NOTE: Updated on 7/20/22 to reflect Raymond's pending application for DNA testing. 

Raymond Warren and his family have been living a nightmare for 28 years. Help us end the nightmare by demanding that the Second District Court of Appeals in Ohio grant Raymond's application for DNA testing. 

Raymond was only 16 years old when this crime occurred. But he couldn’t have done it.

On July 10th, 1994,  Raymond was walking to a friend’s house with two of his childhood friends. They had been fixing a scooter; known as the neighborhood mechanic, Raymond could be found fixing scooters and other motorized vehicles all the time. Raymond and his friends were on another street when the gunshots were fired and yet, Raymond (a young black male) was targeted as the scapegoat when another suspect was not immediately identified. 

Raymond was convicted with two pieces of evidence – both of which have proven unreliable. 

1. The two boys who were with Raymond that night initially testified that Raymond committed the crime. However, since the trial, both have recanted their statements. They indicated that the police threatened to charge them with the murder if they did not implicate Raymond. One of the boys explained, “Hell they had Raymond down there for something he [had] nothing to do with, and I didn’t want to be in his shoes”. Raymond's friends were 14 and 16 years old in 1994. They were approached, escorted to the police station, and interrogated by police officers multiple times without legal counsel, and were scared of going to jail for something that none of them did.
2. On the night of the murder, Raymond voluntarily agreed to an Atomic Absorption (AA) test. Barium and Antimony—two components of gunshot residue—were detected on the palm of Raymond's non-dominant hand. However, since Raymond's trial, the scientific community has all but completely abandoned AA testing due to its limitations and high rate of false positives. Traces of the elements found on Raymond's hand can be picked up readily from other surfaces and do not necessarily indicate that an individual has had contact with a firearm, in sharp contrast to the statements of the expert witness during Raymond's trial. Most notable for a mechanic like Raymond, these elements can be found on the brake pads of motorized vehicles (remember that Raymond was working on a scooter that day). Studies have also shown that these elements can be picked up in the back of police cars and in police stations.

Despite these new developments, the Court has refused to hear Raymond's case on its merits. The Court has repeatedly rejected Raymond's appeals on the basis of a procedural technicality: Raymond's former attorneys did not file his appeal within a “reasonable” timeframe. 

But there is hope. Raymond has a motion pending before the Second District Court of Appeals in Ohio that would allow his team to order DNA testing on the shell casings found at the scene. Modern DNA testing is highly sensitive, and it is now possible to obtain a DNA profile from very small, degraded, and compromised samples (See State v. Reynolds, 186 Ohio App.3d 1, 2009-Ohio-5532, 926 N.E.2d 315, ¶ 18 (2d Dist.)). If a DNA profile can be found on the casings and Raymond is excluded, Raymond could file for a new trial and finally be granted justice. 

Help the Georgetown University ‘Making An Exoneree’ Team push for the exoneration of Raymond Warren by signing this petition. Together, we can spread the word of this tremendous injustice and help an innocent man walk out of prison.