Joseph Janke was convicted of shooting into a group of men and seriously injuring one of them, based solely on identification testimony from a single witness who was at least 165 feet away from the shooters—a distance experts say is too great to allow for accurate identification.
The convictions stemmed from a shooting that occurred in a sparsely populated area of Harvey, IL. On the afternoon on May 11, 2012, four young men (Adam Miller, William Maxwell, Joshua Fisher, and James Grveles) were repairing cars outside Miller’s house. Miller’s father Cranston Green was also outside. Two people on bicycles, wearing hoodies, rode down the road located across a large field from the cars in the driveway (165-185 feet away) and began shooting at the group. Maxwell was hit in the face and seriously injured; Green was grazed by a bullet. The shooting lasted just a few seconds and then shooters then rode away.
By the time police arrived, Miller identified the shooters as Joseph Janke whom he knew and did not like and Fat G, who he later claimed was Joseph Foster. The others in the group did not make identifications but Miller’s father Cranston Green told police the shooters were Hispanic; Joseph Janke is white. No arrests were made. Then, 40 days later, apparently upset that Janke had not been arrested, Miller went to police and for the first time told them about an incident the day before the shooting where Janke and Foster had supposedly threatened Miller. At that time, Janke and Foster were arrested and placed in lineups. Only Miller identified Janke and Foster as the shooters; the other four witnesses could not make an identification.
After a bench trial, Janke was convicted solely on the basis of Miller’s testimony. The judge acquitted Foster because Miller did not previously know him. Janke was originally sentenced to 60 years imprisonment.
The inimitable former CWC Director Karen Daniel took Joseph’s case after Office of the State Appellate Defender attorney Emily Filpi expressed doubts about his guilt to Karen. After meeting with Joseph and agreeing to take the case, Karen and CWC students investigated and filed a post-conviction petition that contained claims that the police withheld critical exculpatory information and that Janke was actually innocent.
What Karen and the students uncovered upended the case. The only witness who did not testify at trial, James Grveles, signed an affidavit stating that he did not believe Janke was one of the shooters, and that he told police this. He also told police that he believed the shooters were African-American. Grveles knew Janke and also was best friends with Miller. No police report was ever discovered that reflects what Grveles told police.
The investigation also led to a former friend of Miller, Cody Fortney. He told the CWC that Miller admitted to him that he did not know who had shot at him but that he pinned it on Janke anyway.
The CWC enlisted identification and memory expert Dr. Brian Cutler who authored a report that outlined numerous factors that could have made Miller’s identification unreliable, including the distance between the shooters and Miller of 165 feet, the multiple shooters, the weapon focus, the duration of the shooting and other reasons.
After Karen’s tragic passing in late 2019, CWC staff attorney Greg Swygert teamed up with current Exoneration Project and former CWC attorney Josh Tepfer to continue fighting for Joseph’s release. In doing their own investigation, they obtained Miller’s DMV record, which showed that his vision at the time of the shooting was only 20/40- which means 165 feet would appear as 330 feet to someone with 20/20 vision.
After numerous COVID-related delays, an evidentiary hearing took place in late 2021 before the Hon. Carl B. Boyd. Students presented the CWC’s witnesses James Grveles and Dr. Cutler and submitted evidence for the court’s consideration. Unfortunately, Cody Fortney had died in June 2021 and did not testify. Janke’s trial attorney also testified, confirming he did not receive Grveles’ exculpatory statements to police, and testifying that in 40 years of practicing criminal defense, this is the one case that he feels an innocent man was convicted.
After closing arguments, on April 15, 2022, Judge Boyd ruled that the new evidence met the actual innocence standard, vacating Janke’s convictions. Soon thereafter, Janke was granted bond and released from custody for the first time in 10 years, after having missed his father’s funeral and most of his daughter’s childhood.
In the late Spring/early Summer of 2023, the State decided to retry Janke despite scant evidence of his guilt. In the late Spring early Summer of 2023. Janke’s retrial legal team consisted of Swygert, Tepfer and Exoneration Project attorney Fadya Salem. While much of the same evidence was presented, new evidence of Miller’s non-perfect eyesight and a video depicting what one sees from 165 feet was introduced. On June 26, 2023, Judge Boyd determined that the State’s only eyewitness’s identification testimony was “incredible, improbable, as well as implausible” and found Joseph Janke “not guilty on all counts.”