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Timothy Cole Research Papers

1150 Words5 Pages

Mary Therese McCormick
September 15, 2017
Innocence Project Research Paper

Timothy Cole

Timothy Cole served 22 of his 25-year sentence before his death in 1999 while in prison for a crime he did not commit. Newly developed DNA evidence proved his innocence and exonerated Cole almost a decade later. Another man was identified as the perpetrator and sent to prison. On March 24, 1985, Michele Jean Murray, a 20-year-old Texas Tech student, was parking her car in a vacant church parking lot across from her dormitory when an African-American man approached her and asked for her help start his car with jumper cables. She explained to the man that she didn't have jumper cables then the man reached in through her window and unlocked the door. The woman screamed in fear and bit the man's thumb, but then noticed that he was holding a knife. Pressing the knife to her throat, he forced her to lie down in the car while he moved into the driver's seat. He drove her to an empty field just outside of …show more content…

The victim in the case, Michele Mallin, speaks and writes about the case to raise awareness about misidentifications and wrongful convictions. “I was positive at the time that it was him,” she said, “I was shocked when I found out it wasn't him. I joined Tim’s family in working to exonerate him because it was the right thing to do. Timothy didn’t deserve what he got.” Cole's family members received $1,060,000 in compensation for his time in prison. I believe this compensation was appropriate because Cole lost his life in jail plus the last 22 years of his life. In 2014, a tall bronze statue of Timothy Cole was dedicated in Lubbock, depicting his younger self looking toward the Texas Tech University Law School. In his hands are two books which read: “Lest We Forget.” The base of the sculpture says “And Justice For

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