Could You Help Identify This Suspect?

This is a scanned copy of an actual police department poster used in Alexandria, Virginia, in February of 2010, and which led to the incarceration of Ashley Jefferson Grissette, currently serving an 18-year sentence in St. Bride's Correctional Center in Chesapeake (see an earlier blog about him). While no copy may be as good as an original, I can assure you that what you see here is as clear as the original copy I scanned at Kinko's last week.

There are two serious problems with this case. First, the images caught on surveillance camera are obviously not clear enough to identify the suspect with any certainty. When shown the images, Grissette's probation officer admitted it could be him, and a resulting affidavit states that his PO made a positive identification, but Grissette steadfastly insists he is innocent and has tried in vain to appeal his case.

The second problem is that Grissette's court appointed attorney urged him to accept a plea deal rather than have the case go to trial and have him risk an getting an even longer sentence. Under pressure to accept the plea, he never imagined it would cost him a decade and a half of his life.

Grissette admits to having committed a variety of crimes as a youth and young adult, for which he served a significant amount of time in prison, but had since held down a good job and was dramatically turning his life around at the time he was apprehended.

And then this.

He has no family support, so he especially appreciates mail:

Ashley Jefferson Grissette 1143033
St. Brides Correctional Center
701 Sanderson Road
P.O. Box 16482
Chesapeake, VA 23328

Read his story, "I Have Been Dealt an Extreme Hand of Injustice."