The victim in the rape has since died, according to the motion. However, the victim's son "expressed regret on behalf of his mother about the wrongful conviction," when authorities reached out to him.
Trigger Warning: This story mentions rape which can be disturbing to readers.
Sullivan Walter was just 17 years old in September 1986 when he was charged in connection to a home invasion and rape in New Orleans. Per court documents, a woman, identified as "L.S." was taking a shower when she saw a man in her house. He had reportedly covered his lower face with a washcloth and was wearing a baseball cap backward.
According to CNN, the man put a shirt over her face, walked her to an "empty unlit bedroom" at knifepoint, and raped her.
Later, the woman told the cops that the man kept dropping his face covering during the crime. She described him to them, and worked with a police sketch artist to make a composite drawing, court documents revealed.
About a month and a half later, Walter was arrested on a simple burglary charge but the cops felt like this was the man the woman described. In fact, when she was approached, she confirmed that Walters was the one who raped her. The only similarity? He was wearing a blue baseball hat, just like the man who assaulted her did.
Sullivan Walter was released after 36 years for a rape he did not commit. He was 17 years old at arrest, but prosecuted as an adult. This is the longest known wrongful incarceration of a juvenile in Louisiana history. pic.twitter.com/3drM6HJ88F
— SAY CHEESE! 👄🧀 (@SaycheeseDGTL) August 28, 2022
He was arrested for the rape and his jury trial lasted one day, court documents revealed. Though Walter went through numerous appeals from 1997 until October 2021, Walter had no legal assistance, court documents said.
However, Walter, now 53, was "exonerated after 36 years, 1 month and 30 days incarcerated for a rape he did not commit," Innocence Project New Orleans (IPNO) said in an Instagram post.
Though he was a teen when he was arrested, he "was prosecuted as an adult," IPNO said in a press release. "This is the longest known wrongful incarceration of a juvenile in Louisiana history and the fifth longest in U.S. history," it added in their social media post.
After taking on Walter's case in October 2021, IPNO attorneys "discovered that though the serological testing in the 1980s concluded that Mr. Walter was not the perpetrator, the jury that convicted Mr. Walter did not know this," the organization said.
53 year old New Orleans man Sullivan Walter has been exonerated after being falsely convicted of raping a white woman. He’s been in prison since age 17.
— chris evans (@notcapnamerica) August 26, 2022
https://t.co/AweaJ3YLcE pic.twitter.com/ZMUCcxXJcv
Walter's "trial attorney did not elicit this evidence from witnesses and the police officer analyst misrepresented the results of his testing," according to the IPNO's post.
"What is unusual about this case is how little effort was made to hide the injustice being done to Mr. Walter," IPNO legal director Richard Davis said in a statement. "The lawyers and law enforcement involved acted as if they believed that they could do what they chose to a Black teenager from a poor family and would never be scrutinized or held to account. This is not just about individuals and their choices, but the systems that let them happen."
The victim in the rape has since died, according to the motion. However, the victim's son "expressed regret on behalf of his mother about the wrongful conviction," when authorities reached out to him.
Walter, meanwhile, is just happy to be proven innocent after all these years. "I'm just ready to live," Walter said after his release. "I just want to live an honest, free life."
References:
https://people.com/crime/man-wrongfully-convicted-of-new-orleans-rape-freed-after-36-years-in-jail/
Cover Image Source: YouTube | WWLTV (Man wrongly convicted released after 36 years)
