Latest / Wrongful Conviction Podcasts / 524: #524 Jason Flom with Clemente Aguirre
Transcript
- 00:00:03 Speaker 1: Hey, I'm Ben Bullet. You might know my podcast stuff they don't want you to know. And if you like Wrongful Conviction, you'll see that we have a vibe in common in that we bring stories that need to be told to the wider world. And with our pal Jason out of town, the Lava for Good team invited me to introduce a few of my favorite episodes. So as a guy who lives in Georgia, I loved hearing a story so close to home, one that was also recorded very close to home. The interview we're about to hear took place at the twenty nineteen Innocence Network conference held here in Atlanta, and the guest Clemente Shorty. Again, his story is particularly resonant in this current political climate. He's a Honduran man who established himself in the US. He got wrongfully convicted of a double murder, and then he got sent to death row in Florida, only to later be exonerated by DNA evidence and the real killer's multiple out of court confessions. Shorty is off death row right now and out of prison, but as of this recording, he could still be deported back to Honduras, where honestly another death sentence awaits, this time at the hands of the gang he refused to join so many years ago. His story is an incredible one, and it's one that needs our attention right now. So let's hear from the man himself. 00:01:31 Speaker 2: Clemente Shorty Aguire grew up in Honduras, but in two thousand and one, when rival street gangs demanded that he pick aside or die, he found himself with no choice but to run. He escaped to the United States, crossing our southern border illegally, and ultimately he found work as a cook, living in Seminole County, Florida, in a trailer park, where he formed friendly ties with various neighbors. But on June seventeenth of two thousand and four, Shorty was hanging out into the wee hours of the morning when he went to his friend Cheryl Williams's trailer to grab a beer, and there he found himself inside of a gruesome crime scene. The trailer had been ransacked and was covered in blood. Cheryl and her mother Carol had been stabbed repeatedly and were dead. He checked the bodies for signs of life, thereby inadvertently tampering with the crime scene. Knowing that nothing would bring them back, and fearing deportation or worse, he chose to stay quiet initially, but later that day Clemente came forward about his discovery. His immigration status and unwitting crime scene tampering made him a prime suspect, and with the deadly combination of an ineffective public defender and the prosecution's tunnel vision, Clemente was convicted and sent to death row. In this episode, recorded at the Innocent Network conference in Atlanta, we speak with Clemente Shortia Giri and one of his lead post conviction attorneys, Maria Deliberado, who, along with a list of mostly pro bono private council would properly reinvestigate the crime and test the one hundred and ninety seven pieces of crime scene evidence that had never been tested for DNA. Ultimately excluding they even found new evidence that would lead to the identity of the woman who was almost certainly the true perpetrator and who confessed to the crime on numerous occasions, Cheryl's own daughter, Samantha Williams. Shorty spent over fourteen long years in prison, most of it on death row, for a crime he simply did not commit This is wrongful Conviction. You're listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one week early and ed free by subscribing to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction. Today's show is going to take you on a journey that you will probably never forget, and not because of anything I'm going to say, but because of the story you're going to hear. And today we have as our very special guest, Clemente aka Shorty Agere from Honduras, right, who was wrongfully convicted in Florida the double murder and who served fourteen years and four months on death row. Shorty, welcome to rofl Conviction. 00:04:21 Speaker 3: Thank you for having me. 00:04:22 Speaker 2: As I always say, I'm sorry you're here, but I'm happy you're here. So you know how that and with him is one of his incredible we'll just call it what it is, dream team of lawyers. Maria Deliberado, which is a great name for lawyer, by the way, not for nothing. It's perfect and so Maria, welcome to rofl Conviction. 00:04:42 Speaker 4: Thank you, happy to be here. 00:04:44 Speaker 2: So Shorty, you were you were sort of a star in your native country, right, I guess. 00:04:50 Speaker 3: So you can say that I was very likable, friendly play soccer when I'm singing competition representing in this. 00:05:00 Speaker 2: I was told it was like the American Idol of Honduras. Is that right? Yeah? 00:05:04 Speaker 3: I were called championships and it was between the school so it was knowledge, it was dancing, and it was singing. So I performed I and I want the first place? 00:05:15 Speaker 2: Wow? And how old were you? 00:05:16 Speaker 3: I was ten years old? 00:05:17 Speaker 2: Ten years old, so amazing start to a crazy journey. And is it true that as a result of you winning this competition, the gang's kind of left you alone for a while, right, for. 00:05:28 Speaker 3: A little bit, since Sia was going to school those times, it really wasn't di Stronos. Again, in that period of time when growing up and going to high school, I was well known because I played soccer there. But my problem was I live in a neighborhood with a rival game and I play and go to school with the other gang high power off. So it was very controversial because one would say I belonged to one and the other one would say I belonged to the other one, which it wasn't the case. 00:06:00 Speaker 2: And in fact, you were able to belong to neither of them because of the status that you enjoyed being sort of this celebrity in your area. 00:06:07 Speaker 3: Right basically, and because my mother too, she didn't play, and I have this select group of friends. It was seven of us. It didn't attract to us anything about no game at all. 00:06:18 Speaker 2: But then, as I understand it, when you got a little older the gangs, you were going to join the gang or get killed basically. 00:06:25 Speaker 3: Right, Yeah, they told me they weren't playing. I was harassed and put guns in a face. I live in a neighborhood full of MS thirteens, and I got to go to school where the eighteens lived. So when I get out of the territory from the thirteens, the eighties grabbed me and made me undress in public to see if I didn't have tattoos belonging to the other game. 00:06:54 Speaker 2: Ultimately, you decided you had to leave because your life was in danger. Right, But what was it that made you Because that's a big step to leave your country, And it's a very important story to tell right now, especially right with what's going on in this country. Because you had a crazy journey ahead of you. But what was it that happened. 