Life on the Outside

by Katie Fallon, Marietta Daily Journal , December 4, 2006

ATLANTA - Robert Clark was a 21-year old father of two with a steady job when his life changed forever in 1981.

Clark, who had a 3-year-old son and an infant daughter by two different women, admits he was no angel in his youth and even notes a juvenile burglary conviction for which he spent six months in a halfway house.

In 1982, a Cobb jury convicted him for the 1981 rape of an Atlanta woman. A Cobb Superior Court judge sentenced him to life in prison plus 20 years.

Photo courtesy of Marietta Daily Journal

Clark would spend the next 23 years in five prisons across the state.

Friday is the first anniversary of his exoneration after DNA testing proved his innocence. His release came after nearly six years of investigation into his case by the New York-based Innocence Project, and later the Atlanta-based Georgia Innocence Project.

While much of today's world is different than the world he left in 1982, Clark said he, too, has changed.

"My family would say I'm not the same person I was before I went to prison," Clark said. "I used to get in trouble. I used to fight and now, you can't get a fight out of me. I don't like to argue or anything like that."

Clark, now 46, also missed his children growing up, the birth of his five grandchildren and the death of his mother, Lula. He said not having the support of his mother has been one of the biggest adjustments for him.

"My mother passed away two years ago," Clark said. "I can't see her anymore, but I visit her grave often. I have to adjust to her not being there for me."

Her death came within weeks before his vindication of the crime and his subsequent release from prison.

Having spent nearly a quarter of a century in prison, Clark said he also has had to get used to living free in the world where prison guards no longer dictate his actions.

"Basically, I'm just dealing with life now," Clark said. "I know I have to make it on my own now."

Technology also has advanced dramatically since Clark was sent to prison.

He said after a year as a free man, he still has trouble with cell phones and computers. He owns a mobile phone, but he said storing numbers and responding to text messages has been challenging. And he's still learning more about modern computers.

Today, Clark wears a broad smile and a gold crucifix around his neck. A victim of circumstance, he said he holds no ill will toward the woman who misidentified him, or the justice system that stripped him of 23 years of freedom.

"I haven't always been the humble person that I am now, the person that prison made me," Clark said. "I did people wrong before I went to prison and I want forgiveness from them, all the people who I hurt, so I have to forgive the people who hurt me."

Nonetheless, Clark said he was stunned when his guilty verdict was handed down in 1982.

"It was a hurting feeling," Clark said. "It was so hard to believe. I just felt that I had lost everything and everybody."

The odyssey toward Clark's forgiveness began in 1992 when he read an article in a prison newspaper about the Innocence Project, a group that formed the same year as a nonprofit legal clinic that handles cases in which post-conviction DNA testing could yield conclusive proof of innocence or guilt.

Clark said he knew as soon as he read the article that help would be on the way. He soon wrote the Georgia Bureau of Investigation for a list of all the evidence in his case and learned two slides with DNA taken from the rape victim did exist at some point. When he wrote and received a response from the Innocence Project in 1999, his hope grew even more. The Georgia Innocence Project came on board early in 2003.

"Once they decided to handle my case, I knew I'd be coming home," Clark said.

Georgia Innocence Project chief legal counsel Aimee Maxwell said the organization was lucky in Clark's case that a DNA sample was even found.

"We were lucky that Cobb County kept the evidence," Ms. Maxwell said. "The general public probably believes this stuff is sacred. But once the case is over, it could be anywhere. We're very lucky that Cobb County has a very good clerk of court."

Ms. Maxwell said opening an investigation into any case begins with a lot of research and trying to figure out if a DNA sample was taken, whether it still exists and if the organization can find it.

In Clark's case, Ms. Maxwell said the Innocence Project knew a sample had been taken, but it didn't know if it still existed.

Once the Innocence Project found the DNA samples and received a court order to test them at a private lab in California, it took about four months to get the results. After that, she said it was just a matter of getting a hearing on the Superior Court calendar and getting Clark transferred to the Cobb County Jail.

On Dec. 8, 2005, Cobb Superior Court Judge Dorothy Robinson released Clark from jail.

Robert Clark's case is just one of a handful the Georgia Innocence Project has taken on and successfully proven innocence. Lisa George, the group's communications director, said the organization has received 2,600 requests for assistance, which have to come directly from prisoners. Of those 2,600 requests, between 75 and 85 still are in the preliminary investigation stage.

Since it's inception in August 2002, the Georgia Innocence Project has taken on 11 cases. Seven of those cases remain open and active. Of the remaining four, one client was found guilty, one died and two have been exonerated.

Clark's release was preceded by the exoneration of Clarence Harrison, who spent 18 years in prison for rape, robbery and kidnapping. Harrison was released from prison in August 2004.

As the anniversary of his release approaches, Clark said he would like to take a trip outside Georgia. Since his release, he has traveled to Seattle, New York City and Saint Simon's Island, but those trips have been on business for the Innocence Project. Clark said he now would like to visit either Los Angeles or Las Vegas.

Meanwhile, Clark said he looks forward to a good, comfortable life. He is working on a long-term construction project in Atlanta that can keep him busy six days a week. Clark said he hopes to maintain that security.

"I try to learn something new every day about the business," Clark said. "I work around some good people. We work long hours -10, 12, 14 hours a day sometimes."

In the past year, Clark said his faith in God that his mother instilled in him has gotten him through his new life. A soft-spoken man, Clark said he has advice for those who find themselves down on their luck.

"I would just say to everybody that if they have a dream and goals to work toward them and have faith and believe in the Lord," Clark said.