There was no evidence of a crime, no witnesses, no sounds of angry screaming or violent banging, but 3-year-old Isiah Meza was dead and his mother’s boyfriend, Jose Olivares, was the last person with him.
Olivares told police he went to the bathroom for about five minutes that day, February 14, 2011. Isiah was playing with his toys and jumping on the bed. When Olivares went outside, Isiah was lying on the ground, crying and acting strangely.
Doctors who treated Isiah at the hospital for three days, and later – after his death – examined his body, told law enforcement that the injuries the boy suffered – retinal damage, severe bleeding and swelling in the brain – could only be sustained by someone. It can also be caused by violently shaking the baby, a medical phenomenon known as shaken baby syndrome.
After a 16-day trial in 2014, Olivares was convicted of assault resulting in death of a child under 8 years of age and sentenced to 25 years in prison.
Ten years later, a Los Angeles County judge vacated Olivares’ conviction on September 19, after lawyers for the 39-year-old man argued that new evidence showed his prosecution was based on medical testimony that was now outdated. It has, and it is wrong. For years, medical experts believed that injuries like Isiah’s could only be attributed to shaken baby syndrome, or SBS, but new research shows that a fall from a short distance — from a bed fall — The same injuries can occur.
Olivares was released Wednesday on $100,000 bond.
Lorin Barbosa Findley, an attorney with the Northern California Innocence Project who represented Olivares, said, “The facts always showed that Mr. Olivares was innocent, but medicine needed time to catch up and prove it.” “Mr. Olivares’ case is both exceptionally unique and tragically common as flawed medical testimony has long been used to convict too many loving parents and caregivers.
The latest medical findings have cast a new critical eye on hundreds of SBS convictions in California and across the country, where lawyers say parents and caregivers may have been falsely accused and wrongfully convicted of murdering their own children. Must have been appointed.
But Olivares’ legal troubles still loom.
Jose Olivares with his family on Wednesday after being released from the Los Angeles Sheriff’s Men’s Central Jail on $100,000 bond.
(Carla Spain/Northern California Innocence Project)
In court filings, prosecutors noted that one of the doctors who testified at the trial, Donald Minkler, changed his opinion from his previous testimony, and agreed with defense attorneys that the habeas corpus motion met legal standards.
But prosecutors opposed dropping all charges outright, arguing that four other doctors who testified at the trial believed Isiah’s death “was not accidental.”
Olivares is set to return to court Oct. 31 for a pre-trial hearing.
Prosecutors presented five medical experts who testified that Isiah’s injuries could only have been caused by SBS and could not have been the result of a fall from the bed.
The sentence was handed down despite there being no previous reports of abuse and Isiah’s body showing no visible injuries. No one testified that Olivares lost his temper with the young boy that day or before.
Hours after Isiah was taken to the hospital, Los Angeles police responded. One of the attending physicians, Dr. Barry Markowitz, told an officer that Isiah’s injuries – retinal damage, severe bleeding and swelling in the brain – were “inconsistent” with a fall from the bed.
“Those injuries cannot have been sustained simply by a child falling out of bed,” the doctor told the officer, according to court filings.
Olivares, who had been dating Isiah’s mother for about a year, had no history of abuse, his lawyers argue. The three other adults who were in the home when Isiah was hurt said that none of them heard yelling, hitting, or signs that Olivares was angry, or that Isiah was being fussy. According to his lawyers, Isiah’s small, 40-pound body showed no other signs of violence, with no bruises or marks on his arms or legs.
According to court records, relatives testified that Olivares “was a loving, gentle father and father figure who had no history of abuse and would never have intentionally harmed Isiah.”
But prosecutors at the trial pointed to the injuries and medical opinion at the time.
“This case is really simple,” prosecutors told jurors in their closing statements, according to court filings. “You either believe that Isiah fell 18 inches while jumping, which the defense would have us believe, or that he suffered a violent abusive head injury at the hands of this defendant who was supposed to care for him, but she Killed him.”
The American Academy of Pediatrics and the National Association of Medical Examiners have supported the medical opinion that such injuries to the child can be attributed to SBS, and have published reports stating that “these injuries are a group of minor falls. Doesn’t work together.”
But many medical experts now believe that some cases previously associated with shaken baby syndrome may have been caused by a short fall. In 2020, the American Academy of Pediatrics updated its position, and wrote for the first time in a new report that there were no “unique” injuries that could be attributed solely to SBS, and that small falls can cause fatal intracranial injuries. Are.
