Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #301 Jason Flom with Willie Timmy Donald

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#301 Jason Flom with Willie Timmy Donald · Wrongful Conviction

0:03
Speaker 1: On February twenty seventh, nineteen eighty two, a string of
0:05
Speaker 1: five armed robberies occurred in Gary, Indiana, leaving one man
0:09
Speaker 1: shot dead in front of his wife and three young daughters.
0:12
Speaker 1: All the victims described the assailant as a black man
0:15
Speaker 1: around five to six with a kangle hat, red bandana,
0:18
Speaker 1: black leather jacket, and some sort of scarring on his face.
0:22
Speaker 1: Instead of compiling a photo array of men fitting that description,
0:26
Speaker 1: investigators included the photo of Timmy Donald, a man who
0:29
Speaker 1: was six feet tall with no facial scarring, and, according
0:32
Speaker 1: to at least one victim, was the suggested choice of investigators.
0:36
Speaker 1: In fact, a search warrant had already been obtained for
0:39
Speaker 1: Timmy's home before he had been misidentified. Three of the
0:43
Speaker 1: robbery victims, including one former Gary police officer, were separately
0:47
Speaker 1: shown the photo array and did not identify Timmy, but
0:50
Speaker 1: the other two view the array together. A mixture of
0:53
Speaker 1: police and peer pressure produced two misidentifications during the live lineup.
0:58
Speaker 1: According to one victim, when she said that Timmy was
1:01
Speaker 1: bigger than the armed robber, she was assured that they
1:04
Speaker 1: had the right guy, even though it was proven that
1:07
Speaker 1: Timmy was at work at the exact time that the
1:09
Speaker 1: victim had spotted the actual attacker on the street and
1:11
Speaker 1: tried to report it. Tunnel vision had already set in
1:15
Speaker 1: and that report was hidden from the defense. Despite no
1:18
Speaker 1: physical or forensic evidence, as well as a solid alibi
1:21
Speaker 1: and the protests of all the other victims, the misidentifications
1:25
Speaker 1: were enough to send Timmy Donald away for a sixty
1:28
Speaker 1: year sentence. This is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to wrongful conviction.
1:45
Speaker 1: Today's case is pretty much mind blowing. It was an
1:49
Speaker 1: insane crimes fore but how they ended up convicting a
1:54
Speaker 1: man named tim Donald and sending him to sixty years
1:58
Speaker 1: to life in prison on some of the shakiest eyewitness
2:02
Speaker 1: testimony I've ever heard, ignoring and covering up exculpatory evidence.
2:08
Speaker 1: And that's just the beginning. We're talking about an Indiana
2:13
Speaker 1: case that occurred in the early nineties in a time
2:18
Speaker 1: when police corruption. It would be comical if it wasn't
2:21
Speaker 1: so sinister. And we have the man himself here today
2:27
Speaker 1: with us, So without further ado, Tim Donald, welcome to
2:31
Speaker 1: wrong for conviction.
2:33
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.
2:34
Speaker 1: And you know I always say I'm sorry you're here
2:37
Speaker 1: because of the reason why you're here, but I'm very
2:39
Speaker 1: grateful and honored to have you here on the show
2:41
Speaker 1: with us, and of course with you today. Is my
2:44
Speaker 1: friend and someone who a lot of us call a
2:47
Speaker 1: hero in this movement. She's a professor of criminal justice
2:51
Speaker 1: who serves as the executive director of the Center for
2:53
Speaker 1: Justice and Post Exoneration Assistance at Purdue University Northwest. Doctor
2:58
Speaker 1: Nikki Jackson. Welcome to Rawfel Conviction.
3:00
Speaker 3: Thanks Jason, Thanks for having.
3:02
Speaker 1: Me so Tim. It's been thirty years since this happened,
3:05
Speaker 1: but it must seem like yesterday in some ways to you.
3:09
Speaker 1: Let's go back in time too, before this insanity, when
3:13
Speaker 1: you were just a young man with hopes and dreams
3:15
Speaker 1: like anybody else. What was your life like growing up
3:20
Speaker 1: in Indiana back in the in the seventies, eighties and
3:23
Speaker 1: early nineties.
3:25
Speaker 4: I had four sisters, mother, step dad, doing grade school,
3:29
Speaker 4: middle school, and high school. I enjoyed playing sports, baseball, basketball,
3:34
Speaker 4: and just hanging around my family in France.
3:38
Speaker 1: Were you a good player? Good athlete?
3:39
Speaker 2: Pretty good?
3:43
Speaker 1: I hear the underneath that tone. It sounds like he
3:45
Speaker 1: was probably really good some humility.
3:48
Speaker 4: I had dreams of playing center field for the Chicago
3:51
Speaker 4: cust so.
3:52
Speaker 1: You were good. Yeah, let's not listen. I had dreams
3:55
Speaker 1: of being a pro ball player.
3:56
Speaker 2: I often knew that probably every young man he dreams.
4:00
Speaker 1: Yeah, mind, there was no connection between those dreams and reality.
4:05
Speaker 1: So you grew up. And did you have any run
4:08
Speaker 1: ins with the law before this insane series of events.
4:12
Speaker 2: Yeah.
4:12
Speaker 4: In nineteen eighty nine, we wanted to bar my friend's
4:16
Speaker 4: uncle Carr to go to the beach, and I know
4:19
Speaker 4: the neck of the stadium column was missing. That's usually
4:23
Speaker 4: associated with the car being stolen. So I askedly his
4:27
Speaker 4: uncle what was going on with that. He said he
4:29
Speaker 4: said he lost the key and he was in the
4:31
Speaker 4: process of getting that a NIX fixed. So we got
4:35
Speaker 4: stopped by the police and he noticed the NISS and
4:38
Speaker 4: automatically he thought the car was stolen, so we was arrested.
