The 200^th Exoneration Underscores Critical Flaws in the U.S. Criminal Legal System; Other Innocent Prisoners Remain on Death Row

Since the U.S. Supreme Court’s land­mark rul­ing in Furman v. Georgia (1972), 200 death-sen­tenced men and women across 30 states have been exon­er­at­ed. Analysis from the Death Penalty Information Center reveals these indi­vid­u­als have col­lec­tive­ly spent 2,621 years in harsh prison con­di­tions for crimes they did not com­mit. On aver­age, death row exonerees spent 13 years under the sen­tence of death before their exon­er­a­tions, with some indi­vid­u­als spend­ing more than 40 years fight­ing to prove their inno­cence. 65% of exonerees are peo­ple of col­or, and of them 54% are Black, high­light­ing sys­temic racial dis­par­i­ties. Florida has the high­est num­ber of death row exon­er­a­tions of any state (30), fol­lowed by Illinois (22), and Texas (18).

The Death Penalty Information Center has col­lect­ed and doc­u­ment­ed the case details of these 200 exon­er­a­tions. Larry Roberts (pic­tured), the 200^th exoneree, was wrong­ful­ly con­vict­ed in 1983 for the mur­der of a fel­low pris­on­er and prison guard at the California Medical Center in Vacaville, California. The only wit­ness­es to these stab­bings were fel­low pris­on­ers who tes­ti­fied against Mr. Roberts; he was sen­tenced to death for both killings. After 41 years, the California Attorney General’s Office has now agreed with a U.S. dis­trict judge who grant­ed Mr. Roberts a new tri­al and has said it will not retry him.

Of the 200 exon­er­a­tions that the Death Penalty Information Center has doc­u­ment­ed, 141 cas­es (70.5%) have includ­ed offi­cial mis­con­duct by police, pros­e­cu­tors, or oth­er gov­ern­ment offi­cials, and 127 cas­es (65%) have includ­ed false accu­sa­tions or perjury.

There are many oth­er death-sen­tenced pris­on­ers who have not been exon­er­at­ed, despite strong evi­dence of their inno­cence. In Texas, Melissa Lucio was sen­tenced to death for the death of her two-year-old daugh­ter, despite per­sua­sive evi­dence that now indi­cates her daugh­ter suc­cumbed to injuries from an acci­den­tal fall, not abuse. Similarly, Robert Roberson, also on death row in Texas, was sen­tenced to death for the death of his daugh­ter based on the so-called ​“Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS),” and is now sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed on October 17, 2024, even though SBS has now been thor­ough­ly debunked by new sci­en­tif­ic and medical evidence. 

In Alabama, Toforest Johnson has been on death row since 1995 for mur­der despite hav­ing a cred­i­ble ali­bi and clear evi­dence of pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct involv­ing the state’s star wit­ness. In 2001, Marcellus Williams was con­vict­ed and sen­tenced to death for the mur­der of a local jour­nal­ist in Missouri. Mr. Williams has main­tained his inno­cence and DNA test­ing done in 2015 revealed a male DNA pro­file incon­sis­tent with that of Mr. Williams. He is sched­uled to be exe­cut­ed on September 24, 2024.

In Oklahoma, Richard Glossip was sen­tenced to death for his sup­posed role in a mur­der-for-hire plot. Mr. Glossip has also main­tained his inno­cence in this crime and has gar­nered wide­spread sup­port for a new tri­al from var­i­ous Oklahoma offi­cials, includ­ing Attorney General Gentner Drummond. The United States Supreme Court is set to hear Mr. Glossip’s appeal in fall 2024 to con­sid­er whether the state’s sup­pres­sion of pros­e­cu­tion wit­ness tes­ti­mo­ny vio­lat­ed his due process rights, whether the entire­ty of the evi­dence must be con­sid­ered in assess­ing claims of pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al mis­con­duct, and whether the vio­la­tions of due process war­rant revers­ing Mr. Glossip’s conviction.