Ten years after his toddler died in a hot car, a Georgian father was freed from prison; the case gained international attention when the prosecution charged him with murder.
According to Georgia Department of Corrections records, Justin Ross Harris was released from the Macon State Prison on Sunday, Father’s Day. His sentence was served by Dec. 6, 2016.
In 2012, Harris relocated to the Atlanta region in pursuit of employment from Tuscaloosa, Alabama. He admitted to authorities that he neglected to drop off his 22-month-old son Cooper to daycare on the morning of June 18, 2014. Rather, he told detectives, he left the infant in his car seat and drove directly to his job as a web developer for The Home Depot.
In suburban Atlanta, Cooper passed away after spending roughly seven hours in the rear seat of his father’s Hyundai Tucson SUV. The day’s temperature had at least risen into the upper eighties.
Prosecutors conjectured during the trial that Harris killed his son in order to end his marriage because he was unhappy there.
They provided proof of his extramarital sex practices, such as meeting several ladies and girls for sex and exchanging obscene images and messages with them.
In November 2016, Harris was convicted guilty on eight charges, including murder with malice. For further offenses, a judge also sentenced him to 32 years more in prison and life without the possibility of parole.
However, the Georgia Supreme Court declared that the jury had seen information that was “extremely and unfairly prejudicial” and ruled 6-3 to reverse his murder and child cruelty convictions in June 2022.
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At the time, the prosecution declared that he would not be tried again in connection with Cooper’s passing. In a statement, the Cobb County district attorney’s office, which handled the case’s prosecution, expressed disagreement with the majority’s ruling.
Prosecutors, however, claimed that they could no longer use vital evidence on Harris’ motivation as a result of the ruling. Attorneys for Harris have consistently argued that the boy’s death was a terrible accident and that Harris was a loving father.
The state Supreme Court maintained Harris’ convictions for three sex crimes against a sixteen-year-old girl, although dismissing the murder conviction.
Harris had not filed an appeal for any of these convictions. He was freed from prison on Sunday after serving his whole sentence for those offenses.
The case of Harris garnered remarkable attention, generating global headlines and igniting discussions on websites and TV news programs.
Relocating the trial to Brunswick, Georgia’s coast was agreed upon by the presiding judge, who realized that the trial in Cobb County, suburban Atlanta, would be more difficult to find an impartial jury due to the pretrial publicity.
