Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #496 Maggie Freleng with William Beeman

Transcript

#496 Maggie Freleng with William Beeman · Wrongful Conviction

• 0:01
  Speaker 1: Hello, You have a call at no expense to you
• 0:03
  Speaker 1: from an inmate at Anamosa Dave.
• 0:09
  Speaker 2: What did he call himself?
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: You may begin speaking now, Hello.
• 0:18
  Speaker 3: Hello, how you doing?
• 0:21
  Speaker 2: I'm good? Is this William?
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: Yes?
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: Okay? What do you like to be called? Do you
• 0:25
  Speaker 2: like to be called will or William?
• 0:29
  Speaker 4: Most people call me Drifty Drifty.
• 0:33
  Speaker 2: Bill got the nickname drifty because his mind tends to
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: wander and he's.
• 0:37
  Speaker 3: Aloof Bill was kind of a loner.
• 0:40
  Speaker 2: This is his mom, Donna.
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: He's off from the corner by himself, reading or watching television.
• 0:47
  Speaker 4: I just don't like crowds.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: Crowds even people I like it, don't like crowd especially
• 0:54
  Speaker 2: in prison.
• 0:56
  Speaker 4: I come in when I was twenty three. I was
• 0:59
  Speaker 4: sixty seven. Now do you realize what happened day to
• 1:03
  Speaker 4: day in a place like this? And I just he
• 1:12
  Speaker 4: wouldn't believe some of the stuff I've seen.
• 1:15
  Speaker 2: So he sticks to himself, and the name drifty stuck
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: to him. Like this. One time in the prison yard,
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: two guys started getting into it.
• 1:23
  Speaker 4: They get dark in then down the old fort. I
• 1:27
  Speaker 4: used to watch the two red tail hawks sore while
• 1:31
  Speaker 4: they were arguing, and he says, ah, there he goes
• 1:34
  Speaker 4: drifted off again.
• 1:37
  Speaker 2: Drifty Beaman, but he also says I can call him Bill.
• 1:42
  Speaker 4: I'm William Beaman. I've been incarcerated for forty four years
• 1:46
  Speaker 4: or something that I didn't do, and I hope some
• 1:51
  Speaker 4: good comes of this, not only for me, but for others.
• 1:55
  Speaker 2: From LoVa for good. This is wrongful conviction with Maggie
• 1:58
  Speaker 2: Freeling today. William Beeman. William Beeman was born April twenty second,
• 2:08
  Speaker 2: nineteen fifty seven, in Muscatine, Iowa. What was life like
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: growing up in Iowa?
• 2:14
  Speaker 1: Hey?
• 2:14
  Speaker 4: It was great. Mustin eat that that rule. I mean,
• 2:24
  Speaker 4: it ain't no big city, but we had a lot
• 2:27
  Speaker 4: of industry and stuff around. Heine's fargest metalw factory was
• 2:34
  Speaker 4: in Muscatine Banded eggs Hedge Corners. We had three factors
• 2:39
  Speaker 4: to them.
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: And many many other factories. Once known as the pearl
• 2:45
  Speaker 2: button capital of the world in the early nineteen hundreds,
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: before most buttons were made of plastic, Muscatines button factories
• 2:52
  Speaker 2: employed half of the city's workforce. The city was the
• 2:56
  Speaker 2: world's largest producer of pearl buttons. Muscatine was a blue
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: collar town, and so was Bill's family. Here's Bill's mom
• 3:05
  Speaker 2: Donna again.
• 3:06
  Speaker 1: I was a checkout at highge and I also managed
• 3:11
  Speaker 1: the music department at war Worse.
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: She was also a mom to two other.
• 3:18
  Speaker 3: Kids, two girls and a boy.
• 3:21
  Speaker 2: Bill is in the middle.
• 3:22
  Speaker 4: Harry's four years older than I am. She's mom's first marriage.
• 3:29
  Speaker 4: And my little sisters you're younger. And we were together
• 3:35
  Speaker 4: all the time, and Teresa.
• 3:37
  Speaker 1: Teresa and Belle were like two pieces of pod where
• 3:40
  Speaker 1: you've seen one, you've seen the other.
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: Bill and his little sister, Teresa did everything together.
• 3:47
  Speaker 4: Every now and then at dolls was or so she'd
• 3:50
  Speaker 4: play army with me. I thought both of them how
• 3:55
  Speaker 4: to fight is one against two, But I got a
• 4:00
  Speaker 4: little nose star fighting back. They had to learn how
• 4:03
  Speaker 4: to fight, so it kind of hard. Hits some sentence too.
• 4:09
  Speaker 1: The girls kicked on him that I think it was
• 4:11
  Speaker 1: because he was a boy.
• 4:13
  Speaker 5: What would they do?
• 4:15
  Speaker 3: Oh just tale tale stuff.
• 4:19
  Speaker 1: Uh, Bill's doing this, Bill's doing that?
• 4:22
  Speaker 3: Which wasn't He wasn't doing anything really, so.
• 4:26
  Speaker 4: I was two against fun. One time I got accused
• 4:29
  Speaker 4: of shooting out a woman's neighbor woman's window with my beaf. Again,
• 4:34
  Speaker 4: as the only guy on the blocks that had to
• 4:37
  Speaker 4: beat against him, I had to pay for the window.
