Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #020 Jason Flom with The San Antonio Four

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#020 Jason Flom with The San Antonio Four · Wrongful Conviction

0:01
Speaker 1: My interview with the San Antonio four was one of
0:03
Speaker 1: the first ones that I recorded in front of a
0:05
Speaker 1: live audience, and we did it at south By Southwest
0:08
Speaker 1: and the episode originally aired on April seventeenth of twenty seventeen.
0:13
Speaker 1: The good news is these four extraordinary women who went
0:17
Speaker 1: through this impossible ordeal, frame job and persecution and false conviction.
0:23
Speaker 1: In twenty eighteen, they finally had their criminal records expunged
0:27
Speaker 1: fully expunged. Cassandra Rivera started working in a law office
0:30
Speaker 1: in twenty seventeen. Elizabeth Ramirez married a woman named Angel
0:34
Speaker 1: who she met in prison in February of twenty eighteen.
0:38
Speaker 1: Anna Vasquez get Ready for this started serving as the
0:40
Speaker 1: director of outreach for the Innoctance Project in Texas in
0:43
Speaker 1: March twenty sixteen, and in June twenty nineteen, she was
0:46
Speaker 1: appointed as a representative of the Houston Forensic Science Center,
0:50
Speaker 1: where she will help to oversee Houston forensic scientists, providing
0:54
Speaker 1: a valuable perspective on the consequences of flawed evidence analysis
0:57
Speaker 1: and confirmation bias and Chris D. Mayhew is now studying
1:02
Speaker 1: at the Vettech Institute of Houston, pursuing her dream of
1:05
Speaker 1: becoming a veterinarian that was put on hold for over
1:09
Speaker 1: fifteen years because of a crime she didn't commit. With
1:21
Speaker 1: the police banging on the door, open up.
1:26
Speaker 2: The choice to be in that lineup was the last
1:28
Speaker 2: choice I made as a free man. A year later,
1:31
Speaker 2: I ended up writing in the system.
1:34
Speaker 3: I'm going to be one of those people who everyone
1:36
Speaker 3: in the world is going to think as a monster
1:38
Speaker 3: or suspect as a monster for the rest of my life,
1:40
Speaker 3: and I'm just going to have to come to peace
1:41
Speaker 3: with that.
1:43
Speaker 4: Somebody was able to look at my picture in a
1:45
Speaker 4: database and say that I was somewhere where I definitely wasn't.
1:50
Speaker 4: I overheard three of the jailers discussing what part they
1:53
Speaker 4: might have to play in my hanging.
1:55
Speaker 5: They had been told that two prison officers would have
1:58
Speaker 5: to participate in my execution.
2:01
Speaker 1: Now walk back inside that prison for the last time. Man,
2:04
Speaker 1: all help, broke loops. Man, this is wrongful conviction. Wow,
2:16
Speaker 1: how's everybody doing out there? South By Southwest? Let's go.
2:21
Speaker 1: So I'm really happy to be here. I've been coming
2:24
Speaker 1: to south By Southwest for many years, but in the
2:26
Speaker 1: past I always came down in my other job, my
2:29
Speaker 1: other life as a record executive and checking out bands,
2:33
Speaker 1: which I'll be doing while i'm here, but this time
2:35
Speaker 1: I'm here as the host of Wrongful Conviction, which is
2:39
Speaker 1: a podcast that I started after having worked with the
2:42
Speaker 1: Innocence Project for over twenty years. I'm a founding board
2:45
Speaker 1: member of the Innocence Project, and it's been my calling
2:48
Speaker 1: in life to help exonerate people who are factually actually
2:53
Speaker 1: innocent from prison, and to help them after they have
2:56
Speaker 1: been exonerated, to reintegrate back into society, which is of
3:00
Speaker 1: course a whole nother malla wax because it's getting out.
3:03
Speaker 1: You know, people see in the newspapers, the celebration on
3:06
Speaker 1: the courthouse steps with the family and the lawyers and
3:09
Speaker 1: the balloons and the press. But then, as these women
3:12
Speaker 1: can attest, it's a tough road even after that. So
3:15
Speaker 1: it was a logical extension for me to start this podcast.
3:18
Speaker 1: And today I'm particularly excited because the first time I'm
3:21
Speaker 1: doing it in front of a live audience, which is you,
3:23
Speaker 1: So thanks for being here. We're here today to talk
3:25
Speaker 1: about and to talk with Annabasquez, Cassandra Riviera, Elizabeth Mariirez,
3:31
Speaker 1: and Christy Mayhew, who are the San Antonio four, as
3:34
Speaker 1: well as their attorney, Mike Ware.
3:36
Speaker 6: In nineteen ninety seven, despite believing their innocence would prevail,
3:40
Speaker 6: the four were quickly found guilty.
3:42
Speaker 1: They were convicted twenty years ago of sexually assaulting two
3:45
Speaker 1: little girls.
3:46
Speaker 6: The San Antonio four still can't quite comprehend what happened.
3:50
Speaker 6: The little girls claimed they were raped during a drug
3:53
Speaker 6: fueled satanical rage with a gun pointed at their head.
3:57
Speaker 7: But then one of the alleged victims recanted her story,
4:00
Speaker 7: same for the forensic testimony. Those and other factors convinced
4:04
Speaker 7: the court to exonerate these women.
4:07
Speaker 6: Their attorney, Mike Ware, says this was a classic miscarriage
4:10
Speaker 6: of justice brought about by a panic over the women's
4:13
Speaker 6: lifestyle and a rush to judgment.
4:16
Speaker 1: So welcome to all of you, and thanks for being here.
4:20
Speaker 1: For those of you who are not familiar, this case
4:23
Speaker 1: was a case in which two little girls claimed to
4:26
Speaker 1: have been sexually assaulted in a very strange and fantastical
4:31
Speaker 1: scenario that made no sense to anybody who was actually
4:34
Speaker 1: paying attention. But the two actually most common causes of
4:37
Speaker 1: wrongful convictions were both prevalent factors in this case. One
4:41
Speaker 1: is I woulds misidentification. In this case, it's particularly as
4:44
Speaker 1: I was victim wrongful identification and there was a crime
4:47
Speaker 1: that never even happened. The second most common cause is
4:50
Speaker 1: junk science, and that may seem counterintuitive, but in this case,
4:52
Speaker 1: there was a doctor who testified as to the sexual
4:55
Speaker 1: assault that had taken place, but in fact it had
4:58
Speaker 1: never taken place, falls squarely in the area of junk science.
5:03
Speaker 1: And then there was a third factor, which was inherent
5:07
Speaker 1: bias and prejudice because each of these women had recently
5:10
Speaker 1: come out as being gay, which in the nineties in
5:13
Speaker 1: San Antonio wasn't an acceptable thing to be right. In fact,
5:17
Speaker 1: it was still illegal in Texas back then, which is insane.
5:20
Speaker 1: But that's beside the point I want to get into
5:22
Speaker 1: the story. Let's go back and let's start with you
5:25
Speaker 1: this situation. It must have been just a surreal thing
5:28
Speaker 1: to be caught up in. What was your life like
5:30
Speaker 1: prior to getting caught up in this crazy criminal justice nightmare?
5:34
Speaker 4: You know, recently graduated from high school. I mean, I
5:36
Speaker 4: was an athlete during those years. I had started school
5:40
Speaker 4: college education, and you know, I was looking forward to
5:43
Speaker 4: the future and becoming a registered nurse. That was my
5:46
Speaker 4: go back then, and you know, lots of friends. I mean,
5:50
Speaker 4: I was having the time of my life. Actually, you know,
5:52
Speaker 4: you had your whole life ahead of you.
5:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, of course, of course. And then the next thing
5:56
Speaker 1: you know, you're being branded in the press and everywhere
5:58
Speaker 1: else as this sort of monster. Right, And there was
6:01
Speaker 1: a satanic panic in the nineties as well that sort
6:04
Speaker 1: of got caught up in this thing too. And you
6:06
Speaker 1: were accused. Well you were accused because there was a
6:10
Speaker 1: whole setup. But we'll get to that, right, There was
6:11
Speaker 1: a reason why these girls invented this story. And you know,
6:16
Speaker 1: I want to move to Cassandra and talk to you
6:18
Speaker 1: a little bit about this as well. Take us back
6:20
Speaker 1: to the time when this all went so horribly wrong. God,
6:24
Speaker 1: it was.
6:25
Speaker 5: It was a very dark time for us. It was
6:27
Speaker 5: back in nineteen ninety four. We were, like Anna said,
6:29
Speaker 5: we're living our lives. We're enjoying ourselves. And we were
6:32
Speaker 5: just hanging out with friends, just living normal lives. We
6:35
Speaker 5: had just come out. I had just come out. Me
6:38
Speaker 5: and Anna were in a relationship with each other. I
6:40
Speaker 5: was raising my two small children, and all of a
6:43
Speaker 5: sudden we were hit with these false allegations and it
6:47
Speaker 5: was the biggest nightmare that you can even think of,
6:50
Speaker 5: to just wake up one day and being told that
6:51
Speaker 5: you're accused of lesting children.
6:54
Speaker 1: And Elizabeth, it was your nieces, right, who are nine
6:56
Speaker 1: and seven at the time, And it's fair to say
6:59
Speaker 1: that our father put them up to this because of
7:02
Speaker 1: an unrequited situation that he had, and it's crazy how
7:06
Speaker 1: people could behave in these circumstances, and what he did
7:09
Speaker 1: is in a certain way. Not only were you all
7:11
Speaker 1: victims of this, but so were the little girls right right,
7:14
Speaker 1: because they were forced under threat of violence, these young,
7:18
Speaker 1: impressionable little girls who were basically playing with Barbie dolls,
7:22
Speaker 1: and that led to these the line from how they
7:24
Speaker 1: were playing with Barbie dolls too, you must have been
7:27
Speaker 1: sexually assaulted if you're taking the clothes off and putting
7:29
Speaker 1: them on the barbie dolls, right, I mean, yeah, who
7:31
Speaker 1: wouldn't think that is such a crazy thing. But for you,
7:35
Speaker 1: it's even more personal because of the fact that you
7:37
Speaker 1: were really at the center of all this because it
7:39
Speaker 1: was your nieces and it was this non relationship with
7:43
Speaker 1: a guy who actually had been married to your.
7:44
Speaker 8: Sister, right, right, that's correct. They would come over and
7:47
Speaker 8: we would visit and they would stay over. So it
7:48
Speaker 8: was just a natural family thing that we did. And
7:51
Speaker 8: all of a sudden there come these charges and being
7:54
Speaker 8: accused of this crime and then including our friends and
7:57
Speaker 8: it also and.
7:58
Speaker 1: Ultimately, you know, we'll get to that. But the older
8:01
Speaker 1: of the two girls recanted her testimony many many years later, right,
8:06
Speaker 1: a younger one yet, Yes, And Christy, you were Liz's
8:10
Speaker 1: roommate at the time, right, yes, Well, let's go back again,
8:13
Speaker 1: Like what was your life like at the time. You
8:15
Speaker 1: were not some serial sexual offender who was out praying
8:18
Speaker 1: on young children either, right, like waiting by the ice
8:20
Speaker 1: cream stand.
8:21
Speaker 3: Actually, like four days after I graduated, I was going
8:24
Speaker 3: to Texas and him. My dream was always to be
8:26
Speaker 3: a Venarian. So actually I had taken a break from
8:30
Speaker 3: school and went back to San Antoniano, was working working
8:34
Speaker 3: at a grocery store. Through there I met Liz and
8:37
Speaker 3: then later on she was pregnant, so I was staying
8:41
Speaker 3: there to help her out. And then that's when the
8:42
Speaker 3: allegations came about, because our nieces came over like for
8:46
Speaker 3: a week to stay. It was like summer vacation during
8:49
Speaker 3: the end of it. Yeah, and then shortly after that
8:52
Speaker 3: we were being accused, and you know, we molest them
8:55
Speaker 3: during that week that they stayed there because you know,
8:58
Speaker 3: Cassieanna would come and hang out. We were all friends,
9:01
Speaker 3: you know, just an ordinary life. We're all just young,
9:05
Speaker 3: enjoying life when trying to get started on a career.
9:09
Speaker 1: Right. And it's interesting too, right, how society loses in
9:12
Speaker 1: this situation too. You were going to be a veterinarian,
9:15
Speaker 1: a nurse, a mother. It's like everybody loses in this situation.
9:19
Speaker 1: And in this case, it's extra tragic because of the
9:21
Speaker 1: fact that it's a crime that never even happened. It
9:23
Speaker 1: wasn't like you were the wrong people, there was no crime, right,
9:26
Speaker 1: And then we see that not infrequently, unfortunately, these things
9:30
Speaker 1: just they sort of gained momentum of their own, and
9:33
Speaker 1: somebody's got to be held responsible because nobody wants to
9:37
Speaker 1: admit that they're wrong, even when they know it right.
9:40
Speaker 1: And Mike, let's turn it to you for a second.
9:41
Speaker 1: How much of a factor was the climate at the time,
9:46
Speaker 1: the fact that they were lesbians in this right, because
9:49
Speaker 1: they were little girls, they were lesbians. I'm guessing in
9:52
Speaker 1: San Antonio in the nineties you probably had a hard
9:54
Speaker 1: time finding a jury that wasn't somewhat homophobic.
9:58
Speaker 9: Well, you're exactly right. I wasn't involved in the trials,
10:01
Speaker 9: but in going back and reading the transcripts of the
10:04
Speaker 9: trials that you're exactly right about the jury Vanire and
10:07
Speaker 9: the inherent bias against lesbians that was coming out in
10:11
Speaker 9: the Vordyre process. I think the real role that the
10:15
Speaker 9: fact that they were gay, and it just recently had
10:17
Speaker 9: come out is is that the accusations in this case
10:21
Speaker 9: were inherently preposterous. I mean, two little girls said they
10:25
Speaker 9: had been gain raped by four young women who had
10:28
Speaker 9: absolutely nothing in their history that would indicate that they
10:32
Speaker 9: had any kind of propensity like that, no criminal history whatsoever.
10:36
Speaker 9: The accusations were totally absurd. They were preposterous, and had
10:40
Speaker 9: they been made against members of what might have been
10:43
Speaker 9: considered back then more mainstream society, for junior leaguers, for example,
10:49
Speaker 9: the police would have considered it ridiculous and never have
10:53
Speaker 9: even pursued the investigation in the first place. I don't
10:55
Speaker 9: think they wouldn't have felt like they had the moral
10:57
Speaker 9: authority or the courage to pursue the investigation.
11:00
Speaker 1: And then you had the issue with the doctor.
11:03
Speaker 6: The science backed it up. At trial, pediatrician doctor Nancy
11:06
Speaker 6: Kellogg testified that internal scars were caused by physical trauma.
