Another DNA exoneration

Friday, September 22, 2006

Another DNA exoneration

Jeffrey Deskovic of Peekskill, New York was incarcerated at 16 and convicted for the killing of Angela Correa on the basis of a confession, even though he had recanted by the time of his trial, and his DNA did not match DNA from semen found on the victim.

His release came after the DNA was matched this year to a man already in jail for another murder. His release comes following the hard work of The Innocence Project and Nina Morrison.

He is the 184th person exonerated by DNA.

The New York Times notes: Among the people who Mr. Deskovic said refused to review his case is Jeanine F. Pirro, the former Westchester district attorney, who took office after his trial; she is now the Republican nominee for state attorney general.

The freed inmate and his lawyer expressed outrage that Ms. Pirro had scheduled a news conference to call for the reinstatement of the death penalty in New York just as Mr. Deskovic was being released Wednesday morning, but Ms. Pirro ended up canceling the event.

Ms. Pirro’s successor, Janet DiFiore, agreed to run the evidence through a national DNA databank after she was approached in June by Barry Scheck, a director of the Innocence Project, which works to free the wrongly convicted.