Posted on 07/20/2006 10:33:03 AM PDT by newgeezer
Johnny Briscoe is a free man today, after serving 23 years for crimes the state now says he didn't commit.
Briscoe walked out of a state prison in Charleston, Mo., on Wednesday after serving part of a 45-year sentence for convictions involving a 1982 sexual attack on a woman ...
Thanks to DNA testing, authorities confirmed ... that Briscoe was innocent and that the real rapist was already in another Missouri prison.
...
St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney Robert P. McCulloch called him ... and "apologized to him on behalf of the county, particularly for the past six years."
...
There was no DNA testing in 1983 when Briscoe was convicted. In 2000 and again in 2001, McCulloch ... asked the crime lab to look for evidence in the Briscoe case and other cases where DNA could now be applied to existing evidence.
McCulloch said his office was told the evidence had been destroyed.
... The laboratory reported that the freezer where the evidence might have been kept was searched and that the evidence - cigarette butts - had presumably been destroyed.
In 2004, the crime lab "was inventorying and cataloging everything in the lab" and found the cigarette butts in the freezer, McCulloch said, but his office didn't learn about their existence until July 6.
...
Testing of the three cigarette butts confirmed that the victim's DNA was found on all three but that the third contained DNA that matched a different man than Briscoe - one who is also in the Missouri prison system ...
(Excerpt) Read more at stltoday.com ...
While I do believe the death penalty is an appropriate penalty for some crimes, I've long since come to regard it as just another government program gone wrong.
You were not the only one. The reporter writes terribly.
"does he get 'time served' if by chance he happens to get convicted of a new crime?"
by the time he finishes suing and collecting for false arrest/imprisonment, etc., he'll have enough to buy the town and not need to burlarize any time soon.
I guess nothing is perfect.
Before or after?
"36,000 for each year wrongly imprisoned?! ... I guess on the bright side, home boy here almost has a cool mil in his pocket for his troubles.... though thats not really compensation."
a sad amount really. interest would help significantly, but unfortunately they'll prob tax him like it was lottery winnings. . .
Thats true but..... As someone else demonstated clearly earlier on this thread, eyeball witnesses are not nearly as reliable as it seems they should be. Johnny Briscoe may be innocent, I hope he is, since he has been busted out. My point was though, DNA cant prove innocence.
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