A prison escapee killed a man and sent Gary Beeman to death row for the crime
Gary Beeman in 2002. (Photo: Mary Hanlon)
Gary Beeman was sentenced to death in 1976 for a murder the previous year in Ashtabula County, Ohio.
The conviction rested solely on the testimony of Clair Liuzzo, a convicted felon who claimed he saw Beeman leave a bar in the company of the victim, 52-year-old Robert Perrin, and later saw Beeman with blood on his clothes and driving Perrin's car. Liuzzo also testified that Beeman, 25, initially told him he had been in a fight, but later admitted that he had shot Perrin.
At the time of the murder, Liuzzo was an at-large escapee from the Ohio State Reformatory in Mansfield. When arrested in Cleveland after the murder, Liuzzo wound up in jail with Robert Westfall, whom Beeman sought to call as a witness at the trial.
Westfall was prepared to testify that Liuzzo had admitted that he, not Beeman, killed the victim and boasted that he was going to blame the crime on Beeman. The judge, however, refused to allow Westfall's testimony, holding that no foundation had been laid to introduce a prior inconsistent statement. The defense sought to recall Liuzzo to lay a foundation, but the judge refused to allow that as well.
The Ohio Supreme Court reversed the conviction and remanded the case for a new trial in 1978, declaring in an unpublished opinion that the judge's refusal to allow further cross examination of Liuzzo was “not justified by, and clearly against, reason.”
At his retrial in 1979, Beeman was acquitted after five witnesses testified that Liuzzo had admitted that he committed the crime and that Beeman was not involved.
Both Beeman and Perrin were Caucasian.
This account was written by Rob Warden, executive director of the Center on Wrongful Convictions, and posted here June 6, 2002. Permission is granted to reprint, quote, or post on other web sites with appropriate attribution.
