by Matthew T. Clarke

Hundreds of thousands of men and women are hidden from society—social failures convicted of felonies—behind concrete walls and razor wire in isolated parts of our country. Nestled among them are society's silenced victims—the wrongfully convicted.

Society is loath to admit its mistakes. Citizens would rather believe the police are trustworthy than accept they plant evidence. The community would rather believe that a criminal was captured and brought to justice than a crime remains unsolved. Prosecutors who have publicly accused a person of a crime are reluctant to admit a mistake. Indictments and press releases are the life-blood of public officials.

This bias is further magnified when a series of similar crimes occurs, causing community pressure on police, judges, and prosecutors to find and convict someone—anyone. Harried prosecutors manipulate police, forensic experts, and other witnesses to conform their testimony to the desired outcome. All this leads to conviction of the innocent along with the guilty. Once convicted, this injustice is seldom undone.

It is uncomfortable to believe that innocent people are in prison or worse—executed. Therefore, prosecutors, police, witnesses, judges, juries, victims and the media join in a great festival of public denial insisting-that wrongful convictions are ...

by Mumia Abu Jamal


Illinois Gov. George Ryan, in the last passing days of his first and only term, saved the best for last.


He sent shock waves across the nation when he issued four pardons to men sitting on the Condemned Units of the state's prison system, opening the doors of the dungeon for four men, one who sat in the shadow of the gallows for nearly two decades. Speaking in a soft Midwestern accent, his words were as damning as the death sentences that his orders negated: "The system is broken."


With these orders, he ushered four men-Stanley Howard, Madison Hobley, Aaron Patterson and Leroy Orange-from the darkest corners of the land into the light. Quoting a tale of that famed Illinoisan, Lincoln, he recalled the job of the nation's chief executive, who, reviewing execution orders for those who were convicted of violating the military code during the Civil War, asked one of his generals why one young man had no letters in his file from any who wished his life spared. The general, shrugging his shoulders matter-of-factly, said, "He's got no friends," Lincoln, lifting his pen, remarked, "He's got one friend," and pardoned the man from the ...

Wichita Kansas Pays $6.2 Million
to Settle Detainees' Lawsuit


On May 7, 2002, Wichita's City Council approved $6.2 million to be awarded to the 7,000 citizens who had their 14th Amendment rights violated. The suit filed by what the city has labeled as Municipal Court Scofflaws, (scofflaws means one who ...

The Court of Common Pleas of Marion County, Ohio, has granted release to an Ohio prisoner on habeas corpus after finding that Department of Rehabilitation and Correction (DORC) officials illegally altered a court sentencing entry to "correct" a perceived error in awarding jail-time credit. Issuance of the writ was not appealed by DORC.


William R. Dailey was a DORC prisoner at North Central Correctional Institution (NCCI), in Marion County, Ohio. He received consecutive sentences of eighteen and six months from the Court of Common Pleas of Marion County.


Subsequently, he received an eight-month sentence from the Court of Common Pleas of Summit County, Ohio, the time to be served consecutively to the Marion County terms. The Summit County Court also awarded Dailey 139 days of local jail credit, and later confirmed that award by a subsequent entry.


The Records Supervisor at NCCI refused to grant Dailey the jail-time credit. The Supervisor testified that it was DORC policy to deny credit to prisoners already serving prison time on other charges. DORC claimed that the jail-time credit award was contrary to law and must be corrected by DORC in order to comply with the law. DORC filed a motion to dismiss and ...

The Superior Court of New Jersey, Appellate Division has held that the New Jersey Department of Corrections (NJDOC) cannot depart from the terms a sentencing judge imposes. In September 1994, prisoner Larry Hill was released on parole for a 1990 conviction. On January 31, 1997 and July 25, 1997, he received five year sentences for new charges, which were to run concurrently. On May 21, 1997, Hill's parole was revoked. Because the sentences were imposed at different times and with the parole violation considered an aggregation, the NJDOC ran the five year sentences consecutively, and Hill's established maximum release date was set for October 29, 2004.

Hill wrote the trial judge, Honorable Hector DeSoto, who twice clarified his order to NJDOC as the sentences to be run concurrently pursuant to the plea bargain. Unfortunately, the state has shown a dogged resistance to admit that they committed error," wrote Hill in court documents after NJDOC refused to heed Judge DeSoto's clarification.

The NJDOC argued that state law allowed it to: 1) aggregate the January 31, 1997 with the May parole violation; and 2) sentences imposed at different times cannot be run concurrently and consecutively. The Superior Court noted the NJDOC failed ...

Innocence Project Northwest (IPNW) is undertaking a review of cases in which Washington State Patrol scientists Arnold Melnikoff and Michael Hoover conducted forensic testing or offered expert testimony.


It was recently revealed that Melnikoff engaged in scientific fraud during his tenure as the director and hair examiner for the Montana State Crime Laboratory during the 1980's. Melnikoff's false testimony about hair comparisons led to at least two wrongful convictions of factually innocent men in Montana. The most recent exoneration involved Jimmy Ray Bromgard. Mr. Bromgard was released from prison on September 30, 2002, when DNA testing established his innocence. He had served 15 years of his 40-year sentence.


Melnikoff served as the director of the Montana State crime laboratory from 1970 to 1989. He then moved to the Washington State Patrol, working briefly in the Kelso office before moving to the Spokane office. At least initially, it appears that his work in Washington was restricted to drug analysis and site inspections at alleged clandestine drug labs. Melnikoff's work is undergoing an audit by the Washington State Patrol, in conjunction with IPNW and the Innocence Project at Cardozo Law School.


Michael Hoover, a chemist with the Washington State Patrol, was sentenced ...

by John E. Dannenberg


In the largest legal settlement in its history, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors agreed in May, 2002 to pay $27 million to compensate 400,000 former jail prisoners who had been held on wrong warrants, held beyond their release dates or who had been inappropriately ...

An Indiana county jail's lack of policy for the eventual release of detainees arrested pursuant to a Body Attachment raised sufficient facts to defeat the sheriff's motion for summary judgment, thus allowing an overdetained prisoner's civil rights complaint to proceed to trial.

Shakidi Johnson was arrested pursuant to an Allen County Court Body Attachment for minor misdemeanors which required him to serve a total of 40 days in jail. However, he wasn't released until 18 days after his time had been served.

He sued for this overdetention under 42 U.S.C. § 1983, citing the Fourteenth Amendment's Due Process Clause. At issue was what caused his extended stay, and whether that cause rose to the level of a constitutional violation.

Allen County Sheriff James Herman had authority under the court's writ of attachment to arrest Johnson and bring him to court. Herman, however, had no intrinsic authority to otherwise detain Johnson. After Johnson appeared and was sentenced, Herman had authority to hold him for 40 days, but not 58 days. But despite 14 written inquiries from Johnson to Herman as to when his release date was, or why he was still incarcerated, he got no responsive answer.

The problem turned out ...

On October 29, 2001, a federal jury in Chicago awarded $15 million plus about $2 million in attorney fees to James Newsome, 45, who was wrongfully convicted of murder and spent 15 years behind bars. It was the largest wrongful imprisonment verdict in Illinois history.

In 1979, Newsome was arrested ...

On November 20, 2001, a Los Angeles county jury returned a $1 million verdict to 39 year-old Jay Reynolds, a former jail detainee who was raped by his cellmates after a judge ordered his release from jail. Reynolds was arrested in March 1999, when a traffic stop by police showed ...