00:07:10 Speaker 3: Well, it was in two thousand and one January of February around there. I was with my Beyonce to be at a moment and the taxi pull up in front of my house. I'm sitting down outside and they got this raincoach, this long rail black coat and put an a K forty seven and put it in my face. The drivers step down and say, we ain't playing no more. TikTok, TikTok. In that particular moment in time, my mom came out at the door and say what you're doing? I said, Mom, go inside? What good doe? She is out here and I got a gon to my pace and my girlfriend is holding me for their life. I'm like home down. So they left. And then you say, TikTok TikTok mean the clock is running. You need to tie up and join all else. And December, a few months back, they killed one of my best friends because he didn't want to join AH. They killed him on December twenty, two thousand, So it was very very scary. My mother said, you go to your grandma. They sent me to Nicarawa and then Nicaragua is no place to live. It's like it's more poverty. They wasn't Honduras. So in two thousand and two, my sisters came from the United States already with her residency, and we went from there. I need to come to the United States. I cannot live in Nicarada for poverty. I cannot live in my native country because if I don't join again, they will kill me. So the only way I got out of here is go to the United States. 00:09:00 Speaker 2: Addy, everything you've been through is enough for someone to go through. But this isn't even the beginning. How did you get from Nicaragua all the way to eventually swimming across the Rio Grande. 00:09:10 Speaker 3: I came to Mexico and I buy some papers and I learned a national anthem of Mexico and history. I lived there for a couple of months, and I flew to Mexico City and there to New Laredo, and from there I went to a bar where when I got in, there as this coyot. Back then it was coyot. You say, it was no cartels and stuff like that, passing people and these coyote is to say, okay, you have sixteen hundred dollars on you. No, But I can call. So we arranged that here is going to pass me through all the way to Laredo, Texas. So he wanted me to swing with this the did they go inside the tire like inner two right, So because he asking me, can you swim? And this moment in time, I feel like I'm the micro fellow the river. I didn't know how big real ground there really was. You see, I'm picturing a river that is just like my grandma. 00:10:15 Speaker 2: It's like a stream. 00:10:16 Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean it's something that you can pass in two minutes. I never thought I'm gonna take me seventeen minutes almost to pass the river across that I almost drowned. And you know, so he told us to take the close off, so we did, but we keep the underwear on. When he turned back and like, what you're doing. This isn't no gay shit, teed you underwere off because when you run, you need to be dry. If you wet, it's gonna it's gonna hurt you and it's gonna slow you down. Believe me, I'm doing this for a long time. So we did. Put it in a plastic bag, put in my mouth, start swimming. We make it to the other side. Somehow, God only he could help me to pass through that river because it was strong, and we'd write off. He say, every paper that you have, every picture that you have, throw it away, every money that you have, throw it away. You cannot bring anything with you to the United States unless it's American dollars. I didn't have any American dollars, so you know, it was fifty pests of Mexico. So I threw it away, and he said, when I tell you so, follow me and run. When we make it to the other side, it was like ninety five people in there, you know, females, men, you own, people from Ecuador, Columbia, Costa Rica, you name it. So we saw immigration car pass by, and then another one and you may say, I ain't waiting here. We're taken off. So I'm taking after him because he got my money. So I'm thinking I cannot let him go away with my money. You know, how am I going to make it to the other side. And this moment in time, I'm in the United States, but I haven't made it to civilization yet. With the off running, I wasn't thirty second and we hear helicopters, police cars, dogs and sirens saying stop, stop, but we're going to shoot. We hear some shots at this moment in time, everybody has take off running two and I'm running right next to this guy. So I'm running and I'm asking him where to where to? He didn't tell me where to because I think I can run him. I really believe I can run him. I'm so desperate to pass back. So it's some shots. I don't think they were shouting at us. I think they were shouting to the airth so people get scared or whatever. But that's all I hear in my neighborhood. So they really didn't call me anymore. It was I'm so used to or I was so used to. We make it to the fence, and by the time we're going to jump the fence, I used to feel this hand in my hand and say, senor please my son. It was this woman running next to me with the child in her hand. So I grabbed the kid, I give it to the next guy. I push her up, and then I jumped. We went to a house call my sister went to Houston. From Houston, came to my sister house March eighteen, six fifteen in the morning. Three months sixteen day after I was out of my house. 00:13:15 Speaker 2: Three months and sixteen days starting in Nicarago. 00:13:17 Speaker 3: Right, started from Honduras January second, all the way to March eighteen, two thousand and three. 00:13:23 Speaker 2: And you ended up in Florida in a little town. 00:13:25 Speaker 3: Right, yes, and altamund spring. 00:13:28 Speaker 2: So you end up in Florida. You got a job, right? 00:13:31 Speaker 3: Yes. My boy saw me courting lawn and shaving some kind of palms, and he led the way I work, so he offered me a job as a discwatcher dishes for a couple of months. And one day the cooks were really busy, so my mom teached me how to cooks. And I was six seven years old and everybody was busy, and they saw me cooking for me. So my boss saw and say, oh, okay, so you can cut, you can prep. I think you're going to be good in the prep line. So they may may do salads, bread and prep everything for the line. 00:14:17 Speaker 2: So now you're moving up in the world a little bit at a time, right, going from the cutting trees or whatever to the to the kitchen and now doing the prep work and starting to use your skills that you had developed as a cook. So things are looking up right right? And where were you living? 00:14:34 Speaker 3: I moved from my sister and Altimo Sprinto Longwood in the trailer park in forty four. 00:14:41 Speaker 2: And the trailer park is a very important role in the story. This is where this shit really hits the fan. Maria, do you want to sort of set the table here, because you've worked on this case for ten years, you know every single detail of what happened. 00:14:55 Speaker 4: Absolutely. 00:14:56 Speaker 5: I mean I don't even really know where to start at. I mean I used to be a prosecutor actually before I did criminal defense thirteen years ago. And so from that perspective getting this case, the fact that they saw him as the suspect shut their eyes to any possible other alternative is to me the biggest travesty here. But I'll sort of set the stage, I guess in the sense of he was living next door to the victims. 00:15:21 Speaker 4: It was a. 00:15:22 Speaker 5: Trailer part on Vagabond Way, and that was the name of the street, and he had socialized with them on more than one occasion. 