Amicus Curiae Brief — Hamed Kian, Petitioner v. Florida

No. 25-6623

In the Supreme Court of the United States

HAMED KIAN, PETITIONER

v.

STATE OF FLORIDA, RESPONDENT

ON WRIT OF CERTIORARI

TO THE FLORIDA DISTRICT COURT OF APPEAL,

FOURTH DISTRICT

BRIEF OF THE INNOCENCE PROJECT, INNOCENCE

PROJECT OF FLORIDA, AND THE MIAMI LAW INNOCENCE CLINIC, AMICI CURIAE

IN SUPPORT OF PETITIONER

M. CHRIS FABRICANT

ADAM GERSHENSON

MATTHEW A. WASSERMAN

Counsel of Record

INNOCENCE PROJECT

WEIL, GOTSHAL & MANGES LLP

40 Worth Street, Ste. 701

1001 Boylston St., Ste. 300

Boston, MA 02115

New York, NY 10013

(617) 772-8310

adam.gershenson@weil.com

SETH E. MILLER

INNOCENCE PROJECT OF

BRIAN G. LIEGEL

FLORIDA, INC.

124 Marriott Dr., Ste. 104 SARAH M. STERNLIEB

DYLAN C. BROWN

Tallahassee, FL 32301

WEIL, GOTSHAL & MANGES LLP

1395 Brickell Ave., Ste. 1200

CRAIG J. TROCINO

Miami, FL 33131

MIAMI LAW INNOCENCE

CLINIC

1311 Miller Dr., Ste. B400 MCKAYLA R. ROBINSON

WEIL, GOTSHAL & MANGES LLP

Coral Gables, FL 33146

2001 M St., Ste. 600

Washington, D.C. 20036

Counsel for Amici Curiae

i

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

Interest of Amici Curiae ................................................. 1

Summary of argument.................................................... 2

Argument......................................................................... 4

I. Williams rested on empirical predictions

about smaller juries that subsequent research

has disproved.......................................................... 4

A. Smaller juries are less representative and

disproportionately exclude minority jurors .... 5

B. Smaller juries deliberate less thoroughly

and produce less reliable results ..................... 7

II. Innocent people have repeatedly been

convicted by non-twelve-person juries.................. 9

A. James Tillman ................................................ 11

B. Dontrell Baker ................................................ 12

C. Eric Shaughnessy ........................................... 13

D. Sidney Holmes ................................................ 13

E. Andre Bryant .................................................. 14

F. Wilton Dedge .................................................. 15

G. Richard Paey................................................... 17

H. Jed Gressman and Troy Hancock ................. 18

Conclusion ..................................................................... 19

ii

TABLE OF AUTHORITIES

Cases

Page(s)

Ballew v. Georgia,

435 U.S. 223 (1978) ........................................ 3, 6, 7

Cunningham v. Florida,

144 S. Ct. 1287 (2024) ............................................ 3

Flowers v. Mississippi,

588 U.S. 284 (2019) ................................................ 6

Gale v. State,

726 So. 2d 328 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App.

1999) ............................................................... 12, 13

Khorrami v. Arizona,

143 S. Ct. 22 (2022) ................................................ 4

Paey v. State,

943 So. 2d 919 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App.

2006) ..................................................................... 17

Patton v. United States,

281 U.S. 276 (1930) ................................................ 3

Peña-Rodriguez v. Colorado,

580 U.S. 206 (2017) ................................................ 6

Pitchford v. Cain,

146 S. Ct. 1345 (2026) ............................................ 6

Powers v. Ohio,

499 U.S. 400 (1991) ................................................ 7

State v. Hancock,

874 P.2d 132 (Utah Ct. App. 1994)...................... 18

State v. Tillman,

600 A.2d 738 (Conn. 1991) ................................... 11

Thompson v. Utah,

170 U.S. 343 (1898) ................................................ 7

iii

Tillman v. Warden,

No. 90844, 1997 WL 374961 (Conn.

Super. Ct. June 25, 1997), aff’d sub

nom. Tillman v. Comm’r of Corr.,

738 A.2d 208 (Conn. App. Ct. 1999) .................... 11

Williams v. Florida,

399 U.S. 78 (1970) ........................................ passim

Periodicals

Alisa Smith & Michael J. Saks, The

Case for Overturning Williams v.

Florida and the Six-Person Jury:

History, Law, and Empirical

Evidence, 60 Fla. L. Rev. 441 (2008) ..................... 8

Armen H. Merjian, Anatomy of a

Wrongful Conviction: State v. Dedge

and What It Tells Us About Our

Flawed Criminal Justice System, 13

U. Pa. J.L. & Soc. Change 137 (2010) ................. 15

Clive A. Stafford Smith & Patrick D.

Goodman, Forensic Hair Comparison

Analysis: Nineteenth Century Science

or Twentieth Century Snake Oil?, 27

Colum. Hum. Rts. L. Rev. 227 (1996).................. 16

Craig Pittman, Convicted Man Walks

Free, But Jury Member in the Case

Does Not, St. Petersburg Times, Oct.

