SURVIVOR STORIES

Edward Mitchell

Edward Mitchell
Tortured and framed for murder

On the evening of July 31, 1999, eight-year-old Paulette Peake was shot and killed while standing inside Pat’s Food and Liquor store on the corner of 79th Street and Sangamon in Chicago, diagonally across from St. Leo High School. Officer Ronald Spraggins of the Chicago police department said he arrived on the scene shortly after the shooting and observed Edward Mitchell jumping over a fence, pursued him, and arrested him in an alley. Mitchell says that during this arrest he was handcuffed kicked, and his wallet and ID were taken out of his pocket by Spraggins. He was not advised of his Miranda rights. Mitchell says he was told by Spraggins that a young girl had been shot and that police were looking for Kenneth (Kenny) Guy as a suspect.

Spraggins and his partners Officers Dwayne Betts and Heard put Mitchell in a police wagon and threatened him that he'd better tell them about the shooting. He told them he had no information or knowledge that a shooting had occurred.  The cops told him that failure to cooperate would result in charging him with the shooting. One of the officers climbed into the police wagon with him, struck him, and questioned him. During the next few hours Mitchell was taken to several different locations around the neighborhood in the police wagon. Potential witnesses were told he was a suspect in the murder and asked to ID him through the wagon’s rear window by flashlight, thereby prejudicing any identification they might make. 

Detective Robert Arteaga also arrested Kevin Johnson for the murder, who he said had been identified by a witness, Marie Coffee, who saw him shooting in the direction of Pat's and running away afterwards. Arteaga testified that he had expected Coffee to identify Mitchell. After a day of questioning at Area 2 by Detectives Patrick Durkin, Paul Alfini, and Assistant State’s Attorney (ASA) Arunas Buntinas, Johnson confessed. He named Mitchell as his accomplice and the shooter. Once Johnson named Mitchell, The police apparently dropped the investigation of Guy as a suspect.

They first had taken Mitchell to the Sixth District station for interrogation. Other detectives involved in his interrogation were Patrick Durkin and Paul Alfini. At the 6th District they aggressively questioned him, threatened him, kneed him in his groin and slapped him. A gun-shot residue (GSR) test was conducted on his hands, wrists, and forearms that came back negative.

During the early morning hours the next day Mitchell was taken from the 6th District to Area 2 Homicide by Detectives Arteaga and Sylvia Vanwitzenberg. He was placed under arrest and handcuffed. He did not consent to this. However, Det. Arteaga testified his trial that Mitchell volunteered to go to Area 2 to help them investigate the murder. There are no notes or reports of this voluntary transport to Area 2 by any police officer. 

At Area 2 Mitchell was placed in an interrogation room and was handcuffed to a ring on the wall by Det. Vanwitzenberg. The door was shut, and he was left like this for what felt to him like several hours. He was questioned numerous times over the next 4 days, but never formally charged with a crime. Police questioned him aggressively, threatening and pressuring him to identify others involved in the shooting. Mitchell’s lengthy interrogation, lack of communication with any counsel, and prolonged time in custody prior to arraignment is documented by police reports and undisputed. 

• At Area 2 he was handcuffed to the wall he held in a position that did not allow him to sleep.

• Over the next several days, he repeatedly asked to see his attorney and provided contact information for his attorney, which police ripped up. He had previously experienced the criminal justice system and was familiar with his Miranda rights. He says he repeatedly asked for his lawyer.

• He was alternately taken between a holding cell, where he was chained to the wall, and an interrogation room, where he was repeatedly shown the video of the shooting.

• Mitchell was hit, slapped, and kicked in various parts of his body, including his head and chest.

• He was choked and kneed in the groin area by officers.

• Officers did not permit Mitchell to use the bathroom and berated him when he urinated on the floor.

• Officers did not provide Mitchell any food and water until after he confessed;

• They encouraged Mitchell to kill himself. They left an empty soda can crushed on the floor and threatened to kill him if he didn’t confess.

• Mitchell attempted suicide by cutting his left wrist with the sharp edge on the soda can. When the detectives found Mitchell in his cell bleeding from this self-inflicted cut to his wrist, they kicked him in his head, arms, chest, back and legs. One of them said “we hope you die”.

• Police took him to Roseland Hospital where he received stitches and medical care. Then he was transported back to his cell at Area 2 for further interrogation and abuse. They again handcuffed him to the wall cuffing his injured wrist. Throughout August 5th they further tightened the handcuff on his left wrist causing excruciating pain.

