Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #420 Maggie Freleng with Wilson Rivera

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#420 Maggie Freleng with Wilson Rivera · Wrongful Conviction

0:05
Speaker 1: In September of nineteen ninety three, Wilson Rivera and his
0:09
Speaker 1: friend Roger Murfick were lying in wait to rub a
0:12
Speaker 1: pizza delivery driver in South Detroit. They'd been tipped off
0:15
Speaker 1: that the pizza guy was carrying a couple thousand dollars
0:19
Speaker 1: in drug money, but the payoff was less than they expected,
0:23
Speaker 1: only a few hundred dollars. A few nights later, two
0:27
Speaker 1: masked gunmen burst into a nearby house. Twenty year old
0:31
Speaker 1: Doug Williams and his mother, Lavanda were both shot and killed.
0:35
Speaker 1: The investigator's theory was that Doug had known about the
0:39
Speaker 1: robbery and was killed to keep him from snitching. The
0:42
Speaker 1: police wasted no time in rounding up some local gang
0:46
Speaker 1: members for questioning, including Wilson Rivera.
0:50
Speaker 2: They are risk me at my house. I'm under the
0:52
Speaker 2: assumption that they're looking for me for the robbery, and
0:55
Speaker 2: so when they take me to homicide, I'm thinking that
0:58
Speaker 2: this is a trick that they're playing on me, so
1:00
Speaker 2: that I could go ahead and admit to the robbery.
1:04
Speaker 1: Wilson had a solid alibi for that night, but one
1:07
Speaker 1: by one, the other suspects were dropped from the investigation.
1:11
Speaker 1: By the time Wilson went to trial, he was the
1:14
Speaker 1: only one left.
1:16
Speaker 2: My name is Wilson Rivera and for the last thirty
1:20
Speaker 2: years I've been seven times for crima. Did not commit from.
1:24
Speaker 1: Lava for good. This is wrongful conviction with Maggie Freeling
1:28
Speaker 1: today Wilson Rivera. Wilson Rivera was born in nineteen seventy
1:47
Speaker 1: four in southwest Detroit.
1:50
Speaker 2: My whole family's porter. My mother was born in Chicago,
1:56
Speaker 2: but my father I was born in Puerto Rico, so
2:00
Speaker 2: we have family on both sides of the ocean, if
2:02
Speaker 2: you will. I spent most of my time as a
2:07
Speaker 2: teenager in Detroit, but I was raised in Puerto Rico.
2:10
Speaker 2: My mother tells me that as a child, she said,
2:14
Speaker 2: I was I was a pretty lively individu you. As
2:16
Speaker 2: a child, I'm animated, hyper to a degree. Always, she said.
2:21
Speaker 2: I always always smiled.
2:23
Speaker 1: But the family had its troubles. Both of Wilson's parents
2:27
Speaker 1: struggled with substance abuse.
2:31
Speaker 2: My father was an alcoholic. He was as far as
2:33
Speaker 2: I could remember images, I could see my father being
2:36
Speaker 2: a man abuser, getting in domestical youth. My mother ended
2:40
Speaker 2: up engaging drugs, drinking, and so her life at that
2:44
Speaker 2: time she did. My mother had a lot of personal
2:46
Speaker 2: issues and personal demons that she was struggling against that
2:50
Speaker 2: she never could deal with at the time, so her
2:52
Speaker 2: life was spiraling out of control.
2:55
Speaker 1: Wilson's parents separated, and his father ended up moving back
2:59
Speaker 1: to Puerto Rico. His mother did her best to care
3:02
Speaker 1: for Wilson and his brother Antonio.
3:05
Speaker 2: My mother did struggle at the time, but she may
3:08
Speaker 2: do with what we had. I don't remember going hungry,
3:10
Speaker 2: and we always have something to eat, whether it was
3:13
Speaker 2: some wig or food stamps or focus home. I can
3:18
Speaker 2: honestly said that we became somewhat of introverts, Me and
3:21
Speaker 2: my brother. We could depend on each other, but that
3:23
Speaker 2: was about it only because throughout our childhood it was
3:27
Speaker 2: always me and hid that were together, Me and my
3:28
Speaker 2: older brother. It's alway about one year Antonio.
3:32
Speaker 1: For most of his childhood, Wilson went back and forth
3:34
Speaker 1: between their mother and Detroit and their father in Puerto Rico.
3:39
Speaker 1: In nineteen eighty four, when he was ten, they moved
3:42
Speaker 1: back to Detroit, but he struggled in school.
3:47
Speaker 2: I had the language barrier. We didn't really speak English.
3:51
Speaker 2: They placed us in bilingual classes where basically we were
3:54
Speaker 2: just put in a classroom and as far as I
3:57
Speaker 2: can remember, just left there. That you become kind of
4:00
Speaker 2: like ostracized, and I began to resent school. I was
4:03
Speaker 2: constantly getting to fight in school and get in trouble.
4:06
Speaker 1: The trouble continued through his teens.
4:10
Speaker 2: I used to be a member. We were through a
4:12
Speaker 2: local street gang, Camel Boys Incorporated CBI, and consequently we
4:16
Speaker 2: was involved in a lot of mischievous behavior as in
4:19
Speaker 2: the neighborhood, and I started getting trouble shoplifting and things
4:25
Speaker 2: of that nature at the time and skipping out of school.
4:30
Speaker 1: But soon the neighborhood mischief was escalating into something else.
4:37
Speaker 2: About nineteen eighty seven, Southwest Detroit began to receive the
4:41
Speaker 2: influx of national gangs. There were two or three primary
4:45
Speaker 2: gags for Chicago who ended up coming to Southwest Detroit
4:49
Speaker 2: and they began to recruit individuals and what ends up
4:53
Speaker 2: happening local street gangs in the neighborhood. We all bended
4:56
Speaker 2: us one together and where we were constantly fighting with
4:59
Speaker 2: these the gangs.
5:01
Speaker 1: In nineteen ninety, when Wilson was sixteen, one of his
5:05
Speaker 1: friends was shot in the face by a member of
5:07
Speaker 1: a rival gang. This led to an incident that would
5:11
Speaker 1: end up having deep repercussions for Wilson.
5:15
Speaker 2: Basically, one of my other friends went and got a weapon,
5:18
Speaker 2: a shotgun, and brought me the shotgun and I opened
5:22
Speaker 2: fire at the rival gang, and as I fled the scene,
5:27
Speaker 2: I came face to face with a member of the
5:30
Speaker 2: Detroit Police. I pulled the webinarut and as I pulled
5:34
Speaker 2: the webin out, I hope discharged it and it didn't
5:37
Speaker 2: hit him. Later on the following day, I was arrested
5:41
Speaker 2: and eventually I pled guilty to the offense.
5:46
Speaker 1: He was charged with attempt to commit bodily harm on
5:49
Speaker 1: a police officer.
5:50
Speaker 2: That's what I want you to do, w I'm for.
5:56
Speaker 1: Wilson spent over two years at the Maxie Boys Training School,
6:00
Speaker 1: a juvenile correction facility about an hour outside of Detroit,
6:05
Speaker 1: and when he was released in nineteen ninety three, he
6:08
Speaker 1: still hadn't graduated high school, but he did manage to
6:12
Speaker 1: find a job in a factory.
6:14
Speaker 2: At the time I was working, but then I had
6:16
Speaker 2: suffered a hand injury or gusha wound where I couldn't
6:19
Speaker 2: really use my hand and keep up with the production.
6:22
Speaker 2: So instead of being fired I quit the job, and
6:25
Speaker 2: the way that I will survive it would be either
6:27
Speaker 2: petty hustle or I will engage in small and I'm
6:31
Speaker 2: not minimizing it, but it was what we would consider
6:34
Speaker 2: small robberies in the neighborhood, and it would be dope
6:36
Speaker 2: dealers or things of the source.
6:40
Speaker 1: Wilson got by on the petty crimes and was still
6:43
Speaker 1: running with the Camel Boys, but when he was around nineteen,
6:46
Speaker 1: his girlfriend told him some news that made him want
6:49
Speaker 1: to change his lifestyle.
6:51
Speaker 2: I was excited when I found out that Sho was pregnant.
6:55
Speaker 2: I wasn't I wouldn't say I was scared, but I
6:57
Speaker 2: knew that I want to make like a shift in
7:02
Speaker 2: my life. I wanted to be a person for my daughters, and.
7:05
Speaker 1: To Wilson, that meant leaving gang life behind, but he
7:09
Speaker 1: found that was easier said than done.
7:12
Speaker 2: I had started applying for jobs. I wanted to try
7:16
Speaker 2: to see if I could get back in the old
7:17
Speaker 2: factory where I was working at, but maybe in a
7:19
Speaker 2: different position where it then requires for me to work
7:22
Speaker 2: in the machines that I had to be working on before. Unfortunately,
7:25
Speaker 2: though I still live in the same environment. Though the
7:27
Speaker 2: neighborhood where I lived at, like my house was smacked.
7:31
Speaker 2: It in the middle of basically all the rival gangs
7:36
Speaker 2: that I was in fights with, So there was one
7:39
Speaker 2: of them things where it was kind of constantly going
7:41
Speaker 2: back and forth.
7:43
Speaker 1: Wilson was living in the neighborhood, spending his nights at
7:45
Speaker 1: his girlfriend's house and leaving early in the morning to
7:48
Speaker 1: try and avoid the other gangs.
7:51
Speaker 2: I figured that me going home in the mornings would
7:53
Speaker 2: be a lot safer as opposed to you know, coming
7:56
Speaker 2: home at midnight or late at night time because said
8:00
Speaker 2: by that company rival gangs, because he that you're home.
8:04
Speaker 1: Wilson had decided to give up the petty crime in
8:06
Speaker 1: gang life, but he hadn't found a job yet and
8:09
Speaker 1: he was still involved with the same crowd. One of
8:12
Speaker 1: his friends, kal Matta, was in a gang called the
8:14
Speaker 1: cash Flow Posse, a gang that the Camel Boys had
8:17
Speaker 1: an alliance with. Cal also worked at a local pizza shop,
8:22
Speaker 1: and one day Cal approached Wilson and his friend Roger
8:25
Speaker 1: Murfk with a scheme to make some easy money.
8:29
Speaker 2: What he had informed those was that there was a
8:31
Speaker 2: guy that was delivering pizzas, but he was doing so
8:35
Speaker 2: while at the same time challenge drugs, we were led
8:38
Speaker 2: to believe that this person had at least two thousand
8:41
Speaker 2: dollars from drug proceeds on himself.
8:47
Speaker 1: On September twelfth, nineteen ninety three, Wilson and Roger were
8:51
Speaker 1: armed and waiting to rob the pizza guy along his route,
8:54
Speaker 1: but he was taking longer than they expected, so they
8:57
Speaker 1: thought they might have missed him. Roger knew a guy
9:00
Speaker 1: named Douglas Williams who lived across the street, and he
9:03
Speaker 1: went over to Doug's house to ask if he could
9:05
Speaker 1: use the phone.
9:08
Speaker 2: Eventually, the piece that every guy comes and we robbed
9:12
Speaker 2: the guy and he didn't have no two thousand dollars.
9:16
Speaker 2: He didn't have eight hundred dollars. The individual actually only
9:19
Speaker 2: had four hundred dollars. So when Kel comes to the
9:21
Speaker 2: apartment after he gets out of work at ten o'clock
9:24
Speaker 2: and he asked for his portion of the money, I
9:27
Speaker 2: told him he wasn't going to get the money because
9:29
Speaker 2: he lied about what the guy had, and so we
9:31
Speaker 2: fell out over there.
