A judge freed them and said they never committed the murder for which they served hard time. Connecticut is back in court anyway trying to return Ron Taylor and George Gould to prison — while on a separate front Taylor combats colon cancer.
The state continues to appeal Superior Court Judge Stanley Fuger’s decision that freed Taylor and Gould earlier this year after they served 16 years of an 80-year sentence for a New Haven murder.
The men in turn are pressing to have the case end in their favor. Taylor wants to have a ruling soon — in part because he is being treated for colon cancer that has metastasized to his lungs and liver. He is about to undergo radiation treatment.
Peter Tsimbidaros, the pair’s attorney, filed a motion in late September to transfer the appeal from the state appellate court directly to the Connecticut Supreme Court— in effect, cutting out a step in the process.
Taylor and Gould were released April 1 after Judge Fuger ruled March 17 in their favor on a habeas petition. He ruled they were actually innocent (a high legal standard) and had suffered a “manifest injustice.” He ordered that their sentences, the guilty verdicts, the results of the probable cause hearing and the arrest warrants all be thrown out. (The video at the top of the story captures the scene on the day of their release.)
Melinda Tuhus Photo
Tsimbidaros explained the latest developments in the long saga after a recent event at the New Haven Free Public Library where he, Taylor, Gould, and Gerald O’Donnell, the investigator who helped win their release, all spoke. (They are pictured above, left to right.)
On Oct. 12 the state’s attorney’s office filed an objection to sending the case to the Supreme Court. The office argued, among other assertions, that there’s no record that Taylor has cancer
Tsimbidaros said Taylor was diagnosed while in prison and had surgery in prison to remove part of his colon and his entire spleen, and then underwent chemotherapy. “This is what we’re dealing with,” Tsimbidaros said with frustration.
“He [Tsimbidaros] didn’t cite anything in the record about cancer,” Assistant State’s Attorney Michael O’Hare responded in a phone interview. “If you’re going to cite anything you have to provide evidence. He said it, but that’s not a sufficient basis for granting relief; he needs to provide certified documentation.”
Asked what kind of documentation would suffice, he said only, “A lawyer would know what he needs to do to support that claim.” He added that Tsimbidaros did try to add documentation later, but, O’Hare said, “That was not accepted by the court.”
“Those comments smack of yet another ploy by the state’s attorney office to divert the focus of this case from where it should be — that being the manifest injustice suffered by Ronald Taylor and George Gould,” Tsimbidaros parried. Ronald Taylor is battling Stage 4 cancer, he said. “This is not a game of semantics. I supplied the appeals court with documentation furnished to me by the Department of Corrections which clearly support Ronald Taylor’s dire medical condition. There is not an automatic right to file a response to an objection, but the court did not return them to me, so I believe they accepted them.”
O’Hare filed an appeal immediately seeking to overturn the judge’s ruling and send the men back to prison. Failing that, he will pursue a new trial, he said. The men currently must wear electronic bracelets and report weekly to state officials.
Which Time Did Witness Lie?
Why the continued pursuit?
O’Hare asserted there was “clear error on the part of the habeas court in granting relief. First, the court erred in finding them innocent; the court applied the wrong standard in meeting the burden of showing actual innocence. Second, the court’s factual determination is clearly erroneous — that the witness’s recantation was credible.”
The judge ruled that the prosecution’s key witness, Doreen Stiles, had lied at trial, O’Hare claimed she lied when she subsequently recanted, paving the way for the defendants’ release.
The first claim in his appeal cites that Judge Fuger excluded evidence offered by the state regarding the circumstances surrounding Stiles’s recantation.
The prosecutor who tried the case, James Clark, had told the jury, “This case rises and falls on the testimony of Doreen Stiles.” She was a drug-addicted prostitute at the time she fingered Taylor and Gould; she was allegedly clean at the time of her recantation.
Judge Fuger made his decision based solely on the recantation of the witness, not DNA evidence, “which was inconclusive,” O’Hare said. “He [the judge] mentioned it in his decision, but made no findings based on it. So the DNA evidence is not before the appellate court.”
His objection to the transfer motion reiterates the state’s claims made in its appeal. It adds that Gould and Taylor — having been released from prison while their appeal is pending — are in a better position than many others seeking relief while incarcerated.
“Indeed,” the objection states, “it would be inappropriate for this court to take extraordinary steps to expedite the resolution of this case while other habeas corpus petitioners remain incarcerated while their appeals are heard. Accordingly, the petitioners should not be heard to complain that they are prejudiced by any delay in the resolution of the respondents’ appeals.”
“Our principal claim is that they failed to show that they were actually innocent, and we’re asking the appellate court to reverse the judgment of the habeas court and that would result in them being returned to prison,” O’Hare concluded in the interview. “In our brief to the appellate court, we did say that even if the court’s ruling on actual innocence is upheld, the appropriate remedy for that is not release; rather, it is a new trial.”
Bracelet Hampers Medical Care
At the recent talk at the library, sponsored by the activist group People Against Injustice, O’Donnell, the private investigator, and Tsimbidaros said they have forged close bonds with not only Gould and Taylor, but with their families as well. O’Donnell said Gould’s mother, Martha, and Taylor’s wife, Mary, had been in regular — often daily — contact with him.
Mary Taylor said that her husband’s health has suffered from having to wear an electronic bracelet. For example, at one point his doctor had requested an emergency CT scan and an emergency MRI. She said it took more than a day to track down the appropriate official who could give permission to cut off the bracelet so her husband could get the procedures.
“That’s caused delays in emergency medical attention that he needs,” not to mention the added stress, she said.