Innocence Project Achieves 300th DNA Exoneration

Louisiana death-row inmate Damon Thibodeaux exonerated with DNA evidence

First, here is some interesting, relevant data to which this case adds: (the emphasis is mine)

Of 83 exonerations in the past five years, more than 15 percent didn’t involve rape. As many as a quarter of the cases involved a false confession, in which one or more defendants admitted to the crime under interrogation.

Samuel Gross, an author of a report by the recently created National Registry of Exonerations at the University of Michigan, calculated that based on the proven rate of exonerations among death-row prisoners in the past two decades, U.S. courts appear to have an error rate in capital cases of between 2.5 percent and 4 percent.

In June, researchers examining biological evidence from hundreds of Virginia rape convictions between 1973 and 1987 determined that new DNA testing appeared to exonerate convicted defendants in 8 percent to 15 percent of cases.

See Washington Post story here.

And here is a link to a CNN article on the story.

Here is a link to the Innocence Project’s web page featuring the story.