List of wrongful convictions in the United States

Nov 12, 1805

Dominic Daley and James Halligan

Murder

Wilbraham, Massachusetts

Death

Executed

Yes

In November 1805, the body of a young farmer, Marcus Lyon, was found on the open road near the town of Wilbraham, Massachusetts. Irish immigrants Dominic Daley and James Halligan were traveling in the area, heading for New Haven, Connecticut, when they were arrested for the murder on November 12, 1805. Their captor received a reward of $500. They had a lengthy confinement, and were not granted defense attorneys until 48 hours before their trial. Once the trial began, they were convicted within minutes. One of the defense attorneys said that the evidence was so flimsy it was obvious their conviction was based on outright bigotry. They were executed the next day. On St. Patrick's Day 1984, Governor Michael Dukakis of Massachusetts issued a proclamation exonerating Daley and Halligan.

1812

Jesse Boorn and Stephen Boorn

Murder*

Manchester, Vermont

Death

Less than 1 year

Yes

In 1812, farmer Russell Colvin disappeared from Manchester, Vermont. Colvin and his brothers-in-law, Jesse and Stephen Boorn, had a tense relationship. Many suspected the Boorn brothers of murdering Colvin, but no evidence emerged until 1819. That year, their uncle Amos claimed Colvin's ghost had appeared to him and stated he had been murdered. The ghost also told him he was buried on the Boorn farm. An excavation revealed bones, and the brothers were arrested. A jailhouse informant claimed Jesse had admitted to the crime, which Jesse later did to investigators. The brothers were convicted based on their confessions. In November, however, the New York Post published a letter by an eyewitness who claimed to have seen Colvin alive earlier that year. Colvin, now living in New Jersey, was brought back to Vermont. The court vacated the Boorns' convictions.

Dec 31, 1843

John Gordon

Murder

Knightsville, Rhode Island

Death

Executed

No

In 1845 Gordon was the last person executed by Rhode Island. His conviction and execution have been ascribed by researchers to anti-Roman Catholic and anti-Irish immigrant bias. He was convicted for the murder of Amasa Sprague, a Cranston textile factory owner. The court justices, who included Justice Job Durfee, were involved in all three trials as both trial judges and the court of final appeal. Durfee "told the jurors to give greater weight to Yankee witnesses than Irish witnesses." Rhode Island Governor Lincoln Chafee pardoned Gordon on June 29, 2011.

1855

Chief Leschi

Murder

Olympia, Washington Territory

Death by hanging

Executed

No

Leschi was a Nisqually chief when the United States government attempted to relocate the tribe to reservations. Leschi protested the move, claiming the reservation designated for the Nisqually was a rocky piece of high ground unsuited to growing food and cut off from access to the river that provided salmon, the mainstay of their livelihood. Leschi traveled to the territorial capital at Olympia to protest the terms of the treaty. He became war chief, in command of around 300 men, and led a small number of raids. Early in the conflict, Territorial militiamen Abram Benton Moses and Joseph Miles (or Miller) were killed. Leschi maintained his innocence. He was convicted and executed. In 2004, he was posthumously exonerated by a historical court of inquiry but this decision was not legally binding.

1862

Jack Kehoe

Murder

Schuylkill County, Pennsylvania

Death by hanging

Executed

Yes

Kehoe was one of the alleged leaders of the Molly Maguires, a secret society which fought against mine bosses and enacted its own brand of vigilante justice in the anthracite region of Pennsylvania. The Mollies were exposed after an infiltration by Pinkerton detective James McParland, whose testimony resulted in Kehoe's conviction on attempted murder charges in 1876; not satisfied with Kehoe's sentence, the authorities then tried Kehoe for the 1862 murder of mine foreman Frank Langdon, who was beaten to death after leaving a meeting during which Kehoe had reportedly threatened to kill him. Witnesses testified that Kehoe was not at the scene of the crime and no evidence connected him to the attack aside from his threat against Langdon and the well-known animosity between the two men. Kehoe was hanged on December 18, 1878. In 1970, Governor Milton Shapp issued a pardon posthumously clearing Kehoe.

1863

Chipita Rodriguez

Murder

San Patricio, Texas

Death by hanging

Executed

Yes

Rodriguez was convicted of murdering John Savage with an axe and executed. She was posthumously exonerated in 1985.

May 5, 1872

William Jackson Marion

Murder*

Liberty, Nebraska

Death by hanging

Executed

Yes

Marion was convicted of killing John Cameron, who left with him to work on the railroad in 1872. In 1891, four years after Marion's execution by hanging, Cameron turned up alive, explaining that he had vanished by his own volition. He had spent twenty years traveling across Mexico, Alaska, and Colorado. On March 25, 1987, Marion was pardoned posthumously by the State of Nebraska on the 100th anniversary of his hanging.

May 4, 1886

Oscar Neebe, Michael Schwab, and Samuel Fielden

Haymarket affair

Chicago, Illinois

15 years

7 years

Yes

Neebe was not present at the Haymarket Square on the day of the bombing, and stated that he was not aware it had happened until he was told about it the following day. He was arrested because of his association with the defendants. At trial, the evidence against Neebe was particularly weak, mostly based on his political views, his having attended socialist meetings, being associated with the newspaper, Arbeiter-Zeitung, and the fact that a shotgun, a pistol and red flag were found in his home. On June 26, 1893, Illinois Governor John Peter Altgeld pardoned Neebe and two of his co-defendants, having concluded that they were innocent.

1893

Will Purvis

Murder

Marion County, Mississippi

Death (commuted to life in prison)

Five years

Yes

Will Buckley, a member of a white supremacist militia known as the Whitecaps, was gunned down in an ambush over a dispute with his fellow Whitecaps. Bloodhounds led police from the crime scene to the home of Will Purvis, a known Whitecap who was identified by Buckley's brother as one of the gunmen. Purvis was sentenced to death in spite of witnesses who supported his alibi, but an attempt to hang him failed and his sentence was commuted in 1895. He was pardoned and released in 1898 when Buckley's brother recanted his testimony, and was later fully compensated after one of the real killers made a deathbed confession clearing him in 1917.

Aug 9, 1894

George Washington Davis

Sabotage of Locomotive 213

Lincoln, Nebraska

10 years

Yes

Davis was convicted of causing the 1894 Rock Island railroad wreck, which killed eleven of thirty-three people on a passenger train traveling from Fairbury, Nebraska, to Lincoln. Some survivors claimed to have seen him holding a lantern at the site of the crash; however, there was no evidence that Davis had anything to do with the incident. In 1905, Davis was paroled by Nebraska governor John Mickey, citing "grave doubts" as to his involvement in the crash.

1895

Nellie Pope

Murder

Detroit, Michigan

Life imprisonment

22 years

Yes

Dr. Horace Pope was killed in a burglary of his home in 1895. The killer, William Brusseau, claimed that Pope's wife Nellie had orchestrated the crime for a life insurance payment. Both Brusseau and Nellie Pope were given life sentences. Brusseau died while serving his sentence, and confessed on his deathbed that Nellie Pope was not involved in the crime and he had acted alone. This led to a prolonged campaign for her exoneration until Governor Woodbridge N. Ferris granted her a conditional pardon in 1916 and she was released; this pardon did not address her guilt or innocence, and she was not officially exonerated until Governor Fred W. Green granted her a full pardon in 1928 which declared her innocent. She died less than a year later.

1896

Jack Davis

Murder

Silver City, Idaho

Death by hanging

6 years

Yes

Davis was convicted of the Deep Creek murders of Daniel Cummings and John Wilson. He was later pardoned following confessions by James Bower and Jeff Gray.

1900

Caleb Powers

Murder of William Goebel

Frankfort, Kentucky

8 years

Yes

Powers was convicted of complicity in the assassination of Governor William Goebel in 1900. The prosecution charged that Powers was the mastermind, having a political opponent killed so that his boss, Governor William S. Taylor, could stay in office. He was sentenced to prison. An appeals court overturned Powers' conviction, though Powers was tried three more times, resulting in two convictions and a hung jury. Governor Augustus E. Willson pardoned Powers in 1908. Powers had served eight years in prison. While in prison, Powers wrote a memoir, My Own Story (1905).

Feb 11, 1906

Ed Johnson

Rape of Nevada Taylor

Chattanooga, Tennessee

Hanging

Lynched prior to execution

Yes

Ed Johnson, a black man, was convicted in Chattanooga, TN of the rape of Nevada Taylor, a white woman, and sentenced to death. Taylor's initial description of her assailant was very vague. She told police she did not get a good look at him, and was unsure if he was black or white. After the reward was increased to $375, another man in town told police he saw Johnson at the scene. Taylor subsequently identified Johnson as her rapist. Johnson was beaten by sheriff Joseph Shipp to extract a confession, but maintained his innocence. On March 3, 1906, Johnson appealed the conviction, alleging that his constitutional rights had been violated. Specifically, he said that all blacks had been excluded from the jury considering his case, and that he should have been granted a change of venue, and a continuance. He was granted a stay of execution and an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. When Sheriff Shipp learned of the court's decision, he moved most prisoners to other floors of the jail and sent home all but one deputy. Johnson was pulled from his cell by a mob of white men and hanged at the Walnut Street Bridge. Following the lynching, Shipp publicly blamed the Supreme Court's interference with local courts for Johnson's death. The Supreme Court charged Shipp, his chief jailer, and several members of the lynch mob with contempt of court on the basis that Sheriff Shipp, with full knowledge of the court's ruling, willfully ignored his duties to protect a prisoner in his care and allowed Johnson to be lynched. United States v. Shipp is the only criminal trial of the Supreme Court in its entire history. It is considered an important decision in that it affirmed the right of the US Supreme Court to intervene in state criminal cases. Shipp and several of his co-defendants were convicted and sentenced to terms from 2–3 months in federal prison. Johnson's conviction was overturned in 2000, 94 years after his death, after a court ruled that he had not received a fair trial.

1912

William Cantwell Walters

Kidnapping of Bobby Dunbar

St. Landry Parish, Louisiana

Two years

Yes

4-year-old Bobby Dunbar disappeared on a fishing trip with his parents on August 23, 1912. Eight months later, William Walters was arrested while travelling with a boy who resembled Dunbar. He told authorities that the boy was Bruce Anderson, the son of his employer who he was looking after, and Anderson's mother confirmed this; however, the Dunbars maintained the boy was their son. A court ultimately ruled in favour of the Dunbars and the boy found with Walters was given to them and lived as Bobby Dunbar until his death. Walters was convicted of kidnapping, but was released on appeal after two years; in 2004, DNA profiling revealed that the child, now deceased, was indeed Bruce Anderson, posthumously vindicating Walters.

1912

Bill Wilson

Murder*

Blount County, Alabama

Life in prison

6 years

Yes

Wilson was convicted of murdering his wife, Jenny Wilson, and their 19-month-old daughter. Bones presented by the prosecution in court were later discovered to be those of at least four or five people and likely of indigenous ethnicity. Wilson received a formal pardon from the Alabama governor after his wife and daughter were discovered to be living in Vincennes, Indiana.

1913

Thomas and Meeks Griffin

Murder

Chester County, South Carolina

Death

Executed

Yes

The Griffins were prominent black farmers in Chester County, South Carolina, believed to be the wealthiest blacks in the area. They were convicted and executed via the electric chair in 1915 for the murder in 1913 of 74-year-old John Q. Lewis. The Griffin brothers were convicted based on the accusations of another black man, John "Monk" Stevenson, who was known to be a small-time thief. Stevenson, who was found in possession of the victim's pistol, was sentenced to life in prison in exchange for testifying against the brothers. Two other African Americans, Nelson Brice and John Crosby, were executed with the brothers for the same crime. Some in the community believed that Lewis may have been murdered because of his suspected consensual sexual relationship with 22-year-old Anna Davis, a black married woman. Davis and her husband were never tried for the murder of Lewis, possibly for fear of a "mixed race relationship" scandal. Over 100 people petitioned Gov. Richard Manning to commute the brothers' sentence. The signatories included prominent white people, including Blackstock's mayor, a sheriff, two trial jurors, and the grand jury foreman. But the governor allowed the brothers to be executed. In October 2009, the governor of South Carolina pardoned Thomas and Meeks Griffin. Their great-nephew Tom Joyner had achieved the pardons after investigating the case and presenting evidence to the state of the injustice, after learning about his relatives' executions.

1913

Leo Frank

Murder

Marietta, Georgia

Death, later commuted

2 years; killed by lynch mob

No

Frank was a factory superintendent who was convicted in 1913 of the murder of 13-year-old Mary Phagan, a female employee. Originally sentenced to death, Georgia's outgoing governor commuted Frank's sentence to life in prison. Frank was subsequently abducted from prison and lynched. In 1986, the Georgia State Board of Pardons and Paroles issued a pardon in recognition of the state's failure to protect Frank from being lynched and the state's failure to prosecute the lynchers. The pardon explicitly declined to address Frank's guilt or innocence, but the consensus of historians is that he was innocent.

