"It does give me hope, because you see things do change and get corrected," Caulley, 43, said in an interview yesterday at the North Central Correctional Institution.

Read the full story here. (Columbus Dispatch, 10/04/08)

Also in Ohio, authorities are planning to run in the database a DNA profile from a 1990 rape case in which Brian Piszczek was wrongfully convicted. Piszczek spent three years in prison before DNA testing proved his innocence, but it wasn't until recently that a Columbus Dispatch investigation again sparked interest in checking the database for the real perpetrator in the case. In nearly 40 percent of wrongful convictions overturned by DNA, the evidence also leads to the identity of the real perpetrator.

Today marks the 14th anniversary of Piszczek's exoneration. Read more about his case here. (Columbus Dispatch, 10/05/08)

Read about dozens of other possible wrongful convictions in the Dispatch's five-part series "Test of Convictions".

"Time is running out," said Wyniemko of Rochester Hills, who is among four people in Michigan freed from prison with the help of DNA. "Nobody else should have to go through what I went through, and what the others went through."

Read the full article here.

Innocence Project supporters across Michigan this week are sending letters to the Senate Committee on the Judiciary.

Do you live in Michigan? Send your letter today.

Have friends or family in Michigan? Forward them info on this campaign so they can protect justice in their state.

Yesterday's blog post on this issue included a video interview with Wyniemko about the pending legislation.

Today marks the sixth anniversary of the day Jimmy Ray Bromgard was exonerated in Montana, after serving more than 14 years for a crime he did not commit. Bromgard was convicted at 18 and released at 32, losing the prime years of his life behind bars. Participating in a prison program for sex offenders could have led to his early release, but he refused to take them. "I would have had to admit my guilt," he said after his release. "I'd rather sit there in prison for all my life than admit my guilt."

On March 20, 1987, an intruder broke through a window into the home of an eight-year-old girl in Billings, Montana, and raped her. The perpetrator escaped after the attack, stealing a purse and jacket. Later in the day the victim was examined, and police collected hairs and semen from the crime scene.

Based on the victim's description, the police drew a composite sketch of the intruder. An officer linked the sketch to a local teenager he knew, Jimmy Ray Bromgard. After officers videotaped a lineup including Bromgard, the tape was shown to the victim, who said she was "60% or 65% sure" that Bromgard was the perpetrator. During trial, the victim continued to say she was unsure whether Bromgard was the assailant. Yet, Bromgard's assigned counsel never objected to the victim's identification.

The prosecution tied Bromgard to the crime by using the testimony of a state forensic hair examiner, Arnold Melnikoff, who claimed hairs found on the victim's bed were similar to Bromgard's, and further argued there was less than a one-in-10,000 chance that the hairs did not come from Bromgard. Melnikoff's testimony was fraudulent; there has never been a standard by which to statistically match hairs through microscopic inspection.

Despite stating he was at home and asleep when the crime was committed, Bromgard's attorney did not follow up the investigation or obtain an expert to challenge the state's forensic expert. Bromgard was convicted of three counts of sexual intercourse without consent and sentenced to 40 years in prison. Bromgard spent his twenties in prison, and was finally freed after the Innocence Project attorneys obtained DNA testing on his behalf, which proved that biological evidence from the crime scene came from another man.

Fraudulent science may have played a large role in Bromgard's wrongful conviction, but Bromgard's own court-appointed lawyer also failed to show the inconsistencies in the state's case. Click here to read more about bad lawyering.

Other exoneration anniversaries this week:

Earl Washington, Virginia (Served 17 years, Exonerated in 2000)

George Rodriguez, Texas (Served 17 years, Exonerated in 2005)

Albert Johnson, California (Served 10 years, Exonerated in 2002)

Led by Deirdre Enright, a 1992 Law School graduate and experienced capital post-conviction lawyer, the clinic includes 12 students each year and will soon employ a full-time investigator to help collect evidence for appeals.