9:34
Speaker 1: And that should have been that robbery and a small
9:36
Speaker 1: argument over a few hundred dollars, but it wasn't. Twenty
9:41
Speaker 1: year old Douglas Williams lived with his parents, Lavanda and
9:44
Speaker 1: Daniel Brown, and three days after the pizza man was robbed,
9:48
Speaker 1: two men burst into their house wearing ski masks. One
9:52
Speaker 1: of the intruders shot and killed both Doug and Lavanda,
9:56
Speaker 1: but Daniel, Doug's father survived. He talked with police shortly afterwards.
10:02
Speaker 1: Daniel told them that Doug had known about the armed
10:04
Speaker 1: robbery from a few days before.
10:09
Speaker 3: Daniel Brown said that his son Doug had told him
10:13
Speaker 3: that Wilson Rivera and Roger Murfick were the two individuals
10:17
Speaker 3: involved in that armed robbery.
10:20
Speaker 1: This is Wilson's post conviction attorney, Rachel Wolfe.
10:23
Speaker 3: There was plenty there for the prosecution to latch onto
10:26
Speaker 3: and for the police to investigate, because they knew exactly
10:29
Speaker 3: who Roger Murfick and Wilson Rivera were at the time.
10:33
Speaker 1: And one member of the Detroit Police Department, Officer Gerald Packard,
10:37
Speaker 1: had his own reasons for focusing on Wilson. The officer
10:41
Speaker 1: that Wilson had shot at back when he was sixteen.
10:44
Speaker 1: Officer Ayala was Packard's partner.
10:48
Speaker 3: So Officer Packard knew Wilson. He knew that he had
10:52
Speaker 3: gotten what I imagine Packard would assume is a short
10:56
Speaker 3: sentence for something like that. He is not on the
11:01
Speaker 3: homicide team. He was not part of the homicide investigation,
11:07
Speaker 3: but he was the one when he heard that Roger
11:10
Speaker 3: and Wilson were potentially suspects. He was the one that
11:14
Speaker 3: went to Wilson's apartment knocking on the door, and then ultimately,
11:19
Speaker 3: once the warrant was obtained, just busted right in to
11:23
Speaker 3: the apartment.
11:25
Speaker 2: And when they arrest me at my house, I'm under
11:28
Speaker 2: the assumption that they're looking for me for the robbery.
11:30
Speaker 2: And so when they take me, the homicide Sergeant Morell
11:34
Speaker 2: tells me that he's arrested me for murder. I'm thinking
11:36
Speaker 2: that this is a trick that they're playing on me
11:38
Speaker 2: so that I could go ahead and admit to the robbery.
11:42
Speaker 1: But Wilson knew nothing about the homicide. The night of
11:45
Speaker 1: the shooting, he had been with his girlfriend and her
11:48
Speaker 1: mother at their house. He didn't learn about the shooting
11:50
Speaker 1: until the next day, when he found out that Roger
11:53
Speaker 1: had also been arrested.
11:57
Speaker 2: I've seen Roger aside, and when they put him in
12:01
Speaker 2: a bulkin, and that's when I asked Rogers like what's
12:05
Speaker 2: going on, and he explained to me what had actually
12:08
Speaker 2: taken place with the murder with the ham size. Now again,
12:12
Speaker 2: I'm operating under this concept of loads that we have
12:16
Speaker 2: within the gang, right, so I'm not going to say nothing.
12:20
Speaker 2: They're not going to say nothing, you know, and we
12:22
Speaker 2: just take it out and see what happens. In my mind,
12:24
Speaker 2: I'm assuming that eventually the facts are going to bear
12:27
Speaker 2: me out. Since I don't have nothing to do with it,
12:29
Speaker 2: it's just a matter of time before I'm clear. Unfortunately,
12:34
Speaker 2: if we could see, that's not where I ended up
12:35
Speaker 2: taking place.
12:47
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling.
12:51
Speaker 1: You can listen to this and all the Lava for
12:53
Speaker 1: Good podcasts one week early and ad free by subscribing
12:57
Speaker 1: to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Pods cast. In
13:10
Speaker 1: the aftermath of the shooting, the Detroit homicide squad, headed
13:13
Speaker 1: up by Officer Carrie Russell, rounded up a number of
13:17
Speaker 1: local gang members and charged them with the murders. One
13:20
Speaker 1: of the first to be arrested with cal Mata.
13:24
Speaker 3: They knew they were looking for Wilson and Roger. They
13:27
Speaker 3: went to this house that was a known location for
13:32
Speaker 3: both the cash Flow Posse gang and the Camel Boys Gang,
13:35
Speaker 3: so they they came in, they arrested Cal. At that time,
13:40
Speaker 3: he was the only person in that apartment with a
13:43
Speaker 3: number of firearms. They also found a ski mask and
13:47
Speaker 3: a jacket inside of that apartment that they ultimately seized
13:50
Speaker 3: and ended up admitting at trial as well.
13:54
Speaker 1: While in custody, Cal told Officer Packard that he had
13:58
Speaker 1: heard Wilson and Roger talking about Doug Williams calling him
14:02
Speaker 1: a snitch. Cal took that to me and they were
14:04
Speaker 1: going to take steps to make sure Doug couldn't report
14:07
Speaker 1: them for the robbery. The police also brought in a
14:10
Speaker 1: couple of other gang members for questioning, Armando Campos and
14:14
Speaker 1: Ephram Garcia. Both of them were in the cash Flow
14:17
Speaker 1: Posse and according to Wilson, Ephram was trying to climb
14:21
Speaker 1: the ranks in the gang.
14:23
Speaker 2: The way that the gang was operating was that in
14:26
Speaker 2: order for an individual to move up in the ranks,
14:29
Speaker 2: right to either become an enforcer or treasurer or whatever
14:33
Speaker 2: other upper echeline in the gang, what they would have
14:36
Speaker 2: to do is they would have to what we call
14:38
Speaker 2: back then put in work, you know, whether it be
14:41
Speaker 2: if you rob somebody, if you shout somebody, he jumped
14:44
Speaker 2: somebody in the schools and all that. The reputation of that,
14:47
Speaker 2: whatever you do, goes to the gang. So in order
14:49
Speaker 2: for Ethom to move up in the ranks in his gang,
14:53
Speaker 2: he wanted to put in the work, and in.
