Judge declares Cleveland man who spent 45 years behind bars in wife's murder wrongfully imprisoned

CLEVELAND — A judge in Cleveland on Thursday declared that an 83-year-old man convicted of murdering his wife was wrongfully imprisoned for more than 45 years. Isaiah Andrews, whose 1975 conviction was overturned after Ohio Innocence Project attorneys discovered in 2018 that Cleveland police hid evidence during the original trial that led detectives to arrest a different man, was acquitted by a jury after a new trial in October. Andrews sued the state after his acquittal seeking to be declared a wrongfully imprisoned person, which would make him eligible to collect money from the state for each year he spent behind bars. Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court Judge Ashley Kilbane on Thursday granted a joint motion from Andrews' attorneys and Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost's office to declare Andrews wrongfully imprisoned. "We certainly hope that you can move forward and when you pursue this wrongfully imprisoned claim that although nothing can take back the years that were taken from you, that justice in some small part will be served to you for the remainder of your time here," Kilbane said. Sarah Gelsomino, who represents Andrews along with Marcus Sidoti from the Friedman & Gilbert law firm, told Kilbane that Andrews always knew he was innocent. "In October, the jury saw the truth," Gelsomino said. "To hear it from the state of Ohio and you, your honor, is frankly monumental." Gelsomino thanked Yost's office for conducting a swift review of Andrews' case and "confronting some difficult truths" to determine that Andrews was innocent. "This is a difficult case to even imagine," Assistant Ohio Attorney General Tina Bradford said during the hearing. "Giving the relief that is due to the plaintiff is the least we can do at this point." Andrews was flanked by three other men who were freed after serving lengthy prison sentences for crimes they didn't commit. Lamont Clark, who spent 22 years in prison after he was convicted of murdering his wife in 1992, was freed in 2016 after attorneys discovered that prosecutors withheld medical records showing his wife told doctors before she died that the gun went off accidentally. RuEl Sailor was freed from prison in 2018 after the prosecutor's office's conviction integrity unit determined Sailor wasn't even at the scene of the 2003 killing for which he was convicted. Charles Jackson was convicted of a 1991 killing, but freed in 2018 after the Ohio Innocence Project found several pages of police reports weren't turned over to his defense at trial. Andrews said that other people serving in prison wrongful convictions need to fight, "because that's the only way you're gonna win." Andrews and his attorneys sued the City of Cleveland last month in U.S. District Court accusing police of violating his civil rights. That lawsuit is pending. Regina Andrews went missing two months after she and Isaiah Andrews married. A worker on his lunch break found her body in Forest Hill Park on the border of Cleveland and Cleveland Heights. She was wrapped in bedding from three different hotels, including the Colonial Inn where the couple lived. Some of the linens also bore the stamp of a hotel where Willie Watts had stayed the previous night. Cleveland police detectives discovered Watts' room was missing bedding, and Watts' mother lived less than a quarter-mile from Forest Hill Park. Detectives arrested Watts, who gave them an alibi for the time they believed Regina Andrews was killed. They released him without charging him, and then turned their sights on Isaiah Andrews. No physical evidence tied Isaiah Andrews to the crime. Instead, detectives relied on witnesses who said he was acting strange after she disappeared but before her body was found. Detectives later changed Regina Andrews' suspected time-of-death to be outside of Watts' alibi, but never revisited him as a suspect. Watts died in 2011. Andrews' attorneys sought DNA testing of evidence including the bedding in 2018. It wasn't until after an appeals court ordered the DNA testing to occur that they learned the evidence had been destroyed, and received the Cleveland police report detailing the investigation into Watts that was not handed over at his first trial. Cuyahoga County Prosecutor Michael O'Malley fought to keep Andrews in prison and prevent him from receiving a new trial. ©2022 Advance Local Media LLC. Visit cleveland.com. Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC.