A former Philadelphia Police homicide detective was found guilty of assaulting an innocent man more than a decade ago to obtain a false murder confession and then lying about his misconduct during court proceedings.
James Pitts, 53, was convicted July 16 after a jury found him guilty on two counts of obstruction and perjury, which led to Obina Onyiah’s conviction following his false confession to a 2010 robbery and murder.
As a result, Onyiah spent more than a decade in prison for a crime he didn’t commit, while the real killer got away and was never apprehended.
Now, with the tables turned, Pitts faces his own sentencing in the Court of Common Pleas on Oct. 4, with potential to serve as much time behind bars as Onyiah did.
The judge, however, denied a motion to jail Pitts right away, allowing the officer to remain free for now, giving the disgraced cop more than a two-month grace period to make arrangements before he goes away.
Back in 2013, Pitts gave false testimony during both a pretrial motion and the jury trial, denying that he ever assaulted Onyiah to obtain the confession.
The detective’s downfall began during an interrogation three years earlier, when Pitts assaulted Onyiah to force him to admit killing jewelry store owner William Glatz, who shot and killed one of the two robbers before he died. The second bandit escaped.
The Philadelphia Inquirer reports that Onyiah, who had previous convictions for bank robbery, became a suspect when a former crime partner called police to implicate him in the Glatz slaying.
But even though the officer had no hard evidence, he coerced Onyiah’s confession despite being fully aware of his innocence, investigators said.
As a result, Onyiah was found guilty of killing Glatz and spent 11 years behind bars before his conviction was vacated in 2021 after a review of surveillance video from the robbery scene proved the 6-foot-3 Oniyah could not have been the considerably shorter accomplice who fled the scene.
A year later, a grand jury indicted Pitts for roughing up Onyiah.
Pitts had previously faced numerous lawsuits and complaints for using physically aggressive interrogation tactics and coercing false confessions, leading to several murder cases collapsing at trial, according to Fox43.
The Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office issued a statement thanking the jury for its guilty verdict, while calling attention to the first case in the city’s history that a Philadelphia detective has been found guilty of coercing a confession that led to a wrongful conviction.
“My administration will continue to seek evenhanded justice in all cases prosecuted by this office, regardless of the defendant, because no one is above the law,” said DA Larry Krasner.
Michael Garmisa, whose unit inside the District Attorney’s Office investigates disputed convictions, said the jury delivered justice for Onyiah.
“I want to thank Mr. Onyiah for courageously testifying about the abuse he suffered at the defendant’s hands,” he said.
