Should robbing and attempting to rob two Family Dollar stores be what is almost a life sentence? It is for James Graham, a 64-year-old Milwaukee man who has been imprisoned for 23 years, has 14 more to serve, and who is seeking a commutation. The court file makes it far from clear that the inmate actually did one of the crimes. (An eyewitness initially said the robber was 240 pounds. Graham was 170. And there was no forensic evidence in that case. One robber was lefthanded, the other right.) What if the defendant’s Christian religious beliefs were held against him at sentencing? The judge now facilitates dream groups and is long retired.
A month after Gov. Tony Evers an his nnouncedew commutation scheme, I asked the Milwaukee County District Attorney’s office for the list of people who applied. You can’t go through Evers’ office. The process is shrouded in secrecy, and critics expect him to fast-track releases after November on a level this state has never seen. After all, he’s already pardoned a record number of people, but those come after conviction. Commutations are another thing altogether; they occur while a person is still serving his or her time. They aren’t old law paroles. Those are done by a gubernatorial appointee and only inmates sentenced before 2000 qualify for them. Every inmate in the system, save for sex offenders and people who abused children, qualify for commutation.
Governors have always had commutation authority in Wisconsin; it’s just that they, including Evers (until now) had almost never used it in modern times. You have to go back to Tommy Thompson, and he only commuted seven sentences in 14 years. Evers’ guidelines showcase his expansive philosophy; even homicide lifers can now apply for release after 20 years, including cop killers, and almost everyone else can try after serving 50% of their time. Evers’ office didn’t even bother to respond when asked for a list of applicants; his office told a victim’s family in the Fox Valley that none exists even though applications are flowing into DA offices around the state (which can’t stop the releases anyway). Victims’ family members are already complaining about problems with notification. The governor baked a loophole into his executive order that allows him to skip the new board he created, and fast track the cases right to his desk.
Amid this broader context, I received a response from the Milwaukee County DA’s office and started going through the names and court cases; 28 of the 55 Milwaukee County commutation applicants (as of May) were convicted killers, and some of the cases were the worst you could imagine, including a woman who shot and killed a pregnant romantic rival, slaying both the woman and the unborn child. Why put the victims’ families through this, so many years later, injecting new uncertainty into a process they thought was said and done, backed up by the promise of truth in sentencing? Legislators erupted against it.
We focused on the killers at first because the rest of the media likely will not. They’re too busy writing about the other side, framing prison release through the lens of “mass incarceration” and alleged racism, and ignoring the stories of victims. Wisconsin Right Now exists to tell you the stories the media won’t, not to reinforce their narratives.
However, my fidelity is to the truth and justice, and that brings me to James Graham and Derek Williams. While going through the Milwaukee County list, amid the killers, these two cases jumped out at me. Both are armed robbery cases. Both men have served decades behind bars, and neither caused anyone physical harm. There’s not much argument that they deserved significant time (even Williams acknowledged this in an interview), but how much is enough? Graham is serving a 41 year prison sentence that was reduced to 38 years. He will be 78 when he gets out.
I stumbled upon a Change.org petition posted by Graham’s daughter, Lakusha Bush, whom I haven’t been able to reach. It has more than 1,000 signatures, but she posted it about five years ago.
“Help Me Free My Father, Pastor James Graham,” it starts. “I am reaching out to ask for your support in the fight to free my father, Pastor James Graham. In 2003, my father was sentenced to 46 years in prison for two counts of Strong Armed Robbery, a Class B felony. While I understand that actions have consequences, this sentence is excessively harsh compared to many others who have committed far worse crimes.”
Could this be true, I wondered, and court records soon revealed that Graham was convicted of an armed robbery and attempted robbery of Family Dollar stores. No one was injured physically. The robber had a gun, but he didn’t fire it, and it was inoperable, at least in one. Does it really benefit society to keep a man locked up for most of his natural life for trying to stick up two Family Dollars? I mean, that’s not a good thing to do obviously, so he needed some time, but should society throw his life away?
