The National Registry of Exonerations 2019 Annual Report, a must-read for advocates of criminal justice reform, offers important insights on wrongful conviction at a particularly distressful time for our nation and the incarcerated.
“Right now, there are likely thousands of innocent people in U.S. jails and prisons as a result of wrongful convictions. It is hard to imagine the horror of being incarcerated today – innocent or guilty – as the COVID-19 virus is spreading through these closed spaces and threatening lives,” said Barbara O’Brien, the report’s author, who is law professor at Michigan State University and editor of the National Registry.
Read the report here.
Key takeaways:
How many? The Registry recorded 143 exonerations achieved in 2019. The total of known exonerations from 1989 until year-end 2019 was 2,556.
How many years stolen? Last year set a sobering new record in the number of years wrongfully convicted persons served for crimes they did not commit before they were exonerated and released: on average 13.3 years. In total, 1,908 years were stolen from the year’s exonerees, which brought the total years lost since 1989 to more than 22,000 years. The year recorded an unusual number of cases in which innocent people served sentences of more than 30 years. Ten of the Registry’s 52 cases involving serving more than 30 years in prison were added in 2019.
What crimes were involved? Of the 143 exonerations, 117 were of violent crimes, including homicide (76 cases), child sex abuse (10), and sexual assault on adults (11). Three of those wrongfully convicted of homicide had been sentenced to death.
In 50 exonerations, no crime was actually committed.
Why were innocent people convicted of crimes they didn’t commit? The top three contributors to wrongful conviction in the 2019 exonerations were perjury or false accusation (contributed in 101 of the 143 cases); official misconduct (93); and mistaken witness identification (48). Defendants offered guilty pleas in 34 exonerations and gave false confessions in 24 cases.
Who helped achieve the year’s exonerations? Conviction Integrity Units (CIU’s) or Innocence Projects prompted exonerations in 87 of the year’s exonerations. The important trend of the increasing establishment of Conviction Integrity Units within prosecutorial offices continued in 2019. The year also witnessed a promising new development — attorneys general in Michigan and New Jersey launched statewide CIUs. (Pennsylvania’s attorney general also launched one in early 2020.)
The annual report provides more than important numbers and analysis that can inform reforms and advances. It also tells the extraordinary stories of exonerees and unthinkable injustice. These horrific cases should motivate Americans to continue all efforts that will reduce wrongful conviction and, armed with this important research, dispel the arguments of those who resist meaningful reforms.
The National Registry of Exonerations — a joint project of the University of California Irvine Newkirk Center for Science & Society, the University of Michigan Law School, and the Michigan State University College of Law — once again has clarified wrongful conviction with the inescapable conclusion that we can and must advance toward a more accurate and just criminal justice system.
Miscarriages of justice (as wrongful convictions are more commonly referred to in the UK) rarely feature in the national media in the UK. This has been noted for many years now. If a case is sufficiently high-profile or has some peculiarity (i.e. involves a footballer or other ‘celebrity’), then it may merit a short piece in a national newspaper. Most will only make a paragraph or two in a regional newspaper if lucky supporters can provoke the interest of a local journalist. The overwhelming majority get no media coverage at all. This is not because of a lack of miscarriages of justice (our Criminal Court of Appeal is as over-run with work as ever, as is our Criminal Cases Review Commission), but a perceived lack of public interest. Perhaps domestic miscarriages lack the ‘drama’ of an exoneration in the US (we lack the ridiculously lengthy sentences for a start). The contrast is becoming increasingly stark, with ‘Making a Murderer’ lawyers ‘on tour’ in the UK speaking to rapturous crowds, while campaigners for domestic cases struggle to be heard. In just one example: a leading national newspaper this week has a major splash on an exoneration in the US, that has a small ‘home’ angle that can be exploited:
New Zealand has seen a few high profile miscarriages of justice in recent years, yet successive governments have ruled out the possibility of setting up a body – similar to the Criminal Cases Review Commision in the UK – to investigate potential miscarriages of justice. Justice William Young said courts could benefit from having a Criminal Cases Review Commission, like that established in the UK – an idea backed by the Police Association and most political parties. In a rare interview – which you can listen to here: 
Wrongful Convictions Blog 
The Terrible Old Rule that Undermines Conviction Accuracy
Samuel Gross has provided an insightful commentary in response to the U.S. Supreme Court’s June 22 vote (6 to 2) in Turner vs. United States, that affirmed the murder convictions of seven men and reaffirmed “a terrible old rule that has done great harm to the accuracy of criminal trials…”
A professor of law at the University of Michigan and founder and Senior Editor of The National Registry of Exonerations, Gross notes that in half of more than 800 exonerations since 1989 in which people had been wrongly convicted of murder, the prosecution had concealed exculpatory evidence at trial.
Students of the law and of wrongful convictions recognize these instances as Brady violations. In 1964, in Brady v. Maryland, the high court ruled that the government is obligated to disclose evidence that is favorable to the defense if it is “material” to the case. “Materiality” was later further defined as having a “reasonable probability” that the outcome of the trial would have been more favorable to the defendant if the evidence had been disclosed.
But can this rule be accurately applied? Is there a better way that could cure this nation’s “epidemic” of Brady violations? Gross answers both questions in his commentary, “How Concealing Key Evidence Convicts the Innocent.”
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Posted in Editorials/Opinion, Reforming/Improving the system, wrongful conviction
Tagged Brady Violation, Commentary, materiality, opinion, supreme court