• 4:41
  Speaker 4: I had to help fix mode and filled the snowing
• 4:45
  Speaker 4: lawn for a year. Yeah, I've been down here four
• 4:50
  Speaker 4: or five years and found out Terry's the woman done it,
• 4:53
  Speaker 4: because that woman made her mad.
• 4:56
  Speaker 2: Donna now remembers those times fondly.
• 4:59
  Speaker 3: He was a happy, go lucky kid.
• 5:02
  Speaker 1: He had a no adney on a mini bike, and
• 5:05
  Speaker 1: he made ramp some things out here in the backyard
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: and jumped them and rode over him.
• 5:11
  Speaker 2: She remembers hunting and family camping trips and making him
• 5:15
  Speaker 2: his favorite food.
• 5:16
  Speaker 1: He likes whoppers, and then he likes pizza. When he
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: was a kid, I fixed stuff on the grill at
• 5:24
  Speaker 1: that time, and there was hamburgers and hotbugs.
• 5:28
  Speaker 3: You know, he just lived on stuff like that.
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: Donna remembers being close with her only son.
• 5:35
  Speaker 1: It just seemed like every time he had a little problem,
• 5:39
  Speaker 1: he would come to me and his dad usually sup
• 5:45
  Speaker 1: a lot in the daytime because he worked at night.
• 5:49
  Speaker 3: And I just I don't know what to say. Bill
• 5:53
  Speaker 3: and I were just close.
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: Donna says. The girls were troublemakers, but not Bill.
• 5:59
  Speaker 3: Bill smoked, He never drank, he never took street drugs.
• 6:06
  Speaker 1: He just well I don't know.
• 6:08
  Speaker 3: He stayed home most of the time.
• 6:10
  Speaker 2: At night, they would watch TV or cook, or Bill
• 6:14
  Speaker 2: would go off and do his favorite thing.
• 6:17
  Speaker 1: That was what he was more interested than was his
• 6:19
  Speaker 1: mini bike and modad and his motorcycle.
• 6:23
  Speaker 2: As Bill got older, he struggled in school. Donna says
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: he would have to stay home often because he'd get
• 6:29
  Speaker 2: so worked up about going to school he'd make himself sick.
• 6:33
  Speaker 1: He actually ran a fever and throw up. Really yeah,
• 6:38
  Speaker 1: and Bill was very smart.
• 6:40
  Speaker 2: Despite being smart, school just wasn't for Bill, so Donna
• 6:44
  Speaker 2: took him out instead. Bill got his ged and joined
• 6:48
  Speaker 2: a job core program in South Dakota.
• 6:50
  Speaker 4: I went to South Dakota. I got thirtified as a
• 6:55
  Speaker 4: welder Union carpentry building supply.
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: After getting certified, Bill bounced around working different gigs, trying
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: to figure out what he wanted to do in life.
• 7:06
  Speaker 4: Or did gas station as maintenance man at a nursery
• 7:11
  Speaker 4: or nursing home. I was a maintenance man in a
• 7:15
  Speaker 4: dress shop or gas stations, working a couple of different
• 7:20
  Speaker 4: button factories, one feet mill bandagg rubber, retire pre.
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: Treading, lots of working and writing. What did you write?
• 7:31
  Speaker 4: What I was doing? The street racing and stuff on
• 7:34
  Speaker 4: the street with the dirt bike was three fifty six
• 7:40
  Speaker 4: fifty straight bike and a GS thousand Dzuki street.
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: In his early twenties, Bill was good looking, tall, slim,
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: with floey brown hair. He's been described as a charmer,
• 7:55
  Speaker 2: and that's evident by the amount of girlfriends Bill says
• 7:59
  Speaker 2: he had.
• 8:00
  Speaker 4: That's kind of a butthole because how was Cardra to
• 8:06
  Speaker 4: settle down.
• 8:07
  Speaker 2: After a while searching for the right job, Bill finally
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: found one he liked as a part time DJ at
• 8:14
  Speaker 2: a local night spot called Baker's Front Street Disco. What
• 8:20
  Speaker 2: kind of music were you playing?
• 8:22
  Speaker 4: Disco?
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: Disco? So you know, what would that have been like
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: in nineteen seventy eight, What were the heads?
• 8:31
  Speaker 4: What all depends on the real disco was always you
• 8:36
  Speaker 4: had to beg Michael Jackson had more than people thought.
• 8:42
  Speaker 4: Then you had poin Iner sisters and oh it's been
• 8:47
  Speaker 4: a long time.
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: You might be wondering what a guy who hates crowds
• 8:55
  Speaker 2: was doing as a DJ.
• 8:57
  Speaker 3: Well.
• 8:58
  Speaker 2: Bill says that the DJ booth was on the side
• 9:00
  Speaker 2: and floor. There was only room for him and a
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: few chairs.
• 9:04
  Speaker 4: So there wasn't a bunch of people coming up there
• 9:07
  Speaker 4: and stand in row right, so I wasn't in any
• 9:09
  Speaker 4: crowds and stuff.
• 9:11
  Speaker 2: And Bill loved it. He was part of the fun,
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: but far away enough to feel safe.
• 9:16
  Speaker 4: I could look out over the dance floor and everything,
• 9:19
  Speaker 4: see everybody having a good time, and I knew they
• 9:22
  Speaker 4: were doing it because of me. And that's what being
• 9:26
  Speaker 4: a DJ mean to me.
