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What It’s Like to Be Wrongly Convicted · The Infographics Show Podcast

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  Speaker 1: Welcome back to Beyond infragraphics. Today, we're taking a deep
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  Speaker 1: dive into something pretty heavy, actually, miscarriages of justice, specifically
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  Speaker 1: wrongful conviction and imprisonment, and really the human impact when
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  Speaker 1: things go wrong.
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  Speaker 2: That's right. We've been pulling together insights from well quite
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  Speaker 2: a lot of material research, personal stories articles, trying to
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  Speaker 2: get a handle on what happens when someone's locked away
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  Speaker 2: for a crime they just didn't commit. You know, you
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  Speaker 2: hear about the big cases, the headlines, but the underlying stuff, yeah,
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  Speaker 2: the systemic issues, the personal cost that Alsen gets missed exactly.
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  Speaker 1: And that's kind of our mission today, isn't it to
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  Speaker 1: unpack what we've learned. How do these wrongful convictions even happen,
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  Speaker 1: what's it actually like inside prison when you're innocent, and
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  Speaker 1: maybe most importantly, what are the effects long term on people,
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  Speaker 1: their family and well on our trust in the whole system.
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  Speaker 1: We'll probably touch on some related issues too, because it's
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  Speaker 1: all sort of connected, as we found. Okay, let's unpack this.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, So I think one of the first things
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  Speaker 2: that really struck me digging into this is that wrongful
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  Speaker 2: conviction isn't some like rare fluke. It's recognized. It's a
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  Speaker 2: persistent problem in places like the US and Canada too.
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  Speaker 1: Right, not just anomalies. And the material we looked at
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  Speaker 1: pointed to some really consistent factors, didn't it. Things like
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  Speaker 1: mistakes in eyewitness identification, which is wow, surprisingly common, and
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  Speaker 1: police or prosecutor misconduct.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, and false confessions, which is a whole complex thing
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  Speaker 2: in itself, problems with informants, sometimes unreliable ones, and you know,
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  Speaker 2: flawed forensic science stuff that maybe isn't as certain as
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  Speaker 2: people think.
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  Speaker 1: And what seemed crucial is how these things often don't
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  Speaker 1: just happen one at a time. It's usually a combination,
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  Speaker 1: right exactly.
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  Speaker 2: It's rarely just one single error. They tend to kind
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  Speaker 2: of pile up, so you might have say a shiky
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  Speaker 2: eyewitness ID maybe combined with some pressure during interrogation that
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  Speaker 2: leads to a false confession, and maybe the defense wasn't
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  Speaker 2: adequately resourced. It all sort of interlocks.
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  Speaker 1: And the numbers, when you look at the scale, it's
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  Speaker 1: pretty sobering. We saw figures like, since nineteen eighty nine,
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  Speaker 1: over what three hundred exonerations in the US alone, over
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  Speaker 1: three thousand people prove an innocent after conviction.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, think about that and the time lost, the cumulative
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  Speaker 2: years spent locked up for crimes they didn't do. It's enormous.
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  Speaker 2: Over twenty nine, nine hundred and fifty years. It's almost
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  Speaker 2: impossible to really wrap your head around that number. And
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  Speaker 2: we saw that similar kinds of factors pop up in
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  Speaker 2: Canadian cases too. It's not just a US phenomenon.
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  Speaker 1: And you really can't look at this without considering the
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  Speaker 1: bigger picture of the systemic context. In the US, for instance,
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  Speaker 1: mass incarceration is just huge. The scale itself, the fact
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  Speaker 1: that the US has the highest incarceration rate.
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  Speaker 2: Globally, right, and that huge system disproportionately affects black and
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  Speaker 2: brown communities That came through really clearly. When a system
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  Speaker 2: gets that big, it puts immense strain on resources. You
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  Speaker 2: get overloaded public defenders, less time for proper investigations, and.
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  Speaker 1: It can feed into existing biases too. Can It may
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  Speaker 1: be reinforcing a presumption of guilt for certain.
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  Speaker 2: Groups, absolutely and potentially leading to a kind of institutional
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  Speaker 2: indifference when the numbers are just so vast. We saw
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  Speaker 2: that really chilling example from Georgia back in the seventies.