14:55
Speaker 1: This case, the work was to keep Doug Williams from
14:59
Speaker 1: snitching a about the pizza robbery. Wilson says that that
15:03
Speaker 1: day at the jail, Roger told him exactly how it
15:06
Speaker 1: had gone down.
15:08
Speaker 2: And so Roger and Etham go to the house where
15:11
Speaker 2: the witness of the robbery was and Ethel kicks down
15:13
Speaker 2: the door and opens fire and hits Dug, and then
15:17
Speaker 2: Roger comes from the other side and hits Doug. And
15:20
Speaker 2: then as Doug's mother attempts to flee that the residence,
15:25
Speaker 2: Roger opens fire on him and he hits her as well.
15:32
Speaker 1: After what Roger told him, Wilson was confident that the
15:36
Speaker 1: truth would come out and he'd be released. But Roger
15:39
Speaker 1: never confessed to anyone else, and the homicide team continued
15:43
Speaker 1: to question.
15:44
Speaker 2: Wilson, and I told him exactly where I was at.
15:47
Speaker 2: To him, I was spending the night with my daughter's
15:49
Speaker 2: mother and she was at the time twenty half months pregnant.
15:52
Speaker 2: In my mind, I know where I was at. So
15:54
Speaker 2: I gave him to Alibi and gave him everything where
15:56
Speaker 2: I was, that and everything. And my expectation was that
15:59
Speaker 2: they were talk through my daughter's mother, but that never
16:02
Speaker 2: took place.
16:05
Speaker 1: When Armando compost was questioned, he told police that the
16:08
Speaker 1: day after the homicide, Roger had turned up at his
16:11
Speaker 1: house desperate for money.
16:14
Speaker 3: Roger red, I just smoked someone. I just smoked someone.
16:19
Speaker 3: I need as much money as possible. I got to
16:21
Speaker 3: get out of town. And then, when questioned a little further,
16:25
Speaker 3: Armando also said, yeah, he mentioned Wilson too. He mentioned
16:29
Speaker 3: Wilson was there too.
16:31
Speaker 1: Wilson and Roger were now the primary suspects, and both
16:35
Speaker 1: were charged with the murders. In September of nineteen ninety three,
16:39
Speaker 1: a joint preliminary hearing was held, at which cal and
16:42
Speaker 1: Armando testified. Both repeated what they had told police, but
16:47
Speaker 1: when Roger Murphick went to trial in April of nineteen
16:50
Speaker 1: ninety four, Armando changed his story.
16:54
Speaker 3: Armando recanted everything he had said at the preliminary examination.
16:58
Speaker 3: He said, no, I never made those statements. The only
17:02
Speaker 3: reason that I made those statements is because I was arrested.
17:06
Speaker 3: You know, I was charged. I was threatened by the police.
17:09
Speaker 3: I said exactly what they wanted me to say. Roger,
17:12
Speaker 3: of course, was acquitted of all of the.
17:14
Speaker 1: Charges, but Wilson remained in jail. He went to trial
17:19
Speaker 1: a few months later on September sixth, nineteen ninety four.
17:23
Speaker 1: The judge was Helen Brown and the prosecutor was Lisa Lindsay.
17:27
Speaker 1: As far as physical evidence, there wasn't much for the
17:30
Speaker 1: state to present.
17:32
Speaker 3: We don't have fingerprints, They didn't fingerprint the shell casings
17:36
Speaker 3: or anything in the house at the time. Obviously there's
17:39
Speaker 3: no DNA or anything like that. It was a really
17:41
Speaker 3: quick homicide.
17:43
Speaker 1: Officer Packard and the homicide squad had searched Wilson's home
17:47
Speaker 1: the day they arrested him.
17:49
Speaker 3: And they find two firearms and two ski masks, one
17:54
Speaker 3: of which was black or dark blue in color. The
17:58
Speaker 3: other one was a multicolored. Those guns were tested against
18:01
Speaker 3: some of the shell casings that were recovered in the house,
18:04
Speaker 3: and the there was a bullet I believe recovered from
18:08
Speaker 3: Doug's body during the autopsy, and there wasn't a match
18:12
Speaker 3: so conclusively neither of the weapons found in Wilson's home
18:16
Speaker 3: were involved in the homicide. They were allowed, however, to
18:20
Speaker 3: admit them at trial, along with a bunch of ammunition
18:23
Speaker 3: that they found in Wilson's home, none of which was
18:26
Speaker 3: the right caliber to be involved in the homicide either.
18:29
Speaker 1: But they presented it as if it could be.
18:32
Speaker 3: They sure did. Yeah, they presented all of that to
18:34
Speaker 3: the jury.
18:36
Speaker 1: The state relied heavily on police and witness testimony to
18:39
Speaker 1: make their case, but there wasn't much of that either.
18:43
Speaker 3: Daniel Brown testified to the armed robbery and named these
18:48
Speaker 3: two co defendants as perpetrators of that armed robbery, and
18:52
Speaker 3: then they also had testimony from one other witness, kal Matta.
18:58
Speaker 1: Cal repeated the statement he had given the police that
19:00
Speaker 1: he had heard Wilson and Roger talking about getting rid
19:02
Speaker 1: of Doug Williams, and that was about it for the
19:06
Speaker 1: prosecution's case.
19:08
Speaker 2: The officer in charge of the case, you know who,
19:11
Speaker 2: was basically the one that was responsible for taking other
19:13
Speaker 2: testimonies from all these witnesses and all that she felt
19:16
Speaker 2: to shored up for my trial, even though she knew
19:17
Speaker 2: my trouble set for that day, and so all of
19:20
Speaker 2: these things that was taken place, I'm looking at what
19:23
Speaker 2: was going on. I was like, yeah, at least in
19:25
Speaker 2: my mind, I was hoping that the judge was going
19:28
Speaker 2: to say, you know, I'm going to interfere in this
19:30
Speaker 2: thing here and I'm going to dismiss it for the
19:32
Speaker 2: lack of evidence, and because of what was going on
19:34
Speaker 2: with the prosecute fell to produce their witnesses.
