After spending more than 4 decades in jail for triple-murder, prosecutors want Kansas City man acquitted

3years ago

Kansas City news, Missouri news.

Prosecutors have asked this week for the release of a wrongfully convicted Kansas City man who spent 43 years behind bars for a triple murder he did not commit.

Kevin Strickland, now 61, was a teen when he was accused of the April 1978 slayings but co-defendants, who later admitted their guilt, revealed in November that Strickland was never with them.

A sole survivor who sustained gunshot wounds had initially incriminated Strickland, before requesting to recant her testimony shortly before her death in 2015.

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  • “I was the only witness and things were not clear back then, but now I know more and would like to help this person if I can,” she said.

    Jackson County Prosecutor Jean Peters Baker called for Strickland’s acquittal Monday calling his imprisonment “a profound error we must correct now.”

    “All those who have reviewed the evidence in recent months agree – Kevin Strickland deserves to be exonerated. Keeping him incarcerated now on a jury verdict, where the jury heard none of this convincing exculpatory evidence, serves no conceivably just purpose.”