Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #569 Jason Flom with Dusty Turner

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#569 Jason Flom with Dusty Turner · Wrongful Conviction

0:05
Speaker 1: Hey, it's counter Hall, the producer for wrongful Conviction. After
0:09
Speaker 1: thirty one years of wrongful incarceration, Dusty Turner was freed
0:14
Speaker 1: just a few weeks ago, and Maggie was able to
0:17
Speaker 1: snag a post release interview. It's hard to believe that
0:20
Speaker 1: Jason covered his story nearly ten years ago. Right here,
0:25
Speaker 1: Dusty Turner.
0:30
Speaker 2: I fell into the hands of a corrupt detective.
0:34
Speaker 3: I was naive enough to believe that I would be
0:37
Speaker 3: able to just present all of my proof of actual innocence,
0:40
Speaker 3: that they would investigate adequately, and so that I wouldn't
0:43
Speaker 3: be going to prison because I was a good person.
0:44
Speaker 3: I hadn't do anything wrong.
0:47
Speaker 2: In the back of your mind, you say, well, when
0:48
Speaker 2: we go to a hearing, we go to court, the
0:51
Speaker 2: truth will come out. The prosecution from day one knew
0:54
Speaker 2: I was innocent and let forced testimony go uncorrected from
0:58
Speaker 2: the lower courts all the way up to the United
1:01
Speaker 2: States Supreme Court.
1:03
Speaker 4: You have someone with a badge with ultimate and really,
1:09
Speaker 4: in that moment, unchecked authority.
1:12
Speaker 3: Don't presume that people are guilty when you seem on TV,
1:16
Speaker 3: because it may just be a dirty da that is
1:18
Speaker 3: trying to rise upward.
1:25
Speaker 5: This is wrongful conviction.
1:38
Speaker 6: Hello, this is a pre kay call from an animated
1:43
Speaker 6: Virginia Department of Correction Green Steel Correctional and Work Center.
1:47
Speaker 6: To accept this call, plus Nero refuses. This call is
1:51
Speaker 6: from a correction facility and is subject to monitoring and recording.
1:55
Speaker 5: Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flaum. Today, I'm
1:58
Speaker 5: interviewing someone who I have a great deal of respect
2:01
Speaker 5: and admiration for, Dusty Turner.
2:05
Speaker 4: On June nineteenth, the twenty one year old pre men
2:08
Speaker 4: student went missing while vacationing with family friends at Virginia Beach.
2:12
Speaker 7: Twenty one year old Jennifer Evans abducted and murdered while
2:15
Speaker 7: vacationing in Virginia Beach that Sunday night. Jennifer Evans left
2:19
Speaker 7: the now defunct Bayou Nightclub with former Navy Seal training
2:23
Speaker 7: Dustin Turner. Police say the two got in the car
2:26
Speaker 7: with another Seal trainee, Billy Joe Brown. Police found her
2:29
Speaker 7: body nine days later in this wooded area of Newport News.
2:33
Speaker 7: She had been strangled. Both men blamed each other in court.
2:36
Speaker 4: Turner was sentenced to eighty two years and Brown to
2:39
Speaker 4: seventy two years.
2:41
Speaker 7: Both sentenced to spend the rest of their lives in prison,
2:43
Speaker 7: but the appeals continued through this year. When Brown told
2:46
Speaker 7: police he was solely responsible for Jennifer's death, the confession
2:50
Speaker 7: gave Dustin Turner one last chance to walk free.
2:54
Speaker 4: The Virginia Supreme Court ruled unanimously Friday against Dusty Turner's
2:57
Speaker 4: petition for exoneration. The really means Turner, in another seal training,
3:02
Speaker 4: Billy Joe Brown will spend the rest of their lives
3:05
Speaker 4: in prison for the murder of Jennifer Evans.
3:09
Speaker 5: Dusty, welcome to the show.
3:11
Speaker 6: Thank you.
3:12
Speaker 5: The reason you're hearing him sound sort of like he's
3:15
Speaker 5: on another planet is because he is. He's in prison
3:17
Speaker 5: in Virginia where he's been locked up for twenty two
3:20
Speaker 5: years for a crime he had nothing to do with.
3:23
Speaker 5: It's a complicated case and a very tragic situation because
3:28
Speaker 5: Dusty had just completed the training to be a Navy
3:30
Speaker 5: seal when he was arrested for a murder that he
3:33
Speaker 5: didn't commit. And Dusty, let's go back to that. When
3:37
Speaker 5: did you sign up for the Navy? What made you
3:39
Speaker 5: want to serve your country?
3:41
Speaker 6: Well, my family has been in the military, my father,
3:45
Speaker 6: my stepfather, my brother, my older brother, he was in
3:48
Speaker 6: the Navy before me, and I guess I just have
3:50
Speaker 6: always had that appeal towards the military to serve my country.
3:54
Speaker 5: Right, But you took it to another level going through
3:56
Speaker 5: that Navy seal training. That is the most extreme thing
4:00
Speaker 5: you can do.
4:01
Speaker 4: Right.
4:01
Speaker 5: Seals and rangers are the most elite troops that we have,
4:06
Speaker 5: and so you decided to subject yourself to basically torture
4:09
Speaker 5: in order to really become a machine.
4:11
Speaker 6: Right, Well, yeah, I guess that's right. You know, initially
4:16
Speaker 6: when I first signed up to the military and the Navy,
4:19
Speaker 6: I wanted to be a diver. I was a scuba
4:21
Speaker 6: diving for about fifteen years, and before I was in
4:24
Speaker 6: the PASTOBA Delayed Entry program, and so before I actually
4:28
Speaker 6: arrived at boot camp, I set my sights on becoming
4:32
Speaker 6: a stew I don't know really what it is that
4:36
Speaker 6: drove me so much, but I just wanted to be
4:40
Speaker 6: in the most elite unit that I could to be
4:43
Speaker 6: in order to fight for my country.
4:45
Speaker 5: And ironically, this all went horribly wrong. And there's a connection,
4:51
Speaker 5: there's a very strong connection to the training because of
4:53
Speaker 5: the fact that it was that faithful night when you
4:57
Speaker 5: were out with your training buddy, when all of this
5:00
Speaker 5: tragedy began. Your training partner was Billy Brown, right, Yes.
5:05
Speaker 6: Billy Brown and I were paired together early on in
5:08
Speaker 6: bus training and throughout the entire field training. We were
5:13
Speaker 6: paired of. And actually the only reason we're paired of
5:15
Speaker 6: at the beginning is because we're the same height, and
5:18
Speaker 6: as fate would have it, that's why we were paired of.
5:21
Speaker 5: And why does that matter.
5:22
Speaker 6: Well, everyone's assigned to a boat crew in bus training,
5:27
Speaker 6: and your boat crew is dependent upon the height, and
5:30
Speaker 6: so we were in the same boat crew. We're the
5:32
Speaker 6: same height. Want to structures that you and you you're together,
5:36
Speaker 6: You're now slim, buddy. And that was early in training.
5:40
Speaker 5: And the issue was Billy was a very volatile character. Right.
5:45
Speaker 5: There's questions that have been raised as to whether he
5:47
Speaker 5: should have ever been admitted into the Navy in the
5:50
Speaker 5: first place when he had a history of well, let's
5:55
Speaker 5: just say, erratic behavior that would be concerning you would
5:58
Speaker 5: think before allowing him into serve in that capacity. Can
6:02
Speaker 5: you talk a little bit about that.
6:04
Speaker 6: Yeah, So I didn't know about his pass until after
6:08
Speaker 6: the trial. He did have a violent history. Apparently he
6:12
Speaker 6: had assulted at least one femail before he came to
6:17
Speaker 6: the military. He was discharged out of the Coastguard before
6:21
Speaker 6: he came into the Navy, and he had a couple
6:24
Speaker 6: other things on his record, which again I was unaware
6:28
Speaker 6: of the prior. You know, some people have said that
6:32
Speaker 6: when he would have gone through the process get his
6:34
Speaker 6: security clearance, that they would have recognized this and then
6:38
Speaker 6: kicked him out of the service. I'm not so sure
6:42
Speaker 6: if that's the case or not, but he certainly had
6:44
Speaker 6: the final pass, and it is surprising, you know, in hindsight,
6:48
Speaker 6: he's very surprising that he was allowed not only in
6:50
Speaker 6: the military, but to come through to the Special Forces.
