Students at the University of Illinois Springfield, working with the Illinois Innocence Project, have helped obtain a new trial for a Centralia man convicted of murder in 1998.
A Marion County judge last month ordered vacated Anthony Murray’s conviction for stabbing to death Seneca Jones of Centralia after a dice game. Murray was serving a 45-year sentence at Menard Correctional Center.
UIS students helped review the case and assisted Innocence Project lawyer John Hanlon and Marion County public defender Timothy Hewitt. The students searched for new evidence, interviewed Murray, and attended a June hearing challenging his conviction.
“We spent a lot of time going through trial transcript and contacting witnesses,” said Rebecca Jo Luke, a senior legal studies major completing an applied study term with the Innocence Project. “I think it was clear to everyone that there had been a miscarriage of justice.”
The story was featured by the State Journal-Register on September 10, 2012.
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