No criminal justice system is perfect, and fallibility leads to miscarriages of justice. Even when all the standards for a fair trial are upheld, wrongful convictions can occur. Many countries that practice capital punishment, however, do not meet these standards. For instance, in Japan, the prosecution’s failure to disclose exculpatory evidence has led to a number of wrongful convictions. In India, prosecutorial misconduct has also led to several high profile cases of wrongful convictions. In China and the United States, torture and police misconduct have contributed to the conviction of innocent persons. Inadequate legal representation, shoddy police investigations, eyewitness misidentification, racial prejudice, and falsified evidence are additional factors that contribute to wrongful convictions around the world.

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