US to free innocent man after 30 years
Source: Agencies |
January 5, 2011, Wednesday
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Print Edition
Print Edition
Cornelius Dupree Junior finally made parole in July, after spending 30 years in prison for aggravated robbery with a deadly weapon. A week later, DNA test results came back proving his innocence.
The 51-year-old Texas man was due to get his day in court late yesterday, when a judge was expected to set aside his conviction on claims of actual innocence. The hearing came a day after Dallas County District -Attorney Craig Watkins said the DNA testing shows Dupree "did not commit this crime."
Dupree may then be the longest-serving DNA exoneree in Texas, which has freed 41 wrongly convicted inmates through DNA since 2001 - more than any other state.
Nationally, only two other DNA exonerees spent more time in prison, according to the Innocence Project, a New York-based legal center representing Dupree that specializes in wrongful conviction cases. James Bain was wrongly imprisoned for 35 years in Florida, and Lawrence McKinney spent more than 31 years in a Tennessee prison.
Dupree's 30 years in prison will surpass James Woodard, who spent more than 27 years in a Texas prison before he was cleared of murder in 2008.
There have been 21 DNA exonerations in Dallas alone since 2001, more than any other county in the nation.
Dallas' record of DNA exonerations is unmatched nationally because the county crime lab keeps biological evidence even decades after a conviction, leaving samples available to test.
The testing in Dupree's case also excluded a second defendant, Anthony Massingill, who was convicted in another sexual assault case and sentenced to life in prison. Massingill remains in prison but maintains his innocence.
Dupree was charged in 1979 with raping and robbing a woman and was sentenced a year later to 75 years in prison for aggravated robbery. He was never tried on the rape charge.
According to court documents, the woman and her male companion stopped at a Dallas liquor store in -November 1979. As they returned to their car, two men, at least one of whom was armed, forced their way into the vehicle and ordered them to drive. They also demanded money from the two victims.
The men ordered the car to the side of the road and forced the male driver out of the car.
The perpetrators drove the woman to a park, where they raped her at gunpoint. They kept her driver's license and said they would kill her if she reported the attack.
Dupree and Massingill were arrested in December as they looked like two suspects in another sexual assault and robbery. The woman picked both men out of a photo array, but her male companion did not identify them.
The 51-year-old Texas man was due to get his day in court late yesterday, when a judge was expected to set aside his conviction on claims of actual innocence. The hearing came a day after Dallas County District -Attorney Craig Watkins said the DNA testing shows Dupree "did not commit this crime."
Dupree may then be the longest-serving DNA exoneree in Texas, which has freed 41 wrongly convicted inmates through DNA since 2001 - more than any other state.
Nationally, only two other DNA exonerees spent more time in prison, according to the Innocence Project, a New York-based legal center representing Dupree that specializes in wrongful conviction cases. James Bain was wrongly imprisoned for 35 years in Florida, and Lawrence McKinney spent more than 31 years in a Tennessee prison.
Dupree's 30 years in prison will surpass James Woodard, who spent more than 27 years in a Texas prison before he was cleared of murder in 2008.
There have been 21 DNA exonerations in Dallas alone since 2001, more than any other county in the nation.
Dallas' record of DNA exonerations is unmatched nationally because the county crime lab keeps biological evidence even decades after a conviction, leaving samples available to test.
The testing in Dupree's case also excluded a second defendant, Anthony Massingill, who was convicted in another sexual assault case and sentenced to life in prison. Massingill remains in prison but maintains his innocence.
Dupree was charged in 1979 with raping and robbing a woman and was sentenced a year later to 75 years in prison for aggravated robbery. He was never tried on the rape charge.
According to court documents, the woman and her male companion stopped at a Dallas liquor store in -November 1979. As they returned to their car, two men, at least one of whom was armed, forced their way into the vehicle and ordered them to drive. They also demanded money from the two victims.
The men ordered the car to the side of the road and forced the male driver out of the car.
The perpetrators drove the woman to a park, where they raped her at gunpoint. They kept her driver's license and said they would kill her if she reported the attack.
Dupree and Massingill were arrested in December as they looked like two suspects in another sexual assault and robbery. The woman picked both men out of a photo array, but her male companion did not identify them.
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