4:42
Speaker 4: His uncle eventually came to the police station, run the
4:45
Speaker 4: proper paperwork showing ownership of the car, and I was
4:49
Speaker 4: released and was not.
4:50
Speaker 2: Charged with a crime.
4:52
Speaker 1: Good thing he had that.
4:53
Speaker 2: And I got arrested for the legend car.
4:55
Speaker 4: I was fingerprinted and that's how my pictures got in
4:59
Speaker 4: the Gary police.
4:59
Speaker 1: Depart And I think that's an important point. To touch on,
5:02
Speaker 1: because I think it's why a lot of young men
5:04
Speaker 1: like yourselves, who come from varias when over policing is occurring,
5:08
Speaker 1: end up in the system through no fault of your
5:10
Speaker 1: own in this case. So this crime, this is a
5:15
Speaker 1: crazy scenario I'm talking about. On February twenty seventh, nineteen
5:20
Speaker 1: ninety two, in Glen Park, which was a neighborhood in Gary, Indiana, there.
5:24
Speaker 3: Were five armed robberies, all within one hour of each other,
5:29
Speaker 3: and the fourth robbery resulted in the death.
5:33
Speaker 1: A man named Bernard Jim Menez was arriving home with
5:36
Speaker 1: his wife, Kimberly Bolinsky, and their three little daughters. A
5:40
Speaker 1: man had a handgut and he grabbed the little girl
5:43
Speaker 1: with the biggest one, the seven year old, and demanded money,
5:45
Speaker 1: and Miss Belinsky said that her husband put the cash
5:49
Speaker 1: from his wallet, which was less than twenty dollars on
5:51
Speaker 1: the ground, told the robber to go into the house
5:53
Speaker 1: and take whatever he wanted. The robber picked up the money,
5:56
Speaker 1: but was angry what he saw that was so little
5:58
Speaker 1: of it, threw it down on the ground, yelled out,
6:00
Speaker 1: you don't value your family, and then he pointed his
6:03
Speaker 1: gun at the one year old's face. This is a sick,
6:06
Speaker 1: sick guy. Then the victim, mister Jimenez, through a small
6:10
Speaker 1: wooden picnic table at the assailant. There was a struggle,
6:15
Speaker 1: and the struggle ended with the robber fatally shooting this
6:19
Speaker 1: young father and fleeing.
6:22
Speaker 3: Five minutes after mister Hemenez was murdered. The perpetrator then
6:27
Speaker 3: gets to another victim, robs her and her daughter. And
6:31
Speaker 3: she is a former Gary police officer. And I think
6:34
Speaker 3: that's really important as well.
6:36
Speaker 1: Right, And since this is a case of myth identification, Curiously,
6:40
Speaker 1: this former Gary police officer never identified you, and one
6:45
Speaker 1: would think that her judgment might hold more weight with
6:48
Speaker 1: the local police. I mean, she's a cop after all,
6:52
Speaker 1: but it did not. And all of the robbery victims,
6:55
Speaker 1: as well as mister Jimenez's wife, Kimberly Belinski, described as
6:59
Speaker 1: sale in a similar way. Right blackmail about five six,
7:04
Speaker 1: black leather jacket, a kgo hat with a red bandana,
7:07
Speaker 1: really sleepy eyes. And they all said that he had
7:11
Speaker 1: really bad skin, like maybe acne scarring or something like that.
7:16
Speaker 1: So let's go to the first most obvious thing, Tim
7:19
Speaker 1: how tall are you?
7:20
Speaker 2: I'm six feet So.
7:21
Speaker 1: The victims described the perpetrator, who was five six or
7:25
Speaker 1: five seven exactly. I mean, did you suddenly grow after
7:29
Speaker 1: you went to prison? Were you maybe five six five seven?
7:31
Speaker 1: Back then?
7:32
Speaker 4: I musta grew? You hit an excellent makeup artist.
7:39
Speaker 1: Yeah, you didn't have anything wrong with your skin either,
7:42
Speaker 1: as all the victims had described the assailant. Right, it's
7:47
Speaker 1: a mystery as to how you could have even been
7:50
Speaker 1: considered a potential suspect. What did your skin like magically
7:54
Speaker 1: heal itself overnight or magically get terrible over it? I mean,
7:57
Speaker 1: it's also it's monstrously ridiculous, yet inexplicably the investigation still
8:03
Speaker 1: was sent in your direction. We still don't know. Maybe
8:06
Speaker 1: we'll never know what the motivation was. But before they
8:08
Speaker 1: had even done this sort of shady identification procedure, Timmy
8:14
Speaker 1: was arrested on some kind of traffic violation. Just four
8:17
Speaker 1: days after this crime.
8:19
Speaker 2: I was arrested more a second.
8:21
Speaker 3: They came to his home with this arrest warrant for
8:25
Speaker 3: failure to sign.
8:28
Speaker 1: Yeah that sounds fishy, but at this point you're probably
8:31
Speaker 1: still just thinking, Okay, I'll go take care of this
8:33
Speaker 1: and be on my way.
8:34
Speaker 4: I knew someone was wrong when they came to the house.
8:37
Speaker 4: They like they was picking up the president for the
8:39
Speaker 4: White House, with all the cars and things of this nature.
