A new report by a national prisoner-rights organization says that once again the state of Texas led the nation in 2013 in exonerations, with 13 cases, and Illinois and New York were not far behind with 9 and 8, respectively.   Although this is the highest figure in 25 years according to available data, it still represents only the known or acknowledged cases where defendants were wrongfully convicted.

This dubious distinction comes into sharper focus, when you consider that over 1 million criminal cases are processed in Texas every year, and shows there is still much to be done, a fact acknowledged by Shannon Edmonds, director of governmental relations for the Texas District and County Attorneys Association.

Exoneration figures have been tracked for the past several years by the authors of the new report, the National Registry of Exonerations, a program formally launched in 2012 by two U.S. law schools, the University of Michigan and Northwestern Law Schools.  The group’s most recent study shows that nationwide 85 of the wrongfully-convicted were cleared and released in the past year.  According to the same report, the figure has steadily increased in the past several years, and totals 1309 since records  began to be ...

The lies of Chicago police officers, as well as the concealment of clearly exculpatory evidence, kept Jermaine Walker in Illinois prisons for ten years – but he never stopped proclaiming his innocence. Plainclothes officers contended that on February 21, 2006, at approximately 8:30 p.m., they saw Walker hand cash to another individual in an alley in what they said was an illicit drug transaction.

Walker maintained that a video security camera on a building at the site of the alleged drug sale had recorded his confrontation with the arresting officers, Eric Reyes and Sebastian Flatley, and would prove he had committed no crime. Police officials and an investigator with the State’s Attorney’s office, Thomas Finnelly, asserted there was no security camera; based on their statements, the court declined to appoint an investigator to help Walker prove the camera and video footage existed. At trial, prosecutors introduced photos of the alleged crime scene, taken by Finnelly, that were carefully staged to avoid showing the presence of any security camera.

In fact, during closing arguments the prosecutor told the jury, “If there was a camera, do you think this defendant and his brother would be stupid enough to deal drugs in front ...

The Supreme Court of New York, Appellate Division has upheld a $35,000 damage award in favor of a former prisoner illegally confined for three weeks.

In October 2007, Robert Miller was charged with second- and third-degree drug offenses. He pleaded guilty to a single third-degree offense in March 2009 and ...

Exclusive! Breaking News: Illinois Prisoner Exonerated, Released after Ten Years

by Derek Gilna 

The lies of Chicago police officers, as well as the concealment of clearly exculpatory evidence, kept Jermaine Walker in Illinois prisons for ten years – but he never stopped proclaiming his innocence. Plainclothes officers contended that on February 21, 2006, at approximately 8:30 p.m., they saw Walker hand cash to another individual in an alley in what they said was an illicit drug transaction.

            Walker maintained that a video security camera on a building at the site of the alleged drug sale had recorded his confrontation with the arresting officers, Eric Reyes and Sebastian Flatley, and would prove he had committed no crime. Police officials and an investigator with the State’s Attorney’s office, Thomas Finnelly, asserted there was no security camera; based on their statements, the court declined to appoint an investigator to help Walker prove the camera and video footage existed. At trial, prosecutors introduced photos of the alleged crime scene, taken by Finnelly, that were carefully staged to avoid showing the presence of any security camera.

            In fact, during closing arguments the prosecutor told the jury, “If there was a camera, do you ...

The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed a district court’s dismissal of a false imprisonment suit based upon an improper immigration detainer, as the district court incorrectly held that it lacked Article III standing.

In June 2007, Bernardo Mendia was arrested on several California state charges. The court granted bail but Mendia needed the assistance of a bondsman to get out.

Before Mendia could make bail, he was interviewed by two agents with Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) – Ching Chang and John M. Garcia. Mendia insisted that he was an American citizen and had a valid U.S. passport, and gave them his Social Security number. He then invoked his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent, directing the agents to speak with his public defender. Agent Garcia became irate and said, “Oh! You don’t want to talk to me? We’ll see if you want to talk when we’re deporting your ass!”

An immigration detainer was immediately lodged against Mendia, falsely declaring that he was an illegal immigrant of Mexican nationality. The detainer blocked Mendia from posting bail. All the bondsmen he contacted “refused to even consider posting a bail ... because of the immigration detainer.”

About six months later the ...

An exonerated Michigan man will receive $2.5 million for his almost 26 years of wrongful incarceration. He was released from prison after it was discovered that Detroit police had tainted the victim’s identification and withheld exculpatory evidence.

Walter Swift was 21 when he was arrested on September 16, 1982 for ...

The Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals held an insurer did not breach its duty to protect a group of detectives from punitive damages in a civil rights action. The court further questioned whether Illinois law would allow a suit that shifted the burden of punitive damages from the tortfeasor to ...

The District of Columbia’s Court of Appeals has reversed a judgment against the D.C. government based upon the municipal liability standard set forth in Monell v. Dept. of Social Services, 436 U.S. 658 (1978). According to the appellate court, the plaintiff, who had been wrongfully jailed following a parole revocation, failed to show that the violation of his rights resulted from a municipal policy or custom, shielding the District from liability for the improper acts of its employees.

The Court of Appeals wrote that “[t]he District of Columbia Board of Parole revoked plaintiff Charles Singletary’s parole based primarily on unreliable multiple-hearsay testimony. This court later determined that the evidentiary basis for his parole revocation failed to satisfy the requirements of the Due Process Clause.”

Singletary filed suit against the D.C. government under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, arguing “that the District bore responsibility for the Board’s unconstitutional revocation decision. The district court found the District liable, and a jury awarded $2.3 million in damages for the period of Singletary’s confinement following the revocation of his parole.” [See: PLN, Sept. 2012, p.30].

The U.S. Supreme Court’s decision in Monell is the controlling case for determining municipal liability. To prevail, a ...

Michael Alan Crooker, wrongfully convicted in Massachusetts on a federal charge of being a felon in possession of a firearm, had his conviction reversed on appeal by the First Circuit in 2010, setting the stage for a certificate of innocence and a claim for financial damages from the federal government ...

An Illinois man who was wrongfully convicted of a sex offense, and released from prison after his supposed victim was discredited, has filed a federal lawsuit against the city of Chicago, the Chicago police department and other defendants as a result of his 2002 conviction for a rape he did not commit. In the meantime, Carl Chatman, 59, has had to defend himself against the faulty bookkeeping of Illinois’ sex offender registry.

Chatman was released from prison in 2013 thanks to the efforts of the Northwestern Law School’s Center on Wrongful Convictions. The prosecution did not oppose his certificate of innocence; in fact, the Cook County State’s Attorney’s office provided hard copies of Chatman’s release documents to the Illinois Department of Corrections, and prison officials claimed they entered a “Court Ordered Discharge” into the state’s criminal database – though they failed to indicate the reason for the discharge. As a result, Chatman’s name continued to appear on the sex offender registry and he was later arrested for failure to register.

“The whole thing is kind of a mess, and it really ought to be cleaned up and fixed so this kind of thing doesn’t happen,” said Rob Warden, executive director ...