Home -> Law Blog Directory -> Criminal Law Blogs -> StandDown Texas Project

Criminal Law

: StandDown Texas Project

Texas Supreme Court Clarifies Tim Cole Compensation Act

By Steve Hall

The Texas Supreme Court ruling in In RE: Billy James Smith is in Adobe .pdf format.  The Court ruled Friday. "Court orders state to pay exonerated inmates $2.7 million," is the title of the Austin American-Statesman coverage by Chuck Lindell. The Texas Supreme Court on Friday ordered the state to pay $2.7 million to three wrongly convicted Texans who spent, in total, 52 years in prison for crimes they did not commit. Wrongly convicted Texans may collect $80,000 for every year in prison, but Comptroller Susan Combs' office ruled that the three men were ineligible for full compensation because they had been on parole for prior crimes when they were imprisoned. But a unanimous Supreme Court said Combs' office was too restrictive in applying the law, enacted in 1965 and updated in 2009 to compensate exonerated convicts for the emotional, physical and economic toll of prison...continue to full post

Full post as published by StandDown Texas Project on March 07, 2011 (boomark / email).