1914

Joe Hill

Murder

Salt Lake City, Utah

Death

Executed

No

Joe Hill was convicted for the murder of John Morrison, a grocer, and his son. On the evening that the murder occurred, Hill appeared on the doorstep of a local doctor with a bullet wound through his left lung. Moreover, the killer was reported to have worn a red bandana, something which Hill also owned. However, the majority consensus among historians is that Hill was sentenced primarily for political reasons, as he was an outspoken member of the IWW, a revolutionary labor union, and that he was innocent.

1916

Thomas Mooney

Preparedness Day Bombing

San Francisco, California

Death

22 years

Yes

After being convicted and imprisoned for a 1916 bombing in San Francisco, Mooney appealed his case. He filed a writ of habeas corpus that was heard by the United States Supreme Court in 1937. Although he presented evidence that his conviction was obtained through the use of perjured testimony and that the prosecution had suppressed favorable evidence, his writ was denied because he had not first filed a writ in state court. His case was important for helping to establish that a conviction based upon false evidence violates due process. Mooney was pardoned in 1939 by Governor Culbert Olson.

1920

Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti

Murders of Alessandro Berardelli and Frederick Parmenter during an armed robbery

Braintree, Massachusetts

Death

Executed

No

In 1977, as the 50th anniversary of the executions approached, Massachusetts Governor Michael Dukakis asked the Office of the Governor's Legal Counsel to report on "whether there are substantial grounds for believing—at least in the light of the legal standards of today—that Sacco and Vanzetti were unfairly convicted and executed" and to recommend appropriate action. The resulting "Report to the Governor in the Matter of Sacco and Vanzetti" detailed grounds for doubting that the trial was conducted fairly in the first instance, and argued as well that such doubts were reinforced by "later-discovered or later-disclosed evidence." The report questioned prejudicial cross-examination that the trial judge allowed, the judge's hostility, the fragmentary nature of the evidence, and eyewitness testimony that came to light after the trial. It found the judge's charge to the jury troubling because it emphasized the defendants' behavior at the time of their arrest and highlighted certain physical evidence that was later called into question. The report dismissed the argument that the trial had been subject to judicial review, noting, "the system for reviewing murder cases at the time ... failed to provide the safeguards now present." Based on recommendations of the Office of Legal Counsel, Dukakis declared August 23, 1977, the 50th anniversary of their execution, as Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti Memorial Day. His proclamation, issued in English and Italian, stated that Sacco and Vanzetti had been unfairly tried and convicted, and that "any disgrace should be forever removed from their names." However, Dukakis did not pardon the two men as many had urged him to do, feeling that this would imply they were guilty; as such, their convictions were not expunged in spite of the admission that their convictions were unjust.

April 1928

Louise Butler and George Yelder

Murder*

Lowndes County, Alabama

Life imprisonment

Two months

Yes

Butler and Yelder were sentenced to life imprisonment after Butler's daughter testified that they had killed Yelder's niece, Topsy Warren, and dismembered her body. However, less than a week later the local sheriff found Topsy Warren alive. Butler and Yelder were officially pardoned and released in June.

Mar 14, 1929

Robert Coleman

Murder

Jonesboro, Georgia

Life in prison

Four years

Yes

Robert Coleman was convicted of beating his wife to death due to bloodstains on his overalls. He was sentenced to life on a chain gang. Four years into Coleman's sentence, murderer Rader Davis was arrested and pointed the police to burglar James Starks (or Sparks), who Davis said had confessed to murdering Mrs. Coleman while sharing a cell with him. Starks soon admitted the crime, telling police he had crushed Mrs. Coleman's skull with a fire poker after she caught him burgling her house, and Coleman was pardoned by Governor Eugene Talmadge while Starks was sentenced to life on the chain gang.

Oct 3, 1930

Alexander McClay Williams

Murder

Delaware County, Pennsylvania

Death by electrocution

Executed

Yes

Williams, a 16-year-old black teenager, confessed to the murder and attempted rape of Vida Robare, a white matron at his reform school. At his racially charged trial, he protested that he only confessed because he was promised that his confession would help him to avoid the death penalty. He was executed on June 8, 1931, becoming the youngest person ever executed by the state of Pennsylvania. In 2015, his attorney's great-grandson, Samuel Lemon, spearheaded efforts to renew interest in Williams' case. In 2022, following a posthumous review of Williams' case, his conviction was overturned, and all charges against him were dismissed, effectively exonerating him.

Mar 24, 1931

Scottsboro Boys

Rape

Paint Rock, Alabama

Varied, 8 were sentenced to death

Varied

Yes

Following an altercation with a group of white teens, nine black teenagers were accused of rape by two women, Ruby Bates and Victoria Price. The Scottsboro case is considered a landmark case, prohibiting racial discrimination in the jury selection process, as no blacks were allowed to be considered to serve on the jury before which the teenagers would be tried.

Dec 9, 1932

Joseph Majczek and Theodore Marcinkiewicz

Murder

Chicago, Illinois

99 years (both)

11 years

Yes

Majczek and Marcinkiewicz were arrested and convicted of the murder of 57-year-old Chicago police officer William D. Lundy on December 9, 1932. Initially, officials held 10 youths in custody on suspicion of killing the officer. Some .mw- .mw- .mw- .mw- 11+1⁄2 years later in 1944, following the intervention of Chicago Times reporters John McPhaul and James McGuire, both men were exonerated of the crime. The real killers have never been identified.

Aug 26, 1936

Joe Arridy

Murder

Pueblo, Colorado

Death by gas chamber

Executed

Yes

Arridy was convicted and executed for the 1936 killing of 15-year-old Dorothy Drain with a hatchet. In 2011, Gov. Bill Ritter posthumously pardoned Arridy. Ritter said an overwhelming amount of evidence suggests Arridy did not commit the crime and was likely not in Pueblo at the time of the crime. The victim's sister had testified that the murder was committed by Frank Aguilar (who was convicted of helping to kill Drain and executed two years before Arridy) and that Arridy was not involved.

Mar 23, 1944

George Stinney Jr.

Murder

Alcolu, South Carolina

Death by electrocution

Executed

Yes

Stinney, a 14-year-old African-American, was convicted of the first-degree murder of two pre-teen white girls: Betty June Binnicker (11) and Mary Emma Thames (8). No physical evidence existed in the case, and the sole evidence against Stinney was the circumstantial fact that the girls had spoken with Stinney and his sister shortly before their murder. Three police officers claimed that Stinney had confessed to the murders, though Stinney claimed that the officers starved him into confessing. Stinney's trial lasted only two and a half hours, where all African-Americans including Stinney's family were denied entry, the all-white jury found him guilty after ten minutes of deliberation, and Judge Philip H. Stoll sentenced him to death. Governor Olin D. Johnston denied several requests for clemency in the two months following and Stinney became the second youngest person to be sentenced to death and executed in the United States, behind Hannah Ocuish. Seventy years after his death on December 17, 2014, Stinney's conviction was vacated by circuit court judge Carmen Mullen, effectively clearing his name, and in January 2022 state representative Cezar McKnight introduced a bill titled the George Stinney Fund, which would make the state of South Carolina pay $10 million to the families of the wrongfully executed if their conviction is posthumously overturned.

April 30, 1944

Lena Baker

Murder*

Cuthbert, Georgia

Death by electrocution

Executed

Yes

Baker, a black woman, was convicted of first-degree murder in the killing of Ernest B. Knight, her white employer. Baker contended that she killed Knight in self-defense; locals in Cuthbert and Randolph County, Georgia, confirmed that Knight would hold Baker as a "slave woman" in his gristmill and physically and sexually abuse her. Baker claimed that on the night of the murder, Knight threatened to kill her with an iron bar, after which they fought over his pistol and he was shot dead. She was convicted by an all-white, all-male jury on August 14, 1944, executed by electric chair on March 5, 1945, and buried in an unmarked grave behind her church. In 1998, locals raised money for a proper headstone for Baker, generating renewed interest in her case; Cuthbert locals, alongside Baker's surviving relatives, then began campaigning to have her conviction posthumously overturned. In 2005, the Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles granted Baker a full and unconditional pardon.

July 30, 1945

Charles B. McVay III

Sinking of USS Indianapolis

Pacific Ocean

Loss of numbers in rank

N/A (non-custodial sentence)

Yes

USS Indianapolis was torpedoed by the Japanese I-58 submarine on July 30, 1945 while en route to Leyte, resulting in the deaths of 879 of the 1,195-man crew. The ships captain, Charles McVay, survived the sinking and was later court-martialled for his alleged responsibility. He was convicted of having failed to zig-zag to avoid being hit by the torpedo; however, the I-58's commander, Mochitsura Hashimoto, had testified that zig-zagging would not have stopped him from sinking the ship, and American submarine experts also stated that zig-zagging was not practical under the circumstances anyway. It was later revealed that the navy were aware of enemy submarines in the area but did not warn McVay or afford any protection to Indianapolis, leading historians to believe that McVay was scapegoated to conceal the navy's responsibility for the sinking. In 2000, the U.S. Congress and President Bill Clinton passed a resolution officially exonerating McVay.

December 10, 1945 - January 7, 1946

William Heirens

Two counts of murder

Chicago, Illinois

Three life sentences

65 years (died in prison)

No

Heirens was arrested on suspicion of being the so-called "Lipstick Killer" thought to be responsible for three murders in Chicago between June 1945 and January 1946. He was supposedly linked to two of the crimes by fingerprint evidence, but significant questions were raised about the veracity of these fingerprints: one had the appearance of being a rolled fingerprint from an index card, suggesting that it had been planted at the scene, and had previously been declared not to match Heirens' fingerprints, and others came from evidence which had been handled by numerous people outside of the chain of custody. Heirens' handwriting also did not match the handwriting from a message written by the killer. Heirens confessed to the crimes twice, the first time after having been drugged and illegally interrogated, but his account of the crimes contained numerous factual inaccuracies. Heirens ultimately pleaded guilty to two of the "Lipstick Killer" murders in 1946 after his lawyers pressured him to take a plea agreement, but immediately recanted his confession after his sentencing. A petition for clemency was denied and Heirens ultimately died in prison in 2012.

July 16, 1949

Groveland Four

Rape and Assault

Lake County, Florida

Varied

Varied

Yes

The Groveland Four (Ernest Thomas, Charles Greenlee, Samuel Shepherd, and Walter Irvin) were falsely accused of raping 17-year-old Norma Padgett and assaulting her husband on July 16, 1949, in Lake County, Florida. Thomas fled and was killed on July 26, 1949, by a sheriff's posse of 1,000 white men. Greenlee, Shepherd and Irvin were arrested and beaten to coerce confessions. The three survivors were convicted at trial by an all-white jury. Greenlee was sentenced to life because he was only 16; the other two were sentenced to death. In 1949, the Florida NAACP organized a campaign against the wrongful conviction and in 1951, the U.S. Supreme Court overturned the convictions and remanded the case to the lower court for a new trial. In November 1951, Sheriff Willis V. McCall of Lake County, Florida shot Irvin and Shepherd while they were in his custody and claimed they had tried to escape while being transported for the new trial. Shepherd died on the spot; Irvin survived and told Federal Bureau of Investigation investigators that McCall had shot them in cold blood and that his deputy had also shot him in an attempt to kill him. At the second trial, Irvin was represented by Thurgood Marshall and again convicted by an all-white jury and sentenced to death. In 1955, his death sentence was commuted to life in prison by recently elected Governor LeRoy Collins. He was paroled in 1968 and died the next year. Greenlee was paroled in 1962 and lived with his family until he died in 2012. On November 22, 2021, Judge Heidi Davis granted the state's motion to posthumously exonerate the men.

Jun 4, 1951

Mack Ingram

Attempted rape*

Yanceyville, North Carolina

Two years with hard labour

1.5 years

Yes

Mack (or Matt) Ingram, a Black farmer, visited the farm of his white neighbour Aubrey Boswell on June 4, 1951, to borrow a wagon. He mistook Boswell's daughter Willa for Boswell due to how she was dressed and followed her, trying to get her attention; when Willa noticed him, she interpreted his behaviour as threatening and ran away, later accusing him of attempting to rape her based entirely on the fact that he had supposedly "leered" at her. Ingram was convicted of assault with intent to rape despite no physical contact having taken place. After numerous appeals by the NAACP on Ingram's behalf, the North Carolina Supreme Court dismissed the charges in 1953, declaring that no actual crime had been committed.

Jul 4, 1954

Sam Sheppard

Murder of Marilyn Sheppard

Bay Village, Ohio

Life in prison

12 years

Yes

On the night of July 3-4, 1954, Marilyn Reese Sheppard was beaten to death in her bed. Her husband Sam, who had also suffered injuries in the alleged attack, claimed that an intruder had broken into the house and attacked Marilyn, knocking him out when he tried to intervene. The media were convinced that Sam was the guilty party, with the Cleveland Press in particular vilifying him as a murderer and calling for his arrest and conviction, and this appears to have influenced both the police investigation and jury deliberations as the jury were not sequestered. Sam had suffered injuries consistent with the alleged attack, and two witnesses had seen a man resembling the alleged intruder near the Sheppard home on the day. His conviction was overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court in the 1966 case Sheppard v. Maxwell after it was found that the media coverage had prevented him from getting a fair trial. At Sam's second trial, evidence was presented showing that the killer was left-handed (Sam was right-handed). Sam was found not guilty on November 16, 1966.