Court records indicate that Judge Jean DiMotto gave Graham 41 years, not 46 as Bush wrote, and a later judge shaved a couple years off of it, but that’s not much better as he was 41 at the time. Graham was sentenced after truth-in-sentencing, so he doesn’t have any chance for parole at all.
The original sentence would have him sit until he’s 82. His mandatory release date today would keep him incarcerated to age 78. His application for commutation is now pending. I asked the Milwaukee DA’s office for their opinion on his case, but they are still reviewing it. The DA is short-staffed and, as with other prosecutors’ offices in the state, they are starting to be deluged with commutation requests since Evers’ April executive orders reignited the process.
“My father is not a bad person he is a father of 9 children and a grandfather to 20 grandchildren. Like many others in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, he struggled in an environment that offers little opportunity and guidance for Black men,” Bush continued. “…During his 18 years in the prison system, my father has transformed his life. He is now a pastor, preacher, and teacher. He has earned doctoral degrees in ministry and arts and works tirelessly to counsel and guide his fellow inmates. He is a model of rehabilitation and someone who has taken full responsibility for his actions and emerged stronger, wiser, and ready to give back to his family and community. Please pray for his release and help us fight for justice.” Prison records bear this out.
The daughter’s words stayed with me. And they nagged at me. In fact, Graham’s case kept me up late at night. If I didn’t listen, who would? The system is a cold, expensive, and non-empathetic place, and what if it got something wrong? It struck me that this is exactly what the commutation system is for: Not an escape valve for prison crowding or a fix for the grievances of the far ago past. But to correct a true injustice – the few cases where the judge just didn’t get it right. The judge in this case was Jean DiMotto, now retired and facilitating dream groups in her spare time. She is a nurse married to another judge, the latter regarded as one of the most brilliant legal minds in the courthouse ever. She didn’t have that reputation.
This is a dangerous slope to go down, of course. Do we really want a single politician to undo a judge’s judgment decades later based on a cold read of a file versus body language in court, and so on? Yet judges and prosecutors are human beings, the system is built on the judgement of people, and I don’t believe that anyone would argue that human beings always get everything right. If I were governor, I would fall somewhere in between Scott Walker’s no-pardons-and-commutations-ever policy and Tony Evers naming a Parole Commission chairman who freed some of the most sadistic killers in state history (and if you think that’s hyperbole, google Terrance Shaw and Randolph Whiting, because I assure you it is not.) I’d probably be like Tommy Thompson, using commutation authority but extremely sparingly, and saving it for a man like James Graham or Derek Williams.
While I was thinking about Graham, I received an email from a woman named Rikki Williams. She had read my 28 killers story. Rikki is an empathetic ball of fire who monitors supervised child custody visits for the system, and she implored me to look into the case of her husband, Derek Williams. That was interesting because his case was already one I had flagged in my own mind, although to a lesser degree than Graham’s because, although he also was convicted for armed robberies, there were more of them. Still, Derek was very young at the time. Still, the length of his sentence seemed off.
“As someone sentenced under Wisconsin’s ‘old law,’ my husband originally received an extremely harsh 180-year sentence in a case where no one was hurt or killed. Even today, many individuals convicted of rape or homicide do not receive sentences of that magnitude,” Rikki said.
She’s right about that, and, under Evers’ appointee, many sadistic murderers were released early.
“In 2023, however, he was granted a sentence modification after saving the life of a correctional officer in 2019. His sentence was reduced from 180 years to 90 years, and he became eligible for parole in 2020,” she continued. “Despite this, he remains incarcerated and continues to be trapped in what many consider to be a deeply broken and outdated parole system.”
This is true, records show. Williams valiantly saved the life of a guard. The system then decided he’d served enough time and gave him a chance for parole. Yet, six years later, he sits because the parole commission chairman wants to see progress on work release but the prison warden won’t give him it. And a co-actor is still serving 180. He’s coming up for parole again this summer. Unlike Graham, Williams qualifies for parole because he’s an old law case before truth-in-sentencing, but there’s no requirement that the parole board grant it. And Williams has had bad timing; paroles ground to a near halt after the public learned that Evers’ parole commission chairman, who resigned, had freed some of the state’s worst killers. He may have been caught in that shuffle.
