Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #194 Jason Flom with Alexis Ke'Erica Martin

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#194 Jason Flom with Alexis Ke'Erica Martin · Wrongful Conviction

0:03
Speaker 1: Alexis Kierka Martin was raised by her grandmother in Akron, Ohio,
0:07
Speaker 1: and had a strained relationship with her birth mother and father.
0:12
Speaker 1: She had a boyfriend to Shawn Spear, but they broke
0:14
Speaker 1: up around age thirteen, the same time that an older
0:18
Speaker 1: man named Angelo Kearney began grooming her.
0:21
Speaker 2: For the sex trade.
0:23
Speaker 1: By the time she was fourteen, she was actively being trafficked.
0:28
Speaker 1: Time passed and Deshaun reached out to Kierka to ask
0:31
Speaker 1: if the rumors he had heard about prostitution were true. Then,
0:35
Speaker 1: one night, after a party at Angelo Kearney's, Kierka and
0:39
Speaker 1: another woman, Jena Jones, were alone with Angelo and his
0:42
Speaker 1: brother Alicio Samuel. Kierka was aware that robbery was about
0:47
Speaker 1: to take place that would afford her an opportunity to escape.
0:52
Speaker 1: While she was being raped by Alicio, Samuel, Deshaun and
0:55
Speaker 1: his friend Travaski Jackson broke in, wearing masks and carrying guns.
1:01
Speaker 1: Kearney was shot and killed, and Samuel survived.
1:04
Speaker 2: A gunshot to his head.
1:07
Speaker 1: When Samuel came to at the hospital, he mentioned nothing
1:10
Speaker 1: about the child he had been raping, but he did
1:13
Speaker 1: mention the other people he had been with earlier that night.
1:16
Speaker 1: A further investigation led to Alexis Kierka Martin. Ohio's brand
1:22
Speaker 1: new safe Harbor law was written for situations just like this,
1:25
Speaker 1: but neither her lawyer nor the state invoked it before
1:29
Speaker 1: she was tried in adult court for the murder of
1:32
Speaker 1: the man that held her captive in child sex slavery.
1:37
Speaker 1: This is wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm. Welcome back to
1:57
Speaker 1: wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm.
1:59
Speaker 2: That's me.
2:00
Speaker 1: I'm your host, and today if my voice is cracking
2:03
Speaker 1: a little, it's because this story is it's painful to read,
2:07
Speaker 1: it's painful to talk about. It's an absolute disgrace that
2:12
Speaker 1: any of this happened. It's also the story of triumph
2:15
Speaker 1: over tragedy. Though with us today we have an extraordinary lawyer,
2:19
Speaker 1: Sasha Naman from the Ohio Justice and Policy Center. Sasha,
2:23
Speaker 1: it's wonderful to have you here. Welcome to wronful Conviction.
2:27
Speaker 1: Thank you so much, and we're going to tell the
2:29
Speaker 1: story with the person who lived it, Alexis Kierica Martin.
2:34
Speaker 1: You'll hear her referred to as Kierica as we go through,
2:37
Speaker 1: but she's also known as Alexis Martin. So, Alexis, thank
2:40
Speaker 1: you for being here and sharing your story.
2:43
Speaker 3: Thank you for allowing me the time and opportunity.
2:45
Speaker 1: So let's go back to your childhood, Akron, Ohio, Heartland
2:51
Speaker 1: of America. What was your childhood like before this tragedy,
2:56
Speaker 1: this series of tragedies struck.
3:00
Speaker 3: It would be what some people would call unstable. I
3:04
Speaker 3: grew up with multiple family members, but predominantly I was
3:08
Speaker 3: blessed with having my grandmother raise me. All in all,
3:12
Speaker 3: through everything, I would say that she did a pretty
3:14
Speaker 3: good job with at least making sure I knew how
3:15
Speaker 3: to say thank you.
3:18
Speaker 4: Alexis was a child when she was trafficked. She had
3:21
Speaker 4: a tough childhood in some ways, and she said her
3:24
Speaker 4: grandma was a light in that in a big way.
3:27
Speaker 4: But at fourteen years old, she was surviving some horrific things,
3:31
Speaker 4: things that are unimaginable to many Americans. Is a prolonged
3:34
Speaker 4: and terrible sex trafficking situation, and she wanted a life
3:38
Speaker 4: that was free and safe and healthy, where she could
3:41
Speaker 4: go to school, where her and her siblings weren't in danger.
3:45
Speaker 3: And she was a.
3:45
Speaker 4: Child, so she was in a position where she hoped
3:48
Speaker 4: that she could finally have this opportunity to flee from
3:52
Speaker 4: the trafficking, and that brought her into involvement with the
3:56
Speaker 4: robbery of her trafficker.
