POLI 203 Speakers

Question 1

Isaac Knapper and Amy Banks

Answer 1

• Amy’s dad was killed outside of a hotel in New Orleans
• Isaac was arrested and convicted and served 12 years in prison including at the notorious Angola prison

Question 2

Kristine Bunch

Answer 2

• Convicted of murder by arson for her son
• Had to study the arson manual so that she knew what she could prove that the fire was an electrical fire in her own innocence hearings

Question 3

Chris Ochoa

Answer 3

• Pizza Hut murder
• Testified against his co defendant
• Was lied to by police
• Pled guilty, but official perpetrator confessed and DNA showed Chris was innocent
• was exonerated in 2001

Question 4

Chris Turner

Answer 4

• one of the 17 young people in DC charged with the 8th and H case
• Served 26 years in prisons all around the country
• Told us the funny story about traveling from the West Coast in the greyhound bus

Question 5

Betty Anne Waters

Answer 5

• Her brother was wrongfully convicted of murder in 1980 and served 18 years of a life sentence before being released through Betty Anne’s efforts
• She knew her brother was innocent, put herself through communication college, college, and law school working to free him

Question 6

Leon Benson and Kolleen Schoen Bunch

Answer 6

• Leon was convicted for Kolleen’s brother’s murder
• He spent 24 years in prison for a crime that was committed by a police informant named Joseph Webster, all this was known to police or prosecutors at the time
• Kolleen has befriended Leon, much to the dismay of her family

Question 7

Marvin Anderson

Answer 7

• Arrested and sentenced to 210 years in Virginia’s prison for a heinous raping that he had no relation to
• the vicim pointed him out, even though she said the man white light skin among other things that Marvin was not
• Happened in Virginia where he faced extreme racism
• Exonerated when DNA evidence excluded him and pointed to someone many had suspected from the beginning