Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #082 Jason Flom with Dusty Turner - RE-RELEASE

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#082 Jason Flom with Dusty Turner - RE-RELEASE · Wrongful Conviction

0:02
Speaker 1: I fell into the hands of a corrupt detective.
0:07
Speaker 2: I was naive enough to believe that I would be
0:10
Speaker 2: able to just present all of my proof of actual innocence,
0:13
Speaker 2: that they would investigate adequately, and so that I wouldn't
0:15
Speaker 2: be going to prison because I was a good person.
0:17
Speaker 2: I hadn't done anything wrong.
0:19
Speaker 1: In the back of your mind, you say, well, when
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Speaker 1: we go to a hearing or we go to court,
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Speaker 1: the truth will come out. The prosecution from day one
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Speaker 1: knew I was innocent and let forced testimony go uncorrected
0:30
Speaker 1: from the lower courts all the way up to the
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Speaker 1: United States Supreme Court.
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Speaker 3: You have someone with a badge with ultimate and really,
0:41
Speaker 3: in that moment, unchecked authority.
0:44
Speaker 2: Don't presume that people are guilty when you see them
0:47
Speaker 2: on TV, because it may just be a dirty DA
0:50
Speaker 2: that is trying to rise upward.
0:57
Speaker 4: This is wrongful conviction.
1:11
Speaker 5: Hello, this is a pre bay call from I'm enidated
1:15
Speaker 5: from Virginia Department of Corrections, Green Steel Correction and Work
1:18
Speaker 5: Center to accept this call plus zero who refuses. This
1:23
Speaker 5: call is from a correction facility and is subject to
1:26
Speaker 5: monitoring and recording.
1:28
Speaker 4: Welcome back to wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm today, I'm
1:31
Speaker 4: interviewing someone who I have a great deal of respect
1:34
Speaker 4: and admiration for, Dusty Turner. On June nineteenth, the twenty
1:39
Speaker 4: one year old pre med student went missing while vacationing
1:42
Speaker 4: with family friends at Virginia Beach.
1:44
Speaker 6: Twenty one year old Jennifer Evans abducted and murdered while
1:48
Speaker 6: vacationing in Virginia Beach that Sunday night, Jennifer Evans left
1:52
Speaker 6: the now defunct Bayou Nightclub with former Navy seal training
1:55
Speaker 6: Dustin Turner. Please say the two got in the car
1:58
Speaker 6: with another seal trainee, Billy Joe Brown. Police found her
2:02
Speaker 6: body nine days later in this wooded area of Newport News.
2:05
Speaker 6: She had been strangled. Both men blamed each other in court.
2:09
Speaker 3: Turner was sentenced to eighty two years and Brown to
2:12
Speaker 3: seventy two years.
2:13
Speaker 6: Both sentenced to spend the rest of their lives in prison,
2:16
Speaker 6: but the appeals continued through this year. When Brown told
2:19
Speaker 6: police he was solely responsible for Jennifer's death, the confession
2:23
Speaker 6: gave Dustin Turner one last chance to walk free.
2:26
Speaker 3: The Virginia Supreme Court ruled unanimously Friday against Dusty Turner's
2:30
Speaker 3: petition for exoneration the rule. He means Turner and another
2:34
Speaker 3: Seal trainee, Billy Joe Brown, will spend the rest of
2:37
Speaker 3: their lives in prison for the murder of Jennifer Evans.
2:42
Speaker 4: Dusty, welcome to the show. The reason you're hearing him
2:46
Speaker 4: sound sort of like he's on another planet is because
2:48
Speaker 4: he is. He's in prison in Virginia where he's been
2:51
Speaker 4: locked up for twenty two years for a crime he
2:53
Speaker 4: had nothing to do with. It's a complicated case and
2:57
Speaker 4: a very tragic situation because Dusty had just completed the
3:01
Speaker 4: training to be a Navy Seal when he was arrested
3:05
Speaker 4: for a murder that he didn't commit. And Dusty, let's
3:08
Speaker 4: go back to that. When did you sign up for
3:10
Speaker 4: the Navy? What made you want to serve your country?
3:13
Speaker 7: Well, my family has been in the military, my father,
3:17
Speaker 7: my stepfather, my brother, my older brother he was in
3:20
Speaker 7: the Navy before me, and I guess I just have
3:23
Speaker 7: always had that appeal towards the military and to serve.
3:26
Speaker 4: My country, right, but you took it to another level
3:28
Speaker 4: going through that Navy Seal training. That is the most
3:31
Speaker 4: extreme thing you can do, right. Seals and rangers are
3:35
Speaker 4: the most elite troops that we have, and so you
3:39
Speaker 4: decided to subject yourself to basically torture in order to
3:42
Speaker 4: really become a machine, right, Well, yeah, I.
3:46
Speaker 7: Guess that's right. You know, initially, when I first signed
3:49
Speaker 7: up to the military, to the Navy, I wanted to
3:52
Speaker 7: be a diver. I was scuba diving for about fifteen
3:55
Speaker 7: years ago, and before I was in the Sacovia Delayed
3:58
Speaker 7: Entry program, and before I actually arrived the boot camp,
4:01
Speaker 7: I set my sights on becoming a stew I don't
4:06
Speaker 7: know really what it is that drove me so much,
4:10
Speaker 7: but I just wanted to be in the most elite
4:14
Speaker 7: unit that I could to be in order to fight
4:17
Speaker 7: for my country.
4:18
Speaker 4: And ironically, this all went horribly wrong. And there's a connection.
4:23
Speaker 4: There's a very strong connection to the training because of
4:26
Speaker 4: the fact that it was that faithful night when you
4:29
Speaker 4: were out with your training buddy when all of this
4:32
Speaker 4: tragedy began. Your training partner was Billy Brown, right, Yes.
4:38
Speaker 7: Billy Brown and I were paired together early on in
4:40
Speaker 7: bus training and throughout the entire field training. We were
4:45
Speaker 7: paired of and actually the only reason we're paired of
4:48
Speaker 7: at the beginning is because we're the same height, and
4:51
Speaker 7: as fate would have it, that's why we were paired.
4:53
Speaker 4: Of And why does that matter.
4:55
Speaker 7: Well, everyone's assigned to a boat crew in bus training,
5:00
Speaker 7: and your boat crew is depended upon height, and so
5:03
Speaker 7: we were in the same boat crew. We're the same height.
5:06
Speaker 7: One instructors that you and you, you're together. You're now
5:08
Speaker 7: slim buddy.
5:09
Speaker 4: And that was early in And the issue was Billy
5:15
Speaker 4: was a very volatile character. Right, There's questions that have
5:18
Speaker 4: been raised as to whether he should have ever been
5:20
Speaker 4: admitted into the Navy in the first place when he
5:24
Speaker 4: had a history of well, let's just say, erratic behavior
5:29
Speaker 4: that would be concerning you would think before allowing him
5:32
Speaker 4: to serve in that capacity. Can you talk a little
5:35
Speaker 4: bit about that.
5:36
Speaker 7: Yeah, So I didn't know about his past until after
5:40
Speaker 7: the trial. He did have a violent history. Apparently he
5:45
Speaker 7: had adulted at least one email before he came to
5:49
Speaker 7: the military. He was discharged out of the Coastguard before
5:54
Speaker 7: he came into the Navy, and he had a couple
5:57
Speaker 7: other things on his record, which again I was unaware of.
6:01
Speaker 5: The Brier.
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Speaker 7: You know, there's some people have said that when he
6:05
Speaker 7: would have gone through the process get his security clearance
6:08
Speaker 7: that they would have recognized this and then kicked them
6:11
Speaker 7: out of the service. I'm not so sure if that's
6:14
Speaker 7: the case or not, but he certainly had this vile
6:17
Speaker 7: pass and it is surprising, you know, in hindsight, is
6:20
Speaker 7: very surprising that he was allowed not only in the military,
6:23
Speaker 7: but to come through into the Special Forces.
6:26
Speaker 4: And Dusty so going through the training with him, I mean,
6:30
Speaker 4: you guys are taught to protect each other at all costs,
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Speaker 4: even if it means risking or putting your own life
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Speaker 4: in danger. Is that right?
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Speaker 7: Yes, it is during the training throughout a good majority
6:43
Speaker 7: of it. If we were separated more than six feet,
6:45
Speaker 7: we would be punished for that. You know, I could
6:49
Speaker 7: trust him in the field, so to speak, to shoot
6:52
Speaker 7: over top of my back and you know, my parachute,
6:55
Speaker 7: so to speak. So there was a great deal of
6:59
Speaker 7: trust and a binding bors for it to come with the.
7:02
Speaker 4: Training, right, you literally had to trust each other with
7:05
Speaker 4: your lives in a very, very in a very real way.
7:09
Speaker 4: I'm bringing that up because it has a bearing on
7:13
Speaker 4: the events, the tragic events that happened on June nineteenth,
7:17
Speaker 4: nineteen ninety five in Virginia Beach. And I don't think
7:21
Speaker 4: anybody who hasn't been in your shoes can judge how
7:25
Speaker 4: you acted on that particular night. It's a very unique
7:30
Speaker 4: case and a very unique set of circumstances. Let's talk
7:33
Speaker 4: about that. Because you guys went out to a bar
7:36
Speaker 4: that night. The evening started innocently enough, but Billy had
7:40
Speaker 4: a drinking problem from what I've read, and apparently he
7:43
Speaker 4: got pretty blitzed. Is that right?
7:46
Speaker 7: Yeah, he had been drinking that day from early on
7:49
Speaker 7: and it just continued into the evening, and that we
7:51
Speaker 7: were at the club at ninety and he was absolute.
7:55
Speaker 4: Devote So walk us through what happened, Dusty, because this
8:00
Speaker 4: is really the moment right when your life was turned
8:04
Speaker 4: upside down. How did this unravel from the time you
8:08
Speaker 4: were in the club to when you ended up in
8:09
Speaker 4: the car, and then ultimately what happened after that.
8:12
Speaker 7: Well, you know, it started off as kind of a normal,
8:15
Speaker 7: normal evening. I'd been to that club a few times previous.
8:20
Speaker 7: I was relatively new to the area in Virginia Beach,
8:24
Speaker 7: not only been there maybe maybe three weeks, and so
8:28
Speaker 7: initially three of us guys were going to go out
8:30
Speaker 7: and to the club at night. One of the guys
8:32
Speaker 7: ended up going and I don't know, going off with
8:34
Speaker 7: his girlfriend or something. So Billy and I went to the club.
8:38
Speaker 7: It was again, it was kind of a normal here,
8:40
Speaker 7: Billy is drunk. Again. I kind of separated myself at
8:43
Speaker 7: the club from him, and I had met a very
8:47
Speaker 7: nice young lady named Jennifer Evans. We kind of hit
8:50
Speaker 7: it off. We were having a good time. We're sharing
8:52
Speaker 7: with each other what we were into. You know, she
8:55
Speaker 7: was a college studit down in Georgia, and I generally
8:58
Speaker 7: didn't talk very open about my still experience, but with her,
9:02
Speaker 7: I did, and I opened up and I told her
9:04
Speaker 7: what I was doing there for the beach. Now, mind
9:07
Speaker 7: you that I was in the club with a underage
9:11
Speaker 7: and I had a fake ID that I got in there.
9:15
Speaker 4: You were twenty at the time, man, that was yeah.
9:17
Speaker 7: I was twenty years old. Jennifer was twenty one, and
9:20
Speaker 7: so again we you know, different and I we.
9:21
Speaker 8: Hit it off.
9:22
Speaker 7: We had to separate ourselves from from Billy. I had
9:25
Speaker 7: met her girlfriend, her two friends that she came there with.
9:28
Speaker 7: We had been out on the dance floor and you know,
9:32
Speaker 7: again it was very very normal type of evening. And well,
9:37
Speaker 7: the last thing I was imagining was some contractic happening
9:40
Speaker 7: that night, so it put it in the night her
9:42
Speaker 7: girlfriend had left. Briefly they were going to go get
9:45
Speaker 7: some coffee. Ten everyone to say was be in the club.
9:47
Speaker 7: So we actually had an idea of trying to go
9:50
Speaker 7: down to the beach, taking our shoes off, and walking
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Speaker 7: down on the beach. But as the night for breast
9:55
Speaker 7: and her girlfriends were going to come pick her back
9:58
Speaker 7: up at two o'clock in the morning, which is the
10:00
Speaker 7: this club quote, Jennifer and I realized we didn't know
10:03
Speaker 7: his time to go down to the beach and then
10:05
Speaker 7: make it back to meet her girlfriend, so we stayed
10:08
Speaker 7: in the club, and in fact we went out into
10:10
Speaker 7: the lobby where it was more quiet, and we did
10:13
Speaker 7: that out there and had a conversation. Just previous to this,
10:17
Speaker 7: I had gotten Billy to ride home with his ex
10:21
Speaker 7: girlfriend and it happened to be in the club that
10:22
Speaker 7: night Christian's Bishop, and reluctantly she did agree to take
10:28
Speaker 7: him home. She was reluctant, hesitant because she knows the
10:31
Speaker 7: type of character that he is and she really didn't
10:34
Speaker 7: want to deal with him, especially because he was so drunk,
10:37
Speaker 7: which I understood, but you know, I was happy that
10:39
Speaker 7: she was willing to take him home, so I was
10:42
Speaker 7: confident that I wouldn't even see him for the rest
10:44
Speaker 7: of the night. And I was with Jennifer, and it
10:47
Speaker 7: was closing upon two o'clock in the morning. We were
10:50
Speaker 7: out in the lobby and we decided to go out
10:54
Speaker 7: into the parking lote and wait for her girlfriend and
10:56
Speaker 7: sit in my car and listened to some music. And
10:59
Speaker 7: so within about ten minutes, still too again, we went
11:03
Speaker 7: out to my car and we were sitting there, listening
11:05
Speaker 7: to music and looking forward her girlfriends to show up
11:08
Speaker 7: at any minute. Instead, what we saw coming down the
11:11
Speaker 7: hill was Billy Brown, and he was heading towards the
11:15
Speaker 7: park spot. You know, I certainly wasn't expecting him. Christian
11:19
Speaker 7: was supposed to take him home. I knew he was
11:21
Speaker 7: drunk and belligerent, but when he's approaching the vehicle, I
11:24
Speaker 7: told Jennifer, I said, look, you know this is the
11:27
Speaker 7: guy I come here with. You know, he's drunk, just
11:30
Speaker 7: still paying no attention to them. I've seen him in
11:33
Speaker 7: the past, especially when we were in Puerto Rico. I've
11:36
Speaker 7: seen him, witness him become kind of violent towards women.
11:40
Speaker 7: I didn't think that he would become violent towards Jennifer,
11:43
Speaker 7: but I did assume he was at least going to
11:46
Speaker 7: be obnoxious and somewhat belligerent. So when he got into.
11:50
Speaker 4: The car, wait, hold up there for a second, Dusty,
11:52
Speaker 4: what kind of car was it?
11:54
Speaker 7: So I had a small geostorm.
11:57
Speaker 4: So that's a small car, right, yeah, it is very car.
12:00
Speaker 4: And you big guys, both of you guys.
12:02
Speaker 7: Are He was bigger than I. We were both six
12:05
Speaker 7: foot two and a half, I guess, and he outweighed
12:08
Speaker 7: me by him maybe maybe fifteen twenty pounds, so he
12:11
Speaker 7: was I think he was about two hundred and thirty
12:14
Speaker 7: somewhere around that's thirty pounds. But he approaches the passer's
12:17
Speaker 7: side of the car and he opens the door and
12:19
Speaker 7: he kind of pushes the car sty forward with Jennifer
12:22
Speaker 7: is sitting, he pushes the feat forward a little roughly,
12:26
Speaker 7: and he gets in the car in the back seats
12:28
Speaker 7: right behind her. Of course, his big frame compared with
12:32
Speaker 7: fitback and this he's did a very small car. Those
12:36
Speaker 7: knees are against the back of her seat. And as
12:40
Speaker 7: soon as he sits down, I turned to him and
12:43
Speaker 7: I said, Billy What's what's going on? Why why was
12:46
Speaker 7: Christian not taking you home? And he immediately goes into
12:51
Speaker 7: a tirade about oh, screw me, that f bet girls
12:55
Speaker 7: you think you know, blah blah, he's nothing but a favet.