3:58
Speaker 3: I was fourteen when I met my trafficker, and me
4:03
Speaker 3: and my co defriend and DeShawn Spear. He was my
4:06
Speaker 3: boyfriend and we separated before this case occurred, and then
4:12
Speaker 3: while I was in active trafficking, we would see each
4:15
Speaker 3: other and check on each other, but I never got
4:17
Speaker 3: too close with him or really like engaged. Everybody kept
4:23
Speaker 3: hearing rumors about me being prostituted. Some people were bold
4:27
Speaker 3: enough to act, some people weren't. They just you know,
4:30
Speaker 3: kind of turned their nose up to me. Well, he
4:33
Speaker 3: asked me a couple of times, and I continued to
4:35
Speaker 3: deny it and just admitted that I was dancing, but
4:38
Speaker 3: I wouldn't tell him where I was dancing at.
4:40
Speaker 1: So as of that moment, he's left in the dark.
4:43
Speaker 1: And before the night that the Shawn Spirit tried to
4:46
Speaker 1: free Kierka, which was November seven, twenty thirteen, Sasha she
4:50
Speaker 1: had tried to find another way to get out of
4:53
Speaker 1: that life.
4:53
Speaker 4: Right she was trying to reach out to adults for help.
4:56
Speaker 4: So before the night of this offense happened. She was
4:59
Speaker 4: trying to and herself in. She actually proactively went to
5:03
Speaker 4: the juvenile system because she had kind of an active
5:06
Speaker 4: case that had kind of been going on in parallel,
5:08
Speaker 4: and she was hoping that they would take her in,
5:11
Speaker 4: that they would arrest her, they would put her in
5:12
Speaker 4: a program. But her trafficker sends her with someone who
5:16
Speaker 4: poses as her caretaker and says she's fine and she's
5:19
Speaker 4: cared for, and even though these adults see the way
5:22
Speaker 4: she's dressed, even though they see these red flags, they
5:24
Speaker 4: let her back out with that person.
5:27
Speaker 1: Alexis, as much as you're comfortable with talking about it.
5:30
Speaker 1: That night when this robbery occurred, can you tell us
5:34
Speaker 1: how this whole thing happened and how somebody ended up dead.
5:38
Speaker 3: I was caught to the house and Jenney Jones was
5:42
Speaker 3: also there. They had a party and Angela was training
5:45
Speaker 3: me more so to be his madam. So I had
5:47
Speaker 3: to be there to make sure that the rest of
5:49
Speaker 3: the girls did what they were supposed to and that
5:53
Speaker 3: I made money that night. So during the whole time
5:57
Speaker 3: that the party occurred, I did what Angelo told me
6:00
Speaker 3: to do. I danced, I collected money, I served drinks,
6:04
Speaker 3: and then as it got late, everybody left. But that
6:09
Speaker 3: means that there was a lot of eyewitnesses that seen
6:11
Speaker 3: me with him, some of his other brothers, they were
6:15
Speaker 3: there that night. When they left, it was just me,
6:18
Speaker 3: Jenny Jones, Angelo Corney, and Alisio Samer.
6:22
Speaker 4: Alexis was aware that Deshaun and Trevaski were going to
6:27
Speaker 4: be coming into the house. And in Ohio there's something
6:32
Speaker 4: called felony murder, as there is in many other states.
6:35
Speaker 4: And if you're aware of something like a robbery, if
6:38
Speaker 4: you're found legally culpable in something like a robbery and
6:42
Speaker 4: then somebody gets killed, then you're culpable for the homicide
6:46
Speaker 4: that happened. Alexis never shot anybody, never hurt anybody, never
6:51
Speaker 4: wanted anybody to get hurt. But there was this robbery
6:54
Speaker 4: that happened, and when Deshaun Spears and Travaska Jackson break in,
7:00
Speaker 4: when they shoot her trafficker and kill him, when they
7:02
Speaker 4: shoot the man who is raping her, although she is
7:05
Speaker 4: the child and she is the victim there, she became
7:07
Speaker 4: legally culpable ultimately for the death.
