Scanning the blogs at lunch, I came across Jeff Coopers link to Jeanne dArcs post about the Manhattan wilding arrests, and the news that a recent confession and DNA testing are set to exonerate the youths convicted back in 1989.
Jeffs reaction is cautionary:
The large quantity of cases reversed by DNA evidence over the past several years ought to give us pause as the government seeks broad new investigative and prosecutorial powers as part of the war on terror. Much as I admire prosecutors (full disclosure: my wife was a deputy prosecutor in Indianapolis for five years), there is a tendencynot invariable, but nevertheless realon the part of police and prosecutors to sink their teeth into particular suspects and hold on regardless of contrary evidence. Why should we be confident that prosecutorial abuses would be less of a problem in secret or military courts with secret evidence than they are in the public trials that produced verdicts that we now know were erroneous?
While Jeannes is more Im looking for a word self-satisfied:
A lot of people say that September 11 changed everything, which is nonsense, of course, but it changed a lot of things, among them Americans’ willingness to set aside the Constitution and launch wars that no one can explain. Some stories change the way we view the world, and the story of the Central Park jogger was one of those. It emboldened people who were already filled with hate, and made those of us who weren’t a little more defensive. I, for one, grew more embarrassed by people like Al Sharpton, who seemed to cry racism at every turn. (It should be noted now — for whatever it’s worth — that one of the few people to stand up for the Central Park “rapists” was Al Sharpton). I became less likely to wonder if racism lay behind an arrest. I assumed the boys were guilty. And I became more likely to assume that if a nagging suspicion that something was wrong tugged at me, I was simply guilty of having an embarrassing “bleeding heart.”
The revised story wasn’t widely covered. It won’t have an emotional impact on as many people as the original story had. It probably won’t change anything big.
But it will make me trust my bleeding heart again. And nobody’s going to make me feel embarrassed or defensive about it.
My reaction is actually surprisingly different. Im thrilled. And excited. And proud. I feel bad for the youths wrongly convicted (although my bad feelings are somewhat offset by the admitted fact that they had been wilding
randomly assaulting innocent people in the park
). Im bothered by the fact that poor kids of color get worse legal representation than rich white guys like Skakel.
But none of this changes the fact that Im proud because we live in a society where we are willing to face up to and admit our mistakes. To correct them where possible. No politically connected prosecutor was able to bury the confession or prevent the DNA testing that ultimately appears to have exonerated them. Im thrilled that we have been able to take the fruits of our technology and apply them, fairly and objectively to support the interests of people who would normally be beneath consideration. Im excited because I believe that these tools
the technology and the open legal system
that are the product of this society will be used in the future to prevent bad things from happening
like convicting the wrong people of horrible crimes.
Im interested in why our three reactions are so disparate, and it cuts to one of my significant core issues, the alienation of many of us from our society and the overt disgust with all the instruments of government. In other words, the collapse of legitimacy.
Im interested in why it is, when we correct the injustices of the past, and devise tools to ensure that it will be difficult to make the same mistakes again, we are dwelling on the Oh, no, we were so bad rather than the were getting better. See, I think that real liberalism
the kind that builds schools and water systems and improves people’s lives
comes from a belief in progress.
We arent perfect. No one is or ever will be
to quote William Goldman, Life is pain, Highness! Anyone who says differently is selling something. But we can either keep trying to get there or sit on the floor dwelling on our shortcomings. Which one would you rather do, and why?
Date: 09/16/2002 00:00:00 AM
A.L.–I think you’re misinterpreting the facts of what just happened. No one has been freed because of these revelations–the five who were convicted served their sentences and got out, one is back in prison on unrelated matters (unless you think spending a long time in jail predisposes you to criminality). I don’t think their records have been wiped clean yet.My point? Mostly pettyi nitpicking, but even in this case, there’s a ways to go before we can say that the system has worked.
Date: 09/13/2002 00:00:00 AM
Uh, sure. I suppose those kids confessed just for kicks, too. Why not? Gotta help out your local police officer.
Date: 09/15/2002 00:00:00 AM
We agree with Jeff Cooper–there are too many restrictions to allow relief to all who need it. See our post today on this topic and the incredible need for the passage of the Innocence Protection Act pending in Congress.
Date: 09/16/2002 00:00:00 AM
Hi there. I’ve responded to your post, AL, but it’s long enough so I didn’t want to put it here – you can find it here on my blog.
Date: 09/12/2002 00:00:00 AM
No, sheesh, Henry, don’t you know? Most of the cops and prosecutors out there spend the bulk of their evenings knocking back tequila shots and picking innocent children-of-color off the streets, and then beating confessions out of them to crimes they have staged with no real victims.Or so I’m told…Non-smartass post will follow.A.L.
Date: 09/11/2002 00:00:00 AM
rc — All later said the confessions were coerced out of them by the police. If you think the NYPD doesn’t have ways of coercion that don’t leave marks, you haven’t been the guest of the NYPD lately (I have my own personal recollections of their hospitality from my juvenile days). A case of such magnitude and outcry in NYC at the time could certainly have triggered such coercive techniques in the quest for conviction.Another man has already confessed to the attack on the Central Park Jogger (of his own free will, as he was already in prison for life on a rape/murder and supposedly ‘found God’).A.L. — Sure, it’s nice to focus on the positive. Hey, let’s give ourselves a nice little pat on the back that our justice system stole ten years from a bunch of kids and NOW exonerates them! Wow, that’s great! How focusing on the injustice done in the first place somehow “paralyzes” us from taking action on anything else is just beyond me. I suppose focusing on the terrible effects of the 9/11 attacks is “paralyzing” our war effort in Afghanistan, too.
Date: 09/11/2002 00:00:00 AM
“We can either keep trying to get there or sit on the floor dwelling on our shortcomings.”Or – “If you never try – you never fail.”I’d rather we try and fail, than go “Well, we shouldn’t even try because it won’t be perfect!”J.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
Does anyone here have any evidence to offer that the prosecutors did anything but make a mistake? Crying “racism” doesn’t make it true. Was there really a conspiracy, or was this just a case of overzealousness and human frailty?We can’t hope to eliminate error. But no one has shown that this was anything BUT an error. Zizka: The USSR deliberatly lied to put people away for purely political reasons. Unless someone can provide some proof that this happened, we should regret the error, try to prevent it in the future–but not take it as evidence of our society’s inherent, eternal evil nature.Also, there was a significant increase in crime in the late 80’s/early 90’s–do you suppose this may have had something to do with increased prison spending?What it comes down to is this: we cannot hope to make progress if we decide that not living in Utopia is the same as living in Hell. We aren’t perfect, we should try to get better, but we are doing damn well (better than anywhere else or any other time) and we should acknowledge that.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
Hold on a minute. Do the recent revelations really “exonerate” the five? If I recall correctly, the accused had 1) assaulted other people on the same night, and 2) confessed to the crime, on videotape, with a parent or adult relative present, after repeatedly being informed of, and waiving, their rights.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
The idea that “We shouldn’t be paralyzed with grief in self-loathing” is diametrically wrong. The self-congratulatory interpretation of A.L. is much more likely to lead to the paralysis of smugness.Who were the people who made the exoneration possible? They were probably people of the kind A.L is warning us against. Old liberals and radicals who get angry at things. (I don’t know where “grief and self-loathing” came from).If I thought things were getting better, I’d be more likely to agree. But we have the Patriot act, and a lot of legal changes between “the wilding” and now have made the system worse in many respects.Nobody here has proof of prosecutorial misconduct, but this story isn’t very old yet and it may well show up. Prosecution is an area where culpable (not honest) mistakes are frequent.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
Henry wrote:As others have noted, I don’t think finding out that we sentenced a bunch of young men to a decade or more in prison to be something to celebrate.See, I’m just puzzled, because my reaction was “Cool!! We were wrong and we freed them! They were saved!” My focus wasn’t on the inustice ten years ago, but the justice done today. This isn’t a challenge right now as much as just a lack of understanding of the difference in reaction….A.L.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
“and if we are going to be paralysed with grief and self-loathing at each one, I don’t thinkwe’ll get much done about cleaning them up. “I don’t think it’s a matter of getting paralysed. It’s a matter of getting the actual news of the mistakes and outright lies to the public.The assumptions of the public will always be that the police and prosecutors are always right unless they are pounded with these exonerations as hard as they were pounded with the falsehoods about “superpredators” coming to get them.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
But to what extent is our willingness to face up to and admit our mistakes connected with our distrust of government? Maybe the skepticism towards those in power is the reason that wrongs get corrected eventually.Just a thought…
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
As others have noted, I don’t think finding out that we sentenced a bunch of young men to a decade or more in prison to be something to celebrate.Dwelling on the mistake is also part of remedying it. One must find out why the process was perverted in this way before it can be changed. Refusing to do this is basically asking for another racially-based mob trial the next time a white woman is brutally assaulted in a public place.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
Oh, come on folks. Innocent people have been convicted of crimes as long as there has been a criminal justice system. Some have been convicted out of racism or economic injustice, some out of just plain bad luck. It is in inevitible artifact of any system of justice.The reality is that ours is, for the most part, better at filtering these artifacts than most and getting better still.There are doubtless thousands of innocent people sitting in California prisons today. That sucks. But there are thousands of things that suck in the world, and if we are going to be paralysed with grief and self-loathing at each one, I don’t thinkwe’ll get much done about cleaning them up.A.L.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
I would also add that the disparity in the coverage of the original trial and debate about “superpredator” youths, and that of the exoneration of the convicted is troubling.For me it offsets the pleasure I take in the state freeing the innocent. If we are to pride ourselves for doing “right thing” we ought to admit in no less strident terms that we have previously done the “wrong” thing. Is George Will going to go on about how wrong he and his ilk were? I doubt it very much.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
I agree that the willingness now to face up to some rather drastic errors in the past is a positive characteristic. As a lawyer and law professor, though, I can’t help but note the significant obstacles to habeas review that we’ve adopted, legislatively and judicially, in the last decade. These obstacles make it far less likely that individuals who were wrongfully convicted will be able to obtain meaningful judicial review.
Date: 09/10/2002 00:00:00 AM
“No politically connected prosecutor was able to bury the confession or prevent the DNA testing that ultimately appears to have exonerated them.”Not for want of trying though…That five innocent people are only exonerated after thirteen years is no reason for celebration.
Date: 09/09/2002 00:00:00 AM
Your point is valid in the sense that in the old Soviet Union or Maoist China this sort of exoneration (sp?) didn’t happen. But we’re finding too many frameups, and the hysteria which included this phony case led to an enormous rewriting of US law and publ;ic policy, so that now several states spend more on prisons than on schools.I also had a sort of sick feeling wondering how I would take it if I spent ten years in jail for something I didn’t do.”He may not have been guilty of precisely that crime, but he was a bad guy so I’m not too upset” — it’s a rather short slippery slope from that kind of thinking to the oldstyle Southern sheriff.