Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #100 Jason Flom with Dr. Yusef Salaam

Transcript

#100 Jason Flom with Dr. Yusef Salaam · Wrongful Conviction

0:01
Speaker 1: In twenty eighteen, I had the privilege of interviewing Yusuf
0:04
Speaker 1: Salam well now doctor Yusuf Salam and doctor Salam now Sirs.
0:09
Speaker 1: I love the way that sounds on the board of
0:10
Speaker 1: the Innocents Project with me. He's a father of ten children,
0:14
Speaker 1: extraordinary and he is an accomplished and celebrated motivational speaker,
0:20
Speaker 1: an author, and a tremendous advocate for criminal justice reform.
0:25
Speaker 1: Most dramatically, the story of Yusuf Salam and the four
0:31
Speaker 1: other wrongfully convicted boys because they were just children when
0:35
Speaker 1: they were teenagers, young teenagers when they were wrongfully convicted,
0:38
Speaker 1: then known as the Central Park Five, now known as
0:41
Speaker 1: the Exonerated Five, were featured in the hit Netflix show
0:45
Speaker 1: and the hit is not as strong enough here the
0:47
Speaker 1: smash Netflix show when they see us sixteen Emmy Award
0:51
Speaker 1: nominations and it's become a cultural phenomenon. It also has
0:56
Speaker 1: resulted in actual consequences for the people who wrongfully prosecuted
1:02
Speaker 1: and persecuted Yusef and the other kids. Both prosecutors have
1:07
Speaker 1: faced some censure, not strong enough punishments in my view,
1:11
Speaker 1: for what they did, but it really is a full
1:14
Speaker 1: circle turnaround that couldn't possibly have been imagined back when
1:20
Speaker 1: this terrible mischaracter justice was happening. Doctor Yoseph Salam's episode
1:24
Speaker 1: is one of my favorites. I'm excited for you to
1:26
Speaker 1: hear it.
1:32
Speaker 2: I've never been in trouble in my life. I didn't
1:34
Speaker 2: even have a parking ticket.
1:35
Speaker 1: You know what I mean. I was brought up like
1:37
Speaker 1: cops are the good guys.
1:40
Speaker 3: I didn't know what was going to happen, but I
1:42
Speaker 3: do know that everything was stacked against me. Everything everything,
1:48
Speaker 3: This isn't supposed to happen this way. I'm innocent. I
1:52
Speaker 3: know I'm innocent. I know I had nothing to do
1:55
Speaker 3: with this. How is this possible?
1:58
Speaker 2: I grew up trusting this is I've grew up believing
2:01
Speaker 2: that every human beings should do the right thing. And
2:04
Speaker 2: that's why, even though I knee I was dealing with
2:06
Speaker 2: more rough people, I wasn't going to break anyone to
2:08
Speaker 2: get me out of prison because I wouldn't live with
2:11
Speaker 2: the fact that I break my way out of my
2:12
Speaker 2: wife's death. I'm not innocent, too proven guilty. I'm guilty
2:17
Speaker 2: until I prove my innocence. And that's absolutely what happened
2:20
Speaker 2: to me.
2:21
Speaker 4: Our system since I've been out ten years, It's come
2:23
Speaker 4: a little ways, but it's still broken.
2:27
Speaker 2: A totally little trust in humanity have towards happ into it.
2:30
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm That's me
2:34
Speaker 1: And today I'm actually a little bit starstruck or awe
2:39
Speaker 1: struck because we have as our guest today Yusef Salaam,
2:44
Speaker 1: who is one of the most inspiring people I've ever
2:48
Speaker 1: had the privilege to be around. And so Yusef, welcome
2:52
Speaker 1: to the show.
2:53
Speaker 4: Oh thank you for having me. This is definitely my pleasure.
2:56
Speaker 1: And you know, I always say I'm happier here, but
2:59
Speaker 1: I'm sorry you're here because you never should have gone
3:01
Speaker 1: through this in the first place. But it's really it's
3:04
Speaker 1: an incredible, incredible story, both in terms of the you know,
3:09
Speaker 1: the story itself and the total breakdown of the criminal
3:14
Speaker 1: justice system that this case so perfectly highlights, but also
3:22
Speaker 1: because of what you've how you've managed to turn it
3:27
Speaker 1: into such an amazingly positive thing, and who you've become.
3:33
Speaker 1: So we'll get into that later though, but let's go
3:35
Speaker 1: back in time, like in the movies when it gets
3:37
Speaker 1: all foggy and we go back as this because this
3:40
Speaker 1: goes back to the eighties, right, I mean, and I
3:44
Speaker 1: lived in New York. This is a New York case.
3:46
Speaker 1: It's one of the most famous cases, the Central Park
3:48
Speaker 1: geogra case, or one of the most infamous cases in
3:52
Speaker 1: the history of New York City, which is, of course
3:54
Speaker 1: the media capital of the world. And I lived in
3:58
Speaker 1: New York back then, and it was it was crazy place.
4:00
Speaker 1: You were just a kid to get fifteen years old.
4:04
Speaker 1: Fifteen years old, unbelievable.
4:06
Speaker 4: I was.
4:07
Speaker 1: You know, I'm a little bit older than you, so
4:09
Speaker 1: I was in my late twenties already, but I remember
4:12
Speaker 1: it like it was yesterday. I mean, this case was
4:15
Speaker 1: blasted everywhere. This was the crime wave, right, This was
4:20
Speaker 1: a time when the only thing there was a lot
4:22
Speaker 1: of crime in New York, but the hysteria around the
4:25
Speaker 1: crime was was far exceeded the actual problem. And you know,
4:32
Speaker 1: you were a young guy growing up. And had you
4:37
Speaker 1: prior to this horrible incident, had you had any dealings
4:43
Speaker 1: with the law, had you ever been in trouble before?
4:45
Speaker 4: No, So I think that, you know, when I look
4:47
Speaker 4: at myself back then, being innocent, being you know, full
4:53
Speaker 4: of promise and hope and dreams and aspirations. You know,
4:58
Speaker 4: My my so to speak, interaction with police officers or
5:02
Speaker 4: authority figures was that we would see them in the
5:06
Speaker 4: neighborhoods walking around and you know, these were back when
5:08
Speaker 4: the cops actually walked the beat and knew the people's
5:11
Speaker 4: names that they you know, policed and and so I
5:14
Speaker 4: thought that police officers were very friendly, very very helpful.
5:21
Speaker 4: And you know, you supposed that with the backdrop of today,
5:25
Speaker 4: and it's like a horror scene when you look at
5:28
Speaker 4: what happened, you know. But my my interaction was very
5:33
Speaker 4: I didn't have I didn't have any interactions. And what
5:35
Speaker 4: I knew about police officers was that they were they
5:39
Speaker 4: were your friends, and if you needed help, you could
5:41
Speaker 4: call on them to help you and they would come
5:45
Speaker 4: and they would help you because they are public servants,
5:47
Speaker 4: did the protect and serve right.
5:49
Speaker 1: So you grew up like I did, thinking these are
5:52
Speaker 1: the these are the good guys. A lot of us
5:54
Speaker 1: when we were young boys, we all, you know, looked
5:58
Speaker 1: up to every I looked at the most people in uniform.
6:01
Speaker 1: Everyone in uniform. I always thought be one. It's a
6:03
Speaker 1: classic cliche. You grow up wanting to be a fireman
6:05
Speaker 1: or a police officer. A lot of young kids, you know,
6:07
Speaker 1: play play act in those roles. But this crime. I
6:12
Speaker 1: want to talk about this crime because you know, interestingly,
6:16
Speaker 1: the first guest we ever had on this podcast, and
6:18
Speaker 1: now we're deep into our sixth season, right, So the
6:22
Speaker 1: first guest we ever had was Raymond Santana, who did
6:24
Speaker 1: an incredible interview. Just an amazing, amazing man he is,
6:30
Speaker 1: and did a great job telling the story. So, you know,
6:34
Speaker 1: fans of the podcast would be familiar with the case
6:36
Speaker 1: from that, but you have your own perspective on it,
6:39
Speaker 1: you know, and there's a very and I say that
6:42
Speaker 1: for a very specific set of reasons. But going back
6:44
Speaker 1: to the case, this was a case where a woman
6:48
Speaker 1: who was a Wall Street banker, a white, twenty eight
6:53
Speaker 1: year old woman from the Upper East Side, was jogging
6:56
Speaker 1: in Central Park and she was It was dusk right
7:01
Speaker 1: when she was attacked, and she was brutally beaten. When
7:06
Speaker 1: she was found. To give people some perspective, she seventy
7:10
Speaker 1: five percent of the blood in her body was gone.
7:12
Speaker 1: Her tempered body temperature was eighty four degrees. I mean,
7:14
Speaker 1: she was as close to dead as you can be.
7:16
Speaker 1: And she had been raped and beaten to within an
7:19
Speaker 1: inch of her life, and this triggered everyone's worst fears,
7:23
Speaker 1: right because it was, oh my god, this is a
7:27
Speaker 1: you know, you know, an innocent woman whatever, white and
7:31
Speaker 1: there was a whole racial aspect to it. And man,
7:34
Speaker 1: when that happened, the news media went nuts and there
7:38
Speaker 1: was a lot of pressure to solve this crime. Do
7:41
Speaker 1: you want to add anything to that description?