6, 1997 .................................................................. 12

Hans Zeisel & Shari Seidman Diamond,

Convincing Empirical Evidence on

the Six Member Jury, 41 U. Chi. L.

Rev. 281 (1974) ....................................................... 8

iv

Hans Zeisel, . . . And Then There Were

None: The Diminution of the Federal

Jury, 38 U. Chi. L. Rev. 710 (1971) ....................... 8

John Tierney, Punishing Pain, N.Y.

Times, July 19, 2005 ............................................ 17

Matt Kelly, Innocent Quincy Man

Finally Freed, Patriot Ledger, Jan.

28, 1998 ................................................................ 13

Michael J. Saks, The Smaller the Jury,

the Greater the Unpredictability, 79

Judicature 263 (1996) ............................................ 8

Richard O. Lempert, Uncovering

“Nondiscernible” Differences:

Empirical Research and the JurySize Cases, 73 Mich. L. Rev. 643

(1975) .................................................................. 7, 8

Samuel D. Hodge, Jr. & Amelia

Holjencin, A Post-Mortem Review of

Forensic Hair Analysis – A

Technique Whose Current Use in

Criminal Investigations is Hanging

on by a Hair, 64 St. Louis U. L.J. 219

(2020) .................................................................... 16

Samuel R. Sommers, On Racial

Diversity and Group DecisionMaking: Identifying Multiple Effects

of Racial Composition on Jury

Deliberations, 90 J. Personality &

Soc. Psych. 597 (2006) ............................................ 6

Shari Seidman Diamond et al.,

Achieving Diversity on the Jury: Jury

Size and the Peremptory Challenge, 6

J. Empirical Legal Stud. 425 (2009) ...................... 5

v

Other Authorities

Def.’s Agreed Successive Mot. for

Postconviction Relief at 64, State v.

Holmes, No. 88-019279CF10A (Fla.

17th Cir. Ct. 2023) .............................................. 14

Def.’s Am. Mot. for Postconviction Relief, State v. Bryant, No. 2006-CF003229 (Fla. 12th Cir. Ct. 2015) .......................... 15

Did Dog Handler Fake It Again?,

Orlando Sentinel (Oct. 25, 2009),

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/200

9/10/25/did-dog-handler-fake-itagain/ .................................................................... 16

Edward L. Carter, New Evidence Means

Freedom for 2 Inmates, Deseret

News (June 13, 1996),

https://www.deseret.com/1996/6/13/1

9248369/new-evidence-meansfreedom-for-2-inmates/ ....................................... 18

FBI Testimony on Microscopic Hair

Analysis Contained Errors in at

Least 90 Percent of Cases in Ongoing

Review, Fed. Bureau of Investigation

(Apr. 20, 2015),

https://www.fbi.gov/news/pressreleases/fbi-testimony-onmicroscopic-hair-analysis-containederrors-in-at-least-90-percent-ofcases-in-ongoing-review ....................................... 16

Jacob Sullum, Pill Sham, Reason (Apr.

23, 2004),

https://reason.com/2004/04/23/pillsham/ ................................................................... 18

vi

Jeff Blackburn, Dog Scent Lineups: A

Junk Science Injustice (2009) .............................. 16

Maurice Possley, Andre Bryant, Nat’l

Registry of Exonerations (Sep. 24,

2019),

https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/

11877 .................................................................... 14

Maurice Possley, Dontrell Baker, Nat’l

Registry of Exonerations (Sep. 14,

2015),

https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/

11864 ................................................................... 12

Maurice Possley, Eric Shaughnessy,

Nat’l Registry of Exonerations

(Oct. 7, 2012),

https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/

11184 ................................................................... 13

Maurice Possley, James Calvin

Tillman, Nat’l Registry of

Exonerations (Mar. 7, 2026),

https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/

10907 ................................................................... 11

Maurice Possley, Jed Allen Gressman,

Nat’l Registry of Exonerations (Aug.

16, 2017),

https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/

10496 .................................................................... 18

Maurice Possley, Sidney Holmes, Nat’l

Registry of Exonerations (Aug. 9,

2025),

https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/

13505 .................................................................... 13

vii

Maurice Possley, Troy Jon Hancock,

Nat’l Registry of Exonerations (Aug.

29, 2011),

https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/

10505 ................................................................... 18

Maurice Possley, Wilton Dedge, Nat’l

Registry of Exonerations (Jan. 26,

2026),

https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/

10401 ................................................................... 15

Stephanie Denzel, Richard Paey, Nat’l

Registry of Exonerations (Aug. 31,

2011),

https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/

11006 ................................................................... 17

Understanding the Registry, Nat’l

Registry of Exonerations,

https://exonerationregistry.org/under

standing-registry (last visited Aug.

11, 2026) .............................................................. 10

INTEREST OF AMICI CURIAE1

Amicus the Innocence Project is a nonprofit law office

providing free legal representation to innocent people

wrongfully convicted of crimes. Since it was founded in

1992, it has helped to free or exonerate more than 250

innocent individuals nationwide, who were wrongfully

incarcerated for a total of more than 4,100 years in

prison. In addition to working to exonerate and free the

innocent, the Innocence Project has long studied the

root causes of wrongful convictions and uses the lessons

from these injustices to advocate for changes in laws

and policies that contribute to wrongful convictions.

