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WASHINGTON - December 9 -
A Pennsylvania man today became the 112th person to be freed from death row because of factual innocence after prosecutors announced they are dropping charges against him.
Nicholas James Yarris, 41, has spent 21 years on death row for a crime he did not commit. He is Pennsylvania's fifth exoneree and the 10th of this year. According to the Death Penalty Information Center, the ten people who have been freed from death row due to actual innocence in 2003 ties a record set in 1987, when ten people also were exonerated.
"The death penalty in America is not merely flawed; it is broken and beyond repair," said Brian Roberts, executive director of the National Coalition to Abolish the Death Penalty. "For every eight people that have been executed in this country during the past three decades, one person has been found to be actually innocent. The 112 people found to be innocent were not released due to what some might call a legal technicality - flawed jury instruction, for example - but because they actually did not do the crime."
In recent years, the number of exonerated people freed from death row due to actual innocence has slowly but steadily increased. In 2003, nine people were removed from death row due to actual innocence, and between 1999 and 2003, a total of 34 people were exonerated.
"We expect this trend will continue in 2004," Roberts said. "We are monitoring innocence cases in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Ohio, Tennessee and Texas and we anticipate exonerations in some, if not all, of these states. This evolving story is a further reminder of how the death penalty system is ensnaring innocent Americans in its complicated legal web. It is a system plagued by racial problems, incompetent attorneys, unethical law enforcement officers and prosecutors and appeals courts that are becoming increasingly indifferent to mistakes made at the trial level."
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