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Woman convicted in 2001 of
setting fire that killed two daughters asks for new trial
By Rachel Dissell - The Plain Dealer
January 02, 2014
CLEVELAND, Ohio -- A Cleveland mother sentenced
to two life terms in prison after a jury found she set a fire that
killed her two young daughters is asking for a new trial.
Lawyers for Angela Garcia, who was 24 when sent
to prison in 2001, say arson investigators who testified at her
trial relied on flawed fire investigation techniques that have
since been debunked.
Garcia was convicted in the deaths of her
daughters Nyeemah Garcia, 3, and Nijah Evans, 2, after a third
trial. Two prior juries were unable to decide unanimously whether
she had intentionally set the fire, though one of the juries found
her guilty of fraudulently overvaluing the items in her home.
Her daughters died of smoke inhalation after
firefighters pulled them out of an upstairs bedroom of their
Harvard Avenue home on Nov. 20, 1999.
The Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's office has
until Jan. 21 to respond. Common Pleas Judge Michael Astrab will
then decide whether to grant the motion for a new trial.
Prosecutor Timothy J. McGinty said Thursday
that his office is reviewing the motion.
"We take claims of newly discovered evidence
very seriously," McGinty said through a spokesperson. "We will
examine this case, as we do others, as they come to us."
More than a decade ago, prosecutors contended
that Garcia set her rental home ablaze and trapped her daughters
inside in order to collect $40,000 in insurance.
Garcia is currently first eligible for parole
in 2049.
In a court filing, Assistant State Public
Defender Joanna Feigenbaum argues Garcia deserves a new trial
based on unreliable fire "science" and new scientific evidence.
Feigenbaum, relying on a series of studies, reports and a fire
investigation expert, contends the original testimony on how the
fire started is highly questionable.
Cleveland Fire Department arson investigators
initially determined that the fire was accidental – likely started
by a large unattended candle -- after viewing the home and after a
trained dog didn't detect any accelerants, or flammable liquids.
The home was demolished two days after the fire
and no evidence was collected or preserved for laboratory testing.
The cause of the blaze was changed a month
later after investigators learned Garcia had overvalued the
contents of her home on a renter's insurance claim and Garcia was
indicted on charges including aggravated murder, manslaughter and
insurance fraud.
During the trial, prosecutors and witnesses
questioned Garcia's perceived lack of emotions and varying stories
as to how she escaped the intense fire while her children remained
inside. In addition, during the third trial a jailhouse snitch
testified that Garcia said she had set two fires in order to
collect insurance money.
Garcia and her family members maintained she
was innocent throughout her three trials, as did her attorneys,
who said she passed multiple polygraph tests.
"We're 100 percent sure of her innocence," said
Thomas E. Shaughnessy in 2001 after his client was convicted. A
later court appeal based mainly on how the trial was conducted was
not successful. That appeal did not bring up the fire
investigation techniques.
Since 2001, arson science has evolved
considerably, from more of an "art" to an actual science, Garcia's
lawyers say. More is now understood about what causes some fires
to burn more intensely or spread more rapidly based not only on
how they start but the materials a home is made of or contains.
The nationally accepted changes have led to new
techniques for investigating fires– and number of arson-related
criminal convictions being overturned across the country.
A national fire expert and author who reviewed
the fire investigation and testimony in Garcia's case said the
conclusions reached by fire investigators where not based on
scientific reasoning and that the cause and origin of the fire
should be considered undetermined.
Garcia's lawyers point out in the filing that
between the second and third trials, different fire investigators
testified, including adding a new location of a second fire and
new theory based on photographs that accelerants had been used.
"It is now known that the reasoning and
conclusions of the State's arson experts were wrong," attorney
Feigenbaum wrote in the motion filed last month. "A review of Ms.
Garcia's case using the dictates of modern fire science shows that
the conclusions of the original fire investigators as to the cause
and origin of the fire were based upon flawed and outdated
assumptions that were not tested by the scientific process, and
that numerous potential accidental causes, including the home's
electrical system, were not properly considered or eliminated
before the fire was deemed to be incendiary." |