• One officer mentioned Mitchell’s brother who was deceased, and his other brother who was imprisoned, saying he knew them and had been involved in their arrest and prosecution, demonstrating great personal prejudice.

• Mitchell was subjected to prolonged sleep deprivation. Officers kept him in an uncomfortable position and questioned him every few hours over a six-day period.

• The cell in which he was kept was uncomfortably cold, and he was not provided with blankets, towels, or a pillow.

• Officers told him the interrogation would not end and he would not be moved to a warmer place and given food until he confessed.

• He was told to confess, to repeat the story given to him by the police in exchange for removal of the handcuff from his injured arm, receiving food, water, and use of a restroom. He was rehearsed by the detectives as to what they wanted him to say on videotape.

• After hours of such rehearsal, the actual “confession” was conducted by ASA Butinas and photos were taken of most of his injuries. Mitchell’s video-recorded “confession” was the first such confession recorded in Illinois.

• Even in his taped “confession” Mitchell showed injuries to the camera and described physical abuse to ASA Butinas.

• After his “confession” he was beaten and hospitalized again.

Finally, on August 6, 1999, 6 days after his arrest, and constant torture, and ultimate “confession,” Mitchell was arraigned and charged with the murder of Paulette Peake. At the arraignment Mitchell stood before the court in a hospital robe, his physical and psychological injuries for all to see. He informed the court that he he’d been beaten and injured by the police, and the court ordered pictures to be taken of his entire body by the offices of the Cook County Public Defender and State's Attorney. The photos were filed in Mitchell's main discovery and exhibited during his pretrial motions, his first trial, and direct appeal. Yet the trial court found he had “confessed” voluntarily. At every opportunity Mitchell has said his “confession” was extracted through torture. His torture was never addressed, and none of the police officers or prosecutors involved were ever held to account.

First Trial

Mitchell was convicted in the Circuit Court, Cook County, of first-degree murder in 2002. The court refused to suppress Mitchell’s video-recorded “confession” in a pre-trial hearing. It was introduced through testimony by Det. Sylvia Vanwitzenburg and ASA Torreya Hamilton and published to the jury. When Mitchell testified it was displayed again with questions posed to him. 

A witness, Demetrius Jones testified that that just prior to the shooting, he and his mother, Mary Jones, were walking toward Pat’s store.  He looked toward St. Leo’s and saw Mitchell and a younger man close to the alley behind the school.  Jones said that he went briefly into Pat’s, then he and his mother walked north on Sangamon toward her house.  He then looked over to St. Leo and saw Mitchell and the young man. Jones said that, at the alley near Pat’s, he stopped to talk with someone named Toppy for 15 seconds while his mother kept walking.  After that, he said that he crossed the alley and stopped to speak with a girl named Linda for two to three minutes.  Jones testified that he then heard gunfire and ducked in between a nearby car and a tree until the shooting stopped.  

Then, he said, he immediately looked for his mother to see how far she had to go to get to her house and then watched as she “jogged” some 300 feet into the house.  Jones testified that he then he saw Mitchell across the street from Pat’s wearing a dark jacket, under which Mitchell appeared to be trying to conceal a rifle, and then went into the alley.  Jones then ran back to Pat’s.  

Dennis Ward testified for the defense at the first trial. He said he saw and spoke with Mitchell at Harden's Food/Liquor Store (7931 S. Halsted St.) and received change from him, shortly before Mitchell’s arrest. This was a third of a mile from the scene of the murder.

First Direct Appeal

Mitchell filed a Direct Appeal Petition to the Illinois Appellate Court 1st District challenging his “confession” as involuntary and coerced. After 9 months, during which over 900 pages of testimony from 18 witnesses were taken, the Appellate Court found that the trial court had erred in denying Mitchell’s motion to suppress his confession and ordered a new trial. 

The appellate court stated: “A review of this record reflects the trial judge was manifestly erroneous in denying suppression of defendant’s confession based on the totality of the circumstances, including, but not limited to, the following: (1) the length of the delay in taking defendant to court for a hearing to determine probable cause for a warrantless arrest (Gerstein hearing); (2) the failure of the State to demonstrate any bona fide emergency or other extraordinary circumstance for the delay; (3) the nature, extent, and duration of repeated questioning by police and prosecution; (4) defendant's physical condition at the time of questioning; (5) defendant's denial, which persisted for 100 hours; (6) the trial court's inconsistent credibility findings; and (7) the trial court's findings of fact, which were contradicted by the record.

