Innocence Blog

Dallas man freed after DNA proved his innocence

Posted: September 19, 2008 2:10 pm

Johnnie Earl Lindsey walked out of a Dallas courtroom this morning a free man after serving nearly 26 years in prison for a rape he didn’t commit.

He was 31 years old when he was convicted in 1982 of raping a woman in a Dallas park; he is 56 years old today. It wasn’t until a year after the assault that the victim identified him as the perpetrator, in a six-photo lineup that police had mailed to her. She had said the attacker was a shirtless African-American man, and Lindsey was one of the two shirtless men in the lineup.

Lindsey, who is represented by public defender Michelle Moore, is the 21st person cleared by DNA testing in Dallas County since 2001, more than any other county in the nation in that timeframe.

Read more about his release here.