Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #189 Jason Flom with Nelson Cruz

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#189 Jason Flom with Nelson Cruz · Wrongful Conviction

0:02
Speaker 1: East New York is a notoriously tough Brooklyn neighborhood, and in
0:05
Speaker 1: the seventies, eighties, and nineties it had an equally corrupt
0:09
Speaker 1: local precinct, the seventy five or seventy fifth Precinct, home
0:13
Speaker 1: to many of the wrongful convictions of notorious and YPD
0:17
Speaker 1: detectives Luis Garcela and Stephen Camill. On March twenty eighth,
0:22
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety eight, Nelson Cruz was out in the neighborhood
0:24
Speaker 1: with some friends celebrating his seventeenth birthday over Chinese food
0:28
Speaker 1: when they heard gunshots close by, so close, in fact,
0:32
Speaker 1: that they saw the police swoop in immediately to get
0:36
Speaker 1: the situation under control. A police officer had seen the
0:40
Speaker 1: actual muscle flash of the gun in Eduardo Rodriguez's hand.
0:44
Speaker 1: Trevor Vieira, a man in his mid twenties known for stickups,
0:48
Speaker 1: was lying dead in the street. Rodriguez was brought in
0:51
Speaker 1: for questioning, where Scarcela and Camille turned what should have
0:55
Speaker 1: been an open and shutcase into another horrific wrongful conviction
1:00
Speaker 1: with the false testimony of a man who didn't even
1:03
Speaker 1: know police were unseen to arrest Rodriguez and in spite
1:07
Speaker 1: of the testimony of that uniform police officer stating that
1:10
Speaker 1: Nelson Cruz was definitely not the shooter, Nelson was convicted
1:15
Speaker 1: and sentenced to twenty five years to life, and if
1:18
Speaker 1: matters couldn't get any worse, despite a mountain of new
1:22
Speaker 1: exculpatory evidence, the judge who oversaw his most recent appeal
1:27
Speaker 1: suffers now from early onset Alzheimer's, which has impaired her
1:31
Speaker 1: ability to follow the case and set Nelson free. This
1:36
Speaker 1: is Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flopp. Hello.
1:55
Speaker 2: This is a.
1:55
Speaker 1: Prepaid collect call from an inmate at New York State
1:59
Speaker 1: Department of Care and Community Supervision.
2:02
Speaker 3: This call is subject to recording and monitoring. To accept charges,
2:06
Speaker 3: Press one to refuse charges, Press two.
2:10
Speaker 1: Thank you producing, So curis you may start the conversation. Now,
2:14
Speaker 1: welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason flamm That's me.
2:17
Speaker 1: I'm your host. Today. We have a deeply, deeply troubling
2:22
Speaker 1: situation to talk to you about. Today. We're on the
2:25
Speaker 1: phone with Nelson Cruz, an innocent man who's been in
2:28
Speaker 1: prison for a twenty two years now in New York State,
2:32
Speaker 1: and I'm going to introduce now to you an attorney.
2:35
Speaker 1: You have a tremendous amount of respect for who I'm
2:37
Speaker 1: proud to work with on a day to day basis
2:39
Speaker 1: on various cases, including this one. Justin bonus, Welcome to
2:42
Speaker 1: wrongful Conviction.
2:44
Speaker 3: Good morning, Jason, how are you?
2:45
Speaker 1: I'm all right. Thanks, I'm glad to be here with you,
2:47
Speaker 1: and most of all, I'm glad to be here with
2:49
Speaker 1: the man of the hour, Nelson Cruz. Nelson, I'm sorry
2:53
Speaker 1: you have to be here under these circumstances, but I'm
2:55
Speaker 1: really glad you're here to tell your story. So welcome
2:57
Speaker 1: to wrongful Conviction. I'm on to which prison are you in? Now?
3:02
Speaker 4: What Burn Correction? The facility up state New York?
3:04
Speaker 1: Can you take us back to that time?
3:07
Speaker 4: I was in tenth grade at the time. It was
3:09
Speaker 4: a nice night in March twenty eighth, nineteen ninety eight,
3:12
Speaker 4: the day for my birthday. Me and like three of
3:15
Speaker 4: my friends, we walked around the corner to the Chinese
3:17
Speaker 4: restaurant to purchase some food, and me and my friends was,
3:21
Speaker 4: you know, laughing and joking like we usually do. We
3:24
Speaker 4: stepped outside and shot the fire down the block on
3:28
Speaker 4: braffing and picking and when I looked I've seen a
3:30
Speaker 4: police officer car that pulled up immediately and was getting
3:33
Speaker 4: the area under control, and I've seen that they had
3:36
Speaker 4: a Spanish guy on the floor and they was arresting
3:39
Speaker 4: the guy. However, about four in the morning, Homicide contacted
3:44
Speaker 4: my mom. Told my mother they wanted to interview me
3:47
Speaker 4: for the murder, and I was like, how can this be.
3:49
Speaker 4: I don't have nothing to do with the situation. So
3:51
Speaker 4: my big Weather step, We're going to get an attorney.
3:53
Speaker 4: We're going to go down to the priests, and don't
3:55
Speaker 4: go down there by yourself, because you know the seventy
3:57
Speaker 4: fifth priestst is dirty. I said, fine, And on April third,
4:02
Speaker 4: about a turny went to the priests with attorney and
4:06
Speaker 4: went to a lineup and I've never seen the scrief again.
4:09
Speaker 1: Justin I want to turn to you because this case
4:11
Speaker 1: is the definition of an open and shut case. It
4:15
Speaker 1: should have never even been anywhere near Nelson or his
4:18
Speaker 1: family because they knew from day one exactly who did it.
4:22
Speaker 1: Can you explain what I'm talking about here?
