Kenneth Richey, a British and an American cit­i­zen, is expect­ed to be freed soon after spend­ing 20 years on Ohio’s death row for the mur­der of his ex-girlfriend’s 2‑year-old daugh­ter in a 1986 apart­ment fire. Richey’s con­vic­tion was over­turned by a fed­er­al court in August 2007 after 15 years of appeals that cast doubts on wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny and the com­pe­ten­cy of his defense attor­ney at the ini­tial tri­al. More recent­ly, the orig­i­nal evi­dence pre­sent­ed by arson experts was found to be based on ​“unsound sci­en­tif­ic prin­ci­ples,” and it now appears that the fire that killed 2‑year-old Cynthia Collins was acci­den­tal.

Richey will plead no con­test to attempt­ed invol­un­tary manslaugh­ter, child endan­ger­ing and break­ing and enter­ing. He is expect­ed to be sen­tenced to time already served. Richey’s orig­i­nal tri­al was heard by three judges after his defense attor­ney advised him to for­go a jury tri­al. Prosecutors stat­ed that Richey, who main­tained his inno­cence through­out the tri­al, did in fact try to save the tod­dler. The judges, how­ev­er, did not take that evi­dence under con­sid­er­a­tion. His case prompt­ed inter­ven­tion by Tony Blair, the Pope, the European Parliament and Amnesty International.

Alistair Carmichael, a Scottish Member of Parliament who had cam­paigned for Richey’s release, stat­ed after he heard the news, ​“The real­i­ty of some­body who is kept locked up in a cell for 23 hours a day for 19 years is quite mind-blow­ing. It is a dread­ful, inhu­mane and dehu­man­is­ing sys­tem. If one man is off it, then remem­ber there are hun­dreds of peo­ple in America still endur­ing that dreadful situation.”

(“Kenneth Richey to be released after 20 years on death row,” London Times Online, December 19, 2007). See Innocence and Representation.

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