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  Speaker 2: The joiny gate case material where prosecutors in one area
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  Speaker 2: were literally using codes on their notes.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, like N for race and ranking black jurors from
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  Speaker 1: one to five based on how undesirable they thought. They were,
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  Speaker 1: even adding nasty comments all to try and get all
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  Speaker 1: white juries.
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  Speaker 2: That's not just bias. That's a deliberate manipulation of the
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  Speaker 2: system and understanding that the systemic part is so important.
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  Speaker 2: It shows why these aren't just isolated mistakes or bad luck.
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  Speaker 2: What's fascinating, in a grim way is seeing how those
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  Speaker 2: individual factors, a bad ID, a coerced confession, could really
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  Speaker 2: lock into place within this larger system.
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  Speaker 1: So, Okay, someone's wrongly convicted, they're inside. What's that experience?
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  Speaker 2: Like? The accounts we encountered painted a well a terrifying picture. Yeah.
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  Speaker 2: Massive assault was one phrase used. A daily reality of violence,
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  Speaker 2: especially tough, you imagine for someone who's never been in
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  Speaker 2: prison before. We read about Mark, who had actually worked
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  Speaker 2: inside of prison briefly as an electrician before he was convicted.
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  Speaker 1: Right. He mentioned even then just being there as a
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  Speaker 1: worker was unsettling, watching his tools, being wary. He said,
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  Speaker 1: he just couldn't have fathomed being on the other.
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  Speaker 2: Side, and once you are on the other side, the
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  Speaker 2: fear sounds constant. Jason described making basically body armor out
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  Speaker 2: of national geographic magazines and duct tape. Eleven magazines, two
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  Speaker 2: rolls of tape. He wore it every day under his
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  Speaker 2: clothes in a maximum security place, afraid of metal detectors,
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  Speaker 2: but you know, more afraid of the violence of the
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  Speaker 2: armed groups.
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  Speaker 1: This constant fear, and Mark mentioned carrying a weapon too,
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  Speaker 1: didn't he a shive or a fork? And he pointed
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  Speaker 1: out the particular danger for people accused of sex crimes,
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  Speaker 1: even innocent ones. He just never knew it. Sounds like
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  Speaker 1: needing constant hyper vigilance just to physically survive.
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  Speaker 2: And survival meant finding ways to cope. The individuals we
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  Speaker 2: learned about used different methods. Some used violence themselves, some
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  Speaker 2: tried to cooperate, others just with true But there was
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  Speaker 2: this one strategy that seemed really specific to the wrongly convicted.
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  Speaker 1: The preoccupation with their case exactly.
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  Speaker 2: This total, all consuming focus on proving their innocence. They
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  Speaker 2: just immersed themselves in it, pouring over transcripts, legal files,
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  Speaker 2: writing letters NonStop. Max apparently wrote to the queen. Didn't
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  Speaker 2: do much he admitted, but it shows the desperation. Sean
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  Speaker 2: called it an obsession, waking up at night to write
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  Speaker 2: things down. His case was his baby to save.
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  Speaker 1: And here's where it gets, I mean incredibly messed up, right,
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  Speaker 1: This intense focus, this drive to prove their innocence, it
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  Speaker 1: was often seen negatively. Yeah, by the prison and parole people.
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  Speaker 2: Decisely, it's this terrible paradox. It was interpreted as not
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  Speaker 2: showing remorse for a crime they didn't commit, or like
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  Speaker 2: they weren't adjusting properly to prison life, because the wouldnt
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  Speaker 2: just accept it. Sean talked about his case managed reporting.
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  Speaker 2: He just denies and denies. He was told straight up
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  Speaker 2: he'd never get out if he didn't admit guilt.
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  Speaker 1: Wow, so you're trapped. You maintain your innocence, which is
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  Speaker 1: the truth, and it actively hurts your chances of getting out.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, as Sean put it, sorry, I'm not guilty, I'm
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  Speaker 2: not denying. I'm just telling you the truth. An impossible bind.
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  Speaker 1: So, okay, let's say they survived prison years, maybe decades,
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  Speaker 1: and finally they're exonerated, released. But what we found is
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  Speaker 1: freedom doesn't just magically fix everything, does it. The suffering continues,
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  Speaker 1: described as a sustained catastrophe.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, the losses are just immense, obviously the loss of
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  Speaker 2: freedom itself, but also this profound loss of self, of
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  Speaker 2: their identity before prison. Jason put it so starkly, I
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  Speaker 2: lost me is what I lost, my identity, who I am,
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  Speaker 2: the way I viewed life.
