A 9-by-9 cell was Curtis McCarty's home for more than 2 decades. The underground cell on death row in Oklahoma meant he didn't see the sun or the moon for 16 years. He was allowed little or no human contact.

Sentenced to death row for the 1982 murder of Pam Willis in Oklahoma City, McCarty was convicted based on prosecutorial misconduct and tainted evidence. In 2007, a special FBI investigation and work by the Innocence Project freed him from death row. He is 1 of 18 death row inmates exonerated through DNA evidence with the help of the Innocence Project. McCarty spoke in Chadron Monday night at an event sponsored by Nebraskans for Alternatives to the Death Penalty (NADP). A spokesman for NADP said more than 140 death row inmates in the U.S. have later been cleared of their crimes, and evidence shows that at least 10 innocent individuals have been executed.

McCarty's story began with a good childhood that turned sour at age 15 when he became addicted to drugs. He alienated himself from his family and friends and dropped out of school. His new lifestyle introduced him to Willis, who had a similar background.

"She was a good person. She had a good heart. She made some bad decisions and they ended up costing her life," McCarty said. Willis was raped and killed in 1982. A thorough investigation followed, but police were unable to apprehend anyone for the crime. They did identify 42 men she knew, and McCarty was one of them. He voluntarily provided them with a statement, fingerprints and DNA samples in the initial phases of the investigation.

Despite the tragedy, he continued his hard-living lifestyle, failing to learn a lesson from Willis' death. 3 years passed and police took another look at the homicide. Believing McCartney possibly knew who committed the crime, he was taken in for questioning and eventually told that if he didn't give the perpetrator up he would be charged with the crime.

"I was so completely shocked," he said. Charged with 1st degree murder, McCarty said he found solace in the things he'd learned about America's justice system in school, believing the Constitution would protect him and that jurors would see through the ruse.

"But I had no idea the lengths they would go to secure a conviction," he said. A jailhouse snitch, cops and a police crime lab specialist all perjured themselves on the stand during his trials. The crime lab specialist, Joyce Gilchrist, testified that physical evidence found at the scene was consistent with McCarty.

"It was perjury. It absolutely was not true," McCarty contends.

He was convicted of murder and during the sentencing phase, the damage he had done to his reputation became apparent. He had no one to speak on his behalf except his parents. "Their efforts were futile, and the jury sentenced me to death. ... I thought my life couldn't possibly get any worse. I was wrong."

Once he arrived on death row in Oklahoma, he realized all he knew about the death penalty and how it is applied and how the inmates are treated was wrong. Many of the men on death row with him were grossly incompetent, had been convicted has children, had little education and there was a pronounced racial disparity.

"It was brutal and savage," he said. It wasn't enough to remove the admittedly dangerous criminals from society in order to protect the public, they were also stripped of their dignity.

As his appeals process drew to an end, he began to accept that he would die in prison. Then one day, a newspaper clipping from his mother arrived in the mail. It said Gilchrist was the subject of an FBI investigation involving tampering with evidence in several cases, including one of McCarty's neighbors on death row.

"I knew what it meant. I knew they would find out about me and rescue me."

McCarty eventually did win his release in 2007. Diagnosed with severe post-traumatic stress disorder, he spent the next 9 months at home with his parents, holding himself back from society. He waited for doors to be opened for him and would pace 9 steps by 9 steps in the driveway instead of walking in the neighborhood or in a nearby park.

The Innocence Project's social services department sponsored a trip to Lincoln for him to address the Nebraska Legislature about the death penalty as a form of therapy. Though he was hesitant, he now speaks to audiences around the world on alternatives, namely life in prison, and lives in Lincoln.

Though he said he understands the desire for revenge having lived next to men whose actions "made my blood boil" the important thing is to remove them from society and prevent them from continuing their crimes. There is no need to treat them like animals or take their lives, he said. The possibility of 1 innocent life being lost due to mistakes - intentional or unintentional - by law enforcement makes the death penalty too great a risk, he said.

It's also more expensive than other forms of punishment, with attorneys' fees, repeated hearings and massive amounts of paperwork. McCarty's file is 50 banker boxes full - 100,000 pages. Those pages had to be copied each time the file was transferred through the system. 1 year of work on his federal appeals cost $600,000.

In America, citizens are taught not to take the law in to their own hands, that the system will work. While he believes most law enforcement officials are honorable, they are still human and prone to mistakes. When that happens, the system doesn't work. In his case, it didn???t work for him or for Willis' family, who has never learned who killed her.

"I felt so sorry for them all those years. We never forgot about them."

State Senator Al Davis, who serves on the Judiciary Committee, was present at Monday's event and urged citizens to contact their senators when the death penalty is addressed during the next session. Life without the possibility of parole is a better solution, he said.

"People like Curtis symbolize the real problem and there are cases of false conviction in Nebraska."

Source: Rapid City Journal, November 20, 2013