Wrongly convicted man freed after 18 years

[LeftHander]

Stanley - Under a bright sun just before 9 Thursday morning, Steven Avery took his final steps toward freedom with his sister on one arm and his daughter on the other, his parents and his history-making legal team trailing behind.

Surrounded by the media, Steve Avery arrives at the home of his parents Thursday. Avery told the media he hopes to take one day at a time, and to one day re-establish contact with his children.

There was a pause as the group approached the final set of locked doors at the prison. More than 17 years behind bars for a wrongly convicted man were about to end.

"I'm out!" the soft-spoken Avery cried. "Feels wonderful."


http://www.jsonline.com/news/state/sep03/169169.asp

I saw the story on the morning news and to see his face as he walked out with his family was wuite moving. The look of sheer joy on his face was amazing.

On Edit: I found a pic to brighten your day

[prolesunited]

1. Good thing he didn't face the death penalty

for his "crime." Ooops, we goofed. :shrug:

[Kemet]

2. exactly my thought. nt

[jmm]

15. My thoughts too.

Every now and then a headline like this will appear but I find it hard to believe that we eventually catch every single mistake.

[Sinistrous]

3. Thank you for the picture.

It is good the prison phase of this man's ordeal is over. I hope he receives all the assistance he needs to rebuild his life.

One wonders how many other victims of police, prosecutorial, and judicial misconduct are still unjustly behind bars. How many more will have their lives stolen by the bush/ashcroft brownshirts with their new "Patriot" Act powers?

[arwalden]

4. They Should Pay Him... BIG TIME!!!

Even though this wasn't a death penalty case... it PROVES BEYOND A DOUBT THAT MISTAKES ARE MADE!!!

How many death penalty mistakes have been made? How many have been discovered and covered up after the fact?

[Drifter]

21. Exactly ...

This man should never have to work a single day in his life (and live a relatively good life). 17 years was stolen from him. He should be able to do nothing but attempt to regain those years.

Cheers
Drifter

[maxanne]

5. those jurors

sound pretty callous. I'd be horrified to find I'd sent the wrong guy to prison - and they just shrug it off.

Glad they aren't sitting in judgement on me.

[salin]

8. One feels bad... that he was released (even though he is innocent)

the other feels bad... that the dna showed he didn't do it (what - you wished he had done it?) Absolutely NO feeling bad for a man who spent 17 years in jail, for a crime he did not commit. My guess is that they don't want to be bothered feeling guilty. That is how callous we have become as a society. Instead of trying to sort through how it happened (gee, was a 2 hour deliberation enough? Especially when there were so many witnesses that countered the story?), and feeling some regret, and then trying to sort through dealing with the guilt and coming to acceptance, they seem to wish he had been guilty.

Even if they do not feel bad for this man, aren't they even concerned that in a hasty conviction that the real rapist was out there... likely to strike again?

How disturbing. The below snip is from the linked article:
Shirley Wegforth said, "I don't know if (releasing him) was the right thing to do. I don't remember a lot. It was so long ago. But no, I don't have a guilty feeling about putting him away."

Another juror, Violet Hansen, said: "We found him guilty off of everything that we heard. It took us about two hours, and I think we all agreed at that time. I thought from the beginning that he was guilty. I feel kind of sad (that the DNA evidence found he was innocent)."

[TahitiNut]

9. Just look at the Milgram Experiments ...

... to understand such jury 'sentiment'. After all, the authority of the judge and prosecutors is a handy cover. :shrug:

[gratuitous]

11. Well, I don't hold the jurors too liable

I presume they rendered their verdict on the evidence presented, and most jurors of my acquaintance take their task very seriously. It's not surprising that all these years later, called cold, they don't remember all the particulars of the case. I do agree, however, that the reaction that the one juror is sad that Avery was proven innocent is unfortunate. Although the comment could also be read to mean that she was sad for Avery that he was imprisoned even though he was innocent all along. The other juror's sentiment that even though he's been proven to be innocent, she's not sure whether releasing Avery is the right thing to do. Things that make you say :wtf:

However, there's no sense in not feeling as charitable as possible now that the injustice is in the process of being redressed.

In the larger context, though, this should be one more object lesson for the court system in terms of trusting too much to the prosecutors to be fair and balanced when they're bringing a criminal case. Ashcroft's assertions that the Bill of Rights needs to be suspended when dealing with persons they claim are terrorists should be met with the highest level of skepticism any judge can muster, exactly because of cases like Steve Avery's.