13:00
Speaker 4: This is the last thing you want to see, right,
13:02
Speaker 4: You're having a nice moment with a girl, you have
13:04
Speaker 4: a nice connection with her. The last thing you want
13:06
Speaker 4: to see, last thing anybody would want to see is
13:10
Speaker 4: a drunk, belligerent, violent anybody. You don't want to see
13:14
Speaker 4: anybody at that point. You just want to be in
13:16
Speaker 4: your little bubble with her, listen to music. Everything's good.
13:19
Speaker 4: I mean, you never could have predicted how bad it
13:21
Speaker 4: was going to get, but already it's bad.
13:23
Speaker 7: Yeah, So this is obviously, this is the crux of
13:26
Speaker 7: the situation. Jennifer and I were having a time. You know,
13:29
Speaker 7: we were not romantically involved at this time. Earlier I
13:34
Speaker 7: had given her a husband when I thought that she
13:36
Speaker 7: was going to leave with her girlfriends, And that's the
13:39
Speaker 7: only time we had any come physical context. Say, Jeff,
13:42
Speaker 7: she's a very decent young lady. You know, she was
13:46
Speaker 7: a good girl with a great teacher and farmer who
13:49
Speaker 7: was going to college. And it's a very nice young lady.
13:52
Speaker 7: And so we're having a great conversation, and as you said,
13:55
Speaker 7: here comes this drunk buddy of mine down.
13:58
Speaker 5: To the calling.
14:00
Speaker 4: So he's now in the back seat and is acting
14:04
Speaker 4: as you would have probably predicted that he would have
14:07
Speaker 4: act because of what you know about his character and
14:09
Speaker 4: his current state of mind. But then it gets much worse.
14:13
Speaker 7: Yeah. Yeah, So after asking him why Christian was taking
14:17
Speaker 7: him home, and you know, he said what he said
14:19
Speaker 7: about her, and he turns the bench to the Jennifer
14:23
Speaker 7: and he made some very rude comments, if I remember correctly,
14:27
Speaker 7: he said something about asking her if she was a virgin,
14:30
Speaker 7: something like that. It was certainly inappropriate. And I immediately said, look, really,
14:36
Speaker 7: why don't you get out and go find Christians that
14:39
Speaker 7: she's gonna take him home. And so he was not
14:42
Speaker 7: trying to hear that at all. He's like, that's that bitch.
14:45
Speaker 7: So again he kind of turns his bench to Jennifer
14:48
Speaker 7: in Now, mind you, within two or three or four
14:51
Speaker 7: minutes before her girlfriends are coming to pick her up
14:55
Speaker 7: right there where we're at in the parking lot. They're
14:57
Speaker 7: supposed to arrive there, and they told us to be
14:59
Speaker 7: there to the bot, and it has to be within
15:02
Speaker 7: a couple of minutes before too. And of course I
15:04
Speaker 7: didn't know at that point too what had transpired in
15:07
Speaker 7: the gloves between him and Kristen that made him additionally belligerent.
15:13
Speaker 7: So he turns his entire back to Jennifer and he
15:17
Speaker 7: said something about her hair. He reached her up with
15:20
Speaker 7: his right hand. I don't know if he pushed her
15:22
Speaker 7: her shoulder or her hair, but at that point Jennifer had,
15:28
Speaker 7: throughout this time, this brief couple of minutes, she had
15:31
Speaker 7: not said a word, did not open her mouth to
15:34
Speaker 7: him or refined to him. And so when he pushed
15:39
Speaker 7: her hair or her shoulder, she smacked his hand from behind,
15:43
Speaker 7: you know, swatted his hand, and that's when he snapped.
15:47
Speaker 7: So you know, I wasn't looking directly at him when
15:50
Speaker 7: he snapped, but with all his might, he violently brushed
15:56
Speaker 7: his arms around her body, her neck area, and with
16:01
Speaker 7: so much force that the whole car literally see.
16:06
Speaker 4: Right, And I'm thinking about it, Dusty. He had his feet,
16:09
Speaker 4: as you said, his knees were up against the seat.
16:12
Speaker 4: And here's a big, strong, two thirty pound guy who's
16:17
Speaker 4: trained to kill with his with his hands, and he's
16:19
Speaker 4: got total leverage right because he's got the knees. I mean,
16:23
Speaker 4: you know, it would have been nothing for him to
16:25
Speaker 4: do this considering all of these well.
16:27
Speaker 7: You know, I don't you know, I don't know about
16:30
Speaker 7: saying it would have been nothing. I really don't know.
16:32
Speaker 7: I know that if seemingly it was coming for him,
16:36
Speaker 7: the strike that he did upon this innocent young woman
16:41
Speaker 7: was so violent that when I turned and start screaming
16:47
Speaker 7: at him to just let her go, and he's screaming
16:50
Speaker 7: at me, just ep and drive, just ep and drive. First,
16:53
Speaker 7: I started crying and trying to pull his arms off
16:55
Speaker 7: over and screaming at him. This entire brief time when
16:59
Speaker 7: this happened, Jennifer never once reached up to defend herself.
17:05
Speaker 7: It was that quick that she was out, And so
17:09
Speaker 7: I immediately grabbed his arms and I'm screaming at him,
17:12
Speaker 7: just let her go, let him and he's screaming at me,
17:14
Speaker 7: just fucking drive, just up and drive. Only after a
17:17
Speaker 7: couple of seconds at pulling in his arms didn't work,
17:20
Speaker 7: so I reached under his fingers literally and pried his arms,
17:23
Speaker 7: using one hand on his elbow and the other under
17:25
Speaker 7: his fingertips and pride his arms up off of her.
17:29
Speaker 7: At this point, when I dig at his arms off her,
17:31
Speaker 7: he took back in the seat, and she is out, said,
17:36
Speaker 7: her head is built towards the passenger side window, her
17:41
Speaker 7: arms on the other side. She had belittered herself. And
17:45
Speaker 7: I'm just complete shot and just uttered confusion and disbelief,
17:51
Speaker 7: and I and I'm and him still he is yelling
17:54
Speaker 7: at him, just epping drive, just epping dry dust.
17:58
Speaker 4: I'm just thinking that I'm just the physics of it.
18:01
Speaker 4: I mean, it would have been almost impossible for anyone,
18:03
Speaker 4: even a strong guy like yourself, to pull somebody off
18:06
Speaker 4: from the side when he's in a position like he
18:09
Speaker 4: was in, especially when it happened as quickly as it did.
18:12
Speaker 4: I mean, you really had no chance to save this
18:15
Speaker 4: poor girl. And I mean I obviously you did what
18:17
Speaker 4: you could, but she had no chance. And at this point,
18:21
Speaker 4: were you concerned that he was going to try to
18:23
Speaker 4: kill you too, No, it certainly wasn't mind.
18:26
Speaker 7: They didn't go through my head at the time.
18:28
Speaker 4: No.
18:29
Speaker 7: My only thought, I'm not think that anyone sitting in
18:31
Speaker 7: my seat would have had a same reaction. You know,
18:35
Speaker 7: one minute having a good time with a young lady
18:39
Speaker 7: and the next minute, this guy, this violence predator, completely
18:43
Speaker 7: just alters history. I don't know it's spoke stream, but
18:47
Speaker 7: I mean the one act that he does, it changes
18:50
Speaker 7: the lines and so many people. Sure, and he's drunk,
18:54
Speaker 7: and you know, I'd like to think that he really
18:56
Speaker 7: didn't know what the heck he's doing. He has his past,
18:58
Speaker 7: and he has nance asked the violence start women. But
19:01
Speaker 7: he's been increasingly becoming an alcoholist over the last several
19:06
Speaker 7: weeks or months, in which he's drinking every single night.
19:09
Speaker 7: It's just a bad, bad bruise, not to mention the
19:12
Speaker 7: fact that he was thinking sterially leading up to this
19:14
Speaker 7: as will.
19:15
Speaker 4: Obviously, he destroyed her and get killed her, and he
19:19
Speaker 4: ruined the lives of everyone who cared about her, her family, etc.
