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#476 Maggie Freleng with Marvin Haynes · Wrongful Conviction

• 0:04
  Speaker 1: In May of two thousand and four. Marvin Haynes was
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: a pretty average sixteen year old kid.
• 0:10
  Speaker 2: I was a party animal at that time, so it
• 0:12
  Speaker 2: was like I just couldn't wait for the weekends and
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: just you know, just to have a good, nice clothes
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: on and just be able to go have fun. That's
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: what I was like doing.
• 0:21
  Speaker 1: Marvin didn't have a care in the world except for
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: the latest trends and chasing girls. That is until he
• 0:28
  Speaker 1: was picked up by the police.
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: It was just like basically something happened bad and just
• 0:34
  Speaker 2: asking me like was I involved or do I know
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: anything like that? And they was talking about a flower shop,
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: so I didn't really know what they were talking about.
• 0:42
  Speaker 3: They never really told me it was a murder.
• 0:45
  Speaker 1: Marvin says he had never been in any kind of
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: serious trouble, so he wasn't really worried about it. He
• 0:50
  Speaker 1: figured there was a mix up and the police would
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: get it right.
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: I was thinking more like at that time, as long
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: as I get out by Friday and so I can
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: go on.
• 0:58
  Speaker 3: What I was doing is wels, Yeah, So I was
• 1:01
  Speaker 3: like that's all my thought process was.
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: But Marvin never left the station.
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: Hi, my name is Marvin Haynes. I was wrongly convicted
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: at sixteen. I spent nineteen in like seven months incarcerated.
• 1:17
  Speaker 1: From lava for good. This is wrongful conviction with Maggie
• 1:20
  Speaker 1: Freeling today. Marvin Hayes Marvin Haynes was born on December sixth,
• 1:33
  Speaker 1: nineteen eighty seven. He was raised in a working class
• 1:41
  Speaker 1: family in Minneapolis, Minnesota. His father worked in construction and
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: his mother stayed at home raising the family. He's one
• 1:49
  Speaker 1: of seven kids.
• 1:51
  Speaker 2: I got three sisters older than me, well, four sisters
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: and then me. Then I got a little brother and
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: a little sister. I'm the oldest boy.
• 2:00
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 2:00
  Speaker 3: We had a close knit family.
• 2:02
  Speaker 2: So it was like we did all a lot of
• 2:04
  Speaker 2: things together, like summer vacations to my granny home.
• 2:08
  Speaker 3: State Vllley Fair, six Flags, you know what I'm saying.
• 2:12
  Speaker 1: So it was kind of like Marvin says, growing up,
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: life was pretty good.
• 2:16
  Speaker 3: As a kid.
• 2:16
  Speaker 2: I just like to have fun and like you know,
• 2:19
  Speaker 2: play with cars and you know stuff like that, just
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: like kid things. So like I go home watch Nickelodeon literally,
• 2:26
  Speaker 2: so yeah, that was like one of my things.
• 2:28
  Speaker 1: All the classic Nickelodeons, all the classes, you know. Hay Arnold's.
• 2:32
  Speaker 1: There was like, oh, did you ever watch Doug Doug?
• 2:35
  Speaker 3: Also, what's the Rugrats? You know what I mean? So
• 2:38
  Speaker 3: like all that stuff.
• 2:39
  Speaker 1: Marvin told me he especially loved to bike ride.
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: People look at me and be like at my cass
• 2:44
  Speaker 2: and be like, do you play football? Used to play football?
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: But no, I just used to watch ride bikes.
• 2:48
  Speaker 1: A lot, kind of bikes like BMX bikes, regular.
• 2:50
  Speaker 2: All the BMX bikes like Gt. Dino's, Gary Fisher's.
• 2:55
  Speaker 3: You know, yeah, the nice bikes. Yeah.
• 2:57
  Speaker 1: But as he got older and became a teenager, Marvin
• 3:00
  Speaker 1: says his priorities changed.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: It was all about being having the newest clothes and
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: like girls parties every weekend, go to like all the
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: parties in the neighborhood, so you know, just having fun.
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: Having fun with your friends around.
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: Yeah that was me. Yeah, literally, Like so I liked
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: it having all the new shoes and stuff like that.
• 3:20
  Speaker 3: So that was like what I liked doing.
• 3:22
  Speaker 1: Did you work? No?
• 3:23
  Speaker 3: I didn't work.
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: How'd you get money to buy nice shoes?
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: I got five sisters and stuff, So I used to like, honestly,
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: some of my sister used to have the nicest shoes
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: and if I couldn't get them that week or something,
• 3:34
  Speaker 2: I'd probably get, you know, get their shoes or because
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: they had jobs and stuff.
• 3:38
  Speaker 1: So yeah, so I had ways, and Marvin knew how
• 3:42
  Speaker 1: to hustle his sisters.
• 3:43
  Speaker 4: I had children really young.
• 3:45
  Speaker 1: This is Marvin's sister, Marvina. She's four years older.
• 3:49
  Speaker 4: And Marvin helped me out with the kids because I
• 3:51
  Speaker 4: was like always like going out and running the streets.
• 3:56
  Speaker 1: And you left your baby brother to you.
• 3:59
  Speaker 4: But it was the house of us, right. It was
• 4:01
  Speaker 4: like the mom is there and she probably don't want
• 4:03
  Speaker 4: to watch the kid. And then Marvin's like, you give
• 4:06
  Speaker 4: me five dollars. I'm like, yeah, I'm giving you five dollars.
• 4:10
  Speaker 5: I'm out of.
• 4:13
  Speaker 1: Marvin was just an ordinary sixteen year old kid, hanging
• 4:16
  Speaker 1: out with friends and chasing the latest trends.
• 4:19
  Speaker 5: Honestly, I was just living for the that day, Marvin
• 4:28
  Speaker 5: told me.
• 4:28
  Speaker 1: The evening of Sunday, May sixteenth, two thousand and four,
• 4:31
  Speaker 1: was just like any other.
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: I was at a party, you know what I'm saying, Like,
• 4:36
  Speaker 2: just having fun, doing regular things, went home late, you know,
• 4:39
  Speaker 2: like two in the morning, two three in the morning, slept.
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: And woke up like a normal day. You know, like
• 4:47
  Speaker 3: woke up at like late in the afternoon.
• 4:49
  Speaker 1: Marvin says he got up and went to meet up
• 4:50
  Speaker 1: with friends at some local spots.
• 4:52
  Speaker 5: Like where I know everybody yet, so just going about
• 4:55
  Speaker 5: your norse.
• 4:55
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I was going by my normal life.
• 4:56
  Speaker 1: So a few days later, on May nineteenth, Marvin wakes
• 4:59
  Speaker 1: up to his mom and I think it was a Wednesday.