Jun 3, 1957

Jack McCullough

Murder of Maria Ridulph

Sycamore, Illinois

Life in prison

5 years

Yes

After investigation of a cold case, in 2012 Jack McCullough was exonerated of murder, as it was decided his prosecution had been based on hearsay evidence and concealment of exculpatory evidence. FBI files proving he was nowhere near the scene at the time were excluded by the prosecution from evidence.

Oct 1958

James Thompson and David Simpson

Child molestation*

Monroe, North Carolina

Indefinite sentence in reformatory school

Three months

Yes

In October 1958, a prepubescent white girl named Sissy Marcus kissed two black boys, James Thompson (9) and David Simpson (7), on their cheeks while they were playing together. She later mentioned it to her mother, who flew into a rage and accused Thompson and Simpson of sexually assaulting her daughter. Both boys were detained for six days with no access to legal counsel before Juvenile Judge Hampton Price convicted them both of molesting Sissy Marcus, remarking later that he knew they were guilty because they didn't deny it when asked. Price sentenced both boys to be sent to reform school indefinitely. After three months Governor Luther H. Hodges pardoned Thompson and Simpson under massive international pressure and they were discharged from reform school.

Jun 3, 1961

Clarence Earl Gideon

Breaking and entering, petty theft

Panama City, Florida

5 years

2 years

Yes

Gideon had been denied an attorney at the time of his first trial. At the time, the state of Florida did not have public defenders in all judicial circuits and the law did not require the court to appoint an attorney to the indigent. After conviction, he handwrote a petition for writ of certiorari to the U.S. Supreme Court. The justices considered the matter as Gideon v. Wainwright and ruled unanimously that Gideon's rights had been violated. When he was retried with a defense attorney, it was determined that the primary prosecution witness had committed the crime. The case inspired the book Gideon's Trumpet and a film adaptation by the same name.

Apr 16, 1963

James Dean Walker

Murder

North Little Rock, Arkansas

Death (later life in prison)

12 years (originally), 6 years (following escape and recapture)

No

After getting into a bar fight, police shot Walker five times, during which Officer Jerrell Vaughan was killed. Despite Walker's gun not having been fired, he was convicted of murder. He spend several years in prison before escaping during a furlough, remaining free for four years in Nevada. Although he fought extradition back to Arkansas due to its poor prison conditions, he was sent back. In 1985 his conviction was overturned due to evidence showing he did not fire at the officer, and the following year he pled no contest to manslaughter and was sentenced to time served.

Apr 23, 1964

George Whitmore Jr.

Attempted rape

Brownsville, Brooklyn, New York

5 to 10 years

7 years

Yes

21-year-old nurse Elba Borrero was attacked near her home by an assailant who tried to rape her but was chased away by a police patrolman. The same patrolman stopped George Whitmore five hours later while searching for the assailant, but concluded that he was too short to be the same person. The following day Whitmore was questioned further and was identified by Borrero as her attacker. While Whitmore was in custody, police wrongly identified a woman in a photo he had on him as Janet Wylie, one of the victims in the Career Girls Murders, which led to Whitmore being beaten by the police until he confessed to those murders, the attack on Elba Borrero, and the murder of Minnie Edmonds eleven days before the attack on Borrero. Whitmore was convicted of the attempted rape of Elba Borrero, but sentencing was deferred while he went on trial for the murders. However, while Whitmore was awaiting trial, another man named Richard Robles confessed to the Career Girls Murders and the charges against Whitmore for those murders were dropped (Robles would later be convicted of the murders). Two months later Whitmore's conviction was vacated by the trial judge due to racial bias by the jury. Despite Robles' conviction effectively discrediting Whitmore's confession, prosecutors vowed to try Whitmore again; a jury failed to reach a verdict on the murder of Minnie Edmonds, but Whitmore's second trial for the attack on Elba Borrero ended in a guilty verdict. He was sentenced to 5 to 10 years in prison. He was then given a third trial in 1967 after his coerced confession was declared inadmissible, but was convicted yet again on the strength of Borrero's testimony. In December 1972, a journalist investigating Whitmore's case discovered that Borrero, contrary to her trial testimony, had identified another man as her attacker before identifying Whitmore, a fact which had been withheld at all three of Whitmore's trials. District Attorney Eugene Gold re-opened the case and confirmed the accuracy of the journalist's claims before formally requesting that Whitmore's conviction be vacated. On April 10, 1973, the Brooklyn Supreme Court officially vacated Whitmore's conviction and exonerated him.

Feb 21, 1965

Muhammad Abdul Aziz and Khalil Islam

Assassination of Malcolm X

Manhattan, New York

Life in prison

20 years (Aziz) and 22 years (Islam)

Yes

Aziz and Islam were convicted of the murder of Malcolm X based on mistaken witness ID and official misconduct, despite Thomas Hagan, one of Malcolm X's actual killers, testifying that Aziz and Islam had nothing to do with the murder. Due to questions over their guilt, the two men were paroled in the 1980s. Aziz was paroled in 1985 and Islam was paroled in 1987.

Mar 12, 1965

Henry Tameleo, Louis Greco, Joe Salvati, Peter Limone

Murder of Edward Deegan

Chelsea, Massachusetts

Life in prison

Varied

Yes

Bonanno crime family gangster Edward Deegan was gunned down in Massachusetts in revenge for robberies he had committed against the Patriarca crime family. Patriarca family hitman and FBI informant Joseph Barboza named six people who, he alleged, had been involved in Deegan's murder. All six were convicted; four received the death penalty, but their sentences were commuted to life after Furman v. Georgia, while the other two received life sentences. In 1970, Barboza recanted his testimony and confessed that four of the men - Henry Tameleo, Louis Greco, Joseph Salvati, and Peter Limone - were not involved in the crime. Appeals against the convictions were denied and Tameleo and Greco both died while serving their sentences. In 2001, secret FBI documents were found revealing that the FBI had evidence proving that the murder was committed by Barboza and Vincent Flemmi without the aid of the four men, but had allowed Barboza to perjure himself in order to keep Barboza and Flemmi as informants. Salvati and Limone were freed from prison in January 2001 after their convictions were vacated, with the court also posthumously exonerating Tameleo and Greco.

Jun 17, 1966

Rubin Carter, John Artis

Murder

Paterson, New Jersey

Life in prison

19 years

Yes

Carter was a professional boxer who was twice convicted of the murders of James Oliver, Fred Nauyoks, and Hazel Tanis, along with his friend and fellow defendant John Artis. Carter's second conviction was overturned in 1985. Carter inspired the 1975 Bob Dylan song "Hurricane", and the film The Hurricane (1999) was based on his case.

Oct 25, 1967

James Joseph Richardson

Murder

Arcadia, Florida

Death

21 years

Yes

James Richardson was convicted of poisoning his seven children with pesticides and received the death penalty. Authorities believe that it is likely that a neighbor, Bessie Reece, committed the murders. After she developed Alzheimer's disease, she confessed more than 100 times to the murders of these children to her caregivers at the nursing home. At the time of the crime, Reece was on parole after being convicted of the poisoning death of her late husband. Reece was not investigated thoroughly at the time, although she was the last known person to see the children alive, and the last to feed them. She had at first denied going into their apartment.

Aug 28, 1968

Rennie Davis, David Dellinger, Tom Hayden, Abbie Hoffman, Jerry Rubin

Crossing state lines to incite a riot

Chicago, Illinois

5 years

2 years

Yes

Five members of the Chicago Seven, a group of left-wing activists prosecuted for allegedly inciting a riot during the 1968 Democratic National Convention protests. The violence was in fact caused by officers of the Chicago Police Department who were attempting to suppress the protests. During the trial, Judge Julius Hoffman "went out of his way to constrict or alienate the defense", including holding defendants and their attorneys in contempt for minor infractions and refusing to allow key evidence to be shown to the jury. Five of the eight defendants were found guilty of offences under the Anti-Riot Act, but all convictions were overturned by the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit two years later.

Dec 18, 1968

Geronimo Pratt

Murder

Santa Monica, California

27 years

25 years

Yes

Pratt, a member of the Black Panther Party, was convicted of murdering Caroline Olsen during a robbery on a tennis court. After 25 years, his conviction was vacated in 1997. It was found that the prosecution had concealed evidence proving that Pratt was 400 miles away when the murder was committed.

1971

Richard Phillips

Murder

Detroit, Michigan

Life without parole

45.7 years

Yes

Richard Phillips was 25 years old when he was imprisoned for a fatal shooting in Detroit in 1971—a case prosecutors now say was "based entirely" on false testimony from one witness. He was sentenced to life without parole. He was released in 2017 and exonerated in 2018 after the University of Michigan's innocence project took up his case, declaring him the longest-serving innocent man in the United States, although his record has since been broken. In prison Phillips taught himself to paint watercolors. He painted custom greeting cards for other inmates to send to their families, and used the proceeds to buy more art supplies. Phillips painted and saved hundreds of original watercolors, now on display in his gallery. As the gallery describes, "He painted to stave off the loneliness. He painted to break up the monotony. He painted to fill the long days. He painted to keep his heart soft and hope alive."

1972

Anthony Mazza

Murder

Boston, Massachusetts

Life without parole

47.3 years

Yes

A Massachusetts jury found Mazza guilty of first-degree murder and robbery based on his answers often contradicting his statements to police and to the grand jury due to Mazza having a developmental disability and that he was functionally illiterate and had been in special-education classes for most of his time in school which was not revealed to the jury at his trial. He is now the second-longest-serving innocent man in the United States.

1972

Wilbert Jones

Sexual assault

Baton Rouge, Louisiana

Life in prison

44.7 years

Yes

A Louisiana jury found Jones guilty of aggravated rape based solely on the victim's testimony. The victim expressed some uncertainty about her identification of Jones in a lineup, e.g., "[the victim] described her attacker variously as 5 feet 8 inches tall, 5 five feet 9 inches tall, and 6 feet 3 inches tall. She said he had a single gap between his front teeth and a smooth, soft voice. ... [After identifying Jones as the perpetrator] she expressed concern because Jones' voice was "rougher" than her attacker's, and because Jones was only 5 feet 3 inches tall ...." The prosecution did not tell the defense about a serial rapist who had been arrested recently and fit the victim's [in Wilbert Jones' case] description. Louisiana incarcerated Jones for nearly 45 years before Innocence Project New Orleans helped him petition for a new trial. A district judge vacated Jones' conviction and ordered a new trial. The prosecution appealed to the Louisiana Supreme Court, but the state's highest court rejected the appeal. The prosecution dismissed the charges on October 11, 2018. Jones' nearly 45 years in prison was the second longest time spent incarcerated after a known wrongful conviction in U.S. history at the time.

June 3, 1973

Chol Soo Lee

Murder

San Francisco, California

Life in prison

9.8 years

Yes

Lee was convicted of the shooting death of Chinatown gang leader Yip Yee Tak and sentenced to life in prison. While behind bars, Lee was also convicted of killing Morrison Needham in a prison yard, which he claimed was self-defence. In 1982 Lee was retried and acquitted of Tak's murder and Lee's death sentence was nullified. He was released on March 28, 1983. He was not given an apology nor compensation from the state.

Sep 28, 1973

Peter Reilly

Manslaughter

Falls Village, Connecticut

6-16 years

Two years

Yes

Barbara Gibbons' mutilated corpse was found by her son Peter Reilly on September 28, 1973. Police quickly made him their prime suspect, based solely on his presence at the scene and what they felt to be an unusual lack of emotion. He was interrogated at length for 24 hours, having voluntarily agreed not to have an attorney present, and eventually confessed to the crime after being subjected to oppressive interrogation tactics. Reilly was ultimately convicted of manslaughter rather than murder. In 1976 he received a new trial; two witnesses, including a state trooper, had seen Reilly driving his car when the murder was believed to have happened, leaving him without enough time to get back home, commit the murder, and dispose of all the evidence before the police arrived. The charges against Reilly were dismissed in November.

1974

Gregory Bright

Murder

New Orleans, Louisiana

Life in prison

27.5 years

Yes

Bright was convicted of second-degree murder in 1974 at the age of 20. After several years of appeals, Bright was granted a new trial in 2001 on the grounds that the prosecution had withheld evidence from the defense in his previous trial. On June 24, 2003, after 27+1⁄2 years in prison for a crime they did not commit, Bright and Earl Truvia were both released after the Orleans Parish district attorney dismissed all charges. Bright speaks around the country about his wrongful incarceration and life since prison. In 2010, Bright joined Innocence Project New Orleans as Assistant Education and Outreach Director.

Feb 3, 1974

Delbert Tibbs

Rape, murder

Fort Myers, Florida

Death

3 years

Yes

Teenager Cynthia Nadeau was raped and her boyfriend, Terry Milroy, was murdered by a man who picked them up while hitchhiking. Despite an alibi, Tibbs was convicted on the basis of a false eyewitness identification and an alleged confession to a fellow inmate. In 2011, Tibbs was instrumental in the decision of Governor Pat Quinn to repeal the death penalty in Illinois.