8:43
Speaker 4: So I knew it was something more than a traffic
8:46
Speaker 4: I didn't know it was to this degree.
8:48
Speaker 1: Have you heard about this crime spree? I mean, was
8:52
Speaker 1: it no one in the area.
8:53
Speaker 4: I think my sister had read about it in a
8:56
Speaker 4: news type.
8:57
Speaker 3: So after he was taken to the police station under
9:00
Speaker 3: this warrant for these failure to appear in court, he
9:05
Speaker 3: was placed in a photo lineup. So mister Donald's picture
9:09
Speaker 3: was put in a six pack in that photo lineup
9:12
Speaker 3: based on that nineteen eighty nine arrest. Okay, so it
9:17
Speaker 3: was tossed in.
9:18
Speaker 1: Now, three of the victims, you'd line up separately, but
9:20
Speaker 1: that wasn't the case with these other two, Kimerly Bleinski
9:23
Speaker 1: and Rhonda Williams.
9:25
Speaker 3: From my understanding, these two women were placed in the
9:29
Speaker 3: same room and identified mister Donald, whereas all the other
9:34
Speaker 3: victims did not identify him. They all had said, this
9:38
Speaker 3: is not the man. What happened was, these two women
9:41
Speaker 3: are in this room. It's one's a Caucasian, one's African American.
9:45
Speaker 3: The Caucasian female says, I'm not sure. At some point
9:49
Speaker 3: in the game, she changes her story and says, yes,
9:52
Speaker 3: it's him, Yes, it's him later and we can talk
9:55
Speaker 3: about this because I think this is so important to
9:57
Speaker 3: Timmy's case. Is the recantation made by Ronda Williams. When
10:03
Speaker 3: Ronda says she was basically coerced to pick mister Donald
10:10
Speaker 3: out of that photo lineup, Kimberley Bolinsky says, no, we
10:16
Speaker 3: got the right guy.
10:17
Speaker 1: So you have this element of cross racial identification, which
10:20
Speaker 1: study after study has proven to be actually less accurate
10:24
Speaker 1: than guessing. And yes, you heard that right, it's less
10:26
Speaker 1: accurate than guessing, especially in cases where someone witnesses a
10:29
Speaker 1: violent crime up close. So at first Kimberly was not sure.
10:34
Speaker 1: Then she eventually comes around to that idea, and all
10:38
Speaker 1: the other people in the room lean on Ronda.
10:40
Speaker 3: And what's really important to note is that all of
10:44
Speaker 3: the victims, every victim had reported that the assailant had
10:50
Speaker 3: really bad skin, had a different build than mister Donald,
10:54
Speaker 3: had the man they described could not have been mister Donald.
10:59
Speaker 3: Yet in a photo lineup, these two women together picked
11:05
Speaker 3: out mister Donald. After the victims were shown the photo lineup.
11:09
Speaker 3: Then there was a physical lineup.
11:11
Speaker 4: The lineup was like, it was suggestive. Everybody supposed to
11:14
Speaker 4: resemble one another. Then none of the gas resemble me.
11:18
Speaker 4: I was like the taller, the tallest one in the lineup.
11:21
Speaker 3: And the same two victims identified mister Donald.
11:25
Speaker 1: Right. Well, we know that photo lineups can be done
11:28
Speaker 1: in a very suggestive manner, and they often are. And
11:31
Speaker 1: then once the victim or even eyewitness sees that photo
11:35
Speaker 1: in the photo lineup and identifies it, now their mind
11:38
Speaker 1: starts to lock in on that image. And then they
11:41
Speaker 1: go to the live lineup, and you have a person
11:44
Speaker 1: who doesn't resemble the actual perpetrator, but resembles the person
11:47
Speaker 1: that they picked out when they were being suggestively shown
11:51
Speaker 1: the photos in the six pack. And of course you go, oh,
11:54
Speaker 1: that's yeah, because you're already that's the way our mind works.
11:58
Speaker 3: The next day they went and conducted a search of
12:01
Speaker 3: his home. The kingle hat and a red bandana were
12:04
Speaker 3: never discovered.
12:05
Speaker 4: None of the victims, but longest wasn't found there my
12:08
Speaker 4: home either.
12:08
Speaker 3: They found absolutely no evidence that linked mister Donald to
12:14
Speaker 3: any of these robberies or the murder of mister Hemenez.
12:18
Speaker 4: The thing that struck me is they had the affidavit
12:21
Speaker 4: for a search want signed by the judge an hour
12:25
Speaker 4: before the lineup was even conducted. But you need probable
12:29
Speaker 4: calls to get the search.
12:31
Speaker 3: WM right, and they didn't have that.
12:33
Speaker 1: They made their minds up and they were going to
12:35
Speaker 1: make the evidence fit the narrative that they wanted instead
12:38
Speaker 1: of looking at the evidence and then analyzing it for
12:41
Speaker 1: what it was.
12:41
Speaker 3: It's very shocking to even know that this even got
12:45
Speaker 3: to trial. I mean, there was zero evidence, zero.
12:49
Speaker 1: Yet you were charged with first degree murder and two
12:52
Speaker 1: counts of armed robbery. The trial took place in Lake
12:55
Speaker 1: County Circuit Court in June of ninety two. Now, your
12:58
Speaker 1: older sister, Sheila and her partner Dan Hopkins, both testified
13:04
Speaker 1: during the evening of the crimes, you were car shopping
13:06
Speaker 1: with them in a place called Barrelville and Crown Point, Indiana,
13:10
Speaker 1: And the car salesmen testified. Right, so someone could say,
13:14
Speaker 1: well the relatives, people say whatever they say about that.
