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Innocence Project, Inc. is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit legal organization that is committed to exonerating individuals who have been wrongly convicted, through the use of DNA testing and working to reform the criminal justice system to prevent future injustice. The group cites various studies estimating that in the United States between 1% and 10% of all prisoners are innocent. The Innocence Project was founded in 1992 by Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld who gained national attention in the mid-1990s as part of the "Dream Team" of lawyers who formed part of the defense in the O. J. Simpson murder case.
As of 2021, the Innocence Project has helped to successfully
overturn over 300 convictions through DNA-based exonerations. In 2021,
Innocence Project received the biennial Milton Friedman Prize for Advancing
Liberty from Cato Institute, awarded in recognition and gratitude for its work to
ensure liberty and justice for all. In March 2022, The Innocence Project won
two Webby Awards for its Happiest Moments video, winning the Best Humanitarian
& Services campaign in both the brand and non-profit categories. Happiest
Moments was the organization's first-ever public service announcement that
premiered in June 2021 and was produced by Hayden5.
Founding
The Innocence Project was established in the wake of a study
by the U.S. Department of Justice and U.S. Senate, in conjunction with Yeshiva
University's Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, which claimed that incorrect
identification by eyewitnesses was a factor in over 70% of wrongful
convictions. The Innocence Project was founded in 1992 by Scheck and Neufeld as
part of a law clinic at Cardozo. It became an independent 501(c)(3) nonprofit
organization on January 28, 2003, but it maintains institutional connections
with Cardozo. Madeline deLone was the executive director from 2004 until 2020,
succeeded by Christina Swarns on September 8, 2020.
The Innocence Project is the headquarters of the Innocence
Network, a group of nearly 70 independent innocence organizations worldwide.
One such example exists in the Republic of Ireland where in 2009 a project was
set up at Griffith College Dublin.
Mission
The Innocence Project's mission is "to free the staggering number of innocent people who remain
incarcerated, and to bring reform to the system responsible for their unjust
imprisonment."
The Innocence Project focuses exclusively on post-conviction
appeals in which DNA evidence is available to be tested or retested. DNA
testing is possible in 5–10% of criminal cases. Other members of the Innocence
Network also help to exonerate those in whose cases DNA testing is not
possible.
In addition to working on behalf of those who may have been
wrongfully convicted of crimes throughout the United States, those working for
the Innocence Project perform research and advocacy related to the causes of
wrongful convictions.
Some of the Innocence Project's successes have resulted in
releasing people from death row. The successes of the project have fueled
American opposition to the death penalty and have likely been a factor in the
decision by some American states to institute moratoria on criminal executions.
In District Attorney's
Office v. Osborne (2009), US Supreme Court Chief Justice Roberts wrote that the post-conviction challenge "poses
questions to our criminal justice systems and our traditional notions of
finality better left to elected officials than federal judges." The
opinion, another justice wrote that forensic science has "serious deficiencies". Roberts also said that post-conviction
DNA testing risks "unnecessarily
overthrowing the established system of criminal justice." Law
professor Kevin Jon Heller wrote: "It
might lead to a reasonably accurate one."
The Innocence Project, as of June 2018, receives 55% of its
funding from individual contributions, 16% from foundations, 16% from events,
8% from investments, and the remaining 5% from corporations, Yeshiva University,
and other sources.
Work
The Innocence Project originated in New York City but
accepts cases from other parts of the country. The majority of clients helped
are of low socio-economic status and have used all possible legal options for
justice. Many clients hope that DNA evidence will prove their innocence, as the
emergence of DNA testing allows those who have been wrongly convicted of crimes
to challenge their cases. The Innocence Project also works with the local,
state, and federal levels of law enforcement, legislators, and other programs to
prevent further wrongful convictions.
All potential clients go through an extensive screening
process to determine whether or not they are likely to be innocent. If they
pass the process, the Innocence Project takes up their case, resources
permitting. About 2,400 prisoners write to the Innocence Project annually, and
at any given time the Innocence Project is evaluating 6,000 to 8,000 potential
cases. In addition to their co-directors and a managing attorney, the Innocence
Project has six full-time staff attorneys and nearly 300 active cases.
In almost half of the cases that the Innocence Project takes
on, the clients' guilt is reconfirmed by DNA testing. Of all the cases taken on
by the Innocence Project so far, about 43% of clients were proven innocent, 42%
were confirmed guilty, and evidence was inconclusive and not probative in 15%
of cases. In about 40% of all DNA exoneration cases, law enforcement officials
identified the actual perpetrator based on the same DNA test results that led
to exoneration.
