A woman whose murder conviction was overturned after she served 43 years of a life sentence was released Friday, despite attempts in the last month by Missouri’s attorney general to keep her behind bars.
Sandra Hemme, 64, left a prison in Chillicothe, hours after a judge threatened to hold the attorney general’s office in contempt if they continued to fight against her release. She reunited with her family at a nearby park, where she hugged her sister, daughter and granddaughter.
Hemme had been the longest-held wrongly incarcerated woman known in the U.S., according to her legal team at the Innocence Project. The judge originally ruled on June 14 that Hemme’s attorneys had established “clear and convincing evidence” of “actual innocence” and he overturned her conviction. But Republican Attorney General Andrew Bailey fought her release in the courts.
“It was too easy to convict an innocent person and way harder than it should have been to get her out, even to the point of court orders being ignored,” her attorney Sean O’Brien said. “It shouldn’t be this hard to free an innocent person.”
I’m against the massive payouts over changed convictions. It makes it less likely states will play ball with not fighting overturned convictions (except this missouri d-bag) and its oftentimes not the states fault they were wrongly convicted. Give her like $150k, and then like $50k a year from then on.
Was she arrested by a state trooper? Was she accused by a state prosecutor? Was she sent to prison by a state judge? Why is it not the states fault?
Not to mention, damages paid by governments don’t just come out of thin air. Contemporary taxpayers shoulder the burden, in some way, for the misdeeds of previous generations. An unfortunate reality. At the same time, I wholeheartedly agree that this woman deserves some form of additional restitution. It just becomes very tricky who actually bears that cost.
Taxpayers also pay the money for her being wrongfully imprisoned. Taxpayers also suffer from her not being able to contribute to the economy. Taxpayers pay the salary of the shitheads that framed and convicted her.
That is how a state works. Of all these things her being compensated for wrongful imprisonment is the least problematic to pay for.
Not to mention the taxpayers are who voted for the police chief and the judges who wrongfully incarcerated this woman
My point is more about public servants, such as the justice system, government officials, etc. not doing a good job. Everyone loses in this case. I’m not at all against government spending. It’s just really unfortunate that (1) this woman’s life was ruined and (2) we as a society also have to foot that bill.
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Not at all. I agree that’s what tax funds are for and ought to be spent when necessary. I’m just making a more nuanced point that it’s unfortunate that government officials and the justice system not doing a proper job has led to two adverse outcomes.