Their Charges Were Dismissed, But These Two Men Are Not Free

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Update: The N.C Supreme Court denied on Tuesday a motion to dismiss a stay keeping Rayshawn Banner and Nathaniel Cauthen in prison. Justices Richard Dietz, Allison Riggs and Anita Earls dissented. The ruling means that the two men will remain imprisoned while prosecutors appeal a judge’s decision exonerating them and two others in the 2002 murder of NBA star Chris Paul’s grandfather, a process that could take several years.

Teresa Ingram keeps two bedrooms empty in her Winston-Salem house, hopeful that one day her sons will return home. 

On August 8, Ingram received the phone call she had been awaiting for more than two decades. She scrambled to buy air mattresses, shoes, and underwear. She prepared to take the next month off from work to spend time with her sons, Nathaniel Cauthen and Rayshawn Banner, who have been in prison since they were teenagers. 

Superior Court Judge Robert Broadie, citing newly discovered evidence and a key witness’ recantation, dismissed all charges against Cauthen and Banner “with prejudice”—meaning the men would be set free and could not be retried. The ruling came months after Broadie presided over a three-week evidentiary hearing last January.

But within days, the state of North Carolina moved to block Banner’s and Cauthen’s release, thrusting their case into a legal standoff that could take years to resolve. 

“It went from reaching the heavens to falling all the way back down to the ground,” Ingram said in a phone interview. “And it is a hard drop.” 

Banner and Cauthen, now 37 and 39 respectively, were two of five Winston-Salem teenagers convicted in the 2002 murder of NBA star Chris Paul’s grandfather, Nathaniel Jones. Four are living; one died in 2019. 

After Broadie’s August decision, the state requested a temporary stay, which prevented Banner’s and Cauthen’s release. The N.C. Court of Appeals denied the state’s request on September 30, affirming the men’s exonerations. 

Just as Banner and Cauthen eagerly packed up their bags for a second time, the state blocked their exonerations again through an emergency petition to the N.C. Supreme Court. It ruled October 15 to keep the men behind bars until the Court of Appeals reviews the merits of the case. 

Three Supreme Court justices dissented, stating that the appellate court acted within its discretion to deny the state’s request for a stay. “Every moment that these defendants are imprisoned when they should be freed is an irreparable harm,” Justice Allison Riggs wrote in her dissent.  

It could be years before the legal maneuvering plays out. “It’s frustrating that we’ve got to go through it and continue to go through it,” Banner said in a phone interview from prison. 

On December 3, attorneys for all four men filed a motion asking the state Supreme Court to dismiss the stay. 

Two of the “Winston-Salem Five,” Christopher Bryant and Jermal Tolliver, were released from prison in 2017 after completing their sentences for second-degree murder. Dorrell Brayboy was released a year later and was murdered in 2019. Banner and Cauthen, convicted of first-degree murder, are serving life sentences. 

“It went from reaching the heavens to falling all the way back down to the ground. And it is a hard drop.” 

Teresa Ingram, mother of Nathaniel Cauthen and Rayshawn Banner

The five men had maintained their innocence for decades, claiming their initial confessions were coerced. In 2020, the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission reviewed the case and found sufficient evidence of factual innocence. The commission referred the case to a three-judge panel, which upheld the defendants’ convictions in 2022. 

A prosecutor with N.C. Attorney General Jeff Jackson’s office wrote in the August emergency petition that the state is acting “out of an abundance of caution” about releasing Banner and Cauthen. The petition states that the men were convicted by a jury of their peers and that the decision was upheld by the 2022 court decision. 

A dismissal with prejudice, which permanently closes a case, is a rare remedy. The state argued in its petition that it has the right to appeal Broadie’s decision. 

“That a single superior court, more than twenty years after the Defendants’ convictions were obtained, could vacate those convictions and award unconditional release without any opportunity for the State to seek appellate review is unprecedented and would be perilous for our criminal justice system,” the petition said. 

Jackson’s office declined further comment.

Neither Paul nor other members of Jones’ family could be reached for comment. Paul grew up in the Winston-Salem area, starred at Wake Forest University, and had a stellar 20-year NBA career. He was recently released by the Los Angeles Clippers and had previously announced that he would retire at the end of this season.

Paul has not made any public statements about recent developments in the case. In his 2023 memoir, Sixty-One: Life Lessons from Papa, On and Off the Court, Paul said he still believed the men were guilty but was conflicted about their lengthy sentences. His family has also said they believe the men committed the crime.

‘This Should Be Over’ 

When Broadie dismissed the charges in August, Banner and Cauthen packed their bags, gave away their food and few belongings, and waited for a release that never came. 

