Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #199 Jason Flom with Al Cleveland

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#199 Jason Flom with Al Cleveland · Wrongful Conviction

0:02
Speaker 1: In the late eighties and early nineties, the crack epidemic
0:05
Speaker 1: was in full swing in many parts of the country,
0:07
Speaker 1: including Lorain, Ohio, where Sunset Boulevard was known as the
0:11
Speaker 1: place to buy and smoke crack without being hassled by
0:15
Speaker 1: the authorities. The infamously corrupt Lorraine Police Department had a
0:19
Speaker 1: relationship with a drug dealer, addict and notorious informant named
0:22
Speaker 1: William Avery Senior, who ran the scene on Sunset Boulevard
0:26
Speaker 1: and he didn't appreciate New Yorkers encroaching on his turf.
0:30
Speaker 1: On August eighth, nineteen ninety one, the bodies of Marsha
0:33
Speaker 1: Blakeley and Floyd Epps were discovered separately. The tire marks
0:37
Speaker 1: on their heads were at least in part, to blame
0:40
Speaker 1: for their deaths. After the cases went cold, two thousand
0:43
Speaker 1: dollars reward drew the attention of William Avery Senior, who
0:46
Speaker 1: brought in his teenage son to falsely accuse four men
0:50
Speaker 1: from New York, including Al Cleveland. The fact that al
0:54
Speaker 1: Cleveland was in New York at the time of the
0:56
Speaker 1: murder and that Avery Junior recanted his statement at the
1:00
Speaker 1: first of the four trials did not stop prosecutor Jonathan
1:03
Speaker 1: Rosenbaum from going ahead with all four of these sham trials.
1:08
Speaker 1: The Ohio criminal legal system continuously ignored William Avery Junior's
1:12
Speaker 1: recantations for twenty five long years, leaving parole as Al
1:17
Speaker 1: Cleveland's only avenue for relief. This is Wrongful Conviction with
1:22
Speaker 1: Jason Flamm. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm.
1:38
Speaker 1: That's me, and today you're going to hear a story
1:42
Speaker 1: that defies description. I'm going to first of all, introduce
1:47
Speaker 1: first Jennifer Passion urge around. It's been on the show
1:50
Speaker 1: before as the deputy director of the Ohio Innocence Project. Jennifer,
1:53
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction.
1:55
Speaker 2: Thank you, it's good to be back.
1:56
Speaker 1: And Al Cleveland. I'm just going to say this. Al
2:01
Speaker 1: has lived about seven or eight lifetimes so far, and
2:06
Speaker 1: he survived twenty five years in prison for a gruesome
2:09
Speaker 1: double murder that happened in Ohio while he was in Queens,
2:13
Speaker 1: New York. That's just the beginning. So without further ado,
2:17
Speaker 1: Al Cleveland, I'm so happy you're here. I'm sorry you
2:20
Speaker 1: have to be here, but I'm happier here.
2:22
Speaker 3: Hey, I'm here. Man I'm with Jason plump. You got
2:25
Speaker 3: to realize, Jason, like, I'm fresh home, like I've just
2:27
Speaker 3: been home maybe five months, and I sat on the
2:30
Speaker 3: rack visualizing this. So here we are. Man, I'm excited,
2:33
Speaker 3: I'm pumped up, and thank you for doing this. Thank
2:35
Speaker 3: you for doing this.
2:37
Speaker 1: I don't even know what to say. That means. That
2:38
Speaker 1: means more to me than you could even know. And
2:41
Speaker 1: so al going back to the beginning, you grew up
2:45
Speaker 1: such a fascinating story. You were a hip hop artist,
2:49
Speaker 1: and not only that, but you were very close friends
2:51
Speaker 1: with ll cool J back in Hollis Queens. Tell us
2:54
Speaker 1: about that.
2:55
Speaker 3: Yeah, so he grew up right around the corner from me.
2:58
Speaker 3: So we were always in the basement, you know, making
3:02
Speaker 3: mixtapes and making songs, and like I seen his assent
3:07
Speaker 3: from the basement to you know, a national stage. You know,
3:11
Speaker 3: used to go with him on tour, like if he
3:13
Speaker 3: was in any of the surrounding states, we would get
3:16
Speaker 3: in the vent and go wherever he was and get
3:19
Speaker 3: backstage passes and you know, just have tons of fun.
3:23
Speaker 3: It was just tons of fun seeing that rise.
3:26
Speaker 1: Yeah, you witnessed literally the birth of a legend. And
3:28
Speaker 1: here's your dear friend. I mean that rumor has it
3:31
Speaker 1: that you actually painted his room.
3:33
Speaker 3: I mean so crazy, I did, I did, I did,
3:37
Speaker 3: and he owes me thirty bucks still for it.
3:39
Speaker 1: Oh my god, with interest. That's incredible. In his nineteen
3:43
Speaker 1: ninety eight book I Make My Own Rules, ll actually
3:45
Speaker 1: shouts you out and credits your artwork actually as an
3:48
Speaker 1: early inspiration of his. So that's one. Okay, that's just one.
3:52
Speaker 1: You ain't heard nothing yet. Stick with us, Okay. So
3:56
Speaker 1: another childhood friend of yours is Damon John, and this
3:59
Speaker 1: I think highlights how crazy and random all this shit
4:03
Speaker 1: is because I think it's fair to say you all
4:06
Speaker 1: had the same potential, but the system grabbed you and
4:09
Speaker 1: those guys went on to become success stories while you
4:14
Speaker 1: were being held captained by the state for a crime
4:17
Speaker 1: you didn't commit. And for those of you who don't know,
4:19
Speaker 1: Damon John is the founder and CEO of Fubu. So
4:22
Speaker 1: tell us about Damon just quickly and how you come
4:24
Speaker 1: to know him in the beginning.
4:25
Speaker 3: Oh man, me and Damon we went to the same
4:28
Speaker 3: Catholic school together in our neighborhood, from maybe second or
4:31
Speaker 3: third grade all the way up. We go on adventures,
4:34
Speaker 3: bike rides, camping with my dad. That was my guy.
4:38
Speaker 3: I wrote a book about it, actually a little children's book,
4:40
Speaker 3: What Don't you Do?
