Ricky Jackson is an African-American man who spent nearly 40 years behind bars in Ohio for a murder he did not commit.
On the discovery of his innocence, he was awarded $2 million from the state for his wrongful imprisonment. A witness had falsely testified against him.
This will not be the first time a black American was lied against in the court house.
A United States report released in April, says that one in every 25 death row inmates in the United States is innocent.
Together with his friend Wiley Bridgeman, Rick Jackson was convicted for the murder of a businessman, Harry Franks on May 19, 1975. Both had served 40 long years in prison paying for a crime they were innocent of.
The 13 year old witness back then in 1975 has retracted his testimony. Report says that the now 53-year old man, Eddie Vernon, confessed to a minister who visited him at the hospital that the 2 black American men were innocent of the murder crime.Eddie says that he never even witnessed the crime. According to him he was pressured by the Police authorities to lie about the incident.
It is not a hidden fact that blacks in America are arrested more often than any other race. In the present time it has gone far beyond arrests of innocent black citizens.
Quite a good number of blacks in recent times have been gunned down by the American police for no clear cause to do so.
Not many people will be as lucky as Ricky Jackson and Wiley Bridgeman. Their exoneration is proof that there is still justice in the world no matter how long it takes.
The Ohio Innocence Project, which took up Ricky and Wiley’s case, is grateful that the duo were finally set free. The Innocence project says that both men were the longest-serving exonerees in US history.
$2 million may never take away the pain of the years but the innocent man expressed his gratitude for it anyway.