7:44
Speaker 4: You know it was it was definitely a witch hunts
7:46
Speaker 4: and a frenzy of a witch hunt because when you
7:48
Speaker 4: think about other people's progyptions, you know, folks look at
7:53
Speaker 4: people from so to speak, the darker ants of society
7:56
Speaker 4: as the worst of the worst. You know, I'm I'm
8:00
Speaker 4: in the motivational speaking world now, and I'm told that
8:04
Speaker 4: if you look at a person and an addressing person
8:07
Speaker 4: as they should be, you raise the level of what
8:09
Speaker 4: they could be as opposed to trying to be trying
8:12
Speaker 4: to address them as their circumstances are. Not everybody who
8:16
Speaker 4: may be in those same circumstances may be of that
8:20
Speaker 4: particular element. And that's the thing that's unfortunate, because there
8:24
Speaker 4: was this some speak, broad stroke brush you know, accusation. Uh,
8:30
Speaker 4: these people type of rhetoric and talk, and the notion
8:35
Speaker 4: was that of course they did it because they're black
8:38
Speaker 4: and brown, and so you know when they when they
8:42
Speaker 4: when the woman was found, you know, towards the northern
8:46
Speaker 4: northern end of Central Park. There was just this desire
8:51
Speaker 4: for one to solve this crime, and to solve this
8:55
Speaker 4: crime as quick as possible. And so I remember Mayor
8:59
Speaker 4: coach back and saying something like people wanted to know
9:03
Speaker 4: how the criminal justice system in New York City will work,
9:08
Speaker 4: and they're going to get a great opportunity as regards
9:11
Speaker 4: this case, to see how this system works. We're going
9:15
Speaker 4: to go after us with the full full arm of
9:17
Speaker 4: the law, you know, and true to farms, despite wheels
9:22
Speaker 4: of justice, mowed us down. But in their rush to judgment,
9:28
Speaker 4: they dropped the ball in the worst way and allowed
9:32
Speaker 4: to reill criminals to continue to hurt, to maim, and
9:37
Speaker 4: ultimately murder. His lash victim, who was a young, pregnant
9:42
Speaker 4: Latina woman, he brandished his knife, came into her home.
9:46
Speaker 4: She said, hold on for one moment, and I put
9:49
Speaker 4: my days in the next room. He allowed her to
9:51
Speaker 4: do so. She put her children in the next room,
9:53
Speaker 4: and she locked the door and then he raped her
9:56
Speaker 4: and stabbed her death, killing her and her unborn child.
10:00
Speaker 1: And that is I'm glad you brought that up because
10:02
Speaker 1: it just it makes it make anybody sick to their stomach.
10:05
Speaker 1: And you know that that scene that you're describing is
10:09
Speaker 1: right out of a horror movie. And and it never
10:13
Speaker 1: should have happened, and it never needed to happen because
10:16
Speaker 1: in this case, and it's it's so tragically common you
10:20
Speaker 1: when you have uh, this tunnel vision and this you know,
10:25
Speaker 1: this willful framing of innocent people. And in this case
10:29
Speaker 1: it's even worse because they really knew who the guy was.
10:33
Speaker 1: I mean, first of all, they knew for and so
10:35
Speaker 1: this woman never should have been killed. The other women
10:37
Speaker 1: that he raped in the months following the you know,
10:40
Speaker 1: your your arrest never never should have been raped. They
10:45
Speaker 1: should have gone on and had their lives not destroyed
10:48
Speaker 1: the way it were, those kids would still have a mother.
10:52
Speaker 1: This the consequences of the actions of the authorities in
10:56
Speaker 1: this case goes so far beyond having this droid young lives,
11:02
Speaker 1: five young lives, and your families and how it affected
11:05
Speaker 1: had on your families. You know, it's amazing. I've seen
11:07
Speaker 1: the picture of your mom when you were finally exonerated,
11:10
Speaker 1: and the joy is so amazing. But but going back
11:12
Speaker 1: to this, the crazy thing is they knew from the
11:16
Speaker 1: beginning that it was a single perpetrator because this poor
11:20
Speaker 1: woman was dragged into and the ground was wet, right,
11:26
Speaker 1: and she was dragged into this area. You know, obviously
11:28
Speaker 1: he wanted to take her to a secluded area. And
11:30
Speaker 1: for people who are not from the city, who haven't
11:32
Speaker 1: been to the city, Central Park is about three miles
11:34
Speaker 1: long and about a mile wide. It's a big place.
11:37
Speaker 1: And she was jogging up in the northern section of
11:39
Speaker 1: the park, so they knew that there was only one
11:44
Speaker 1: set of footprints in the dewey grass. They knew that
11:47
Speaker 1: there was only one There was only traces of one
11:50
Speaker 1: person's bodily fluids. And as things progressed, even though they
11:55
Speaker 1: had you guys, and they rested you guys, and we
11:57
Speaker 1: know they interrogated you, each of you separately. And don't
12:02
Speaker 1: want to hear about that, because Raymond's description of that
12:05
Speaker 1: is truly terrifying what he went through for you know,
12:09
Speaker 1: for hours on end, almost almost twenty four hours without
12:15
Speaker 1: in Raymond's case, I know in your case, but without
12:17
Speaker 1: food or water or a lawyer or an adult, and
12:23
Speaker 1: ultimately ultimately everyone confess except you, which is amazing too.
12:27
Speaker 1: I mean, the fact that you, as a fifteen year
12:30
Speaker 1: old kid, under the most intense pressure that anyone could
12:33
Speaker 1: ever face, scared out of your mind, with your life
12:37
Speaker 1: at stake, still maintained your innocence is I don't even
12:41
Speaker 1: know where that kind of strength comes from. But okay,
12:44
Speaker 1: so explain the situation. So you were brought at some point,
12:48
Speaker 1: you were arrested, You were with your friends in the park.
12:51
Speaker 1: There was you know, it was a sort of chaotic
12:53
Speaker 1: night in the park. It was you know, hot night whatever.
12:56
Speaker 1: How did this hall come down? How did you come
12:58
Speaker 1: to be arrested? How did you have in the police station?
12:59
Speaker 1: How did that after that?
13:01
Speaker 4: So interestingly enough, if we can kind of show to speak,
13:04
Speaker 4: shift off a frame of reference to folks, to TV
13:07
Speaker 4: shows like PSI, to NCIS, forensics, you know, these types
13:14
Speaker 4: of things, what we get is an understanding that, just
13:17
Speaker 4: like you said, they had information based on their skill
13:20
Speaker 4: set as police officers and so forth. So let them know, okay,
13:27
Speaker 4: this is what happened. They could recreate the crime team
13:30
Speaker 4: based on forensics alans, Okay, this happened first, this happened next.
13:33
Speaker 4: If we saw the blood over here and then here
13:35
Speaker 4: it is here. We were in Central Parks never denied
13:39
Speaker 4: being in Central Park, and all of the guys who
13:43
Speaker 4: became known as the Central Park Five were absolute witnesses
13:48
Speaker 4: to all of the mayhem that had gone on in
13:51
Speaker 4: the park. With the exception of the rape of the Jagga.
13:54
Speaker 4: No one had no idea a woman was raped, didn't
13:56
Speaker 4: know anything about it. And so here I am. At
14:00
Speaker 4: the time, I was about six foot two inch two inches,
14:04
Speaker 4: very slim, had an outfit on that was a Skybrew
14:08
Speaker 4: jacket with skyblw matching pants. My sky blue pants had
14:13
Speaker 4: artwork on it. I'm actually a person who was going
14:16
Speaker 4: to LaGuardia Music and Art for Arts, so I'm a
14:20
Speaker 4: great graphic designer and I drew some stuff from my
14:23
Speaker 4: pants that was just you know, how how people did
14:25
Speaker 4: back then. But if we can think about these TV shows,
14:29
Speaker 4: what we know is that when they start going into
14:32
Speaker 4: the community to try to recreate what happened and to
14:35
Speaker 4: ask people what happened, what they do is they say, okay,
14:38
Speaker 4: well who who's there? And folks in there, in there thinking, okay,
14:45
Speaker 4: damn what it was a guy that was a tall guy.
14:48
Speaker 4: I remember there was a tall guy in the park
14:50
Speaker 4: with a flat top. I was probably maybe the most
14:54
Speaker 4: stand out ish looking for fellows because not only was
14:58
Speaker 4: I tall and lanky, but what I had on almost
15:01
Speaker 4: looked like I was wearing white in the life of
15:04
Speaker 4: Central Park. And so, of course no one knew my name.
15:08
Speaker 4: None of us knew each other. I actually met Raymond
15:10
Speaker 4: Santana and the other guys in prison. I only knew Corey.
15:14
Speaker 4: Why But as things go further, as you can imagine,
15:17
Speaker 4: they go to the surrounding communities and start interrogating everyone.