March 17, 1974

Inez García

Murder*

Soledad, California

Five years to life

Two years

Yes

Inez García was raped and battered by Miguel Jimenez and Luis Castillo. Later that night Jimenez called her and threatened to kill her; when García and her roommate Fred Medrano confronted them, Castillo began beating Medrano and Jimenez brandished a knife towards García, who shot him dead. The police accused her of lying about the rape, although she had told multiple friends and relatives before and immediately after the confrontation that she was raped, and said she had killed Jimenez over a drug-related dispute. García was convicted of second-degree murder and served two years in prison before she was given a new trial and acquitted on the grounds of self-defense.

May 15, 1974

Michael Lloyd Self

Murder

Galveston, Texas

Life in prison

24 years

No

Teenagers Rhonda Johnson and Sharon Shaw disappeared while at a beach in Galveston, Texas, on August 4, 1971; their remains were found in a marsh in January 1972. Though Michael Lloyd Self, a local sex offender, wrote a confession, he contended that police officers forced him to do so at gunpoint. Self was sentenced to life imprisonment in 1975. In 1976, two of the officers who took his confession were arrested for numerous bank robberies and sentenced to 30–50 years. In 1998, Edward Harold Bell, a convicted serial killer, admitted to the murders of Johnson and Shaw, though no direct connection could be made. Self died in prison in 2000 of cancer. Numerous investigators, a Galveston police officer, and a former Harris County prosecutor all protested Self's conviction.

December 30, 1974

Glynn Simmons

Murder

Edmond, Oklahoma

Death, later reduced to Life in prison

48 years

Yes

Mistaken Witness ID, Perjury or False Accusation, Official Misconduct, and Inadequate Legal Defense caused him to be found guilty. Exonerated in December 2023. He is now the longest-serving innocent man in the United States.

Mar 29, 1975

David Bryant

Murder

Bronx, New York

25 years to life

40 years, 9 months

Yes

In March 1975 8-year old Karen Smith was found dead in a stairwell of her apartment building. Previously charged twice for sexual misconduct, David Bryant was taken in as a suspect the same day and was convicted to serve 25 years to life a year later in October 1976. Bryant was briefly released in 2013 but was taken back to prison in 2014, until finally being released in 2018 and having his charges dismissed in 2019.

Sep 6–Oct 21, 1975

Ledura Watkins

Murder

Detroit and Highland Park, Michigan

Life without parole

41 years, 3 months

Yes

Ledura Watkins was convicted of the murder of 25-year-old public school teacher, Evette Ingram, who was also a drug dealer, based on testimony by Travis Herndon who gave conflicting stories about who had committed the crime. Herndon initially said Ledura Watkins committed the crime; later adding it was at the request of crooked Highland Park police officer Gary Vazana who was known for dealing drugs, and wanted Herndon and Watkins to kill Ingram and take any drugs they found so the drugs could be sold and the three of them could split the proceeds. Vazana was found murdered the same day Herndon began telling his stories to police. The Cooley Law School Innocence Project at Western Michigan University began investigating the case in 2012. In January 2017, they filed a petition for post-conviction relief citing the undisclosed police and laboratory reports, Herndon's recantation, the failure of the prosecution and police to disclose favorable treatment of Herndon in exchange for his testimony, and unreliable hair analysis. On June 15, 2017 the Wayne County Prosecutor's Office joined in supporting the motion which led to the judge vacating Watkins's conviction and the charges being dismissed due to insufficient evidence for a retrial. Watkins filed a federal civil rights lawsuit that was settled in 2021 for $2,350,000.

1975

Ricky Jackson, Ronnie Bridgeman, and Wiley Bridgeman

Murder

Cleveland, Ohio

Death

Varied

Yes

Jackson and both the Bridgeman brothers were convicted and sentenced to death for the killing of Harold Franks, a money order salesman, based on the evidence of a 12-year-old boy, Eddie Vernon, who claimed to have seen them attack Franks. There were no other witnesses nor evidence linking the accused to the crime. In a signed affidavit in 2014, Vernon recanted, saying he had been coerced by the police. Jackson had escaped the death sentence because of a paperwork error. The sentences of the Bridgemans had been commuted to life. Jackson and Wiley Bridgeman were held in prison longer than any other persons who had been exonerated. Ronnie Bridgeman had been paroled after serving 28 years. All three men received compensation and settlements from the state for their wrongful convictions and imprisonment.

May 2, 1976

Clifford Williams Jr.

Murder, attempted murder

Jacksonville, Florida

Death

42 years, 7 months

Yes

Jul 1976

Charles Ray Finch

Murder

Wilson, North Carolina

Death

42 years, 11 months

Yes

Jul 1976

Lewis Fogle

Rape, murder

Indiana County, Pennsylvania

Life without parole

34 years

Yes

Fogle was convicted in 1982 of raping and killing 15-year-old Deann Katherine Long, who had died in 1976. DNA tests on the semen in the girl's body proved he was not the rapist. In August 2015, a senior judge vacated his conviction. The local district attorney joined in the motion to vacate his conviction, and Fogle was released.

Nov 27, 1976

Randall Dale Adams

Murder

Dallas, Texas

Death

12 years

Yes

Adams was convicted of killing Dallas police officer Robert W. Wood. In 1988, the film The Thin Blue Line, which was based on the case, was released. Public outcry over the film prompted officials to re-examine the case. Adams was released in 1989.

1977

Dewey Bozella

Murder

Poughkeepsie, New York

20 years to life

26 years

Yes

Bozella was accused of killing 92-year-old Emma Kapser. He was convicted on the basis of testimony from two jailhouse informants. DNA testing was not available because evidence from the crime had been destroyed post-conviction. Bozella's first conviction was overturned because the prosecutor removed all African Americans from the jury. He was tried again in December 1990. At the second trial, one witness recanted his prior statements, but Bozella was convicted a second time. The other witness later recanted. In addition, the defense later learned that the prosecution failed to turn over exculpatory evidence to the defense, including a fingerprint recovered from the scene that was linked to a felon. In 2009, Bozella's conviction was overturned and all charges were dropped.

Mar 14, 1977

Brian Baldwin

Murder

Monroe County, Alabama

Death

Executed

No

Naomi Rolin was a white girl of 16 who was raped and murdered. Ed Horsely confessed to the murder, which he said he alone had committed, and was executed. But the police charged Baldwin with the murder based on his confession, which Baldwin said was extracted under beatings and an electric cattle prod. No forensic evidence connected Baldwin with the crime. The murder was committed by a left-handed person whereas Baldwin was right-handed. All evidence was lost or destroyed after the execution.

Jul 9, 1977

Gary Dotson

Rape*

Chicago, Illinois

25–50 years

6 years (approximately)

Yes

Sixteen-year-old Cathleen Crowell Webb made up a rape allegation to explain her pregnancy concerns to her foster parents after having had consensual sex with her boyfriend the previous day. After a religious conversion, Webb confessed to her pastor that she had wrongly accused Dotson and began efforts to get him released. The prosecution refused to take any action, so they went to the media. The resulting public sympathy led the authorities to review the case. Eventually Dotson was cleared via DNA testing and released.

May 11, 1978

The Ford Heights Four: Verneal Jimerson, Dennis Williams, Kenneth Adams, and Willie Rainge

Rape, murder

Ford Heights, Illinois

Death (Jimerson, Williams), 75 years (Adams), life (Rainge)

18 years (Williams, Adams, Rainge), 11 years (Jimerson)

Yes

The Ford Heights Four were convicted of the rape of Carol Schmal and murder of Schmal and Lawrence Lionberg based on false forensic testimony, coercion of a prosecution witness, perjury by another witness who had an incentive to lie, and prosecution and police misconduct. Witness and DNA evidence uncovered in an investigation by three journalism students at Northwestern University cleared the Ford Heights Four and led to the arrest and conviction of the real killers.

May 11, 1978

Paula Gray

Rape, murder, perjury

Ford Heights, Illinois

50 years

9 years

Yes

Paula Gray was an additional suspect in the Ford Heights Four case. Gray, an intellectually disabled teenager, was interrogated for two days before confessing to her involvement in the crime. However, Gray soon recanted her confession, stating that she had been drugged and coached by the police. Upon her recantation, Gray was charged with rape and murder and with perjury. She was ultimately found guilty and sentenced to 50 years in prison. In 1982, after two of the Ford Heights Four won new trials, prosecutors offered to release Gray in exchange for her testimony against the two men. Gray accepted the offer and was released in 1987. Following the exoneration of the Ford Heights Four, Gray's conviction was overturned, and in 2002, the governor issued her a pardon.

Aug 31, 1978

Joseph Sledge

Murder

Elizabethtown, North Carolina

Two consecutive life sentences

36 years

Yes

Sledge escaped from prison during a four-year sentence for misdemeanor larceny and was recaptured days later. During this time, Josephine and Aileen Davis were killed in their home in Elizabethtown, North Carolina. Sledge was convicted of murdering the two women based on the testimony of two inmates who claimed that Sledge had admitted to the crime while in prison the next year. One of the informants later recanted his testimony, saying that he had lied due to police coercion and a reward of early parole and $3,000 prize money. The other informant received similar special treatment. Mitochondrial DNA testing of hairs found at the crime scene believed to be from the killer did not match Sledge, and he was declared innocent in January 2015. He had served more than 36 years for the crime.

Aug 31, 1978

Bobby Joe Maxwell

Murder

Los Angeles, California

Life without parole

39 years

Yes

Maxwell was falsely believed to be the Skid Row Stabber, and was convicted of two stabbings.

Nov 11, 1978

Craig Coley

Murder

Simi Valley, California

Life without parole

39 years

Yes

Coley was convicted of the murder of 24-year-old Rhonda Wicht and her 4-year-old son Donald Wicht in 1978. DNA tests not available at the time of his trial later showed Coley could not have done the murders, and DNA from others was present. Police officers testified that the original investigating officer had mishandled the investigation. Coley was pardoned in 2017 after serving 39 years.

Jun 22, 1979

Jay C. Smith

Murder (three counts)

Ardmore, Pennsylvania

Death

6 years

Yes

Susan Reinert and her two children, Karen and Michael, disappeared in June 1979. Susan's murdered body was later found in her car in Harrisburg; her children were never found and are presumed dead. The murders were orchestrated by Bill Bradfield, Susan's co-worker and fiancée who stood to benefit financially from her death. In the days before Susan disappeared, Bradfield had told multiple people that she would be murdered by Jay Smith, the principal of the school where they both worked; although it was thought that Bradfield was trying to incriminate Smith to protect himself, police still came to suspect that he may have been involved in the crime. After Bradfield's trial, where he was sentenced to life in prison for conspiracy to murder, prosecutors charged Smith with carrying out the murders. They alleged that a comb from Smith's army regiment was found with Susan Reinert's body; that a pledge pin found in Smith's car belonged to Karen Reinert; that Smith had confessed the crime to jailhouse informant Raymond Martray; and that hair and fibre evidence placed Susan Reinert in Smith's house before she died. Smith was convicted and sentenced to death in 1985. In December 1989, Smith was given a new trial after Bradfield's statements implicating him were declared inadmissible. In March 1992, while Smith was awaiting retrial, a junkman emptying the attic of lead investigator Jack Holtz found a box of evidence that had been withheld at trial, including the comb found with the body, which was not the one presented at trial; witness statements showing that Karen Reinert's pledge pin was blue (the one in Smith's car was green); and handwritten notes by Holtz indicating that Raymond Martray had told him Smith never confessed. The prosecution had also withheld evidence supporting the defense's theory that Susan Reinert was killed at Cape May, where Bradfield was on the day of the murder. The Supreme Court of Pennsylvania ruled in September 1992 that the prosecutorial misconduct was so egregious that a second trial would amount to double jeopardy and barred the state from re-trying Smith.

Sep 30, 1979

Kevin Green

Second-degree murder, attempted murder, rape

Tustin, California

15 years to life

16 years

Yes

On September 30, 1979, Diane Green, who was nine months pregnant with a girl, was assaulted and raped in her apartment by an assailant who beat her into a coma. She was found by her husband Kevin and taken to hospital where doctors decided to perform a caesarean section, but they were unable to save the unborn girl. Diane came out of her coma a month later and was initially unable to identify her attacker; however, she later claimed to have remembered that Kevin attacked her after being refused sex. Based solely on Diane's testimony, Kevin was convicted of her rape and attempted murder and the second-degree murder of their unborn daughter in spite of witnesses who testified he was at a fast food restaurant during the attack. 16 years later, investigators re-opened the case of the "Bedroom Basher" - a serial killer active in California during the 1970s who would break into women's apartments, rape them, and beat them to death with a hammer. DNA testing to try and identify the killer revealed that the DNA profile matched the one taken from Diane Green's rape kit. This profile was later linked to Gerald Parker, who confessed to the attack on Diane Green and the other murders and was sentenced to death in 1999. A judge declared Kevin Green factually innocent in June 1996 and ordered his release.

Nov 23, 1979

Cornelius Dupree

Aggravated robbery

Dallas, Texas

75 years

30 years

Yes

Dupree was convicted of aggravated robbery on the basis of eyewitness identification after allegedly robbing and raping a 26-year-old woman during a carjacking. He was later exonerated by the Innocence Project via DNA testing of pubic hair from the rape.

