False Oregon DMV records lead to mistaken arrests, convictions for driving with suspended license
Nicholas Chappelle spent nearly a year at Snake River Correctional Institution after he was arrested and convicted for driving with a suspended license.
But he never should have spent a day behind bars.
Chappelle is one of untold numbers of Oregonians stopped by police, arrested, put in jail and even wrongfully convicted based on faulty DMV information -- a breakdown in record-keeping that has existed for years but the state never fixed.
The DMV has no idea how many people have been charged and prosecuted because of the erroneous records, but DMV administrator Amy Joyce acknowledges the problem has gone unaddressed for years.
https://www.oregonlive.com/crime/2023/02/false-oregon-dmv-records-lead-to-mistaken-arrests-convictions-for-driving-with-suspended-license.html
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Obscene!!!
1- Your defective system sends someone to PRISON BY MISTAKE.
2- IMO the state owes this guy (and every other person imprisoned for this same charge) triple any pay lost due to this MASSIVE state sanctioned assault until such time as he is back to up to twice the time spent in prison.
3- SERIOUSLY? YOUR SYSTEM SENDS PEOPLE TO PRISON FOR DRIVING SUSPENDED WITH NO OTHER CRIME INVOLVED?
Coffin v US (1895):
~~ 'The law presumes that persons charged with crime are innocent until they are proven, by competent evidence, to be guilty. To the benefit of this presumption the defendants are all entitled, and this presumption stands as their sufficient protection, unless it has been removed by evidence proving their guilt beyond a reasonable doubt.'
The court sited for one:
'The noble (divus) Trajan wrote to Julius Frontonus that no man should be condemned on a criminal charge in his absence, because it was better to let the crime of a guilty person go unpunished than to condemn the innocent.'
So how is Oregon's record on civil forfeiture? 