Wrongly Convicted Database Record
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Charge: |
Murder |
Sentence: |
Death |
Years Imprisoned: |
10 |
Year Crime: |
1992 |
Year Convicted: |
1993 |
Year Cleared: |
2002 |
U.S. State or Country of Crime: |
Arizona |
County or Region of Crime: |
Pima |
City of Crime: |
Tucson |
Result: |
Judicially Exonerated |
Summary of Case: |
"Andre Minnitt was co-defendant of Christopher McCrimmon. They were wrongly convicted in 1993 of a triple murder and sentenced to death. Minnitt and McCrimmon's convictions were overturned by the Arizona Supreme Court in 1996 based on juror coercion. McCrimmon was acquitted by a jury that deliberated for 42 minutes after a retrial in 1997, while the jury couldn't reach a verdict about Minnitt. Minnitt was tried for a third time in 1999, and after his conviction of murder he was again sentenced to death. Minnitt appealed and argued his third trial violated his right against double jeopardy because of prejudicial prosecutorial misconduct during his first two trials. On October 11, 2002 the Arizona Supreme Court vacated Minnitt's conviction and ordered dismissal of the charges with prejudice because the prosecutor committed misconduct "with knowing indifference to the danger of mistrial or reversal, if not a specific intent to cause a mistrial." (State v. Minnitt, 55 P. 3d 774 (Ariz. Sup Ct 2002)) Their codefendant Martin Soto-Fong convicted in 1993 in a separate trial protests his innocence but he remains in prison as of January 1, 2014." |
Conviction Caused By: |
Prejudicial prosecutor misconduct. |
Innocence Proved By: |
"Andre Minnitt's triple murder conviction was reversed by the Arizona Supreme Court on October 11, 2002, which ordered dismissal of the charges against him with prejudice." |
Defendant Aided By: |
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Compensation Awarded: |
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Was Perpetrator Identified? |
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Age When Imprisoned: |
21 |
Age When Released: |
31 |
Sex: |
Male |
Skin/Ethnicity: |
Black |
Information Source 1: |
"State v. Minnitt, 55 P. 3d 774 (Ariz. Sup Ct 2002)" |
Information Location 1: |
"http://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=9667739866347475513&q=Andre+Minnitt&hl=en&as_sdt=6,48" |
Information Source 2: |
"Killer Instincts: Did A Famous Prosecutor Put the Wrong man on Death Row, Jeffrey Toobin, The New Yorker, January 17, 2005, pg. 54 (10) (54-63)." |
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Innocents Database Created and Maintained by Hans Sherrer innocents@forejustice.org