A man originally sentenced to life in prison for murder will get out in six years after a problematic verdict form given to jurors earned him a lesser sentence, according to court documents.
Darrian Pye was sentenced to life for the 2005 slaying of Maynon Freeman, records show.
Prosecutors said Pye and two other men — who are also in prison — were responsible for Freeman’s death. An indictment obtained by AJC.com accused the men of stealing Freeman’s 2001 Ford Expedition and shooting him with a rifle.
Freeman’s sister, Sherika Rucker, told Channel 2 Action News her brother was shot in the back of the head with an AK-47 because the men believed he had stolen their car rims.
A jury convicted Pye in 2008, and he was sentenced to life in prison with the possibility of parole plus 25 years. He has spent the past 14 years in prison.
“He took a life,” Rucker said. “He ought to do life. That’s only fair.”
However, a judge said Monday that a flawed verdict form nullified his life sentence.
“As the trial judge, it’s totally at my feet, the error,” Fulton County Superior Court Judge Craig Schwall said.
The problem with the form is in the verbiage, prosecutors said. It reads “we the Jury unanimously and beyond a reasonable doubt ...”
Credit: Fulton County Superior Court
Credit: Fulton County Superior Court
“That is improper because it makes it appear that there is a ‘beyond reasonable doubt’ standard to find someone not guilty,” Fulton County District Attorney spokesman Chris Hopper said.
In essence, the form doesn’t read as if a defendant is “innocent until proven guilty,” and could mislead jurors into believing that they must make a decision after they are presented with proof of innocence instead of on the presumption of innocence.
The problem was discovered in 2012. The Georgia Supreme Court ruled to overturn a Fulton County man’s malice murder conviction over the form’s inappropriate language.
Soniel D. Cheddersingh was convicted on several charges in connection with the shooting death of a man in 2008. The Supreme Court ruled that the form misinformed jurors about where the burden of proof lies.
“The presumption of innocence is fundamental to a fair trial,” former Chief Justice Harris Hines said at the time, “and a conviction resulting from a procedure in which the trial court misinformed the jury regarding that presumption affects not only the fairness of that proceeding itself, but public confidence in the judicial process as a whole.”
Legal experts said it is not clear how many verdicts were potentially impacted by the verdict form.
Because of the precedent set by the Supreme Court case, Schwall overturned Pye’s sentence Monday and instead sentenced him based on a plea that was previously negotiated by the district attorney’s office and the defense attorney.
Court officials said Pye pleaded guilty to voluntary manslaughter and robbery. Those charges led to a sentence of 20 years in prison and 20 years on probation, which Pye will now finish serving.
Schwall said the alternative to an earlier release would have been a new trial.
“And I’m sure the state has told you of the problems with trying a case nearly two decades after the crime occurred,” he said in court.
The victim’s sister was not pleased with the outcome.
“That’s not fair,” Rucker said. “That’s not justice, either.”
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