Hello all of you who believe in protecting innocent persons from being arrested and convicted of crimes they did not commit. This blog is devoted to those people.
We welcome family members who have innocent relatives in prison to write about their experience with the criminal justice system.
Some may believe innocent persons could never be erroneously railroaded into prison in this country, but witness the 250+ exonerations in the U.S. since 1995 when Innocent Projects began popping up throughout this country.
So many negative issues bombard us every hour of every day : unemployment, foreclosures, downsizing, and death defying politics among a litany of other issues impacting our lives. So much so our heads are in a perpetual state of spinning!
ReplyDeleteWith all of these ongoing occurrences how could we possibly have time, inclination, or enough energy to consider the plight of innocent persons sitting in a 9’x15’ cement jail cell paying for a crime he did not commit?
We might be able to take a look at a couple of those innocent people in prison, but now!!! How could we right now? Especially now! It’s the holidays! We’ve got so much to do!!! The house must be decorated, then there’s the front yard. We must dust off the plastic Christmas tree and prop it up in front of the big window. Take the wreath out of moth balls, and tack it up on the front door. Then the tree has to be decorated. Multiples of lights on electric strings must be tested. Santa, his sleigh and all those reindeer must be securely screwed to the top of the roof. Then we must jump up in the middle of the night, run to the mall at 4:00a.m. hunt for parking places close to the front door, push others this way, and pull others that way so we can buy, buy, buy all those presents we can’t afford in the first place.
Then we rush back to the now decorated house to wrap all those too expensive presents, and rush to put them under the tree. Jesus! Look how busy we are with the holidays, and all the requirements there of. The clock is ticking, and for us soon Santa will be knocking on our door! Tick –tock.
I wonder if we would have dragged all those decorations, the sleigh, reindeer, Santa, the tree, and the wreath out so fast if it was our husband, or brother, or adult child sitting in that 9’x15’ cement cell paying for a crime they did not commit - something tells me we wouldn’t.
Living in a cement cell on the 25th of December comes and goes like any other day. There are no Christmas trees, reindeer, Santa or decorations, and certainly no presents. Inmates don’t sing Christmas carols. Inmates don’t purchase jewelry for the ladies in their families. Nor do they purchase sweaters for their brothers or uncles. Inmates don’t drive through neighborhoods at night to look at Christmas decorations.
They sit. They sit on a cement bench thinking while the clock ticks. They know they are innocent, and think about how this could possibly have happened. The ‘how did I get here’ tape plays in a loop inside their heads. Every minute of every day the tape plays on.
Tapes briefly stop when it’s time for a meal. A prison guard makes a loud announcement that interrupts the tape. The inmate is ordered to stand at his cell door, the door open, he steps out into the hall to stand in line with other inmates. The guard yells again, and they walk in single file to the dining hall where he eats whatever is put in front of him.
On December 25th there may be a turkey and dressing, but it will be cold, dry, and tasteless. They eat with other inmates. It’s not food that is hot or nutritious or tasty. It just is. Inmates eat the food because hunger is a tremendous motivator.
We feed our animals better food that human inmates eat on any given day of the year.
But, wait a minute! The prisoner must have done something or else he wouldn’t be in that predicament. Innocent people don’t just end up in prison charged with crimes they did not do! This is America. Things like that don’t happen here, does it? We have the best criminal justice system in the world, don’t we?
To be continued!
continuation of previous comment:
ReplyDeleteAlright, let’s cut down to the bare bones truth of innocence! Most of us naively believe if someone is in prison it is because the police, district attorneys, courts, judges and other members of the criminal justice system are on the same ‘moral page’ of right and wrong. In other words, all of those criminal justice professionals worked within the legal instructions of the U.S. Constitution, State Statutes, and local laws to put the criminal behind bars.
Well, guess what? Since 1995, more than 250 inmates have been exonerated because of police and/or prosecutorial misconduct that include just flat out lying to put the innocent person into prison. Now, you may think that 250 exonerated out of 2 million prisoners is not such a high number, then consider this: it’s only 250 persons because the Innocence Projects across this country are so inundated with applicants to be exonerated they can’t get to them fast enough.
Criminals should be in prison. Not because it works, but because in the history of the world it’s all we have come up with to handle criminals. Innocent persons should not be in prison. That is a plain fact. Innocent persons should have the same opportunity to be involved with their families during all the holiday hustle and bustle as the rest of us.
Sometimes I believe that with all the rush of the holiday season we forget the impetus of the holiday, and that is to celebrate the birth of the religious icon who was touted as the person who always made time for those who struggled with poverty, sickness and hunger. He also worked with those innocents who were accused of crimes they did not do before he was imprisoned, and we should never forget that before the State put him to death - he too was innocent.
Before continuing this discussion I must tell you that there are thousands of devoted and honest peace officers and district attorneys who would never violate the Civil Rights laws of the 14th Amendment, and they are not the persons we address in this blog.
ReplyDeleteWe thank those of the criminal justice culture who work to protect us and our freedoms everyday of their careers. Thank you for a job well done!