Crosley Green: Florida convict back in prison for 1989 murder insists he is innocent
TITUSVILLE, FLORIDA: A Florida man who served 33 years in prison for a murder he claims he did not commit returned to custody on Monday, April 17 to resume a life sentence. Crosley Green, who was found guilty of Charles Flynn’s murder in 1990, was given a provisional release in 2021 after his lawyers cited health concerns in the wake of the Coronavirus pandemic.
65-year-old Green returned to the Florida prison just two weeks after US District Judge Roy Dalton issued an order requiring him to surrender to the police by April 17 in order to continue serving a life sentence. He turned himself over to the Florida Department of Corrections on Monday while being accompanied by his fiance Kathy Spikes and his attorneys, Keith Harrison and Jeane Thomas, who have both worked on his case for 15 years. His lawyers are fighting for his freedom and even asked the Supreme Court to hear Green's case, but the Justices turned down the request in February, according to CNN.
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Why was Crosley Green arrested?
Green was first arrested on April 3, 1989, in connection to the death of 22-year-old Chip Flynn, who was shot to death in a Central Florida orange grove. Kim Hallock, Flynn's ex-girlfriend, reported to authorities that she and Flynn were abducted by a black man. Hallock said she managed to escape but Flynn couldn't. She later confirmed Green as a suspect by identifying him in a questionable photo lineup. Green was arrested and charged with kidnapping, robbery, and murder, despite the lack of any direct evidence tying him to the shooting, according to CBS News.
At his 1990 trial, Green was offered a plea bargain but he refused to take it, maintaining his innocence. Eventually, an all-white jury convicted him and sentenced him to death. However, in 2009, Green was resentenced to life in prison due to a technicality related to the sentencing phase of his trial. In 2018, Judge Dalton determined that prosecutors had unlawfully concealed evidence showing that police first believed a different person was the shooter, leading to his release in 2021. But the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals eventually reinstated Green's conviction after concluding that the concealed evidence had no bearing on the outcome of the case.
'I am not bitter'
Green has said he has faith in God and that people will see he deserves to be free. "I am not bitter. I am not down and out," he said in a statement provided by his attorney. "I am trying to set an example of faith and hope for my family, for my church, and for my town." The grandfather said he spent some of the most beautiful moments of his life in the past two years. "The last two years have been the best years of my life. I reunited with my family and met my grandkids for the first time. I learned a new job that I really love. I've enjoyed worshiping with my church in Titusville. And I've begun new relationships that have changed my life. I would like to live the years I have left in freedom and peace,” Green continued in the video, according to CBS.
Green’s legal team said his only options for remaining out of prison now are clemency or parole. “We think he’s an outstanding candidate for parole,” Thomas said, according to CNN. “He’s demonstrated that in the last two years - he’s been under supervised release. He’s been an incredibly successful person on the outside with his work, his church, and his family.” Reflecting on Green’s return to prison, his fiancee Spikes told CNN, “I’ve been with this man for two years. To not be able to have a 5 o’clock phone call to say, ‘I’m home,’ for me to say, ‘What do you want for dinner,’ that’s what I’m anxious about.”