The light of this new evidence lead the court to believe in Cookes confession what helped in other case, also linked with Cooke. Darryl Beamish was wrongly convicted in 1962 of the 1959 axe murder of Jillian Brewer. He was sentenced to death and was later commuted to life in prison. Similar to Buttons case Beamish’s conviction was based on a police pressured false confession, one year later when Cooke confessed the murder of Rosemary he also confessed the murder of Jillian Brewers. Beamish appealed but, as mentioned, the judges had no trust in Cooke’s confession. Beamish was released in 1977 after 15 years of imprisonment, and in 2005, following Buttons exoneration, he appealed for the sixth time and was exonerated. Both Button and Beamish were victims of police officers who were looking to convict someone for the serious crime that had …show more content…
been committed. These injustices were the results by the police to examine in enough detail the circumstances of the two crime scenes and to keep an open mind about the alternative theories.
In both cases, police employed coercion and physical harassment to obtain confessions and these confessions persuaded the respective juries at the trials to convict, based on the arguments presented to the courts by the prosecutions. (Miscarriages of justice). Another example of this case is the case of Andrew Mallard. Andrew Mark Mallard was wrongfully convicted in 1995 of murdering jeweller Pamela Lawrence at her Mosman Park shop on May 23, 1994. He was sentenced to life imprisonment but in 2006 walked free after 12 years in jail, when his conviction was quashed by the High Court of Australia. (Mallard) In 2006, the police reviewed the handling of the investigation back in 1994 and conducted a cold case review of the original murder. These two reviews uncovered sufficiently compelling evidence to charge Simon Rochford, who had been previously convicted of killing his girlfriend Brigitta Dickens. The evidence also eliminated Mr Mallard as a
suspect. The evidence used in Mallard’s trial was obscure, and it was later revealed that police withheld vital information from his defence team. At the time of the murder, Andrew was being treated at Graylands Psychiatric Hospital for a bipolar disorder. It was here that the police first interviewed Andrew. Andrew was questioned at the police station for more than eight hours, this interview was not taped, but an officer took notes and asserted than Andrew had confessed. The Western Australian Commission on Crime and Corruption led an investigation in whether there was misconduct by any public officer associated with this case and had findings against two policemen and a senior prosecutor. In total, 14 adverse findings were recommended against Assistant Police Commissioner Mal Shervill and 11 against fellow Assistant Commissioner David Caporn. The inquiry into the case detailed that the pair had removed and changed facts in the statements of four witnesses, to rid the case of inconvenient material and to then convict Mr Mallard. Police Commissioner apologised to Mallard for any part the police had played in his conviction. It is not uncommon cases in which the court gives a verdict without the support of a proper analysis of the forensic evidence. Through history there is a list of cases of wrongful sentenced persons later exonerated due new or correct analysis of forensic evidence.
Among the many differing cases of wrongfully convicted Canadians, the case of Guy Paul Morin is very interesting. There were many issues that caused an innocent man from Queensville, Ontario to be convicted of the murder of Christine Jessop. We’re going to look at how the police failed to conduct a thorough investigation, how the court system failed, and how cases like this can be preventing in the future.
Convicted for the murders of his wife and two kids, thirty-four years ago, Dr. MacDonald still endures the agony of being accused of killing his family. Even after twenty-four years of imprisonment and several unlawful court hearings, additional documentation continues to up hold Dr. MacDonald’s testimony.
Decades later in 2001 the AIDWYC (Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted) became actively involved in the case and asked for it’s reopening. After the review of the case by retired Justice Fred Kaufman and his submission of a 700-page report, in 2004 then Justice Irwin Cotler found “that there was a reasonable basis to conclude that a miscarriage to justice likely occurred” (Timeline of the Truscott Case Truscott Timeline). Also, Irwin Cotler made the Ontario court of appeal listen to the Truscott case again as it was new, with fresh evidence. In 2006 the Court of Appeal listened to witnesses that claimed to see Truscott with Harper on his bicycle crossing a bridge towards Highway 8, years ago on the day of the murder in 1959.
There is also a lot of confusion of if Brendan Dassey is guilty or was just convinced to give a confession. He did file an appeal, but it was declined and they are still working on this case. His lawyers filed a federal habeas petition, but a judge has yet to rule on this and if things work out Dassey could end up getting out of jail.
The legal system is considered a place where justice is served and criminals are sent to prison. However, this is not always the case, as seen with Robert Baltovich, who suffered a serious miscarriage of justice. Baltovich was accused and unfairly convicted for a murder that he did not commit. The investigation into the murder of Elizabeth Bain was unfairly skewed to gain a conviction against Baltovich. The bias against Baltovich, in the murder investigation, and his subsequent trial was a disservice to him and to Canadian society.
...lice or lawyers used their integrity. The police skirted around the law and use evidence that the witnesses said was not correct. They had a description of the suspect that did not match Bloodsworth but, they went after him as well. They also used eyewitness testimony that could have been contaminated.