7:11
Speaker 3: Once Alicio was shot and Angela was killed, the question
7:15
Speaker 3: was where was I, Because I was always with him,
7:20
Speaker 3: and if I wasn't with him, then I was in
7:22
Speaker 3: a position where one of his brothers knew where I
7:24
Speaker 3: was at, So where was I was missing? After Alicio
7:28
Speaker 3: woke up in the hospital, he identified Jane, he never
7:33
Speaker 3: identified me, And my theory on this subject is he
7:36
Speaker 3: didn't identify me because I was a child and he
7:39
Speaker 3: was an adult. But other people that the police questioned
7:42
Speaker 3: that night continuously brought up my name. So I turned
7:46
Speaker 3: myself in and I was arrested. I was fifteen, and
7:51
Speaker 3: I feel like it was the first time in life
7:53
Speaker 3: that anybody was actually like listening to me. I kind
7:58
Speaker 3: of just told him everything that they wanted to know.
8:01
Speaker 3: My only thing was I just wanted to know was
8:05
Speaker 3: he alive or was he dead? Because I wasn't sure,
8:07
Speaker 3: And when he told me Angelo was dead, I didn't
8:09
Speaker 3: really know how to feel. It didn't click into me
8:12
Speaker 3: that I was truly being arrested for his death until
8:15
Speaker 3: they took me away from the detention center. I was
8:18
Speaker 3: on probation, so I've been arrested a couple times. I
8:21
Speaker 3: was used to the detention officers and stuff like that,
8:24
Speaker 3: so it was kind of like finally that night, I
8:27
Speaker 3: was going to be safe until they pulled away from
8:31
Speaker 3: there and took me down to the dog question interrogation,
8:36
Speaker 3: where they left me in the code for about three
8:38
Speaker 3: or four hours. I threw up on the table. They
8:41
Speaker 3: didn't clean that up. I asked for my mother. They
8:44
Speaker 3: told me that my mother left, and I knew some
8:47
Speaker 3: of my rights, and I was like, you know, I
8:49
Speaker 3: thought my mom had to be present because I was
8:50
Speaker 3: only fifteen, and they told me she didn't care. And
8:54
Speaker 3: then I continuously asked for my attorney. And I was fifteen.
8:59
Speaker 3: I knew some of my rights right because of Criminal
9:01
Speaker 3: Minds and whatever else I watched, but I didn't really
9:05
Speaker 3: know how to enforce my rights. How they knew I
9:09
Speaker 3: had involvement was I admitted my own involvement. I didn't
9:12
Speaker 3: know what human trafficking was. I only knew what prostitution
9:15
Speaker 3: and escorting was. I didn't understand that I was a victim.
9:20
Speaker 3: I also admitted to the cops Angela was training me
9:23
Speaker 3: to be his madam. And I also admitted to the
9:25
Speaker 3: cops that I called this man my dad. But that
9:30
Speaker 3: night and for months on, nobody pays attention to that.
9:43
Speaker 2: This episode is brought to you by Stand Together.
9:46
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9:51
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10:12
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10:23
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10:29
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10:57
Speaker 4: Before Alexis's case happened, iiO had passed this safe harbor
11:01
Speaker 4: law that was specifically meant to protect survivors of human
11:05
Speaker 4: trafficking like Kerica. The law would allow juvenile courts to
11:09
Speaker 4: offer services to children like her who were trafficked and
11:12
Speaker 4: to help them. And when she was arrested and sent
11:17
Speaker 4: to juvenile court, that law was in effect, but her
11:19
Speaker 4: attorney didn't know about it and didn't understand it. And
11:23
Speaker 4: Kierko is actually the one who brought this question about
11:26
Speaker 4: this law to the attorney because she had heard about
11:28
Speaker 4: it somewhere, so she was now advocating for herself. And
11:32
Speaker 4: this is above and beyond a fifteen year old who
11:34
Speaker 4: is trying to educate her attorney.
11:36
Speaker 3: Who then did look into it but didn't.
11:37
Speaker 4: Understand the law, and then neither he nor the court
11:40
Speaker 4: nor the prosecutor brings it up. You have this case
11:43
Speaker 4: that the law is made for, the law is in effect,
11:47
Speaker 4: and nobody brings it up, nobody applies it. In fact,
11:50
Speaker 4: the only person who had mentioned it in the process
11:53
Speaker 4: really is Kerka herself.
11:56
Speaker 1: Just to clarify for our audience, the Save Harbor Law
12:00
Speaker 1: Ohio specifically mandates that miners under the age of sixteen
12:04
Speaker 1: do not need to prove that they were compelled to
12:06
Speaker 1: engage in commercial sexual activity. They're automatically considered victims of
12:10
Speaker 1: child sex trafficking, and the statute requires juvenile courts to
12:15
Speaker 1: appoint a guardian to the defendant, a professional other than
12:19
Speaker 1: a parent or attorney, who was responsible for advocating in
12:22
Speaker 1: the best interests of the child on trial. So here
12:25
Speaker 1: the defense, lawyer, the court itself, everybody. They just didn't
12:30
Speaker 1: do what they're supposed to do. Nobody did. It's crazy,
12:33
Speaker 1: and then to make matters worse, they send you to
12:36
Speaker 1: adult court.
