Exonerees call for Texas innocence commission

Nine people exonerated after serving years in prison for crimes they didn’t commit met with students at Texas Wesleyan School of Law on Saturday to tell their stories and to call for the creation of a state innocence commission.

Six states

currently have such panels, which work to review and recommend criminal justice reforms aimed at eliminating wrongful convictions. Among the speakers on Saturday was Anthony Robinson, who spent 10 years in Texas prison before DNA testing proved his innocence.

Since Texas has one of the nation's largest prison systems and routinely puts inmates to death, Robinson said he doesn't understand why Texas doesn't have a similar agency.

A bill to establish a Texas Innocence Commission did not pass during the last legislative session. The proposed nine-member commission would have had the authority not only to review court documents, but also to call witnesses about what went wrong with the case.

"If Texas is to remain great, we need to step up and fight the good fight," Robinson said. "This is not a set of isolated incidents. There have been a lot of bitter tears shed."

Read the full story here

. (Fort Worth Star-Telegram, 09/09/07)

View a map of the

six states with innocence commissions

, and read more about the Innocence Project’s recommendations for the

creation of these panels nationwide

.

Read more about

Anthony Robinson’s case

.