19:38
Speaker 1: And not only that, Wilson had an alibi. Remember on
19:42
Speaker 1: the night of the murders, he'd been with his girlfriend,
19:45
Speaker 1: but she never testified at trial, and surprisingly Armando Compos
19:50
Speaker 1: did not appear either.
19:56
Speaker 2: So when my attorney at the time, mister Griffin, asked
19:59
Speaker 2: to I have a due diligence hearing as to why
20:04
Speaker 2: Armando has not shown up to testify, we find out
20:07
Speaker 2: that the prosecutor at the time has failed to subpoena
20:11
Speaker 2: Armando and so he never showed up to testify because
20:14
Speaker 2: he never knew.
20:16
Speaker 3: I think ultimately it's entirely possible that Roger was acquitted
20:20
Speaker 3: and Wilson was convicted because of the absence of Armando
20:25
Speaker 3: Compos's testimony.
20:27
Speaker 1: On September ninth of nineteen ninety four, the jury found
20:30
Speaker 1: Wilson Rivera guilty of the premeditated murders of Donald Williams
20:34
Speaker 1: and Lavanda Brown. He was sentenced to life in prison
20:38
Speaker 1: without the possibility of parole.
20:59
Speaker 2: After I came to prey sat within the first year,
21:01
Speaker 2: I winned for an enimy to get into a fight
21:03
Speaker 2: and he got stamped. Eventually he died understad one and
21:09
Speaker 2: he basically laid out, and so they locked us down,
21:14
Speaker 2: and I told myself, Yeah, that's not going to happen
21:16
Speaker 2: to me, you know. So I went into hope defensive postering,
21:21
Speaker 2: and any issue that I had, I either was going
21:24
Speaker 2: to get into a fight. I wasn't going to wait
21:25
Speaker 2: for anybody to stab me to try to kill me
21:27
Speaker 2: in prison. And so what I ended up doing I
21:30
Speaker 2: started acting O first, so if I felt that we
21:33
Speaker 2: had an issue, I would act first. And I actually
21:36
Speaker 2: caught a couple of assault tickets in prison. I spent
21:39
Speaker 2: several years in mechimum security, several years, and the whole
21:44
Speaker 2: you know, I didn't care much about where I was
21:46
Speaker 2: at in prison at that time, you know, and had
21:49
Speaker 2: just turned twenty and being sentenced to life without parole,
21:53
Speaker 2: and the only thing that kind of set me to
21:55
Speaker 2: a degree. Balanced out was that I was I wanted
21:58
Speaker 2: to see my daughter.
22:00
Speaker 1: While Wilson was in jail awaiting trial, his daughter, Sierra
22:03
Speaker 1: was born.
22:05
Speaker 2: The first time that I got a chance to see
22:07
Speaker 2: her was actually doing my sentencing. So the time that
22:10
Speaker 2: I'm being sentenced to life without parole, I'm actually paying
22:13
Speaker 2: more so attention to my daughter, who basically was just
22:16
Speaker 2: a few months old at the time.
22:17
Speaker 4: You know, he's been in prison my whole life. So
22:20
Speaker 4: what I do know is from the relationship we formed
22:22
Speaker 4: with him being in prison.
22:24
Speaker 1: This is Wilson's daughter, Sierra Ramirez.
22:31
Speaker 4: He's funny, he's intelligent, and I are a lot of like,
22:35
Speaker 4: very talkative. He's an encourager. You know, it's only fifteen
22:40
Speaker 4: minute phone calls at a time, but I feel pretty
22:42
Speaker 4: open when I talk with him.
22:46
Speaker 1: What was that like, growing up only knowing your father
22:50
Speaker 1: from prison from visiting rooms.
22:52
Speaker 4: I guess for me, it was a norm. I didn't
22:54
Speaker 4: see it as anything weird because it was all I knew, basically,
22:58
Speaker 4: you know, when I started getting old and going to
23:00
Speaker 4: my friend's house and I'm like, oh, okay, this is
23:03
Speaker 4: a little bit different. You know, there's there's a different
23:06
Speaker 4: dynamic that comes from having.
23:07
Speaker 3: Your dad in your life.
23:09
Speaker 4: And I had him to an extent, but not fully.
23:12
Speaker 4: And now as an adult, when I look back, I
23:14
Speaker 4: see how that impacted me just as a woman, as
23:17
Speaker 4: a girl growing up, you know, as a white how
23:20
Speaker 4: it impacted me.
23:21
Speaker 1: Did you ever feel angry or resentful towards your dad.
23:26
Speaker 4: I did feel some anger with him when I was younger.
23:28
Speaker 4: I felt very abandoned and I did tell him I
23:31
Speaker 4: was angry at him and felt like he made the
23:34
Speaker 4: choice to leave me no, and I was coming. He
23:37
Speaker 4: was very receptive, you know, he apologized, and he's definitely
23:41
Speaker 4: done what he can as a father to his best
23:44
Speaker 4: of his ability. You know, whether when I was young,
23:47
Speaker 4: he would send me, you know, we're Hispanic. He would
23:49
Speaker 4: send me tapes to learn Spanish, and he would send
23:51
Speaker 4: me these books and make me bracelets and stuff like that.
23:54
Speaker 4: He's always caught. I've always seen him. He's always sent cards.
23:57
Speaker 4: He's definitely done what he can. I give that to
24:00
Speaker 4: him for sure.