11:11
Speaker 6: It was critical testimony.
11:13
Speaker 1: And this was a respected doctor at the time, doctor Kellogg. Right.
11:16
Speaker 1: And we see in wrawful conviction cases. We've seen, I
11:20
Speaker 1: mean so many different factors and even when it comes
11:23
Speaker 1: to junk science.
11:24
Speaker 6: Former Bear County District Attorney Susan Reed later admitted the
11:28
Speaker 6: medical science presented at trial was wrong.
11:31
Speaker 7: It was believed at that time that that was evidence
11:35
Speaker 7: of scarring from a tear and that it would have
11:37
Speaker 7: been indicative of a sexual assault. There has been further
11:41
Speaker 7: studying which has led to information that it can occur naturally.
11:47
Speaker 1: We have well intentioned doctors who make mistakes. Then we
11:50
Speaker 1: have doctors who willfully lie, right, And that's a common thing.
11:53
Speaker 1: And you know I talk about often on the show.
11:55
Speaker 1: I mean, every one of you here and everyone listening
11:57
Speaker 1: out there is a potential jury. Everyone's going to get
11:59
Speaker 1: called for jury. Dude, at some point. Maybe you don't
12:01
Speaker 1: like it, but you're going to be. And nobody loves
12:03
Speaker 1: getting that notice in the mail. But the fact is,
12:06
Speaker 1: when you get called to trial and to be on
12:08
Speaker 1: a jury, it's important that you hear these stories because
12:12
Speaker 1: of the fact that you're going to be presented with
12:16
Speaker 1: testimony from people who look like they're practically wearing lab
12:19
Speaker 1: coats in there. There're gonna be people you're going to say, Wow,
12:21
Speaker 1: they're credited from this university. They must be telling the truth.
12:24
Speaker 1: But that's not always the case, mate, That's exactly right.
12:26
Speaker 9: I mean, sometimes they're practically wearing lab coats and sometimes
12:30
Speaker 9: they're wearing police uniforms, but it doesn't mean they're necessarily
12:34
Speaker 9: telling the truth. In this case, this doctor, I believe,
12:37
Speaker 9: in all good faith, testified to what she believed were
12:43
Speaker 9: physical findings of sexual abuse, scientific physical findings of sexual
12:47
Speaker 9: abuse stemming from her examination of the children. And it
12:50
Speaker 9: was common back then, what she thought she saw whatever,
12:54
Speaker 9: for doctors to get on the stand and testify that
12:57
Speaker 9: these are indicators, physical indicators of sexual abuse. But what
13:02
Speaker 9: we know now, and basically there was sort of this
13:04
Speaker 9: watershed study in two thousand and seven, I guess, approximately
13:09
Speaker 9: nine years after these trials that show that what was
13:12
Speaker 9: commonly thought by doctors back then as indicators of sexual abuse,
13:16
Speaker 9: we're actually it's just old wives tales, just urban myths
13:19
Speaker 9: that in fact, when they in two thousand and seven,
13:21
Speaker 9: when they examined I don't know how many, many, many
13:24
Speaker 9: many young girls in which there was no suspicion of
13:28
Speaker 9: sexual abuse, that these young girls had the same physical
13:32
Speaker 9: characteristics that had previously been thought to be indicators of
13:36
Speaker 9: sexual abuse, and actually they're not. They're perfectly normal. They
13:40
Speaker 9: occur naturally. So up until that point, doctors, et cetera,
13:45
Speaker 9: you know, in other indisha of being experts, were testifying
13:49
Speaker 9: based not on science but on urban myths and old
13:52
Speaker 9: wives tales. And it's very effective for the prosecutors. I mean,
13:55
Speaker 9: in this case, for example, the testimony was all over
13:59
Speaker 9: the map. The testimony was not inherently believable. But for
14:03
Speaker 9: the prosecutor to get up there and say, well, we've
14:05
Speaker 9: had scientific physical evidence that somebody sexually abused these children,
14:11
Speaker 9: then that was very powerful in this cause.
14:13
Speaker 1: You know what's ironic about this, the only actual sexual
14:15
Speaker 1: abuse took place during the examinations. Like, as a father
14:19
Speaker 1: of a daughter, I can't imagine my daughter at that
14:21
Speaker 1: age being subjected to having to be probed in this way.
14:26
Speaker 1: It's disgusting, right, And so those girls now have to
14:28
Speaker 1: live with that trauma as well. And it's interesting too
14:31
Speaker 1: because you talk about how these things are old lives tales.
14:33
Speaker 1: And you know what else we've learned is that arson
14:35
Speaker 1: science is just complete nonsense too.
14:37
Speaker 9: Right.
14:38
Speaker 1: For years, I mean, it takes you could take a guy,
14:42
Speaker 1: I could ask the audience, but I'll just tell you, right,
14:44
Speaker 1: it takes forty hours at a correspondence course to become
14:47
Speaker 1: a licensed arson investigator, right, forty hours, So, I mean,
14:51
Speaker 1: and I don't even know what those questions look like.
14:53
Speaker 1: But so for years you had arson experts getting up
14:56
Speaker 1: and testifying as to this guy committed arson or that guy.
14:58
Speaker 1: And we had, of course the most notorious take cases
15:01
Speaker 1: here in Texas with Cameron Todd Willingham who was executed
15:04
Speaker 1: for an arson fire that killed his three kids. And
15:07
Speaker 1: we now, and we knew then, I mean, the evidence
15:11
Speaker 1: was widely available and was available to the authorities at
15:15
Speaker 1: that time that it was not an arsen fire, was
15:16
Speaker 1: an electrical fire. But these you know, generations of firemen
15:20
Speaker 1: had just passed along this information that had nothing to
15:23
Speaker 1: do with science. And of course that's you know, one
15:25
Speaker 1: of the most tragic cases imaginable where three kids died
15:28
Speaker 1: and then the father was executed after having lost his kids.
15:46
Speaker 1: So Liz few were sort of the feud as the
15:49
Speaker 1: ring leader, right, And they really threw the book at you.
15:51
Speaker 1: I mean, Liz, who really doesn't look like a dangerous
15:53
Speaker 1: criminal to me. I don't want to judge a book
15:55
Speaker 1: by its cover. Maybe she robs banks on the weekends.
15:57
Speaker 1: But you were sentenced that thirty seven and a half
16:01
Speaker 1: years in prison. I can't even thirty seven and a
16:05
Speaker 1: half years. What was like the moment when you got convicted.
16:09
Speaker 1: Nobody can imagine that it hasn't been through it. But
16:10
Speaker 1: could you put that into words?
16:12
Speaker 8: Well, I don't really think there's kind of any words
16:14
Speaker 8: to kind of express the way I felt. I just
16:16
Speaker 8: I couldn't believe that they convicted me of a crime
16:19
Speaker 8: that never happened. And I believed in the truth, and
16:22
Speaker 8: I was like, how can they convict me of something
16:24
Speaker 8: that never happened, you know, and I believe. After they
16:28
Speaker 8: had sentenced me, I walked to the back and I fainted.
16:31
Speaker 8: It was just unbelievable. I was like, my god, how
16:33
Speaker 8: did this happen? How did something by a statement made
16:38
Speaker 8: by a child just convict me?
16:40
Speaker 3: Just like that?
16:41
Speaker 8: And my whole life was taken away from me.
16:44
Speaker 1: Does any of the others want to weigh in on that.
16:47
Speaker 1: I mean, that's something that it's really the stuff of nightmares, right.
