Exonerated in 2010: How DNA and New Evidence Freed Five Wrongly Accused
Shawn Massey
Conviction: Second degree kidnapping, felonious breaking and entering and robbery
Year of Conviction: 1998
Exoneration Date: May 6, 2010
Sentence Served: 12 Years;entered at the age of 25, released at the age of 37
Contributing Causes: Eyewitness Misidentification
Massey was assisted by Duke Law School’s Wrongful Conviction Clinic in overturning his 1998 conviction of second degree kidnapping, felonious breaking and entering and robbery. He served 12 years.
According to IndyWeek:
Massey was convicted of forcing Samantha Wood and her two young children into their Charlotte apartment at gunpoint and robbing Wood on May 22, 1998. Woods described her attacker as a 5-foot-9, 180-pound black male with cornrows. His conviction was largely based on photo identification by Woods, when she wrote under his photograph that he looked like the suspect, “except for the braids.”
Massey was never visited by detectives on the case. Nor did Woods and Massey have a face-to-face encounter until the trial nearly one year later. That’s when Woods remarked that Massey appeared smaller than her attacker and did not have braids, although she remained confident that he committed the crime. A jury convicted him and he was sentenced to a minimum of 11 and a half years.
The cornrows ended up being key to Massey’s emancipation. The Duke law school students working on the case consulted barbers with hair braiding experience and “confirmed it was impossible that Massey’s hair could have grown long enough in 11 weeks to be braided into cornrows.”