Innocence Institute founder will discuss overturning convictions in Murrysville

In 1989, Drew Whitley was sentenced to life in prison for a murder he didn’t commit.

Seventeen years later in 2006, with the help of the Innocence Institute at Point Park University, he was exonerated and freed. One of the people who helped establish Whitney’s innocence will be the featured speaker at the next American Association of University Women meeting in Murrysville.

Point Park journalism professor, Pulitzer Prize finalist and former investigative reporter Bill Moushey will present “The Innocence Movement and Prosecutorial Misconduct” at the AAUW’s Feb. 13 meeting.

After spending nearly two decades in prison for a 1988 murder at a McDonald’s in Duquesne, Whitley said in 2010 that he experienced a wide range of emotions every day.

“I’m glad I’m free every day,” he said. “I’m glad I’m over that nightmare. I’m getting up in age. I’m nervous from all the torture I’ve been through. I’m taking the bitter with the sweet and taking things day by day.”

Moushey, 66, of Shaler, developed the Innocence Institute at Point Park in 2001 and devised a journalism curriculum centered around investigating alleged wrongful convictions in Western Pennsylvania. More than 100 students participated and 17 convictions were eventually overturned.

“I’ve always covered bad guys,” Moushey said of his reporting career at WPXI and the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. “In the 1990s, I started seeing more and more instances of prosecutorial midconduct involving things like false eyewitness identification, junk science, hiding evidence and a host of things that tilted the scales of justice, especially for poor folks.”

The Innocence Institute project was shuttered a few years ago due to lack of funding, but Moushey still presses for a resolution in several cases through his “Win At All Costs” podcast. He said he’s received pushback “in virtually every case at every element of every case.”

“Most folks don’t like to admit they are wrong,” he said.

Moushey is the winner of the 1997 National Press Club’s Freedom of Information Award, for an exposé about the federal witness protection program, and is the author of “Win At All Costs” and “Game Over: Jerry Sandusky, Penn State and the Culture of Silence.”

Whitley said his exoneration was due to the Innocence Institute and Moushey.

“Bill Moushey is my hero,” Whitley said. “Everybody’s got a hero growing up, like Superman. Bill Moushey is my hero. He really stuck up for me. I’ll never forget that for as long as I live.”

The public is invited to attend his presentation, which will be at 9:30 a.m., Feb. 13 in the Murrysville Community Library at 4130 Sardis Road.

There is no registration required.

For more, see Murrysville-PA.aauw.net or email MurrysvilleAAUW@gmail.com.