00:15:30 Speaker 2: And this was a woman, her mother and her daughter living together in this trailer. 00:15:34 Speaker 5: That's correct, Yes, And Clemente lived with two other men about his age. They were both cousins, and so they were about the same age as the daughter and her brother also lived in the trailer for periods of time, so sort of all people of his age Clemente at the time. Obviously you can hear him today speaking English. He didn't speak any English back then. He taught himself English in prison, which is a great story that he does need to tell at some point point. How he taught himself English. It's one of my favorite stories that he tells. But he didn't speak any English then, but you know, he was able to communicate enough with them. They shared parties, they shared drinks, sort of a friendly neighborhood scene. The day that he was arrested, the mother and grandmother were killed, and the morning that their bodies were discovered, Monday had gone there in the morning, as he often did. He had been out with friends the night before. They always were known to have lots and lots of beer. If you look at the crime scene video, I mean there was just thousands and thousands of cans. And in Florida, alcohol is sold in all the grocery stores, but not until certain hours. So the grocery store wasn't open yet, and Clemente was a you know, in his early twenties. We can all remember what it's like to be able to party all night in your early twenties. And he had finished a hard day's work and was letting this with some friends and wanted to keep the party going. So he had just gone over there for a beer, as he had done many times. They had an open door policy. 00:17:00 Speaker 2: Let's turn over to you a climate day, because this is such a nightmare. I mean, I've told your story so many times, but you actually lived it. So can you take us back to that day. 00:17:09 Speaker 3: I've been drinking all day, I'm going to go home, and I went home, but I want another beer, so I went inside and I didn't find it. So it's why I wait until daytime to go to the next door and ask for a beer, like I had done dozens of time before. 00:17:22 Speaker 2: What time was it when you went over to It. 00:17:24 Speaker 3: Was like six something in the morning. 00:17:25 Speaker 2: Six in the morning, right, And so you went over there as you've done so many times, to scoop up a few more beers whatever? Right, What did you encounter when you got there? 00:17:35 Speaker 3: I turn knocked the door, but when I touch it, push open, But it didn't open all the way. It's strange because I've been in the house. I mean, if I want to give you a number over seven hundred times, right, So I know that door opened all the way and this time didn't. So I push it and it it didn't go further than was So I look, it was like a little window, and I saw Cherry Williams there body. 00:18:10 Speaker 2: This was the mom. 00:18:11 Speaker 3: That was the mother, Yes, Samantha's mother, yes, and Carol daughter. 00:18:16 Speaker 2: So you saw the body like, so that's why they couldn't open the door because the body was blocking. 00:18:20 Speaker 3: But it was blocking it, yes, sir. 00:18:22 Speaker 2: Right, and so now you see the body. But is there blood everywhere? Or what's the first thing that you. 00:18:27 Speaker 3: Her body is there? I just jump immediately inside without thinking right, and she was too close to by the door, so I had to close the door and touch her dress looking for a pose. So I said, maybe I'm too drunk that I don't feel it. So I picked her up and put it on the top of my legs into her neck because in the position she was, I couldn't touch her neck. And a moment and asked her to wake up, and she didn't. 00:18:57 Speaker 2: At this point, did you see there was blood and there was. 00:18:59 Speaker 3: Yes everywhere, and now it was like a horror movie scene. So I'm asking somebody here, and I find the grandmother of her wheelchair almost under the table, so I want to touch her too. She was dead, and I heard this noise and I'm asking somebody here. And with that, I walked in the house and my footprints were there, and it was it was crazy. 00:19:29 Speaker 2: You found the murder weapon. 00:19:30 Speaker 3: Right, I did? I did. I saw it when I saw the first victim. It was on the top of a beer box, but I didn't touch it. Then I touched until I heard the noise. Later I found out it was a dog there. But I know, I'm crazy. I heard the noise. So anyway, I went and grabbed a knife like like a domas and uh, asking somebody here, And I walked and I went to someon a bedroom and everything was everywhere in the house. Chair will flowed down, clothes was everywhere. Everything was like a like a Hura camp passed by there and then I walked to the next room, but I think went in there because I found Cherry already. So I said, oh my god, what am I going to do? So I took off running. They got running again, This. 00:20:40 Speaker 2: Is a really bad scenario on every level. I mean, you've got now the murder victim's blood on you, right, because you've been trying to help them, trying to check and see if they're alive. Obviously that was hopeless because they were dead. You've got your fingerprints on the knife right because you picked up the pick up. Yet, I mean, it couldn't be any worse. You can't make it harder for your lawyers, right in this case. I mean, this is circumstantial levelis it doesn't get much worse than that. And I'm sure when it eventually came to your arrest, they must have looked at it like, okay, well, so you don't really have to work too hard on this one. We got this guy dead to rights, Well what did you do? So? Now you ran? Where did you run too? 00:21:21 Speaker 3: I ran to my house. I'm debating. Am I going to call the policeman? And the person I'm debating is I know the police officer arrest you, they call immigration on you. It's a fact, So they did. I mean, and now I'm going to be deported for it, So I know I didn't do nothing wrong, even though everything sounds wrong so far. I didn't kill nobody anyway. So I took a shower and I'm like, I can't copolice. I decided against it because I don't want to be deported. It was my fear. It was my fear, and legitn't of fear because I'm running from my life. You know, I'm running for my life. I don't want to be killed in my country because I don't want to be a criminal. 00:22:21 Speaker 2: Right, What an irony? Right? You were running away from the criminals to come here to start a better life, and now now you're going to be accused of a crime that you didn't commit in the first place. And the options are all bad. Right, You're either going to go and get deported or you're going to get convicted. I mean you must have known as well that things were looking pretty bad. If you call the police, the first person they're going to suspect. We know that in general, in many cases anyway, the person who finds the body is the person they usually. 