After spending 42 years behind bars in Missouri, Kevin Strickland was released from prison after Jackson County prosecutors, using a new state law, said he was innocent in a 1978 triple murder in Kansas City.
But thanks to Missouri's compensation law, he won't be getting any money from the state since it only gives compensation to prisoners exonerated by a specific DNA testing statute.
"Unlike guilty prisoners, a parole officer will not help Strickland find counseling, housing or work. And unlike exonerees in some other states, he will not be eligible through a compensation package for social services, such as participating in the state's healthcare program," The Kansas City Star reports.
Speaking to ABC News, Strickland joked that he might have to live under a "bridge somewhere."
"I mean, what do I have?" asked Strickland, who now uses a wheelchair. "If they would tell me to roll out now, they'd take this chair. I'd have to crawl out of the front door. I have nothing; I have nothing."
If Strickland was in neighboring Kansas, things would be much different.
"Sean O'Brien, a University of Missouri-Kansas City law professor who has helped free innocent prisoners, said Missouri should adopt a compensation law similar to the one in neighboring Kansas, which in 2018 passed a measure making the wrongly convicted eligible to receive $65,000 in compensation for each year they were incarcerated," The Kansas City Star reports. "For Strickland, that law would have made him eligible for more than $2.7 million. In other recent exonerations in the area, Kansas paid Lamonte McIntyre $1.55 million for serving 23 years for two murders he did not commit in Kansas City, Kansas."
Read the full report over at The Kansas City Star.
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