A pregnant wife was brutally beaten, raped, and left for dead. The unborn baby did not survive the trauma. The wife recovered after a long coma, at which time she identified her husband as the attacker, not withstanding his claim that he was out getting some fast food for them. The police closed the investigation despite the fact that the circumstances of the attack were similar to the activities of a serial killer who was active in the area. The husband was convicted and received a fifteen-years-to-life sentence for second-degree murder for the death of the unborn child. After serving16 years, as a result of police reviewing unsolved cases, DNA collaboration, and the confession of the actual serial murderer, the husband was exonerated. Everyone involved in the prosecution process (wife, police, prosecutor) sincerely believed they had the guilty party. But, they were wrong!
Examples of police officers prematurely closing cases (noted above) or designing identification procedures in such a way as to prejudice decisions of the witnesses. In other cases prosecutors fail to provide defense attorneys with crucial information or resist the implications of scientific evidence gained after trial that could lead to the reversal of a convi

February 2000, Illinois Governor George Ryan announced a statewide moratorium on the death penalty until he could declare with moral certainty that everyone sentenced to death in his state was truly guilty. Since the death penalty was reintroduced in 1977, more Illinois death row inmates had been exonerated and released (13) than executed (twelve). Among the 5 set free in 2001 was Charles Fain, who had spent 18 years on death row in Idaho before DNA evidence proved that he was not guilty of kidnapping, rape and murder. Sandra Day O’Connor, a Supreme Court Justice, admitted in July, the statistics imply that “the system may well be allowing some innocent defendants to be executed.” Not long after the Illinois decision, one-third of the other state legislatures, with the death penalty, began to consider moratoriums of their own. All of which has led to suggestions that we are witnessing the beginning of the death penalty’s own death.

conviction. There are convictions resulting from biased or incompetent forensic science. In the area of defense attorneys, they are under funded, overworked, or lazy. Such attorneys miss facts, do not investigate thoroughly, and often are hampered by limited resources. Last week the 100th death-row inmate found to be wrongfully convicted since capital punishment was restored in 1977 was freed from an Arizona prison. Most wrongfully accused are exonerated, as a result of emerging DNA technology, there was biological evidence that could be used to prove a wrongful conviction. But, what about the tens of thousands of cases where biological evidence is not a factor? The same system was active in investigating, prosecuting, and convicting them too.

We can easily reject rehabilitation as a justification for the death penalty. Death does not rehabilitate the person upon it is imposed on; it simply takes