Oklahoma Man Freed Due to DNA Testing

[Theophylact]

Dec. 3, 2003 | LAWTON, Okla. (AP) --

A man who spent 20 years in prison for rape was freed Wednesday after DNA testing proved he was innocent of the crime.

Calvin Lee Scott, 48, finished the rape sentence last year but stayed in prison on a three-year term for assault and battery of a correctional officer, the Department of Corrections said. He walked out of the Lawton Correctional Facility on Wednesday morning.

Genetic material taken from the victim the night of the rape showed Scott was not the attacker, said Jim Bednar, executive director of the Oklahoma Indigent Defense System.

DNA technology was not available at the time of the trial. Microscopic analysis of hair taken from the rape victim's bed was used to convict Scott.

Pontotoc County Assistant District Attorney Nancy Shew, who prosecuted Scott in 1983, said there is no hope of finding and prosecuting the real rapist because the statute of limitations has expired.

"You do your job and you think you have righted a wrong, and it turns out 20 years later you haven't," Shew said. "It's very upsetting."

I bet Calvin Scott finds it upsetting, too.

[Mike]

I bet Calvin Scott is going to be calling a lawyer as well.

What do all the right wingers think of this?

[implexant]

Originally posted by Mike
I bet Calvin Scott is going to be calling a lawyer as well.

What do all the right wingers think of this?

Life ain't fair, that's what I think about it.

-Chris

[EDIT] well maybe I should expand on that a little more...

I think at least two sources of information should have been used to convict. It's the way the Bible clearly labels a good justice system. Only one was used in this instance...

[willy_ph]

Hmmm, anyone else predicting a financial windfall heading his way?

[alivin]

I don't really understand the legal part of this. who would he sue ? On what grounds ?

[Rand Dusing]

I think he can sue them..because they falsely accussed him and made him stay in prison for 20 years. I would be pretty mad.

[Epidemic]

Flip side of the coin is that he still could be guilty.

I am relatively sure that more than a hair was used to convict.

Circumstances, motive, proximity, no aliby, eyewittness. Something made the cops suspect Scott. Simpy a hair found at the scene does not make someone think scott did something wrong.

I can just see it now "chief I found a hair". "Good job officer lets go arrest Scott."

Now with out more information I do not know either way. But unless the hair was in a big clump as if ripped from his head with scalp on it. The hair could be from a co worker, secret lover.

No one would convict over a hair. Unless of course it was the clincher in a series of evidence.

I always suspect these cases a man found to be innocent after the fact.

He could be innocent but just don't think that this is proof of wrong doing from info given.