Released without an apology

"It’s like a bad story on the twilight zone," David Pope tells a PBS reporter about his wrongful conviction. "The man wakes up in jail and he keeps waking up there and he can’t believe it’s really happening."

A recent episode of Life & Times, on Los Angeles PBS affiliate KCET, covered wrongful convictions and the lack of compensation for many exonerees nationwide.

In a guest blog on the show’s website, Innocence Project Co-Directors Barry Scheck and Peter Neufeld write that compensation should come packaged with reforms:

Even in their first days of freedom, the euphoria that many exonerated people feel is tempered by a personal understanding of the larger problem and an unwavering resolve to help fix a broken system. They don’t want anyone else to be robbed of life and liberty as they were.

Watch the episode and read the full blog post here

. (KCET)

Read more about

David Pope’s case

and the case of

Herman Atkins

, who was also featured on the episode.

Read more about proposed

exoneree compensation reforms

.