News
December 19, 2007
Paper Calls for Alabama Governor to Allow DNA Testing on Tommy Douglas Arthur
TuscaloosaNews.com, Published Wednesday, December 19, 2007
Among the nations we consider our peers, only China continues with the death penalty. The other nations that routinely execute people include Iran, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan, Yemen, Vietnam, Jordan, Mongolia and Singapore.
Here in Alabama, we have had a pause in executions while courts and state officials wrangle over the procedure for administering death. Perhaps, during this pause, we might reconsider the reasons for resuming executions
......advancements in DNA testing have shown we sometimes convict the wrong people. Since 1989, 210 inmates have been exonerated by DNA tests, according to the Innocence Project, which has spearheaded efforts to broaden DNA testing. Two of these mistaken convictions have been discovered in Alabama.
"Thousands of cases have been closed and innocent suspects freed with guilty ones punished because of the power of a silent biological witness at the crime scene," the U.S. Justice Department says on its Website.
Certainly some people were wrongly put to death before DNA testing became available in the mid-1980s. In all likelihood, others on death row now would be exonerated if DNA testing could prove guilt or innocence in their cases.
The U.S. Supreme Court has refused to reconsider DNA testing for Tommy Douglas Arthur, who waits on death row in Alabama for a 1982 murder in Muscle Shoals. The court found that Arthur missed a deadline in filing his appeal. His execution is on hold while the court considers lethal injection challenges. Amazingly, this state doesn't require DNA testing for murder defendants, even though the tests may provide the most reliable way to determine guilt or innocence.
December 7, 2007
Bill Would Give Tax Break to Exonerated Prisoners
By FERNANDA SANTOS
Seven months after his release from prison in 2001, after serving 15 years for a rape he did not commit, David Pope received $385,000 in compensation from the State of Texas and set out to rebuild his life: He rented an apartment, bought a car, helped his mother pay bills and traveled overseas for the first time.
The money did not last long, but being broke is not the only problem Mr. Pope, 46, has grappled with since his exoneration. He said the Internal Revenue Service has notified him that he owes $90,000 in federal taxes on the compensation he received for his wrongful conviction, but he has no idea how he is going to settle the debt.
“I didn’t know I had to pay taxes over it until the government started sending me letters,” said Mr. Pope, who has struggled to find a steady job.
Yesterday, a bill that would exempt exonerated prisoners from paying federal income taxes on compensation received for a wrongful conviction was introduced by Senator Charles E. Schumer of New York. The measure pushes the issue of taxation to the forefront of the debate over how to compensate the wrongly convicted properly for the years they spent behind bars.
After 13 years in prison, Chad Heins is a free man
He always maintained that he didn't murder his sister-in-law in April 1994.
By Paul Pinkham, The Times-Union
Chad Heins grinned victoriously as he emerged from the Duval County jail Tuesday afternoon, hugged his lawyers one by one, then stepped outside as a free man for the first time in 13 years. "I made it. Finally. Forever, but finally," the 33-year-old said before facing a throng of TV cameras camped outside. Two hours earlier, prosecutors announced they were dropping first-degree murder and attempted rape charges against Heins in the brutal 1994 stabbing death of his sister-in-law in Mayport. State Attorney Harry Shorstein said the agreement hinged on Heins waiving his speedy trial rights, allowing prosecutors to re-open the case if new evidence comes to light. The decision essentially ends a 13-year legal battle that began when Heins was sentenced to life in prison for a crime he always insisted he didn't commit.
Chad Heins Talks About His New Freedom
By Jackelyn Barnard First Coast News
JACKSONVILLE, FL -- Brett Favre was the Green Bay Packers quarterback when Chad Heins went into prison. Thirteen years later, Favre is still the quarterback of Heins' favorite football team and Heins says it is the only thing he can relate to today. Heins says he has not seen a cell phone or the internet yet, that he basically grew up in prison and is nervous about his new beginning. Heins was released from prison after the State Attorney, Harry Shorstein, dropped the case based on new DNA evidence found in the 1994 murder of Heins' sister-in-law. The evidence found that there was another person in the home at the time of the murder and not just Heins. In Heins' first moments of freedom, he didn't know exactly what to say. "I can't explain how it feels now," were Heins' first words after his release.
