"What did Pinchback think as he watched 21 DNA exonerees walk out of Dallas County courthouses as free men?
Did it make him angry that flawed eyewitness testimony was to blame in 20 of those cases, just like in his own?
Truth is, no one can imagine the thoughts a man has during the almost 27 years that he is locked up for a crime he didn’t commit.
But there are the two questions that can be answered, ones Texans must ask their lawmakers right now: How many more Johnny Pinchbacks, Cornelius Duprees and Charles Chatmans are there? And what are lawmakers going to do about it?"
EDITORIAL: THE DALLAS MORNING NEWS;
Photo: Johnny Pinchback hugs his mother, Lillian Bunton, after Pinchback's exoneration, while his wife, Sandra, waits for her turn.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
"One month before Ronald Reagan was re-elected president, in 1984, a jury in Dallas found Johnny Pinchback guilty of a double rape. They had the wrong man," the Dallas Morning News editorial published on May 13, 2011 under the heading, "Lawmakers must fix justice flaws now," begins.
"On Thursday, after DNA tests proved it wasn’t him, Pinchback was set free," the story continues.
"It’s hard to imagine what Pinchback thought about all those years. Before DNA science progressed in the 1990s, he may have spent most of his time wondering why two teenage girls mistakenly picked him out of a photo lineup. Who was the real rapist? What was that man doing with his freedom?
If he dared dream of a DNA exoneration, Pinchback probably was dismayed by the infamous Criner decision, written by Texas Court of Criminal Appeals Justice Sharon Keller in 1998. In it, she disregarded DNA evidence and emphasized that finality was what really mattered.
Did Pinchback get his hopes up in 2001 when the Legislature passed a law allowing some inmates to seek post-conviction DNA testing? If so, his optimism was misplaced, because in Dallas, San Antonio and Houston alone, more than 22,000 rape kits remain untested.
What did Pinchback think as he watched 21 DNA exonerees walk out of Dallas County courthouses as free men?
Did it make him angry that flawed eyewitness testimony was to blame in 20 of those cases, just like in his own?
Truth is, no one can imagine the thoughts a man has during the almost 27 years that he is locked up for a crime he didn’t commit.
But there are the two questions that can be answered, ones Texans must ask their lawmakers right now: How many more Johnny Pinchbacks, Cornelius Duprees and Charles Chatmans are there? And what are lawmakers going to do about it?
Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst and House Speaker Joe Straus need to intervene to move along four vital bills. First, they need to pass HB 215, which will require police departments to create written standards for collecting and using eyewitness evidence. Second, they need to pass SB 122 to expand access to post-conviction DNA testing. Third, they need to pass SB 1616, which would create uniform standards for collecting and preserving DNA evidence. (The reason Dallas County leads the nation is because it has done a better job of preserving this evidence than others.) And, finally, they need to pass SB 1636 to require the Texas Department of Public Safety to subject all rape kits to DNA testing.
These bills aren’t just good policy; they are penance. The state of Texas has destroyed lives. Mistaken prosecutors, confused witnesses and misled jurors have robbed mothers of their sons, children of their fathers, wives of their husbands.
As the clock runs down on a Legislature sometimes paralyzed by partisan bickering, these bipartisan reforms can unite lawmakers behind a single goal: We will not allow justice to be delayed any longer for the innocent."
The editorial can be found at:
http://www.dallasnews.com/opinion/editorials/20110513-editorial-lawmakers-must-fix-justice-flaws-now.ece
PUBLISHER'S NOTE: The Toronto Star, my previous employer for more than twenty incredible years, has put considerable effort into exposing the harm caused by Dr. Charles Smith and his protectors - and into pushing for reform of Ontario's forensic pediatric pathology system. The Star has a "topic" section which focuses on recent stories related to Dr. Charles Smith. It can be found at:
http://www.thestar.com/topic/charlessmith
For a breakdown of some of the cases, issues and controversies this Blog is currently following, please turn to:
http://www.blogger.com/post-edit.g?blogID=120008354894645705&postID=8369513443994476774
Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog; hlevy15@gmail.com;