00:22:49 Speaker 3: But honestly speaking, I wasn't afraid they are going to be accused of the murder. I really wasn't, because I know I didn't do it. I was more afraid than if. 00:23:02 Speaker 2: So what happened for you, sure. 00:23:04 Speaker 4: So, I mean he can tell it as well. 00:23:06 Speaker 5: But the police eventually came because Samantha's boyfriend, which we'll later get to in more detail, actually was told by Samantha to come to the house that morning to get her laundry out of the dryer was the purported reason, or out of the washer, and to check on her mom and grandmother because she had a bad feeling. So he comes to the scene about nine am. He finds about easy of course, calls nine one one, and then the police come. So by a couple of hours go by, the police are there and you know, normally they're knocking the canvassing the neighborhood. So they knock on the door of Clemente's trailer, and first knock on the door, you know, they didn't. They just said we don't. 00:23:43 Speaker 3: Know anything, We don't know anything. 00:23:45 Speaker 5: And the police that knocked on his door, nobody spoke Spanish, so they were all English speaking, and everybody in Clemente's house then only spoke Spanish, so there's also a language barrier. And then later in the day, I mean, Clemente can tell you why he felt compelled to come forward and then sort of have that back out on him. When he came forward and tried to tell what happened as you said, they immediately were like, great, we've got our guy, and they just started accusing him of murder pretty immediately and threatening him. There was a female Spanish speaking detective finally who came unseen, and Colemente wanted to talk to her. He felt like he could trust her with the full story. 00:24:22 Speaker 3: I came forward. I say, this is the best country in the world. I'm telling the truth. But they're going to investigate and they're going to find out the truth eventually. So I went and I say I found in it, you know. And soon I say that I need to speak with somebody who Spanish, and it was two people behind her telling her get him getting When I asked her to talk alone, the investigator told me if you touch her, I'm fuck you up. I don't know what that world mean, but the face that he put in my face told me everything I need to know. And I'm looking crazy and I say, no, no, I'm not going to do anything. 00:25:06 Speaker 5: It also probably should be noted Clemente got his shorty nickname because he's four foot eleven, so not exactly you're threatening, imposing criminal, but. 00:25:16 Speaker 2: Also you have such a sort of a sweet gentle face. I mean like if I was three feet eleven, I wouldn't be scared of you, you know what I mean? 00:25:22 Speaker 3: Like right, So they bring me disinvestigator, and soon I tell him about the first victim. He started kissing me or rape. I know I didn't break nobody. I know I didn't kill nobody. So I told him, well, he mentioned something like, I don't need you to finish or have an orgasm in her. I just need you to penetrate her. And I got your DNA. I said, go for it. They my DNA because I know I'm mean acent. But there was a swap there. They took your fingernails, then my pingernails, and and she went to dig. I believe now nobody can take me out of these. She was trying to cut me. 00:26:03 Speaker 5: When they took his fingertiped swabs they do the scrapings, they like, jammed it under his nail. 00:26:08 Speaker 3: She went way too deep. So you can see it's like you have to describe a little bit. You don't have to go to deep. They always dishort always because I work in the kitchen, so you know, I'm always with sure nails and sure hair. 00:26:20 Speaker 2: Do you think they were trying to cut him? 00:26:22 Speaker 5: Because I think the perception that he tells the story was there was a lot of hatred and animosity from the police from the beginning towards him because he was not in this country legally, because they believed that he murdered these two women, one of them in a wheelchair, and so they just treated him. 00:26:39 Speaker 4: You know, this whole theme of the. 00:26:40 Speaker 5: Conference that we're attending is presumption of innocence, and there was none of that for Clemente. 00:26:45 Speaker 2: Right, And just for context, we're recording in a conference room in Atlanta where the Innocent Network conference is being held. So there's an amazing, amazing group here of over two hundred exgneries and hundreds of lawyers and social workers and activists, and it's an amazing, amazing place to be. And as you said, the theme is presumption of innocence, which is well, it's part of American jurisprudence. It's in the constitution, right, but it doesn't actually work the way it's supposed to, and certainly didn't in this case. So they interrogate you. You didn't have a lawyer with you at the time. 00:27:21 Speaker 3: At that moment in time, I say, and your lawyer right, do nothing. 00:27:25 Speaker 2: Yeah, and that's a common thing. I mean to be surprised. How many people, even people who grew up in America who maybe have higher education degrees or whatever, they think the same thing. Well, if I just go in and tell the truth. But when you get an adversarial situation like you were in, it changes very quickly and people are not expecting it. You had no reason to expect it. But that's exactly what happened. And so at what point did you become aware that you are now looking at the potential of being well arrested, tried, and convicted. I will even sentence to death. 00:27:57 Speaker 3: A wig later, they come and take my fingerprints and they told me they found my left pump print in the knife, which I say, it is impossible, and say, how come you touched the knife? Yeah, but I'm right handed. I'm not going to grab a knife with my left hand. So they charmed me with murder and they told me we're going to be asking for the death penalty. As the state asked for the dead penalty. Send you to death row. 00:28:27 Speaker 2: You've now been arrested you're locked up in the local jail. 00:28:30 Speaker 3: I assume, yeah, Seminal County. 00:28:32 Speaker 2: How long did it take from that point to go to trial? 00:28:35 Speaker 3: Twenty two months? 00:28:36 Speaker 2: So you're in jail for twenty two months, Yes. 00:28:38 Speaker 3: Sir, Seminal County jail and sam for got to be one of the most disgusting places to be at. The food is terrible because it's private, you see, Seminal County is private, so they run it the way they want to. They beat you up, They put you in a place where it's the camera. They beat you up in anything and. 00:28:59 Speaker 2: All that happened to you what happened to me? Because you were the most notorious guy in the jail at this time, right, your name is in the paper. You're accused of a double murder or an illegal immigrant. You've got the whole, you. 00:29:13 Speaker 3: Know, because of this brown little guy who apparently killed two white people. By the time I got taken the trial, I was found guilty in one hour fifteen minutes maybe the jury the jury user. 00:29:31 Speaker 2: The jury was out for an hour and fifteen minutes. 00:29:33 Speaker 3: The trial last maybe four or five days, I mean the criminal trial. The sentence in like another four days aroun there. 00:29:42 Speaker 5: In Florida, the penalty phase in the guilt phase or separate. 00:29:45 Speaker 3: Yeah, it's two different trial basically. 00:29:47 Speaker 2: So who represented you a trial? 