Advocate praises 'Hurricane' Carter's legacy of hope
- Rubin %27Hurricane%27 Carter was wrongfully convicted in a 1966 triple homicide%2C a judge ruled in 1985
- Released after 19 years in prison%2C Carter co-founded a group to help others seek exoneration
- Carter%2C a native of New Jersey%2C made Toronto%2C Canada%2C his adopted hometown and died Sunday at 76
A Canadian advocate for the wrongfully convicted visited Rubin "Hurricane" Carter at his Toronto home two days before his death, and even though Carter was unresponsive she wanted to tell him about the impact he'd had on others seeking exoneration.
"I told him about how he had inspired them and given them hope,'' said Win Wahrer, director of client services for the Toronto-based Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted, a group she co-founded with Carter.
Carter, who spent 19 years in prison in New Jersey until a federal judge ruled in 1985 that he'd been wrongfully convicted of three murders, died Sunday at age 76. The former middleweight boxer, whose all-out punching style inspired his nickname, had been battling prostate cancer.
Wahrer met Carter in 1992 while she was working with a group called the Justice for Guy Paul Morin Committee. Morin, who'd been convicted in Canada of the murder of a 9-year-old neighbor girl, was exonerated in 1995 by DNA evidence. Carter had only been released seven years earlier at the time he met Morin, who was in prison.
"I was so naiΜve back in those days," Wahrer told USA TODAY Sports on Sunday. " β¦ It never occurred to me he (Carter) might walk out and say, 'This guy is as guilty as sin.' But he didn't do that. He came out and he helped us to bring attention to the Guy Paul Morin case because Rubin had a celebrity status β not only being wrongfully convicted but also as a boxer."
Wahrer's group was reconstituted in 1993 to become the Association in Defence of the Wrongly Convicted. Carter became its co-founder and executive director and held that position until 2004. The associated says it has assisted with the exonerations of 18 Canadians, most of whom had been convicted of murder.
Carter's own case inspired a 1975 song called Hurricane by Bob Dylan. It was the subject of the 1999 film of the same name starring Denzel Washington. Muhammad Ali and other celebrities spoke in Carter's behalf. Carter wrote an autobiography titled The Sixteenth Round.
"Of all the wrongful convictions, I would think that Rubin's is probably the best known worldwide," said Wahrer. " β¦ Certainly, there are a lot of cases that make it into the news. But the thing is you read them today, do you remember them tomorrow? Rubin's is one of those (you remember)."
In a statement Sunday, Washington said, "God bless Rubin Carter and his tireless fight to ensure justice for all."
Even as he fought cancer, Carter remained involved in trying to help others.
On Feb 21, the New York Daily News published an article written by Carter in support of David McCallum of Brooklyn, N.Y., imprisoned since 1985 after being convicted of kidnapping and murder.
"I am now quite literally on my deathbed and am making my final wish to those with the legal authority to act," Carter wrote.
He noted that McCallum was imprisoned the same year he was released. Carter urged new Brooklyn District Attorney Ken Thompson to "look straight in the eye of truth" and re-examine the case.
"If I find a heaven after this life, I'll be quite surprised," wrote Carter. "In my own years on this planet, though, I lived in hell for the first 49 years, and have been in heaven for the past 28 years.
"To live in a world where truth matters and justice, however late, really happens, that world would be heaven enough for us all."
Wahrer said she visited Carter at his home last Friday for about 3 1/2 hours. She said he "looked very at peace" but was not able to speak. The first time she entered him room she said, "I just sort of in my head said things."
But she said after she left and went downstairs, she recalled that when her own mother died someone had told her "the last thing to go is their hearing. They can hear you."
So she returned to Carter's bedside and told him how she'd just returned from an Innocence Project meeting in Oregon that was attended by 113 exonerees β who had signed three posters wishing him well and thanking him.
"I told him how honored I was that I had been included in his life β¦ and wished him well on his next journey," she said.
Does she believe he heard her?
"It's very difficult to know if they're not responding to you,'' said Wahrer. "But I felt it was important for him to know that I cared about him, I loved him and that I would miss him."
Prosecutors had argued that the 1966 fatal shooting of three white people at a bar in Paterson, N.J.., by two black men β witnesses identified the race of the suspects but not Carter or John Artis β were in retaliation for a murder hours earlier of a black tavern owner by a white man.
Carter and Artis were convicted twice and sentenced to life in prison. Artis was paroled in 1981.
But Carter's conviction was overturned in 1985 in federal court in New Jersey. Judge Haddon Lee Sarokin ruled the prosecution's case rested upon "racial stereotypes, fears and prejudices." He also wrote that if the prosecution had revealed all of its evidence "there is a reasonable probability that the result of the trial would have been different." Prosecutors declined to try the case again.
Wahrer said Carter's story will continue to give others hope.
"Because of his credibility, because of the face of Rubin "Hurricane" Carter, because he was so well known," she said. "People who wouldn't normally pay attention to this sort of subject matter were paying attention. β¦ Unfortunately, many people feel that if you've gone to prison it's because you deserve to be there, and they don't think beyond that."
PHOTOS: 'HURRICANE' CARTER THROUGH THE YEARS