• 5:03
  Speaker 2: I was woke up early in the morning and my
• 5:06
  Speaker 2: mom was basically saying, like, the police here. They got
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: a warrant for your arrest. They just want to talk
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: to you.
• 5:12
  Speaker 1: At first, Marvin says he wasn't too concerned because.
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: This that happened to me before, for like violations of
• 5:17
  Speaker 2: curfews and different things like that.
• 5:19
  Speaker 1: In fact, that's exactly the charge. They picked him up
• 5:23
  Speaker 1: and held him on he'd missed a court appearance for
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: breaking curfew.
• 5:29
  Speaker 6: With you, okay.
• 5:31
  Speaker 1: The police took Marvin into the station for questioning.
• 5:34
  Speaker 2: Okay, okay, Yeah, they brought me into an interrogation room,
• 5:41
  Speaker 2: set me in there for a while.
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: I feel like I don't have nothing to hide, okay,
• 5:48
  Speaker 3: your junior.
• 5:51
  Speaker 1: So Marvin spoke to the officers with no adult or
• 5:54
  Speaker 1: attorney president, thinking this was just for a curfew violation,
• 5:59
  Speaker 1: and I think it was a curve from g.
• 6:02
  Speaker 3: And I was walking to the club.
• 6:06
  Speaker 6: She regretting because you don't have a car, you don't
• 6:08
  Speaker 6: have a relacens.
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: I ain't got no much, okay, but just was telling
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: them my normal thing of what I was doing that
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: past week, you know, like the past days that led
• 6:18
  Speaker 2: it to me being in that room. So I'm just
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: telling them like who I hang with, where i'd be at,
• 6:24
  Speaker 2: you know, just stuff like that, and oh my cousin
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: Poopie house. I actually had some cash on me, so
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: I was asking them about, like, hey, did you make
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: sure you give me a receipt for the money that
• 6:35
  Speaker 2: I you know that I had when I came here?
• 6:37
  Speaker 3: I said, seat because they took they took my money
• 6:40
  Speaker 3: after the game. I didn't know nothing. I had no
• 6:43
  Speaker 3: idea what was going on.
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: Marvin had no idea that while he was sitting there
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: worrying about receipts for a few dollars, that he'd been
• 6:52
  Speaker 1: identified in a murder.
• 6:54
  Speaker 2: But then when I when I was hearing them saying
• 6:57
  Speaker 2: like we got your fingerprints and stuff like that, and
• 6:59
  Speaker 2: I was just like I was like discompibulated, Like what
• 7:02
  Speaker 2: what was y'all talking about.
• 7:03
  Speaker 3: I had to really think back, like what did I
• 7:05
  Speaker 3: do wrong this weekend?
• 7:08
  Speaker 7: We know you were in that Mark, Okay, so we
• 7:10
  Speaker 7: know that.
• 7:10
  Speaker 3: And they was talking about a flower shop, and I
• 7:13
  Speaker 3: ain't never told nobody ain't a flower shop. Yeah you have, Yeah,
• 7:17
  Speaker 3: you have, Marvin straight up. Now, I'm keeping it real
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: with you.
• 7:19
  Speaker 4: You say, keep unreal.
• 7:20
  Speaker 7: I'm just trying to give her town.
• 7:21
  Speaker 3: That's Martin.
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: Where you saying, you saying that you're trying to point
• 7:24
  Speaker 4: You're trying to say that you were in the flower shop.
• 7:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 7:28
  Speaker 2: Straight, I was putting two together and I still was
• 7:30
  Speaker 2: kind of confused, expressing to them like y'all got the
• 7:33
  Speaker 2: wrong person.
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: That person had shot and killed fifty five year old
• 7:40
  Speaker 1: Randy Scharer inside his family business, Jerry's Flower Shop.
• 7:51
  Speaker 7: Is that a flower shop in North Minneapolis May sixteenth,
• 7:55
  Speaker 7: two thousand and four. Someone comes in and is asking
• 8:00
  Speaker 7: for flowers, ends up, you know, pulling a gun and
• 8:03
  Speaker 7: saying he wants money from from the back.
• 8:07
  Speaker 1: This is Andrew Marcourt. He's a managing attorney at the
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: Great North Innocence Project. Andrew explains that the robber had
• 8:14
  Speaker 1: originally been speaking with Cynthia McDermott when her brother Randy walked.
• 8:18
  Speaker 7: In and the person shoots him two times.
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: Then McDermott flees out the back.
• 8:25
  Speaker 7: She becomes kind of the primary eyewitness in the case.
• 8:30
  Speaker 1: McDermott had run to a neighbor's house and called nine
• 8:32
  Speaker 1: one one before rushing back to the flower shop, where
• 8:35
  Speaker 1: she found her brother Randy dead. McDermott told first responders
• 8:40
  Speaker 1: that the gunman was a tall, thin blackmail in his
• 8:44
  Speaker 1: early twenties. She said he weighed about one hundred and
• 8:47
  Speaker 1: eighty pounds, and she also specified his hair was short
• 8:51
  Speaker 1: cropped to his head. When police first showed her a
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: photo lineup, she identified someone with what she said was
• 8:58
  Speaker 1: seventy five to eighty percent confidence.
• 9:01
  Speaker 7: This witness Cynthia McDermott. She actually picked a filler, which
• 9:04
  Speaker 7: is like one of the nun suspects in the lineup.
• 9:07
  Speaker 7: You know, she picked this person who looks nothing like
• 9:11
  Speaker 7: Marvin and more to the points, I mean, you know,
• 9:17
  Speaker 7: in terms of just best practices, when someone picks a filler,
• 9:21
  Speaker 7: I mean, what that tells you is they don't, you know,
• 9:23
  Speaker 7: like they don't have a good memory of what the
• 9:26
  Speaker 7: suspect looks like.
• 9:27
  Speaker 1: Why wouldn't it have been that guy.
• 9:28
  Speaker 7: Well, one, he was a filler, so there was no
• 9:30
  Speaker 7: reason to suspect him. He was just pulled from the database.
• 9:34
  Speaker 7: But also they did they did actually look into whether
• 9:36
  Speaker 7: he could be a credible suspect, and he appeared to
• 9:41
  Speaker 7: have an alibi that he was in South Dakota at
• 9:44
  Speaker 7: the time. That really should have been the end of
• 9:47
  Speaker 7: it for her, that that should have been like, well,
• 9:49
  Speaker 7: she doesn't know, so we're going to have to solve
• 9:50
  Speaker 7: this case some other way. But that wasn't the end
• 9:52
  Speaker 7: of it. So Marvin comes to the attention of the
• 9:56
  Speaker 7: police a few days later with an an anonymous with
• 10:02
  Speaker 7: a tip saying that there's some word that little Marvin
• 10:07
  Speaker 7: was involved.