[Art_from_Ark]

12. Where do they find these hayseed jurors?

So Violet thought from the beginning that the guy was guilty-- which means she wasn't really interested in the testimony of the 16 people who placed the defendant at another location.

I'm beginning to wonder whether the juryless Japanese system of three somber judges listening to emotionless arguments is a better way to go
:shrug:

On edit: Given the American propensity to appoint marginally -qualified judges to benches based on their (right-wing) ideology, maybe it would not be such a good idea after all

[Brucey]

6. Perhaps what we need

are professional juries, instead of picking people from voting ledgers then weeding out the smart ones.

[CounterCoulter]

7. Yeah, no potential for corruption there...

nm

[Brucey]

13. Of course, corruption is always possible, even now

but one wouldn't play a baseball game with umpires selected from th public and then widdled down to mostly the uninformed and uneducated. Would you prefer to have a jury of hayseeds (like this man had), or professionals who could weigh evidence properly (and give reasonable doubt) if you were innocent?

[Guaranteed]

10. Hey, he's WHITE!

THERE'S a surprise!

[WhereIsMyFreedom]

14. Our system is sooo broken

My mother just finished her 3-month sentence for crossing the line at SOA Watch. She met a lot of people inside who shouldn't have been there. There is apparently a lot of abuse of the conspiracy charge. A grandmother was sentenced for conspiracy to deal drugs simply because her grandson sometimes used her telephone to conduct deals. I believe the claim was that the owner of the house always knows what's going on inside.

Other people were asked to do things by their boss and they did so not realizing that it was a crime (many times they were told that it was company policy). They ended up in prison for it and their boss either wasn't convicted or merely received a slap on the wrist.

There was another couple in prison that were trying to overturn their conviction. Their trial was a blantant case of their lawyers and the prosecuting lawyers deciding outside of the courtroom that they were guilty then steering the jury to that conviction (lots of evidence that they were innocent wasn't presented by their own lawyers).

[prolesunited]

16. I would like to hear more about your mother

Three months time for an act of civil disobedience?!?!? :wtf:

Could you provide more details?

[WhereIsMyFreedom]

17. More details

Last November at the rally run by SOA Watch, http://www.soaw.org , 96 people "crossed the line" or trespassed onto the property of the School of the Americas. Trespassing is a petty misdemeaner, which carries a maximum penalty of 6 months in prison and a $5000 fine. Of course, most people who are convicted of trespassing end up with no jail term and a fairly small fine, <= $250.

Of these 96 participating in the civil disobedience, something like 15 of them received the maximum jail time, about another 30 of them received 3 months, a few received 2 months, and most of the rest of them received 1 year of probation. Most of them recieved between $500 and $1000 fine too. The majority of those who received jail time were 1st time offenders. For a fairly complete list of sentences, check here: http://www.soaw.org/new/pressrelease.php?id=55.

The arresting process was somewhat degrading and abusive too. Jack Neis, one of those arrested, does a nice job of describing that process here: http://www.harlemlive.org/community/activist/SOA/SOAprisoner.html. My mother caught pneumonia after spending the night in that cold dank jail cell.

And finally, you can visit my mother's website and read some about her thoughts and experiences (click on the updates section). http://www.sonjaandreas.com. Her experience in prison was relatively pleasant, but she ended up being one of the lucky ones. Even so, it is not surprising that prisons breed criminals. If you filled one up with innocent people, after a couple of years a great many of them would come out as criminals.

[joshcryer]

18. WHAT THE FUCK!

WHAT THE FUCK... :(

[prolesunited]

19. Your mother is a very courageous person

Please give her a hug from me when you see her. Although I am not a religious person, I truly respect and admire people like her who follow the true path of Christ's teachings. Thank you for sharing this fascinating story. I hope I will have the same strength your mother has shown if my convictions are tested in such a manner.

BTW, welcome to DU. :hi: It obviously runs in the family. It would be wonderful if your mother could join us as well if she already hasn't.

[WhereIsMyFreedom]

20. Thanks, I will. :-)

And I'll let her know what you said. Knowing that others really support what she does makes the sacrifice so much easier. In fact, you could tell her yourself at [e-mail]. She loves to hear from other people, though it might take awhile for her to respond as she's still behind in her email from being in prison.

And thanks for the welcome. I've told her about this board many times and I frequently let her know what I read here, but she isn't one for spending much time online.

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

22. Thankfully it was a misdemeanor and not a felony

So your mom and the rest can still VOTE.