After 20 years, Ohio Innocence Project steams ahead

Founded in 2003, OIP is celebrating its 20th anniversary and is continuing its initial purpose: working to free every person in Ohio who has been convicted of a crime they didn’t commit. OIP’s work also includes helping develop and advocate for lasting criminal justice reform through legislation, educating the public to be sensitive to systemic problems in justice and to rally for change. It also launched OIP-u (Ohio Innocence Project University), an active network of student groups at colleges across the state.

Smith, a champion of the OIP mission, is also one of its beneficiaries. 

She’s a former Head Start bus driver who in 1994 was wrongfully convicted of sexually abusing children in her care. That wasn’t true and Smith has battled daily to clear her name ever since. She spent nearly 15 years behind bars before her release with the help of OIP. In February 2022, the charges against her were finally dismissed by a judge.

For Smith, painting offered an escape behind bars. She’s a big fan of Bob Ross, an American painter, instructor and television host who created the PBS series, “The Joy of Painting.” His books helped with her technique and were a source of inspiration. She first painted with oils in prison though she had been dabbling in watercolors ever since high school.

“I thought I could paint myself out of here,” says Smith referring to her incarceration. ”I would imagine myself being out on that mountain, that lake or cabin I was creating whenever I would paint.”

“When I was in prison, the last two or three years, they had a thing called the Art Guild and we would paint for high schools, and we would do their prom decorations and backdrops,” says Smith. “In the meantime, when I wasn’t doing that I was painting pictures of landscapes for my kids. I did a time or season for when each of my kids was born representing winter, summer, spring or fall.”

“I would like to say thank God for the Ohio Innocence Project,” says Jackson. “I wish them much success, and I want them to free all the wrongfully convicted. I will crawl through the mud anytime they call me. They restored my life and put families back together.”

“When I got out I felt like I was an intruder in other people’s lives,” says Jackson. “You are gone so long that when you come home you don't know anybody. Even your family feels like strangers. My own family, I would be in their space and I was very interested in finding my own space.”

Jackson was able to enroll in a culinary skills class after prison and to help a nephew who was especially supportive during incarceration. The nephew was forced on dialysis and would frequently call Jackson just to chat about life.

After exoneration, Jackson found he was a universal donor and gave his nephew a kidney.

“People at OIP always made sure to call me every day and make sure I was good after prison,” says Jackson. “They would check on me financially and mentally. I was going through many issues mentally, being around people and not being able to trust anyone.

“Being in prison you are feeling like your life is in danger and then you get out here and you get used to living in that danger,” says Jackson. “After all those years being in prison I felt like I left ‘home.’ It sounds crazy when I say it out loud but I felt like prison was my home.

“I was coming back to the world and it was scary. There was no internet or cell phones when I left or any of that. I came out in this big old world and people from OIP, family and close friends helped me find my way,” says Jackson.

Smith called OIP a blessing “that was bestowed on exonerees.”

“OIP kept me strong and they never let me down. I know I can trust them with all my heart. They are such good people. It’s an awesome family. That’s what we are — a family, from the students to the lawyers to the exonerees. We are one big family. Without them we would still be sitting in that prison. They brought us home. They give us hope.”

During its early days OIP focused on finding cases where there was DNA to test to exonerate the wrongfully convicted. It has since expanded to include more difficult cases that use material in public records, interviews with witnesses and non-DNA based evidence to confirm innocence. 

And when DNA evidence remains part of discussion it’s because of technological advances that make use of trace material. OIP is looking at use of touch DNA such as evidence left on spent shell casings fired from a weapon or material that only a victim and perpetrator would have touched. Those cases are harder to crack.

“Ohio Innocence Project now has a reputation in the legal community across Ohio and when we come to court with something, even if there’s structural resistance, and there is always structural resistances to post-conviction cases, the judges know that we’re only coming if there is something to what we are saying,” explains Caster.

“We are in court because someone has asked us to be here and we’ve come to the conclusion that the person is innocent and that they have a legal right to relief,” says Caster. “So 20 years later, those of us who are doing this work now have the benefit of the path that others laid and the ground they broke.”

“Students are motivated to vote and are inundated with a lot of campaigns, partisan and nonpartisan. People have to move beyond the noise of what they are seeing on television,” says Reed. “They have to be reminded they elect Ohio state Supreme Court justices, judges at every level, prosecutors and sheriffs across the state.”

“Our students’ diligence and their tenacity is critical to our success,” explains Reed. “Students have been trained how to talk with lawmakers, train other professionals and to study issues of wrongful conviction that need more attention. For example, how have women been wrongfully convicted? How have LGBTQ communities been impacted by wrongful conviction? They want to understand how language barriers can lead to wrongful conviction and what can be done about it.”

Reed says another area that’s received critical support is care for exonerees once they have been released from prison. OIP has a post-release client support team, which includes Donna Mayerson, a psychologist who provides an array of services for freed clients and also OIP lawyers, staff and students.

Her work includes facilitating organizational discussions, providing staff and students with mental health services related to trauma and providing freed clients with mental health services, education and support related to post-traumatic stress disorder and other injuries caused by wrongful imprisonment.

“What we have been able to do to help our clients gain true freedom, I always think of the first barrier is to help clients get physical freedom, get them out of a prison and that’s a lot of work and a lot of time and a lot of energy,” says Reed.

“Then the second barrier is how to help clients get true freedom in their psyche, in their heart and in their wallet. Mayerson is instrumental in helping all our clients overcome the trauma of being in prison and being an innocent person in prison.,” Reed adds.

Featured top image: Jennie Rosenthal, the daughter of Dick Rosenthal, is shown at the podium of Ohio Innocence Project Breakfast held at the Hyatt Regency in 2018. To the left of Rosenthal are OIP exonerees Raymond Towler, Nancy Smith, Ru-El Sailor, Dean Gillispie and Robert McClendon. Photo/Joe Fuqua II.