![handle is hein.journals/vlrtoleg67 and id is 1 raw text is: Comment
HOPE EMERGES FROM THE SHADOWS: RIOJAS AND MCCOY OFFER
NEW TOOL FOR EXONOREES
JACK NELSON*
Justice delayed is justice denied. - William Gladstone
I. MISCARRIAGES OF JUSTICE: PHILADELPHIA'S RAMPANT WRONGFUL
CONVICTIONS
In June 2021, forty-nine-year-old Theophalis Wilson moved into his first
apartment since he was a teenager.1 In 1989, police identified then seventeen-year-
old Wilson as a suspect in a North Philadelphia triple murder; four years later he
was behind bars, convicted, and sentenced to life without parole.2 In 2020, Wilson
became the twelfth person exonerated by Philadelphia District Attorney Larry
Krasner's Conviction Integrity Unit (CIU) after serving twenty-eight years of his
life sentence.3
Wilson's trial was a perfect storm of prosecutorial misconduct, teeming
with lying witnesses, ineffective assistance of counsel, and withholding exculpatory
evidence.4 After spending years trying to challenge his conviction, Wilson finally
convinced the CIU to review his case, which precipitated his release.5 However,
* J.D. Candidate, 2023, Villanova University Charles Widger School of Law; B.A., 2019,
Boston College. This Comment is dedicated to my parents, who have always supported me in my
endeavors.
1. Samantha Melamed, As Philly Tops Two Dozen Exonerations, City May Face Tens of Millions in
Cii/Liabiliy, PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER (June 13, 2021) https://www.in-
quirer.com/news /wrongful-convictions-philadelphia-civil-settlements-lawsuits-20210613.html
(detailing that Wilson recently got married and started a nonprofit called Before It's Too Late).
Wilson also works part-time as a legal apprentice at Phillips Black, the law firm that helped free
him. Id.
2. See id. (noting that Wilson and his twenty-nine-year-old co-defendant were convicted and
sentenced in 1993 based solely on the testimony of a criminal informant who gave multiple con-
flicting statements).
3. See id. (detailing how the CIU has uncovered a deep catalog of problems in Pennsylva-
nia's legal system). See also Theophais Wilson Exonerated After 28 Years in Pennsyvania Prison, EQUAL
JUSTICE INITIATIVE (Jan. 24, 2020) https://eji.org/news/theophalis-wilson-exonerated-after-28-
years-in-pennsylvania-prison/ [hereinafter Wilson Exonerated] (No words can express what we
have put these people through; what we have put Mr. Wilson through; what we have put his fam-
ily through ... what we have put our community through, said the judge who exonerated him).
4. See Wilson Exonerated, supra note 3 (acknowledging that Wilson's trial was infected by
serious prosecutorial misconduct, Brady violations, a critical witness who supplied false testimony,
and ineffective assistance of counsel). For decades, the Philadelphia District Attorney's Office
concealed evidence, undisclosed deals in exchange for testimony, corrupt relationships with in-
formants, and inadequate funding of defense counsel that condemned men to prison for dec-
ades. Id.
5. See id. (citing Philadelphia prosecutors' violation of Brady v. Maryland, the CIU moved to
withdraw all charges against Wilson). Wilson had been challenging his conviction without legal
help for years, however, he finally got his case into court after the Supreme Court struck down
mandatory life-without-parole sentences for children in Miller v. Alabama, which gave Wilson a
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