A Clay County resident who spent four of his teenage years in prison on a wrongful murder conviction is taking his battle for compensation to the Mississippi Supreme Court.
A compensation claim for Tyler Edmonds, 27, will go before the state’s highest court today. He is requesting $50,000 in compensation for each year he was incarcerated — which would amount to $200,000. State law allows compensation for those wrongfully convicted of crimes, according to Edmonds’ attorney Jim Waide of Tupelo. Wilson D. Minor with the Attorney General’s Office will represent the state in the case.
Edmonds confessed to murdering his brother-in-law, Joey Fulgham, in 2003 at the age of 13 and while he was in seventh grade at West Point Junior High School. He and his sister, Kristi Fulgham, were both arrested for the murder, and an Oktibbeha County Circuit Court jury convicted Edmonds in 2004. Edmonds later claimed he was pressured to give a false confession, and the Supreme Court ruled in 2007 that he did not get a fair trial, effectively throwing out his conviction.
Edmonds previously took his claim for compensation to federal court, alleging investigators violated his constitutional rights. The court rejected the claim, according to a press release Waide issued on Monday.
He then took the suit to circuit court under the Mississippi Wrongful Conviction Statute. Oktibbeha County Circuit Judge Lee Coleman ruled Edmonds is not entitled to compensation because he brought about his own conviction by fabricating evidence.
Waide disagrees.
“According to the Innocence Project, false confessions are a primary contributor to wrongful convictions,” Waide’s press release said. “A holding that the Mississippi Wrongful Conviction Act does not apply to false confessions means that there will be no remedy for a significant number of persons who suffer years of imprisonment for crimes they did not commit.”
Neither Minor nor Waide could be reached for further comment by press time.
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