Roberto Miranda, a Cuban native who spent 14 years on Nevada’s death row before being cleared of all charges and freed, has set­tled a law­suit against Clark County, the pub­lic defend­er’s office, and two for­mer Las Vegas police detec­tives for $5 mil­lion. Miranda’s con­vic­tion and death sen­tence were thrown out in 1996 when a fed­er­al judge ruled that the defense attor­ney who rep­re­sent­ed him dur­ing his 1982 tri­al had com­mit­ted glar­ing errors. The judge ordered a new tri­al, but pros­e­cu­tors declined to pro­ceed with the case and Miranda was then freed from prison. He filed a civ­il com­plaint two years lat­er in 1998, argu­ing that his civ­il rights were vio­lat­ed when pub­lic defend­ers did vir­tu­al­ly noth­ing to defend their Spanish-speak­ing client after he per­formed poor­ly on a poly­graph exam­i­na­tion by an English speak­ing exam­in­er. He also claimed that police with­held excul­pa­to­ry evi­dence dur­ing his tri­al. At first, a fed­er­al judge threw out the suit, find­ing that Miranda could not sue the coun­ty or the pub­lic defend­ers office regard­ing his rep­re­sen­ta­tion. The Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit lat­er rein­stat­ed the case, and the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review the Ninth Circuit’s rul­ing, there­by open­ing the door for sim­i­lar suits around the coun­try. Miranda’s attor­ney, JoNell Thomas, stat­ed, ​“There’s no amount of mon­ey that will give him back those 14 years.” (Associated Press, June 29, 2004; see also Spence, Maoriarity & Shockey Press Release, June 29, 2004). See Innocence.

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