19:23
Speaker 4: He ruined your life, He ruined his own life. He
19:26
Speaker 4: ruined the lives of your families, right, your family all
19:29
Speaker 4: military heroes and so yeah, in one short burst of
19:32
Speaker 4: violence from what it sounds like last only seconds, not
19:36
Speaker 4: even minutes, he managed to destroy so many people. And
19:41
Speaker 4: then that's where the story gets into a whole different phase. Right,
19:46
Speaker 4: and again, I can't walk in your shoes, No one
19:50
Speaker 4: can walk in your shoes with all the factors that
19:53
Speaker 4: were going on, Dusty, with the fact that you had
19:55
Speaker 4: been now trained, practically indoctrinated into this idea that you
20:00
Speaker 4: must protect this guy and he's going to protect you.
20:04
Speaker 4: You know, that's just in the mix. I just want
20:06
Speaker 4: to put that in there. But besides that, you're in
20:08
Speaker 4: a state I can imagine a complete shock and panic,
20:13
Speaker 4: and who could imagine this terrible turn of events, as
20:17
Speaker 4: you said, And what a dramatic turn when it goes
20:19
Speaker 4: from what sounds like a beautiful night a nice connection
20:24
Speaker 4: to this absolute horror that you're you've just witnessed as
20:30
Speaker 4: close and personal as you can imagine with somebody that
20:32
Speaker 4: you were supposed to trust and protect and someone else
20:34
Speaker 4: that you would have liked to protect but you couldn't.
20:37
Speaker 4: He's screaming at you to drive what happened?
20:41
Speaker 7: Yeah, And this is, like you said, this is why
20:44
Speaker 7: you're in prisons is because of what you've done afterwards,
20:48
Speaker 7: and that people can't understand your reaction afterwards. The normal
20:53
Speaker 7: person would have jumped out of the vehicle and ran
20:55
Speaker 7: to find the phone or the police somewhere or somebody.
21:00
Speaker 7: Something just terrible has happened, And that might be the
21:03
Speaker 7: case for most people. I don't know, but I think
21:05
Speaker 7: that the way I reacted it would have been different.
21:09
Speaker 7: Even if my own brother would have been in Billy
21:12
Speaker 7: Brown's place, I think I would have reacted differently, because,
21:15
Speaker 7: like you said too, the way I was conditioned and
21:19
Speaker 7: indoctrinated at twenty years old, I reacted how I reacted.
21:24
Speaker 7: I'm not a criminal. I've never been violent, and I
21:28
Speaker 7: certainly have never been violent towards women, and I'm not
21:31
Speaker 7: criminally minded. And so why is is did a twenty
21:34
Speaker 7: year old trust in this position which I should never
21:37
Speaker 7: have been to begin with, and had to make these
21:39
Speaker 7: kinds of decisions. And so when I realized that Jennifers did,
21:45
Speaker 7: and Billy Brown screaming them, and I really didn't know
21:49
Speaker 7: what it is. I was in a place in this area,
21:53
Speaker 7: like I said, I had only been ever being beach
21:55
Speaker 7: for a couple of weeks and a three weeks in time.
21:59
Speaker 7: So I just put the car to drive and I
22:02
Speaker 7: took off driving, and I didn't know where I was going.
22:05
Speaker 7: I didn't even know how to barely get out of
22:09
Speaker 7: the Virginia Beach area until I ended up in I
22:12
Speaker 7: Phil Brown. When I started driving, he said, I'll turn
22:16
Speaker 7: left here to turn right there, and I ended up
22:18
Speaker 7: on sixty four, and on sixty four, I'm familiar with
22:22
Speaker 7: that highway, and so I just started traveling west on
22:25
Speaker 7: sixty four and I didn't know where I was going,
22:29
Speaker 7: and I just kept driving and driving until I started
22:32
Speaker 7: seeing a lot of wooded area, and so I pulled
22:35
Speaker 7: off on an exit. Again, I have no idea where
22:37
Speaker 7: I'm at, and I'm just driving, and I pulled off
22:39
Speaker 7: into another area which seemed more wooded, until I get
22:43
Speaker 7: to a more secluded area which is not that far
22:46
Speaker 7: from the interstate, and both of us, myself and Billy, get.
22:50
Speaker 5: Up the car.
22:52
Speaker 7: I grabbed Ennifer's wrist, he grabbed her legs, and we
22:57
Speaker 7: carried her perhaps thirty or into the wood. And again
23:04
Speaker 7: I was in complete chaotic shock, and I didn't know
23:10
Speaker 7: what I was doing. I didn't know what else to do.
23:14
Speaker 7: And yeah, I understand that people people look at that
23:18
Speaker 7: moment there and say, you know that, why would you
23:21
Speaker 7: do that? Why you know I would have done that?
23:24
Speaker 7: But others have topped in in my shoes. They don't understand,
23:28
Speaker 7: and perhaps I don't even understand why I reacted that
23:30
Speaker 7: with other than to say that this is kind of
23:33
Speaker 7: how I was trained to react. They didn't say any
23:35
Speaker 7: situation which you know there's been a crime and it's
23:38
Speaker 7: a civilian who's been hurt, profect your swim budding. Oh
23:42
Speaker 7: of course I didn't say that. However, now, from what
23:45
Speaker 7: I understand, when you go through still training today, they
23:48
Speaker 7: do have classes in training that says, look, if this
23:52
Speaker 7: type of scenario happens, you need to consider what you know,
23:56
Speaker 7: where you're at, what you're doing, and so forth, and
23:59
Speaker 7: do not protect your if he has done something so horrendous,
24:03
Speaker 7: so wrong. And that's the place today because because.
24:07
Speaker 8: Of this city.
24:08
Speaker 4: But Dusty, I want to bring up an important point.
24:10
Speaker 4: What is important from a legal perspective to remember is
24:13
Speaker 4: that in Virginia, hiding a body after a murder is
24:17
Speaker 4: a misdemeanor punishable by up to twelve months in jail.
24:21
Speaker 4: And that's not what you got convicted of. That's not
24:24
Speaker 4: what they wanted you for. And we're going to get
24:26
Speaker 4: to that in a minute. But that's a very important
24:29
Speaker 4: thing to remember. In certain states that's not the case.
24:31
Speaker 4: There's some states where it's treated very differently. In some states,
24:35
Speaker 4: it's treated the same as murder, just you know, hiding
24:37
Speaker 4: the body after the fact. But that's the only thing
24:41
Speaker 4: that you were guilty of, and that's one of the
24:43
Speaker 4: reasons why I've dived into your case and why I'm
24:46
Speaker 4: doing everything I can to help you try to find justice,
24:49
Speaker 4: because it's obviously a terrible miscarriage of justice, the fact
24:55
Speaker 4: that you're serving time for murder when what you did
24:59
Speaker 4: was wrong, but it's not murder. So now going forward,
25:05
Speaker 4: you go back to the base, and this is big news,
25:09
Speaker 4: right the town is up in arms. Everyone's wondering what
25:11
Speaker 4: happened to this girl? And this must have been driving
25:14
Speaker 4: you crazy, right, Well, I wasn't.
25:16
Speaker 7: Really aware at the time of the news the media,
25:19
Speaker 7: But what was driving me crazy is just having witnessed
25:23
Speaker 7: it and and knowing about it and attempting to remain
25:28
Speaker 7: silent about it. It was, Uh, it put me in
25:32
Speaker 7: a state of almost like a zombie like state throughout
25:36
Speaker 7: the next week in which I held this speacret and
25:41
Speaker 7: witness really do this terrible, terrible beat, and I had
25:46
Speaker 7: it within and and I couldn't tell anybody, and so
25:50
Speaker 7: it was it was definitely eating me up on the inside.
25:54
Speaker 7: So of course, the coming week we were up north
25:57
Speaker 7: something a place called a support a doing additional training
26:02
Speaker 7: for men. I wasn't during the time. I wasn't aware
26:05
Speaker 7: of the news in the media down in Virginia Beach,
26:08
Speaker 7: but it was certainly eating you up.
26:10
Speaker 8: On the inside.
26:11
Speaker 4: So your conscience got the best of you, and you know,
26:15
Speaker 4: you did the right thing after having done the wrong
26:17
Speaker 4: thing and went to the authorities, right. And that's where
26:21
Speaker 4: things get really dicey from everything I've read, where they
26:25
Speaker 4: didn't behave in a straightforward manner when it comes to
26:28
Speaker 4: how they treated you right.
26:30
Speaker 7: Well, first of all, you know, I did it till
26:31
Speaker 7: the detectives, you know, everything that they asked me. You know,
26:35
Speaker 7: at first I did.
