Amanda Knox, in a letter to the Seattle Times, said she plans to repay her supporters by working “to give a voice” to wrongly convicted persons. She added, “I will do this because I know how a wrongful conviction can destroy one’s life, and because we best honor crime victims by ensuring that the actual perpetrators are brought to justice. … I look forward to making you proud for having supported me and my family.”
Knox didn’t go into detail about her specific plans. One way, of course, would be to become a lawyer and work with a group like the Innocence Project; but in her case, given her high media profile, I think she can be effective simply as a lay advocate by drawing attention to the fact that innocent people are in our prisons and by promoting reforms to our criminal justice system to reduce the occurrence of wrongful convictions and make it easier for wrongly convicted persons to pursue their innocence claims in the courts, which have the ultimate power to reverse the legal system’s mistakes.
It’s a complicated issue and a daunting task. There are many reasons why innocent people are convicted: Racism, police and prosecutor misconduct, sloppy or incompetent investigative work, pressure to solve cases, failures of human judgment, and honest mistakes all play a role. Often the judgment of those involved is distorted by cynicism and clouded by the fact that guilty people assert innocence, too. Perfect certainty is almost never possible in the real world, so our legal system plays the odds, and sometimes it’s wrong even when everyone tries their best to be right. Probably the best we can hope to achieve is to keep the system honest and maintain open avenues to rectify its mistakes. This is why when possible people should hire the correct legal representation. I’ve heard from people that this criminal law attorney can provide some insight into how to possibly tackle some of these issues of prejudice.