Township taxpayers on the hook for $45M for wrongful imprisonment

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(The Center Square) – Miami Township, OH may have to pay a $45 million civil judgment after the U.S. Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal against the municipality for wrongful imprisonment.

A man sued the township after he spent 20 years in prison for a crime he did not commit. A civil jury awarded him damages but the township appealed, claiming it had immunity. However, the Sixth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled against the city last year and the U.S. Supreme Court last week, without comment, refused to review the lower court decision.

The case goes back to 1988 when two women reported that they were raped at gunpoint in a parking lot. A third woman also said she was raped at another location by a man matching the description of the alleged rapist.

A detective, Gary Bailey, was assigned to the case.

 “Detective Bailey proceeded to visit the crime scene, speak with the victims, develop a composite sketch of the alleged perpetrator, and investigate over 20 subjects,” according to a court synopsis of the case. “Yet as time passed, ‘the good leads ran out,’ and the investigation went cold.”

A possible suspect, George Gillispie, was identified, but detectives ruled him out because he did not match the description of the alleged rapist.

In 1990, the township assigned two new detectives to the case, who showed the victims photos of suspects.

“All three identified Gillispie as their attacker,” the court synopsis said.

Gillispie was convicted and spent more than 20 years in prison before a court freed him, ruling that documents from the original detectives that said the victims did not identify Gillespie as the rapist were never turned over to Gillespie’s defense attorneys during his trial.

Gillespie later sued the township in federal court and a jury awarded him $45 million.

The township appealed, claiming the award was excessive, but lost.

“Gillispie was forced to spend years of his life unfairly locked in a maximum-security prison, labeled a violent felon, and deprived of the opportunity to live a normal life,” the Sixth Circuit ruling states.

It’s not certain how the township would pay the $45 million. Township officials did not immediately respond to requests for comment.