Hi Please , see the attached

Reply needed for both

Katie

There are multiple different obstacles to litigating post-conviction innocence. One that stuck out to me was that “...once a defendant pleads guilty, the appellate courts will not hear arguments that his confession was coerced, that a witness lied to police, or that forensic evidence was unreliable” (King, p. 218). It is very possible that the defendant does not know this information and essentially now they are trapped. The only way out of this situation is to prove that “...his plea was involuntary or uninformed” which rarely succeeds (King, p. 218). This then makes the court question the validity that the defendant is being honest and not just lying. Another obstacle is that the appellate courts only review the court record and do not have the power to consider new evidence (King, p. 219). In most wrongful convictions the evidence to support the defendant is normally discovered/uncovered long after they were convicted so it will not be seen by the appellate court. The defendant must await a post-conviction review for new evidence to be introduced and examined. The obstacles that these individuals are forced to face in hopes of proving their innocence and getting exonerated are lengthy and difficult. In the Garrett chapter, he discusses how it took exonerees on average “...six and a half years after their conviction to exhaust all of their appeals and habeas proceedings” (Garrett, 2011, p. 181). Reading more about the process in King’s chapter gave me a better understanding of how long this process can really take.  

Trevor 

The first limitation that is a tremendous obstacle I did not realize existed is,"in many states, new trial motions must be filed within a designated period ranging from a month to three years after sentencing,"( King,p.218). That window of time is very small and requires investigative resources that may not be available to the person convicted. Even when new evidence is found, it requires ,"that the evidence could not have been discovered earlier and is persuasive enough to convince the judge that retrial would probably end in acquittal,"(King,p.218). In addition to time constraints, typically the defendant must demonstrate that if he/she pled guilty, it was not done voluntarily. If an admission of guilt was done as part of a plea agreement, this makes an appeal very difficult if not impossible. When on trial in what appears to be a case that will be won by the prosecution, a plea arrangement may seem the lesser of the evils with a typically shorter incarceration period, but this can also mean if new evidence surfaces it cannot change the guilty plea. Another roadblock post-conviction is that, "most states do not routinely provide attorneys to help investigate, compose, or litigate post-conviction petitions,"(King,p.221). This equates to having the resources, financial or otherwise, to secure legal counsel in the hopes of proving one's innocence. In my opinion, a truly innocent person must possess immense dedication and determination to prove their innocence post-conviction and even then there is no guarantee. It seems there needs to be procedures and policy's implemented to attempt at minimizing wrongful convictions.