Texas DNA exonerees find prosperity after prison

[dkf]

By JEFF CARLTON, Associated Press Writer Jeff Carlton, Associated Press Writer – 1 hr 10 mins ago

DALLAS – Thomas McGowan's journey from prison to prosperity is about to culminate in $1.8 million, and he knows just how to spend it: on a house with three bedrooms, stainless steel kitchen appliances and a washer and dryer.

"I'll let my girlfriend pick out the rest," said McGowan, who was exonerated last year based on DNA evidence after spending nearly 23 years in prison for rape and robbery.

He and other exonerees in Texas, which leads the nation in freeing the wrongly convicted, soon will become instant millionaires under a new state law that took effect this week.

Exonerees will get $80,000 for each year they spent behind bars. The compensation also includes lifetime annuity payments that for most of the wrongly convicted are worth between $40,000 and $50,000 a year — making it by far the nation's most generous package.

"I'm nervous and excited," said McGowan, 50. "It's something I never had, this amount of money. I didn't have any money — period."

His payday for his imprisonment — a time he described as "a nightmare," "hell" and "slavery" — should come by mid-November after the state's 45-day processing period.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090904/ap_on_re_us/us_exoneree_millionaires

[TexasObserver]

1. It's not enough, but it's something.

[EOTE]

2. Damn straight.

And the overzealous prosecutors who went after these people need to start paying out of their own pockets, too. Until the people responsible for these travesties of justice start being held accountable, this isn't going to change.

[oligarhy]

3. Wait, this is Texas? Are you sure it isn't from the Onion?

I know it is not.

Good for them.

This should be a Federal law.

[Lone_Star_Dem]

4. "No amount of money can replace the time we've lost."

Too true.

Considering Texas leads in exonerated, wrongfully convicted people, it's only fitting Texas now have the best compensation program in the nation. It's just a shame it isn't coming directly out of the pockets of the people who put these innocent men behind bars.

[HamdenRice]

5. And the state should seek reimbursement from corrupt DAs and cops

The purpose of these payments is to provide a disincentive to wrongly convict people.

But if the actors who wrongly convict people don't pay a price then the cost is entirely externalized to the taxpayer.

[EOTE]

8. Exactly.

This may provide a bit of compensation to people whose lives were ruined because of overzealous prosecutors and other people who have no respect for the law, but it does nothing to prevent it from happening again in the future. That needs to change.

[Peace Patriot]

6. That's the best thing I've heard about Texas in a long, lo-o-o-ong time!

It even beats "The Lone Star Iconoclast"--the tiny Crawford newspaper that damn near saved Texas' reputation after Texas gave us the blivet as pResident. And I'm talking hard to forgive.

But this...wow!

I'm impressed. I really am. How does this locked-down state manage to have such a progressive law?

Texas has the most general compensation package for exonerees in the country, according to this article. As well as cash payouts of $2 million for 25 year stints on false convictions for rape, "Exonerees also receive an array of social services, including job training, tuition credits and access to medical and dental treatment. Though 27 other states have some form of compensation law for the wrongly convicted, none comes close to offering the social services and money Texas provides."

It appears to be the work of state legislators and a Lubbock, Texas, attorney named Kevin Glasheen (who represented some of the defendants). The motive of the legislators was probably to get the exonerees to drop their federal civil rights lawsuits, which I'm guessing might have resulted in much bigger awards for the exonerees, at the discretion of federal judges and juries, if they were litigated in small groups or as individuals. If so, this was a smart move by the Texas legislature--looking at it purely from a state budget viewpoint--but it is also a GOOD law, the best in the country.

I'm also impressed with the fact that the exonerees hold regular meetings--to help deal with the obvious problems that 25 years in prison followed by freedom and prosperity might cause--and are helping out a less fortunate exoneree who fell by the wayside, and others who don't come under the new law.

Kudos and laurel wreaths to the state of Texas!!!*

:applause: :bounce: :applause:

And thank you, Texas, for "The Lone Star Iconoclast"! (And for Molly Ivins!)

---------------------------

*(The New York-based Innocence Project also had a hand in this.)

[UTUSN]

7. Oh. I thought it meant relatives of "EXXON" or "ENRON" inmates!1 Nevermind!1 n/t