This is an academic list of examples, and not a recommendation or suggestion, nor a list of things that should or shouldn't be done

This website lists probably a few dozen cases where there is significant question about the guilt of somebody in prison.

Several popular methods have been used in trying to resolve the Utah case, including Reddit, Twitter and Youtube, and in each case posts have been displayed at the mercy or quirks of a particular site.

Reddit has deleted dozens of comments with no explanation and given warnings about offenses against rules regarding nonsensical issues, Twitter buries comments on the case and hides them from most viewers, Youtube avoids showing any videos which offend rules which are not clear.

The case had reached at some point around 100 Twitter followers and 50 subscribers on Youtube, I don't remember if Reddit has followers or subscribers. None of these produced any indication of progress. The most success was in 2014 when a dozen or more people assisted online in discussing the case, but that has so far not produced any result either, as of Feb 2023.

This page will list various methods used in different countries historically to solve this problem, as well as likely future methods.

The purpose is not to recommend or suggest any specific path, it is simply an academic list of things tried in the past by various individuals and groups around the world, and new things that may develop.

Experts agree that there are at least a few tens of thousands of people in prison in the U.S. for crimes they did not commit.

Fewer than 1% of these individuals are likely to be exonerated, and the vast majority of wrongfully convicted people who receive long sentences die in prison.

It is not illegal for law enforcement to put a person in prison, knowing that they are innocent of the associated crime, and law enforcement employees who do that are seldom punished in any way, unless there is social unrest and publicity associated with the case.

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None of the options on this page are recommended or suggested.

This is only an academic list of things that have been used in the past, and are likely to be used in the future, around the world.

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The Esar Met case is covered in depth on this website. From the very beginning there were signs of problems with the case, but nobody in Utah has been willing to step in.

Among the tiny sliver of wrongfully convicted who are exonerated, common themes are celebrity involvement, and the help of a powerful deep pocket legal outfit like the Innocence Project. These are only available though when there is overwhelming proof of innocence, something which does not exist in most wrongful convictions.

So the important question is whether a convicted person should receive post conviction defense if there is not compelling evidence of guilt, but there is not conclusive proof of innocence either. This page doesn't address that. Nor does the page address whether a person has a right, or an obligation, to target paid state employees who routinely target innocent people.

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Here are a list of various things that have been tried in various countries. These are not recommendations and if a person is in a place where a specific method is illegal or inappropriate then of course they should not do it.

1) The court system

Success rate <0.1% to <1% depending on the country

The success rate varies by country. In the United States there is aggressive resistance to freeing innocent people, and the chances of exoneration, even with strong evidence of innocence, is well under 1%.

In Pakistan several years ago there was a high profile case in which a high court judge learned of a group of police who had framed some innocent people. The judge freed the innocent people immediately and had an agency open criminal cases against the police.

Something like that does not happen in the United States. In fact one current Supreme Court judge has said publicly that he does not believe there are more than a miniscule number of wrongfully convicted, and it is not a problem for that U.S. Supreme Court judge. Occasionally, after an innocent person has been exonerated a judge will gush with rhetoric about justice, but only when the legal system has been exhausted and the innocent person is certain to be freed.

Scalia says 99.973% of people in prison are guilty. Experts estimate the number at about 95% to 97%.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/40042842 

He also uses clever legalisms to claim that it is not a problem 'constitutionally' to execute innocent people.

https://www.businessinsider.com/antonin-scalia-says-executing-the-innocent-is-constitutional-2014-9 

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2) Targeting offenders

Success rate 80% to 100% if carried out properly

Historically this has been the first option for tribal groups, or disempowered minorities, around the world.

It reliably works, but can be difficult in surveillance/police states.

The basic way this is done is to make a list of the individuals involved in the wrongful conviction, make that list public, make the objective clear and public, then target those listed in proper order.

Modern variations of this have developed, and many more will be coming soon. One example is 'assassination currencies' like Auger/REP which will be modified to make them resistant to interference by police state factors.

There are numerous problems with these still developing coins, such as the fact that they require the offended party to have significant resources, and they are equally available to both guilty and innocent. A possible solution would be an assassination coin market which required a degree of consensus among people on the network while still protecting the network from interference.

The biggest problem with this path is that most people who consider themselves qualified, are not. The average person who goes this route will end up in jail without having accomplished anything.

An important distinction has to be made between seeking fairness and seeking vengeance. If the purpose is to free a wrongfully convicted person then violence is an appropriate tool, but gratuitous violence is not. If the purpose is vengeance, then of course a different calculus applies.

Again, the purpose here is not to promote this path, simply to mention it academically.

It is something that has been done in the past, around the world, and is likely to continue being an option, and to develop.

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3) Petitions/websites

 Success rate ~0% to 0.1%

Petitions are useful to police/surveillance states because they herd potentially active people into groups, as well as letting those people exhaust their energies in a way that accomplishes nothing.

Websites can occasionally be educational, but in terms of being an effective path to fairness in a legal case, they are not. Education is important though it should not be the priority. As the saying goes "When somebody is drowning you should not be giving swimming lessons".

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4) Money

Success rate ~99%, if you have enough

In the United States, and most countries, enough local money can solve literally any legal situation with no exception.

Most people, of course, do not have the resources to solve even medium legal issues this way, but some people do, and for them it should be the first option in a situation where the convicted person is not guilty. A person with enough money generally won't be in that situation anyway though.

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