Overturned convictions
As of January 2022, 375 people previously convicted of
serious crimes in the United States had been exonerated by DNA testing since
1989, 21 of whom had been sentenced to death. Almost all (99%) of the wrongful
convictions were males, with minority groups constituting approximately 70%
(61% African American and 8% Latino). The National Registry of Exonerations
lists 2,939 convicted defendants who were exonerated through DNA and non-DNA
evidence from January 1989 through January 2022 with more than 25,600 years
imprisoned.
According to a study published in 2014, at least 4.1% of
persons overall sentenced to death from 1973 to 2004 are probably innocent. The
following are some examples of exonerations they helped bring about:
Steven Avery was
exonerated in 2003 after serving 18 years in prison for a sexual assault charge.
After his release, he was convicted of murder.
Cornelius Dupree was
convicted of sexual assault and robbery in 1980, and exonerated by DNA evidence
in 2011 by the Innocence Project.
Douglas Echols and
Samuel Scott were convicted in 1987 of sexual assault and robbery, and
exonerated in 2002 by DNA evidence by the Innocence Project.
Clarence Elkins was
convicted in 1999 for rape and murder, and exonerated by DNA evidence in 2005;
defended by Ohio Innocence Project.
Ryan Ferguson was
convicted in 2005 for a 2001 murder, and exonerated in 2013 because the
prosecution withheld exculpatory evidence and the witnesses who testified
against him recanted their testimony; defended by Missouri Innocence Project.
Glenn Ford was
exonerated in 2014 in the murder of Isadore Newman. Ford, an African American,
had been convicted by an all-white jury without any physical evidence linking
him to the crime and with testimony withheld. He served 30 years on death row
in Angola Prison before his release.
Darryl Hunt was
exonerated in 2004 after serving 19+1⁄2 years in prison of a life sentence for
the rape and murder of a newspaper copy editor, Deborah Sykes.
Michael Morton was
convicted of murder in 1987, spent over 24 years in prison, and was exonerated
through DNA and withholding of evidence in 2011 with help from the Innocence
Project. In 2013 his prosecutor was convicted of withholding evidence, agreed
to disbarment, and spent 4 days in jail.
Anthony Porter was
convicted of murder in 1983, and exonerated in 1999 by the Medill Innocence
Project.
James Calvin Tillman
was exonerated in 2007 after an investigation begun by the Innocence Project,
and after serving 16+1⁄2 years in prison for a rape he did not commit. His
sentence was 45 years.
Archie Williams was
convicted in 1983 of sexual assault and sentenced to life without the
possibility of parole but was exonerated in 2019 due to DNA evidence after over
three decades in prison.
Ken Wyniemko was
convicted in 1994 of sexual assault, and exonerated in 2003 through DNA evidence
by the Innocence Project.
Michael Sutton and
Kenny Phillips went out for Phillips' birthday in May 2006, they were
wrongfully arrested and incarcerated for 15 years. In 2023, their attempted
murder convictions were overturned and the University of Akron granted them
full scholarships to earn their college degrees.
Innocence Network
The Innocence Project is a founding member of the Innocence
Network, a coalition of independent organizations and advocates, including law
schools, journalism schools, and public defense offices that collaborate to
help convicted felons prove their innocence. As of 2021, there were 68
organizations in the network, operating in all 50 US states and 12 other
countries, and had helped exonerate 625 people.
In South Africa, the Wits Justice Project investigates South
African incarcerations. In partnership with the Wits Law Clinic, the Julia
Mashele Trust, the Legal Resources Centre (LRC), the Open Democracy Advice
Centre (ODAC), the US Innocence Project, and the Justice Project investigate
individual cases of prisoners wrongly convicted or awaiting trial.
Causes of wrongful
conviction
Wrongful convictions are a common occurrence with various
causes that land innocent defendants in prison. Most common are false
eyewitness accounts, where the accused are incorrectly identified by viewers of
a crime. Most times eyewitnesses will select the individual in a lineup for
example that most resembles their memories of the suspect. This relies on the
person’s ability to perceive and later recall faces accurately, which studies
have shown is more than lacking. This accounts for 69% of the exonerations that
took place due to the Innocence Project, further proving that eyewitness
accounts are often unreliable. While it is known that eyewitness identification
can lead to wrongful convictions little has been done to prevent this
inaccuracy and this is why it remains a leading cause of the conviction of the
innocent. Eyewitness testimonies are still used in court and studies have shown
that jurors have a limited ability to determine the reliability of eyewitnesses
as evidence. In fact, they tend to over-believe eyewitnesses instead of weighing
out the potential errors. This measure has proven to be inaccurate in many
police lineups, as there is much bias, and suspects can be singled out based on
their appearance and the frequency that they are placed in front of witnesses.
