Man Who Was Wrongly Imprisoned For 28 Years Sues US State, Claims Officers Framed Him

A Missouri man, who was exonerated after nearly three decades of imprisonment, has initiated a federal lawsuit against the city of St. Louis and eight officers whom he alleges framed him for a murder he did not commit.

Lamar Johnson, 50, filed a wrongful conviction lawsuit on Wednesday in U.S. District Court in the Eastern District of Missouri. Mr Johnson spent 28 years in prison for the 1994 murder of his friend Markus Boyd, People reported.

According to a statement from his attorneys at the national civil rights firm Neufeld, Sheck, Brustin, Hoffman & Freudenberger, Mr Johnson, then 20, was with his girlfriend miles away on October 30, 1994, when two masked men shot Boyd while he was sitting on his front porch in St. Louis.

"But police coerced an eyewitness into a false ID and manufactured false evidence from a racist and unreliable jailhouse informant while failing to interview numerous people who could have testified to Johnson's whereabouts, seek a single search warrant, or investigate other obvious evidence of his innocence," Emma Fruedenberger, a partner at NSBHF, said in a statement.

Mr Johnson and a now-dead man, Phillip Campbell, were convicted of shooting Marcus Boyd over an alleged drug debt, leading to life sentences for both. However, in 2023, Mr Johnson was released after a judge determined that he had been wrongfully convicted, according to the Associated Press.

Mr Johnson is now pursuing punitive damages and an undisclosed monetary amount as compensation for the 28 years he lost.

"I am grateful to be free and I'm doing my best to make up for all the time that was stolen from me and my family, especially my daughters," Mr Johnson said in a statement. "I want to put this dark and painful chapter behind me, but there can be no healing without answers and accountability. I deserved better and so did Markus. I intend to make sure this doesn't happen to anyone else."

His attorneys agree. "This lawsuit is about accountability," Emma Freudenberger, a partner with NSBHF, said in the statement. 

"The defendant officers framed a young man with his life ahead of him. Even after the Court declared his innocence, there have been no apologies and no consequences," the statement continues. "The City of St. Louis cannot continue to simply ignore the glaring police misconduct that has caused Mr. Johnson and his family so much harm."

According to CBS News, Mr Johnson admitted to selling small amounts of drugs when he was working at Jiffy Tube while taking classes at a community college. But he was determined to clear his name and be released from prison, so he sought help from the Midwest Innocence Project. They worked with then-Circuit Attorney Kim Garner to investigate the slaying.

In August 2022, Mr Gardner filed a motion asking a judge to vacate Mr Johnson's conviction. 

In a December 2022 hearing in St Louis Circuit Court, a man named  James Howard reportedly confessed to Boyd's murder, saying he and Campbell killed Boyd and that Johnson had nothing to do with it.

St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported that Howard and Campbell killed Boyd because he had disrespected Howard's partner, Sirone Spates, aka Puffy.