“I believe his story raises serious questions about sentencing disparities, rehabilitation, second chances, and the reality of parole for individuals sentenced under the old law system. I would welcome the opportunity to discuss this further with you,” Rikki added.
Why are brutal killers being freed, but armed robbers sit for 40 years, until they’re old men? Are those really cases where society should throw away a person forever? What if they had a prior record? What if they committed 12 robberies, not two? These are complicated questions not easily answered with slogans. I’m not going to tell you what to think. However, I have an obligation to bring you the other end of the spectrum.
I scoured court records and transcripts. I also met with Rikki and spoke to Williams by phone. In the next few days, I will tell you Williams’ story. First, though, here is what the voluminous court file says about James Graham.
James Graham
Graham was convicted after a jury trial in 2003, on a count of robbery with threat of force and use of a dangerous weapon and a second count of robbery with threat of force with use of a dangerous weapon. The judge was Jean DiMotto. He’s served 23 years in prison. The armed robberies were at Family Dollars in Cudahy and West Milwaukee and one was only an attempt. They occurred on October 16 and October 22, 2002.
There was strong evidence that Graham was the suspect in the completed robbery, and he later admitted to this while in prison.
A victim told the jury that the suspect came up to her when she was throwing stock “and showed me a gun and he wanted to know where the money was.” She pointed out Graham as the robber in court. Police had her sit in a car and look at three men sitting on a lawn, and she picked Graham out as the robber. Then they took her to a formal lineup, and she picked him out again.
Graham was identified as a suspect when police stopped a car while responding to the the robbery report. The men inside said they were going to apply for jobs. Police found a sweatshirt with a stain similar to one described by a witness and a gun. The men had worked on a neighbor’s porch that day. Multiple eyewitnesses identified Graham in this case.
The store manager from the second robbery attempt said the suspect pulled out a gun and said, “Give me all the money.” He was brought to a suburban police department to meet with a police sketch artist and “they had a book of what facial features that he should draw, and I gave him the facial features to put together.”
The two police departments compared notes on the suspects, and the composite sketch from the one was compared to Graham because he was arrested in first. That’s how he came to be identified as a suspect in attempted robbery #2. An officer compared the sketch to Graham and decided that it was consistent with him and a second man in the car from the first robbery. He then brought the witness to a lineup with Grahamin it.
However, in the second robbery attempt, a second witness did not pick Graham out. Another woman couldn’t see the robber’s face. However, the manager later picked Graham out of a lineup. Officers couldn’t get fingerprints and there was no surveillance video.
The defense attorney, Joel Rosenthal, said in his closing that Graham was misidentified because the manager said the suspect was 6 foot and 240 pounds but then testified that he was 130 to 150, which is 110 pounds less. Graham was 5 foot 9 and weighed 170 pounds. Rosenthal said the October 24 robber was right handed and the October 16 robber appeared to be left-handed. “All you have from the Oct. 16 incident is one witness whose descriptions vary by 110 pounds. There’s nothing else. No scientific evidence. The only black witness… couldn’t pick him out.”
He added, “You can’t make him into a 240-pound 6 footer (as one witness testified), and you can’t make him into a right handed robber (as another witness said).”
The Judge Slams James Graham
The judge slammed Graham and gave him a rocket ride. The sentencing transcript makes it clear that his refusal to participate in a presentence investigation was part of the reason why. That’s a routine process, in which defendants’ backgrounds are documented and presented to sentencing judges. However, the transcript also reveals that DiMotto made some odd comments about Graham’s Christian religious beliefs.
Court documents say that an agent was assigned to conduct the presentence investigation and met Graham at the House of Correction. He initially agreed to participate. He told the agent “that he had been wrongly convicted and pointed out the contradictions which should have led to his acquittal. He explained that he was unwilling to take responsibility for these crimes as he didn’t commit the robberies.”
Now this is where it gets complicated. Judges don’t like it when defendants don’t express remorse, but what if they really didn’t do it? In the case of Graham, he would later admit to one of the robberies, but he has steadfastly denied he attempted the second, and there’s evidence that he might not be lying.
