Talk:List of wrongful convictions in the United States/Archive 1

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Archive 1

Richard LaFuente

@IDLMovie: Hey, are you planning to create a page for Richard LaFuente or Incident at Devil's Lake? The guidelines for List of wrongful convictions is that there has to be a wikipedia page for that person. I think we could even make the exception if there is a page about the film. :-) Bali88 (talk) 20:05, 8 July 2014 (UTC)

Sorting

Kelly2357, thanks for your help! I suspect there may be an easier and more aesthetically pleasing way to do the sorting. I know there is a way to make the names sort by last name first. Let me see if there is one that does the year in the same way before we switch the year to the front of all of them. Bali88 (talk) 23:08, 8 October 2014 (UTC)

Ethel Rosenberg

Would she be an entry? The trial was a farce, and most people say she knew about the spying but wasn't a spy. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.137.67.0 (talk) 16:48, 18 December 2014 (UTC)

Sorry, I missed this before. I have definitely heard that opinion before. Dershowitz feels pretty certain the government executed an innocent woman to put pressure on her husband to give up the goods, but I'm not sure if there is enough consensus. If we can find sufficient sources, we can include it. Bali88 (talk) 19:33, 25 April 2015 (UTC)

Anthony Porter

What to do about Anthony Porter who was exonerated, but was later found to actually be guilty. See: http://www.jsonline.com/news/milwaukee/duped-by-innocence-project-milwaukee-man-now-free-b99386015z1-281852841.html

When was he found to be actually guilty? There are more than two options for who the killer could have been. That whole section needs fixed anyway. It starts out talking about Porter and then switches midstream to Simon without one word about who Simon even is. I'll get to it later this week if no one else does. Primium mobile (talk) 18:09, 24 July 2015 (UTC)

Thomas Cornell, Jr.

The first person in the list is Thomas Cornell, Jr., who doesn't have a Wikipedia page, nor any information to indicate how it was determined that he was wrongly convicted. Surely if someone is in the list then we should be able to determine from it, or from a subsequent article, how it was determined that they were wrongly convicted? If that information isn't supplied then surely Thomas Cornell, Jr. should be removed from the list? FillsHerTease (talk) 23:54, 17 January 2016 (UTC)

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Carlos De Luna

Why is he on the list? It has never been officially established that he was wrongfully convicted.AjjeSmit (talk) 22:25, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

Cameron Todd Willingham

Again, why is someone who stands officially convicted on the list? Surely no one should be on this list unless their conviction is overturned or otherwise vacated. If we're allowed to offer our own personal opinion on who should be on the list, I'll be happy to add a number of people whose convictions stand, despite my personally knowing they are actually innocent and therefore in my opinion wrongfully convicted.AjjeSmit (talk) 22:38, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

West Memphis Three

Really? Their convictions not only stand legally, they admitted the evidence was sufficient to convict them. Including them on a list of "wrongful" convictions is advocacy, and nothing less. Is advocacy allowed on Wikipedia?AjjeSmit (talk) 22:43, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

Help is appreciated!

This is a looong list and it's going to take some time to write. That's why I'm putting it in article space prior to it having any meaningful information. I'm hoping some folks will help me build it. Only include people who have wikipedia articles and only people whose cases have been settled (they've been exonerated, cases overturned, or situations like the West Memphis Three where they got released via Alford pleas). Bali88 (talk) 02:20, 21 June 2014 (UTC)

Hey there Bali88, thanks for getting things going! Added Glenn Ford for you, just finished writing his Wikipedia page and thought I'd contribute here. Let me know if you think my description isn't concise enough, I'll try to shorten it. Birkwad (talk) 21:21, 30 April 2015 (UTC)

Thanks so much! I might read through the case later and add more info about the specifics of the case, but it looks great for now. Bali88 (talk) 22:25, 30 April 2015 (UTC)
I don't think people who admit, via an Alford Plea, admit they were rightfully convicted should be on a list of the wrongfully convicted.AjjeSmit (talk) 22:51, 16 March 2016 (UTC)
The opening paragraph says only those with a Wikipedia page should be included. But not everyone on the list has a Wikipedia page.AjjeSmit (talk) 22:53, 16 March 2016 (UTC)

Should only be used for people who's convictions were overturned.

