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Kansas City exoneree now teaches prosecutors about innocence

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Andrea Tudhope
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KCUR 89.3
Ricky Kidd on the day he was released from prison, Aug. 15, 2019.

Since his exoneration and release from prison in 2019, Ricky Kidd has developed a workshop for lawyers who bring accused people to trial. The first district attorney's office he presented it to was Jackson County's — the same one that prosecuted him.

For Ricky Kidd, innocence is not an abstract idea. Wrongfully convicted of a double murder, Kidd endured 23 years in prison and 11 appeals before he was exonerated of those crimes.

Now Kidd works to bring prosecutors a "closeness to innocence" with The Cost of a Prosecutor's Decision, a training program he and his wife created.

During the workshop, Kidd stands in front of district attorneys and prosecutors as a real-life example of an innocent person who nonetheless was convicted and sent to prison.

"I just think it bodes well and it feels different," Kidd says, "when the prosecutor get to see the result of a mistake in their face."

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