16:50
Speaker 1: I'm sure some of you have probably had a nightmare
16:52
Speaker 1: where you were caught doing some crime or I mean,
16:54
Speaker 1: I've had those those weird dreams where I'm like, you know,
16:57
Speaker 1: in one of those TV shows like Locked Up Abroad
16:59
Speaker 1: or something like that, I've got so I pick up
17:01
Speaker 1: the wrong suitcase. It it's like a Hitchcock movie and
17:03
Speaker 1: the next thing, you know, So it really is a
17:06
Speaker 1: real life nightmare. Fainting would probably be the only logical
17:10
Speaker 1: response that the body could have to something like that, right,
17:13
Speaker 1: because it's all so surreal nothing happened. And I hear
17:16
Speaker 1: this again and again in interviewing exunreis, both on the
17:20
Speaker 1: podcast and just in my work at the Instance Project,
17:22
Speaker 1: where they just keep thinking that justice is going to
17:26
Speaker 1: be done because this is America. We don't lock people
17:30
Speaker 1: up for things that they didn't do. Now, if you
17:32
Speaker 1: listen to some of the authorities, that's what they'll tell you. Oh, yeah,
17:35
Speaker 1: we don't arrest people who aren't guilty. Yeah, and so
17:37
Speaker 1: it's very important for us to counterbalance that and to expose,
17:42
Speaker 1: to talk about these stories so that people understand that
17:43
Speaker 1: we do We do it with an unbelievable frequency. And
17:47
Speaker 1: in fact, the best social sciences estimate that there's up
17:50
Speaker 1: to eight percent of people in prison in America right
17:52
Speaker 1: now are innocent. And if you take that number, it's
17:55
Speaker 1: pretty scary because eight percent of two point two million
17:57
Speaker 1: is a big number. Anybody do the math. Yeah, it's
17:59
Speaker 1: a big numb It's like two hundred thousand. So yeah,
18:02
Speaker 1: do you want to do you want to talk about that?
18:04
Speaker 4: So, Christy, myself and Cassie were advised by attorneys not
18:08
Speaker 4: to be in court while Liz was on trial because
18:11
Speaker 4: we had several trials. So my mom went down in
18:15
Speaker 4: place of us and to show support for Liz.
18:17
Speaker 9: And her family.
18:18
Speaker 4: But when I got the call that she was actually
18:21
Speaker 4: convicted and it didn't take very long to convict her,
18:25
Speaker 4: it was devastating. And I remember getting the call at
18:29
Speaker 4: work and I immediately had to leave work.
18:31
Speaker 1: I just I just couldn't believe it. So you were
18:35
Speaker 1: out on bail, yeah, yeah, And then you must have thought,
18:38
Speaker 1: oh my god, if they could do that to her,
18:40
Speaker 1: they could do it to watch too. Oh absolutely.
18:42
Speaker 4: I mean, you know, the frightened a panic. But at
18:47
Speaker 4: the same time, when they did come to us with
18:50
Speaker 4: a plea offer, which was ten years deferred adjudication, and
18:54
Speaker 4: that was to basically plead guilty and then you would serve,
18:58
Speaker 4: you know, not even a day in Prinz. There's other
19:01
Speaker 4: things related to that, but they didn't, of course tell
19:04
Speaker 4: us that. But we, you know, we stood our ground
19:06
Speaker 4: and we believed wholeheartedly that we knew that none of
19:10
Speaker 4: us are capable of such a crime. It wasn't something
19:13
Speaker 4: where I thought Christy might have been capable of it.
19:16
Speaker 4: I mean, there was just absolutely nothing to indicate anything
19:21
Speaker 4: could have ever happened. I mean, it just was impossible.
19:24
Speaker 4: And I believe that that's why we have stuck so
19:26
Speaker 4: hard to our innocence. And you're absolutely right, and I'm
19:30
Speaker 4: sure you know, Jason Baldwin can attest to this. You
19:32
Speaker 4: do believe in the judicial system, and you do believe
19:35
Speaker 4: that somehow, some way that it is going to come out,
19:40
Speaker 4: the truth will come out, it will finally prevail, And
19:44
Speaker 4: it finally did. It's just it took a long time
19:46
Speaker 4: to prevail.
19:47
Speaker 1: Well, this was at a time in America too, when
19:50
Speaker 1: there had been a rash of rawful convictions related to
19:54
Speaker 1: these daycare centers and day schools and stuff like that,
19:57
Speaker 1: where there was this hysteria that would start, sometimes with
20:02
Speaker 1: something relatively benign, like a parent complaining about something and
20:05
Speaker 1: a teacher not acting the way they wanted to do,
20:06
Speaker 1: and then they just invent these stories and the next
20:08
Speaker 1: thing you know, you had whole schools, all these teachers
20:11
Speaker 1: being locked up for these crazy accusations of things that
20:16
Speaker 1: never happened, right, because it's not a common thing, right,
20:19
Speaker 1: And the fact is, you have to really stir things
20:22
Speaker 1: up to get people to believe that normal people with
20:26
Speaker 1: no records, who seem to be just going along with
20:29
Speaker 1: their lives, going to school, whatever, are these sexually deviant criminals.
20:34
Speaker 1: And it's it's really it's a horrendous crime that you
20:36
Speaker 1: were accused of, right, I mean, abusing a child is
20:39
Speaker 1: at the bottom of the scale in terms of what
20:42
Speaker 1: you could could actually be accused of. You stood your ground,
20:45
Speaker 1: and you know, you refused this deal, which is a
20:48
Speaker 1: very principled but a very dangerous stand, especially when you
20:51
Speaker 1: knew that that they're yeah, you do what they were
20:54
Speaker 1: the Cable. You knew that Liz had already been convicted.
20:55
Speaker 4: Well not only that, but the charges alone they carry
20:59
Speaker 4: from fire years to ninety nine years.
21:01
Speaker 1: So we knew what we were faced.
21:03
Speaker 4: But we still, you know, we still stuck to our ground.
21:06
Speaker 1: Would you have, Mike, would you what would you have advised?
21:09
Speaker 3: In that?
21:09
Speaker 1: What can you even say? Right? He doesn't like that question.
21:14
Speaker 9: Now, No, they obviously did the right thing in the
21:16
Speaker 9: long run by refusing to plead guilty to something they
21:19
Speaker 9: were completely innocent in.
21:20
Speaker 1: Right, cons It's turned to you because ultimately, even though
21:23
Speaker 1: you wouldn't have served the day in prison, you would
21:26
Speaker 1: have been branded a sex offender. And what goes? I mean,
21:28
Speaker 1: what does that look like? Because actually after you got out,
21:31
Speaker 1: you were still, until you were fully exonerated, you were
21:33
Speaker 1: living as sex offenders. Is that right?
21:35
Speaker 5: Actually, the three of us did not have to register
21:38
Speaker 5: a sex offenders.
21:39
Speaker 1: Annam was the only one that did have to.
21:41
Speaker 5: But if we would have taken a plea bargain, yes,
21:43
Speaker 5: we would have had to register. And to me that
21:46
Speaker 5: I mean, none of that was going to happen because
21:48
Speaker 5: you know, we never committed the crime. We were not
21:50
Speaker 5: getting into something we did not do. And like Anna said,
21:52
Speaker 5: we continue to fight we had to fire attorneys that
21:55
Speaker 5: did not want to fight for us, we had to
21:57
Speaker 5: retain more attorneys that would fight for us, And that
22:00
Speaker 5: would have damaged me completely because I do have two children.
