My life was ruined when I was wrongly convicted of a sex crime – I didn’t even get an apology

For Gareth Jones, the most painful part of being wrongly imprisoned for a sexual offence was not the three years he spent inside, it was what came after. 

“It’s like living with a black cloud. You walk into a pub, and it’s just boom – silence. People stare.” 

It took 10 years for Jones, who had always maintained his innocence, to finally clear his name, including an agonising six years in which he was ostracised and even attacked. But despite all he’s been through, Jones has no chance of obtaining compensation. 

Since 2014, the government has refused nine in 10 applicants to its compensation scheme for victims of miscarriages of justice, meaning many like Jones are put off from even applying. 

Keir Starmer has twice been challenged by MPs to fix the scheme – who branded it a “travesty of justice” – in the last two months. 

Jones, now almost 40, is still living with the repercussions of his wrongful conviction. 

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In 2007, he was charged with a sexual offence against a 77-year-old woman he was caring for at a nursing home in Brecon, Wales. 

Jones, who has learning difficulties, had helped the woman, who had severe dementia, to bed and was changing her incontinence pads when he discovered she was bleeding heavily. He raised the alarm and later accompanied her to hospital.  

Almost two weeks later, the police arrested him, charging him with having caused the injuries. 

At the trial the following year, prosecutors accused the then 24-year-old Jones of carrying out a “vicious and sadistic attack” on the woman. But expert medical reports at the time acknowledged that her injuries could have been caused by an earlier fall. 

There was no forensic or DNA evidence to support the accusation and witnesses said Jones had only been alone with the resident for around four minutes. 

During the trial, he struggled to answer some of the questions put to him under cross-examination, at times giving “bizarre” responses. Neither the judge nor the jury was made aware that he had a learning disability which made it difficult for him to understand the proceedings. 

“They called me a red herring. I remember saying, ‘What the hell are they calling me a fish for?’,” Jones said. 

The jury found him guilty and he was sentenced to nine years in prison, later reduced to seven on appeal. 

There were no accommodations made for Jones’s disability in prison, the experience left him with lasting trauma.  

“I was shell-shocked,” he says. “I had people screaming abuse at me.” 

When he was released on probation, after three and half years for good conduct, Jones’s relief vanished as he came to terms with life on the outside. Having been placed on the sex offenders’ register, he could no longer live at his family home in Trecastle, Wales, where his young niece was living.  

A family friend, Paula Morgan, who had known Jones since he was a child, stepped in to act as his carer. Morgan believed he was innocent and spent years writing to lawyers to no avail until the Cardiff University Innocence Project answered her. 

Founded by law professor and solicitor Julie Price, the project aims to support people to challenge their wrongful convictions. With the help of staff and law students, Jones was able to quash his conviction in 2018.  

A judge agreed that the jury had not been presented with medical evidence that could have supported alternative explanations for the injuries.

More significantly, the trial failed to take account of Jones’s learning disability. New psychological evidence showed he was highly suggestible and prone to confusion under pressure, traits that may have led him to give unreliable answers during cross-examination. 

The questioning Jones was subjected to would “have been objectionable if asked of a witness without learning disabilities” and never have been allowed to stand if his disability was known, the judge concluded. 

Although Jones overturned his conviction, he has never received any compensation from the government. 

“They didn’t even apologise. Didn’t even say a word. I lost almost a decade of my life. Not a penny in compensation,” he says. 

Since 2014, victims of miscarriages of justice have had to prove their innocence “beyond reasonable doubt” to receive compensation, following a change to the law. Before, it was enough for their conviction to be overturned.  

Payouts under the compensation scheme have since fallen steeply. Between 1999 and 2007, 307 applicants received a share of a total £81 million in compensation from the Ministry of Justice. Between 2016 and 2024, there were 591 applicants but only 39 claimants were awarded a share of just £2.4m. 

The campaign group APPEAL say the law change has set “an almost impossible standard” to meet that leaves victims destitute. Last month, Keir Starmer, who co-wrote a book on miscarriages of justice during his time as a lawyer, confirmed he was looking at the issue.  

“It’s wrong,” says Jones. “Even if I got £100,000, I’d tell them to shove it. It doesn’t give me back three and a half years… or six years fighting to clear my name.” 

Those six years, between his release and conviction being quashed, took a toll on Jones. He suffered from depression and even considered suicide.  

During that time, Jones said he received abuse on the streets and on one occasion was even physically assaulted.  

“I’ve always promised my niece I wouldn’t go back inside. So I bit my lip and walked away. But it’s hard,” he said.  

Speaking to Big Issue, Ann Davies, Plaid Cymru MP for Caerfyrddin, said: “The case of Gareth Jones is a stark reminder of the devastating and lasting consequences of wrongful convictions. While having a conviction overturned can bring immense relief, it does not undo the years of suffering, stigma and isolation that individuals like Mr Jones endure – both inside and outside prison walls.

“For Gareth, the injustice didn’t end with his release. He has struggled to rebuild his life, find employment, and simply be seen as the person he is – not the label he was wrongly given. Wrongful convictions are not just legal errors; they are life-altering tragedies. The trauma lingers long after the courts have corrected their course.

“I stand with my Plaid Cymru colleague in urging the UK government to urgently reform the compensation system for victims of miscarriages of justice. Justice must not stop at overturning a conviction – it must extend to helping people reclaim their lives. How many more lives must be derailed before we see real, meaningful change?”

Since clearing his name, Jones has regained some normality in his life. He now has no shortage of friends to go to the pub with. But without compensation, he has found it difficult to become more independent. Just having enough to buy a car or study for new qualifications would make a significant difference, he says.  

Despite everything he has been through, Jones remains resilient.  

“Every day’s a new day – it doesn’t matter – I wake up and think, right: ‘Different day, different Gareth,’” he says. 

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