| On August 18, 2010, police in Marion County, Oregon, arrested 33-year-old Jacob Watkins and charged him with first-degree rape and three other sexual-assault charges.
The complaining witness, 18-year-old I.H., said that Watkins had assaulted her on June 19, 2010, at a party.
Watkins’s’ case went to trial in Marion County Circuit Court on January 4, 2011. I.H. testified that Watkins forced her to have sex with him and perform various sex acts. Watkins testified that he and I.H. had sex, but it was consensual.
On January 5, 2011, the jury found Watkins guilty of all four counts by a 10-2 vote. Watkins was sentenced to 12 years and six months in prison.
Watkins appealed his conviction, which was affirmed by the Oregon Court of Appeals on August 22, 2012.
In 2020, in the case of Ramos v. Louisiana, the United States Supreme Court struck down the use of non-unanimous verdicts, which were only still in use in Oregon and Louisiana. But the ruling in Ramos only applied to future cases and those still on direct appeal. The court ruling left it to the states to determine whether to apply the ruling retroactively. Two years later, on December 30, 2022, the Oregon Supreme Court extended post-conviction relief to all old convictions tainted by non-unanimous verdicts.
Judge Sean Armstrong vacated Watkins’s conviction on February 7, 2023. He was released from prison on February 15, 2023.
Although Watkins had served nearly all of his prison sentence, his case was reopened by the Marion County District Attorney’s Office.
Watkins’s attorney provided several affidavits from people who had been at the party or knew Watkins and the complaining witness.
Christopher Sexson said in his affidavit that he saw Watkins and I.H. “flirting and kissing” before the party and that I.H. had talked about “dumping” her boyfriend for Watkins. Sexson said he was never contacted by Watkins’s trial attorney. He said that after the trial, I.H. told him that Watkins “shouldn’t be in prison over their relationship and that she was sorry she testified against him.”
Other witnesses gave similar accounts of I.H.’s behavior at the party and said that she had a well-deserved reputation for being untruthful and manipulative.
The state then moved to dismiss the case, saying in court papers: “Reversed on Ramos and evidence is now weaker. State can no longer prove beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Judge Armstrong dismissed the case on April 20, 2023.
On June 28, 2023, Watkins filed a claim for $812,233 in state compensation.
– Ken Otterbourg
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