In an age of advanced forensic science, the first step toward ending Kenneth Reed’s prolonged series of legal appeals should be simple and quick: a DNA test, for which he has offered to pay, on evidence from the 1991 rape of which he was convicted.
Louisiana, where Mr. Reed is in prison, is one of 46 states that have passed laws to enable inmates like him to get such a test. But in many jurisdictions, prosecutors are using new arguments to get around the intent of those laws, particularly in cases with multiple defendants, when it is not clear how many DNA profiles will be found in a sample.
1 comment:
I wish these prosecutors would just let these prisoners take the test especially if they're willing. While I understand the point about multiple defendants, it is not widely known that 4.5 people are wrongly convicted each year, with 23 wrongly executed in this century which is a disconcerting fact when you consider the US has increased the number of executions it performs. Even if prosecutors are worried about having an open case on their hands if the convicted individual is exonerated/letting victims' families down rather than facing up to the fact police/prosecutors may have made a mistake, it still means somewhere along the way the justice system failed if the DNA testing proves otherwise.
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