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  Speaker 1: And maybe the most devastating loss that came up again
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  Speaker 1: and again was family. Mark's story was just heartbreaking. His
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  Speaker 1: wife had a breakdown while he was inside, their kids
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  Speaker 1: went into care, they lost their home. He lost that
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  Speaker 1: closeness with his own father too. He called losing family
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  Speaker 1: the hardest part.
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  Speaker 2: And think about the families themselves. They're often forgotten victims
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  Speaker 2: in this, losing not just the person but emotional support,
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  Speaker 2: often income. Jason's wife left alone with four kids, a
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  Speaker 2: mortgage bills, having to figure all that out while he
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  Speaker 2: was gone. It's immense pressure.
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  Speaker 1: And then after release, the psychological scars remain really raw, anger, aggression,
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  Speaker 1: volatility towards the system, towards society. Max who was wrongly
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  Speaker 1: convicted for robbery, just talked about being full of hate,
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  Speaker 1: raging about the injustice.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, others mentioned being angry or more easily provoked than before.
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  Speaker 2: Jason said he used to be patient, but now it
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  Speaker 2: doesn't take anything to set him off.
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  Speaker 1: It changes you fundamentally, and there's this heightened sense of
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  Speaker 1: injustice radar, like an intolerance of injustice. Sam described being
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  Speaker 1: hyper sensitive to seeing anyone else getting mistreated by the system.
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  Speaker 1: That constant state of alert you needed inside prison. It
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  Speaker 1: seems like it's almost impossible to switch off.
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  Speaker 2: Right and that feeling of being in prison doesn't always
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  Speaker 2: end at the prison gates. Max felt psychologically trapped for
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  Speaker 2: decades after release. Mark described having a panic attacks, buying groceries,
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  Speaker 2: feeling watched, judged, and still having to report to probation
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  Speaker 2: even after being freed, still feeling like a prisoner. Jason
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  Speaker 2: still had flashbacks, prison nightmares.
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  Speaker 1: And then there's the stigma, the spoiled identity as it's called.
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  Speaker 1: Mark talked about the label rapist following him even after exoneration.
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  Speaker 1: People remember the accusation. Others face similar labels child killer.
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  Speaker 1: It makes rebuilding incredibly hard, finding housing, finding work.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah. The material suggested that maybe a public apology from officials,
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  Speaker 2: or if the real perpetrator is found, that can help
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  Speaker 2: lessen the stigma. Sometimes but often that label just sticks unfairly.
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  Speaker 1: Just think about the depth of that damage years after
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  Speaker 1: you're proven innocent. The loss, the trauma, the stigma. Here's
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  Speaker 1: where it gets really interesting, how deeply this experience wounds
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  Speaker 1: even after innocence is proven. It's just layer upon layer.
• 9:01
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• 9:04
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  Speaker 2: And looking beyond the individual suffering. The material kept bringing
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  Speaker 2: us back to the systemic problems, the things that caused
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  Speaker 2: these convictions, and also the frankly shocking lack of support.
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  Speaker 1: Afterwards, we mentioned eyewitness error, flawed science, but official misconducts
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  Speaker 1: that was a big one. Police prosecutors, things like corruption,
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  Speaker 1: prosecutors hiding evidence, sometimes even telling place not to write
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  Speaker 1: certain things down. This whole win at any cost mentality
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  Speaker 1: that seems to creep in.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, there were some really disturbing specific examples, like a
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  Speaker 2: judge taking bribes whose case involves someone later exonerated, or
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  Speaker 2: a prosecutor making a deal based on testimony they knew
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  Speaker 2: was false just to get a conviction. It's not always
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  Speaker 2: just mistakes. Sometimes it's active wrongdoing.
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  Speaker 1: And false confessions. That's such a tricky area. We learned
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  Speaker 1: how certain interrogation methods, even legal ones like long isolation
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  Speaker 1: lying about evidence can really increase the risk, especially for
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  Speaker 1: certain kids, people with intellectual disability.
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  Speaker 2: Right, And once you have a confession, it's incredibly persuasive.
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  Speaker 2: It can bias judges juries.
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  Speaker 1: Right.
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  Speaker 2: Even forensic experts might interpret evidence differently once they know
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  Speaker 2: there's a confession.
