![]() ![]() She has inspired other athletes to follow her lead. If there is an immense amount of work to do, Moore knows she cannot do it all and she is not alone in her fight. "When I first started getting educated I was so overwhelmed - as we all are, those who have been having their eyes opened more recently." But she now knows the importance of criminal justice reform and of changing the USA's approach to imprisonment. Prosecutorial reform has been the main focus of Moore's and Irons' fight. Should drug laws be changed? Are the police overfunded? Are they underfunded? What is better, punitive or restorative justice? How can voting procedures be changed? When asked what she has learned in the process of Irons' release, the list is lengthy and the scope of issues overwhelming. But selflessness is perhaps what the world needs to drive real change.Īnd being so intertwined with one man's future means that, though she has been successful on this occasion, she knows exactly how hard the struggle could get. It is a selflessness many of us would not have the strength to access. Moore believes in sacrificing what she has to lift others up and in turn become a better person. "If you have any sort of power or resources, you give it up and you power others," she says. Her whole philosophy can be boiled down into three words: keep showing up. When he was freed, she invited Irons into her home. Moore fought against the dehumanisation she speaks of by playing checkers with Irons. It is what people do when no-one is looking that matters. But she also does not care what your social media says. She is not asking every athlete to quit their job and join her. It was evidence that could have proved someone else committed the crime, but it was never turned over to the defence team in the trial in 1998.Īt the click of a button, you can sign an online petition to ask for a wrongfully convicted person to be freed. In his decision, the judge cited a fingerprint found inside a door in Stotler's home that matched neither Stotler nor Irons. Judge Daniel Green described the original case as "very weak and circumstantial at best". On 9 March 2020, Irons' conviction was overturned. They tried to prevent a review but were unsuccessful and, in October 2019, Irons was finally able to state his innocence in front of a judge. Some 21 years after Irons' conviction, state prosecutors were still not willing to admit defeat. So in early 2019, when she was supposed to be preparing for the new WNBA season, Moore got to work with Irons and his lawyers to request a retrial. "He just had to keep believing that if we could get the truth in front of the right people, who want to do the right thing, they'll do it." "There's something about truth that makes you believe it's going to happen," Moore says. Why? Because she always believed Irons was telling the truth. In December 1998, aged 18, Irons was convicted of assault and burglary by an all-white jury and sent to prison for 50 years.Įventually, she decided to press pause on her basketball career. "We need to send a message to some of these younger people that if you are going to act like somebody old, you are going to be treated like somebody old." He is as dangerous as somebody five times that age. There were particularly harsh sentences for young offenders handed out.Ī prosecutor is quoted as saying about Irons:, external "Don't be soft on him because he is young. The officer who questioned Irons was alone and did not record the interview.Īt the time of the trial, in October 1998, American politicians were running on tough-on-crime platforms. Prosecutors said Irons had admitted the offence, something he and his lawyers denied. No corroborating witnesses.Ī public defender would not allow Irons to take the stand to proclaim his innocence, saying he was too young and uneducated. But there were no fingerprints connecting the teenager to the crime. Later, at a preliminary hearing, Stotler identified Irons as the assailant. According to the New York Times,, external a police officer asked him to make his best guess and he pointed at a picture of Irons and another one of a different African-American man. Stotler survived and was initially unable to identify the perpetrator in a line-up of six photos. When Stotler returned, the burglar shot him in the head. On 14 January 1997, someone entered the home of Stanley Stotler, situated in a white working-class suburb of St Louis, Missouri. Although he was just 16 when the crime took place, Irons was tried as an adult. ![]()
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