A scary thought.
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JosephASpadaro — 9 years ago(July 29, 2016 09:38 AM)
As an absolute number, yes, I am sure it's "quite a bit".
As a relative number a percent of all those who have been incarcerated I am sure it's quite negligible. A drop in the bucket.
In other words, 99.99% of people in prison are guilty. And maybe 0.01% are innocent. -
JosephASpadaro — 9 years ago(July 30, 2016 12:03 AM)
Wikipedia says:
In June 2012, the National Registry of Exonerations, a joint project of the University of Michigan Law School and Northwestern University Law School, initially reported 873 individual exonerations in the U.S. from January 1989 through February 2012; the report called this number "tiny" in a country with 2.3 million people in prisons and jails, but asserted that there are far more false convictions than exonerations.
873 / 2,300,000 = 0.03% -
JosephASpadaro — 9 years ago(September 24, 2016 02:46 PM)
The evidence was all 100% circumstantial. It'd never hold up in a court.
Why not? Circumstantial evidence is still evidence. And it can and does hold up in court.
Many people are under the misconception that evidence cannot be used if it is "merely" circumstantial. That is simply not true.
In fact, many/most cases rely on circumstantial evidence.