4:41
Speaker 1: I feel like you? Okay, but we're going to get
4:43
Speaker 1: into that later. So to set the stage, we're back
4:45
Speaker 1: in the eighties and early nineties. The crack epidemic was
4:50
Speaker 1: in full swing, and you were now going back and
4:54
Speaker 1: forth to Northeast Ohio. Right, it seems so random. Why
4:58
Speaker 1: would a kid from Queen's end up in Loreno, Ohio.
5:01
Speaker 3: All Right, So since I'm talking to you, Flam and
5:03
Speaker 3: you got experience in the music business, I want to
5:05
Speaker 3: just go back a little bit to help you and
5:08
Speaker 3: help everybody understand. So late eighties, my sister gets killed
5:12
Speaker 3: by some skinheads in Detroit, and it was a big thing.
5:15
Speaker 3: My mom was protesting, but me, I internalized this thing
5:20
Speaker 3: and just kind of like went into my art and
5:23
Speaker 3: at the time I was doing graffiti and you know
5:26
Speaker 3: art on that level, trying to get into galleries and
5:28
Speaker 3: trying to make my way, but it wasn't happening. So
5:32
Speaker 3: I started promoting parties, doing shows, ran into a guy
5:35
Speaker 3: who had a studio. We started going to the studio.
5:38
Speaker 3: I found out Hey, I got some talent, I can rap,
5:40
Speaker 3: I can do this, I seen ll do it. Let
5:42
Speaker 3: me take this route. So we started going to the
5:44
Speaker 3: studio and making songs, and we started forming a vision
5:48
Speaker 3: of what we wanted to do. But the problem was Jason.
5:51
Speaker 3: Back then, you know, you had to get records pressed up,
5:54
Speaker 3: you had to get a song mastered, you had to
5:55
Speaker 3: go through all these steps, and I didn't have the
5:57
Speaker 3: money for that. At every stage, we kept finding ourselves broke.
6:02
Speaker 3: So ninety ninety one, a friend of mine gets in
6:05
Speaker 3: touch with me. He had left New York to go
6:08
Speaker 3: to Ohio with a few other dudes, and they were
6:11
Speaker 3: into the drug scene, low level, but he was incarcerated
6:14
Speaker 3: and he asked me to help him with the bond money.
6:17
Speaker 3: At the time, I didn't have it. I only had
6:19
Speaker 3: my rent money. So he enticed me a little more
6:22
Speaker 3: and told me he would double my money. Just come
6:24
Speaker 3: on out, give him a few days, and he would
6:25
Speaker 3: have the money back for me. And at the time
6:28
Speaker 3: I wanted to explore the music scene out here. I said,
6:30
Speaker 3: you know what the heck man, and I did it.
6:32
Speaker 3: I sent him the money came out here. That's how
6:35
Speaker 3: I wound up out here. He took me to a project.
6:38
Speaker 3: You know, he's showing me how he does his thing.
6:41
Speaker 3: You know, gave me the little package to hold. Police comes,
6:44
Speaker 3: they chase him, arrest him. I have the little thing
6:48
Speaker 3: I dished, a little thing. I wound up meeting some guys.
6:51
Speaker 3: Went to a guy's house who wound up being the
6:53
Speaker 3: guy who wound up setting us up. But I went
6:56
Speaker 3: to his house. He asked me if I had anything,
6:58
Speaker 3: and I'm like, I kind of do. He asked me
7:00
Speaker 3: about from New York. Do I know my code defending.
7:03
Speaker 3: I'm like, yeah, I know him. Yeah. He's like, if
7:05
Speaker 3: you got something, I can sell it. So I went
7:07
Speaker 3: and retrieved this stuff. You start breaking it down with him.
7:10
Speaker 3: I didn't even know the prices were haggling, and he
7:13
Speaker 3: takes what he buys from me, goes right out into
7:15
Speaker 3: the street and he's stopping cars like he's a traffic controller,
7:19
Speaker 3: is selling his thing. And maybe an hour and a
7:21
Speaker 3: half later, the whole little bag of stuff I had
7:24
Speaker 3: was it was gone. I had about twenty two hundred
7:27
Speaker 3: dollars in my pocket. For the next thirty to forty days,
7:29
Speaker 3: I just went on a mission to get my startup capital.
7:32
Speaker 3: So I mean, I know it was wrong, but that
7:34
Speaker 3: was I had a vision. I had a vision, Jason.
7:36
Speaker 1: And I can't leave out the fact that when you
7:39
Speaker 1: look at the history of hip hop music, there's so
7:42
Speaker 1: many artists, legendary artists who grew up the same way
7:46
Speaker 1: you did, some of them from the same area you
7:48
Speaker 1: came from. And he ended up in the crack game
7:51
Speaker 1: because that was the option that was available at the time,
7:53
Speaker 1: like you said, to get startup capital or whatever it
7:55
Speaker 1: may be. And just by fate, they didn't get arrested.
8:00
Speaker 1: And many people know the names, I mean, because these
8:01
Speaker 1: people are they're not secretive about it. When I had
8:03
Speaker 1: Meek Bill on the podcast and I asked him this
8:05
Speaker 1: question how many people he met in prison that were
8:08
Speaker 1: as talented as he is, and he said he couldn't
8:10
Speaker 1: even count. How many.
8:11
Speaker 3: You know, I've met so many guys in there, Jason,
8:14
Speaker 3: who the visionaries. You know, they're the bread winners and
8:17
Speaker 3: their families. And I just want to make it clear.
8:19
Speaker 3: I just want to make sure I share this message
8:22
Speaker 3: that if you do have a dream, if you do
8:24
Speaker 3: have a vision, try to find out how to do
8:26
Speaker 3: a business plan, try to find out how to go
8:28
Speaker 3: to a bank or ask people family members to invest
8:32
Speaker 3: in your dream instead of taking that route and putting
8:36
Speaker 3: yourself at risk to come to the penitentiary because it's
8:39
Speaker 3: full of guys with dreams that fall through. So I
8:45
Speaker 3: just wanted to share that.
8:46
Speaker 1: No, I'm glad you did. And Jennifer, I want to
8:48
Speaker 1: talk about the Lorraine Police Department because of course Loraine,
8:51
Speaker 1: Ohio was where I was spending his time in those days,
8:54
Speaker 1: and they were known for sexual abuse and brutality, which
8:57
Speaker 1: is sadly a problem that exists to this day. So
9:00
Speaker 1: many different police departments around this country. Can you paint
9:03
Speaker 1: a picture of what was going on back then and
9:06
Speaker 1: there and what was the deal with their unsavory relationship
9:11
Speaker 1: with this shady character William Avery sor.
