After reading a number of articles, and attending the “Picking Cotton” lecture. I have come to the conclusion that, without the breakthrough of DNA extraction technology. Many people would still be convicted of a crime they never committed. One of the biggest pushes for this change in the judicial system, was the Thompson Vs. Cotton case. Ronald Cotton was accused of raping twenty two year old college student, Jennifer Thompson. During a lecture at Ferris State University, Thompson recalled thinking over and over again that “once I [survive] and live, I will make sure that I know everything about you […] to help the police find you”. Little did she know, the man that she chose in both picture and physical lineup was an innocent man. …show more content…
In Eller’s book of Cultural Anthropology, he notes that Anthony Wallace says that Revitalization Movements “are conscious, deliberate, and organized efforts on the part of some member(s) of a society to create a new better, and more satisfying culture” (Eller). People were beginning to realize how out of date the judiciary system was, and were beginning to be skeptical on how accurate it really was.
It is a horrifying idea to think that so many people were accused and locked up in prison. They were average people who had families, friends, and jobs, and were taken away from them and they don’t even know why. Ronald Cotton was only twenty two, when he walked into the police station to clear his name of any misidentification he may have had. What he didn’t know was that was the last time he would have freedom.
Eleven years was taken from him because of a poor system that relied on the human brain’s capability to recall memory. If the human brain cannot instantly recall a memory the odds of having a correct recall drops dramatically. This is because the brain begins to piece faulty items into the memory. This makes it seem so real, that it had to be what the person thought they saw. Improvements are slowly beginning to make their way to the judiciary system. With these strides toward new developments and strategies, the police can help reduce any more incidents like the
I had a hard time picking my Mercy Moment, but after reading this article on Ronald Cotton and Jennifer Thompson, I knew this would be a good topic. Ronald was charged of an act he never committed. He served eleven years behind bars for no reason at all. One thing that made Cotton seem more suspicious was his previous relations with a white woman. He was in a relationship with a white woman for a couple of months so, to the police he seemed even more guilty. Ronald was then convicted to serve life in prison with fifty-five plus years. He then was convicted of another rape that also happened that night and was punished with two life sentences along with one-hundred and eighty plus years. It was not until eleven years served, 1995, that Cotton was founded not guilty after taking a DNA test that was just newly founded. Thompson grieved for picking Cotton, she felt horrible. She was happy to see him behind bars, the man she believed hurt her. But, after cops showed up to her door to tell her Cotton was not the one who raped her it was Poole, she immediately felt terrible. She then approached Cotton and told her how sorry she was and how terrible she felt. Cotton, with the heart he has, forgave her. They then went out to write a book together titled, Picking Cotton. In this book it talks about the trial, how Thompson felt after
This Organisation is a non-profit Legal organisation dedicated to exonerating wrongfully convicted people through DNA testing and reforming the criminal justice system to prevent future injustices. The Innocence Project was established in a landmark study by the United States Department of Justice and the United States Senate in conjunction with the Benjamin N.Cardozo School of Law, which found that incorrect identification by eyewitnesses was a
Clarence Harrison and David Ranta cases are similar due to the fact that it shows the main goal for our criminal justice system is to seek justice. Harrison was wrongly convicted of a crime due to a flawed eyewitness testimony and DNA blood test. His armed robbery conviction at the age of nineteen also played a major part in his case, because it allowed his face to be put into a lineup of suspects. The victim who was sexually assaulted picked out Harrison as the man who attacked and raped her at the Marta Bus station. Sophisticated DNA blood testing was not even available during the time of Harrison’s conviction. The blood test administrated could only rule that Clarence was one of the eighty-eight percent of the population who could have committed the sexual assault. Unfortunately, Harrison had no clear alibi, and eyewitness testimony the jurors found him guilty of rape where he served seventeen years before he was later exonerated.
Had the evidence which contained the DNA samples not been preserved, he would have never found his freedom. The development of PCR as a method of amplifying minute amounts of DNA and then comparing it to controlled samples had saved him from a life behind prison walls. The prosecutor had contended that they did nothing wrong in light that an innocent man had had been convicted twice of a crime he had not committed.
In her book “Picking Cotton,” Erin Torneo address problems that came across Jennifer Thompson and Ronald Cotton like Eyewitness Testimony, the power of Forgiveness, and Race play in Justice System using Ethos, Logos, and Pathos to express credibility, trust, logic reason, proof, and emotion. Torneo states how these circumstances can be a problem because it can create a change in people’s life whether they’re good or not. She argues that Eyewitness Testimony can be inaccurate which can cause wrongful conviction just by looking through how Jennifer make a rash decision when she identify the culprit when her memory was being contaminated, which then lead her to send an innocence man to prison. According Elizabeth Loftus, she gives a demonstration
Many famous people and non-famous people think that they have a growth mindset, because they are trying to go on a diet for an hour in a half or less; they think that they have accomplished an object that is enormous. But what they do not realize is what they are missing. How it can be cruel to not encourage oneself how to avoid the way that you can have a growth mindset over what they have brought out. To add on, not everyone has the push to begin their life as a smart person or looked at as smart, but what they do practice the most is being looked up to. Even though it should not be that way, having a growth mindset can be satisfying.
