Lying Witness May Open Door To New Trial

Terrell Johnson Gets Some Relief After 12 Years In Prison

By Bill Moushey, Innocence Institute of Point Park University

Once the early appeals were exhausted and court-appointed lawyers were gone, Terrell Johnson was consigned to life in prison in the 1995 gangland-style slaying of a police informer in Hazelwood unless he could prove the eyewitness testimony of a crack-head criminal was riddled with lies.

Working from behind bars with his fiancé and others for more than a decade, Mr. Johnson verified Evelyn “Dolly” McBryde was a thief and child abuser and a career criminal, but then found a man who said she was not even there.

In 2006, in a pro se – for self – petition with no aid of counsel, Mr. Johnson claimed the new witness said at the exact time of the killing, Ms. McBryde was smoking crack cocaine with him a block away.

That jail house petition recently caused a three-judge panel of the Pennsylvania Superior Court to rule if Mr. Johnson, now 31, can prove the new evidence was unavailable at trial, he should be re-tried. It also ordered Mr. Johnson be provided with a court-appointed attorney.

“Johnson’s proposed evidence that McBryde was nowhere near the crime scene at the time of the shooting does not simply impeach her credibility, it renders her story impossible, and, if believed, would likely exonerate Johnson,” said Pennsylvania Superior Court Judge Richard B. Klein in an 11-page opinion joined by Judges Maureen E. Lally-Green and Joan Orie Melvin in sending the matter back to Allegheny County Common Pleas Court for a hearing.

If trial judge Judge Lawrence O’Toole decides the evidence meets legal standards to be considered new, Mr. Johnson will be tried again after 12 years of incarceration.  In 1998, Judge O’Toole ordered a new trial after Mr. Johnson’s lawyer admitted failing to investigate Ms. McBryde’s eyewitness statements but another group of judges on the Superior Court reinstated the conviction.

At issue is whether Mr. Johnson had a sufficient opportunity before trial to find a former drug abuser named Kenneth “Skinny” Robinson, who claimed he was smoking crack cocaine with Ms. McBryde at the precise time sirens and flashing lights arrived at the murder scene a block away.  

During previous testimony, Ms. McBryde, who had a severe drug habit and poor eyesight, repeatedly changed her story about where she was when she observed the murder.

Other statements were contradicted repeatedly, her description of the man she later identified as Mr. Johnson did not resemble him.  Among other issues, she could not accurately say how many shots were fired at Ms. Robinson, the first person ever put into the city’s witness protection program, who was killed before she could testify in an un-related case against members of the Hazelwood Mob, a former street gang.

Mr. Johnson characterized himself at the time as a non-gang-banging small-time teen-aged drug dealer who became a suspect in the crime because earlier he was charged with assaulting Ms. Robinson – also a crack addict – over drug debt.  He says he was asleep five blocks away at the time of the murder.  None of his five alibi witnesses testified. 

In 2003 story in the Post-Gazette, the Innocence Institute debunked much of Ms. McBryde’s story about her movements on the night of the killing.  It also uncovered court records never seen by Mr. Johnson’s jury depicting at least 50 charges she’d faced using 11 different names and six different Social Security numbers during a life of crime while repeatedly trading information on others for sentence reductions.   After he was sentenced to life in prison, two co-defendants – who had the benefit of knowing all of Ms. McBryde’s past – were acquitted on murder charges.

Since, she has been charged with petty thefts in state court and now awaits sentencing on guilty pleas in U.S. District Court on three 2005 bank fraud charges. 

In January, she pleaded guilty to a scheme in which she inflated supposed deposits at automatic teller machines, withdrawing funds that did not exist.  Her federal plea agreement was sealed in U.S. District Court – usually an indication of cooperation.  U.S. Attorney Mary Beth Buchannan of the Western District of Pennsylvania said in an e-mailed statement that “the circumstances of this case warranted the sealing of the plea agreement,” adding if things change, she will ask the court to unseal it. 

Ms. McBryde remains on bond until her July 9 sentencing where she faces as much as 30-years of incarceration on each count.  Wayne DeLuca, her attorney, refused comment.

A spokesman for Allegheny County District Attorney Stephen A. Zappala refused comment because of the pending hearing, which has yet to be scheduled.

“He’s speechless, he’s happy, like finally…,” said Saundra Cole, his fiancé, who spoke with him by phone recently.  “Now he can’t wait to get back in there (court),” she said.

Post-Gazette Staff Writer Bill Moushey, director of the Innocence Institute of Point Park University can be reached