22:03
Speaker 5: I did at the time, they were ages seven and eight,
22:05
Speaker 5: one on eight and nine, and that would have ruined me.
22:08
Speaker 1: Well, you wouldn't have been able to take them to school,
22:10
Speaker 1: you wouldn't been able to go to the playground, you
22:11
Speaker 1: wouldn't have been able to do really anything. Then it's
22:14
Speaker 1: so crazy, right, we have and this is not something
22:17
Speaker 1: I talked about a lot, but there's a great article
22:18
Speaker 1: in the Economists about this. There's almost a million people
22:20
Speaker 1: on the sex offender registry in America, which is totally
22:24
Speaker 1: fucking insane, right, and probably fifty thousand of them are
22:28
Speaker 1: actually dangerous. So what does that mean. That means that
22:31
Speaker 1: a we can't keep track of a million people anyway,
22:34
Speaker 1: So it is counterproductive, Like a lot of government policies, right,
22:37
Speaker 1: it's actually counterproductive because what we should be doing is
22:39
Speaker 1: trying to monitor the activities of the people who are
22:41
Speaker 1: actually dangerous, but instead we have a million people who
22:44
Speaker 1: are convicted of things like peeing in public. Right, you
22:47
Speaker 1: may not know this but if you, I don't know
22:49
Speaker 1: about you, but I love to pee, like in my house.
22:50
Speaker 1: If I'm on the lawn, that's my law. I'm gonna
22:52
Speaker 1: pee on the fucking lawn. I'm saving water, right, That's
22:56
Speaker 1: how I look at it. I'm trying to always be
22:58
Speaker 1: a good environmentalist. But if somebody's riding by on their
23:02
Speaker 1: bike and calls up and says, or drives by in
23:05
Speaker 1: their car and their kids at the back, and they go,
23:07
Speaker 1: I saw this guy peeing on this lawn on your
23:09
Speaker 1: own property, you could become a registered sex offender. Oh yeah.
23:13
Speaker 1: And then I mean there's so many that the list
23:16
Speaker 1: of things that can get you on that list, it's
23:18
Speaker 1: so long, and it's permanent, there's nothing you can do
23:21
Speaker 1: about it. And then you can't live anywhere either, like
23:23
Speaker 1: you can't live within a certain radius of a school,
23:26
Speaker 1: which like in certain cities there is nowhere that you
23:29
Speaker 1: can live except like under a bridge. And we see
23:31
Speaker 1: that there are communities of people that are sprung up
23:33
Speaker 1: or registered sex offenders who live under an overpass because
23:36
Speaker 1: there's no housing that doesn't put them in violation of
23:40
Speaker 1: the law by being in too close to approximity to
23:42
Speaker 1: a school or a playground or a church, or it
23:45
Speaker 1: could even be a typing school by the way, that's closed.
23:47
Speaker 1: It doesn't matter. They can call it whatever they want.
23:49
Speaker 1: So yeah, I can understand it's a really bad choice
23:52
Speaker 1: to have to make. There's no good news there whatsoever.
23:54
Speaker 1: Your career is over. You're gonna have to fill out
23:56
Speaker 1: every job application ever you have to fill out. You're
23:58
Speaker 1: gonna be like, yeah, I'm a registered sex offender, but
24:00
Speaker 1: I really like to work here. And it's like, uh, yeah,
24:03
Speaker 1: I think we got somebody else that might be perfect
24:04
Speaker 1: for the job, you know what I mean. I mean,
24:06
Speaker 1: you seem nice and everything. So Chris still has turned
24:10
Speaker 1: to you heading into this trial, and were you optimistic,
24:13
Speaker 1: did you think there was a chance you'd actually win,
24:15
Speaker 1: or had you pretty much resign yourself the fact that
24:17
Speaker 1: they're just going to fuck us and that's the way it.
24:18
Speaker 3: Is, to be honest, I still had hope that somehow,
24:22
Speaker 3: like you said, we believe in the justice system. I
24:24
Speaker 3: just felt some way that they would somebody would see
24:27
Speaker 3: the truth that we were telling the truth. Nothing happened,
24:30
Speaker 3: no crime occurred. We weren't capable of it. I mean,
24:33
Speaker 3: we were just basically like four young kids. You know,
24:36
Speaker 3: we were just barely becoming adults, which is more capable
24:40
Speaker 3: of doing this.
24:41
Speaker 1: How long was it from Liz's trial until you're a trial?
24:45
Speaker 9: What it was a year?
24:46
Speaker 1: Almost year? So you had a year of being in
24:48
Speaker 1: this sort of purgatory right where you're just you're going
24:52
Speaker 1: along with your life, but you know there's this incredible
24:54
Speaker 1: weight hanging over your head that at any time is
24:57
Speaker 1: going to come and destroy everything, and that you're dreaming
25:01
Speaker 1: of everything that you stand for. What is that like?
25:03
Speaker 1: Were you all in contact with each other? Did you
25:05
Speaker 1: have meetings? The relationship must have strained over this now
25:08
Speaker 1: you knew you were all going to try together.
25:10
Speaker 3: No, I mean I think we've remained friends strong through
25:14
Speaker 3: this whole thing. You know, I don't think it ever
25:17
Speaker 3: separated us.
25:18
Speaker 1: Liz was already you were already in prison at this point, right, yes,
25:21
Speaker 1: So were you in touch? Were you allowed to be
25:24
Speaker 1: in touch? At this point?
25:25
Speaker 4: It was advice by our attorneys again to not write
25:27
Speaker 4: letters because they would go through their mail. So again
25:31
Speaker 4: we're kind of separated because of that, because they except
25:34
Speaker 4: they would read our mail and see if there's anything
25:36
Speaker 4: that we're telling.
25:37
Speaker 1: I guess I don't know, and Liz, that must have
25:39
Speaker 1: been extra hard for you because there you are locked up,
25:41
Speaker 1: facing thirty seven years in prison, and you're separated from
25:45
Speaker 1: your friends. I would think that's an even an additional
25:47
Speaker 1: strain for you to be facing this terrible situation alone.
25:51
Speaker 3: Yeah, it was.
25:52
Speaker 8: But at the same time, when I had gotten my time,
25:54
Speaker 8: I was writing. As soon as I was locked up
25:57
Speaker 8: at the county, I started writing organizations to try to help,
26:00
Speaker 8: and I knew the crime had never happened, and I
26:03
Speaker 8: was trying to reach out to people at that time already.
26:06
Speaker 1: What is it that gets you through? I'm always fascinated
26:09
Speaker 1: by this because I think a lot of people I
26:11
Speaker 1: have a morbid fear of being locked up and everything
26:14
Speaker 1: about it. Anybody else shared that fear. Yeah, we have
26:18
Speaker 1: a few hands up you HOI an the other ones
26:19
Speaker 1: just look scared, so they're too scared to raise their
26:23
Speaker 1: hands anyway. So what is it that got you through?
26:27
Speaker 1: We see different people that have been in this situation
26:30
Speaker 1: who some of them find faith in prison, some of
26:32
Speaker 1: them lose faith in prison, some of them find this
26:35
Speaker 1: sort of inner gear that is almost incomprehensible to me.
26:40
Speaker 1: But what was it for each of you, what was
26:41
Speaker 1: it that got you through this nightmare of being in
26:44
Speaker 1: prison for almost half your life at that point.
26:47
Speaker 4: So the three words that come to my mind automatically
26:49
Speaker 4: are faith, hope, and love. My faith was obviously my
26:53
Speaker 4: religious beliefs. God was there with me throughout it all.