15:22
Speaker 4: One thing leads to another, and my name is mentioned,
15:27
Speaker 4: and I'm finding out that the police officers are looking
15:30
Speaker 4: for me. And I say, well, you know what, Hey,
15:33
Speaker 4: I knew I didn't do anything wrong. I'm with Corey.
15:35
Speaker 4: Corey said, hey, I left the park almost right after
15:38
Speaker 4: we went in. Well, let's sort of the cops and
15:41
Speaker 4: to tell them what we saw and we'll be home
15:44
Speaker 4: before our mom get that.
15:45
Speaker 1: So when did you get picked up? Like the crime
15:47
Speaker 1: happened at night right and the publicity happened immediately after
15:53
Speaker 1: the crime, when did you become aware that the cops
15:55
Speaker 1: were looking for you.
15:56
Speaker 4: I became aware of it. I went to school the
15:58
Speaker 4: next day. I was actually one of the only children
15:59
Speaker 4: that had school the next day. I went to school.
16:02
Speaker 4: The next day, came home from school and the blocks
16:06
Speaker 4: was completely empty. It was the weirdest thing that you
16:09
Speaker 4: can imagine if children didn't have school. Everybody be outside
16:11
Speaker 4: riding skateboards, bikes, having fun, just hanging out. And I'm
16:15
Speaker 4: looking around, I'm like, where's everybody at? And not only that,
16:19
Speaker 4: I see a whole bunch of unmarked police cars, and
16:22
Speaker 4: so I'm like, man, that's just crazy stairs not thinking
16:25
Speaker 4: anything up it, changed my clothes and come back downstairs
16:27
Speaker 4: with my playoutfit con you know. And Corey's girlfriend at
16:34
Speaker 4: the time comes up to me and says, hey, when
16:37
Speaker 4: you see Corey, bring him to my house. I need
16:39
Speaker 4: to show you all something. I said, sure, no problem,
16:43
Speaker 4: show Corey. A little while later, we go up to
16:44
Speaker 4: his house, to his girlfriend's house, and she shows us
16:49
Speaker 4: the news. She turns the news on him. At this point.
16:51
Speaker 4: It's maybe around for a stock or something like that,
16:54
Speaker 4: and of course they do the things breaking and it
16:56
Speaker 4: was a sul shape. Women found it as part uh,
17:00
Speaker 4: so far and so on. I'm not understanding why she's
17:03
Speaker 4: showing this to us. And then she looked at us
17:06
Speaker 4: and says, hey, do you have anything to tell me?
17:08
Speaker 4: And then looking at her like what's up, what's up?
17:11
Speaker 4: What's going on? And she said, they're saying that this
17:14
Speaker 4: was you guys, that you're all in the park last night,
17:16
Speaker 4: and this is what you all did. And I said, right, no, no, no, no,
17:20
Speaker 4: no no. And then she said, and they're looking for you,
17:23
Speaker 4: and so I said, well, I'm going to go to
17:25
Speaker 4: them and tell them what I saw. I know I
17:27
Speaker 4: didn't do anything wrong. Corey said he didn't do anything wrong.
17:30
Speaker 4: He didn't hurt nobody or do anything bad. He left
17:33
Speaker 4: the park after entering, and we get picked up. As
17:38
Speaker 4: a matter of fact, when we finally got a hold
17:43
Speaker 4: of the offices that it's kind of strange and ironic
17:46
Speaker 4: that I'm saying it that way, but I was looking
17:48
Speaker 4: for them. When the officers finally came in contact with us,
17:52
Speaker 4: they were in front of my door trying to convince
17:54
Speaker 4: my thirteen year old brother to put his clothes on
17:57
Speaker 4: and come down to the prison with them. He had
18:00
Speaker 4: had not been in the park he didn't know what
18:02
Speaker 4: was going on, and they were trying to convince him
18:05
Speaker 4: to put his clothes on to come down to the
18:07
Speaker 4: precinct to be questioned and interrogated. That would have ended disastrously.
18:12
Speaker 4: As you came back, I turned the corner to approach
18:16
Speaker 4: my door and they're in front of my door talking
18:18
Speaker 4: to my brother and they asked me who am? I
18:20
Speaker 4: askaid you, soud Salami look at this document that they
18:22
Speaker 4: had in their hands and said, this is one of
18:24
Speaker 4: the guys you were looking for. They asked Corey who
18:26
Speaker 4: was he? And he said, I'm Corey Wise. And they
18:28
Speaker 4: looked at the paper and said, you're not on this paper,
18:33
Speaker 4: But do you want to come downtown with your buddy.
18:35
Speaker 4: You'll be right back, and you know, you know how
18:38
Speaker 4: that story ends. Of course, Cory is sixteen years old
18:41
Speaker 4: at the time. He ends up getting railroaded and convicted
18:44
Speaker 4: and spending almost thirteen to fourteen years of the next
18:49
Speaker 4: part of his life in prison or crime that we
18:52
Speaker 4: all hannot committed.
18:54
Speaker 1: Wow, So he was actually the most random of them all.
18:58
Speaker 1: He just went down because he was trying to be
18:59
Speaker 1: a boody d you basically right, And that was the
19:02
Speaker 1: one that was the most worst decision he ever made.
19:06
Speaker 1: He made it for the right reason. So the process
19:09
Speaker 1: that happened in the precincts, it was the Central Park
19:11
Speaker 1: precinct that you were brought to, right.
19:13
Speaker 4: That was the initial precinct. And then they then they
19:17
Speaker 4: you know, because Manhattan, Manhattan nor hoomicide squad steps and
19:21
Speaker 4: they start they are the now then they are now
19:24
Speaker 4: the officers that are interrogating. They're the ones that are saying, Okay,
19:28
Speaker 4: this is looking like it's going to be a homicide.
19:31
Speaker 4: We need to figure this out and and solve this
19:34
Speaker 4: crime and top quickly and appease the fears of the
19:38
Speaker 4: public and let them know that we have the city
19:40
Speaker 4: under control. We are in control, and we caught so
19:45
Speaker 4: called perpetrators.
19:46
Speaker 1: Yeah, so how did the interrogations go, Like what you
19:49
Speaker 1: were brought in? What was the whole process? You're brought
19:51
Speaker 1: to the precinct, you were with Corey.
19:54
Speaker 4: I was with Corey, and they immediately separated us, you know,
19:58
Speaker 4: and they started interrogating. And while they were asking me
20:02
Speaker 4: the questions I had, I was very very forthcoming. I said, yeah,
20:05
Speaker 4: this is what happened first, is what happened next? I'm
20:07
Speaker 4: like you know, thinking, hey, I'm just going to go
20:09
Speaker 4: in there and tell them what I saw, and like
20:11
Speaker 4: I said, I'll be back home before my mom gets back.
20:14
Speaker 4: And when I when I wrapped up the first time,
20:19
Speaker 4: the guy said, okay, well what about the jagga? And
20:22
Speaker 4: I'm like, what jogga? What are you talking about? And
20:25
Speaker 4: he says, okay, well, let's start. Tell me what happened
20:27
Speaker 4: again from the top I saw from the top of them,
20:31
Speaker 4: and things began to intensify. And it began to intensify
20:35
Speaker 4: in such a way that I started feeling afraid. And
20:38
Speaker 4: then they you know, at some point they would leave
20:41
Speaker 4: the room and come back in, and I never seen
20:43
Speaker 4: at one point they left the room for a very
20:45
Speaker 4: very long time. And at this point, hours were going by,
20:48
Speaker 4: and I'm feeling tired and I'm starting to doze off,
20:51
Speaker 4: and I am immediately Joe toed for wait because I
20:55
Speaker 4: hear Cory Wise yelling in the next room. Now, Cory
20:59
Speaker 4: VI is just to give you a little his background
21:00
Speaker 4: of Corey. Corey Wise was the U was, probably was
21:05
Speaker 4: and still is the guy who you wanted to have
21:08
Speaker 4: as a friend because you knew that he would have
21:11
Speaker 4: your back. He wasn't gonna let nothing bad happen to you.
21:14
Speaker 4: He was gonna make sure that you know you were okay.
21:17
Speaker 4: And so to hear Corey, this person who had such
21:20
Speaker 4: a big heart or fearful person, yelling and screaming okay,
21:26
Speaker 4: I'll tell you, I'm I'm like, oh my goodness. They're
21:31
Speaker 4: beating him up. I hear them smacking him around. I
21:35
Speaker 4: hear them. I hate he's under this. He is in
21:39
Speaker 4: a position that I have never heard him in before.
21:43
Speaker 4: And that immediately joke to me. A word sent chills
21:47
Speaker 4: down my spine, and I'm like, oh my god, that's
21:48
Speaker 4: they're gonna kill us. And at this point, I'm scared.
21:53
Speaker 4: At this point, I'm still trying to maintain my innocence.
21:56
Speaker 4: I'm still trying to let them know what happened. And
22:00
Speaker 4: now it's like a boxing match.
22:04
Speaker 1: Did at any point did you have a lawyer or
22:07
Speaker 1: a guardian or a parent or anybody else in there
22:09
Speaker 1: with you?
22:10
Speaker 4: No. And this is one of the most interesting things.
