One Day After Exposé of Informant Wins Journalism Award, Florida Trial Court Denies James Dailey’s Innocence Claim

A Florida judge has denied death-row pris­on­er James Dailey​’s motion for a new tri­al on May 29, 2020, rul­ing that no new admis­si­ble evi­dence sup­port­ed Dailey’s claim of inno­cence. Pinellas-Pasco Circuit Judge Pat Siracusa’s deci­sion came just one day after jour­nal­ist Pamela Colloff won a National Magazine Award for her inves­ti­ga­tion of a noto­ri­ous jail­house infor­mant who pro­vid­ed key tes­ti­mo­ny against Dailey. 

At a hear­ing in March, Dailey’s attor­neys had hoped to present tes­ti­mo­ny from his co-defen­dant, Jack Pearcy. Pearcy and Dailey were con­vict­ed in sep­a­rate tri­als of the 1985 mur­der of Shelley Boggio. After Pearcy was sen­tenced to life, inves­ti­ga­tors solicit­ed tes­ti­mo­ny from sev­er­al jail­house infor­mants who claimed that Dailey con­fessed to them, and Dailey was sen­tenced to death. 

No phys­i­cal evi­dence links Dailey (pic­tured) to the crime and he has con­tin­u­ous­ly main­tained his innocence. 

Pearcy’s sto­ry about the crime has shift­ed over the years. He ini­tial­ly said Dailey helped him com­mit the mur­der, but lat­er stat­ed on sev­er­al occa­sions that he alone killed Boggio. In December 2019, he gave a sworn state­ment say­ing, ​“I com­mit­ted the crime alone.” But at the most recent hear­ing, he refused to tes­ti­fy and instead claimed his own innocence. 

“Unfortunately, the tri­al court ruled today that it could not con­sid­er the over­whelm­ing evi­dence of Mr. Dailey’s inno­cence, includ­ing Jack Pearcy’s repeat­ed con­fes­sions that he com­mit­ted the mur­der alone, because of its view con­cern­ing a num­ber of tech­ni­cal legal require­ments,” Dailey’s lead defense attor­ney, Josh Dubin, said. ​“We respect­ful­ly dis­agree with the Court’s rul­ing and will con­tin­ue to fight for jus­tice for James Dailey. He did not mur­der Shelly Boggio.” 

Dailey was con­vict­ed large­ly on the basis of jail­house infor­mant tes­ti­mo­ny from Paul Skalnik, a man police described as a ​“Con-man extra­or­di­naire.” A December 4, 2019 exposé by Pamela Colloff for ProPublica in part­ner­ship with the New York Times Magazine revealed Skalnik’s career as a ser­i­al prison infor­mant, often obtain­ing or over­hear­ing ​“con­fes­sions” from pre­tri­al detainees who said they nev­er met or talked to him. Skalnik tes­ti­fied in at least 40 dif­fer­ent cas­es. In exchange for his tes­ti­mo­ny, he was reg­u­lar­ly reward­ed by pros­e­cu­tors with favor­able treat­ment on charges rang­ing from child molesta­tion to grand theft to fraud, and nei­ther his expec­ta­tion of ben­e­fits nor the ben­e­fits them­selves were dis­closed to the defense. 

On May 28, the day before Judge Siracusa released his deci­sion, Colloff’s sto­ry was award­ed the National Magazine Award for report­ing. For her inves­ti­ga­tion on Skalnik, she filed more than 50 pub­lic records requests, inter­viewed dozens of peo­ple, and exam­ined thou­sands of pages of police reports, arrest records, and court records dat­ing back 50 years. The sto­ry prompt­ed an out­cry among colum­nists and edi­to­r­i­al boards across the state of Florida. Earlier this year, Dailey’s peti­tion before the U.S. Supreme Court received sup­port from for­mer pros­e­cu­tors, faith lead­ers, and a net­work of con­ser­v­a­tives, all rais­ing con­cerns that Florida might exe­cute an innocent man.