Additionally, 52% of the Innocence Project cases’ wrongful
convictions have resulted from the misapplication of forensic science. These
include faulty hair comparisons, arson artifacts, and comparative bullet lead
analysis. These methods of evidence collection evolve as new technology arises,
but said technology can take decades to create, making cases based on faulty forensic science cases difficult to overturn.
In 26% of DNA exoneration cases—and more than double that
number in homicide cases—innocent people were coerced into making false
confessions. Many of these false confessors went on to plead guilty to crimes
they did not commit (usually to avoid a harsher sentence or even the death
penalty). Currently, there is a racial aspect of this issue where many black
people are discriminated against during both their trial and while in jail. The
hashtag #blackbehindbars has allowed
those exonerated after false confessions to share their stories and the
injustice they faced due to the failure of the criminal justice system.
Another large contributor to wrongful convictions is
fabricated testimonies that falsely incriminate defendants. The Innocence
Project has found that 17% of its cases have been caused by false testimonies,
allowing the person who gave the testimony a shorter or better sentence while
the accused faces harsher repercussions. Many of these stories are given by
inmates who have been given an incentive to falsely testify against certain
people with rewards such as a reduction of their sentences or leniency in prison.
In popular culture
Film
After Innocence (2005) is a documentary featuring the
stories of eight wrongfully convicted men who were exonerated by the Innocence
Project.
Conviction (2010) is a film about the exoneration of Kenneth
Waters, who was a client of the Innocence Project. Hilary Swank plays Waters'
sister Betty Anne, who went to college and law school to fight for his freedom,
and Sam Rockwell plays Waters. Barry Scheck is portrayed by Peter Gallagher.
Happiest Moments (2021) is a Webby Award-winning video by
Innocence Project. It's the organizations first-ever public service announcement,
produced by Hayden5.
Literature
In his nonfiction book The Innocent Man: Murder and
Injustice in a Small Town (2006), John Grisham recounted the cases of Ron
Williamson and Dennis Fritz, who were assisted on appeal by the Innocence
Project and freed by DNA evidence after being wrongfully convicted of the
murder of Debra Ann Carter.
Podcasts
Serial in its first season referenced the Innocence Project
in episode 7 when Deirdre Enright, director of investigation for the Innocence
Project at the University Of Virginia School Of Law, and a team of law students
analyzed the case against Adnan Syed.
Television
Castle, an American television series, in the episode "Like Father, Like Daughter"
(season 6, episode 7), mentioned the Innocence Project, as well as Frank Henson
who was wrongfully convicted in 1998 of the death of Kimberly Tolbert.
The Innocence Project, a BBC One drama series that aired
from 2006 to 2007, is based on a UK version of the organization.
The Innocence Project was discussed in season 2, episode 9
of The Good Wife, "Nine Hours"
(December 14, 2010). Project co-founder Barry Scheck played himself in the
episode, which was largely based on the actual Innocence Project case of
Cameron Todd Willingham. Cary Agos, a recurring character on The Good Wife, is
written to have worked for the Innocence Project after law school (and is a
family friend of Scheck's).
In season six of Suits, a US legal dramedy, law student, and
paralegal Rachel Zane takes on an Innocence Project for a man wrongfully
accused of murder.
In season three of Riverdale, a dark reimagining of the
Archie Comics universe, Veronica Lodge mentions starting a chapter of the
organization to help free her boyfriend Archie Andrews from prison following
being falsely convicted of murder.
Making a Murderer is a two-season (of 10 episodes each)
documentary relating to Steven Avery's wrongful conviction. The episodes were
released on Netflix between 2015 and 2018.
The Innocence Files (2020) is a series of nine documentary
films based on the work of the Innocence Project, released on Netflix in April
2020.
Quantum Leap, in the episode "Ben Song for the Defense" the Innocence Project is
mentioned after Ben, having leaped into a public defender, successfully defends
a teenager wrongfully accused of killing a gang recruiter.
The Innocent Man (2018) is a Netflix mini-series composed of
six episodes based on the Grisham nonfiction book The Innocent Man: Murder and
Injustice in a Small Town.
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