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: Bill had the life.
• 9:30
  Speaker 4: As DJ and night I built remodeled houses during the day.
• 9:35
  Speaker 4: I really liked that.
• 9:48
  Speaker 2: One night in April nineteen eighty, twenty three year old
• 9:51
  Speaker 2: Bill Beeman was in his DJ booths.
• 9:53
  Speaker 4: People would use all kinds of different reasons to come
• 9:57
  Speaker 4: talk to me up in the booth, and I think
• 10:00
  Speaker 4: gets first place I heard.
• 10:01
  Speaker 2: About it about the body of a young woman found
• 10:05
  Speaker 2: in the campground of wildcat Den State Park. She was
• 10:10
  Speaker 2: naked and had been beaten and stabbed seventeen times. Whispers
• 10:16
  Speaker 2: of the crime were making their way around town.
• 10:19
  Speaker 4: Yeah, everybody was talking about it. Mom and dad was
• 10:21
  Speaker 4: talking about it.
• 10:23
  Speaker 2: The body turned out to be twenty two year old
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: Michelle Winkle. Police said she had last been seen on Monday,
• 10:29
  Speaker 2: April twenty first, nineteen eighty at the Canterbury Inn and Spa,
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: A hotel she would go and swim at after work.
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: Michelle Winkle allegedly spent a lot of time alone.
• 10:41
  Speaker 5: She didn't seem to have a lot of close friends
• 10:45
  Speaker 5: are relatives.
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: Erica Nichols Cook is the director of the Wrongful Conviction
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: Unit at the Iowa Public Defender's Office. She says Michelle
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: also spent a lot of time at the mall.
• 10:56
  Speaker 5: She was also known as the crier by a group
• 11:00
  Speaker 5: of girls who worked at the mall. That's so mean
• 11:03
  Speaker 5: because she'd walk around them all crying.
• 11:07
  Speaker 2: Erica says Michelle had a troubled life.
• 11:10
  Speaker 5: She had experienced a lot of mental instability. She had
• 11:16
  Speaker 5: been treated for psychiatric issues in seventy eight seventy nine
• 11:20
  Speaker 5: at the University of Iowa.
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: She had recently moved back home with her parents, who
• 11:25
  Speaker 2: were devout Catholics, and Erica says Michelle's father could be.
• 11:29
  Speaker 5: Abusive, comments about her being overweight. There was comments that
• 11:34
  Speaker 5: she wouldn't wear red because her dad said only sluts
• 11:38
  Speaker 5: were read, that he called her piggy, those types of things.
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: So kind of a sad life.
• 11:45
  Speaker 5: That sounds like, yes, I think, much more so than
• 11:51
  Speaker 5: the state portrayed at the trial. She'd had some struggles.
• 11:55
  Speaker 5: We also learned that she liked a hitchhike.
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: Michelle had recently been in a car accident and her
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: dad wouldn't let her drive the family car anymore. Despite
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: living on a state highway, she had to walk everywhere.
• 12:08
  Speaker 5: So she would walk along this state highway and catch
• 12:12
  Speaker 5: a ride into town or catch a ride back out.
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: She was last seen that Monday around ten forty five pm,
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: leaving the spa and getting into a brown car with
• 12:22
  Speaker 2: a white man. Five days later, her body was found.
• 12:27
  Speaker 5: One of the sticking points in this investigation was that
• 12:32
  Speaker 5: they didn't have any immediate leads of who Michelle was
• 12:36
  Speaker 5: with or who she could have been hanging out with
• 12:39
  Speaker 5: or gotten a ride from.
• 12:41
  Speaker 2: Police evaluated her body for sexual assaults and collected semen
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: and blood samples, but in nineteen eighty forensic testing was
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: in its infancy. The most law enforcement could determine from
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: a sample was blood type, and their tests found specimens
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: from an unknown male and.
• 13:00
  Speaker 5: Someone told investigators that she used to go to Baker's
• 13:04
  Speaker 5: Front Street disco and that they had seen her there.
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: Police thought maybe she got a ride to the disco
• 13:11
  Speaker 2: after swimming.
• 13:12
  Speaker 4: That was the only reason they even interviewed me. They
• 13:16
  Speaker 4: thought maybe her with somebody.
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: More than a week after the body was found, police
• 13:21
  Speaker 2: brought him Bill for questioning. Bill says he was laid
• 13:24
  Speaker 2: up and on painkillers because he'd broken his foot on
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: his birthday about two weeks earlier. He also had a migraine.
• 13:32
  Speaker 4: I've had migraine headaches since I was a little kid,
• 13:35
  Speaker 4: and my dumbass didn't know I couldn't mix the pain
• 13:41
  Speaker 4: painkiller from migraines with the painkiller for more broken foot.
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: And on top of that, he was now in a
• 13:47
  Speaker 2: police station being asked about Michelle.
• 13:50
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I didn't know her at all, but police.
• 13:53
  Speaker 2: Let him go home.
• 13:54
  Speaker 5: His girlfriend is then questioned.
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: His girlfriend, Joyce, and she.
• 13:58
  Speaker 5: Says, well, he was with me that week of his birthday,
• 14:02
  Speaker 5: and you know, after he broke his foot, but.
• 14:04
  Speaker 2: Her memory was blurry, and she says.