24:06
Speaker 1: Soon after his conviction, Wilson's attorney filed a direct appeal
24:09
Speaker 1: based on prosecutorial misconduct and the improper admission of the
24:14
Speaker 1: firearms founded his house, which had been found to be
24:17
Speaker 1: not connected to the murders. The courts denied the appeal,
24:22
Speaker 1: and Wilson knew that if he wanted to get out
24:24
Speaker 1: of prison, he would have to dedicate all of his
24:27
Speaker 1: time and resources to proving his innocence.
24:31
Speaker 2: After about seventeen years in prison, of going to all
24:34
Speaker 2: these up and downs and the disappointment was the case,
24:37
Speaker 2: I started investing more time in the pace and I
24:40
Speaker 2: started working, saving my money that I learned for my
24:44
Speaker 2: prison detail and basically I will try to hire my
24:48
Speaker 2: private investigators to try to find the information that I
24:51
Speaker 2: needed to prove my innocence. I decided to start studying
24:55
Speaker 2: the law myself, and eventually I got trained as a
24:58
Speaker 2: legal writer or a prison pail. And I did this
25:02
Speaker 2: shit in two thousand and ten.
25:05
Speaker 1: Then in twenty eighteen, Rachel Wolf began working on Wilson's case.
25:10
Speaker 3: It was funny when Wilson and I first met, he
25:13
Speaker 3: was worried about me because I was young, and because
25:17
Speaker 3: I and he said, this is a quote sound like
25:20
Speaker 3: a Republican. So I had to I had to assure
25:24
Speaker 3: him that that wasn't going to be an issue. So
25:27
Speaker 3: when I first went to meet him. I didn't know
25:30
Speaker 3: what to expect, but we clicked right away.
25:33
Speaker 1: Initially, Rachel was skeptical about the strength of Wilson's argument.
25:37
Speaker 3: You know, how are we going to prove this case
25:40
Speaker 3: there is a motive? And people find that very, very convincing.
25:44
Speaker 3: So regardless of the strength of the evidence as it exists,
25:48
Speaker 3: or the existence of other possible suspects, which there are,
25:51
Speaker 3: it's easy for people to latch onto and easy for
25:54
Speaker 3: them to say, well, of course he did it. He
25:56
Speaker 3: had a reason to do it, you know, without looking
26:00
Speaker 3: at any closer at the case.
26:02
Speaker 1: So what convinced you of his innocence or what made
26:05
Speaker 1: you want to keep digging?
26:08
Speaker 3: When I started talking to people, and especially like the
26:12
Speaker 3: leaders of the cash Flow posse and some other members
26:15
Speaker 3: of you know, some other people who were involved in
26:18
Speaker 3: the gang activity at that time, I started just getting
26:20
Speaker 3: some information that did not jive with the prosecutor's theory.
26:29
Speaker 1: For one thing, remember ephrom Garcia. He was arrested in
26:33
Speaker 1: the DPD roundup along with Roger Murfik, and Roger had
26:36
Speaker 1: told Wilson straight out that he and Ephram had done
26:40
Speaker 1: the killings, But somehow Ephram was dropped from the case
26:43
Speaker 1: early on.
26:46
Speaker 3: We didn't know at the time. They subjected e from
26:49
Speaker 3: Garcia two way polygraph and he failed it, but they
26:53
Speaker 3: didn't disclose it to Wilson's defense counsel. He didn't know
26:56
Speaker 3: about it at the time of trial. We discovered that
26:59
Speaker 3: much later, and that's you know, part of the basis
27:02
Speaker 3: from my legal challenge to his case is that he
27:04
Speaker 3: should have had this evidence. There was this suspect, and
27:07
Speaker 3: we know that e from Garcia was released after that.
27:10
Speaker 3: He wasn't investigated for involvement in this homicide any further
27:14
Speaker 3: by the Detroit Police Department. They started looking for Roger
27:19
Speaker 3: and Wilson, and I don't think they were going to
27:21
Speaker 3: change their minds at any point. Yeah, from the description
27:25
Speaker 3: he was there, he failed as Polly, but they did.
27:27
Speaker 3: They wanted Roger and they wanted Wilson.
27:31
Speaker 1: Officer Packard especially wanted Wilson. He hadn't forgotten it was
27:36
Speaker 1: Wilson who had shot at his partner, Officer Ayala.
27:40
Speaker 3: He was I think central to this case and maybe
27:44
Speaker 3: maybe you know, part of the reason they didn't investigate
27:48
Speaker 3: e from any further or any other possible suspects. Ephrom
27:52
Speaker 3: Garcia was indicted for the exact same homicide five years later.
27:57
Speaker 3: He never actually ended up with that homicide conviction. He's
28:00
Speaker 3: incarcerated now for several additional homicides.
28:03
Speaker 1: They've also uncovered previously undisclosed information about Cal's testimony.
28:08
Speaker 3: Cal was on probation, and he also was found and
28:12
Speaker 3: arrested with guns and drugs in a known gang location.
28:19
Speaker 3: His probation was dismissed very shortly after Wilson's trial and sentencing,
28:27
Speaker 3: and he was never charged. He was initially actually charged
28:31
Speaker 3: with the homicide, and then ultimately they dismissed that, and
28:35
Speaker 3: then they never even charged him with any of the
28:38
Speaker 3: other offenses.
28:40
Speaker 1: Then there's the matter of proving Wilson's alibi.
28:44
Speaker 3: So he had his girlfriend at the time. He was
28:49
Speaker 3: with her at her mother's house. He stayed the night there,
28:53
Speaker 3: i think until early in the morning, early morning hours,
28:56
Speaker 3: We're talking like two am, three am.
28:58
Speaker 1: Wilson's girlfriend never testified to this at trial. When Rachel
29:02
Speaker 1: interviewed her, she found out why because she was scared.
29:07
Speaker 3: She says an individual in a suit approached her in
29:10
Speaker 3: the hallway outside of the courtroom and said, look, we're
29:14
Speaker 3: holding your brother. He's currently facing these additioninal charges. If
29:17
Speaker 3: you go in there and testify, you know, we're going
29:19
Speaker 3: to reconsider the severity of the charges in the possible
29:23
Speaker 3: sentence against your brother. And so she was too afraid
29:27
Speaker 3: to testify, and I think her testimony probably would have
29:30
Speaker 3: made a difference.
