The nightmare continues, even after acquittal on rape charge

YAKIMA -- More than 10 years after being arrested, convicted and imprisoned for a rape he says he didn't commit, Ted Bradford was found not guilty at a second trial prompted by advances in DNA testing.

But in many ways he still lives the life of an ex-con, overshadowed by the stigma of once having been labeled as a rapist.

Now the same attorneys who helped win his acquittal are starting a movement to compensate the wrongfully convicted for the time they spent in prison.

"It becomes very clear they need assistance and they need it right now," said attorney Lara Zarowsky of Innocence Project Northwest, the University of Washington legal clinic that worked on Bradford's case. "They need our help. They need help from the state and they deserve help from the state because of being wrongly convicted."

The issue has gained attention across the country over the past decade. In Washington, Bradford is one of four convicts cleared in the last two years who could benefit from legislation sought by the UW lawyers.

Bradford had a steady job at what was then Canam Millworks in Moxee when he was arrested in 1996 for the rape of a woman in her Barge-Chestnut neighborhood home in September 1995.

The woman was forced to wear a mask and never saw her assailant's face. No physical evidence linked Bradford to the crime, but police said he confessed and they pointed to inconsistencies in his alibi.

He served nine years in prison and was released before advances in science led to a second trial, where evidence from the rape showed someone else's DNA. Defense attorneys said the confession was the result of being pressured after nearly nine hours of intermittent questioning.

The jury took less than five hours to acquit him.

But life has not been easy since.

His wife divorced him midway through his prison stay. He had to register as a sex offender, until his acquittal. He's been separated from his kids, a hardship he says he endures to reduce the drama in their lives.

Except for a yearlong job that he says ended because he had to focus on the appeal, he hasn't counted on a regular paycheck much. He says he's been stuck working for temp agencies, getting work one week and off the next.

Bradford perhaps could get away with a technical argument that he hasn't been convicted of a felony.

"I still feel I should just tell them the truth," he says. He offers prospective employers the short version of his story: that he was arrested, did time, got acquitted, is trying to make it.

Regardless, the nightmares that started in prison continue to this day.

"Most times, I'm dreaming that I'm still in there, in one form or another," Bradford said.

"There" could be any one of the five state prisons where Bradford spent his sentence. He was shuttled from the central processing facility at Shelton to Walla Walla, then to Colorado, over to Airway Heights near Spokane and finally to Stafford Creek, the state's newest prison near Aberdeen.

That's where he played in a band with another former prisoner who could benefit from the compensation proposal. Alan Northrop was cleared in a Clark County rape case after DNA tests pointed toward an unknown suspect.

Advocates for the wrongly convicted point out that they receive less support after prison than most inmates, who may have access to job training, housing and other services.

How to treat the wrongly
convicted has been debated in the United States for nearly as long as the criminal justice system has been around, but improvements in DNA testing have brought the issue to the forefront because that offers the clearest, most independent evidence to support innocence.

Washington is among 23 states that do not have a system to compensate the wrongfully convicted. Compensation varies throughout the other states.

Texas offers the most: $80,000 for each year behind bars and $25,000 per year on parole or the sex offender registry, plus job training, school and some health care benefits. Texas also has the highest number of exonerated prisoners, nearly 40 at last count.

Zarowsky and Jackie McMurtrie, director of Innocence Project Northwest, say they would lobby for a compensation system similar to that used by the federal government.

That legislation -- first approved in 1938 and enhanced in 2004 -- provides $50,000 per year for each year in custody, or $100,000 for each year on death row. It covers reasonable legal expenses regarding the compensation request.

Given the state's budget crisis, it's questionable what chance such legislation has of passage.

The attorneys say justice is not a budgetary issue, that Bradford and those like him should not suffer longer because the state is struggling financially.

Following models from other states, any Washington compensation would likely require a finding of "actual innocence," either by a judge or jury, in a process resembling a civil trial.

There's no guarantee Bradford's case would make it over that hurdle, although a report by the New York-based Innocence Project suggests an acquittal would be enough.

Prosecutors have indicated that Bradford's confession played a key role in him being identified as the suspect, and a Superior Court judge gave some weight to that argument even as he cleared the way for a new trial.

Furthermore, prosecutors have suggested that just because Bradford's DNA wasn't found, it doesn't mean he wasn't the rapist.

The most clear-cut DNA exonerations involve scenarios where the DNA is recovered directly from the victim and doesn't belong to the convicted person, something that didn't happen in the Yakima attack.

After Bradford's trial, deputy prosecutor Sam Chen held firm to the belief that the police had identified the right suspect. Bradford was investigated after being caught trying to peep through windows in the same neighborhood where the rape was reported.

State Rep. Tina Orwall met with Bradford and the other three wrongfully convicted men in October after a Seattle conference on compensation for the wrongly convicted. The Normandy Park Democrat, a longtime social worker and affordable housing advocate, is sympathetic to their plight.

"That's why we feel it's symbolic to apologize and see what we can do to help them improve their lives," Orwall said.

On the other hand, she knows that a new budget initiative won't enjoy a warm reception at the statehouse right now.

She said she's considering legislation that would give the wrongfully convicted access to a range of government-provided services, including job training and housing. This may not be the time for a full compensation package, she said.

Bradford holds out hope, tempered by patience. Like many who will never know the stigma of once having been a prisoner, he wants to be able to stop bumming rides, have his own car, live in his own home, have health insurance.

"I have all the hope in the world that something good will happen. I think sometimes it just takes a long journey for it to come, or for people to realize it or understand it."

* Mark Morey can be reached at 509-577-7671 or mmorey@yakimaherald.com.