Plaintiff:
Alprentiss L. Nash
Incident date:
04/30/1995
Location:
11000 S. Wentworth Ave.
Allegations:
In the winter of 1994, Nash was stopped and searched without cause by two Area 2 police officers. The officers found a bag of marijuana. Instead of arresting Nash, the officers took his money and pager. They also said Nash would be “sorry” if he told anyone. Still, Nash told people in the neighborhood that two police officers had robbed him. A few months later, three masked men robbed and fatally shot a man named Leon Stroud in his home. There were two witnesses to the incident, one inside and one outside the home. Both witnesses said they saw three men enter the home and shoot Stroud, and one of the witnesses identified Alvin Wyatt as one of the three masked men. The police questioned Wyatt, who denied any involvement in the incident. Investigators interviewed Wyatt again and used verbal and physical force to make him say he was in Stroud's home and met only one other man there. The investigators told Wyatt he would not be charged or go to jail if he agreed to tell this story. Wyatt agreed, and Officers Solecki and Baker, who are Area 2 police officers, arrested Nash despite proof that he had been shopping the day of the incident. Solecki and Baker then put Nash in a suggestive lineup. One of the witnesses identified Nash as one of the masked men. The witness, however, had known Nash for years and had not named him earlier. Solecki and Baker hid evidence proving Nash's innocence from prosecutors, and failed to disclose the fact that both witnesses saw three masked men leave the home, rather than two. Despite no physical evidence connecting Nash to the crime, Nash was convicted of murder. He spent the next 17 years in prison. In October 2007, Nash filed a motion to seek DNA testing on the mask found at the crime scene. Three years later, a test revealed that Nash did not match either of the DNA profiles found on the mask. Two years later, Nash received a certificate of innocence and all charges against him were dismissed.