Virginia’s Supreme Court has handed down a ruling that could help people wrongfully convicted of crimes.
Early one morning in 1999, a group of young men robbed a diner in Norfolk, and lawyer Jim Neale says that crime led to murder.
“An off-duty federal police officer was a customer in that diner during that robbery, and she attempted to intervene, and a gunman, a masked gunman shot and killed her.”
Police later found the weapon, mask and a pair of shoes worn by the gunman, and they charged 16-year-old Arsean Hicks with murder, even though another suspect said – on tape -- that the gun, mask and shoes were his.
“It’s evidence that would tend to negate Mr. Hicks’ guilt … under the Constitution of the United States.”
The prosecution did not share that evidence, and Hicks got life in prison, but years later he heard about the other suspect’s taped statement. Under state law, it was too late to appeal, but the Innocence Project and a group of UVA law school alumni decided to challenge the law. They persuaded Virginia’s Supreme Court that when people like Hicks discover exculpatory evidence suppressed by police or prosecutors, they should be allowed to ask for a new trial, regardless of how much time has passed.
