Broward County, Florida pros­e­cu­tors moved to posthu­mous­ly exon­er­ate Ronald Stewart (pic­tured) of a rape and mur­der he did not com­mit. Stewart pled no con­test to the 1983 rape and mur­der of Regina Harrison after he was threat­ened with the death penal­ty. The actu­al killer, whose guilt has since been con­firmed by DNA test­ing, went on to mur­der at least two more women after Harrison.

On March 21, 2019, pros­e­cu­tors released a state­ment announc­ing that they were seek­ing to over­turn Stewart’s con­vic­tion in Harrison’s rape and mur­der after the con­fes­sion of anoth­er man, Jack Jones, led them to test DNA evi­dence from the case. ​“Although Stewart is now deceased, it is appro­pri­ate that the record be cor­rect­ed at this time to reflect the results of the new infor­ma­tion and evi­dence uncov­ered since November 2018,” Broward State Attorney’s Office spokes­woman Paula McMahon said in a joint news release with the Hollywood Police Department. ​“It is also impor­tant to try to deter­mine if Jones killed oth­er vic­tims. … We regret that [Stewart] plead­ed no con­test to a mur­der he did not com­mit and that this divert­ed atten­tion from the real killer.”

Stewart’s no-con­test plea was not an admis­sion of guilt. At his sen­tenc­ing, his lawyer told the court, ​“Rather than, you know, run the risk of the death penal­ty, he chose to enter this plea.” Counsel point­ed out that the evi­dence of guilt was weak, since fin­ger­prints from the crime scene did not match Stewart and key tes­ti­mo­ny came from unre­li­able jail­house infor­mants. However, Stewart feared that he would be sen­tenced to death because he had pre­vi­ous­ly been con­vict­ed of a series of rapes. He was serv­ing con­cur­rent 50-year sen­tences for Harrison’s mur­der and three oth­er rapes when he died in prison in 2008.

The re-exam­i­na­tion of the case came as a result of a let­ter writ­ten by Arkansas death-row pris­on­er Jack Jones, pri­or to his 2017 exe­cu­tion. Jones sent his sis­ter the let­ter with instruc­tions not to read it for a year after his death. In that let­ter, Jones con­fessed to Harrison’s mur­der, writ­ing, ​“So, you just let [Harrison’s fam­i­ly] know that I am deeply sor­ry, that I couldn’t rest easy until they knew the truth. Let them know that in the end I became a bet­ter per­son, and I did the best I could to be as much as I could for oth­ers, out of respect for the ones I’ve harmed.” His sis­ter gave the let­ter to detec­tive John Curcio, who reopened the inves­ti­ga­tion and had DNA evi­dence test­ed. In 1991, Jones killed Lori Barrett, a tourist who was vis­it­ing Fort Lauderdale. Four years lat­er, he mur­dered Mary Phillips in Arkansas.

The case is one of a grow­ing num­ber of exon­er­a­tions in which the threat of the death penal­ty has induced false con­fes­sions or caused inno­cent defen­dants to enter guilty or no-con­test pleas to crimes they did not com­mit. Recent high-pro­file exam­ples of this phe­nom­e­non include the Beatrice Six in Nebraska and the Norfolk Four in Virginia.

(Jessica Lipscomb, Broward Prosecutors Exonerate Man From 1983 Rape, Murder of College Student, Miami New Times, March 21, 2019; Kristin Lam, Ronald Stewart con­fessed to a 1983 mur­der and died in prison. He did­n’t do it, pros­e­cu­tors say, USA Today, March 21, 2019; Rafael Olmeda, A ser­i­al rapist took the blame for South Florida woman’s mur­der. A ser­i­al killer was real­ly the cul­prit., South Florida Sun Sentinel, March 21, 2019.) See Innocence.

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