On Wrongful Conviction Day, people rally for incarcerated loved ones in Minnesota

On the Marion Street overpass above I-94 in St. Paul, Marvina Haynes held up a single fist, unwavering through gusts of wind.

“Free the innocent,” chanted Haynes, the sister of Marvin Haynes — a man who spent nearly 20 years in prison before he was cleared of a murder conviction and released last year.

Around her, over a dozen advocates and people with incarcerated loved ones gripped signs with names of people they believe have been wrongfully convicted, too: Bryan Hooper Sr., Joseph Campell, Jesse Curry, Chris Johnson, Curtis Holmes, Deaunteze Bobo. 

“This fight is not easy, but it is worth it, and today I stand here, not just for my brother, but for everyone who is still waiting for their day for freedom,” she said. “Too many of our innocent lives have been destroyed. Too many families torn apart by a justice system that has failed us, and today, we are here to demand justice for all of these families.”

Wednesday marked the 11th annual International Wrongful Conviction Day, an awareness effort spearheaded by the Innocence Network. The justice coalition includes Minnesota’s Great North Innocence Project, whose attorneys helped prove Marvin Haynes’ innocence.

Haynes and others on the bridge called on state leaders to declare a state of emergency on wrongful convictions and for the public to educate themselves on the matter. They urged the attorney general’s office to expedite the review of cases brought to its Conviction Review Unit.

The CRU, which started taking cases in 2021, has so far recommended three murder convictions be vacated. Last year, the unit recommended the 1998 murder conviction of Thomas Rhodes be cleared (although the unit maintained his involuntary manslaughter conviction), after 24 years behind bars.

Recently, the CRU recommended convictions against Brian Pippitt and Edgar Barrientos-Quintana be cleared. It will be up to the courts to decide what happens next.

Since 1989, the National Registry of Exonerations recorded 3,586 exonerations, totaling nearly 33,000 years lost. A report from the registry found that Black Americans are seven times more likely than white Americans to be falsely convicted of serious crimes.

That includes Marvin Haynes, who was 17 years old when he was sentenced to life, despite no physical evidence tying him to the scene. For almost two decades, Marvina Haynes fought for her brother’s innocence. She doesn’t want any other families to face the same grief.

He can’t get back that time, and neither can she.

“No person should spend one minute in prison for a crime they did not commit,” said Haynes, who founded MN Wrongfully Convicted Judicial Reform. The organization supports families fighting for their loved ones’ freedom.

Nakisha Armstrong was one of the people on the bridge, holding a sign for an incarcerated loved one.

She said she believes the father of her two sons was wrongfully convicted for aiding and abetting a drive-by shooting. The person who claimed her ex-partner confessed later admitted to lying, she said, and no physical evidence tied him to the shooting.

His case is now under review by the Conviction Review Unit and has been taken on by the Innocence Project — but Armstrong said she had already spent the last 17 years fighting for his innocence while raising their children and working other full-time jobs.

Altogether, she estimated she and his family have spent $100,000 in efforts to clear his conviction. Her sons are now the same age as their father when he began his life sentence.

“I look at my sons and I’m thinking in my head, ‘you guys are kids.’ And I’m thinking about their dad. That was a kid,” she said. “I talk to individuals who came out of [prison] and they all say this place is like the belly of the beast. Just imagine a kid going into this place.”

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