"This is sort of the dream class if you're a law student because it involves great issues for research that are topical - DNA, new techniques in DNA, new testing, eyewitness ID, jailhouse informants, poor lawyering, poor prosecuting -it's all these great cutting-edge issues," Enright said.

"The Innocence Project at UVA School of Law will bring critical expertise and resources to investigating wrongful conviction cases," Innocence Project Co-Director Peter Neufeld said. "We know that innocent people are convicted and spend years or decades in prison in Virginia, and this clinic will help exonerate more of them."

Read more here. (UVA press release, 09/30/08)

Marla Mitchell-Cichon, the co-director of the Cooley Law School Innocence Project in Lansing, Michigan, wrote in today's Detroit News that it is critical that lawmakers protect justice by passing this law.

Lawmakers have an obligation to Michiganians to extend a law that promotes justice and is cost-effective. The time to act is now -- before an innocent person loses his or her chance for freedom. Justice demands it.

Read the full story here. (Detroit News, 10/2/08)

Movieweb: Hillary Swank is Betty Anne Waters (10/1/08)

Read about Kenneth Waters' case here.

Watch a video with Betty Anne Waters at the 2007 Innocence Project Celebration of Freedom & Justice.

There have been too many instances in recent years, by no means only in Durham, of North Carolina courts rendering judgments that turn out to demonstrably flawed. People have been sent to prison for crimes they didn't commit, and even have been placed at risk of execution.

Causes range from court systems struggling with a lack of resources to prosecutors who are too focused on the courtroom contest at the expense of getting things right. But the effects, besides the cruel unfairness of wrongful conviction, are also to let the guilty go free and to shake public trust in the judicial system.

Read the full story here. (News & Observer, 09/27/08)

"I'm delighted that we are finally getting recommendations for an independent board," Milgaard's mother, Joyce Milgaard, told a news conference in Saskatoon shortly after the Saskatchewan government released the commission of inquiry report.

"It will be worthwhile," she said. "Everything our family has gone through, if we now, if we really follow through and get this independent board."

Read the full story here. (Canadian Broadcasting Corp., 09/26/08)

North Carolina recently created a similar oversight and review panel, and the group issued its first findings earlier this month.

An article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution today examines the court's motivation for granting a stay in the Davis case, and the effect the final decision could have on future cases.

With the exonerations of inmates nationwide based on DNA evidence, the U.S. Supreme Court is giving more careful scrutiny to innocence claims, said (Indiana University law professor Joseph) Hoffman, a death penalty expert.

"This is the kind of case that has the court on edge right now," he said. "So it's not completely surprising that out of all the death cases that come before it this would be the one granted a stay."
Ezekiel Edwards, an attorney with the Innocence Project in New York, called the state Supreme Court's decision troubling.

"It sets a terrible precedent for innocent people who are incarcerated and where there isn't DNA evidence but where there may be one or multiple recanting witnesses who for a whole bevy of reasons are saying their original testimony was false," he said. "In most recantation cases, you could never meet the standard they've set."

Read the full story here. (Atlanta Journal-Constitution, 09/29/08)

Read more about Davis' case here.

Scott Henson, who writes the blog Grits for Breakfast and works as a consultant with the Innocence Project of Texas, attended the meeting and wrote about his reactions on Grits. Here's what he found:

Pat Johnson, who's the field supervisor for DPS' state-run crime labs and a member of the Integrity Unit panel, performed an informal survey of non-DPS crime labs in Texas operated by local jurisdictions. Respondents said that less than 10% of evidence collected at crime scenes was gathered by lab personnel, with most of it being collected by cops. Austin PD is the main exception, he said, with an entirely civilian Crime Scene Investigation unit.

A majority of labs, when asked how good a job they were doing, replied that some improvements were needed.

One lab said they did not believe they were receiving all available evidence that should be examined, while a majority said "we don't know."

...

