WI - Jessica Payne, 16, raped & murdered, Milwaukee, 30 Aug 1995

[Wudge]

“The police managed to get two boys basically to implicate Chaunte in a murder he had absolutely nothing to do with. They pressured the boys and they managed to get them to tell this false story.”
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"One of the most difficult to accept things about this case is it took four more years until anybody told Chaunte and his lawyers, the DNA on the victim actually matched other women who were killed in the same fashion.”


http://www.wuwm.com/programs/news/view_news.php?articleid=5046


"Last month, this guy called to accuse the Milwaukee Police Department of covering up evidence about a serial killer in Milwaukee who was preying on black women.

Frankly, I didn't take him very seriously. What a difference a month can make.

His name is Chaunte Ott, a Milwaukee man released after serving 13 years of a life term in prison for the murder of a teenage runaway, Jessica Payne. Ott, 35, was released in January after the discovery of identical DNA evidence on Payne and two other slaying victims with whom he had no connection.

The Milwaukee County district attorney's office decided not to oppose Ott's release.

But it was clear that prosecutors and police who had worked on the case did not immediately accept the notion that an innocent man had been cleared due to DNA evidence.

In April, Ott called me to talk about his case and proclaim his innocence.

At the time, he didn't seem bitter over his circumstances as much as he seemed concerned about what he felt was reluctance by police to find a serial killer.

Those were his exact words back then: a serial killer.

"Someone's out there killing women," he told me. "It's like the cops don't care."
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"I initially didn't write a column about my conversation with Ott, but I did talk with police sources who warned me of the man's claims of innocence. The official stance was that many of the people who investigated the case were still convinced Ott was responsible for Payne's death. There was also speculation that the serial killer who left DNA at the scene of the murders of six other women - all African-Americans - may have had sex with Payne but probably didn't kill her.'

[blinkety blank morons ... even worse, crooked morons]


http://www.jsonline.com/news/milwaukee/45559347.html

http://www.wisn.com/news/19672285/detail.html


"The homicide of Jessica Payne dates back 15 years. MPD made the arrest after developing probable cause to believe Chaunte Ott was the perpetrator. A jury found that the case had been proved beyond a reasonable doubt and found him guilty."

[police manufactured evidence, then blame the jury]

http://www.wisn.com/news/20823907/detail.html


"DNA has tied Ellis to at least 9 dead women who were murdered between 1986 and 2007. But the case could be complicated because other men were charged for two of the murders.

Curtis McCoy has already been acquitted in the 1994 murder of Carron D. Kilpatrick, 32. They were living together at the time and had a daughter."

[The false charges by Milwaukee LE went beyond Chaunte Ott.]


http://www.truecrimereport.com/2009/09/milwaukee_serial_killer_police.php


I long had Chaunte's case on my list of likely wrongful convictions. Moreover, he was a convict who recognized that the murder of the 16 year old girl was likely the work of a serial killer, not LE in Milwaukee. Real justice would be imprisoning those in LE who manufactured the evidence (false testimony) against Chaunte Ott.

 

[TheMeaningOfItAll]

What a mess. The scary thing is there was a serial killer out there that no one caught because they were too busy pinning things on innoncent people. I get just as upset about these cases as I do when the "bad guy" walks.

 

[ohiogirl]

Absolutely amazing! Good work LE.

 

[Snick1946]

And, are we surprised? The sad thing is that many of us are not. Despite the strong support many of us on these boards have for LE we also know that there are elements in our police departments that see nothing wrong with pinning false evidence on someone just to close a case. Probably they justify it by convincing themselves they are guilty or maybe that they are somehow deserving to be imprisoned.
This happens all the time, always has. Maybe a bit less so now that we have DNA and other forensic tools available. Sad.