And this is when James Graham started talking about God. “He said he’s been found guilty by a court of man,” said DiMotto in the transcripts. “I am sure he meant people but that’s meaningless because he’s a man of God and noted that judgement alone rests with God and not with man. Again, I’m assuming he’s using that word to refer to human beings of either gender.” DiMotto then said that Graham “then stated that it was apparent that the agent did not have God in her life as the agent was concluding based on his conviction that he was guilty.” He said he was a deacon.
The agent told him the purpose of the interview was not to debate religion but to collect pertinent information for the court.
Graham responded, “I’m sorry you don’t have God in your life.” He was advised that if he continued to direct religious comments to the agent, the interview would be terminated.
He started talking about the fear of God anyway and terminated the interview. The agent returned five days later and reiterated to Graham that the purpose of a presentence investigation was “not a religious debate.” But Graham said he did not want to participate in the interview anymore, noting that he didn’t feel it would benefit him.
DiMotto pointed out that Graham, then 41, was encouraged by the agent to participate in the interview “absenting from any religious commentary” but Graham reiterated that he didn’t feel it would be beneficial, so the interview was terminated. The agent noted that Graham was “at both times polite and remained or had a positive attitude but that the first meeting was terminated due to his religious rhetoric and the second because he elected not to participate.”
Jonathan LaVoy, Graham’s defense attorney, told the judge that Graham accused the agent of using a “very negative tone with him and made comments to Mr. Graham that he was a menace to society and that, at that point, he became concerned that the agent may not be taking into account his best interests and that’s why he terminated his cooperation. I believe the first he was cooperating. I believe it was terminated at the agent’s request because of the religious rhetoric.”
Someone anonymously sent the court a reprint of a 2002 Milwaukee Journal Sentinel article that seemed designed to highlight the fact that other armed robbers were hitting Family Dollars around the same time.
The assistant DA, Jennifer Rypel, recommended 30 years behind bars on count one and 15 on count two, to run consecutively, plus 15 more years of extended supervision in the community. But, as Graham was 41 already, that would keep him in prison until age 86, if he lived that long – essentially a life sentence WITHOUT THE POSSIBILITY OF PAROLE because, three years before Graham was sentenced, Wisconsin eliminated parole. While this created certainty for victims and their families, it also meant that, if the judge adopted Rypel’s sentence, James Graham would likely die behind bars for robbing a Family Dollar and trying to rob a second one, heists in which no one was physically injured. She came close, giving him 41 years confinement time.
“I think that our community believes that this is one of the worst kind of crimes that can be committed, an armed robbery,” Rypel said. Witness Phaedra Allen said it is “forever burned into her memory.” The prosecutor called it “a crime of greed.” She said Graham was “not remorseful for his involvement in these charges. The defendant has a right to a trial; he doesn’t have a right to lie.”
Rypel said the jury deliberated for only a half hour, adding, “what troubled me even more about the defense that was presented is the way that Mr. Graham I think tried to get the jury to sympathize with him by using religion.”
She then ticked off Graham’s prior record. He was convicted of misdemeanor battery, party to a crime, 11 years before and received probation. A victim was beaten unconscious by Graham and other men. He had a prior felony for dealing cocaine from nine years before. He was arrested on an ordinance violation with 14 grams of crack cocaine in his pocket. He indicated he had been selling cocaine for “two months to support his family. He was using drugs for about 10 years and selling mainly because of the financial situation.” In 1994, he was sentenced for a drug offense and received parole. He had two operating after revocation cases. He was convicted of disorderly conduct and resisting. In 1999, officers were dispatched to see him yelling and “waving his arms trying to provoke a fight with another male and a crowd began to gather.” He pushed an officer and yelled and resisted.
The prosecutor said she didn’t think Graham would change. A victim told the court, “I’ve gone through emotional torment. When people are walking behind me around campus or sitting near me on the bus, I get frightened that someone will pull a gun on me. I could be more mentally at rest if he received the maximum extent allowable for his crime.”