• 14:07
  Speaker 5: I don't know for sure about Monday night if he
• 14:11
  Speaker 5: stayed at my house or went to his apartment.
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: Bill had accompanied Joyce to the police station that day
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: on May eighth, and police brought him back in to
• 14:18
  Speaker 2: question him again about what had happened Monday night.
• 14:22
  Speaker 5: And during that interrogation they tell Bill that we know
• 14:28
  Speaker 5: that you know something. We think you picked her up
• 14:35
  Speaker 5: and killed her Monday night.
• 14:38
  Speaker 4: They must have realized I was on drog or whatever
• 14:42
  Speaker 4: and decided to had done.
• 14:44
  Speaker 2: They also knew Bill had a reputation.
• 14:47
  Speaker 4: I've never been addicted to anything other than motorcycles.
• 14:51
  Speaker 2: And maybe girls. Bill had a reputation with girls.
• 14:57
  Speaker 4: And a club. I had three motorcycles. I had a
• 15:01
  Speaker 4: fifty seven two to a hard top. I had a
• 15:03
  Speaker 4: blue van and the sixty eight BIS came and a
• 15:08
  Speaker 4: fan cloth and they made a joke about it. Day
• 15:17
  Speaker 4: after I got arrested, nine girls come down Stanley. We
• 15:22
  Speaker 4: were engaged and needed to talk to me. See, I
• 15:27
  Speaker 4: told you I was about all the time.
• 15:28
  Speaker 2: He might have been a butthole, but Bill says he
• 15:31
  Speaker 2: wasn't a killer, and he had an alibi for Monday night.
• 15:35
  Speaker 4: I stopped the Clark gas station. It was not far
• 15:40
  Speaker 4: from where I lived, talked to a girl about my
• 15:43
  Speaker 4: birthday party. The next day I got home.
• 15:47
  Speaker 2: Joyce was there, but detectives weren't buying it. They were
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: pointing the finger at Bill in the interrogation room, and
• 15:55
  Speaker 2: Bill says his mind was cloudy from the meds and
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: from fear.
• 16:00
  Speaker 4: They both had their guns out, wiping them off of handkerchiefs,
• 16:04
  Speaker 4: and I was thinking, this don't look good, and I
• 16:11
  Speaker 4: was starting to feel kind of happy, I guess, and
• 16:17
  Speaker 4: they kept saying, well, what if we had somebody that
• 16:19
  Speaker 4: seen it. I said, they're lying because I didn't do it.
• 16:24
  Speaker 4: I was confused because I knew I didn't do it,
• 16:28
  Speaker 4: So how can they have this evidence? How can they
• 16:30
  Speaker 4: have these witnesses.
• 16:32
  Speaker 2: The interrogation wasn't recorded, and Bill didn't have a lawyer present,
• 16:36
  Speaker 2: and the next thing he knows, he's in a holding cell.
• 16:40
  Speaker 4: I just thought they gout me for like a drunken
• 16:43
  Speaker 4: disorderly or something like that, and cop star laughing, SNA boys.
• 16:50
  Speaker 4: So they got you in here for murder.
• 16:52
  Speaker 2: Police called Donna to the station.
• 16:55
  Speaker 1: He didn't even know where he was at or what
• 16:56
  Speaker 1: he was doing in there. When I walked in, I
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: said Bill, I said what is going on? And he said, Mom,
• 17:04
  Speaker 1: I don't know. He said, they took my picture and
• 17:08
  Speaker 1: took my wallet and my shoe strings.
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: According to police, Bill signed a confession. Do you remember
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: signing anything like? Do you remember having anything in front
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: of you?
• 17:18
  Speaker 4: I don't remember riding nothing, not I remember going in
• 17:23
  Speaker 4: there and Nick harping on this. Bad witnesses, bad evidence.
• 17:28
  Speaker 4: They were cleaning their guns, they were doing this. I mean,
• 17:31
  Speaker 4: my mind was on cody.
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: But there was the statement signed by Bill saying he
• 17:38
  Speaker 2: picked up Michelle that night, took her to the park
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: where they made out, and after she refused to have
• 17:43
  Speaker 2: sex with him, he kicked her in the head with
• 17:46
  Speaker 2: a steel toe boot. By the time the sexual assault
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: kit came back, it didn't matter that the samples didn't
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: match Bill. Law enforcement had what they needed, a confession.
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: Bill arrested that day on May eighth, for the murder
• 18:02
  Speaker 2: of Michelle Winkle. Donna was frantic trying to help Bill
• 18:07
  Speaker 2: and pay a two hundred and fifty thousand dollars bond.
• 18:11
  Speaker 1: They said that we could have got him out of
• 18:14
  Speaker 1: bond by putting my house up for you know, collateral.
• 18:19
  Speaker 3: And Dick wouldn't do it.
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: Bill's dad, He said no.
• 18:24
  Speaker 1: And I tried to sell my coin collection and different things,
• 18:29
  Speaker 1: but it wasn't enough money.
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: Wow, how much money did you get for the coins?
• 18:36
  Speaker 1: Well, I only got five hundred dollars and I should
• 18:38
  Speaker 1: have got about two thousand.
• 18:41
  Speaker 3: That I had to pay.