22:12
Speaker 4: I didn't know my mother had came to the priest
22:14
Speaker 4: and I didn't know she was there. It wasn't until
22:16
Speaker 4: after a few more hours passed that one of the
22:22
Speaker 4: I think it might have been either Fairstein or Elizabeth
22:24
Speaker 4: Letter or came into the room. I mean they shouldn't
22:27
Speaker 4: come to a knocked on the door and summoned the
22:29
Speaker 4: officer out of the room. And when they summoned the
22:32
Speaker 4: officer out of the room, they the officer came back
22:36
Speaker 4: in and said to be how old are you? Now?
22:41
Speaker 4: Mind you? They they they first when they took me
22:46
Speaker 4: into custody at my apartment building, they took my ID,
22:51
Speaker 4: which had my ID from Mount Signai Hospital, which had
22:54
Speaker 4: my birth date on it. Inside my wallet had my
22:58
Speaker 4: Mount sign I I d I'm ID, but you know,
23:01
Speaker 4: like the hospital, your hospital card. I had that. I
23:06
Speaker 4: had the bus pad and I had a pocket knife,
23:12
Speaker 4: so they knew how old I was. So the guy
23:15
Speaker 4: comes in and says how old are you? How how
23:18
Speaker 4: old are you again? And I said I'm fifteen, and
23:21
Speaker 4: he curses and throws his pad across the room and says,
23:24
Speaker 4: why the didn't you tell me that? And I'm not
23:28
Speaker 4: even knowing why that's even relevant. I don't even understand
23:33
Speaker 4: what's going on. Then they bring me down to my
23:37
Speaker 4: mom and she's telling me, hey, do not talk to
23:41
Speaker 4: these people. I did not give them permission to talk
23:44
Speaker 4: to you. You're a minor. They need my permission. I
23:48
Speaker 4: am not giving them permission. Don't talk to them. That
23:51
Speaker 4: was how it went.
23:53
Speaker 1: But then then what happened, Because now you've spoken to
23:55
Speaker 1: your mom. That must have been a very emotional situation.
23:58
Speaker 1: And now you've just heard Corey getting eating up. You
24:01
Speaker 1: know that you're in real trouble. Your mom is there
24:04
Speaker 1: like like a lifeboat, right, like a life uh you know, uh,
24:09
Speaker 1: life saver. But but you're but but you're still in
24:13
Speaker 1: the custody of the cops. And then so did they
24:16
Speaker 1: then pull you away from her and put your back
24:19
Speaker 1: in the room.
24:20
Speaker 4: And they did, And that's the part, that's the craziest part.
24:23
Speaker 4: They don't have my they don't have her permission, they
24:25
Speaker 4: don't have her consent to talk to me. That meeting
24:28
Speaker 4: was so short. I don't know how long it lasted,
24:31
Speaker 4: but it felt like minutes. It felt like minutes. It
24:34
Speaker 4: felt like it was less than five minutes. And then
24:37
Speaker 4: they brought they almost ripped me out of her arms
24:41
Speaker 4: again and brought me back to the back and they
24:44
Speaker 4: continued to interrogate, and I remember one of the officers,
24:49
Speaker 4: the main officers interrogating. He says, uh, you know, you
24:52
Speaker 4: don't have to tell us anything. That's fine. You know,
24:54
Speaker 4: we have we have your we pulled your fingerprints off
24:57
Speaker 4: of her off for short, Like how the heck did
25:01
Speaker 4: they prove my fingers off for short? Like I didn't,
25:03
Speaker 4: I wasn't there.
25:04
Speaker 1: Yeah, and that's something he said that that you know,
25:06
Speaker 1: I don't understand either. I mean, the fact that they're
25:08
Speaker 1: allowed to lie in the interrogation process is so uh,
25:13
Speaker 1: it's just I don't know, it doesn't make sense to me,
25:15
Speaker 1: but go ahead.
25:16
Speaker 4: Yeah, And I mean at this point, I'm like, oh man,
25:19
Speaker 4: I'm I'm I'm doing I'm done for. But they took
25:22
Speaker 4: my threats and put it on her.
25:24
Speaker 1: But they didn't the fact that your prints weren't on it.
25:26
Speaker 1: They just they just lied, I mean because they're trying
25:28
Speaker 1: to pressure fantastic.
25:29
Speaker 4: So ye again I'm being trained and I'm like, oh uh,
25:33
Speaker 4: but yeah, they lied?
25:42
Speaker 1: And did they did they actually beat you up like
25:44
Speaker 1: did the other guys?
25:46
Speaker 4: No, No, they didn't. They the threat was very real,
25:50
Speaker 4: the threat was extremely real, but they didn't. They didn't
25:53
Speaker 4: touch me.
25:54
Speaker 1: And ultimately, you were there for do you even know
25:56
Speaker 1: how many hours you were in there.
25:57
Speaker 4: For no I don't I know. I was brought in
25:59
Speaker 4: that evening and I remember we didn't have an eating
26:02
Speaker 4: to eat, a drink, and you know, being worn down
26:05
Speaker 4: from that, you know, you think about I have I
26:06
Speaker 4: have ten children. So it's an interesting dynamic when you
26:10
Speaker 4: think about, you know, how much a child could eat.
26:14
Speaker 4: And so my my fifteen year old consumed everything in
26:19
Speaker 4: the house. You know, you got to basically go to
26:21
Speaker 4: Costcos just for that one child alone and buy in bulk,
26:24
Speaker 4: because you know that they're going to eat everything, you know.
26:28
Speaker 4: But we didn't get anything to eat, We didn't get
26:30
Speaker 4: anything to drink. I remember the next morning we were
26:33
Speaker 4: we were at another precrint and they bought McDonald's, you know,
26:37
Speaker 4: and I remember eating McDonald's was the first time.
26:38
Speaker 1: I had eat and so and you said, I mean,
26:42
Speaker 1: there's a very powerful video that I saw you do
26:45
Speaker 1: that people can watch that you did in conjunction with
26:47
Speaker 1: the New Yorker magazine and the Marshall Project, in which
26:50
Speaker 1: you talk about the fact that you thought you were
26:53
Speaker 1: going to go and as you just said you'd be
26:56
Speaker 1: home before your mom got back, and in fact he
26:59
Speaker 1: didn't get home. From seven years so from this point,
27:04
Speaker 1: you never did confess, right, the other guys were, and
27:07
Speaker 1: which is interesting too because of the fact and kind
27:10
Speaker 1: of amazing because of the fact that we know that
27:12
Speaker 1: false confessions are very common. The general public doesn't understand.
27:17
Speaker 1: Jurors don't understand why anyone would confess to a crime
27:20
Speaker 1: they didn't commit. But when they're under that type of
27:23
Speaker 1: pressure and their adolescence and their brain hasn't even fully formed,
27:26
Speaker 1: like yours, Adam, what were you in ninth grade? It's ridiculous.
27:29
Speaker 1: And so the pressure gets to people and they also
27:32
Speaker 1: think like it must have occurred to you at some point,
27:34
Speaker 1: because you come into that room thinking, well, these are
27:37
Speaker 1: the good guys, and there's going to be even if
27:39
Speaker 1: these guys that are in front of me aren't good guys,
27:41
Speaker 1: there's going to be some other good guys that are
27:43
Speaker 1: going to understand that are going to save me, because
27:45
Speaker 1: I got to get out of this room, like I
27:47
Speaker 1: got to get away from these people who are tormenting me,
27:50
Speaker 1: who are threatening me, who may kill me. And that's
27:53
Speaker 1: what the whole you know, interrogation techniques called the red
27:56
Speaker 1: technique is designed to do. It's designed to basically make
27:59
Speaker 1: your mind collapse in on itself so that you see
28:02
Speaker 1: no other option other than to confess. So that's why
28:05
Speaker 1: false confessions are extremely common in juvenile and adolescents. And
28:10
Speaker 1: that's important for people who are listening, who are someday
28:13
Speaker 1: going to serve on a jury to know if you're seeing,
28:16
Speaker 1: especially a case where there's no other evidence other than
28:18
Speaker 1: a false confession, other than a confession, you really have
28:22
Speaker 1: to dive into that, and you have to be aware
28:24
Speaker 1: that that confession very well may be a false confession
28:28
Speaker 1: and you may be dealing with it and its in person.
28:31
Speaker 1: So then it comes to the trial, and you know,
28:34
Speaker 1: you've got this sensational trial so much media. You guys
28:41
Speaker 1: were you know, I mean even I was buying into
28:43
Speaker 1: it back then. I'm ashamed to admit it. But there
28:45
Speaker 1: was only one narrative. There wasn't like somebody else going, well,
28:48
Speaker 1: wait a minute, may be blah blah blah. Because they
28:50
Speaker 1: were withholding all the evidence that they had, right they
28:53
Speaker 1: knew that, I mean, weeks into your case. They knew
28:57
Speaker 1: that it was impossible that you or any of the
29:00
Speaker 1: four guys could have done this, but they didn't care.
