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(回答先: ＤＮＡ鑑定で無罪判明、服役１９年後に自由の身に ［ＣＮＮ］【それでも恨み言を言わないという“美談仕立て”の記事】 投稿者 あっしら 日時 2005 年 8 月 03 日 02:01:47)
犯行を否定すると仮出所は出ないという話をThe Practiceでやっていたので興味を持った次第です。（最近弁解癖がついた）
下の記事を見ますと、前々から冤罪有望者だったようです。
http://www.innocenceproject.org/case/display_profile.php?id=163
Thomas Doswell
Year of Incident: 1986
Jurisdiction: Pennsylvania
Charge: Rape, Criminal Attempt, Simple Assault, Terroristic Threats, Unlawful Restraint
Conviction: Rape, Criminal Attempt, Simple Assault, Terroristic Threats, Unlawful Restraint
Sentence: 13-26 years
Year of Conviction: 1986
Year of Exoneration: 2005
Sentence Served: 19 years
Real perpetrator found? Not yet
Compensation? Not yet
On August 1, 2005, Thomas Doswell was released from prison after serving 19 years for a crime he did not commit. He was convicted in 1986 of rape, criminal attempt, simple assault, terroristic threats, and unlawful restraint. Postconviction DNA testing in 2005 conclusively proved that Doswell could not have been the man that committed this crime.
THE CRIME
In March 1986, a white woman, was attacked by an African American male as she entered the hospital where she worked in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The perpetrator followed her into the building and then the cafeteria. He locked the cafeteria doors behind him, threatened to kill the victim, and then forcibly raped her. A short while later, a co-worker began banging on the cafeteria doors in an effort to help the victim. The assailant fled the hospital and was chased for three blocks by another hospital employee.
The victim was taken to another hospital, where a rape kit was collected. Investigators also took the victim’s clothing as evidence. Though nothing was found on the clothing, the Allegheny County Crime Laboratory found evidence of spermatozoa on the vaginal swabs from the rape kit.
THE EVIDENCE AND THE TRIAL
On the day of the crime, the police showed the victim a photographic lineup. None of the photographs were marked except for Doswell’s. His photograph had the letter “R” written on it. At trial, a police officer explained that photographs marked with an “R” represented photographs of people who had been charged with rape.
After this identification, Doswell was arrested and charged. At trial, both the victim and the co-worker who had initially come to her aid made in-court identifications of Doswell. Testing was performed on samples from the rape kit. The serologist found A, B, and H antigens on the samples. Because the victim was a type AB secretor, no conclusions could be made about what blood type the rapist was because the victim’s type masked the perpetrator’s.
Doswell’s defense challenged the reliability of the identifications, arguing that the photographic lineup was faulty due to Doswell’s picture being the only picture that was marked. The defense also argued that Doswell did not fit the victim’s initial description of her attacker.
A jury convicted Doswell of rape, criminal attempt, simple assault, terroristic threats, and unlawful restraint in November 1986. He was sentenced to 13-26 years (aggregate).
POSTCONVICTION
Doswell continued to attack the reliability of the eyewitness evidence against him, but was unsuccessful in his appeals. In December 1996, Doswell contacted the Innocence Project. In 1998, Doswell filed a request for testing but was denied because the motion was filed too late. In 2004, after confirming that the evidence from trial was located in the police department’s property room, the Innocence Project and local counsel James DePasquale filed a motion to gain access to the evidence and have it subjected to DNA testing. Testing was granted in March 2005.
For 19 years, Doswell has maintained his innocence. Refusing to confess to a crime he did not commit, Doswell was turned down for parole four times. Only one week after exculpatory test results returned from the Allegheny County Crime Lab, prosecutors agreed to join in Doswell’s motion to vacate his conviction and sentence.
Thomas Doswell was released on August 1, 2005, and welcomed home by his family. He was 25 years old when he was arrested for this crime in 1986.
オリジナル記事はAPのようです。本人も家族も怒っていない理由は、APによりますと、「怒ると体に悪い」とのことですが、謎です。司法に文句でもいうとまた陥れられるのか、それとも賠償金が安くなるのか？
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/08/01/AR2005080100629.html
DNA Test Frees Man After Nearly 18 Years
By RAMESH SANTANAM
The Associated Press
Monday, August 1, 2005; 10:39 PM
PITTSBURGH -- A man who spent 19 years behind bars for a rape he didn't commit was released from prison Monday after new tests of DNA evidence cleared him.
Friends and family broke into applause when a county judge dismissed charges against Thomas A. Doswell. About 30 minutes later, Doswell walked out of the county jail a free man _ expressing thanks, not bitterness.
"I'm thankful to be home," he told The Associated Press from his mother's house. "I'm thankful justice has been served. The court system is not perfect, but it works."
Doswell, 46, was convicted in the 1986 rape of a 48-year-old woman at a hospital in Pittsburgh. At the time, he was the father of two young children.
He was sentenced to 13 to 26 years in prison and was denied parole four times because he refused to accept responsibility for the crime.
Prosecutors originally opposed DNA testing for Doswell, but a judge ordered it. When the tests came back last month showing that semen taken from the victim was not from Doswell, prosecutors filed motions to vacate his sentence and release him.
"These tests confirmed what Mr. Doswell has been saying from the moment he was charged, that he was innocent and that this was a misidentification brought about by police officers who may have engaged in misconduct," said Colin Starger of the Innocence Project at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University in New York.
The victim and another witness had picked out Doswell's photo from a group of eight shown to them by police.
At the time, Pittsburgh police identified mug shots of people charged with rape with the letter "R." Doswell insisted witnesses identified him as the rapist only because the letter "R" appeared under his mug shot.
His photo was marked because an ex-girlfriend had accused him of rape, but he was acquitted of that charge. Police officials say they no longer mark photos of rape suspects with an "R."
Authorities plan to compare the DNA sample taken from the victim with national databanks, but so far do not have any suspects.
Although Doswell spent nearly two decades in prison, neither he nor his family said they were angry.
"I couldn't walk around with anger and bitterness," said Doswell, speaking on a cell phone for what he said was the first time. "It would have done me more harm than good."
Doswell spent his years in prison getting an associate's degree, learning to speak Spanish and mastering seven musical instruments, including the guitar, saxophone, flute, drums and trumpet.
"I am so happy to be actually seeing him at home instead of in jail," said Crystal Glover, Doswell's girlfriend. "Now we can get on with our lives."
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