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Federal judge: Don’t deport exoneree
Posted: October 10, 2008 4:04 pm
Ulysses Rodriguez Charles served 17 years in Massachusetts prison for a rape and robbery he didn’t commit before he was exonerated in 2001. In June, he was arrested and jailed pending deportation to his native Trinidad, despite his pending civil rights lawsuit against the Boston Police Department. His mother, who lives in Boston, said authorities were timing the deportation proceedings to disrupt his lawsuit.
"The whole deportation thing is a cooked-up business to deny him his rights to get what's due to him," Manzoni, 78, of the South End, said later. She said Charles lost nearly two decades of his life "for a crime he never dreamed to do, and now when it's time to get his justice, they put him behind bars again."A federal district judge demanded that immigration authorities at least delay the deportation until after the trial, but officials said the judge didn’t have jurisdiction. They also said there was no connection between the immigration issue and the civil suit.
Read the full story here. (Boston Globe, 10/09/08)
Tags: Ulysses Rodriguez Charles
City of Boston Seeks to Remove Judge from Civil Suit
Posted: November 18, 2008 3:25 pm
Ulysses Rodriguez Charles, who was exonerated in 2001 after serving 17 years in Massachusetts prison for a rape he didn’t commit, is facing deportation by U.S. immigration authorities at the same time his wrongful conviction civil suit against the city of Boston is pending.
And now lawyers for the city want U.S. District Court Judge Nancy Gertner to recuse herself from the case, saying that she showed “deep-seated favoritism and antagonism” in comments she made alleging that the city may have worked with immigration officials to deport Charles before his April civil trial.But Charles said last week that Gertner's comments were "extremely intuitive" and that the city is simply "judge shopping."
"I think they want it to be biased, and they see that she's fair," Charles, 58, said from his mother's house in the South End. "They thought they would get a judge who's pro-government because I'm suing the government. But she's extremely familiar with the underhanded tactics of the Boston Police Department."Read the full story here. (Boston Globe, 11/17/08)
Tags: Massachusetts, Ulysses Rodriguez Charles
Friday Roundup
Posted: November 28, 2008 4:40 pm
Innocence news from around the country this week:
A federal judge refused to disqualify herself from the civil case of exoneree Ulysses Rodriguez Charles after the city of Boston alleged that she displayed “favoritism” toward Charles.
The Albuquerque Police Department is running ads in a local paper seeking informants. As most Innocence Blog readers know, snitch testimony is a major cause of wrongful convictions, and paid or incentivized informants are at the center of the problem.
Irish photographer Denis Minihane won a Justice Media award for his shots of Innocence Project client Walter Swift.
Professors at the University of Texas at Arlington received a grant to study the reentry process for the exonerated.
Innocence Project of Florida client Jimmy Ates will have a hearing December 17 on his petition to overturn his conviction for a murder he says he didn’t commit.
And North Carolina defendant Ronnie Wallace Long was back in court this week in his continuing quest to clear his name of a 1976 rape.
Tags: Ulysses Rodriguez Charles
Friday Roundup: Unvalidated Forensics
Posted: May 22, 2009 2:09 pm
As the new Just Science Coalition calls for forensic reform in the United States, cases involving unvalidated forensics continued to make news this week:
Joseph Ramirez has been convicted four times in Florida for a 1983 murder, and each trial involved a form of unvalidated forensic evidence – from toolmark comparison to shoeprint identification. Reporter Maurice Possley wrote about his case this week at the Crime Report.
Meanwhile, an Oklahoma man was charged with murder based on bite-mark evidence.
For more stories on forensic science and calls for reform, remember to check the news page at the new Just Science Coalition website. Innocence Project supporters continued to sign the coalition’s petition this week calling for a federal agency to support and oversee forensic science in the U.S. Add your name today.
A column in the Fort-Worth Star-Telegram this week praised Dallas for its Conviction Integrity Unit and called on Tarrant County (which includes Fort Worth) to improve its reviews of possible wrongful convictions and its evidence preservation practices. On Thursday, Tarrant County DA Joe Shannon, Jr., responded to the column, writing: “Because of our history of integrity, openness and discretion, Tarrant County has been spared the rash of wrongful convictions that have made headlines elsewhere.”
Guardian columnist Eric Allison wrote this week about his theory on why prisoners seem to be good at determining when a fellow inmate has a legitimate claim of innocence.
A civil jury recently found “clear and convincing evidence of innocence” in the case of Massachusetts exoneree Ulysses Charles, making him eligible for up to $500,000 in damages.
Many readers of this blog are already members of our Facebook Cause, but we now have a Facebook page, too. Join here – and let us know if there are other social network sites where you’d like the see an active Innocence Project presence.
Tags: Ulysses Rodriguez Charles