4:25
Speaker 3: This murder happens March twenty eighth, nineteen ninety eight, at
4:28
Speaker 3: eleven fifteen at the corner of Bradford and Picking. Two
4:32
Speaker 3: cops in a patrol car. Officer William Paietti actually watches
4:37
Speaker 3: the man with the ponytail, who we later find out
4:39
Speaker 3: is at Wardo Rodriguez firing the gun, sees the muzzle
4:42
Speaker 3: flare towards Bradford and Picking, which is where the deceased
4:46
Speaker 3: Trevor Vieira was found. Pietti actually arrests at Wardo, Rodriguez
4:50
Speaker 3: tells him to drop the gun, and Officer Palmery chases
4:54
Speaker 3: a black man. I guess who runs away. These are
4:57
Speaker 3: what the two cops say at one one forty five
5:01
Speaker 3: in the morning when they're interviewed by none other than
5:03
Speaker 3: Detective Lewis Scarcela and Detective Steven Kimmel. And just to
5:08
Speaker 3: tell you who those men are, I mean, they're probably
5:12
Speaker 3: some of the most storied police officers in the country
5:14
Speaker 3: when it comes to wrongful convictions in relation to homicides.
5:17
Speaker 3: And Lewis Scarcella with Camill shows up at the scene
5:20
Speaker 3: at eleven fifty five. They are totally involved with this case.
5:23
Speaker 3: Scarcella and Camille are at the precinct with Rodriguez. Rodriguez
5:28
Speaker 3: at around three o'clock in the morning or so actually
5:31
Speaker 3: makes a statement. Another witness, William Johnson, who later testifies
5:35
Speaker 3: that Nelson wasn't at the scene, He was an eyewitness
5:38
Speaker 3: arrested at the scene. He was interviewed, does not indicate
5:41
Speaker 3: anything about Nelson Cruz. So the first person to actually
5:44
Speaker 3: name Cruise is at Wardo Rodriguez. And then there was
5:47
Speaker 3: a third witness. His name is Andre Bellinger, who was
5:49
Speaker 3: interviewed at something around three forty five in the morning,
5:52
Speaker 3: and he says Nelson as well. Nelson turns himself in
5:56
Speaker 3: on April third. He's barely seventeen years old. Mark Brooks
5:59
Speaker 3: runs the lineup. He is allegedly the lead investigator out
6:02
Speaker 3: of the seventy fifth because Stephen Camill is the lead
6:05
Speaker 3: investigator for Brooklyn North. And how you understand the politics
6:08
Speaker 3: between Brooklyn North and the local precincts is one detective
6:12
Speaker 3: from Brooklyn North would work with a precinct detective. So
6:15
Speaker 3: Stephen Camill was the lead partner detective with Mark Brooks
6:19
Speaker 3: who was the detective from the seventy fifth precinct, and
6:22
Speaker 3: Lewis Scarcella was Stephen Camill's partner from Brooklyn North. You know,
6:26
Speaker 3: so what we have happened is a lineup that's conducted,
6:29
Speaker 3: and Andre Bellinger is the only witness that comes in to
6:33
Speaker 3: view the lineup.
6:34
Speaker 1: So little does Nelson know he's going right into the
6:37
Speaker 1: eye of the storm. Here, you were living through this
6:40
Speaker 1: a tenth greater. I mean, can you take us back
6:43
Speaker 1: to what you were thinking and feeling at that time,
6:45
Speaker 1: starting on the third when you turn yourself in, Yes, Jason.
6:49
Speaker 4: So I'm go into the precinct and I'm sitting down
6:51
Speaker 4: just waiting for the detective to go look for us.
6:54
Speaker 4: On Philistlana Scarcella, he's on his desk with a seat
6:57
Speaker 4: picked up, smoking a cigar. I never forget this. He's
7:01
Speaker 4: smoking a cigar and he asks me, Uh, you're not
7:03
Speaker 4: scared to be here. I said, no, I wouldn't be here,
7:06
Speaker 4: but I committed this murder. He should have head, he said,
7:09
Speaker 4: all right. After they got the filler, we went into
7:12
Speaker 4: the lineup. I got picked out, of course by Andre Billinger,
7:15
Speaker 4: and my attorney's explained to me, listen, don't say nothing
7:18
Speaker 4: to the detective. The only thing that you supposed to
7:20
Speaker 4: stay to them is your name and address. So they
7:22
Speaker 4: kept me in the bullpen for a little while for
7:23
Speaker 4: a couple of hours, and they took me out the
7:26
Speaker 4: bullpen and then bring me right back into the lineup
7:29
Speaker 4: rung and they cuffed me into like the little rails
7:31
Speaker 4: inside the lineup rum and start. Seller brings the paper
7:34
Speaker 4: into the room and he's telling me, listen, we already
7:37
Speaker 4: know what happened. Just sign it and you will be leaving.
7:40
Speaker 4: So I tell Scott Seller that I'm not signing anything.
7:44
Speaker 4: He gets a little frustrated, So you got your meal,
7:46
Speaker 4: trying to play the gut cop. He's telling me, listen,
7:48
Speaker 4: just sign it and you'll be walking out. We already
7:50
Speaker 4: know what happened. So I tell him again, I'm not
7:52
Speaker 4: signing anything. Scott's Feller get a little frustrated, crumble the
7:56
Speaker 4: paper and slaps me in the face with this again.
7:59
Speaker 4: He's telling me, you know, hostile, just signed the paper,
8:01
Speaker 4: you'd be and I'm like, I'm not signing anything. They
8:03
Speaker 4: left me in a room for like a half hour.
