PRINTMidwestern innocence
Staff
April 22, 2009 | 12:00 a.m. CST
The profiles in this issue of Vox about interesting, important individuals within the local criminal justice system carry a back story that isn’t obvious to the casual reader. All the bylines come from writers enrolled in an MU Journalism School class that educates them about the strengths and weaknesses of the criminal justice system in Boone County and across the nation.
The class, in turn, is linked to the Midwestern Innocence Project (themip.org), based in Kansas City. An “innocence project” exists to hear appeals from prison inmates who say they have been wrongfully convicted, that they had nothing to do with the crime but ended up incarcerated anyway. Those mistakes occur more often than is generally acknowledged. The rise of sophisticated DNA testing starting about 20 years ago has illuminated the wrongful conviction phenomenon so that nobody can deny its existence. Fortunately, wrongful convictions in mid-Missouri over the decades appear to be rare occurrences.
The Midwestern Innocence Project began at the law school on the UMKC campus. It expanded two years ago to include faculty, staff and students at the MU Law School and the MU Journalism School. On the UMSL campus, faculty, staff and students from the criminology program have participated. The budget of the innocence project is extremely limited, which means most of the inmates whose sagas seem worthy of investigation receive no help. Right now, MU students, faculty and staff are involved in about half of the 30 investigations under way.
Twitter
Facebook
