Gov. Mike Parson raises an interesting, but not terribly well-informed, point about how Missouri’s criminal justice system works. Last week in a radio interview, he questioned why the state should be the one to compensate wrongfully convicted prisoners when county prosecutors are the ones responsible for sending innocent people to prison.
It’s a fair question. County prosecutors are the ones who receive criminal cases and weigh whether there’s adequate evidence to win a conviction. County prosecutors act as agents of the state in criminal cases, and it’s because they’re acting on the state’s behalf that they have the power to send a person to a state prison.
In an interview last week with Kansas City public radio, Parson was asked about compensation for wrongfully convicted people like Kevin Strickland, who spent 42 years in prison for a triple murder he didn’t commit. He was freed in November but didn’t receive a dime in state compensation.
“Who is responsible for that, if there is a responsibility party?” Parson asked. “I just think, to say: OK, all the taxpayers in the state of Missouri are responsible for that. … If he was wrongfully convicted in a county or in a city, what responsibilities do they have to that?”
County prosecutors have authority to decide which cases to pursue, and they are responsible for abiding by all state laws concerning prosecutorial ethics. If they hide exculpatory evidence or ignore credible information pointing to another person’s guilt, state law should ensure they are held accountable. At the same time, newspapers across the state have been telling Parson for years that strong witness testimony pointed to Strickland’s innocence, yet Parson was uninterested and repeatedly refused to pardon him. In the end, it was Parson who made the decision to keep a wrongfully convicted man in prison. To quote Parson, “Who is responsible for that?”
The Legislature should be asking whether counties deserve to foot at least part of the compensation bill, but lawmakers first must establish that wrongful conviction — regardless of how it is affirmed — is government’s responsibility to correct with generous compensation. Missouri currently allows a pittance in compensation, and then only when DNA testing proves innocence.
Texas, where Republicans hold a supermajority, ranks among the most generous in the country when it comes to compensating the wrongfully convicted. Why? Because Texas conservatives believe in personal responsibility, and they extend the concept to the state when it’s the state that has committed a wrong. When any person is wrongfully deprived of liberty, Texas conservatives embrace the concept of compensation with gusto. Texas pays $80,000 per year of wrongful imprisonment — DNA or not.
Before quibbling about who covers the cost, Parson should start by acknowledging that the wrongfully convicted deserve to be pardoned, and that they deserve full and fair compensation for having been robbed of their freedom. That’s the conservative thing to do.
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