Brandon Moon was exonerated five years ago this week after spending over sixteen years in Texas prisons for three sexual assaults he did not commit. Moon, who was the only person in both photographic and live lineups conducted during the police investigation, was tenuously identified by one victim, who had been raped at her home. Two other rape victims subsequently identified Moon, and he was convicted and sentenced to 75 years in prison, despite his testimony that he was on his college campus at the time of the crime, and had no opportunity to commit the rape because he did not own a car.

Moon first gained access to DNA testing in 1989, the results excluded him as a contributor of the semen on the victim’s bedspread, but the profile was never compared to the victim’s husband or son. It would take another fifteen years before testing determined that the semen matched the victim’s husband and an unknown male, officially excluding Moon.

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