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Some of
the best resources and links on the falsely accused
below:
"Loose the chains of injustice and untie the
cords of the yoke, to set the oppressed free.
Then
your light will break forth like the dawn, and your healing will
quickly appear."
Isaiah
58: 6-8.
(The true
story above of Reverend Michael Cartwright was edited by
former classmate
Attorney Timothy L. Knudtson of South Dakota.
I believe God has
shaped Timothy's heart to be so passionate in helping so
many others is
because he
understands their grief and suffering, because he himself has
been falsely accused and
arrested.)
(picture
of Tim and me right before we went hiking in Southern California Jan
2008)
I am very passionate about this subject of those who
are falsely accused ,
Our very own Lord and Savior was falsely accused and
crucified.
One day
I will create a Website for the falsely accused: www.Falsely-accused.org
There are many
men and women on the Internet links below
who we
must never
forget are someone's father, mother
husband,
wife, son, or daughter,
brother, sister,
uncle, aunt or friend who have lost ten,
twenty or
more years of their lives in prison being
falsely
accused. Many who have been
released, because of
being proven
innocent from D.N.A. testing.
My Life is not
without bitter sweet sorrow
There are many
wonderful organizations that will help people
who have been falsely accused and are now
serving time in prison.
March 20, 2008
ABC News 7
55 year old William Earl Green was
falsely accused and was just released from prison after
serving 23 years.
This is what he had to say
"I'm not bitter, I don't hate anybody. I don't
hate Wille Finley for doing what he did,
I forgive
him too. If I want God to forgive me for my
sins, than who am I?
I'm not God, so I have to forgive him for what he
did to me. I'm a better man today."
Willie Earl Green
Thanks to wonderful organizations like the
"Innocent Project"
The
world now knows there are many other cases where
people have been truly falsely accused
and
have spent many years in prison.
Thanks to God's blessings of new advanced DNA
technology
that can prove a persons innocence!
Over 400 people who have been falsely
accused
have been released from prison,
and 100 just from the "Innocence
Project" alone!
and
many other projects that are similar.
I was suppose to serve on jury duty last
month
but I obtained an extension because of my
schedule.
Anybody that serves on the jury should always have an
open mind
and a pure heart,
And
we should only go only by the evidence and not be
persuaded by our own personal feelings,
opinions and judgments.
God
will bless you for it because you are truly blessed by the truth
and
not cursed by lies.
"A false witness will not go unpunished, and he
who pours out lies will perish."
Proverbs 19:9
Back to WOWFaith
Devotionals
Top of Page
Back to Home Page
Below are some of the best
links on facts and projects
concerning the
falsely accuse:
There is a wonderful movie about the falsely accused
titled:
After
Innocence- www.Afterinnocence.com
It first appeared in
New York as of November 2005.
Below are some
of the best falsely accused Web sites that
I have
personally been too.
www.innocenceproject.com
www.exonerated.com
www.activevoice.net
Web Sites For Other Innocence
Projects
California Innocence Project
Equal Justice Initiative of Alabama
The Innocence Project
The Innocence Project of The National Capital
Region
North Carolina Center on Actual
Innocence
Northern California Innocence
Project
Innocence Project
Northwest
Wisconsin Innocence Project
Truth in Justice
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The Innocence Project The
Innocence Project is a non-profit legal clinic which works to
free innocent people who have been wrongly convicted and
incarcerated, and to bring substantive reform to the criminal
justice system responsible for their unjust
imprisonment
After
Innocence is a documentary that follows seven
men on their journey back into society after exoneration. The
film won a Jury Prize at the Sundance Film Festival in
January, 2005
Burden of Innocence A PBS
Frontline documentary about the experiences of the wrongly
convicted after exoneration.
The Center on Wrongful
Convictions is dedicated to identifying and
rectifying wrongful convictions and other serious miscarriages
of justice
The Justice Project (TJP) is a
nonpartisan organization dedicated to fighting injustice and
to creating a more humane and just world
The Constitution Project is a
bipartisan nonprofit organization that seeks consensus on
controversial legal and constitutional issues through a unique
combination of scholarship and activism
Death Penalty Information Center
provides state-by-state information on executions, history of
the death penalty, discusses mental retardation, race,
innocence, deterrence, and botched execution
Death
Penalty Focus is dedicated to the abolition of
capital punishment through grassroots organizing, research,
and the dissemination of information
Equal
Justice USA, a project of the Quixote Center,
is a grassroots campaign for human rights in the U.S. legal
system. Through education and mobilization, it seeks to bring
into clear focus the racial, economic and political biases
active in U.S.
