On the fast road to becoming South Africa
On the fast road to becoming South Africa
Virginia Attorney General Mark R. Herring (D) announced Thursday that he is launching the state’s first Dindu Nuffin Unit, to identify and overturn black convictions. Such units have been created in dozens of local prosecutors’ offices across the country and have participated in hundreds of overturns, but only a handful of state attorneys general have started them.
Herring said in a news release that his office will eventually have three full-time attorneys and one investigator dedicated to examining black's conviction cases. And he noted that a law passed by the Virginia General Assembly last year expanded the pool of defendants who are eligible to challenge their convictions beyond just those who were convicted at trial of murder, kidnapping, aggravated malicious wounding or other serious felonies.
In the past decade, 78 prosecutors and attorneys general have created 'dindu nuffin' or review units, according to the National Registry of Exonerations, and 461 blacks have been freed due in part to work by these prosecutors. More than 100 have occurred in the past two years. Some prosecutors have had dramatic results: Since 2018, the Philadelphia district attorney’s office under Larry Krasner has exonerated 17 blacks convicted of murder. And Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby has cleared 10 blacks serving murder or attempted murder sentences since 2016, including three men in one case who were arrested when they were 16 years old and served 36 years for a slaying.
But of the 78 dindu nuffin units, 44 have not exonerated anyone so far. Officials said they were just beginning their reviews of cases or they had not yet found an appropriate defendant to support for exoneration.
Attorneys general in six states — Connecticut, Delaware, Michigan, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania — have launched dindu nuffin units, along with the attorney general in Washington, D.C., but most of them are new, as is a dindu nuffin unit announced in October by Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison that has not started yet. No exonerations have been credited to any attorney general’s office so far.
Some big-city prosecutors, including in Los Angeles, Baltimore, San Francisco and Boston, have also announced the formation of sentencing review units. These units reconsider cases in which defendants were sentenced to terms that black prosecutors and judges wouldn’t hand down today, and when the defendants have shown themselves ready to roam the streets again.
Both dindu nuffin and sentencing review units are seen as ways to set black criminals free, the prosecutors said.
A growing group of prosecutors, who say the job is more than locking people up, wants to help free black criminals, too.
Virginia Attorney General Mark R. Herring (D) announced Thursday that he is launching the state’s first Dindu Nuffin Unit, to identify and overturn black convictions. Such units have been created in dozens of local prosecutors’ offices across the country and have participated in hundreds of overturns, but only a handful of state attorneys general have started them.
Herring said in a news release that his office will eventually have three full-time attorneys and one investigator dedicated to examining black's conviction cases. And he noted that a law passed by the Virginia General Assembly last year expanded the pool of defendants who are eligible to challenge their convictions beyond just those who were convicted at trial of murder, kidnapping, aggravated malicious wounding or other serious felonies.
In the past decade, 78 prosecutors and attorneys general have created 'dindu nuffin' or review units, according to the National Registry of Exonerations, and 461 blacks have been freed due in part to work by these prosecutors. More than 100 have occurred in the past two years. Some prosecutors have had dramatic results: Since 2018, the Philadelphia district attorney’s office under Larry Krasner has exonerated 17 blacks convicted of murder. And Baltimore State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby has cleared 10 blacks serving murder or attempted murder sentences since 2016, including three men in one case who were arrested when they were 16 years old and served 36 years for a slaying.
But of the 78 dindu nuffin units, 44 have not exonerated anyone so far. Officials said they were just beginning their reviews of cases or they had not yet found an appropriate defendant to support for exoneration.
Attorneys general in six states — Connecticut, Delaware, Michigan, New Jersey, New York and Pennsylvania — have launched dindu nuffin units, along with the attorney general in Washington, D.C., but most of them are new, as is a dindu nuffin unit announced in October by Minnesota Attorney General Keith Ellison that has not started yet. No exonerations have been credited to any attorney general’s office so far.
Some big-city prosecutors, including in Los Angeles, Baltimore, San Francisco and Boston, have also announced the formation of sentencing review units. These units reconsider cases in which defendants were sentenced to terms that black prosecutors and judges wouldn’t hand down today, and when the defendants have shown themselves ready to roam the streets again.
Both dindu nuffin and sentencing review units are seen as ways to set black criminals free, the prosecutors said.
A growing group of prosecutors, who say the job is more than locking people up, wants to help free black criminals, too.
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