The Appellate Court found “Inherent inconsistencies in the trial judge’s evaluation of [arresting officers Detective Van Witzenberg and Detective Arteaga’s] credibility, noting that “Detective Van Witzenberg is the same detective who, together with Detective Arteaga, testified that defendant voluntarily helped the police investigate the homicide and willingly stayed in interview room 3 on August 1, 1999, with the door locked, from 6 a.m. until 2 p.m.”

The Court also noted that “The trial judge's findings regarding testimony provided by [Detectives Van Witzenberg and Arteaga] as to defendant's physical condition during repeated interrogation is … against the manifest weight of the evidence.” The Court found, “Prolonged detention between arrest and confession ‘may serve to amplify the coercion latent in a custodial setting, particularly when there are other indicia of coercion.’” 

Mitchell’s Second Trial and Direct Appeal

During Mitchell’s second trial, the prosecution was not permitted to mention his confession. Nonetheless, he was convicted again on the basis of testimony by his co-defendant Kevin Johnson and three neighborhood residents. Johnson had not testified at Mitchell’s first trial. 

Marie Coffee testified at the second trial. She identified Kevin Johnson and testified that she saw him shooting several shots in the direction of the store. Police files report that Johnson had led police to the garage where the murder weapon was found. Det. Arteaga testified that the weapon was identified by him. Bullets and  shell casings were found at and around the crime scene that could have been tested for body residue or blood, but they were not, or the tests were buried. The bullet that caused death was not tested.

Also testifying at the second trial was M. Lewis, who said she was on her porch and saw people standing on the corner of 79th St. corner near Leo High School. Identified Kenny Guy and Edward Mitchell among the people there. However, her first report to police on August 2 she had been on her porch from 8:15 in the evening on July 31 and that after she heard shots she went to the corner and overheard someone say that Kenny and Mitch “be on 79th and Sangamon all the time” and that she started yelling the names Kenny & Mitch. 

In addition, Demetrius Jones’ testimony from the first trial was read for the jury into the record, over objections from the defense. The State said that efforts to locate and bring in Jones to testify again were unsuccessful.  Because he wasn’t there for the second trial Mitchell’s counsel was not allowed to impeach Jones, who had made numerous conflicting statements to police.

At the second trial Johnson testified that he had been with Mitchell, who had been the shooter.  However, he also admitted on cross-examination that Kenneth (Kenny) Guy, the original suspect identified by police to Mitchell, had a key to a garage at 7927 S. Sangamon that he and his friends, including Mitchell, had used as a hang-out. He had told police about the garage, and they had found the murder weapon there. Guy resided directly next door to the garage. Guy is very light in complexion, same as Mitchell, and approximately the same height and build. However, once police had Johnson’s confession implicating Mitchell, they dropped Guy as a suspect.

This garage is where the police found a rifle that could have been the murder weapon, gloves that might have had Mitchell’s DNA in them, and fingerprints on a car window that might have been Mitchell’s. This was largely irrelevant since Mitchell had admittedly been a frequent visitor to this garage, where he and friends often hung out. Nonetheless, this evidence was allowed by the court even though Mitchell’s defense had not been allowed to question it. 

At his second trial Mitchell did not testify about the abuse he had suffered at the hands of the police. He wanted to testify about it but his counsel advised him against it because the “confession” had been suppressed. Mitchell also wanted to move for a substitution of judge, but his counsel did not agree.

Kevin Johnson’s testimony

Kevin Johnson had quickly confessed to the crime after being arrested but named Edward Mitchell as the shooter. He agreed to testify against Mitchell and was promised in exchange he’d serve no more than 7 ½ years in prison. He did not testify at the first trial, but he did at the second. In exchange for his testimony Johnson received a ten-year sentence for his confessed role in the murder of Paulette Peake. Of this he only served 7 ½. Mitchell was sentenced to 100 years.

Demetrius Jones’ testimony

On the night of the shooting when the police had arrived at the scene, police say that Demetrius Jones told one of the officers that he had seen what happened. Det. Clarence Hill testified in a pre-trial hearing that Jones told him that “Mitch’s boys” had been shooting. On August 4, 1999, 4 days after Jones spoke to him at the scene, Hill notified Area 2 that he had a witness to view defendant in a lineup.   Mitchell was identified by Jones.   