9:14
Speaker 2: Yeah, there was a huge crack problem. Similar to lots
9:17
Speaker 2: of other areas in the country. The police had people
9:20
Speaker 2: like William Avery Senior, who, at least according to Avery,
9:25
Speaker 2: could kind of do some favors as a CI and
9:28
Speaker 2: then be left alone and do whatever you wanted. So
9:31
Speaker 2: there seemed to be sort of this unofficial arrangement between
9:34
Speaker 2: the cops and some of the people there. So it
9:36
Speaker 2: seemed to me that when folks from New York came
9:38
Speaker 2: in and started sort of messing with that system. It
9:41
Speaker 2: did not go over well with either the residents or
9:44
Speaker 2: the police.
9:45
Speaker 1: You had just gotten involved in this business, so to speak.
9:48
Speaker 1: Al were you aware of what the Lorraine police department
9:52
Speaker 1: was up to?
9:53
Speaker 3: No, I wasn't. Actually I found out years later through
9:57
Speaker 3: our investigation that one I'm a co defendent, was the
10:00
Speaker 3: one who invited me out here. He was kind of
10:02
Speaker 3: like a target. We actually found a picture with him
10:04
Speaker 3: with a bullseye in their police files like here, I
10:07
Speaker 3: am just waltz right into Lorraine.
10:09
Speaker 1: I had no idea you were sitting duck. Let's face it.
10:12
Speaker 1: And as part of the story centers around a guy
10:14
Speaker 1: named William Avery Senior, who was a prolific paid informant
10:19
Speaker 1: at the time, and he received special treatment as informants
10:22
Speaker 1: do in exchange for his help. He lived on Sunset
10:26
Speaker 1: Boulevard in Lorain, Ohio with his son, William Avery Junior,
10:30
Speaker 1: who he had introduced to crack when the kid was
10:33
Speaker 1: just fourteen years old, and this had become this sort
10:35
Speaker 1: of neighborhood spot where people would come to smoke crack,
10:38
Speaker 1: and the police looked the other way of course, because
10:40
Speaker 1: he was helping them out while lying for them on
10:43
Speaker 1: cases as well as maybe providing accurate information once in
10:46
Speaker 1: a while, have no idea. And then there was Marsha Blakeley.
10:48
Speaker 2: Well, Marsha Blakely was the murder victim, and she was
10:51
Speaker 2: a young woman who was addicted to crack and other
10:53
Speaker 2: drugs and was known on the streets for churning tricks,
10:58
Speaker 2: selling stolen goods to feed her addiction. She was just
11:02
Speaker 2: a user who, for reasons that I still don't quite understand,
11:05
Speaker 2: ended up brutally murdered in this whole situation.
11:09
Speaker 1: Yeah, so she and a guy named Floyd Epps turned
11:12
Speaker 1: up dead and this is, you know, one of the
11:15
Speaker 1: most brutal crimes I've ever heard of. On August eighth,
11:19
Speaker 1: nineteen eighty one, at nine eighteen in the morning, Marsha
11:22
Speaker 1: Blakeley's body was discovered in an alley behind the West
11:24
Speaker 1: Coast Shopping Center in the rain. She had twenty five
11:27
Speaker 1: stab wounds, fractured ribs, a broken neck, a slit throat,
11:31
Speaker 1: and torture wounds on her neck and head. And if
11:34
Speaker 1: that wasn't enough, her head had been run over by
11:36
Speaker 1: a car twice now earlier that same day at one
11:39
Speaker 1: twenty five am, Floyd Epps's body was found nearby and
11:43
Speaker 1: his head had also been run over by a car.
11:46
Speaker 1: So this is bizarre because police believed that the murders
11:48
Speaker 1: were related. Anyone would, of course, I mean, you don't
11:50
Speaker 1: hear stories too often people being the heads run over
11:53
Speaker 1: by cars, thankfully, But no arrests were made in the
11:57
Speaker 1: Epps killing, and no arrests have been made to this date,
12:01
Speaker 1: which is the whole separate problem. But when nothing was
12:04
Speaker 1: happening with these cases, the cops offered a two thousand
12:07
Speaker 1: dollars reward for information. So now we go all the
12:09
Speaker 1: way to over a month later, September tenth, William Avery
12:13
Speaker 1: said he had information and they told him that the
12:17
Speaker 1: reward would only be given to someone with first hand knowledge.
12:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, so William Avery sor takes his son, William Avery
12:24
Speaker 2: Junior in the next day to meet with the cops
12:26
Speaker 2: to say what you know, he knew about the crime.
12:29
Speaker 2: But his story as it was told that day does
12:32
Speaker 2: not match up to what he eventually said in the trials.
12:36
Speaker 2: And in addition, it was just a bizarre meeting where
12:40
Speaker 2: you know, the cops are interviewing William Avery Junior about
12:42
Speaker 2: supposedly witnessing this urter, and yet his father sat in
12:46
Speaker 2: on the entire interview and said like, yeah, I'm here
12:50
Speaker 2: to remind him of the things that he forgot, which
12:54
Speaker 2: just raised all kinds of red flags. But yet that's
12:56
Speaker 2: that's what they went with.
12:58
Speaker 1: So when Avery Sor and j went to the police,
13:01
Speaker 1: Junior implicated four individuals and the death of Marsha Blakely.
13:04
Speaker 1: That four men were Lenworth Edwards, Benson Davis, John Edwards,
13:08
Speaker 1: and Alfred Cleveland, men that he claimed were drug dealers
13:12
Speaker 1: from New York.
13:12
Speaker 3: Now.
13:12
Speaker 1: Avery Junior went on to say that he owed you
13:15
Speaker 1: Al money and in order to pay off the debt.