00:29:49 Speaker 3: The public Defender's officer Seminal County. 00:29:53 Speaker 2: And did they mount any kind of a defense? 00:29:58 Speaker 3: No, whats whoever? 00:29:59 Speaker 2: No defense? 00:30:00 Speaker 3: They did present a case on my he did it because he drunk. He did it because he did he didn't. You know, I didn't do nothing. You're trying to kill me for something I didn't do. I didn't do nothing. I am not going to take this to me. It was no conceivable that I am going to accept you calling me a killer. And I'm there and I'm not going to stand up and call you a liar, even you my attorney. I don't care. I didn't do nothing, So you don't believe me after you he never believed me. 00:30:31 Speaker 2: Man. 00:30:32 Speaker 3: He didn't talk to nobody. I wasn't about until three third in the morning with like thirty two people. He didn't talk to no one of them. 00:30:38 Speaker 6: What you were wiping, I wasn't a bar before we went to my friend's house, the three todd in the morning, because back then they were saying I did a crying three something in the morning. 00:30:50 Speaker 3: You see, then they changed it to early in the morning. 00:30:53 Speaker 5: They never really were able to pin down the time of death because they were relying on Samantha and Mark Benzan who said they saw the last alive at about eleven thirty. 00:31:02 Speaker 4: And then they were found by Mark VanZant at nine. 00:31:05 Speaker 5: So the state was never able to really pin down the time of death, so they just fit it to the time when Clemente had said he went in there, but he did have a solid alibi until three thirty in the morning. He was at a local bar. It was actually me who went into that bar for the first time in probably two thousand and ten or so. I mean, it's just inmfathomable to me that as a criminal defense attorney, your client tells you where they were, you know, in the preceding twenty four hours, and you don't even walk into the bar to see, like, hey, was he here? Is there anybody that we can talk to? And I mean when I went in in twenty ten, so this is mindjew six years after the murder, it was a Saturday morning. I went in with my investigator and kind of like sat down at the bars, maybe eleven thirty. 00:31:50 Speaker 4: We didn't tell anyone we were coming. 00:31:51 Speaker 5: We just went and the bartenders like, you know, can I help you? And we said, you know, we're looking for Bob Buntruck, who was the owner. She said, oh, he's not here, you know, can I help you? I said, well, I represent Clemente Gary And it was like time stood still. I thought she was going to drop the glass she was holding. She was like, thank God, somebody is finally helping him. I know he didn't do it. And to walk into a place six years later and get that kind of reaction for me as the lawyer handling his case was just stunning. And she gave us a treasure troes of information that actually led us to who ultimately is the actual piller in this case. 00:32:28 Speaker 2: So yeah, and that's I'm getting the chill just thinking about that. What a moment. It's very cinematic the way you described it, But yeah, I mean it must have really weighed on the people who knew you and knew that you didn't do it. To be walking around with that knowledge and yet knowing that you're on death row. 00:32:43 Speaker 4: And felt helpless. 00:32:44 Speaker 5: You know, there was no avenue for them because there was no investigation by either the prosecution or the defense. I mean, it was just a complete collapse of the adversarial system. 00:32:52 Speaker 3: This particular lady who talked to her name is Jamie, and she was the street almost in front of Samantha's house until fight something in the morning, and I haven't make it home yet. 00:33:06 Speaker 5: Yeah, so she actually ended up alibying him until you know, five point thirty or and sort of aliby in the house until then. 00:33:13 Speaker 3: Because I haven't made home yet. She was from Peter. There's some peace, so Peter used to leave him from a Samantha Williams house, so she stayed there with him, having a couple of dreams that night. And I'm still on my friend's house with all the two friends. I haven't make it home yet. 00:33:28 Speaker 5: But the state just fit their time of death with the time he said he went in the house. Once he said he went in the house, they just had tunnel vision and that was it. They just fit all their evidence to comply with that. 00:33:40 Speaker 2: Wow. And we're going to get into Samantha in a minute, because this is one of those cases, and there's probably a dozen, maybe that we profiled on the show, where all the signs were there that would have led even a cursory investigation to focus on someone else, but it was not necessary because they already had somebody that they wanted. They had somebody who was an easy target, and also somebody that apparently they didn't like, because they didn't like the fact that you were here illegally or whatever their personal biases were, you know. And it's worth noting too that in a case like this, because it's such a terrible violent crime, the idea that they would allow the perpetrator to remain free just so they can close the case and you put your life, you know, which they viewed as expendable, apparently, it's really another very serious thing to look at, right, I mean, the people in that community were in danger. They still are, right, And let's talk about that. Because Samantha, the daughter whose mother and grandmother were killed, she had been in and out of mental institutions dozens of times, right. 00:34:50 Speaker 5: In the upwards of like sixty I think she said at the post conviction hearing she was Baker acted, which is Florida's involuntary mental health commitment sixty times. 00:34:59 Speaker 2: Six is zero, that is, folks, right, So I mean that's a full on revolving door in and out of mental institution. And the fact is that, as I understand it, she actually vocalized her plan when she was in the mental institution. She said that she was going to do this right in front of other people. Yeah, there was a she announced. 00:35:18 Speaker 5: It a couple of years before the murders on one of her Baker acts. She had to be restrained because she was so violent in the hospital, kicking, spitting, throwing things, And she said, with her mother right next to her, I'll kill you. I'll kill all of you when I get out. 00:35:31 Speaker 2: I'll kill you. I'll kill all of you when I get out. And I guess she should have taken her a little more seriously, and then we wouldn't be sitting and having this conversation at all. And in fact, we know now too that her biological evidence was found all over the clime scene right, not just because she lived there part time, but because she had actually done these gruesome deeds and then left her own blood for. 00:35:59 Speaker 5: Some eight separate blod stands within inches of the victim's blood throughout the trailer. 