John Vasquez from the Texas Association of Property and Evidence Inventory Technicians (TAPEIT) gave an interesting presentation about evidence preservation failures and the need for greater professionalism and implementation of best practices by police department property rooms. TAPEIT has about 600 active members who work in law enforcement agencies around the state, he said. (See their rather active message boards.)

...

One of the CCA "Integrity Unit" members, Texas House Corrections Chairman Jerry Madden, posed a question to Justice Project President John Terzano regarding snitches during his presentation yesterday that inspired me to (perhaps rudely?) interject from the audience a response to his concerns. (I was attending as part of my consulting gig with the Innocence Project of Texas.)

Terzano was arguing that informants whose testimony will be compensated by money, reduced charges or more lenient sentences for other crimes they've committed should be subjected to a pre-trial reliability hearing in which a judge, outside the purview of the jury, makes an independent determination whether the informant is a reliable source.

Read the three posts on the meeting. (Grits for Breakfast, 09/26/08)

"If we have even one person in prison on evidence that was improperly done, that's a huge problem," Worthy said. "As prosecutors, we completely rely on the findings of police crime lab experts every day in court and we present this information to juries. And when there are failures of this magnitude, there is a ... betrayal of trust."

The audit warned that if the error rate holds, "the negative impact on the judicial system would be substantial, with a strong likelihood of wrongful convictions and a valid concern about numerous appeals."

"The language may be dry, but it destroys the credibility of the firearms lab and calls into question all the lab work in general," said David Moran, head of the Innocence Project at the University of Michigan Law School.

Read the full story here. (Detroit Free Press, 09/25/08)

Read the Innocence Project's recommendations for forensic oversight here.

"More than 22 years after her murder, this verdict finally brings justice for Galua Crosby and her family. We are glad that the DNA testing and investigation we did in Clay Chabot's case helped identify and apprehend Jerry Pabst, and we commend the District Attorney's office for finally bringing Pabst to justice. Clay Chabot fought for years for the DNA testing that led a judge to recommend overturning his conviction and resulted in Jerry Pabst's arrest. With justice finally done, we hope Clay's case can be resolved quickly."

Read more about Chabot's case here.

Download recent filings in the case.

The results of a five-month audit of the Detroit Police Firearms laboratory were released Thursday, revealing a "shocking level of incompetence" in investigations into cases involving ballistic evidence, Wayne County Prosecutor Kym Worthy said.

The findings uncovered mistakes "so severe as to demonstrate a systemic problem in all disciplines within the crime lab and requires drastic action to ensure the integrity of the criminal justice system in Wayne County," Worthy said.

Read the full story here. (Detroit News, 09/25/08)

One solution for wrongful convictions, however, has not been explored in a sustained, meaningful manner. It is a solution that cannot be legislated or even come from the government. The solution requires writers and editors for newspapers, magazines, radio stations, television stations, Web sites and books to practice preventive journalism rather than after-the-conviction, too-late journalism.

Until and unless journalists improve their performance, far more innocent people will be imprisoned than the criminal justice system seems likely ever to acknowledge. The logical extension of the preceding statement seems obvious, but I'll say it anyway: Unless journalists get better at covering the justice system, many criminals will continue to go unpunished, free to murder or rape or rob again. So investigating wrongful convictions is not - as perceived by too many police, prosecutors and judges - an assault by soft-on-crime bleeding hearts. Rather, it is an attempt to serve law and order, to improve the administration of justice and to foster faith in the criminal justice system.

Read the full story here. (Miller-McCune Magazine, 09/23/08)

And an article by Jon Whiten in Extra! Magazine in late 2007 pointed out that coverage of DNA exonerations very rarely includes a reflection on the media's role in convicting the innocent.

What is striking about all of the coverage...of wrongful conviction in general, is the lack of self-examination. The press, in detailing the reasons that such awful miscarriages of justice happen, never points to its own role as enabler.

