Open AccessInnocence and Prevention
Author(s) -
James M. Doyle
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
the wrongful conviction law review
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2563-2574
DOI - 10.29173/wclawr19
Subject(s) - innocence , blame , criminal justice , criminology , restorative justice , economic justice , sociology , psychology , political science , law , social psychology
Some contemporary writers argue that wrongful convictions represent system failures in a complex criminal justice system. Currently explorations are underway into whether pursuit of non-blaming, all-stakeholders, forward-looking “sentinel event” reviews focused on lowering risk rather than laying blame can improve safety from wrongful convictions. This article reviews the underlying theory of safety-based practices and sketches one model of how work on preventing wrongful convictions might be institutionalized: made a part of a new culture of continuous improvement that lowers the risk of future wrongful convictions and offers a degree of restorative justice to the victims of errors.