Shaurn Thomas
Posted on 12/09/2024 4:21:47 AM PST by george76
A Philadelphia man who was exonerated and given a $4.1 million settlement after serving 24 years in prison for a murder conviction that was dropped is headed back to prison — for a separate killing.
Shaurn Thomas — who was freed from a life sentence in 2017 after his 1992 murder conviction was overturned — pleaded guilty last Thursday to a 2023 slaying, The Philadelphia Inquirer reported.
Thomas, 50, was convicted of gunning down his girlfriend’s friend, Akeem Edwards, last year after the 38-year-old father allegedly failed to pay out $1,200 for the cocaine Thomas gave him to sell
...
The judge at the plea hearing appeared nearly stunned by the facts of the case — that a multi-millionaire who spent nearly half his life in prison would risk being sent back over a comparably measly amount of cash,
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In addition to the murder charge, Thomas pleaded guilty to conspiracy, illegal gun possession and other crimes.
Edwards’ family members told the Inquirer they hope his killer gets sent back to prison for the rest of his life at his sentencing scheduled for February.
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Thomas had already been sentenced to life in prison once when he was just 20 years old before his conviction was overturned.
At the time, a jury convicted him of second-degree murder for the 1990 shooting death of a North Philadephia businessman in a robbery gone wrong
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Prosecutors said they weren’t 100% convinced that Thomas was completely innocent of the killing, but the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office declined to retry his case,
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
First, I would be surprised if the guy was a 'multimillionaire' at the time he murdered the other guy. Typical behavior for reprobates like him is to blow all the cash on parties, sycophants, drugs, hookers, and such. If he was awarded $4 million back in 2017, I doubt any of that was left.
But in the end, it wasn't about money, probably. The guy probably felt 'disrespected' because the guy didn't pay him back.
The entire thing appears to be typical Leftism and Leftist policies to me.
.......the guy has admitted to this murder. A low voltage electric chair that takes all day to kill him is appropriate. Why spend a million dollars housing and feeding and providing medical service to this obvious “bastard”?
The execution should be on National TV including forced watching in colleges and universities with NO counselors allowed.
It wasn’t the cash. It was the disrespect. He gave away that $4M
Shaurn Thomas
Most likely the jury got it right the first time. That how it goes in these "found innocent" cases. Endless legal pettifogging and technicalities cause the prosecution to give up. Now I recognize that technicalities are there to protect our rights, but there is a limit.
Of course. His previous “exoneration” and settlement was bs. He’s a scumbag drug dealing killer.
So IOW he was *very* probably guilty of the first murder as well.
I knew a former prosecutor and we discussed innocent people being convicted of crimes. I’m condensing his response. He said the press always portrays the person convicted as the typical middle class guy next door. That’s rarely the case. As a prosecutor you see the same people over and over in connection with lots of crimes. Because of the nature of the system getting a conviction is very hard. Along comes a crime and this same guy you’ve seen a lot of before. If you can make the connection, you go for it. Afterall the purpose of the prosecutor’s office is to protect the law-abiding people from people who perpetrate crimes. Very rarely some evidence comes up later that might exonerate this particular perpetrator from a particular crime. There’s always more to the story you read in the papers.
Prosecutors said they weren’t 100% convinced that Thomas was completely innocent of the killingFrom this 2017 (com)Post article at the time he was released,
The Philadelphia district attorney’s office had been under fire for having a conviction review unit that hadn’t overturned a single conviction since launching in 2014. District Attorney Seth Williams reorganized the unit in February and put his chief of staff, Kathleen Martin, in charge. Thomas became the first person whose case was overturned, Martin said.It was amidst BLM mania, with ongoing protests in Philadelphia in 2016: they had to find someone to let go.
btt
Overturning a previous conviction isn’t “being found innocent” although the press will try to convince us it is.
Was his case part of the Innocence Project?
Reminds me of a 1970s incident made into a TV movie. “Dummy”(1979)
About a black man who cannot speak or hear accused of murder. Found Not Guilty he is released, then kills again.
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0079088/
He missed the three not hots and a cot
***...to blow all the cash on parties, sycophants, drugs, hookers, and such.***
Reminds me of Rodney King. Awarded millions for a beating he probably deserved, he died a few years later totally broke.
I can think of others who got good payouts for injuries who blew it all in just a few years. More money than they have EVER SEEN and thought it would last forever.
I remember the Atlanta Child murders. When the perp was caught and convicted, a TV movie was made which tried to show he was innocent and railroaded to prison. But when caught, the child murders stopped.
Never trust the news media to tell the truth.
I get that completely. But I think the legal standard is “reasonable doubt” which is a fluid concept.
It seems to me a prosecutor could say “I am 99% sure the guy was guilty, and I don’t see 1% as “reasonable doubt” so...punish the guy.”
Obviously, if I think there is a 60% surety that the guy was guilty, that 40% would probably be considered “reasonable doubt”.
I don’t like that statement by the Prosecutors that “...they weren’t 100% convinced that Thomas was completely innocent of the killing...”
What does that mean in a legal setting? I understand that sometimes, it is 100%...you see the person on video doing the shooting, he is easily identified, and multiple sources have testified they saw him do it, etc.
But in the absence of those things, who is ever 100% sure? It just seemed an odd thing for them to say.
I like your use of the little-used word “pettifogging”, which seems appropriate in this context.
“ Most likely the jury got it right the first time.”
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Yep. Sometimes exoneration may mean actual innocence but sometimes it most definitely doesn’t mean that.
Another phony exoneration.
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