6:54
Speaker 5: And Dusty so going through the training with him, I mean,
6:58
Speaker 5: you guys are taught to protect each other at all costs,
7:03
Speaker 5: even if it means risking or putting your own life
7:06
Speaker 5: in danger. Is that right?
7:07
Speaker 6: Yes, it is during the training throughout a good majority
7:11
Speaker 6: of it. If we were separated more than six feet,
7:13
Speaker 6: we would be punished for that. You know, I could
7:17
Speaker 6: trust them in the field, so to speak, to shoot
7:20
Speaker 6: over top of my back and you know, a para,
7:23
Speaker 6: so to speak. So there was a great deal of
7:26
Speaker 6: a trust in a binding force, I guess to come
7:29
Speaker 6: with the training.
7:31
Speaker 5: Right, you literally had to trust each other with your
7:33
Speaker 5: lives in a very, very, in a very real way.
7:37
Speaker 5: I'm bringing that up because it has a bearing on
7:41
Speaker 5: the events, the tragic events that happened on June nineteenth,
7:45
Speaker 5: nineteen ninety five in Virginia Beach. And I don't think
7:49
Speaker 5: anybody who hasn't been in your shoes can judge how
7:53
Speaker 5: you acted on that particular night. It's a very unique
7:57
Speaker 5: case and a very unique set of circumstances. Let's talk
8:01
Speaker 5: about that. Because you guys went out to a bar
8:04
Speaker 5: that night. The evening started innocently enough, but Billy had
8:08
Speaker 5: a drinking problem from what I've read, and apparently he
8:11
Speaker 5: got pretty blitzed. Is that right.
8:14
Speaker 6: Yeah, he'd been drinking that day from early on and
8:17
Speaker 6: it just continued into the evening until we were at
8:19
Speaker 6: the club at nine, and he was absolutely.
8:24
Speaker 5: So walk us through what happened, Dusty, because this is
8:28
Speaker 5: really the moment, right when your life was turned upside down.
8:33
Speaker 5: How did this unravel from the time you were in
8:36
Speaker 5: the club to when you ended up in the car,
8:37
Speaker 5: and then ultimately what happened after.
8:39
Speaker 6: That, Well, you know, It started off as kind of
8:42
Speaker 6: a normal, normal evening. I've been to that club a
8:46
Speaker 6: few times. I was relatively new to the area in
8:50
Speaker 6: Virginia Beach, not only been there maybe maybe three weeks,
8:55
Speaker 6: and so initially three of us guys were going to
8:58
Speaker 6: go out and to the club at nine one. The
8:59
Speaker 6: guy ended up up going, I don't know, going off
9:02
Speaker 6: with his girlfriend or something. So Billy and I went
9:05
Speaker 6: to the club. It was again, it was kind of
9:06
Speaker 6: a normal here. Billy is drunk again. I kind of
9:09
Speaker 6: separated myself at the club from him, and I had
9:13
Speaker 6: met a very nice young lady named Jennifer Evans. We
9:17
Speaker 6: kind of hit it off. We were having a good
9:18
Speaker 6: time for sharing with each other. Fellow was what we
9:22
Speaker 6: were into.
9:22
Speaker 5: You know.
9:22
Speaker 6: She was a college student down in Georgia, and I
9:25
Speaker 6: generally didn't talk very openly about my field experience, but
9:30
Speaker 6: with her I did, and I opened up and I
9:31
Speaker 6: told her what I was doing there the beach. Now,
9:34
Speaker 6: mind you that I was in the club with a
9:38
Speaker 6: underage and I had a fake ID that I got
9:42
Speaker 6: in there.
9:43
Speaker 5: You were twenty at the time, man, That was yeah,
9:45
Speaker 5: I was.
9:45
Speaker 6: Twenty years old. Jennifer was twenty one. And so again
9:48
Speaker 6: we you know, Jenffer and I we hit it off.
9:50
Speaker 6: We had to separate ourselves from from Billy. I had
9:53
Speaker 6: met her girlfriend, her two friends that she came there with,
9:56
Speaker 6: We had been out on the dance floor, and you know,
10:00
Speaker 6: again it was very very normal type of evening, and well,
10:05
Speaker 6: the last thing I was imagined was something trastic happening
10:07
Speaker 6: that night, So it put it in the night. Her
10:10
Speaker 6: girlfriend had left briefly they were going to go get
10:13
Speaker 6: some coffee and everyone to say with me in the club.
10:15
Speaker 6: So we actually had an idea of trying to go
10:18
Speaker 6: down to the beach, taking our shoes off and walking
10:20
Speaker 6: down on the beach. But as the night progressed and
10:23
Speaker 6: her girlfriends were going to come pick her back up
10:26
Speaker 6: at two o'clock in the morning, which is the time
10:27
Speaker 6: of this club quote, Jennifer and I realized we didn't
10:30
Speaker 6: know the time to go down to the beach and
10:32
Speaker 6: then make it back to meet her girlfriends, So we
10:35
Speaker 6: stayed in the club, and in fact we went out
10:37
Speaker 6: to the lobby where it was more quiet, and we
10:41
Speaker 6: just got out there and had a conversation. Just previous
10:43
Speaker 6: to this, I had gotten Billy a ride home with
10:48
Speaker 6: this ex girlfriend who happened to be in the club
10:50
Speaker 6: that night, Christians Bishops, and reluctantly she did agree to
10:55
Speaker 6: they come home. She was reluctant, hesitant because she knows
10:59
Speaker 6: the type of character that he is and she really
11:02
Speaker 6: didn't want to deal with him, especially because he was
11:03
Speaker 6: so drunk, which I understood, but you know, I was
11:06
Speaker 6: happy that she was willing to take him home, so
11:09
Speaker 6: I was confident that I wouldn't even see him for
11:12
Speaker 6: the rest of the night. And I was with Jennifer,
11:15
Speaker 6: and it was closing upon two o'clock in the morning.
11:18
Speaker 6: We were out in the lobby and we decided to
11:21
Speaker 6: go out into the parking lot and wait for her
11:23
Speaker 6: girlfriend and sit in my car and listened to music.
11:26
Speaker 6: And so within about ten minutes, still two again, we
11:30
Speaker 6: went out to my car and we were sitting there
11:32
Speaker 6: listening to music and looking for her girlfriend to show
11:36
Speaker 6: up at any minute. Instead, what we saw coming down
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Speaker 6: the hill was Billy Brown, and he was heading towards
11:42
Speaker 6: the parkpot. You know, I certainly wasn't expecting him. Christian
11:47
Speaker 6: was supposed to take him home. I knew he was
11:49
Speaker 6: drunk and belligerent, but when he was approaching the vehicle.
11:52
Speaker 6: I told Jennifer, I said, look, you know, this is
11:54
Speaker 6: the guy I come here with. You know, he's drunk.
11:57
Speaker 6: Just just don't pay no attention to him. I've seen
12:00
Speaker 6: him in the past, especially when we were in Puerto Rico.
12:03
Speaker 6: I've seen him, witness him become kind of violent towards women.
12:08
Speaker 6: I didn't think that he would become violent towards Jenner Firm,
12:11
Speaker 6: but I did assume he was at least going to
12:14
Speaker 6: be obnoxious and somewhat belligerent. So when he got into.
12:18
Speaker 5: The car, wait, hold up there for a second, Dusty,
12:20
Speaker 5: what kind of car was it?
12:21
Speaker 6: So I had a small geostorm.
12:24
Speaker 5: So that's a small car, right, yeah, it is a
12:27
Speaker 5: very small car. And you're big guys, both of you
12:30
Speaker 5: guys are.
12:30
Speaker 6: He was bigger than I. We were both six foot
12:34
Speaker 6: two and a half, I guess, and he outweighed me
12:36
Speaker 6: by maybe fifteen to twenty pounds, So he was I
12:39
Speaker 6: think he was about two hundred and thirty somewhere aund
12:42
Speaker 6: indus or thirty pounds. But he approaches the passer's side
12:45
Speaker 6: of the car and he opens the door and he
12:47
Speaker 6: kind of pushes the car seat forward where Jennifer was sitting,
12:51
Speaker 6: he pushes a seat forward a little roughly, and he
12:54
Speaker 6: gets in the car in the back seats right behind her,
12:57
Speaker 6: and of course his big frame compared with the back
13:00
Speaker 6: in this once you did a very small comb Those
13:04
Speaker 6: knees are against the back of her seat. And as
13:08
Speaker 6: soon as he sits down, I turned to him and
13:11
Speaker 6: I say, Billy, what what's going on? Was was Christian
13:15
Speaker 6: not thinking you home? And he immediately goes into a
13:19
Speaker 6: tirade about oh, screwing that f bet girl you think
13:23
Speaker 6: you know, blah blah, he's a nothing.
