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Hofstra Law Review

Actual innocence

Publication Year

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Stop Blaming The Prosecutors: The Real Causes Of Wrongful Convictions And Rightful Exonerations, Charles E. Maclean, James Berles, Adam Lamparello Jan 2015

Stop Blaming The Prosecutors: The Real Causes Of Wrongful Convictions And Rightful Exonerations, Charles E. Maclean, James Berles, Adam Lamparello

Hofstra Law Review

Wrongfully convicted and rightfully exonerated criminal defendants spent, on average, ten years in prison before exoneration, and the ramifications to the defendants, the criminal justice system, and society are immeasurable. Prosecutorial misconduct, however, is not the primary cause of wrongful convictions. To begin with, although more than twenty million new adult criminal cases are opened in state and federal courts each year throughout the United States, there have been only 1,281 total exonerations over the last twenty-five years. In only six percentof those cases was prosecutorial misconduct the predominant factor resulting in those wrongful convictions. Of course, although prosecutorial misconduct …


Prosecutorial Conflicts Of Interest In Post-Conviction Practice, Keith Swisher Jan 2012

Prosecutorial Conflicts Of Interest In Post-Conviction Practice, Keith Swisher

Hofstra Law Review

Prosecutors, our ministers of justice, do not play by the same conflict of interest rules. All other attorneys should not, and cannot, attack their prior work in transactional or litigation matters; nor should other attorneys unquestionably represent clients in matters in which the attorneys themselves face disciplinary, civil, or criminal liability. When prosecutors have likely convicted an innocent person, however, prosecutors are asked to review their own prior work objectively and then to undo it. But they understandably suffer from a conflict between their duty to justice and their duty to themselves — their duty to seek the release of …


Prosecutors And Corrupt Science, Kevin C. Mcmunigal Jan 2007

Prosecutors And Corrupt Science, Kevin C. Mcmunigal

Hofstra Law Review

No abstract provided.