As the press has repeatedly reported in the past decade, the accused don't always get a fair trial, and many have been convicted and sent to prison for crimes they did not commit. Doesn't it then make sense for journalists to report on the cops and the courts with that awareness in mind?

It is a welcome sign that the press extends its conscience enough to report quite often on wrongful convictions, exonerations and the flaws with the criminal justice system. But the press needs to take responsibility and think about these lessons when doing daily beat reporting on crime and trials.

Read the full story here. (Extra!, November/December 2007)

As a State Representative I am committed to ensuring that the citizens of Tennessee have faith in the justice system.. The case of Paul House casts grave doubt on the "justice" of the system. Given that the state of Tennessee is dealing with a significant budget shortfall how can we justify the cost of another trial for Mr. House with no evidence pointing his guilt? How much money has already been spent attempting to keep House on death row? Now with even more DNA evidence pointing to House's innocence how can General Phillips justify his decision to move forward with a new trial?

Today marks the fifth anniversary of Calvin Willis's exoneration in Louisiana. After serving 21 years in prison for a crime he did not commit, Willis was finally released when post-conviction DNA testing excluded him as the perpetrator of a 1981 rape.

In June 1981, an intruder entered a home in Shreveport, Louisiana, where three girls (aged 7, 9, and 10) were sleeping. The 10-year-old awoke to a man standing above her. The attacker proceeded to choke her and banged her head against the wall. The victim fled to the back yard, but the perpetrator caught up, kicking her in the stomach. During the struggle, the victim lost consciousness and was sexually assaulted. Police were not contacted until the next morning, when a woman returned to the house.

Although police said one of the girls identified Willis as her attacker, the girl later said she never saw Willis' photo and she did not identify him in court. He was also considerably smaller than the attacker described to police by the girls. A rape kit was collected from the victim, and semen from the perpetrator was identified, showing that the perpetrator must have type O blood. Calvin Willis has type O blood, as do 49 percent of African-American men in the United States. This evidence was presented at Willis' trial to show that he could have been the attacker.

In 1998, the Innocence Project began to search for evidence in Willis' case. DNA testing on items from the crime scene proved that another man was the attacker and led to Willis' release on September 18, 2003. He was officially cleared on September 23, 2003.

Upon his release Willis said, "People don't know what exonerated is. When you have been in prison for 20 years there is a stigma. I am going to file for a full pardon from the governor." Two years after Willis was exonerated, Louisiana passed a law compensating the wrongfully convicted for $15,000 per year served, up to a maximum of $150,000. (The federal standard is $50,000 per year.) Willis, however, has yet to be compensated.

Watch a video interview with Willis and his friend, exoneree Rickey Johnson, here.

Find out if your state offers compensation and how you can help here.

Other exoneration anniversaries this week:

Monday: Chester Bauer (Served 8 Years, Exonerated 9/22/1997)

Saturday: Frederick Daye (Served 10 Years, Exonerated 9/27/1994)

In a reversal of political stereotypes, the Republican Ryan, who left office in 2003, was sensitive in the way his successor, the Democrat Blagojevich, hasn't been to the predicaments in which the exonerated typically find themselves upon leaving prison: impoverished and, still officially classified as ex-cons, veritably blacklisted from employment opportunity.

The Innocence Project's new Young Professionals Committee held its first fundraiser on Monday night at the Rubin Museum of Art in New York City. The event was a success, featuring speeches by Innocence Project Co-Director Barry Scheck and exoneree David Shephard, who served more than nine years in New Jersey for a crime he didn't commit. Above, Scheck and Shephard onstage at the event.

The event raised money for the Innocence Project Exoneree Fund, which supports Innocence Project clients with basic necessities like housing, shelter and clothing after their release.

Read about the event and view a photo slideshow in the New York Sun.

View more photos of the event here.

Interested in hosting an event in your community? We'd love to help. Click here to get started.

