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SALT LAKE CITY (AP) -- Anyone wrongfully convicted of a crime would be compensated $40,000 a year for their time in prison, under a bill being presented to the Utah Legislature. The rate would be $70,000 a year for someone on death row.
The proposal, drafted by Rep. David Litvack, D-Salt Lake City, also outlines compensation for lost wages, physical and mental health care, and services necessary for reintegration into society.
He said the bill is not meant to punish the state, but to atone for an error.
"It isn't going to happen every day," said Jensie Anderson, University of Utah law professor and president of the Salt Lake City-based Rocky Mountain Innocence Center. "But when it does happen, we need to take seriously the time that's been taken away from them."
According to Anderson, Utah had its first exoneration two years ago, when Bruce Dallas Goodman -- now 55 -- was released from prison 19 years after he was arrested for fatally beating a 21-year-old Salt Lake City woman.
The partly nude and bound body of Sherry Ann Fales Williams was found next to an Interstate 15 on-ramp near Beaver in November 1984. Goodman was convicted in 1986 of second-degree murder and sentenced to five years to life in prison.
Testing of crime scene bodily fluids showed the perpetrator had the same blood type as Goodman, who had been living with Williams in Nevada. But DNA testing last year revealed the fluids were not Goodman's.
Prosecutors agreed to Goodman's release, but -- pointing to other circumstantial evidence -- they won't concede he is innocent of the crime.
Goodman would not benefit by the bill's passage, because it is not retroactive. Anderson, however, said Goodman is a poster child for such legislation.
Goodman is living a transient lifestyle as he searches for work and tries to reconnect with his three children, who are now adults.
There were 328 exonerations nationwide between 1989 and 2003 -- 145 inmates were exonerated by DNA; 183 were cleared by other sorts of evidence, Anderson said.
"Most spent about 10 years in prison," she said. "That's a good chunk of their life taken away."
Anderson said it is difficult for wrongly convicted inmates to pick up their lives where they left off. Technology has advanced, family members have died or become estranged; and people are not welcoming to ex-cons, even those who have been exonerated.
The bill is the brainchild of University of Utah law student Heather Harris, who began researching wrongful convictions last spring.
"It shocked my conscience how they were treated once they were exonerated," said Harris, who plans to be a criminal defense attorney. "Instead of whining about it, I decided to help with the fight."
Harris said at least 20 other states have adopted wrongful-conviction compensation laws.
To raise awareness, the Utah Law Innocence Association will present a free sneak preview of a documentary about wrongfully convicted inmates trying to rebuild their lives.
"After Innocence," which took a Special Jury Prize last year at the Sundance Film Festival, will be shown at 6:15 p.m. Wednesday in the Moot Courtroom at the S.J. Quinney College of Law, 332 S. 1400 East.
Scott Hornoff, an inmate featured in the film, is scheduled to answer questions afterward. The film is set for release in March.
------ Information from: The Salt Lake Tribune, http://www.sltrib.com
(Copyright 2006 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
