Oregon bill streamlining payout process for wrongfully convicted draws support

Yahoo

7 days ago

A new bill aiming to speed up and improve the compensation process for wrongfully convicted individuals is gaining support in the Oregon Legislature.
Oregonians who have been wrongfully imprisoned can petition the state for tens of thousands of dollars in compensation and an official finding of innocence, a process that criminal justice reform advocates have long complained drags on and shortchanges exonerees.
But a new bill introduced in February, Senate Bill 1007, aims to solve that problem by making it easier and faster to obtain compensation and findings of innocence from the state. The measure's provisions would set a deadline for an initial written decision on compensation at 180 days and allow the state to consider new evidence that comes to light after previous trials.
'We have not seen this kind of delay and fight everything to the death attitude across the country,' said Janis Puracal, executive director of the Portland-based Forensic Justice Project. 'Oregon is doing that entirely differently than what the rest of the country is doing.'
Forty states currently have laws on the books ensuring a pathway for wrongfully convicted individuals to receive compensation.
The measure unanimously cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee in March, and it's currently sitting in the Joint Ways and Means committee, where it will be evaluated alongside other spending priorities in the state budget. The bill's fiscal impact is 'indeterminate,' according to a bill analysis, because the deadline will reduce legal costs but the bill may prompt more settlements and claims. Lawmakers have yet to set a hearing date.
'I'm hoping it can be made a priority,' said Sen. Kim Thatcher, R-Keizer, one of the bill's two primary authors, in an interview. Far too often, settlements with Oregon's Department of Justice have actually resulted in 'pennies on the dollar' for exonerees, she said. That process, she said, was fueled by 'hostile compliance' from former Attorney General Ellen Rosenblum.
'They're not the party who committed the crime and therefore shouldn't have done the time,' she said. 'To execute what was intended is what we're trying to do now.'
The new bill's thrust traces back to a 2022 law allowing those who have been wrongfully accused of a crime to receive reimbursements of $65,000 for each year of imprisonment and $25,000 additionally for each year of post-release supervision.
So far, only eight of the 35 petitions for redress filed have been settled, according to an Oregon DOJ spokeswoman. The department successfully resisted two petitions by winning trials, and another eight were dismissed by the court system. The other 19 cases are still being negotiated, and the department estimates that another 35 cases are still awaiting petitions to be filed.
SB 1007 would build on previous law by broadening the scope of proof acceptable for those cases to show innocence. Receiving clemency or pardon by the governor, or being listed on a 'nationally recognized' registry for exonerated individuals would all be ways to meet the requirements. The bill would also allow for petitions claiming losses in education through standardized college tuition and health insurance fees, as well as reimbursements for costs paid to expert witnesses.
Under amendments passed in a March committee hearing, the legislation would go into effect July 15, mandating the Oregon Department of Justice and Attorney General Dan Rayfield review all cases, past and present, in which exonerees have petitioned for compensation. He would have 180 days to make a written determination.
The campaign to reform Oregon's compensation process gained steam in the wake of several stories from formerly incarcerated activists who have pointed to new evidence after trial and procedural errors by authorities. One of them is Philip Scott Cannon.
Cannon was arrested for a 1998 murder in Polk County on the eve of his oldest son's ninth birthday, he recalls. A jury found him guilty just two years later, and he received three life sentences. When he alleged his trial lawyer failed to adequately challenge prosecutors' bullet casing evidence in 2009, however, his conviction was vacated for a new trial.
But forensic evidence had also gone missing in exchanges between local prosecutors and the Oregon Department of Justice, and it wasn't uncovered until 2011. A year later, the local district attorney announced that he would be reconsidering the evidence and whether to charge Cannon again. No charges have been filed.
Twenty-four years after his arrest, Cannon filed in 2022 for compensation with the state, but he said nothing has come of the case. He already missed the birth of his youngest son while he was in custody awaiting trial. The first time he held him in his arms was in prison. He's spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on trials and litigation, seeing how his kids changed after being bullied in school amid the publicity of his case.
'There should be something that is done to make things right, at least some effort,' he said. 'Right now, it's been like pulling teeth to get the DOJ to do anything.'
The Oregon DOJ and Rayfield have taken a neutral position on the legislation. But they have been providing input to the bill's supporters so that the law can be implemented if passed.
'We take our responsibility seriously when it comes to ensuring access to justice,' Oregon DOJ spokeswoman Jenny Hansson said in a statement. 'We've worked with advocates to craft clearer legal language in the bill and suggested ways to move away from time-consuming trials to a more streamlined administrative process, as some other states have done.'
Thatcher said she supports the effort to streamline an administrative process, but the specifics need to be 'spelled out in statute' to avoid variation depending on different elected attorney general's enforcement policies.
'I want it to be as specific as it can be, while allowing them latitude in how they're going to execute it,' she said. 'What we did last time was allowing too much.'
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