Excerpt from a speech by Attorney General Eric Holder:
"An analysis conducted by the State Appellate Defender Office in Michigan found that the state's failure to invest resources at the trial court level has contributed to the costly imprisonment of defendants whose convictions were later reversed. The office reported that since 1996, there have been approximately 50 successful habeas corpus actions based on ineffective assistance of counsel claims in state court proceedings.
"Even assuming these defendants were guilty of the crimes for which they were originally convicted, the public still must bear the cost of appeals and retrials because the system didn't get it right the first time. And for those cases in which the defendants were not guilty, then obviously the price tag is much higher -- both in the ultimate nightmare scenario of sending an innocent person to jail, and in terms of letting the person who actually committed the crime remain free.
"Let me give you just one example of all of the losses associated with the crisis in representation. Eddie Joe Lloyd served nearly 17 years in a Michigan prison for the murder and rape of a young girl -- crimes that DNA evidence later proved he did not commit. Lloyd's appointed attorneys -- one replaced another a week before trial -- failed to conduct any investigation. No one ever cross-examined the police about Lloyd's false confession -- which Lloyd gave to the police while he was a non-voluntarily committed patient in a mental health hospital. No one ever interviewed Lloyd's family or his doctors. No one visited the crime scene, or challenged Lloyd's competence. The appeals and the 17 years of imprisonment cost Michigan nearly a million dollars, and that amount does not include the $4 million civil judgment Lloyd later obtained for his wrongful conviction. And of course there is the real danger to the community of having the actual murderer and rapist remain at large some 20 years later."
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6 comments:
I love DNA exonerations.
I love hearing about them, I love reading about them. I cry when I see the faces of the men released after decades in prison by them.
DNA plays such a small part in the over all numbers of falsely accused and wrongly convicted, sad to say.
If it never happened, there's no DNA.
" Attorney General Holder calls sending an innocent person to jail 'the ultimate nightmare scenario'"
I could ask how he knows. There are so many ways an innocent perosn can be wrongfully jailed or imprisoned it might shock or stun the average human being.
It is so true sgtMom. In my husband's case, the accuser did not accuse of rape because she knew (from past false allegations) that with no DNA, there could not be a conviction. So she figured out other ways to poison the system and coerce men into doing stupid things.
CBGirl
This is why I wish polygraphing BOTH accused and accuser was required.
There are dozens of excuses why accusers won't be polygraphed, no excuses accepted for the accused to refuse.
Can you imagine how revealing it would be if BOTH were polygraphed?
It would show polygraphs for what they are -
Which is why it isn't done.
I think, like DNA technology in the OJ case, if the polygraph 'hand' were forced, it would either have the whole thing outlawed, or maybe improve it to a degree were results could be admissible in court.
Why would anybody not want that?
Attorney General Holder calls sending an innocent person to jail 'the ultimate nightmare scenario'
Then why is it still allowed to happen?
Putting an innocent person in jail or prison is an abomination to justice and all that is good and fair.
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