26:36
Speaker 8: Not deny it.
26:37
Speaker 7: I denied everything, but it came to a point, especially
26:41
Speaker 7: after they had presented me with the fact that dinner
26:44
Speaker 7: first family is an absolute going to a traumatic and
26:48
Speaker 7: brieving experience and they just want to know how they
26:51
Speaker 7: want to know whether their daughter is et cetera. And
26:54
Speaker 7: it was through this line of enquirer questioning that you know,
26:59
Speaker 7: I asked to see my superior officer and my spirit
27:04
Speaker 7: off came in and we were alone, and I told
27:06
Speaker 7: him everything that happened, and so he said that he
27:08
Speaker 7: was going to attempt to call the dad officer and
27:11
Speaker 7: to see what we could do as far as illegally
27:13
Speaker 7: or something like that, but nonetheleast fifteen minutes later, when
27:17
Speaker 7: the Texas come in, I told them everything that they
27:20
Speaker 7: had asked me, and they even asked me if I
27:22
Speaker 7: would help them first draw maps to where Jennifer's Bobby was,
27:26
Speaker 7: which I did, I attempted to do, and then asked
27:30
Speaker 7: me if I would accompany them and they helped find
27:32
Speaker 7: Jennifer's Bobby, so which I did also, and I still
27:37
Speaker 7: my spreit officer in one of the expectives. We went
27:40
Speaker 7: to the location and we separated the search through the woods.
27:44
Speaker 7: Finally I did find her body. At that point I
27:48
Speaker 7: went back to the base they had prevented Billy Brown
27:52
Speaker 7: with the map that I had drawn, and said, look,
27:55
Speaker 7: your buddy completely dis rolled on you. He told us
27:58
Speaker 7: everything you're going, you're probably gonna get the deaf penalty
28:02
Speaker 7: whatever else. And so at that point that he began
28:06
Speaker 7: with the stories about now I had something part to
28:09
Speaker 7: do with it. He later said that he was going
28:12
Speaker 7: down He's gonna take me with and so he made
28:14
Speaker 7: up a story saying that.
28:15
Speaker 4: We're both all yeah. I mean, he was obviously furious
28:19
Speaker 4: because he believed that you, who was supposed to be
28:21
Speaker 4: his protector, had betrayed him. He's going to do what
28:23
Speaker 4: he can to bring you down with him, because, in
28:27
Speaker 4: his twisted way of thinking, you should have covered up
28:31
Speaker 4: this murder and protected him, And so you did what
28:34
Speaker 4: you thought was right albe it after the fact and
28:39
Speaker 4: the consequences started to become very real now from what
28:43
Speaker 4: I've read, Dusty, the detectives made certain promises to you,
28:46
Speaker 4: right that if you help them, you were going to
28:49
Speaker 4: be kind of okay, right.
28:51
Speaker 7: Yeah, they you know, they did say that laughter, telling
28:54
Speaker 7: Monster officer what had happened, and he spoke to the
28:57
Speaker 7: sextus as will.
29:00
Speaker 8: Together.
29:00
Speaker 7: They said, look, just just to answer their questions, it'll
29:04
Speaker 7: be all right. And I said, are you sure you know?
29:06
Speaker 7: And I kind of took it as a direct order
29:08
Speaker 7: from my carey officer. I said, very sure, that's what
29:10
Speaker 7: I should do, and he said, yes, just answer the questions,
29:13
Speaker 7: be all right. I said, okay. Now, they didn't come
29:16
Speaker 7: to me and say anything like, well, you know, for
29:18
Speaker 7: your testimony, will allow some kind of agreement or something
29:22
Speaker 7: like that. Now, they never actually came to me and
29:24
Speaker 7: said that. Of course, being very ignorant of the criminal
29:28
Speaker 7: justice stem, you know, I didn't know that I would
29:30
Speaker 7: even need a lawyer, or that I should remain time
29:34
Speaker 7: about certain things or what have you. But you know,
29:37
Speaker 7: I willingly asked them to search my vehicle. I mean,
29:42
Speaker 7: I answered their questions truthfully, and I thought that maybe
29:46
Speaker 7: what this would lead to was at some point me
29:49
Speaker 7: on a witnessman explaining as Billie Brown and being charged
29:53
Speaker 7: with her murder, that I would be explaining exactly how
29:57
Speaker 7: things happened. Maybe I was naive, but I assume that's
30:00
Speaker 7: company work. I certainly didn't assume that they were going
30:03
Speaker 7: to charge me.
30:05
Speaker 8: After speaking with Billy Brown and him pointing the finger
30:08
Speaker 8: as much Phil, I certainly didn't think want to be
30:10
Speaker 8: George Hurd.
30:12
Speaker 4: And this is an important point, Dusty, right, because the
30:15
Speaker 4: police spent forty eight hours examining your car, right, so
30:19
Speaker 4: they turned that thing upside down, And yet they never
30:24
Speaker 4: used any of the evidence from the car at trial
30:28
Speaker 4: because it wasn't going to be favorable to them. And
30:31
Speaker 4: in fact, by not presenting the evidence at trial, they
30:33
Speaker 4: didn't have to turn over to the defense, when in fact,
30:36
Speaker 4: if they had, it would have been definitely in your
30:40
Speaker 4: favor because of the fact that everything you were saying
30:44
Speaker 4: makes true, that the physics of it just don't add
30:47
Speaker 4: up some of the things that they said. It doesn't
30:49
Speaker 4: make sense to add insult to injury, and in a
31:01
Speaker 4: terrible call it a coincidence. The year that you were convicted,
31:06
Speaker 4: nineteen ninety five was the same year that Virginia abolished parole,
31:09
Speaker 4: which is shocking to my conscience. In a nation where
31:12
Speaker 4: we believe in second chances and we believe in redemption,
31:15
Speaker 4: and we believe in that stuff, the idea that if
31:18
Speaker 4: you were so misfortunate is to be convicted in Virginia
31:20
Speaker 4: nineteen ninety five or later, you are not eligible for parole.
31:23
Speaker 7: I wouldn't even know what parole meant. I wasn't aware,
31:27
Speaker 7: you know today had just abolished parole in Virginia. I
31:29
Speaker 7: don't think I would have would have paired its time.
31:32
Speaker 7: I wasn't so I gets concerned about the sins I
31:35
Speaker 7: was given. I was concerned about the fact that I
31:36
Speaker 7: was convicted of to charges that I did not commit.
31:41
Speaker 7: Whether it gave me ten years or one hundred years
31:43
Speaker 7: I was convicted of something I didn't commit, and that's
31:46
Speaker 7: that was the travisy.
31:47
Speaker 4: It's it's I can't I can't really imagine how that
31:52
Speaker 4: could make sense in a society like ours, But it
31:55
Speaker 4: is in fact a reality, and it's your reality. And
31:58
Speaker 4: it's why now everyone is working so hard to help
32:03
Speaker 4: you get clemency or a pardon or a conditional pardon
32:07
Speaker 4: from the governor because of the fact that that is
32:09
Speaker 4: the only recourse left. Another thing that's of sort of
32:13
Speaker 4: a unique and to me troubling concept is the idea
32:19
Speaker 4: that you only have really one appeal of actual innocence
32:23
Speaker 4: in Virginia, right, And that's something I want to get
32:25
Speaker 4: to Dusty, because, first of all, a crazy thing happened
32:30
Speaker 4: in two thousand and two, right, which is that Billy
32:34
Speaker 4: he had some sort of an awakening and decided to
32:37
Speaker 4: come clean and tell the truth. We're talking two thousand
32:39
Speaker 4: and two, fifteen years ago, right, and he recanted and
32:43
Speaker 4: admitted that he was the sole murderer. And I think
32:45
Speaker 4: people are listening now and going, well, wait a minute,
32:47
Speaker 4: if that happened, why is Dusty still in prison? Can
32:50
Speaker 4: you explain that scenario?
32:53
Speaker 7: Yeah, I'll I'll regan explain it. Yes, as he's serving
32:57
Speaker 7: his time in some other prison, I guess some guys
33:01
Speaker 7: had approached them and got them to get into Christianity,
33:05
Speaker 7: and this allowed him to finally relieve this burden that
33:10
Speaker 7: he's been holding for all these years and to confess.
