Actual Innocence

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AlienLanes82

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I wanted to create a thread for people to discuss issues in the criminal justice system related to actual innocence.

'Actual innocence' is a term used to mean "really didn't do it." It's intended to contrast with merely "found not guilty" or "innocent under law".

It's very difficult to demonstrate actual innocence with 100% certainty. Only DNA evidence comes close. But in many cases, DNA did not play a part, because there was no DNA available, or police failed to preserve it, or the case preceded the DNA era. Those people may be innocent but have no absolute mechanism to prove it.

When a rational analysis of the evidence leads to a conclusion that it's "really likely" or "highly probable" that someone didn't do it, that's a legitimate case to refer to as an actual innocence case [the legal jargon for that situation would be something like "a demonstration of innocence by clear and convincing evidence" as opposed to "beyond a reasonable doubt"]. Even a case where someone is more likely than not innocent ("preponderance of evidence" standard") is worthy of discussion.

Here are a couple of links for those new to these issues:
http://www.innocenceproject.org/
http://www.skepticaljuror.com/
http://wm3.org/
 
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http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-englewood-dna-20111117,0,7337772.story

DNA evidence prompts judge to throw out convictions for 4 in murder, rape

By Steve Mills, Chicago Tribune reporter

November 17, 2011
A Cook County judge threw out the convictions Wednesday of four men in a 1994 murder and rape on Chicago's South Side, saying DNA evidence that connected another man — a convicted murderer — to the crime was powerful evidence of their innocence.
 
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Great NY Times article discussing the case of Juan Rivera and the Lake County IL Prosecutor's Office.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/27/magazine/dna-evidence-lake-county.html?pagewanted=all

"“This is a rape and murder of an 11-year-old child, and the semen found inside the girl excludes Juan Rivera,” Jeffrey Urdangen, one of Rivera’s lawyers, said. “According to the state’s perverse theory, the girl, the unfortunate victim, was having sex with another man who was not the murderer. It’s ludicrous.” "

...
 
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The Englewood Four finally had something to be thankful for this Thanksgiving. On Wednesday, November 16, a Cook County (IL) judge overturned the convictions of the four African American men – Vincent Thames, Terrill Swift, Harold Richardson and Michael Saunders – who were convicted of raping and murdering a prostitute as teenagers in 1995. Their convictions were largely the result of false confessions, and advanced DNA testing revealed last May that the real perpetrator was a man that police had interviewed at the crime scene.

Johnny Douglas was interviewed by police at the time of the murder because he lived in the neighborhood where the body of Nina Glover was found. Douglas, however, was soon let go after he denied knowing the victim. When he was later linked to the murder through DNA, it was discovered that Douglas had a rap sheet containing 38 convictions, including for murder and sexual assault. In 2008, he was shot to death.

And it turns out that Douglas was not the only one with a rap sheet. According to the Huffington Post, Detective James Cassidy, who always maintained that the four teenagers voluntarily confessed to the crime, had a history of taking false confessions...

http://www.falseconfessions.org/blog-wp/2011/11/first-taste-of-freedom-for-englewood-four/
 
The reliance on DNA as virtually infallible is a very dangerous trend, IMO. This apparently blind faith fails to account for how a given sample may have come to be discovered. This faith apparently ignores corrupt police and malicious civilians. An example nearing the extreme end may serve to clarify the basic idea. Imagine John hates Jim for some reason. John's character is of an eminently questionable quality. John decides Jim is going to pay for whatever transgression he may have committed, real or imagined. John manages to get his hands on a sample of Jim's semen and perhaps other scraps of DNA. This is not nearly as difficult as one might think on the average, especially where a strongly motivated seeker is involved.

John finds a prostitute, has sex with her with a condom, then kills her and introduces Jim's semen sample as appropriate and sprinkles other samples of Jim's DNA about the crime scene. John waits until the body is discovered and then anonymously drops a dime on Jim. Po' Jimmy is going to spend the rest of his life in prison or get the needle if the DNA evidence is taken as gospel. If John has conducted his actions with sufficient care, there may be perhaps no amount of investigative care in scrutiny that reveal his perfidy. Jim goes up protesting his innocence and everybody respond's with "yeah, that's what they all say".

None of this is to say that there are not circumstances where DNA is a reliable indicator of truth, but that even this can be manipulated so as to erect an enormously convincing image of guilt that is nonetheless false.
 
