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Exonerated While Black: America's guilty secret about convicting innocents
It's hard to imagine a worse fate than being sent to prison or even being sentenced to death for a crime you did not commit. There's no way of knowing for sure how many of the over 2 million Americans who are currently incarcerated were wrongfully convicted, but studies estimate that somewhere between 2 and 5% of them, which would amount to up to 100,000 people, may be innocent of their crimes.
What we do know, however, is that since 1989, more than 1,000 people, some of whom have spent decades in prison, have been exonerated (pdf). We also know that of that number. more than half were black and male; and their treatment by the criminal justice system, post release, is not a whole lot better than it was prior to their incarceration.
In 1989, the 16-year-old Shareef Cousins was convicted on eyewitness testimony of a murder he didn't commit, and was sentenced to death. If you review the circumstances of his case there was no DNA evidence linking Cousin to the crime and there was actual video footage of him playing in a basketball league at the time of the murder it's almost impossible to see how he could have been found guilty, never mind sentenced to die...
What we do know, however, is that since 1989, more than 1,000 people, some of whom have spent decades in prison, have been exonerated (pdf). We also know that of that number. more than half were black and male; and their treatment by the criminal justice system, post release, is not a whole lot better than it was prior to their incarceration.
In 1989, the 16-year-old Shareef Cousins was convicted on eyewitness testimony of a murder he didn't commit, and was sentenced to death. If you review the circumstances of his case there was no DNA evidence linking Cousin to the crime and there was actual video footage of him playing in a basketball league at the time of the murder it's almost impossible to see how he could have been found guilty, never mind sentenced to die...
Read more: http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/apr/19/exonerated-while-black-america-guilty-secret
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Exonerated While Black: America's guilty secret about convicting innocents (Original Post)
PETRUS
Apr 2013
OP
The fact that we have a wrongful conviction problem should make us step back and
midnight
Apr 2013
#1
midnight
(26,624 posts)1. The fact that we have a wrongful conviction problem should make us step back and
stop what seems to be a pattern of prosecutorial misconduct in this country....
http://www.law.northwestern.edu/cwc/
1StrongBlackMan
(31,849 posts)3. Mistakes will be made in court ...
But I have written on these pages, the solution to prosecutorial/judicial misconduct.
If we were to enact laws specifying that any court officer that is found to (convicted of) prosecutorial/judicial misconduct, shall be sentenced to the same penalty as the wrongfully convicted person. This crap would end tomorrow.
midnight
(26,624 posts)4. Best remedy to this horrific crime.... And you are right... It would end immediately....
1StrongBlackMan
(31,849 posts)6. The horror of the practice of law is ...
it is no longer about "Justice"; but rather, wins and loses (by any means necessary).
RainDog
(28,784 posts)5. k&r n/t