8:04
Speaker 4: They brings me back into the book pen, and about
8:06
Speaker 4: maybe like an hour after that, they put me into
8:09
Speaker 4: a van. They driving me to us Central Bookman. And
8:12
Speaker 4: later on when I get my voluntary disclosure for him,
8:15
Speaker 4: I see that they put a DD five report in
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Speaker 4: a statement that I made a spontaneous statement. The statement
8:20
Speaker 4: s face sensed the fact that I got shot in
8:23
Speaker 4: my leg and I shot the guy and ran and
8:25
Speaker 4: I'm looking at I'm telling my attorney. I never said
8:27
Speaker 4: any of this to these detectives. Number never said any
8:30
Speaker 4: of this.
8:31
Speaker 3: And the statement that he attributes to Nelson is the
8:34
Speaker 3: same type of language that's in all of these Scarcella
8:37
Speaker 3: Incamil cases when you have these quote unquote confessions.
8:42
Speaker 1: And by the way, I have to say this before
8:43
Speaker 1: I get back to Justin. It sounds to me like
8:45
Speaker 1: you did everything right. You did what we always ask
8:48
Speaker 1: people to do on the show, don't talk. You didn't
8:51
Speaker 1: sign a piece of paper, although it sounded like a
8:53
Speaker 1: pretty good offer, like to a kid in tenth grade.
8:56
Speaker 1: So you did everything right and the system failed you. Anyway, Justin,
9:00
Speaker 1: do you have a theory on how this Rodriguez character
9:03
Speaker 1: could have possibly convinced the detectives that I mean, my
9:07
Speaker 1: mind goes to a pretty dark place here. But why
9:09
Speaker 1: did he finger Nelson?
9:10
Speaker 3: The only theory I have is Rodriguez knew who Nelson
9:13
Speaker 3: was and he just pinned it on somebody that maybe
9:16
Speaker 3: looked more like him. Than anybody else did. But one
9:19
Speaker 3: other thing about Edward or Rodriguez, the seventy fifth was
9:22
Speaker 3: very familiar with him. He had multiple arrests from the
9:25
Speaker 3: seventy fifth robbery I believe in nineteen ninety and then
9:29
Speaker 3: a drug conviction in ninety five. He was on parole
9:32
Speaker 3: at the time of this murder for that drug conviction
9:34
Speaker 3: from ninety five.
9:35
Speaker 1: They knew him, and they might have found him to
9:38
Speaker 1: be useful, and in this case, they didn't want to
9:41
Speaker 1: put him in jail. I mean, that's clear, because they
9:44
Speaker 1: could have. They should have. It was their responsibility to
9:47
Speaker 1: do so, and instead they decided to pin it on
9:49
Speaker 1: an innocent man named Nelson Cruz, which was standard operating
9:52
Speaker 1: procedure for them at that time.
9:54
Speaker 3: Anyway, the seventy fifth, as Nelson said, is notorious. The
9:57
Speaker 3: quote from Michael Race when he was ahead of that
10:00
Speaker 3: squad from the early eighties into the early nineties, he
10:03
Speaker 3: was involved with seven hundred and fifty homicide investigations and
10:06
Speaker 3: only one time did they actually follow the rules. So
10:11
Speaker 3: Rodriguez tells them I didn't do it, and they bring
10:14
Speaker 3: Andre Bellinger in. He gives them the information that they
10:16
Speaker 3: want to hear, and what we know about Andre Bellinger
10:19
Speaker 3: is in nineteen eighty one, Andre Bellinger was charged with
10:22
Speaker 3: murder and he only does a one and a half
10:24
Speaker 3: to three. At the time of Nelson's arrest, Andre Bellinger
10:28
Speaker 3: was working with the PAAL, which is the Police Athletic League,
10:30
Speaker 3: and he lived only two blocks away from the seventy
10:33
Speaker 3: fifth precinct. And what we know from a hearing what
10:36
Speaker 3: Detective Brooks testifies to is right before the lineup Scarcel
10:40
Speaker 3: and Camille, they're alone with Andre Bellinger.
10:43
Speaker 1: So now we have to get to the trial. A
10:46
Speaker 1: New York City police officer testified that they had not
10:50
Speaker 1: seen Nelson Cruz at the scene. I'm going to read
10:53
Speaker 1: the testimony here. Nelson, your lawyer walked the officer through
10:57
Speaker 1: what happened. He said, did you see the muzzle flashes
10:59
Speaker 1: of the gun. He answers, I saw muzzle flashes, and
11:03
Speaker 1: you jumped out of the car almost immediately upon hearing
11:05
Speaker 1: the shots. Correct, and the officer says correct, your gun drawn.
11:10
Speaker 1: Officer says yes, did you ever see Nelson Cruz on
11:13
Speaker 1: the scene. No? Did you ever see Nelson Cruz with
11:16
Speaker 1: a nine millimeter handgun in his hand? No, you did
11:19
Speaker 1: see Eduardo Rodriguez with a nine millimeter handgun in his hand. Correct. Yes,
11:24
Speaker 1: As a matter of fact, you were pointing your nine
11:26
Speaker 1: milimeter at him. Correct. Officer replies correct, because he had
11:30
Speaker 1: a gun in his hand. Correct. Correct. And you were
11:33
Speaker 1: screaming at the top of your lungs to drop the gun,
11:36
Speaker 1: drop the gun. Correct. Officer replies correct. Now, that is
11:41
Speaker 1: some of the most powerful testimony I have ever heard,
11:44
Speaker 1: and all of it serves to prove that you could
11:48
Speaker 1: not did not commit this crime.
11:50
Speaker 4: You know, as you just read the testimony, I remember
11:54
Speaker 4: it like yesterday, and I'm still confused, Jason, the only
11:57
Speaker 4: one is against me was not like Rodriguez. At Montreal,
12:00
Speaker 4: they used Andre Billinger. And when you ask Andre Billinger
12:05
Speaker 4: to space, he was there from the beginning to the
12:07
Speaker 4: Did you see police on the scene he states no.