Darryl Hunt is an African American born in 1965 in North Carolina. In 1984, he was convicted wrongfully of rape and murder of Deborah Sykes, a young white woman working as a newspaper editor. This paper researches oh his wrongful conviction in North Carolina. Darryl Hunt served nineteen and a half years before DNA evidence exonerated him. The charges leveled against him were because of inconsistencies in the initial stages of the case. An all-white bench convicted the then nineteen-year-old Hunt, even though there was no physical evidence linking him to the crime. A hotel employee made false claims that he saw Hunt enter the hotel bathroom, and later emerge with bloodstained towels. Other witnesses also fixed Hunt to the case.
Miscarriages of justices occur due to many variables including faulty or wrong confessions, faulty identifications, wrongful DNA evidence, and the police’s overreach of power. On February 9, 1978, a student from the College of William and Mary, located in Williamsburg, Virginia was sexually assaulted at gunpoint. When the police arrived at the scene, she described her assailant as an African-American male about 5’6 in height and weighing around 145. Having gathered this information, the victim agreed to identify her assailant through photo arrays at the police station. Bennett Barbour was identified arrested and in the span of about two months was charged with rape on April 14, 1978. Despite having an alibi, not matching the victim’s description, and having brittle bone disease Barbour was declared guilty by a jury. Barbour’s case is representative of the many cases in which wrongful eyewitness testimony produces miscarriages of justice. Bennett Barbour served 5 years in prison and 29 years of parole until he was cleared of his charges due to DNA evidence when the Virginia Supreme Court cleared his charges.
DNA evidence is extremely helpful in criminal trials not only because it can determine the guilt of a suspect, but also because it can keep innocent people from going to jail. The suspect must leave a sample of their DNA at the crime scene in order for testing to occur, but DNA can be found in the form of many things such as semen, blood, hair, saliva, or skin scrapings. According to Newsweek, "thousands of people have been convicted by DNA's nearly miraculous ability to search out suspects across space and time… hundreds of innocent people have also been freed, often after years behind bars, sometimes just short of the death chamber" (Adler ). Though some may think it is a waste of time to go
DNA exonerations are very common. So much so that in the United States alone, there have been “317 post-conviction DNA exonerations” (2014). The very first DNA exoneration dated back to 1989. The Innocence Project examined these DNA exonerations and found that “8 of the 317 people exonerated through DNA served time on death row. Another 16 were charged with capital crimes but not sentenced to death” (2014). More so, the average time served was about 13.5 years, and the average age was 27 (2014). This means that before the age of
There have been many incidents where cases have needed a solid prosecution in order to convict the defendant in a murder or rape case. This is where DNA Testing comes in to help. By taking a DNA test, a person can be found guilty or not guilty. If a person claims they have been raped there can be a sperm sample taken from the suspect in order to prove that he is guilty or not. In addition, in a murder case there can be blood taken from the suspect so they can tell of his innocence. There are several ways to determine whether a person is guilty or not by this method. Many cases have begun to use this method saying that it is foolproof. People say this is the method of the future of crime
exonerate, or bring about a conviction. In Today’s society DNA evidence and technology is vital
Wallace defines a revitalization movement as a deliberate, organized, conscious effort by members of a society to construct a more satisfying culture. Revitalization is not a classic process of culture change. The classic processes include evolution, drift, diffusion, historical change, and acculturation, all of which produce changes in cultures as systems; but revitalization occurs as a result of deliberate intent by members of society. The classic movements that cause change are slow, but “revitalization movements are abrupt, and frequently within a few years the new plan is put into effect by the participants in the movement.” (wallace)
In the past decade, eyewitness testimonies have cast a shadow on what is wrong with the justice system in today’s society. Before we had the advanced technology, we have today, eyewitness testimonies were solid cold-hard facts when it came to proving the defendant was guilty. However, time has changed and eyewitness testimonies have proven to be the leading causes of wrongful convictions due to misidentification. The Thompson and Cotton case is a perfect example of how eyewitness testimonies can put an innocent man behind bars.
False confessions have been a leading factor in destroying the lives of many innocent people. Since the advances of technology, victims of false confessions have been exonerated from the charges previously placed on them while others are still fighting for innocence or died a criminal. One technological advance that has exonerated many individuals is DNA testing. According to Randy James, DNA testing was discovered in 1985 and was first used in court to convict Tommie Lee Andrews (Time, 2009). Today many Americans are convicted because of false confessions that have not yet been overturned with new evidence (Kassin, 2014). Although DNA testing has led to freedom for many innocent Americans, there are still many innocent people who are locked