A new bill in the Louisiana Senate aims to increase compensation for individuals who have been wrongfully incarcerated, raising the maximum payout from $400,000 to $600,000.
Sen. Gerald Boudreaux, a representative for Acadiana, has been guiding the bill through the Senate, where it was passed unanimously. Next, it goes before the House Committee on the Administration of Criminal Justice.
Currently, the state pays victims of wrongful incarceration $40,000 per year over a period of 10 years.
On the Senate floor, Boudreaux said, "Innocent people in prison lose not only the years of their lives, they also lose the ability to work, to earn, and provide for their families. They don't have an opportunity to pay into Social Security or save for retirement, and those who have served those long terms, 30 in some cases 40 years, wrongly convicted, leave prison at an age where their peers are now in a position approaching retirement."
I reached out to Zachary Crawford, a staff attorney with Innocence & Justice Louisiana, to talk about the bill. He said SB 125 moves to extend that payout period by five years, bringing it from 10 to 15 years.
The compensation is based on the number of years served.
"It would be prorated... Let's say you served 180 days— you would receive half of the $40,000. So it is, it's based off the years [served]," Crawford said.
To get access to these funds, an individual has to prove themselves to be fully factually innocent. This is an additional process that comes after a conviction is overturned. The funds are not for people who are found guilty of a lesser crime.
"You do have to go through the process, which can be quite time-consuming, of proving your factual innocence in order to receive the compensation," Crawford disclaimed.
He said this solution is not perfect, but it is better.
"There are 40 people in the state of Louisiana who have ever been found to be factually innocent in this process and awarded compensation; for the most part, they served well over a decade of wrongful imprisonment. I believe the average was maybe something around 19 years. So, so this bill isn't even, isn't even getting us up to compensating the average, but it's much closer," Crawford said.
