Making amends for jailing the innocent

New York's system is a role model, some observers say, because a judge evaluates each claim and is not bound by any limits. "They allow individuals to prove their loss just the way any claimant in a personal-injury case would," says Adele Bernhard, an associate professor at Pace University School of Law in White Plains, N.Y., who tracks compensation options in all 50 states.

"The issue is whether you are going to make an attempt to make the person whole," Bowman says. "If you're going to try to do that, you have to look at these issues - the lost life, the pain and suffering, and the future impact of the incarceration on the person's life expectations."

It's easier, too, to qualify for compensation in New York, where all that's needed is for the charges to be dismissed because of innocence - rather than an official nod from the governor. That reduces the likelihood of politics coming into play, yet still screens cases to prevent a flood of claims, Ms. Bernhard says.

The potential for arbitrary decisions is even stronger in states with no such law. In Massachusetts, for instance, state Rep. Thomas Kennedy (D) says he pursued restitution on behalf of constituent Peter Vaughn partly because he is a friend of Mr. Vaughn's lawyer.

Representative Kennedy is sponsoring a bill to set up a commission that would study the compensation issue more broadly.

"Our system, although an excellent system, is far from perfect, and ... we're going to find people who were unjustly convicted and who deserve a redress from the government," he says.

No one argues that money is the answer to all the challenges a person may face after being released from prison. But advocates for compensation argue it has value on two levels.

Practically speaking, "what's necessary in many cases are things that money can buy - intensive psychotherapy, a degree of material comfort, the ability to support oneself for a period of time without holding a job," says Bowman.

Symbolically, it can be a recognition of the harm done, and should amount to more than covering just legal fees and lost salary, advocates say.

No group tracks the number of wrongly convicted people released from prison each year. Among inmates on death row, however, 82 people have been exonerated and released since 1973, according to the Death Penalty Information Center in Washington.

"Some years ago, people would say, 'Oh, that's just Georgia, or Mississippi," says Ann Lambert, legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union of Massachusetts.

Now, she says, Illinois has released as many people as it has executed. "When you hear about these situations ... you start thinking, shouldn't we do right by people who are wrongfully convicted?"

(c) Copyright 1999. The Christian Science Publishing Society

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