12:37
Speaker 3: At that point, I was educated on what human trafficking was,
12:42
Speaker 3: so I actually realize that you're a victim and you
12:45
Speaker 3: hold no power, and that somebody you thought you cared
12:48
Speaker 3: about was hurting you. To know that they were knowledgeably
12:51
Speaker 3: hurting you, and that was their only intent ever, was
12:55
Speaker 3: to hurt you, it's pretty defeating. It hurts. So I
13:01
Speaker 3: know all this now. I learned about what the grooming
13:04
Speaker 3: process was, and I identified what my grooming process was.
13:08
Speaker 3: I learned about the trafficking. I learned about the stages
13:11
Speaker 3: with a juvenile counselor named Hilary Finkel, and she's the
13:16
Speaker 3: one who's bringing in this lady named Magan Madimo, who
13:20
Speaker 3: ultimately brings up the safe harbor law to the juvenile
13:23
Speaker 3: court after I'm bound over into the adult court, who
13:26
Speaker 3: ultimately educates my attorney. But while I was in the courtroom,
13:33
Speaker 3: Judge Theodosia, who leads the Human Trafficking Division in Summon
13:37
Speaker 3: County still to this day, set, out of her own mouths,
13:41
Speaker 3: can we take a second in pause? And I want
13:44
Speaker 3: to ask you, Noah, my attorney and the prosecutor, what
13:50
Speaker 3: do we do about this fifteen year old's trafficking? She
13:54
Speaker 3: admits out her mouth that I'm traffic. Not only was
13:56
Speaker 3: I sex traffic, but labor traffic. She admits this. Nobody
14:01
Speaker 3: had a response. The prosecutor and my attorney looked at
14:05
Speaker 3: each other, looked at the judge and was kind of
14:07
Speaker 3: dumbfounded when she asked this question. My attorney, I can't
14:11
Speaker 3: even remember. He mustered up some answer, but it clearly
14:14
Speaker 3: must not have been good enough for Thiodosia, because two
14:17
Speaker 3: months later, even after you admit that I'm traffic, I
14:21
Speaker 3: got bound over, and that made me feel like prior
14:25
Speaker 3: to the trafficking, I was raped and I've reported it
14:29
Speaker 3: and I never got help. One of my cousins raped
14:32
Speaker 3: me from nine to ten and they found him not guilty,
14:34
Speaker 3: and it made me feel the exact same way that
14:38
Speaker 3: no matter how many times I tell somebody somebody did
14:41
Speaker 3: something to me that was wrong, I'm always going to
14:44
Speaker 3: either be accused of a liar or it doesn't matter.
14:48
Speaker 3: So I started to lose hope again.
14:51
Speaker 1: It's a miracle that you clung onto any hope at
14:53
Speaker 1: all after everything you had been through. And so February seventeenth,
14:57
Speaker 1: twenty fifteen, a day that will live in it infamy. Kieraka,
15:01
Speaker 1: you were advised by your attorney that, with the goal
15:04
Speaker 1: of returning to juvenile court, you should plead guilty to
15:07
Speaker 1: polonious assault and murder. Yes, this was, of course a
15:12
Speaker 1: terrible strategy, and ultimately you were sentenced to twenty one
15:17
Speaker 1: to life.
15:18
Speaker 2: How did you process that.
15:19
Speaker 1: Sentence and how did you manage to maintain any sort
15:24
Speaker 1: of trace of sanity.
15:26
Speaker 3: Well, I have a little sister that's three and a
15:29
Speaker 3: half years younger than me, and we were talking when
15:33
Speaker 3: I was six years old, and I promised her that
15:36
Speaker 3: I would never let nobody hurt her and I would
15:38
Speaker 3: always be there to protect her. While I was fighting
15:42
Speaker 3: my case at detention center, I tried to kill myself.
15:46
Speaker 3: I busted all the above vessels in my face, and
15:48
Speaker 3: I was really close. It hurt her bad while I
15:54
Speaker 3: was in prison. She's left out in the world with
15:57
Speaker 3: my father and my birth mother, the two people I've
16:00
Speaker 3: tried to protect her from my whole life. So if
16:03
Speaker 3: I gave up fighting, I gave up fighting for her life.
