Innocence Blog

Friday Roundup: Overturning Injustices from 1995 and 1915

Posted: October 9, 2009 6:15 pm

Richard Miles could be freed in Dallas on Monday after an investigation by Centurion Ministries turned up evidence that he didn’t commit a rape for which he was convicted in 1995.

Syndicated radio host Tom Joyner is seeking posthumous pardons for two of his great-uncles, who may have been executed for a crime they didn’t commit in South Carolina in 1915.

Coverage continued across the country this week of the 2004 wrongful execution of Cameron Todd Willingham. The Buffalo News said the case makes a clear argument for forensic reforms. We reported on other developments in the case earlier in the week here.

The blog Grits for Breakfast wondered how the state can best review other claims of wrongful conviction based on faulty arson science. The Texas Observer reviewed several of those cases.

A story in Washington Lawyer examined the landmark 1963 Gideon v. Wainwright Supreme Court decision that guaranteed the right to an attorney, and found an “unfulfilled promise.” “Thousands of people across the country go to jail every year without ever being competently defended or even talking to a lawyer,” Bob Kemper writes. Read more.

The Herald de Paris reported on the case of Hiroshi Yanagihara, who confessed to an attempted rape he didn’t commit in Japan and spent two years in prison before he was cleared.

An upcoming three-part series from the BBC will examine problems with eyewitness misidentification.

The Voice of America reported on calls for forensic reform.

A new study from Simon Fraser University in British Columbia casts further doubt on the reliability of the “Mr. Big” investigation technique used by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.