Significance For The Anti-death Penalty Movement
Coleman's case was the second instance in U.S. history where DNA evidence was examined after the person in question had been executed.
Supporters who believed Coleman's innocence had expected DNA tests to exonerate Coleman. Some death penalty opponents also believed that evidence of an innocent man's execution would have a profound impact on the death penalty debate in the United States, and help accelerate a growing reluctance to use execution. However, the results prompted death penalty supporters to argue that Coleman's case instead showed that proper safeguards were in place.
Read more about this topic: Roger Keith Coleman
Famous quotes containing the words significance, penalty and/or movement:
“Politics is not an end, but a means. It is not a product, but a process. It is the art of government. Like other values it has its counterfeits. So much emphasis has been placed upon the false that the significance of the true has been obscured and politics has come to convey the meaning of crafty and cunning selfishness, instead of candid and sincere service.”
—Calvin Coolidge (1872–1933)
“It is odd that the NCAA would place a school on probation for driving an athlete to class, or providing a loan, but would have no penalty for a school that violates Title IX, a federal law.”
—Cardiss L. Collins (b. 1931)
“Suppose these houses are composed of ourselves,
So that they become an impalpable town, full of
Impalpable bells, transparencies of sound,
Sounding in the transparent dwellings of the self,
Impalpable habitations that seem to move
In the movement of the colors of the mind....”
—Wallace Stevens (1879–1955)