Amicus Innocence Project of Florida (“IPF”) provides

pro bono legal services to indigent individuals whose actual innocence may be established through post-conviction DNA testing or other evidence. The work of amicus

has led to the exoneration or release of 38 individuals

who have spent a combined 885 years in prison for

crimes they did not commit. IPF also assists freed

wrongfully convicted individuals rebuilding their lives

after release and works to prevent future wrongful convictions by researching their causes and pursuing legislative and administrative reforms to enhance the truthseeking function of the criminal justice system.

Amicus the Miami Law Innocence Clinic is a pro bono

legal clinic at the University of Miami School of Law

dedicated to providing legal and/or investigative

Pursuant to Sup. Ct. R. 37.6, amici affirm that no counsel for a

party authored this brief in whole or in part and that no person or

entity other than amici and counsel made a monetary contribution

to its preparation or submission.

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services to Florida prisoners for whom evidence discovered post-conviction can provide conclusive proof of innocence. The Innocence Clinic is a member of the Innocence Network, an affiliation of seventy-four organizations worldwide that provide pro bono legal services to

those seeking to prove their innocence. The Innocence

Clinic’s mission is to represent those with claims of actual innocence and to seek to improve the accuracy and

reliability of the criminal justice system in future cases.

Amici have an interest in putting an end to less-thantwelve-person juries in Arizona, Connecticut, Florida,

Indiana, Louisiana, Massachusetts, and Utah, because

twelve-person juries provide an important safeguard

against convicting innocent people. Therefore, in the interest of ending the unacceptably high risk of wrongful

convictions by undersized juries, amici respectfully file

this brief in support of Petitioner Hamed Kian.

SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT

Amici’s role in the criminal legal system is to free innocent people. That work provides the basis for the case

histories below, detailing real-world trials where undersized juries repeatedly sent innocent individuals to

prison. These stories are not isolated incidents. Drawing

on decades of experience with the legal systems of Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, Massachusetts, and Utah—states permitting juries of fewer

than twelve in some felony cases—amici have observed

how smaller juries weaken safeguards essential to accurate verdicts. Undersized juries narrow community representation, reduce the likelihood that minority perspectives will be meaningfully heard, and diminish the

rigor of deliberations. The result is an increased risk of

unreliable verdicts, including the gravest error the

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criminal legal system can commit: convicting an innocent person.

As Justice Gorsuch has explained, these states “do[]

what the Constitution forbids”—a result this Court

sanctioned in Williams v. Florida, 399 U.S. 78 (1970)—

by substituting flawed “social science for careful attention to the Constitution’s original meaning.” Cunningham v. Florida, 144 S. Ct. 1287, 1287 (2024) (Gorsuch,

J., dissenting from denial of certiorari). In holding that

a six-person jury could satisfy the Sixth and Fourteenth

Amendments, Williams departed from this Court’s

longstanding precedents recognizing twelve members

as essential to the jury-trial right. See Patton v. United

States, 281 U.S. 276, 288–89 (1930), abrogated by Williams v. Florida, 399 U.S. 78 (1970).

Williams justified that departure by speculating that

reducing a criminal jury from twelve members to six

would not materially diminish its representativeness,

the quality of its deliberations, or the reliability of its

verdicts. See 399 U.S. at 100–02. That prediction

quickly proved false. Within eight years, this Court

acknowledged empirical evidence indicating that

smaller juries deliberate less effectively, produce less

consistent and potentially less accurate results, and are

less likely to reflect the demographic makeup of the

community. Ballew v. Georgia, 435 U.S. 223, 232–38

(1978). Subsequent research has only deepened those

concerns.

These concerns are not hypothetical or theoretical.

They are borne out in the experiences of innocent people

convicted by juries of fewer than twelve, imprisoned,

and later exonerated. Their cases put a human face on

the risks identified by the research: when a smaller jury

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narrows community representation, suppresses minority viewpoints, or shortchanges deliberation, the resulting error can cost an innocent person years—or decades—of freedom. No system can be perfect, but these

kinds of imperfections cannot be accepted in our system

of ordered liberty.

ARGUMENT

I. Williams Rested on Empirical Predictions About Smaller

Juries That Subsequent Research Has Disproved.

In Williams v. Florida, this Court held that “the 12man requirement cannot be regarded as an indispensable component of the Sixth Amendment.” 399 U.S. 78,

100 (1970). That departure from more than seven centuries of common-law tradition rested substantially on

flawed predictions. Justice Gorsuch has described that

tradition as “a mountain of evidence” showing that “the

right to a trial by jury for serious criminal offenses

meant a trial before 12 members of the community—

nothing less.” Khorrami v. Arizona, 143 S. Ct. 22, 23

(2022) (Gorsuch, J., dissenting from denial of certiorari).

Yet the Williams Court expected that six-person juries

would “probably” deliberate as effectively as twelve-person juries and that reducing jury size would have no

meaningful effect on community representation. Williams, 399 U.S. at 100–02. Those predictions did not

withstand scrutiny, then or now. Research available before Williams—and research published since—showed

that smaller juries are less representative, deliberate

less effectively, and produce less reliable results.

