Nick Hillary has been found innocent despite being the prime suspect in the Garrett Phillips case. Hillary previously coached football.
Potsdam football coach Nick Hillary received a summons to the police station on October 26, 2011. Garrett Phillips, 12, had been found strangled and dead two days earlier.
As Hillary had dated the boy’s mother’s ex, she was considered a suspect. After being detained by police for several hours, Hillary was subjected to a strip search, and his car and phone were also confiscated.
The police chief later admitted that no one else had been strip searched there in the previous 20 years. Another ex-boyfriend of the boy’s mother, Deputy Sheriff John Jones, has not been arrested.
Nick Hillary
What happened to Nick Hillary?
Former college football coach Nick Hillary was today cleared of the murder of his ex-son, 12-year-old girlfriend Garrett Phillips. Felix Catena, the judge’s girlfriend, decided accordingly.
Hillary waived her right to a jury trial and requested a bench trial. Aaron Collins, Garrett’s younger brother, cried violently after the court announced its decision, and Tandy Cyrus, Garrett’s mother, also broke down in tears.
After the verdict was announced, Hillary hugged her lawyers before leaving the courtroom. The prosecution is doing unstable DNA analysis work relying on a single negligible DNA sample.
Since Oral “Nick” Hillary was first detained by police in Potsdam, New York, in connection with the murder of Garrett Phillips, more than ten years have passed.
After a trial that gripped the city and attracted widespread media coverage, Hillary was finally found not guilty. On Monday in Albany, the trial in his civil rights action against the Potsdam police will finally open.
Previews on Nick Hillary Age and Wikipedia
Potsdam’s football coach was Nick Hillary. Hillary was born in Jamaica, but he and his family emigrated to the United States in 1990 when he was just a child.
He graduated from Brooklyn High School, served in the military, and then captained the national champion football team at St. Lawrence University in 1999.
In a 2016 St. Lawrence County Court trial without a jury, he was cleared of all charges related to the murder. However, his story generated a lot of interest and was the subject of the HBO documentary “Who Killed Garrett Phillips?”
Hillary was found not guilty after that tense and dramatic trial in 2016. There is still no concrete evidence from police linking Hillary to the crime scene.
Hillary and her attorneys, Brett Klein of Manhattan and Mani Tafari of Long Island, claimed Hillary was unlawfully detained by police on October 26, 2011.
Nick Hillary: Who Killed the Garrett Phillips Update?
The next problem to solve is who killed Garrett Phillips once Nick Hillary established his innocence.
Fourth Amendment protections against unlawful search and seizure were tested, and the jury was challenged to decide whether Hillary’s incarceration was lawful.
Unlike criminal trials, where juries must find a person guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, civil trials require juries to return a verdict based on the preponderance of the evidence.
In his closing remarks on Thursday, Gregg T. Johnson, the Clifton Park attorney representing the city and the police, said there was reason to believe Hillary was responsible for the child’s death.
Johnson accused Hillary of lying to police, acting evasive and withholding key details, including her daughter’s name. Police believe the toddler’s killer jumped out of the window and injured his ankle.
