photo by: Kaylen Ortiz/Contributed Photo

Oliver "Ollie" Lynn Ortiz, pictured at 3 months old

The Douglas County District Attorney’s Office has reopened the investigation into an infant’s death in 2016 at a Eudora day care amid an ongoing wrongful-conviction lawsuit. The office claims there’s new evidence warranting a new investigation, but it has declined to provide any additional information.

The wrongful-conviction lawsuit was filed in 2023 by Carrody Buchhorn, 49, who was convicted in 2018 of second-degree murder in connection with the death of 9-month-old Oliver “Ollie” L. Ortiz on Sept. 29, 2016, at Sunshine Kids Group Daycare Home, 1307 Chestnut Lane in Eudora.

Her conviction was overturned in 2021 on appeal, and District Attorney Suzanne Valdez announced that she intended to retry Buchhorn. However, after Valdez failed to produce an expert who could say how the child died, the court dismissed the case without prejudice in December 2022. Valdez shortly thereafter said she would cease prosecution of Buchhorn — after having actively pursued the case for well over a year — citing a report filed on Jan. 3, 2023, from a forensic pathologist who reviewed the child’s autopsy report and concluded that Ortiz “died from natural disease and pathophysiologic processes unrelated to child abuse.”

photo by: Contributed

Carrody Buchhorn

After the dismissal and Valdez’s statement to cease prosecution, Buchhorn filed a civil suit against the State of Kansas seeking a certificate of innocence and compensation, almost $400,000, for attorney fees and the more than five years she was incarcerated in some form in connection with the case. The certificate of innocence would effectively expunge the arrest and conviction from her record while the money would only begin to pay back the legal fees and debt Buchhorn’s family has incurred throughout the process, as the Journal-World reported.

The civil suit is being argued in Douglas County District Court by Buchhorn’s appeals attorney, Bill Skepnek, while the state is being represented by Shon Qualseth of the Kansas Attorney General’s Office. Qualseth has argued that Buchhorn is not entitled to compensation because her conviction was overturned on appeal because Buchhorn’s trial attorneys, Paul Morrison and Veronica Dersch, were deemed ineffective and not because Buchhorn is innocent. Qualseth has sought his own medical examiner to present at trial who can testify how Ortiz died, as the Journal-World reported.

In a recent filing in the case, Valdez’s attorney, Holly Dyer, of Wichita, asserted that new evidence has been procured and that there is an active investigation into Ortiz’s death.

“Because new evidence has been developed in this case, the DA’s Office considers the matter of this child’s tragic death to be an open investigation with the potential for new charges,” the brief said.

Valdez and Deputy District Attorney Joshua Seiden were called by Skepnek as witnesses to be deposed in the case and to testify about what information the state relied on to prosecute Buchhorn. During the appeal and Buchhorn’s pending retrial throughout 2021-2022, Seiden said the state was seeking a new medical expert to review Ortiz’s autopsy because the state did not intend to rely on the original report from former Douglas County Coroner Erik Mitchell, who resigned in September 2018.

Since the dismissal and filing of the suit, Skepnek has worked to get Valdez and Seiden scheduled for interviews and has asked Judge James McCabria to expedite the process. Skepnek warned the court repeatedly in summer and fall of 2023 that delay tactics by Valdez would drag out the case beyond reason.

As the Journal-World reported, Valdez and Seiden’s attorneys said that no one in the current DA’s office was well enough informed about the case to provide details about what information was relied upon, despite having pursued prosecution for well over a year, and that Skepnek should pursue the attorneys who prosecuted the case prior to conviction, Judge Mark Simpson, who left the DA’s office and was appointed to be a Douglas County district judge in 2019, and CJ Rieg, who left the DA’s office in 2020.

The filing wherein Valdez’s attorney claims new evidence has been found was a request to the court to delay depositions of Valdez and Seiden in the wrongful-conviction case. The motion to delay the depositions was also filed in part to ask the court for a protective order for any testimony that members of the DA’s office give as well as any documents that they have already provided to Skepnek related to “issues of privilege and confidentiality that apply to prosecutor files, documents, and testimony,” including any prosecution documents inadvertently produced, prosecutor’s investigation and trial preparation materials, and highly sensitive and personally identifiable information contained in the records.

“The DA’s Office reserves the right to object to any deposition or testimony that invades the work product protection or other privilege,” the brief said.

The DA’s office had previously told the court that it had produced the entire discovery file used by the DA’s office to prosecute Buchhorn, but said in the brief, “Further investigation has recently revealed that is not the case.”

The Journal-World reached out to the DA’s office and asked what type of new evidence had been found and whether it implicated Buchhorn or another suspect, as well as whether the investigation was being conducted by police or internally.

“The District Attorney’s Office has no comment,” said the DA’s public information officer, Cheryl Cadue, in an email to the Journal-World.

When reached for comment, Skepnek said that he could not say much about the pending case but that he was taken by surprise in open court.

“At the last hearing, we were surprised when Valdez’s lawyer told Judge McCabria that they reopened the investigation in response to Mrs. Buchhorn’s claim,” Skepnek said.

He said that he was surprised “because Mrs. Buchhorn is innocent and they know it.”

Seiden has been issued a subpoena for May 21 and Valdez for May 22, for their depositions to be taken. The case is scheduled for May 13 for a hearing on the pending issues.