The cumulative effect of Convicting the Innocent is stunning. Almost all of the 250 DNA exonerations occurred in murder or rape cases. Murder and rape amounts to less than 1% of all felony convictions. The errors typically flowed not from malicious motives but from the normal cognitive biases that lead detectives and prosecutors to be convinced that they have the right person. The result must be thousands of erroneous guilty pleas and trial convictions each year.
A new documentary series uses individual cases of false convictions to reveal a terrifyingly unreliable criminal justice system.
The cumulative effect of Convicting the Innocent is stunning. Almost all of the 250 DNA exonerations occurred in murder or rape cases. Murder and rape amounts to less than 1% of all felony convictions. The errors typically flowed not from malicious motives but from the normal cognitive biases that lead detectives and prosecutors to be convinced that they have the right person. The result must be thousands of erroneous guilty pleas and trial convictions each year.
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