29:03
Speaker 4: And that's the thing that you know, But when I
29:04
Speaker 4: when I when I look at a lot of these
29:06
Speaker 4: cases and I understand the law a lot more, I
29:09
Speaker 4: realized that it's not really about the facts, it's about
29:11
Speaker 4: who can tell the best stories. And in many ways,
29:15
Speaker 4: we had an effective counsel. We had, you know, we
29:18
Speaker 4: were facing a situation where even the evidence that you see,
29:22
Speaker 4: you know, you would think that it's a gag rate,
29:24
Speaker 4: that there's definitely going to be some femen, some type
29:29
Speaker 4: of something. Nobody had blood on them, nobody had anything
29:32
Speaker 4: on them that even indicated that they were at this place,
29:37
Speaker 4: you know. But yet they still went and stepped over
29:39
Speaker 4: the bounds of the law, manufactured evidence, like you said,
29:44
Speaker 4: and went full stream ahead because not only not only
29:47
Speaker 4: did they do this in the worst way, but I've
29:50
Speaker 4: always said that it was more attractive, it was more sexy,
29:54
Speaker 4: if you will. For there to be five people brutally
30:00
Speaker 4: assaulting one woman who was white, five five people of
30:04
Speaker 4: color brutally assaulting a white woman, then there it have been.
30:09
Speaker 4: With the evidence shows from the clim scene there's one
30:13
Speaker 4: person dragging one person into the woods and trying to
30:19
Speaker 4: murder them after they raped them.
30:22
Speaker 1: Right, it's a wolf pack situation. It's it's preying on
30:25
Speaker 1: everybody's primal fears. It's playing on the on the race card,
30:28
Speaker 1: everything else, and you know, and it's so it's so
30:30
Speaker 1: tragic because they knew that this Matthias race guy, they
30:33
Speaker 1: were already watching him. They knew that he was a
30:34
Speaker 1: suspect and a prior rape that had many of the
30:36
Speaker 1: similar characteristics. I mean, there was this case really came
30:40
Speaker 1: with instructions and as this evidence started coming in and
30:43
Speaker 1: they they became aware in a very short time after
30:47
Speaker 1: you guys were arrested, and some of the evidence probably
30:49
Speaker 1: was even in before you arrested, that it was a
30:50
Speaker 1: single perpetrator, be that it wasn't any of you guys.
30:53
Speaker 1: See that they could have so easily gone and picked
30:57
Speaker 1: up Matthias, and they would have, they would have had
31:00
Speaker 1: the guy, and we keep coming back to that, and
31:02
Speaker 1: none of these other people would have suffered the way
31:04
Speaker 1: they didn't. Neither would you. But that's not what happened
31:07
Speaker 1: because these people were they were overtaken by ambition and
31:14
Speaker 1: publicity and accolades that they wanted to get, and they
31:19
Speaker 1: were perfectly happy to convict inns and people. It was
31:22
Speaker 1: almost like not even inconvenient for them. It was just like,
31:24
Speaker 1: let's just get it done and take the bows and
31:28
Speaker 1: do their whole thing along with their lives. And they
31:30
Speaker 1: have gone on with their lives. I don't know how.
31:32
Speaker 1: I don't know how they sleep at night, but they do.
31:34
Speaker 4: You know. Jason's interesting as you talk about that, because
31:36
Speaker 4: that's one of the things that I give people try
31:38
Speaker 4: to get people to understand as well. This is not
31:40
Speaker 4: a situation where oh my goodness, we dropped the ball,
31:43
Speaker 4: my dad, Oh my gosh, we've never done this before.
31:46
Speaker 4: This is this is a situation where it's the convincibility
31:51
Speaker 4: of our guilt, which was we weren't guilty. But if
31:55
Speaker 4: they were able to convince the public of this lie
31:58
Speaker 4: and do it so well, I've always said, well, how
32:02
Speaker 4: many other cases after I'll never forget When the Central
32:07
Speaker 4: prop five film came out that King Burns did, which
32:09
Speaker 4: was an amazing film. I never forget. When it was released,
32:13
Speaker 4: people from Columbia Law was watching it, and Elizabeth Letter
32:18
Speaker 4: is an adjunct professor at Columbia Law. I don't know
32:20
Speaker 4: if she's still there, but she was there then, and
32:23
Speaker 4: the students started an online petition to get her fired.
32:27
Speaker 4: They did not want her to teach them, because in
32:30
Speaker 4: their minds they were looking at this case and saying,
32:34
Speaker 4: what kind of law is she going to teach? If
32:36
Speaker 4: she did this to the central PLoP five, what is
32:39
Speaker 4: she training us to do? And they did not want
32:42
Speaker 4: her to teach them, and instead of Columbia Law firing her,
32:47
Speaker 4: they protected her. But the document's painted pictures that this
32:51
Speaker 4: wasn't just about we're going to prosecute this case. We're
32:55
Speaker 4: just going to do our jobs and you know, make
32:57
Speaker 4: sure that justice is served. They hated us. They hated
33:02
Speaker 4: us with every fiber of their bodies and wanted us
33:06
Speaker 4: to be guilty. And in that they did anything and everything,
33:11
Speaker 4: by hook or by crook to make sure that they
33:15
Speaker 4: can get a conviction. I never forget why. When they
33:19
Speaker 4: leaked out something about the DNA, they said that DNA
33:22
Speaker 4: evidence and then they tested us and no match came back.
33:28
Speaker 4: And once did they do, they had to come out
33:30
Speaker 4: and say that no, there's no match. But they quickly
33:33
Speaker 4: swept that under the rug. Because that's tsunami of media
33:35
Speaker 4: reports that were present within the first few weeks of
33:38
Speaker 4: this trial, or not even the trial, but the case
33:41
Speaker 4: being broadcast. That sunami of media reports dwarfs, any of
33:47
Speaker 4: these small little things that came out because it mudded
33:50
Speaker 4: the waters and caused people to just say to themselves,
33:53
Speaker 4: there was something about DNA in this case. They don't
33:56
Speaker 4: remember that there was no DNA match. They just remembered
33:59
Speaker 4: there was something about DNA, and then when it came
34:02
Speaker 4: out in the trial and said this will say, will
34:05
Speaker 4: be no DNA evidence in the stakes. What we will
34:09
Speaker 4: rely on on their confessions.
34:12
Speaker 1: Stay tuned, We'll be right back. Let's move to the
34:21
Speaker 1: trial itself. How long did the trial last?
34:24
Speaker 4: Wow? Man, So I want to say that the trial
34:28
Speaker 4: lasted for maybe just under a year. I don't know
34:33
Speaker 4: specific time frames, but I do know that I was
34:36
Speaker 4: out on bail. I was only in lock up initially
34:42
Speaker 4: for a little while that I got out on bail,
34:45
Speaker 4: and that was nineteen eighty nine. And how of nineteen
34:49
Speaker 4: nine years when they convicted us.
34:51
Speaker 1: But okay, so that's weird too, because you're out on bail.
34:54
Speaker 1: I mean, you couldn't go to school. You must have
34:56
Speaker 1: had to stay inside the house. You're one of the
34:57
Speaker 1: most notorious criminals in New York state history at that time.
35:00
Speaker 1: It was.
35:01
Speaker 4: It was one of the worst and scariest times ever because,
35:04
Speaker 4: as you can imagine, also Donald Trump, early on, we
35:07
Speaker 4: hadn't even been gone, we haven't even gone to trial yet.
35:10
Speaker 4: Donald Trump takes out a full page ad two weeks
35:13
Speaker 4: after we were accused, and it runs in the New News,
35:17
Speaker 4: the Daily, the New York Times, Daily News, the Post,
35:20
Speaker 4: all of the major newspapers. It run and it's it's
35:25
Speaker 4: an outcry. It's an outcry from someone from the darker
35:29
Speaker 4: enclaves of society to come into our home, to drag
35:34
Speaker 4: us from our bay, and to hang us from trees
35:38
Speaker 4: in Central Park, to do to us what they had
35:40
Speaker 4: done to ever till. And I say that because what
35:42
Speaker 4: happened as a result of that article being that ad
35:46
Speaker 4: being grand in place, people began to write us hateful mail.
35:51
Speaker 4: People began to write us threatening letters. They began to
35:54
Speaker 4: say that they were going to that we that they
35:56
Speaker 4: hoped that we would be fried in oil, that we
36:00
Speaker 4: would be raped, that we'll be castrated. That twenty to
36:03
Speaker 4: thirty years from now, next year is the thirtieth anniversary
36:07
Speaker 4: of the Central Park jogger case. Twenty to thirty years
36:11
Speaker 4: from now, some people will never forget. And one letter
36:15
Speaker 4: specifically says that maybe the one time that you don't
36:18
Speaker 4: check your back is the one time that someone want
36:21
Speaker 4: just be there to say hello. And so if you
36:24
Speaker 4: can imagine the language and all of the stuff that
36:28
Speaker 4: was going on back then, like they wanted to murder us.
36:33
Speaker 4: They wanted to do to us what they had done
36:35
Speaker 4: to m Mitil. We became the modern day scotspital boys, definitely,
36:39
Speaker 4: but they wanted to do to us what they had
36:41
Speaker 4: done to Emmettil.
