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Helping More Men Get Out Of Prison

After a ‘fabulous’ year, Innocence Project receives money to expand

By CHRISTIAN NOLAN

In 2007, friends of Karen Goodrow joked that she should just quit while she was ahead. Those comments came after her upstart Connecticut Innocence Project freed James Tillman, a man wrongfully convicted of rape and imprisoned for 18 years until Goodrow and DNA evidence proved otherwise.

But Goodrow didn’t rest on the laurels of the Tillman case. Indeed, her hard work culminated in a 2009 that may be difficult for her to top. This time, two innocent men were exonerated while serving lengthy prison terms.

Miguel Roman, after serving 20 years of a 60-year sentence for allegedly murdering his pregnant ex-girlfriend, was freed this spring after DNA tests revealed he could not have been the killer. Police have already charged a known sex offender for the same murder.

Kenneth Ireland, convicted of the rape and murder of a Wallingford factory worker, was freed in August after DNA and other evidence proved he, too, was innocent. Ireland had served 21 years in prison.

The icing on the cake is that the Connecticut Innocence Project learned recently it will be able to step up its efforts, thanks to federal grant funds that will create a partnership between Goodrow’s organization, which is a branch of the state Division of Public Defender Services, and state prosecutors.

Goodrow described this year simply as “fabulous.” Humbled by her selection as one of the Law Tribune’s “Dozen Who Made A Difference,” Goodrow said a lot of other people did a lot of work to make the exonerations possible.

“I always have this kind of mental image. If we look at Tillman, Roman and Ireland, how do they get from behind bars in their khaki prison uniform to on the street like a normal person?” said Goodrow. “It’s the 24 to 30 persons standing next to us that nobody sees that helped make that happen. It really is quite a fabric of all these folks that come together in small and large ways that help this occur.”

Cardboard Box

At its inception in 2004, the Connecticut Innocence Project consisted of Goodrow, then the Tolland public defender, and Brian Carlow, then Middlesex Public Defender, literally meeting for coffee someplace a couple times a month with a cardboard box full of old case files. “We couldn’t do it at either of our offices. There were too many disruptions,” Goodrow recalled.

Goodrow had some contacts at the Hartford office of McCarter & English who supported the initiative and said the project could use some of their firm’s office space when reviewing old case files. That office space turned out to be a 37th floor suite at Hartford’s City Place, where Goodrow’s organization remains, rent-free, to this day.

“It morphed from space to pro bono assistance on cases,” Goodrow said of the McCarter & English contributions. “I hate to sound too optimistic, but they’ve never said no” to helping us with a case.

“There’s nothing more important than making sure innocent people don’t spend their lives in prison,” said Eric Grondahl, managing partner of McCarter & English’s Hartford office. “I think her work is as important as any work anybody is doing in the state right now and we’re really proud to be associated with it.”

In 2007, Goodrow was officially named the Innocence Project’s first director, which enabled her to work on exonerations full time. Meanwhile, Carlow became the state’s deputy chief public defender. It was also that year when the legislature began funding the project, and Connecticut joined Kentucky and Maryland as the only three Innocence Projects nationwide run out of the public defender’s office.

“I feel like I got the support of the chief public defender’s office and on the other hand the support of McCarter & English. How can one lose with that kind of support?” said Goodrow.

With the state funding, Goodrow was then able to hire three additional full-time staff members, an investigator, Pete Palmer; a paralegal, Joan O’Rourke; and another full-time lawyer, Mike Lefebvre, who had been in private practice for about 15 years before joining the Innocence Project. Goodrow also has a slew of voluntary law school interns.

“I read about James Tillman and Karen Goodrow,” said Lefebvre. “I was impressed with the work that had been done for James and I saw the opportunity to apply for this position and I did.

“I was looking for an opportunity where I could make more of a difference in the lives of people in need,” continued Lefebvre. “I don’t mean that in a naïve way. I suppose with age comes the desire to make a difference. My daughter is a nurse. I can see she’s making a difference in the lives of the patients she works with.”

Goodrow said one of Lefebvre’s strengths is “taking a very complicated trial case and going through it with a fine-tooth comb, dissecting it, comparing inconsistencies among witnesses.”

Seven-Year Investigation

Goodrow said it took the staff about 2 ½ years worth of work to gain freedom for Roman and a little less than two years for Ireland. She said some cases could take even longer, especially if the evidence in the case hinges on more than just DNA.

For instance, she said the project is now working on a case where the critical evidence does not hinge on DNA results. Goodrow has personally been working on the case for more than seven years.

“It’s a good old fashioned investigation,” said Goodrow. “We’re getting close and when we have what we feel will be a compelling case we’ll bring it to the state.”

So far her relationship with prosecutors has been a smooth one, as the legal proceedings leading to the Tillman, Roman and Ireland exonerations were met with little resistance.

Because of that relationship between the two sides, the Innocence Project, the Chief State’s Attorney’s Office and the State Police Forensic Lab were recently awarded nearly $1.5 million in federal grant funds.

Goodrow explained that the grant calls for new investigations into murder, non-negligent manslaughter and forcible rape convictions where biological evidence can be tested for DNA and DNA might establish innocence. She said her Innocence Project does not otherwise limit their work to just those types of cases.

“That comes down to about 700 eligible inmates in Connecticut,” said Goodrow. “We’re in the process of notifying inmates of the program and that sort of thing.”

The grant is for 18 months and it has enabled Goodrow to hire additional full-time help. That includes John Watson, a retired lifelong public defender, and Darcy McGraw, a former distract attorney in New York who also worked in private practice in Connecticut for many years.

On the state’s attorney side, New Haven prosecutor James Clark will take the lead and will also hire an inspector. The state forensic lab will add two positions.

But Goodrow’s experience is that some of the best help often comes from people not on the payroll, ranging from interns to police officers to court clerks. “It’s often people that don’t know you who are kind,” Goodrow said. “People really just want to help.” •