• 10:07
  Speaker 1: Why did you have the nickname Little Marvin?
• 10:10
  Speaker 3: My dad named.
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: Marvin, So it was like everybody that know me called
• 10:13
  Speaker 2: me little Marvin, or everybody that like literally that know.
• 10:16
  Speaker 3: Me, call me Little Marvin.
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: At the time, Marvin was indeed little, at least compared
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: to the suspect that McDermott had described.
• 10:24
  Speaker 7: He was much smaller, I think about fifty pounds lighter
• 10:28
  Speaker 7: than the estimate, several inches shorter, several years younger, but
• 10:32
  Speaker 7: perhaps most Obviously, the witnesses just both to describe someone
• 10:36
  Speaker 7: with short hair. The primary witness that he had short cropped.
• 10:40
  Speaker 1: Hair, and at the time Marvin had a tall afro.
• 10:44
  Speaker 7: Nothing anyone could describe as close cropped hair. When they
• 10:47
  Speaker 7: did the photo lineup, though, they didn't use a contemporaneous
• 10:51
  Speaker 7: picture of him, even though he'd been arrested at that
• 10:53
  Speaker 7: time and they had there was you know, they had
• 10:55
  Speaker 7: a mugshot created that day.
• 10:58
  Speaker 3: What they used was a.
• 10:58
  Speaker 7: Two year old photo where he did have short hair,
• 11:02
  Speaker 7: so it was much more closely resembling what the witnesses
• 11:06
  Speaker 7: had described, even though that wasn't how he looked that day.
• 11:10
  Speaker 7: So that was a problem.
• 11:12
  Speaker 1: So they have they they have Marvin in custody right now.
• 11:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah afro. They know this witness they're looking for is
• 11:19
  Speaker 1: taller with no afro, and they're like, well, fine, we'll
• 11:22
  Speaker 1: just we'll still go for him.
• 11:23
  Speaker 5: But an old picture, yeap.
• 11:24
  Speaker 7: So they so they use this old picture and in
• 11:27
  Speaker 7: that time she she did pick him. I mean, this
• 11:29
  Speaker 7: case is just an absolute disaster from a eyewitness identification perspective.
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: At least, I'm keeping it.
• 11:36
  Speaker 6: I'm keeping it.
• 11:37
  Speaker 3: When they came to see me, they was asking me that,
• 11:40
  Speaker 3: so this is how you wear your hair?
• 11:42
  Speaker 6: Tell me why did you change your hair style?
• 11:45
  Speaker 3: And I didn't put twods too together because I'm like,
• 11:47
  Speaker 3: I didn't. I just like this, I'll wear my hair,
• 11:50
  Speaker 3: you know. They kept asking me about my hair.
• 11:57
  Speaker 1: Eventually, Marvin was put in a live lineup work.
• 12:01
  Speaker 3: Going in March. Stand right there and right there, look
• 12:05
  Speaker 3: straight at the window. Turns it right.
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: I've never been in a lineup? What is that like?
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: Is it like in the movies? Like are you? Is
• 12:15
  Speaker 1: there a glass wall and you can't see that?
• 12:17
  Speaker 3: No way, I can't even lie to you.
• 12:19
  Speaker 2: It's true when they say that when you go to
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: like through a like a uh a difficult moment in
• 12:24
  Speaker 2: or life or is something like hard like that, you
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: can't really remember it like I can't.
• 12:28
  Speaker 3: I couldn't really remember it for years until I really seenk.
• 12:31
  Speaker 7: It don't move and allowed the many voice repeat that
• 12:34
  Speaker 7: to me.
• 12:35
  Speaker 3: Don't don't move. Where's the tape? Where's the tape? This
• 12:39
  Speaker 3: is no joke, there's no joke. I want the money.
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: I want the money.
• 12:45
  Speaker 1: No tell no till in that lineup, McDermott picked Marvin again,
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: and at this point Marvin realized he might be in trouble.
• 13:00
  Speaker 2: Got intense, and then I realized, like, man, like they
• 13:03
  Speaker 2: trying to, you know, frame me. But then I was
• 13:06
  Speaker 2: thinking like, well, they gonna find the right person and
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: then they gonna just gonna come and correct this. I
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: literally didn't think that I would be going to prison
• 13:13
  Speaker 2: or I would be arrested for something like this. So
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: I was more thinking I was in I was trusting them,
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: thinking like Okay, well they gonna figure this out and
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: they gonna come to me and be like, Okay, we
• 13:23
  Speaker 2: got the wrong person, you know what I mean. So
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: I never thought I would go to prison or I
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: would be arrested for something like this. At that time,
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: these my family didn't know nothing about the justice system.
• 13:39
  Speaker 2: We never had a family member to go through anything
• 13:41
  Speaker 2: like this, you know what I mean. So we was
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: not knowledgeable about things like this or what to do
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: when it happened.
• 13:48
  Speaker 3: Or don't talk to the police. We was talk like
• 13:51
  Speaker 3: the police is the good guys.
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: But the police charged Marvin with first degree murder and
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: second degree assault. Happened to Marvin. It affected our whole family,
• 14:03
  Speaker 1: Mervin's mother especially.
• 14:05
  Speaker 2: She asked me once though, she was like, Marvin, did
• 14:07
  Speaker 2: you have anything to do with this, and I told her,
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: like she only asked me one time. I said, no,
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: I had, I don't know nothing about this, and she
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: never asked me again. She knew that I wasn't lying
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: about that, you know what I mean.
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: We were a good kid, yeah, but never I.
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: Wouldn't say I was a great kid. But she knew
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: that I wasn't involved in on stuff like that, you
• 14:23
  Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. So it only took for me
• 14:25
  Speaker 2: to tell her one time that I wasn't involved in
• 14:27
  Speaker 2: it or I didn't have and she knew that I
• 14:29
  Speaker 2: wasn't lying about it, you know what I mean.
• 14:31
  Speaker 1: But the truth that her sixteen year old boy was
• 14:34
  Speaker 1: being charged with murder was too much for Mervin's mom
• 14:37
  Speaker 1: to handle.
• 14:38
  Speaker 4: My mom kind of like mentally checked out. There was
• 14:46
  Speaker 4: like never any more dinner at the dinner table. Our
• 14:51
  Speaker 4: parents separated totally at that point. And so when it
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: affected my mom and my parents, it affect us all,
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: which caused the other children to end up being like
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: the system. My mom eventually lost her kids and my
• 15:08
  Speaker 4: sister took them, and so it's just like it affected
• 15:16
  Speaker 4: me in crazy ways, affected our whole family and we
• 15:20
  Speaker 4: wasn't able to ask her, We wasn't able to check
• 15:28
  Speaker 4: on her, because when you were mom, everybody just think
• 15:32
  Speaker 4: you're strong.