36:43
Speaker 1: Yeah, the m Motel case haunts me all. It's just
36:45
Speaker 1: really one of the most just really one of the
36:48
Speaker 1: darkest episodes in American history. That that poor kid with
36:52
Speaker 1: that little baby face that he had. But you were
36:55
Speaker 1: almost the same age as he was at the time, Right,
36:57
Speaker 1: he was fourteen, you were fifteen. And here you are
36:58
Speaker 1: now you're a president in your own home. You have
37:01
Speaker 1: this guy who we know as a racist taking out
37:03
Speaker 1: these ads advocating a lynch mob. The fact that the
37:07
Speaker 1: papers would even run these paper ads is insane. And
37:10
Speaker 1: and then then the trial comes. So how did the
37:12
Speaker 1: trial itself? And you know, obviously you were not avaquately represented.
37:17
Speaker 1: I don't know if a good lawyer could have gotten
37:18
Speaker 1: you out with all the hysteria at that time because
37:20
Speaker 1: you'd been trialed, you had already been tried in the media.
37:23
Speaker 1: But the fact is, you know, there's that saying that
37:24
Speaker 1: in America you're better off being guilty and rich than
37:27
Speaker 1: innocent and poor. So the the fact is, so you
37:31
Speaker 1: go to the trial. The trial itself lasted how many days?
37:35
Speaker 4: Oh man? So the trial, that's That's another thing that's
37:37
Speaker 4: very foggy on me. But I know that as the
37:39
Speaker 4: trial went in, it was like, okay, as it was
37:42
Speaker 4: drawing on and drawing on, and forget the very at
37:45
Speaker 4: the very end. What I remember most is I was
37:47
Speaker 4: on the phone with a friend and I never forget
37:51
Speaker 4: it was the day was the day was ending, and
37:54
Speaker 4: I'm on the phone and say, hey, this is what's
37:55
Speaker 4: going on. You know, Okay, it looks like we'll we'll
37:59
Speaker 4: you know, they're not going to have a verdict and
38:01
Speaker 4: I'll be able to see you all shortly. And then
38:04
Speaker 4: somebody came running down the hallway and said, the verdict
38:06
Speaker 4: is in. The verdict is in. I said, man, vertic
38:08
Speaker 4: is in. Okay, great, I'll see you soon. And I
38:13
Speaker 4: just don't know. We were all found guilty.
38:17
Speaker 1: You were were you tried together.
38:20
Speaker 4: Well, they split the trial, and they split the case
38:22
Speaker 4: in half. And so the first of us, myself, Remiston, Tanna,
38:25
Speaker 4: and Anton mccuariar went and then the next three that
38:29
Speaker 4: was there because it was initially called the Center Park
38:32
Speaker 4: seven and Michael Briscoe was able to get out of
38:36
Speaker 4: the case and get freed, and then it became the
38:40
Speaker 4: Center Park six. And when that first file happened to myself,
38:46
Speaker 4: Remiston's moon, yeah, myself, Ramison Tanna, and Antony McCrae, we
38:49
Speaker 4: got convicted. We lost, and the next trial jearing up
38:54
Speaker 4: Corey Wise, Kevin Richardson and Steven Lopez, Stephen Lopez, if
39:00
Speaker 4: Cole Fee. All kinds of rumors were out there about
39:03
Speaker 4: how much time we were facing. They wanted to try
39:06
Speaker 4: us as adults and convict us as adults, and they
39:09
Speaker 4: tried us as adults, and then when the convictions came
39:11
Speaker 4: down a few months later, for a little while later
39:14
Speaker 4: they gave us juvenile times. But each of these charges
39:19
Speaker 4: they were saying could have given us three and a
39:22
Speaker 4: half three was three three and a third to ten years.
39:27
Speaker 4: And so for the major charges, I think it was
39:29
Speaker 4: two of them we could have been facing dition two
39:32
Speaker 4: thirds to twenty years if they wanted to give us
39:34
Speaker 4: that kind of time. And like I said, Stephen Lopez
39:39
Speaker 4: got cold feet. He heard about this, these rumors. Oh
39:41
Speaker 4: my goodness, they got convicted. I can't do that much time.
39:45
Speaker 4: Let me just cop out to something that I didn't
39:47
Speaker 4: do so I can get out of this thing. And
39:49
Speaker 4: of course we know that he copped out to robbery
39:52
Speaker 4: or something like that and got a year. He did
39:55
Speaker 4: one year and came home. I think it was one year.
40:00
Speaker 4: Unfortunate too, because it shows what you said, if you're
40:02
Speaker 4: poor in your innocence, you're not going to get a
40:06
Speaker 4: fair chance. You're not going to be afforded the same
40:10
Speaker 4: opportunities of the under the law as a person who.
40:13
Speaker 1: Maybe more and so so that you actually believed, up
40:17
Speaker 1: until the moment that the diverted came in that you
40:20
Speaker 1: were going to be exonerated. It's amazing after everything you've
40:22
Speaker 1: been through that you still had that type of and well,
40:25
Speaker 1: and now that I know you as I do, the
40:27
Speaker 1: fact that you're the optimistic attitude is I guess I
40:30
Speaker 1: shouldn't be surprised, but after everything you had been through
40:32
Speaker 1: at that time, it's amazing that you still maintained hope.
40:37
Speaker 1: But in fact the worst possible outcome came to be,
40:43
Speaker 1: which is that you were found guilty and then you
40:45
Speaker 1: were taking to prison. Now you're sixteen years old, right
40:49
Speaker 1: and you're going to some of the worst prisons in
40:52
Speaker 1: America arguably the world.
40:55
Speaker 4: This is this is the worst of nightmare times twenty
41:02
Speaker 4: And that was in the juvenile facility as well. I
41:05
Speaker 4: know that Corey Wison in regards Island, in Reconds Island
41:08
Speaker 4: is incomparable to Sponsored or any of the other juvenile facilities.
41:14
Speaker 1: You know.
41:14
Speaker 4: The worst thing that can happen to you and Jubie
41:16
Speaker 4: is that you might get sliced or you know, beat
41:19
Speaker 4: up or something like that. But in Reconsiland, God, you
41:22
Speaker 4: could lose your life. For us that went to the
41:35
Speaker 4: juvenile facility, it was hell. And then when we got convicted,
41:39
Speaker 4: they sent us to one of the three maximum as
41:42
Speaker 4: treat facilities at the time that was there. They sent
41:45
Speaker 4: me to Harlem Valley, they sent Raymonds and Canada Ghoshen,
41:49
Speaker 4: and they sent Antema Creates a book work, you know,
41:53
Speaker 4: and it was the worst, worst kind of situations that
41:57
Speaker 4: we had to grow up very bad figure out how
42:00
Speaker 4: we were going to survive when just yesterday we were
42:03
Speaker 4: riding skateboards and you know, being food groups or something
42:08
Speaker 4: like that.
42:08
Speaker 1: I'm doing graphic design and looking forward to your.
42:10
Speaker 4: Life, just just just being a normal, innocent child. And
42:16
Speaker 4: now yet that whole reality is gone, and it's hard
42:20
Speaker 4: to it's hard to fully describe everything that went on
42:23
Speaker 4: because my story is a little bit different, because I
42:26
Speaker 4: started to really try to get some type of understanding
42:30
Speaker 4: about this. I wanted to figure out why why, Like
42:32
Speaker 4: I knew that I was innotant, I knew that we
42:35
Speaker 4: hadn't done it, but here we were, we were in prison,
42:38
Speaker 4: and I was trying to figure out why were we convicted?
42:42
Speaker 4: How did this happen? And nece again. A guy comes
42:45
Speaker 4: up to me in prison, one of the officers, and
42:47
Speaker 4: he's been watching me for the few months that I
42:50
Speaker 4: had been there at this time, and he asks me
42:52
Speaker 4: this one question, This one question changed my life. He said,
42:56
Speaker 4: who are you? And I, in my ignorance and confusion,
43:03
Speaker 4: my answer was probably the same as anyone else, without
43:07
Speaker 4: understanding the philosophical realm of where he was going, I said,
43:10
Speaker 4: I'm used of Salon, one of the guys they accused
43:12
Speaker 4: of raping the essential park Joenre But I didn't do it,
43:15
Speaker 4: and he said, no, no, no, no, I know that,
43:17
Speaker 4: he said, but I've been watching you. You're not supposed
43:20
Speaker 4: to be here, You're not a criminal. Why are you here?
43:23
Speaker 4: Who are you? And it caused me to really evaluate
43:28
Speaker 4: my life and my circumstances, short as it may be,
43:31
Speaker 4: at a particular point in time, to understand things in
43:35
Speaker 4: a greater, so to speak, way, to understand that we
43:39
Speaker 4: all are here on purpose. There's things that we have
43:41
Speaker 4: to do, and we are the ones that are chosen
43:44
Speaker 4: to do that. And if we don't do it, it
43:46
Speaker 4: won't be done. If we don't bless the world with
43:49
Speaker 4: our book, that book will never be written. They say
43:51
Speaker 4: the graveyard is the wealthiest place in the world because
43:55
Speaker 4: it's filled with the ideas and the dreams and the
43:57
Speaker 4: hopes of people that just did not get over the
44:00
Speaker 4: hump of doing those ideas and dreams and hopes, you know.
