The Innocence Project is expressing caution about the startling
findings of an Urban Institute study on the rate of wrongful convictions
in Virginia sexual assaults from 1973 to 1987.
"DNA testing eliminated between 8 and 15 percent of convicted
offenders and supported exoneration," while past studies put wrongful
conviction rates at 3 percent or less, said a news release about the
institute's findings released last month.
But Madeline deLone, executive director of the Innocence Project,
which helps exonerate wrongfully convicted people using DNA, sent a
letter to supporters and colleagues last week questioning the
institute's conclusions.
"While this study represents a valuable first step to explore the
prevalence of wrongful convictions in Virginia, the researchers did not
have sufficient information to make a definitive finding about the
number of innocent people who were wrongly convicted by the state during
the period studied," she wrote.
DeLone's letter "was really designed to address any audience that was
kind of concerned about those (Urban Institute) figures," said Paul
Cates, communications director for the Innocence Project.
The Urban Institute's study was based on the findings of Virginia's
massive DNA post-conviction study that is testing evidence discovered in
old forensic case files from the 15 years prior to the widespread use
of DNA in criminal investigations.
Thousands of tests in hundreds of cases have been conducted since
2005, thus far exonerating a half-dozen people. Most of the testing was
paid for by a $4.5 million grant from the U.S. Department of Justice's
National Institute of Justice.
The grant required the Virginia Department of Forensic Science to
share its largely confidential findings with the Urban Institute for its
study released last month. In a substantial number of cases, the
convicted person's DNA was not found or was excluded.
Last week, in response to Freedom of Information Act requests, the
Department of Forensic Science released the test results in more than 70
DNA exclusion cases.
A handful of those cases are under investigation by police and
prosecutors, and all of them will be studied by the Innocence Project
and affiliated projects in Washington and Virginia.
Just because a convicted person's DNA is not found in crime scene
evidence does not necessarily mean they are innocent — though consistent
with innocence, such results are often irrelevant to the question.
The Urban Institute said 33 such DNA exclusion cases supported innocence.
The Urban Institute conceded that because its study contract ran out,
it was unable to go to local courthouses where the crimes occurred to
better assess the relevance of the DNA test results.
DeLone wrote in her letter, "Although the authors of this report make
it clear that they did not have important case facts to make final
determinations of innocence, they did calculate potential rates of
wrongful convictions involving sexual assaults.
"Unfortunately, these suggested wrongful conviction rates have been
widely interpreted as definitive, or at least highly probable," she
wrote.
The Innocence Project believes it is premature to discuss potential
rates of wrongful conviction because evaluating the impact of
exclusionary results in post-conviction DNA testing is extremely
complex, she wrote.
"This is especially true in cases involving multiple perpetrators,
where it is not possible to conclude whether an exclusionary DNA result
is supportive of exoneration prior to a comprehensive review of all case
facts."
Reached by telephone Friday, John Roman, the lead researcher in the
Urban Institute study, said, "We're doing a different (kind) of research
than what they do — we're trying to answer a different question.
"They're trying to go case by case and figure out: Should this person
be exonerated? We're trying to figure out: What percentage of the time
did somebody get convicted who shouldn't have been convicted?" he said.
"Those are really quite different things," Roman said. "We want to
know if all the evidence available today, including DNA analysis, had
that been available at the time the case was tried, would that person
have been convicted."
While the DNA results might not be strong enough to exonerate someone
already convicted, it might have been strong enough to raise reasonable
doubt and prevent a conviction, he said.
In her letter, deLone noted that Virginia already has had 15 DNA exonerations, seven as a result of the post-conviction study.
"There will most likely be other exonerations to come, as investigations into these DNA exclusions continue," deLone wrote.
