Ohio Innocence Project says man isn't killer of 3 Kevin Keith faces death penalty in 1994 Bucyrus murders Tuesday,  June 30, 2009 12:39 PM By Andrew Welsh-Huggins ASSOCIATED PRESS COLUMBUS -- An organization devoted to freeing innocent inmates has gone to bat for a condemned Ohio killer, a rare move for a group better known for using DNA evidence to challenge convictions in non-death-penalty cases. The Ohio Innocence Project says Kevin Keith did not kill three people, including a 7-year-old girl, and wound three others in a 1994 shooting in Bucyrus. "This case gave me grave concerns," project director Mark Godsey said. "I felt we should weigh in." The group, which has asked the Ohio Supreme Court to consider Keith's claim of innocence, generally steers clear of death-penalty cases because inmates already have attorneys making their case. In this one, Keith's public defenders say there is another suspect and that a police detective lied about a witness' statement. Police and prosecutors allege Keith opened fire on the group in retaliation for a drug arrest that he blamed on a snitch related to the victims. Keith, 45, has exhausted his regular state and federal appeals, losing his innocence argument in lower courts. He has asked the Ohio Supreme Court to consider his claim he didn't do it. "This appeal is an attempt to repackage previously rejected claims," said Clifford Murphy, an assistant Crawford County prosecutor. "There is overwhelming guilt in this case." Innocence claims by Ohio death-row inmates are relatively rare. Ohio public defenders have filed only a handful of similar claims in the past five years. The state has 172 men and one woman on death row. The shooting happened Feb. 13, 1994, at an apartment in Bucyrus, about 65 miles north of Columbus. Prosecutors say Keith entered the apartment and sprayed it with gunfire, killing Marichell Chatman, 24; her 4-year-old daughter, Marchae; and the child's aunt, Linda Chatman, 39. Marichell Chatman was the brother of an undercover police informant whose efforts led to a four-count indictment against Keith for selling drugs, according to prosecutors. Three others were shot that night but survived: Richard Warren, who would testify against Keith at trial; Quanita Reeves, 7; and her brother Quinton Reeves, 4. Keith's public defenders say they uncovered evidence that bolsters a theory first presented at Keith's trial: that there was another suspect. That person was a suspect in a series of pharmacy robberies around the time of the killings. He testified at trial that he told surviving family members that the shootings might have been in retaliation over the informant. Keith's attorneys found additional information in the files of an Ohio Pharmacy Board investigator who had been looking into the pharmacy robberies. In those files, the other suspect said before the shootings that he had been paid $15,000 to "cripple" the informant. Prosecutors say the claims aren't any different than what came up at trial. Keith's attorneys also say a detective perjured himself in describing how a survivor identified Keith. Capt. John Stanley of the Bucyrus Police Department read a transcript at trial of a nurse's call to police saying that Richard Warren, who survived the shooting, had woken up and identified the shooter as someone named "Kevin." Keith's attorneys say the nurse Stanley identified, Amy Gimmets, never worked at the hospital. They say Warren's real nurse, named Amy Whisman, never told Stanley the name of the alleged shooter. "Stanley created the fictitious Nurse Gimmets, and he lied about the conversation he had with Warren's real nurse," Rachel Troutman, Keith's public defender, said in a court filing. Prosecutors dismiss the discrepancy as irrelevant, saying Warren testified at trial that Keith shot him. Stanley, now retired, declined to comment.

Death Penalty Issues

Innocent Imprisoned