13:19
Speaker 1: But the car salesman testified that the three of you
13:22
Speaker 1: were at their dealerships at the same time of day
13:24
Speaker 1: as the crimes occurred. But for some reason, the dealership
13:28
Speaker 1: employees didn't verify that they were on the exact same
13:31
Speaker 1: day as the crime. I don't understand what was that
13:35
Speaker 1: all about.
13:35
Speaker 2: They keep being said.
13:37
Speaker 4: But my sister Brown proved a business card that was
13:41
Speaker 4: dated and had car prices on it the same day
13:45
Speaker 4: that these crimes was committed, So I don't know what
13:47
Speaker 4: it was put out there, like when we visited the
13:49
Speaker 4: car dealership it went on the same day, or the.
13:51
Speaker 3: Crimes and the cameras in the auto dealership the footage
13:55
Speaker 3: had been erased, So that's one of the issues.
13:57
Speaker 4: My trail attorney didn't get there in time and erased tights.
14:02
Speaker 1: And since you didn't have the money to bond out,
14:05
Speaker 1: you were not able to develop the alibi evidence that
14:07
Speaker 1: your lawyer didn't seem to have the time or inclination.
14:11
Speaker 1: Let's call it what it is to develop now. Any
14:14
Speaker 1: absence of physical or forensic evidence was explained away just
14:17
Speaker 1: as we were. Abi evidence was as well, and even
14:20
Speaker 1: though three of the five victims never identified you, they
14:23
Speaker 1: still had Kimberly Bolinski adamantly supporting her id while Ronda
14:27
Speaker 1: Williams was convinced to go through with her as at trial. Meanwhile,
14:31
Speaker 1: any of Ronda's reservations at the live lineup and the
14:34
Speaker 1: fact that she had reported seeing the attacker proven to
14:37
Speaker 1: not be you in the street. In the days following
14:40
Speaker 1: your robberies, all that critical information was hidden from your
14:43
Speaker 1: defense team, and so the jury found you guilty and
14:47
Speaker 1: you were sentenced to sixty years.
14:49
Speaker 4: After the verdict was ready, I've just looked back towards
14:52
Speaker 4: my family because they were sitting directly in back of me,
14:55
Speaker 4: and one of my sisters was frenant at the time.
14:59
Speaker 2: She just collapsed. Yes, I already know that.
15:02
Speaker 4: I had that found guilty, and my man, my main
15:05
Speaker 4: concern was the safety and welfare my sister at the time.
15:20
Speaker 1: The Pacers Foundation is a proud supporter of this episode
15:23
Speaker 1: of Rawfuel Conviction and of the Last Mile organization, which
15:26
Speaker 1: provides business and tech training to help incarcerated individuals successfully
15:30
Speaker 1: and permanently re enter the workforce. The Pacers Foundation is
15:34
Speaker 1: committed to improving the lives of Hoosiers across Indiana, supporting
15:38
Speaker 1: organizations that are dedicated primarily to helping young people and students.
15:42
Speaker 1: For more information on the work of the Pacers Foundation
15:45
Speaker 1: or the Last Mile program, visit Pacers Foundation dot org
15:48
Speaker 1: or the Lastmile dot org.
15:57
Speaker 4: The first time I went to yard and I looked
16:01
Speaker 4: at that forty foot wall and you can't see nothing.
16:05
Speaker 4: Only thing that you could see at the sky, And
16:08
Speaker 4: that's what really stuck in my head. Of course, in
16:11
Speaker 4: the prison, you experienced different type of emotions. You know,
16:15
Speaker 4: you go through about a depression. I remember one time
16:18
Speaker 4: I was having a hard time sleeping and I remember
16:22
Speaker 4: this show I was watching. I forgot the name on
16:24
Speaker 4: the show. It was a guy on death row in
16:27
Speaker 4: textas he wrote a letter to an innocent project and
16:31
Speaker 4: eventually they helped him get out of death row and
16:34
Speaker 4: release from prison. And at that moment, I just sat
16:39
Speaker 4: down there and I wrote a summary of my case.
16:41
Speaker 4: I got a directory of all the innocent projects in
16:45
Speaker 4: the United States, and I got a copy of the letter.
16:48
Speaker 4: I just sent them out to all the innocent projects.
16:51
Speaker 1: Amazingly, things started to turn around. It was not that
16:57
Speaker 1: long after you went to prison, right that it was
16:59
Speaker 1: discovered that not long after the crime and before you
17:03
Speaker 1: had been arrested, one of the victims, a victim named Williams,
17:06
Speaker 1: had called the police and reported that she saw the
17:09
Speaker 1: man who robbed her on the street.
17:11
Speaker 3: So Williams had been living with the fact that she
17:15
Speaker 3: felt like she had picked out the wrong man, and
17:19
Speaker 3: we now know that she had called the police, I
17:22
Speaker 3: believe three days after she had been robbed. She said,
17:27
Speaker 3: I see the man. I think this is him who
17:30
Speaker 3: actually robbed me. So the police went to her home,
17:34
Speaker 3: they spoke with her, and then they went to mister
17:37
Speaker 3: Donald's workplace. They checked out his time card, they spoke
17:41
Speaker 3: to his supervisor, and they found that there was no
17:46
Speaker 3: way that mister Donald could have been the man in
17:48
Speaker 3: front of her home when he was at work. In fact,
17:52
Speaker 3: he had lunch with his supervisor at the time that
17:55
Speaker 3: she had phoned the police.