• 15:33
  Speaker 3: She took it hard.
• 15:34
  Speaker 2: She started partying more too after that and just going out.
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: My mom never was going out. She stayed at home,
• 15:38
  Speaker 2: took care of us. But once this happened to me,
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: she's just like, you know, like was trying to escape it,
• 15:43
  Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, or trying to figure because
• 15:45
  Speaker 2: she felt like she couldn't do.
• 15:47
  Speaker 1: Nothing, and she couldn't. The case was moving forward with
• 15:51
  Speaker 1: the witness ideas in the bag, the police focused on
• 15:54
  Speaker 1: what they believed had happened, homing in on Marvin's family
• 15:58
  Speaker 1: for answers.
• 16:08
  Speaker 7: They claim that Marvin was hanging out with some friends
• 16:14
  Speaker 7: and his cousin over at another friend's house.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: The police questioned Marvin's fourteen year old cousin, Isaiah. During
• 16:21
  Speaker 1: the first few interviews, Isaiah didn't have anything to say,
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: but then in a later interrogation, Isaiah cracked. He allegedly
• 16:30
  Speaker 1: told police.
• 16:31
  Speaker 7: That Marvin said that the mourning of that he was
• 16:35
  Speaker 7: going to go hit a lick, which is like a
• 16:37
  Speaker 7: slang term for committed a robbery. Afterwards, he told him
• 16:43
  Speaker 7: he had shut a white man.
• 16:48
  Speaker 1: He'd be the first of three kids who the police
• 16:50
  Speaker 1: would use to implicate Marvin in the crime. A few
• 16:53
  Speaker 1: months later, a fourteen year old acquaintance of Marvin's gave
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: a statement. Anthony Todd told police had also heard Marvin
• 17:01
  Speaker 1: bragging about hitting a lick. Then a year later, in
• 17:05
  Speaker 1: August two thousand and five, seventeen year old Marvin Haines
• 17:09
  Speaker 1: went to trial. Mike Fernstall prosecuted the case. He presented
• 17:14
  Speaker 1: multiple witnesses he believed with I d Marvin as the shooter,
• 17:18
  Speaker 1: including Cynthia mcdermodd, who said she had no doubt Marvin
• 17:22
  Speaker 1: had shot and killed her brother. But then Marvin's cousin
• 17:26
  Speaker 1: Isaiah took the stand.
• 17:29
  Speaker 7: He actually, in a pretty dramatic moment, actually tried to
• 17:34
  Speaker 7: recant from the stand at trial and said, look, this
• 17:40
  Speaker 7: isn't true. The only reason I said it is that
• 17:42
  Speaker 7: they were threatening me with my own time. Said that
• 17:45
  Speaker 7: I was looking at you know, up to fifteen years,
• 17:47
  Speaker 7: get half of what Marvin's looking at if if I
• 17:51
  Speaker 7: don't cooperate.
• 17:52
  Speaker 3: He told the people.
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: He told a judge, he said, look y'all making me
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: say my cousin to jail for something he didn't do.
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: He's screaming like this man is He's saying, like my
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: cousin is innocent, And they took him off the stay.
• 18:03
  Speaker 7: They they call a recess because things really went off
• 18:07
  Speaker 7: the rails. I mean, this is in live court with
• 18:09
  Speaker 7: the state, and then they go back and you know,
• 18:14
  Speaker 7: basically they're threatening him with perjury charges if he doesn't
• 18:18
  Speaker 7: recant his recantation. And he was you know, there was
• 18:23
  Speaker 7: testimony that he's on the hall he's you know, a
• 18:26
  Speaker 7: kid and who like bawling in the hallway because he's
• 18:31
  Speaker 7: been placed in this this impossible situation. So anyway, they
• 18:34
  Speaker 7: bring him back in and he ends up and kind
• 18:38
  Speaker 7: of fits and starts basically going back to the original
• 18:43
  Speaker 7: story he told the police.
• 18:46
  Speaker 1: A few other witnesses were called to the stand, including
• 18:48
  Speaker 1: Robb Seely, who was a fourteen.
• 18:51
  Speaker 7: Year old boy who was in the neighborhood attending temple
• 18:59
  Speaker 7: and just happened to be walking by and heard shots
• 19:02
  Speaker 7: and saw someone fleeing shortly.
• 19:04
  Speaker 1: After the shooting. Seely had ideed Marvin in a lineup,
• 19:08
  Speaker 1: but a year later on the stand, Seely said he
• 19:11
  Speaker 1: had doubts. Another witness Jennifer Coleman testified that she had
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: spoken to Marvin the morning of the shooting at his
• 19:17
  Speaker 1: house and he told her he shot some old white man. However,
• 19:22
  Speaker 1: Coleman could not I d Marvin in court and the
• 19:25
  Speaker 1: house she had said was Marvin's was actually the house
• 19:28
  Speaker 1: of another person named Marvin. Things were looking shaky for
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: the prosecution. Finally it was the defense's turn. Marvin's mom
• 19:45
  Speaker 1: hired a private defense attorney, Cassius Benson, to represent Marvin.
• 19:50
  Speaker 1: Benson advised Marvin not to take the stand, as many
• 19:53
  Speaker 1: defense attorneys do. However, Marvin insisted.
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: What I'm like, man, look often in take the stand
• 19:59
  Speaker 2: and tail they's people that I'm innocent.
• 20:00
  Speaker 3: You know what I'm saying.
• 20:01
  Speaker 2: I'm telling my story, and I was able to I
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: was able to tell, you know, I wasn't the person
• 20:06
  Speaker 2: that committed this crime.
• 20:07
  Speaker 8: You know.
• 20:07
  Speaker 7: He gave a story which is the same story he's
• 20:12
  Speaker 7: been saying for years, which is that he was home
• 20:16
  Speaker 7: in bed that morning, that he went out with friends
• 20:18
  Speaker 7: the night before, was I got home kind of late,
• 20:21
  Speaker 7: slept in and it was kind of an unremarkable day.
• 20:27
  Speaker 7: So that that was essentially the defense case.
• 20:31
  Speaker 1: After a week long trial. With no forensic evidence tying
• 20:35
  Speaker 1: Marvin to the shooting, no murder weapon, shaky witness ideas,
• 20:39
  Speaker 1: and even a witness recanting on the stand, Marvin thought
• 20:43
  Speaker 1: he'd be back to being a teenager in no time.
• 20:46
  Speaker 1: Did you think you'd be convicted?