29:36
Speaker 1: Rachel says she's spoken with other potential witnesses from the neighborhood.
29:40
Speaker 1: People will have knowledge of what actually happened, but they
29:44
Speaker 1: have similar reasons for not coming forward.
29:47
Speaker 3: They're all afraid of the police. They're all afraid of
29:50
Speaker 3: the prosecutor and of coming into court, just because I
29:53
Speaker 3: think that's what their lived experience has taught them to fear.
29:59
Speaker 3: They are hesitant to come into court. And that's made
30:03
Speaker 3: the investigation of this case a little more difficult as well,
30:06
Speaker 3: is that I have witnesses who were willing to provide
30:09
Speaker 3: me with information that are not willing to come in
30:13
Speaker 3: and testify in court. They're not willing to talk to
30:16
Speaker 3: the prosecutor's conviction integrity unit. They're just not going to
30:19
Speaker 3: do that.
30:20
Speaker 1: That's so interesting. They're more scared of the law enforcement
30:25
Speaker 1: than they are of snitching and being a snitch on
30:28
Speaker 1: the street.
30:29
Speaker 3: Yeah, at least that's what they're telling me.
30:32
Speaker 1: According to Rachel, all of this is tied in with
30:34
Speaker 1: the culture in the Detroit Police Department at the time.
30:38
Speaker 1: People in the community had little reason to trust the
30:41
Speaker 1: cops and plenty of reason to fear them.
30:45
Speaker 3: They had this practice, they called it witness roundups. You're
30:48
Speaker 3: not supposed to arrest somebody without probable cause. But what
30:52
Speaker 3: they would do, and they did it in Wilson's case.
30:55
Speaker 3: They would go and everybody who they thought was a
30:58
Speaker 3: possible witness, they would charged them with the underlying offense.
31:02
Speaker 3: So in a homicide investigation, you're all charged with homicide.
31:06
Speaker 3: And then they would bring them in, hold them, interview them.
31:11
Speaker 1: The place was Detroit Police Headquarters at thirteen hundred Bobian,
31:15
Speaker 1: and it was notorious for being the seat of police corruption.
31:20
Speaker 3: All the witnesses, all of the clients that I have,
31:22
Speaker 3: you say, thirteen hundred Bobian, everybody knows exactly what you're
31:25
Speaker 3: talking about. That interview room that they used to take
31:28
Speaker 3: people is awful, Like cockroaches are in there. They don't
31:31
Speaker 3: give you food. You know, you can't see out, so
31:34
Speaker 3: you'll see through the nineteen nineties, these witnesses all testifying
31:38
Speaker 3: like I was held for like three days, I was
31:40
Speaker 3: charged with the homicide, and of course they weren't involved,
31:43
Speaker 3: you know, they weren't, But that's what DPD was doing.
31:46
Speaker 3: So in the late nineteen eighties and all throughout the nineties,
31:50
Speaker 3: there was significant corruption within the Detroit Police Department.
31:55
Speaker 1: In the year two thousand, seven, years after Wilson's conviction,
31:59
Speaker 1: the Department of Justice ran an investigation of the DPD
32:03
Speaker 1: that turned up a number of significant violations.
32:07
Speaker 3: In nineteen ninety five, Carlos Rodriguez, who was one of
32:11
Speaker 3: the investigators on Wilson's homicide team, was indicted along with
32:15
Speaker 3: four other officers for operating a narcotic spring through the
32:20
Speaker 3: fourth Precinct in the city of Detroit. The entire DPD
32:25
Speaker 3: forensics lab was shut down in two thousand and eight
32:27
Speaker 3: because the investigators had found widespread errors in their analysis.
32:32
Speaker 3: And then a few years later, David Pouch, the firearms
32:36
Speaker 3: examiner in Wilson's case, was found to have intentionally fabricated
32:41
Speaker 3: ballistics evidence to obtain a conviction in a nineteen ninety
32:45
Speaker 3: two case, so a year before he testified at Wilson's trial,
32:50
Speaker 3: he had intentionally fabricated ballistics evidence that individual to his case.
32:55
Speaker 3: His name is Desmond Rix. He was also exonerated on
32:59
Speaker 3: that basis.
33:00
Speaker 1: With all of this new information to present, Rachel is
33:03
Speaker 1: hopeful that Wilson will be granted a new trial.
33:07
Speaker 3: Short of a commutation or pardon from the governor. There's
33:12
Speaker 3: one other way you can get out of prison when
33:14
Speaker 3: you have a life without parole sentence, and that is
33:16
Speaker 3: through a motion fu a leaf from judgment. So basically
33:19
Speaker 3: what you do is you go back to the state court,
33:22
Speaker 3: back to the same court that convicted you in the
33:24
Speaker 3: first place, and you say I'm entitled to a new
33:27
Speaker 3: trial for this reason, this reason, and this reason. So
33:30
Speaker 3: you investigate the hell out of everything because you only
33:34
Speaker 3: get one chance. So now that we have all of
33:38
Speaker 3: that evidence collected, there are some significant legal challenges that
33:43
Speaker 3: we can raise. One of them, of course, is the
33:46
Speaker 3: Brady violation. Wilson should have had information that e from
33:51
Speaker 3: Garcia was given a polygraph examination and failed it so
33:55
Speaker 3: that he would be able to properly investigate that avenue
33:57
Speaker 3: of defense, and he wasn't. So that's certainly one of
34:01
Speaker 3: our claims. I think we were prepared to go to
34:04
Speaker 3: court probably about two years ago, and so we'll be
34:08
Speaker 3: moving forward very quickly now.
34:14
Speaker 1: And in the meantime, in addition to becoming a prison paralegal,
34:18
Speaker 1: Wilson has accomplished another important goal. In May of twenty
34:23
Speaker 1: twenty three, he graduated magna cum laude from Calvin University.