33:14
Speaker 7: And so that happened again in early two thousands, and
33:18
Speaker 7: here it is fifteen years later, and I'm still sitting here,
33:22
Speaker 7: still sitting here after he's come clean, after he finally said, yeah,
33:28
Speaker 7: everything that Dusty said, that's what happened, and the judge
33:32
Speaker 7: rule that he's credible in that confession. So there was
33:35
Speaker 7: no mechanisms more recently of even getting back into court
33:39
Speaker 7: with such new evidence. But there was a time later
33:43
Speaker 7: in two thousand and sixty five to seven, and so
33:46
Speaker 7: we finally rid of actual innocence to the appeals court,
33:50
Speaker 7: which ended with well, the appeals court initially overturned my convictions.
33:55
Speaker 7: They did convict me of the misdemeanor accessory after the
33:59
Speaker 7: fact to the pelony, which indeed I am built, and
34:03
Speaker 7: like you said earlier, that was a maximum sentence of
34:06
Speaker 7: twelve months in jail when they made this ruling and
34:10
Speaker 7: they dropped my charges as the two thousand and eight,
34:13
Speaker 7: two thousand and nine, I'll expect to be home within
34:16
Speaker 7: a matter of days or weeks.
34:18
Speaker 4: This is what makes me insane. And I think anybody
34:20
Speaker 4: listening is like, wait, wait, wait, So your conviction was vacated, right,
34:25
Speaker 4: And then that means to a layman who's not intimately
34:29
Speaker 4: familiar with the law or criminal proceedings, when your conviction
34:34
Speaker 4: is vacated, you have every reasonablieve you're going to go home. Right.
34:36
Speaker 4: They've actually come out and said, okay, we are now
34:39
Speaker 4: acknowledging there is no physical evidence connecting you to this.
34:42
Speaker 4: None of this stuff adds up, right, not to the murder,
34:45
Speaker 4: Like you said you're guilty of the accessory after the fact,
34:48
Speaker 4: and now you have the actual killer confessing in court
34:53
Speaker 4: under oath. Sounds like a winner. Right, You're going home,
34:57
Speaker 4: except for then the state decided to put it's foot
35:00
Speaker 4: back on your neck, so to speak. Right, And then
35:02
Speaker 4: what happened?
35:04
Speaker 7: Yeah, so the pins the vacated my conviction and I
35:08
Speaker 7: was expected to be home with a matter of days.
35:10
Speaker 7: The acting Attorney General came forward and said that if
35:13
Speaker 7: he wanted to appeal this decision, and so they appealed it.
35:17
Speaker 7: And it went back through the appellate court and then
35:20
Speaker 7: on into the later into the Supreme Court in Virginia,
35:23
Speaker 7: and under a new theory that one of the judges
35:25
Speaker 7: of the pelate court created, and the bread of actual
35:29
Speaker 7: innocence is so demanding as they say that the evidence
35:32
Speaker 7: has to be just as substantial as DNA evidence, which
35:36
Speaker 7: unfortunately there's no DNA evidence in my case. But so
35:39
Speaker 7: one of the judges says, well, although he didn't have
35:43
Speaker 7: anything to do with the murder, and this has been
35:45
Speaker 7: decided by the judges, he didn't have anything to do
35:47
Speaker 7: with the murder, and he didn't restrain the victim. This
35:53
Speaker 7: judge says, well, perhaps a jury could believe that when
35:58
Speaker 7: Dusty walked out of the bar to the parking lot
36:01
Speaker 7: to his calm, that a jury could believe that that
36:04
Speaker 7: was an abduction by deception. And if a jury believed
36:08
Speaker 7: that and then Jennifer was later killed, regardless of power
36:12
Speaker 7: who was killed her, that I would still be guilty.
36:15
Speaker 7: And the jerk is still found me guilty of both
36:17
Speaker 7: the abduction and the murder. So they created a new
36:19
Speaker 7: theory in my face, there's just not only the asonine,
36:23
Speaker 7: but it was never presented before a jury, and there's
36:26
Speaker 7: no jury in the world that would believe this idea,
36:29
Speaker 7: especially with all the additional evidence. So under that, because
36:34
Speaker 7: of that and all the semantics of this word restraint,
36:38
Speaker 7: and that's what it comes down to, I'm still in
36:40
Speaker 7: prison because of the semantics of the word restraint. And
36:43
Speaker 7: it's unbelievable. So they overturned my release and they reinstate
36:49
Speaker 7: my conviction. And here it is seven years later and
36:53
Speaker 7: I'm still sitting here for crime but I did not spend.
36:56
Speaker 4: So they're basically trying to say that they're going back
37:00
Speaker 4: back in time to nineteen ninety five. They're going back
37:02
Speaker 4: inside the nineteen ninety five and trying to come up
37:05
Speaker 4: with a theory that could actually read your mind. Right,
37:09
Speaker 4: They're going back in a time machine and reading your
37:13
Speaker 4: mind and saying, well, this may have been, could have been,
37:16
Speaker 4: would have been something that he might have been thinking
37:18
Speaker 4: of doing. There's no evidence to prove it. How could anybody?
37:23
Speaker 4: I don't know. It makes me nuts. It's such a
37:25
Speaker 4: bizarre It's such a bizarre thing for a court or
37:29
Speaker 4: a judge to say, as far as I'm concerned, nothink
37:32
Speaker 4: to be.
37:33
Speaker 7: The legislators recognized that after my case, and they said,
37:36
Speaker 7: you know, this rivaculinniscence is obviously entirely to restrictiveness and
37:42
Speaker 7: to open for interpretation or whatever. So they since I
37:45
Speaker 7: went through this rivactionlinscence, now they've changed the law the
37:49
Speaker 7: wording of arivactionism. Instead of saying could any jurorifying you
37:55
Speaker 7: with this dies? Now it's more specific and it may
37:58
Speaker 7: sound public, but it's more the thing would a rational
38:02
Speaker 7: juror still find deal with this new evidence and the
38:06
Speaker 7: new word in which I can't go back into the
38:08
Speaker 7: very rationalist just because it's the one shot deal and
38:11
Speaker 7: to I'm left hung out to drial on this whole time.
38:14
Speaker 4: Well, hopefully not for too long, because you have a
38:16
Speaker 4: lot of really great people on your side now, and
38:18
Speaker 4: you have a governor who cares about these issues and
38:21
Speaker 4: who has shown in actions that he believes in justice,
38:26
Speaker 4: that he believes in fairness, and that he has the
38:29
Speaker 4: courage to do something about these things.
38:32
Speaker 7: From my perspective, he does seem like a very fair man,
38:35
Speaker 7: and I do have hope. I do think that he
38:39
Speaker 7: will look at my case, and I know and I'm
38:42
Speaker 7: very confident that if he does, if he just looks
38:44
Speaker 7: at my case, then he'll realize that I'm not supposed
38:47
Speaker 7: to be here. I do have that tremendous hope that
38:51
Speaker 7: he will take action in my case.
38:53
Speaker 4: Well, Dusty, I can tell you that I think that
38:55
Speaker 4: there's a lot of reason to have hope in this
38:58
Speaker 4: current administration we have there because of the fact that
39:01
Speaker 4: you do have such a ground swell of support, and
39:05
Speaker 4: not only that, because of what you've done, the remarkable
39:10
Speaker 4: record of accomplishment that you've had on the inside. And
39:14
Speaker 4: I want to talk about that. I know that you
39:16
Speaker 4: know you're finding hope in a hopeless place, but I
39:20
Speaker 4: want to paint a picture for the audience of just
39:22
Speaker 4: how grim it is to be in the situation you're in,
39:25
Speaker 4: and then also what you've managed to make out of
39:28
Speaker 4: that experience.
39:29
Speaker 7: Well, you know, I've got a quote from a guy
39:32
Speaker 7: who knows suffering, and a couple of things have pip me.