• 20:48
  Speaker 3: No, I did not think I was going to be convicted.
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: I did not ever think I was going to be convicted, Like,
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: especially with all the evidence that I seen myself. So
• 20:57
  Speaker 2: I'm thinking, like, it's so obvious they this is impossible
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: for me to get convicted.
• 21:02
  Speaker 3: So when it happened, it was just like I was shocked.
• 21:05
  Speaker 3: I was just like damn.
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: On September second, two thousand and five, the jury convicted
• 21:10
  Speaker 1: Marvin a first degree murder and second degree assault. Did
• 21:14
  Speaker 1: you see your family in the courtroom?
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: Yeah? Hell, yeah, my mom that that.
• 21:25
  Speaker 1: Yeah, that's okay. There's tissues right here too.
• 21:33
  Speaker 3: Yeah.
• 21:33
  Speaker 2: I'm good though, But I just see my mom. I
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: had affected her. That's the only thing that made me upset.
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: She actually just walked out, and she was said so mad.
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: After seeing his mother walk out, seventeen year old Marvin,
• 21:49
  Speaker 1: upset and angry, lashed out at the judge, yelling.
• 21:53
  Speaker 4: All y'all gonna burn it hell, because you'll know I
• 21:56
  Speaker 4: didn't commit this, that's what you said.
• 21:58
  Speaker 3: Yeah I did. It was just like I said.
• 22:01
  Speaker 2: When it happened, I couldn't believe that they was able
• 22:04
  Speaker 2: to you know, a judge was able to see this
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: stuff taking place, and like it was. The courtroom was
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: packed with people and they seen that, you know, I
• 22:11
  Speaker 2: was actually wrongly convicted.
• 22:13
  Speaker 4: It was very hard for us to actually understand what
• 22:16
  Speaker 4: was happening to Marvin because we had this faith into
• 22:21
  Speaker 4: the system.
• 22:24
  Speaker 1: Later that month, Judge Robert Blazer sentenced Marvin to life
• 22:28
  Speaker 1: in prison. Well, Marvin's family grappled with their new reality.
• 22:36
  Speaker 1: Marvin was in his own health, sent to an adult
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: men's prison to serve his time, and in order to survive.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: Marvin says he had to be tough.
• 22:46
  Speaker 2: When I first got to prison, I had to, you know,
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: do a lot of different things to establish my dominance
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: and let them know, like I'm not going for none
• 22:53
  Speaker 2: of this type of stuff.
• 22:54
  Speaker 1: Well did you have to do you're a kid that
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: winds up in an adult prison, Yeah, I had.
• 22:59
  Speaker 3: I was doing a lot of fighting when I came
• 23:01
  Speaker 3: to the county. I was fighting adults.
• 23:04
  Speaker 2: I understand now that a lot of people going through
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: a lot of things in there, So anything could send
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: somebody over there over the top, any little thing, or
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: it's just like that because you people facing life. I
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: was hopeless at that point.
• 23:16
  Speaker 1: Marvin told me, with time like that, some people have
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: nothing to lose, so they'll try to prove themselves by
• 23:22
  Speaker 1: picking on someone else like a kid.
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: You gotta, you know, protect yourself by any means, you
• 23:27
  Speaker 2: know what I'm saying, Or you'll become a victim in
• 23:30
  Speaker 2: that place because in them environments like you test it
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: all the time, you know what I mean, Or just
• 23:34
  Speaker 2: like you got to prove yourself.
• 23:36
  Speaker 3: I was.
• 23:37
  Speaker 2: I was hanging out with people that I wasn't you know,
• 23:39
  Speaker 2: that wouldn't have the best my best interest at hand.
• 23:41
  Speaker 3: So I had to really learn a lot.
• 23:43
  Speaker 1: You know.
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: When I first got there, I was seventeen years old,
• 23:45
  Speaker 2: so I was, you know what I'm saying, just trying
• 23:48
  Speaker 2: to get by.
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: Actually, Marvin says he's lucky he's not facing time for
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: something he actually did, like fighting with other prisoners.
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: I could have harmed somebody in there, or somebody could
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: have harmed me because in them environments, like people I
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: don't understand like you test it all the time.
• 24:03
  Speaker 1: But Marvin says things changed when he wound up in
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: solitary confinement just shortly after he got to prison.
• 24:08
  Speaker 2: I ended up in a whole one time and I
• 24:11
  Speaker 2: read about the Innocent Project. It was at the last
• 24:13
  Speaker 2: page of the the article that I of this magazine
• 24:16
  Speaker 2: that I seen. It was literally the last page and
• 24:19
  Speaker 2: it was just saying, if you actually innocent, you wrongly convicted, please.
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: Contact Is this in a prison magazine or like what
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: magazine was the Innocence Project advertising in?
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: Yeah? Probably I think it was. It was like a
• 24:30
  Speaker 3: mirror of prison mirrors.
• 24:32
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, it was so yeah, it was at the
• 24:35
  Speaker 2: last page, and I'm like, damn, I'm like I I
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: literally ripped it out. So when I got out the whole,
• 24:45
  Speaker 2: when write to the lad Iberry, that's when I really
• 24:48
  Speaker 2: started finding out like, damn, You're not the only person
• 24:50
  Speaker 2: that's gone through this or that went through this.
• 24:52
  Speaker 3: So I started writing people I could beare to even write, No, I.
• 24:55
  Speaker 1: Still can't get over that you were a child, Like
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: thinking back for sixty and I don't know if I
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: would even comprehend what a life sentence is.
• 25:04
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I couldn't even describe it. Yep, I show you
• 25:06
  Speaker 3: a letter.
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: I was all over the place where explaining my story
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: of people and just trying to get them to understand
• 25:12
  Speaker 2: that I'm innocent.
• 25:16
  Speaker 1: Marvin says. A week later, the Great North Innocence Project
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: wrote him back and sent a questionnaire. He filled it
• 25:21
  Speaker 1: out and sent it back and then waited and waited,
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: but nothing. So we went ahead and filed an appeal
• 25:29
  Speaker 1: without them in two thousand and seven, but he was denied.
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: I got that letter in the mail and I sat
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: down and I read it, and I was just like,
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: all right, I gotta find a different way. Like literally,
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: I didn't never give up. I didn't cry, I didn't
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: I wasn't mad or nothing. I was just like, okay,
• 25:44
  Speaker 2: well they not listening at this time, you know, and
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: I'll go to I used to go tell the people
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: that I was close to in there, and I used
• 25:50
  Speaker 2: to tell them like, look, man, my appeal got denied,
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: and they and they ain't really give me no words
• 25:54
  Speaker 2: and encouraged me. I had to do it myself, you
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: know what I'm saying. I had to encourage myself that
• 25:59
  Speaker 2: it'll be okay.
