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A Sentence to Close to Death

By standdown

That's the title of an OpEd in today's Los Angeles Times by Arthur Hall, who spent 20 yeats in California prison before being exonerated and freed.  LINKBecause I was sentenced to life without parole, exoneration was my only chance for release. I repeatedly asked for DNA testing of the evidence in my case, but for years my request was denied by the courts. In 2003, a court looked again at the jailhouse informant and granted me a new trial. As a result, the DNA evidence was finally tested, proving my innocence. In 2004, I was finally free. I returned to Los Angeles a very different man. Living in prison without hope of parole is a horrible punishment that breaks a person down. I maintained my sanity, but I met inmates who would gladly have accepted execution rather than continue living in those conditions...continue to full post

Full post as published by StandDown Texas Project on March 27, 2008 (boomark / email).