INNOCENCE: Kwame Ajamu Officially Exonerated, Becomes 150^th Death Row Exoneree

At a hear­ing on December 9, Kwame Ajamu (for­mer­ly Ronnie Bridgeman) was for­mal­ly exon­er­at­ed of the 1975 mur­der for which he was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death. Ajamu joins his broth­er, Wiley Bridgeman, and co-defen­dant, Ricky Jackson, on DPIC’s Exoneration List, becom­ing the 150^th death row exoneree since 1973. Ajamu, Bridgeman, and Jackson were con­vict­ed based on the tes­ti­mo­ny of a 12-year-old boy who recent­ly admit­ted that he nev­er saw the killing. Ajamu’s death sen­tence was reduced in 1978 when Ohio’s death penal­ty statute was found uncon­sti­tu­tion­al. He was released from prison in 2003. Upon his exon­er­a­tion, Ajamu said, ​“The impor­tant part is that we have been unit­ed while we are stand­ing for­ward and upward and that we are not look­ing at each oth­er in the grave­yard,” adding, ​“I feel vin­di­cat­ed. I feel free.” The three men are expect­ed to file for com­pen­sa­tion for their many years of wrong­ful impris­on­ment. Cuyahoga County pros­e­cu­tors said they will not object to efforts to obtain com­pen­sa­tion, say­ing that the men were ​“vic­tims of a terrible injustice.”

(J. Caniglia, “ ​‘My bat­tle is over!’ Judge throws out the 1975 mur­der con­vic­tion of Ronnie Bridgeman,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, December 9, 2014.) See Innocence.