Do you want to join the young professionals committee or learn more about upcoming events in New York? Email us here.

Read more about his release here.

"Execution's Doorstep," a new book by Leslie Lytle, tells the stories of five men who were released from death row based on evidence that they didn't commit the crimes for which they had been convicted.

"Where the justice system so manifestly failed and innocent people were imprisoned for 11 years (and one almost put to death)," the judge wrote in his decision throwing out the lawsuit, "it is necessary to analyze and criticize our judicial system (and the actors involved) so that past mistakes do not become future ones."

"This is a victory for free speech and for holding officials publicly accountable for their role in wrongful convictions," Scheck said in statement.

Read the full story here. (Associated Press, 09/18/08)

In November of 1987, Lyons was a recently engaged Navy Reserve Officer living in suburban Chicago when a white woman was raped in the neighboring apartment complex. While Lyons maintained he had been home that night, the victim and the neighbors matched Lyons to a police composite sketch. Although Lyons weighed 160 pounds and the victim identified the perpetrator as weighing 200 pounds, he was brought in for questioning.

Lyons permitted police to search his apartment where they found brown polyester pants similar to the victim's description of the perpetrator's clothing. The victim identified Lyons as the perpetrator in a photo lineup and testified at his trial, and the jury convicted him. Lyons hired a private lawyer to file an appeal on his behalf, but the attorney never filed it. He was released on parole three years after his convicted, but says he struggled with the stigma of a felony conviction for a crime he didn't commit. He was exonerated one year ago today when DNA testing proved he wasn't the man who raped the victim.

Sunday will also mark the one-year anniversary of Larry Bostic's exoneration. Accused of a rape he didn't commit in 1988, Bostic pled guilty to avoid a possible harsh sentence at trial. He was sentenced to eight years in prison, and was released on parole after three years. He would later be convicted of an unrelated assault and sentenced to 17 years in prison as a repeat offender. When he was exonerated on September 21, 2007, after DNA testing proved he never committed the rape, he was just 13 days from the end of his sentence.

After his release, Bostic said: "If you got an attorney telling you to take a plea agreement, and you might not win if you go to trial, what seems better to you? A little bit of time or a whole bunch of time?"

Both Lyons and Bostic sought DNA testing in their cases for years before they were finally exonerated. None of the 220 people exonerated by DNA evidence would be free today if they didn't have access to DNA tests to clear their names. Seven states have no statute under which a defendant can apply for DNA testing. Is yours one? View our interactive map to find out.

Thousands of Innocence Project supporters have signed our petition for DNA access. Add your name today.

Other exoneration anniversary this week:

Gilbert Alejandro, Texas (Served 3.5 Years, Exonerated in 1994)

My fortune turned in 2006, when The Innocence Project took my case. With the cooperation of District Attorney Janet DiFiore, further DNA testing proved who was the real perpetrator. On Nov. 2, 2006 all charges were dismissed and I was publicly acknowledged as innocent. I received some apologies but none were from those who played a role in wrongfully convicting me.

Readjusting to being free, dealing with the effects of my ordeal, learning new technology, trying to rebuild relationships with my family and experiencing financial pressure have all been hard. I was released with nothing.

Read the full post here. (Alternet.org, 09/16/08)

Not receiving Innocence Project email updates? Click here to sign up.

"Juries back in the day believed that when a woman was raped, she must be able to identify her attacker," Ms. Moore said. "We know so much more now. There have been so many studies about how bad eyewitness accounts can be."

Read the full article here. (Dallas Morning News, 09/15/08)

A situation involving a mendacious jailhouse snitch out of Orange, Texas shows how such cases play out when DNA evidence doesn't exist to prove innocence to a certainty. KPRC-Channel 2 in Houston recently told the story of Daniel Meehan (Sept. 4) whose 1998 conviction and 99-year sentence was based in part on testimony by an informant who now says he lied to get his own cases dismissed and that prosecutors told him what to say.