• 18:43
  Speaker 1: The lawyers had to pay somebody. They got court appointed,
• 18:47
  Speaker 1: but there was somebody they had to pay, so I
• 18:51
  Speaker 1: had to sell it and give them the money. And
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: I was on disability and I didn't get much money
• 19:00
  Speaker 1: at that time. I think I was only getting ninety
• 19:02
  Speaker 1: two dollars a month, and I tried to save my
• 19:07
  Speaker 1: money and I hired a private detective, but that didn't
• 19:10
  Speaker 1: go any place, and I couldn't keep him because I
• 19:13
  Speaker 1: couldn't afford it.
• 19:15
  Speaker 2: Bill was actually offered a plea before.
• 19:18
  Speaker 4: Trial, second great plea barg well second degree then was
• 19:22
  Speaker 4: only twenty five years and me, mom, dad and lawyer's
• 19:28
  Speaker 4: got talked about it and I didn't do it. So
• 19:33
  Speaker 4: I believed in system and boy.
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: Bill went to trial in October, just short of five
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: months after his arrest.
• 19:47
  Speaker 5: The state's theory was that Bill picks her up close
• 19:52
  Speaker 5: to the SPA, but not from the SPA, at a
• 19:54
  Speaker 5: gas station and offers to give her a write home,
• 19:59
  Speaker 5: and they just said to drive around, and they end
• 20:01
  Speaker 5: up at the park, they start making out and then
• 20:05
  Speaker 5: you know the failed sexual encounter, but that he killed her.
• 20:08
  Speaker 5: On Monday the twenty.
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: First, a pathologist testified that Michelle's body was infested with
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: maggots placing the time of death around three to fourteen
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: days before her body was found on Saturday, but she
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: was last seen five days prior, on Monday the twenty first. Remember,
• 20:26
  Speaker 2: Bill had broken his foot on Tuesday the twenty second,
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: and the lead investigator conceded that Bill had an alibi
• 20:33
  Speaker 2: for all the days between Tuesday and Saturday when Michelle's
• 20:37
  Speaker 2: body was found. So law enforcement determined that if Bill
• 20:41
  Speaker 2: killed her, it had to have been on Monday, but
• 20:44
  Speaker 2: the evidence to back that up had holes.
• 20:47
  Speaker 4: The only thing they had against me was the statement,
• 20:51
  Speaker 4: no way doubt stands see you know. The said, well,
• 20:54
  Speaker 4: we know he'd done it because we've seen it, or no,
• 20:57
  Speaker 4: we know he'd done it because this evidence backs it up.
• 21:00
  Speaker 4: All their evidence counterdicted the statement.
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: Michelle was seen getting into a brown car. Bill's defense
• 21:06
  Speaker 2: said he used a motorcycle to get around because his
• 21:09
  Speaker 2: car didn't run well. The defense also presented three alibi
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: witnesses for the evening of April twenty first, who testified
• 21:17
  Speaker 2: to seeing Bill between ten thirty and midnight, when the
• 21:20
  Speaker 2: crime had supposedly occurred. But most surprising of all was
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: that a witness testified at trial that she'd seen Michelle
• 21:28
  Speaker 2: alive after the twenty first. A high school peer of
• 21:32
  Speaker 2: Michelle's testified she had seen her at the mall on
• 21:35
  Speaker 2: April twenty second, the day after she was supposedly killed,
• 21:39
  Speaker 2: with a man who was not Bill. At trial, Bill's
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: defense also contended he had signed the alleged confession out
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: of fear and confusion. Still, after deliberating for five and
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: a half hours, the jury found Bill guilty of first
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: degree murder on October eighth, nineteen eighty. Donna sat through
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: the whole trial.
• 22:04
  Speaker 3: It was terrible. I I really.
• 22:08
  Speaker 1: Can't explain it. I have believed Bill right from the start.
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: Bill just couldn't do that g anybody. I done a
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: lot of crying.
• 22:19
  Speaker 4: God took me through the value of death. You know,
• 22:22
  Speaker 4: I stuff my tongue as and I'm still in the
• 22:28
  Speaker 4: value of death. Far as that concern.
• 22:34
  Speaker 2: Used to being alone, safe up in his DJ booth,
• 22:37
  Speaker 2: far away from everyone, Bill was surrounded in prison.
• 22:42
  Speaker 4: When I got Donald Fort Madison, it was like they
• 22:49
  Speaker 4: were throwing a goki in the shark tan.
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: Bill says he had to fight to survive.
• 22:54
  Speaker 4: I turned out to be a wolf, and he.
• 22:56
  Speaker 2: Was angry, resentful about what happened to him. And his family,
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: and he took it out on anyone who crossed him.
• 23:03
  Speaker 4: I had that rage. Somebody could say something stupid, go
• 23:07
  Speaker 4: off on him.
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: After decades, the rage turned into loneliness, and people on
• 23:12
  Speaker 2: the outside fell.
• 23:14
  Speaker 4: Off, girlfriend's friends, family, everybody did.
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: Even Teresa.
• 23:19
  Speaker 4: After a while, she just kind of fell off.
• 23:22
  Speaker 2: Too, everyone except Donna.
• 23:26
  Speaker 1: People don't have that much to do with somebody in prison,
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: you know, they kind of forget him.
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: But Donna never forgot about her only son.
• 23:39
  Speaker 1: I feel terrible. I told Bill just this morning, I
• 23:42
  Speaker 1: wish I could do more. I wish there was something
• 23:45
  Speaker 1: I could do, and he said, Mom, you'd done it
• 23:48
  Speaker 1: when you were younger.