44:05
Speaker 4: And so here I was, in this place that I
44:08
Speaker 4: was supposed to be. Damned, I'm getting a sense of
44:11
Speaker 4: purpose that I would have never really really understood had
44:16
Speaker 4: not gone through this.
44:17
Speaker 1: Did you did you maintain a relationship with that officer
44:20
Speaker 1: going forward, because that's deep I mean, the first person
44:23
Speaker 1: that said that those same words to me was Deepak Chopra.
44:26
Speaker 1: I'm not comparing this guy to Deepac Choprah, but but yeah,
44:30
Speaker 1: I mean what happened with I mean, did you did
44:32
Speaker 1: you continue to have dialogue with him?
44:34
Speaker 4: I did. As a matter of fact, this this guy
44:36
Speaker 4: uh befriended me. It was one of it was one
44:39
Speaker 4: of the mini officers that befriended me, you know. And
44:43
Speaker 4: it was weird because at the same time there was
44:45
Speaker 4: there were little things that were going on, and one
44:47
Speaker 4: time I would come back to my cell and I
44:49
Speaker 4: would see chopicicana orange juice and Intimates cookies and it
44:52
Speaker 4: would happen often enough that it's kind of like, oh wow,
44:55
Speaker 4: this is this is kind of strange. And it happened
44:57
Speaker 4: to like choplic kind of orange and into cookies. But
45:00
Speaker 4: in the back of my mind, I had this voice
45:02
Speaker 4: playing in my head that they were trying to kill
45:04
Speaker 4: me with the food and so I wouldn't never eat it.
45:07
Speaker 4: Then one David Lady comes up to be another officer
45:09
Speaker 4: and she says, hey, have you been getting the goodies
45:12
Speaker 4: I've been leaving to you? And I said, oh wow,
45:14
Speaker 4: I didn't know you were leaving. I didn't know it
45:16
Speaker 4: was you. I said, why did you do that? And
45:20
Speaker 4: she said, I know you're innocent, I know you're not
45:23
Speaker 4: supposed to be here, but I can't take this key
45:27
Speaker 4: and let you go for you. So every time I
45:31
Speaker 4: come in here and you here, I want to make
45:33
Speaker 4: your time as easy and as comfortable as possible. And
45:38
Speaker 4: this was her way of doing that.
45:39
Speaker 1: You found this incredible purpose in this darkest place that
45:46
Speaker 1: you could possibly be in, and it has obviously carried
45:50
Speaker 1: you through. You ended up serving on a five to
45:53
Speaker 1: ten years sentence six years and eight months. Let's talk
45:57
Speaker 1: about the fact that Matthias Reyis actually confessed all these
46:04
Speaker 1: years later when he met one of the central part
46:08
Speaker 1: He met Corey in prison and then suddenly his conscience
46:11
Speaker 1: got to him. Imagine that he actually met a guy
46:15
Speaker 1: who was serving time for the crime that he committed,
46:18
Speaker 1: and then all of a sudden he got this attack
46:20
Speaker 1: of conscience. I think he may have found religion by
46:22
Speaker 1: then or I don't know what, but anyway, it doesn't matter.
46:25
Speaker 1: He confessed, how did you find out that you now
46:29
Speaker 1: had this ray of light and that you you know,
46:32
Speaker 1: that you were now going to be actually had a
46:36
Speaker 1: real chance of becoming being exonerated.
46:38
Speaker 4: So you know, when we heard the news just like
46:40
Speaker 4: everyone else, and our attorneys were telling us about how
46:44
Speaker 4: you know what happened. And you know, one of the
46:46
Speaker 4: worst things that, of course happens in the case like that,
46:49
Speaker 4: is if you've been ran all about the five wills
46:52
Speaker 4: of justice once, you absolutely do not trust that they
46:55
Speaker 4: are going to do the right thing this time. And
46:59
Speaker 4: so felt like, okay, you know this this the world
47:03
Speaker 4: workers came out, he confessed to the crime. He confessed
47:07
Speaker 4: in a compelling way that let him know that he
47:09
Speaker 4: alone did this. They did his DNA and lo and
47:11
Speaker 4: behold his DNA matches, and like I said, then when
47:17
Speaker 4: they tested his DNA and as DNA matched, they knew
47:20
Speaker 4: beyond a shadow of a doubt, Oh my goodness, we
47:24
Speaker 4: did the wrong thing and convicted the wrong guys. And
47:28
Speaker 4: we have to fix this, and so to judge vacate
47:32
Speaker 4: our convictions. As a matter of fact, as we as
47:36
Speaker 4: we go forward, we see that Robert Morgan's office as man,
47:40
Speaker 4: had we known then what we know now, we would
47:43
Speaker 4: have never convicted them. And I'm appreciative and happy that
47:46
Speaker 4: he said that. But what we all submit is that
47:50
Speaker 4: they did know back then what they knew now. They
47:54
Speaker 4: did know Robert Morgansawt had people working for him and
47:58
Speaker 4: under him that should have ever went after us. And
48:02
Speaker 4: it cost the city millions of dollars. It costs a million.
48:08
Speaker 1: Well, it costs so much more than just the millions
48:10
Speaker 1: of dollars they had to pay out, because it also costs,
48:14
Speaker 1: as we said, the lives of these other innocent people.
48:16
Speaker 1: It costs your lives, It costs your family untold heartache
48:20
Speaker 1: and paying. It costs tax money that we we had
48:23
Speaker 1: to pay to keep you guys incarcerated. Right, that's that
48:26
Speaker 1: runs into the millions of dollars when you're talking about
48:28
Speaker 1: forty years of prison time collectively or more. When and
48:31
Speaker 1: then we talk about the lost the lost taxes that
48:34
Speaker 1: you could have been outside paying, Right, if you guys
48:36
Speaker 1: were if you guys had gone through your normal schooling
48:39
Speaker 1: and come out and then become gotten your jobs, whatever
48:41
Speaker 1: you're going to be doing, we've been paying taxes you
48:44
Speaker 1: had been contributing to society. So it's a it's a
48:46
Speaker 1: loss for society in every conceivable way. And it was
48:50
Speaker 1: preventable and it's despicable what happened. And I think everybody
48:55
Speaker 1: owes you a tremendous apology, and so I'm going to
48:58
Speaker 1: apologize to you on behalf of New York City and
49:01
Speaker 1: America and the human race because none of this, none
49:03
Speaker 1: of us, should have ever gone down the way it did.
49:06
Speaker 1: And and let me I want to get to the
49:08
Speaker 1: to what you're doing now, but and and talk about
49:11
Speaker 1: your public speaking and other advocacy work that you're doing.
49:14
Speaker 1: But before we get to that, so, so you had
49:18
Speaker 1: this euphoria, it still took all this time to put
49:20
Speaker 1: your life back together, but you've done it. And to
49:24
Speaker 1: see you now, no one would ever know that you
49:28
Speaker 1: had been through this stuff. I mean today, are you bitter?
49:33
Speaker 4: You know I'm not bitter. I think that what it
49:35
Speaker 4: is is that we've been able to take our circumstance.
49:38
Speaker 4: And when I think we, I know that myself and Raymondsontanna,
49:42
Speaker 4: we've gone out and we've spoken a lot more than
49:45
Speaker 4: the other folks of a gentleman in the Centrafak geography case.
49:48
Speaker 4: But what the idea is that be able to take
49:52
Speaker 4: this this this uh shad part, this really horrific part
49:56
Speaker 4: of life and turn it into something beautiful. And so
50:00
Speaker 4: I'm reminded of what Nelson Mandela said when he was
50:05
Speaker 4: talking about how he had to be in the world
50:10
Speaker 4: and what he had to leave behind in the prison,
50:12
Speaker 4: and he said he had to lead anger and resentment
50:16
Speaker 4: and bitterness in the prison because and we all hear
50:19
Speaker 4: him say, it's like, it's like drinking poisons and expecting
50:24
Speaker 4: your enemy to die. To use that anger, you write it,
50:28
Speaker 4: you paint it, you dance it, you march it, you voted,
50:33
Speaker 4: you do everything about it. You talk it, never stop talking.
50:37
Speaker 4: And so I say that because I've been trying to
50:40
Speaker 4: utilize my energy and my platform to articulate what happened
50:45
Speaker 4: to us in a way that makes sense, so that
50:48
Speaker 4: other folks can understand how important their role is and
50:52
Speaker 4: how important they need to be as regards to what
50:54
Speaker 4: happens in the criminal justice system, you know. And so
50:57
Speaker 4: I've taken that anger and I redirected it, I transformed it,
51:02
Speaker 4: and I made it into something that is more beautiful
51:04
Speaker 4: and more powerful.
51:06
Speaker 1: And and and this is where I stand now, And
51:08
Speaker 1: let me ask you this. So if people want to,
51:10
Speaker 1: I know you're doing a lot of public speaking.
51:11
Speaker 4: You have a book.