12:11
Speaker 4: We ask him, did you see anybody get arrested on
12:13
Speaker 4: the crowd saying? He states no, so and my mom
12:17
Speaker 4: is like, what crowd saying was this guy in?
12:20
Speaker 1: How could you be confused as to whether or not
12:22
Speaker 1: there were police officers? He wasn't confused. He said there weren't,
12:25
Speaker 1: but there were. This is not a thing you could
12:27
Speaker 1: mix up like the color of the shirt the guy
12:29
Speaker 1: was wearing. You know.
12:30
Speaker 3: Bellinger His story is that Nelson gets into it with
12:33
Speaker 3: a guy named Shaq, and that Nelson drives his car,
12:36
Speaker 3: comes back around and then gets into it with Vieira.
12:39
Speaker 3: Bellinger says that Nelson accused Vieira of giving Shack a gun.
12:43
Speaker 3: That Nelson just kills Vieira. That's basically Bellinger's story. No
12:46
Speaker 3: one else says that, no one And what's interesting is
12:50
Speaker 3: Shaq actually came to testify in twenty nineteen and he
12:53
Speaker 3: said he never had a fight with Nelson Cruz, so
12:55
Speaker 3: that was a made up story. And what corroborates what
12:58
Speaker 3: Shaq says is when Andre Bellinger speaks to the conviction
13:01
Speaker 3: review Unit in twenty fifteen, says he says he can't
13:03
Speaker 3: even remember the incident with Shack, which is the whole
13:06
Speaker 3: basis of this altercation. This case is a joke, okay.
13:11
Speaker 1: Bellinger was also the least credible witness, not just because
13:16
Speaker 1: of his background, but also because Bellinger testified that the
13:19
Speaker 1: police told him who to identify. And Bellinger also testified
13:23
Speaker 1: that he'd only been able to identify the murder weapon
13:25
Speaker 1: as a nine millimeter gun because the police had told
13:28
Speaker 1: him that's what it was.
13:30
Speaker 3: They didn't know the gun that Rodriguez was arrested with
13:34
Speaker 3: was the murder weapon until just before Nelson's trial. And
13:37
Speaker 3: this is a common theme in policing from the NYPD
13:40
Speaker 3: is they don't do any forensic investigation. Okay, so the
13:45
Speaker 3: ballistics from the nine millimeter that Rodriguez has caught with
13:48
Speaker 3: matched the shellcasings that murdered Trevor Vieira.
13:51
Speaker 4: When the police officer testified states then he didn't see
13:55
Speaker 4: me at all. He didn't send me with no gun,
13:56
Speaker 4: he stated, who he's being able with the gun. I'm like,
13:59
Speaker 4: I'm an go home. And at the end when the
14:02
Speaker 4: tribute came back with the guilty murder, just believe it
14:05
Speaker 4: and get sentence the twenty out of life. You've got
14:09
Speaker 4: the god with the smoking gun. All five shell cases
14:12
Speaker 4: match that gun. I still can't believe it.
14:23
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15:02
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15:09
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Speaker 1: and individuals most in need. More recently, the program added
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Speaker 1: criminal and social justice reform as a key pillar of
15:32
Speaker 1: its mission. Nelson didn't exactly take this lying down. Instead,
15:43
Speaker 1: you got busy behind bars, right, I mean tell us
15:46
Speaker 1: about the actual innocence crewment.
15:48
Speaker 4: Like I said, I was sentence to twenty five years
15:51
Speaker 4: to life, and I'll come up to state. Didn't know
15:54
Speaker 4: anything about the law, and I'm just setting a little
15:57
Speaker 4: library actions for help, and you know, reading a lot
16:00
Speaker 4: of statues and trying to familiarize myself. So I ran
16:04
Speaker 4: across you know, a lot of good guys and they
16:06
Speaker 4: teaching me about the laws. And at the same time,
16:09
Speaker 4: I'm trying to gather up my evidence to submit my
16:12
Speaker 4: affidavits to the Thought Division. At the time, my director
16:16
Speaker 4: pill was pending. But I couldn't because you know, my family,
16:19
Speaker 4: we're not rich. We're not rich, We we don't got
16:21
Speaker 4: money like that to be hiring private investigator. So I
16:24
Speaker 4: had my mother. She was, you know, going into these
16:27
Speaker 4: dangerous projects, looking for my friends, looking for people that
16:30
Speaker 4: was at the crime scene that night. And with the
16:33
Speaker 4: help with my mother, I was getting phone numbers, and
16:35
Speaker 4: with the phone numbers, I was contacting people's gathering evidence.
16:38
Speaker 4: I had got about maybe two, like two or three
16:40
Speaker 4: Afid Davis at first, and then my brother laid on
16:43
Speaker 4: we had hire a private investigator to locate these witnesses
16:46
Speaker 4: and get Abid Davis from them. And as I'm submitting
16:50
Speaker 4: these motions to the court, I'm getting shot down. I'm
16:52
Speaker 4: losing hope, but I'm still fighting because I said, listen,
16:55
Speaker 4: something one day's son got to give here. I know
16:57
Speaker 4: I ain't commited this crime, and to the course of
16:59
Speaker 4: the years me being I'm hearing of a guy named Bush,
17:02
Speaker 4: which is Derek Hamilton. I don't know if you're familiar
17:04
Speaker 4: with him. He's a jail house William And I'm like, wow,
17:07
Speaker 4: I got to meet this guy because I heard he's
17:08
Speaker 4: a beast with the lord. So I end up meeting
17:10
Speaker 4: Derek Hamilton in the law library and we exchanged information
17:14
Speaker 4: D five and stuff like that, and I'm explaining to
17:16
Speaker 4: him about my case. He reviewed my d D five.
