Exonerated in 2010: How DNA and New Evidence Freed Five Wrongly Accused
Michael Anthony Green
Conviction: Aggravated rape
Year of Conviction: 1983
Exoneration Date: 10/20/10
Sentence Served: 27 Years
Contributing Causes: Eyewitness Misidentification
Michael Green was sentenced to 75 years in prison for the 1983 rape of a Houston woman based on faulty eyewitness identification. In April of 1983, a woman talking on a pay phone was abducted at gunpoint by several men at a gas station. The men drove her to a secluded area where three of the four men raped her.
According to the Houston Chronicle:
Green was picked up the night of the assault by officers looking for a stolen black car in the area where the woman was raped. According to court records, when police spotted the car and pulled it over, the four black men inside fled. Police began stopping all black men walking in the area and detained Green, who is black.
Green and another man were left in a police car that night, illuminated by headlights, while the victim was brought to the scene. Court records say the woman saw both men but said neither was among those who had assaulted her.
Eight days later, however, police showed the victim a photo array that included Green, and she picked him out. Later that day, she picked him out of a live lineup.
The victim identified him in court four months later, after having seen him three times. He was the only person convicted of the crime, according the District Attorney’s Office.
The Harris County District Attorney’s Office found a pair of jeans stored in a warehouse that had been worn by the victim during the crime and tested it for DNA evidence – the results excluded Green in June 2010. Two other men matched DNA that had been recorded in the national DNA database. A third man’s DNA also was found.
Through interviews with the two suspects, investigators were led to two more men. Test results returned this week showed that one of those two, not Green, was the third man involved in the sexual assault. One of the suspects admitted he was there and said Green was not.
He was officially exonerated on October 20, 2010
