A recent report from the Pennsylvania Advisory Committee on Wrongful Convictions called for seri­ous reforms in the state’s crim­i­nal jus­tice sys­tem. The com­mit­tee, which was instruct­ed to iden­ti­fy the most com­mon caus­es of wrong­ful con­vic­tions (some of which were cap­i­tal cas­es) and any cur­rent laws and pro­ce­dures impli­cat­ed in each type of cau­sa­tion, found that, ​“under [the cur­rent] insti­tu­tion­al struc­ture, defen­dants have been pun­ished for crimes they did not com­mit. Compounding these con­cerns, bio­log­i­cal evi­dence is avail­able in only a small num­ber of cas­es involv­ing vio­lent crimes. There is every rea­son to believe that mis­tak­en iden­ti­fi­ca­tions, false con­fes­sions, inad­e­quate legal rep­re­sen­ta­tion, and oth­er fac­tors under­ly­ing wrong­ful con­vic­tions occur with com­pa­ra­ble reg­u­lar­i­ty in crim­i­nal cas­es where DNA is absent.” The com­mit­tee deter­mined the most com­mon caus­es of wrong­ful con­vic­tions to be: ​“mis­tak­en eye­wit­ness iden­ti­fi­ca­tions; false con­fes­sions; per­ju­ri­ous infor­mant tes­ti­mo­ny; inac­cu­rate sci­en­tif­ic evi­dence; pros­e­cu­to­r­i­al and defense lawyer mis­con­duct; and inad­e­quate fund­ing for defense ser­vices,” and made sev­er­al pro­pos­als that are intend­ed to address each cause. The report con­cludes, ​“The sys­tem can­not rou­tine­ly accept the con­vic­tion of an inno­cent per­son with­out being chal­lenged to con­sid­er mea­sures to reduce the like­li­hood of error and grant redress to vic­tims of these errors… [Exonerations] rep­re­sent tragedy not only for the per­son whose life is irrepara­bly dam­aged by incar­cer­a­tion for a crime he did not com­mit, but also for the vic­tim since each wrong­ful con­vic­tion also rep­re­sents the fail­ure to con­vict the true per­pe­tra­tor.” Read full report.

(“Report of the Advisory Committee on Wrongful Convictions,” Joint State Government Commission, September 2011; post­ed Oct. 21, 2011). See Innocence and Studies.

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