A Brief Note On Wrongful Conviction And Criminal Justice...

Vernon Randall Professor George Slone Effectiveness in Writing 102 Date due: March 8, 2015 The wrongly accused Introduction: Despite the growing consciousness of a flawed criminal justice system, many cannot identify with being wrongfully convicted, weakening public demand for change. Nevertheless, reforms designed to reduce miscarriages of justice take hold. The issue should not be viewed as a partisan issue but one of vital concern to all criminal justice stakeholders and the public. A leading wrongful conviction authority outlines the matter. Wrongful Conviction and Criminal Justice Reform Wrongful Conviction and Criminal Justice Reform, making justice is not a compendium of what has been learned about wrongful convictions since†¦show more content†¦They initially presented their findings in the mid-1980s. Less than a decade later, stories of wrongful conviction poured forth as DNA exonerations provided proof that the innocent had been imprisoned. Some of the investigations were done by journalists, including David Protess, his students at Northwestern University, as well as teams of reporters at papers like the Chicago Tribune. Other work was conducted by academics, including such luminaries as Sam Gross, Richard Leo, and Brandon Garrett. And, of course, the innocence project, led by law professors and advocates Barry Scheck and Barry Neufeld, has uncovered case after case of wrongful conviction. Certainly, the studies of wrongful conviction have been able to generate press coverage especially when the findings tell the story of an innocent defendant who narr owly escaped a death sentence. Due to the fact that much of the American public assumes that it is not at risk for a wrongful conviction, few of those stories have â€Å"legs† to breed sufficient interest in reform. In this assumption the public is correct. Notwithstanding the claims of some reformers that anyone of us could be subject to a wrongful conviction, the research actually suggests that most individuals have little to fear. Indeed, the most recent national study of wrongful convictions shows that individuals with a prior criminal record are at the greatest risk of being wrongful convicted (Gould et