Innocence Blog

Winston-Salem "looks forward" with report on Darryl Hunt case

Posted: March 7, 2007

A special committee created to review injustices in the Darryl Hunt case released its report last month, urging that the city take steps “to ensure that such a tragic series of events may never happen again.”

Hunt was convicted in 1984 and freed 19 years later. DNA testing had cleared him of the crime in 1994, but it took 10 years of legal battles before he was released. Read more about his case here.

The committee recommends that the city’s police department immediately begin videotaping custodial interrogations, a reform supported by the North Carolina Actual Innocence Commission and the Innocence Project.

The committee also issued a written apology to Hunt. Read the apology here.

And officials have said that the committee couldn’t answer all questions raised by the case. The report notes that it is a first step in a process of reform that will take time.

"We freely admit, we couldn't answer some of the questions," said Don Nielsen, the chairman of the Sykes Administrative Review Committee, which compiled the information in the report. He said he hopes that the report "is a building block so that people can look forward instead of backward."

Read the full story here. (Winston-Salem Journal, 03/04/07)

City officials also announced last month that a settlement had been reached for the city to pay Hunt $1.6 million in compensation for his wrongful conviction. Read more here.

Read more on the committee’s recommended reforms.

Read the full committee report.

"The Trials of Darryl Hunt," a moving documentary film following Hunt's case as it wends through the court system for two decades, will premiere on HBO on April 26. Click here for more information.