Larry Johnson spent over 18 years in a Missouri prisons for a rape he did not commit. The victim described a clean-shaven African American male, but identified Johnson at a lineup, even though he had a mustache. He was convicted in 1984 based largely on the cross-racial identification. In more than half of wrongful convictions involving eyewitness misidentification, the eyewitness and defendant were of different races.

Johnson first contacted the Innocence Project in 1995, but it took six more years, and repeated motions, before a Missouri court allowed DNA testing on the remaining biological evidence. The results conclusively excluded Johnson as the perpetrator, and he was officially exonerated eight years ago this week.

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