DNA Testing Bill Would Protect the Innocent
By Jennifer Thompson
Thompson, a North Carolina resident, tells her story and explains her support for a DNA bill in the U.S. Senate, which provides funds to help victims and improve the criminal justice system. In the summer of 1984, I was raped at knifepoint by a man who broke into my apartment. I was 22 years old.
As I felt the cold metal of his knife against my throat, I promised myself that I would do everything I could to make sure that this man would be punished for his crime. If I survived this nightmare, I would take with me the memory of his face - I would make no mistake, and I certainly wouldn’t forget.
I remember feeling a sense of urgency to cement every detail of my attacker’s face in my mind. I looked for scars, tattoos - I even studied his hairline. I knew that these details would help the authorities capture him and, more so, help me identify him later.
The authorities brought me to the precinct after several days to help them identify the man who attacked me by looking at a series of police photos. On another occasion, I picked out the same man in a lineup. Both times, I was completely sure that I had identified the right man. I knew this man, and now I knew that he would pay for his crime.
Based on my sworn testimony in 1985, Ronald Junior Cotton was sentenced to life in prison. I couldn’t have been more relieved; the nightmare was ending, and I now could pick up the pieces of my life and start anew.
Two years later, another inmate, Bobby Poole, bragged to a cellmate that he was my attacker, and an appellate court overturned Mr. Cotton’s conviction. When Poole was brought into court during a pretrial hearing, I swore under oath that I had never seen him before. Mr. Cotton was sentenced again to two life sentences.
Eleven years after my ordeal, Cotton was still proclaiming his innocence. In 1995, I agreed to a DNA test so that the evidence could confirm what I already knew, and I could move on, once and for all.
But the results of the DNA test told me the most shocking news of my life: Ronald Cotton did not rape me. The man I had condemned in court was innocent. The man who had ripped my life from me, the man I was so sure I had never seen in my life, was Bobby Poole.
As a result of these experiences, I learned that serious error exists in our criminal justice system. When the system works, the guilty are punished and the innocent are protected. In this case, an innocent man was wrongfully accused and incarcerated for 11 years while the true rapist remained free to endanger society.
Thanks to tremendous advances in forensic DNA testing, it is possible for rape survivors and victims of violent crimes to feel completely confident in the way our criminal justice system determines guilt and innocence.
Legislators, including Sen. John Edwards, are now recognizing how DNA evidence provides conclusive proof that the right people are being punished for their crimes. The Advancing Justice Through DNA Technology Act is the most comprehensive legislation to date that harnesses the potential of DNA technology and improves the quality of legal representation in capital cases.
Currently, there are more than 300,000 untested rape kits waiting in state labs to be tested. This bill will provide $755 million to states to clear up the DNA backlog, so rapists can be identified, and rape victims can begin to take the road to recovery. It will also authorize more than $500 million for state labs and programs to better keep up with testing demands.
Another provision of the legislation, the “Kirk Bloodsworth Post-Conviction DNA Testing Program,” provides $25 million over five years to help states pay for the costs of post-conviction DNA testing. Ronald Cotton, who spent 11 years in jail for a crime he never committed, deserved the opportunity to prove his innocence. I deserved to know the truth.
Because they knew it would serve the interests victims of violent crime like me, and innocent people like Mr. Cotton, but also the interests of all American citizens who deserve fairness and accuracy in our criminal justice system, Republicans, Democrats and Independents came forward and voted overwhelmingly to pass this bill in the U.S. House of Representatives last November.
In 2002, over 200,000 women above the age of 12 were the victims of sexual assault. I hope that during April, National Sexual Assault Awareness & Prevention Month, our legislators will continue to build on the bipartisan spirit that moved this bill through the House and show their support for victims’ needs and rights by cosponsoring and passing the bill in the Senate before April 30.
This editorial originally ran in the Durham Herald-Sun (North Carolina).
