SHORT READ
A Rush to Convict is Sending Innocent Men to Prison
LVMPD apologizes to innocent man after ‘mixed up’ DNA samples sent an innocent man to prison for four years.
On November 6th, 2001, in Las Vegas, Nevada, a mother was getting her two young children ready for dinner. Her husband was at work, and when she heard movement in the other room, she had assumed it was her husband coming home. She called out, but who emerged was not her husband but a young man, carrying a baseball bat.
The man demanded all of her cash, but the woman only had twenty-three dollars. He then decided to threaten the woman to get into her car, drive them to the nearest ATM and withdraw as much as she could.
She did as instructed, and while at the ATM, the woman’s husband spotted her and ran at the pair. The robber then fled, and they called the police. In her statement, the woman described her attacker as African American. By his voice, she knew that he was likely a teenager. He had been wearing a blue hoodie and ski mask.
Police began canvassing the area, and while outside the victim’s home, they saw two teen boys riding their bikes. Police followed them and saw them go inside a home nearby. Police began looking around the house’s exterior, in the…