13:18
Speaker 1: Avery Junior claimed that Al took him to Epps's apartment
13:21
Speaker 1: where Marcia Blakely was, and that Al told him to
13:25
Speaker 1: assault her. Avery Junior claimed to refuse because he knew
13:29
Speaker 1: Marshall Blakeley. So, according to this crazy tale from Avery Junior,
13:32
Speaker 1: the three other men assaulted her for twenty minutes while
13:36
Speaker 1: he and Al watched. Avery continued on that he went
13:38
Speaker 1: back to his apartment after the assault, but said that
13:42
Speaker 1: Al came by after and told him, quote, we took
13:45
Speaker 1: care of the junkie. We knocked her off.
13:48
Speaker 2: And thanks just started rolling from there. Although they never
13:52
Speaker 2: really found any other evidence at all implicating these guys.
13:55
Speaker 1: But they can't find something that doesn't exist because they
13:57
Speaker 1: weren't absolute. So we aren't even been fucking ohio, right,
14:01
Speaker 1: what tell us where you were during this week and
14:04
Speaker 1: how we know that that's really true?
14:05
Speaker 3: All right? So, yeah, I was on probation at the time.
14:07
Speaker 3: I didn't realize when I was going to trial. I
14:10
Speaker 3: wasn't sure because it was like four years later that
14:14
Speaker 3: that was the day that I went to my probation officer,
14:16
Speaker 3: but I knew. I went back to New York to
14:19
Speaker 3: see my probation officer and I was in New York
14:22
Speaker 3: with Damon John, who had a van business at the time.
14:25
Speaker 3: I went to buy a TV and I needed him
14:27
Speaker 3: to come bring the TV to my house. And this
14:30
Speaker 3: is all, you know, the seventh, the eighth, when these
14:32
Speaker 3: people were killed, and when I was going to trial,
14:34
Speaker 3: I had to receipt for this TV. You know, we
14:37
Speaker 3: got those times. You know, he came to trial and
14:39
Speaker 3: prosecuted try to dog him out like he was some
14:41
Speaker 3: young punk. You know, he tried to discredit him and
14:45
Speaker 3: it was crazy.
14:46
Speaker 2: I mean, the state acknowledged that he had seen the
14:47
Speaker 2: probation officer in New York on August seventh, but they
14:51
Speaker 2: just said, well, he must have decided he was going
14:54
Speaker 2: to either drive or fly to Ohio to come and
14:57
Speaker 2: commit this brutal murder against this woman. He didn't even know.
15:00
Speaker 2: But it was just the word of one person, that
15:02
Speaker 2: was it.
15:02
Speaker 1: So four people were victims of this compromise to say
15:06
Speaker 1: the least paid informant and it was a two thousand
15:08
Speaker 1: dollars award, and then they paid him again.
15:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, he got the two thousand dollars reward for coming
15:12
Speaker 2: forward initially, which was interesting because the award was listed
15:15
Speaker 2: for anyone would get it, leading to an arrest. They
15:19
Speaker 2: arrest Lynworth Edwards, one of the co defendants, so he
15:21
Speaker 2: gets the two thousand dollars. They then schedule a deposition
15:25
Speaker 2: of William Avery Junior claiming that his life is in
15:28
Speaker 2: danger or something, and he gets paid again, and then
15:31
Speaker 2: he ends up getting paid more so at the end
15:33
Speaker 2: of the bowl saga, he ended up getting paid around
15:35
Speaker 2: five thousand dollars for his testimony.
15:37
Speaker 1: Right we're talking nineteen ninety one dollars is a lot
15:40
Speaker 1: more money than it is today.
15:41
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, to someone who was a crack addict who
15:44
Speaker 2: you know, on the stand said he never really had
15:46
Speaker 2: a job, so this was his income.
15:48
Speaker 1: So Avery Junior changed and recanted his story multiple times
15:52
Speaker 1: after the initial interrogation, but his claims anyway were enough
15:56
Speaker 1: and the authorities were happy to use them to convict
15:59
Speaker 1: four men. Avery Junior was supposed to testify in the
16:03
Speaker 1: first trial because guys were tried separately, Right, Lynworth Edwards
16:06
Speaker 1: was the first trial.
16:07
Speaker 2: Yes, so at Lynworth Edward's first trial, this was the
16:11
Speaker 2: first of the four to be tried. Yeah, William Avery
16:14
Speaker 2: Junior basically demanded ten thousand dollars to keep giving his testimony,
16:19
Speaker 2: which you know, of course, the prosecutor said, well, no,
16:22
Speaker 2: we're not paying you anything. So at this point Avery
16:25
Speaker 2: Junior then says, well, I'm not going to testify. Everything
16:29
Speaker 2: I said before was a lie. So yeah, they end
16:32
Speaker 2: up throwing him in jail and charging him with contempt.
16:36
Speaker 2: But he later comes back and it's the second trial
16:38
Speaker 2: for Lynworth and says, well, the reason I flip flopped
16:43
Speaker 2: before was because I was threatened in the jail if
16:47
Speaker 2: I went forward with telling what I know about this crime,
16:51
Speaker 2: and so that's how they got away with putting on
16:53
Speaker 2: his testimony in Lynworth's second trial and then in the
16:57
Speaker 2: rest of the defendant's trials. However, we found out later
17:02
Speaker 2: years later, was that those threats never happened. We found
17:06
Speaker 2: records showing that Avery Jr. He actually got in trouble
17:10
Speaker 2: for making false reports about getting threatened. And so the
17:13
Speaker 2: whole case was just built on a lie.
17:15
Speaker 1: Basically a lot of life. Well yeah, several but and
17:21
Speaker 1: al your trial, you were the third one tried, right,
17:25
Speaker 1: and your trial lasted six days.
17:29
Speaker 3: When the jury came in, I turned around to look
17:34
Speaker 3: at them, and I saw it was hatred. Bro I
17:45
Speaker 3: saw a hatred and my mom was there, a couple
17:50
Speaker 3: of supporters. And when the judge read the verdict, he
17:55
Speaker 3: told me that I'm sentenced to life, and I told
18:00
Speaker 3: him I didn't do it. And damn the screech when
18:07
Speaker 3: he said guilty. The screech came from a mother's voice.
18:17
Speaker 3: I knew it took a part. Yes, apart from all
18:27
Speaker 3: I can do is try to turn around comforter her
18:29
Speaker 3: like it's gonna be okay, It's gonna be all right.
18:41
Speaker 1: This episode is underwritten by the AIG pro Bono Program.