1979

Kevin Strickland

First Degree Murder (1 count), Second Degree Murder (Two Counts)

Kansas City, Missouri

Life without parole for 50 years

42 years, 4 months

Yes

Strickland was exonerated for three murders and released in 2021 on November 23. His wrongful incarceration of 42 years and 4 months was the longest in Missouri

1979

Jerry Frank Townsend

Murder (six counts)

Broward and Miami-Dade County, Florida

Multiple life sentences

21 years

Yes

Townsend, an intellectually disabled man with an IQ of 50, was arrested for rape in 1979 and confessed to a number of murders committed in Broward and Miami-Dade counties. He was convicted or pled guilty to six of the murders he had confessed to and received seven life sentences. While he was in prison, DNA testing showed that at least two of the murders he had confessed to were in fact victims of serial killer Eddie Mosley, casting doubt on the accuracy of his confession. Further testing cleared him of two more of the murders. At the request of prosecutors, Townsend's conviction was vacated and he walked free after 21 years in prison.

1980s

At least 36 people

Child sexual abuse*

Kern County, California

Varied

Varied

Some

The Kern County child abuse cases are a notable example of day-care sex-abuse hysteria of the 1980s. The cases involved claims that a pedophile sex ring performed Satanic ritual abuse: as many as 60 young children testified they had been abused. At least 36 people were convicted and most of them spent years imprisoned. 34 convictions were overturned on appeal. Two convicts died in prison. A documentary titled Witch Hunt was produced and released in 2007. MSNBC also did a documentary on John Stoll and the Kern County cases. In 2009, John Stoll sued Kern County and was awarded $5 million in compensation. Prior to the start of the Kern County child abuse cases, several local social workers had attended a training seminar that foregrounded satanic ritual abuse as a major element in child sexual abuse, and had used the now-debunked memoir Michelle Remembers as training material.

1980s

Cathy Woods

Murder

Reno, Nevada

Life without parole

35 years

Yes

May 6, 1980

Joyce Ann Brown

Murder, aggravated robbery

Dallas, Texas

Life in prison

9 years, 5 months, 24 days

Yes

Brown was convicted of robbery in 1980, although the rental car used in the crime had been leased to a different Joyce Ann Brown, who lived in Denver, Colorado. The defendant had a strong alibi, as she was at work at the time of the crime. The conviction was based on eyewitness identification and on testimony of a cellmate that she had confessed. Following investigations by 60 Minutes, The Dallas Morning News, and Centurion Ministries, an appeal was filed. The Texas Court of Criminal Appeals set aside Brown's conviction because of prosecutorial misconduct: they had not revealed that the prosecution witness had been convicted of perjury, and it was not revealed that she received a reduced sentence after testifying. Her record was expunged in 1994.

May 21, 1980

Kenneth Waters

Murder

Ayer, Massachusetts

Life in Prison

18 years

Yes

Kenneth Waters was convicted on May 11, 1983, for the 1980 murder of Katherina Reitz Brow and was sentenced to life in prison until he was exonerated, with the help of his sister Betty Anne, on March 15, 2001, when DNA test results proved he was not the perpetrator. Waters died in an accident six months later on September 19, 2001. His case became the subject of a 2010 film titled Conviction. In 2025, it was announced that a suspect had been identified through forensic investigation of genealogy data.

Jul 6, 1980

Clifford Henry Bowen

Murder for hire (three counts)

Oklahoma City

Death

Five years

Yes

On July 6, 1980, three men were gunned down outside a motel in Oklahoma City. Police suspected that the murders were orchestrated by police officer turned drug dealer Harold Behrens, who believed that one of the men, Ray Peters, was planning to inform on him to the police. A police officer who had worked with Behrens while he was on the force thought the description of the shooter resembled Clifford Bowen, a criminal the two of them had surveilled together, and suspected that Behrens may have hired Bowen to carry out the murders. Two witnesses identified Bowen as the shooter, although Behrens denied knowing Bowen; he was sentenced to life without parole for ordering the murders, having turned down an offer to serve just ten years which would have required him to implicate Bowen. Bowen was convicted despite being able to prove that he was 300 miles away from Oklahoma City when the murders took place and was sentenced to death. His conviction was overturned in 1986 after the prosecution was found to have suppressed evidence which implicated Leonard Lee Crowe as the shooter.

Aug 23, 1980

Clarence Brandley

Murder

Conroe, Texas

Death

9 years

Yes

Brandley was working as a janitor at Conroe High School when 16-year-old Cheryl Dee Fergeson was raped and murdered in the loft above the auditorium following a volleyball game. A foreign blood sample was found on Fergeson's shirt that did not match either Fergeson's or Brandley's blood type. Following conviction, Brandley's defense team discovered that several pieces of exculpatory evidence were not disclosed by the prosecution. Semen had been found at the scene, but was destroyed without being tested. A Caucasian pubic hair was found on the body; Brandley is African American. Also missing were photographs taken of Brandley on the day of the crime showing that he was not wearing the belt that the prosecution claimed had been the murder weapon. The prosecution received statements implicating two other men in the crime, but failed to disclose them. One of the janitors went to police following Brandley's arrest. He told police he saw another janitor leading the victim up the stairs. He alleged that he was threatened with arrest if he didn't implicate Brandley at trial.

Oct 12, 1980

Steve Titus

Rape

Seattle, Washington

N/A

N/A

Yes

Titus was convicted of the 1980 rape of Nancy Von Roper, a hitchhiking teenager. Seattle Times reporter Paul Henderson began investigating the case after a similar rape was committed a few months after Titus' conviction. His investigation of the case led to Titus' conviction being overturned, and the charges were dropped before he was sentenced. Henderson won the Pulitzer Prize for his articles on the case. Titus lost his job as a result of the case and died of a heart attack in 1985, shortly before being awarded compensation.

Nov 12, 1980

Sandra Hemme

Murder

St. Joseph, Missouri

50 years

43 years

Yes

Hemme was accused of murdering Patricia Jeschke. However, evidence linked police officer Michael Holman to the crime instead. On June 14, 2024, Judge Ryan Horsman ruled that all evidence linked Holman to the crime and there was no evidence linking Hemme. She served the longest prison service for an American woman wrongfully convicted of a crime.

Dec 21, 1980

Claus von Bülow

Attempted murder*

Newport, Rhode Island

30 years

3 years

Yes

Claus von Bülow was convicted of attempted murder of his wife, Sunny von Bülow, on the theory that he injected his wife with insulin, sending her into a coma. She was comatose for 28 years until her death in 2008. His conviction was overturned and he was retried. His defense team hired a number of world-class experts who argued that Sunny's coma was caused by a combination of oral medications, alcohol, and chronic health conditions. Also entered into evidence was a hospital admission only three weeks prior to her irreversible coma where she ingested at least 73 aspirin tablets. The defense argued that this act demonstrated Sunny's mental state was such that she once again ingested an overdose of drugs. They also argued that the presence of insulin on the tip of the needle found near Sunny suggested that it had been dipped in the insulin, but not injected, as injecting it would've wiped the needle clean. He was acquitted.

Summer 1981

Thomas Martin Thompson

Rape, murder

Laguna Beach, California

Death

Executed

No

Thompson was convicted and executed for the rape and murder of Ginger Fleischli, a crime for which he is widely believed to be innocent. He was mainly convicted on the evidence of two notorious informants who claimed Thompson had admitted committing the crime in jail. The prosecution did not inform the judge or the defense that they had also charged and later convicted another person of the crime.

Aug 14, 1981

Arthur Lee Whitfield

Rape

Norfolk, Virginia

63 years

22 years

Yes

In less than one hour on the night of August 14, 1981, two women in Norfolk, Virginia were raped. Both victims eventually identified Arthur Whitfield as the assailant. In 1982, he was convicted of one of the crimes and pled guilty to the second in order to receive a lighter sentence and have some of the charges dropped. DNA testing in 2004 proved that he was innocent of both crimes. The first victim was accosted as she got out of her car. The assailant threatened her with a knife, stole her money, and ordered her to undress. The perpetrator raped her and left her there. She then drove to a friend's house and reported the rape. At trial, she testified that she had several opportunities to view the perpetrator by the light of a streetlight and a spotlight on a nearby house. At the police station, she picked out seven photographs. One of the pictures was Whitfield's. She subsequently identified him from a live lineup. The second victim was attacked not long after the first. She had exited her car and was accosted, threatened with a knife, and raped. At trial, the defense argued that Whitfield had been misidentified. Both victims described their attacker as having no facial hair, but Whitfield wore a beard at the time. Whitfield's family testified that he was with them the entire evening. The jury convicted and Whitfield was sentenced to 45 years. He pled guilty to the second crime and received 18 years, to run consecutively to the first sentence, a total of 63 years. In October 2003, Whitfield filed pro-se under the Virginia statute that governs postconviction DNA testing (passed in 2001). It appeared that the evidence had been destroyed. In December 2003, however, the state crime laboratory found pieces of evidence taped inside a notebook of the serologist who had originally tested the evidence. Mary Jane Burton had, against laboratory protocol, saved samples from some of the cases she had worked on. In 2001, evidence located in a similar manner exonerated Marvin Anderson. In 2003, the evidence Burton saved in Julius Ruffin's case was tested and exonerated him. In 2004, the evidence in Whitfield's case was subjected to DNA testing. Whitfield was excluded from the rape kit samples of both victims. The profile obtained from testing indicated that another inmate, already serving life for another sexual assault, was the true perpetrator.

Sep 7, 1981

Grover Thompson

Stabbing

Mount Vernon, Illinois

40 years

Died in prison in 1996

Yes

Serial killer Timothy Krajcir broke into the apartment of 72-year-old Ida White and stabbed her in her shower. Thompson, who was sleeping in a post office across the street from White's apartment building, was arrested for the crime; the victim misidentified Krajcir as a black man, as did a man who witnessed the culprit fleeing. Thompson's possession of a pocket knife with a speck of dried blood was used as evidence against him. While confessing to other crimes in return for avoiding the death penalty, Krajcir said he attacked a woman in Mount Vernon and that a "black guy" had been arrested for the crime. Reporter Carly O'Keefe linked the crime to White's stabbing; after work from the Illinois Innocence Project and unsuccessful appeals, Governor Bruce Rauner granted Thompson posthumous executive clemency based on actual innocence.

Sep 18, 1981

Raymond Towler

Assault, rape

Cleveland, Ohio

12 years to life, 7–25 years, and 5–25 years

27 years

Yes

Towler was convicted for the assault of a 12-year-old boy and rape of 11-year-old girl in a wooded area. Towler was exonerated by DNA testing.

Oct 29, 1981

Ernest Holbrook and Herman Rucker

Murder of Tina Harmon

Lodi, Ohio

Life imprisonment

One year

Yes

Holbrook and Rucker were accused of the abduction and murder of 12-year-old Tina Harmon in 1982. There was no physical evidence against either man and Holbrook had an alibi for Harmon's abduction, but they were convicted after two eyewitnesses linked them to the crime. However, one of the eyewitnesses was found to be a pathological liar and the other, who was mentally challenged, recanted his testimony and claimed police had pressured him to lie. Rucker was given a new trial in 1983 on the basis of the recantation and was found not guilty. Holbrook was denied a new trial, but the following year his conviction was overturned after evidence came to light implicating Robert Anthony Buell in the crime.

Dec 1981

Gloria Killian

Murder, attempted murder, burglary, robbery, conspiracy

Rosemont, California

32 years to life

20 years

Yes

In December 1981, Gary Masse and Stephen DeSantis, disguised as telephone repairmen, entered the home of an elderly couple in Rosemont, California, shot both occupants and stole six suitcases of silver. Masse's wife told the police that a woman named Gloria masterminded the robbery, prompting the police to arrest 35-year-old Gloria Killian, a former law student with no criminal record. After a preliminary hearing, the charges against Killian were dismissed. Masse was sentenced to life in prison without parole. However, after striking a deal with the Sacramento Sheriff's Department to reduce his sentence in exchange for testimony against others involved, Masse implicated Killian. Killian was re-arrested, and based solely on Masse's testimony, a jury convicted her of first-degree murder, attempted murder, burglary, robbery and conspiracy and sentenced her to 32-years-to-life in prison. Masse's sentence was reduced to 25 years. Ten years later, defense investigators discovered the deal struck between Masse and prosecutors, including a letter where Masse wrote to the prosecutors, "I lied my ass off for you people." Masse later admitted that his testimony against Killian was false. In March 2002, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals reversed Killian's conviction, and in August 2002, Killian was released. The prosecutor, Christopher Cleland, was admonished by the California State Bar for his conduct in the case.

Dec 6, 1981

Julius Ruffin

Rape, sodomy, robbery

Norfolk, Virginia

Life

21 years

Yes

On December 6, 1981, Julius Ruffin was accused of raping, sodomizing, and robbing a woman in her home. The victim looked for a black male and identified Ruffin as her attacker, though the description did not match up. Ruffin is 6'1" (187 cm), with light skin, and two distinguishable gold teeth and facial hair. She identified her attacker as 5'8" (174 cm) with dark skin. On October 1, 1982, he was sentenced to life in prison. Although the real criminal has been convicted, only one of the 'convicts' has had his name totally cleared. Julius Ruffin received $1.5 million in compensation and has had his name completely erased from the registered sex offender list and his record has been cleared of the crimes. Aaron Doxie III, the real perpetrator, was convicted for unrelated rapes, and will not be tried for the Virginia rapes because the cases are too cold and much of the evidence has been destroyed.