51:13
Speaker 1: But if people want to have you come and speak,
51:15
Speaker 1: how did they reach out to you? How do they
51:17
Speaker 1: contact you? What's the name of the book. Let's give
51:19
Speaker 1: a nice plug for any of your social media or
51:21
Speaker 1: anything else that you want to talk about.
51:23
Speaker 4: Yeah. Absolutely, I used my real name on social media
51:25
Speaker 4: so folks can connect with me Useef Salam y U
51:30
Speaker 4: S E F S A L A A M on
51:32
Speaker 4: all social media platforms. My photo was this so that
51:35
Speaker 4: you'll know it's me. The name of the book is
51:39
Speaker 4: Words of a Man. It's on my website. My website
51:42
Speaker 4: is use speaks dot com. That's why U S E
51:47
Speaker 4: F S P E A K S dot com. And
51:51
Speaker 4: you know, folks can book me by emailing me. Why
51:54
Speaker 4: U S G S at you speaks dot com used
51:57
Speaker 4: to speaks dot com and I worked for myself, so
51:59
Speaker 4: I'm you know, people can book me, people can bring me,
52:03
Speaker 4: and so I can travel. And this is where it's at,
52:07
Speaker 4: being able to bring these real life stories into spaces
52:10
Speaker 4: that can really effectuate change, whether at be universities, whether
52:14
Speaker 4: that be forums wide and broad.
52:18
Speaker 1: So the last thing I would like to do is
52:22
Speaker 1: is usually the last thing we do here on the show,
52:24
Speaker 1: and It's actually my favorite part of the show, and
52:26
Speaker 1: I think probably a lot of people people's favorite part
52:28
Speaker 1: of the show. This is the part of the show
52:30
Speaker 1: where I get quiet and I like to just turn
52:34
Speaker 1: the microphone over to you for last words. Anything that's
52:39
Speaker 1: on your mind, anything that you can share that will
52:42
Speaker 1: give people some new perspective in your own words, yousef.
52:48
Speaker 4: So what I want to do in this moment is
52:51
Speaker 4: take people back in time. And I love to do
52:53
Speaker 4: this because it's something that I do on the road
52:55
Speaker 4: of my teaking engagement. So take them back into the courthouse.
52:58
Speaker 4: I take them back to the day right after I
53:01
Speaker 4: got convicted, and here we were standing in front of
53:03
Speaker 4: the judge and we were about to be sent in,
53:06
Speaker 4: and they axed us, do you have anything to say
53:09
Speaker 4: before we sent inte? And rather than throwing myself on
53:12
Speaker 4: the mercy of the court like everyone has been telling me,
53:15
Speaker 4: I had been reading Malcolm Max, I had been reading
53:17
Speaker 4: about Marcus Garvey. I had been reading about countless individuals
53:21
Speaker 4: who are freedom fighters trying to fight for justice. And
53:24
Speaker 4: what I stood up and said to the judge was
53:26
Speaker 4: says I said, I'm not going to sit here at
53:30
Speaker 4: your table and watch you eat and call myself dinner.
53:34
Speaker 4: Sitting here at your table doesn't make me dinner, just
53:37
Speaker 4: like being here in America doesn't make me an American.
53:40
Speaker 4: Let us begin stresses the anger that is built up inside.
53:44
Speaker 4: Rage is the anger that is no longer built kicking
53:47
Speaker 4: on the sucker that soon you have killed American. Free
53:50
Speaker 4: will doesn't mean you can kill and take another person's life.
53:53
Speaker 4: You live your life, Trice. I'm a skill builder, So
53:56
Speaker 4: on skills I do builds. We ain't to given knowledge
53:59
Speaker 4: to this black man soon to enhance my words across
54:03
Speaker 4: the land. I'm a smooth type of fellow, cool, common mellow.
54:06
Speaker 4: I'm kind of laid back. But now I'm speaking so
54:08
Speaker 4: that you know I got used and abused and even
54:12
Speaker 4: was put on the news without CRUs. Some gay cus
54:15
Speaker 4: selling out like fools and I'll check this who did
54:18
Speaker 4: what and who did who?
54:19
Speaker 2: End?
54:19
Speaker 4: But in situation that you don't know what to do
54:22
Speaker 4: and some brothers go wild and we're not down with them.
54:26
Speaker 4: Who would have thought I'd have to lock in? I
54:28
Speaker 4: said it, choose checking the scene from how the situation
54:33
Speaker 4: was instead of getting facts. The media made you blur.
54:36
Speaker 4: Now the people don't know all they see is the media.
54:39
Speaker 4: They never hear the blame because they're constantly deceiving us.
54:43
Speaker 4: The DA is dead wrong. This is a master plan.
54:46
Speaker 4: This case is not a case. It's just the craft
54:48
Speaker 4: as sham Joe. Instead of trying to get your name made,
54:51
Speaker 4: it's reconstructing the crime that really paid me. It's lam
54:56
Speaker 4: e law being supreme over Satan, but no man as
54:59
Speaker 4: a law. If summer science dropper on the righteous path,
55:02
Speaker 4: So how the hell could I take a rapist path?
55:05
Speaker 4: Think about that and then think about this. All my
55:08
Speaker 4: friends it was me, they dished, said, dismissed, because I
55:11
Speaker 4: don't really need any friends like that, like when I
55:13
Speaker 4: really needed you. Where we're at, I'm not distant involved,
55:17
Speaker 4: but the ones that I called, they went and just
55:19
Speaker 4: me like I was an inch, small, like a rat,
55:22
Speaker 4: a mouse, not even the man wrongly accused, like the
55:25
Speaker 4: knife in my hands. How does it look me? Clock now?
55:28
Speaker 4: I'm surek, But like Matt Locke, soon the accused, it
55:31
Speaker 4: took the hook. It's real when she remembers and says,
55:34
Speaker 4: damn the cops that you win. I stand the cues.
55:39
Speaker 4: Few people stop this. Rachel dispersed and yo, you've seen
55:43
Speaker 4: that kid Vincent, he's in the Hurst and so we
55:46
Speaker 4: take it just Vic and Hurst Fields, white type bullet proof.
55:48
Speaker 4: Bet we had no kind of shield. How does it
55:51
Speaker 4: look they killed a black man being black. It's time
55:54
Speaker 4: we take a stand in our situation. You saw our
55:57
Speaker 4: faces clear, but not mine. Not because of fear. It's
56:01
Speaker 4: because the black race was disgrace and for the Muslim
56:05
Speaker 4: they must have felt shame. But I'm not to blame.
56:07
Speaker 4: With the words you fought. The media took our words,
56:10
Speaker 4: the paper, the ones the cops distorted. I told the
56:13
Speaker 4: cops truth like this, and then boom, they were smacking
56:15
Speaker 4: my man. Koby Wine's in the next room. Now, why
56:18
Speaker 4: no minds that Roses can't stand the Bobby lawn. They
56:21
Speaker 4: never helped. They just babblan. I used to think the
56:24
Speaker 4: people and cops were cooled, but who protects us from you?
56:28
Speaker 4: I stand the que and as I wrapped it up,
56:32
Speaker 4: the judge's face was getting angrier and angrier, and I
56:35
Speaker 4: could tell they were about to throw the book it
56:39
Speaker 4: and then I took my seat and it gave me.
56:42
Speaker 4: The maximum amount of time that they could give me
56:44
Speaker 4: was just five to tent And they hoped that they
56:47
Speaker 4: could have given me more. I'm sure that's what I said.
56:51
Speaker 4: That actually is one of the poems that's in my
56:54
Speaker 4: book Words of a Man that's on my website. I
56:57
Speaker 4: also when I come around and seek, I usually have
56:59
Speaker 4: some with me as well. That's good.
57:02
Speaker 1: Well, all I can say is, you know, I wish
57:07
Speaker 1: you all the best, all the blessings of life. I'm
57:11
Speaker 1: so happy to see you thriving, building your family, building
57:14
Speaker 1: your career, and spreading the word alongside so many of
57:19
Speaker 1: us in the movement. And I look forward to working
57:24
Speaker 1: with you and spending time with you in the future.
57:26
Speaker 1: And I just want to thank you again for taking
57:29
Speaker 1: your time to be on the show, and I want
57:32
Speaker 1: to thank the audience also for listening. This has been
57:35
Speaker 1: a very special and moving episode of Wrongful Conviction. So yusef,
57:40
Speaker 1: thank you again, my pleasure, Thank you for having them.
57:47
Speaker 1: Don't forget to give us a fantastic review wherever you
57:49
Speaker 1: get your podcasts.
57:51
Speaker 2: It really helps.
57:52
Speaker 1: And I'm a proud donor to the Enesis Project, and
57:55
Speaker 1: I really hope you'll join me in supporting this very
57:58
Speaker 1: important cause and helping to event future wrongful convictions. Go
58:02
Speaker 1: to Innocentsproject dot org to learn how to donate and
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Speaker 1: get involved. I'd like to thank our production team, Connor
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Speaker 1: Hall and Kevin Wartis. The music in the show is
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Speaker 1: by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure
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Speaker 1: to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on
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Speaker 1: Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm
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Speaker 1: is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association
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Speaker 1: with Signal Company Number one