Of the confirmed 2021 exonerations, official misconduct played a role in 102 of them \u2014 nearly 70%. Official misconduct covers law enforcement officials, prosecutors and forensic analysts. O\u2019Brien said the most common mistake is officials withholding exculpatory evidence \u2014 evidence that could help the defendant plead their innocence.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt doesn\u2019t have to be dispositive of innocence, but if it tends to make it more likely that the defendant is (innocent), the state has an obligation to turn that over,\u201d O\u2019Brien said. \u201cIt\u2019s ultimately the prosecutor\u2019s responsibility but there are definitely cases where the police don\u2019t tell the prosecutor. So it\u2019s on the police to turn it over to the prosecutor. It\u2019s the prosecutor\u2019s job to turn it over to the defense.\u201d<\/p>\n
\n
Corey McCall leaves the Michigan Reformatory on June 25, 2021. McCall was wrongly convicted of a 2005 murder he did not commit. McCall was represented by Michigan\u2019s Conviction Integrity Unit. (Photo courtesy WMU-Cooley Law School)<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\nPATTERN OF RACIAL BIAS<\/h2>\n African Americans make up just 13% of the U.S. population, but according to the NRE, of the 3,060 exonerations since 1989, 51% of them are for African Americans. In 2021, 109 of 161 exonerations were for Black men or women. In Michigan, it was seven out of 11 cases<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\nRobyn Frankel, Michigan\u2019s assistant attorney general and the director of the statewide Conviction Integrity Unit<\/a><\/strong>, says systemic racial bias can\u2019t be ignored.<\/p>\n\u201cSystemic racial bias has been there forever,\u201d Frankel told News 8. \u201cWe can debate critical race theory and racial bias and systemic racism, but my position would be that that\u2019s where it all comes from.\u201d<\/p>\n
While it isn\u2019t measured directly by the NRE, Frankel suspects socioeconomic status also plays a key role in the number of arrests and mishandled cases.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe vast majority of folks that you will see coming through (conviction integrity units) are from (marginalized) neighborhoods,\u201d Frankel said. \u201cI think that even the white folks are not normally the wealthy white folks. The folks who we traditionally see are folks more socioeconomically depressed.\u201d<\/p>\n
The NRE is working on a separate study to break down the elements that tie race and wrongful convictions. That study is expected to be released later this year.<\/p>\n
ONE BAD APPLE<\/h2>\n Illinois had the most exonerations of any state in 2021, almost single-handedly thanks to one crooked police officer.<\/p>\n
Over the course of a decade, Chicago Police Department Sgt. Ronald Watts<\/a><\/strong> and his squad regularly terrorized a housing complex, essentially collecting a tax from drug dealers in exchange for turning a blind eye while manufacturing criminal charges against people who wouldn\u2019t cooperate.<\/p>\n\n
Former Chicago police Sgt. Ronald Watts leaves a U.S. Courthouse in 2013. (Getty Images file)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\nDozens and dozens of people, arrested on random drug charges, were brought in by Watts and his team. Most of them took plea deals to avoid longer prison sentences. Investigators quickly realized that most of the defendants were pleading guilty because they knew the system was fixed against them and they had no real chance at proving their innocence.<\/p>\n
Watts and one other officer were arrested<\/a><\/strong> in 2012 and eventually charged with stealing government funds after getting caught in an FBI sting. Watts eventually pleaded guilty. At his sentencing, the judge dressed him down, calling his actions \u201cunconscionable\u201d and a \u201cbetrayal\u201d to his community. Though the federal law allowed for a maximum punishment of up to 10 years in prison, Watts was sentenced only to 22 months and a year of probation.<\/p>\nNow, nearly a decade after his arrest, Watts\u2019 crimes are still making an impact. In 2021, 15 people with charges connected to Watts<\/a><\/strong> were exonerated. Already in 2022, 34 more prisoners have been exonerated<\/a><\/strong>. At least 150 cases have been exonerated in all and more than 200 pending cases have been thrown out.<\/p>\nSeveral members of Watts\u2019 squad remain with the Chicago Police Department and have yet to be disciplined, despite investigators\u2019 insistence that all of them participated in the crimes. According to a report by NBC Chicago<\/a><\/strong>, 10 officers from Watt\u2019s team were put on a list by the Cook County State Attorney\u2019s Office, saying they would never be asked to testify in a case because of the questions surrounding their credibility.<\/p>\nTHE KEY TO MOVING FORWARD<\/h2>\n Both O\u2019Brien and Frankel credit the rise of conviction integrity units in finding and fighting for more exonerations.<\/p>\n
\u201c(Conviction integrity units) are important for a lot of reasons but one of them is that we all agree that people who are innocent shouldn\u2019t be locked up,\u201d Frankel said. \u201cAnd sometimes the information that actually proves innocence just isn\u2019t available. It\u2019s not there for decades and by the time that information rises to the top, somebody\u2019s legal avenues have all been exhausted. You only get so much in the way of an appeal in the criminal justice system.\u201d<\/p>\n
Michigan has five active units. Wayne and Washtenaw counties were the first to launch. The statewide agency that Frankel leads was announced in 2019 and formally started taking cases in January 2020. Since the start of 2022, Oakland and Macomb counties have launched their own CIUs.<\/p>\n