Dec 16, 1981

Nick Yarris

Murder, rape

Delaware

Death

22 years

Yes

Yarris, facing a possible life sentence for crimes of which he was later acquitted, attempted to strike a deal with prosecutors by falsely implicating another man in the rape-murder of Linda Mae Craig earlier that month. When Yarris' story was disproved, he became the prime suspect and was convicted the following year. After 22 years on death row, Yarris was exonerated by DNA testing and his conviction was overturned.

1982

Ron Williamson and Dennis Fritz

Murder

Ada, Oklahoma

Death (Williamson), life in prison (Fritz)

11 years

Yes

Debra Carter was murdered in her apartment following a night out with friends at a local bar. Evidence against the men included expert testimony in hair analysis, which is now regarded as unreliable. Ada resident Glen Gore testified against both Williamson and Fritz that Carter had complained to a friend that Williamson "made her nervous". Gore was later connected to the murder by DNA testing and convicted. He is serving life without parole. The case served as the inspiration for John Grisham's The Innocent Man: Murder and Injustice in a Small Town.

Jan 11, 1982

Alton Logan

Murder

Chicago, Illinois

Life

26 years

Yes

Two African-American men shot and killed Lloyd Wickliffe and wounded Alvin Thompson on January 11, 1982, in an attempted armed robbery of a McDonald’s restaurant on the far south side of Chicago where the victims were security guards. Andrew Wilson, having been arrested and charged with the unrelated murders of two Chicago police officers, confided to his lawyers that he had indeed committed the crime of which Logan had been convicted. However, his lawyers were bound by attorney–client privilege, during Wilson’s lifetime, not to reveal what he had told them in confidence. Wilson died of natural causes in prison on November 19, 2007, and his attorneys were then able to release a notarized affidavit describing Wilson’s confession to them. Logan was released in September 2008, more than 26 years after he was arrested for a murder he did not commit. He subsequently received a certificate of innocence, and was awarded $199,000 in state compensation. In January 2013, the City of Chicago agreed to pay Logan $10.25 million to settle a federal wrongful conviction lawsuit.

Feb 24, 1982

Charles Fain

Murder

Nampa, Idaho

Death

18 years

Yes

9-year-old Daralyn Johnson was kidnapped, raped, and murdered while on her way to school. Charles Fain, who lived a block away from the victim, was convicted of the crime. Expert witnesses testified that pubic hair found on the body and a footprint found nearby "could have been" Fain's, and two prison inmates testified that he had confessed to the crime. DNA testing on the pubic hairs exonerated Fain, whose conviction was overturned in 2001, and David Dalrymple was later charged with the murder in 2022.

Mar 5, 1982

Victor Rosario

Murder, arson

Lowell, Massachusetts

Life

35 Years

Yes

A building fire killed eight people, including three adults and five children. Although evidence suggested the fire was accidental, prosecutors believed Rosario and his brothers set the building on fire with Molotov cocktails as revenge for a drug deal. Rosario's Attorney stated he was trying to rescue people from the fire. Rosario's brothers were not tried because he refused to testify against them. Rosario signed a confession believing it would let him go, not fully understanding it due to English not being his first language. In 2014 a court vacated his conviction and in 2019 Rosario filed a lawsuit against the city.

Jun 1982

Earl Washington Jr.

Murder

Culpeper, Virginia

Death

17 Years

Yes

Washington was convicted of the murder of Rebecca Lynn Williams solely on the basis of coerced confessions during which he seemed to have little knowledge of the crime, the victim's appearance, or the location of the crime. Washington, a farmworker who has an intellectual disability, was exonerated in 2000 by DNA tests.

Jul 12, 1982

Walter Forbes

Murder, arson

Jackson, Michigan

Life in prison

37 years

Yes

On July 12, 1982, a man died in a fire that was set in Jackson, Michigan. Dennis Hall was killed in an apparent arson at his apartment. Prior to his death, he was involved in an altercation at a bar which was broken up by college student Walter Forbes. The day after the bar fight, Hall shot Forbes requiring a few months to recover. As Hall and Forbes had been involved in two recent altercations, police arrested Forbes for Hall's death. Forbes would be convicted in court for the murder and arson in May 1983 and he was sentenced to life in prison for first degree murder. In 2017, a witness who had claimed she had seen Forbes and two others burn down the apartment recanted her statement. She claimed to a judge in 2020 that she had been threatened to do so by two men from her neighborhood who warned they would harm her and her family if she failed to testify against the three. Of them, only Forbes had been convicted due to discrepancies in her testimony. In addition to other evidence being uncovered, Forbes' conviction was overturned and he was freed in November 2020. It is now believed that the owner of the apartment, David Jones, was behind the arson as part of an insurance fraud scheme. Jones received a significant payout for the arson that damaged the building and killed Hall. Eight years later, Jones would be convicted of a different insurance fraud scheme involving arson where another person died. Two people confessed to conspiracy in that arson and testified against Jones in court.

Jul 17, 1982

Marvin Anderson

Rape

Hanover County, Virginia

Life in prison

15 years

Yes

A woman who stopped to help an injured bicyclist was instead attacked and dragged into the woods. During the rape, the black perpetrator told the victim that she reminded him of his white girlfriend. Based on this, Anderson, a local black man with a white girlfriend, was arrested. He was sentenced to life in prison, and despite a man named John Otis Lincoln confessing to the rape in 1988, his conviction was not vacated. He was released on parole in 1997. In 2001, it was discovered that the criminalist who worked on the case had saved the cotton swab used, against agency policy. When tested, it confirmed that Anderson was not the rapist. Governor Mark Warner pardoned him in 2002.

Oct 21, 1982

Johnny Briscoe

Rape, robbery

St. Louis, Missouri

45 years

23 years

Yes

Briscoe was tried for a 1982 rape and robbery. After the rape, the perpetrator smoked a cigarette, leaving the butt behind. While at the crime scene, the victim asked the perpetrator for his name. He told her his name was John Briscoe. Briscoe's photo was shown to the victim. A week later, she picked him out of a lineup in which he was the only one wearing a prison jumpsuit; the other men were wearing civilian clothing. Briscoe was convicted on the basis of a cross-racial eyewitness identification and hair analysis of hairs found at the crime scene, both of which are known to have a high degree of unreliability. In 2004, the cigarette butt was found from the crime scene matching another man named Larry Smith. Prior to the identification of Smith via DNA, Briscoe and Smith were serving time together in the same prison. Briscoe had heard rumors that Smith was the perpetrator and confronted him about it. Smith denied that he was involved. It is unknown why Smith used Briscoe's name during the crime, although he may have done it in order to frame Briscoe.

Feb 4, 1983

Carlos DeLuna

Murder

Corpus Christi, Texas

Death

Executed

No

DeLuna was executed in 1989 for stabbing gas station attendant Wanda Lopez to death in a robbery. He had been identified by eyewitnesses to the crime, but the witnesses' accounts contained many inconsistencies and several were unable to tell apart photos of DeLuna and alternative suspect Carlos Hernández. DeLuna claimed to have witnessed Hernandez committing the murder, and investigations after DeLuna's execution found multiple people who claimed Hernandez had bragged about the crime.

Feb 25, 1983

Rolando Cruz and Alejandro Hernandez

Murder of Jeanine Nicarico

Naperville, Illinois

Death

Eight years

Yes

10-year-old Jeanine Nicarico was abducted by an intruder while home alone with influenza on February 25, 1983. Two days later her raped and beaten body was found in a wooded area near her home. Two Latino gang members, Rolando Cruz and Alejandro Hernandez, both separately made up details about the murder in an attempt to claim a monetary reward for information, but when their stories were disproven they soon became suspects and were convicted in 1987. Police allegedly added details of the crime that had not been made public to the men's confessions after the fact in order to make them more authentic. During the trial, serial killer Brian Dugan, on trial at the same time, offered to confess to Jeanine Nicarico's murder as part of a plea agreement but was turned down; this information was not given to the defense. Cruz and Hernandez were both given new trials in 1989 due to prosecutorial misconduct but were both convicted and sent back to death row. However, in 1994 DNA testing exonerated both men and proved that Dugan committed the murder. The following year, Cruz was acquitted at his third trial and the State's Attorney dismissed the charges against Hernandez. Brian Dugan later pleaded guilty to the murder of Jeanine Nicarico.

Aug 1983

Willie Earl Green

Murder

Los Angeles, California

33 years to life

25 years

Yes

Denise Walker was killed during a robbery at the home of her boyfriend, Willie Finley. One burglar struck Finley on the head as he was returning from a store, and then brought him into the house where he ordered Walker to let in a second burglar. Walker's mother told police that Willie Green had robbed Denise a year earlier. Finley identified Green in a lineup and he was convicted. Green sought help from Centurion Ministries, a New Jersey-based wrongful conviction advocacy group. In 2004, during their reinvestigation, Finley recanted his testimony. He said that he was high on crack at the time of the attack and that his eyesight had been impaired by the blow to the head. He told investigators that he did not identify Green until police suggested Green as the attacker and told him of the earlier robbery. Based on Finley's recantation, his conviction was vacated in March 2008, and prosecutors decided not to retry him.

Sep 13, 1983

Juan Roberto Melendez-Colon

Murder

Auburndale, Florida

Death

17 years

Yes

Melendez had an alibi and was convicted of the murder of Delbert Baker largely on testimony of David Falcon, who had a longstanding grudge against Melendez. Witnesses said Falcon had threatened to kill Melendez at some point prior to Melendez allegedly confessing to him. His appeal was denied three times when defense lawyers discovered a taped confession made by Vernon James. In light of the new evidence, Justice Barbara Fleischer determined that Melendez was entitled to a new trial. The state of Florida declined to prosecute a second time since the key witness at the original trial, David Falcon, was now dead and another witness for the prosecution had since recanted his testimony.

Sep 23, 1983

Henry McCollum and Leon Brown

Murder, rape

Red Springs, North Carolina

Death (McCollum); death, commuted to life (Brown)

31 years

Yes

McCollum and Brown were 19 and 15-year-old half-brothers, respectively, when they were arrested for the rape and murder of 11-year-old Sabrina Buie. Both half-brothers had intellectual disabilities, which made them susceptible to manipulation during their police interrogations. Red Springs and Robeson County police and interrogators convinced McCollum and Brown to waive their Miranda rights and sign inconsistent and contradictory confessions that implicated them in the murder, despite the evidence suggesting that Roscoe Artis, a serial rapist and possible serial killer in the area, had committed Buie's murder as he had committed several other similar crimes against at least two other women. In addition, Brown signed his confession in block letters rather than a signature because he was nearly illiterate and could not read his confession. In October 1984, both McCollum and Brown were sentenced to death, with Brown becoming the youngest person on North Carolina's death row. U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia used McCollum's case to justify the existence of the death penalty. After appealing, both death sentences were overturned in 1988, and the two had retrials in 1991. McCollum was again convicted of rape and murder and re-sentenced to death, while Brown was only convicted of rape and sentenced to life imprisonment. The two remained in prison/on death row for a total of 31 years before DNA testing confirmed that neither McCollum's DNA nor Brown's were found at the crime scene. However, because technology could not provide a positive match at the time, the two were held in prison until the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission looked into their case and concluded that the physical evidence matched Roscoe Artis. McCollum and Brown were exonerated in September 2014, with McCollum being the longest-serving death row inmate in North Carolina history. The two were formally pardoned in 2015, enabling them to pursue compensation for their wrongful imprisonment. After multiple state and federal lawsuits, a federal court cumulatively awarded McCollum and Brown with $75 million, the largest award for a wrongful conviction in United States history. Artis died in prison in 2020 while serving a life sentence for a separate murder.

Nov 1983

John Gordon Purvis

Murder

Fort Lauderdale, Florida

Life in prison

10 years

Yes

Police received a tip that a man named Robert Wayne Beckett Sr. may have been involved in the murder of Susan Hamwi. Eventually a new set of detectives investigated Beckett, who admitted to the murder for hire on the instruction of Paul Hamwi, her ex-husband. He named Paul Serio as an accomplice.

Nov 1983

Glenn Ford

Murder

Shreveport, Louisiana

Death by electrocution

30 years

Yes

An all-white jury delivered a guilty verdict in the case of the murder of Isadore Rozeman without any physical evidence directly linking Ford to the crime, with the inexperienced public defenders unable to secure any witnesses. Evidentiary hearings in 2004 and 2005 found the state failed to disclose exculpatory evidence. The state actively suppressed evidence from before the trial that showed two confidential witnesses corroborating Ford's story that he became involved in the crime after the murders, and that another man was in possession of the murder weapon after the crime. In 2013, the state notified Ford's counsel that a confidential informant for the Caddo Parish Sheriff's Office stated that another man confessed to the murder. Ford was exonerated and released in 2014.

