Imprisoned for 29 years by flawed science

George Perrot has spent 29 years in prison for a rape he always said he did not commit. Until recently, it looked like he would die there.

Now, a single strand of hair stands between him and freedom. And that slender manacle may just have been snapped by federal authorities.

Even if you believe he’s guilty — as Hampden County prosecutors say they still do — there is plenty in Perrot’s case to trouble even the hardest of hard-liners, to shake our trust in those who are supposed to protect us.

Perrot was 17 in the fall of 1985. A series of horrendous attacks on elderly women in Springfield had begun the previous year, and police believed the crimes were connected. Some women were raped more than once; on Nov. 30, one of them, aged 78, was raped for the third time in 18 months.

Back then, Perrot was every parent’s nightmare, committing crimes and using drugs. Early on the morning of Dec. 7, 1985, he was arrested for breaking into a house in the 78-year-old’s (and his) neighborhood and for snatching a purse at a nearby Denny’s. Because of the way he broke into the house, investigators suspected he was also responsible for all of the rapes.

Read this whole story at https://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2015/09/05/abraham/iCJsoQ3nJDsuHOTaC0j...