Tyrone Brown facts for kids

Tyrone Brown (born 1973) is an African-American man from Texas who, in 1990, was sentenced to a life term in a Texas maximum security prison and was kept incarcerated for 17 years after testing positive while on probation for robbing a man of two dollars at the age of 17. No one was hurt in the robbery, and Brown had voluntarily returned the wallet to the victim. Brown's case attracted some attention in the press in 2006, and he was later granted a conditional pardon by Texas Governor Rick Perry. He was released on March 16, 2007.

Early life

Brown was a high-school dropout and had been a victim of child abuse by his father, who had reportedly beat him.

Press attention

Brown's case was contrasted in the press with the case of an influential white defendant; both defendants were sentenced by the same judge, Keith Dean. The other man had committed murder. Probation records indicated that the man had failed five drug tests over a three-year period. In contrast with the way Brown was treated, the other defendant was never sent to jail and received an early lifting of all of the usual conditions of probation.

After Brown's case and the contrasting treatment of the other man became well known, in part due to a feature report on the ABC News television program 20/20, the judge involved in the two cases, Keith Dean, failed to win re-election to his position.