Innocence Project

Dennis Maher sits in a black cushioned desk chair in a family room stockpiled with toys. He has wild steely hair, a bushy gray beard and calm eyes. His 5-year-old daughter, Aliza, is pulling a plastic Little Mermaid-themed vanity across the smooth hardwood floor with surprising speed. Maher watches patiently as she clicks a purple flower into place; the tiny vanity begins to whir and twinkle while the distorted strum of a wistful harpsichord completes the magic. Aliza shrieks with delight and jumps onto Maher's lap, burrowing he r child-sized glasses in his broad chest.

In the summer of 2002, Brian Banks' future looked bright: He was a 17-year-old high school football star being heavily recruited by a number of colleges. But in a single day that changed with the accusations of kidnapping and rape by a female student. He maintained there was no rape and their sexual contact was consensual but his lawyer urged him to plead no contest rather than risk a sentence of 41 years to life in prison if convicted. He followed the advice and went to prison for six years, shattering his dreams of gridiron glory.

In the summer of 2002, Brian Banks' future looked bright: He was a 17-year-old high school football star being heavily recruited by a number of colleges. But in a single day that changed with the accusations of kidnapping and rape by a female student. He maintained there was no rape and their sexual contact was consensual but his lawyer urged him to plead no contest rather than risk a sentence of 41 years to life in prison if convicted. He followed the advice and went to prison for six years, shattering his dreams of gridiron glory.

GEORGETOWN, Texas - A Texas grocery store employee who was wrongly convicted and spent nearly 25 years in prison in his wife's beating death walked free yesterday after DNA tests showed another man was responsible. His attorneys say prosecutors and investigators deliberately kept evidence out of court that would have helped acquit him at trial. Michael Morton, 57, was convicted on circumstantial evidence in the August 1986 death of his wife, Christine. Morton said he left her and the couple's 3-year-old son to head to work at 5:30 a.m. that day and steadfastly maintained...

DALLAS — A courtroom packed with family and friends burst into applause yesterday when a judge freed a Dallas man who spent 27 years in prison for aggravated sexual assault before DNA evidence cleared him. Johnny Pinchback, the 22d person to be exonerated through DNA testing in Dallas County since 2001, was found to have been wrongly convicted of raping two teenage girls in a Dallas field in 1984. Dressed in a white pinstriped suit, Pinchback, 55, said faith and support from his family kept him motivated to fight for his innocence.

NEW ORLEANS -- Nearly 30 years after Darrel Miles was sent to prison for rape, he thought he was on his way to proving his innocence. Now he worries that his chance for freedom was destroyed by Hurricane Katrina. The organization known as the Innocence Project found that some of the DNA evidence from the crime scene in Miles's case had been saved, possibly giving him a chance to clear himself of the 1978 rape. But Katrina raged through New Orleans, flooding the police evidence rooms to the ceilings.

DALLAS - A wrongly convicted man freed by DNA evidence is suing his civil lawyer and an Innocence Project of Texas official, saying they want too large a chunk of the nearly $1.3 million he received for spending 16 years in prison. Patrick Waller, wrongly imprisoned from 1992 to 2008, is on an expanding list of Texas DNA exonerees upset over what they call excessive attorney fees. His lawsuit filed this week is the second in a month as a formerly feel-good story about freedom and delayed justice devolves into a battle over turf and money.

DALLAS -- In a case that has renewed questions about the quality of Texas justice, a man who spent 10 years behind bars for the rape of a boy has become the 12th person in Dallas County to be cleared by DNA evidence. That is more DNA exonerations than in all of California, and more than in Florida, too. In fact, Dallas County has more such cases than all but three states -- a situation one Texas lawmaker calls an "international embarrassment. " James Waller, 50, was exonerated by a judge earlier this week and received an apology from the district...

DALLAS — A Texas man declared innocent yesterday after 30 years in prison had at least two chances to make parole and be set free — if only he would admit he was a sex offender. But Cornelius Dupree Jr. refused to do so, doggedly maintaining his innocence in a 1979 rape and robbery, in the process serving more time for a crime he didn’t commit than any other Texas inmate exonerated by DNA evidence. “Whatever your truth is, you have to stick with it,’’ Dupree, 51, said yesterday, minutes after a Dallas judge...

