THIBODAUX – When Jennifer Coleman speaks about the direction her life has taken since the night she was arrested for beating a man with a baseball bat, she is enveloped by fear and frustration.

“I know I did not deliver the crippling blow to Frank Byonne, I know I’m not responsible for his injuries,” Coleman said. “I’m very sorry that all this happened, but I don’t want the family to think I did this because I know I didn’t.”

Byonne died Aug. 1 after a five-year struggle with injuries suffered in an attack for which Coleman was convicted of aggravated battery and sentenced to 20 years in prison.

Coleman, who served two years and seven months behind bars, says she feels sympathy for Byonne’s family, but more than that she wants to try to salvage her reputation.

“I am wrongfully convicted,” the 30-year-old mother of four said, saying she wants people “to know that I am innocent, that I did not beat Frank Byonne with no baseball bat.”

Candidly, she admits the damage to her name hurts more than the knowledge that a man is dead from the ordeal Byonne suffered the night of his arrest for burglary.

NEW TRIAL; JAIL TIME

Last year, the 1st Circuit Court of Appeal ruled that based on the testimony of a witness who came forward after the trial, Coleman should be retried.

When asked about her time in prison, Coleman responded simply by the look in her widened eyes.

“No way do I want to go again.”

Thoughts of her children and distress over her conviction made the days hard and rendered the nights almost unbearable, Coleman said. Up every morning by 4:30 for work, she nearly reached the breaking point, despite having made a few friends.

“It got to the point where I really just wanted to give up,” she said.

Studying the Bible and the promise of seeing her children every weekend became her lifelines.

“I’m changed, I just want to be a better mom, a better person. I don’t want society to look at the me like I’m a bad person, I’m not a bad person.”

‘100 PERCENT RESPONSIBLE’

But Byonne’s family does not buy her claims of innocence or welcome her sympathy.

“We do hold her 100 percent responsible,” said David Byonne, Frank’s brother. “She’s responsible for his death.”

The family suffered along with Frank, who worked as a mechanic before the beating.

Mary Thomas, Frank’s mother, said the case should go through the courts again.

“I would like for her to go back to trial and have this all done over again,” Thomas said.

Prosecutors are awaiting a decision by the Louisiana Supreme Court to determine whether the appellate court ruling will stand, Assistant Attorney General Julie Cullen said Friday.

Coleman said she is prepared for whatever comes.

“I just pray and leave it all in the hands of God. To me, man has hurt me all he’s going to hurt me,” she said.

NIGHT EVERYTHING CHANGES

Now, her focus is moving on with hers and her children’s lives, putting the events of May 25, 2001, behind them.

That was the night Coleman caught Byonne exiting the apartment she had been moving out of for about a week.

Although Coleman admits to confronting Byonne with a baseball bat after she caught him coming out of her apartment, she maintains she never dealt the blow to his head, and would never have done such a thing over possessions.

She’d called the police earlier that evening to report a burglary, and hours later, learned from a neighbor that someone was inside the home. Coleman armed herself with her son’s baseball bat and met Byonne as he was coming out the back door.

She demanded her belongings, and Byonne promised to get them before he took off running, she said.

Byonne sought shelter at a nearby convenience store, where a brief chaotic confrontation that included Coleman, who still carried the bat, broke out before police arrived.

Coleman and other witnesses said Byonne showed no sign of injury after the crowd dispersed and even told officers he hadn’t been in a fight. Several hours later, he was in intensive care and would never recover.

Coleman was arrested that night after Byonne collapsed in his holding cell at the Thibodaux Police Department.

Coleman’s mother, Olivia Coleman, said, “I knew she was innocent from the very beginning. Evidently something happened after they got to the police station. She might have swung the bat, but she never hit him.”

Olivia cared for her daughter’s children after the conviction, but suffered the most stress from her belief that Jennifer had not committed a crime.

JURY DIDN’T BELIEVE IT

During her trial, Coleman said one officer testified that he went back to the scene to look for blood droplets and torn clothing, but found nothing.

“It just don’t add up. They know ain’t no baseball bat beat that man at that store. It’s always going to be a mystery about what happened after he was arrested.”

Cullen, who prosecuted the case, said allegations that something happened to Byonne at the police station came up at the trial.

“That was all part of the trial,” Cullen said. “The jury heard that exact argument, and they didn’t believe it.”

One month after the beating, Byonne was moved into a Natchitoches nursing home, where he was sustained by a feeding tube and unable to speak.

Natchitoches Coroner Charles Curtis said Byonne died of complications from head trauma.

Thibodaux Police Chief Craig Melancon refuted suggestions that Byonne encountered more violence after his arrest.

“When we came into contact with Mr. Byonne, he showed no extreme physical signs that indicated he was not OK for transport and booking,” Melancon said. “At no time did my officers beat this man.”

But for a bump on his head, Byonne seemed fine and was responsive until his collapse at the police department, the chief said.

By the time he arrived at the hospital, the man could no longer communicate, Melancon said.

Byonne’s family said they were told consistently by doctors that his head injury most likely was inflicted by the baseball bat.

“There’s no way that Frank was ever conscious from the time he went to the hospital,” David Byonne said.

His mother agreed, and dismissed theories that something may have occurred between her son’s arrest and arrival at the hospital.

“I can’t fault the policemen,” Thomas said.

OBSTRUCTION OF JUSTICE

In March 2005, the 1st Circuit Court of Appeals overturned District Judge Jerome Barbera III’s 2003 denial of Coleman’s request for a new trial, and in October 2005, after serving enough time to earn probation for an obstruction of justice charge, she was freed.

Coleman said the incident that garnered her the obstruction charge happened a day before her July 2003 sentencing, when, during a heated argument over what she says was false testimony, she pushed a friend who testified at her trial.

The next day, along with two concurrent 15-year sentences for aggravated second-degree battery and second-degree kidnapping, Coleman was told she would serve five additional years for obstruction of justice.

The appellate court ruled that Coleman’s new trial must allow the testimony of Medicaid caseworker Sheila Williams of Schriever, who said in a post-conviction hearing that a bruised and blood-stained Byonne had whispered repeatedly “the police” to her in the hospital the day after the beating.

Larry Boudreaux, the Thibodaux lawyer who represented Coleman during her trial, said the state Supreme Court has yet to rule on the writ filed by prosecutors.

If it is denied, prosecutors have the option to retry her, and if it is upheld, confirming her conviction, she must return to prison to serve the rest of her sentence, the lawyer said.

“They released her pending what the Supreme Court is going to do,” he said.

Boudreaux believes issues in the case that warrant a much closer look include Williams’ testimony, testimony from officers who said Byonne showed no sign of injury when he was arrested and a seven-minute gap in a surveillance video of Byonne in his cell at the Thibodaux Police Department, after which he is bloodied and can be heard moaning in pain.

Melancon said he has reviewed the tape and did not notice any gap in it.

“You see the fellow disappear, you hear some moaning; I don’t think he beat himself,” Boudreaux said.