How American "Justice" Fails Americans
I used to be naive and believe that if you were falsely accused of a crime and told the truth, everything would be okay, because our system is set up to reward the innocent and punish the guilty. The reality is that our American criminal justice system is set up to fail us. We have people within it who will do anything to win, even if it means breaking the very laws they swore to uphold. They will coerce a false confession, conduct no investigation, charge you with no probable cause, coach witnesses against you to lie and cry on cue, tamper with evidence to make you appear guilty, and then take you to trial and prosecute you for a crime they know you did not commit. All the court requires to send you to prison FOR LIFE is one person to accuse you and a State Attorney to prosecute you. The truth won't matter to anyone - not law enforcement, the prosecutor, the judge, the jury, or even your defense attorney - nor will they care that the accuser has a motive to lie, lacks credibility, there's no proof or corroboration to the story, and the testimony is so inconsistent and self-contradictory, it can't possibly be believed. In our case, all that mattered to The State was that the case was win-able. In fact, when our trial was over, the prosecutor was seen running out of the courtroom, waving the verdict forms and shouting, "I got my verdict! I got my verdict!" Shameful.
When you're found guilty of the crime, your first "appeal" is based solely on technical errors made at your trial (if there were any). The appellate court does not consider any evidence in your favor that was not used to defend you at your trial, or any new evidence that has come to light since your trial. On average, 99% of cases fail to see any relief from this first step in the appeal's process, which takes several years to complete. If you lose that first appeal, the system no longer allows you access to a public defender, so going forward, you must hire a private attorney to represent you, or handle your case your self (Pro Se), which is frowned upon by the court.
If you file a second "appeal," claiming your trial counsel was ineffective and failed to defend you by not calling witnesses to testify on your behalf, not presenting evidence that supports your innocence, not objecting to the prosecution witnesses' false testimony, etc., all the attorney has to tell the court is that the way in which you were defended was his/her "trial strategy," and the lawyer is off the hook. You've now spent several more years waiting for that post-conviction petition to be decided upon. If you lose, you can appeal to the Feds, but they rarely overturn cases - opting, instead, to uphold the lower court convictions - and you will wait several more years for their decision.
At this point in time, you've most likely been in prison for more than 10 years, you have no money to pay for an attorney to write and file the necessary Motion(s), and most of your family and friends have left you for dead. The "wait and see" mentality is horribly stressful, and the stalling appears to be designed to drain you of all financial, emotional and mental ability to fight for your freedom, which is exactly what happens, in most cases. The terrifying thought is that while innocent people languish in prison, the real criminals - those who committed the crime and those who made up false accusations in order to execute their own version of vigilante justice - are out here among us, free to commit more crimes!
THAT is the sad reality of how our "justice" system trap works. Once you're caught up in it, you have very little chance of getting free from it. If you're one of the fortunate who did not know all that, then THANK GOD EVERY DAY for sparing you from this nightmare, and please share this article with those who can help us make much needed changes, to ensure that innocent people do not continue to suffer, and the guilty do not continue to go free. Thank you and God bless!