The Georgia Innocence Project welcomes the 2023 summer interns. Coming from different parts of the United States, the group of individuals unite to bring their unique backgrounds and skill sets to tackle the injustices within our criminal legal system. Together, they are united by a common passion for addressing wrongful convictions. Here are our wonderful …
Lee Clark embraces his uncle after being released from jail. As a fellow traveler in the mission to end wrongful incarceration, I want to take this opportunity to thank you. Thank you for sharing our commitment to this work! You are an integral part of our community–and it is thanks to you that we have …
For the past 25 years, Glen Clark celebrated Father’s Day by opening gifts from his son Lee– gifts sent from prison where Lee was incarcerated for a crime he did not commit. This year, however, is different. For the first time in over two decades, Glen and Lee will get to celebrate the day in …
This week, join us as we commemorate Juneteenth and celebrate Black Americans’ perseverance and history. What Does Juneteenth Commemorate? On January 1st, 1863, President Abraham Lincoln signed the Emancipation Proclamation, declaring that all enslaved individuals were now free; however, the news didn’t reach all of the states. It wasn’t until more than two years later, …
In this post, we will dig deeper into one of GIP’s long-time active cases and explain how a procedural error can keep someone behind bars despite evidence of innocence. For Sonny Bharadia, that evidence of innocence comes in the form of DNA from inside a pair of gloves. The DNA proves that Sonny Bharadia was …
We are regularly asked how many innocent people are in prison in the United States. It’s impossible to know the exact rate of wrongful convictions in our country. To make a sound estimate of a rate of wrongful conviction, one must identify all cases of actual innocence (the numerator) among the total population of similar …
At 7:19 pm on January 11, 2000, Rome-Floyd County 911 dispatched an ambulance to the scene of a single vehicle accident on Hwy 27, which runs between Rome and Cedartown, GA. The driver, 21 year old Isaac Dawkins, was rushed to the hospital. X-rays would later reveal that Isaac had been shot in the head; he died shortly thereafter.
“There is almost nothing more convincing than a live human being who takes the stand, points a finger at the defendant, and says, ‘That’s the one,’” wrote the late U.S. Supreme Court Justice William J. Brennan Jr. in a 1981 dissent. The identification of eyewitnesses plays an important role in the investigation and prosecution of …
Eyewitness Misidentification and Wrongful Convictions Read More »
It is with both deep sadness and many warm memories that we share the news of the passing of our friend and partner in advocating for the wrongfully convicted, Calvin C. Johnson Jr. He was 65 years old. As the first person in the state of Georgia to be freed by DNA evidence (with the …
On December 20th, the Supreme Court of Georgia unanimously affirmed Habeas relief for Joey Watkins. This favorable opinion comes after years of ongoing litigation, most recently including oral arguments in front of the Georgia Supreme Court on October 4th and a three-day evidentiary hearing in Walker County in February and March. At the evidentiary hearing, …
