Birmingham man, wrongly convicted of child rape, and served 4 years 6 months is now free. Alleged victim was 9 years old when the accusation was made. "The victim lied, and she maintained that lie through the investigation and trial," Jefferson County DA says.

Lawtonfogle · 2011-10-23T18:23:23+00:00

While I think the stepmother who withheld the information is disgusting, she is not the one who should face charges. The witnesses and counselors who questioned the girl with leading questions and the prosecutor who used such testimonies knowing the faultiness of such should each have to spend 5 years in jail and give up five years salary to this man to get him back on his feet.

This may seem harsh, but the catch is that we know you can lead a child (and even many adults) to lying if you ask them the correct leading question. It is even possible to edit the victims very memory and change what she believes, and in this case if that had happened, the guy would have never been free.

And once the real guy who did it is found, a significant portion of his funds should be transferred over to the innocent man as well and he should face more than just child rape charges.

We cannot let the justice system go back to the witch hunts of the past, and child sexual abuse cases are one of the two big ones (the other being terrorism, though these days you don't even need a court to hear a case before being executed on suspicion of such).

blueyb · 2011-10-23T16:30:00+00:00

I hope you're not trying to blame the child, who apparently came out when she was a teenager as saying she was told she would be hurt if she said the truth.

2011-10-24T09:17:15+00:00

So she said something, then said something contrary and they cherry picked meaning and fitted up the black man.

A double hitter for prejudice.

The conviction was never sound. blaming the child is a smoke screen because they know how utterly fucked up they were in using that evidence and presenting it to the judge as sound.

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