DETROIT (AP) - Declaring "justice prevailed," a Michigan man walked out of prison for the first time in 25 years, freed after new tests showed that the bullets presented as evidence at his trial weren't the ones taken from the body of the victim.
Desmond Ricks, 51, met his legal team before leaving the western Michigan prison, the culmination of a remarkable effort to clear himself in a fatal shooting outside a Detroit burger joint in 1992.
The Innocence Clinic at University of Michigan law school asked Judge Richard Skutt to reopen the case after prosecutors in 2015 turned over photos of two bullets removed from the victim, Gerry Bennett. The bullets were in poor shape and didn't resemble the pristine bullets that were presented as evidence by Detroit police in 1992.
Police at that time said a gun belonging to Ricks' mother was the murder weapon, but new tests ruled out any connection, Innocence Clinic director David Moran said.
One of the bullets doesn't match the gun and the other was too mutilated for a thorough analysis, he said.
"I'm not bitter. I'm not angry. I'm just relieved," Ricks told The Associated Press after eating his first meal since getting out, a grilled turkey and cheese sandwich. "Justice prevailed. ... I want to get a job. I want to pay taxes. I just want to be a normal citizen."
Skutt threw out Ricks' second-degree murder conviction on Friday after the Wayne County prosecutor's office agreed it should be erased. A second trial seems highly unlikely. Spokeswoman Maria Miller said a decision about whether to completely dismiss the case will be discussed in court on June 1.
Moran said Ricks was a great advocate for his own cause.
"What he was saying seemed to be outlandish: The Detroit police crime lab would not only make mistakes but switch bullets. It wasn't outlandish - it was true. This outlandish conduct cost Desmond Ricks 25 years," he said.
The crime lab was shut down after a 2008 audit revealed that it had conducted sloppy work, including the botched analysis of gun evidence.
Miller said it's too early to say whether there should be an investigation to determine whether the bullet mix-up in Ricks' case was accidental or deliberate.
"However, the defense has acknowledged that the statute of limitations has probably lapsed," she said.
In 1992, Ricks was with Bennett when Bennett was shot in the head outside a restaurant. Ricks said he ran away, dodging gunfire. But a few days later, police pinned the slaying on him and seized his mother's gun.
Ricks had a key ally in his bid to reopen the case: an independent firearms expert who was involved in the 1992 trial. Ricks found David Townshend's name in a law journal in 2009 and wrote to him from prison.
Townshend agreed to help. He recalled that the bullets originally presented to him by police appeared to be in excellent shape with no trace of blood, bone or hair that would suggest they were removed from the victim's brain and spine.
Townshend said they didn't resemble the actual bullets that were locked away in police storage and produced just two years ago.
"Townshend's a hero," Moran said. "He was willing to put his reputation on the line."
The Innocence Clinic has exonerated or helped free 14 people in Michigan since 2009 by exposing bad police work, finding new witnesses and tapping specialists.
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