18:45
Speaker 1: AIG is a leading global insurance company, and for over
18:49
Speaker 1: a decade, the AIG pro Bono Program has provided thousands
18:53
Speaker 1: of hours of free legal services and other support to
18:56
Speaker 1: nonprofit organizations and individuals most in need. More recently, the
19:00
Speaker 1: program added criminal and social justice reform as a key
19:04
Speaker 1: pillar of its mission.
19:10
Speaker 3: Yeah.
19:11
Speaker 4: So I went to a high security prison they call
19:14
Speaker 4: them close camps where they send people that you know,
19:18
Speaker 4: done some of society's worse crimes.
19:21
Speaker 3: They're there, and those first six or seven years that
19:25
Speaker 3: kind of blurried to me because I was so focused
19:30
Speaker 3: on fighting and educating myself. I had to totally like
19:35
Speaker 3: re educate myself because everything I had thought I believed
19:40
Speaker 3: turned out to be alive about the system and everything.
19:43
Speaker 3: You know, I had to learn about myself, you know.
19:45
Speaker 3: I learned about my history, learned about the history of
19:48
Speaker 3: this country, learn about you know, other people who suffered injustices,
19:52
Speaker 3: and tried to understand how these things happened. You know,
19:58
Speaker 3: it wasn't just me, and I started learning like, man,
20:00
Speaker 3: this is a big problem. So I just got on
20:04
Speaker 3: a mission to better myself and better educate myself so
20:09
Speaker 3: I could learn how to write better, learn how to
20:12
Speaker 3: communicate better to get support. You know, I had to
20:15
Speaker 3: be able to write people. It's like you're going on
20:18
Speaker 3: a campaign and you just got to learn how to
20:20
Speaker 3: articulate yourself. At the same time growing spiritually, working out,
20:26
Speaker 3: trying to be an impact on the guys in there,
20:28
Speaker 3: because I started seeing that, you know, a lot of
20:30
Speaker 3: guys weren't educated at all, like no GEDs and a
20:33
Speaker 3: lot of illiteracy. So I put myself in a block
20:36
Speaker 3: where I could tutor guys and just help out in
20:40
Speaker 3: that way. I knew it was other guys that were innocent,
20:42
Speaker 3: and if they were illiterate, they didn't stand a chance.
20:46
Speaker 3: You know, it's tons of guys in there for stuff
20:48
Speaker 3: they didn't do, but they don't have any support. They
20:50
Speaker 3: don't know how to explain their situation. They don't even
20:52
Speaker 3: really know what happened. They don't really understand the language
20:55
Speaker 3: that was used on them in the courtroom, just sitting
20:58
Speaker 3: there trying to fight their way through the everyday life
21:01
Speaker 3: of prison. So I just had to try to be
21:03
Speaker 3: an impact in there. I wasn't going to allow what
21:06
Speaker 3: happened to me to make me bitter, make me anger,
21:10
Speaker 3: because I saw that it directly affects your health. So
21:13
Speaker 3: I had to make my mind up to you know,
21:16
Speaker 3: understand forgiveness and try to understand that maybe these people
21:18
Speaker 3: made a mistake. Maybe they really thought we did do this,
21:21
Speaker 3: you know, but I found out later on. This gets
21:24
Speaker 3: me angry, man, is that they knew it was other
21:27
Speaker 3: people and other suspects. They were on these guys trail, man,
21:32
Speaker 3: and these are people that we're finding out other people
21:34
Speaker 3: that committed the crime, and they were on that track,
21:37
Speaker 3: but just wanted us just focus on us, man, and
21:39
Speaker 3: went forward with a full story a preschool. It could
21:43
Speaker 3: have poke holes in this God's story, but they moved
21:47
Speaker 3: forward with it.
21:48
Speaker 1: Yeah. I mean, it's extraordinary to me that you and
21:53
Speaker 1: others have found a way to now we find this
21:56
Speaker 1: spiritual grace or whatever you want to call it, but
21:58
Speaker 1: also to overcome the best word I can think of
22:01
Speaker 1: this incredible hardship is not even I can't find the
22:05
Speaker 1: right word. But it's worth noting that al was convicted
22:08
Speaker 1: about five years after the crime was committed, all the
22:12
Speaker 1: way in nineteen ninety six, and that same year there
22:16
Speaker 1: was a motion for a new trial based on an AFPHA.
22:18
Speaker 1: David from Jeremiah Abdulah Charlton al who was he and
22:23
Speaker 1: why was his affidavit significant?
22:26
Speaker 3: So this was a few years after my conviction. I
22:29
Speaker 3: run into this guy who says he had some information
22:32
Speaker 3: that he's been trying to share and had in fact
22:35
Speaker 3: shared with police, and he was the last person to
22:40
Speaker 3: see Marshall Blakeley. At least he alleged he was, you know,
22:43
Speaker 3: put her into the car with two guys to exchange
22:46
Speaker 3: four drugs. I guess he was like pimping, so to speak,
22:50
Speaker 3: and he put her in the car with these guys.
22:53
Speaker 3: So the judge did give us a hearing based on
22:56
Speaker 3: his affidavit. Anytime somebody files an affidavit, you have to
23:00
Speaker 3: come to testify to the truthfulness of the appidated. But
23:04
Speaker 3: when we get to the hearing, Malloya wasn't even prepared,
23:07
Speaker 3: didn't call him, didn't subpoena any and lo and behold,
23:10
Speaker 3: I found out this same prosecutor had indicted her for
23:14
Speaker 3: some stuff in her office, you know, stuff that they
23:17
Speaker 3: were going through, and had her under indictment at the
23:20
Speaker 3: time of that hearing. So she wasn't in her right mind.
23:22
Speaker 3: And the judge denied the hearing based on her unpreparedness,
23:27
Speaker 3: and she was a good attorney. I mean, she fought,
23:29
Speaker 3: she believed in me, but she couldn't go up against
23:32
Speaker 3: these guys man, they were too influential.
23:34
Speaker 1: It seems to me that there were any number of
23:38
Speaker 1: times when the state had not just the opportunity, but
23:41
Speaker 1: the obligation to right this wrong, but like it often does,
23:46
Speaker 1: instead it sort of got under its shell like a
23:49
Speaker 1: turtle and deflected any new information or evidence to protect
23:53
Speaker 1: this wrongful conviction or these four wrong for convictions.