• 26:00
  Speaker 1: Marvin says he didn't even want to tell his family
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: because he didn't want to disappoint them. Plus he was
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: on the outs with some family members like his cousin
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: Isaiah and his sister Marvina.
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: I didn't talk to Marvin for like three or four
• 26:13
  Speaker 4: years just because of family issues.
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: But Marvina and Marvin eventually reconnected and she became the
• 26:19
  Speaker 1: driving force behind his case. It all happened when Marvin
• 26:23
  Speaker 1: convinced her to take over his social media. We talked
• 26:26
  Speaker 1: over the phone a few times and Marvin was like,
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: just take my past code. I don't want your past go.
• 26:31
  Speaker 4: So I finally took the past code and I started
• 26:34
  Speaker 4: to work his social media account. And then as I
• 26:38
  Speaker 4: was sitting on my couch, I had started connecting with
• 26:41
  Speaker 4: people like all over the world in Hong Kong, people
• 26:44
  Speaker 4: from Detroit, Michigan, everywhere, and I was aligning myself anywhere
• 26:49
  Speaker 4: that I can to tell what had happened to my brother.
• 26:54
  Speaker 4: But then as I was sitting on a couch, on
• 26:56
  Speaker 4: a couch similar to this one, and I'm doing the Facebook,
• 27:00
  Speaker 4: I heard a voice in my head and it said,
• 27:03
  Speaker 4: you're not going to get your brother out behind this keyboard.
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: So Marvina hit the streets and made a sign with
• 27:09
  Speaker 1: Marvin on it, and I went out to this protest.
• 27:13
  Speaker 4: A sister by the name Amoni Dotton asked me if
• 27:16
  Speaker 4: I wanted to speak on my brother's behalf, and when
• 27:19
  Speaker 4: she pulled.
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: Me to the front, is like she pulled me through
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: a universe, and I felt this power. At the time,
• 27:28
  Speaker 1: North Minneapolis was dealing with a surge in violent crime.
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: Many residents were scared and elected officials and the police
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: responded by arresting people in record numbers, not all of
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: them guilty, and many from families just like Marvina's.
• 27:45
  Speaker 6: So family started to reach out to me and they say,
• 27:48
  Speaker 6: we found you on Facebook, We've seen you on a
• 27:50
  Speaker 6: news or we heard you speak here.
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: This is going on with our family.
• 27:55
  Speaker 4: I started organizing protests and press conferences for my brother
• 28:00
  Speaker 4: in Minneapolis.
• 28:00
  Speaker 6: Woke Marvin up at the age of sixteen in our
• 28:04
  Speaker 6: mother house. In two thousand and four, they gave him
• 28:08
  Speaker 6: life for a crime evidence shows he didn't commit this
• 28:11
  Speaker 6: t I was like popping up at the key at
• 28:15
  Speaker 6: the General's office, going to the Governor's house wherever I
• 28:21
  Speaker 6: needed to be, because I needed people to understand that
• 28:24
  Speaker 6: when we're talking about Wronfau incarceration.
• 28:27
  Speaker 4: That's a state of emergency. There's more than one way
• 28:31
  Speaker 4: to lynch amen, and what they're doing with wrongfo incarceration,
• 28:37
  Speaker 4: that's called a miling day lynching.
• 28:40
  Speaker 1: While Marvina fucked for Marvin on the outside, Marvin continued
• 28:43
  Speaker 1: researching his case and writing The Great North Innocence Project.
• 28:47
  Speaker 1: From the inside.
• 28:48
  Speaker 7: There was a couple of rounds where he had reached
• 28:51
  Speaker 7: out to us over the years, and there weren't any
• 28:54
  Speaker 7: real big breaks for a long time. But then finally
• 28:57
  Speaker 7: just a couple of years ago, we were able to
• 29:00
  Speaker 7: get some new evidence. Kind of the big break for
• 29:04
  Speaker 7: us was we were able to talk with Robbie Seely,
• 29:08
  Speaker 7: who was one of the eyewitnesses.
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: Robbie Ceely was the fourteen year old who said he
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: saw someone fleeing the flower shop. He'd initially id'd Marvin,
• 29:18
  Speaker 1: but later on the stand expressed doubts.
• 29:21
  Speaker 7: He told us that he never actually got a good
• 29:26
  Speaker 7: look at Marvin's face, that he didn't know who the
• 29:31
  Speaker 7: perpetrator was, that he felt pressured to make an identification
• 29:35
  Speaker 7: because you know, he himself was a young kid at
• 29:38
  Speaker 7: the time and the police were saying this is a
• 29:40
  Speaker 7: really serious case. He felt like he needed to help
• 29:43
  Speaker 7: him out, and he did the best he could within
• 29:48
  Speaker 7: some very flawed procedures, but he had no idea and
• 29:52
  Speaker 7: he never saw the person's face and was willing to
• 29:54
  Speaker 7: go on the record with that.
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: From there, the prosecution's entire case crumbled.
• 29:59
  Speaker 7: Got recantation from Anthony Todd, who is one of one
• 30:03
  Speaker 7: of the witnesses who said a trial that Marvin had
• 30:05
  Speaker 7: told him he was going to go.
• 30:07
  Speaker 3: Hit a lick.
• 30:08
  Speaker 1: Remember he was fourteen, a middle schooler.
• 30:10
  Speaker 7: He originally said he didn't know anything until he got
• 30:15
  Speaker 7: into some trouble himself. And so the police go and
• 30:19
  Speaker 7: see him and and you know, similarly are sort of
• 30:23
  Speaker 7: threatening him with his own time, and he cracks in
• 30:27
  Speaker 7: the same way that Isaiah Harper did.
• 30:30
  Speaker 1: Marvin's cousin Isaiah.
• 30:32
  Speaker 4: The police had tried to talk to Isaiah many, many times.
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: They came to him multiple times, saying, well, you're going
• 30:40
  Speaker 2: to get charged with drive without license or these different
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: charges if you know you don't give us information.
• 30:47
  Speaker 7: Now, he had had tried to recance back at trial,
• 30:51
  Speaker 7: but he he, you know, sort of reaffirmed his reincantation
• 30:54
  Speaker 7: to us. He said that they had reason to think
• 30:58
  Speaker 7: it was Marvin and that they knew he had him
• 30:59
  Speaker 7: from and that look, you know, if you are if
• 31:03
  Speaker 7: you're obstructing an investigation, you can get half the time
• 31:07
  Speaker 7: that the principal actor is looking at You could be
• 31:10
  Speaker 7: looking at fifteen years and he was I think he
• 31:14
  Speaker 7: was fourteen at the time. He was even younger than Marvin.