00:36:04 Speaker 4: None of Clement's DNA. 00:36:06 Speaker 3: So I always thought I stand up in court before my trial and asked for the DNA to be testing. They just told me, I need to be a specific. I don't know what is specific me. I thought, it's a crime scene. You're gonna investigate, You're gonna test everything, because this is when I interact with the Innery Project. And they asked me, what do you want us to tell? I say everything, everything, her nails, the cheats, everything. So it was one hundred and ninety seven pieces of evidence with blood which nobody tells ever so pictured yourself accused of a crime, which have so many pieces the evidence to be testing for DNA neither to stay or you attorney tested, and you asked the George vocally, please made my attorney tested, and he said, you need to be specific. Why would I be specific? Test everything? Right? I want to prove that I didn't do it. Maybe the killer left something behind. It was always always my argument, you are not going to find my blood there because I didn't do it. If you test them, maybe you find something else. Right. The accusume or rape, the accuracyme of killing, the acacimea, all of these things. I'm for eleven. If I stab somebody one hundred and twenty nine times, I ain't going to have this splatter blood all over. No one drop or splatter blooding me. Everything is contact. Like I say, it was my footprint on a round chair that are fall down. A mirror was done and it's not a footprint under it, it's on top of it. They found her d NA that mirror, she saying trout that mirror was on the wall when she left. But they found her blo ain't her fingerprint? No mind, so they didn't. There's nothing. So here I go to death row no English beat up. They batting me up all the time because I don't speak English, and that row ye no no. The emails the guards because they thought I was acting, so they thought it by beating me up, I will speak English. So I started taking newspapers from guard which to start reading. I don't know what I was reading. And then I asked for a Bible because I got a Bible in Spanish, you see. So I say, maybe with a Bible in English I can translate, it's going to be more easier for me. And they sent me a Penhouse letter Book, number four, four hundred and seventeen pages, Penhouse letter Book. It's a foot book, you see. I didn't know. I didn't know what it was. 00:39:15 Speaker 7: The other inmates so we asked for a Bible because you want to learn English, and the other inmates, I guess thought it would be funny or I'm not really sure, but that's how that's what. 00:39:26 Speaker 3: They give him Penhouse Letter Book number four. So that's what I got. That's what I started reading. So I stay at night when it was quiet and there was no light. That's why my eyes I all missed up. Now and I gave the light from the hallway, and I got a bat up dictionary in Spanish and English, and I will go there and I will go with the letters. I read it seventeen times, the book, the fuck book. 00:39:54 Speaker 4: Yes, so I taught himself English. 00:39:57 Speaker 2: That's amazing. 00:39:58 Speaker 3: But that seventeen time, I'm start getting a roused. And I got so happy. Not because I got a roused, you know. I got so happy because I got roused because I wasn't understanding what I was reading. But now I want to prove to my mother that I didn't do this. And I started writing letters. One hundred and seventy five letters I wrote. I roll oprah. I said, I don't know who you are, but they telling me you they could not television. Maybe you know somebody who can teach this evidence. They turney came me for something I didn't do, and next to it, I would put a letter in Spanish too, so it was somebody who speaks Spanish in my English that bad. They can translate it. One answer me bad. Innocent Projic of New York in Amerson from the Innocent Projects. And I got to meet Maria. Remember I just have a polic defender. I didn't never have a private attorney. I don't know what it's like. And she told me she would never lie to me, and that she will work hard, and that she thought it was something wrong in my case. They got some people were working and they would push for DNA. They allow us to test eighty two pieces of evidence. 00:41:14 Speaker 5: First, the first time there was two drops of Samantha's blood, and then we asked for the rest. Of course, the state agreed to blood the first time, and then once Samantha's blood came back and they had evidence of her confessions which they withheld from us for anywhere from around two years or maybe longer, hard to say, they objected to any more testing. After two drops of her blood come back. She's admitted that she's killed her family. They object to more DNA testing, but it was granted, thankfully. 00:41:43 Speaker 2: And she confessed on a number of occasions to a number of different people. 00:41:46 Speaker 5: Yeah, I think it's somewhere around seven or nine. But this first one was a Baker act, one of her many Baker acts, where she had tried to burn the trailer down and sort of set herself on fire. She was like, set some bedding on fire, and she told a neighbor who told the police that demons in her head had made her kill her family. 00:42:04 Speaker 3: She told her best friend Nikki, and two separate occasions did she her mother When Nikki asked her, what did you do? I heard them doing any stubbing motion to her chest. Had grab my guy's tab in the chest. According to the medical coach Saminar So, I never see this woman named Nikki in my life. I don't know her. She came forward to stay attorney and they send her back. 00:42:36 Speaker 2: So they didn't want to hear it. 00:42:37 Speaker 3: Oh, they don't want to hear it. They say they got the killer. But she contacted my defense attorneys and told them too. She testified it first conviction. 00:42:47 Speaker 2: Here. Kurus to her for not giving up right because it would have been pretty easy for her to go to the police and say I want to talk and they say no, and then she goes, well, I try my best. What am I going to do? Right? But she actually took it to the next level type of view. 00:43:00 Speaker 3: Yeah. 00:43:01 Speaker 4: And we had been piecing it together who she was based on the. 00:43:03 Speaker 5: Police report because we could tell that's who the person was in the statement that Samantha had made. 00:43:09 Speaker 4: The statement to. 00:43:10 Speaker 2: So now they start trying to backpedal, right now, all of a sudden, they're like, wait a minute, We're going to stop cooperating and stop giving you access. Yes, And that's when the dream team really kicks into gear, right. I mean you had not just you and Nina, but Josh Dubin. Yeah. 00:43:24 Speaker 4: So that was at the retrial. 00:43:25 Speaker 5: So the post conviction hearing was done just by myself and Marie Palmer, who's my law partner now in our investigator Polly, and then Nina came down for the first two days of the evidentiary hearing in twenty thirteen. That was a two week hearing that we put on tons and tons of witnesses, all the DNA, all of the confessions, and then we lost, of course at the circuit court level and. 00:43:46 Speaker 4: We knew that. 00:43:48 Speaker 5: We always had the idea of getting a bigger team on this case. You know, it's one thing when lawyers from my office at the time, you know, stand up before the flour Spring Court and say this is a travesty. It's quite another when we get the Innocence Project and private law firms and you know, people really fighting for this. 00:44:04 Speaker 4: It makes a difference. 