17:19
Speaker 4: He sees that scart seller name is in the bottom
17:22
Speaker 4: and he's like, wow, this guy's in my case. He
17:25
Speaker 4: loud on me on my case and he's fighting Actual
17:27
Speaker 4: editing the same thing. So we leave Shawongong. We end
17:31
Speaker 4: up in Auburn. When we go to Auburn Correction Facility again,
17:35
Speaker 4: I'm in Laura Liveburn and I meet Shabaka Shabacca's there.
17:38
Speaker 4: A guy by the name of Danny Ringkolng there also
17:41
Speaker 4: fighting innocent and Derek ended up a rising. That's when
17:45
Speaker 4: he came up with the name Actual Edison Team AI Team.
17:48
Speaker 4: And what we was doing was like one day we
17:50
Speaker 4: will work on my case, the next day we will
17:53
Speaker 4: work on Derek case. Like that, we'll take turns on
17:55
Speaker 4: each other case and Derek telling me, what the dude
17:58
Speaker 4: right over here, right over here, do this, do that.
18:00
Speaker 4: And at the same time I see telling me what
18:01
Speaker 4: to do. I'm learning. And basically what I was doing
18:04
Speaker 4: was lawyer shopping. I'm somemn in a big package with
18:07
Speaker 4: all my evidence, with my AFFID Davis, my DD five
18:09
Speaker 4: crime scene sketches that I drew, trying to get some
18:12
Speaker 4: help from the outside. I wrote every actually innocent project.
18:15
Speaker 4: I wrote governors, I wrote the President, I wrote everywhere Jason,
18:18
Speaker 4: anywhere you can think of, I wrote. And at this
18:21
Speaker 4: time Derek ended up going home in twenty eleven. So
18:24
Speaker 4: Derek always told me, listen, I'm not gonna forget about you.
18:28
Speaker 4: Once I'm making home, I'm near. I got you. I'm
18:30
Speaker 4: not gonna forget And I don't heard that so many
18:32
Speaker 4: times Jason being in here that you know, guys tell
18:34
Speaker 4: you listen, they're gonna go home do this, and guys
18:36
Speaker 4: just go home and live their life. So I'm like, wow, now,
18:39
Speaker 4: I hope Deryck don't do this to me, you know.
18:42
Speaker 4: And Derek went home and kept his word. Jason. He
18:45
Speaker 4: put justin on my case and from there we gathered
18:50
Speaker 4: more evidence, and I'm well not today.
18:53
Speaker 1: Derek has been on the show, Danny ring kon Tobacca, Shakur.
18:56
Speaker 1: I mean, all these people are people I know well,
18:59
Speaker 1: and I've talked often about the awesome power that you
19:03
Speaker 1: guys collectively manifested, all of whom had been through the
19:06
Speaker 1: same experience at the hands of the same people, and
19:09
Speaker 1: setting up basically a law firm inside the laws of
19:12
Speaker 1: the prison. You know, call it whatever you want. Shakur, Cruz, Hamilton,
19:16
Speaker 1: and Ringcone. I could see it on a letterhead, and
19:18
Speaker 1: hopefully someday you guys will actually form a law firm
19:21
Speaker 1: on the outside, because I think you guys would be
19:24
Speaker 1: incredible together. Derek, when he was on wrongful Conviction, I
19:27
Speaker 1: was like, oh my god, this is like interviewing a
19:29
Speaker 1: yeah law professor. I mean, this guy is on fire,
19:33
Speaker 1: so knowledgeable.
19:34
Speaker 3: That is my mentor. By the way, Derek, we call
19:37
Speaker 3: him mom Google Legal. Give him a fact and he'll
19:40
Speaker 3: give you a case.
19:41
Speaker 1: And Nelson, you should know it's Derek, but it's not
19:44
Speaker 1: just Derek. I mean all of us are just super
19:47
Speaker 1: committed to seeing you get home and get on with
19:50
Speaker 1: your life.
19:51
Speaker 3: So Nelson litigated his case, he filed an emotion of vacant,
19:55
Speaker 3: he filed an appeal and got shot down at every
19:59
Speaker 3: turn over the past twenty years. And so the hearing
20:02
Speaker 3: that we were finally granted in twenty nineteen, and the
20:06
Speaker 3: evidence that we presented was it was quite astounding. I mean, obviously,
20:10
Speaker 3: we called Officer Paietti and again who said that he
20:12
Speaker 3: did not see Nelson Cruz at the scene before, after,
20:15
Speaker 3: or during the crime. We called William Harden who was
20:18
Speaker 3: across the street watched the ponytailed man kill his friend.
20:22
Speaker 3: He knew Trevor Vieira and did not see Nelson Cruz there.
20:25
Speaker 3: He saw the police pull up at the scene. And
20:27
Speaker 3: then we called William Johnson, who was the other man
20:30
Speaker 3: that was arrested at the scene, and he testified that
20:32
Speaker 3: he knew Nelson Cruz and he did not see Nelson
20:34
Speaker 3: Cruz at the scene. I mean, those are three eye witnesses.
20:38
Speaker 3: We called two alibi witnesses, Ralph Johnson, and the only
20:41
Speaker 3: questions that the DA had for Ralph Johnson was did
20:44
Speaker 3: he eat his Chinese food or not that night. That's
20:47
Speaker 3: how solid Ralph Johnson was on the witness stand. Another
20:50
Speaker 3: alibi witness Bonnie Cooper, who was at the time Andre
20:54
Speaker 3: Bellinger's mistress, testified that Andre Bellinger admitted to her he
20:58
Speaker 3: never saw the crime. Christopher Cooper, Bonnie Cooper's son, who
21:02
Speaker 3: was playing basketball with Andre Bellinger that night. Chris Cooper,
21:05
Speaker 3: testified that Bellinger couldn't have seen it because the shooting
21:08
Speaker 3: had already happened by the time they get there. We
21:11
Speaker 3: also called Ja Salpeter, who was a private investigator who
21:14
Speaker 3: interviewed Andre Bellinger, and he asked, Andre Bellinger, why didn't
21:17
Speaker 3: you mention the police or Edward O. Rodriguez? And Bellinger
21:21
Speaker 3: told j. Salpeter that the police never told him that
21:26
Speaker 3: Rodriguez or the police were at the scene, I mean.
