By ReShonda Tate
In May, 1994, Dallas resident Richard Miles found himself heading to prison for murder. The 19-year-old had been walking home when police arrested him, saying he fit the description of a man who had shot two men at a petrol station in Dallas earlier.
After one witness identified him and despite the fact that several other witnesses could not identify Miles from photos, Miles was charged with murder and attempted murder. Despite evidence he believes proved his innocence, Miles was found guilty and sentenced to 60 years behind bars, robbing him of the remainder of his youth.
“I oftentimes say, ‘May 15, 1994 is the day that Richard Ray Miles, Jr. died.’ I became a number – 728716,” Miles later told CNN.
He was released in 2009 but said he couldn’t do much until Speaking Truth helped declare him innocent in 2012.
“I’ve enjoyed both releases and the obtaining of freedom and just after that, I think society should just understand what we go through,” Miles said.
Miles said anger was one of the emotional stages he and other people who are wrongfully incarcerated experience.
“You begin this cycle of systematic living, anger creeps in, you’re upset with the attorneys, you’re upset with the prosecutor… And obviously, resentment, to a point where you’re looking at your life, and you ask yourself, what is the value? What is the purpose?It takes a person a higher level of connectivity to understand what you’re physically going through isn’t the end.”
Wrongful Conviction Day
In honor of Wrongful Conviction Day, which was Oct. 2, people across the country paid homage to those who had their freedom snatched away and highlighted the work still needed to be done within the justice system.
Founded by the Innocence Network, a collective of organizations dedicated to offering pro-bono legal and investigative services for those seeking exoneration, Wrongful Conviction Day aims to rectify the root causes of these miscarriages of justice while also providing support to the exonerated as they reintegrate into society.
Since its inception in 1989, over 3,320 wrongful convictions have been unearthed nationwide, resulting in a staggering cumulative loss of 29,500 years for those unjustly incarcerated. Today, it remains impossible to ascertain the exact number of innocent individuals still languishing behind bars. However, experts estimate that between 2% and 5% of the nearly 2 million incarcerated in the US are victims of wrongful convictions, indicating that anywhere from 40,000 to 100,000 people are presently suffering this grave injustice.
Recent studies show a 70% increase in wrongful convictions in five years. Analysis of those cases showed race is a significant influence in wrongful convictions.
Race and Wrongful Convictions in the United States 2022 examined 3,200 innocent people exonerated in the U.S. from 1989. They concluded that Black Americans are seven times more likely than white Americans to be wrongfully convicted of severe crimes. This applies to all significant crimes except white-collar crime.
Drug offenses show the most significant racial differences. African Americans are 19 times more likely to be wrongfully convicted of drug crimes. Wrongfully convicted Black persons serve harsher sentences than innocent white people in all crime categories.
Organizers at The Innocence Network noted that this Wrongful Conviction Day is a rallying call to educate and disseminate knowledge about this pressing issue. The Innocence Network, a loose coalition of independent innocence organizations, has remained at the forefront of the battle, working tirelessly to combat wrongful convictions globally and advocate for systemic reform in the criminal legal system.
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