Cameron Todd Willingham's unthinkable story has shocked the conscience of many Americans. The state of Texas executed Willingham in 2004 for supposedly murdering his three children by setting their house on fire. His conviction was based in substantial part on testimony by the state's arson experts about the cause of the fire. A recent report by a fire expert hired by Texas condemns the state's arson testimony as bogus and unscientific.
In other words, Willingham almost certainly was innocent as he desperately maintained until his last dying breath.
The expert's damning report has led to an onslaught of publicity about the case. However, this publicity should not mislead Americans into thinking Willingham has been the only innocent victim of our error-prone system of capital punishment. There have almost certainly been at least nine others, and possibly many more given the flaws in our criminal justice system revealed by the recent explosion in DNA exoneration. These include Carlos DeLuna, Ruben Cantu, Gary Graham, Larry Griffin and, perhaps, Sedley Alley names no doubt unfamiliar to most Americans.
The state of Texas executed DeLuna in 1989 for stabbing to death a clerk at a convenience store. At his trial, DeLuna's lawyers attempted to show that the murder was committed by a man named Carlos Hernandez. The lead prosecutor called Hernandez a phantom. Hernandez was real. A post-execution investigation by the Chicago Tribune showed that Hernandez almost certainly committed the crime, and Hernandez's family acknowledged that he boasted about getting away with the murder.
Cantu was executed by the state of Texas in 1993 for an attempted robbery-murder. His conviction was based on testimony from his co-defendant and a surviving victim of the attempted robbery. After Cantu's execution, both men recanted, and the victim disclosed that he had been coerced by police to identify Cantu. The prosecutor in Cantu's case, Sam Millsap, has since become a vocal campaigner against the death penalty.
In 2000, the state of Texas executed Graham, who changed his name while in prison to Shaka Sankofa. The evidence against him consisted of one eyewitness who, after being subjected to a suggestive photo lineup, said she saw Graham through her car windshield in a dark parking lot from 20 to 40 feet away. Other witnesses stated that Graham was not the murderer because the murderer was much shorter than he was.
Missouri executed Griffin in 1995 for a murder that occurred during a drive-by shooting. Prior to his trial, no one bothered to interview a surviving victim of the shooting who knew Griffin. When contacted after Griffin's execution, this victim stated categorically that Griffin was not involved in the crime. Also after Griffin was put to death, the first police officer on the scene gave a new account that thoroughly undermined the testimony of the one witness who had identified Griffin as the murderer.
Not everyone is convinced that these men were innocent. Some assert that they have not been shown to be innocent beyond a reasonable doubt. That may be true in some of the cases.
However, absent DNA evidence, which exists in only about 10 percent of murder cases, a death-row inmate often has a nearly impossible time proving beyond a reasonable doubt that they did not commit a crime. As the old saying goes, it can sometimes be impossible to prove a negative. That is one reason why our criminal justice system requires prosecutors to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt, and does not require criminal defendants to prove their innocence.
DNA evidence did exist in Alley's case but it didn't do him any good. The state of Tennessee executed Alley in 2006 for the rape and murder of a 19-year-old servicewoman. Alley had confessed to the crimes, but a leading expert on false confessions concluded that his confession was probably false. There was a simple way to find out. The Innocence Project, which took on Alley's case, asked the courts to allow it to test the DNA evidence to see whether Alley was innocent. The courts and the state of Tennessee refused. Alley was put to death, despite the serious doubts about his guilt.
Willingham's case would be frightening enough if it were unique. The fact that there may be several innocent people who have been executed is abhorrent and should give any capital punishment proponent serious pause.
The execution of an innocent person is an irrevocable event that, as Supreme Court Justice Harry Blackmun once wrote, comes perilously close to murder. No society should tolerate it. Of that, there can be no doubt.
Source: John Holdridge is director of the American Civil Liberties Union Capital Punishment Project; Christopher Hill is state strategies coordinator for the ACLU Capital Punishment Project---- Houston Chronicle, Sept. 19, 2009
