Man who spent 17 years on death row for crime he didn’t commit only wanted one thing after being released
Lucy Devine
Featured Image Credit: LADbible Stories
A man who was wrongly convicted and ended up spending almost two decades on death row has explained the one thing he wanted after he was finally released.
Juan Roberto Melendez-Colon spent 17 years, eight months and one day in jail in Florida for a murder he did not commit, despite there being no physical evidence to tie him to the crime.
Melendez-Colon also had an alibi, but was convicted of first-degree murder in 1983 based on the testimony of two witnesses.
His conviction was upheld several times on appeal, but 16 years on and his attorneys discovered a taped confession by a man named Vernon James. They were also able to locate witnesses who said they recalled that James had confessed to the murder.
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Melendez-Colon has since explained to LADbible Stories' Minutes With that there was one simple thing that he wanted after he was released, but he's still waiting.
"That made me the number 99 death row prisoner in Florida released at that time. And they never say, I'm sorry. And that's the part. I don't want no millions, I don't want nothing. All I wanted them people really, would have been for me to tell me, 'Juan, I'm sorry what I did to you'," he said.
"And that would've been the best compensation I would've had in my life. None of them came to me and say, 'I'm sorry, what happened'. None of them. And that's where the part hurt more than anything. If only I had got compensation now."
Melendez-Colon also spoke about the moment he was convicted, revealing why he actually wanted the death penalty when he was sentenced. He explained how if he had been sentenced to life in prison, he my not have had the same opportunities to prove his innocence.
"I wanted the death penalty, but I wanted the death penalty to get publicity so I can prove my innocence. Because if they sentence you to death and give you a life in prison, they gonna forget about you. But with the death penalty, you can still in process 'till they kill you," he said. "So you got to have a lawyer, they got to have a lawyer. So that's what I wanted to, if I wouldn't have had the death penalty, I would probably be in prison right now."
Despite everything, Melendez-Colon explained that he now tries to look forward, instead of focusing so much on the past.
"I ain't got no time for that. I look forward now, I ain't got no time. I don't think looking back, it will happen like you say, it will make you angry. And I got enough of that. That's gone, gone long time ago. It is one thing that I learned in the inside, I learned how to forgive," he said.
"And believe me, when you forgive, you're not helping the one you've forgiven, you're helping yourself. Living with hate and hang all of us and holding grudges and all this, that's not me."
He also shared a message for those who support the death penalty, adding: "Do your research, research and see and look for the facts of the death penalty... find out if the death penalty deters crime, find out if the penalty is racist, find out if the penalty is cruel or, or necessary. Do we have alternatives? Find out if it costs too much. Find out how many innocent people they kill, how many people they got inside there."