• 23:50
  Speaker 3: I've gave him money as.
• 23:52
  Speaker 1: When I could, and done everything I could for him.
• 23:57
  Speaker 2: For more than four decades, They've stayed in con instant
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: contact through phone and visitation. What is that like? Going
• 24:04
  Speaker 2: to visit your son in prison.
• 24:09
  Speaker 1: After forty four years? You get used to it, but
• 24:12
  Speaker 1: I don't like it.
• 24:14
  Speaker 3: I want him home.
• 24:17
  Speaker 2: Do you worry that maybe you're getting older and you
• 24:21
  Speaker 2: might not see him come home?
• 24:23
  Speaker 4: Yes?
• 24:23
  Speaker 3: I do.
• 24:25
  Speaker 1: I'm ninety two and I have several things that matter.
• 24:31
  Speaker 1: My voice, as you can tell, I have COPD, which
• 24:36
  Speaker 1: kind of gets worse all the time, and I have
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: an ampathy in my legs and of course the usual
• 24:43
  Speaker 1: arthritis and everything, and I.
• 24:47
  Speaker 3: Just want him home. I'd like to know I have
• 24:50
  Speaker 3: a sum for a while.
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: I just sometimes feel like I've never had a son.
• 25:00
  Speaker 1: And then there's times I feel like, you know, I've
• 25:04
  Speaker 1: had him and he's just gone for a while.
• 25:09
  Speaker 3: But I don't sleep.
• 25:10
  Speaker 1: I uh, if you just had a key where you
• 25:13
  Speaker 1: could shut off your mind, but you can't do that.
• 25:21
  Speaker 2: However, when Erica came across Bill's case, Donna was able
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: to sleep a bit easier. When Erica's office was first started,
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: she was given a specific assignment from higher.
• 25:34
  Speaker 5: Ups get a DNA exoneration.
• 25:36
  Speaker 2: Iowa had never had one, so she was on the hunt,
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: and Bill's case appeared to have evidence from which her
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: team could potentially recover DNA.
• 25:46
  Speaker 5: We had a chance to know submit that all for
• 25:51
  Speaker 5: testing if it could be found, and that kind of
• 25:56
  Speaker 5: started our quest.
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: I guess, a quest that gave Donna nude hope.
• 26:02
  Speaker 1: Oh, Erica is a doll. I there you if she's
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: a miracle. She has found out stuff that we didn't
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: even know.
• 26:12
  Speaker 2: Erica started with the basics, what would have been Bill's
• 26:17
  Speaker 2: motive to kill Michelle.
• 26:19
  Speaker 5: The most fascinating part was that there was no connection
• 26:24
  Speaker 5: between him and the victim. They weren't They hadn't dated,
• 26:26
  Speaker 5: they didn't go to school together, they hadn't been seen together.
• 26:30
  Speaker 2: But Michelle had been seen with an unidentified man in
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: a brown car from the beginning. Were there any better
• 26:37
  Speaker 2: suspects that should have been looked into?
• 26:40
  Speaker 5: Yes, we found a handwritten suspect matrix from the in
• 26:45
  Speaker 5: the DCI file.
• 26:47
  Speaker 2: That is something you could only hope to find.
• 26:54
  Speaker 5: And we'd read a little bit about the fact that
• 26:58
  Speaker 5: she had gone out with a guy or told someone
• 27:01
  Speaker 5: that she had a date with the Larry Dance.
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: Erica found that Larry Dance had gone out with Michelle
• 27:07
  Speaker 2: about a month before she disappeared.
• 27:10
  Speaker 5: He told investigators that he'd picked her up from the spa.
• 27:14
  Speaker 5: They'd gone back to his house. They were messing around,
• 27:18
  Speaker 5: they got naked and got into his bed, and then
• 27:21
  Speaker 5: she changed her mind and didn't want to have sex,
• 27:25
  Speaker 5: and so they went to sleep, and he took her
• 27:27
  Speaker 5: to her friend to a mutual friend's house the next
• 27:30
  Speaker 5: morning and dropped her off there and to me the
• 27:34
  Speaker 5: similarities between his story and the confession quote unquote were
• 27:40
  Speaker 5: so eerily similar.
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: And Danz didn't have an alibi for the night of
• 27:45
  Speaker 2: the twenty first, but he was cleared after a polygraph and.
• 27:49
  Speaker 5: The lead DCI investigator, Rick saiwasinc His brother Jeff vouched
• 27:56
  Speaker 5: for Larry Dance and said he's a good guy. I
• 27:58
  Speaker 5: play softball with her. But the most alarming was that
• 28:04
  Speaker 5: law enforcement had her dad, Francis Winkle, as a suspect
• 28:09
  Speaker 5: on their list.
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: Remember, Michelle had a troubled home life, which was evident
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: to Erica by the fact that no one had reported
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: her missing.
• 28:18
  Speaker 5: I can't imagine if my family saw me on Monday
• 28:23
  Speaker 5: and didn't hear from me when my body was found
• 28:25
  Speaker 5: on Saturday, that they still hadn't raised an alarm.
• 28:29
  Speaker 3: Wow.