23:56
Speaker 2: Yeah, how did his sort of regular direct appeals which
24:00
Speaker 2: didn't go anywhere. And then later Avery Junior, you know,
24:03
Speaker 2: the only guy that put him at the scene, he
24:06
Speaker 2: recanted and admitted that he made the whole thing up.
24:09
Speaker 2: What's interesting about that is it took a long time
24:13
Speaker 2: for Al's family to track down Avery Junior. He kind
24:16
Speaker 2: of lived off the grid and it was hard to
24:18
Speaker 2: find him. But once they did and he admitted, you
24:21
Speaker 2: know that he had lied in this. What we later
24:24
Speaker 2: found out was that that wasn't the first time he recanted.
24:27
Speaker 2: He actually recanted a couple of years before that to
24:31
Speaker 2: an FBI agent in Detroit, just completely out of the blue,
24:34
Speaker 2: and on his own. Nobody from the state ever got
24:38
Speaker 2: a hold of Al or any of his attorneys to
24:39
Speaker 2: let him know that. So at that point there was
24:43
Speaker 2: no evidence left, and the States admitted that in filings
24:46
Speaker 2: before that without Avery Junior, there's no case against Al.
24:50
Speaker 2: So this was before Ohio Innocence Project and I got
24:53
Speaker 2: involved in the case. But he went back to state
24:55
Speaker 2: court with this sworn statement in affidavit from Avery Junior,
24:59
Speaker 2: and in the state court they finally eventually held a
25:01
Speaker 2: hearing where they called him into testify. Well, they read
25:04
Speaker 2: him his rights on the stand, he threatened to prosecute
25:08
Speaker 2: him with perjury in the four different trials if he
25:11
Speaker 2: proceeded to recant on the stand, and he said, well,
25:14
Speaker 2: I'm not going to prison for thirty years, took the
25:17
Speaker 2: fifth and walked out. Now, the only reasonable conclusion you
25:21
Speaker 2: could draw from that was that he was going to
25:23
Speaker 2: testify that he lied at the trial because he wasn't
25:26
Speaker 2: in any danger if he was going to suddenly say
25:28
Speaker 2: he was telling the truth at the trial, if that
25:31
Speaker 2: makes sense. But in any case, he walks outside and
25:34
Speaker 2: there's an interview with a reporter right afterward where he says,
25:36
Speaker 2: dude's innocent but I'm not going to prison for it.
25:39
Speaker 3: Yeah.
25:40
Speaker 1: Yeah, his silence spoke volumes.
25:42
Speaker 2: Absolutely, and if they were interested in justice, they would
25:45
Speaker 2: have let him testify. So yeah, then he lost there
25:48
Speaker 2: and then we ended up in federal court, and that's
25:50
Speaker 2: where I kind of came in.
25:52
Speaker 1: We know how difficult the federal court is. Unfortunately, due
25:56
Speaker 1: to EDPA, the chances of success in federal court are
26:00
Speaker 1: basically the same as a snowballs chance in hell. But
26:03
Speaker 1: tell us what you did, how you did it, and
26:05
Speaker 1: how the hell you finally managed to bring him home
26:09
Speaker 1: as a miracle.
26:10
Speaker 2: So we filed it in federal court, and the district
26:13
Speaker 2: court had said that we couldn't go forward with the
26:16
Speaker 2: habeas case because there's this statute of limitations for of
26:20
Speaker 2: one year, and long story short, they said we were
26:23
Speaker 2: too late. So we filed an appeal because there's this
26:26
Speaker 2: exception if you can show that someone is actually innocent,
26:31
Speaker 2: and that's what we did with the recantation from avery.
26:35
Speaker 2: And then we had evidence from the alibi witnesses and
26:38
Speaker 2: additional alibi witnesses as well. So the state, you know,
26:42
Speaker 2: had poked holes in Al's Alibia trial by saying, well,
26:46
Speaker 2: he could have driven or flown here after the times
26:49
Speaker 2: we knew he was in New York. Well, we had
26:51
Speaker 2: additional witnesses that we found that proved that al was
26:54
Speaker 2: in New York at the time the crime happened, or
26:58
Speaker 2: so close in time to it that it lets he
27:00
Speaker 2: could time travel, he could not have possibly gone back
27:04
Speaker 2: to Ohio. So based on those things, we convinced the
27:08
Speaker 2: Sixth Circuit that we had shown that he was actually innocent.
27:11
Speaker 2: That didn't mean that he got to go home. That
27:13
Speaker 2: just meant that we got the right to actually pursue
27:16
Speaker 2: the habeas claims in the district court. So in federal
27:21
Speaker 2: court you have to make federal constitutional claims. So we
27:24
Speaker 2: were making federal claims of Brady violations where the state
27:28
Speaker 2: had hid evidence and also that they had intentionally put
27:32
Speaker 2: on false evidence from Avery that they knew was false,
27:35
Speaker 2: and also claimed like an effective assistance of trial council
27:39
Speaker 2: for failing to find some of these additional alibi witnesses.
27:42
Speaker 2: And then we also made a claim based on actual
27:45
Speaker 2: innocence and said, you know, he has a federal constitutional
27:49
Speaker 2: right to not be in prison if he's actually innocent.
27:51
Speaker 2: Although interestingly, the US Supreme Court even to this day
27:54
Speaker 2: has not expressly recognized that that's a federal constitutional right
27:59
Speaker 2: to not be in prison and if you're innocent. So
28:03
Speaker 2: we had this hearing and then we lost. I mean,
28:07
Speaker 2: I can't even describe how I felt when the notification
28:10
Speaker 2: came in. It came over email and I saw it,
28:12
Speaker 2: and I think I just about fell out of my chair.
28:17
Speaker 3: You know.
28:17
Speaker 2: Losing the appeals in this case has been I think
28:20
Speaker 2: the hardest thing I've had to deal with professionally. It
28:23
Speaker 2: still boggles my mind and infuriates me and saddens me
28:28
Speaker 2: all at the same time. And then, because of the
28:33
Speaker 2: weirdness of habeas law, we weren't allowed to appeal directly.
