$1 million a year

Published Jul 26 2007, 03:36 PM by David S. Bernstein

That's pretty much what the four wrongfully convicted "gangland murder" men and their families got in Judge Nancy Gertner's award against the federal government for, to put it as politely as I can, dicking them over. According to the Globe, which broke the story online this morning, Gertner told the government to pay $101.4 million to compensate for the combined 108 years or so the four sent in jail. (It would have been have been more like 120 years, but two of them died in prison before the exonerations.)

A million a year is roughly the high-end benchmark for wrongful conviction judgments won at jury trial, so this was not a total stunner, but it's still a hell of a kick in the Justice Department's teeth.

That Department has thoroughly shamed itself by continuing to insist that it had no obligation to tell state prosecutors, before during or after the trial, that it was sitting on knowledge and evidence that these guys were innocent.

Meanwhile, somewhere in Boston, Shawn Drumgold's attorney is looking at today's judgment and smiling; his civil suit is moving closer to trial.