Davontae Sanford was only 14, illiterate and blind in one eye when he walked over to police who were at the 2007 murder scene on Runyon Street, in a Detroit neighborhood. He was immediately pegged as a suspect, The Associated Press reports. He pleaded guilty to second-degree murder and wound up in prison, but a new legal team hopes to have the conviction thrown out.
Smothers,34, has been trying to help Sanford for some time, and in the affidavit, he goes into minute detail regarding the murders. He writes that the victims were watching football on television when he fired an AK-47. He scoped out the house for weeks, he says. At one point he even played catch with a friend so he could check out the neighborhood.
Smothers is frustrated that prosecutors won’t acknowledge that the wrong man is behind bars.
“I have nothing to gain from testifying about my commission of the Runyon murders,” he writes in the affidavit. “I only want to tell the truth in order to prevent an innocent kid from serving time for crimes that I committed. I hope to have the opportunity to testify in court to provide details and drawings of the crime scene that could only be known by the person who committed the crime: Me.”
Smothers also said that he confessed to the killings — and several others — during recorded interviews when police caught him in 2008.
Sanford was taken to the police station on Sept. 17, 2007, right after the murders at the house on Runyon Street. Police questioned the developmentally disabled teenager twice, without the presence of his parents or an attorney, The Marshall Project reported, via The Innocence Project. Eventually he offered two statements; in the first one he denied any involvement but indicated that he may have possibly known who committed the crime. In the later statement he identified details about the crime and allegedly implicated himself as one of the shooters. The Marshall Project stated that once Sanford was charged with murder, “he told a psychologist that he had made it all up because the police had told him he could go home if he would ‘just [tell] them something.'”
During his trial, Sanford was represented by Robert Slameka, an attorney with a record of incompetence, The Marshall Project wrote, per The Innocence Project. Slameka was later suspended from practicing law in Michigan. During the trial, he didn’t raise questions about Sanford’s interrogation and confessions, and the teenager’s age and disability should have cast at least some doubt on the validity of his statements. Sanford was convicted of the murders and received a sentence of four concurrent terms of 37 years to 90 years in prison.
Now 22, Sanford is not eligible for parole until 2046, The Associated Press reports.
Smothers, then 27, was arrested two weeks after Sanford’s conviction. He confessed to the murder he was being arraigned on. He also confessed to 11 other murders, including the ones on Runyon Street. During his confession, he offered details about the weapons used and was even able to tell police where to find one of the murder weapons that had been hidden. The Marshall Project writes that even though Smothers denied that Sanford was involved, prosecutors offered him a deal: 50 years to 100 years for all of the murders. All he had to do was promise not to testify in Sanford’s defense.
In 2012, Sanford filed to have his plea withdrawn, but the motion was denied by Wayne Circuit Judge Brian Sullivan, The Detroit Free Press reports. Sullivan refused to bring Smothers to court as the prisoner had claimed the Fifth Amendment right to remain silent on two earlier occasions there. The Free Press also reported that Sullivan said Sanford’s confession stood up to scrutiny.
Then the Michigan Court of Appeals reversed Sullivan, but after that, the Michigan Supreme Court ruled that the motion to withdraw the guilty plea was not filed properly, which means the process had to start all over again.
Now, Sanford is being represented by lawyers and law students from innocence clinics at the University of Michigan and Northwestern University. They have filed a motion asking for a new trial and for Sanford’s convictions to be overturned.
Lawyers for Sanford have tried, so far without success, to get the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office to accept that a mistake was made, said Megan Crane, a lawyer with Northwestern’s Center on Wrongful Convictions of Youth.
“The real reason we are here today is because the Detroit criminal justice system can’t handle the truth,” Crane said in a news conference. “For far too long, the truth in this case has been hidden and suppressed by Detroit police and prosecutors. And that truth is that professional hit man Vincent Smothers committed the crime for which Davontae Sanford is doing time.”
The director of the Michigan clinic, Dave Moran, said their case is strong for Sanford’s innocence, the Free Press reports.
“After a lengthy investigation, we’ve put together what we think is an irrefutable case that Vincent Smothers and not Davontae Sanford was responsible for the Runyon Street massacre,” Moran said on Tuesday. “And we hope justice will prevail.”
Sanford’s statements to the police are inconsistent, Moran said. Smothers, however, has provided police with accurate details, and guns that were used in the Runyon Street killings were connected to him. Not only that, but Smothers implicated an accomplice, who shot and wounded another man later, Moran said.
While part of Smothers’ motivation to clear Sanford is partly due to a desire for redemption, it is also partly due to professional pride, Moran said.
For its part, the Wayne County Prosecutor’s Office has, in the past, stood by Sanford’s conviction. Referring to the case in an email, spokeswoman Maria Miller said “We obviously don’t agree with the statements made today.
“However, our longstanding protocol is not to argue our cases in the press,” she wrote. “We speak through our pleadings and will argue the case in open court.”
Taminko Sanford-Tillman, Sanford’s mother, said she’s grateful for the new help her son is receiving, the Free Press reports.
“Yes, we do miss him. Yes, I do get weak. But I can’t give up because … If we give up, he give up,” she said. “And we’re not going to allow him, as a family, to give up.”
On April 15, Sanford’s lawyers filed a motion for a new trial, The Innocence Project reports. They may still be in for the long haul.
“It remains to be seen whether or not the motion is granted, but as the Marshall Project writes, ‘It has taken seven years just to get to this stage of this case, and there will likely be many more years of litigation to come before this excruciating process is over.'”
Hopefully Smothers, who says he has nothing to lose, will be able to help Sanford, who has lost everything.
