State v. Parker, 2013 Ohio 3177

In 2005 Parker was convicted after a bench trial of felonious assault and kidnapping and sentenced to consecutive 7-year terms (aggregate 14 years); this court affirmed on direct appeal.
In 2007 Parker moved for leave to file a delayed motion for new trial based on an affidavit by witness Amber Wilt partially recanting trial testimony; the trial court denied leave and this court affirmed in Parker II.
In 2010 Parker filed a petition for post-conviction relief asserting Wilt’s trial testimony was false and that three witnesses committed perjury to erase drug debts; the trial court dismissed and Parker did not appeal.
In 2012 Parker moved for leave to file a delayed petition for post-conviction relief, attaching new affidavits from Wilt and Brandy Matheny recanting their testimony and claiming they testified to eliminate drug debts.
The trial court dismissed the 2012 motion as untimely and successive under R.C. 2953.23(A)(1); Parker appealed, arguing the affidavits were newly discovered evidence and that an evidentiary hearing was required.
The appellate court affirmed: it applied res judicata to Wilt’s affidavit (previously rejected in Parker II), found Matheny’s affidavit inadequate to show unavoidable delay or prosecutorial knowledge of perjury, and held Parker failed to satisfy R.C. 2953.23(A)(1).

Issue	Plaintiff's Argument	Defendant's Argument	Held
Timeliness / Successive petition	Parker argued affidavits are new evidence justifying late, successive petition	Motion was untimely and successive under R.C. 2953.23(A)(1) but affidavits show new facts	Denied — petition barred absent satisfying both R.C. 2953.23(A)(1) conditions
Unavoidable delay standard	Affidavits prove he was unavoidably prevented from discovering recantations earlier	Delay due to incarceration and lack of contact suffices	Denied — affidavits do not show how evidence came to light or explain long delay; incarceration alone insufficient
Sufficiency of recantations as exculpatory evidence	Affidavits by Wilt and Matheny completely undermine trial testimony and exonerate Parker	Affidavits at best impeach credibility; do not fully exculpate or show constitutional error	Denied — statements are partial recantations or do not establish innocence; do not meet clear-and-convincing standard in R.C. 2953.23(A)(1)(b)
Need for evidentiary hearing	Parker requested an evidentiary hearing to present affidavits and witnesses	Trial court properly dismissed without hearing because statutory prerequisites were unmet	Denied — no hearing required when petitioner fails to satisfy R.C. 2953.23(A)(1) thresholds

State v. Parker, 178 Ohio App.3d 574 (Ohio Ct. App. 2008) (addressing Wilt affidavit, unavoidable-delay standard, and partial recantation analysis)