Wrongly Convicted Database Record
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Charge: |
Murder |
Sentence: |
8 years |
Years Imprisoned: |
1 |
Year Crime: |
1981 |
Year Convicted: |
1981 |
Year Cleared: |
1982 |
U.S. State or Country of Crime: |
Guatemala |
County or Region of Crime: |
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City of Crime: |
Santiago de Atitlan |
Result: |
Judicially Exonerated Released |
Summary of Case: |
"Three Guatemalan's were wrongly convicted in 1981 of the July 28, 1981 murder American Roman Catholic priest, the Rev.Stanley Rother of Okarche, Oklahoma. The three men were sentenced to 8 years in prison. In May 1982 a Guatemalan appellate court overturned the three men's murder convictions and they were released after 9 months in incarceration. The three men were relatively small and Francisco Bocel, a man who worked at the church and had moved to the U.S., provided new evidence after the men's trial that the killers were large men. U.S. Embassy officials agreed that the three men who were friends of the Reverand Rother were likely innocent scapegoats." |
Conviction Caused By: |
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Innocence Proved By: |
In May 1982 a Guatemalan appellate court overturned the three men's murder convictions and they were released after 9 months in incarceration. |
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Was Perpetrator Identified? |
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Sex: |
Male |
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Information Source 1: |
"Guatemalan Court Clears 3 in Slaying, By Staff and Wire Reports, The Daily Oklahoman, May 26, 1982" |
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Innocents Database Created and Maintained by Hans Sherrer innocents@forejustice.org