21:29
Speaker 3: And we called Jermaine Fraser, the man Shack who Bellinger
21:33
Speaker 3: said started this whole thing off, and Shaq testified that
21:37
Speaker 3: he never pulled a gun out on Nelson, that there
21:39
Speaker 3: was never a dispute that night, that that's all false.
21:42
Speaker 3: Of course, we called Scarcella and Camill and you know,
21:45
Speaker 3: Scarcela has amnesia. He can remember what he was wearing
21:48
Speaker 3: in nineteen seventy three, but when you ask him about
21:51
Speaker 3: the case that you're talking about now, he can't remember anything,
21:54
Speaker 3: but Mark Brooks puts him in Camill right with Andre
21:57
Speaker 3: Bellinger before the lineup. I mean, this was such a
21:59
Speaker 3: bad blowout that April twelfth, twenty nineteen, I made an
22:03
Speaker 3: oral argument and also on paper to release Nelson on bail,
22:07
Speaker 3: which is astounding in the middle of a post conviction hearing.
22:11
Speaker 3: It was going that bad that I said in the
22:13
Speaker 3: interest of justice that this court should release him, and
22:15
Speaker 3: Judge Simpson on that day said that Louis Scarcela was
22:19
Speaker 3: totally involved with this case, Andre Bellinger was unreliable, and
22:22
Speaker 3: that Chris and Bonnie Cooper she found to be reliable witnesses.
22:26
Speaker 3: That was April. By August, she was in another place.
22:32
Speaker 4: You know, God bless Chanda what happened. But I knew
22:34
Speaker 4: something strange was going on. While she was deciding over
22:37
Speaker 4: my hearing, Jason, she was, you know, moving funny. You know,
22:41
Speaker 4: she would be given credit to certain amount witnesses testimony,
22:45
Speaker 4: and then later on when Justin highlights it to her,
22:48
Speaker 4: it's like she's lost. Jason's like she don't know, like
22:51
Speaker 4: what happened a couple of days ago. And at the
22:53
Speaker 4: end when I went to the decision on August twenty ninth
22:55
Speaker 4: when she's an my motion, Jason, I was like Lois,
22:58
Speaker 4: but we found out that, you know, she was mentally
23:01
Speaker 4: ill with al Zamas. Has she been in her right
23:04
Speaker 4: state of mind, I would have been home already.
23:06
Speaker 1: You know, there's no question. You know, Nelson is referring
23:10
Speaker 1: to a very respected judge from the Brooklyn Supreme Court
23:13
Speaker 1: who was known for her willingness to vacate wrongful convictions.
23:16
Speaker 1: Her name which is Shandiah Simpson, and she had ordered
23:20
Speaker 1: due trials previously for other men who had been also
23:23
Speaker 1: framed by Louis Scarcella. Listen to this quote. In the
23:26
Speaker 1: case of someone named Hargrove, Judge Simpson had this to
23:30
Speaker 1: say specifically about Scarcella. The pattern and practice of Scarcella's conduct,
23:36
Speaker 1: which manifests a disregard for rules, law and the truth,
23:40
Speaker 1: undermines our judicial system and gives cause for a new
23:44
Speaker 1: review of the evidence. I mean, she just called it
23:47
Speaker 1: out like it was, and here it is again right
23:50
Speaker 1: in front of her. But the craziest twist of fate,
23:53
Speaker 1: it was that this poor woman who's not an old
23:56
Speaker 1: lady r she was in her young fifties. She had
23:58
Speaker 1: early on set Ali Alzheimer's and she just literally lost
24:02
Speaker 1: the plot.
24:03
Speaker 3: When I was listening to her decision on August twenty nineteen,
24:08
Speaker 3: the first decision she read off, I argued orally, she
24:11
Speaker 3: left the bench totally abruptly. A court officer came out
24:15
Speaker 3: and told us to come back after lunch, And when
24:17
Speaker 3: she came back out after lunch, she read off another decision,
24:20
Speaker 3: which I was left wondering what hearing that she sat through.
24:25
Speaker 3: Her decision is based on an erroneous understanding of what
24:28
Speaker 3: we put forward. I mean, it's that we presented EDWARDO.
24:31
Speaker 3: Rodriguez as our witness for a self defense claim, which
24:36
Speaker 3: we never took that position. We always took the position
24:38
Speaker 3: at Edward Rodriguez was the killer. The prosecutor put Edward
24:42
Speaker 3: Rodriguez on the witness stand, so she misstated that, I mean,
24:46
Speaker 3: there's video of it.
24:48
Speaker 5: The present and hearing, and this decision falls on the
24:51
Speaker 5: following Rodriguez testified and his hearing that the Vistom fired
24:56
Speaker 5: the first shot at Cruise and then Cruise shot back
24:58
Speaker 5: in self defense. The defense claims both that Rodriguez is
25:02
Speaker 5: unreliable and at the same time asks that the court
25:05
Speaker 5: find his testimony supports a claim of self defense, and
25:09
Speaker 5: that this.
25:10
Speaker 3: Constitutes new evidence.
25:12
Speaker 5: For this reason, the motion must be denied.
25:16
Speaker 6: You want to say.
25:16
Speaker 2: Something never claimed that Rodriguez was newly discovered evidence claimed
25:21
Speaker 2: that Rodriguez was unreliable from day one.
25:23
Speaker 6: Well, they put him on.
25:25
Speaker 3: That's the revidence.
25:26
Speaker 2: They put evidence on that contradicted the only evidence that
25:30
Speaker 2: was at trial, which is Andre Balinger.
