After 16 Years In Prison, A Whole New World

After 16 years in prison, a whole new world
By Stephanie Chen | CNN

To see the world through Greg Taylor's eyes, imagine being stuck in a time machine for 16 years and delivered to 2010.

Facebook, flat screens and DVDs are all new to him. Relationships that used to come with natural ease seem awkward.

Since 1993, Taylor, now 47, had been locked away in North Carolina's prison system for the murder of a prostitute. Last month, he was exonerated and freed....

Taylor is the first man to be exonerated by a state innocence commission, which makes his case stand out from those of the more than 500 people across the country who have been exonerated by the work of private attorneys, according to the Life After Exoneration program.

The group that freed Taylor, the North Carolina Innocence Inquiry Commission, was created in 2006 after a succession of wrongful convictions were revealed. It's a one-of-a-kind program with a state-mandated panel that re-examines questionable cases, including those that don't involve DNA evidence like Taylor's.

Other jurisdictions are following North Carolina's lead, looking at creating government agencies to prevent and reverse wrongful convictions. Read more.