Wrongfully convicted rapist is freed after 17 years.. and hit with a $110,000 bill for backdated child maintenance

An innocent man jailed for 17 years after being wrongfully convicted of rape will not get any compensation for the time he spent behind bars - but he has been given a $111,000 bill for backdated child maintenance payments.

Alan Northrop and co-defendant Larry Davis were arrested following the January 1993 rape of a woman near Vancouver, Washington State. In July of that year, the pair were given jail terms of more than 23 years after being convicted of first-degree rape, kidnapping and burglary.

But in a dramatic turnaround last year, Washington State prosecutors were forced to withdraw the charges in light of fresh DNA evidence, and the men were released having served 17 years in jail.


Innocent man: Alan Northrop spent 17 years in jail for a crime he did not commit

DNA testing showed that skin cells found underneath the fingernails of the victim belonged to two other, unknown men.

But Northrop's relief at finally being exonerated was short-lived. Under Washington's law, exonerated inmates can try to sue for damages, but such cases rarely succeed because they need to prove intentional misconduct by law enforcement officials.

Instead, Northrop was told he owed $111,000 in back child maintenance payments. About half of that sum was owed to the mother of his children and half to the state, which helped support the family while Northrop was incarcerated.

The state's Department of Social and Health Services has a programme for writing off child support bills in hardship cases, and it waived its share of Northrop's balance in November.

But Northrop still owes tens of thousands of dollars to his former partner, and the state has now enforced mandatory monthly payments of $100 out of his wages.

Northrop is struggling to save up enough money for a car so he can keep his $12-an-hour job at a metal fabrication shop in Vancouver. He lives with his girlfriend, a former classmate with whom he became re-acquainted last spring.

'They owe us - somebody does,' he said.

'I'm struggling right now. I need every penny.'

Northrop's co-accused has also fallen on hard times, working for just three days since his release.

Now state legislators are moving to change the law to compensate innocent people who serve prison sentences after being wrongfully convicted. Northrop and Davis are among 15 prisoners released following after their cases were taken up by the Innocence Project Northwest at the University of Washington Law School.

Lara Zarowsky, a policy staff attorney with the project, said: 'Philosophically, it's a statement to the community that we acknowledge these cases exist, and when they do we're going to have safeguards in place to protect these people.

'We need it in terms of making a statement about what our society values.'

Rep. Tina Orwall says the episode illustrates a failure on the part of the state.

She's planning to introduce legislation that would recompense wrongfully convicted inmates for their time behind bars, bringing Washington into line with more than half of U.S. states and the federal government.

It calls for giving former inmates found to be actually innocent $50,000 per year in prison, plus $50,000 more for every year spent on death row and $25,000 for every year on community supervision or as a registered sex offender. Other tenets could include providing health care and paying child support obligations incurred by prisoners during their incarceration.

But because of Washington's dire financial situation - lawmakers are trying to fill a $4.6 billion budget gap - Orwall's bill wouldn't allow exonerated inmates to start collecting until 2014.

'The bill is about fairness," Orwall said.

'Hopefully the money helps them rebuild their lives. They really need a certain amount of support and resources.'