25:31
Speaker 1: Right.
25:32
Speaker 2: One witness who says the police told him who did it?
25:35
Speaker 3: Who says the police told them what weapon was used?
25:38
Speaker 3: Who even testifies that the police told him that Cruz
25:40
Speaker 3: was in the lineup. How reliable is that witness?
25:45
Speaker 2: And then we hear from a witness, the witness that
25:50
Speaker 2: is the first person.
25:51
Speaker 6: Who points to Nulson Cruz he has at guard, Agriguez
25:57
Speaker 6: has a motive to lie, and then fifteen years later
26:02
Speaker 6: says it self defense.
26:04
Speaker 3: We don't take his position. That's evidence that day put
26:07
Speaker 3: before the court.
26:09
Speaker 2: We're gonna believe that on the day of his birthday
26:12
Speaker 2: he kills somebody.
26:15
Speaker 3: Unfortunately, in cases like this, the law doesn't really protect
26:20
Speaker 3: a seventeen year old. I make my point that Rodriguez
26:24
Speaker 3: wasn't our witness, and she pulls everybody up to the
26:28
Speaker 3: bench schedules a reargument, she never provides a written decision,
26:32
Speaker 3: and tells us to come back in December of twenty nineteen.
26:35
Speaker 3: You do twelve sixteen, be back on twelve. That's a Monday.
26:40
Speaker 1: I've shared this video with the district attorney myself. I
26:44
Speaker 1: like Eric personally, I do have a lot of respect
26:47
Speaker 1: for him. I'm completely confused as to why this case
26:50
Speaker 1: has been ignored.
26:52
Speaker 4: When I came back from court last year, you know,
26:55
Speaker 4: I pulled down my tite right and I started writing
26:58
Speaker 4: and numerous letters to Evergon, to people under him, and
27:02
Speaker 4: never received a response.
27:04
Speaker 1: There's a very powerful quote where you said in a
27:07
Speaker 1: letter to Eric Gonzalis, I know, deep in my heart
27:10
Speaker 1: something went wrong at my hearing. I know me reaching
27:13
Speaker 1: out to you may not be the proper way to
27:15
Speaker 1: go about it, but I truly need help in this
27:17
Speaker 1: matter and feel that you have the power to step
27:19
Speaker 1: in and conduct an investigation. And of course, a year
27:22
Speaker 1: after the hearing, in early August twenty twenty, it was
27:24
Speaker 1: confirmed that Judge Simpson had early on said Alzheimer's and
27:27
Speaker 1: she retired.
27:29
Speaker 4: You know, they should be ashame of what they're doing
27:31
Speaker 4: with me. Something went wrong Domnis proceed and something was
27:35
Speaker 4: wrong with the judge, and you got the power of
27:38
Speaker 4: the empathene. You got to see all you you to do,
27:41
Speaker 4: which you know, I think ever since Kenneth Thompson died,
27:45
Speaker 4: they not following what Kenneth Thompson was doing.
28:05
Speaker 1: So justin a reargument was granted. It's tragic what happened
28:09
Speaker 1: for Judge Sandaiah Simpson. What the fuck happens now?
28:13
Speaker 3: So, in a normal course, the judge will issue a
28:16
Speaker 3: written decision, the court will enter the decision. She granted
28:20
Speaker 3: the motion to reargue, which is very, very very rare.
28:24
Speaker 3: She never issues a written decision. The court doesn't even
28:27
Speaker 3: enter this decision, which is what has to be done.
28:30
Speaker 3: So almost a year goes by and in August of
28:34
Speaker 3: twenty twenty, we find out that Judge Simpson has been
28:37
Speaker 3: diagnosed with Alzheimer's. So then Judge Demik, the administrative judge,
28:42
Speaker 3: assigns Raymond L. Rodriguez to the case. So we file
28:46
Speaker 3: the reargument and Judge Rodriguez told us that he wouldn't
28:50
Speaker 3: hear any of these filings, that the only thing that
28:53
Speaker 3: was in front of him was Judge Simpson's competency during
28:58
Speaker 3: the hearing and when she rendered her decision.
29:00
Speaker 1: Right, but which decision, the initial denial of the motion
29:04
Speaker 1: to vacate or the decision to grant a reargument.
29:08
Speaker 3: You bring up a phenomenal point. This is a very
29:10
Speaker 3: confusing procedural history. He tells us in January of twenty
29:15
Speaker 3: twenty one that the motion to reargue was taken off
29:19
Speaker 3: the calendar. He was not going to hear it. The
29:22
Speaker 3: only thing he ruled on is her oral decision denying
29:26
Speaker 3: the motion to vacate, the conviction and the motion to vacate.
29:30
Speaker 3: Her decision based upon her competency. He basically says that
29:34
Speaker 3: I'm not going to deal with the fact that she
29:36
Speaker 3: granted reargument, which I don't know how he does that
29:39
Speaker 3: she already granted it. And then on March first, twenty
29:42
Speaker 3: twenty one, Judge Raymond Rodriguez determined that she was competent
29:46
Speaker 3: and upheld her oral decision to deny Nelson Cruz's motion
29:50
Speaker 3: to vacate. And it's very interesting because in our motion
29:54
Speaker 3: to vacate Judge Simpson's decision that we filed back on
29:57
Speaker 3: August of twenty twenty, we had an affidavit from an
30:01
Speaker 3: investigator that spoke to her husband. We also had a
30:03
Speaker 3: pro public article where the husband spoke and said that
30:06
Speaker 3: he had noticed that Judge Simpson's mental health had been
30:09
Speaker 3: slipping as far back as the summer of twenty eighteen,
30:12
Speaker 3: which is almost a year before Nelson Cruz's actual hearing,
30:16
Speaker 3: let alone the decision. So Judge Rodriguez said that all
30:20
Speaker 3: of that information was speculative and said, I see how
30:23
Speaker 3: she could come to her decision. There's a reasonable basis
30:27
Speaker 3: for her decision. I don't know how he comes to
30:29
Speaker 3: that decision because he's not a doctor, and to be frank,
30:32
Speaker 3: I mean, he's not a mind reader. So Judge Rodriguez's decision,
30:36
Speaker 3: we filing leave to appeal. We're also filing a motion
30:41
Speaker 3: to compel a written decision from the Supreme Court because
30:45
Speaker 3: it's our position that Judge Simpson's oral decision wasn't effectively
30:49
Speaker 3: a decision. It was never filed it, it was never signed
30:52
Speaker 3: off on by her, and how could she sign off
30:55
Speaker 3: on it. Two days after she was in court and
30:57
Speaker 3: rendered that decision, she went on medically because she was
31:00
Speaker 3: suffering from Alzheimer's.
