Madhu Kumar is a scientist who received his PhD in biology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Between 2009 and 2014, he served as a postdoctoral fellow at the London Research Institute, where he received the Hardiman-Redon Prize. For his charitable activities, Madhu Kumar serves as a consultant for the New England Innocence Project (NEIP).
The NEIP is an organization that provides pro bono legal services to people wrongfully convicted who have claims of actual innocence. In the course of the NEIP’s advocacy work, it also aims to raise awareness for the causes of wrongful convictions in hopes of bringing about reforms that will lead to the reduction of such cases.
On its website, the NEIP identifies several causes of wrongful convictions. The apparent leading cause is eyewitness misidentification. Mainly due to the fallibility of human memory, eyewitnesses can wrongly identify a suspect, thereby leading to a false conviction. In 75 percent of cases, DNA tests prove these false testimonies wrong and thereby absolve the convicted of any wrongdoing.
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