Jones had not told the police on the night of the shooting that Mitchell was the alleged shooter. He did not tell the police investigators the next day that Mitchell was the shooter.  When he later received a phone call from the police, he did not tell the officer that Mitchell was the shooter.  The first time that Jones identified Mitchell as the shooter was on August 4, 1999, four days after the shooting, when he was brought down to the police station to view the lineup.  

Jones changed his story several times. In his original statement to police he said he pushed his mother toward the alley and then turned around in the direction of the store to see Mitchell wearing a dark jacket under which he was trying to conceal a rifle. In Jones’ grand jury testimony he said that he saw Mitchell with a rifle that he was not trying to conceal. And in his written statement to police on August 4 he said that from the time he left Pat’s until he heard the shots 10 to 15 seconds elapsed, and after hearing the shots, he got up slowly and walked toward Pat’s, making no mention of his mother.  

These accounts all conflict with his testimony at the first trial, which was read into the record at the second. There he had said that he and his mother had been walking toward Pat’s store when he looked and saw Mitchell and a younger man close to the alley behind St. Leo’s.  He testified that he went briefly into Pat’s and then he and his mother walked north on Sangamon toward her house. Jones said that, at the alley near Pat’s, he stopped to talk with someone named Toppy for 15 seconds while his mother kept walking.  After that, he said that he crossed the alley and stopped to speak with a girl named Linda for two to three minutes.  It was then that he testified that he heard gunfire and ducked in between a nearby car and a tree until the shooting stopped.  

In his testimony he said he immediately looked for his mother and watched as she “jogged” some 300 feet into the house.  Jones testified that he then saw Mitchell across the street from Pat’s wearing a dark jacket, under which Mitchell appeared to be trying to conceal a rifle, and then went into the alley.  Jones then ran back to Pat’s.  

These contradictions suggest that at best, Jones’ memory was unclear. But Jones had disappeared by the time of Mitchel’s second trial, and his defense was no able to cross- examine Jones. Such questioning could have called into doubt his entire story.

Fingerprint evidence

Since Mitchell had testified that he’d been in the garage identified by Johnson as a hangout many times this evidence was largely irrelevant. Nonetheless, the state’s fingerprint examiner, Heather Siemer, was allowed to testify that no fingerprints were found on the gun found in the garage (the murder weapon), magazine, or cartridge casings. She was able to obtain a latent print from one of the ammunition boxes. To make an identification, Siemer testified that she did a side-by-side comparison with the Mitchell’s inked prints, aided by a magnifier.  Siemer initially stated that the ammunition box contained a print of Mitchell’s left middle finger. She said that this result was reached with the “highest degree” of scientific certainty. Shortly thereafter, Siemer corrected herself and stated that the print on the ammunition box was from Mitchell’s right middle finger. 

A fingerprint lift had been obtained by police technicians from a pane of glass in a car in the garage. Siemer stated that she likewise did a side-by-side comparison of that print with Mitchell’s, aided by a magnifier. She concluded that the lift from the pane of glass contained a print of Mitchell’s left middle finger. She showed a chart of a print comparison to the jury, which she said was “a little bit distorted.” On cross-examination, Siemer was asked what ACE-V was.  (ACE-V stands for the Analysis, Comparison, Evaluation and Verification methodology used by forensic practitioners primarily when conducting feature comparisons.)  She did not know.  When asked if that was the standard used now by the FBI, she responded that she did not know what it was.  She also stated that she made no notes of her analysis of the two latent prints, only of the fact that Mitchell had been identified.

On redirect examination, Siemer stated that the method she used has been employed for over 100 years. She said she had sen no need to take notes on her comparison of Mitchell’s fingerprints to the one found on the car window. The court also failed to hold a hearing to determine whether or not the method by which she obtained the fingerprint evidence was generally accepted by experts in the field of finding and preserving crime scene fingerprints (a Frye hearing).

So Mitchell’s fingerprint might have been on the ammunition box and the car window, and it might not have been, not really news either way.

DNA evidence

A pair of gloves was found in the garage mentioned by Kevn Johnson. An expert in forensic biology and DNA, Harold Johnson, was qualified by the court. He stated that he could not get readings at all 13 DNA loci, he presumed because of decomposition.  He obtained results at only 4 loci.  He said the sample contained DNA mixtures of at least three people. After comparing the sample with the DNA profile generated from Mitchell, Johnson concluded that Mitchell could not be excluded as a donor: “My statistics read as follows,” he testified, “Approximately 1 in 71 black; 1 in 71 white; and 1 in 82 Hispanic unrelated individuals cannot be excluded from having contributed to this mixture of DNA profiles.”  

