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Essays on wrongful convictions
Wrongful convictions throughout history
Wrongful convictions throughout history
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Introduction The book that I selected is called “Getting Life” by Michael Morton, who is a man that was wrongfully convicted of killing his wife in Texas in 1986. This book takes us from a happy young couple to the day of the murder, through the investigation into his wife’s murder, Michael’s trial and conviction, 25 years in prison, appeals, release from prison, and reintegration into society. One unique fact about this case is that is the first case where the prosecutor in a wrongful conviction case was subsequently convicted of prosecutorial misconduct, stripped of their law license and sentenced to serve time in jail.
Throughout the court of Canada there has been many records of wrongfully convictions that have occured. Today we still investigate those cases and why this lead for an wrongful act. Thomas Sophonow, David Milgaard, and James Driskell are three of the many that were wrongfully convicted. They were all imprisoned for murder and served jail time for 5 or more years.
The Trinity Western v. Law Society of Upper Canada case occurred between Trinity Western University and the Law Society of Upper Canada. To begin the appellant Trinity Western University (“TWU”) is a long established and well respected private university located in British Columbia. The school's mandate is anchored in an evangelical Christian philosophy. Which means that TWU’s education is to be taught with “a fundamental philosophy and viewpoint that is in accordance with the Christian tradition.” Accompanying the school's core Christian beliefs is their community covenant, The Community Covenant is a code of conduct which encompasses TWU’s Christian religious values.
Let's explore another case, where we have Ryan Ferguson, from Jefferson City, Missouri. Ferguson is accused of killing a popular sports editor, Kent Heitholt, from Columbia Daily Tribune, on Halloween night in 2001. Ferguson has been in prison now for eight years. The accuser is Charles Erickson, who claims that he and Ferguson agreed to rob someone for money to help them buy more alcohol. Erickson went in to the police station two years after the murder and gave the police suspicion that he knew some of what happened the night Heitholt was killed.
The James Holmes and the Aurora theatre shooting case. There are many pieces of evidence in this case that could be looked at as someone who committed a premeditated shooting and someone who was in fact insane. Ultimately the insanity plea did not work in James Holmes favor but it did extend what would have already been a long death penalty case. Some key pieces of evidence were highly controversial in the fact that there was arguing over whether or not it should be allowed in court.
Richard P. Charboneau was murdered on March 9th, 2018 at around 4:33 pm. So Mrs. Stukey asked Mr.Charboneau to come down to the cave the primary crime scene as she sipped on her Mcdonalds Unsweetened Tea from lunch. Then suddenly Mrs. Stukey choked Mr.Charboneau with a plastic electrical cord around the neck. Explaining the Ligature marks on the neck from the autopsy reports and Mrs. Stukey agreed she had electrical wires in her classroom during interviews. Choking him from behind based on the way the bruising was wrapped around the neck.
Both men were successful in their appeals as a verdict of guilty could not be settled upon as the case was based on improbabilities and circumstantial evidence that could not lead to a definite
“On July 30, 1992, an innocent person was convicted of a heinous crime”. Guy Paul Morin, an ordinary man, was arrested, imprisoned and convicted of first degree murder. The victim was Christine Jessop, a nine-year-old girl from Ontario, Canada. She was found murdered in a field about fifty kilometres from where she lived. Due to the investigation team’s carelessness and tunnel vision, the systematic failure of the justice system, and the poor handling of evidence by the crown there was not only one, but two victims in this case.
Damian Swanson 12/13/16 English 3 Argumentative Essay Im Serial let him out of jail In the United States ten thousand people are wrongly convicted every year. (researchnews.org) This is what happened to a seventeen year old kid named Adnan Syed.
The Eighth Amendment was created to prohibit cruel punishments that the colonists would receive from the British. The British brought colonists over to an unfair trial and then received punishment that sometimes would be death. The writers of the wanted to make sure that the colonists received the fair trial and fair punishment they deserve. The Eight Amendment was ratified in December 5, 1791 as a part of the Bill of Rights. The Eighth Amendment has not been changed since the ratification in 1791.
With millions of criminal convictions a year, more than two million people may end up behind bars(Gross). According to Samuel Gross reporter for The Washington Post, writes that also “even one percent amounts to tens of thousands of tragic [wrongful conviction] errors”(Gross). Citizens who are wrongfully convicted are incarcerated for a crime he or she did not commit. Many police officers, prosecutors, and judges are responsible for the verdict that puts innocents into prison. To be able to get exonerated many wait over a decade just to get there case looked at, not many are able to have the opportunity of getting out.
Therefore, this is an outdated claim, due to our justice system changing and adapting to public beliefs. There may be a few wrongful convictions in the criminal justice system, however that does not make it cause more harm than good. In any system there are flaws, we cannot disregard all the good the justice system does. Although this system has flaws like all others, it is what safeguards our society's
Luckily, it is known what causes wrongful convictions and how to fix them. Many wrongful convictions are due to mistaken eyewitnesses, jailhouse snitches, or false evidence. I think many of the wrongful convictions could be solved with harder evidence, more information. A case should not rely on a single eye witness but multiple.
Countless times the wrong person has been sentence to death or convicted because of an error made by the law. The percentage for convicting the wrong is 4.1%; the wrong person could serve a life sentence (Gross). Along with decision errors, government officials can be biased. For example, Brock Turner, a Stanford star swimmer was convicted of rape, but he only served six months. Apparently, his judge, Aaron Pesky, was biased against women and did not take sexual assault cases seriously.
Can you begin to imagine spending over 30 years of your life in prison over something you knew you never did? Imagine the point in which you were voiceless and the odds seemed to be against you. That is what has happened to so many people in North Carolina particularly due to wrongful convictions. Since 2007 the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission has been able to get over 7 people exonerated from the death penalty and back into society after spending more than 15 years incarcerated for a crime they did not commit due to tampering of evidence, coerced confessions, plea bargains, and much more. The legal definition for wrongful conviction is persons who are in fact innocent but who have been wrongly convicted by a jury or other court
