IONIA, Mich. (AP) — A Detroit man has walked out of an Ionia prison after 25 years, after tests showed he was convicted of murder with sham evidence.
Desmond Ricks, now 51, met his legal team Friday at the Richard A. Hanlon Correction Facility a few hours after a judge threw out his conviction.
The Innocence Clinic at University of Michigan law school asked Judge Richard Skutt to reopen the case after prosecutors in 2015 turned over photos of two bullets removed from Gerry Bennett. The bullets were in poor shape and didn’t resemble the pristine bullets that were presented as evidence by Detroit police in 1992.
Police at that time said a gun belonging to Ricks’ mother was the murder weapon, but new tests now have ruled out any connection, Innocence Clinic director David Moran said.
One of the bullets doesn’t match the gun, and the other bullet was too mutilated for a thorough analysis, he said.
Photo: mug shot of Desmond Ricks. (Michigan Department of Corrections)