IUP hosts presentation on war on drugs, how students can be involved – Indiana University The Penn Online

A presentation discussing the war on drugs was sponsored by IUPs Title IX, Social Equity office and Office of Students Wellness and Engagement on Wednesday.

Dr. Mai Naito Mills was the speaker, an associate professor of criminology at the University of West Georgia in the department of civic engagement and public service.

Mills obtained her masters in criminology from IUP.

The presentation was unique in that it required good bit of audience involvement through technology.

She started by talking about what exactly a wrongful conviction is and what kind of circumstances can lead to an individuals conviction.

Mills also discussed the case of Curtis Flowers, an example of direct appeal.

There was a quadruple murder in Winona, MississippiCurtis Flowers was the one charged for this crime. He was actually put on trial six times for this crime.

This trial went on so many times due to racial discrimination and the ignorance of the prosecutor at this time. The Supreme Court found racial bias in the case, which eventually led to the charges being dismissed in 2020.

Getting a pathway for a wrongful conviction are very, very, very hard to overturn. The cause of a wrongful conviction can be official error, false accusation, false confession, false evidence, and mistake ID. False accusation are the most common types of error in wrongful convictions.

Mills next touched on the total number of drug arrests. In fact, over 64,000 federal inmates are currently behind bars for drug offenses for more than any other category of conviction, a problem that is highlighted. According to the National Registry of Exonerations (NRE) there have only been 3,000 exonerations.

Mills talked about the amount of racial discrimination with drug cases and prosecutions, specifically discrimination against African Americans. The Harris County exoneration emphasized this. Despite Black people only making up 20% of the population, they made up 62% of drug related exonerations.

She eventually focused on three specific drug convictions in Pennsylvania. One had their charges dismissed when it was discovered that the officials involved were corrupt. Another had their convictions dropped due to an officer lying on the stand. The third had an inadequate defense official. In summary, there is a big problem with official corruption in this field.

Overturning these wrongful convictions has been getting more attention recently thanks to activism and social media. More people are noticing this problem and are demanding change and fighting for the rights and innocence of others.

Mills cited The Innocence Project as an organization to support in fighting wrongful drug convictions.

Those interested in learning more about Mills can check her out at https://www.westga.edu/profile.php?emp_id=90868.

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IUP hosts presentation on war on drugs, how students can be involved - Indiana University The Penn Online