Name: Why Did I Serve 16 Years for Murder When I Didn't Kill Anyone? | NYT Opinion
Uploaded: 2020-03-25T07:18:17.000Z
Duration: 5 min 51 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

This is me just a few months ago in San Quentin State

The judge, the prosecutor and the jury in my case

all agreed that I hadn’t killed anyone,

but they still sentenced me as the actual killer

and put me in prison with 25 years to life.

I want to tell you about something called the felony

system, a glitch we only have in the United States.

Any death which occurs during the commission of a felony

is first-degree murder, and all participants

in that felony can be charged with and found guilty

someone gets killed, you can be found guilty of murder

Let’s say you let your friend borrow your car.

You know he’s going to use it to commit a robbery.

equally guilty of the murder as your friend.

This actually happened to a guy named Ryan Holle.

Instead of going to prison for an attempted robbery,

he’s serving life without the possibility of parole.

You and your friend decide to commit a robbery.

even though it was the cops who killed him.

There’s a kid named Tevin Lewis serving 52 years

and grab where your accomplice unexpectedly pulls out

We agreed that no weapons were to be used,

The jury found me guilty of an intent to commit a robbery,

I should be sentenced for first-degree murder.

Maybe you’re thinking I deserved to go to prison,

I committed a robbery, and I should be held responsible.

of a fair legal system is that people should only

The felony murder rule dates way back to England

in the 1700s, but they repealed it in 1957.

Now, the felony murder rule does have its supporters.

you should expect that someone’s going to get hurt.

But how can you expect an accidental death

or know that someone is going to suddenly pull out

That might work if people knew the rule even existed.

but it should be the person who actually did it.

for murders everyone agrees they didn’t commit?

Nobody is keeping track of this, not even the courts.

The closest we have is a guess from a study of crime data.

It said that one in five people for murder convictions

If that’s true — and again, we’re not for sure —

but if that’s true, that’s 36,000 people

for murders they should never have been charged with.

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Why Did I Serve 16 Years for Murder When I Didn't Kill Anyone? | NYT Opinion

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