A man convicted of a 1985 rape in Georgia, a man convicted of
a 1991 murder in New York and a man convicted of raping a 12-year-old boy in
Texas in 1982 have been set free after new DNA testing of evidence in their
cases, according to the Innocence Project. The project has now freed 195
innocent prisoners nationwide using DNA testing.
Roy Brown, 46, was convicted of the May, 23, 1991 murder of Cayuga County, New York social worker Sabina Kulakowski, who was found in her burning farm house with bite, strangulation and stab wounds. An expert prosecution witness testified that the bite marks on Kulakowski matched Brown.
Willie O. "Pete" Williams, 44, was convicted of the 1985 rape of a woman in an apartment complex parking lot. At his trial, the victim identified Williams as her attacker. He spent nearly half his life in a South Georgia prison before DNA evidence pointed to another perpetrator.
James Waller, 50, of Dallas was convicted of the rape of a 12-year-old boy mostly on the testimony of the victim in court. Although there were discrepancies in the boy's account, the jury took 46 minutes to find him guilty. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison and was paroled in 1993, but had to register as a sex offender.
New DNA testing in Waller's case pointed to another person. It was the most recent of 12 cases in Dallas County in which DNA evidence has cleared innocent people.
"Nowhere else in the nation have so many individual wrongful convictions been proven in one county in such a short span," said Barry C. Scheck, co-founder of the Innocence Project. "No one knows why we have 12 and counting in Dallas."
Background:
The Innocence Project: Wrongful Convictions
See Also:
Williams a Free Man After 21 Years
DNA Tests Clear Men in Georgia, New York
‘You Just Can't Give Up'
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