REVIEW
- Socialist
Worker. November 15, 2002 | Page 09
Reviewed by Elizabeth Wrigley-Field
Exhibit
details cases of wrongful convictions
Innocent and left to rot
in prison
EXHIBIT: Innocent: Inside Wrongful Conviction Cases, an
exhibit at the John Jay College of Criminal Justice, 899 10th Ave.,
New York City, through November 30, 2001.
INNOCENT:
INSIDE Wrongful Conviction Cases is a free exhibit based
on research by Scott Christianson for a forthcoming book. Coming
on the heels of national attention on wrongful convictions that
sent innocent people to death row--and that pressured governors
in Illinois and Maryland to declare a moratorium on executions--the
exhibit focuses on showing that the problem is widespread in New
York, too.
Wrongful
convictions, says Christianson, are the product of "deep-seated
and sometimes pervasive problems" in the criminal justice
system. The exhibit’s strong point is its many case studies
that bring to life the nightmare of false convictions.
One example is Kelly Jarrett, a 48-year-old lesbian and the longest-serving
woman in the New York state prison system. Jarrett was convicted
of murder and sentenced to 25 years to life in 1975--after she
was given a lawyer with no murder trial experience.
The
main evidence against Jarrett was an "eyewitness" who--two
years after the fact--picked her out as being "possibly the
accomplice," based on a photo spread in which Jarrett’s
was the only picture with a "Sheriff’s Department" label.
Despite a 1982 affidavit from her codefendant that he had committed
the crime and that Jarrett was not involved, she remains behind
bars.
The
exhibit does a particularly good job of showing how police and
prosecutorial corruption can put people behind bars--and keep
them there even after the corruption comes to light. One of the
worst patterns of police corruption was uncovered by a study
of the New York Police Department in Harlem from 1986 to 1994.
According to the study, the exhibit says, "No fewer than one-sixth of
cops in the 30th Precinct routinely robbed drug dealers, fabricated
evidence, committed perjury and engaged in other crimes in the
course of their explicit duties…Even prosecutors said that
false police testimony had tainted the evidence in at least 2,000
criminal trials."
In the case of Fernando Bermudez, information that could have
cleared him was removed from a videotape of a police identification
before it was given to the defense lawyer--a clear violation of
the law. Although the doctoring of the tape has come to light,
Bermudez is still serving a sentence of 23 years to life.
The
exhibit’s biggest failing is that it doesn’t
explicitly take up race or class as the main factors in determining
who is convicted. But it does succeed in showing how New York’s
criminal justice system puts innocent people in prison and keeps
them there.
And
Christianson isn’t interested in merely describing
the problem. Since May 2001, when he selected 10 active cases to
include in the exhibit, three convictions have been overturned.
And Christianson says, "I won’t be satisfied until justice
is done in the other seven."
