Herman Lindsey

sbutlersmith
Feb 17
3 min read

Updated: Mar 5

State: Florida

Convicted: 2006

Exonerated: 2009

Race: Black

DNA used in exoneration? No

Reasons for wrongful conviction:

False accusation Official misconduct

Herman's Wrongful Conviction

Herman Lindsey was wrongfully convicted and sent to Florida’s death row in 2006. He endured 3 years on Florida's death row for the robbery and murder of Ft. Lauderdale pawnshop owner, Joanne Mazzola, back in 1994.

In a unanimous verdict, the Florida Supreme Court ruled in July 2009 that there wasn’t enough evidence to find Herman guilty of anything, much less sentence him to death, and that he did not receive a fair trial.

Help Herman raise awareness about injustice in the criminal jutice system. DONATE >>

The court said that “the state had failed to produce any evidence in this case placing Lindsey at the scene of the crime at the time of the murder,” and that the evidence presented was “equally consistent with a reasonable hypothesis of innocence." The chief justice also issued an additional opinion stating that the prosecutor asked questions during the penalty phase of the trial “that were not only improper but were also prejudicial and made with the apparent goal of inflaming the jury.''

Herman was exonerated in 2009 after spending 3 years on Florida's death row.

Herman's Work Today Herman became the 135th person to be exonerated from death row since the death penalty was reinstated in the U.S., and the 23rd person to be exonerated from Florida’s death row. Florida has the highest rate of exonerations from death row of any state in the nation.

Herman currently resides in Florida where he works with at-risk youth. He is the Executive Director of Witness to Innocence, on the Board of Directors of Floridians for Alternatives to the Death Penalty and served as an Ambassador for Represent Justice. He hosts the online show "Cruel Justice" where he interviews guests on topics related to criminal justice reform. He speaks across the U.S. and internationally and has given talks in Italy and Belgium.

Join Herman's Fight >>

Publications:

The Deprived: Innocent on Death Row

"The book is based on interviews with 10 Americans who have all been affected by wrongful convictions and the death penalty."
Includes interviews from Kwame Ajamu, Derrick Jamison, Damon Thibodeaux, and Herman Lindsey.

In The Media:

5.15.13 Fmr. Death Row Inmates Want Gov. Scott To Veto “Timely Justice Act”

5.15.13 Exonerated inmates protest Florida death row law

5.17.13 Florida’s Timely Justice Act Is Neither Timely Nor Justice

1.31.16 How the nation’s lowest bar for the death penalty has shaped death row

3.10.17 Florida’s death penalty fix heads to Rick Scott

3.14.17 Despite Former Death Row Inmate’s Testimony, Death Penalty Changes Pass Florida Legislature And

Gov. Scott

1.14.08 Lethal injection is the wrong debate

10.13.08 Life after Deathrow

3.21.17 Eye-for-eye mentality is uncertain, costly, imperfect, senseless

3.29.17 Florida can reduce prison population