Empowering the Innocent (ETI) does not assume nor work on the basis that the alleged innocent victims in the cases that feature in its publications or public discourses are innocent victims of wrongful conviction and/or imprisonment.
Rather, ETI was established because innocent people are routinely wrongly convicted and imprisoned in England and Wales and the way that the Court of Appeal (Criminal Division) and the Criminal Cases Review Commission (CCRC) are structured and deal with claims of innocence by appellants or applicants means that innocent victims of wrongful conviction may not be able to overturn their convictions.
As such, innocent people can be, and are, languishing in prison unable to overturn their convictions, achieve their freedom and clear their names.
Overall, ETI believes that justice is not served to victims and/or families of victims of crime nor society as a whole when innocent victims are wrongly convicted for crimes that did not occur or they they did not commit, with the latter leaving guilty offenders at wrongful liberty with the potential (and reality as shown in research) to commit further crimes.
From this standpoint, the ETI project, CCRC: Reform or Replace? calls for the CCRC to reformed so that it seeks the truth in alleged cases of wrongful conviction so that true justice can prevail for victims of crime and victims of wrongful convictions alike.
As things stand, the CCRC is not able to perform this vital function and if cannot be reformed so that it can then ETI calls for the replacement of the CCRC with a new body with these functions that is fit for the purpose of assisting the innocent to overturn their convictions.
Finally, if it is found that an alleged innocent victim of wrongful conviction in a case featured by ETI is not innocent, ETI will cease involvement with the case and any information about the case will deleted from its website.