I’m envisioning a case where someone is convicted of murder, but no body is recovered. Such as a wife disappears under mysterious and suspicious circumstances, shortly after the husband publicly threatened to kill her, then went out on his boat with a 55 gallon drum and several bags of concrete, then returned without them. He’s convicted of murder, and 6 months later, the wife comes back to the USA after living in a monastery in Tibet. She finds out that the letter she mailed her husband that she was leaving him got lost in the mail, and immediately goes to the police to report her continuing existence. Clearly she’s not dead, so the husband could not possibly have murdered her. What would have to happen in the legal system to void his conviction and release him from prison?
According to Justice Scalia, being innocent doesn’t mean you didn’t get a fair trial.
Being innocent isn’t a ground for appeal.
However, I think the prosecutor would agree to vacate this guy’s sentence, and if he was reluctant, the press would love this story.
Putting questions of legal procedure aside for a moment, what happens practically when a currently incarcerated person is adjudicated innocent and ordered released? Does he get escorted to the prison gates immediately and kicked out onto the street and left to find his own way home? Are there transition programs? Iirc most people who leave prison leave it on parole or probation and are given some measure of support. For the guy ruled innocent, is that it, goodbye, hope you have a good life?
What happens if the guy is in solitary confinement or is subject to some other type of disciplinary sanction when the order comes down vacating his conviction and/or ordering his release? Does he have to serve the rest of the five days “in the hole” for violating prison policies on keeping food in his cell or does that go away immediately?
Depends on the jurisdiction. Typically the order is alongs the lines of “to be released forthwith, if not already needed in another case”. Usually some sort of process is needed. If a person is found not guilty at trial, then the process may be at the Court or maybe ay the prison. If the release is ordered by a higher court, then the process might be more complicated depending on the type of Court and relief granted.
Scalia’s comments were in a dissent.
How does a dissenting opinion establish the law?
In Herrera v. Collins, 506 U.S. 390 (1993), the Supreme Court said:
Typically, as happened in DNA cases, there is a petition (to the appeal court?) for a new trial based on newly discovered evidence. Meanwhile, the DA’s office and the entire state justice system tries as hard as it can to avoid having the DNA tested. For some reason, the justice system seems more concerned that they not prove an error occurred than that actual justice be done.
Of course if the evidence to the contrary is alive and kicking and giving interviews on national TV, I suspect the process would be somewhat faster. The governor can expedite the process by granting a temporary release clemency or even a pardon. (Although a pardon would short-circuit any appeal and verdict of innocent, I presume).
A lot of the people I read about who manage to get a new trial (typically on DN evidence) seem to have either family or some support group to help them when released. In the event they have nobody I would suspect there would be an offer to stay at some half-way house. Certainly the guy would be eligible for welfare. (“You just got out after 20 years in jail. Whaddya mean you can’t find a job?”) plus, depending on how the case was handled and how long they were in, they may be in line for a decent financial settlement.
To be fair, Scalia is saying that just because a person was wrongly convicted does not automatically mean he did not get a fair trial.(Although it’s a good indicator that may be the case, based on past cases in the news). The evidence may have been weighted against them or the jury may have believed a lying witness.
Any chance whatsoever we could keep the politics out of this? I’ll postulate that everyone, from the judge to the prosecutor to Scalia to Stephen Colbert to Rush Limbaugh agree that yes, the person who showed up is in fact the supposed murder victim, that even though the husband was convicted the fact that the victim is still among the living means that no crime was actually committed, and he should be released ASAP and his record should be cleared. Now what?
Being innocent isn’t grounds for appeal. That was the whole point of the original trial, to prove your claimed innocence. If you failed, well, shit happens.
Being able to likely prove your innocence, with significant and relevant evidence that was not present at the original trial, is grounds for appeal. If you did not have a crucial piece of evidence, maybe that is relevant and the case should b re-heard.
An appeal is not a matter of “they heard the evidence but concluded wrong, let me try again to convince you”. IANAL, real lawyers will likely weigh in, but generally appeal courts deal with errors in facts and procedure, not judgement.
the appeal court will not rehear a case because the judge or jury believed A over B and the defendant disagrees with that call. The appeal court might order a new trial, or set aside the verdict, if for example, the judge failed to allow legitimate evidence A was a habitual lying sonofabitch, so the jury did not get the whole story. Or DNA evidence or newly found video or a new corpse or live person proves that something presented at the original trial was very incorrect. IIRC, the appeal court determines whether such new evidence might have introduced reasonable doubt in the original trial.