16:07
Speaker 3: If I gave up fighting, everything that happened to me,
16:10
Speaker 3: every time a man abused me, hit me, sex with me,
16:14
Speaker 3: everything that I have ever done to protect her was
16:17
Speaker 3: ultimately for nothing. If I lay down and just gave up. Now,
16:23
Speaker 3: I was scared to go to trial because my co defendant,
16:26
Speaker 3: Deshan just got forty one to life. I would have
16:29
Speaker 3: went if I had somebody believe in me that told
16:31
Speaker 3: me to go. I had two people that told me
16:36
Speaker 3: you should maybe go to trial. One was another fifteen
16:40
Speaker 3: year old girl, and all she said was best friend,
16:42
Speaker 3: if you go, I'm gonna support you. And then I
16:46
Speaker 3: had my older sister who was paying for my attorney,
16:49
Speaker 3: and she was telling me she thinks I should take
16:51
Speaker 3: it to trial. I had an indecisive father that kept
16:54
Speaker 3: telling me one minute plead out and act crazy. The
16:57
Speaker 3: next one, he was telling me to take it to
16:58
Speaker 3: trial my birtha. She barely went to any hearings, but
17:02
Speaker 3: she was telling me, plead, because you don't want to
17:05
Speaker 3: get max out at the box. And then I have
17:07
Speaker 3: my attorney who knows more than me that's telling me, plead,
17:11
Speaker 3: we have a good chance of winning your appeal because
17:15
Speaker 3: of this safe harbor law. So I pled, but I
17:19
Speaker 3: kept fighting because I have a baby's sister that at
17:23
Speaker 3: the end I promise I would protect and if I
17:25
Speaker 3: didn't protect her, nobody else would. So I fought and
17:30
Speaker 3: I continue to fight after denial after denial, after denial.
17:35
Speaker 4: Her new attorney. Ke's new attorney, Jennifer Kinsley, ends up
17:39
Speaker 4: taking on this case pro bono and appealing it all
17:43
Speaker 4: the way to the Ohio Supreme Court, arguing that Kierka
17:47
Speaker 4: should have received the protections of the Safe Harbor law,
17:50
Speaker 4: and ultimately the Ohio Supreme Court rejected the case. And
17:54
Speaker 4: they did that while saying that there is ample evidence
17:57
Speaker 4: that Kierka was a victim of human traffic. But unfortunately,
18:01
Speaker 4: the original trial attorney didn't present evidence linking the crime
18:06
Speaker 4: to Kerka being a victim of sex trafficking, So the
18:09
Speaker 4: Supreme Court said, because he didn't create that link between
18:13
Speaker 4: the known trafficking and the crime. They were not going
18:16
Speaker 4: to apply the safe harbor law to Key, And to me,
18:19
Speaker 4: that's a little bit absurd, because of course there's a connection.
18:24
Speaker 4: You have a fifteen year old child trying to free
18:27
Speaker 4: herself from being trafficked by adults. It doesn't take a
18:31
Speaker 4: lot to think about how there could be a connection there.
18:34
Speaker 1: While justice was delayed, it surely wasn't going to be denied. Ultimately,
18:40
Speaker 1: you petitioned Governor de Wine for clemency and you had
18:43
Speaker 1: a hearing on that in September of twenty nineteen.
18:47
Speaker 3: I went in front of the pro Board on determination
18:51
Speaker 3: of my clemency. In November I got an eight to
18:54
Speaker 3: two vote, eight in favor, two against. In January, Governor
18:59
Speaker 3: de Wine considered my clemency and said that he wanted
19:02
Speaker 3: me to do this program Tapestry, and after I completed it,
19:06
Speaker 3: I would come home. I started Tapestry January twenty first,
19:10
Speaker 3: twenty twenty. Tapestry closed down due to COVID and I
19:15
Speaker 3: was released April twenty of twenty twenty.
19:18
Speaker 1: So, after serving seven long years in prison, what was
19:23
Speaker 1: it like walking out?
19:25
Speaker 2: Take us inside that day, that moment.
19:28
Speaker 3: April eighteenth, on national television. I was told I was
19:33
Speaker 3: going to be released. It didn't seem real at all,
19:38
Speaker 3: Like this is something that I dreamed about many days
19:41
Speaker 3: in prison. It was going home, going home, And now
19:44
Speaker 3: I'm signing a paper to agree to conditions of parole
19:48
Speaker 3: and clemency and being told that I'll be free by monday.
19:53
Speaker 3: So I signed the papers, and then I'm told, you
19:55
Speaker 3: have to go to the whole.
19:58
Speaker 2: To the hole.
