Protecting the innocent  by searching for the truth.  

Our justice system is premised on an objective search for the truth.  In reality, the indigent innocent person often suffers greatly from ill-conceived, belated and grossly inadequate investigations due to prejudice, shortcuts or simple lack of attorney time.  Innocence Matters tackles this reality through a variety of investigation programs and resources through which we aim to: 

Be the leading “second look” resource in Southern California for correcting wrongful convictions, by providing thorough and accurate investigations and highly-skilled direct representation for those who could not secure help elsewhere. 

Prevent wrongful convictions by providing future and current lawyers essential experiential training that will enable them to objectively and thoroughly investigate and advocate claims of innocence, and by empowering the innocent with proactive tools to build a stronger working relationship with their lawyers while creating a record of innocence. 

A key place to instill a genuine understanding of best practices to promote justice is law school.  However, though law schools prepare students to research, write and develop a theory of the case, the crucial first steps of evaluating the credibility and reliability of the evidence presented in police reports in support of a theory of guilt are skills not typically covered in the law school curriculum.  Skillful case theory development in the absence of careful examination of the accuracy and integrity of the facts upon which it is based increases the likelihood of wrongful convictions.

by provided "direct" representation in post-conviction cases.  We accept a very small number of post-conviction cases where we assume the role of the lead lawyer.  In order to qualify, the accused must meet each criterion listed below:

the accused is indigent;
has been convicted of a crime for which s/he is factually innocent;
in a Los Angeles County case;
is willing to submit to and successfully pass a polygraph examination;
has already been rejected and/or is not eligible (e.g., too early in the process) for the services of California Innocence Project;
and Innocence Matters is not already at capacity

To be considered have the inmate send us a letter confirming she/he mets the criteria listed above to: Innocence Matters, PO Box 1098, Torrance, CA 90505

Those outside of CA are encouraged to review our links to other projects in your jurisdiction.  

We are NOT currently accepting cases outside of Los Angeles, CA.

Dropdown Menu

The Dropdown Menu is an advanced CSS drive dropdown menu system. It offers advanced structural features such as multiple columns, inline icons and text, inline modules and positions, custom column widths, item distribution and menu offset. All of these are configurable for each menu item.

 

SplitMenu

A static menu system that displays 1st level items in the main horizontal menu and further children in the Sidebar.

 

All Menu Items can be edited from Admin → Menu → Menu Name → Menu Item.

 

Responsive Mode: Smartphone

For mobile devices, there are two options, a dropdown panel menu with items in a tree format or a select box using the browsers own UI elements. Chose a format in the template's menu settings.

The mobile menu is active for both the Dropdown Menu and SplitMenu.

 

Creating child menu items

Go to Admin → Menu → A Menu → A Menu Item → Select a Parent Item, and it will appear as a child of it.