{"id":998,"date":"2009-01-13T12:27:59","date_gmt":"2009-01-13T19:27:59","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/?p=998"},"modified":"2009-01-13T12:28:55","modified_gmt":"2009-01-13T19:28:55","slug":"man-who-served-10-years-for-crimes-he-did-not-commit-delivers-keynote-at-wrongful-convictions-forum","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/?p=998","title":{"rendered":"Man Who Served 10 Years for Crimes He Did Not Commit Delivers Keynote at Wrongful Convictions Forum"},"content":{"rendered":"

by Kaitlin Tambuscio \u201910<\/strong><\/p>\n

While some people associate Christmas Eve with family gatherings, presents, and holiday cheer, the day has a different connotation for David Shephard.<\/p>\n

\"wrongfulOn December 24, 1983, a college student was raped and kidnapped near Hillside, NJ. The woman was found near Newark Airport\u2019s north terminal. Shortly after, Shephard, an airport employee at the time, was approached by local police and brought in to \u201ctalk about a stolen car in Hillside\u201d\u2014or so he was told by the officers. The interrogation quickly turned to Shephard being questioned about the rape and kidnapping of the young woman.<\/p>\n

Shephard was eventually convicted on charges of rape, robbery, weapons violations, and making terroristic threats. He was sentenced to 30 years in prison\u2014for crimes he did not commit. It would be a decade before he was able to prove his innocence.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was scared,\u201d Shephard told a TCNJ audience in November, in reference to his original interrogation by police. \u201cI didn\u2019t know what they were talking about. I didn\u2019t know what to say. I didn\u2019t know the right thing to say, the wrong thing to say.\u201d<\/p>\n

Shephard was on campus to share his story as part of a Wrongful Convictions Forum, which was sponsored by the Bonner Center and the College\u2019s Liberal Learning Program. As the keynote speaker, Shephard detailed the events that led to his conviction and imprisonment, and explained how he regained his life through post-conviction DNA testing.<\/p>\n

In 1992, Shephard filed court papers requesting that all evidence which was used against him at trial and contained DNA be released for testing. The prosecution agreed, and the results of the tests proved that Shephard had not been the perpetrator of the crimes for which he had been serving time. Finally, in 1995, he was released.<\/p>\n

\u201cThose years in prison were the worst years of my life. They were like a nightmare I couldn\u2019t wake up from,\u201d Shephard told those in attendance at November\u2019s event.<\/p>\n

Shephard\u2019s traumatic experience continues to affect every aspect of his life, even 13 years after being exonerated, he said. Today he is a family services worker in Essex County, and works to help people qualify for public assistance, but he is forever changed by the 10 years he served in prison.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m more insightful now than I was before. I don\u2019t take anything at face value,\u201d said Shephard.<\/p>\n

Also, family was, and always has been, Shephard\u2019s top priority. \u201cThere were times when I lost all hope and faith. If it wasn\u2019t for my son and my family, I don\u2019t know what would\u2019ve happened.\u201d<\/p>\n

As part of the November forum, students from Adjunct Professor Lynn Goedecke<\/strong>‘s class, Wrongful Convictions: Causes and Remedies, presented information on how wrongful convictions can occur. They also detailed what states, specifically New Jersey, are doing to prevent them. For more on information on Goedecke\u2019s class, see the spring 2007 issue of TCNJ Magazine<\/em>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

David Shephard was sentenced to 30 years in prison for crimes he did not commit. He spent a decade behind bars before he was able to prove his innocence. Last November, as part of a Wrongful Convictions Forum sponsored by the Bonner Center and the College\u2019s Liberal Learning Program, Shephard detailed the events that led to his conviction and imprisonment, and explained how he regained his life through post-conviction DNA testing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":11,"featured_media":999,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[23,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-998","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-february-2009","category-on-campus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/998","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/11"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=998"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/998\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/999"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=998"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=998"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.tcnjmagazine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=998"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}