Man convicted in Montrose slaying freed
After Grant spent nearly 7 years in prison, family sees ‘hope’ as 2010 case reinvestigated
Donna Poe paced in the sticky fall air along North San Jacinto Street, waiting for her son, Lydell Grant, to emerge from the Harris County Jail.
Anxious, fretting, praying — she had spent more than seven years fighting for this day.
Grant was convicted of capital murder in the 2010 stabbing death of a 28-year-old man outside a bar in Montrose and sentenced to life in prison, but he has long maintained his innocence. In recent years, he has drawn support from lawyers with the Innocence Project of Texas. And a recent DNA analysis ruled Grant out as a potential suspect and matched with a profile already in the system, for a man with a violent criminal history who lived in Houston at the time of the murder.
On Tuesday, two days before Thanksgiving, Poe’s wait ended. In a brief hearing, District Judge George Powell ordered the 42year-old Grant released from prison on bond, while authorities reinvestigate the case.
“It’s been a long journey,” said Poe, 60. “I dreamed of this day, for the holidays, when my son would be here with me and my family. This is just such a happy day.”
Late Tuesday afternoon, a
beaming Grant emerged from the courthouse, flanked by his mother and brother, their hands clasped and held high.
“Free at last!,” they yelled.
Grant’s release came nearly nine years after 28year-old Aaron Scheerhoorn was stabbed to death late one night outside a bar in Houston’s Montrose community.
Grant was convicted in 2012 after six eyewitnesses testified they saw him stab Scheerhoorn outside Blur Bar on Dec. 10, 2010.
Mike Ware, executive director of the Innocence Project of Texas, argues that investigators used faulty police methods — particularly by having a detective on the case show photo arrays to witnesses. State law now requires such arrays be performed in a “blind manner,” or in a way “designed to prevent opportunities to influence (a) witness.”
Jurors also heard incorrect testimony that DNA analysis could not rule Grant out as a suspect, his lawyers argued.
“In our system, it is much more difficult to exonerate an innocent person who has been wrongfully convicted than it is to convict an innocent person in the first place,” Ware said Tuesday, “But today’s a good day and we’re going to enjoy today.”
New developments
After taking the case, Ware asked for new analysis of DNA taken from Scheerhoorn’s fingernails and ran the data through national DNA crime databases.
The new analysis ruled Grant out as a potential suspect.
Grant’s lawyers took the information to Harris County prosecutors, who asked Houston police to review the case.
Harris County District Attorney
Kim Ogg said the new DNA analysis was “significant.”
“It’s a strong factor, and a darn good reason to reinvestigate a case,” Ogg said Tuesday.
Ogg said investigators discovered the person identified by the new analysis had a recent violent incident with a knife. When investigators examined Grant’s phone, they failed to discover any connection between Grant and Scheerhoorn. And they re-interviewed someone Grant said he had been with the night of the murder.
“This is still pretty rare in prosecution, in the criminal justice system, that all these stars line up,” she said.
Prosecutors and defense attorneys agreed to recommend that Grant be freed from prison on bond and subject to ankle monitoring while the case was re-examined.
After the judge ordered Grant’s release from jail, where he had been transferred from prison for the proceeding, about a dozen of his relatives and supporters eagerly waited for him to emerge. His young cousins jostled and sparred.
Alonzo Poe, Grant’s younger brother, drove out to Mattie’s Catfish Kitchen and More to get lunch — fried fish and dirty rice.
Donna Poe left, briefly too, to fetch clothes for her son.
Kemani Anthony, Grant’s older cousin, didn’t mind the wait.
“We’ve been waiting nine and a half years,” she said. “We can wait a little longer.”
She and Grant’s sisters were mindful that Thanksgiving was just around the corner. With Grant’s release, they were expecting as many as 50 people to celebrate.
‘It was all, all good’
“We’re going to have to do some rearranging,” she joked.
Word came down hours later, Grant was finally headed down. Sheriff’s deputies ushered Grant’s relatives inside the jail.
At 4:18 p.m. the doors opened and they walked out, arms held high in jubiliation.
Grant looked out at smiling family members and addressed a crowd of reporters.
He thanked his family for their support, and especially his younger brother Alonzo, who visited him every weekend, even when he was in prisons hours away from Houston.
“He made it happen,” he said, “It was the Lord up in heaven who gave him the strength to travel up and down them highways, and come and see me, and gave me hope when I didn’t have hope.”
Prison made him feel like “an animal in a cage,” Grant acknowledged.
“Especially knowing I didn’t do it. Knowing the actual killer was still roaming the streets,” he said. “Knowing my family was suffering. But with God, it was all, all good.”
He was ready to go home, to have a Thanksgiving meal of turkey and peach cobbler, and after that, take time for meditation and quiet, something he’s been missing for almost a decade.
And he had offered advice to others who might be incarcerated wrongly.
“If you know for a fact that you are innocent of any crime you are alleged to have commited, never give up,” he said.
“Don’t spend your time up in here playing dominoes, don’t spend your time playing chess. Don’t spend your time having useless conversation. Get into the law library. Write anybody you can. It don’t cost nothing but a stamp. .. write and write and write and write, and have faith, and have hope.”