One of the former Northwestern students involved in the case, Evan Benn, now 27 and working as a reporter and editor at the St. Louis Dispatch, called the accusations that he bribed witnesses into giving interviews "patently false," and said he is shocked that five years after he researched the case McKinney is still behind bars for a crime Benn is convinced he didn't commit. Email sign up Join our mailing list to receive the latest news and updates from the Innocence Project: More recently, Rolando Cruz and Alejandro Hernandez were found to have been wrongfully convicted after having been prosecuted by Illinois Attorney General Jim Ryan for the 1983 rape and murder of 10-year-old Jeanine Nicarico. Big budgets and perfect plans aren't necessary to start an innocence project, according to Jacqueline McMurtrie, director of the Criminal Law Center at the University of Washington School of Law. The Chicago Sun-Times reports that the investigation into the recordings is just one skirmish in a prolonged battle between the Innocence Project and state prosecutors. The Innocence Project has since exonerated 10 more men. A project designed to expose and fix the errors of the justice system stands accused of committing a few errors itself. The Chicago Sun-Times reports that the investigation into the recordings is just one skirmish in a prolonged battle between the Innocence Project and state prosecutors. The Northwestern University Innocence Project had earlier assisted in the exoneration of four men on death row. When Northwestern lawyers sought a new trial for McKinney, prosecutors responded by issuing subpoenas for all manner of records from the Project. "It's a convicted killer and another man who has a long criminal record who told provably false stories to the state attorney's investigators who then reported them in a court filing yesterday.". Media outlets lined up against the subpoenas, fearing an incursion into the privacy of sources. Northwestern 'Innocence Project' students slapped with subpoena. When Drake began losing his cool, Serritella started recording the interview. He went on to say his testimony that implicated Tony Drakes in the murder was "a story" that he gave the female students so they would stay with him longer. . But it raises "serious legal and ethical questions about the methods that the professor and his students employed during their investigation," State's Attorney Anita Alvarez wrote in a statement. "Our job as prosecutors is to investigate whether it proves guilt or innocence," said Sally Daly. But the documents reveal that he also later told investigators that the female students who interviewed him "flirted with him" and "flattered him" during the interviews. Paula Gray (Photo courtesy of Innocence Project) In the early morning of May 11, 1978, Lawrence Lionberg and Carol Schmal were abducted from a Clark filling station where Lionberg worked in the mostly white Chicago suburb of Homewood, Illinois. The school worries that turning the legal microscope on the students could deter future students from participating in the Innocence Project. Lawsuit Claims Innocence Project Professor Conspired to Frame Man for Double Murder. Stanford Libraries' official online search tool for books, media, journals, databases, government documents and more. In a strange twist to a case that eventually led to the abolishment of the death penalty in Illinois, Northwestern University’s Innocence Project and other defendants have settled on undisclosed terms a $40 million federal lawsuit filed by a man who said he was coerced by an investigator employed by the university to admit guilt for a murder he said he did not commit. A spokeswoman for the prosecution said the subpoena for the students' records was a regular part of the investigative process. Medill is known for graduates who "mix high-tech savvy with hard-nosed reporting skills". When the university filed a motion to quash the subpoena, the state replied with Tuesday's court documents, further detailing why they say they need access to all the students' documents in order to determine whether McKinney's prison term should be vacated or he be given a new trial. Anthony McKinney is currently serving a life sentence for that murder. We print below a December 3 Partisan Defense Committee letter to Illinois’ Cook County State’s Attorney protesting the prosecutors’ outrageous effort to subpoena student records from the Medill Innocence Project at Northwestern University’s journalism school. 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