The prison had everything in place for the men to leave once again after the Court of Appeals denied the state’s request for a stay in late September. The following day, the state filed the emergency petition to block their release, forcing Banner, as he put it, to “start back from scratch.” 

“They went down to receiving because they were told they were being picked up to go home, and then they were told, ‘Sorry, just kidding, go back to your cell,’ and they had already given all their things away,” said Christine Mumma, the attorney representing both Banner and Cauthen. 

Cauthen said he was looking forward to reuniting with his brother, who has been held in a separate prison for the past two decades. They’ve only seen each other in court, and January’s evidentiary hearing was the first time in years that they were able to embrace. 

“Me and my little brother should be at home right now, and this should be over with,” Cauthen said in a phone interview from prison. 

The brothers occasionally talk by phone when they manage to both call their mother at the same time and she can connect the lines. But, they said, they miss the relationship they had growing up. 

Ingram said the family was extremely close when the boys were young, including her oldest son, Joseph Cauthen, who is now 43. When the boys were teenagers, she left her shifts at Bojangles to meet them at the recreation center and took her sons to Bible study several times a week. With extended family nearby, the boys always had someone looking out for them. 

“That a single superior court, more than twenty years after the Defendants’ convictions were obtained, could vacate those convictions and award unconditional release without any opportunity for the State to seek appellate review is unprecedented and would be perilous for our criminal justice system.”

emergency petition from the state

“They came from a structured home,” Ingram said. “They came from people that love them. They had a support system.” 

When her sons were first held in a Morganton facility after their convictions, Ingram visited them twice a week, as often as the prison allowed. Banner and Cauthen were later split up and shuffled between prisons throughout the next decade, and Ingram drove up to eight hours round trip each week to visit her sons, depending on where in the state they were. 

Ingram and her sons, separated by glass, would put their hands up to each other’s at the end of the visits. Before departing on the long drive home, Ingram would sit in the parking lot and cry. 

“The visits were always nice,” Ingram said through tears. “It was just that when I had to leave, and I can’t say whether it was hard on them, but I can certainly tell you, it was certainly hard on me.” 

Currently, Cauthen is held in Pender Correctional Institution in Burgaw, which is in southeastern North Carolina—the opposite side of the state from his brother, who is 340 miles away in Mountain View Correctional Institution in Spruce Pine. 

Ingram speaks with Banner twice per week, which is as often as the prison allows. Cauthen’s prison has fewer restrictions, and he stays on the phone with her each night until it cuts off at 10 p.m. In recent years, Ingram has been able to see her sons at their court appearances in Forsyth County. 

When Ingram scrambled to prepare for her sons’ homecoming, only for the state to block their release, she said it felt like the world was crumbling around her. But, she said, she’s tried to stay strong for her sons. 

“Somebody has got to be mad, somebody has got to be angry, and I’m going to be that person,” Ingram said. 

Recanted Testimony 

Broadie vacated the charges based on newly discovered evidence and his finding that Cauthen and Banner had ineffective counsel at trial. That evidence includes a key witness recanting her prior testimony and new research that explains why the teenagers might have falsely confessed. 

When the five boys were accused at ages 14 and 15, the state brought in one witness: Jessicah Black, a 16-year-old white girl who was with them at the time of the murder. At the jury trials, Black testified that she drove the boys near Jones’ house and heard them yell at Jones as they beat him to death. 

She now says that was all a lie. 

At the January evidentiary hearing, Black said that the officers who initially questioned her said she would go to prison as an accessory to murder if she didn’t testify for the state, and she had to repeatedly alter her story to match what they wanted her to say. She testified that officers lied to her that Jones’ blood was in her car. 

“Everything I said to them had to be changed, time and time again,” Black said at the January hearing. “And then once they would stop asking me about certain things, I made the assumption that I got it right, I finally got it right.” 

Black first recanted her witness testimony to a Houston Chronicle journalist in 2019, and she has repeated her statement under oath several times since then. 

Broadie found her recantation to be credible, and it was part of his decision to vacate the charges with prejudice. 

“There is reasonable probability that but for the admission of Ms. Black’s false testimony, a different result would have been reached at the Defendants’ trials,” Broadie wrote. 

Northeastern University Professor of Law Daniel Medwed, who wrote the 2022 book Barred: Why the Innocent Can’t Get Out of Prison, said courts tend to view recantations with caution.

“Often recantation cases are ones that prosecutors are skeptical of because they think maybe someone got to the witness, and maybe the witness is feeling intimidated, or maybe they, for whatever reason, begin to doubt the credibility of that witness now,” Medwed said. 

