Exonerated by DNA After 16 Years in Prison

Since 1973 a total of 114 innocent persons sentenced to death in 25 states have been exonerated and released from death row, many after being imprisoned for a decade or more, and some after narrowly avoiding execution by only a few days. (Five of the exonerees--Jerry Banks, Earl Charles, James Edward Creamer, Gary X. Nelson, and Robert Lewis Wallace--were Georgia death row inmates.) In addition, since 1989 no less than 138 innocent convicted persons (including some of the 114 death row exonerees) have been exonerated and released from prison due to the efforts of the New York-based Innocence Project, a legal clinic at Cardozo law school which litigates cases where DNA testing of evidence can yield conclusive proof of innocence