26:58
Speaker 4: You know, I had support from family, work from friends,
27:00
Speaker 4: but nobody's actually in the prison with you.
27:03
Speaker 1: During this time.
27:04
Speaker 4: It's very difficult, especially to be innocent of a horrendous
27:08
Speaker 4: crime like so, and then you're having to deal with
27:10
Speaker 4: the prison world and it's really tough. I mean, there's
27:12
Speaker 4: just so much that it all entails. But so my
27:15
Speaker 4: faith in God is what carried me through. And I'm
27:17
Speaker 4: going to say my hope was that some days, somehow,
27:21
Speaker 4: some way, our innocence would be proven. And here it
27:24
Speaker 4: has now, of course twenty two years later, but it
27:28
Speaker 4: did work. And then the love, the love from my
27:31
Speaker 4: family that continued throughout this whole process, the love of
27:35
Speaker 4: my friends, the love of our supporters now, and honestly
27:40
Speaker 4: the love of Mike Whare, the Innocence Project of Texas
27:43
Speaker 4: and the filmmakers which is dev Escuonazi and Sam Tabbitt,
27:48
Speaker 4: And I feel like all of those That whole combination
27:51
Speaker 4: is what helped you our release arconeration.
27:55
Speaker 1: I would give you a hugs up for the chair
27:56
Speaker 1: would fall over. So that was that was incredible. Let's
28:02
Speaker 1: go right down the line. Even I don't think I
28:04
Speaker 1: can top that. No, I don't think anything. It's okay
28:08
Speaker 1: that the.
28:10
Speaker 3: West.
28:11
Speaker 1: Yeah, Anna pretty much hit everything.
28:13
Speaker 5: Basically when I went in, I went through many different emotions.
28:17
Speaker 5: You don't know how to feel. You know, you've just
28:19
Speaker 5: been wronged by a system that you were supposed to
28:21
Speaker 5: believe in. You know, you told the truth and you
28:24
Speaker 5: were taken down anyway, You're taken from your family, from
28:26
Speaker 5: your loved ones, from everybody around you that means something
28:29
Speaker 5: to you, and you're put into a world almost like
28:32
Speaker 5: a cage.
28:33
Speaker 1: It is a cage.
28:34
Speaker 5: You're having to fight for yourself from the inside, not
28:38
Speaker 5: knowing if anybody is going to listen to you. Because
28:40
Speaker 5: as Liz said, we wrote letters, we reached out from
28:43
Speaker 5: the Innocence Project, the ASIL, you lambda, there's so many
28:46
Speaker 5: different other ones that always gave us a negative response.
28:50
Speaker 5: So being that we kept receiving these letdowns, you have
28:54
Speaker 5: to pick yourself up. I started taking college courses like
28:57
Speaker 5: Anna said, we had love from friends and family. My
29:00
Speaker 5: mom came to see me faithfully. She always brought my kids.
29:02
Speaker 5: Miss Blaska's Anna's mom came to see us faithfully. You know,
29:05
Speaker 5: when you have a love support, a love line, that
29:08
Speaker 5: is what keeps you going. And I truly believe that.
29:11
Speaker 5: As Anna said, you know your faith in God because
29:14
Speaker 5: you have to believe in something. And obviously he came
29:16
Speaker 5: through with us because he did bring us. Michael where,
29:18
Speaker 5: darryl Otto, the people that helped us, Debbie s Canauzi,
29:22
Speaker 5: Sam Tibitt, everybody that started fighting for us, and here
29:25
Speaker 5: we are today exonerated.
29:28
Speaker 1: Well that's that's that's a pretty good reference when you
29:35
Speaker 1: get a reference from God, you know what I mean?
29:40
Speaker 3: All right?
29:58
Speaker 1: I think being in contact with someone on the inside
30:01
Speaker 1: is so important, right and I hear that over and
30:02
Speaker 1: over again, and writing to and there are various places
30:05
Speaker 1: you can go to write letters to people who are
30:09
Speaker 1: duck and so alone on the inside. And it's also
30:10
Speaker 1: important to note that the LGBT community is vastly overrepresented
30:15
Speaker 1: in the criminal justice system. And it's partially I think
30:17
Speaker 1: and Mike imagine a degree, but it's partially because of
30:19
Speaker 1: these inherent biases that you fell victim to. It's approximately double.
30:25
Speaker 1: In terms of the number of adults who identify themselves
30:28
Speaker 1: as LGBT and the number of people who are incarcerated
30:31
Speaker 1: in the system, it's off by two hundred percent, and
30:34
Speaker 1: that's something as a country we really have to take
30:36
Speaker 1: a hard look. I mean, everyone knows that minorities are overrepresented,
30:39
Speaker 1: and overrepresented is the wrong way of putting it, because
30:41
Speaker 1: that sounds like a good thing, but they are discriminated against.
30:45
Speaker 1: They're locked up at terribly alarming numbers. Percentage wise. Think
30:49
Speaker 1: that by now fifty years after the Civil rights movement,
30:51
Speaker 1: we would be past that, but we still have a
30:54
Speaker 1: long long way to go. So Liz, let's turn to you.
30:57
Speaker 1: You are facing this alone well through the first year anyway.
31:01
Speaker 1: How did you get through it?
31:03
Speaker 3: Well?
31:03
Speaker 8: I think both the girls have kind of touched base
31:05
Speaker 8: on everything, But I believe my faith in God is
31:07
Speaker 8: what really carried me through, and the fact that I
31:10
Speaker 8: had three friends that were incarcerated and I needed to
31:13
Speaker 8: stay strong and prove that we were innocent and the
31:16
Speaker 8: crap had never happened. And to me, I think that
31:18
Speaker 8: was what gave me the strength to continue fighting. Because
31:22
Speaker 8: I didn't. I wanted someone to hear us and know that, hey,
31:26
Speaker 8: nothing ever happened. And I think that is what kept
31:29
Speaker 8: me going all those years that I was incarcerated, and
31:33
Speaker 8: kept me writing and writing even after every leaddown. You know,
31:37
Speaker 8: I had a child out there, Kathy had children, and
31:39
Speaker 8: I had a mom. We all had family out there,
31:42
Speaker 8: and it wasn't fair that our life was taken away
31:45
Speaker 8: for nothing that ever happened. And I felt like that
31:49
Speaker 8: was my only avenue to be able to help in
31:52
Speaker 8: some sort was to write, because that's all we happened there.
31:55
Speaker 1: It was just paper and stamps in school. I think, yeah,
32:00
Speaker 1: which helps so many people too. And it's and it's
32:02
Speaker 1: crazy because I see this how the government, you know,
32:06
Speaker 1: and we went through this recently in New York State
32:08
Speaker 1: with this is big out quite Why are we educating prisoners.
32:10
Speaker 1: We shouldn't be spending money. And the fact is it's
32:13
Speaker 1: critically important, not only for the people on the inside
32:16
Speaker 1: who are innocent, but also for other people. And I'm
32:19
Speaker 1: always amazed how politicians forget the fact that ninety nine
32:24
Speaker 1: or whatever it is percent of people or ninety five percent,
32:25
Speaker 1: I don't know the exact number. Of people who are
32:27
Speaker 1: cars right, are going to come out one day, the
32:30
Speaker 1: and the you know, if they get an education at
32:32
Speaker 1: prison and they get that hope and they get that
32:34
Speaker 1: you know, second sort of second chance, they have such
32:38
Speaker 1: a vastly improved chance of being successful on the outside,
32:44
Speaker 1: which then of course benefits everyone in society, even people
32:47
Speaker 1: who think that prisoners are all bad or whatever. They
32:49
Speaker 1: may end up living next door to whoever it is
32:51
Speaker 1: it gets out, and you're much better off having somebody
32:54
Speaker 1: there who's got a chance and wants to, you know,
32:56
Speaker 1: has the ability to turn their life around. So let's
33:00
Speaker 1: turn to you, Christy. Was there a key for you?
