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Life After Exoneration
Supporters of the Pennsylvania Innocence Project had the gratifying experience of meeting three clients who are now free thanks to their support of our mission. Clients Gene Gilyard, Kenneth Granger and Teri Smallwood spoke at a breakfast on December 4 at the Pyramid Club, sponsored by Merck & Co., Inc., and related their experiences with life after wrongful imprisonment. Gene was still in his teens when he was sentenced to life in prison for a murder committed by another man.He spent 16 years in prison before his release in 2013. With the strong support of his family, Gene is now married, working full time, and the father of a beautiful young daughter, Amirah, and his stepson, Najir. He remains surprisingly upbeat despite losing 16 years of his life to a wrongful conviction.
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Executive Director Richard Glazer, Gene Gilyard, Kenneth Granger
& Teri Smallwood
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Kenneth was released in 2010 after 28 years in prison. Like Gene, Kenneth was sentenced to life in prison for a murder committed by another man. He's now married and has a full-time job. While happy to be employed, he voiced a desire to move to a more demanding position that would allow him to use skills he learned in prison. But he feels his 28 years of incarceration make job advancement difficult. Kenneth admitted that adjusting to life on the outside "is still hard every day." At 42 years, Teri was incarcerated the longest and has only been out of prison since May 2015. Her transition after more than four decades of wrongful incarceration for arson-murder has been difficult, she said. However, the fact that she was able to make a public appearance and speak candidly to a live audience was a testament to her strength and how far she has come in such a short period of time. Poignantly, she described her one regret since being released as her separation from her best friend in prison, the first person with whom she shared the news of her release. | 
