Many Good, Innocent People Languish In Our Prison Systems. This Is So Wrong.
But when the state of Missouri goes one step further and declares that a man, wrongfully imprisoned for 42 years, and eventually acquitted, gets no compensation, how can anyone, ANYONE, turn a blind eye to such incredible injustice?
Life is short. And because it is so, you don’t want to find yourself on the wrong side of the law, especially if you are colored.
Yesterday I wrote this article about Marilyn Mulero, who languished in prison for more than half her life, wrongly-accused, and essentially forgotten by a system that appears to be happy to try, and then forget, some offenders.
I was truly moved by her story. Her trial was botched to say the least, and it was through pure serendipity that another, compassionate and caring legal professor read her story and was moved to action.
When he took her case on, he was a mere 29 years of age. When Marilyn was eventually released, he was middle aged, (as was Marilyn!).
This is a travesty, and it’s not how any legal system should work.
World-wide, the legal fraternity could consider taking a leaf out of the books of Norway’s prison system. Not only are prisoners treated with dignity, but they are career-trained whilst in prison, they are not locked away, and the incidence of recidivism is impressively low.
There is no set-and-forget punishment in Norway’s judicial system.
Would that all countries could all hold to such standards
I’d like you to imagine, just for a moment, being wrongfully jailed for some 42 years of your life…not someone else’s, YOURS!
It’s a bit scary, is it not!
It happened to a black Missouri man, Kevin Strickland, in 1978, and 42 years later, after a retrial by the Midwest Innocence Project, he was finally set free.
That’s half a life, if you live to be 84, but two thirds if you only reach 63.
We can play around with the arithmetic here, but you get my point, I’m sure.
There is something very seriously wrong here
How angry would you be?
On the other hand, could pure joy consume you?
Or would it be almost enough to encourage a person to seek revenge and find oneself back in maximum security?
Bear in mind, this man has no financial comeback on the legal system. It’s just how things are in Missouri. He’s served 42 years in prison, has no real work experience to speak of, so at 62, left high and dry, what in heaven’s name is a man supposed to do?
All he got was his FREEDOM!
Read an excerpt on the case below, and I challenge you not to be sickened by what passes as fairness.
“A judge on Tuesday ordered the immediate release of Mr Strickland from state custody, after 15,487 days behind bars.
“Lawyers for the Midwest Innocence Project, who have worked for months to help free Mr Strickland, told the BBC they were “ecstatic” about the news.
“We were confident any judge who saw the evidence would find Mr Strickland is innocent and that is exactly what happened,” said Midwest Innocence Project legal director Tricia Rojo Bushnell in a statement.”
She added:
“Nothing will give him the 43 years he has lost and he returns home to a state that will not pay him a cent for the time it stole from him. That is not justice.”
NO, it’s not justice. Wrongfully accused of a triple murder, despite there being no evidence of Strickland having been at the scene of the crime, committed in the end by an all-white jury, what is not to hate?
“Lawyers for the Midwest Innocence Project, who have worked for months to help free Mr Strickland, told the BBC they were “ecstatic” about the news.”
The Midwest Innocence Project is doing fabulous work, but it’s only a small hard-working group, with the same number of hours in their day as we have. Their business is that of proving innocence and obtaining subsequent release.
1.Can we just leave it there and hope for the best for released prisoners?
2. Maybe we can tell ourselves that a benefactor will step up to the plate and ensure the Stricklands of the system are given homes and pensions?
3. Or Strickland might be a one-off star in his own drama?
4. Or might we feel shame enough to demand fixing up a severely-questionable system? We’ll be running out of blinkers soon!