13:26
Speaker 5: But of this event, this is the last thing you
13:29
Speaker 5: want to see, right, You're having a nice moment with
13:31
Speaker 5: a girl, you have a nice connection with her. The
13:33
Speaker 5: last thing you want to see, last thing anybody would
13:35
Speaker 5: want to see is a drunk, belligerent, violent anybody. You
13:41
Speaker 5: don't want to see anybody at that point. You just
13:43
Speaker 5: want to be in your little bubble with her, listen
13:45
Speaker 5: to music. Everything's good. I mean, you never could have
13:47
Speaker 5: predicted how bad it was going to get, but already
13:50
Speaker 5: it's bad.
13:51
Speaker 6: Yeah, So this is obviously, this is the crux of
13:54
Speaker 6: the situation. Jennifer and I were having the time, you know,
13:57
Speaker 6: we were not romantically involved at this time. Earlier I
14:02
Speaker 6: had given her a husband when I thought that she
14:04
Speaker 6: was gonna leave with her girlfriends, and that's the only
14:06
Speaker 6: time we had had a come physical contact. I said,
14:09
Speaker 6: said Jeniffer, she's a very decent young lady. You know,
14:14
Speaker 6: she was a good girl, was a great teacher in
14:16
Speaker 6: front of her who was going to college. And it's
14:19
Speaker 6: a very nice young lady. And so we're having a
14:21
Speaker 6: great conversation and you said, here comes this drunk buddy
14:25
Speaker 6: of mine down to the calling.
14:27
Speaker 5: So he's now in the back seat and is acting
14:32
Speaker 5: as you would have probably predicted that he would have
14:34
Speaker 5: act because of what you know about his character and
14:37
Speaker 5: his current state of mind. But then it gets much worse.
14:41
Speaker 6: Yeah. Yeah, So after asking him while Christian was taking
14:44
Speaker 6: him home, and you know, he said what he said
14:47
Speaker 6: about her, and he turned his attention to Jennifer, and
14:51
Speaker 6: he made some very rude comment, if I remember correctly,
14:55
Speaker 6: he said something about asking her if she was a virgin,
14:58
Speaker 6: something like that, certainly inappropriate. And I immediately said, look, Billy,
15:04
Speaker 6: why don't you get out and go find Christians that
15:07
Speaker 6: she was going to take me home, And so he
15:09
Speaker 6: was not trying to hear that at all. He's like
15:12
Speaker 6: half that bitch. So again he kind of turns his
15:15
Speaker 6: benches to Jenner from my eyes, who within two or
15:18
Speaker 6: three or four minutes before her girlfriends were coming to
15:21
Speaker 6: pick her up right there where we're at in the
15:24
Speaker 6: parking lot. They're supposed to arrive there, they told used
15:26
Speaker 6: to be there at to the clock, and it has
15:29
Speaker 6: to be within a couple of minutes before too. And
15:31
Speaker 6: of course I didn't know at that point too what
15:34
Speaker 6: it transpired in the gloves between him and Christian that
15:38
Speaker 6: made him additionally belligerent. So it turns his SENSI back
15:42
Speaker 6: to Cennifer, and he said something about her hair. He
15:47
Speaker 6: reached up with his right hand. I don't know if
15:49
Speaker 6: he pushed her her shoulder or her hair. But at
15:53
Speaker 6: that point Jennifer had just throughout this time, the brief
15:58
Speaker 6: couple of minutes she had not set a did not
16:00
Speaker 6: open her mouth to him or refined to him, And
16:05
Speaker 6: so when he touched her hair or her shoulder, she
16:08
Speaker 6: smacked his hand from behind, you know, swatted his hands,
16:13
Speaker 6: and that's when he snapped. So I wasn't looking directly
16:17
Speaker 6: at him when he snapped, but with all his might.
16:21
Speaker 6: He violently thrust his arms around her, of her body,
16:26
Speaker 6: her neck area, and with so much force that the
16:31
Speaker 6: whole car literally shaped right.
16:34
Speaker 5: And I'm thinking about it, d'sti. He had his feet,
16:37
Speaker 5: as you said, his knees were up against the seat.
16:40
Speaker 5: And here's a big, strong, two thirty pound guy who's
16:44
Speaker 5: trained to kill with his with his hands, and he's
16:47
Speaker 5: got total leverage right because he's got the knees. I mean,
16:51
Speaker 5: you know, it would have been nothing for him to
16:53
Speaker 5: do this considering all of these well, you know, I
16:55
Speaker 5: don't you.
16:56
Speaker 6: Know, I don't know about saying it would have been nothing.
16:59
Speaker 6: I really don't know. I know that if seemingly it
17:02
Speaker 6: was coming for him, the strike that he did upon
17:07
Speaker 6: this innocent young woman was so violent that when I
17:13
Speaker 6: turned and started screaming at him to just let her go,
17:17
Speaker 6: and he's screaming at me just ep and drive, just
17:19
Speaker 6: up and drive first, I started crying and trying to
17:22
Speaker 6: pull his arms off of her and screaming at him.
17:25
Speaker 6: This entire brief time when this happened, Jennifer never once
17:30
Speaker 6: reached up to defend herself. It was that quick that
17:34
Speaker 6: she was out, and so I immediately grabbing his arms,
17:38
Speaker 6: and I'm screaming at him, just let her go, let
17:40
Speaker 6: her go, And he's screaming at me, just fucking drive,
17:43
Speaker 6: just up and drive, you know. Only after a couple
17:45
Speaker 6: of seconds at pulling in his arms didn't work, so
17:47
Speaker 6: I reached under his fingers literally and pried his arms,
17:51
Speaker 6: using one hand on his elbow and the other under
17:53
Speaker 6: his fingertips, and pride his arms up off of her.
17:56
Speaker 6: At this point, when I dig at his arms off her,
17:59
Speaker 6: he took back and the seat and she is now
18:03
Speaker 6: did her head is built towards the passenger side window,
18:08
Speaker 6: her arms on the other side. She had delided herself.
18:13
Speaker 6: And I'm just complete shocked and just utter confusion and disbelieve.
18:19
Speaker 6: And I'm still he is yelling at him. He just
18:23
Speaker 6: has been drawn.
18:24
Speaker 5: Drawn, Dusty. I'm just thinking that I'm just the physics
18:28
Speaker 5: of it. I mean, it would have been almost impossible
18:30
Speaker 5: for anyone, even a strong guy like yourself, to pull
18:33
Speaker 5: somebody off from the side when he's in a position
18:36
Speaker 5: like he was in, especially when it happened as quickly
18:39
Speaker 5: as it did. I mean, you really had no chance
18:42
Speaker 5: to save this poor girl. And I mean I obviously
18:45
Speaker 5: you did what you could, but she had no chance.
18:48
Speaker 5: And at this point, were you concerned that he was
18:50
Speaker 5: going to try to kill you too?
18:52
Speaker 6: No, it certainly wasn't an they didn't go through my
18:55
Speaker 6: head only thought. I'm not thinking anyone sitting in my
18:59
Speaker 6: seat would have had the same reaction. You know, one
19:03
Speaker 6: minute having a good time with a young lady, and
19:07
Speaker 6: the next minute, this guy, this violent predator, cleatly just
19:12
Speaker 6: alters history. I don't know it's spoke stream, but I
19:15
Speaker 6: mean he is. The one act that he does, it
19:18
Speaker 6: changes the lives of so many people.
19:20
Speaker 5: Sure, one act.
19:21
Speaker 6: And he's drunk, and he's and you know, I'd like
19:23
Speaker 6: to think that he really didn't know what the heck
19:24
Speaker 6: he's doing. He has his past, and he has lent
19:27
Speaker 6: past of a violence towards women. But he's been increasingly
19:30
Speaker 6: becoming an alcoholic over the last several weeks or months,
19:35
Speaker 6: in which he's drinking every single night. It's just a bad,
19:37
Speaker 6: bad brude. Not to mention the fact that he was
19:40
Speaker 6: thinking sterile. He's leading up to this as will.
