Profiteering Criminals

This is more of a hypothetical situation than anything else, but suppose this:

After being convicted of a crime, Prisoner Joe (who has protested his innocence all along) writes a book about the crime, his trial, and his life in prison thus far. Suppose this book shoots to a best seller. The courts, under a Son of Sam type law take his book profits and give them to the family of the victim. Flash forward 5 or 10 years and said family has been living high on the hog and have gone through most if not all of Prisoner Joe’s book profits. Suddenly there is new evidence and Prisoner Joe is exonerated. Now what happens to poor Ex-prisoner Joe? All of his money was taken from him and given to the victim’s family. Said family has blown most of it. What becomes of Joe? I mean, it doesn’t seem fair to allow him to sue the family because they didn’t really do anything wrong; in their eyes he was guilty and they had every right to that money. I don’t believe Joe can sue the judge that took his money because judges are protected against mistakes like this. Does Joe end up with bupkis?

IANAL, but bupkis is probably the answer. Joe was lawfully if incorrectly convicted. So with no laws broken there’s no grounds for him to sue on.

If he was convicted fairly, meaning there was no malice, everyone from the Judge, prosecuter, defense and jury, saw the evidence an resonably belived he was guilty, there is little he can do.

Most publishers shy away from publishing a book by a criminal anyway. The (now innocent) criminal would probaby have to sign a waiver to give the profit over to the victim in order to get the book published. And I’m sure a lawyer would be smart enough to stick a “If he ever is proven inncoent tough” clause in there

The original Son of Sam law was declared unconstitutional years ago. The replacement (in New York, home of the original law) gives victims an extended right to sue the person who benefits – but only if the amount is more than $10k. Thus, any payment is the result of a civil suit, not due to any legal requirements.

Thus, if proven not guilty, the person would have to take his case to civil court and sue to have the money returned. However, if the money’s not there, it’s unlikely to be worth the effort.