Read the full Grits post here. (9/16/08)

Q: What's your process for answering (requests)?

HD: First we evaluate the case to see if it can be resolved by DNA. If it might be, or if we don't have enough information, we send the defendant a questionnaire about defense and prosecution theory, as well as what evidence was collected, what might be tested, what documents they have, who represented them, things like that.

Q: Why did the project choose DNA as its standard?

HD: It's a level of investigation that can be done from one place but still have nationwide scope. We can't go out and interview all of the witnesses in any given case, in any given jurisdiction. With DNA we can locate the evidence, have it tested, and do the litigation without putting resources on the ground.

Q: How has this work shaped your view of the criminal justice system?

HD: I don't know how anyone can not see that the system is fraught with potential for human error. As much as race and class shouldn't affect a system that is designed to be fair, we see that they do- both in targeting an investigation and in rates of incarceration. People are always asking me questions like, "How many innocent people are in prison?" I don't know, but there are over two million people in prison, and if 1 percent are innocent, you have tens of thousands. A 1 percent error rate-which would be good in any other system-is very disturbing.

Read the full Q & A here.

Have a case to submit to our intake department for review? Click here to get started.

"If we would have had the evidence that was withheld from us, there's no doubt in my mind that Tim Masters would have been exonerated at the trial," Fischer said.

... "I don't know what to say about that," Masters said of the decision when reached by phone by The Associated Press. "I spent 10 years in prison for something I didn't do. It's something, I guess."

Read the full story here. (Associated Press, 09/10/08)

From 2005 to 2007, Lauren Kaeseberg worked at the Innocence Project as a student in the legal clinic and then as a teaching assistant. She graduated from the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law in 2007, and today works as a criminal defense lawyer in Waukegan, Illinois.

The Baltimore Sun ran a comprehensive story on the reliability of forensic science and the process of accreditation and oversight across the country.

The Innocence Project and the Mississippi Innocence Project are reviewing hundreds of cases for potential forensic fraud and wrongful conviction, and the Jackson Clarion-Ledger profiled two death row cases in Forrest County involving testimony by discredited medical examiner Steven Hayne and forensic dentist Michael West.

CBS News' "60 Minutes" Sunday night will provide an update on an investigation it aired in late 2007 about nearly four decades of faulty ballistic testimony by FBI analysts. Watch the full "60 Minutes" segment here.

A letter to the editor from a candidate for Attorney General of Vermont responded to an editorial in the paper that criticized a bill in the state that would impose mandatory minimums on convicted sex offenders without improving crime lab funding and standards.

And Chicago officials are seeking to begin collecting DNA profiles from police officers to eliminate them when testing samples they may have touched, but the police union is opposing the measure.

Over 20 years ago, a woman was brutally raped and robbed in a shoe store in Riverside. To this day, no one knows who committed the crime. But because of other people's mistakes, I spent almost 12 years in prison for his crime-until the Innocence Project used DNA to prove I was innocent. Even though I lost 12 years of my life and suffered the indignities and horrors of more than a decade in California's prisons, I am one of the lucky ones. For most people, there is no DNA to prove their innocence and no free lawyers to help them.

Four bills that would help reduce wrongful convictions in California were introduced in the legislature this year, and two have finally made it to the Governor's desk. The state's budget crisis killed the other two bills even though they had very moderate price tags. Nonetheless, the two bills on Gov. Schwarzenegger's desk are important first steps and he must sign them now.

Failing to enact these reforms puts public safety at risk. As in my case, when an innocent person is convicted, the investigation stops and the real perpetrator is often never found. We cannot wait one more year to take action to reduce wrongful convictions.

The first bill, SB 1589, would require corroboration for jailhouse informant testimony. Informants have good reasons to lie: they are getting something in exchange for what they say. Yet, they are persuasive. In fact, informants are the leading cause of wrongful convictions in death penalty cases. We already require corroboration for co-defendant informants; SB 1589 simply extends that same precaution to jailhouse informants.

