A Friend to the Court, a Friend to our Community

When most people think of “policy” work, it conjures lessons about how a bill becomes a law. Without a doubt, legislation—such as whether exonerees are fairly compensated or whether an innocent person can return to court to overturn their conviction—is essential to our community members. But we don’t just advocate for policy changes in the legislature; we also do so in the courts by filing amicus briefs. 

If you are not a lawyer, you may not have heard much about “amicus curiae” briefs. Like many legal terms, “amicus curiae” is a Latin phrase and may seem intimidating or inaccessible. We aim to change that. 

Translated, “amicus curiae” means “friend of the court,” and these briefs allow organizations, like the New England Innocence Project, to offer information, expertise, and perspective to a court deciding an issue. Traditionally, a court case involves two sides: one fighting for something and one fighting against it. But when a higher court (an appellate court) issues a decision, it can affect all of us because lower courts are bound to follow it. In fact, some of the most important rules of criminal law come from individual court decisions (not the legislature), like when the police can stop, search, and arrest you, and whether unreliable forensic evidence can be used in court against you if you are accused of a crime. These case outcomes impact our community; wherever possible, it is important for organizations like NEIP to use our voices to guide courts toward the most just outcome. 

By being a “friend” to the Court—and offering quantitative and qualitative research from our work in wrongful convictions—NEIP can advocate for a just decision in an individual case and for broader change across the criminal legal system. Just as with our legislative policy work, we approach our judicial policy work in coalition with others whose values align with ours. 

Over the last year, we filed 12 amicus briefs in Massachusetts courts—double the number we filed the year before. We weighed in on cases involving unreliable forensic science, official misconduct, racial profiling in policing and jury selection, and eyewitness misidentification, among other issues commonly found in wrongful conviction cases. 

This is just a snapshot of the issues we raised with our courts this year:

Convictions cannot stand based on lies.

• Commonwealth v. Mallory: Over 60% of wrongful convictions documented across the country since 1989—and nearly 75% of wrongful convictions of Black men in Massachusetts—involved some form of official misconduct. When police lie in an investigation that results in a conviction, that conviction is unjust. Mr. Mallory’s conviction should not stand because it hinged on lies that the police told in order to obtain a warrant to search his home.

• Commonwealth v. Watson: Wrongfully convicted people should always have the opportunity to prove the truth, whether that truth can be uncovered through DNA testing or another form of evidence. The vast majority of exonerations across the country have resulted from non-DNA evidence. Mr. Watson should be able to pursue post-conviction cell phone analysis in his case to show that a witness at his trial lied—which has happened in nearly 65% of documented exonerations since 1989—and that his conviction is unjust. 

Familiarity does not guarantee accuracy in eyewitness identifications.

• Commonwealth v. Donovan: It may be surprising to hear that eyewitnesses can misidentify people they recognize. In fact, dozens of documented wrongful convictions involved eyewitnesses who were familiar with the people they misidentified. As we argued in our brief, Massachusetts "has led the country in adopting the science of social influence and eyewitness memory—and limiting the use of unduly suggestive identification procedures to prevent wrongful convictions." Massachusetts courts should ensure that these protections also include cases in which eyewitnesses have some familiarity with the people they identify, as they are still at risk for making a misidentification.

Unreliable forensic science has no place in the courtroom.

• Commonwealth v. Hsu: Science is constantly evolving, and scientific advancements can uncover past errors and reveal newfound truths. Years of scientific research have exposed the unreliability of the “Abusive Head Trauma [formerly Shaken Baby Syndrome]” (AHT/SBS) hypothesis. This unproven theory is not reliable scientific evidence and should not be able to form the basis of a conviction. AHT/SBS cases often rely on suspicion—infected with racial and gender stereotypes—rather than science. Dozens of wrongful convictions prosecuted as AHT/SBS cases have been overturned, with findings that the injuries/deaths were, in fact, the tragic result of accidental or medical causes. As we stated in our brief:

“Not all tragedies are crimes. An entire category of wrongful conviction cases, known as ‘no crime’ cases, involves people erroneously prosecuted for tragic outcomes that were no crime at all. The National Registry of Exonerations lists 1,505 people exonerated since 1989 after wrongful convictions for such outcomes. Women who care for children are especially at risk: 72% of female exonerees were wrongfully convicted in cases where no one committed a criminal act, with 65% of those cases involving child victims. These exonerations underscore why, when a tragedy like the death of a child occurs, courts must be especially vigilant to safeguard the presumption of innocence."

Case Spotlight: Commonwealth v. Stephen Pina

Stephen Pina speaking at Voices of the Innocent in 2025

Stephen Pina was wrongfully convicted in 1996 and spent 28 years in prison for a murder he did not commit. In February of 2025, a judge overturned Mr. Pina’s wrongful conviction, but he is still fighting for his full freedom. NEIP is fighting alongside him in the community and in the courts, including by filing an amicus brief in his case this year.

Mr. Pina’s conviction hinged on eyewitness misidentification and prosecutorial misconduct. Eyewitness misidentifications are a leading cause of wrongful convictions, but eyewitness testimony remains incredibly persuasive to juries. If the prosecution has evidence about the unreliability of an eyewitness—as it did in Mr. Pina’s case—it must be turned over to the defense, as this evidence can be critical for jurors to consider in evaluating the accuracy of an identification. As we argued in our brief, "where the identity of the person who committed the crime is the question that the jury must answer, depriving [jurors] of material information regarding an eyewitness’s reliability affects the integrity of their deliberative process and, as a result, the justice of the conviction." 

Further, a new, reliable DNA analysis method developed since Mr. Pina’s conviction has excluded him from critical pieces of evidence at the crime scene, shedding more light on the injustice of his conviction. Taken together, the DNA exclusion and the previously withheld evidence undermining a key eyewitness support what Mr. Pina has maintained all along: he did not commit the crime for which he was convicted.

We are grateful to our community and pro bono partners who support our amicus efforts, making it possible for us to educate courts on critical issues and shape the law impacting our communities.