00:44:05 Speaker 5: So that was always our plan, and Nina was of course amazing and instrumental in getting us help. So we got lawyers from Alabama to do the appeal with us. 00:44:14 Speaker 4: They did the appeal at the flour Spring Court. 00:44:16 Speaker 5: We all worked on it and we got the reversal in twenty sixteen, and that's when sort of the trial team really came back together. And so my role sort of formally ended in twenty sixteen, and then I just consulted with the trial team and talked to Clemente every Sunday for two and a half years while he was waiting his retrial. 00:44:35 Speaker 3: Well, let me tell you something. We have a DNA a confession for the perpetrator who DNA was found in the crime seat, which she said she wasn't there. Red Fresh Red Bright and then we have a judge. We have a judge who keep denying. Now, we don't understand what these judge followed the law. Right later we find out that she's got detagenda against me, using my case to get a promotion. She had stayed a sixty seventh page drueling against me and brag about it. 00:45:06 Speaker 2: So she was trying to get elevated. 00:45:08 Speaker 3: Yeah, and used his case, used my case about it. 00:45:12 Speaker 4: Yeah. 00:45:12 Speaker 5: She eventually was recused and did not preside over the retrial. That's when Josh came on, Josh Stephens. He did the jury selection and in front of her first time in February of twenty eighteen, and her complete lack of knowledge of the law. I mean, Josh just pointed it out and we were able to recuse her from the case. And then the trial started in October of twenty eighteen with quite a team Josh picking the jury, Maury Parmer, who's my law partner, Lindsay Bonie, Dylan Blackbrooks, Proctor, I mean, just Jeff Horowitz. There was like, at one point Clemente said, what did you tell them? 00:45:50 Speaker 3: Oh man? It was it was too many or them right, And I'm like heyo, y'all making me look bad right here. Some of you need to go see down the bag, you know, I. 00:45:58 Speaker 4: Said some of them on the prosecution to make sure. 00:46:00 Speaker 3: That it was too many to me, I don't want to look like, why this guy got so many Lowyoh he got money. He might have done it, so I don't want them to think like that. Ever. 00:46:11 Speaker 2: Wow, you went from having too little help to us. Well you were thinking too much help. But it was not the case. And Josh is an amazing guy. I mean, it's funny because Nina originally introduced us I don't know whatever a couple three years ago, and he says to me, you know, I'm a church selection expert. I go, yeah, he goes, I can look in your eyes and see your soul. I was like, so, you know, he's a guy. Here's that guy. He's amazing. Yeah. And he was keeping me posted. Then when he was down there at Florida, Argua, we were talking and he was giving me the updates and he was really Yeah. It was a very intense time, even for me watching from the sidelines from a thousand miles away. So let's get to the good stuff. 00:46:53 Speaker 3: Okay. 00:46:54 Speaker 2: So then finally your conviction is overturned. 00:46:58 Speaker 3: On now October twenty seven. 00:47:01 Speaker 2: But they kept you on death row anyway. 00:47:02 Speaker 3: Until and then back to the county, back to the county jail. 00:47:06 Speaker 2: Right. And it's amazing because you know, I talked to give speeches a lot, and I talked to civilians all the time about this work and about cases like yours, and almost everyone says, but I understand, the convictions overturn, you go home. 00:47:20 Speaker 3: That's not the way it works. 00:47:22 Speaker 2: I mean, sometimes it is, but in your case it certainly was not. And the conviction was overturned. They're going to retry you because they didn't like losing. 00:47:28 Speaker 3: Right. Oh, immediately they say same day, yeah, same day, they say, we are going to retry the case. 00:47:35 Speaker 5: I mean, this was a unanimous reversal from the floor Spreme Court in which the opinion said, no longer is a Gary, the creepy, shadowy figure who lived next door. He's escapegoat for her crimes. That's seven justices of the Flora Supreme Court calling Samantha the murderer and they're still trying him again. 00:47:54 Speaker 2: Okay, okay, yeah, I mean this is seven justices in the Deep South. Yeah, with a guy who doesn't have the same skin color as they do. I mean they're saying and in the strongest possible way, that this is not your crime, that this is a huge mistake. You heard those words. How did that feel? 00:48:11 Speaker 5: So the prison doesn't allow They require twenty four hour notice for calls, so we couldn't even tell him until the next day. So opinions come out every Thursday. At eleven opinion came out. We knew we couldn't get a call to him, but we also knew it was going to be on the news, and so I know, I didn't interview. I think Lindsay did too, And I was like, well, Monday. 00:48:28 Speaker 7: If you're listening, congratulations, because we were going to get to talk to him until the next day. 00:48:32 Speaker 4: But guys on the road heard it. 00:48:34 Speaker 3: They told me, yeah, hey, Tody, they're banging on the bars and what I think you want to trial? I said, hold on, man, don't play like that because it's too it's too soon. It was six months, twenty days, so they take twenty two months in answering and don't play like that. Man. You know that's not funny. I'm serious, man. They say a funny name like your like by name, like the one you have. So hey, listen up my name to say somebody say, Jody want a new trial. Everybody go to the news and trying to find it. And I got a frame named Alex Alex Pagan who say, yeah, it's the Ogani pace in seven point four and we went there and they were saying, I got a I won't. 00:49:18 Speaker 2: We have limited time left. But in the time that we do have, I want to get to the ultimate victory. Right. So they immediately announce they're going to retry you. They're not done fucking with you yet. I can't think of a better way to say that. But now you've got the dream team, like we said, and you go for the new trial, and you want to take this one. 00:49:39 Speaker 5: Sure, we start in November. We had sort of a fall start in February. We ended up getting rid of the judge who was clearly biased against him. We started start in October with the new chief judge, incredibly fair, promised both sides of fair trial, and totally delivered. 00:49:53 Speaker 4: Jury selection is ongoing. 00:49:55 Speaker 5: Josh is picking the jury to critical in court depositions heard that really sort of crumbled. 00:50:02 Speaker 4: The States case. 00:50:03 Speaker 5: One was the ex wife of Mark Van Zant, who discovered the bodies. Two of our lawyers, Mary Palmer and Dylan Black, went to meet with her. She gave a remarkable story in an Affidavid that Mark had always told her that Samantha went out the window that night, the night of the murders. He had always alibied her, always said that she was with him all night. Turns out he was a liar. We had listened to about twelve hundred of his jail calls over the summer in which he admitted that he was a liar. Mary Palmer did an in court deposition of Mark that was just masterful. It was like the climactic scene of a movie where he basically just admitted that he was a pathological liar and his credibility was done. And the second one was Josh did a deposition of Samantha in court where she effectively said, I do a lot of things when I'm drunk. I guess it's possible I did this too, and. 00:50:52 Speaker 4: I don't remember. 00:50:53 Speaker 5: So between the actual murderer admitting hunder oath that she maybe committed this crime and her alibi witness admitting that he was a pathological liar and that she had gone out the window that night their case was done. 00:51:11 Speaker 2: Were you in the courtroom when you were finally found to be yes, I was. 00:51:17 Speaker 3: I was numb. Ah, I pray. I always think God all win. And to me it was like had about experience. You know, I lois looking at myself and I'm always going to remember these I looking at me saying it over. 00:51:35 Speaker 4: Finally jury came in no, so the state actually announced. 00:51:40 Speaker 2: No prosper nol pross, which is short for a Latin term that translates to quote, we shall no longer prosecute. 00:51:49 Speaker 5: They announced nor pross. We didn't know what they were going to do. They had asked for extra time to think about it. Turns out they were getting an immigration hold put on him because they had never bothered to do that in the fourteen years that he was locked up, so that you know, he couldn't actually walk free from the courtroom, which we were able to rectify later getting him an immigration bond. So they had to put the icehold on it. But we still didn't know what they were going to do. We didn't know if they were going to continue to go forward. And they came in the courtroom was full. 00:52:14 Speaker 4: We were all sitting there. 00:52:15 Speaker 5: Nina flew down or like you got to come. We think they're going to drop it. I mean they had no way forward. Really, the state stood up and announced a nol pross and I know I crumbled into a ball, I think, almost on the floor. I couldn't believe it. And the judge was so kind and kind of gave everybody a minute. I went up and hugged Clemente and we were all hugging, and then he wanted to speak. 00:52:38 Speaker 2: And you remember what you said? Yeah, what'd you say? 00:52:41 Speaker 3: I say, God send you angles so you feed, don't hear from us, and you angered. You have called upon me. And if I hear you, I will free you and I will glorify you. I will give you many years of life and I will show you my salvation. And it sounds ninety one, fourteen, fifteen and sixteen. I think everybody will help me out. The ones who send me money. They want to make me look like a human being. And I say, you don't have an enemy in me from this humble legal immigrant. If I can forgive somebody, I forget whoever, don't drunk me because I want to live a better life. 00:53:30 Speaker 2: Wow, So I have one more question and then we're going to wrap up. I think I already know the answer to this question, but I'm going to ask anyway, are you better about what happened to you? 00:53:42 Speaker 3: Angry? Better? Angry? Is what you ask? 00:53:45 Speaker 2: Better? Yeah? Better angry? Ye, it's sort of a similar thing. 00:53:48 Speaker 3: Yeah, somehow I think it's an injustice. This is I know it's an injustice. Yeah, I can say I angry, but I'm not hateful. You know. A long time ago, I let that go because what's killing me. So the way I see it now is I just try to adjust, man, and I get aggravated for things, maybe because I got stoked so many years ago. But I know I'm gonna get better. It will, it has to be. 00:54:23 Speaker 2: I have to lead it, and it is. And it's great to see you here. I almost when you were talking about breaking down the corner when I was broke down myself at to get a little lump in my throat. So the tradition here at Wrongful Conviction is that at the end of each episode, first thing I do is thank you both for coming and being here. Thank you having Aria and of course Shorty. And then my favorite part of the show is this, because this is the part of the show where I get to stop talking and just listen. And so I would like to now turn it over to you for any final thoughts that you have. Again, thanks for being here and for everything that you're doing, and I wish you, you know, all the happiness in the world. And so Maria, why don't you go first, and then Shorty you can close. 00:55:15 Speaker 5: Sure, thank you so much for having us and for drawing attention to this case, and you know, obviously very important cause overall, I mean, I think just for the listeners, you know, like you said, if they end up on jurys like really listen, hold the state to their burden. But also when the exoneration happens and all the happiness happens. You know, Clemente has a life to live and he's trying to piece his life back together, and it's especially hard for him because he's not allowed to work right now because his immigration case is ongoing. You know, he's fortunate for the benefits and the donations of others, and that's something that we continue to rely on. So I know that Innocence Project is going to do some fundraisers for him. He does some speaking and people give him donations for that. Unfortunately, he and I get to spend He lives three miles from my house now in a community for ex Houneries, so we see each other every week for laundry and groceries. But you know, any kind of donations that listeners are willing to do, we'll have that set up pretty quickly. Just really supporting xuoneries. It's great to do events like this conference that we're at, but making sure that you know, after the dust settles and their home, we continue to support them. 00:56:29 Speaker 3: Yeah, thank you for having me. Just taking back from there, Yu get out is not enough there for you know, after so many years incarcerated and almost everybody turned back when you family members, loves friends going away. We need medical, we need dental, you know, the mental health. But I always remember the three sides of the story, hers and the truth. They don't test evidence. I mean, they don't want to find out the truth. And that's simple. If it defended is so adamant to test the evidence. And you an attorney at there, and you client asking you to please test the evidence, maybe you should listen to him. He might be telling you the truth. So thank you for listening, and God bless you all. 00:57:31 Speaker 2: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one week early and ed free by subscribing to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I want to thank our production team Connor Hall and Kathleen Fink, as well as my fellow executive producers Jeff Kempler, Kevin Watis, and Jeff Clibern. The music in this production was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us across all social media platforms at Lava for Good and at Wrongful Conviction. You can also follow me on Instagram at It's Jason flamm Ralfel Conviction is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number One. 00:58:07 Speaker 3: We have worked hard to ensure that all facts reported in this show are accurate. 00:58:11 Speaker 5: The views and opinions expressed by the individuals featured in this show are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Lava for Good