19:43
Speaker 5: Obviously, he destroyed her and get killed her, and he
19:46
Speaker 5: ruined the lives of everyone who cared about her, her family,
19:50
Speaker 5: et cetera. He ruined your life, he ruined his own life,
19:53
Speaker 5: He ruined the lives of your families, right, your family,
19:56
Speaker 5: all military heroes and so yeah, in one short violence,
20:01
Speaker 5: from what it sounds like last only seconds, not even minutes,
20:05
Speaker 5: he managed to destroy so many people. And then that's
20:10
Speaker 5: where the story gets into a whole different phase. Right,
20:14
Speaker 5: and again, I can't walk in your shoes. No one
20:18
Speaker 5: can walk in your shoes with all the factors that
20:20
Speaker 5: were going on, Dusty, with the fact that you had
20:23
Speaker 5: been now trained, practically indoctrinated into this idea that you
20:28
Speaker 5: must protect this guy and he's going to protect you.
20:32
Speaker 5: You know, that's just in the mix. I just want
20:34
Speaker 5: to put that in there. But besides that, you're in
20:36
Speaker 5: a state I can imagine of complete shock and panic,
20:40
Speaker 5: and who could imagine this terrible turn of events, as
20:44
Speaker 5: you said, And what a dramatic turn when it goes
20:47
Speaker 5: from what sounds like a beautiful night, a nice connection
20:51
Speaker 5: to this absolute horror that you're you've just witnessed as
20:57
Speaker 5: close and personal as you can imagine with somebody you
21:00
Speaker 5: were supposed to trust and protect and someone else that
21:02
Speaker 5: you would have liked to protect, but you couldn't. He's
21:05
Speaker 5: screaming at you to drive what happened?
21:09
Speaker 6: Yeah, And this is like you said, this, this is
21:11
Speaker 6: why you're in prison is because of what you've done afterwards.
21:15
Speaker 6: And if people can't understand your reaction afterwards, the normal
21:20
Speaker 6: person would have jumped out of the vehicle and ran
21:23
Speaker 6: to find the phone or the police somewhere, or to
21:27
Speaker 6: tell somebody something just terrible has happened. And that might
21:30
Speaker 6: be the case for most people. I don't know, but
21:33
Speaker 6: I think that's the way I reacted. It would have
21:36
Speaker 6: been different. Even if my own brother would have been
21:39
Speaker 6: in Billy Brown's place, I think I would have reacted differently.
21:42
Speaker 6: This is like you said, to the way I was
21:44
Speaker 6: conditions and indoctrinated at twenty years old, I reacted how
21:51
Speaker 6: I reacted. I'm not a criminal. I've never been violent,
21:55
Speaker 6: and I certainly have never been violent towards the women,
21:58
Speaker 6: and I'm not criminally minded. And so why is is
22:01
Speaker 6: did a twenty year old trust in this position which
22:04
Speaker 6: I should never have been in to begin with, and
22:06
Speaker 6: had to make these kinds of decisions. And so when
22:10
Speaker 6: I realized that in the first day and Billy Brown
22:14
Speaker 6: screaming them and I really didn't know what to do.
22:18
Speaker 6: I was in a place in this area, Like I said,
22:21
Speaker 6: I had only been in Virginia Beach for a couple
22:24
Speaker 6: of weeks and three weeks of five. So I just
22:28
Speaker 6: put the car to drive and I took off driving,
22:31
Speaker 6: and I didn't know where I was going. I didn't
22:34
Speaker 6: even know how to barely get out of the Virginia
22:37
Speaker 6: Beach area until I ended up in fact Phillip Brown.
22:40
Speaker 6: And when I started driving, he said, I'll turn left here,
22:44
Speaker 6: turn right there, and I ended up on sixty four,
22:47
Speaker 6: and on sixty four, I'm familiar with that highway, and
22:51
Speaker 6: so I just started traveling west on sixty four, and
22:55
Speaker 6: I didn't know where I was going, and I just
22:58
Speaker 6: kept driving and driving until I started I seen a
23:00
Speaker 6: lot of wooded area, and so I pulled off on
23:03
Speaker 6: an exit. Again, I have no idea where I'm at,
23:05
Speaker 6: and I'm just driving. I pull off into another area
23:08
Speaker 6: which seemed more wooded until I get to a more
23:11
Speaker 6: secluded area which is not that far from the interstate,
23:15
Speaker 6: and both of us myself can bally get up the car.
23:19
Speaker 6: I grabbed Nimfer's risks, he grabbed her legs, and we
23:25
Speaker 6: carried her perhaps thirty yards into the wood. And again
23:32
Speaker 6: I was in complete chaotic, shocking, and I didn't know
23:38
Speaker 6: what I was doing. I didn't know what else to do.
23:42
Speaker 6: And yeah, I understand that people people look at that
23:45
Speaker 6: moment there and say, you know that, why would you
23:48
Speaker 6: do that? Why you know I would have done that?
23:51
Speaker 6: But others have not been in my shoes. They don't understand,
23:55
Speaker 6: and perhaps I don't even understand why I reacted that
23:58
Speaker 6: with other than to say that this is kind of
24:00
Speaker 6: how I was trained to react. They didn't say, in
24:03
Speaker 6: a situation which you know there's been a crime and
24:06
Speaker 6: it's a civilian who's been hurt, tect your swim body.
24:09
Speaker 6: Oh of course I didn't say that. However, now from
24:12
Speaker 6: what I understands, when you go through still training today,
24:16
Speaker 6: they do have classes in training that says, look, if
24:20
Speaker 6: this type of scenario happens, you need to consider what
24:24
Speaker 6: you know, where you're at, what you're doing, and so forth,
24:26
Speaker 6: and do not protect your swim body if he has
24:28
Speaker 6: done something so horrendous, so wrong. And that's the place
24:33
Speaker 6: today because of this city.
24:35
Speaker 5: But Dusty, I want to bring up an important point.
24:37
Speaker 5: What is important from a legal perspective to remember is
24:41
Speaker 5: that in Virginia, hiding a body after a murder is
24:45
Speaker 5: a misdemeanor punishable by up to twelve months in jail.
24:49
Speaker 5: And that's not what you got convicted of. That's not
24:52
Speaker 5: what they wanted you for. And we're going to get
24:54
Speaker 5: to that in a minute. But that's a very important
24:56
Speaker 5: thing to remember. In certain states that's not the case.
24:59
Speaker 5: There's some states where it's treated very differently. In some
25:02
Speaker 5: states it's treated the same as murder, just you know,
25:05
Speaker 5: hiding the body after the fact. But that's the only
25:08
Speaker 5: thing that you were guilty of. And that's one of
25:11
Speaker 5: the reasons why I've dived into your case and why
25:13
Speaker 5: I'm doing everything I can to help you try to
25:16
Speaker 5: find justice, because it's obviously a terrible miscarriage of justice,
25:23
Speaker 5: the fact that you're serving time for murder when what
25:26
Speaker 5: you did was wrong, but it's not murder. So now
25:32
Speaker 5: going forward, you go back to the base and this
25:36
Speaker 5: is big news, right the town is up in arms.
25:38
Speaker 5: Everyone's wondering what happened to this girl, and this must
25:41
Speaker 5: have been driving you crazy, right.
25:43
Speaker 6: Well, I wasn't really aware at the time of the
25:45
Speaker 6: news in the media, but what was driving me crazy,
25:48
Speaker 6: is just having witnesses and knowing about it and attempting
25:55
Speaker 6: to remain silent about it. It was, Uh. It put
25:59
Speaker 6: me in a state of almost like a zombie like
26:03
Speaker 6: state throughout the next week in which I held this
26:07
Speaker 6: speakert and witness bill. They do this terrible, terrible beat
26:13
Speaker 6: and I had it within and and I couldn't tell anybody,
26:18
Speaker 6: and so it was it was definitely eating me up
26:20
Speaker 6: on the inside. So of course the coming week now
26:23
Speaker 6: we were up north something from a place called a
26:26
Speaker 6: support ap doing addigital training for men. I wasn't during
26:31
Speaker 6: the time. I wasn't aware of the news in the
26:34
Speaker 6: media down in Virginia Beach. But it was certainly eating
26:37
Speaker 6: you up on the inside.
