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Barry Scheck, cofounder of the Innocence Project, places Ofra Bikel's report on Frank Lee Smith in the context of her previous "riveting" and "very brave" documentaries on criminal justice. A national expert on wrongful convictions in capital punishment cases, Scheck lays out how Florida seems to have disregarded the lessons it should have learned from the miscarriages of justice in Smith's case, including the need for condemned prisoners to have access to DNA testing. Scheck outlines how Florida has passed legislation -- since Frank Lee Smith died on death row -- that will constrain, if not block, a prisoner's ability to get DNA testing to prove his or her innocence.
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This q&a with Bikel offers an overview of how she came to this story, with her insights on what aspects of this film mirror her previous reports on the U.S. criminal justice system for FRONTLINE, and her thoughts on what viewers can do after watching the dark story of how Frank Lee Smith, wrongfully convicted, died on death row in Florida, still trying to prove his innocence.
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Howard Rosenberg, longtime television critic for the Los Angeles Times, has followed Ofra Bikel's documentaries over the past decade, especially those dealing with criminal justice. Here, he reviews her report on the Frank Lee Smith case and sketches a profile of Bikel and her motivations and passions for taking on these kinds of stories.
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home + eight things to know + closer look + smith's long hard life + ofra bikel
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