News

Students at Northwestern Law's Bluhm Legal Clinic, under the supervision of clinical assistant professor Jane Raley, were instrumental in securing a rare gubernatorial pardon for a clinic client on grounds of actual innocence.

Alejandro Dominguez was 16 when he was charged in September 1989 with home invasion and rape in Waukegan . He was convicted in a 1990 trial, mostly based on the victim's identification, though he insisted he had been wrongly identified and was innocent. Sentenced to nine years in state prison, he served more than four years and was released in December 1993 with time off for good behavior.

Still professing his innocent, Dominguez hired a private attorney to arrange DNA testing. The tests excluded him as a source of the semen, prompting Lake County prosecutors to join in his request to vacate his convictions in April 2002. Out of money and seeking assistance to file his clemency petition, Dominguez came to the Center on Wrongful Convictions for help. 

Former clinic students Rachel Miller (JD '04) and Justin Ruaysamran (JD '04) drafted the petition requesting Dominguez's pardon based on innocence. Miller gave the argument to the Prisoner Review Board. In order to draft the petition and make a compelling argument, the students had to reinvestigate the case, negotiate with prosecutors, gather legal documents from Dominguez's past minor offenses, collect letters of recommendations, and prepare their client to testify before the board despite him not being fluent in English. They also had to work around his status as an illegal immigrant.

By the end of their exhaustive investigation, the clinic team felt prepared to answer any question about Dominguez's life. When he failed to get a pardon in January along with the other DNA exonerees, clinic attorneys and students recruited some influential persons to intercede on his behalf with Governor Rod Blagojevich. Tom Sullivan and Roberto Ramirez, representatives of former Governor Ryan's Commission on Capital Punishment, wrote letters and made phone calls as did representatives of the Mexican Consulate and U. S. Congressman Louis Guttierez. 

Their combined efforts paid off, and Dominguez finally obtained his pardon from the governor. Professor Raley attributes their victory to the students' dedication: "No question it takes a village, but the students did the work. This is their victory."

Miller is now clerking for a federal district court judge in Nashville and Ruaysamran works for a firm in Manhattan.

• Categories: