Dharun Ravi's bias convictions in Tyler Clementi case overturned

An appeals court exonerated former Rutgers student Dharun Ravi in the Tyler Clementi webcam case, nj.com reported.

The appellate court agreed with Ravi's attorneys who had argued that he never should have been charged with bias crimes and his convictions should be reversed. The court also ordered a new trial saying Ravi could not have received a fair trial as the bias evidence permeated the trial. 

‘I'm extraordinarily pleased with the decision. I haven't spoken with the Ravi family yet, but I can only imagine they're pleased as well,’ Ravi's attorney Steven Altman said.

The arrest of Dharun Ravi, 18, of Plainsboro, New Jersey after the suicide of his roommate Tyler Clementi, 19, at Rutgers University in 2010 attracted national attention. Both had joined the university less than a month before the incident. Clementi ended life jumping off the George Washington Bridge. Soon Ravi and another student were charged with invasion of privacy for secretly placing a camera in Ravi’s dormitory room when Clementi and another man had an intimate affair. They transmitted it on the internet.

Clementi came to know of this and it led him to commit suicide, the prosecution accused.

But Ravi was not charged in Clementi's death and his defense maintained the webcam incidents had nothing to do with Clementi's decision to commit suicide. Ravi was sentenced — and has already served — his 30-day sentence, three years of probation and 300 hours of community service, according to nj.com

After Ravi's conviction in 2012, the state Supreme Court in a separate case struck down part of the state's bias crime statute that focused on the victim's state of mind. According to that case, it is the defendant's state of mind and intent that is important, not the victim's. Ravi was sentenced on the basis of the bias crime law.

During the appeal hearing the prosecution too agreed that four of Ravi's bias convictions should be void after the Supreme Court decision. The appeals court also dismissed Ravi's conviction on hindering his own apprehension and tampering with witnesses.

The court also rejected the prosecution's argument that Ravi should have received a stiffer sentence. 

Altman said the prosecution now has 20 days to decide whether or not to appeal to the state Supreme Court.

The suicide and arrest of Ravi were sensational news in the mainstream media.

Ravi's Twitter feed on that date said: ‘Roommate asked for the room till midnight. I went into molly's room and turned on my webcam. I saw him making out with a dude. Yay,’ Ravi said on his Twitter page in a September 19, 2010 entry posted at 6:17 pm.

Two days later, Ravi posted another entry directing his Twitter followers to iChat. ‘Anyone with iChat, I dare you to video chat me between the hours of 9:30 and 12. Yes it's happening again,’ Ravi wrote in the September 21 post.