19:58
Speaker 3: The craziest thing is, yes, I have to go get
20:02
Speaker 3: COVID nineteen tested and be put in quarantine in the
20:06
Speaker 3: whole until Monday so that I could be released to
20:09
Speaker 3: this program. So I pack up my stuff and for
20:13
Speaker 3: two days, it's like the longest agony in the world,
20:16
Speaker 3: knowing that in two days you'll be released. In two days,
20:21
Speaker 3: you'll get to enter into a world of something you
20:25
Speaker 3: don't know. I left as a kid, and I left
20:27
Speaker 3: a world of chaos, and I'm supposed to be being
20:30
Speaker 3: released into a world of peace and freedom. Right. I
20:33
Speaker 3: decided that I didn't want to go back to my hometown, Akron,
20:37
Speaker 3: because I didn't want to go back to the same people,
20:39
Speaker 3: the same way, as the same lifestyle. I believe that was,
20:42
Speaker 3: you know, the biggest reason of why I didn't get
20:46
Speaker 3: to reach my goals as a kid. I believe God
20:48
Speaker 3: gave me a second opportunity with the new family, and
20:51
Speaker 3: I chose to take it. They released me from the prison,
20:55
Speaker 3: and it's this long corridor you have to walk down,
20:58
Speaker 3: really really really long, and they hand him my release ID,
21:02
Speaker 3: and it's none of this is still real, that I'm
21:04
Speaker 3: really being released until I passed through the other side
21:08
Speaker 3: of the metal detectors and there's Jennifer and Sasha and
21:16
Speaker 3: they hug me and we walk out the doors and
21:20
Speaker 3: we walk out the doors to cameras in my face.
21:23
Speaker 3: They tell me I get to say hi. I say hi,
21:27
Speaker 3: and finally I get to embrace my little sister. Finally
21:32
Speaker 3: I get to embrace this little girl that's not a
21:36
Speaker 3: little girl anymore. I left and she was eleven, and
21:39
Speaker 3: I came home and she's eighteen and has a big,
21:41
Speaker 3: old round belly. It was hard seeing somebody that I
21:49
Speaker 3: thought was my baby not a baby no more.
22:02
Speaker 2: So are you are you an aunt? Now?
22:05
Speaker 3: I am? I also have another niece. She was born
22:10
Speaker 3: four months after I went to prison. The reason why
22:13
Speaker 3: I mentioned this is that I was supposed to raise her,
22:17
Speaker 3: and four months before she is born into this world,
22:20
Speaker 3: I am looking away from her. Currently right now, we
22:25
Speaker 3: are in the process of getting temporary custody of her,
22:29
Speaker 3: and she is here with me. So I am an aunt.
22:32
Speaker 3: I am an aunt by a lot. I have eleven
22:35
Speaker 3: nephews and nieces together.
22:38
Speaker 1: So I want to talk now about something you began
22:42
Speaker 1: in prison that I hear you're hoping and planning to
22:45
Speaker 1: continue with on the outside, and that's working with other survivors.
22:49
Speaker 1: I heard that when you were in prison. This sounds,
22:53
Speaker 1: I mean incredible, but hear me out you improved on
22:56
Speaker 1: an existing program by reaching out to someone with the
22:59
Speaker 1: f who had actually interviewed you.
23:02
Speaker 3: I got interrogated by the FBI about the human trafficking
23:05
Speaker 3: and stuff, and so I contacted one of the contacts
23:09
Speaker 3: and told her like, hey, you know, I'm trying to
23:10
Speaker 3: run this group. Do you have any pointers on what
23:12
Speaker 3: I should teach these girls about what is human trafficking?
23:15
Speaker 3: And she actually sent me like these packets and stuff.
23:18
Speaker 3: So me and one of my case managers we went
23:21
Speaker 3: through what I wanted to touch on, and I created
23:24
Speaker 3: a twelve week group on human trafficking and prostitution education.
23:29
Speaker 3: So it talked about healthy relationships, talked about sex, It
23:32
Speaker 3: talked about what is grooming, It talked about family loves.
23:37
Speaker 3: It touched on the trafficking part of it, but also
23:39
Speaker 3: some of the healing process of it. And then after
23:43
Speaker 3: you went through the group, you became a mentor to
23:46
Speaker 3: the new ladies that was going through a group. So
23:48
Speaker 3: it was an ongoing cycle that you had somewhere to go.
23:52
Speaker 3: And every time that group was going on, it would
23:54
Speaker 3: keep me and a lot of other girls out of
23:56
Speaker 3: trouble because you had a place where you were not alone,
24:00
Speaker 3: somebody could feel every emotion that you felt and wouldn't
24:03
Speaker 3: look at you like you were crazy. I actually have
24:06
Speaker 3: a mentee that I still talk to. She sits on
24:08
Speaker 3: a human trafficking board in Columbus, Ohio, and she wrote
24:12
Speaker 3: me a letter I was in prison and told me
24:15
Speaker 3: that because of me is the reason why she believed
24:19
Speaker 3: that she was a survivor and not just a prostitute.
