After nearly three decades, a Maryland man, convicted as a teen of a crime he says he didn’t commit, will be coming home. A new law, passed in 2021, that allows inmates locked up as juveniles and who have served over 20 years to have their sentences reduced, aided in his being released.
On Thursday, Feb. 9, a Baltimore City Circuit Court judge approved a motion reducing Kenneth Bond’s life plus 60 years in prison sentence under Maryland’s Juvenile Restoration Act, the Prisons and Justice Initiative reports.
Bond was incarcerated at the age of 16, when he was convicted of the 1995 shooting death of Terrance Augusta McKoy, a Morgan State University freshman.
McKoy was standing at a bus stop in Northeast Baltimore when he was fatally injured by a gunman — believed at the time to be Bond.
For 27 years, Bond has maintained his innocence.
In 2018, Bond became the subject of a documentary produced by Georgetown University students, titled “Making an Exoneree.”
Marc Howard, director of Georgetown University’s Prisons and Justice Initiative, said after reviewing Bond’s file, he believed in his innocence.
“…Looking into his case,” Howard shared, “I believed in his innocence and I believed in him. And while we’re still hoping to clear his name, I’m overjoyed that Kenneth is finally home where he belongs.”
Three students were assigned to work on this case: Nada Eldaief, Cassidy Jensen and Julia Usiak.
The team found issues with the case, most noticeably the “shaky” testimony of the eyewitnesses and the ballistics used to connect Bond to the murder. Also, the trial lawyer Bond had as a minor never presented his alibi in court.
The case is still under review by Baltimore’s Conviction Integrity Unit, the oldest and most active CIU in the state. Since 2016, nine people have been exonerated by the investigative work of this agency.
The team saw an opportunity to get Bond home quicker with the…
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