17:57
Speaker 1: So Ronda Williams, prior to your formal charges, had spotted
18:01
Speaker 1: the actual assailant on the street and reported it, and
18:05
Speaker 1: the police looked into it, and it turned out that
18:08
Speaker 1: the person that she saw could not have been you
18:11
Speaker 1: because you had been at work provably so at the
18:15
Speaker 1: time that she had seen the attacker. I'm just pausing
18:19
Speaker 1: for a second for emphasis. That seems like it should
18:22
Speaker 1: have mattered to the police.
18:24
Speaker 3: That's right, and yet nobody knows about this. The detectives
18:29
Speaker 3: did not inform anybody. This didn't come out till after
18:33
Speaker 3: he'd been incarcerated for many, many years.
18:36
Speaker 4: That was just the first time that they would tell
18:38
Speaker 4: evidence on mar case.
18:40
Speaker 3: If the attorney had had this information, this case would
18:43
Speaker 3: have pretty much been a done deal.
18:45
Speaker 1: That information, as I understand it, became the basis for
18:47
Speaker 1: a post conviction motion to vacate Tim's conviction. But the motion,
18:51
Speaker 1: as well as the subsequent appeals were denied.
18:56
Speaker 4: They said the information he had married. But it was
18:59
Speaker 4: a town and that's why that got ton. During that time,
19:02
Speaker 4: I was transitioning to another attorney, my trial attorney. He
19:06
Speaker 4: was running for the mayor Gary, So at this time
19:10
Speaker 4: I didn't have an attorney, and I guess the town
19:13
Speaker 4: framed it. It supposed to have been found it had overlapped.
19:17
Speaker 1: I mean, the technicalities make me crazy. I think most
19:20
Speaker 1: people would agree that justice is more important than the
19:24
Speaker 1: technical details and furthermore, finality, which seems to be the
19:28
Speaker 1: opposite of the way our system functions. So now we
19:31
Speaker 1: fast forward to two thousand and six, when the Medill
19:36
Speaker 1: Innocence Project at Northwestern University's Middill School of Journalism and
19:39
Speaker 1: later the Chicago Innocence Center began reinvestigating your case, and
19:45
Speaker 1: they found evidence that showed that an eighteen year old
19:49
Speaker 1: street gang member, a guy named Lavelle Thompson who had
19:53
Speaker 1: facial acne and was about the right hype. He had
19:58
Speaker 1: been murdered shortly after the robberies and the murder of
20:01
Speaker 1: mister Jimenez. Now in two thousand and nine, so another
20:06
Speaker 1: three years go by. Williams provided as Warren statement saying
20:11
Speaker 1: that at the time she viewed the photographic lineup, she
20:13
Speaker 1: was with Bolinski. It so, Williams said, she pointed to
20:17
Speaker 1: your photo and Olinsky began to weep. However, a police
20:22
Speaker 1: officer noted a report that Bolinsky was not completely sure
20:26
Speaker 1: of her identification. Williams also said in the statement that
20:30
Speaker 1: when she viewed the live lineup, she told the detective
20:33
Speaker 1: that Timmy, that you were bigger and taller than the robber, right,
20:36
Speaker 1: just like we kee been saying this whole time, and
20:39
Speaker 1: as you had been saying probably the whole time. However,
20:41
Speaker 1: the detective assured her that you were in fact the guy,
20:46
Speaker 1: and that you had been arrested across the street from
20:48
Speaker 1: Williams's home. Now, she said, the detective quote unquote, convinced
20:52
Speaker 1: me that I had picked the right guy, end quote.
20:55
Speaker 1: Williams also said she never told prosecutors about her reservations
20:59
Speaker 1: or the detectives successfully coercing her, and she said that
21:02
Speaker 1: she remained convinced that the man that she saw shortly
21:05
Speaker 1: after the robbery was the gunman who robbed her, which
21:08
Speaker 1: again would have mean that it could not possibly have
21:10
Speaker 1: been you. And everybody knew that because they knew that
21:13
Speaker 1: you had been at work at that time, that was
21:15
Speaker 1: beyond any doubt. But she testified to her doubts and
21:19
Speaker 1: to the police detective's effort to persuade her during a
21:22
Speaker 1: sworn deposition that she gave in twenty thirteen as part
21:26
Speaker 1: of the post conviction proceeding to vacate your conviction. So
21:31
Speaker 1: now things are really gathering momentum.
21:34
Speaker 2: About this time.
21:35
Speaker 4: That's when the notes was discovered that Rada and our
21:40
Speaker 4: trial prosecutor had a meeting. This was before trial lay
21:45
Speaker 4: back in ninety two. Landa had told the dean prosecutor
21:49
Speaker 4: that was prosecuting my case that she wont one hundred
21:52
Speaker 4: percent certain that I was the individual. She said I
21:55
Speaker 4: was taller, she said my shoulders was wider, and that
21:58
Speaker 4: she was sure he knew about these notes and he
22:02
Speaker 4: got her own stand knowing that she testified to something
22:05
Speaker 4: that she ain't sure about. So these noes stay hidden
22:09
Speaker 4: in this prosecutor file for over twenty years before they
22:12
Speaker 4: were discovered. That's the second Brady violation.
22:16
Speaker 1: I don't have any words for that, right, Nikki, What
22:19
Speaker 1: can you say about this type of behavior? What can
22:21
Speaker 1: you say?