34:28
Speaker 2: Was going for a bachelor's degree in Faith and Community
34:31
Speaker 2: Leadership with a minor and social work, the highest grade
34:34
Speaker 2: I ever completed with the seventh grade. I never went
34:37
Speaker 2: to high school, and so being able to kind of
34:41
Speaker 2: like accomplish not just a gain in a college degree,
34:45
Speaker 2: but with a high GDA three point ninety three, it
34:49
Speaker 2: was personally a huge accomplishment and it just gave me
34:53
Speaker 2: a huge sense of self work as well.
34:57
Speaker 1: So your daughter Sierra was telling me that she was
35:00
Speaker 1: able to go to your graduation.
35:01
Speaker 2: Yeah, to me, right is invaluable. I mean, it's a
35:04
Speaker 2: moment there and I look at the picture and that
35:07
Speaker 2: I'm still with such a man. I'm extremely proud of
35:09
Speaker 2: my daughter that got fishes my heart.
35:12
Speaker 4: It was nice, you know, to be able to be
35:15
Speaker 4: there and watch him do like kind of like this
35:18
Speaker 4: normal thing. It was awesome to see and maybe feel
35:21
Speaker 4: proud of him, you know. I feel like it was
35:22
Speaker 4: a great example of how he even given his circumstances,
35:26
Speaker 4: he was able to accomplish something so great.
35:29
Speaker 1: It was very inspiring, and Sierra credits her father with
35:33
Speaker 1: inspiring her in other ways.
35:36
Speaker 4: I've seen what a wonderful person he is and how
35:40
Speaker 4: someone like I said, can make bad choices at one
35:43
Speaker 4: point in their life, but then you know they can
35:46
Speaker 4: turn that around and not let that define them and
35:49
Speaker 4: contain them no matter where they're at, being in prison.
35:51
Speaker 4: I think it's important to know your own worth and
35:55
Speaker 4: not see other people's decisions as how worthy you are.
36:00
Speaker 4: I guess because that's how I felt. I felt like
36:02
Speaker 4: I was unworthy of love and I was someone who
36:05
Speaker 4: just had this abandonment. And you know, I guess it
36:08
Speaker 4: would be that doesn't define who you are as a person.
36:11
Speaker 4: I guess for me, it was just you know, learning
36:14
Speaker 4: my identity and who I am. Aside from that, you know, So.
36:18
Speaker 1: Do you and your dad ever talk about maybe the
36:20
Speaker 1: future anything like that.
36:23
Speaker 4: He talks to me when you know, if he gets out,
36:25
Speaker 4: he would love to move here. Yeah, he would love
36:27
Speaker 4: to move here, and you know some time with me
36:30
Speaker 4: and I'm my daughter, and you know I may and
36:32
Speaker 4: not have been able to have a childhood with him,
36:33
Speaker 4: but my children being able to have him around and
36:37
Speaker 4: you know, see that side of him that I never
36:39
Speaker 4: got to see that I will grow to see. I
36:41
Speaker 4: think that would be pretty awesome.
36:47
Speaker 1: Wilson believes that his experience gave him a perspective that
36:51
Speaker 1: can make a difference to others even while he remains
36:54
Speaker 1: behind bars.
36:55
Speaker 2: I think people depressed. I think people whommit soul sid.
36:58
Speaker 2: I don't think people can't suicide, you know. And so
37:01
Speaker 2: this is the environment. And I told myself, well, because
37:03
Speaker 2: I have this education, while I'm still fighting to prove
37:06
Speaker 2: my innocent, I could be a summer of assistance to
37:09
Speaker 2: these individuals around me as well.
37:11
Speaker 1: So when you get out, what do you want to do.
37:13
Speaker 2: I would love to be able to work with youth
37:15
Speaker 2: and games. I would love to be able to step
37:17
Speaker 2: out of prison and start programs, mentioning programs, tutoring programs,
37:21
Speaker 2: because I know the value of that, Programs that help interpret,
37:26
Speaker 2: you know, because I know how that feels not to
37:27
Speaker 2: be able to express your feelings because you have the
37:30
Speaker 2: you don't have the proper words in English to do so.
37:34
Speaker 2: So these are kind of things that I would love
37:35
Speaker 2: to be affected in our community as well. I no
37:39
Speaker 2: longer kind of view myself as this individual who's just
37:42
Speaker 2: in prison and poor me. You know, when I figured
37:46
Speaker 2: out that even though I'm still fighting for my freedom
37:48
Speaker 2: to prove my innocent, I could still be effective in
37:50
Speaker 2: helping other individuals.
38:06
Speaker 1: If you'd like to help support Wilson in his fight
38:09
Speaker 1: to prove his innocence, go to Freewilson rivera dot com.
38:13
Speaker 1: We'll post that link in the episode description. Thank you
38:23
Speaker 1: for listening to Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling. Please support
38:26
Speaker 1: your local innocence organizations and go to the links in
38:29
Speaker 1: the episode description to see how you can help. I'd
38:32
Speaker 1: like to thank our executive producers Jason Flam, Jeff Kempler,
38:35
Speaker 1: and Kevin Wortis, as well as senior producer Annie Chelsea,
38:39
Speaker 1: producer Kathleen Fink, story editor Hannah Beal, and researcher Shelby Sorels.
38:45
Speaker 1: Mixing and sound design are by Jackie Pauley, with additional
38:48
Speaker 1: production by Jeff Cleiburn and Connor Hall. The music in
38:52
Speaker 1: this production is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
38:56
Speaker 1: Be sure to follow us on all social media platforms
39:00
Speaker 1: at Lava for Good and at Wrongful Conviction. You can
39:03
Speaker 1: also follow me on all platforms at Maggie Freeling. Wrongful
39:07
Speaker 1: Conviction with Maggie Freeling is a production of Lava for
39:09
Speaker 1: Good Podcasts in association with Signal Company Number one