24:23
Speaker 3: One thing with a lot of survivors is we have
24:26
Speaker 3: a problem with men for a while. So somebody that
24:29
Speaker 3: may not have had the issue with men, if I say,
24:32
Speaker 3: oh God, I want to punch him in his face.
24:35
Speaker 3: Somebody that hasn't had that issue would be like, there's
24:37
Speaker 3: something wrong with her, But another survivor would be like, girl,
24:40
Speaker 3: I know too, Like yeah, he was talking really mean
24:43
Speaker 3: or something. You know. So the group was just very
24:45
Speaker 3: productive and supportive, and it gave us a family, which
24:49
Speaker 3: ultimately most of us never really had a family or helped.
24:52
Speaker 3: We had a family that cared about us. So those
24:56
Speaker 3: are one of the things that I did in prison.
24:58
Speaker 3: Since I've been home, I'm working on going back to
25:01
Speaker 3: college to start my business so I can do a
25:04
Speaker 3: business for at risk tines. That's ultimately what I want
25:07
Speaker 3: to work with. I want to work with kids before
25:10
Speaker 3: they even get involved in a victimization. So that is
25:15
Speaker 3: my dream.
25:16
Speaker 1: Oh my god, he's doing more than most three people
25:19
Speaker 1: I know.
25:19
Speaker 2: It's a really beautiful thing.
25:21
Speaker 1: And I know after hearing your story, Kierka, people are
25:24
Speaker 1: going to want to get involved even more than they
25:26
Speaker 1: already are.
25:27
Speaker 2: So please, Sasha, you want to.
25:29
Speaker 4: So there is a GoFundMe for Alexis Kierka Martin. She's
25:34
Speaker 4: building up her new future, so she's in a position
25:37
Speaker 4: where she's gonna need some resources to continue her education.
25:42
Speaker 4: She hopes to one day start her own nonprofit to
25:46
Speaker 4: serve survivors, but also just to get up on her feet.
25:49
Speaker 4: And there's this GoFundMe if you look for Alexis Kierka
25:53
Speaker 4: Martin Support Fund, people can donate and help keep it
25:57
Speaker 4: on her way to the bright future that she deserves.
26:00
Speaker 4: And the other pieces and say is Ohio Justice and
26:03
Speaker 4: Policy Center does lots of work to free people who
26:07
Speaker 4: are unfairly sentenced and unfairly incarcerated. And if people want
26:12
Speaker 4: to learn more about Key's case or about similar cases
26:16
Speaker 4: or about our work, our website is Ohio JPC dot org.
26:21
Speaker 4: So Ohio Justice Policy Center JPC dot org. Those are
26:26
Speaker 4: two distinct ways people can help Key and then also
26:29
Speaker 4: learn more about the way we need to change our
26:31
Speaker 4: systems and the work that's being done throughout Ohio.
26:34
Speaker 3: And I wanted to say it's not up and running yet,
26:37
Speaker 3: but I would just ask that people stay tuned. I
26:39
Speaker 3: will be releasing my first poetry book. It's all the
26:43
Speaker 3: poems that I did fighting my case and while I
26:45
Speaker 3: was in prison. The person that I'm working with, we
26:48
Speaker 3: are hoping to publish it sometime after my birthday in
26:51
Speaker 3: twenty twenty one.
26:53
Speaker 1: Well, we will be happy and proud to help support
26:56
Speaker 1: it and promote it when it comes out. Congratulations on
27:00
Speaker 1: and we will also be putting the links to the
27:02
Speaker 1: GoFundMe in our episode guide, so we'll make it easy
27:07
Speaker 1: for our audience to get involved, and we'll post it
27:10
Speaker 1: on our Instagram as well.
27:11
Speaker 3: Thank you.
27:12
Speaker 1: Now we turn to the segment of the show that
27:16
Speaker 1: I always look forward to, closing arguments, where first of all,
27:20
Speaker 1: I once again thank each of you, Sasha Name and
27:25
Speaker 1: Kierka Martin for being here and sharing your amazing saga
27:30
Speaker 1: of a life and a case. We wish you all
27:33
Speaker 1: the best of everything. And then I turned my microphone
27:36
Speaker 1: off and I kick back in my chair and close
27:41
Speaker 1: my eyes so that you can share anything you want
27:44
Speaker 1: to share with our audience. And of course, Kerica, we'd
27:48
Speaker 1: like to save you for last. Sasha, if you can
27:51
Speaker 1: go first, and then whenever you're done, hand the mic
27:54
Speaker 1: off to Kierka Alexis.