I always wondered about this hypothetical, my mind built a scenario around a cigarette butt. Smokers beware.
 
osan said:
The reliance on DNA as virtually infallible is a very dangerous trend, IMO. This apparently blind faith fails to account for how a given sample may have come to be discovered. This faith apparently ignores corrupt police and malicious civilians. An example nearing the extreme end may serve to clarify the basic idea. Imagine John hates Jim for some reason. John's character is of an eminently questionable quality. John decides Jim is going to pay for whatever transgression he may have committed, real or imagined. John manages to get his hands on a sample of Jim's semen and perhaps other scraps of DNA. This is not nearly as difficult as one might think on the average, especially where a strongly motivated seeker is involved.

John finds a prostitute, has sex with her with a condom, then kills her and introduces Jim's semen sample as appropriate and sprinkles other samples of Jim's DNA about the crime scene. John waits until the body is discovered and then anonymously drops a dime on Jim. Po' Jimmy is going to spend the rest of his life in prison or get the needle if the DNA evidence is taken as gospel. If John has conducted his actions with sufficient care, there may be perhaps no amount of investigative care in scrutiny that reveal his perfidy. Jim goes up protesting his innocence and everybody respond's with "yeah, that's what they all say".

None of this is to say that there are not circumstances where DNA is a reliable indicator of truth, but that even this can be manipulated so as to erect an enormously convincing image of guilt that is nonetheless false.
Click to expand...


I haven't heard of a case where someone was framed with DNA evidence, but it is definitely coming if it hasn't happened already.
 
Just saying most smokers haphazardly toss their butt on the ground. Having been in their mouths the butts contain their DNA. A butt tossed one place (maybe not a butt, maybe a condom or some gum) may wind up in another... perhaps a murder scene or perhaps a crime scene of another sort. If we rely on DNA evidence as some kind of truth-serum then a cigarette butt at the scene of the crime proves opportunity... 1/2 of a conviction, since when has motive been hard to fabricate? I don't want to sound to critical of the science as it seems to be responsible for the release of many unjustly incarcerated. Alas, must always the good come with the evil?
 
Former police captain Douglas Prade found actually innocent of murder through DNA testing:

http://www.ohio.com/news/break-news...eared-in-murder-released-from-prison-1.368825

" He had served nearly 15 years of a life sentence after being convicted of the 1997 shooting death of his ex-wife, Dr. Margo S. Prade. But Summit County Common Pleas Judge Judy Hunter ruled Tuesday morning that DNA test results exclude him as a suspect and he is “actually innocent of aggravated murder.”

Hunter ordered that Prade be set free immediately."
 
David Ranta has been exonerated of killing Hasidic rabbi Chaskel Werzberger after serving 23 years in prison.
Police coerced a teenage witness to give a false identification of Ranta, and prosecutors relied on two jailhouse snitches who gave false testimony in order to obtain favorable plea agreements.
Ranta suffered a heart attack the day after his release. Fortunately, he is in stable medical condition.

http://www.reuters.com/article/2013/03/21/us-usa-crime-exonerated-idUSBRE92K17U20130321
 
AlienLanes82 said:
I wanted to create a thread for people to discuss issues in the criminal justice system related to actual innocence.

'Actual innocence' is a term used to mean "really didn't do it." It's intended to contrast with merely "found not guilty" or "innocent under law".

It's very difficult to demonstrate actual innocence with 100% certainty. Only DNA evidence comes close. But in many cases, DNA did not play a part, because there was no DNA available, or police failed to preserve it, or the case preceded the DNA era. Those people may be innocent but have no absolute mechanism to prove it.

When a rational analysis of the evidence leads to a conclusion that it's "really likely" or "highly probable" that someone didn't do it, that's a legitimate case to refer to as an actual innocence case [the legal jargon for that situation would be something like "a demonstration of innocence by clear and convincing evidence" as opposed to "beyond a reasonable doubt"]. Even a case where someone is more likely than not innocent ("preponderance of evidence" standard") is worthy of discussion.

Here are a couple of links for those new to these issues:
http://www.innocenceproject.org/
http://www.skepticaljuror.com/
http://wm3.org/
Click to expand...

John Adams once said:

“It is more important that innocence be protected than it is that guilt be punished, for guilt and crimes are so frequent in this world that they cannot all be punished.

But if innocence itself is brought to the bar and condemned, perhaps to die, then the citizen will say, ‘whether I do good or whether I do evil is immaterial, for innocence itself is no protection,’ and if such an idea as that were to take hold in the mind of the citizen that would be the end of security whatsoever.”
 
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