On cross-examination, Johnson confirmed that the FBI requires 13 markers for its database. He further testified that he identified alleles at only four loci, that there were five loci at which he was unable to detect any alleles, and that there were four loci that he did not test at all.   He also stated that he was aware of the situation in Arizona where a 9-loci match had been the same for two people. Johnson further testified that he used a computer software program to do the statistical calculation for him.  He could not, himself, figure out how many of more than 1 million Black people  would have had the same DNA indicators at 4 loci. Lynette Wilson, another forensic scientist, and state witness, said that Kevin Johnson was excluded from contributing DNA to the gloves.

So Edward Mitchell might have put on the gloves found in the garage, or he might not have, just like a he have touched a window on the car in the garage, or he might not have. All of which is insignificant considering that Mitchell, by his own testimony, had been a frequent visitor to that garage.

In his appeal Mitchell challenged the fingerprint evidence that placed him in the garage where the murder weapon was recovered and disputed the fingerprint expert’s expert status. He challenged the testimony of the prosecution’s DNA expert. And he contended that the lower court erred in rejecting his request to further impeach a material and unavailable witness, Demetrius Jones, whose testimony from the first trial was read to the jury.

The Appellate Court disagreed and affirmed Mitchell’s conviction. Justice Robert Gordon, however, issued a very strong eleven-page dissent (longer than the majority opinion), in which he cited numerous errors made by the trial and appellate majority. 

The TIRC Investigation

Mitchell filed a claim of police torture and coercion with the Torture Inquiry and Relief Commission (TIRC) on July 14, 2013. The TIRC found compelling evidence that Mitchell had been tortured by police but could not link the “confession” to the material evidence used to convict him at his second trial, after the tortured confession had been suppressed by the court. Thus they dismissed his claim based on lack of jurisdiction. Mitchell’s attorney, Steven Becker, suggests however, that Mitchell’s confession to police included admissions about returning the murder weapon to a car in a garage. He maintains this led police to the murder weapon and a fingerprint found on the window of the car in the garage. Both pieces of evidence were used in the second trial to convict Johnson. True, the gun was recovered on August 1, 1999 at 3 p.m., long before Mitchell confessed, and the fingerprint also was recovered the same day. Investigators fingerprinted Mitchell on August 3, 1999 as part of their investigation. This all occurred before Mitchell’s August 5, 1999 confession. However, the questionable fingerprint analysis wasn’t issued until August 23, 1999 -- well after Mitchell’s “confession.” Although the fingerprints were collected because of Johnson’s confession before Mitchell confessed, the faulty analysis was strongly prejudiced by Mitchell’s coerced  confession.

Prior to interviewing Mitchell, the TIRC attempted to locate Mitchell’s co-defendant, Kevin Johnson, via a private investigator, to help assess the jurisdictional issues.  He could not be found, having long since completed the small sentence he received.

Mithell has asked for administrative review of the TIRC finding, as provided by the TIRC Act (Mithell v Olmstead). Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul has moved to withdraw the state’s motion to dismiss the case. It will have been heard on August 25, 2022, in the Chancery Division of the Circuit Court.

Pending Successive Post-Conviction Petition

Mitchell’s Successive Post-Conviction Petition is currently pending before Judge Stanley Sacks. Mitchell has submitted newly discovered evidence and affidavits from witnesses who state that they were with Mitchell at the time of the crime several blocks away from the scene. He also has submitted affidavits from experts in the fields of identification and eyewitness reliability and psychology. When considered alongside the trial evidence this new evidence would probably would have established enough doubt to lead to a different result, i.e., a verdict of not guilty. 

Mitchell also has a petition for an Executive Pardon pending before the Prisoner Review Boad and Governor J. B. Pritzker.

• Prepared by Ted Pearson

1.  The information presented here is taken mainly from the report of the Torture Inquiry and Relief Cmmission on Mitchell’s claim before that body. BEFORE THE ILLINOIS TORTURE INQUIRY AND RELIEF COMMISSION, Claim of Edward Mitchell, https://tirc.aem-int.illinois.gov/content/dam/soi/en/web/tirc/documents/decisions/2021.6.16%20Mitchell%20Sumary%20Dismissal-Approved%2c%20signed.1.0.pdf 

2. The entire dissent by Justice Gordon should be read. It can be found at https://www.casemine.com/judgement/us/5914fb66add7b049349ad341.