The City of Los Angeles agreed last month to pay over $8 million to a man who spent 17 years in prison on a wrongful murder conviction, reports revealed Sunday.
Evidence presented by Los Angeles police and eyewitness trial testimony sent Obie Anthony, 40, and another accused accomplice to life in prison for the 1994 shooting death of Felipe Gonzales Angeles outside a brothel, the Los Angeles Times reported.
But his murder conviction was overturned and he was released in 2011 after a Los Angeles County judge determined that a pimp who ran the brothel lied during testimony about seeing Anthony and the alleged accomplice, Reggie Cole, ambush and shoot Angeles outside the building in an attempted robbery.
Both Anthony and Cole were in county jail on unrelated carjacking charges around the time of the murder.
"The money will never make up for it," Anthony, who now lives with his wife in San Bernaradino County, told the LA Times.
Anthony's lawsuit against the city also claimed two LAPD detectives- Pete Razanskas and Marcella Winn- withheld evidence that could have exonerated him and ignored the possibility the pimp was the killer.
The morning after the shooting, Razanskas and Winn found shell casings and bullet fragments on the brothel's roof. But instead of collecting the evidence, Razanskas gave the rounds to a LA Times reporter who was with them at the time, the newspaper reported.
An autopsy on Angeles concluded he was shot from a downward trajectory. But none of the bullets from the roof were ever tested for comparison against the ones found at the crime scene below, according to Anthony's lawyers.
Testing on the roof bullets and the crime scene ones later showed they came from the same weapon, the lawsuit claims according to the newspaper.
"The misconduct by police led to a miscarriage of justice and Obie spending 17 years in prison for a murder he obviously did not commit," David McLane, the plaintiff's attorney, told the LA Times.
With the help of the California Innocence Project, which investigates possible wrongful convictions, it was later revealed the pimp, John Jones, gave a false testimony. Jones also testified in exchange for prosecutors giving him a lighter sentence for his own charges of pimping and pandering. The deal was never disclosed by prosecutors.
Anthony, who maintained at his trial and all these years he did not kill Angeles, was later found factually innocent. Cole's conviction was also overturned.
Jones could not be reached for comment.
Razanskas, who has since retired, also could not be reached for comment, the LA Times reported. Winn did not respond to requests seeking comment.
Though Anthony will receive $8 million, attorneys for the city said the detectives committed no wrongdoing and properly conducted the investigation. The city also argued it is not required to disclose that Jones could have been considered a suspect.
Anthony is also seeking compensation from the state for his time in prison, which is still pending.
Cole's wrongful conviction lawsuit is also pending.