33:02
Speaker 1: Was there something that you clung to while you were
33:05
Speaker 1: in this nightmare?
33:06
Speaker 3: I would say it was my faith. Just my faith
33:08
Speaker 3: in God is what kept me strong, kept me going.
33:11
Speaker 3: And I mean I did positive stuff. I would try
33:14
Speaker 3: to education, you know, while I was in there, to
33:16
Speaker 3: keep me on a good level, you know, and not
33:19
Speaker 3: get caught up in the system. That was the one
33:21
Speaker 3: thing for me was that I felt like, Okay, the
33:25
Speaker 3: system took everything away from it, but I refused for
33:27
Speaker 3: them to take away me. So I conducted myself. It's
33:32
Speaker 3: still the same I was doing education out here, so
33:35
Speaker 3: I did education in there, you know, And I just
33:37
Speaker 3: stay positive, and I just I refuse to let the
33:39
Speaker 3: system take me, you know, myself. So I just stayed strong.
33:44
Speaker 1: You've got some difficult job, right. You're out there fighting
33:48
Speaker 1: against a system that doesn't want to see you, doesn't
33:50
Speaker 1: want to know about you. They like their convictions just
33:54
Speaker 1: the way they are. And we're in Texas too, right
33:56
Speaker 1: where they really like their convictions.
33:58
Speaker 3: Right.
33:59
Speaker 1: So you are up against everyday impossible odds. They've got
34:03
Speaker 1: the money and the resources and the thing and the people,
34:07
Speaker 1: and you're out there fighting the good fight. How do
34:09
Speaker 1: you stay strong? How do you maintain that optimism against
34:13
Speaker 1: these overwhelming odds?
34:15
Speaker 9: Well, number one, the successes that we do have are
34:19
Speaker 9: so rewarding. That's certainly the main thing that keeps me going.
34:22
Speaker 9: I mean, you know, these are four wonderful people, and
34:25
Speaker 9: of course you don't know when this is going on.
34:28
Speaker 9: This could have all failed. As it turns out, it
34:30
Speaker 9: was completely successful, and they've all been completely exonerated now
34:34
Speaker 9: and those sorts of successes and we've had others as
34:37
Speaker 9: well as really what keeps us strong. So you know
34:39
Speaker 9: it can happen in spite of the ones that fall
34:42
Speaker 9: short of the mark. We get one hundred and twenty
34:45
Speaker 9: letters a month, probably from inmates wanting our help. And
34:48
Speaker 9: we're a small nonprofit, so it's difficult, but thank goodness,
34:52
Speaker 9: we have a very competent staff that works for next
34:56
Speaker 9: to nothing to keep all this going.
34:59
Speaker 1: It's noble work and I imagine you sleep pretty well at night.
35:02
Speaker 1: Let's put in a plug for the nonprofit. By the way,
35:04
Speaker 1: what's the website? How can people get involved? How can
35:06
Speaker 1: they donate? Thank you?
35:07
Speaker 9: We're the Innocence Project of Texas. We have a website.
35:11
Speaker 9: You can google this and get to the website and
35:13
Speaker 9: the Facebook page. It will instruct you how you can
35:16
Speaker 9: donate in certainly, all donations, no matter how big or
35:19
Speaker 9: small or much.
35:19
Speaker 1: Appreciated, and they can and they do, and they will
35:22
Speaker 1: lead to more exonerations of more good people like the
35:25
Speaker 1: people that we have here on the page. And also
35:27
Speaker 1: the work. It's important to recognize that the work. Every
35:30
Speaker 1: time somebody gets exonerated or a google people gets exonerated.
35:34
Speaker 1: The ripple effect is profound because every time there's a
35:37
Speaker 1: story in the newspaper, and the media plays such an
35:40
Speaker 1: important role in all of this right, and the movie
35:43
Speaker 1: about the Girls, all these movies that have now become
35:46
Speaker 1: such an important part of pop culture. Every article. It
35:49
Speaker 1: influences people to think differently and to be more aware
35:53
Speaker 1: and to be better jurors. It comes back to that,
35:56
Speaker 1: because everybody's got a responsibility to be informed, to be skeptical,
36:02
Speaker 1: to be the best juror that they can be when
36:04
Speaker 1: someone's life is literally in your hands. Okay, so let's
36:08
Speaker 1: open it up to a couple of questions. You can
36:10
Speaker 1: even ask a question to Mike through God if you
36:13
Speaker 1: want to. We've already established that, or you or any
36:17
Speaker 1: other girls or me or whatever. Let me repeat the
36:20
Speaker 1: questions because I don't know if everybody could hear it
36:22
Speaker 1: in the air. So the question was, once you were released,
36:26
Speaker 1: did you find skepticism? Did people accept you as being
36:28
Speaker 1: in a center? Did people still just judge you based on,
36:32
Speaker 1: you know, whether you had been wrongly convicted of you.
36:34
Speaker 5: Know, when we first got out two weeks later, I
36:36
Speaker 5: was already working. I had a job, and with this
36:40
Speaker 5: job I would see many people because I'll just tell
36:44
Speaker 5: you I worked at a car wash, I worked for washtub.
36:46
Speaker 5: I don't know if y'all do you'll have one here
36:48
Speaker 5: in Austin washtubs. No, okay, Well they're in San Antonio
36:52
Speaker 5: and everybody goes to get their cars detailed and clean there.
36:56
Speaker 5: And it was the first job that I could get
36:57
Speaker 5: because see, I could not apply online because then I
37:00
Speaker 5: would have to put that I was a registered sex
37:02
Speaker 5: I mean I was a registered I was a convicted
37:04
Speaker 5: sex offender fell in. Okay, whatever, but anyway, it's all terrible,
37:09
Speaker 5: but anyway, so I would have to put on there
37:12
Speaker 5: that I had been convicted of this horrible crime. So
37:14
Speaker 5: basically I wanted to go somewhere where I could actually
37:18
Speaker 5: speak to somebody face to face, fill out an application
37:20
Speaker 5: and explain my situation so they wouldn't just judge by
37:24
Speaker 5: that convicted fell.
37:25
Speaker 1: In part of an application.
37:26
Speaker 5: So when I went and I was hired, it all
37:29
Speaker 5: wrote really well. And like I said, I met people
37:31
Speaker 5: constantly because you have to start in the vacuums.
37:34
Speaker 1: So my customers would get.
37:36
Speaker 5: Off their cars and leave them with us so we
37:37
Speaker 5: could clean them out, in vacuum them and throw out
37:39
Speaker 5: their trash. Well, this one gentleman looked at me and
37:41
Speaker 5: he was like, I know you, And I was just
37:44
Speaker 5: like how Because I didn't know. I mean, this is
37:46
Speaker 5: my first time being in society since nineteen two thousand.
37:51
Speaker 5: So when he said that to me, I just looked
37:53
Speaker 5: at him. I didn't know what to say. And then
37:55
Speaker 5: finally I said, are you sure?
37:57
Speaker 1: And he said, yeah, I think.
37:58
Speaker 5: And then he realized he had seen me on the
37:59
Speaker 5: news and he told me congratulations. And I never ever
38:04
Speaker 5: received any negative type of treatment, none of us ever have.