Chad Heins Released from Prison-Freed by DNA Evidence
JACKSONVILLE, FL (AP) -- A 33-year-old man walked out of jail Tuesday after being cleared of murdering his sister-in-law 13 years ago, and prosecutors decided he should not be retried because his DNA did not match crime scene evidence. Chad Heins wore a Green Bay Packers shirt as he hugged his lawyers in the jail lobby after being freed. His conviction was tossed this year after a group that helps the wrongly convicted secured the DNA testing. "It (the system) didn't work in the beginning, but it worked at the end," said Heins, surrounded by reporters as he left the Duval County Jail. "I made it one day at a time and watched my back. I just want to go home to my family and get out of the state of Florida."
Work Of Innocence Project Key In Heins' Freedom
By Ryan Duffy First Coast News
JACKSONVILLE, FL -- In the courtroom Tuesday morning, the moment Chad Heins lawyers had been working toward for years. Judge L. Page Haddock told Heins the case was dropped and he was a free man. It was in 2001 when Heins contacted, from prison, a group of attorneys called the Innocence Project. Those attorneys pushed for new DNA testing that would eventually lead to his murder conviction being tossed out and Tuesday morning, his freedom. "An innocent man is going to be going home to his family in Wisconsin for Christmas, glad, glad to see this day," says Jennifer Greenberg with the Innocence Project. Greenberg and other Innocence Project members were in the courtroom Tuesday. The organizations new testing showed hair and fingernail evidence from the crime scene did not match Heins. The State Attorney's office conducted its own tests and dropped all charges.
How much for 13 years?
Palm Beach Post Editorial
Wednesday, December 05, 2007
Add another name to the list of those whom Florida owes compensation for wrongful incarceration. On Tuesday, after 13 years, Chad Heins became a free man again. Mr. Heins had been sentenced to life in prison for the 1994 murder of his sister-in-law, Tina Heins. She shared a Jacksonville apartment with Mr. Heins and his brother, Tina's husband, Jeremy, who was away on active duty in the Navy. Ms. Heins' body, stabbed 26 times, was found in her bedroom. Mr. Heins, who had been out drinking that night, claimed to have been asleep on the living room sofa. Jurors doubted his story enough to overlook the lack of physical evidence. In 2001, Mr. Heins contacted The Innocence Project, which dispatched its lawyers and had help from two private lawyers in Jacksonville who worked the case pro bono.
After 13 Years Locked Up, Chad Heins Starts Life Over
Heins Says He Holds No Grudge
NEWS4JAX.com POSTED: 11:22 am EST December 5, 2007
JACKSONVILLE, Fla. -- He was arrested at 19 on charges of rape and murder, convicted at 22 and sentenced to prison for life plus 15 years. Now 33, Chad Heins is a free man after new DNA evidence convinced a judge to overturn his conviction and the state attorney to drop the charges that he repeatedly stabbed his sister-in-law in a Mayport apartment they shared in 1994 while his brother was at sea in the Navy. Wednesday morning, as he prepared to board a plane and fly home to be reunited with his family in Wisconsin, Heins said he doesn't hold a grudge for his time behind bars -- he just wants to move on with his life. After spending nearly 14 years in various jails and prisons, the past 24 hours have been a blur for Heins. While his conviction was overturned a year ago, he didn't know until five minutes before a hearing Tuesday that he found out he would be set free. "They've been giving me the runaround for so long," Heins said. "I didn't know what would happen for sure." Heins always maintained his innocence and said he had the support of his family -- even his brother, the victim's husband. But he said he began to lose hope that he would ever be cleared when he contacted The Innocence Project, which took on his case in 2001.