• 31:16
  Speaker 7: So a fourteen year old kid saying if you don't cooperate,
• 31:19
  Speaker 7: you could go to prison for fifteen years.
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: Teenagers being threatened to lie on another teenager.
• 31:25
  Speaker 7: I mean, it's not that hard to understand, like why
• 31:28
  Speaker 7: you would crack under those circumstances.
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: Marvina, did you talk to your cousin at that time?
• 31:34
  Speaker 4: Yeah, he lived with me throughout it. I helped support
• 31:38
  Speaker 4: it Isaiah, even when folks out that I shouldn't have
• 31:43
  Speaker 4: had supported Isaiah.
• 31:45
  Speaker 1: That's still my blood cousin.
• 31:46
  Speaker 4: And at that time I knew that the police had
• 31:49
  Speaker 4: done something bad and then even using our cousin to test,
• 31:53
  Speaker 4: to make him throw him in adult prisons, to make
• 31:57
  Speaker 4: him say that his own blood cousin did that. Do
• 31:59
  Speaker 4: you you know how it made Isaiah feel walking into Thanksgiving,
• 32:04
  Speaker 4: everybody's whispering around his head.
• 32:06
  Speaker 1: He's fourteen years old.
• 32:08
  Speaker 2: A lot of my cousins and stuff family members, they
• 32:10
  Speaker 2: didn't even allow him over at their house because they like,
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: you send little Marvin and jail for life. And you know,
• 32:16
  Speaker 2: he's innocent. I got cousins that don't even still talk
• 32:18
  Speaker 2: to him to this day, and he's affected by that.
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: So they created more victims victims by doing that.
• 32:30
  Speaker 7: Well, we were able to get an eyewitness i ID
• 32:34
  Speaker 7: expert to do a really deep dive on some of
• 32:38
  Speaker 7: the problems with his case and the science behind eyewitness
• 32:42
  Speaker 7: identifications to show that this was just a really profoundly
• 32:47
  Speaker 7: flawed idea.
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: To start. The photo lineup was not done in a
• 32:53
  Speaker 1: double blind manner.
• 32:54
  Speaker 7: Which you know, means that the person administering the lineup
• 32:59
  Speaker 7: does and know who the suspect is, which is just
• 33:04
  Speaker 7: a really basic fundamental best practice for eyewinness identifications.
• 33:09
  Speaker 1: And then the police used to Marvin again in a
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: second lineup, this time a.
• 33:14
  Speaker 7: Live, old fashioned in person lineup, and that again just
• 33:22
  Speaker 7: violates sort of every best practice. No, and like it's
• 33:26
  Speaker 7: just a basic principle that you don't show the witnesses
• 33:29
  Speaker 7: the same suspect more than once. And there's a couple
• 33:32
  Speaker 7: of reasons for that that are pretty intuitive, Like, once
• 33:34
  Speaker 7: they've seen him, he's gonna look familiar to them, right,
• 33:39
  Speaker 7: because he's the one. He's the only common denominator, right,
• 33:42
  Speaker 7: He's the one they're showing me more than once. That
• 33:43
  Speaker 7: must be the guy they think did it. And of course,
• 33:46
  Speaker 7: with good procedures, that is exactly what you want to avoid,
• 33:50
  Speaker 7: is any suggestion to the witness of who the suspect is.
• 33:54
  Speaker 3: So that was.
• 33:57
  Speaker 7: Just enormously problematic, and.
• 33:59
  Speaker 1: From the jump one of the officers at the lineup
• 34:01
  Speaker 1: had raised concerns, Michael Keef. He said he wasn't confident
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: in the identification correct, that he had doubts as to
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: convicted defendants guilt.
• 34:12
  Speaker 7: Yeah, and he testified that he had problems with the
• 34:15
  Speaker 7: lineup procedures, and he objected at the time and it
• 34:17
  Speaker 7: was overruled. And he testified that this was the one
• 34:22
  Speaker 7: case he'd worked on that had resulted in a conviction
• 34:25
  Speaker 7: where he had real doubts about whether that person was guilty,
• 34:29
  Speaker 7: which was a pretty pretty dramatic moment in the court
• 34:33
  Speaker 7: that week.
• 34:49
  Speaker 1: Andrew and the Great North Innocence Project filed their case
• 34:52
  Speaker 1: in late June of twenty twenty three and had a
• 34:55
  Speaker 1: hearing around Thanksgiving. By this point, the case was huge news.
• 35:00
  Speaker 2: When I came back from court, everybody that I knew,
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: I will everybody in the prison was just like walking
• 35:05
  Speaker 2: up to me, like, man, you was on court TV
• 35:08
  Speaker 2: because you see all the and stuff and seeing that
• 35:11
  Speaker 2: I was on front page to start your grew and
• 35:13
  Speaker 2: I'm like, look, it's it's impossible for them not to,
• 35:16
  Speaker 2: you know, give me some gestice at this time, because
• 35:18
  Speaker 2: it's it's everywhere, you know what I mean, people seeing that.
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: You know, I was actually growly convicted that they put
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: the facts in there, you know what I'm saying. So
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: it was just like me seeing that and stuff, I'm like,
• 35:28
  Speaker 2: I was in a good move.
• 35:29
  Speaker 3: I was just so happy.
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: And then Marvin's thirty sixth birthday came.
• 35:35
  Speaker 3: I was actually just being a chill that day. I
• 35:37
  Speaker 3: worked out.
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: It was gonna make me some food and just watch
• 35:41
  Speaker 2: the sport. I wasn't gonna watch the NBA like it was.
• 35:43
  Speaker 2: NBA was a Wednesday, I think it was Boston. It
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: was a couple of double hitters or something like that
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: that day. So I was keeping it simple actually, and
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: then I got a call and shit.
• 35:52
  Speaker 7: And December sixth we were able to call him and
• 35:58
  Speaker 7: tell him that the Stay Headed read that we had
• 36:01
  Speaker 7: proved our case, they were gonna concede, and that he
• 36:05
  Speaker 7: was gonna go home. It was pretty incredible.
• 36:08
  Speaker 1: What did he say? Do you even remember like what happened?
• 36:11
  Speaker 3: I mean, it was just I kind of could hear
• 36:13
  Speaker 3: a little happiness then Andrew voice.
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: Because you know, he more nuts alned with his stuff
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: and just like reserve and shit, So he really don't
• 36:22
  Speaker 2: he really you don't really see too much emotion from him,
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying, Like that.
• 36:25
  Speaker 3: Was just like WHOA.
• 36:26
  Speaker 2: I couldn't even really I just was like Pam. I
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: just was excited because I knew that day was gonna come.
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: I never doubted it, you know what I'm saying.
