Examples Of Wrongly Convicted People

DNA Evidence Free Wrongly Convicted People

DNA testing can be used to free wrongly convicted people like Kennedy Brewer and Herman Atkins. Too many people get charged for crimes they did not commit. Kennedy Brewer and Herman Atkins are both examples of wrongly convicted people. On April 8th 1986, in Lake Elsinore, a female clerk was working at a shoe store when sometime between 11:30 AM and 12:00 PM, she was raped and robbed at gunpoint. The women was working her shift when this happened. “She was a young white woman who was raped and robbed at gunpoint.” (Weinstein). “The rapist had ejaculated and then later wiped the semen onto the girl’s sweater.” (Weinstein). She was later found in the back of the store. “Following the rape, she was taken into the hospital.” (Innocence Project). “Later, they took vaginal swabs and took the sweater with the semen and was marked for identification.” (Innocence Project). Herman Atkins conviction was 45 years for two counts of forcible rape, two counts of forcible oral cop, and robbery on September 8, 1988. They figured out it was Herman Atkins by showing the victim pictures to help her identify the rapist. They gave the young woman a yearbook of the town’s schools, and she did not find the person who raped her in them.
She was later found by a creek in Noxubee County, 500 yards from her home. Police were suspicious of both Brewer and the mother. “Christine’s mother Gloria had been arrested several times for child abuse and neglect.” (Dewen). Brewer had been the only one home when the child was abducted. (Dewen). “The child was at home with them when they were sleeping. In the morning, the two discovered that Christine, who had been asleep on a makeshift pallet of a sofa, was gone.” (Dewan). “The girl could have been abducted by way of a broken window in the bedroom.”