• 28:29
  Speaker 5: Michelle never came home, and the brothers also had a
• 28:37
  Speaker 5: really callous attitude towards her, things like she'd being a
• 28:43
  Speaker 5: problem child, used to run away. And then none of
• 28:46
  Speaker 5: the family members testify at trial. They actually call the
• 28:51
  Speaker 5: brother Mark's girlfriend now wife, Diana, to say the last
• 28:56
  Speaker 5: time that she saw her at the house was that
• 28:58
  Speaker 5: Monday afternoon. She wanted a ride into town, so she
• 29:02
  Speaker 5: could go to the bank before going to work, and
• 29:04
  Speaker 5: her brother refused to take her, so she left on foot.
• 29:10
  Speaker 2: What did all this information tell you?
• 29:13
  Speaker 5: That the investigation that it had all of the features
• 29:17
  Speaker 5: of a wrongful conviction, That investigators focused on the player right,
• 29:22
  Speaker 5: the DJ, the guy that had multiple girlfriends. They ignored
• 29:29
  Speaker 5: all these other legit credible alibis or motives for murdering her.
• 29:37
  Speaker 5: We knew there was just there had to be more
• 29:39
  Speaker 5: to the story.
• 29:42
  Speaker 2: Erica and her team discovered a list of people who
• 29:44
  Speaker 2: said they saw Michelle alive after the twenty first, the
• 29:48
  Speaker 2: only day the state concedes Bill could have killed Michelle.
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: It wasn't just the schoolmate who testified at trial that
• 29:55
  Speaker 2: she'd seen Michelle at the mall Tuesday.
• 29:58
  Speaker 5: People saw her alive up through Thursday.
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: This list was never disclosed to the defense. Erica filed
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: this as a Brady violation withholding exculpatory evidence from the defense.
• 30:12
  Speaker 2: Then she turned to the crime scene.
• 30:14
  Speaker 5: The pathologist testified she was heavily infested with maggots, and
• 30:18
  Speaker 5: she's not when you look at the crime scene photos.
• 30:22
  Speaker 5: An entomologist that we hired said that the best in
• 30:27
  Speaker 5: her opinion, the best estimate was that Michelle died Wednesday night,
• 30:31
  Speaker 5: the twenty third, and that she did not die on Monday,
• 30:35
  Speaker 5: that the bugs that were there, the maggots, and the temperatures,
• 30:42
  Speaker 5: that there's no way she died on Monday and looked
• 30:46
  Speaker 5: like that on Saturday.
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: And again everyone agrees Bill could not have killed Michelle
• 30:51
  Speaker 2: after Monday the twenty first. So Erica also filed an
• 30:56
  Speaker 2: actual innocence claim, but she had to explain if Bill
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: was actually innocent, why did he confess? She says, to
• 31:03
  Speaker 2: start calling the statement a confession is a stretch.
• 31:08
  Speaker 5: It's a one page statement, and he never admits or
• 31:13
  Speaker 5: remembers killing her. It's I must have done it, but
• 31:17
  Speaker 5: I don't remember it. And so it raises all of
• 31:21
  Speaker 5: these red flags about whether it's reliable, and what coercion
• 31:28
  Speaker 5: was happening in that room, and how vulnerable was he.
• 31:33
  Speaker 2: In terms of the evidence that brought Erica to Bill's
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: case in the first place.
• 31:37
  Speaker 5: We were denied DNA testing because the state kept saying
• 31:40
  Speaker 5: the evidence was gone. They don't have it, they can't
• 31:43
  Speaker 5: find it.
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: The sexual assault kit the one thing that could help
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: prove Bill's innocence.
• 31:48
  Speaker 5: We could find everything but the physical evidence.
• 31:51
  Speaker 2: So Erica also filed a young blood claim.
• 31:54
  Speaker 5: Young Blood versus Arizona, which is a due process violation
• 31:59
  Speaker 5: for destruction of evidence. And so we just had a
• 32:02
  Speaker 5: trial on that in June, and the court ruled and
• 32:05
  Speaker 5: denied that claim and said that while the sexual assault
• 32:10
  Speaker 5: kit has been destroyed, it wasn't done in bad faith.
• 32:17
  Speaker 5: A couple of big things the court missed was that
• 32:21
  Speaker 5: the victim's clothing is still unaccounted for. It was never released,
• 32:26
  Speaker 5: it was never on an order to be released it.
• 32:32
  Speaker 5: It was there, they collected it, they had it.
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: So you just don't know where it is. Like, do
• 32:39
  Speaker 2: you think it was destroyed?
• 32:41
  Speaker 5: I think it was destroyed. I think it should have
• 32:43
  Speaker 5: been with the sexual assault kit. Wow, it should have
• 32:46
  Speaker 5: been in the sheriff's office.
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: And remember agent Saiwazink, whose brother vouched for Larry Dan's.
• 32:52
  Speaker 5: He's the last one to have known to have had
• 32:55
  Speaker 5: the sexual assault kit or any physical evidence. He picked
• 32:58
  Speaker 5: it all up from the lab des Moines and was
• 33:01
  Speaker 5: supposed to drive it back to Muscatine a couple hours away.
• 33:05
  Speaker 5: But he doesn't file a report, he doesn't sign a
• 33:08
  Speaker 5: chain of custody document, he doesn't do anything.
• 33:17
  Speaker 2: All of the claims Erica filed have been denied. She's
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: amending them and refiling.
• 33:23
  Speaker 5: If we lose these claims in Iowa, I think next
• 33:27
  Speaker 5: stop is federal court.
