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Former Marine Kirk Bloodsworth was convicted of sexual assault,
rape, and first-degree premeditated murder in 1984. He was sentenced
to death and spent two of his nine years in prison on death row.
But Bloodsworth’s case turned out to be the first capital conviction
to be overturned as a result of DNA testing in the United States.
Today, as a Program Officer for The Justice Project and The Justice
Project Education Fund, Bloodsworth travels around the country to
tell the story of his conviction, incarceration, and release. He
will be on campus on Tuesday, October 13, at 7:30 pm to speak in the
Goodroe Auditorium in Memorial Hall. The event, sponsored by the
Office of Student Activities, is free and open to the public.
“This is not just a presentation for those with an interest or
background in criminal justice,” says Dr. Tony Simones, Assistant
Professor Political Science and Criminal Justice.
“Kirk Bloodsworth’s story is one that every citizen should know. His
case shows that our system is not perfect, and even an upstanding
and law-abiding individual can be unjustly convicted and placed on
death row.”
After Bloodsworth was sent to prison in 1984, he continued to
proclaim his innocence and was granted a new trial on the grounds
that evidence had been withheld from his first trial. However, he
was found guilty again and sentenced to two consecutive life terms.
His request to have a DNA test performed to exonerate him was
finally realized in 1993 when evidence from the crime scene
confirmed that Bloodsworth’s DNA did not match any of the evidence
received for testing. He was released from custody, and almost a
decade later, in September 2003, a DNA match was made in the case,
and the person who committed the murder pled guilty the following
May.
Simones says that the fact that a former Marine could be “railroaded
in this manner” shows that wrongful convictions can happen to
anyone.
“We have one of the best systems in the world, but Bloodsworth’s
plight shows that it is not perfect and we should be vigilant in our
insistence that it work properly and fairly.”
Bloodsworth has been an ardent supporter of the Innocence Protection
Act (IPA) since its introduction in Congress in February 2000. The
IPA established the Kirk Bloodsworth Post-Conviction DNA Testing
Program, a program that helps states defray the costs of
post-conviction DNA testing.
The dramatic story of Bloodsworth’s twenty-year journey is
chronicled in a book by Tim Junkin: Bloodsworth: The True Story of
the First Death Row Inmate Exonerated by DNA.
Bloodsworth has spoken about his story on numerous television shows,
including Oprah, and he has been featured in national publications,
including the New York Times Magazine. |
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