Florida exonerees wait for compensation

Twenty-one states have laws compensating the wrongly convicted after their release. Few of these states, however, parallel the federal government’s standard of $50,000 per year of wrongful incarceration. A new bill pending in Florida would meet this monetary standard and provide funds for state education.

Alan Crotzer

hopes this will be the year the Florida Legislature passes a bill to compensate people like him: He was wrongfully imprisoned for 24 years for a brutal armed robbery and rape in Tampa. DNA testing eventually cleared him.

Crotzer walked empty-handed from prison on Jan. 23, 2006. He wasn't offered rent vouchers or job referrals, like the guilty inmates who complete their sentences.

Neither was he eligible for prerelease transition services — training on how to reenter society, job counseling and psychological assistance that inmates are given in the months before their release.

Read the full story here

. (Miami Herald, 02/26/07)

Of the six Florida men exonerated by DNA evidence since 2001, only

Wilton Dedge

has been compensated. He received a settlement after the state legislature passed a private bill to compensate him. Compensation bills have been introduced twice before in the Florida legislature but both died in committee.

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Exoneree Compensation