Texas man serving life sentence innocent of double murder, judge says

[NaturalHigh]

Source: The Guardian

A central Texas man serving a life sentence for a double murder in 1992 is innocent, as are three codefendants no longer in prison, a state judge has found.

Retired district judge George Allen ruled Friday that Richard Bryan Kussmaul, 45, should be free. His three codefendants each received 20-year sentences and have already been released.

DNA evidence not available two decades ago shows the four weren’t involved in the fatal shootings of 17-year-old Leslie Murphy and 14-year-old Stephen Neighbors at a home near Moody, south of Waco, Allen said in a four-page opinion.


Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/aug/20/texas-life-sentence-innocence-dna-richard-bryan-kussmaul

[cstanleytech]

1. Makes you wonder how many other innocent people have been railroaded into prison. nt

[citood]

3. Its Texas

Makes you wonder how many innocent people have been executed.

[Paladin]

4. As if Texas is the only place where wrongfully-convicted people are being freed. (nt)

[citood]

5. Just pointing out that Texas is a leader in carryng out the death penalty

And the chance of wrongful conviction is one of the biggest reasons I oppose the death penalty.

[Tommy2Tone]

12. I live in Texas

and sadly I agree with you. I don't see it changing anytime soon either.

[cab67]

9. Current estimates are 3 to 5 percent of the prison population is innocent.

I don't have the citation for that number in front of me - I can try to dig it up later, after I get some other things off my desk.

Sounds small, but (a) it's thousands and thousands of people, (b) is dominated by people convicted of crimes with no DNA evidence, or for which the evidence no longer exists, and (c) is too large even if it's one, because every miscarriage of justice has a ripple effect. It destroys the life of the wrongly convicted person, harms that person's family, denies true justice for the victim and/or victim's family, and often allows criminals to continue committing crimes.

[NaturalHigh]

13. I wouldn't have guessed it was that high. That's outrageous!

[Hestia]

14. Also, prosecutors and police prey upon those with lower mental acumen, who seem to only want to

please the police and give false confessions. To me, this is double worse, preying upon the mentally challenged as a way to close cases.

[olddad56]

18. my guess is that in Texas, it way higher than that.

[cab67]

19. It might be, but there are multiple variables involved.

As I indicated elsewhere, some districts have an unusually high number of exonerations not (necessarily) because they have more wrongful convictions, but because they do a better job of storing evidence from old cases. Some are also better at working with defense attorneys and legal groups (e.g. Innocence Project) to uncover old miscarriages of justice. Dallas County in Texas is a good example of both. That's not to say police and DAs were always acting ethically - only that the number of exonerations is not always a straightforward measure of police/DA malfeasance.

Ironically enough, districts with unethical DA's might have fewer exonerations because the DA's will fight efforts to review older cases. Lake County, Illinois, was a good example of that until just a couple of years ago.

[Chakab]

2. He was convicted when he was in his early twenties. They stole his life.

[secondwind]

6. They may get a huge payout, according to the link.

If the court upholds the judge’s opinion and the men’s claims of actual innocence, they each could be eligible for a state payout of $80,000 for each year in prison.

Spending over 20 years in prison cannot ever be erased, but they will be millionaires, if I read this correctly.

[NaturalHigh]

7. I hope they get paid for their suffering.

It won't give them back their lives, unfortunately.

[cab67]

10. Ironically enough, Texas has the best compensation system in the country.

Almost half of the states offer exonerees nothing. They can't even get the services given to people released on parole who actually committed crimes.

It sometimes looks as though Texas has a disproportionate share of wrongful convictions, but there are other variables involved. Dallas County, for example, has a shit-ton of exonerations not only because of the wrongdoing of prosecutors (esp. prior to the current century), but because they did an exemplary job of storing old evidence. No evidence, no exoneration.

[Orrex]

8. Cases like this are an irrefutable argument against capital punishment

There are a great many reasons to oppose that barbaric, bloodthirsty practice, but our nation's proven record of convicting innocent people is proof that the system is too broken to allow it to decide matters of life and death.

[7962]

11. There are plenty who are guilty with ZERO doubt.

There are lots of people caught red handed. The DP should only be sought in those cases. Such as the one in Alabama this weekend where the "ex boyfriend" killed FIVE people & turned himself in. Screw that guy.


Cases like the one in the OP, which didnt get the DP, should never be allowed to have it as a choice. There should be no "beyond a reasonable doubt" when it comes to the DP. It MUST be NO doubt. Which is possible in many cases like the one I mentioned above. And in cases like that, they shouldnt wait 30 years to carry out the sentence either

[Festivito]

15. Zero is only for the cocksure, while others can be filled with doubt.

Does he have a heretofore unknown twin brother? Does he want to commit suicide? Did he kill all the people who could identify him? Was there another shooter? Was it a framing? Was he being threatened at the time? Was he in a drug induced state of mind? Does he have a brain tumor that does not yet show on imaging? Was he hypnotized and lacks memory of it just yet?

And, on and on and on.

[7962]

16. Oh, come on. Read the story. None of the above.

And you'd excuse someone from it simply because they were high on something?
Nope.
We could all say child molesters are mentally off, but many of those willing to talk say they knew what they were doing was wrong.
John Wayne Gacy is another good example of ZERO doubt guilt. Hundreds if not thousands of other good examples.
Just have to get power hungry DAs to stop going for the DP when its NOT one of those cases

[Festivito]

17. Oh, come on -- back at you. And, oh, come on, none in an endless list?

I actually do support the death penalty under one circumstance: A person adjudicated as a life in forfeit who cannot be held, such as an escapee.

Until then, they should be available to psychiatrists and psychologists throughout the remainder of their term in hopes of understanding how we can stop this type of behavior and even how to change it in that person.

[Nye Bevan]

20. So you would want the jury to rule whether there was "no doubt" or a "smidgen of doubt",

and in the latter case, there would be no death penalty but possibly life without parole?

[7962]

21. For death, NO doubt. No chance at all of innocence.

The Atlanta Courthouse killer is another of the many examples. There is ZERO doubt that he is guilty.
I have no problem with life w/o parole for anyone who doesnt fit that criteria.
However, i know whats coming too. Soon, we will start hearing people want to release LWP prisoners because "they're so old now. They're no longer a threat to anyone." Or "he/she's sick, its cruel to keep them locked up"