In 2002, a New York judge tossed out the convictions of five men who had been convicted as teenagers of an infamous sexual assault they didn’t commit. The ‘Central Park Jogger’ case was thrust back into headlines, this time because five young men had been cleared by DNA testing. Friday marked the sixth anniversary of […]
Friday Roundup: Two Are Freed, While Three Continue to Fight
Two people were freed from prison this week as new evidence cast doubt on their convictions and three others were fighting to overturn convictions for crimes they say they didn’t commit.
Miguel Roman was freed today in Connecticut after 20 years in prison for a crime he […]
Miguel Roman was released from a Connecticut prison today after serving 20 years for a murder he has always said he didn’t commit. Prosecutors said DNA testing in Roman’s case had matched crime scene evidence to another man, Pedro Miranda. Prosecutors charged Miranda with the murder - and two other similar murders - on December […]
Rob Warden, director of the Center on Wrongful Convictions in Chicago, writes today in the Huffington Post that settlements from civil lawsuits in wrongful conviction cases have cost Illinois taxpayers $100 million. Until taxpayers begin to hold their government accountable for reforming the criminal justice system, they will continue to foot the bill for the […]
A report in today’s Houston Chronicle offers more details on what went wrong in the case of Ricardo Rachell, a 51-year-old Houston man who was freed last week after serving six years behind bars for a rape he didn’t commit. It appears that police investigators, defense attorneys and prosecutors all missed signs that another man […]
A Florida judge today tossed out the conviction of Jimmy Ates, who has served 17 years in prison for the murder of his wife, a crime he says he didn’t commit. Ates was convicted based in part on evidence from FBI ballistics tests allegedly showing that the lead makeup of bullets used to kill his […]
This morning, the Innocence Project filed a formal allegation with the Maryland State Police, requesting a thorough examination of negligence and error in the Baltimore Police Department Crime Lab.
Months ago, it was discovered that DNA from employees at the lab had become mixed with crime scene samples. Although it is standard practice nationwide for […]