When Cornelius Dupree walked free from a Texas prison after spending the majority of his adult life serving a sentence for a crime he did not commit, his release reignited a debate that comes after every exoneration of a wrongfully convicted man. Namely, the debate about the flaws in the United States criminal justice system kicks off again, with liberal activists predictably screaming that the entire system is so flawed that it should be totally blown up and reworked and more conservative people recognizing that there are flaws in the system, but refusing to sign onto liberal wishes to create a new system that would presumably be more European than American.

As a conservative, I believe in law and order and the old adage that our system is the worst possible system for getting at justice...except for all the others. There is no other system of justice in the entire world that goes so far in trying to provide accused criminals with fair trials as ours, with the burden of proof being on the state; the right to face accusers in open court; the right to legal counsel; and open pretrial discovery for the defendant being some of the better known legal protections in place for the accused. But even with those and other safeguards in place, we still find ourselves dealing with the phenomenon of legal exoneration dominating the national headlines on a periodic basis. Just looking at those lives that have been destroyed should be enough to prove that our system is fatally flawed and must be reformed, right?

Wrong.

While the stories of the exonerated rightly tug at our heartstrings and point out some of the flaws in our criminal justice system, they by no means are conclusive evidence that our system needs wholesale changes to "make sure this never happens to another innocent." For as much as the critics of the system wish that were the case, the sheer numbers prove that even with the periodic headline grabbing exonerations in play, the system actually works fairly well.

While exonerations are certainly splashy and make for compelling stories, the legal exoneration is actually a pretty rare bird. Since 1989, the year I graduated from high school, there have been 265 convicted criminals that have been exonerated. That averages out to approximately 12 exonerations per year over the last 22 years.

While that number seems high, it must be taken in context to be understood. While the devastation of those 265 lives are tragic and call for some type of compensation, the number is actually statistically insignificant when compared to the number of felony convictions that are gained in America's courts on a yearly basis. The federal government compiles the number of felony convictions in the courts every four years and those numbers are staggering: 1990 saw 829,340 felony convictions; 1994 had 872,220; 1998 with 927,720; 2002 with 1,051,000; and 2006, the last year available with 1,132,290 convictions. And did I mention that these are state felony convictions only, with no federal convictions included?

When taken in context, the 265 wrongful convictions do not seem so daunting, and the impact is further diluted when taken as a percentage of all convictions in the above listed years. Following are the percentages of convictions that the exonerated, all 265 of them, constitute in the years on record listed above. To be clear, I  am using all 265 exonerations in each year to come to these percentages (convictions/total exonerations*100) and giving the ratio of exonerated prisoners to convictions.

1. 1990: 0.03%  (1:3129)
2. 1994: 0.03%  (1:3291)
   
3. 1998: 0.029%  (1:3500)
   
4. 2002: 0.025%  (1:3966)
   
5. 2006: 0.023%  (1:4272)
   

And if we use the total number of state felony convictions in the listed years (4,812,570), the percentage drops to 0.005%, or 1:18,160. Once again, that is using the total number of exonerations so far (265), not the yearly average of 12.

Now, I am no mathematical genius, but even I can see that the number of exonerated prisoners is very small when taken in context of the number of lawful felony convictions in the various states from year to year. Such small numbers are not reason to completely overhaul a judicial system that has served us pretty well since the founding of the Republic, the personal pain and anguish of those 265 people notwithstanding.

Further, we need to also keep the actual convictions in a proper historical framework as well. In many of these cases, the people have been exonerated through the use of DNA evidence which was generally not available at the time of trial. Even as late as the late 1980s and early 1990s DNA was not in use for evidentiary purposes in our courts. Clarence Dupree was convicted in 1979 when the most advanced forensic technology was blood type matching, which doesn't really prove anything and the young men who were convicted of the Central Park "Wilding" rape did not have DNA evidence available to back up their assertions that they never came into contact with the victims. In many of these cases the available technology actually pointed in the direction of the accused, and that was the best technology that the state had available. I understand that stands as cold comfort to the Clarence Duprees of the world, but it is still a fact.

Now, do not take this as some blanket endorsement of the status quo in the justice system, because we all know that there are serious flaws that need to be addressed. We have too many instances of Brady violations; overzealous prosecutors; and cops with tunnel vision as it pertains to some suspects. However, when the issue is looked at less emotionally and more rationally, it is inescapable that while it is tragic to see any innocent person languishing behind bars, that happens far less than is often assumed. The system is for sure not perfect, but is not fatally flawed.