GEORGETOWN, Texas - A Texas grocery store employee who was wrongly convicted and spent nearly 25 years in prison in his wife's beating death walked free yesterday after DNA tests showed another man was responsible. His attorneys say prosecutors and investigators deliberately kept evidence out of court that would have helped acquit him at trial. Michael Morton, 57, was convicted on circumstantial evidence in the August 1986 death of his wife, Christine. Morton said he left her and the couple's 3-year-old son to head to work at 5:30 a.m. that day and steadfastly...

Dennis Maher sits in a black cushioned desk chair in a family room stockpiled with toys. He has wild steely hair, a bushy gray beard and calm eyes. His 5-year-old daughter, Aliza, is pulling a plastic Little Mermaid-themed vanity across the smooth hardwood floor with surprising speed. Maher watches patiently as she clicks a purple flower into place; the tiny vanity begins to whir and twinkle while the distorted strum of a wistful harpsichord completes the magic. Aliza shrieks with delight and jumps onto Maher's lap, burrowing he r child-sized glasses in his broad chest.

DALLAS — A courtroom packed with family and friends burst into applause yesterday when a judge freed a Dallas man who spent 27 years in prison for aggravated sexual assault before DNA evidence cleared him. Johnny Pinchback, the 22d person to be exonerated through DNA testing in Dallas County since 2001, was found to have been wrongly convicted of raping two teenage girls in a Dallas field in 1984. Dressed in a white pinstriped suit, Pinchback, 55, said faith and support from his family kept him motivated to fight for his innocence.

EVANSTON, Ill. — A Northwestern University journalism professor whose students are credited with helping to free more than 10 innocent men from prison — including death row — has been pulled from the class that made him famous amid allegations of ethics violations. David Protess told the Chicago Tribune he was notified by e-mail this week that he wouldn’t be teaching the investigative journalism course for the upcoming quarter. He will continue as director of the Medill Innocence Project, but he said he doesn’t know whether the project will continue to be...

DALLAS — A Texas man declared innocent yesterday after 30 years in prison had at least two chances to make parole and be set free — if only he would admit he was a sex offender. But Cornelius Dupree Jr. refused to do so, doggedly maintaining his innocence in a 1979 rape and robbery, in the process serving more time for a crime he didn’t commit than any other Texas inmate exonerated by DNA evidence. “Whatever your truth is, you have to stick with it,’’ Dupree, 51, said yesterday, minutes after a Dallas judge overturned his...

DALLAS — A Texas man who spent more time in prison than any other inmate cleared by DNA evidence in the state is expected to have a court overturn his conviction at an exoneration hearing today. Cornelius Dupree Jr., 51, was paroled out of prison in July after 30 years behind bars for aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon. DNA test results that came back 10 days after his release excluded him as the person who raped and robbed a Dallas woman in 1979. The Dallas County district attorney’s office said yesterday it supports Dupree’s innocence claim.

DALLAS — A DNA test on a single hair has cast doubt on the guilt of a Texas man who was put to death 10 years ago for a liquor-store murder — an execution that went forward after Governor George W. Bush’s staff failed to tell him the condemned man was asking for genetic analysis of the strand. The hair had been the only piece of physical evidence linking Claude Jones to the crime scene. But the recently completed DNA analysis found it did not belong to Jones and instead could have come from the murder victim.

HATTIESBURG, Miss. — A judge yesterday freed two men who spent three decades in prison before DNA evidence showed they did not rape a woman and cut her throat in a grisly 1979 attack. A crowded courtroom erupted in applause after Forrest County Circuit Judge Robert Helfrich’s set aside the men’s guilty pleas, ending a 30-year ordeal for the imprisoned men. Helfrich said the case was marked by a series of tragic events — from the violent attack on the woman to the years the men spent in prison for a crime they did not commit.

HATTIESBURG, Miss. — A judge yesterday freed two men who spent three decades in prison before DNA evidence showed they did not rape a woman and cut her throat in a grisly 1979 attack. A crowded courtroom erupted in applause after Forrest County Circuit Judge Robert Helfrich’s set aside the men’s guilty pleas, ending a 30-year ordeal for the imprisoned men. Helfrich said the case was marked by a series of tragic events — from the violent attack on the woman to the years the men spent in prison for a crime they did not commit.