38:09
Speaker 5: Everybody has told us that they're praying for us. Our
38:12
Speaker 5: case was obviously very highly publicized, you know when we
38:15
Speaker 5: came out, and we've received nothing but love and support,
38:18
Speaker 5: and that support has grown tremendously, so you know, it's
38:22
Speaker 5: a real blessing to have so much on our side
38:25
Speaker 5: for once.
38:26
Speaker 10: Another question here, oh microphone, did you want and or
38:32
Speaker 10: receive any apology from anyone the situation the people?
38:37
Speaker 3: We did receive an apology from the one that we
38:39
Speaker 3: can in She apologized to us.
38:42
Speaker 1: System wise, I don't nobody's.
38:44
Speaker 3: Ever apologized to us. I mean I don't. I mean,
38:46
Speaker 3: I don't want an apology. I just wanted the wrong
38:48
Speaker 3: to be made right, which we got, which was the exoneration. Yes,
38:52
Speaker 3: it was nice for her to the one that recan
38:55
Speaker 3: and to apologize to us, but none of us really
38:57
Speaker 3: blamed her. She was young and it wasn't her fault.
39:01
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was actually very commendable of her to do
39:04
Speaker 4: that as well, I mean, especially knowing the backlash that
39:08
Speaker 4: she faced.
39:09
Speaker 1: So another question in the back.
39:11
Speaker 2: I know you spoke about when you were released you
39:13
Speaker 2: were able to find a job. But have any of
39:15
Speaker 2: you ever considered or did you ever consider entrepreneurship as
39:18
Speaker 2: a method or a way to kind of propel yourself
39:21
Speaker 2: or reactivate into society or do you know of any
39:24
Speaker 2: stories of entrepreneurship and accipenders.
39:27
Speaker 4: Yeah, there's any of exonreies that are out there doing
39:31
Speaker 4: very well for themselves.
39:33
Speaker 1: I will say.
39:34
Speaker 6: That have we thought about it?
39:35
Speaker 1: You know what, this is all pretty new to us.
39:38
Speaker 4: We were really We got the appeal from the appellate
39:42
Speaker 4: courts in November of the twenty third of twenty sixteen.
39:47
Speaker 4: So during that time, you know, we had a report
39:51
Speaker 4: to the bond So in order to do that, we
39:54
Speaker 4: had to maintain jobs throughout this whole process. But now
39:59
Speaker 4: that everything is done and over with, I think that
40:02
Speaker 4: either some or all of us do have some type
40:04
Speaker 4: of entrepreneurship in mind.
40:07
Speaker 1: Okay, I think we had a couple more hands up here.
40:10
Speaker 1: It seems like your life got hijacked when you were
40:12
Speaker 1: at a very young age.
40:13
Speaker 5: How do you think your life might have been different,
40:15
Speaker 5: or maybe your children's lives if this had never happened.
40:17
Speaker 4: Where do you think you'd be now?
40:19
Speaker 2: I would love to know how my kids would have
40:21
Speaker 2: grown up, they would.
40:22
Speaker 1: Have had me.
40:24
Speaker 5: I can't say I would have done better than my
40:26
Speaker 5: mom did, and I can't say that I would have done.
40:28
Speaker 1: Worse, but I would love to know. Do you think
40:31
Speaker 1: there are a lot of people right now that might
40:33
Speaker 1: be going to do the same thing?
40:34
Speaker 5: Oh, yes, ma'am, I do, and that's why the four
40:37
Speaker 5: of us want to make it our life to help them.
40:46
Speaker 1: I think we may have time for one more, but
40:49
Speaker 1: before we do that, I do want to thank the
40:51
Speaker 1: Capital Factory, the audience that's here for being here, iHeart
40:56
Speaker 1: and PRX for hosting us on this very special day
41:00
Speaker 1: of wrong ful conviction with Jason plom that's me And
41:04
Speaker 1: it's a very moving experience hearing from each of you
41:09
Speaker 1: and so powerful and I really consider it a privilege
41:12
Speaker 1: to be able to share your stories with the audience
41:15
Speaker 1: out there. We have time for one more question, and
41:18
Speaker 1: we have one more question.
41:19
Speaker 10: I'm from San Antonio, and I just want you to
41:22
Speaker 10: know that a lot of people there, I mean, we
41:24
Speaker 10: saw through the bullshit, like we all were on your side,
41:27
Speaker 10: and thank you, bless you, And I don't want to
41:29
Speaker 10: make you cry anymore because I feel like you've cried
41:31
Speaker 10: so much. I want you to be happy, So I
41:33
Speaker 10: want to ask you a happy question. What's something when you.
41:35
Speaker 1: Got out that just blew your mind.
41:38
Speaker 10: And you just made you so happy, Like something that
41:40
Speaker 10: you didn't know existed in the world, or something you
41:43
Speaker 10: never got to experience.
41:44
Speaker 1: I know AOL discs.
41:46
Speaker 10: Were probably a big thing back then, Like were you
41:48
Speaker 10: stoked about the iPhone? Like, was there anything that made
41:51
Speaker 10: you that you just love now that you wish you
41:53
Speaker 10: would have had back then?
41:54
Speaker 5: Well, I don't know if I love it. But technology
41:56
Speaker 5: is crazy. I know, Dan, I can tell you some stories.
42:02
Speaker 5: When she first came out, she didn't know anything about it,
42:04
Speaker 5: and she was at a restaurant and everybody was on
42:06
Speaker 5: their phone, so she just thought they were being rude.
42:09
Speaker 5: So technology, I'm still learning, I mean, are.
42:16
Speaker 1: Before we sign off, I want to put in a
42:18
Speaker 1: plug for the film Southwest of Salem, which won some
42:21
Speaker 1: awards recently, I think Tribeca and other things, so please
42:25
Speaker 1: do check out that film. I want to thank again
42:29
Speaker 1: each of you for being here and you might for
42:32
Speaker 1: doing what you do every day. And once again it's
42:35
Speaker 1: the NIS's Project of Texas. I strongly encourage everybody to
42:38
Speaker 1: get involved. If everybody would do a little something, we
42:42
Speaker 1: would put a huge dent in this problem. The awareness
42:45
Speaker 1: is peaking, support for the death penalties at an all
42:47
Speaker 1: time low. We can make a real change and this
42:51
Speaker 1: is a big part of it. And your stories are
42:54
Speaker 1: going to really help move the needle on this very
42:57
Speaker 1: important topic and conversation. So again, thank you all for
43:02
Speaker 1: being here. Check out the movie Southwest of Salem, ANESS
43:06
Speaker 1: Project of Texas. Thanks again, Thank you guys, don't forget
43:20
Speaker 1: to give us a fantastic review. Wherever you get your podcasts,
43:24
Speaker 1: it really helps. And I'm a proud donor to the
43:27
Speaker 1: Ennessis Project and I really hope you'll join me in
43:29
Speaker 1: supporting this very important cause and helping to prevent future
43:33
Speaker 1: wrongful convictions. Go to Innesssproject dot org to learn how
43:37
Speaker 1: to donate and get involved. I'd like to thank our
43:40
Speaker 1: production team Connor Hall and Kevin Wartis. The music in
43:43
Speaker 1: the show is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
43:47
Speaker 1: Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction
43:50
Speaker 1: and on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast. Wrongful Conviction with
43:54
Speaker 1: Jason Flamm is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts
43:57
Speaker 1: and association with Signal Company Number on one