Follow #DionHarrell on his Exoneration Day after 28 Years of Injustice
08.04.16 By Alicia Maule
Dion Harrell at post-exoneration press conference with his attorney Vanessa Potkin and family members.(Photo by Yili Liu)
On August 3, Dion Harrell finally ended a 28-year fight to prove his innocence of a 1988 rape in New Jersey. Although he was freed from prison in 1997 after serving four years for the 1992 conviction, it took two more decades to have his name removed as a sex offender for a crime he did not commit.
“While he walked out of prison in 1997, it is only today that he is finally free,” his attorney and Innocence Project Post Conviction Director Vanessa Potkin said in the Monmouth County Courthouse.
Take a look at highlights from the day of his exoneration.
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August 4, 2016 at 4:42 pm
Dion will never be free. open a feather pillow to the wind then try to gather up all the lost feathers. Once a derogatory statement is created it can never be completely cleaned up. Dion and others like him deserve a special affirmative program and an opportunity to change their names and hide their past. They also deserve a lifetime income because we all know they will never be given a fair chance in the workforce. Police use implications and secret accusations as punitive reprisal against anyone they do not like, this must stop. If no charges are ever filed the innocent victim never gets a chance to hear an accusation and defend their good name. However the rest of the world does hear and covertly denies the victim their just deserts.