Joseph Trigilio, executive director of Loyola’s Project for the Innocent with Loyola Law School, who also worked on the Olivares case, said, “This particular area of science or medical science has come across as unreliable and unreliable in some cases ” “There is no other evidence pointing to Mr. Olivares other than the experts at trial.”
New medical findings on SBS may have implications for many other beliefs.
“This causes a tremendous double tragedy where a parent, or caregiver, loses a child and at the same time they are being blamed for the death,” Findley said.
A new expert presented by Olivares’ lawyer in his habeas petition told the court that, in review of the case and injuries, the most probable cause of the boy’s death was a fall.
“The visual and circumstantial information in this particular case, and the physical findings that are highly consistent with this type of sudden impact injury, indicate that an accidental fall from the height of the jump is a reasonable and probable cause of Isiah Meza’s death.” There is an explanation, wrote Dr. Judy Melinek.
Not everyone is convinced.
Moses Castillo, one of the LAPD detectives in the case, who is now retired, called the theory that Isiah fell out of bed “BS.”
“There’s no way a fall from 18 inches would have caused this,” he said, arguing that the injuries were too severe. “I have seen injuries when children are falling from heights of four floors or more. there’s no way.”
Castillo said he still believed Isiah was murdered, arguing that he had investigated about 10 cases involving shaken baby syndrome during his career, but that Isiah, who was about 4 years old, and his Weighing about 40 pounds, he was the first one to grow larger and larger.
“The shock must have been so strong that it caused these injuries,” he said.
During their investigation, they said they also found a hole in the bedroom wall, which Olivares said he had punched at one point. Castillo said he did not believe Olivares’ version of events and noted that Olivares had several tattoos, including some on his face.
“We’re going to take his word for it?” He said.
Jose Olivares with his nephew moments after being released from Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Men’s Central Jail on Wednesday. Prosecutors are still considering whether to pursue another trial in the death of 3-year-old Isiah Meza.
(Carla Spain/Northern California Innocence Project)
Findley said the hole in the wall was made several months before the incident, before Isiah and his mother moved into the home.
Olivares’ conviction is not the first incident to come into question.
In 2002, 18-year-old Xavion Johnson was convicted of murdering his 4-month-old daughter, Nadia. Like Olivares, Johnson’s criminal case was based on expert medical testimony, although 13 witnesses testified that Johnson had no history of abuse. In 2017, his conviction was overturned After experts rejected some of their testimony.
Clifton Jones, 45, was released in 2021 From prison his lawyer argued that the medical opinion that had been widely accepted at the time of his sentencing was now considered erroneous.
Jones said he was holding his son when he slipped on a shoe at their home in Sacramento. Jones was unable to stop his fall, and his son hit the back of his head against the wall.
In Texas, Robert Roberson is scheduled to be executed on October 17 for the death of his daughter in 2002, but 86 Texas lawmakers They are asking the Texas Board of Pardons and Paroles for clemency in the case. Roberson’s daughter is believed to have died from shaken baby syndrome, but a growing number of people have argued against the original conviction. is one of those arguing to stop Roberson’s execution lead detective in the caseWho now believe that Roberson’s daughter did not die from SBS.
The Northern California Innocence Project, or NCIP, has been conducting a systematic review of SBS-related convictions dating back decades since 2019, and found that many of them were sentenced primarily based on the opinions of medical experts, Even if no other evidence was cited of abuse or violence, NCIP Executive Director Todd Fries said.
The organization has identified 419 criminals linked to SBS in California, he said. It is currently litigating five cases, he said, and reviewing about 40 others, and it expects to assess many more cases.
Reviewing has been a challenge. In SBS cases, he said, many defendants find themselves confused about how to argue their innocence when their convictions were based on medical experts.
“Often in junk science cases, people don’t know what went wrong with their case, and they don’t know how to challenge the case,” Fries said. “As a result, they are hesitant to reach out.”
He said the review of the cases also revealed a disturbing pattern. In approximately 77% of cases where the defendant’s race was identified, the accused was a person of color, he said.
The organization is still reviewing its data, but there is concern that in many cases, doctors, social workers, police and prosecutors may be more willing to suspect abuse in cases involving families of color, leading SBS to Minorities may be disproportionately targeted in cases. Some of them are built on shaky scientific grounds, Fries said.
Fries pointed to one 2021 study Which found that forensic pathologists are more likely to rule a death a homicide rather than an accident when the child is white, compared to when the child is black.
“It tells me that certainly the prosecutors, but also the hospital staff, are really considering race when determining whether abuse has occurred,” Fries said.
Most of the cases appear to have occurred in the 1980s and 1990s, he said, but the number of SBS cases going to trial has declined significantly since then. Legal experts believe this may be due to changes in medical consent.
