The University of Nebraska College of Law students will have the chance to get real world experience this fall, though the colleges new Innocence Law Clinic.
With the help of a $600,000 grant from the U.S. Department of Justice, and in partnership with the Midwest Innocence Project, third-year students in the College of Law will work to exonerate Nebraskan’s who have been wrongfully convicted. As part of the review of cases, students will help establish the primary causes of wrongful conviction, identify prevention methodologies, and raise awareness of wrongful convictions in Nebraska.
In Nebraska, more than 5,500 people are incarcerated in 10 state prisons and another 1,000 are in the custody of private prisons and local jails. Per data from the Prison Policy Initiative and U.S. Department of Justice, the state’s incarceration rate is among the highest in the nation.
According to the National Registry of Exonerations, since 1989, around 3,458 people have had their convictions vacated and were exonerated – meaning they were determined to be actually innocent, indicating their wrongful verdict was not due to procedural mishap that violated their rights. Those wrongfully convicted collectively served more than 31,070 years in prison for crimes they did not commit. Based off this data, one study estimates the current percentage of falsely convicted individuals in the US jail/prison population is 1%; another estimates it may be as much as 4 to 6%.
Extrapolating from these numbers, its estimated as many as 300 Nebraskan’s are currently serving sentences for crimes they did not commit. The new clinic aims to help those people.
There have been just 10 exonerations in Nebraska history, six of which stemmed from a single case: the now infamous Beatrice Six.
Partnering with the Midwest Innocence Project and under the supervision of the clinic director, students will review and investigate cases for potential claims of innocence for individuals whose cases originated in Nebraska and who have applied for assistance from the Midwest Innocence Project. The grant funding provided by the Department of Justice will assist in moving more than 41 cases from the existing waitlist forward.
University of Nebraska College of Law
Dean of the UNL College of Law, Richard Moberly spoke discussed the new clinic on Wednesday’s episode of the Dan Parsons Show.
To give our students practical experiences before they head out our doors is really unique,” said the Dean. He added that in these politically polarizing times, this clinic is something everyone can get behind: “Nobody wants innocent people in jail. So if we can figure out a way to get the truly innocent—who, for whatever reason, got caught up and wrongfully convicted in the system—freed, it would be a great thing for justice.”
The Innocence Clinic will be Nebraska’s 10th clinical program. The others are the Children’s Justice Clinic, Civil Clinic, Criminal Clinic, Debtor’s Defense Clinic, Estate Planning Clinic, First Amendment Clinic, Housing Justice Clinic, Immigration Clinic and Weibling Entrepreneurship Clinic.