The math is, in some ways, quite simple. If the jury

in the movie 12 Angry Men had only six members,

Henry Fonda’s character, the famous juror number

eight, would never have been seated, and the result

would have been a swift, and likely wrongful, conviction.

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The odds of having robust dialogue and an effective decision-making process naturally increase when the

twelve-person requirement is satisfied.

A. Smaller Juries Are Less Representative

Disproportionately Exclude Minority Jurors.

and

Williams wrongly predicted that a dwindling jury of

fewer than twelve members would remain large enough

to provide “a fair possibility for obtaining a representative cross-section of the community.” 399 U.S. at 100. It

further asserted that, “in practice[,] the difference between the 12-man and the six-man jury in terms of the

cross-section of the community represented seems likely

to be negligible.” Id. at 102.

The evidence has proved otherwise. Reducing jury

size reduces opportunities for members of marginalized

communities (including Black and brown citizens) to

serve, making smaller juries substantially less likely to

reflect their communities. A 2009 study of 277 trial juries illustrates the effect: 28.1% of six-person juries included no Black juror, compared to only 2.1% of twelveperson juries. Shari Seidman Diamond et al., Achieving

Diversity on the Jury: Jury Size and the Peremptory

Challenge, 6 J. Empirical Legal Stud. 425, 442 (2009).

The same study found qualified Hispanic jurors were

also disproportionately less likely to serve on six-person

juries. Id. at 444.

The consequences fall hardest on Black and brown

people, who are disproportionately represented among

those facing criminal charges but disproportionately absent from the smaller jury pools that decide their fate—

a disparity compounded by felony disenfranchisement

laws that further thin minority representation in jury

venires.

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In this context, representation matters. Recent research confirms that racial diversity improves the quality of jury deliberations. Diverse juries deliberate

longer, consider a broader range of facts and perspectives, make fewer factual errors, and are more likely to

correct inaccuracies during deliberations. Samuel R.

Sommers, On Racial Diversity and Group DecisionMaking: Identifying Multiple Effects of Racial Composition on Jury Deliberations, 90 J. Personality & Soc.

Psych. 597, 603–06 (2006).

These disparities are statistically significant and

compelling, with downstream effects. The exclusion of

minority jurors affects both the reality and the public

perception of the legitimacy of jury decision-making.

This Court has recognized that jury composition bears

directly on the jury’s ability to bring diverse experiences

and perspectives to deliberations. See, e.g., Peña-Rodriguez v. Colorado, 580 U.S. 206, 223 (2017) (“Permitting

racial prejudice in the jury system damages ‘both the

fact and the perception’ of the jury’s role as ‘a vital check

against the wrongful exercise of power by the State.’”

(citations omitted)); Ballew v. Georgia, 435 U.S. 223,

236–37 (1978) (smaller juries “foretell[] problems not

only for jury decision-making, but also for the representation of minority groups in the community”). Indeed,

this Court has continued to recognize that the “[s]imple

math” of minority population percentages can systematically produce juries without Black members—and

that “[e]qual justice under law requires a criminal trial

free of racial discrimination in the jury selection process.” Flowers v. Mississippi, 588 U.S. 284, 295–96, 301

(2019); see also Pitchford v. Cain, 146 S. Ct. 1345, 1349–

53 (2026) (reaffirming Batson’s protections where the

prosecutor struck four of five Black prospective jurors

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and the trial court denied defense counsel the opportunity to rebut the proffered race-neutral reasons at the

third step).

Since the Magna Carta, people charged with crimes

have had a right to a “jury of one’s peers.” See Thompson

v. Utah, 170 U.S. 343, 349–50 (1898). A jury that is systematically less representative is necessarily less capable of performing the constitutional function that Williams itself identified: placing the commonsense judgment of the community between the accused and the

State. Juries of fewer than twelve members therefore diminish public confidence in jury verdicts and deprive

people accused of crimes of the full protection of the jurytrial right. That result is especially troubling because

the jury serves as a critical safeguard against the State’s

“wrongful exercise of power.” Powers v. Ohio, 499 U.S.

400, 411 (1991).

B. Smaller Juries Deliberate Less Thoroughly and

Produce Less Reliable Results.

As this Court recognized in Ballew, social-science evidence that emerged after Williams undermined its assumption that six-person juries would deliberate as effectively as twelve-person juries. Studies showed

smaller juries are less likely to foster effective group deliberation and more likely to produce inconsistent results. Ballew, 435 U.S. at 232–35.

Subsequent research confirms that jury size affects

both the depth and quality of deliberation. Smaller juries discuss fewer facts, recall evidence less accurately,

deliberate less, and are less likely to correct erroneous

statements. They generate fewer competing perspectives and place greater pressure on dissenters to yield to

the majority. See, e.g., Richard O. Lempert, Uncovering

8

“Nondiscernible” Differences: Empirical Research and

the Jury-Size Cases, 73 Mich. L. Rev. 643, 646–47 (1975)

(explaining why aggregate comparisons of the kind used

in the studies cited in Williams may fail to detect differences between six- and twelve-member juries); Michael

J. Saks, The Smaller the Jury, the Greater the Unpredictability, 79 Judicature 263, 264–65 (1996) (noting the

pressure to capitulate placed on dissenting jurors in

smaller juries); Alisa Smith & Michael J. Saks, The Case

for Overturning Williams v. Florida and the Six-Person

Jury: History, Law, and Empirical Evidence, 60 Fla. L.