Truth in Justice Project is a
nonprofit organization working to free wholly innocent men and
women convicted of crimes they did not commit
Books
Surviving Justice: America's Wrongfully
Convicted and Exonerated (2005) Eggers and Vollen,
eds.
Johnson, Calvin (2003) Exit to Freedom
(Calvin Johnson)
Protess, David and Warden, Rob (1998) A
Promise of Justice. (The Ford Heights Four)
Adams, Randall (1991) Adams V. Texas ( Case
depicted in The Thin Blue Line)
Shapiro, Fred (1969) Whitmore (George
Whitmore)
Haresign, Gordon (1986) Innocence (Steve
Linscott)
Giavanni, Marcus (1998) Nelson VS The United
States of America (Mark Nelson)
Junkin, Tim (2004) Bloodsworth: The True
Story of the First Death Row Inmate Exonerated by DNA (Kirk
Bloodsworth)
Scheck, Barry, Neufeld, Peter, and Dwyer,
Jim (2000) Actual Innocence: Five Days to Execution, and Other
Dispatches from the Wrongfully Convicted
Law Review
Articles
Bernhard, Adele, When Justice Fails:
Indemnification for Unjust Conviction, 6 U. Chi. L Sch.
Roundtable 73 (1999) and Justice Still Fails: A Review of
Recent Efforts to Compensate Individuals Who Have Been Wrongly
Convicted, Drake L. Rev. (2004).
Lopez, Alberto B., $10 and a Denim Jacket? A
Model Statute for Compensating the Wrongly Convicted, 36 Ga.
L. Rev. 665 (2002).
Armbrust, Shawn, When Money Isn't Enough:
The Case For Holistic Compensation of the Wrongfully
Convicted, Am. Crim. L Rev. 157 (2004).
Master, Howard S., Revisiting the
Takings-Based Argument for Compensating the Wrongfully
Convicted, 60 N.Y.U. Ann. Surv. Am. L. 97 (2004).
Gross, Samuel, Exonerations in the United States
1989 Through 2003, 95 Journal of Criminal Law and Criminology
2, 2005. |
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Life After Exoneration Program - P.O.
Box 10208, Berkeley, CA 94709 - info@exonerated.org |
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Copyright 2003-2005, LAEP. All
rights reserved |
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At the time of this writing there were over four
hundred exonerees nationwide,
the numbers are much higher
now
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Life After Exoneration Program - P.O.
Box 10208, Berkeley, CA 94709 - info@exonerated.org |
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Copyright 2003-2005, LAEP. All
rights reserved |
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At the time of this writing there were over four
hundred exonerees nationwide, the numbers are much higher now.
Many of the most
recent exonerations have been through the use of DNA
evidence.
| About the Exonerated |
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Innocent and Forgotten
The exonerated are the increasing numbers of
individuals in this country who have been convicted of crimes
they did not commit, and manage to win release from prison
after having proven their innocence. There are approximately
four hundred exonerees nationwide. Many of the most recent
exonerations have been through the use of DNA evidence. While
there has been a significant attention surrounding the fact of
wrongful conviction in this country, few Americans realize
what awaits someone who has proven their innocence.
Traumatized by their
Experience
A recent LAEP study of sixty exonerees
nationwide confirmed that exonerees have considerable
difficulty rebuilding their lives:
-
half were living with family
members
-
two-thirds were not financially
independent
-
one-third lost custody of their children
as a result of their wrongful incarceration
-
at least a quarter suffer from
post-traumatic stress disorder
Let Down by Society a Second Time
Most people do not realize that most states
have no law providing compensation for an innocent person who
wrongfully convicted for the time he or she spent in prison.
In the states that do have compensation statutes, the amount
is meager and the process to qualify for it is difficult for
most exonerees to negotiate.
What re-entry services are available to
parolees are not available to exonerees. In most instances, a
conviction remains on the exonerees record, even after the
individual has proven innocence, thereby making it difficult
for the exoneree to get a job, rent an apartment, or get
credit.
Convicted of: Rape and
Kidnapping
State: California
Served: 10 years
Released: 2004
Compensated by State: NO
Current
Status: Self-employed
Health Insurance: No
Then: Harsh and coercive
interrogation tactics led a teenage victim to suggest her
assailant was Peter Rose. A father of four with no history of
violent crime or sexual assault, Rose was convicted of rape
and kidnapping and sentenced to twenty-seven years in prison,
leaving his own children without a father and without support.
He always maintained his innocence. At one of his first court
hearings in 1995, Rose told the court "If the DNA tests were
back it would show that I'm not the one." After serving ten
years in California's Mule Creek State Prison, DNA testing
proved him right. Rose’s conviction was vacated and he was set
free.
