Source says Kezer settlement was $4 million

Joshua Kezer received $4 million to settle his federal lawsuit against Scott County, a former sheriff and a former deputy, a source close to the lawsuit said Wednesday.

Kezer was paid the settlement Friday, the source said, and final acceptance of the deal by the U.S. District Court should take seven to 10 days.

Kezer sued Scott County, former sheriff Bill Ferrell and former deputy Brenda Schiwitz in August 2009, six months after he was exonerated of the 1992 murder of Angela Mischelle Lawless. Kezer was convicted by a Ste. Genevieve, Mo., jury in 1994 and spent 16 years in prison before winning the ruling in February 2009 that overturned his conviction.

Kezer was freed after discoveries that evidence implicating other potential suspects had never been turned over to his defense attorneys.

In the lawsuit, Kezer was seeking both compensation for his time in prison and punitive damages because of his wrongful conviction and arrest, which were supported by unreliable evidence, including statements made by four incarcerated men who said Kezer confessed to the crime. The men later recanted their statements.

Lawless was found dead in her car in November 1992 at the Benton, Mo., exit on Interstate 55. She was shot three times and suffered a blow to the head.

The investigation was reopened by Scott County Sheriff Rick Walter, who was the first officer on the scene the night Lawless was found. Walter continues to pursue leads in hopes of making an arrest in the case.

In a news release sent Wednesday afternoon, Kezer addressed briefly why he settled with Scott County, Ferrell and Schiwitz.

Had he not settled, he said, the process could have lasted for years with appeals and more lawsuits.

"I wanted to move on with my life," Kezer said in the release.

Kezer also referred to a mediation session with his attorneys and the defendants in the lawsuit, where Kezer said he offered Ferrell forgiveness.

Kezer wrote that Ferrell responded by saying, "Had I known the things we know now, I would have done things different. I'm not the devil. I just want you to know that."

"And then he laughed," Kezer wrote. "I had offered this man forgiveness for things the entire county knows he had committed and he still thought he could politic his way through the apology and deny things he and I know to be true."

Kezer wrote he had to decide right then what he was going to do.

"Figuring I would be in a better position to make a difference in this world and in the fight against men like the old sheriff with the vast amount of money I would get in the settlement, I chose to accept it," he wrote.

rkeller@semissourian.com

388-3642

ehevern@semissourian.com

388-3635

Pertinent address:

Benton, MO