SUSSEX COUNTY, Va. — Before a full courtroom in Sussex County Wednesday, a judge looked at additional evidence in a 1998 case. Terence Richardson appeared in court in person, seeking exoneration.
He is one of the so-called "Waverly Two" and serving a life sentence connected to the shooting death of Sussex County Police Officer Allen Gibson, Jr., although a jury found him not guilty.
The people who live in Waverly told News 3 that not much has changed in the town over the past quarter-century since Gibson was killed.
Many still remember that day — April 25, 1998.
Court documents report that Gibson, 25, followed two men into the woods behind the Waverly Village Apartments to confront them about a drug deal when they shot him with his service weapon. A 2022 court filing entered in the Court of Appeals reports that Gibson gave a corporal with the Sussex County Sheriff's Office a loose description of the pair before he died.
A trooper, during a preliminary hearing, claimed Gibson described the men as "two black males," and said one was of medium build and balding and the other tall and skinny.
Some people in Waverly told News 3 they remember that at the time most people wanted to get the case solved, but they didn't remember how police narrowed in on their suspects.
The day after the shooting, police arrested Terence Richardson. Days later police arrested Ferrone Claiborne.
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That's when the case got complicated.
Richardson pleaded guilty to involuntary manslaughter and Claiborne pleaded guilty to accessory after the fact. Then federal prosecutors took the case to trial — the men faced charges of drug trafficking in connection to Gibson's death.
The jury determined there wasn't enough evidence to convict the men of murder, but did find them guilty of the drug crimes. In an unusual move, the judge in the case looked to the prior guilty pleas in order to sentence them to life.
Both men have since said they're not guilty of killing Gibson.
Richardson's attorney argued Richardson made the plea in the state case because the death penalty was on the table.
At the hearing Wednesday, the discussion circled around several pieces of evidence, including a 1998 witness statement from a then 9-year-old, a 911 call and an identification made from a photo lineup.
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Richardson's attorneys claim all of this evidence describes a different man who carried out the murder.
Richardson's former defense attorney David Boone testified that he didn't recall seeing these documents mixed in with those he received from the "open file policy" in the late '90s when he was working the case.
Jarrett Adams, Richardson's current attorney, claimed the case appears to be one of "hidden evidence."
Still, the judge wanted to know whether and what people knew about the latest evidence and if it was or was not present in the files in 1998. The woman who had been 9 years old at the time of Gibson's death testified she didn't remember making a statement to police and didn't remember the incident at all.
The hearing's expected to last through Thursday.
