Gruwell reviews Innocence Project
By Michael Tidemann - Staff WriterArticle Photos
Estherville Rotarians Thursday learned about the Iowa Innocence Project, a program in which Iowa Lakes Community College paralegal and legal studies students are working to help those who are incarcerated and innocent find freedom.
Mark Gruwell, who has served as program director and professor of the paralegel and legal studies program until his recent promotion to an administrative position with the college, said the goal of the Iowa Innocence Project is to investigate cases of people in prison who may be innocent. Iowa Lakes students do the initial case screening of Iowa cases in which the convicted individual maintains that he or she did not commit the actual crime. "The burden of proof is on us to prove that," Gruwell said.
Over the past two and a half years, the project has received over 200 requests for assistance. Crimes usually are murder, sexual assault or of a miscellaneous nature including robbery or drug cases. Gruwell said project workers focus on DNA evidence. "DNA has become critically important," Gruwell said.
"Trials are never about truth. They're about evidence," Gruwell said. "It's all about innocence. It's not until the post-conviction stage that we become concerned about the truth."
Gruwell said a Florida conference called by the federal government a year and a half ago was particularly enlightening.
Conference recommendations called for storing DNA evidence, videotaping confessions and setting damage amounts for the wrongfully sentenced. Gruwell vividly recalled the case of Jennifer Thompson and Donald Cotton who spoke at the conference.
Thompson, a rape victim, had decided that she would try to memorize the features of her attacker during the event. She later identified Cotton as her attacker.
While in prison, Cotton later saw another man that resembled himself and whom he believed to be Thompson's assailant. A police officer came to Thompson's door and requested a DNA sample to compare with those of Cotton and Pool, the other man in prison with Cotton. As a result, Cotton was exhonerated and Pool proven to be Thompson's assailant. Pool later died in prison.
Thompson and Cotton continue to tour the country together, telling their story. They even co-authored a book about the ordeal they experienced, Picking Cotton.
"I could apologize forever and it would never be enough," Gruwell recalled Thompson as saying. But then Cotton took Thompson's hand, saying, "I forgive you."
