B.2(y). Wrongful Conviction Review

When new evidence likely would have changed a verdict resulting in a conviction and incarceration, any official possessing it must notify the court. The court must review; if confidence in the verdict is undermined, the Person shall be released, the conviction vacated, and the record expunged.

Widely available estimates based on research suggest that anywhere between 1% and 10% of the prison population is wrongly convicted. Even taking the most conservative of these estimates (1%), with roughly 2.3 million people incarcerated, that translates to 23,000 people imprisoned for crimes they did not commit. No nation that prides itself on freedom and the rule of law can consider that an acceptable state of affairs.

This right cannot reverse that trend on its own. However, it does provide a mechanism that mandates any government official who uncovers evidence that would have had a likelihood of changing a verdict must bring that evidence to the court. It isn’t optional. Similarly, the court must review that evidence. It isn’t optional. If confidence in the verdict is undermined, that means reasonable doubt exists and the verdict is invalid, since that was the standard for conviction in the first place. That’s a simple syllogism. The right then mandates that the convicted person must be released. Their conviction must be vacated. And the record of the conviction must be expunged. It isn’t optional.