On March 13, 2020, Simpson Thacher and the North California Innocence Project (NCIP) secured the release of Jeremy Puckett after 18 years behind bars following a hearing at the Superior Court of California. This followed the Court granting a habeas petition on March 3, 2020, which was filed on behalf of Mr. Puckett. The Court vacated Mr. Puckett’s conviction based on Simpson Thacher’s and NCIP’s work to uncover over 700 pages of material exculpatory evidence that prosecutors withheld from the defense, and their successful arguments that trial counsel rendered constitutionally deficient representation.
Mr. Puckett was convicted of murder and, in 2002, sentenced to life without the possibility of parole. The Simpson Thacher team, working alongside NCIP co-founder Linda Starr and NCIP lawyer and former 30-year career county prosecutor Karyn Sinunu-Towery, had filed two habeas petitions previously on Mr. Puckett’s behalf—both of which were denied by lower courts. However, after filing the third habeas petition with the California Supreme Court, the Supreme Court ordered the trial court to reopen the case. Simpson Thacher and NCIP—through multiple hearings in the fall of 2019, and using the suppressed materials, along with newly discovered evidence that Mr. Puckett’s trial counsel had not found or introduced—proved to the Superior Court that the murder could not have happened on the date the prosecution had contended at Mr. Puckett’s trial. In addition to convincing the Superior Court that the withheld evidence was material, and showing how ineffective trial counsel had been, Simpson Thacher and NCIP also proved Mr. Puckett’s alibi on the date the murder did occur.
In light of all of this evidence, the District Attorney chose not to retry Mr. Puckett, who then walked out of the courthouse a free man.
The case received media coverage by publications including Daily Journal and Bloomberg Big Law Business.
The Simpson Thacher team includes partner Buzz Frahn, Associate Jordan Lamothe, and paralegal Janie Franklin, as well as former colleagues Jason Bussey, Elizabeth White, Jenny Palmer, Adam Crider and Casey Mathews.
For additional information, please see NCIP’s press release here.