 

[Wudge]

And, are we surprised? The sad thing is that many of us are not. Despite the strong support many of us on these boards have for LE we also know that there are elements in our police departments that see nothing wrong with pinning false evidence on someone just to close a case. Probably they justify it by convincing themselves they are guilty or maybe that they are somehow deserving to be imprisoned.
This happens all the time, always has. Maybe a bit less so now that we have DNA and other forensic tools available. Sad.

LE manufacturing evidence does happen all the time. However, in this case LE used an informant to manufacture all the evidence (both physical and false witness).

"One month after the discovery of Payne’s body, an inmate at the Milwaukee County jail told authorities that a man named Richard Gwin was involved in a young white woman’s murder. Police arrested Gwin, who made a statement implicating himself and two others – Sam Hadaway and Chaunte Ott – in Payne’s murder. Gwin told police that in the early-morning hours of August 27, he was driving his car accompanied by Hadaway, Ott and Payne. He parked in front of an abandoned residence where they first remained in his vehicle conversing, listening to the radio, drinking alcohol and smoking marijuana. Gwin said that at some point Hadaway, Ott and Payne exited the vehicle and walked through the alley between the two residences and out of Gwin’s sightline. Soon, Hadaway returned to the car, followed by Ott five minutes later. When Gwin inquired about Payne’s whereabouts, Hadaway said that they had tried to rob Payne, but when her pockets were empty, Ott cut her throat.

Police proceeded to arrest Hadaway and Ott based on Gwin’s statement. Hadaway allegedly confirmed Gwin’s story, providing further details about the murder and confirming that Ott cut Payne’s throat. Hadaway described that Ott tried to rob Payne, grabbing her, and when she struggled, instructed Hadaway to hold her hands while he searched her pockets. When Ott found nothing to steal, he pushed her down onto a mattress, pulled down her pants, pulled up her shirt, and tried to force his way between her legs. Hadaway turned away, but looked back when he heard choking and gagging sounds to see that Payne’s throat was cut and blood was gushing from the wound. Hadaway said he then returned to the car, and Ott followed approximately five or 10 minutes later.

On November 3, 1995, police executed a search warrant at Ott’s home, where they discovered two box cutters and a knife among his possessions."
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"Both Gwin and Hadaway testified for the state at Ott’s trial, describing the details above to the jury. Gwin was not charged with any crime, and Hadaway accepted a plea agreement in exchange for his testimony against Ott. Hadaway pled guilty to attempted robbery and was sentenced to five years in prison.

The only physical evidence produced by the state at trial were the two box cutters and knife police discovered among Ott’s possessions."

http://www.innocenceproject.org/Content/2023.php

 

[OkieGranny]

From December 2013:

http://fox6now.com/2013/12/02/death-of-serial-killer-leaves-questions-unanswered/

A serial killer who eluded Milwaukee investigators for decades is dead. Walter Ellis died in a hospital near the South Dakota where he was serving multiple life sentences. Officials say Ellis died of natural causes.

Ellis’ case involved the rapes and murders of Milwaukee women between 1986 and 2007. Some hoped he would talk more before he died...

“Why he wanted to kill these women it’ll go with him to his grave here. He would have been an interesting person if he would have decided to sit down like Bundy at the last minute if he knew he was dying and clear his soul, but nothing,” said Spingola. “I just wonder about the other cases that he was mentioned in. There’s at least five, maybe seven more that he’s a good suspect in that we’ll probably never know.”

From March 2015:

http://www.jsonline.com/news/crime/...13-years-in-prison-b99472841z1-298216201.html

The City of Milwaukee announced Tuesday it will pay $6.5 million to a man who was wrongfully convicted of a 1995 homicide and spent 13 years in prison before DNA linked the case to serial killer Walter Ellis.

Chaunte Ott filed a federal civil rights lawsuit after his release in 2009, claiming that Milwaukee police detectives pressured witnesses into testifying falsely that they had been with Ott during the murder of Jessica Payne, a 16-year-old runaway...

The case had been scheduled to begin trial in Milwaukee federal court last week. A similar suit from another man wrongly convicted of killing someone later linked to Ellis remains pending.