Early DNA results ruled out Calhoun as rape perpetrator in 2007
Court-appointed attorneys nevertheless advised him to plead guilty, waive appeal of right
Conviction dismissed with prejudice, meaning it cannot be reinstated
Ricardo Ferrell
DPD cop David Kane broke into hearing in unprecedented event, claiming Calhoun should not be exonerated
By Ricardo Ferrell, VOD Field Editor
with Diane Bukowski, VOD Editor
May 15, 2o22
Terance Calhoun (in cap) is joyously embraced by his family on his release from prison April 27, 2022. (Photo: State Appellate Defenders Office)
Imprisoned for 15-years for crimes he didn’t commit, Terance Calhoun reacted with a smile on April 27, 2022, as Third Wayne County Circuit Court Judge Kelly Ramsey announced the dismissal of his 2007 convictions for Kidnapping and Criminal Sexual Conduct with prejudice (meaning the charges can never be reinstated).
He was flanked by his attorneys Valerie Newman, head of Wayne County’s Conviction Integrity Unit, and Michael Mittlestat of the State Appellate Defender’s Office.
In a just world, this moment would have happened 15 years ago. In fact, Calhoun would never have been tried.
A lengthy Statement of Facts attached to Judge Ramsey’s order says, “On June 15, 2007, Short Tandem Repeat (STR) analysis was completed on the condom collected at the scene of the sexual assault on Victim 2. That analysis excluded Mr. Calhoun as a donor of biological material.” STR was a predecessor to current methods of DNA testing.
The Statement and Calhoun’s court documents show that court-appointed attorneys at the trial and appellate levels advised Calhoun to plead guilty on Feb. 21, 2007 prior to his sentencing March 27, 2007, and to waive his appeal of right on September 10, 2007. Prior to those events, Calhoun was determined “competent to waive his Miranda rights” after a forensic exam that also found he still had “cognitive deficits.”
The Statement said there was no evidence that Calhoun’s attorneys had copies of the STR results. The test results were discovered by the State Appellate Defender’s Office in 2019.
DPD Officer David Kane is seen in screenshot at upper left, strutting out of the courtroom after talking to Judge Ramsey (r), who is looking at what he gave her.
In an unprecedented move that echoed the judicial system’s appalling rush to judgement in 2007, Detroit Police Officer David Kane intruded in Judge Ramsey’s courtroom during Calhoun’s first scheduled exoneration hearing April 22. He handed her a folder that he claimed contained evidence that she needed to look over before exonerating Calhoun. News reports indicated that the Judge and Kane knew each other.
Judge Ramsey handed the folder over to Attorney Newman. Newman had already made a determination based on DNA evidence which pointed toward another perpetrator that scientifically showed Calhoun was not responsible, but she still reviewed the file in question and reached the same conclusion that her office would still recommend that Calhoun be exonerated. She said there was nothing new in the materials Kane presented.
Judge Ramsey’s five day adjournment had many in the legal community wondering if the delay would keep Calhoun behind bars, even though DNA evidence undeniably cleared him of the sexual assault and kidnapping convictions.
Calhoun’s attorneys were very displeased by Kane’s action. In a release, the Detroit Police Department said Kane’s action violated DPD policy and procedure, which does not allow for him to blatantly interfere in a courtroom hearing. However, to date, no known disciplinary action has been taken against him.
James Calhoun MDOC photo
This goes to show the arrogance of some police investigators and the total disregard for fundamental fairness, even when undisputable scientific evidence is right before their eyes No wonder there’s a high number of wrongful convictions in Michigan, especially in Wayne County.
Fortunately for Calhoun he was exonerated, but another wrongfully convicted man named Calhoun wasn’t so fortunate.
James Calhoun, who was housed at the Woodland Correctional Facility in Whitmore Lake along with Calhoun, died September 23rd, 2021 from his battle with cancer. Unfortunately, James Calhoun didn’t get the chance to prove his innocence for the 2005 murder of which he was convicted. His daughter, Keila Chambliss, continues to fight relentlessly trying to get her father’s name cleared, even though he’s no longer alive. She’s reached out to the Conviction Integrity Unit and was told the case is being reviewed.
Last September, I helped put together a two-part interview of four exonerees on the Erica Lynn Speaks Podcast. During the interviews, James Calhoun was mentioned and remembered. In October, I wrote a follow-up story in VOD called “Wrongfully Convicted and Unlawfully Imprisoned” where again Calhoun’s case was highlighted. Also, I included the case of Paul Russ, who’s been in prison 38 years on a wrongful conviction. Recently, I received a message from his fiancé Hazel Gunter expressing her concerns about Russ still being in prison based on the shady tactics of the detective in his case.
Paul Russ, in prison since 1984. MDOC photo
“Paul and I have been told by many people to have patience,” she said. “However, information discovered by Mrs. Claudia Whitman that showed a pattern by Detroit Homicide Detective/Sgt. Elwood Gunderson of similar wrongdoings in other cases, a year apart from Paul’s clearly suggest the detective knowingly and deliberately framed him for a murder he didn’t commit.
“There has been a new witness to come forward and provide crucial information in his sworn affidavit that exonerates Paul which reveals he saw and witnessed someone other than Paul committing this crime, Now the new witness has took ill and he’s in real bad shape in the hospital, where he’s not expected to recover. They keep telling Paul and I to be patient, but what if the witness’ new information doesn’t get on the record? Will Paul Russ also die in prison like others have? As his new witness remains in the hospital apparently facing the reality of not pulling through, what else should Paul do, as he patiently awaits for the inevitable?” says Gunter.