Alot of cases on this page are parroting the defense lawyers for the case. If you only talk about one side of the issue then you are going to mislead people. Silent mocker (talk) 23:12, 24 August 2016 (UTC)

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Dassey

At what point should Brendan Dassey be added to this list? After all possible courses of appeals and retrials have been exhausted by the State of Wisconsin? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 131.252.46.187 (talk) 01:15, 23 June 2017 (UTC)

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1984: case of "Employees of Fells Acres Day Care"

This is a very important case judging from the details of the linked article. Yet not a single line of summary explanation on this page. Some info should be added like in other items quoted on the page. werldwayd (talk) 16:33, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

werldwayd, Go for it! Steve Lux, Jr. (talk) 18:10, 8 January 2018 (UTC)

sockpuppets of Robbby45

I have marked several users in the 2601:601: range as sockpuppets of Robbby45, trying to game the article for their own purposes.--Kintetsubuffalo (talk) 06:47, 31 March 2018 (UTC)

Julius Ruffin and Arthur Lee Whitfield

Do Julius Ruffin and Arthur Lee Whitfield deserve mention in this list? ~Kvng (talk) 18:22, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Certainly Ruffin belongs (assuming the facts in our article are correct). Whitfield is a tougher question. He was released, but the record was not cleared, so legally he was not exonerated. The sources in that article need some help, they are clear advocacy sources which might be imparting quite a bit of spin to the bare facts. ResultingConstant (talk) 19:44, 19 April 2018 (UTC)

Criteria for list

How can this list include "people who have not been formally exonerated but are widely considered to be factually innocent."?

This is not encyclopedic.

We can't have a list of "wrongful convictions" based on the (unsupported) assertion that ... tho the person was not exonerated .. they are "widely considered" to be innocent. That's nuts.

That criteria should be deleted. And the list should be only those people who have been exonerated. I believe. --2604:2000:E010:1100:D007:5F1:8AAD:529D (talk) 07:04, 11 May 2019 (UTC)

Good point. I think I understand what the author(s) of that criterion mean, but the general public will not understand it. Therefore the phrase, "... as well as people who have not been formally exonerated but are widely considered to be factually innocent" needs an explanatory note or we should remove it as a criterion.   - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I am a man. The traditional male pronouns are fine.) 03:36, 2 June 2019 (UTC)
I added a "clarification needed" cleanup tag to that part of the sentence.   - Mark D Worthen PsyD (talk) (I am a man. The traditional male pronouns are fine.) 03:44, 2 June 2019 (UTC)

CRIME DOES NOT PAY

You have to wonder how much of a role the crime prevention comics played in some of the earlier (the 60s-70s-80s) cases of injustice, including the one whose title is in the Subject area above. These comics focussed almost entirely on the arrest, conviction, and sometimes execution of criminals, even though in some cases they would not even be convicted of murder under Canadian law, due to the law against felony murder having been declared unconstitutional in the early 90s.Glammazon (talk) 15:47, 19 September 2020 (UTC)

@Glammazon: The is a list article. It's not about the topic of wrongful convictions in general, so your comment is irrelevant to the article. Additionally, talk pages are only for discussion of improvements to the article, not general conversation. See WP:FORUM, Sundayclose (talk) 15:55, 19 September 2020 (UTC)

Should Add Section on "Possible Cases of allegedly wrongful conviction"

This can be a section about people whom there continues to be a debate about until today, people who are held by many to have been wrongfully convicted.(NerdyGenius1 (talk) 04:59, 20 January 2022 (UTC))

Should Add Section on "Possible Cases of allegedly wrongful conviction"

This can be a section about people whom there continues to be a debate about until today, people who are held by many to have been wrongfully convicted.(NerdyGenius1 (talk) 04:59, 20 January 2022 (UTC))

Proposed merge of Overturned convictions in the United States into List of wrongful convictions in the United States

The following discussion is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section. A summary of the conclusions reached follows.
To not merge given the distinction between wrongful and overturned. Klbrain (talk) 08:11, 22 October 2022 (UTC)