26:39
Speaker 5: So your conscience got the best of you, and you know,
26:43
Speaker 5: you did the right thing after having done the wrong
26:45
Speaker 5: thing and went to the authorities, right, And that's where
26:48
Speaker 5: things get really dicey from everything I've read, where they
26:53
Speaker 5: didn't behave in a straightforward manner when it comes to
26:56
Speaker 5: how they treated you right.
26:57
Speaker 6: Well, first of all, you know, I did it tell
26:59
Speaker 6: the Texas you know, everything that they had asked me.
27:02
Speaker 6: You know, at first I did not denied it. I
27:05
Speaker 6: denied everything, but it came to a point, especially after
27:09
Speaker 6: they had presented me with the fact that Jennifer's family
27:13
Speaker 6: is an absolute go into a traumatic and brieving experience
27:17
Speaker 6: and they just want to know how and they want
27:19
Speaker 6: to know where their daughter is, et cetera. And it
27:22
Speaker 6: was through this line of the Enquirer questioning that you know,
27:27
Speaker 6: I asked to see my very officer, and my spirit
27:32
Speaker 6: offic came in and we were alone. I told him
27:34
Speaker 6: everything that happened, and so he said that he was
27:36
Speaker 6: on an attempt to call the Dad officer and to
27:39
Speaker 6: see what we could do as far as legally or
27:41
Speaker 6: something like that. But nonetheless, fifteen minutes later when the
27:45
Speaker 6: texts come in, I told them everything that they had asked,
27:49
Speaker 6: and they even asked me if I was helping them
27:50
Speaker 6: first draw maps to where Jennifer's Bobby was, which I did,
27:55
Speaker 6: I attempted to do, and then they asked me if
27:58
Speaker 6: I would accompany them they Jennifer Scotty, so which I
28:03
Speaker 6: did also, and I still my spreite officer in one
28:07
Speaker 6: of the expecutives. We went to the location and we
28:10
Speaker 6: separated the search through the woods. Finally I did find
28:14
Speaker 6: her body. At that point I went back to the base.
28:17
Speaker 6: They had presented Billy Brown with the map that I
28:21
Speaker 6: had drawn. He said, look, your buddy completely just rolled
28:25
Speaker 6: on you. He told us everything, you're going down. You're
28:28
Speaker 6: probably gonna get the death penalty whatever else. And so
28:31
Speaker 6: at that point that he began with these stories about
28:35
Speaker 6: now I had something to do with it. He later
28:38
Speaker 6: said that if he was going down, he's gonna take
28:41
Speaker 6: me with and so he made up a story saying
28:43
Speaker 6: that we're both gone.
28:44
Speaker 5: Yeah, I mean, he was obviously furious because he believed
28:47
Speaker 5: that you, who was supposed to be his protector, had
28:49
Speaker 5: betrayed him. He's gonna do what he can to bring
28:52
Speaker 5: you down with him, because, in his twisted way of thinking,
28:57
Speaker 5: you should have covered up this murder and protected him,
29:00
Speaker 5: and so you did what you thought was right. I'll
29:04
Speaker 5: be it after the fact and the consequences started to
29:08
Speaker 5: become very real now from what I've read, Dustie, the
29:11
Speaker 5: detectives made certain promises to you, right that if you
29:15
Speaker 5: help them, you were going to be kind of okay.
29:18
Speaker 6: Right, yeah, they think you know. They did say that
29:21
Speaker 6: after telling my sperit officer what had happened, and he
29:25
Speaker 6: spoke to the textives as well, and together they said, look,
29:29
Speaker 6: just answer the question. It'll be all right. And I said,
29:33
Speaker 6: are you sure you know? And I kind of took
29:35
Speaker 6: it as a direct order from my spirit officer. I said,
29:37
Speaker 6: very sure, that's what I should do, and he said, yes,
29:39
Speaker 6: to answer the questions, be all right. I said, okay.
29:43
Speaker 6: You know, they didn't come to me and say anything like, well,
29:46
Speaker 6: for your testimony, will allow some kind of agreement or
29:49
Speaker 6: something like that.
29:50
Speaker 5: Now.
29:50
Speaker 6: They never actually came to me and said that. Of course,
29:54
Speaker 6: being very igorant of the criminal justice, you know, I
29:57
Speaker 6: didn't know that I would even need a lawyer or
29:59
Speaker 6: the that I should do remain time about certain things
30:04
Speaker 6: or what have you. But you know, I willingly asked
30:06
Speaker 6: them to search my vehicle. Mean, I answered the questions truthfully,
30:12
Speaker 6: And I thought that maybe what this would lead to
30:15
Speaker 6: was at some point me on a witness fan explaining
30:19
Speaker 6: that Billy Brown is being charged with her murder, that
30:23
Speaker 6: I would be explaining exactly how things happened. Maybe I
30:26
Speaker 6: was naive, but I assume that's how things worked. I
30:29
Speaker 6: certainly didn't assume that they were going to charge me.
30:32
Speaker 6: After speaking with Billy Brown and him pointing the fingers
30:35
Speaker 6: much so I certainly didn't think that I was going
30:38
Speaker 6: to be charged with the murder.
30:40
Speaker 5: And this is an important point, Dusty, right, because the
30:43
Speaker 5: police spent forty eight hours examining your car, right, so
30:47
Speaker 5: they turned that thing upside down, And yet they never
30:52
Speaker 5: used any of the evidence from the car at trial
30:56
Speaker 5: because it wasn't going to be favorable to them, And
30:58
Speaker 5: in fact, by noting the evidence at trial, they didn't
31:01
Speaker 5: have to turn over to the defense, when in fact,
31:04
Speaker 5: if they had, it would have been definitely in your
31:08
Speaker 5: favor because of the fact that everything you were saying
31:11
Speaker 5: makes true, that the physics of it just don't add
31:15
Speaker 5: up some of the things that they said. It doesn't
31:17
Speaker 5: make sense to add insult to injury. And in a
31:29
Speaker 5: terrible call it a coincidence, the year that you were convicted,
31:33
Speaker 5: nineteen ninety five, was the same year that Virginia abolished parole,
31:37
Speaker 5: which is shocking to my conscience. In a nation where
31:40
Speaker 5: we believe in second chances and we believe in redemption,
31:43
Speaker 5: and we believe in that stuff, the idea that if
31:45
Speaker 5: you were so misfortunate is to be convicted in Virginia
31:48
Speaker 5: nineteen ninety five or later you are not eligible for parole.
31:51
Speaker 6: I wouldn't even be able with parole. Meant, I wouldn't aware.
31:54
Speaker 6: You know that they had just abolished parole in Virginia.
31:57
Speaker 6: I don't think I would have would have paired at
31:59
Speaker 6: the time. I wasn't, So I gets concerned about the
32:02
Speaker 6: sense I was given. I was concerned about the fact
32:04
Speaker 6: that I was convicted of two charges that I did
32:07
Speaker 6: not commit. Whether they gave me ten years or one
32:10
Speaker 6: hundred years, I was convicted of something I didn't commit.
32:13
Speaker 6: And that's that was the Travis.
32:15
Speaker 5: It's I can't I can't really imagine how that could
32:20
Speaker 5: make sense in a society like ours, but it is
32:23
Speaker 5: in fact a reality, and it's your reality, and it's
32:26
Speaker 5: why now everyone is working so hard to help you
32:31
Speaker 5: get clemency or a pardon or a conditional pardon from
32:35
Speaker 5: the governor because of the fact that that is the
32:37
Speaker 5: only recourse left. Another thing that's sort of a unique
32:42
Speaker 5: and to me troubling concept is the idea that you
32:47
Speaker 5: only have really one appeal of actual innocence in Virginia, right,
32:52
Speaker 5: And that's something I want to get to Dusty, because
32:55
Speaker 5: first of all, a crazy thing happened in two thousand
32:58
Speaker 5: and two, right, which is that Billy he had some
33:02
Speaker 5: sort of an awakening and decided to come clean and
33:05
Speaker 5: tell the truth. We're talking two thousand and two, fifteen
33:08
Speaker 5: years ago, right, And he recanted and admitted that he
33:11
Speaker 5: was the sole murderer. And I think people are listening
33:14
Speaker 5: now and going, well, wait a minute, if that happened,
33:16
Speaker 5: why is Dusty still in prison? Can you explain that scenario?