A motion is filed to vacate the conviction and release the prisoner. It is signed by the judge, and sent to the jail and the guy is released.
In New York, we’ll front you for a bus or train ticket to any county in New York. We’ll then drive you to the bus or train station.
Any internal disciplinary sanctions automatically end when you’re released. Your release won’t be delayed because you owe time “in the box” (we don’t call it the hole).
Generally speaking, prisoners know ahead of time when they’re going to be released. We have a pre-release office that works with them in setting things up for their release. In most cases, you’re going to have somebody who will show up on your release date to pick you up and they’ll bring you in some street clothes.
But there have been some cases where I’ve seen a prisoner get released unexpectedly. Maybe he filed an appeal and the judge ruled in his favor. If that’s the case, a judge can sign the paperwork and we take off the cuffs and let the guy walk out of the courtroom if that’s what he wants to do. He’s a free man and he can figure out how he’s going to get his next meal and where he’s going to sleep that night on his own if he wants to.
But in most cases, the guy will think for a minute and realize he’s not immediately ready to hit the streets even though he’s free to do so. So we’ll bring him back to the prison and he can pick up the stuff in his cell and make better arrangements for getting home. Ironically, we usually will confine him in solitary confinement at this point because right before you get out is a dangerous period in a prisoner’s life.
In my jurisdiction the first step is to file a Application for Writ of Habeas Corpus in the trial court, an extraordinary writ separate from a direct appeal. If the trial court holds an evidentiary hearing and decides that the applicant is actually innocent, the court makes a recommendation to the Court of Criminal Appeals that the applicant’s conviction be vacated and that the case be remanded to trial court for a new trial. If the Court of Criminal Appeals agrees, the conviction is vacated and sent back for a new trial. If the DA agrees that the applicant is obviously innocent (and by this point it should be apparent that there is no case), the charges are dismissed.
There is also a federal habeas corpus system once the person has exhausted his state remedies, but if the person is clearly innocent in the state courts it shouldn’t have to get that far.
There was a Florida case a few years ago in which a guy was on death row and DNA evidence showed he was not guilty. The Florida Attorney General fought tooth and nail against releasing him. He claimed that once someone is convicted and sentenced to death, it was his job to see the execution carried out and he would do so even if presented with absolute proof of innocence. Just carrying out orders. I think he was released.
This is what I thought would happen in the case presented in the OP. I suppose some DNA evidence might be requested to actually prove the alleged victim was still alive, but after that I couldn’t see a judge hesitating in this unlikely circumstance. The problem cases I’ve heard of were all matters of proving innocence, not absolute proof that no crime was ever committed.
I am not a lawyer, but if we assume the individual received a full and fair trial and was convicted beyond a reasonable doubt, what is the argument that gets him released? Clearly the crime he was charged with wasn’t committed. But the individual was properly convicted nevertheless. The law doesn’t say an individual is put in jail for committing a crime-he/she ends up in jail on being convicted for a crime.
Hopefully, there is a mechanism for releasing people who are convicted but didn’t commit the crime. I hear about such releases on occasion. What is the legal argument being made. “interest of justice”? Fairness? Are there laws passed saying that a person proven to have not committed a crime should be released?
Could I ask why that is the case? Do the other prisoners just get jealous of the guy who is about to be free?
My google-fu is weak, but I recall an article in the New York Times within the last couple years dealing with the problem of prisoners being released after being found innocent. There is apparently not a lot the authorities do for them and it focused on someone who had been in that situation and now acted as a halfway house for others. If you could find it, I believe it describes the legal and procedural issues of releasing people after they are found to have been wrongfully imprisoned.
Do the guards still treat him like a prisoner, or do they treat him like someone that just needs a safe place to stay overnight?
In Ohio it would probably be a Motion for a new trial because of newly discovered evidence under Criminal Rule 33, or in the alternative, possibly a Post Conviction Relief petition.
That’s a good point. It sounds hard from a practical perspective, but it has to have happened.
Do guard stations have beds where someone could crash for a night? E.g. like an employee break room?
I would think it would be hard to simply put him back in general population and simply leave his cell unlocked, etc., or allow him unrestricted passage into and out of secured areas.
In PA in the past, it could take anywhere from a week to several months to touch all the bases and get sprung even in a case as drastic as “dead person reappears”. Usually the DA had to start the process; if he/she did it would speed things up and you could be out in a week. If not you would be looking at a month or more.
Less drastic cases (combinations of overwhelming evidence) could drag on for a year or more. You either have a judge vacate the conviction or order a retrial. Neither happens real quick.