1983

Mary Ann and Joe Elizondo

Child sexual abuse*

Jefferson, Texas

35 years

7–13 years

Yes

In 1983, 10-year-old Robert Bienvenue and 8-year-old Richard told police that they had been sexually abused by their mother, Mary Ann Elizondo, and stepfather, Joe Elizondo. At the time, the boys were in the custody of their father and only spent weekends with their mother. Both Mary Ann and Joe were arrested and charged with sexual abuse, and in 1984, Joe was sentenced to life in prison, while Mary Ann was sentenced to 35 years in prison. After Mary Ann was released on parole in 1991, she was jailed for another six months for refusing to admit to sexually abusing her sons. All the while, Robert's father told him that Mary Ann simply abandoned him. But on his 17th birthday, Robert discovered a letter from his mother and learned for the first time that she and Joe were in prison, prompting him to reveal to the authorities that his father forced him to falsely accuse his mother of sexual abuse in retaliation for Mary Ann marrying Joe. A court granted Joe a new trial, and in 1997, prosecutors dismissed the case. In 2005, an appeals court vacated Mary Ann's conviction.

1983

Maurice Hastings

Murder, rape

Inglewood, California

Life in prison

38 years

Yes

Hastings was charged with the rape and murder of Roberta Wydermyer. Despite DNA evidence being recovered from semen, the DA's office denied the request to have it DNA tested. In 2022 it was tested and identified as belonging to Kenneth Packnett, who died in prison in 2020 after having been convicted of armed kidnapping and rape. Hastings was released in October 2022, and he was declared "factually innocent" by a judge in March 2023.

1983–1984

Anthony Capozzi

Rape, sodomy, sexual abuse

Buffalo, New York

11–35 years

21 years

Yes

Capozzi spent 21 years in prison maintaining his innocence when in 2006, a woman was killed along a bike path in a Buffalo suburb. Investigators noticed similarities to a number of other rapes and murders in the area and believed they were committed by one individual. DNA testing implicated Altemio Sanchez, who would eventually plead guilty to the 2006 murder and two others. At least eight crimes were eventually linked to Sanchez via DNA analysis. During the investigation, a detective noticed that one of Capozzi's alleged victims testified that she saw her rapist driving several days later and she copied down his license plate information. When the police initially investigated the tip, they found the owner of the vehicle, but he had an alibi. He was reinterviewed in 2006 and admitted that he had lent the car to his nephew, Altemio Sanchez, that day. Authorities subpoenaed the hospital where the rape victims were initially treated for evidence from the rape kits. It was believed that the evidence had been lost or destroyed, but eventually it was found and tested, excluding Capozzi and implicating Sanchez.

1984

Bernard Baran

Child sexual abuse*

Pittsfield, Massachusetts

Three life sentences

21 years

Yes

Baran's conviction is cited as an example of the day-care sex-abuse hysteria of the 1980s and 1990s as well as a case of homophobia. The Baran case is the subject of the documentary film Freeing Bernie Baran.

1984

Alfred Chestnut, Ransom Watkins, and Andrew Stewart Jr.

Murder, robbery, illegal use of a weapon

Baltimore, Maryland

Life in prison

36 years

Yes

1984

Leroy Orange

Murder

Chicago, Illinois

Death

19 years

Yes

Leroy Orange was arrested along with his half-brother Leonard Kidd. He was convicted of killing Ricardo Pedro, Michelle Jointer, his ex-girlfriend Renee Coleman, and her 10-year-old son, Tony, on the basis of a confession allegedly obtained through torture methods such as beating, suffocation, and electroshock. He was pardoned in 2006. Kidd's death sentence was commuted to life in prison. He maintains his innocence and contends that his confession was elicited through torture as well.

1984

Kirk Bloodsworth

Murder

Baltimore, Maryland

Death

8 years

Yes

On July 25, 1984, 9-year-old Dawn Hamilton was found dead in a wooded area. She had been beaten with a rock, sexually assaulted, and strangled. Kirk Bloodsworth was convicted on March 8, 1985, of sexual assault, rape, and first-degree premeditated murder. A Baltimore County judge sentenced Bloodsworth to death. He was exonerated almost nine years later after DNA testing excluded him. Bloodsworth became the first person in the U.S. exonerated with DNA evidence. The Innocence Project established the Kirk Bloodsworth Post-Conviction DNA Testing Program, a program that helps states defray the costs of post-conviction DNA testing.

1984

Darryl Hunt

Murder

Winston-Salem, North Carolina

Life in prison

19.5 years

Yes

Hunt was convicted of the murder of Deborah Sykes on the basis of eyewitness testimony. He was later cleared by DNA testing, and another man went on to plead guilty to the crime.

Jan 3, 1984

Thomas Haynesworth

Rape

Richmond, Virginia

84 years

27 years

Yes

Haynesworth was arrested at the age of 18 in 1984 after a woman identified him as her attacker. He was convicted of a series of violent rapes in Richmond, Virginia, now believed to have been committed by a neighbor who resembled Haynesworth. In 2009, new state laws and procedures allowed for DNA testing, which was not available in the 1980s, and semen collected from the first attack implicated the neighbor. The case, which The Washington Post called "one of the state's most extraordinary legal cases", utilized DNA testing and new state laws that allowed possibly innocent convicts to present new evidence.

July 1984

Ronald Cotton

Rape, burglary

Alamance County, North Carolina

Life in prison

10 years

Yes

Cotton was convicted of raping two women in their apartments in 1984. Both victims identified him as their assailant and rubber from his shoes was said to be consistent with rubber from the assailant's footprints. Ten years into his life sentence he was cleared by DNA testing which implicated another prisoner.

Nov 3, 1984

Robert Lee Stinson

Murder, rape

Milwaukee

Life in prison

23 years

Yes

Stinson was convicted of the rape and murder of his neighbour Ione Cychosz based on the testimony of forensic odontologists Lowell Johnson and Ray Rawson, who both matched a bite mark on the victim's body to Stinson. In 2005 DNA testing requested by the Innocence Project exonerated Stinson and identified another man named Moses Price as the killer. Stinson was released in 2009.

Dec 6, 1984

John Thompson

Murder, carjacking

New Orleans, Louisiana

Life plus 49 years

18 years

Yes

Feb 5, 1985

Beatrice Six: Thomas Winslow, Joseph White, Ada JoAnn Taylor, Kathy Gonzalez, James Dean, and Debra Shelden

Murder

Beatrice, Nebraska

Varies

Varies

Yes

Thomas Winslow, Joseph White, Ada JoAnn Taylor, Kathy Gonzalez, James Dean, and Debra Shelden were found guilty of the 1985 rape and murder of Helen Wilson. They were pardoned in 2008 after DNA evidence from the crime scene identified Bruce Allen Smith as the true culprit. Smith died in 1992.

Feb 25, 1985

Anthony Ray Hinton

Murder, armed robbery

Birmingham, Alabama

Death

29 years

Yes

Hinton was sentenced to death in 1985 for armed robbery and the murders of John Davidson and Thomas Wayne Vason, two fast food managers in Birmingham. The US Supreme Court ruled in 2014 that his defense lawyer had been deficient. Prosecutors admitted that the bullets found at the scene did not match Hinton's gun; Hinton's conviction was thrown out by a circuit court judge in April 2015 and he was freed.

Mar 1985

Dennis Perry

Murder

Camden County, Georgia

Two life sentences

19 years

Yes

Harold and Thelma Swain were killed after an invasion at their church during a bible study session. Perry was convicted based on witness testimony by an ex-girlfriend's mother who later received a Crimestoppers reward. Perry was also believed to resemble a composite sketch made based on the information of several women who were at the church that night. Perry took a post-conviction deal to avoid the death penalty which restricted his ability to appeal. After coverage by the podcast Undisclosed and The Atlanta Journal-Constitution a potential alternate suspect was identified and DNA testing was pursued by the Georgia Innocence Project. DNA evidence from hairs on glasses left at the scene were tested, and did not match Perry, but were consistent with the alternate suspect.

Mar 1985

Margaret Earle

Murder

Plymouth, Massachusetts

Life in prison

5 years

Yes

In March 1985, Margaret Earle left her 21-month-old daughter Rachelle in the care of her boyfriend, Michael Burnham, to celebrate her 21st birthday with a friend. The next morning, Margaret found her daughter ill but was unable to reach her doctor. While Margaret went to a pharmacy, the paramedics rushed Rachelle to the hospital, where she was pronounced dead. Rachelle's autopsy revealed significant injuries, including fractured ribs and internal bleeding. However, both Margaret and Michael denied any wrongdoing, and the case went cold. Years later, Michael called 911 and confessed to murdering Rachelle in anger over having to babysit a child. Police accused Margaret of failing to promptly seek medical treatment for Rachelle, and both Michael and Margaret were charged with first-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison. But after Margaret's appellate lawyer uncovered evidence of Margaret's phone calls to the doctor, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court reversed Margaret's conviction. Prosecutors subsequently dismissed the case.

Mar 9, 1985

David Lee Gavitt

Murder, arson*

Ionia, Michigan

Three life terms

26 years

Yes

On March 9, 1985, a fire broke out at the Gavitt family home. David Lee Gavitt managed to escape the house, but his wife Angela and their daughters Tracy and Katrina were all killed. Arson investigators claimed that irregular circular burn marks on the floor indicated the fire was deliberately started using an accelerant. David Gavitt was accused of starting the fire, although no motive as to why he would have done so was presented, and he was convicted in 1986. He was freed on appeal in 2012 after advances in science revealed that the evidence was consistent with an accidental fire.

1985 and earlier

Margaret Michaels

Child sexual abuse*

Maplewood, New Jersey

47 years

5 years

Yes

Michaels, the owner of the Wee Care daycare centre, was accused of molesting children under her care. 51 children made accusations such as that Michaels forced them to lick peanut butter off of her genitals, that she penetrated their rectums and vaginas with knives, forks and other objects, that she forced them to eat cakes made from human excrement and that she made them play duck, duck, goose while naked. She was convicted of 115 sexual offences against 20 children. Her conviction was overturned after five years after a court ruled that the children's testimonies were unreliable and had been manipulated by the interviewers.

Jul 29, 1985

Steven Avery

Rape

Two Rivers, Wisconsin

32 years

18 years

Yes

36-year-old Penny Ann Beerntsen was jogging along Lake Michigan when she was grabbed from behind, dragged into a wooded area and raped. Despite having alibis, Avery was convicted on the basis of a visual identification by the victim and visual hair analysis. In April 2002, DNA testing of 13 pubic hairs recovered from Beerntsen excluded Avery. The DNA matched a man named Gregory Allen, who bore a striking resemblance to Avery. Avery was exonerated and released. As a result of the case, Wisconsin made changes to their eyewitness protocol. Avery also filed a civil suit for wrongful conviction against Manitowoc County, Wisconsin, and some county officials, seeking $36 million in damages. Avery settled the lawsuit for $400,000, used for his defense of the 2005 murder of Teresa Halbach, for which he and nephew Brendan Dassey were convicted. On December 18, 2015, Netflix released a documentary that covers both of Avery's convictions. This 10-episode documentary titled Making a Murderer was filmed over 10 years. Allen was never charged in the Beerntsen case because the statute of limitations has expired.

Dec 1, 1985

Ralph "Ricky" Birch and Shawn Henning

Murder

New Milford, Connecticut

55 years

30 years

Yes

Birch and Henning were charged with killing 65-year-old Everett Carr, who was stabbed 27 times at his home. There was no forensic evidence directly linking the two to the crime, but they were convicted based on the testimony of forensics expert Henry Lee, who said a towel had tested positive for blood. However, tests conducted after the trial found the substance was not blood, and a judge found there was no evidence Lee had actually conducted any testing on the towel. The murder convictions were vacated in 2020.

1985

Tim Cole

Rape

Lubbock, Texas

25 years

14 years (died in prison)

Yes

Cole was convicted of rape on basis of a visual identification by the victim, Michele Mallin, his classmate. Among other things, Mallin told police that the rapist smoked during the rape. However, Cole never smoked because of his severe asthma. He died in prison on December 2, 1999, from an asthma attack. Another man, Jerry Wayne Johnson, confessed to the rape in 2007. DNA evidence later confirmed that the rape was committed by Johnson. Cole was posthumously exonerated; it was the first posthumous DNA exoneration in the history of the state of Texas. Johnson confirmed in court that he was the rapist and asked the victim and Cole's family to forgive him. "It's been on my heart to express my sincerest sorrow and regret and ask to be forgiven," said Johnson, who is serving life in prison for two other 1985 rapes. However, Johnson cannot be charged in the Mallin case because the statute of limitations has expired.

Apr 13, 1986

Johnny Lee Wilson

Murder

Aurora, Missouri

Life in prison

8 years

Yes

In 1995, Wilson was pardoned by the governor of Missouri, Mel Carnahan. He had been sentenced to life in prison without parole for the 1986 murder of an elderly woman, seventy-nine-year-old Pauline Martz. Wilson confessed to the crime, but Carnahan concluded in his investigation that Wilson, an intellectually disabled twenty-year-old, was coerced by the authorities. Carnahan also concluded that there was no evidence linking Wilson to the murder.

