Wrongful convictions in the US

The defendants lawyer was very poor and the search for the truth on the part of the police and DA was weak. Somebody got away w attempted murder and an innocent man spent 12 years in prison.

NYT "A judge in Philadelphia cleared a man in an attempted murder case on Monday after he spent about a dozen years in prison related to a shooting for which officials said there was weak evidence and the prosecution did not meet the burden of proof. The decision ended a yearslong battle to overturn his conviction.

The man, Charles Rice, who goes by C.J., was serving a 30- to 60-year sentence related to a 2011 shooting that injured four people, according to court records. He was convicted in 2013 on multiple charges, including four counts of attempted murder."
 

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Lewkat said:
Do not respond to a cop's interrogation without an attorney. It looks bad, I know, but safe. Yes sir or no sir is sufficient.
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Actually it's not. You have to say "I'm exercising my right to remain silent." otherwise they can and will use plain silence against you in court. Any response besides that one extends the contact and allows them to keep digging until they trip you up.

And they'll often pose questions with only wrong answers as they've been trained. For instance "you don't mind if I search your vehicle?" and then take both yes and no answers as granting permission. The correct answer is "I do not consent to any searches of my vehicle."
 

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Louis Scarcella - NYPD corrupt cop, prosecutors still covering up his actions

NYT "His overturned cases, some of which left wrongfully convicted people in prison for decades, have cost New York taxpayers more than $100 million in settlements and claims."

"For years, prosecutors did not disclose the broad scope of cases that the detective, Louis Scarcella, may have tainted, despite interest from lawyers and exoneration advocates.

But thanks to a simple computer slip-up, the door recently cracked open to reveal details of dozens of homicide cases that were not scrutinized amid a decadelong re-evaluation of Mr. Scarcella’s cases that led to convictions.

In January, prosecutors mistakenly sent a large, unredacted computer file with the Scarcella lists to the lawyers who represent three men who had served long prison terms after being wrongfully convicted in one of the detective’s cases."
 
Nathan said:
Thankfully there's the Innocence Project that assists in reversing erroneous convictions.


Yes, I agree. I just finished watching a case on TV where a false confession was given and it took the Innocence Project 11 years to get the Governor in Virginia to issue a pardon, which now the defendant is seeking a clemency and then an expungement of his case, which means his case never happened.

This case made me mad. I think the 2 cops that put this witness through the hell that they did should have been fired. The part I found most disturbing was that the suspect was a bit slow, which was very evident and should have been a key to the cops interviewing him and that he was a diabetic and the cops withheld his medicine until they got what they wanted. These cops even gave the defendant the information for the answers they were seeking. After an 11 hour interview, which began at 2 in the morning, the defendant finally threw in the towel and gave the cops what they wanted. Of course, he knew the answers to the questions now because the cops gave them to him. I think both of them should have been fired. Usually, I don’t get mad, but these 2 yokels crossed the line.

If you are interested look up the case of Robert Davis in Virginia.
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againstthegrain said:
$13Million payout by SF in wrongful conviction

SAN FRANCISCO – San Francisco's Board of Supervisors voted unanimously Tuesday to pay $13.1 million to a man found to have been framed by city police in a murder case.

Jamal Trulove, an aspiring actor and hip-hop artist, spent more than eight years behind bars after being sentenced to life in prison in 2010 in connection with the 2007 slaying of a friend and neighbor of his at a city housing project.

The conviction was overturned in 2014 and Trulove was acquitted in a 2015 retrial.

Then a federal jury determined last year that two homicide detectives fabricated evidence, coerced a key eyewitness and withheld vital information that may have exonerated Trulove.

After Trulove filed a civil rights lawsuit against four police officers and the city, a federal jury awarded him $14.5 million. The city sought to appeal that award, but dropped its appeal after reaching this week’s deal on the lower payout.

The jury found that detectives showed an eyewitness only a photo of Trulove, and no one else, in a bid to identify a suspect, and evidence revealed that two homicide detectives were aware of another possible suspect but did not investigate that lead.

The four officers named in the civil lawsuit have retired without facing discipline in connection with the case, Reisman said.


SFPD at their best.
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SFPD is not a PD that should be emulated by any other PD in the country.
 


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