After 19 years in jail and eight years as a freed man, Harold Hall may be able to seek monetary compensation from the City of Los Angeles and the LAPD for what he says was a violation of his Fifth Amendment rights that led to his wrongful conviction.
Hall, who was convicted of a 1985 double murder, was freed in 2004 after it was proven that his conviction was based upon a false confession and a fabricated story by a jailhouse informant. After his release, prosecutors declined to retry him.
He filed a suit against the city but failed to cite the appropriate provision of the law, and a judge dismissed the case. It eventually made it to the 9th Circuit US Court of Appeals, where a split majority decided that the lower court’s decision was a violation of Hall’s rights. He was offered the opportunity to amend his complaint and re-file.
Hall was arrested for an unrelated robbery, which he confessed to. He then was placed in a cell near an informant, who told officials that Hall had confessed to the double murder. Hall was then interrogated without being advised of rights, being offered food, and handcuffed for hours.
Judges called it “unlucky” and “woefully unjust.”
Read the full story at the Los Angeles Times.