Demonstrators, including members of the anti-death penalty Abolitionist Action Committee (AAC) and faith leaders, protest on the steps of the U.S. Supreme Court, marking the 40th anniversary of the first execution since the death penalty was reinstated, on Tuesday, January 17, 2017.
The Innocence Project teaches that far too often innocent people are sentenced to death row. In some cases, a helpful “confession” by the prosecutor’s office admitting a defendant’s innocence can exonerate them before it’s too late. Prosecutors typically only do so, however, after the defense team directly confronts them with the “error.”
But what if the prosecutor’s office determines that a convicted defendant in jail may have been wrongly convicted but is actually guilty? What is their obligation then? Can they just sit on their hands and do nothing? Or, if only as a matter of legal ethics, must they try to repair the wrongful conviction by asking the courts to set it aside, even if they believe the defendant is guilty?
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