22:22
Speaker 3: Well, it's unacceptable, and I think people need to be
22:25
Speaker 3: held accountable. If prosecutors and or police didn't do what
22:29
Speaker 3: they should be doing, they should be held accountable. I mean,
22:32
Speaker 3: at the end of the day, these folks are responsible
22:35
Speaker 3: for stealing this man's life. And if you and I
22:38
Speaker 3: stole somebody's life, we would be held accountable.
22:40
Speaker 1: It's hard to think of another profession where you have
22:43
Speaker 1: no accountability.
22:44
Speaker 3: Right, Because they have this immunity, they're able to get
22:48
Speaker 3: away with these things. But I think once we start
22:52
Speaker 3: holding criminal justice actors responsible, we will start to see
22:56
Speaker 3: change for the better.
22:58
Speaker 2: I thank god that he didn't put the notes through.
23:02
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a miracle right there. And that brings us
23:06
Speaker 1: to twenty and sixteen, twenty four years and we end
23:10
Speaker 1: up on January twenty fifth, twenty sixteen, in the Lake
23:13
Speaker 1: County Circuit Court, right where the judge vacated your convictions
23:17
Speaker 1: and granted a new trial. Now, the judge said that
23:21
Speaker 1: the prosecution contended that the same man had committed both
23:24
Speaker 1: crimes and had argued that the identifications were positive and
23:29
Speaker 1: without any reservations. So the judge ruled that the prosecution's
23:34
Speaker 1: failure to disclose Miss Williams's reservations about her identification, as
23:38
Speaker 1: well as the detective's effort to persuade her successfully as
23:42
Speaker 1: it turned out, to identify you, rendered your trial unconstitutional,
23:46
Speaker 1: constitutionally unfair, as he called it, and so on January
23:50
Speaker 1: twenty seven, two days later, the Lake County State's attorney
23:52
Speaker 1: dismissed the charges and you were released. You went in
23:56
Speaker 1: as a twenty three year old kid. Really, let's say
23:59
Speaker 1: say you're more the kid at twenty three than the man.
24:02
Speaker 1: Now you're a forty seven year old man. And so
24:06
Speaker 1: we talked about that terrible moment when you were convicted
24:10
Speaker 1: of crime. He had nothing to do with what about
24:13
Speaker 1: this moment.
24:14
Speaker 4: I want to take you back a little bit, Jason.
24:17
Speaker 4: Like a week prior to me finding out that the
24:20
Speaker 4: charges was getting distisced, my mother had came to visit me,
24:25
Speaker 4: and she told me it was like a three hundred.
24:28
Speaker 2: And sixty dollars.
24:28
Speaker 4: I can't even remember the exact number power ball, and
24:31
Speaker 4: she said she was gonna play it. So the following Monday,
24:34
Speaker 4: I losely called my mother and my auntie, and my
24:37
Speaker 4: mother told me we won. So I'm thinking, well, she
24:40
Speaker 4: said we won, I'm thinking she's talking about the power
24:42
Speaker 4: ball that I was elated. Here the truth family came out.
24:48
Speaker 1: What about the power ball? They didn't didn't win?
24:50
Speaker 4: That was I didn't win the power Ball. She probably
24:52
Speaker 4: was more excited for this wing.
24:53
Speaker 1: Ye, I guarantee you she would have gave that powerball
24:57
Speaker 1: ticket winning ticket to get her son on question about it.
25:00
Speaker 3: So, and keep in mind, Jason that while he had
25:03
Speaker 3: been exonerated in January of twenty sixteen, we all know
25:08
Speaker 3: he's innocent. The prosecutor has even stated that he is innocent. Listen,
25:15
Speaker 3: there is no statue of limitations for homicide, so the
25:19
Speaker 3: state at any time can still come back and bring
25:24
Speaker 3: charges against mister Donald. And I don't think people really
25:27
Speaker 3: understand that how this haunts mister Donald today tomorrow. I
25:33
Speaker 3: mean this, you know, they can come back even with
25:36
Speaker 3: no evidence, nothing here in Indiana, and that's really problematic.
25:41
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, they can come back everywhere that I
25:43
Speaker 1: know of, Yeah, and they can retry you. Normally they won't,
25:48
Speaker 1: but sometimes they try to extract the plea just in
25:51
Speaker 1: order for you to avoid the retrial. And after everything
25:53
Speaker 1: you'd already been through, you know, who knows how somebody's
25:57
Speaker 1: going to react.
25:57
Speaker 2: To that, they offer me a plea Bog two.
26:00
Speaker 3: At thirteen, the prosecutor had reached out to his attorney.
26:04
Speaker 3: They had offered him an Alfred plea to get out,
26:08
Speaker 3: and he refused because, Timmy, what you shared with me
26:12
Speaker 3: was that you would not agree to something that you
26:15
Speaker 3: did not do, and that they called your mama a liar,
26:18
Speaker 3: And for those reasons, he chose not to accept that
26:22
Speaker 3: Alfred plea, or he would have been out of prison
26:24
Speaker 3: in twenty thirteen.
26:26
Speaker 4: They called my sister, my brother in law, a lawyer.
26:29
Speaker 4: And I just couldn't accept taking a plea walk and
26:32
Speaker 4: I know I didn't have nothing to do with it.
26:34
Speaker 3: So the prosecutor clearly knew in advance, three years earlier
26:38
Speaker 3: that they didn't have anything right. They knew they knew.
