Robert DuBoise, sentenced over a 1983 rape and murder he did not commit, says he hopes others in his position now ‘get justice’

Robert DuBoise, sentenced over a 1983 rape and murder he did not commit, says he hopes others in his position now ‘get justice’

A Tampa, Florida, man who has been authorized to receive $14m for spending nearly four decades in prison over a rape and murder which he did not commit says he hopes his case makes it easier for the unjustly convicted to achieve justice before it’s too late for them.

“I’m just grateful,” Robert DuBoise told the New York Times of the compensation that Tampa’s city council voted to pay him to settle a lawsuit over his wrongful conviction. He said he hoped others in his position now “get justice and can move on without having to spend the rest of their life fighting the system that has already wronged them”.

DuBoise was 18 at the time that 19-year-old Barbara Grams was raped and beaten to death as she walked home from her Tampa restaurant job in August 1983. A medical examiner determined that someone had bitten Grams on one of her cheeks, prompting investigators to take bite samples from multiple men, including DuBoise.

  • loobkoob@kbin.social
    691·
    9 months ago

    $14m seems far too low:

    • 40 years at $350,000 per year
    • 480 months at $29,170 per month
    • 14,600 days at $960 per day

    Those don’t sound too bad until you get to:

    • 350,400 hours at $40 per hour.

    $40 an hour in exchange for losing most of your life - and the vast majority of your best years - is a fucking disgrace.

    • iAvicenna@lemmy.world
      13·
      9 months ago

      not to mention the need for psychological damage compensation. The guy lived 40 years with people around him, his friends and maybe relatives thinking that he brutally raped and murdered a young girl. I would have gone crazy probably, and die of stomach cancer or sth.

    • DrSteveBrule@mander.xyz
      7·
      9 months ago

      I agree he should receive a higher compensation, but have no idea what that should be. I can’t look at it in terms of dollars per hour and think of an appropriate amount worth giving up 40 years of life. If I was in that position I don’t think 1billion would be fair.

    • shugosha@lemmy.world
      2·
      9 months ago

      It should be total FU money. The state should give him free healthcare, free public transportation, free legal services, free public utilities, and free internet.

    • moistclump@lemmy.world
      11·
      9 months ago

      Not to mention the tax dollars spent to house and feed an innocent man. And the salaries of the lawyers and cops involved to get him there.

  • Fenrisulfir@lemmy.ca
    18·
    9 months ago

    Is he actually gonna get it or is there gonna be an appeal where he’s dragged through the courts again for years and only awarded $500k after being forced to pay $10 million in legal fees?

    • boblives@lemmy.world
      18·
      9 months ago

      It’s a settlement, which means the city agreed to pay the $14,000,000 instead of going to trial and risk a verdict of a much higher amount. So no there won’t be any appeals and he should see the money.