Rev. 441, 463–69 (2008) (collecting social science research indicating larger juries are more representative

of communities, have higher quality discussions, resist

pressures on minority perspectives better, and more reliably decide cases); Hans Zeisel, . . . And Then There

Were None: The Diminution of the Federal Jury, 38 U.

Chi. L. Rev. 710, 713–15 (1971) (statistically demonstrating greater variability and less representation in

six-person jury verdicts); Hans Zeisel & Shari Seidman

Diamond, Convincing Empirical Evidence on the Six

Member Jury, 41 U. Chi. L. Rev. 281, 283–92 (1974) (discussing the weakness of studies purporting to support

smaller juries).

Citing “[s]tudies of the operative factors contributing

to small group deliberation and decisionmaking,” Williams also predicted that a lone dissenter on a six-person jury would not feel pressured to abandon his or her

position. 399 U.S. at 101 n.49. The studies on which the

Court relied, however, actually pointed in the opposite

direction because one juror facing five counterparts is

more likely to abandon consciously held beliefs, whereas

two jurors facing ten counterparts are more likely to advocate for thorough deliberation. “[T]he juror who is a

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minority of one on a jury of six is in a much weaker psychological position to resist the majority than the juror

who has one ally with whom to confront a majority of

10.” Saks, The Smaller the Jury, supra, at 265.

The point is intuitive as well as empirical. A dissenting juror on a larger panel is more likely to find (or create) an ally, sustain meaningful discussion, and ensure

that the majority confronts contrary evidence or an alternative view of the case. On a smaller jury, isolation

increases the pressure to conform and makes premature

unanimity more likely.

Real-world evidence thus refutes the assumptions on

which Williams relied. Smaller juries are less representative, deliberate less fully, generate fewer competing perspectives, and pressure dissenters to capitulate.

These are not minor defects—they undermine the jury’s

core function as a deliberative safeguard and increase

the risk that an innocent person will be convicted.

II. Innocent People Have Repeatedly Been Convicted by

Non-Twelve-Person Juries.

Seven states—Arizona, Connecticut, Florida, Indiana, Louisiana, Massachusetts, and Utah—permit

criminal juries of fewer than twelve persons in at least

some felony cases. A review of exonerations from those

states, as tracked and defined by the National Registry

of Exonerations (the “NRE”), illustrates the real-world

risks discussed above.2 The cases discussed below show

The NRE is not an exhaustive measure of wrongful or unreliable

convictions: it excludes ongoing cases and cases in which people convicted of crimes obtained other forms of relief without satisfying its

definition of “exoneration.” The NRE defines an exoneration as:

2

A person has been exonerated if he or she was convicted of

a crime and, following a post-conviction re-examination of

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how the structural limitations of juries composed with

fewer than twelve persons, as identified by empirical research, can contribute to unreliable verdicts.

Each of these miscarriages of justice is unique, but

the pattern is familiar: juries of fewer than twelve convicted individuals despite exculpatory evidence presented at trial. The following examples show the human

the evidence in the case, was relieved of all the consequences of the criminal conviction, and either: (1) was declared to be factually innocent by a government official or

agency with the authority to make that declaration; or (2)

received (i) a complete pardon by a governor or other competent authority, whether or not the pardon is designated

as based on innocence, or (ii) an acquittal of all charges factually related to the crime for which the person was originally convicted, in a court of the jurisdiction in which the

person was convicted, or (iii) a dismissal of all charges related to the crime for which the person was originally convicted, by a court or by a prosecutor with the authority to

enter that dismissal. The pardon, acquittal, or dismissal

must have occurred after evidence of innocence became

available that either (i) was not presented at the trial at

which the person was convicted; or (ii) if the person pled

guilty, was not known by the defendant and the court at the

time the plea was entered. The evidence of innocence need

not be an explicit basis for the official act that exonerated

the person. Despite any other facts, a defendant is not exonerated if there is undisputed evidence that the defendant

knowingly possessed physical objects the possession of

which directly proves the defendant’s guilt of the crime for

which the defendant was convicted, or a factually related

crime.

Understanding the Registry, Nat’l Registry of Exonerations,

https://exonerationregistry.org/understanding-registry (last visited

Aug. 11, 2026).

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cost of entrusting life-and-liberty decisions to undersized juries.

James Tillman, Dontrell Baker, Eric Shaughnessy,

Sidney Holmes, Andre Bryant, Wilton Dedge, Richard

Paey, Jed Gressman, and Troy Jon Hancock collectively

spent over 89 years wrongly imprisoned. Amici and

other innocence organizations proudly represented

many of these men.