39:37
Speaker 7: I don't want to move forward, and it's positive. I
39:39
Speaker 7: can be one of the supporters that I do have,
39:42
Speaker 7: not just my family, but others, you know, total strangers
39:46
Speaker 7: who have reached out. And it gives me a lot
39:49
Speaker 7: of hope, and it gives me a lot of strength
39:51
Speaker 7: to endure. This is what I'm going through in this environment,
39:55
Speaker 7: and it is terrible, it's absolutely But this quote is
39:58
Speaker 7: one of my favorite quotes. It says that everything be
40:02
Speaker 7: taken from a man, but one thing, the last of
40:04
Speaker 7: the human freedom, and that is to choose one's own
40:08
Speaker 7: attitude in any set of circumstance, choose one's own way
40:12
Speaker 7: as a man named Victor Frankel. And you know, I
40:16
Speaker 7: guess I've taken on this, this attitude, you know, that
40:19
Speaker 7: which allowed me to persevere through through bud training to
40:24
Speaker 7: the still training. I reached for this on a daily basis.
40:28
Speaker 7: Now I put my feet on the ground and said,
40:30
Speaker 7: I have to I have to continue on today, and
40:33
Speaker 7: I have to push forward, and I can't allow this
40:35
Speaker 7: environment to get the best of them. And I want
40:39
Speaker 7: to transcend in spite of where I'm at. And so
40:43
Speaker 7: I've looked to try to do things to try to
40:46
Speaker 7: help out not only the people around me in my environment.
40:49
Speaker 7: For years, I've helped guys to have struggle with drug
40:52
Speaker 7: addiction or you know, criminal thinking, and I've just kind
40:56
Speaker 7: of made it as the part of my own our character,
40:59
Speaker 7: just trying to help you guys out and to move past,
41:02
Speaker 7: transcend some of these things in which they've been stuck in.
41:05
Speaker 7: And not only that, proposed a dog training program. That's
41:09
Speaker 7: the last institution that I was at. It was luckily
41:12
Speaker 7: it was to prove and we had the dogs come
41:14
Speaker 7: in and for about three years I was able to
41:17
Speaker 7: be a dog trainer. And I had studied and read
41:21
Speaker 7: up and learned so much about training dogs and I
41:24
Speaker 7: really enjoyed that.
41:25
Speaker 4: And how does that training program works? The dogs? Are
41:28
Speaker 4: they rescue dogs? And what happens to them after they're trained?
41:32
Speaker 3: Right?
41:32
Speaker 7: So these are absolutely rescued dogs. These were abandoned. We
41:35
Speaker 7: worked with a shelter out of Ashville, Virginia called bark
41:39
Speaker 7: Bar Communty and that's the abandon the Jobson and Rescued Canines,
41:43
Speaker 7: a really great organizations and they would bring us six
41:47
Speaker 7: dogs at time and we would have them for three
41:49
Speaker 7: months and we had a total of twelve dog trainers
41:52
Speaker 7: too free stocks, and we would train the dogs. These
41:55
Speaker 7: dogs that were abandoned and you never know what their
41:58
Speaker 7: history was. They could than maybe beacon or however that
42:03
Speaker 7: they were rescued and we were given the tools to
42:05
Speaker 7: help train these dolls, and then afterward they were adopted
42:10
Speaker 7: and we had an adoption rate of some ninety something
42:13
Speaker 7: percent coming out of there, and we taint them in
42:15
Speaker 7: basic and obedience. It was a really, really great, really
42:19
Speaker 7: positive program. And from there I had gotten into Me
42:22
Speaker 7: and another guy, we had been talking about different ideas
42:26
Speaker 7: concerning the judicial system when we'd come across this idea
42:29
Speaker 7: of restorative justice. And after we had studied on it
42:34
Speaker 7: and we had gotten in contact with some restorative justice practitioners,
42:37
Speaker 7: we decided that with our knowledge of this environment in
42:41
Speaker 7: the prison and we knew what was lacking in this environment,
42:46
Speaker 7: we knew some of the things that could help in
42:48
Speaker 7: the rehabilitations of the solo inmates, we constructed a restorative
42:53
Speaker 7: justice program. We're still in the process of kind of
42:56
Speaker 7: fleshing out some of the more detailed aspects of the curriculum.
43:00
Speaker 7: This is what my passion has been into for the
43:02
Speaker 7: past few years. I've really been concentrating my efforts into
43:06
Speaker 7: this program. And we have people and restore just practitioners
43:09
Speaker 7: from university and other organizations really really like what we
43:14
Speaker 7: have created and they want to help them out a
43:17
Speaker 7: little bit.
43:18
Speaker 4: Well, you know, it's you know what it sounds like
43:19
Speaker 4: to me, it sounds like you're doing more good, like
43:22
Speaker 4: I said, from this hopeless place then most people on
43:25
Speaker 4: the outside can never even dream of doing. And that's
43:29
Speaker 4: you know, that's to your credit obviously, and it's another
43:32
Speaker 4: reason why it makes sense for you to be granted
43:38
Speaker 4: your freedom after all these years. And if you even
43:40
Speaker 4: allow your mind to go there, what do you want
43:43
Speaker 4: to do? What's your plan?
43:46
Speaker 7: Well, as you hit upon do I even want to
43:48
Speaker 7: go there? I have been reluctant, especially after seven years
43:53
Speaker 7: ago when I was expecting to get out and I
43:57
Speaker 7: was denied that. It was a very crushing blow and
44:01
Speaker 7: it was difficult to conserve. But yeah, of course I
44:04
Speaker 7: do allow myself to think about once I'm out of here,
44:09
Speaker 7: although I don't dwell upon it because I just I
44:12
Speaker 7: don't know. I just can't go there for so much.
44:16
Speaker 7: But the more I've gotten into restorat justice, the more
44:20
Speaker 7: I think it's an extremely beneficial philosophy and instead of
44:24
Speaker 7: practices to kind of complement our criminal justice system. And
44:29
Speaker 7: so I really want to pursue that direction, and I
44:32
Speaker 7: think that I could help out. I think I have
44:35
Speaker 7: a lot of school or skills, I guess knowledge for
44:39
Speaker 7: being in here for the last twenty two plus years
44:42
Speaker 7: and observing things from the inside, I feel like I
44:45
Speaker 7: have a great perspective to be able to help out
44:48
Speaker 7: in the restora justice.
44:50
Speaker 4: That sounds like a great scenario to me, and we'll
44:53
Speaker 4: have benefits to society across the board. I don't know
45:14
Speaker 4: if you're able to talk about it, but it really
45:16
Speaker 4: struck me earlier when you told me that the prison
45:19
Speaker 4: or your pod is on lockdown. What does that mean?
45:23
Speaker 8: Well, so where I'm at now, we've been on lockdown
45:28
Speaker 8: the last two weeks, which means we're componed to our
45:31
Speaker 8: concrete box, oursel and when we're coming out every seventy
45:35
Speaker 8: two hours to take a shower, they bring the food
45:38
Speaker 8: to our door. And I say our door because I
45:42
Speaker 8: have a fill partner every shows two people for film
45:46
Speaker 8: and just now I've been living for the last two weeks.
45:49
Speaker 8: The moreover, it's pretty much now I've been living for
45:51
Speaker 8: the last twenty two years. So when we're not on lockdown,
45:55
Speaker 8: you know, I do have a potcum of freedoms that
45:58
Speaker 8: you will you know, every one while I can get outside,
46:01
Speaker 8: take fresh air and work out. I've been rolled into
46:05
Speaker 8: a horticulture class and learn about horticulture I can actually
46:09
Speaker 8: have my fingers and the soil and be able to
46:11
Speaker 8: have the opportunity to plant some feeds and vegetables and
46:14
Speaker 8: so forth.
46:15
Speaker 7: It's really been a positive thing, really really enjoining the horticulture.
46:20
Speaker 4: And the last question about the prison experience, what is
46:23
Speaker 4: an average day like when you're not on lockdown, you
46:26
Speaker 4: wake up at five or something, How does how do
46:29
Speaker 4: you get through the day?
