Man held for 21 years has charges dropped
Eleven weeks after a Fairfield County judge ordered his release from prison after 21 years and granted him a new trial for a crime that perhaps never occurred, Ralph Blaine Smith finally felt completely free on Wednesday.
That’s when his ankle monitor was removed by a probation officer in response to a decision by current Fairfield County Prosecutor Kyle Witt to drop all charges against Smith rather than pursue a second trial.
“There are no words to describe how happy I am,” Smith said in a phone interview with The Dispatch as he prepared to enjoy a burger and his favorite food – French fries – at a Co
lumbus Five Guys restaurant.
“I finally got this nightmare over with. I got my life back.”
Smith, 46, had spent 21 years of a 67year sentence behind bars when Fairfield County Common Pleas Judge Richard E. Berens in June granted him a new trial. The judge ruled that prosecutors at the time had withheld evidence suggesting that a Lancaster home-invasion robbery he was convicted of committing may not have happened at all.
Smith was released from prison on bond on July 2 and has been living with family in Columbus, but had been required to wear the ankle monitor, report weekly to a probation officer in Fairfield County and take random drug tests while current county prosecutors contemplated the next step.
Late Tuesday afternoon, Witt filed the dismissal of all charges in the case “without prejudice,” meaning his office reserves the right to file them again in the future.
“The chances of that happening are very, very unlikely,” Witt said Wednesday. “Twenty years have passed already... We put that language in there because we can’t predict the future, but I don’t see (the refiling of charges) happening.”
Witt, who wasn’t the prosecutor at the time of Smith’s conviction in August 2000, said the difficulty of retrying a 21year-old case was just part of the reason for the dismissal.
“If we were to retry this case now, even if we got a conviction, I do not think we would be seeking a sentence in excess of time already served,” he said. “I don’t think that’s a prudent use of our taxpayer resources, the time and talents of our staff, to relitigate a case where he’s already served a sentence of this length.”
The motion for a new trial for Smith, filed by Columbus defense attorney Joe Landusky, focused on evidence suggesting that the crime may have been staged.
Among the pieces of evidence that county prosecutors at the time failed to provide to the defense was a narrative supplement, written by one of the first police officers to arrive at the residence after the reported robbery.
That supplemental narrative “contains numerous observations expressing skepticism about whether a crime had occurred,” Berens stated in his order granting Smith a new trial. The officer wondered how multiple men could have conducted an armed home invasion and fled the Lancaster house without leaving tracks in the snow that covered the area.
Berens determined that evidence was “exculpatory,” meaning that it could create reasonable doubt about the defendant’s guilt and that prosecutors were required to share it with the defense.
Witt said he can’t defend the decision
by his predecessor as county prosecutor, Gregg Marx, to withhold that evidence from Smith’s attorney. But he stopped short of making allegations of wrongdoing against Marx, whom he defeated in the 2016 election.
“I’m not here to say that was handled correctly. I think I would have provided information that this office didn’t provide 20 years ago,” he said. “While I might have handled things differently, I am not going to suggest that the result was due to any prosecutorial misconduct.”
Marx testified at the hearing on whether Smith should get a new trial that he did not believe the officer’s observations in the supplemental report was exculpatory.
Smith was accused of being one of two Black males who forced their way at gunpoint into a Lancaster home that was occupied by a man and a woman and their young children on Feb. 2, 2000. The intruders reportedly forced one of the adults to open a safe, from which they stole rare comic books and approximately $10,000 in cash.
The prosecution’s case hinged entirely on the two adult victims identifying Smith from a photo array, which they reaffirmed in court testimony. There was no other evidence linking Smith to the crime, and no one else has been charged in the case.
None of the stolen items was ever recovered.
Despite the doubts raised about the verdict, Witt said his decision to dismiss the case was not based on a belief in Smith’s innocence.
“Ultimately, this case, then and now, was going to hinge on the testimony of the two people that were in the house that night,” he said. “And they have been steadfast all these years in saying that this happened and their ID was an accurate one... I’m inclined to believe them.”
Landusky, the attorney for Smith’s appeal, has a different take.
“Truly, an injustice was done to this man,” Landusky said. “I know it doesn’t matter what I think, but I’m convinced he wasn’t in that (home).”
Landusky said he and Smith would have welcomed a second trial “to fully vindicate him, but we’re certainly not going to turn down a dismissal.”
As for seeking compensation for the 21 years in prison, Landusky said he and his client are “considering our options.” Such an effort will be challenging, because compensation from the state is typically reserved for those who have been proven innocent after a prison stay, which a dismissal of charges does not accomplish.
Smith said he’s not worried about that for the moment.
“I’m just so happy to get my freedom. I’m not thinking about money,” he said.
On Friday, he starts a new job at the L Brands warehouse in Reynoldsburg.
Smith said he is focused on reconnecting with his family, including a son born just before his conviction and several nieces and nephews who were born during his imprisonment.
No family member is more important to him than his mother, with whom he was living in Gahanna at the time of his arrest.
“I wanted her to be alive to see me as a free man, the end result of all the hard fighting through appeals and the years of her being by my side 100%,” he said. “I’m very happy for that. She’s still in shock at me being out and seeing me.” jfutty@dispatch.com @johnfuttuy
“I wanted her to be alive to see me as a free man, the end result of all the hard fighting through appeals and the years of her being by my side 100%. I’m very happy for that. She’s still in shock at me being out and seeing me.”
Ralph Blaine Smith