26:42
Speaker 3: In fact, I called the prosecutor after I met mister Donald,
26:45
Speaker 3: and I said, Hey, is this guy really innocent? And
26:47
Speaker 3: he said, he's one hundred percent innocent. We locked up
26:50
Speaker 3: the wrong guy. I mean, I will never forget that
26:52
Speaker 3: phone call.
26:53
Speaker 1: Yeah, but what does it say as well about this
26:58
Speaker 1: system and the people in it that they come to you.
27:02
Speaker 1: I'm ninety nine percent sure they knew you were innocent,
27:05
Speaker 1: and they're trying to screw you again by getting you
27:09
Speaker 1: to sign away, literally signing your life away in order
27:13
Speaker 1: to go home.
27:14
Speaker 3: I haven't figured out how people sleep at night, Jason.
27:16
Speaker 3: I'm not going to lie to you. I really don't
27:19
Speaker 3: know how people can sleep at night knowing that an
27:22
Speaker 3: innocent person is sitting in prison and they have the
27:25
Speaker 3: power and the authority to help release that individual.
27:28
Speaker 1: It's unbelievable, And it said they go the exact opposite
27:31
Speaker 1: way and try to make the situation worse, try to
27:33
Speaker 1: double down, because it's not enough that we kept this
27:35
Speaker 1: innocent man in prison for half of his life. Right now,
27:39
Speaker 1: we're going to make sure that he can't ever get
27:42
Speaker 1: justice by making him side a piece of paper that
27:44
Speaker 1: we know is false. I mean, I don't know how
27:47
Speaker 1: they sleep at night either. I think you're a great
28:07
Speaker 1: example for everyone of somebody who's been to hell and
28:12
Speaker 1: back and come out, you know, wanted to make a difference,
28:16
Speaker 1: making a difference in the lives of others, not sitting around.
28:19
Speaker 1: I mean, listen, if you were in the bar, drunk
28:22
Speaker 1: in the corner every day all day, nobody could judge
28:25
Speaker 1: you because of what you went through. But instead you're
28:28
Speaker 1: working hard with doctor Jackson, educating people, helping other axoneries,
28:33
Speaker 1: doing all kinds of incredible stuff.
28:36
Speaker 3: I think it's important to know what happened with Timmy's
28:38
Speaker 3: life like after like literally when he got out.
28:41
Speaker 4: So I leave in prison, coming back into the society,
28:45
Speaker 4: to being dropping the foreign country and you don't know
28:48
Speaker 4: the language and all the customers. I want to stay
28:50
Speaker 4: with my sister, the same sister that I was with
28:53
Speaker 4: a fiance is they now married.
28:56
Speaker 2: They offered me a.
28:57
Speaker 1: Rome great, the same sister and fiance that we're out.
29:00
Speaker 1: Oh by witnesses.
29:01
Speaker 4: Yes, they offered me a place to stay, and I
29:04
Speaker 4: gladly accept it.
29:05
Speaker 3: When I saw this picture of mister Donald in a newspaper,
29:10
Speaker 3: I knew I had to meet him. My background is
29:12
Speaker 3: domestic violence, but when I met mister Donald, what I
29:15
Speaker 3: observed was another victim, but a victim of a system.
29:19
Speaker 3: And when he got out of prison. You know, there
29:21
Speaker 3: were a lot of struggles and challenges, right, dental health issues,
29:25
Speaker 3: medical health, economic strife. I mean, he didn't have a job,
29:29
Speaker 3: a driver's license, a resume. You know, how do you
29:32
Speaker 3: craft a resume when there's twenty four years missing? So
29:36
Speaker 3: think about how hard that is. And so when we
29:39
Speaker 3: met and he shared those struggles, there was no question
29:43
Speaker 3: that things needed to change for exigneries here in Indiana.
29:47
Speaker 4: Well, you being released people that actually committed a crime.
29:51
Speaker 4: They had more resources than people that's been wrongly convicted.
29:56
Speaker 2: And I don't got a problem with that.
29:58
Speaker 4: They needs you're so high, but they still a commo
30:02
Speaker 4: day awful convicted individual.
30:04
Speaker 3: Also, through Timmy, I have learned so much about the
30:08
Speaker 3: flaws and the system and all of the re entry struggles.
30:13
Speaker 3: So I said to Timmy, we've got to fix it.
30:16
Speaker 3: We got to fix it. We've got to address these issues.
30:18
Speaker 3: And that's what we've been doing. One of the first
30:21
Speaker 3: things that I promised Timmy was that we would get
30:24
Speaker 3: a compensation statue in the state of Indiana. I fought
30:27
Speaker 3: very hard, and two years later we have a compensation statute,
30:33
Speaker 3: which is still a problem. Our exonarees have to choose
30:38
Speaker 3: between litigation or compensation the way it currently stands, and
30:43
Speaker 3: that's problematic because again we're revictimizing them. We're saying you
30:47
Speaker 3: can't pursue litigation if you want to receive the compensation. Again,
30:53
Speaker 3: we're holding them hostage.
30:55
Speaker 1: So you and I cross paths during that fight to
30:57
Speaker 1: get the compensation bill passed. And like you may, this
31:00
Speaker 1: bill has its problems, but it's still a first victory
31:03
Speaker 1: in the longer battle for a just system. And you
31:07
Speaker 1: and I go into depth on how you got this
31:09
Speaker 1: done in our interview on my other podcast, Righteous Convictions,
31:12
Speaker 1: where I encourage our listeners please go check this out. Well,
31:15
Speaker 1: we'll have it linked in the bio to make it
31:17
Speaker 1: easy for you. Now, you sat on two prison advisory
31:21
Speaker 1: boards and you were able to use that position knowing
31:23
Speaker 1: a number of lawmakers, and you were able to rally
31:26
Speaker 1: support for this bill, as flawed as it is. So
31:29
Speaker 1: that is something you continue to work on from an
31:32
Speaker 1: organization that you founded in Timmy's name, which is beautiful
31:35
Speaker 1: actually back in twenty twenty, the Willie T. Donald Xoneration
31:39
Speaker 1: Advisory Coalition. So what have you guys been up to?
