn told WBTV in the video below. \u201cI don\u2019t got no animosity towards nobody. What for? Life\u2019s too short for that. You can\u2019t get it back. I just move on forward. It\u2019s a tragedy that happened to me, but I\u2019m pretty sure I\u2019m not the only one.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now 43, Thomas was not in Philadelphia County court to hear the news. He remained in a state prison in Frackville, Pa., until the order from Judge Rose Marie DeFino-Nastasi was entered. Figorski drove up to Frackville that day to retrieve Thomas.<\/p>\n

\u201cAt every level, Shaurn was failed,\u201d Bluestine said. \u201cBy his lawyers, by the prosecutors, by the courts. Ironically, it took a former police officer to dig in and prove he\u2019s an innocent man.\u201d
\nThomas was the fourth person convicted in the November 1990 slaying of Domingo Martinez, who owned three North Philadelphia travel agencies and was active with civic groups in the Latino community for decades. Martinez, 78, had gone to a Mellon Bank branch in Center City about 9 a.m. and withdrawn $25,000 in cash. After he drove away from the bank, his car was struck by another car, and someone in the other car got out, fatally shot Martinez and took the money.<\/p>\n

The case was cold for two years, even though there were a number of witnesses, pedestrians and other motorists, who saw the collision and shooting. Then in 1992, a man named John Stallworth confessed to his involvement and named his brother and Thomas as participants. Stallworth\u2019s confession was shown to be false because one of the other participants he named was in prison at the time of the slaying, but Stallworth still was held. In 1993, facing the death penalty, Stallworth changed his story and eliminated the man who was in prison. Thomas was arrested, charged with murder and jailed in July 1993.<\/p>\n

Stallworth and his brother William cut plea deals in exchange for their testimony against Thomas and his older brother, Mustafa Thomas. Shaurn Thomas\u2019s lawyer tried to present evidence of his alibi, his arrest and processing at the juvenile center, but \u201cit wasn\u2019t presented with the strength and detail that we have now,\u201d Martin said.<\/p>\n

Figorski and Bluestine began meeting with a prosecutor from the district attorney\u2019s Conviction Review Unit in November 2016. Members of the unit reviewed the case and interviewed William Stallworth, who again recanted his trial testimony that Thomas had been involved in the homicide.<\/p>\n

The prosecutors also found 36 pages of witness statements that had not been turned over to the defense during Shaurn Thomas\u2019s trial, some with information implicating other suspects.
\nFigorski and Bluestine began meeting \u201cpretty regularly\u201d with the Conviction Review Unit beginning last year, Bluestine said, \u201cto push them hard to look at this. We\u2019ve never been afraid for them to look at the evidence because we knew he was innocent.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt happened because he had no money or power,\u201d Figorski said. \u201cThey had a cold case they wanted to solve. And they had somebody willing to say [Shaurn] did it.\u201d<\/p>\n

Now, though, Shaurn is holding no malice or anger about the incident. While it took up a large part of his life, he is now happy to be out of the jail cell. He said that he “never lost faith” he would be freed.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom the time I got locked up to the time I got released, I wrote letters,\u201d Mr. Thomas said in a telephone interview on Thursday as he shopped for clothes in Philadelphia. \u201cI wrote letters to people I didn\u2019t even know. I just knew that one day \u2014 I didn\u2019t know when \u2014 that I would be a free person.\u201d<\/p>\n

“Everyone is happy, very, very happy,” Stephonia Long, Thomas’ fianc\u00e9e, told CBS Philly. “The whole time he has been very positive because he believed in his innocence.”<\/p>\n

And free he now is.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

After 24 years, Shaurn Thomas is finally free. Thomas claimed for over 16 years that he did not kill a popular Philadelphia businessman in a street robbery. He was 16 then, and said he had been at a juvenile court proceeding for trying to steal a motorcycle when the daylight murder occurred. But the courts…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":600,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fbia_status":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,4,12,607],"tags":[692,693,691],"class_list":["post-3160","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-good-news","category-inspiring-messages","category-inspiring-people","category-people-who-do-good","tag-good-news","tag-positive-story","tag-shaurn-thomas"],"yoast_head":"\nMan Released from Prison After 24 Years Holds No Grudge<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"With the help of an ex-cop, Shaurn Thomas was cleared of a murder conviction after spending 24 years behind bars. Yet, he holds no anger or malice.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspirationreport\/2017\/06\/man-cleared-charges-24-years-holds-no-grudge.html\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Man Released from Prison After 24 Years Holds No Grudge\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"With the help of an ex-cop, Shaurn Thomas was cleared of a murder conviction after spending 24 years behind bars. 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