A. James Tillman

In 1989, James Tillman, a lifelong Hartford, Connecticut, resident in his mid-twenties, was convicted by

a six-person jury of kidnapping, sexual assault, assault,

larceny, and robbery.3 He was sentenced to forty-five

years in prison. The case rested on a white woman’s

identification of Mr. Tillman, a Black man, after she

viewed his photograph at a Hartford police station. At

trial, the only forensic evidence merely placed the perpetrator within a pool of roughly 20% of males, including Mr. Tillman.

The six-person jury had no Black members and only

one Hartford resident. The Connecticut Supreme Court

recognized that the jury selection procedure described

by defense counsel involved systematic exclusion, and a

court clerk later conceded that “many more minorities

than others were excused from service.” State v. Tillman, 600 A.2d 738, 741 (Conn. 1991); Tillman v. Warden, No. 90844, 1997 WL 374961, at *6 (Conn. Super.

Ct. June 25, 1997), aff’d sub nom. Tillman v. Comm’r of

Corr., 738 A.2d 208 (Conn. App. Ct. 1999).

Maurice Possley, James Calvin Tillman, Nat’l Registry of Exonerations (Mar. 7, 2026), https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/10907.

3

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Yet the conviction remained until, in 2005, DNA testing of the semen sample excluded Mr. Tillman. In 2006,

after eighteen years of wrongful incarceration, his conviction was vacated, and he was released. Since his exoneration, Mr. Tillman has married, enrolled in college

to study human services, mentored students, and

worked with the Capitol Region Education Council.

B. Dontrell Baker

In 1997, eighteen-year-old Dontrell Baker was convicted by a six-person Florida jury of robbery based on a

misidentification and hair evidence that an analyst said

was merely “similar” to his.4 Two masked men had

robbed a hotel, but the victims could not identify them.

A nearby witness later misidentified Mr. Baker and another teenager in a photo lineup. Other witnesses likewise testified that Mr. Baker and the other teenager

were the perpetrators. See Gale v. State, 726 So. 2d 328,

328 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App. 1999).

During trial, one witness confused Mr. Baker with

another teenage defendant, David Shavers. Craig

Pittman, Convicted Man Walks Free, But Jury Member

in the Case Does Not, St. Petersburg Times, Oct. 6, 1997,

at 3B. The jury convicted Mr. Baker and Milton Gale but

not the other teenager, Mr. Shavers. The convictions

were later vacated due to juror misconduct.

Before a retrial, prosecutors finally requested DNA

testing on hair recovered from the ski masks used by the

Maurice Possley, Dontrell Baker, Nat’l Registry of Exonerations

(Sep. 14, 2015), https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/11864 (confirming six-person jury).

4

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robbers. DNA testing excluded Mr. Baker as the source

of the hair, and prosecutors dismissed the charges.5

C. Eric Shaughnessy

Eric Shaughnessy, at twenty-two, was convicted of

assault at a 1996 St. Patrick’s Day parade after a sixperson jury deliberated for fifteen minutes.6 The case

rested on a sixteen-year-old’s photo identification; Mr.

Shaughnessy testified that he was home at the time. He

was sentenced to five years in prison. Matt Kelly, Innocent Quincy Man Finally Freed, Patriot Ledger, Jan. 28,

1998, at 17, 21.

After the conviction was reported in the news, supporters located seven eyewitnesses who said Mr.

Shaughnessy was not involved, including one who admitted to participating in the attack. Id. at 21. After he

spent several months in prison, Mr. Shaughnessy’s motion for new trial based upon this new evidence was

granted. Prosecutors subsequently dropped all charges.

D. Sidney Holmes

In 1989, twenty-three-year-old Sidney Holmes was

convicted of robbery by a six-person jury and sentenced

to 400 years, largely because his car resembled the robber’s—except that it lacked the distinctive trunk defect

described by the witnesses.7 Mr. Holmes, a father of a

seven-month-old baby girl, was at home celebrating Father’s Day when the robbery occurred. Def.’s Agreed

5 Mr. Gale’s conviction was later reversed on appeal due to insuf-

ficient evidence. Gale, 726 So. 2d at 329–30.

6 Maurice Possley, Eric Shaughnessy, Nat’l Registry of Exonera-

tions (Oct. 7, 2012), https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/11184.

7 Maurice Possley, Sidney Holmes, Nat’l Registry of Exonerations

(Aug. 9, 2025), https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/13505.

14

Successive Mot. for Postconviction Relief at 64, State v.

Holmes, No. 88-019279CF10A (Fla. 17th Cir. Ct. 2023).

One victim never positively identified any perpetrator, while the other victim’s descriptions of the man and

car grew more specific over time, after conversations

with his brother about a similar robbery. Id. at 5–7. The

brother later tracked down Mr. Holmes’s car, though its

trunk lock worked normally. Police showed Mr. Holmes

to witnesses in multiple lineups; a witness did not identify him until a suggestive live lineup in which he was

the only person who had appeared in every lineup and

the only person not facing forward.

Despite four alibi witnesses and a stark physical mismatch—the attacker was described as about 5’6” and

overweight, while Mr. Holmes was six feet and 183

pounds—the jury convicted him. Id. at 52.

