NY Legislature Actual Innocence Bill Introduced, 2025-2026 Session

The language in red below would permit a person who pleaded guilty to seek an actual innocence trial. This bill would potentially lead to such a hearing for Jesse Friedman - click here for details. He agreed to a plea bargain in December 1988, almost 37 years ago. Mr. Friedman was released in 2001 and has been seeking an actual innocence hearing ever since.

I will monitor the bill's progress throughout the legislative session.

NY A07422 | 2025-2026 | General Assembly

Status: Introduced on March 25, 2025 - 25% progression

Full language of the bill: https://legiscan.com/NY/text/A07422/id/3188629

§ 440.11 Motion to vacate judgment; change in the law.

     7    1. At any time after the entry of a judgment the court in which it was

     8  entered may, upon motion of the applicant, vacate such conviction:

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(g)  (i)  New evidence has been discovered 

(ii) New evidence has been discovered since the

    56  entry of a judgment based upon a guilty plea, which could not have  been

        A. 7422                             3

     1  produced  by  the  applicant  prior to the entry of the guilty plea even

     2  with due diligence on their part and which is of such a character as  to

     3  create a reasonable probability that the applicant was actually innocent

     4  of the offense and the underlying conduct for which they were convicted.

 

4. For purposes of paragraphs (g) and (h) of subdivision one  of  this

    20  section,  an  applicant is actually innocent, where they prove that they

    21  did not commit the crime for which they were convicted or that the crime

    22  of conviction did not occur. If the court  concludes  that  there  is  a

    23  reasonable  probability  that  the  applicant  is actually innocent, the

    24  court shall vacate the conviction or convictions and order a new  trial.

    25  If  the court concludes by clear and convincing evidence that the appli-

    26  cant is actually innocent of the  crime,  the  court  shall  vacate  the

    27  conviction or convictions and dismiss with prejudice.

Valley So Low: New Book about a Coal Ash Waste Spill and Cleanup Lawsuit in Tennessee

A well-written account that reminds me of The Buffalo Creek Disaster book (West Virginia in the 1970's) that I've used in class. This coal industry disaster occurred in 2008 (Tennessee) and like most of these cases, took years for final resolution. The author, Jared Sullivan, chronicles events from 2008-2023.

Amazon: For more than fifty years, a power plant in the small town of Kingston, Tennessee,  burned fourteen thousand tons of coal a day, gradually creating a mountain of ashen waste sixty feet high and covering eighty-four acres, contained only by an earthen embankment. In 2008, just before Christmas, that embankment broke, unleashing a lethal wave of coal sludge that covered three hundred acres, damaged nearly thirty homes, and precipitating a cleanup effort that would cost more than a billion dollars—and the lives of more than fifty cleanup workers who inhaled the toxins it released.

 https://www.amazon.com/Valley-So-Low-Americas-Catastrophe/dp/0593321111 

In 2023, after a trial and appeals, Jacobs Engineering (company contracted by the TVA to clean up the mess) settled a lawsuit for $77.5 million with 230 workers who got sick from cleaning up the coal ash. After attorney fees/costs, each person received about $220,000.

https://www.enr.com/articles/60072-jacobs-role-in-a-huge-coal-ash-cleanup-and-the-workers-quest-for-justice

Testimony in the 2018 federal trial revealed that managers with both Jacobs and TVA repeatedly told workers coal ash was safe enough to eat and refused to provide them protective gear, including masks. When workers began pressing for respiratory protection, Jacobs’ safety manager Tom Bock ordered masks stored at the disaster site destroyed to prevent workers from wearing them, testimony showed.

Coal ash contains 26 cancer-causing toxins, heavy metals and radioactive material, including radium, lithium, selenium, molybdenum, arsenic, lead, cobalt and uranium. Initial testing in January 2009 by an independent firm showed the Kingston coal ash was six to eight times more radioactive than surrounding soil.

But training materials provided by both TVA and Jacobs to Kingston disaster workers never mentioned the radiological threat coal ash posed or provided a full list of dangerous ingredients in the waste. Instead, the training materials stated the only ingredients of concern in the ash were arsenic and silica.

 https://tennesseelookout.com/2023/05/23/jacobs-engineering-settles-kingston-coal-ash-case/

EPA sued in 2022 for exempting coal ash from health protections

https://earthjustice.org/press/2022/epa-faces-lawsuit-for-exempting-half-a-billion-tons-of-toxic-coal-ash-from-health-protections

Tennessee has 29 toxic coal ash dumpsites as of 2023

https://earthjustice.org/feature/coal-ash-states/tennessee