Members of innocence organizations and lawyers who represent wrongfully convicted persons in the US and East Asia gathered online on December 9, 2021 to share their challenges and achievements over the past year. It was the second year in a row that the U.S.-Asia Law Institute hosted an online wrongful convictions roundtable.
Originally published: Nishi Nippon Shimbun
Publication date: October 16, 2019
Author: Daisuke Kono
Original article location
Abstract: In 1979 the body of a brutally murdered man was discovered in Osaki City, Kagoshima Prefecture. Ayako Haraguchi was charged with the crime but has always maintained her innocence. Recently, Haraguchi’s lawyer called together a meeting of researchers and wrongfully convicted individuals to demand judicial reform.
In Haraguchi’s third request for retrial, a district court and high court initially reviewed the case. In June of this year (2019) the court made the unusual decision to reject the request without returning it to the high court. The defense team has decided to make a fourth claim and is preparing to submit new evidence. “If possible, I would like to be charged within the year or at the latest within the year” says the lawyer.
Meanwhile, at the gathering which included about 110 people, Professor Kana Sasakura from Konan University reported on the situation in the United States in which the false accusations were revealed through DNA testing. “Societies believeing that there is no such thing as wrongful convictions has changed a lot,” she said.
In 2016, Keiko Aoki who was imprisoned for over twenty years for burning six small girls in Osaka in 1995, had his case reopened and was declared innocent. “What happened to me was unfortunate, but I won after my first retrial. It only took twenty years. Compared to Ayako, I had it easier.” The Osaki incident overturned the decision to start three retrials, and criticism has been raised in the prosecutor's appeal, which has been a factor for the lengthy process.
Related coverage and information from Japan Innocence and Death Penalty Information Center.
Originally published: Library Access and Wrongful Conviction Rectification
Publication date: December 7, 2018
Author: Rongjie Lan
Abstract: China’s Public Library Law took effect on January 1, 2018. Not only to the general public, public libraries have a special role for inmates to educate themselves and even help them get exonerated. Some American exoneration cases indicated that prison libraries contributed to the success of innocent inmates regaining freedom. The author advocate for establishing libraries in prisons in China.
Original publication: Journal of Evidence Science
Publication Date: December 2018
Author: Jeff Kukucka, Saul M. Kassin, Patricia A. Zapf, Itiel Dror
Translator: Jinxi Wang
Article Abstract: Exposure to irrelevant contextual information prompts confirmation-biased judgments of forensic science evidence(Kassin, Dror, &Kukucka, 2013). Nevertheless, some forensic examiners appear to believe that blind testing is unnecessary. To assess forensic examiners’ beliefs about the scope and nature of cognitive bias, we surveyed 403 experienced examiners from 21 countries. Overall, examiners regarded their judgments as nearly infallible and showed only a limited understanding and appreciation of cognitive bias. Most examiners believed they are immune to bias or can reduce bias through mere willpower, and fewer than half supported blind testing. Furthermore, many examiners showed a bias blind spot(Pronin, Lin, & Ross, 2002), acknowledging bias in other domains but not their own, and in other examiners but not themselves. These findings underscore the necessity of procedural reforms that blind forensic examiners to potentially biasing information, as is commonplace in other branches of science.
Author: Siyuan Wu
Published: May 23, 2017
Abstract: : Many states in the U.S. started to push for audio or video recording of interrogation after 2003. The main force for this reform is the innocence movement led by the Innocence Project. The article described how the Innocence Project found false confession is one of the leading contributors to wrongful convictions, and the DOJ’ measures on this in 2014. The article also put a great detail in New York State’s practice and regulation, as well as on how an interrogation room is laid out and operated in NYC.
Originally published: Journal of People’s Procuratorate
Publication date: 2015, Issue XI
Author: Barry Sheck
Translator: Zheng Li
Abstract: This article introduced the establishment and operation of the Innocence Project of New York and how DNA exonerations promoted the judicial reform in more effectively redressing wrongful convictions in the U.S. the author stressed that miscarriage of justice is inevitable and there is no silver bullet. However, the author suggested that strict evidentiary review and seeking for root causes in sentinel events are critical in preventing mistakes.
