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Kirk Bloodsworth and author Tim Junkin will be featured at a forum on Junkin's new book “Bloodsworth: The True Story of the First Death Row Inmate Exonerated by DNA,” from 6 to 8 p.m. Sept. 28 at the Center on Wrongful Convictions at Northwestern University School of Law, 375 E. Chicago Ave.

The forum is free and open to the public, but space is limited. RSVP by calling (312) 503-3604 or
e-colfax@law.northwestern.edu. Refreshments will be provided.

Bloodsworth was convicted of the gruesome rape and murder of Dawn Hamilton, a 9-year-old girl in Baltimore County, Md., and sent to death row in 1984, the victim of the mistaken testimony of five eyewitnesses.

A Center on Wrongful Convictions study by Executive Director Rob Warden found that erroneous eyewitness testimony is a leading factor in wrongful convictions, contributing to more than half of all wrongful convictions in capital cases.

Thanks in part to the center's push for reforms, the Illinois legislature passed a measure that creates a pilot project for a more accurate line-up protocol, which, if fully implemented, promises to enhance the accuracy of eyewitness testimony and reduce wrongful convictions.

Nine years after Bloodsworth's conviction, after serving time in one of the harshest prisons in the country, he was set free based on a new procedure called DNA fingerprinting--a procedure he came across while reading a true crime book borrowed from the prison library.

For 10 years after Bloodsworth's release, Baltimore County refused to run crime scene DNA through law enforcement databases. When they finally did, a match was immediately found. The identity of the real perpetrator--a man Bloodsworth knew as a fellow inmate in prison--adds a surprising twist to his amazing story.

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