Should the Supreme Court rule in favor of post trial DNA testing?

By Kayleigh Harvey – Talk Radio News Service

The issue of post-DNA testing is not a new one and is certainly not a resolved one. Currently 44 out of 50 states permit post trial DNA testing.

Today, Georgetown University Law Center hosted a discussion that heard from legal experts and the personal experiences of those who have suffered the injustice of wrong-imprisonment and have since been released due to DNA clearance.

Martin Anderson who was exonerated in 2002, after serving 15 years in prison for rape, said: “A lot of people don’t realize it, but when you are convicted of a serious crime, your name, your family name, your whole life stop, there is nothing you can do….there is evidence to prove someone innocent but the state refused to have it tested and have it done…once the testing was done it excluded me as being the rapist of the crime in 1982, but it also proved who the real attacker was. Today he is now in prison, for the crime I have spent 20 years trying to prove my innocence for.”

The discussion centered around the Supreme Court case of the District Attorney’s Office v. William G. Osborne, which will begin trial on March 2. Osborne is appealing for a DNA test to be granted, in order to prove his innocence against rape and attempted murder charges that he was sentenced to in 1993 in the state of Alaska. Alaska, is currently one of the six states that does not allow post trial DNA evidence to be submitted. Mr. Osborne is filing his appeal for DNA testing under the civil rights act.

Also speaking at the discussion was Michele Mallin, a rape victim whose accused assailant was exonerated posthumously by DNA testing. Mallin identified who she thought was her assailant, Timothy Cole, twice. Cole died whilst serving time in prison and DNA taken from his body proved that he in fact had not raped Ms. Mallin.
Ms. Mallin thought that Cole’s conviction had been based on DNA and her statement, but later found out that the conviction had been based purely on her testimony. Ms Mallin is now campaigning to clear Cole’s name. Ms. Mallin’s real attacker is serving time in prison for two other sexually motivated attacks.