I have been writing stories about innocent people convicted of crimes they didn’t commit, while I myself have been serving decades in prison as a result of grave police misconduct, fabricated statements, faulty evidence gathering and the use of incentive seeking witnesses used by police and prosecutors. This writer can only shake his head at the many injustices he’s seen, and wonder if the hundreds, if not thousands of innocent people will ever be exonerated. More resources are needed to effectively equip these conviction integrity units with the tools they need to review more innocence claims and move expeditiously when undisputable evidence is discovered and proves the accused isn’t responsible for the crime(s).
Additionally, there needs to be an even broader movement to bring our brothers and sisters home, to end life without parole sentencing and other monstrously inhuman practices contributing to mass incarceration.
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Ed. note: the names of the prosecution’s chief witness against Roger Carlos Ray, who may be the actual murderer, and the new witness whose affidavit says that man confessed the crime to him, have been redacted here since judicial action on the case is still pending.
Police referred him and his girlfriend, listed as a witness, who was with him when he saw Ray in bloodied clothing, for polygraph exams twice, but each time the two failed to show up after first stating they would be there.
The lawsuit also describes complicit behavior by other AP’s not cited as defendants. They include Thomas Beadle, Rosemary Gordon, William Peterson, and James Heaphy.
In a May, 2017 Detroit Metro Times article, journalist Ryan Felton exposed the rampant use of jailhouse informants (snitches) by DPD/WCPO. He reported that Edward Allen told a private investigator that Detroit police filed over 100 murder cases as a result of such testimony.
“Prison was hell. It was a new kind of plantation. I felt like an escaped slave. What I saw in the United States in those prisons was slavery, it was Black people with chains, in cells, it was just poor people stepped on and smashed. I’ll never forget what I saw. I’ll never forget what I’ve lived through . . . what my people have lived through.” –Assata Shakur in new documentary, Black and Cuba
These men and women watch from the jail’s narrow windows every day as thousands of party-going visitors flood downtown Detroit’s streets around the prison, and others make their way to work, oblivious to the plight of those inside the jail.
Wiley has been held since Oct. 3, 2017 on capital (life) charges which were dismissed twice in 2017 and 2019 after lengthy trial proceedings including jury trials. He was not released after those trials because judges dismissed the cases WITHOUT prejudice.
In the capital, most observable to the west, Kyiv city authorities say that some 55 buildings have been damaged and that 222 people have died since February 24. It is a city of 2.8 million people.
Editor, Voice of Detroit (Please note: to contact the organizers of these events, use the phone number above for Operation Liberation.)
The 
Although COVID restrictions have been lifted, for the most part, in Michigan and across the country, family members still cannot visit their loved ones in the Wayne County Jail, and even attorney visits are sometimes constricted. Courtrooms are not open to the public in-person.
As far back as 1915, the Supreme Court held that when a state grants a criminal defendant a right to direct appeal, “The proceedings in the appellate tribunal are part of the process of law under which he is held in custody by the state, and to be considered in any question of alleged deprivation of his life or liberty, contrary to the Fourteenth Amendment.” See 
Courts thew out the convictions in proceedings after trial, citing Brady. Tennison later won a $4 million wrongful conviction settlement and was fully exonerated after the prosecutor filed for dismissal of the case.
The cases of Ewing and Searcy have been featured on various national wrongful conviction websites, including a series of six episodes in which legal criminal conviction experts have reviewed the Ewing-Searcy case and found it woefully wanting in evidence to convict.
Voice of Detroit Editor’s Note: I recently announced that this paper is being devoted to issues regarding mass incarceration and police abuse in this country. But as a journalist for the past 22 years, I cannot stand by while the U.S. mainstream media shamelessly delivers coverage of the Russia-Ukraine war straight from the mouths of U.S. politicians and military leaders. 
Under the title “Democratization of Ukraine,” Denis Denisov wrote in Izvestia about the direction of development Russia wants for its neighbor Ukraine. Denisov, Director of the Institute for Peacekeeping and Conflict Initiatives, Associate Professor at the Russian Government’s Financial University, said:
24 February 2022, 08:32
White supremacy is at the heart of US war propaganda. The exhortation to “stand with Ukraine” is no exception to this rule.
Margaret Kimberley, BAR Executive Editor and Senior Columnist
Ironically, it is the white supremacist underpinnings of US/NATO foreign policy which have created all of Ukraine’s suffering. The need to dominate, to “contain” Russia and its ally China is not playing out the way they had hoped but the Ukrainians be damned. The Minsk II agreement which was unanimously approved in the United Nations Security Council was a roadmap to peace. Ukraine should be a neutral nation but that is the exact opposite of what its lords and masters in Washington want. The good faith negotiations that could resolve the crisis are a non-starter because NATO is a very dishonest broker.
Video interview of Michael Thompson by FOX WILX Jan. 29, 2021
Elroy Lucky Jones is listed on the National Registry of Exonerations.
During an evidentiary hearing, it was revealed that a .40 caliber bullet taken from the victim’s body had been concealed in an evidence envelope labeled “9 mm. casing.” The prosecution had claimed the murder weapon was a .45 caliber gun and that the bullets were “too deformed” to identify.