28:37
Speaker 2: We had to ask for permission to appeal. And then
28:40
Speaker 2: the Sixth Circuit, which was the same court that had
28:42
Speaker 2: said we had put forward a case showing that al
28:45
Speaker 2: was actually innocent, then denied us the right to appeal
28:48
Speaker 2: and said we didn't even have the right to appeal,
28:50
Speaker 2: which I still can't explain that. I don't know how
28:53
Speaker 2: you say, well, it looks like he's actually innocent, then
28:55
Speaker 2: get more evidence supporting that, and then just say, well,
28:59
Speaker 2: never mind, we're not going to hear you claim anymore.
29:01
Speaker 2: But that's what happened.
29:03
Speaker 1: That's our system, ladies and gentlemen. The Sixth Circuit said, yeah,
29:06
Speaker 1: you're innocent, but no, we're not going to give you
29:08
Speaker 1: a new trial. Furthermore, the Supreme Court has said that
29:13
Speaker 1: actual innocence doesn't necessarily provide a basis for relief. I
29:18
Speaker 1: think it was Scalia who made that, those awful statements.
29:21
Speaker 1: And you know, we should all be reviled by this,
29:26
Speaker 1: Like what are you talking about? Like what the fuck
29:29
Speaker 1: are you talking about? That actual innocence is not a
29:32
Speaker 1: basis for a relief, Yes it is. Everybody knows this,
29:38
Speaker 1: and yes, that's not the way it works here. It's
29:41
Speaker 1: like procedure is more important than justice. It's basically what
29:45
Speaker 1: it comes down to. And it's madness. It's absolute madness.
29:49
Speaker 1: And we're here, als here in the flesh, as a
29:52
Speaker 1: living example of just how wrong all of this is.
29:57
Speaker 1: But before we get to the closes of the show,
30:00
Speaker 1: I want to talk about one other, absolutely extraordinary aspect
30:06
Speaker 1: of your life, and that is your wife and family.
30:12
Speaker 1: It's beautiful in all this darkness and misery, this woman
30:16
Speaker 1: who I look forward to meeting someday stood by you.
30:21
Speaker 1: How is that even possible twenty five years.
30:23
Speaker 3: We did an interview yesterday and I asked her during
30:25
Speaker 3: an interview what would make a woman make such a
30:29
Speaker 3: huge sacrifice in her life, and she just said, man
30:32
Speaker 3: loved I mean, it was very powerful and this woman
30:38
Speaker 3: loves me. Man. That's why I made that song Jennifer
30:42
Speaker 3: about you guys, and I'm telling all through the song
30:45
Speaker 3: like love can do all things. Yeah, I had Damon
30:48
Speaker 3: John as a friend and he did rise while I
30:51
Speaker 3: was in prison and helped out with attorney fees where
30:54
Speaker 3: he could and where I needed him to. But it
30:57
Speaker 3: wasn't money. It was the love of people, was the
31:00
Speaker 3: love of my wife. It was a love of family
31:02
Speaker 3: members who supported me. It was a love of Jennifer
31:05
Speaker 3: and the Innocence Project. And it's just me saying thanks.
31:08
Speaker 3: So I want to share that. You know, I'll go
31:10
Speaker 3: by the name of Deacon Cleveland. It's called Welcome Back
31:13
Speaker 3: and awesome. Thanks for all of them, Thanks for all
31:17
Speaker 3: your thoughts while.
31:18
Speaker 1: I was up in there and.
31:20
Speaker 3: Appreciate your support while I was down in bed.
31:26
Speaker 1: Now I'm so happy that your talents will finally be
31:29
Speaker 1: put to use in the world. So everyone, please make
31:32
Speaker 1: sure you scroll down we'll have all of this link
31:36
Speaker 1: in the bio.
31:36
Speaker 3: And don't forgive my wife and not books. She's sitting
31:38
Speaker 3: right here with me. Three Strands, one Core, a Couple's
31:41
Speaker 3: Guide to Understanding Incoserration for couples and families going through
31:46
Speaker 3: in conservation. If they need some help on how to
31:50
Speaker 3: navigate that terrain and make it through and possibly even
31:53
Speaker 3: thrive in love, yess, then get the book. It's our
31:58
Speaker 3: way of serving that community. So three strands, one chord,
32:02
Speaker 3: Couple's God to Understanding Incarceration. ROBERTA and Alpha Clean, thank
32:08
Speaker 3: you for real man, those that the Ohio inno'ss Project,
32:12
Speaker 3: Jennifer and them, and Morgan and Jassie.
32:15
Speaker 1: In Virginia, and you know Jason Flem and.
32:18
Speaker 3: Lourie pushing praying, my wife, my kids never complain once
32:25
Speaker 3: move house to house, the house. It was crazy crazy.
32:39
Speaker 1: In summer of twenty twenty, Jennifer, you presented OL's case
32:44
Speaker 1: of innocence along with countless letters of support, and at
32:48
Speaker 1: that pro board hearing they voted in favor of Al's release.
32:53
Speaker 2: So in Ohio, the way it works is if you
32:55
Speaker 2: are recommended for parole and certain crimes, the victims family
33:00
Speaker 2: or the prosecutor has the opportunity to object, so that's
33:04
Speaker 2: what happened, and so then it goes to the full
33:05
Speaker 2: parole board. So there was ten members and we went in.
33:08
Speaker 2: Person Al was not there. It was me and his wife.
33:12
Speaker 2: We came in and spoke, and then Damon John spoke
33:15
Speaker 2: via the internet, and then you know, the victims' family
33:19
Speaker 2: members were allowed to speak too. But it was a
33:21
Speaker 2: really moving and overwhelming moment because one of the victim's
33:26
Speaker 2: family members actually spoke out in favor of parole because
33:29
Speaker 2: she didn't think that they had done the crime either,
33:31
Speaker 2: which just hearing that was overwhelming. So the whole parole
33:35
Speaker 2: board left and we just kind of had to sit
33:37
Speaker 2: there and wait for them to make a decision, which
33:39
Speaker 2: was one of the longest times of waiting I think
33:42
Speaker 2: I've ever felt. But they came back in and it
33:44
Speaker 2: was nine to one in favor of parole for him
33:48
Speaker 2: and his codefendant, Lyndworth Edwards, was also up that day
33:51
Speaker 2: and so they both were granted it, and I mean,
33:54
Speaker 2: it was just incredible knowing he was finally going to
33:56
Speaker 2: come home. It was frustrating knowing he wasn't getting exonerate
34:00
Speaker 2: or no one was acknowledging his innocence yet, but at
34:04
Speaker 2: least he'd be home.
