The Conviction Integrity Unit (“CIU”) of the Hennepin County Attorney’s Office works to investigate criminal convictions within Hennepin County where there is a plausible claim that an innocent person was convicted or some other serious miscarriage of justice occurred and, based on the findings of those investigations, pursue appropriate relief for individuals.
The CIU is hiring for the following position:
The CIU was established based on three basic ideas:
Sometimes the criminal justice system gets it wrong
Like all human systems, our criminal justice system sometimes fails, and people can be convicted of crimes they did not commit. There have been thousands of documented exonerations in the United States since 1989, and the numbers keep rising each year. We know from this large body of cases that certain factors tend to show up in wrongful convictions. Those factors include mistaken eyewitness identifications, false confessions, flawed forensic science, perjured witness testimony, and the failure to disclose evidence favorable to the defense, among other things. We also know that wrongful convictions can occur even in the absence of any wrongdoing on behalf of police or prosecutors.
Wrongful convictions impose a high cost on individuals and society more broadly
Wrongful convictions impose an intolerably high cost on the individual defendant by improperly depriving that person of their liberty, one of the gravest harms the state can impose on one of its citizens. But it is not just the individual defendant who is harmed. Taking that person out of society also harms that person’s family, friends, and community. Society as a whole also suffers when the wrong person is convicted because that means the actual offender is left free to cause further harm.
Prosecutors have a unique and essential role in remedying wrongful convictions
Prosecutors serve a special role in our legal system as ministers of justice whose aim should in all cases be to achieve the right result and not merely to win cases or defend convictions. Therefore, where we discover that an error has occurred in one of our cases, we take seriously the obligation to take steps to remedy that error.
In addition to seeking relief in court on behalf of individuals where an investigation reveals that a wrongful conviction or serious injustice occurred, the CIU seeks to learn from past mistakes in order to improve our systems and avoid such errors in the future.
As of July 2024, the CIU is in the process of setting up its basic processes and systems. We expect to be in a position to accept applications on behalf of incarcerated individuals shortly and will provide additional information on this site about how to apply as soon as that information is available.
Please note that the CIU can only review cases where an individual was convicted in Hennepin County. For Minnesota state court convictions outside of Hennepin County, you may find information about the Conviction Review Unit with the Attorney General’s Office.