In theory, California provides $124 a day in compensation to the wrongfully imprisoned.

In practice, the State makes it VERY hard to ever recover those funds. There are guys who were exonerated years ago who are still waiting to receive a single penny.

Can you expound a little on what makes if difficult to recover the funds? What hoops must one jump through that wouldn't be plainly evident in RLJ's particular situation?

Sure. There are two primary issues.

First, the standard for being compensated is higher than the one for being let out of prison. Ray is free right now because the state has admitted that it no longer has confidence in his conviction.

However, it has not affirmatively conceded his innocence. That may sound pedantic. It let him out of prison and admits he isn't the target of the ongoing investigation. But from a legal perspective, it makes all the difference in regards to whether he is actually entitled to compensation.

Second, even if the State agrees that someone is theoretically entitled to compensation, there are significant budgetary delays. State law requires public hearings before funds can be appropriated, so sometimes you have to wait months upon months for the funds to be allocated... much less actually delivered.

This is one area where Texas is far ahead of California.

Out of curiosity: do they tax these funds? I hope not.

I'd love to learn more about this.

That is low. A good formula would be to treat their stay as if it were forced employment. They should be pro rata'ed 3x the annual median household income annually (since it's a 24 hour a day commitment). And pay tax on it. It's still kind of unfair for a rich person but rich people don't usually get caged unfairly. Maybe some danger pay too if that's a factor.

That's not great, only $10k/yr. For 11 years of wrongful imprisonment, that's $112000.

In the US, there have been cases where the wrongfully imprisoned have received ~600k/yr: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/innocent-man-16-65-...