A tragic judicial error has imprisoned two innocent men for 17 years in Los Angeles (California), in the United States. Dupree Glass and Juan Rayford, both black and with no criminal record, were sentenced to eleven life sentences for attempted murder.
The events occurred in 2004. They were 17 and 18 years old when they were arrested for their alleged involvement in a shooting during a fight in Lancaster, north of Los Angeles. Two people were injured, but their injuries were not serious. The conviction against Glass and Rayford was based on two witnesses who later recanted their statements.
On the contrary, they maintained from the first moment that they had not participated in the shooting and this has been corroborated by other witnesses throughout the investigation that their lawyers have located for five years. That search also led to the confession of the alleged perpetrator of the shots, named Chad Brandon McZeal and considered a member of a gang. He is currently serving a life sentence for another case.
In 2020 an appeal court overturned their convictions and they were released. This week his final exculpation has arrived. His case is the first to be tried under a law that guarantees compensation for defendants whose cases are dismissed and allows them to present evidence proving their innocence. After the exculpatory verdict, the state will have to compensate them with 140 dollars per day of prison sentence, which amounts to about 900,000 dollars for each of them.
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