Jun 30, 1986

Kenny Richey

Murder*

Columbus Grove, Ohio

Death

21 years

No

Two-year-old Cynthia Collins perished in an apartment fire while her mother was away. Her mother told police that Richey was babysitting. After partying with Cynthia's mother, Richey agreed to keep an eye on the girl in exchange for a place to sleep for the night. Richey was able to escape when the fire broke out, but Cynthia died from smoke inhalation. He was convicted on a number of charges related to starting the fire. The scientific evidence presented at trial to prove this was not accidental was highly disputed, and his conviction was eventually overturned. In lieu of taking the case to trial again, prosecutors had offered to accept a "no contest" plea to attempted involuntary manslaughter, child endangerment, and breaking and entering in exchange for release. Although his conviction still stands, the case gained widespread attention across Europe. The European Parliament approved a resolution urging that Richey's life be spared, and Pope John Paul II made an appeal on his behalf. Amnesty International described his case as "the most compelling case of innocence we have come across on death row."

Jul 14, 1986

Santiago Ventura Morales

Murder

Sandy, Oregon

10 years to life

5 years

Yes

Morales was convicted of the murder of Ramiro Lopez Fidel in 1986. At trial, he was provided a Spanish interpreter, though his native language is Mixtec. He maintained his innocence and several jurors later had second thoughts about the conviction and began advocating that he be released from prison. The lack of an appropriate interpreter and other deficiencies in his trial led to his conviction being overturned as well as evidence that pointed to another person. In 1995, the state of Oregon passed a law that requires testing and certification of court interpreters as a result of the Morales case.

Aug 13, 1986

Michael Morton

Murder

Williamson County, Texas

Life in prison

25 years

Yes

Morton was convicted of his wife Christine Morton's murder in 1987. He was exonerated in 2011 after DNA tests linked another man, Mark Alan Norwood, to the murder. Norwood was subsequently convicted of Christine's murder. He also is a suspect in the 1988 murder of Debra Baker in her Austin home. Both women were beaten to death in their beds. The prosecutor in the case was charged with contempt after it was discovered that he withheld evidence from the defense team. He gave up his law license and served five days in jail as part of a plea bargain.

Sep 21, 1986

John Galvan, Arthur Almendarez, Francisco Nanez

Murder, arson

Chicago, Illinois

Life in prison

35 years

Yes

Brothers Guadalupe and Julio Martinez were killed in an arson attack at their apartment in September 1986. Their siblings believed the attack was retaliation for their involvement with the Latin Kings gang. Police suspected teenagers John Galvan, Francisco Nanez, and Michael Almendarez, who had allegedly been seen in the area shortly before the fire, although witnesses attested that Galvan had been at home for at least an hour by this time. Michael Almendarez was allegedly intimidated by the police until he accused Galvan and Nanez of starting the fire, which he would later testify was a lie. Galvan and Nanez confessed to starting the fire with help from Almendarez's brother Arthur, who also confessed; Galvan and Arthur Almendarez later retracted their confessions, accusing police of torturing them, and Nanez claimed he had been tricked into confessing while drunk. All three were convicted and sentenced to life without parole. 21 years into his sentence, Galvan saw an episode of MythBusters during which the presenters proved that it was impossible to ignite a pool of gasoline by throwing a lit cigarette into it - which Galvan and Nanez had claimed was how they lit the fire. Galvan, Nanez, and Almendarez then appealed their convictions on the grounds that their confessions, which constituted the only evidence against them, were scientifically impossible. Their initial motions for a new trial and the suppression of their confessions were denied, but their convictions were eventually vacated and the charges against them dismissed in 2022.

Sep 27, 1986

Douglas DiLosa

Murder

Kenner, Louisiana

Life in prison

14 years

Yes

In September 1986, police were called to the DiLosa home to find Douglas and Glinda DiLosa tied up by intruders. Glinda DiLosa had been strangled to death. Police claimed not to have found any sign of forced entry and accused Douglas DiLosa of killing his wife for her life insurance policy. After his conviction, DiLosa obtained a police report revealing evidence withheld by the prosecution at his trial, which included hair belonging to a black man (DiLosa was white, but the men he accused of the murder were black) found on the rope used to strangle Glinda and unidentified fingerprints being found at the crime scene. DiLosa was released pending a retrial in 2001 and charges were dismissed two years later.

Nov 1, 1986

Walter McMillian

Murder

Monroeville, Alabama

Death

Four years

Yes

Ronda Morrison, an 18-year-old white girl, was shot to death at a dry-cleaners in 1986. Walter McMillian, a black man, was arrested and immediately sent to Alabama's death row, where he was held for two years without having even been charged. McMillian was eventually charged in 1988 despite six witnesses placing him at a fish fry during the murder. Informant Ralph Myers claimed to have witnessed McMillian commit the murder, and two other witnesses placed McMillian's low-rider truck at the scene (although his truck was not converted to a low-rider until after the murder). After six years on death row (including two years pre-trial detention), his lawyer Bryan Stevenson presented evidence withheld by the prosecution, including an interrogation tape in which Myers complained that he was being forced to implicate McMillian. The two witnesses who claimed to have seen McMillian's truck also recanted their testimony. McMillian was granted a new trial, and the charges were dropped later that year.

Jan 22 and Feb 16, 1987

Glen Woodall

Sexual assault, sexual abuse, kidnapping, robbery

Barboursville, West Virginia

2 life terms without parole plus 203–335 years

5 years

Yes

Two victims in two separate incidents were abducted, raped, and robbed. The assailant wore a ski mask, but both victims noted a few characteristics, such as the perpetrator was uncircumcised. Woodall was convicted on circumstantial evidence, including testimony that he shared the same blood type, similar body and beard hair, voice identification, and a partial visual identification by victim two, and the fact that Woodall was uncircumcised. Woodall was granted DNA testing in 1988 on semen samples recovered from the victims—the first ever admitted as evidence at the state level in the United States—which excluded Woodall, and the conviction was thrown out. Woodall was the first person to be exonerated after being convicted due to testimony by lab technician Fred Zain. Woodall's defense team conducted its own tests on the evidence, which determined that Zain had used flawed blood-typing methods in tying the semen to Woodall. It further appeared that Zain had initially determined a piece of hair was unidentifiable pubic hair, but later changed his identification to hair from Woodall's beard. Woodall subsequently sued the state for false imprisonment and won a $1 million settlement. At the request of the state police, Kanawha County Prosecutor William Forbes began a criminal investigation. Forbes was so disturbed by what he found that he asked the Supreme Court of Appeals of West Virginia to appoint a special judge and a panel of lawyers and scientists to investigate the serology department. On November 4, 1993, Senior Circuit Court Judge James Holliday issued a report finding that Zain had engaged in a staggering litany of misconduct and outright fraud. According to the report, Zain had misstated evidence, falsified lab results and reported scientifically implausible results that may have resulted in as many as 134 people being wrongfully convicted. Holliday found that Zain's misconduct was so egregious that any testimony offered by Zain should be presumed as prima facie "invalid, unreliable, and inadmissible". It also found serious deficiencies in the serology division's quality-control procedures. The Supreme Court unanimously accepted Holliday's report on November 12, calling Zain's actions "egregious violations of the right of a defendant to a fair trial" and a "corruption of our legal system". West Virginia paid out a total of $6.5 million to settle lawsuits by people who had been wrongfully convicted due to Zain.

Feb 11, 1987

Tim Masters

Murder

Fort Collins, Colorado

Life in prison

9 years

Yes

Peggy Hettrick was murdered in 1987. Masters was a sophomore in high school at the time of the murder. He was convicted largely on the basis of graphic drawings by Masters portraying violent scenes. He was later eliminated via DNA testing. In 2008, special prosecutors assigned to the case agreed that critical information was not turned over to the original defense team. Rather, the DNA results pointed to Hettrick's sometime boyfriend. In 2008 a Colorado judge vacated Masters' conviction and ordered him released immediately.

Sep 1987

Susie Mowbray

Murder*

Cameron, Texas

Life in prison

9 years

Yes

In September 1987, car dealer Bill Mowbray shot himself in his bed, while his wife, Susie Mowbray, was lying next to him. Despite the fact that Bill had been threatening to commit suicide for months over financial troubles, the police zeroed in on Susie as the culprit and charged her with first-degree murder. At her trial, detectives claimed that the blood spatter indicated that Susie shot her husband, and in June 1988, Susie was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. In 1996, Susie was granted a new trial after it was revealed that the prosecution suppressed a report from blood spatter expert Herbert MacDonnell, who concluded that the police's luminol staining procedure was unreliable and that no blood spatter was found on Susie's nightgown. The police even admitted at a hearing that there was no scientific support for their case. In January 1998, a jury acquitted Susie of the charges.

Oct 24, 1987

Willie Grimes

Rape, kidnapping

Hickory, North Carolina

Life in prison and 9 years

24 years, 9 months, 23 days

Yes

On October 24, 1987, around 9 p.m., a black man forced his way into the home of a white 69-year old widow in Hickory, North Carolina, brandishing a knife. He raped her on her couch, dragged her to her bedroom and raped her again before leaving through the back door, stealing some fruit from a bowl in the kitchen on his way out. Linda McDowell, a neighbor of the victim and sister of Grimes' ex-girlfriend, pointed the police to Willie Grimes, knowing of a $1,000 reward. During his trial, microscopic hair analysis was used to indicate him and the victim identified him as the perpetrator - after pointing to his attorney first. Eight friends who spent the evening with Grimes gave him an alibi and four other witnesses spoke to his "calm" character with no violent tendencies. Grimes himself pointed out that the victim never mentioned a significant scar on his chest and two missing fingertips. Grimes was convicted by a mostly white jury to life in prison for the rapes and 9 years for the kidnapping. In 2001, when post-conviction DNA testing was established in North Carolina, Grimes sought testing of the hair and was told the evidence was destroyed - although his lawyer had requested it to be preserved immediately after the conviction. In 2003, finger prints taken from fruit in the kitchen were matched to Albert Lindsey Turner who had been a suspect before the informant's call. In 2010, a petition was filed with the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission and the case and new evidence were given to a tribunal of judges in 2012. The tribunal decided within 30 minutes to vacate Grimes convictions. In the retrial the DA apologized to Grimes instead of a closing argument and he was exonerated. He was awarded $6.2 million in damages in settlements with the city and state.

1987

Levon Jones

Murder

Duplin County, North Carolina

Death

14 years

Yes

Jones was sentenced to death in 1993 for the murder of Leamon Grady. Lovely Lorden, the sole witness against Jones, admitted in an affidavit that she "was certain that Bo did not have anything to do with Mr. Grady's murder" and that she did not know what happened the night Grady was murdered. His conviction was overturned in 2006 and he was released.

Jan 22, 1988

James Calvin Tillman

Rape

Hartford, Connecticut

45 years

16 years

Yes

Accused and found guilty of rape, Tillman was released after DNA tests proved he was not the culprit.

June 22, 1988

Anthony Michael Green

Rape, Robbery

Cuyahoga County, Ohio

20-50 years

13 years

Yes

Green was convicted of both rape and aggravated robbery at the Cleveland Clinic Inn, in which a Caucasian women was attacked by an African American male, named "Tony". He had been linked to the crime through photos, forensic testing, and a singular washcloth, which led to his conviction of two-consecutive, ten-to twenty five year prison terms. In 1997, Green reached out to the Innocence Project, and was able to retest his legal battle with new DNA testing. On October 9, 2001, Greene was able to walk free after 13 years of incarnation.

Jul 12, 1988

Walter Ogrod

Murder

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

Death

23 years

Yes

Ogrod confessed to luring 4-year-old Barbara Horn into his basement and bludgeoning her to death after trying to molest her. He spent over two decades on death row before his conviction was vacated in 2020 due to DNA evidence which proved Ogrod was not the killer.

Sep 7, 1988

Martin Tankleff

Murder

Long Island, New York

Two terms of 25 years to life

17 years

Yes

Martin Tankleff's parents, Seymour and Arlene Tankleff, were murdered while the 17-year-old Tankleff was sleeping in the home. He was convicted on the basis of a false confession given during an extended interrogation. His convictions were overturned in 2007 after his defense attorney presented an alternative scenario involving Seymour's business partner, to whom he owed money, and three former convicts, one of whom confessed to being the getaway driver.

Sep 10, 1988

David Dowaliby

Murder of Jaclyn Dowaliby

Midlothian, Illinois

45 years

One year

Yes

Seven-year-old Jaclyn Dowaliby was abducted from her home during the night and strangled to death. Police charged her parents, David and Cynthia, with the crime, alleging that a witness had placed David Dowaliby at the scene where the body was dumped on the night of Jaclyn's abduction, and that there was evidence that the couple had staged a break-in at their home. Cynthia was acquitted by direction of the trial judge as there was no evidence against her, but David was convicted. He appealed, arguing that the trial judge should have directed his acquittal as well as his wife's, and it was revealed that the prosecution had withheld evidence that it was impossible for the witness to have recognised David (who he did not know) from 75 yards away in the dark. David's conviction was vacated just over a year after his trial.

Sep 1988

Virginia LeFever

Murder*

Newark, Ohio

Life in prison

21 years

Yes

In September 1988, William LeFever, while in the middle of a divorce, died of an acute drug overdose. His wife, Virginia, found an empty bottle of antidepressants in their home and subsequently told police that he had committed suicide. However, the police accused Virginia of poisoning her husband and charged her with murder. In February 1990, Virginia was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. 20 years later, Virginia's lawyer discovered that the prosecution's key witness, toxicologist James Ferguson, lied about his credentials, prompting a court to reverse Virginia's conviction. In April 2011, the prosecution dismissed the case.