Oct 12, 2015

30 Years on Death Row: A Prosecutor Confesses for Prosecuting an Innocent Man

'In an incredible miscarriage of justice, a prosecutor admits his cowardice and indifference led to the wrongful murder conviction of a man sentenced to death'

Last night 60 Minutes aired a segment, 30 Years on Death Row (Rosen, Nosheen), telling a tale all-too-familiar in prison-prosecutor state America. An innocent man spent 30 years on death row for a crime of which he is innocent.

I don't know what is more appalling: The confirmation bias of the so-called murder investigation (no physical evidence needed) leading to a capital murder conviction of the innocent man, Glenn Ford of Louisiana; the fact that the death penalty continues; or the vile Dale Cox, the acting district attorney of Caddo Parish, who even today defends the prosecution and the conviction of the already-proven innocent Ford.

American law enforcement zeroing in a suspect, with no physical evidence connecting a suspect to a crime, and prosecutors—"arrogant, narcissistic, caught up in the culture of winning"—who have no conception that a prosecutor's office can afford to be and should be just. The quote above is from Marty Stroud, the prosecutor who convicted Glenn Ford and who last night confessed on national TV.

Said Stroud:

I ended up, without anybody else's help, putting a man on death row who didn't belong there. I mean at the end of the day, the beginning, end, middle, whatever you want to call it, I did something that was very, very bad. ... I think my failure to say something [regarding exculpatory leads] can only be described as cowardice. I was a coward.

Every American law student, every district attorney, every prosecutor should view last night's segment produced by Ira Rosen and Habiba Nosheen, because I'm quite sure American prosecutors are not big fans of Robert H. Jackson who warned us against this very tragedy last century.


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