In 2023, after more than thirty-three years in prison,

Mr. Holmes was exonerated based on the discrepancies

in the identifications, the suggestiveness of the lineups,

and the car evidence’s limited value given how common

the model was.

E. Andre Bryant

In 2007, twenty-year-old Andre Bryant was convicted by an undersized jury of an armed robbery for $10

and sentenced to thirty years in prison—even though he

had $1,323 in cash on him at the time, and an alibi placing him six miles away.8 The robber was described as a

5’8” to 6’ Black man with dreadlocks, a durag, a yellow

Hawaiian shirt, and facial marks. In contrast, Mr. Bryant was 6’2”, had facial hair and gold teeth, and did not

8 Maurice Possley, Andre Bryant, Nat’l Registry of Exonerations

(Sep. 24, 2019), https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/11877.

15

otherwise match the description. Def.’s Am. Mot. for

Postconviction Relief at 5, 10, State v. Bryant, No. 2006CF-003229 (Fla. 12th Cir. Ct. 2015).

No physical evidence tied Mr. Bryant to the robbery:

police found no yellow shirt, durag, wallet, or matching

weapon in his SUV or his girlfriend’s home; and the wallet items found far from his SUV’s tracked route did not

bear his fingerprints. Id. at 7–8. A neighbor who reviewed surveillance footage said the person depicted

was not Mr. Bryant. Yet he was convicted after a victim

who had twice signed photo-lineup forms selecting

“none” falsely testified at trial that she had identified

him, first with 80% and then 98% certainty.

Seven years after his conviction, the Sarasota Herald-Tribune reported that someone else had twice confessed to the robbery. After eight and a half years in

prison for a crime he did not commit, Mr. Bryant’s conviction was vacated.

F. Wilton Dedge

Wilton Dedge was twenty-two when a six-person

Florida jury convicted him of sexual assault and sentenced him to thirty years in prison.9 The victim described a large, muscular attacker six feet to six feet two

inches tall, weighing 160 to 200 pounds, with hazel eyes,

a receding hairline, and long blond hair. Mr. Dedge was

5’5”, 125 pounds, blue-eyed, and had a full head of hair.

He was also forty-seven miles away repairing a transmission at the time of the crime. See Armen H. Merjian,

Anatomy of a Wrongful Conviction: State v. Dedge and

9 Maurice Possley, Wilton Dedge, Nat’l Registry of Exonerations

(July 23, 2026), https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/10401.

16

What It Tells Us About Our Flawed Criminal Justice

System, 13 U. Pa. J.L. & Soc. Change 137, 141 (2010).

Even though six witnesses and a check cashed by Mr.

Dedge across the street from where he was performing

the repair supported his alibi, the prosecution secured a

conviction based on a shaky identification, inconclusive

microscopic-hair evidence,10 and a dog that purportedly

traced Mr. Dedge’s scent from paper towels to monthsold bedsheets.11 Id. at 142–48. At a second trial, after

the initial conviction was reversed for evidentiary

10 Hair-microscopy evidence has not been scientifically validated

in the same way as DNA testing and retrospective analysis has indicated frequent errors in its usage. See FBI Testimony on Microscopic Hair Analysis Contained Errors in at Least 90 Percent of

Cases in Ongoing Review, Fed. Bureau of Investigation (Apr. 20,

2015),

https://www.fbi.gov/news/press-releases/fbi-testimony-onmicroscopic-hair-analysis-contained-errors-in-at-least-90-percentof-cases-in-ongoing-review; see also Clive A. Stafford Smith & Patrick D. Goodman, Forensic Hair Comparison Analysis: Nineteenth

Century Science or Twentieth Century Snake Oil?, 27 Colum. Hum.

Rts. L. Rev. 227, 233 (1996) (finding that forensic hair comparisons

have not been subjected to the same validation as more legitimate

forensic sciences accepted in criminal prosecutions); Samuel D.

Hodge, Jr. & Amelia Holjencin, A Post-Mortem Review of Forensic

Hair Analysis – A Technique Whose Current Use in Criminal Investigations is Hanging on by a Hair, 64 St. Louis U. L.J. 219, 220

(2020) (noting that no uniform standard exists for calculating the

frequency of hair characteristics).

See Jeff Blackburn, Innocence Project of Tex., Dog Scent

Lineups: A Junk Science Injustice 4–6 (2009); Did dog handler fake

it again?, Orlando Sentinel (Oct. 25, 2009), https://www.orlandosentinel.com/2009/10/25/did-dog-handler-fake-it-again/ (citing multiple

exoneration cases where John Preston testified and a Florida judge

who stated that “[Preston’s] dog simply could not track anything. In

short, I believe that Preston was regularly retained to confirm the

state’s preconceived notions about cases.”).

11

17

errors, a jailhouse informant testified that Mr. Dedge

had confessed, but the prosecution did not disclose that

the informant had received a 120-year sentence reduction for prior testimony—and was seeking more.

After more than twenty-two years in prison, DNA

testing of pubic hair found at the scene excluded Mr.

Dedge as a possible perpetrator, and he was exonerated.

