According to the Austin-American Statesman, Texas is not only No. 1 in executions, but it is also No. 1 in compensating the wrongly convicted. The Lone Star State has paid more than $65 million to 89 wrongfully convicted former prison inmates since 1992.
Under Texas law, those that have been exonerated after serving time will receive a lump payment of $80,000 for every year they spent in prison plus, under a law signed by Gov. Rick Perry in 2009, $80,000 each year for the rest of their lives. In addition to that, the state also pays for 120 hours of college credit and $10,000 for job training.
Michael Morton, who served 25 years in prison for a murder he did not commit, has thus far received $1.96 million since he was set free in 2011.
One might expect that such generous compensation would be doled out by the liberal spending-binge state of California, rather than by Texas, one of our most conservative states.
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