• 36:34
  Speaker 3: I never, not once.
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: I never thought myself that you're never gonna I never
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: I knew that I wasn't gonna do no life since that,
• 36:41
  Speaker 2: you know what I'm saying.
• 36:42
  Speaker 3: I knew that because I'm I got too much fight
• 36:45
  Speaker 3: in you, you know what I'm saying.
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: A few days later, Marvin was a free man.
• 36:54
  Speaker 8: Almost twenty years ago, a terrible injustice occurred when this
• 36:59
  Speaker 8: state prosecuted Marvin Haines.
• 37:03
  Speaker 1: In front of the press and his family. Mary Moriarty,
• 37:06
  Speaker 1: the county's top prosecutor, looked Marvin in the eye and
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: offered an apology.
• 37:11
  Speaker 8: You lost the opportunity to graduate from high school, to
• 37:16
  Speaker 8: attend prom have relationships, attend weddings and funerals, and spend
• 37:24
  Speaker 8: time with your family around the holidays. I am so
• 37:28
  Speaker 8: deeply sorry for that.
• 37:31
  Speaker 1: Marvin says he was able to keep fighting because of
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: his faith.
• 37:35
  Speaker 3: God finna give me do this. So it was more.
• 37:38
  Speaker 2: I had so much faith, man, You had no idea,
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: and I don't even know how I had that much faith.
• 37:42
  Speaker 2: Even now, I still got the faith, but I always knew.
• 37:45
  Speaker 2: I'm like, man, look this stuff based on truth is
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: gonna reveal.
• 37:49
  Speaker 7: Marvin has had just an incredible support group, you know,
• 37:54
  Speaker 7: an incredible amount of support from his family. His sisters
• 37:58
  Speaker 7: have been standing by his side for years, just fighting
• 38:02
  Speaker 7: relentlessly for him.
• 38:04
  Speaker 1: Marvina founded Minnesota Wrongfully Convicted Judicial Reform because of Marvin's
• 38:09
  Speaker 1: wrongful conviction, but she says she hasn't forgotten about Randy
• 38:12
  Speaker 1: Shearer and Cynthia McDermott.
• 38:15
  Speaker 4: I'm really really sorry that that happened to that family,
• 38:20
  Speaker 4: and when the right person doesn't go to jail, we
• 38:23
  Speaker 4: know that that leaves the killer out to prey on
• 38:26
  Speaker 4: other people in our community.
• 38:29
  Speaker 1: She now works to help other families fighting for loved
• 38:31
  Speaker 1: ones who are wrongfully convicted. Marvin and I spoke at
• 38:35
  Speaker 1: this year's Innocence Network conference in New Orleans, just three
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: months after his release from prison. He told me about
• 38:41
  Speaker 1: his new place he just furnished, and how excited he
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: is to work.
• 38:45
  Speaker 2: I work at It's like a material handler typeverything, fork
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: lift driving, different.
• 38:50
  Speaker 3: Things like that. But my job.
• 38:52
  Speaker 2: I like my job, and stuff is cool because I
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: was in prison working doing similar work and I was
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: getting paid like twenty five cents an hour, you know
• 39:00
  Speaker 2: what I'm saying. So after two weeks of eighty hours,
• 39:04
  Speaker 2: my check fourteen dollars, you know what I'm saying.
• 39:06
  Speaker 3: Or it's just crazy.
• 39:07
  Speaker 2: So to know that I got at least I'm able to,
• 39:11
  Speaker 2: you know, take care of my responsibilities and stuff with
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: a job and just accomplish the goals at I'm sitting, are.
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: You thinking about like dating or having a family or
• 39:20
  Speaker 1: anything like that.
• 39:21
  Speaker 3: No, I don't. I don't thinking about no family.
• 39:23
  Speaker 2: I am dating though I got a girlfriend and stuff
• 39:25
  Speaker 2: that I've been with that that was rocking it out
• 39:27
  Speaker 2: with me when I was in there and stuff. She
• 39:29
  Speaker 2: been there through some through some hard times and help
• 39:31
  Speaker 2: me with a lot of stuff. So yeah, but yeah,
• 39:35
  Speaker 2: I don't see no kids in my future. I feel
• 39:37
  Speaker 2: like I had too much time taking away so I
• 39:39
  Speaker 2: kind of.
• 39:40
  Speaker 5: Wanted, like, just live your own mind in my life.
• 39:43
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and I feel like I want to be the baby,
• 39:46
  Speaker 3: you know what I'm saying, and be spoiled and all
• 39:48
  Speaker 3: that stuff.
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: So yeah, does your girlfriend spoil you?
• 39:52
  Speaker 3: Yeah?
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: She do. Honestly, I'm a miss Like waking up to
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: breakfast and coffee and stuff like that, I was just
• 39:58
  Speaker 2: thinking like, damn, like to know, I'm not going to
• 40:00
  Speaker 2: wake up to that. You know, it's gonna be cray.
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: I gotta do it all myself, like she Yeah, it's
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: gonna be weird, but I do.
• 40:06
  Speaker 3: I'll be ay.
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: Marvin, how do you feel now you're out? But knowing
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: now that that back then there were police officers that
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: weren't they didn't feel good about this. Your cousin was
• 40:25
  Speaker 1: lying like, how do you feel now looking back that
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: all of these people just didn't even feel good about
• 40:29
  Speaker 1: this conviction.
• 40:31
  Speaker 2: At the end of the day, I'm not mad at
• 40:32
  Speaker 2: them because you know, carmar always come back around and
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: truth always prevails. So the end of the days like
• 40:39
  Speaker 2: I can't dwell on what they've done to me or
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: I feel some way about it, because luckily I got
• 40:46
  Speaker 2: my life and I'm still young and I'm able to
• 40:47
  Speaker 2: still go be productive, and I'm so blessed.
• 41:11
  Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling.
• 41:15
  Speaker 1: Please support your local innocence organizations and go to the
• 41:18
  Speaker 1: links in the episode description to see how you can help.
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: This episode was written by me Maggie Freeling, with story
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: editing and mixing by senior producer Rebecca Ibada. Our producer
• 41:28
  Speaker 1: is Kathleen Fink. Our researcher is Halle Dolce, with additional
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: mixing by Josh Allen and additional production help by Jeff Cliburn.
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: Executive producers are Jason Flam, Jeff Kempler, and Kevin Wurtis.
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: The music is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: Make sure to follow us on all social media platforms
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: at Lava for Good and at Wrongful Conviction. You can
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: also follow me on all platforms at Maggie Freeling. Wrongful
• 41:54
  Speaker 1: Conviction with Maggie Freeling is a production of Lava for
• 41:57
  Speaker 1: Good Podcasts in association with Signal Come Any Number One