G. Richard Paey

Richard Paey, a husband and father of three in his

mid-forties, was wrongfully convicted in Florida in 2004

of drug trafficking, prescription forgery, and unlawful

possession of a controlled substance.12 He suffered disabling pain from a car crash, failed back surgeries, and

multiple sclerosis, for which he had been prescribed substantial pain medication. Although his physician initially confirmed the prescriptions, he declared them

forged when police threatened to prosecute the physician based on a false claim that Mr. Paey had confessed.

See Paey v. State, 943 So. 2d 919, 920 (Fla. Dist. Ct. App.

2006).

At his third and final trial—following a mistrial and

an overturned verdict—pharmacists testified that they

had confirmed the prescriptions with the physician.

John Tierney, Punishing Pain, N.Y. Times, July 19,

2005, at A21. Notwithstanding the absence of evidence

that Mr. Paey sold any drugs, Florida law allowed the

jury to infer trafficking from quantity alone. A six-person jury convicted him.

One juror later admitted that he did not believe Mr.

Paey was guilty but voted to convict rather than be the

12 Stephanie Denzel, Richard Paey, Nat’l Registry of Exonerations

(Aug. 31, 2011), https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/11006.

18

lone holdout among six; the foreperson had assured the

holdout that the judge would give Mr. Paey probation.

Jacob Sullum, Pill Sham, Reason (Apr. 23, 2004),

https://reason.com/2004/04/23/pill-sham/. Mr. Paey instead received a twenty-five-year mandatory minimum

sentence. After three and a half years in prison, he received a full pardon in 2007.

H. Jed Gressman and Troy Hancock

In 1992, Jed Allen Gressman13 and Troy Jon Hancock,14 two young men, were convicted of aggravated

sexual assault by an undersized Utah jury after offering

a ride to a woman looking for her husband near a reservoir. She later accused them of driving her away from

the reservoir, restraining her, and sexually assaulting

her. State v. Hancock, 874 P.2d 132, 133–34 (Utah Ct.

App. 1994). The men said their truck had become stuck

in sand and that the woman walked away while they

were freeing it.

The accusation changed over time: the woman initially identified a different man named Jed and described a gray truck, then months later identified Mr.

Gressman and revised the description to match Mr.

Hancock’s orange truck with a black stripe. A DNA expert testified that only about 21% of men—including

Mr. Gressman but not Mr. Hancock—could have contributed the semen, and no other physical evidence or

injuries supported the accusation. Edward L. Carter,

New Evidence Means Freedom for 2 Inmates, Deseret

13 Maurice Possley, Jed Allen Gressman, Nat’l Registry of Exoner-

ations (Aug. 16, 2017), https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/10496.

14 Maurice Possley, Troy Jon Hancock, Nat’l Registry of Exonera-

tions (Aug. 29, 2011), https://exonerationregistry.org/cases/10505.

19

News

(June

13,

1996),

https://www.deseret.com/1996/6/13/19248369/new-evidence-means-freedom-for-2-inmates/. The jury acquitted both men of rape and kidnapping but convicted them

of aggravated sexual assault, and they were each sentenced to five years to life in prison.

Reinvestigation revealed that the accuser had previously made a false rape allegation and that her family

scouted Mr. Hancock’s truck before the description

changed. Advanced DNA testing excluded both men,

and prosecutors dismissed the charges. Both were released in June 1996, after forty-one months in prison.

CONCLUSION

The wrongful convictions described above have been

discovered and proven; many more have not been, and

in all likelihood never will be. Each occurred—often

quickly and easily—in a state that has, for generations,

allowed a person to be convicted of a felony by an undersized jury. And a significant number arose in precisely

the circumstances where the deliberation of a full jury

matters most: cases built on mistaken identification, incentivized witnesses, and discredited forensic science,

where one more voice in the jury room might have

meant the difference between a hung jury or possible acquittal and a ruined life.

To be sure, states requiring twelve jurors have also

wrongly convicted innocent people. But a twelve-person

jury is one protection against wrongful conviction, and

the cases discussed above illustrate the grave consequences that follow when the Constitution’s safeguards

against wrongful conviction are diminished in the name

of efficiency. Each protection provides an additional barrier against an erroneous conviction—and, when those

20

protections are weakened, the risk of irreversible injustice increases. Efficiency was the six-person jury’s principal justification when Williams sanctioned it, but the

Constitution’s safeguards exist precisely because this

Court has long recognized that accuracy, fairness, and

liberty cannot be sacrificed for the sake of expediency.

For the foregoing reasons, the Court should grant the

relief requested by the Petitioner.

Respectfully submitted.

M. CHRIS FABRICANT

ADAM GERSHENSON

MATTHEW A. WASSERMAN

Counsel of Record

WEIL, GOTSHAL & MANGES LLP

INNOCENCE PROJECT

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1001 Boylston St., Ste. 300

Boston, MA 02115

New York, NY 10013

(617) 772-8310

adam.gershenson@weil.com

SETH E. MILLER

INNOCENCE PROJECT OF

BRIAN G. LIEGEL

FLORIDA, INC.

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AUGUST 2026