Both are list articles. Both appear to have identical inclusion criteria. Is there a difference? Daask (talk) 13:51, 19 April 2021 (UTC)

I think there's a difference between an overturned conviction and a wrongful conviction, but I'm not sure either article makes the distinction. To me, an overturned conviction sounds like a conviction that was thrown out by judgment of a court; a wrongful conviction is a conviction where the defendant was later found not to be guilty; or maybe retried and found not-guilty (i.e., which does not imply factual innocence but at least that the government could not meet its burden for conviction).
For example, Ernesto Miranda was convicted of kidnapping. His conviction was thrown out because he had not been informed of his rights (what's now known as the Miranda warning, indirectly named for him) before he confessed to the police. He was retried, without using his confession, and found guilty again, and served five years in prison. Was his an overturned conviction? Yes. A wrongful conviction? I'd say no.
I'm not even sure that one is a subset of the other. Ignoring the "... in the United States" qualifier just for an easy example: a lot of people in the 1600s were found guilty of witchcraft. Their convictions were not (so far as I know) overturned; but they are considered wrongful.
That being said, I can't see that either of the lists has a clear set of definitive criteria for determining its contents; it might make sense to merge them, but only by setting out that criteria first. TJRC (talk) 03:57, 14 July 2021 (UTC)
  • Oppose. A conviction can be wrongful without it being overturned. For example, John W. Webster. deisenbe (talk) 15:49, 29 July 2021 (UTC)
  • Support I think both have overlapping stories about exonerations. Angelgreat (talk) 22:32, 5 October 2021 (UTC)
  • Oppose. One is sorted by state, and the other is sorted chronologically. I think it's useful to have both, in order to both compare states' records on this matter, and to see how it's evolved over time. – wbm1058 (talk) 18:49, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
I'm still not taking a position on whether to merge; but if merged (and even if not) this objection could possibly be addressed by using a table with sortable columns; although it would be a pretty damn big table, which might make this approach impracticable. TJRC (talk) 18:59, 12 January 2022 (UTC)
Wbm1058 is correct that different sorting is quite useful, and TJRC is correct that a multi-column WP:Sortable table is quite feasible (even if sorting takes a few seconds on slower computers). So, the usefulness of different sorting shouldn't be a reason to oppose merging. —173.68.139.31 (talk) 00:44, 23 April 2022 (UTC)
  • Strong Support. The two versions have enormous overlap, and editors shouldn't need to add & maintain so many entries twice in parallel. With stricter inclusion criteria, and case descriptions limited to one- or two-line summaries, and a single large wikitable that's sortable by Date, Surname, State, & Legal Status, we'd have a merged list that's more encyclopedic & more coherent than either version is now. —173.68.139.31 (talk) 00:44, 23 April 2022 (UTC)
  • Strong Oppose. Seconding that a conviction can be wrongful without it being overturned. Another more recent example is Brian Baldwin, whose case is named on the wrongful convictions list (appropriately), but is also appropriately omitted from the overturned convictions page since no legal action has been taken to reverse it. Also see Jesse Tafero and a case like Edward Earl Johnson, where two blatantly innocent executed people are both highly unlikely to ever have their convictions overturned (due to states having very little interest in taking action to address injustice in cases that conclude with judicial execution). There are several similar cases, death penalty and otherwise, for which there is no overlap. Afddiary (talk) 15:43, 24 July 2022 (UTC)
  • Strong oppose for all the reasons other editors have given. A "wrongful" conviction, to me, involves illegal and/or unconstitutional conduct by police and/or prosecutors in order to secure a conviction. It doesn't usually involve interpretations of law or new evidence that comes to light in the fullness of time. It's important that readers know that wrongful convictions occur. Matuko (talk) 05:02, 1 October 2022 (UTC)
The discussion above is closed. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made on the appropriate discussion page. No further edits should be made to this discussion.

Roger Lee Largent

Effectively a death sentence: Maryland inmate’s rape conviction overturned just days after being beaten, killed in his prison cell

Kenny Waters not here yet?

I would have thought someone that they made a movie about would be on this list.

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