27:57
Speaker 4: Kerka Martin is. It's incredibly resilient and smart and kind
28:04
Speaker 4: human being, and she has survived a lot and in
28:08
Speaker 4: so many ways is a unique gift in this world
28:13
Speaker 4: and in some ways her story is one that other
28:16
Speaker 4: people also have and It's important to keep that in
28:20
Speaker 4: mind because the work toward criminal justice has to be
28:26
Speaker 4: centered on the humanity of people like Key, and right
28:31
Speaker 4: now we have a criminal legal system, it's not always
28:33
Speaker 4: a criminal justice system. Key came out of prison just
28:37
Speaker 4: as we had a pandemic, but also this moment where
28:40
Speaker 4: we're really starting to rethink the way we have justice
28:44
Speaker 4: and racial equity and the way we treat human beings
28:48
Speaker 4: in a system that cages people. So there's a lot
28:51
Speaker 4: of work to do, and we're incredibly lucky that Governor
28:55
Speaker 4: DeWine granted clemency for Key, because she's going to be
29:00
Speaker 4: a major player, I think, in the way we improve
29:02
Speaker 4: this world. And I'm just incredibly honored to be on
29:05
Speaker 4: her team and to be her friend and to get
29:08
Speaker 4: to see her grow and to be a part of it.
29:11
Speaker 2: Kierica is all yours, Okay.
29:14
Speaker 3: I just wanted to thank you, know, the listeners for
29:18
Speaker 3: staying tuned and listening. I wanted to thank you guys
29:20
Speaker 3: for having me on and talking with me. I wanted
29:25
Speaker 3: to clarify just maybe for the listeners, because I was thinking,
29:29
Speaker 3: like they may have been wondering, why do I want
29:32
Speaker 3: to be called Kerka? It is taking ownership of who
29:37
Speaker 3: I am. I feel like alexis Lexi Alex. They all
29:43
Speaker 3: have like a bad past. I feel like holding on
29:47
Speaker 3: to that part of my name is like holding on
29:50
Speaker 3: to baggage. I don't plan on dropping my name completely,
29:56
Speaker 3: but Kierka is something that my grandmother named me, and
30:01
Speaker 3: that's really the only good of a lot of my past.
30:05
Speaker 3: So I believe I have a new life, a new start,
30:08
Speaker 3: or a new home, a new dream, So why not
30:12
Speaker 3: a new name. So that is why I like being
30:15
Speaker 3: called Kiera Kurkey, and my final thoughts and final things
30:20
Speaker 3: that I would say is the main reason why I
30:24
Speaker 3: tell my story. I call it getting naked. Main reason
30:28
Speaker 3: why I get naked in front of the audience and
30:30
Speaker 3: I let people see the vulnerability is that anybody can
30:36
Speaker 3: be a victim. Anybody. I was a girl who got
30:41
Speaker 3: all a's in school. I wanted to go to the
30:43
Speaker 3: Air Force. I was in rotc. I just didn't have
30:46
Speaker 3: parents at home that loved me. But I had a dream.
30:50
Speaker 3: I wasn't some bad kid that a lot of people thought.
30:52
Speaker 3: Anybody can be a victim, but it takes love in
30:56
Speaker 3: the community to make that victim into a survivor. And
31:00
Speaker 3: that's the difference between me and a lot of other
31:03
Speaker 3: people is that I didn't let my victimization leave me
31:07
Speaker 3: as a victim. And I'm still fighting and I'm going
31:11
Speaker 3: to continue fighting, and so there's no longer a breath
31:14
Speaker 3: in my body to fight for survivors and not just
31:17
Speaker 3: survivors of human trafficking. And I hope that hearing my
31:21
Speaker 3: story encourages people to if you're not going to, at
31:25
Speaker 3: least support the calls, support your family, Hug the little
31:30
Speaker 3: girl that's alone, play with the little boy that wants
31:33
Speaker 3: to play, and just let your kids know that they're
31:36
Speaker 3: loved so that there's not men like my trafficker that
31:40
Speaker 3: can come in and use and abuse them.
31:49
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flapp.
31:52
Speaker 1: Please support your local innocence projects and go to the
31:55
Speaker 1: link in our bio to see how you can help.
31:58
Speaker 1: I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Clyburn,
32:01
Speaker 1: and Kevin Warnis. The music on the show, as always,
32:05
Speaker 1: is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be
32:08
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Speaker 1: on Facebook at Wrongful conviction podcast Wrongful Conviction with Jason
32:16
Speaker 1: Flamm is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in
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Speaker 1: association with Signal Company Number one