33:21
Speaker 6: Yeah? If I can't explain it, yeah, as he's serving
33:25
Speaker 6: his time and some other prison I guess some guys
33:29
Speaker 6: had approached him and gotten him to get into Christianity,
33:33
Speaker 6: and this allowed him to finally release this burden that
33:37
Speaker 6: he's been holding for all these years and to confess.
33:42
Speaker 6: And so that happened again in early two thousand and
33:46
Speaker 6: Here it is, fifteen years later, and I'm still sitting here,
33:50
Speaker 6: still sitting here after he's complaint, after he finally said, yeah,
33:55
Speaker 6: everything that Dusty said, that's what happened, and the judge
33:59
Speaker 6: rule that he's credible in that confession. So there was
34:03
Speaker 6: no mechanisms more recently of even getting back into court
34:06
Speaker 6: with such new evidence. But there was a time later
34:10
Speaker 6: in two thousand and sixty Pound seven until we finally
34:14
Speaker 6: rid of actual innocence to the appeals court, which ended
34:18
Speaker 6: with well, the appeals court initially overturned my convictions. They
34:23
Speaker 6: did convict me of the misdemeanor accessory after the fact
34:27
Speaker 6: of the felony, which indeed I am blp of and
34:30
Speaker 6: like you said earlier, that was a maximum sentence of
34:34
Speaker 6: twelve months in jail. When they made this ruling and
34:38
Speaker 6: they dropped my charges. This is two thousand and eight,
34:41
Speaker 6: two thousand and nine. I was expecting me home within
34:44
Speaker 6: a matter of days or weeks.
34:46
Speaker 5: This is what makes me insane. And I think anybody
34:48
Speaker 5: listening is like, wait, wait, wait, So your conviction was vacated, right,
34:53
Speaker 5: And then that means to a layman who's not intimately
34:57
Speaker 5: familiar with the law or criminal proceedings, when your conviction
35:01
Speaker 5: is vacated, you have every reasonablieve you're going to go home.
35:03
Speaker 4: Right.
35:04
Speaker 5: They've actually come out and said, okay, we are now
35:07
Speaker 5: acknowledging there is no physical evidence connecting you to this.
35:10
Speaker 5: None of this stuff adds up, right, not to the murder.
35:13
Speaker 5: Like you said, you're guilty of the accessory after the fact,
35:16
Speaker 5: and now you have the actual killer confessing in court
35:21
Speaker 5: under oath sounds like a winner. Right, you're going home,
35:24
Speaker 5: except for then the state decided to put its foot
35:28
Speaker 5: back on your neck, so to speak. Right, and then
35:30
Speaker 5: what happened?
35:31
Speaker 6: Yeah, so the toils the vacated my conviction and I
35:35
Speaker 6: was expect to be home with a matter of day.
35:37
Speaker 6: The acting Attorney General came forward and said that he
35:41
Speaker 6: wanted to appeal this decision, and so they appealed it
35:45
Speaker 6: and went back through the appellate court and then on
35:48
Speaker 6: into the later into the Supreme Court of Virginia and
35:51
Speaker 6: under a new series that's one of the judges of
35:53
Speaker 6: the Pilates Court created. And the thread of actual innocence
35:57
Speaker 6: is so demanding as they say that the evidence has
36:00
Speaker 6: to be just as substantial as DNA evidence, which unfortunately
36:04
Speaker 6: there's no DNA evidence in my case. But so one
36:07
Speaker 6: of the judges says, well, although he didn't have anything
36:11
Speaker 6: to do with the murder, and this has been decided
36:13
Speaker 6: by the judges, he didn't have anything to do with
36:15
Speaker 6: the murder, and he didn't restrain the victim. This judge says, well,
36:22
Speaker 6: perhaps a jury could believe that when Dusty walked out
36:26
Speaker 6: of the bar to the parking lot, to his car,
36:30
Speaker 6: that a jury could believe that that was an abduction
36:33
Speaker 6: by deception. And if a jury believed that and then
36:37
Speaker 6: Jennifer was later killed regardless of power who was killed her,
36:41
Speaker 6: that I which still be guilty and the jury is
36:44
Speaker 6: still find me guilty of both the abduction and the murder.
36:46
Speaker 6: So they created a new theory in my face. There's
36:48
Speaker 6: just not only is the asonine, but it was never
36:51
Speaker 6: presented before the jury. And there's no jury in the
36:54
Speaker 6: world that would believe this idea, especially with all the
36:58
Speaker 6: additional evidence. So under that because of it, and it's
37:02
Speaker 6: all the semantics of this word restraint, and that's what
37:06
Speaker 6: it comes down to. I'm still in prison because of
37:08
Speaker 6: the semantics of the word restraint. And it's unbelievable. So
37:13
Speaker 6: they overturn my release and they reinstate my colas and
37:18
Speaker 6: here it is seven years later and I'm still sitting here.
37:24
Speaker 5: So they're basically trying to say that they're going back
37:27
Speaker 5: in time to nineteen ninety five. They're going back in
37:30
Speaker 5: time the nineteen ninety five and trying to come up
37:33
Speaker 5: with a theory that could actually read your mind. Right,
37:37
Speaker 5: They're going back in a time machine and reading your
37:40
Speaker 5: mind and saying, well, this may have been, could have been,
37:43
Speaker 5: would have been something that he might have been thinking
37:46
Speaker 5: of doing. There's no evidence to prove it. How could anybody?
37:50
Speaker 5: I don't know. It makes me nuts. It's such a
37:53
Speaker 5: bizarre it's such a bizarre thing for a court or
37:56
Speaker 5: a judge to say. As far as I'm concerned, I.
38:00
Speaker 6: Think that the legislators recognized that after my case, and
38:03
Speaker 6: they said, you know, this rivactional innocence is obviously entirely
38:07
Speaker 6: too restrictiveness and to open for interpretation or whatever. So
38:11
Speaker 6: they since I went through this rivactional inscence, now they've
38:15
Speaker 6: changed the law the wording of the rivactionalness. Instead of
38:19
Speaker 6: saying could any juror find guilt with this evidence? Now
38:24
Speaker 6: it's more specific, and it may sound puplicit, but it's
38:27
Speaker 6: more specific thing. Would a rational juror still find guilt
38:31
Speaker 6: with this new evidence and the new word in which
38:34
Speaker 6: I can't go back into the river actionalness because it's
38:37
Speaker 6: the one shot deal. And Tom left hung out to
38:40
Speaker 6: drial this on this whole thing.
38:42
Speaker 5: Well, hopefully not for too long, because you have a
38:44
Speaker 5: lot of really great people on your side now, and
38:46
Speaker 5: you have a governor who cares about these issues and
38:49
Speaker 5: who has shown in actions that he believes in justice,
38:53
Speaker 5: that he believes in fairness, and that he has the
38:57
Speaker 5: courage to do something about these things.
39:00
Speaker 6: From my perspective, he does like a very fair man,
39:03
Speaker 6: and I do have hope. I do think that he
39:07
Speaker 6: will look at my case, and I know and I'm
39:10
Speaker 6: very confident that if he does, if he just looks
39:12
Speaker 6: at my kids, then he'll realize that I'm not supposed
39:15
Speaker 6: to be here. I do have that tremendous hope that
39:19
Speaker 6: he will take action in my case.
39:21
Speaker 5: Well, Dusty, I can tell you that I think that
39:23
Speaker 5: there's a lot of reason to have hope in this
39:26
Speaker 5: current administration that we have there because of the fact
39:29
Speaker 5: that you do have such a ground swell of support,
39:32
Speaker 5: and not only that, because of what you've done, the
39:36
Speaker 5: remarkable record of accomplishment that you've had on the inside.
39:41
Speaker 5: And I want to talk about that. I know that
39:44
Speaker 5: you know you're finding hope in a hopeless place, but
39:47
Speaker 5: I want to paint a picture for the audience of
39:49
Speaker 5: just how grim it is to be in the situation
39:53
Speaker 5: you're in, and then also what you've managed to make
39:55
Speaker 5: out of that experience.