31:02
Speaker 1: So justin this case is just fucking outrageous, And I
31:06
Speaker 1: know a lot of our listeners are going to want
31:08
Speaker 1: to do something after they hear this. So what kind
31:11
Speaker 1: of action cand of just a regular person take.
31:13
Speaker 3: We set up a petition on change dot org. They
31:16
Speaker 3: can sign off on the petition and prayerfully the Brooklyn
31:20
Speaker 3: DA's office and the judges in Brooklyn will see people
31:23
Speaker 3: signing off on this petition.
31:25
Speaker 1: There's going to be a link in the bio. You
31:27
Speaker 1: can take an action that will add up to making
31:30
Speaker 1: a difference and getting the attention to this awful case
31:33
Speaker 1: that it deserves. And now this is the part of
31:35
Speaker 1: the show that we call closing arguments, and this is
31:38
Speaker 1: where I first of all, thank both of you for
31:41
Speaker 1: being here. Justin Bonus criminal defense attorney and Nelson Cruz
31:46
Speaker 1: wrongfully convicted from behind bars. Thank you both for being here.
31:50
Speaker 1: And now I'm going to turn my microphone off and
31:52
Speaker 1: listen to each of you share your final thoughts on
31:55
Speaker 1: whatever you want to talk about. And so let's leave
31:59
Speaker 1: the best for last, of course, that's Nelson Cruz. And
32:02
Speaker 1: first over to you Justin for closing arguments.
32:05
Speaker 3: I just want to make it clear to everybody that
32:07
Speaker 3: this is a disgrace. The Mountains of Evidence show that
32:11
Speaker 3: this man is innocent, and the DA's office says the
32:15
Speaker 3: ability to interview our witnesses, our witnesses were consistent in
32:20
Speaker 3: the conviction review process. Their witnesses weren't consistent. And believe me,
32:24
Speaker 3: they treated our witnesses differently than they treated their witnesses.
32:27
Speaker 3: And this is just it's disgraceful. Andre Bellinger came in
32:33
Speaker 3: in twenty nineteen and he said his trial testimony was truthful.
32:37
Speaker 3: He maintained his trial testimony, which is that they told
32:40
Speaker 3: him what type of gun was used. They told him
32:43
Speaker 3: that it was Nelson Cruz. They told him ed WARDO
32:46
Speaker 3: Rodriguez wasn't reliable. They told him they needed him because
32:50
Speaker 3: EDWARDO Rodriguez wasn't reliable. They told him that Nelson Cruz
32:53
Speaker 3: was going to be in the lineup. This is the
32:56
Speaker 3: only piece of evidence that convicted Nelson Cruz. I don't
33:01
Speaker 3: really know if I have to say anything more other
33:03
Speaker 3: than you heard what I said about what was presented
33:06
Speaker 3: at the hearing. And that's without saying that Scarcella and
33:09
Speaker 3: Stephen Camill were involved in this case. To top it off,
33:12
Speaker 3: they were involved. If ever, there was a case that
33:16
Speaker 3: was presented in court where clear and convincing evidence was
33:19
Speaker 3: presented that a man was actually innocent. It was Nelson
33:22
Speaker 3: Cruz's case.
33:24
Speaker 1: Nelson, over to you for the last word.
33:27
Speaker 4: Thank you who first will Jason sharing my stories in
33:30
Speaker 4: the air, and like my attorney, Justin bon has just said,
33:35
Speaker 4: right now, I'm just hoping we all the you know,
33:38
Speaker 4: the amount of evidence that I have shown the I
33:40
Speaker 4: commit this clown in the next day, the next few weeks,
33:44
Speaker 4: or the next month's coming, I'll be exonerated. I'm just
33:48
Speaker 4: you know, praying to get out of here. Enough is enough.
33:51
Speaker 4: You know, I don't suffer it a lot in here.
33:53
Speaker 4: I don't lost my parents since I've been incarcerated. It's
33:57
Speaker 4: been all for me. It's been all for me.
33:58
Speaker 1: You know.
33:59
Speaker 4: Sometimes I gets frustrated and you know, I lose hope,
34:03
Speaker 4: but I'll fight against it. I'm move forward. I'm move forward.
34:07
Speaker 4: And you know, once again, thank you, Jason. I appreciate
34:12
Speaker 4: you and you know everyone that's listening. I hope I
34:15
Speaker 4: heard my story. Yeah, yeah, hearing it from me directly,
34:19
Speaker 4: and that's what's been going on with me for almost
34:23
Speaker 4: twenty three years.
34:31
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to wrongful conviction with Jason flamm.
34:34
Speaker 1: Please support your local innocence projects and go to the
34:38
Speaker 1: link in our bio to see how you can help.
34:40
Speaker 1: I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff
34:43
Speaker 1: Cliburn and Kevin Wardis. The music on the show, as always,
34:47
Speaker 1: is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be
34:51
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34:58
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35:01
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