This news story about a man who spent 22 years in prison for crimes he didn’t commit inspired the thread.
What if you were sent to prison for two decades for a crime you didn’t commit. Assume this was an honest mistake on the part of everyone’s part, and you weren’t framed. Then, someone finds some new evidence, and you’re freed.
Obviously, no one can give you back your time, but what would it take for you to be satisfied that enough had been done to make things as right as possible? Money? How much? Apologies from the witnesses/prosecutor/police? Anything else?
Apologies by the responsible parties, and as much money as I would have made if I’d been out of prison all that time, plus a bonus of, say, 10%-20%. And yes, I know the money would have to be an estimate.
As an aside, if it wasn’t just an honest mistake, then nothing less than the money above plus the imprisonment of the responsible parties for as long as I was imprisoned. No parole, no time off for good behavior, no cushy “Club Fed” prison.
This is my neck of the woods and I’ve been hearing a lot about it. The lawyers are saying that without malicious intent by the prosecution or the witnesses it will be hard-to-impossible for him to sue and get any money.
There is talk about getting the state legislature to write a one time bill of a “sorry dude, here’s a million bucks” into the next budget.
Yep. My area too. I really hope they can work something out for him. I honestly don’t know what it would take for me to be okay with something like this happening to me. Terrible situation.
I can’t imagine any amount of money would be an acceptable replacement for two lost decades.
But what is Anthony Capozzi actually owed? In my opinion, nothing. I’m not saying this as anything against the man himself - I have nothing but sympathy for somebody who has underwent such a horrible tragedy. But just because something terrible happens to you doesn’t mean you are entitled to some kind of payback. Nobody did anything wrong to put Capozzi in prison* - unless you’re arguing that the justice system itself was wrong to have convicted an innocent man even though all the evidence in existence at the time showed he was guilty. And if you make that argument, how can you jusitfy putting anyone in prison?
*I’m basing this on what I’ve heard about the case. I haven’t read any allegations of any improper legal practices. If it turns out somebody did knowingly lie or sweep some evidence under the rug to convict Capozzi, I think that person should be sent to prison themselves.
I’m not fully up-to-date on this, but some states (not NY apparently) provide financial compensation to people who were wrongfully imprisoned. This makes sense to me, less in a “we screwed up, here’s some money, now go enjoy what’s left of your life” fashion and more in a “we deprived you of some valuable income-generating years, here’s a little something to make up for it” fashion.
ETA: My point (I submitted too early) is that, IMO, there is some justification for providing financial compensation — an innocent guy was stuck in jail, and during that time he was unable to save up money, bulk up his 401K, buy a vacation home, etc. It makes sense that he should be compensated for that.
“What’s it gonna take? Money?”
“No…”
“Drugs? Women?”
“No, I just can’t.”
“Power?”
“Yeah…yeah, power.”
“Julio, you’re fired.”
“Okay, money sex and drugs.”
But as far as I can tell, Capozzi was not wrongfully imprisoned (except in the counter-intuitive sense that he was actually innocent). He was the subject of a reasonable arrest, given a proper trial, had an adequate defense, had all the evidence that was available at the time presented, was found guilty by a jury, was given a reasonable sentence, and had opportunities to appeal his case (at least I’m assuming all this is true until I hear otherwise). It’s a tragedy that this system failed in his individual case but that doesn’t mean the system is wrong.
To make a somewhat ridiculous analogy, it’s possible that an unknown alien base on the farside of the moon is secretly observing Earth and using their mind altering lasers to take control of people’s brains here in America and make them commit crimes as part of a sinister experiment. The people are physically committing the crimes, they even believe that they’re committing these crimes of their own volition, and obviously all of the evidence points to their guilt. But in the year 2030, we’re going to discover the alien base and realize that these people were actually innocent because they were being controlled by a technology we currently have no awareness of.
Could you absolutely 100% swear-on-your-children’s-lives say that what I just described isn’t true? So can we say that nobody should be convicted of any crime today because decades in the future we might make some discovery that will reveal their innocence? I don’t think anybody’s going to argue that’s a good idea. We have to work with the facts as we now know and understand them. If in the future we learn new things (moon bases or DNA evidence) we can reverse our decisions but that doesn’t mean our original decision was wrong at the time we made it.
Now if you’re saying that Capozzi should receive some kind of payment just because he was the victim of a great misfortune, in the same sense that a person whose leg was torn off by a bear or who was struck blind by a bolt of lightning, then I can maybe see your point and agree he should get something.
Given that I have a 7 month old daughter, there would be no amount of reparation you could make to me which would make being mistakenly incarcerated for the next 20 years aceptable.
I hope you can quit. The idea of extending your life by several years near the end of your life is too abstract; howzabout looking at the immediate advantages:[ul][li]better stamina[]no longer a second-class citizen[]no longer wondering if you stink[*]not shivering in the cold[/ul][/li]As for the OP, I’d be mad as hell, but would be relatively satisfied if the state would cut me a check for reasonable lost wages (say, manager of a Wal-Mart). However, I don’t think the state would actually owe me anything; it would be the universe that was at fault.
In any other context, if someone screwed up and cost you 22 years’ worth on income, you’d get paid.
If I cause a car accident - even if it’s an honest mistake - and you’re paralyzed and lose oodles of income, I or my insurance company is going to pay. If I accidentally burn your house down, you can sue me and it’s likely you’ll win, so I will pay. If my food company makes an honest mistake and poisons you, I will likely have to pay you for it.
Why’s this any different? The state screwed up. Even if it was an honest mistake, they cost the man 22 years of freedom. They should pay an appropriate civil penalty.
RickJay pretty much nailed where I’m coming from, but a few things:
Wrongfully doesn’t mean that the judge had to collude to get you into jail, or that your lawyer was getting paid under the table. It means you were imprisoned when you should not have been. Thus wrongfully.
I’m genuinely interested in why you find the following counter-intuitive: He was innocent. He was put in prison. It’s irrelevant whether all the proper procedures were followed because they were inadequate. Thus, he was wronged. It doesn’t mean we throw the entire legal system out the door, it simply means that we recognize that, in this case, the legal system operating the best it could, wrongfully found an innocent man guilty, and he was harmed by that.
That’s exactly what’s happening here. New facts cleared Capozzi. Sure, the legal system did the best it could at the time, and came to the conclusion beyond a reasonable doubt that Capozzi did it. But now the new facts show that he was innocent. Like it or not, the legal system screwed up - not Capozzi - but if we don’t give him anything, then he’s paying for the legal system’s screw up.
And I disagree with you a little bit - when we learn new things, such as in this case, it does mean that our original decision was wrong. In this case the decision was that Capozzi was guilty - wrong. Sure, it was the best decision based on the information available at the time, but that doesn’t change the fact that it was the wrong decision.
Well, I don’t happen to think that we have to give anything to victims of dumb circumstance. For example, if someone gets hit by a lightning bolt, well that sucks, but nobody has any control over that. With the legal system there is control, there are procedures to keep the innocent from being imprisoned, and when those procedures fail, the wrongly imprisoned person should be compensated for their injury.
I think… that the man who-for some godforsaken reason-thinks… it’s perfectly fine to write a newspaper article-like this… should go to prison… for “22 years…” What-the fuck-is wrong with him? … - -
So – he was innocent, he maintained that he was innocent, and would not tell a lie to get parole. That seems fundamentally unjust to me, and at least he should be compensated for the time he spent in prison because he refused to lie and say he was guilty.
