From the Wrongful Convictions Blog: International Innocence Round-up

Govinda Prasad Mainali has already been granted a new trial in Japan, but

further evidence

of police misconduct continues to pile up. Now, one of Mainali’s roommates from 1997 (the year of his supposed crime) claims that Japanese police forced him to sign a statement that supported Mainali’s guilt.

Filipino academics and activists launched a

“Philippines Innocence Project”

last week, the first such project in the country. The first IP workshop was held on June 16 in the University of the Philippines DNA lab. 

Scottish prosecutors have begun a campaign to push its country’s Parliament to remove the requirement of “corroboration”—the requirement that “important evidence presented in a criminal prosecution is required to be supported by two independent sources.” Opponents

claim

that this could result in more wrongful convictions. 

Peter van Koppen, a Dutch legal scholar, is calling upon judges in the Netherlands to “be more critical” and consider the possibility of wrongful convictions in criminal cases. Van Koppen, the founder of Gerede Twijfel (meaning “reasonable doubt,” an organization that re-examines “dubious” convictions), says that recent high-profile Dutch exonerations reveal

the necessity

of the change.