Ten years behind bars Innocent man in prison - 50 million dollars in compensation
A US citizen who spent almost ten years in prison for murder will receive 50 million dollars in compensation.
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- A US citizen was sentenced to 35 years in prison for complicity to murder. He will be released from prison after 10 years.
- His defense lawyers were able to prove that the authorities had used illegal means to force a confession out of him and falsified evidence.
- He receives 50 million dollars in compensation for the innocent time he served in prison.
A federal court in Chicago has awarded 34-year-old Marcel Brown 50 million dollars, the largest compensation for an innocent convicted individual plaintiff in US history, according to the law firm Loevy & Loevy. The man served almost ten years behind bars for murder.
Brown, an African-American, had been sentenced to 35 years in prison. A court had found him guilty of being an accomplice in the murder of a 19-year-old in 2008. However, the charges against him were dropped in 2018 and Brown was released from prison. His defense lawyers were able to prove that the authorities had used illegal means to force a confession out of him.
According to the law firm, police officers had locked Brown in an interrogation room for 30 hours and questioned him non-stop. They gave him nothing to eat, deprived him of sleep and did not allow him to call a lawyer despite repeated requests.
After a two-week trial, the jury came to the unanimous conclusion that the police officers had coerced Brown's confession and falsified evidence. They awarded him ten million dollars in compensation for the time between his arrest and conviction and a further 40 million dollars for the time he subsequently spent in custody.