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  Speaker 1: It's hard to undo, which points to the need for reforms,
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  Speaker 1: doesn't it. Like mandatory video recording of interrogations the whole thing.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, absolutely, that came up strongly recommended by major inquiries
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  Speaker 2: like the soften All inquiry in Canada, and importantly with
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  Speaker 2: an equal focus camera view.
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  Speaker 1: Explain that equal focus bit.
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  Speaker 2: It just means the camera shows both the interrogator and
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  Speaker 2: the person being questioned clearly the whod.
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  Speaker 1: Time, so you can see the dynamic, the body language, everything,
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  Speaker 1: No selective camera angles or editing allowed. It's about transparency
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  Speaker 1: and accountability. Makes sense. But then, even if someone is exonerated,
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  Speaker 1: the support they get on release.
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  Speaker 2: It's often appalling, shockingly inadequate. There's this awful irony where
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  Speaker 2: they often get less help job training, housing assistance, counseling
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  Speaker 2: than someone who is actually guilty and served their time.
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  Speaker 2: The system that broke them often fails to help them.
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  Speaker 1: Rebuild and compensation getting financial help for the years lost.
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  Speaker 2: It's really complicated and often inadequate. In Canada, there's no
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  Speaker 2: automatic legal right to it, so it's tough to get.
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  Speaker 2: In the US, many states have laws statutes for compensation,
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  Speaker 2: but they can be full of hurdles.
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  Speaker 1: Hurdles like what.
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  Speaker 2: Like needing to prove innocence again beyond just the exoneration,
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  Speaker 2: or rules that exclude people if they gave a false confession,
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  Speaker 2: even if it was coerced, which seems incredibly unjust.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, the argument we saw was pretty compelling. Everyone who
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  Speaker 1: is wrongly convicted deserves compensation period the state took their liberty.
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  Speaker 1: They need help.
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  Speaker 2: Rebuilding exactly, and not just money. Ongoing support. Psychological counseling
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  Speaker 2: is crucial for the trauma, help with education, finding housing,
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  Speaker 2: dealing with the job discrimination they still face similar to
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  Speaker 2: Parolle's And.
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  Speaker 1: One last really important group we need to mention the
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  Speaker 1: original victims of the crimes.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, their experience is often overlooked and exoneration stories. It's
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  Speaker 2: a parallel trauma. They might find out the wrong person
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  Speaker 2: was convicted from the news. Imagine that shock, maybe feeling
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  Speaker 2: guilt if they misidentified someone facing media scrutiny, even blame
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  Speaker 2: or threats.
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  Speaker 1: Sometimes that sounds incredibly difficult. So they need support.
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  Speaker 2: Too, Absolutely, the need for neutral advocates to help them
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  Speaker 2: navigate it, protect their privacy, and the value of peer
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  Speaker 2: support connecting with other victims who've been through that same confusing,
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  Speaker 2: painful process when a conviction is overturned. Wow.
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  Speaker 1: Okay, So bringing this all together, what does it all mean?
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  Speaker 1: It means wrongful conviction is this complex beast right rooted
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  Speaker 1: in systemic flaws, individual errors, biases, all potentially combining. It
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  Speaker 1: causes devastating, lasting harm during prison after release, to the individuals,
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  Speaker 1: their families, and even to the original victims of the
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  Speaker 1: prime and the systems that fail them often fall short
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  Speaker 1: and providing the support needed to heal.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, and if you connect this to the bigger picture,
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  Speaker 2: sure it really makes you question things, doesn't it? Trust
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  Speaker 2: in our justice systems? What real accountability looks like when
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  Speaker 2: mistakes of this magnitude happen?
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  Speaker 1: Definitely, which leaves us with a thought, maybe it's something
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  Speaker 1: for you the listener to mull Over. Given these deep
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  Speaker 1: systemic issues and the profound, enduring damage caused by wrongful conviction,
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  Speaker 1: what's our responsibility as a society. How do we move
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  Speaker 1: beyond just finding these cases after the fact to actually
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  Speaker 1: preventing them and truly supporting those whose lives have been
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  Speaker 1: shattered when the system gets it wrong.
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  Speaker 2: Lots to think about there, I'm asking questions exactly.
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  Speaker 1: Thanks for joining us for this deep dive on beyond infographics,
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