Now: Mr. Rose lives in Point Arena, a
small coastal community in Northern California. The sole
source of support for his four children and ailing mother, Mr.
Rose works intermittently with his brother in commercial
fishing. When not out on the water, Mr. Rose raises his four
children, who were not allowed to visit him while he was
incarcerated.
California is one of twenty states that
provides for compensation of the wrongfully convicted. Mr.
Rose is hoping his compensation application will be approved.
He plans to use some of the money buy and renovate houses. His
dream is to own a home of his own, one his children can always
come back to.
Hometown: Point Arena, CA
Convicted of: Rape and Murder
State:
Illinois
Served: 27 years
Released: 2003
Compensated
by State: No
Current Status: Unemployed and housing with
family
Health Insurance: No
Then: Gerald Ford was still the
President when Michael Evans and another teenager were
convicted of a rape and murder they knew nothing about. Each
was 17 years old, and each was sentenced to 200 to 400 years
in prison. After spending twenty-seven years in the Illinois
prison system, DNA confirmed his innocence.
Now: Having left his South Side
Chicago neighborhood as a teen, Mr. Evans returned as a
middle-aged man. Although he had enrolled in prison programs
to complete his high school diploma, he was unable to do so
because the constant vigilance he maintained to protect his
life in prison interfered with his studies. Currently living
with his sister, Mr. Evans has yet to receive the meager
compensation the state of Illinois offers an exoneree after
twenty-seven years of imprisonment, Mr. Evans is looking for
work. Imprisoned before he knew how to drive, he is in the
process of completing driver's education so that he does not
have to travel to remote job locations on public
transportation. Thus far, his employment has been limited to
the fast food industry.
Hometown: Chicago Illinois
Seeking: Driver's education, job training
and employment, health insurance
Convicted of: Aggravated
Rape
State: Louisiana
Served: 22 years
Released:
2003
Compensated by State: No
Current Status: Unemployed
and unable to afford housing
Health Insurance: No
Then: In 1981, Calvin Willis was
convicted and sentenced to life without the possibility of
parole for a rape he did not have anything to do with. He
spent the next twenty-two years in Louisiana's infamous Angola
State Prison. The dedication of his family and long-time
advocate Janet Gregory helped secure DNA testing of the
physical evidence in the case. DNA testing excluded Mr. Willis
as the perpetrator, and he was set free.
Now: When Calvin Willis finally went
home, it was 2003 and home was his grandmother's house. Even
if Mr. Willis qualifies under Louisiana's recently passed
compensation law, he will receive no more than $150,000 for
the 22 years he lost. In prison, Mr. Willis worked as a
barber, but cannot continue to cut hair on the outside without
a barber's license, which requires a high school degree. He
has enrolled in GED test preparation classes, but the sporadic
manual labor jobs he works to make ends meet got in the way.
Mr. Willis is unemployed, and unable to cover his living
expenses. He is currently enrolled in truck driving school.
Hometown: Shreveport, Louisiana
Seeking: Employment as a landscaper or truck
driver, preferably with medical benefits. |
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EYEWITNESS INDENTIFICATION
RESOURCES |
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- New Jersey
New Jersey
Eyewitness ID Protocols
In 2001,
the New Jersey Attorney General ordered all
police departments to adopt sequential double -
blind lineup procedures.
- Northampton, Massachusetts
Northampton
Police Department ID Protocols
The
Northampton police department adopted the NIJ
eyewitness guidelines in 2000 and implemented
sequential double - blind lineup procedures as a
best practice in 2001.
- Santa Clara County, California
Santa Clara
County ID Protocols
According to
an order from the district attorney's office,
Santa Clara County implemented sequential double
- blind lineup procedures in 2002.
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- Innocence Project resources for the
Innocence Protection Act of 2003
Innocence Project Legislation
Page
Includes commentary on the
IPA, Peter Neufeld's Congressional testimony, a
Model Statute for Obtaining DNA Testing, and
remarks from Senator Patrick Leahy and Kirk
Bloodsworth
- Innocence Protection Act of 2001: Full Text
Version of S. 486
View at
Thomas.loc.gov
* 107th Congress,
1st Senate Session, Introduced 7 March 2001
*
Sponsored by Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT)
- Innocence Protection Act of 2001: Full Text
Version of H.R. 912
View at
Thomas.loc.gov
* 107th Congress,
1st House of Representatives Session, Introduced
7 March 2001
* Sponsored by Rep. William
Delahunt (D-MA)
- Commission on Proceedings Involving Guy Paul
Morin (Canada)
Ontario
Attorney General's Office
- Thomas Sophonow Inquiry Report
(Canada)
Province of
Manitoba Justice Site
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