31:42
Speaker 3: And you know, we need some help for the folks
31:44
Speaker 3: here in Indiana. In terms of post exoneration assistance, we
31:48
Speaker 3: have an amazing board of directors. We are very fortunate
31:52
Speaker 3: that we've got the Center for Justice and Post Exoneration
31:55
Speaker 3: Assistants established at the University. Purdue Northwest has been incredible supporter.
32:01
Speaker 3: They have helped fund this, as has the Signmon family.
32:05
Speaker 3: So we are looking at policy issues, you know, policy reform,
32:10
Speaker 3: post exoneration needs of x hoonneries, and also obviously claims
32:15
Speaker 3: of innocence. Mister Donald is paying it forward and there's
32:20
Speaker 3: no better eyes, no better lens to look at a
32:23
Speaker 3: wrongful conviction than an x hoonnery. We have a long
32:26
Speaker 3: list of things that we are attempting to do. As
32:30
Speaker 3: you know, on average, it takes about nine years to
32:33
Speaker 3: get somebody exonerated. I'm not a lawyer, so I am
32:37
Speaker 3: hoping to raise funds to get more money so we
32:40
Speaker 3: can hire an attorney or have attorney's work pro bono
32:44
Speaker 3: on the cases that mister Donald and the students are
32:47
Speaker 3: now reviewing. So some really great things have happened as
32:51
Speaker 3: a result of actually of our friendship, of our meeting,
32:54
Speaker 3: you know, some incredible things have happened. So If anybody
32:58
Speaker 3: is interested in learning more about the work that the
33:01
Speaker 3: Center for Justice and Post Exoneration Assistance is doing, they
33:06
Speaker 3: can email me at CJPA at PNW dot edu. And
33:12
Speaker 3: if there's anybody who's interested in providing donorship sponsorships, we
33:17
Speaker 3: would be very excited to talk to you, you know,
33:20
Speaker 3: help you better understand what we're doing and why this
33:24
Speaker 3: is so important to all citizens of the state of
33:28
Speaker 3: Indiana and actually nationwide.
33:30
Speaker 1: We're going to have all of that linked in the bio,
33:32
Speaker 1: in addition to a GoFundMe for Timmy. And now we're
33:34
Speaker 1: going to go to my favorite part of the show,
33:36
Speaker 1: which of course is called closing Arguments. And closing Arguments is,
33:41
Speaker 1: of course the part of the show where I kick
33:43
Speaker 1: back in my chair. Thank both of you, of course
33:46
Speaker 1: profusely for being here. Turn my microphone off, leave my
33:51
Speaker 1: headphones on, and just listen to anything else you'll want
33:55
Speaker 1: to say.
33:56
Speaker 3: Thank you so much for having me here today. I
33:59
Speaker 3: really do hope that the viewers learned something regarding wrongful convictions,
34:03
Speaker 3: particularly in terms of mistaken witness identification, and that everybody
34:09
Speaker 3: understands that this could happen to you. And one of
34:12
Speaker 3: the things that I end everything with when I'm talking
34:14
Speaker 3: about wrongful convictions is if you were ever placed in
34:19
Speaker 3: police custody, interrogation, whatever, make sure you ask for an attorney.
34:25
Speaker 3: I think that is one of the biggest mistakes that
34:27
Speaker 3: people make, and it makes sense when you're innocent, you
34:30
Speaker 3: have nothing to hide, so you think you don't need
34:32
Speaker 3: an attorney. And unfortunately we know thousands of people have
34:35
Speaker 3: been wrongly convicted and that's just the tip of the iceberg. Right,
34:39
Speaker 3: So again, thank you for having me. And I also
34:42
Speaker 3: want to say thank you to mister Donald for allowing
34:45
Speaker 3: me to enter into his world. So thank you Timmy
34:48
Speaker 3: for that.
34:50
Speaker 2: Thank you. Well wonthful, good vicious should never happen.
34:55
Speaker 4: And it's my hope that thing my journey since I've
34:58
Speaker 4: been out that I think came across the a lot
35:00
Speaker 4: of young people that's entering the law professsion let it
35:03
Speaker 4: be an attorney, prosecutor, and some of them going into
35:08
Speaker 4: police work. And it's my host that learning about my
35:11
Speaker 4: case in other people cases about wrong conviction is my
35:16
Speaker 4: hope that once they entered in today land of work,
35:19
Speaker 4: that the old guard adventurally a leave in the new
35:23
Speaker 4: wave of come in and they'll probably sign up write
35:25
Speaker 4: a light on this troubling issue.
35:34
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. I'd like to
35:37
Speaker 1: thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Cliburn, and Kevin Wardis,
35:41
Speaker 1: with research by Lyla Robinson. The music in this production
35:44
Speaker 1: was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
35:48
Speaker 1: Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction,
35:51
Speaker 1: on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction podcast, and on Twitter at
35:55
Speaker 1: wrong Conviction, as well as at Lava for Good. On
35:58
Speaker 1: all three platforms, you can also follow me on both
36:01
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