The conviction of a person for a crime they did not commit, arising from causes including coerced confessions, mistaken eyewitness identification, unreliable forensic testimony and inadequate legal defense. Organizations such as the Innocence Project use DNA testing to identify and reverse wrongful convictions.
Facts
FAQs
How common are wrongful convictions?
There is no single agreed figure, because it depends on the collecting body and its definition. The Innocence Project reports that eyewitness misidentification played a role in about 69 percent of the more than 375 DNA-based exonerations it has tracked in the United States between 1989 and 2020. That figure describes DNA exonerations specifically, a small, unusually well-documented subset of wrongful convictions, not the rate of wrongful conviction across the whole justice system, which cannot be measured directly because most wrongful convictions are never identified as such.
Connections
Associated With
Source Wikipedia: Bryan Stevenson
Eyewitness misidentification plays a role in more than 75 percent of convictions overturned through DNA testing.
Source Wikipedia: Eyewitness Identification
29 percent of DNA-based exonerations tracked by the Innocence Project involved a false confession.
Source Wikipedia: False Confession
The Innocence Project uses DNA testing to identify and reverse wrongful convictions.
Source Innocence Project: About
Exemplified By Cases
Why this is disputed. Amanda Knox's 2007 conviction was overturned on appeal, reinstated, and finally quashed by Italy's highest court in 2015; unlike the Central Park Five or West Memphis Three, no alternative perpetrator was conclusively established for the wider public record on Knox's own conviction, so its use as a wrongful-conviction exemplar is treated here as debated rather than settled.
Source Wikipedia: Murder of Meredith Kercher
Five teenagers served years in prison before DNA evidence and Matias Reyes's confession exonerated them in 2002.
Source Wikipedia: Central Park Jogger Case
The defendants were released in 2011 through an Alford plea after DNA testing exposed the investigative failures.
Source Wikipedia: West Memphis Three
Informed By
Source Innocence Project: About
Sources
1. Innocence Project: About
Mission & Values section
The Innocence Project works to free the innocent, prevent wrongful convictions, and create fair, compassionate, and equitable systems of justice for everyone.
Mission and Values section
The Innocence Project works to free the innocent, prevent wrongful convictions, and create fair, compassionate, and equitable systems of justice for everyone.
- Associated With: Innocence Project
- Informed By: Innocence Project
In Group: Wrongful Conviction, Exoneration and Legal Defense, About page opening
using DNA and other scientific advancements to prove wrongful conviction
View the SourceWikipedia: West Memphis Three
Wikipedia: Central Park Jogger Case
Exemplified By Cases: Central Park Jogger Case, Exoneration sectionQuote, Exemplified By Cases: Central Park Jogger Case, Exoneration section
a prominent example of racial profiling, discrimination, and inequality in the legal system
Wikipedia: False Confession
Associated With: False Confession, Incidence sectionQuote, Associated With: False Confession, Incidence section
the Innocence Project reports that since 1989, 375 offenders have been exonerated by DNA evidence. Twenty-nine percent of them confessed to the crime for which they were convicted and later exonerated.
Wikipedia: Eyewitness Identification
Associated With: Eyewitness Misidentification, Reliability sectionQuote, Associated With: Eyewitness Misidentification, Reliability section
Eyewitness misidentification is the single greatest cause of wrongful convictions nationwide, playing a role in more than 75% of convictions overturned through DNA testing.
Wikipedia: Murder of Meredith Kercher
Wikipedia: Bryan Stevenson
Associated With: Bryan Stevenson, Equal Justice Initiative sectionQuote, Associated With: Bryan Stevenson, Equal Justice Initiative section
Stevenson was able to discredit every element of the prosecution's initial case, which led to McMillian being exonerated and released from jail in 1993.
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