39:57
Speaker 6: Well, you know, I've got a quote a guy who
40:00
Speaker 6: knows suffering, and a couple of things have kept me
40:05
Speaker 6: I don't know, to move forward, and its positive. I
40:07
Speaker 6: can be one of those the supporters that I do have,
40:10
Speaker 6: not just my family, but others, you know, total strangers
40:13
Speaker 6: who have reached out, and it gives me a lot
40:16
Speaker 6: of hope, and it gives me a lot of strength
40:19
Speaker 6: to endure this what I'm going through in this environment.
40:22
Speaker 6: And it is terrible, It's absolutely terrible. But this quote,
40:26
Speaker 6: it's one of my favorite quotes. It says that everything
40:29
Speaker 6: be taken from a man, but one thing, the last
40:32
Speaker 6: of the human freedom, and that is to choose one's
40:35
Speaker 6: own attitude in any set of circumstances, choose one's own
40:39
Speaker 6: way as a man named Victor Franklin. And you know,
40:43
Speaker 6: I guess I've taken on this, this attitude, you know,
40:47
Speaker 6: that which allowed me to persevere through through bud training
40:51
Speaker 6: and is still training. I reached for this on a
40:54
Speaker 6: daily basis. Now I put my feet on the ground
40:57
Speaker 6: and say I have to I have to continue on today,
41:01
Speaker 6: and I have to push forward, and I can't allow
41:03
Speaker 6: this environment to get the best of them. And I
41:06
Speaker 6: want to transcend in spite of where I'm at. And
41:10
Speaker 6: so I've looked to try to do things to try
41:13
Speaker 6: to help out not only the people around me in
41:15
Speaker 6: my environment for years, and I've helped guys who have
41:19
Speaker 6: struggled with drug addiction or you know, criminal thinking. And
41:23
Speaker 6: I've just kind of made it as part of my
41:25
Speaker 6: own our character to trying to help you guys out
41:28
Speaker 6: and to move past, to transcend some of these things
41:31
Speaker 6: in which they've been stuck in. And not only that,
41:33
Speaker 6: I proposed a dog training program. That's the last institution
41:38
Speaker 6: that I was at. It was luckily it was to
41:41
Speaker 6: prove and we had the dogs come in and for
41:43
Speaker 6: about three years I was able to be a dog trainer.
41:47
Speaker 6: And I had studied and read up and learned so
41:50
Speaker 6: much about training dogs and I really enjoyed that.
41:53
Speaker 5: And how does that training program work? That the dogs are?
41:56
Speaker 5: They rescue dogs and what happens to them after they're trained?
41:59
Speaker 4: Right?
42:00
Speaker 6: So these are absolutely rescued dogs. These were abandoned. We
42:03
Speaker 6: worked with a shelter out of Ashland, Virginia called bark
42:07
Speaker 6: Baar Community and that's the abandoned the adoption and rescued canines.
42:11
Speaker 6: A really great organizations, and they would bring us six
42:14
Speaker 6: dogs at time and we would have them for three months,
42:17
Speaker 6: and we had a total of twelve dog trainers, two
42:20
Speaker 6: free stocks, and we would train the dogs. These dogs
42:23
Speaker 6: that were abandoned and you never know what their history was.
42:27
Speaker 6: They could send maybe beat them or however that they
42:30
Speaker 6: were rescued and we were given the tools to help
42:33
Speaker 6: train these dogs, and then afterward they were adopted and
42:38
Speaker 6: we had an adoption rate of some ninety something percent
42:42
Speaker 6: coming out of there, and we trained them in basic
42:44
Speaker 6: pin obedience and it was a really, really great, really
42:47
Speaker 6: positive program. And from there I had gotten into me
42:50
Speaker 6: and another guy, we had been talking about different ideas
42:54
Speaker 6: concerning the judicial system and we'd come across this idea
42:57
Speaker 6: of restorative justice. And after we had studied on it
43:01
Speaker 6: and we've gotten in contact with some restorative justice practitioners,
43:05
Speaker 6: we decided that with our knowledge of this environment in
43:09
Speaker 6: the prison and we knew what was lacking in this environment,
43:13
Speaker 6: we knew some of the things that could help in
43:15
Speaker 6: the rehabilitations of the fellow inmates, we constructed a restorative
43:21
Speaker 6: justice program. We're still in the process of kind of
43:24
Speaker 6: flushing out some of the more detailed aspects of the curriculum.
43:27
Speaker 6: But this is what my passion has been into for
43:30
Speaker 6: the past few years, and I've really been concentrating my
43:32
Speaker 6: efforts into this program. And we have people restored, just
43:36
Speaker 6: practitioners from universities and other organizations to really really like
43:41
Speaker 6: what we have created and they want to help them
43:44
Speaker 6: out a little bit.
43:46
Speaker 5: Well, you know, it's you know what it sounds like
43:47
Speaker 5: to me. It sounds like you're doing more good, like
43:50
Speaker 5: I said, from this hopeless place than most people on
43:53
Speaker 5: the outside can never even dream of doing. And that's
43:56
Speaker 5: you know, that's to your credit, obviously, and it's another
44:00
Speaker 5: reason why it makes sense for you to be granted
44:05
Speaker 5: your freedom after all these years. And if you even
44:08
Speaker 5: allow your mind to go there, what do you want
44:11
Speaker 5: to do? What's your plan?
44:14
Speaker 6: Well, as you hit upon do I even want to
44:16
Speaker 6: go there? I have been reluctant, especially after seven years
44:20
Speaker 6: ago when I was expecting to get out and I
44:24
Speaker 6: was denied that. It was a very crushing blow and
44:29
Speaker 6: it was difficult to endure. But yeah, of course I
44:32
Speaker 6: do allow myself to think about what I'm out of here,
44:36
Speaker 6: although I don't dwell upon it because I just I
44:40
Speaker 6: don't know. I just can't go there for so much.
44:44
Speaker 6: But the more I've gotten into restort justice, the more
44:48
Speaker 6: I think it's an extremely beneficial philosophy and instead of
44:52
Speaker 6: practices to kind of compliment our criminal justice system. And
44:57
Speaker 6: so I really want to pursue that direction, and I
45:00
Speaker 6: think that I can help out. I think I have
45:02
Speaker 6: a lot of school or feel over here, So now
45:06
Speaker 6: it's for being in here for the last twenty two
45:08
Speaker 6: plus year in observing things from the inside, I feel
45:13
Speaker 6: like I have a great perspective to be able to
45:15
Speaker 6: help out in the source.
45:17
Speaker 5: Just that sounds like a great scenario to me, and
45:20
Speaker 5: both have benefits to society across the board. I don't
45:42
Speaker 5: know if you're able to talk about it, but it
45:44
Speaker 5: really struck me earlier when you told me that the
45:46
Speaker 5: prison or your pod is on lockdown. What does that mean?
45:51
Speaker 6: Well, so, where I'm at now, we've been on lockdown
45:55
Speaker 6: the last two weeks, which means we're componed to our
45:59
Speaker 6: concrete box TI and when we're coming out every seventy
46:03
Speaker 6: two hours to take a shower, they bring the food
46:06
Speaker 6: to our door and I say our door because I
46:09
Speaker 6: have a fill partner. Every sales two people for film,
46:14
Speaker 6: and this is how I've been living for the last
46:15
Speaker 6: two weeks, but moreover, it's pretty much how I've been
46:18
Speaker 6: living for the last twenty two years. But when we're
46:21
Speaker 6: not on lockdown, you know, I do have a ploticum
46:24
Speaker 6: of freedoms if you will. You know, every once in
46:27
Speaker 6: a while I can get outside and take fresh air
46:30
Speaker 6: and work out. I've been rolled into a horticulture class
46:34
Speaker 6: and learn about horticulture. I can actually have my fingers
46:37
Speaker 6: and the soil and be able to have the opportunity
46:40
Speaker 6: to plant some feeds and vegetables and so forth. It's
46:43
Speaker 6: really been a positive thing, really really joining the horticulture.
46:47
Speaker 5: And the last question about the prison experience, what is
46:51
Speaker 5: an average day like when you're not on lockdown? You
46:54
Speaker 5: wake up at five or something, How does how do
46:57
Speaker 5: you get through the day?
