A Douglas County judge has ruled that Albert Wilson, whose conviction in a Lawrence rape case was overturned, is not entitled to compensation under the state’s wrongful conviction statute.

The judge ruled Wilson had to prove the prosecutor dismissed his case because he was actually innocent, which was not the reason the former district attorney cited for not trying the case again.

Wilson, now 29, was 23 years old when he was sentenced to more than 12 years in prison and lifetime post-release supervision after a Douglas County jury found him guilty of rape in January 2019. The case drew attention across the country because many people believed that Wilson, a young Black man, was wrongly convicted by a jury of mostly white women, symptomatic of larger issues of systemic racism. 

Douglas County District Judge Sally Pokorny had ruled in March 2021 that jurors could have come to a different decision in Wilson’s case if they had known about certain evidence that Wilson’s attorney did not use, and if the state’s expert forensic psychologist had not bolstered the accuser’s credibility. Pokorny ruled that a retrial was necessary, and Wilson was released from prison.

However, after a few months of attempting to negotiate a plea ahead of a second trial, then-Douglas County District Attorney Suzanne Valdez in December 2021 dismissed Wilson’s criminal case with prejudice, meaning it cannot be refiled. 

“As time passed and negotiations continued, it became increasingly clear that absent a creative, non-standard resolution, this matter was destined to be retried,” the DA’s office wrote in a Dec. 22, 2021 news release. “In keeping with this Office’s trauma-informed approach to criminal prosecution, we sought the survivor’s input and gauged her expectations and objectives. She wanted to address Mr. Wilson directly and to convey to him the impact this entire experience has had on her.”

Wilson in April 2022 filed a wrongful conviction civil case against the state, seeking $195,000 and a certificate of innocence.

To prevail in the case, Wilson’s attorneys had to prove to a standard of a preponderance of the evidence that he did not do the crime — in other words, the judge would have to be 50.1% or more convinced that Wilson did not do the crime to rule in his favor.

Through a two-day bench trial before Judge Carl Folsom III in January 2024, more specific information about the evidence that sparked the remand emerged, as well as some new evidence. (Read a detailed article about the trial at this link, and more background on the case at the links below.)

However, an August 2024 decision from the Kansas Supreme Court found that the wrongful conviction statute “requires a claimant to establish that the fact the claimant did not commit the crime resulted in one of three outcomes — either the reversal or vacation of the conviction, the dismissal of the charges, or a finding of not guilty on retrial.”

In that case, the defendant’s conviction was reversed on appeal because of a Fourth Amendment violation — not because the defendant had not committed the alleged crime. When the case was remanded, prosecutors dropped the charges and did not pursue a retrial.

The judge’s ruling in Wilson’s case — filed Monday, more than a year and a half after the bench trial concluded — states that Valdez’s decision to dismiss the case was because the accuser did not want to testify again and agreed to participate in a restorative justice process.

Valdez testified in a deposition that she did not believe that Wilson was actually innocent of the crime at the time she dismissed the charges.

Folsom wrote that “Despite this Court’s earlier disagreement with this interpretation” of the wrongful conviction statute, “this Court is required to follow the binding case law of the Kansas Supreme Court.”

Folsom ruled that Wilson had not presented evidence that the reason for the case being dismissed fit within the requirements of the statute.

“Thus, Wilson cannot prevail in his claim for wrongful conviction and imprisonment,” the judge’s decision stated. “… For this reason, the Court does not need to decide the question of whether Wilson is actually innocent of the rape charge that led to his conviction and imprisonment.”

Wilson was represented by Laurel Driskell and Alex Driskell at the wrongful conviction bench trial; Shon Qualseth and Lisa Mendoza of the Kansas attorney general’s office represented the state.

Mackenzie Clark (she/her), reporter/founder of The Lawrence Times, can be reached at mclark@lawrencekstimes.com. Read more of her work for the Times here. Check out her staff bio here.

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