In Louisiana, if you are convicted of a crime and sentenced to life in prison without parole, you are entitled to one appeal. "During that direct appeal, you can’t present any new evidence, even if it proves you did not commit the crime," says Emily Maw, legal director for Innocence Project New Orleans. "Technically, your innocence is irrelevant at this point. The direct appeal is merely a review of your original trial. They’re only looking for procedural errors."
Even if a prisoner walks into the direct appeal with a piece of evidence that exonerates him, she says, the court will not review it. "They deem new evidence totally irrelevant until post-conviction," Maw says. Post-conviction is defined as the legal phase following the direct appeal. It is the first time after the original trial that new evidence proving an inmate’s innocence can be presented. "The problem is," Maw says, "that an inmate is not entitled to legal help after the direct appeal," leaving those without the money to hire a lawyer to fend for themselves in the "extremely complex arena of post-conviction litigation. It sometimes baffles lawyers who have worked in the field for several years."
Indigent prisoners would have to file complicated legal paperwork, orchestrate their own defense and try to gather evidence from behind bars. "Many prisoners have limited education and don’t understand the law," Maw says. "It’s absurd to expect them to prepare their case for post-conviction relief without legal help."
And although state prisons are equipped with law libraries and inmate legal counselors, many inmates never get the chance to use them. A prisoner has only two years to file for post-conviction relief after the direct appeal, but many spend that time housed in a local jail — with no access to legal help. "For many inmates, by the time they are transferred to a state penitentiary, their deadline for post-conviction appeal has passed," Maw says. "And sometimes it’s very hard to convince a judge to hear their case after the deadline."