46:59
Speaker 6: Yeah, so they have what they call count procedures in
47:03
Speaker 6: which they have to come through and literally count every
47:05
Speaker 6: individual while they're locked in the cell, about four times
47:09
Speaker 6: or so every day, spread out throughout the day. And
47:12
Speaker 6: during that time you have to be standing up and
47:15
Speaker 6: your lives have to be on so they can see
47:17
Speaker 6: that you're alive and will and that starts certainly before
47:22
Speaker 6: six o'clock in the morning. So over the last twenty
47:24
Speaker 6: two years, I've been up at five forty five about
47:29
Speaker 6: that time and standing on the feet mid life wrong
47:32
Speaker 6: the fluorescent lights every morning, and that's one of the
47:35
Speaker 6: countsmen like I said, that goes throughout the day, and
47:37
Speaker 6: that kind of segments the day. That in the beating
47:42
Speaker 6: the channel repeating schedule. So the breakfast, unch, and dinner
47:46
Speaker 6: and these kind of condition you and condition one into
47:50
Speaker 6: the segments of the day. And so there's a period
47:53
Speaker 6: in the morning after breakfast, I which if we're lucky,
47:56
Speaker 6: we might get outside the recreation and recreations of a
48:00
Speaker 6: yard as a track. I usually go jogging. If I'm
48:04
Speaker 6: able to, I'll go into the weightlifting area list some
48:07
Speaker 6: weight and they have a couple other recreational things to
48:11
Speaker 6: guys hit around with the volleyball or the basketball. Otherwise,
48:15
Speaker 6: there's not a lot of kind of rehabilitative programs. There
48:20
Speaker 6: are a few, you know, I've been through a lot
48:22
Speaker 6: of those things, but for most guys, I think that
48:25
Speaker 6: you know, this place is more of a warehouse for
48:27
Speaker 6: humans than anything. It's not really designed for as it
48:32
Speaker 6: called correction necessarily, although there has been, you know, steps
48:36
Speaker 6: towards that direction, of the hopeful steps in that direction.
48:40
Speaker 6: You know, I think that the governor has made some
48:42
Speaker 6: steps in that direction with the re entry ideas and
48:45
Speaker 6: so forth. But you know, unfortunately there's largely the prisons
48:50
Speaker 6: are placed with the warehouse humans. So there's only so
48:54
Speaker 6: much a mind too in this environment. And so I
48:57
Speaker 6: do utilize my time studying, you know, I spend my
49:01
Speaker 6: money on the books and there's a library when I can,
49:06
Speaker 6: and so that's kind of how I send my.
49:09
Speaker 5: Well Dusty, all, I can tell you again, I know
49:12
Speaker 5: you know about it, but I hope you can feel it.
49:14
Speaker 5: There's a real wave of support for you among so
49:20
Speaker 5: many people who care and who want to see you
49:24
Speaker 5: or released and able to get on with your life
49:26
Speaker 5: and put this nightmare behind you. And I want to
49:30
Speaker 5: turn it over to you. Typically on wrongful conviction. I
49:34
Speaker 5: like to leave the last word open so that you
49:37
Speaker 5: can share any thoughts you have about anything at all
49:42
Speaker 5: with our audience. I'll turn it over to you, Dusty.
49:46
Speaker 6: Okay, Well, as you mentioned, I do have a lot
49:49
Speaker 6: of very strong supporters out here you Virginia, who are
49:53
Speaker 6: total strangers, some of them gotten to know personally, and
49:58
Speaker 6: they're just break people. I'm very fortunate to have these
50:02
Speaker 6: people in my corner and who have recognized my wrongful prediction.
50:06
Speaker 6: As far as the last words, I'm thankful. I really
50:10
Speaker 6: appreciate mister Bomb for interviewing me. Very thankful that increasingly
50:15
Speaker 6: more people know that I have been wrongfully depicted. And
50:20
Speaker 6: I hope that people, you know, maybe reach out and
50:23
Speaker 6: talk to somebody. The filmmaker named JD. Sleet has created
50:28
Speaker 6: a film called The Target of Opportunity about my case,
50:33
Speaker 6: and I was able to view it one time a
50:35
Speaker 6: few years ago, and I think it encapsulates my situation
50:39
Speaker 6: pretty pretty well. And I just hope that people will
50:42
Speaker 6: take some kind of interest and look into my case.
50:45
Speaker 6: And I know that if anybody does, they will see
50:49
Speaker 6: the travesty and the fact that I've been here for
50:51
Speaker 6: over twenty two years for something I didn't do. I
50:54
Speaker 6: had such a future in front of the military. I
50:58
Speaker 6: love the military, plan to make a career. I want
51:02
Speaker 6: to be in the Philpines and want to be the
51:05
Speaker 6: best still Team operators in the country that I could
51:08
Speaker 6: have been. My world was turned upside down and a
51:11
Speaker 6: lot of so many people over one net brother guy.
51:15
Speaker 6: So many people have been destroyed in Ruin in a
51:18
Speaker 6: Brevin's family and my family, like city, and Billie Brown's family,
51:22
Speaker 6: so many others. But again, I just thank you. I
51:25
Speaker 6: really appreciate opportunities. Back to the interview.
51:28
Speaker 5: So, Dusty, I want to repeat that the name of
51:30
Speaker 5: the film is.
51:32
Speaker 6: The name of the film is Target of Opportunity.
51:34
Speaker 5: Target of Opportunity is the film. I've watched it. I
51:37
Speaker 5: hope other people that are listening now will watch it too.
51:41
Speaker 5: And Dusty, I'm sure people are listening. They want to
51:43
Speaker 5: know how can they get involved? What would you advise?
51:45
Speaker 6: Right? You know, unfortunately I am largely isolated you. I
51:49
Speaker 6: have no Internet accidents. I've never been on the internet.
51:53
Speaker 6: I've never even used the bill phone. However, I think
51:56
Speaker 6: that people could maybe visit. I know that twitters have
52:01
Speaker 6: created a website at Fredusty dot org. And I do
52:04
Speaker 6: know too that there's a Twitter and Instagram account under
52:08
Speaker 6: my name Free Dusty Turner, I think, and I know
52:11
Speaker 6: that it's in a very leaf reaching out there that
52:14
Speaker 6: my supporters would I'm sure to direct folks into the
52:18
Speaker 6: best way that they might be able to help. I
52:20
Speaker 6: know that writing to the governor Governitarry mccallis in Virginia's
52:25
Speaker 6: directly may help out O. Other than that, I'm really
52:29
Speaker 6: not sure what else say about it.
52:31
Speaker 5: Okay, So once again, that's free. Dusty Turner is the
52:35
Speaker 5: Instagram and the Twitter. The movie is Target of Opportunity.
52:40
Speaker 5: Please learn more about this case and get involved. Follow
52:43
Speaker 5: Dusty on social media and there'll be more information there
52:48
Speaker 5: that you can learn how to how to help. And
52:51
Speaker 5: now is the time to do it, because we're really
52:53
Speaker 5: in the home stretch of this, this effort to free
52:57
Speaker 5: Dusty Turner. You have wha we're having Dusty. All I
53:02
Speaker 5: can say is hang in there. We're coming to get you.
53:07
Speaker 5: Thank you Dusty for being on the show, and I'll
53:12
Speaker 5: look forward to seeing you on the outside, hopefully sometime
53:17
Speaker 5: very soon. You've been listening to a very special episode
53:21
Speaker 5: of Wrongful Conviction Behind Bars with Dusty Turner. Dusty, thanks again, Thank.
53:27
Speaker 6: You sir, Thank you for using GTL.
53:38
Speaker 5: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen
53:41
Speaker 5: to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one
53:44
Speaker 5: week early and ad free by subscribing to Lava for
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Speaker 5: Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I want to thank our
53:49
Speaker 5: production team Connor Hall and Kathleen Fink, as well as
53:53
Speaker 5: my fellow executive producers Jeff Kempler, Kevin Wartis, and Jeff Kleiber.
53:57
Speaker 5: The music in this production was supplied by three time
53:59
Speaker 5: OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us
54:02
Speaker 5: across all social media platforms at Lava for Good and
54:05
Speaker 5: at Wrongful Conviction. You can also follow me on Instagram
54:08
Speaker 5: at It's Jason Flamm. Wrongful Conviction is a production of
54:11
Speaker 5: Lava for Good Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number One.
54:15
Speaker 1: We have worked hard to ensure that all facts reported
54:17
Speaker 1: in this show are accurate. The views and opinions expressed
54:20
Speaker 1: by the individuals featured in this show are their own
54:22
Speaker 1: and do not necessarily reflect those of Lava for Good.