34:07
Speaker 1: It's anti climactic in a sense because this is important
34:11
Speaker 1: for the audience to hear. Al still hasn't been declared
34:14
Speaker 1: actually innocent, which means he's not eligible for compensation, he
34:17
Speaker 1: still has to be on parole, etc. I'm going to
34:21
Speaker 1: put it out there right now. I mean, I think
34:23
Speaker 1: we have to explore the possibility of getting an absolute pardon.
34:27
Speaker 1: You know, I will help in any way that I'm
34:29
Speaker 1: asked to. I don't want to get in the way.
34:31
Speaker 1: I think the governor of Ohio is a reasonable and
34:34
Speaker 1: decent man.
34:34
Speaker 2: Well, thank you. I will say that we're not done yet.
34:37
Speaker 2: We think we've identified who actually did the crime, and
34:41
Speaker 2: so you know, we're now in the position the only
34:43
Speaker 2: legal avenue he has forward at this point is if
34:46
Speaker 2: we can solve the crime for the state and kind
34:48
Speaker 2: of take it to them, which is what we're working on.
34:50
Speaker 2: So stay tuned. Hopefully this isn't the end. Hopefully he
34:54
Speaker 2: will eventually get the exoneration he deserves.
34:58
Speaker 1: Amen to that. And at this point we turn to
35:02
Speaker 1: the part where I first of all thank each of
35:05
Speaker 1: you for being here and sharing this unbelievable story. And
35:11
Speaker 1: now I'm going to introduce the closing of the show,
35:15
Speaker 1: which is called closing arguments and probably enough. And this
35:17
Speaker 1: is the part where I turn off my microphone, kick
35:21
Speaker 1: back in my chair, close my eyes, leave my headphones on,
35:24
Speaker 1: and I turn it over to you first, Jennifer, for
35:27
Speaker 1: closing arguments, whatever you want to say, anything you think
35:29
Speaker 1: that's left unsaid, and then we'll save the best for last,
35:33
Speaker 1: and we'll go to you, Al for your closing arguments,
35:36
Speaker 1: and that's how we'll end the show.
35:38
Speaker 2: Well, I wanted to say thank you for having me
35:41
Speaker 2: on today and listening to the story about We barely
35:46
Speaker 2: scratch the surface of all the crazy twists and turns
35:49
Speaker 2: of this case, but I appreciate you bringing this to
35:53
Speaker 2: the audience. And Al, I just wanted to say thank
35:55
Speaker 2: you for believing in me over this whole time, even
36:00
Speaker 2: when things haven't gone as we hoped. But I'm just
36:03
Speaker 2: so delighted that you're home, and I'm so excited to
36:05
Speaker 2: see all the good that you're doing in the world.
36:07
Speaker 2: And I'm happy that other people now finally get to
36:11
Speaker 2: see what I've been able to see for the last
36:13
Speaker 2: eleven years that we've been working on this case together,
36:16
Speaker 2: and I'm excited to see what comes in your future,
36:20
Speaker 2: but also just a reminder that you can't do it
36:21
Speaker 2: all in a day, because I know you're trying well.
36:27
Speaker 3: So, Jennifer, I want to first, I want to thank you.
36:30
Speaker 3: I want to thank Cassie. I want to thank Morgan.
36:32
Speaker 3: I want to thank Virginia. I want to think Professor
36:34
Speaker 3: Gatzi for you know, backing us, putting you in position,
36:38
Speaker 3: for taking the case, taking a huge burden off of
36:42
Speaker 3: me and my family, you know. Thank you. Second, Jason,
36:46
Speaker 3: you talked about going to the governor for a pardon
36:49
Speaker 3: and helping in any way. You can thank you for that.
36:53
Speaker 3: But I have two co defendants who are still incarcerated,
36:57
Speaker 3: Benson Davis and John, and if we went to the
37:02
Speaker 3: governor about anything, I would want the focus to be
37:07
Speaker 3: them and their release because they're sitting in there. Their
37:11
Speaker 3: poor boy days didn't come up like Lenny's and ours did.
37:15
Speaker 3: They're still in there and they don't deserve to be there,
37:19
Speaker 3: so any efforts in that area I would love to
37:23
Speaker 3: be focused on them. I'm gonna be all right, bro,
37:28
Speaker 3: I'm gonna be okay. You know what I mean? With them?
37:33
Speaker 3: And if anybody out there has any information, you know
37:37
Speaker 3: what a long shot this is on a Wrongful Previction podcast.
37:41
Speaker 3: Who knows somebody might listen to this and have some
37:44
Speaker 3: information about who really committed the crimes. We think we
37:48
Speaker 3: know the truth, we think we know who did it,
37:51
Speaker 3: but we need confirmation, we need concrete evidence. So please
37:55
Speaker 3: contact my lawyer at the Innocence Project, Jennifer, please tell
37:59
Speaker 3: us your number or who they can contact if you
38:02
Speaker 3: have any information, contact them and let's get this overwent
38:08
Speaker 3: so we can get these men out of prison. Jennifer,
38:11
Speaker 3: please please tell them me you number.
38:13
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, the Ohio Innocence Project. You can reach us
38:16
Speaker 2: here at five one three five five six zero seven
38:20
Speaker 2: five to two. And I also wanted to just add
38:24
Speaker 2: that the fact that you know you were given the
38:28
Speaker 2: chance to say anything after Jason, and your first thought
38:32
Speaker 2: is to think of your two co defendants who are
38:33
Speaker 2: still in prison, I think tells everybody all they need
38:36
Speaker 2: to know about your character.
38:38
Speaker 3: Appreciate that.
38:46
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm.
38:49
Speaker 1: Please support your local innocence projects and go to the
38:52
Speaker 1: link in our bio to see how you can help.
38:55
Speaker 1: I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff
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Speaker 1: Cliburn and Kevin Warnis. The music on the show, as always,
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Speaker 1: is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
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Speaker 3: Be sure to.
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Speaker 1: Follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on Facebook
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Speaker 1: at Wrongful Conviction Podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm is
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Speaker 1: a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with
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Speaker 1: Signal Company Number one