• 33:30
  Speaker 2: Erica says that Iowa is a hard place to litigate
• 33:33
  Speaker 2: post conviction cases.
• 33:35
  Speaker 5: There's no skepticism and everybody knows everybody and it's oh,
• 33:40
  Speaker 5: I know him, he's a great guy. He's done lots
• 33:43
  Speaker 5: of murder cases. To me, it's a hard place to
• 33:46
  Speaker 5: be because I'm the outsider. I'm a threat. The work
• 33:52
  Speaker 5: is a threat because they're so nice. They don't get
• 33:55
  Speaker 5: anything wrong.
• 33:57
  Speaker 2: Do you get any community backlash?
• 34:00
  Speaker 3: Yeah?
• 34:00
  Speaker 5: I think there is a unwillingness to work with us.
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: And through all this bill sits in prison year after year.
• 34:13
  Speaker 4: Every time we turn around, we prove I didn't do it,
• 34:20
  Speaker 4: and nobody seems to give a shit. There's no justice
• 34:23
  Speaker 4: in Iowa. There's no way you can convince me. I
• 34:27
  Speaker 4: don't care what they do. Convince me. Ryl ever be
• 34:32
  Speaker 4: justice in Iowa or the courts. I mean, if you're
• 34:38
  Speaker 4: going to put somebody in prison, you've got to be
• 34:40
  Speaker 4: damn sure. Especially with a death sentence, which is a
• 34:44
  Speaker 4: life sentence in Iowa, you should be sure you should
• 34:49
  Speaker 4: be on the shadow of a doubt. Well, I got
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: a cave darkness.
• 34:56
  Speaker 2: One minute remaining.
• 35:02
  Speaker 3: I had a dream last night that Bill was home.
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: Were there any specifics in your dream?
• 35:08
  Speaker 1: I just dreamed that he came walking in and we
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: just kind of, you know, I was explaining to him
• 35:19
  Speaker 1: what things were, because Bill no computers, no phones, no,
• 35:24
  Speaker 1: you know, a lot of things. And this town has
• 35:27
  Speaker 1: changed so much since.
• 35:30
  Speaker 3: In fact, it's changed so much.
• 35:32
  Speaker 1: That I see these things whenever this lady takes me
• 35:37
  Speaker 1: to the doctor or out of town that I don't
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: know is there.
• 35:43
  Speaker 3: And that was the main thing, and I was so tickled.
• 35:47
  Speaker 1: I just would let him out of my sight, and
• 35:50
  Speaker 1: I took him to McDonald's because that's the first place.
• 35:54
  Speaker 3: He's gonna go. And then it's going to be a pizza.
• 36:00
  Speaker 2: Every now and then. Donna lets herself believe that dream
• 36:03
  Speaker 2: of having Bill home will become a reality.
• 36:07
  Speaker 3: Oh I'm gonna love it. I don't know as I'm
• 36:11
  Speaker 3: gonna be here that long that I'm gonna love every
• 36:14
  Speaker 3: minute of it.
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: Bill was recently moved to another prison and he's been
• 36:21
  Speaker 2: having a hard time adjusting. He says this new prison
• 36:25
  Speaker 2: is rough, it's also hard holding onto hope. He has
• 36:29
  Speaker 2: yet another petition pending in.
• 36:30
  Speaker 4: Court, but it's gonna take probably a year.
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: I asked Bill if he thinks his mom has a
• 36:38
  Speaker 2: year left.
• 36:41
  Speaker 4: No, no, I'm afraid she don't.
• 36:48
  Speaker 2: What does it mean to you to have had her
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: all these years?
• 36:53
  Speaker 4: Yes, Mama, that's the where mom is.
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: Bill says, if his mom is going on, there's only
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: one other thing he'd want.
• 37:03
  Speaker 4: We left the hell over.
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: And get a motorcycle.
• 37:09
  Speaker 4: I want to have a woman on the back. I
• 37:13
  Speaker 4: want to be going down the road. Reached down and
• 37:15
  Speaker 4: lay my hand on her sigh the land next to
• 37:18
  Speaker 4: me for her being on the back of the bike,
• 37:22
  Speaker 4: and I'll know I'm home.
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: If you want to help Bill, you can contact the Muscatine,
• 37:34
  Speaker 2: Iowa County Attorney Jim Barry. Thank you for listening to
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling. Please support your local innocence
• 37:48
  Speaker 2: organizations and go to the links in the episode description
• 37:51
  Speaker 2: to see how you can help. This episode was written
• 37:54
  Speaker 2: by me Maggie Freeling, with story editing and sound designed
• 37:57
  Speaker 2: by senior producer Rebecca Ibara. Our producer is Kathleen Fink.
• 38:02
  Speaker 2: Our mixer is Josh Allen, with research by Donald Salzman
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: and additional production help by Jeff Cliburn. Executive producers are
• 38:10
  Speaker 2: Jason Flamm, Jeff Kempler, and Kevin Wordis. The music is
• 38:13
  Speaker 2: by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Make sure
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: to follow us on all social media platforms at Lava
• 38:21
  Speaker 2: for Good and at Wrongful Conviction. You can also follow
• 38:24
  Speaker 2: me on all platforms at Maggie Freeling. Wrongful Conviction with
• 38:28
  Speaker 2: Maggie Freeling is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: in association with Signal Company Number one