Raheem Collins, wrongfully convicted of a 2006 Philly shooting that left a child paralyzed, sues city and police
Raheem Collins left prison in November after nearly 19 years.
A North Philadelphia man whose attempted-murder conviction was vacated in the fall after he spent nearly 19 years in prison has sued the city and two police officers, alleging that he was wrongfully convicted based on evidence police knew was “false, improbable and unreliable.”
Raheem Collins, 44, was arrested days after the 2006 high-profile shooting of 6-year-old Jabar Wright, which left the child paralyzed from the neck down. He was one of three men who were convicted of attempted murder, among other charges, following a 2007 trial. A judge gave each the maximum sentence: 62½ to 125 years in state prison.
The prosecution’s star witness was the then-wife of Jabar Wright’s grandfather, who was with the child when he was shot. She identified the four men. Collins had an alibi witness, whom police didn’t believe, his lawyer said. Prosecutors also downplayed surveillance footage that showed that Donte Rollins, Collins’ codefendant and cousin, was shopping at the Gallery mall in Center City roughly 80 minutes before the Strawberry Mansion shooting and on South Street 20 minutes after, undercutting the reliability of the eyewitness’ testimony.
» READ MORE: From 2016: Was wrong man convicted in '06 Strawberry Mansion shooting that paralyzed boy?
The case against two of the men unraveled over the years, and in 2016 Pennsylvania’s Superior Court vacated Rollins’ conviction.
It took eight more years before Collins was free.
In 2022, the star witness recanted her testimony, saying “I now realize I was wrong,” according to the National Registry of Exonerations.
Collins was released from prison in November after a judge vacated his conviction and the Philadelphia District Attorney’s Office dropped the charges.
His lawsuit, filed Dec. 31 in the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, accuses the city and the officers working on the case of deceiving the jury by hinging the prosecution on the testimony of one witness, despite video evidence undercutting its credibility. The complaint also says that the prosecution failed to disclose or pursue evidence that could have helped Collins prove his innocence.
“The most important part of Raheem Collins’ case is that he had an alibi from day one,” said Kevin Harden Jr., an attorney with Ross Feller Casey who represents Collins. “They interviewed that alibi witness and no one believed him.”
Harden called the shooting “an absolute tragedy” and said police in the high-profile case “rushed to judgment about Mr. Collins.”
The federal complaint accuses the police officers of falsely testifying that DNA evidence was available and of misrepresenting the time police stopped Rollins the night of the shooting to discredit his alibi.
Police also failed to thoroughly investigate the case, according to the complaint, leaving evidence — including alibi witnesses, video footage, store receipts, and phone records — that could have contradicted the sole eyewitness undetected.
A spokesperson for the city’s law department declined to comment on the active litigation.
Collins filed his complaint less than a month after another wrongfully convicted man, James Kelly, sued the city after having spent 29 years in prison.
The convictions of 49 people have been overturned since District Attorney Larry Krasner took office in 2018, according to his office’s data. Civil lawsuits have followed — and so have large jury verdicts and settlements. In April, a jury handed the largest payout to an exoneree in city history, awarding $16 million to James Dennis, who spent 25 years on death row. Philadelphia settled three unrelated wrongful-conviction cases in 2023 for a combined $25 million.
Harden said the lawsuit is a means to provide some justice for Collins, who missed nearly the entire childhoods of his two children. He will have to restart life in middle age, when some in the community could still believe that he is guilty.
“To actually reduce gun violence,” the attorney and gun violence survivor said, “we have to get it right.”