The second bill, AB 2937, would provide more services to wrongfully convicted people and remove some of the hurdles to compensation for the innocent. Currently, wrongfully convicted people receive even less assistance than parolees who actually committed the crime. Indeed, my wife and I have established a foundation to provide assistance to wrongfully convicted people because the state does nothing. As the chair of the Council for the Wrongfully Convicted, I had the opportunity to testify before the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice about the difficulties we face after exoneration. My testimony led the Commission to recommend the reforms in this bill.

Also known as the Arthur Carmona Justice for the Wrongfully Convicted Act, AB 2937 is named after a brave young man who was wrongfully convicted at just 16 years old, and whom I had the opportunity to work with before he was tragically killed earlier this year. Arthur and I shared a couple of things in common: we were both wrongfully convicted based on mistaken eyewitness identification and police misconduct, and we also both had loving and dedicated families who fought for and supported us. Even with our strong support systems, we both struggled to cope with life outside of prison with virtually no help from the state that took our best years from us.
The Arthur Carmona Act would change that by ensuring that wrongfully convicted people have the same access to resources that ex-offenders receive when released from prison. It would also require that criminal records relating to a wrongful conviction are sealed, and would remove procedural hurdles to compensation for the factually innocent.

All of these reforms are based on recommendations by the California Commission on the Fair Administration of Justice, which spent the last three years studying our justice system and developing recommendations to make it better and more accurate. The Commission was created by the Senate in 2004, and the legislature has even passed similar bills based on the Commission's recommendations in the last two sessions. But Gov. Schwarzenegger vetoed these bills in the past, causing even a commentator on Foxnews.com to lead with the headline: "Schwarzenegger Vetoes Justice." Now the Governor can redeem himself, at least partially.
The bills that did not make it to the Governor this year, SB 1591 and SB 1590, would have addressed two other common causes of wrongful convictions - eyewitness misidentification and false confessions. Mine was a case of eyewitness misidentification, so I understand the need for reform, and am disappointed that our budget crisis has once again gotten in the way of justice.

Every year that goes by without these reforms, we risk sentencing more innocent people to prison or even the death penalty, we let guilty people go free, and we continue the cycle of injustice by failing to help the wrongfully convicted who are released. Justice cannot wait one more year; Gov. Schwarzenegger must sign the bills in front of him today.

Please contact Gov. Schwarzenegger and urge him to sign SB 1589 and AB 2937.

Herman Atkins lives with his family in Fresno California. He is the founder of the LIFE Foundation, which provides immediate support to wrongfully convicted people on release from prison. He is also the chair of the Council for the Wrongfully Convicted, a coalition of innocent men and women who were wrongfully imprisoned. His story is one of eight featured in the acclaimed documentary, Life After Exoneration. He is a frequent lecturer and public speaker on wrongful convictions and the struggles of the wrongfully convicted on release.Read Herman's last post on the Innocence Blog.

Read the full letter here.

Read more about Dechaine's case here.

Calling the Alley case a criminal defense lawyer's "worst nightmare," Scheck said Alley's earlier defense attorneys never tried to use the evidence to prove his innocence because they were focusing on his claims of mental illness as a defense.

... Scheck also encouraged the committee to standardize police procedures such as taping confessions, taking eyewitness statements and preserving crime scene evidence. Some of the evidence in the case against Sedley Alley was destroyed years after his original trial.

Laura Chase, a deputy state's attorney (in Maryland), said defense lawyers have feared challenging DNA evidence before a jury. As DNA evidence moves to less-violent crimes, she said, "I think it will encourage pleas. It always has encouraged pleas, and that will make the system more efficient."

"It runs the risk of turning the gold standard of evidence into fool's gold," said Stephen Mercer, a Montgomery lawyer.

Read the full article here. (Washington Post, 09/08/08)