. In a single marathon day of court, Tepfer’s work helped wipe unjust convictions from the records of seven people who’d served a collective 174 years behind bars.
“People who live in neighborhoods most impacted by violence tend to have the least amount of trust in law enforcement,” Foxx said. “If I knew that Detective Guevara was out there putting cases on people, or that's the allegation about him, why would I then come and testify for you on a case? Or if I'm a victim of a crime, why would I report that crime?”
After returning stateside and collecting his undergraduate degree, he bounced around from Northern California to Minnesota before making the jump to law school. His father, noting the way he always seemed to see all sides of a situation, frequently told him he’d make a good lawyer. Tepfer wasn’t so sure. He walked around campus his first week, confused by the way his classmates prattled on about “statutes.
Terrill Swift walks to the park with his 1-year-old daughter, Aria Swift, in Lisle, Illinois, on Feb. 28, 2017.16 years — more than half his life. Most of that time behind bars, he felt like he’d been waiting. For whom? He couldn’t be sure. For how much longer? He had no idea. Swift fit into a pattern that Tepfer and his colleagues at Northwestern, along with academics at other universities, were finding: Young people were more vulnerable than adults to making false confessions, particularly when under the thumb — or fist — of abusive police.
As he sat in the courtroom waiting for the case to be called, he flipped through the case documents. “Ben Baker,” the file read. He’d been convicted in 2006 of possession of drugs with the intent to distribute. The judge in the case handed the 32-year-old Baker an 18-year prison sentence. But Baker had claimed the Chicago police sergeant assigned to the public housing project where he lived with his wife and children had planted the drugs on him. Then planted them on his wife.
She had drawn Watts’s ire — and then criminal charges — after she filed formal complaints against him and his crew for his abusive and corrupt practices. The police officers then claimed that they’d found cocaine in the couple’s car. Though it wasn’t true, Glenn didn’t want to risk prison time and the prospect of leaving the couple’s children with both parents behind bars. In exchange for her guilty plea, she received probation.
the famous case of rich white kid coerced into false confession: Marty Tankleff 1989 suffolk county long island. the real killer was the dad's business partner