The concept of justice is timeless, as is the corresponding concern about convicting an innocent person. Indeed, as Daniel Webster once proclaimed, “Justice, sir, is the greatest interest of man on earth.”

This book addresses a specific kind of injustice—wrongful conviction. The topic, in addition to being timeless, is also timely. As we write this, the case of John Demjanjuk, accused of being “Ivan the Terrible,” a Nazi death camp guard who helped in the mass murder of Jews, is being played out on the world's stage. Sharing that international stage within the recent past have been two cases on different continents. First is the wrongful conviction and imprisonment (for 16 years) of the “Birmingham Six,” alleged members of the Irish Republican Army, for the bombing of two British pubs. This case (which inspired the film In the Name of the Father) led to a high-level review of the entire British criminal justice system, which regularly receives scrutiny through a popular television series titled Rough Justice. Second is the tragic wrongful conviction of Lindy and [Page xxii]Michael Chamberlain, an Australian couple whose trial and wrongful conviction in the death of their infant daughter inspired the movie A Cry in the Dark. The Chamberlains were awarded $320,000 in compensation by the Australian government.

The wrongful conviction theme is also important in American popular culture, as reflected in the runaway hit movie attraction The Fugitive. In the movie, Harrison Ford plays the role of Dr. Richard Kimble, a physician who is wrongfully convicted of murdering his wife and who claims that a one-armed intruder was the actual murderer. The movie, and the popular former television series of the same name, is loosely based on the actual wrongful conviction of Dr. Sam Sheppard, an Ohio physician imprisoned for life in 1954 for the murder of his wife.

In the pages that follow, we shall attempt to define, describe, and analyze the problem of wrongful conviction and its implications for society. Not everyone will be pleased with our definition, because we do not include a number of cases in which it is clear that injustice occurred. By our restrictive definition of wrongful conviction, even the case of Jesus would not qualify, because Jesus' behavior, in the name of righteousness, did violate the laws of his day, unfair as they were. We focus here on cases in which the convicted persons did not commit the crimes alleged—in other words, they are behaviorally innocent of the crimes.

We present for the reader's consideration survey data concerning the possible magnitude of the problem and its causes; actual cases of wrongful conviction, as well as some in which doubt remains; detailed analyses of each of the major factors associated with wrongful conviction and how these factors interact; and, finally, a discussion of the public policy implications of our research, including some recommendations for reducing the occurrence of this problem, identifying and compensating those who are wrongfully convicted, and eliminating (or greatly curtailing) the possibility of executing innocent persons.

We will demonstrate that the American system of criminal justice is so large and has so many arrests each year that even if the system were 99.3% accurate, it would still generate more than 10,000 wrongful convictions a year for the eight serious index crimes alone (these eight crimes are murder and nonnegligent manslaughter, forcible rape, aggravated assault, robbery, burglary, larceny-theft, motor vehicle theft, and arson). It is likely that the error rate is even higher for less serious crimes, making it [Page xxiii]highly probable that wrongful conviction affects a great many Americans each year, even though the error rate may be relatively small.

Finally, throughout the volume we shall attempt to dispel a common, but fallacious, assumption about this topic: that wrongful conviction is an issue that should inherently interest “liberals” more than “conservatives” (who are presumed to be more interested in “law and order” and “public safety”). We attempt to refute this assumption by noting (and vividly illustrating, in many of our cases) that every time an innocent offender is wrongfully convicted, the actual offender typically remains free to continue victimizing the public. Thus, this book concerns a problem that affects not only an individual's right to due process and a fair trial, but also a serious public safety concern. The reader will learn about murders, rapes, and other serious crimes that were permitted to occur because the wrong person was arrested for a given crime.

Finally, we present a framework for understanding this problem within the overall context of the American criminal justice system. Drawing on Packer's (1968) contrasting “crime control” and “due process” models, we illustrate how this conceptual framework can be useful for increasing our understanding of the problem of wrongful conviction and for the formulation of public policy recommendations to reduce the frequency with which it occurs. Although no system of justice can be perfect, we believe that if efforts are focused on preventable errors, the U.S. system can substantially reduce the kinds of injustices discussed in the pages that follow. It would be well worth the effort, and it is our hope that this volume may contribute to that end.