grey-at-law

House Bill 4250 has been introduced and referred to the Judiciary Committee for consideration. It is a component of a list of reforms urged by the Innocence Project to address the infrequent, but disastrous problem of conviction and imprisonment of demonstrably innocent individuals. It would allow exonerated individuals to recover compensation for time wrongly imprisoned, economic damages, and physical and mental health care. In short, it would afford wrongfully imprisoned individuals the means to begin to make their lives whole again.

The increasing use of DNA testing to establish identity of criminal suspects has also enabled onclusive exoneration of a significant number of convicted and imprisoned individuals. (However, one exoneration would be a significant number if you were that one individual.) The Innocence Project has been doing a commendable job in bringing attention to this situation and advocating for legislative change. They currently report 215 post-conviction DNA exonerations in the United States. (more…)

is that they are inflexible. A decision released this past week by the Michigan Court of Appeals is an illustration of this feature of the Michigan SOR statute. In the published opinion PEOPLE OF MI V ERIC J HESCH (opinion here) the court followed the letter of the Michigan statute and concluded that Mr. Hesch was properly denied his petition to be removed from the requirement that he continue to register as a sex offender.

Mr. Hesch was age eleven at the time that he committed the acts that led to his guilty plea to second degree criminal sexual conduct.

He sought the removal on the grounds that he was 11 years of age and had a low maturity level at the time of the offense. Defendant, age 19 at the time of his petition, presented evidence that various psychologists and psychiatrists had concluded that he is not a sexual predator and is not likely to commit another sex crime. Defendant did not have any subsequent arrests or convictions for criminal sexual conduct or related offenses.

But by the letter of the law, these mitigating factors are irrelevant. (more…)

As is typical with political scandals, a lot of talk is flying around concerning the running story of Detroit’s Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick’s latest troubles, dubbed the text message scandal. If you do not know the story, go elsewhere for details.

The mayor added to the talk last night, when in his scheduled annual State of the City address, he deviated from his prepared remarks. The Michigan Public Radio story I heard this morning said that his off-the-cuff remarks generated the largest response of the night from the invitation-only audience. (more…)

Yesterday I wrote my inaugural post of this blog, a description of the difficulty I seemed to be having while trying to meet with my Michigan legislative representative, Shanelle Jackson. I had no idea if anyone was going to be finding and reading this blog yet. I had a story that amused me, and I thought would be amusing to others, so I told things as they had happened to me. In the title, I gave a nod to a 1985 movie starring Madonna.

I am happy to report that my search is over. I will be meeting with Rep. Jackson next Monday. Before lunch today I got an email that a response to my post was waiting to be approved. Within fifteen minutes, a second response was waiting to be approved. This one was from Shanelle Jackson herself. (more…)

My Michigan legislative representative is freshman Shanelle Jackson, District 9. I have a concern that I would like to bring before her, to hopefully get her support of legislation that I favor. I could write a letter, but want more than a form letter response. I thought that seeing her in person at a public meeting in the district would be a good choice, as I can not conveniently visit Lansing.

For some reason this plan has not worked out yet. I have actually gone on four different occasions to a location that her staff (or a newsletter) told me that she would be present at a meeting. There turned out to be no meeting that day at that location. What is going on? (more…)