Via Turk, the  AP reports that Herman Wallace and Albert Woodfox were released from solitary confinement, where they had been since 1972, after their convictions in the death of a guard. 

The murder of a prison guard is one of the most troubling crimes to address.  As the individual is already imprisoned, it presents an impossible task.  How does one protect prison guards from violence when the imposition of the sanction of imprisonment, other than the death penalty, is by definition inconsequential.  The answer in this case was solitary confinement.

But 36 years of solitary confinement is still quite shocking.  These men were part of the “Angola Three,” former Black Panthers.  The death was a media sensation at the time, though I personally have no memory of it.  However, it’s now being argued that the panic at the time not only pushed prison officials to act precipitously, but to wrongly convict Wallace and Woodfox for the crime.  It’s not just the Wallace and Woodfox, or their lawyer saying so:

U.S. Rep. John Conyers, a Michigan Democrat and chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, visited the men recently and said he has learned of evidence proving they were wrongly convicted. 

Nick Trenticosta, Wallace’s lawyer, said he believes media scrutiny and the political attention caused  Angola prison officials to “panic and move the two men into new quarters.”  

“We will redouble our efforts to gain justice and therefore freedom for Wallace and Woodfox. Changing their cells is not enough,” Trenticosta said.

While the report fails to provide any clue as to why Conyers thinks the men may have been wrongly convicted, it raises three very distinct problems.  First, is 36 years in solitary confinement, standing alone, cruel and inhuman punishment.  Second, what if they spent 36 years in solitary confinement for a crime they didn’t commit?  And third, given that there will be many who believe that solitary confinement is a “gift” for any convict who kills a prison guard, and that the right punishment should be death, what about the possibility now, 36 years later, that they were wrongly convicted?

Sorry doesn’t cut it after a wrongful execution.