Richmond Professor, Students Help Get Innocent Man Exonerated

Mary Kelly TateA judge recently granted Marvin Grimm a writ of actual innocence that exonerates the Richmond man of murder.

The judgment is thanks to the work of University of Richmond law professor Mary Kelly Tate and other justice advocates, including members of her class.

Tate, director of the Institute for Actual Innocence, has spent over a decade working to identify and exonerate those wrongfully convicted of crimes.

Grimm’s case was about 14 years in the making. He was arrested and charged for the murder, rape, and abduction of a three-year-old boy. He plead guilty in 1975 to avoid the death penalty.

Tate, her students, and members of the Richmond faculty with Grimm’s attorney and advocates from the Innocence Project helped prove the DNA evidence, including hair follicles used against Grimm decades ago, were not his.