Biography
Patrick Hooty Croy was a Shasta Indian sentenced to death for the 1978 shooting death of a Yreka, California police officer following a confrontation that escalated into a hillside shootout. Croy, his sister Norma Jean Croy, and several cousins were prosecuted; Patrick was convicted of first-degree murder in 1979 and sent to death row. In 1985 the California Supreme Court overturned his conviction. At his 1990 retrial, defended by attorney Tony Serra with a landmark defense rooted in the history of violence against Native people, Croy testified that he had acted in self-defense and was acquitted — after roughly twelve years in prison, seven of them on death row. His sister Norma Jean, also convicted in the case, was not released until 1997.
The California Supreme Court’s December 31, 1985 opinion describes Patrick Croy being taken into custody after the July 1978 Yreka confrontation and transported for hospital treatment. The decision reversed the murder, robbery and attempted-murder convictions, but affirmed conspiracy and assault convictions and remanded those counts for resentencing. It was not an acquittal or a physical release. The opinion does not establish his prison-admission date.
People v. Croy, 41 Cal.3d 1, factual account and conclusion.