The evidence presented to myself and the other juror’s proves that Tyrone Washburn is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt of the murder of his wife, Elena Washburn. On March 12, 1979 Elena Washburn was strangled in the living room of her family’s home. Her body was then dragged to the garage, leaving a trail of blood from the living room to the place it was found. Her husband, Tyrone Washburn, found her in the family’s garage on March 13, 1979 at 1:45 A.M. When officer Dale Chambers arrived at the scene he found her lying face down in a pool of blood. The solid evidence in this case proves only one person, Tyrone Washburn, is guilty of murder.
Because police investigators are usually under pressure to arrest criminals and safeguard the community, they often make mistakes. Sometimes, detectives become convinced of a suspect 's guilt because of their criminal history or weak speculations. Once they are convinced, they are less likely to consider alternative possibilities. They overlook some important exculpatory evidence, make weak speculations and look only for links that connect a suspect to a crime, especially if the suspect has a previous criminal record. Picking Cotton provides an understanding of some common errors of the police investigation process. During Ronald Cottons interrogation, the detectives did not bother to record the conversation “But I noticed he wasn 't recording the conversation, so I felt that he could be writing anything down”(79) unlike they did for Jennifer. They had already labelled Ronald Cotton as the perpetrator and they told him during the interrogation “Cotton, Jennifer Thompson already identified you. We know it was you”(82). Jenifer Thompson 's testimony along with Ronald Cotton 's past criminal records gave the detectives more reason to believe Ronald committed the crime. Ronald Cotton stated “ This cop Sully, though, he had already decided I was guilty.”(84). Many investigative process have shortcomings and are breached because the officials in charge make
``In criminal law, confession evidence is a prosecutor’s most potent weapon’’ (Kassin, 1997)—“the ‘queen of proofs’ in the law” (Brooks, 2000). Regardless of when in the legal process they occur, statements of confession often provide the most incriminating form of evidence and have been shown to significantly increase the rate of conviction. Legal scholars even argue that a defendant’s confession may be the sole piece of evidence considered during a trial and often guides jurors’ perception of the case (McCormick, 1972). The admission of a false confession can be the deciding point between a suspect’s freedom and their death sentence. To this end, research and analysis of the false confessions-filled Norfolk Four case reveals the drastic and controversial measures that the prosecuting team will take to provoke a confession, be it true or false.
On June 9, 1959, 12-year-old Lynne Harper was raped and murder, her remains found two days later, near Clinton, Ontario. 8 In September 1959, Steven Truscott was convicted for all crimes committed against Harper. Truscott was only 14 at the time and was initially supposed to be a death row inmate, with the sentence later reduced to life in prison. This is important, because 48 years later in 2007, he was exonerated of all charges. This case shed light on the problems of the criminal justice system, as the conviction of Steven Truscott was a miscarriage of justice brought upon by police tunnel vision and suppression of evidence.
Even those who should have a clear sense of the an interrogation, fail to see the coercion brought upon the suspect that might lead to a false confession, and once a confession has been made, false or true, detectives or police terminates their investigation that could have found potential evidence to exonerate them. Once a confession is obtained, police tend to ‘‘close’’ cases as solved and refuse to investigate other sources of evidence (Leo and Liu) which is why such a high number of innocent people still remain behind bars. Across samples, police-induced false confessions were evident in between 15 and 25% in cases, making it one of the likely leading causes of wrongful conviction (Leo and Liu), but still juries disregard this evidence! Unfortunately, more cases like Rivers are out there. According to the Washington Post, the National Registry ha logged 1,733 exonerating cases of false confession. In one case, a man by the name of Ricky Jackson spent four decades for a crime he did not commit, only to be exonerated by DNA evidence after 40 years. To emphasize, few states, if any at all, courts provides information to the jury regarding how to assess voluntariness, nor do
The aspect of wrongful conviction is established within law to protect the innocent from being abused by the law. Nevertheless, the real issue of concern is the fact of whether wrongful conviction actually helps those who cannot help themselves. With that said, another important underlying factor is whether the criminal justice system has restrictions set up to help those from being innocently convicted and those who have been convicted and later was found to be innocent. By looking at the case of Guy Paul Morin, one will see how the police, courts, and criminal justice system failed in aiding the innocent and bringing justice in society, as well as showing that the system has failed in helping its people, and what must be done to aid those who have been wrongfully convicted.
“Beyond a Reasonable Doubt” clearly demonstrated the role of a prosecutor in the courtroom. Albeit in a negative manner, Hunter effectively bridged the functions of the police to the criminal justice process during the trial of Metcalfe (Neubauer & Fradella, 2014, p. 150). The murder trial of Metcalfe provided a frightening view of prosecutorial misconduct and unethical behavior of a prosecutor. Hunter betrayed the public he served by conspiring with Lieutenant Merchant to fabricate DNA evidence to ensure victory in the courtroom.
...ing him, and the expectation was that there would be a well-publicized trial rather than a brief in which Ray admitted his guilt and was sentenced.” (Clark 240)
They both consist of racism by either the jury or the police. From the novel Monster the jury was just looking at Steve Harmon and already assuming him guilty not even listening to the story that goes behind the crime. In the documentary “Murder on A Sunday Morning” the police men were taking Brenton Butler as a suspect for the crime because he was walking on the sidewalk when the crime happened. Both men were pleaded not guilty and then the actual killer came forward and confessed to the