46:32
Speaker 7: Yeah, so they have what they call count procedures in
46:35
Speaker 7: which they have to come through and literally count every
46:37
Speaker 7: individual while they're locked in the shell, about four times
46:41
Speaker 7: or so every day, spread out throughout the day, and
46:45
Speaker 7: during that time you have to be standing up and
46:47
Speaker 7: your life have to be on so they can see
46:49
Speaker 7: that you're alive and will and and that starts certainly
46:54
Speaker 7: before six o'clock in the morning. So over the last
46:56
Speaker 7: twenty two years, I've been up at five forty five
47:01
Speaker 7: about that time and standing on my feet with the
47:03
Speaker 7: lights on, the fluorescent lights every every morning. That's that's
47:07
Speaker 7: one of the councilors, like I said, that goes throughout
47:09
Speaker 7: the day and the kind of segments the day that
47:12
Speaker 7: in the beating the channel feeding schedule, so the breakfast
47:17
Speaker 7: lunch is center and these kind of condition you and
47:21
Speaker 7: condition one into the the segments of the day. And
47:25
Speaker 7: so there's a period in the morning after breakfast im which,
47:28
Speaker 7: if we're lucky, we might get outside the recreation and
47:31
Speaker 7: recreation consists.
47:32
Speaker 8: Of a yard as a track.
47:34
Speaker 7: I usually go jogging. If I'm able to, I'll go
47:38
Speaker 7: into the weightlifting area and what's some weight and they
47:41
Speaker 7: have a couple other recreational things. The guys be around
47:45
Speaker 7: with the volleyball or the basketball. Otherwise there's not a
47:48
Speaker 7: lot of kind of rehabilitative programs. There are a few,
47:53
Speaker 7: you know, I've been through a lot of those things,
47:56
Speaker 7: but for most guys, I think that, you know, this
47:58
Speaker 7: place is more of a warehouse humans than anything. It's
48:02
Speaker 7: not really designed for as it's called, corrections necessarily, although
48:06
Speaker 7: there has been, you know, steps towards that direction, of
48:10
Speaker 7: the hopeful steps in that direction. You know, I think
48:12
Speaker 7: that the governor has made some steps in that direction
48:15
Speaker 7: with the re entry ideas and so forth. But you know,
48:19
Speaker 7: unfortunately there's largely the prisons are placed with the warehouse humans.
48:25
Speaker 7: So there's only so much a mind to do in
48:27
Speaker 7: this environment. So I do utilize my time studying, you know,
48:32
Speaker 7: I spend my money on books and these the library
48:37
Speaker 7: when I can, and so that's kind of how I
48:40
Speaker 7: in my time.
48:42
Speaker 4: Well, Dusty, all, I can tell you again. I know
48:44
Speaker 4: you know about it, but I hope you can feel it.
48:46
Speaker 4: There's a real wave of support for you among so
48:52
Speaker 4: many people who care and who want to see you
48:56
Speaker 4: released and able to get on with your life and
48:59
Speaker 4: put this nightmare behind you. Of course, Lisa Speeds has
49:03
Speaker 4: been a huge advocate. I think she's a very strong
49:07
Speaker 4: supporter and a very positive and wonderful person. And I
49:10
Speaker 4: want to turn it over to you. Typically on wrongful conviction,
49:14
Speaker 4: I like to leave the last word open so that
49:18
Speaker 4: you can share any thoughts you have about anything at
49:22
Speaker 4: all with our audience. I'll turn it over to you, Dusty.
49:27
Speaker 7: Okay, Well, as you mentioned the you know, we're of
49:29
Speaker 7: my supporters at least that you've been certainly has been great,
49:34
Speaker 7: especially in the what I understand in the social media field,
49:37
Speaker 7: I guess and I do have a lot of very
49:40
Speaker 7: strong supporters out here your Virginia. We're total strangers. Some
49:45
Speaker 7: of them have gotten to know personally and they're just
49:48
Speaker 7: just great people. And I'm very fortunate to have these
49:52
Speaker 7: people in my corner and who have recognized my wrongful conviction.
49:56
Speaker 7: As far as the last word, I'm thankful. I really
50:00
Speaker 7: appreciate mister Bomb for interviewing me. Very thankful that increasingly
50:05
Speaker 7: more people know that I have been wrongfully stick and
50:09
Speaker 7: I hope that people, you know, maybe reach out and
50:13
Speaker 7: talk to somebody. The filmmaker named j. D Weet has
50:18
Speaker 7: created a film called The Target of Opportunity about my case,
50:22
Speaker 7: and I was able to view it one time a
50:25
Speaker 7: few years ago, and I think it encapsulates my situation
50:29
Speaker 7: putting pretty well. And I just hope that people will
50:32
Speaker 7: take some kind of interest and look into my case.
50:35
Speaker 7: And I know that if anybody does, they will see
50:39
Speaker 7: the travesty and the fact that I've been here for
50:41
Speaker 7: over twenty two years for something I didn't do. I
50:44
Speaker 7: had such a future brought up in the military. I
50:48
Speaker 7: love the military and I was planned to make it
50:51
Speaker 7: a career. I wanted to be in the film teams
50:53
Speaker 7: and want to be one of the best fil team
50:56
Speaker 7: operators in the country that I could have been. In
50:59
Speaker 7: my world, it would turn upside down and a lots
51:01
Speaker 7: of so many people over one at Brothers Guy, so
51:05
Speaker 7: many people have been destroyed in ruin in a Brevns family,
51:09
Speaker 7: my family, like city, and Billie Brown's family, so many others.
51:12
Speaker 7: But again, I just thank you. I really appreciate opportunities.
51:16
Speaker 4: Back to the interview, So Dusty, I want to repeat
51:19
Speaker 4: that the name of the film is.
51:22
Speaker 7: The name of the film is Targetive Opportunity.
51:24
Speaker 4: Target of Opportunity is the film. I've watched it. I
51:27
Speaker 4: hope other people are listening now will watch it too.
51:31
Speaker 4: And Dusty, I'm sure people are listening. They want to
51:33
Speaker 4: know how can they get involved? What would you advise?
51:35
Speaker 3: Right?
51:35
Speaker 7: You know, unfortunately I am largely isolated. You know, I
51:39
Speaker 7: have no internet access. I've never been on the internet.
51:43
Speaker 7: I've never even used the bill phone. However, I think
51:46
Speaker 7: that people could maybe visit. I know that twitters have
51:50
Speaker 7: created a website at pre dusty dot org. And I
51:54
Speaker 7: do know too that there's a Twitter and Instagram account
51:58
Speaker 7: under my name of free dust Turner. I think, and
52:01
Speaker 7: I know that's a very leaf reaching out there that
52:04
Speaker 7: my supporters with I'm sure direct folks into the best
52:08
Speaker 7: way that they might be able to help. I know
52:11
Speaker 7: that writing to the governor Unitarry mccaullis in Virginia's directly
52:15
Speaker 7: they help out. Other than that, I'm really not sure
52:19
Speaker 7: what else to say about it.
52:21
Speaker 4: Okay, So once again, that's free. Dusty Turner is the
52:25
Speaker 4: Instagram in the Twitter. The movie is Target of Opportunity.
52:29
Speaker 4: Please learn more about this case and get involved. Follow
52:33
Speaker 4: Dusty on social media and there'll be more information there.
52:38
Speaker 4: You can learn how to how to help, and now
52:41
Speaker 4: is the time to do it, because we're really in
52:43
Speaker 4: the home stretch of this, this effort to free Dusty Turner.
52:48
Speaker 4: You have one in it, Dusty. All I can say
52:53
Speaker 4: is hang in there. We're coming to get you. Thank you,
52:58
Speaker 4: Dusty for being on the show, and I'll look forward
53:03
Speaker 4: to seeing you on the outside, hopefully sometime very soon.
53:07
Speaker 4: You've been listening to a very special episode of Wrongful
53:12
Speaker 4: Conviction Behind Bars with Dusty Turner. Dusty, thanks again, Thank
53:17
Speaker 4: you sir.
53:18
Speaker 8: Thank you for using GTL.
53:29
Speaker 4: Don't forget to give us a fantastic review wherever you
53:32
Speaker 4: get your podcasts. It really helps. And I'm a proud
53:35
Speaker 4: donor to the Innocence Project and I really hope you'll
53:38
Speaker 4: join me in supporting this very important cause and helping
53:42
Speaker 4: to prevent future wrongful convictions. Go to Innocenceproject dot org
53:46
Speaker 4: to learn how to donate and get involved. I'd like
53:48
Speaker 4: to thank our production team, Connor Hall and Kevin Wartis.
53:52
Speaker 4: The music in the show is by three time OSCAR
53:54
Speaker 4: nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on
53:57
Speaker 4: Instagram at Wrongful Conviction on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast.
54:02
Speaker 4: Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flahm is a production of Lava
54:05
Speaker 4: for Good Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number one