LaVoy, the defense attorney, asked for 10 years confinement, saying that sentencing guidelines put Graham “in the medium risk assessment and intermediate category for offense severity,” which pointed to a sentence of 5-10 years.
Said LaVoy: “There were threats of force in this case. There was no actual force used. There were no physical injuries. Clearly, there was some psychological injuries that occurred to the victims…but I think it is important to note that there was actually no physical violence. There was no battery that occurred. There was no gunshots that occurred. And that’s important. There was no ski mask or mask on his face.” He said a relatively small amount of money was taken ($3,000). In the second robbery, an attempt, nothing was taken.
According to LaVoy, Graham was not in a gang and the gun was inoperable. “It just doesn’t make sense to me. I wracked my brains trying to figure out how this went so wrong for Mr. Graham,” said LaVoy. “His family is very very supportive. His wife has been by his side throughout the entire process and is a very nice sweet woman. They’ve been married 9 years and together 16.”
He added: “James has four biological kids, one in common with wife. His wife has five biological children. James is the father figure for all of these children; they all call him dad. Whether they’re his biological child or not, he’s been a provider for the family his entire life. He’s always had food on the table and always been supportive of his children.” He worked as a carpenter.
“Mr. Graham is very religious. He uses religion in every day conversation,” said LaVoy. “I don’t think this was a ploy to try to get sympathy from the jury. I think that’s just the way he is. Whether we agree with his sort of way that he preaches and those types of things, that’s the way he is.” LaVoy said that Graham’s pastor said he was very involved in the church and it was a big part of his life.
Added the defense attorney “I think it is true that if the court follows the state’s recommendation for all intents and purposes it is a life in prison case and I just don’t think that’s appropriate.”
Graham’s wife, Charlotte, told the court, “He has been a provider for us and he has stepped in and took charge with my children. Our children need him. I need him. Our grandkids need him.” She told the court Graham was upset when a girl next door was killed by a stray bullet.
Graham told the court: “I do respect the decision here that was made through this whole ordeal, but I will continue maintaining my innocence for my rights purpose. I always been a man of God for quite a long time now. I’ve been responsible.” He said he organized marches to get guns off the street and marched with Martin Luther King Jr. He said he felt for the victim.
The judge said that the supreme court has determined that “next to murder and rape the most serious crime under the criminal code is armed robbery,” and added that one of the victims stopped working at the store. DiMotto accused Graham of being “in my view, a Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.” She charged that he “has demonstrated an unrelenting pattern of criminality for more than a decade…He is exactly precisely the type of man that this community needs to be protected from for a long, long time.”
DiMotto said she believed that Graham was “cloaking himself as he does in religion.” She gave him 41 years in prison with an extra 10 years of extended supervision. Even though that would make Graham 82 before he has a chance to get out, the judge claimed he was a “healthy well-developed gentleman” so it was not a death sentence.
A pastor said that Graham became “a role model for many young men seeking God; he won a lot of souls to Christ. Deacon Graham is an exceptional character.” He served in the church choir and was entrusted to make deposits at the bank. But the judge was not moved.
James Graham Today
Corrections records show that Graham admitted to the one robbery and said that drugs and drinking were an issue, and he was trying to make ends meet and take care of his family and he fell in with a bad crowd. He ended up making bad decisions. “I used to work dead end jobs,” he explained.
He wants to be free to be an “asset to the community… and no longer be a burden to the taxpayer.” He obtained a doctorate in biblical education in prison, the documents say, and he wants to open a church. DOC records document that he received a certificate in Bible study. He was described as having excellent conduct in prison although he had a few minor issues such as making longer phone calls than allowed.
He has repeatedly sought sentence modifications from the courts, all but one denied.
In 2020, the court reduced his sentence by about three years, But he is still serving time on the attempted robbery charge that is the weakest. Judge Jean Kies found that he had commendable conduct in prison. Afer that point, Corrections sought geriatric release for Graham, but hasn’t been successful.
Today he is 64 years old, still in prison, and has a mandatory release date of 12/21/2040. That’s 14 years from now, when he would be 78.
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