This is the question posed by Andy-Keen Downs from the UK Christian Prison Ministry 'PACT', after Michael Shields was pardoned and released from prison. The full story can be read at: http://www.assistnews.net/Stories/2009/s09090044.htm
Michael Ireland of the Assist News Service reports that Keen-Downs is at the beginning of a very long, hard journey. He reports: "Adjusting to life after prison is never easy." And he has the added challenge of becoming a kind of celebrity. When all the celebrations have died down he has a lot of adjusting to do."
Well-Being Australia chairman, Mark Tronson, says that now, with better techniques of forensic testing (most popularly reported those involving DNA profiles), numerous convictions have been overturned.
Michael Shields' situation is but one of a long list of people who have had a very serious injustice meted out. As a result, several different types of questions arise. Initially, M V Tronson says, it is recognised there is that nothing in this world which can compensate for the injustice.
Revenge it seems does more harm to the revenger and solves nothing. Conversely, it creates more of the same, possibly for a different set of people. The issue of accountability for the injustice is one of immense difficulty. Was this a case of …. 'any Brit will do, they all look alike …'?
What about those cases where at the trial there is insufficient evidence to counter the accusation, and the jury 'convicts' on evidence set before it, yet the accused truly is innocent? Is a bowl of blood poured over the front door lintel of each jury member, the presiding judge and the merciless prosecuting attorney. Is retribution justice?
On the other side of the coin, how does the innocent person, finally released and pardoned, even begin to deal with the situation now faced? There are many issues to deal with.
Self value and respect; Self esteem; Who am I? Do I have the same identity? Will I be trusted again? What will others think of me? Can I trust another person?
These are same issues faced by anyone who has been seriously accused falsely in public for matters such as sexual harassment, theft, fraud, incitement ….. especially where the accuser does it such as way that he or she walks away scot-free.
Re-adjusting to life after such a horrendous circumstance is fraught with anguish, anxiety, stress to name but three, even if the Biblical announcement offers hope and restoration.
Psalm 103: 10-14 "He has not dealt with us according to our sins, Nor punished us according to our iniquities. For as the heavens are high above the earth, So great is His mercy towards those who fear Him. As far as the east is from the west, so far has He removed our transgressions from us. As a father pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear Him. For He knows our frame; He remembers that we are dust."
Joel 2:25 "So I will restore to you the years that the swarming locust has eaten, the crawling locust, the consuming locust, and the chewing locust, My great army which I sent among you."
M V Tronson said that recently a man sent him an Email saying that the darkness had almost enveloped him, but in speaking with him, the word 'hope' was offered and it gave fresh light as one of the three greatest things (1 Corinthians 13).
"Hope is a wonderfully refreshing resurrection continuously-repeatable idea," M V Tronson explained. "Injustice is nonetheless a very difficult row-to-hoe where some deal with it better than others."