Joe D'Ambrosio, once on death row on murder charge, now free after judge dismisses all charges

[HughBeaumont]

http://blog.cleveland.com/metro/2010/03/d.html

Note: I've been following this case for six years, as have many others. Joe D'Ambrosio should not have even been in prison, let alone on death row. A victory for open disclosure, something that corrupt convict-at-all-cost prosecutors like Bill Mason and Carmine Marino seem to have had trouble practicing. Now, it's up to Joe to make his freedom count.

CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A judge declared Joe D'Ambrosio a free man Friday afternoon, ending more than 21 years of incarceration -- mostly on death row -- for a crime he has always said he didn't commit.

D'Ambrosio, 48, remained subdued as supporters hugged in the courtroom. He marched from the Justice Center to the nearby probation offices to have an electronic bracelet removed from his ankle, the last vestige of his imprisonment.

Joe D'Ambrosio is free man to go where he wants after Judge Joan Synenberg's ruling on Friday.On the way back out, he extended his hand to one of the guards.

"Take it easy," D'Ambrosio said. "I'm done."

"Enjoy your life," the guard replied.

D'Ambrosio's newfound freedom is the culmination of a long struggle to win the release of a man several judges ruled was denied justice by prosecutors.

Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Judge Joan Synenberg dismissed all charges against D'Ambrosio and ordered him released without any conditions. The move came two days after U.S. District Judge Kate O'Malley ruled D'Ambrosio cannot be retried for the 1988 killing of Tony Klann.

"Mr. D'Ambrosio, you are free," Synenberg said, after first reviewing details of the case, including several instances where she said prosecutors attempted to turn her court into "a circus."

Several judges have ruled D'Ambrosio likely would not have been convicted if prosecutors turned over several pieces of evidence that could have exonerated him, as they are required to do.

[Cirque du So-What]

1. Yet there are death-penalty proponents

who claim that no innocent person has ever been executed by a state or the federal government. They'll probably try to weasel their way out of calling this case a 'near miss,' however.

It infuriates me to know that the state will suffer no repercussions from having railroaded an innocent person all the way to death row, and that prosecutors will continue the practice as long as it's seen as good for their careers. Where is the outcry from 'fiscal conservatives?' Don't they realize that prosecuting cases costs money? If only people who have been falsely imprisoned were able to sue the government who broke the law to put them there, perhaps then we'd see fewer cases like that of Joe D'Ambrosio.

[HughBeaumont]

2. Sure enough - Bill Mason absolutely REFUSES to give up the ghost:

http://www.cleveland.com/brett/blog/index.ssf/2010/03/post_7.html

Joe held his hand out to quiet them all. "We're not celebrating yet," he whispered.

No, Bill Mason made sure of that. The Cuyahoga County prosecutor got the Ohio attorney general to file an appeal on Friday seeking a new trial days after a federal judge ruled that D'Ambrosio cannot be retried for the 1988 slaying of Tony Klann.

(snip)

How can he not be ashamed and embarrassed at how former Prosecutor Carmen Marino & Co. hid significant chunks of evidence in the first trial, the one where the defense never learned that the first homicide detectives on the scene concluded that Klann wasn't killed at Doan Brook as the "eyewitness" claimed but that his body was dumped there.

No, that would have contradicted the state's only eyewitness, who got a reduced sentence for his testimony, even though he was inconsistent about which night Klann was killed.

Prosecutors also withheld this: Klann was the sole witness subpoenaed to testify that Paul "Stoney" Lewis had raped a legally blind man. Klann ends up with his throat slashed from ear to ear. That's one way to keep someone quiet. Two weeks after Lewis pinned the murder on D'Ambrosio, the rape charge against Lewis was dismissed. Coincidence, or a shady trade by prosecutors?

Then there's the tape recording police had of an informant saying "other people" were involved. The defense never learned of it. That tape? It vanished.

Then last year, Mason hid from the defense and the court the fact that his key eyewitness had died. He hid the death for three months.

Talk about hopeless causes.

What happened to Joe D'Ambrosio is a crime -- a crime against the justice system. Too bad no one will be indicted for that.

(snip)

What's really puzzling is why Mason won't let go of this case. When he did have a new trial date set, do you know how many witnesses he subpoenaed to testify?

Zero.

It appears Mason has little evidence and no witnesses. Just a blind desire to win at any cost, which is the worst kind of prosecutor to have in office.

:banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: Unbelievable. This asshole needs to stop and stop NOW. Do a lookup on Bill Mason - seems to me he's got enough dirty laundry in his Kenmore that he shouldn't worry himself over this fruitless quest.

Got some armchair Nancy Grace fiends in the comment sections too. You know, because I'm quite positive ghosts on the internet know FAR more than, say, actual practicing attorneys (who took on this case pro bono, I might add) on SO many specific details and inconsistencies that the corrupt prosecutors hid from this case to wrongly convict this man. Typical of Cleveland suburbia's media-addled right wingnuts.