Mumma said Black had no external motivation to recant. 

“Her life has been hell since she recanted,” Mumma said. “She’s gotten death threats; she’s had health issues because of the stress. There is no benefit.” 

Black could not be reached for comment. She told The Assembly in August she was happy the men were going to be released but is haunted by her role in their convictions.

“There is reasonable probability that but for the admission of Ms. Black’s false testimony, a different result would have been reached at the Defendants’ trials.” 

Superior Court Judge Robert Broadie

Broadie also ruled that new psychological research on false confessions, published after the 2004 trials, qualifies as newly discovered evidence. Studies now show that prolonged detention and isolation, as well as mental impairment, can lead teenagers to falsely confess. 

The boys didn’t have parents or attorneys present during their initial questioning and were in the police station for more than eight hours before their taped confession statement, experiencing hours of isolation and intermittent interrogations that weren’t recorded. An expert asked to review the case testified in January that the defendants were mentally disabled and had low IQs, according to their school reports. 

Broadie also determined ineffective assistance of counsel, stating the trial attorneys failed to investigate the defendants’ intellectual disabilities. This means the attorneys didn’t use evidence of cognitive impairment to explain the voluntary confessions. 

The men testified at the evidentiary hearing that they thought they could go home if they said what the officers wanted them to say. 

“You don’t isolate a child like that,” Cauthen said of his interrogation. “You don’t do that. That is a child; that is somebody’s child.” 

The state’s petition to block Broadie’s dismissal of the charges argues that a new trial is the proper remedy for recantation evidence and ineffective assistance of counsel, rather than the dismissal of charges. 

Banner welcomes the idea of a retrial. “Since I was 14, I’ve been telling them I didn’t do it,” he said. 

In a recent court filing, lawyers for the four men said the men were willing to be retried if it meant Cauthen and Banner would be released in the meantime. But the lawyers said the attorney general’s office nixed the offer. 

Additional evidence presented at the January hearing showed that the DNA at the crime scene doesn’t match any of the defendants, and Broadie ruled that this evidence contradicts the state’s case at the jury trial. The DNA profiles were developed using testing kits made available after 2015 and thus counted as newly discovered evidence, Broadie ruled. 

Preference for Jury Verdicts

Joseph Hyde, a former special deputy attorney general, said post-conviction release is designed to be difficult to obtain, and post-conviction appeals are often dismissed or denied. 

“The case law recognizes such a strong preference for jury verdicts,” said Hyde, who is now an assistant professor in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s School of Government. “Once the jury has made factual determinations of guilt, that is a pretty hard stop.”

But reversing a conviction in North Carolina has been done before. Since 1989, 78 people convicted of crimes have been exonerated after serving an average of 12.6 years in prison, according to the National Registry of Exonerations. Of those exonerations, 13 included false confessions.

Several of the 78 were dismissed with prejudice. Darryl Hunt was convicted of murder in Winston-Salem at the age of 19 and released almost 20 years later in 2004—10 years after new DNA evidence linked another man to the crime. A Superior Court judge dismissed Hunt’s charges with prejudice, releasing Hunt and ensuring he could never be tried again. 

“The state made this big deal about the [Jones] case being dismissed with prejudice, like saying it’s never been done before, which is baloney,” Mumma said.

Forsyth County District Attorney Jim O’Neill told the Winston-Salem Journal in August that he was shocked by Broadie’s ruling and that the attorney general’s office agreed to work with local prosecutors to uphold the convictions. O’Neill could not be reached for comment. 

The state Constitution establishes the attorney general as independent from each county’s district attorney, with each officer independently elected. 

If they’re eventually released, Banner and Cauthen both said they want to use their platforms to advocate against injustice in the legal system, especially for wrongfully convicted people. 

“The quicker I get out, the quicker I can be a voice for them,” Banner said. 

There’s no set timeline for how the appeals process will move forward. The state will file a petition with the Court of Appeals early next year, asking it to review Broadie’s ruling, and depending on what happens, the case could end up at the state Supreme Court. Mumma thinks it could be at least two years before the appeal is final. 

While they wait, Cauthen reads and plays chess to occupy his mind while staying up to date on the legal filings in his case. Banner stays busy with his job as a supply clerk and plays basketball. They both check in with their mother every week. 

“I’m just waiting for the storm to pass through,” Banner said. 

Michael Hewlett contributed. A version of this article was published previously by the Media Hub at UNC-Chapel Hill’s Hussman School of Journalism and Media.