'Justice can prevail' — Man has conviction overturned in Texas for murder of Limerick priest
Murder, Reyos Facebook/the Was Photo: 1983 Convicted To After In Project Falsely He Admitted Recanting James The Before Innocence
An Apache American convicted 40 years ago of the murder of a Limerick priest has been exonerated.
Fr Patrick Ryan, 49, from Doon, was found naked, bound and beaten to death in his motel room in Odessa in Texas in December 1981. He had booked into the motel under the pseudonym John Killey.
On Wednesday afternoon, the Criminal Court of Appeal in Texas cleared James Reyos of the murder. The exoneration follows the re-opening of the case earlier this year after three new suspects were identified through fingerprints taken from the scene of the murder in a motel in Odessa, Texas in December 1981.
Mr Reyos was convicted in 1983 after he falsely admitted to the murder, before recanting. He has spent the last 20 years of his life on parole. He spent 20 years before that serving more than half of a 38-year prison sentence imposed for the murder of the Limerick Pallottine priest.
He will automatically be entitled to a lump sum of up to $2.6m for the 40 years he has spent either in prison or on parole. A compensation statute in Texas means that somebody who has been wrongly convicted is automatically entitled to recompense.
Odessa Police Department re-opened the investigation into the murder recently following the identification of three suspects after fingerprints taken from the scene in 1981 found matches in the US national fingerprint system last year.
The three — Vietnam War veteran Bobby Collins, Gary Ehrman, and Charles Burkart — are all since deceased. Ehrman was a guest in the motel on the night of the murder, while Collins and Burkart lived in Odessa.
Collins was buried with military honours in 2012 and was the holder of two Purple Hearts, an honour given to those wounded or killed while serving with the US military.
The Innocence Project of Texas took up Mr Reyos’ case. Police previously told the that there was considerable damage caused to the room on the night of the murder, including holes in doors, blood spatters on the walls, and the bed was broken.
No prior connection between the three identified suspects and Fr Ryan has been established. Police have established that a chalice, an accordion and personal items including his wallet were stolen in the incident.
Mr Reyos met the Doon native three weeks before the murder when Fr Ryan gave him a spin when he saw him hitch hiking. Both lived in Denver City in Texas and met a number of times in the following three weeks.
Mr Reyos, who is now 67 years old, says that Fr Ryan forced him to engage in oral sex when he visited his apartment a day before the murder in December 1981.
He says he bears no grudge against the authorities in Texas for his conviction after he confessed to the killing in a drink- and drug-fuelled moment 11 months after the murder.
“I am so grateful to Innocence Project of Texas for this day. I want this to serve as hope to the people of Texas that justice can prevail,” said Mr Reyos on hearing the court’s decision. Reyos, whose father died while he was in prison, added: “My father told me to never give up and I never did.”