Latest / Wrongful Conviction / #538 Jason Flom with Kendrick Gillum
Transcript
- 0:02Speaker 1: On February first, nineteen ninety seven, in West Memphis, Arkansas,
- 0:06Speaker 1: a young man named Charles Newsom was fatally shot in
- 0:10Speaker 1: his car. According to some witnesses, Charles was with two
- 0:15Speaker 1: others in his car, but only one was ever identified.
- 0:19Speaker 1: Frederick Tyrone Ellis. Ellis gave inconsistent accounts about the number, location,
- 0:27Speaker 1: and identities of the assailants, eventually fixing the narrative on
- 0:31Speaker 1: first four and then three men from a rival neighborhood,
- 0:35Speaker 1: Antonio Williams, DeMarco Wilson and Kendrick Gillham, who he placed
- 0:39Speaker 1: outside the vehicle for the shooting. However, the ballistics and
- 0:44Speaker 1: physical evidence say something different. This is wrathful Conviction. You're
- 0:55Speaker 1: listening to wrongful Conviction. You can listen to this and
- 0:58Speaker 1: all the Lava for Good podcasts one week early and
- 1:01Speaker 1: ad free by subscribing to Lava for Good Plus on
- 1:04Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts. Welcome back to Wronful Conviction, where we're going
- 1:15Speaker 1: to return to West Memphis, Arkansas. Yes, the home of
- 1:18Speaker 1: the West Memphis three, one of whom Jason Baldwin first
- 1:22Speaker 1: told our colleague Maggie Freeling about the case we're going
- 1:25Speaker 1: to be covering today and we're going to link that
- 1:28Speaker 1: episode of unjustin Unsolved in the episode description. In this
- 1:32Speaker 1: case involves the same local legal system, as well as
- 1:36Speaker 1: three co defendants, one of whom Kendrick Gillham, is calling
- 1:39Speaker 1: in from an Arkansas prison. Ken, thanks for joining us,
- 1:43Speaker 1: Thank you, you're welcome. Now a second former guest, Marty Tankliffe.
- 1:47Speaker 1: It was his efforts through the making an ex reclass
- 1:50Speaker 1: at Georgetown University with Professor Mark Howard that led a
- 1:53Speaker 1: group of students to reinvestigate the case for Ken. And
- 1:57Speaker 1: we're joined by one of those former students who is
- 1:59Speaker 1: currently seeking her master's in investigative journalism, Claudia Mendeweta.
- 2:04Speaker 2: Welcome, thank you for having me.
- 2:06Speaker 1: So let's start with Ken's life growing up in this
- 2:09Speaker 1: small and notorious city of only about twenty five thousand
- 2:13Speaker 1: people on the west side of the Mississippi River from Memphis, Tennessee,
- 2:17Speaker 1: called West Memphis.
- 2:19Speaker 3: My mom she haed me two that twenty fourth, nineteen
- 2:22Speaker 3: seventy one. You know, I had a pretty normal childhood.
- 2:26Speaker 3: You know, my mom, she took good care of me
- 2:28Speaker 3: and my brothers. We come from a big family and
- 2:30Speaker 3: all of us was closer the neighborhood because I said,
- 2:33Speaker 3: like from five years old, we would always get together
- 2:36Speaker 3: on the weekends, all as the summer the school was out.
- 2:39Speaker 3: We was always somewhere on the bikes together, played football, basketball,
- 2:44Speaker 3: collecting knes it's, cutting yards together. We had a little
- 2:47Speaker 3: long services, we hated, you know, we gave some money
- 2:49Speaker 3: in our pockets, and you know, we all just grew
- 2:51Speaker 3: up together. You know, we were basically always there for
- 2:54Speaker 3: each other.
- 2:55Speaker 1: This group of family and friends lived in the Foxwood
- 2:58Speaker 1: area of West Memphis and then was a rival neighborhood
- 3:01Speaker 1: group from about a mile and a half away on
- 3:03Speaker 1: Eighteenth Street, and Foxwood continued to stick together as the
- 3:07Speaker 1: kids became teens and as problems became more complicated as
- 3:13Speaker 1: they were introduced to the drug trade.
- 3:15Speaker 3: I said, part of the started, I said about ninth grade.
- 3:18Speaker 3: You know, we started hanging out, chasing girls, drinking girl
- 3:21Speaker 3: not doing my mom's see. And then like like sixteen,
- 3:24Speaker 3: I was really like I was just full plays one
- 3:26Speaker 3: of the streets and I had a partner that I
- 3:29Speaker 3: used to run with and he'd be setting drugs all
- 3:32Speaker 3: night and I'd just be running around with him. And
- 3:34Speaker 3: I was like seventeen when I first got shot. Oh yeah,
- 3:39Speaker 3: I was like seventeen when I first got shot, So
- 3:42Speaker 3: I've been shot three other times. The front, it went
- 3:44Speaker 3: through my tophicals and it came by my shoulders, and
- 3:47Speaker 3: then I was shot in the stomach and it came
- 3:49Speaker 3: out my bank. No time I was shot in the
- 3:51Speaker 3: league in the upper part, almost by my balls. And
- 3:54Speaker 3: the last time did they take this? Watch the eighteenth
- 3:57Speaker 3: Street dudes shoot up where I was at. They came
- 4:00Speaker 3: through three car fee and he watched him shoot it
- 4:04Speaker 3: us and then he pulled up and shot me. And
- 4:08Speaker 3: he shot my home boy two mo pans, which added
- 4:11Speaker 3: to the eleven hands that he was already shot.
- 4:13Speaker 2: Detective Brian Ridge, who's also a big character in the
- 4:16Speaker 2: West Memphis three, shot his friend. His friend is kind
- 4:19Speaker 2: of on the side of the road. Ken is trying
- 4:21Speaker 2: to take him to the hospital and then he shoots
- 4:23Speaker 2: Kin so he can't help him.
- 4:25Speaker 3: Laying on the float bleeding and the police got a
- 4:27Speaker 3: gun to my head. They shot my mama house up
- 4:30Speaker 3: to right around the corner. He wants three cars with
- 4:35Speaker 3: its cas shoot up his house and he didn't pursuit him.
- 4:39Speaker 1: It seems like Detective Brian Ridge and potentially others were
- 4:43Speaker 1: at the very least turning a blind eye to the
- 4:45Speaker 1: Eighteenth Street guys.
- 4:47Speaker 2: I didn't get any evidence to this, but it was
- 4:49Speaker 2: something that everyone told me when I was in West Memphis,
- 4:52Speaker 2: like the people in the A. Treen Street group were
- 4:55Speaker 2: working with the police to sell drugs. One woman sat
- 4:58Speaker 2: down at me and she was like, how do you
- 4:59Speaker 2: think drugs get into West Memphis? Like we don't have
- 5:01Speaker 2: a port. Police will do a drug bust, and you
- 5:05Speaker 2: think they're throwing those drugs away, they're not. They're putting
- 5:08Speaker 2: them right back in circulation.
- 5:10Speaker 3: The girl I was going with but I had the
- 5:12Speaker 3: kids buy they pulled upon her brother over at the
- 5:16Speaker 3: gas station one day and he was saying that they
- 5:18Speaker 3: pulled up on him and said, Hey, you need to
- 5:20Speaker 3: go talk to Kendrick. We got something for you, and
- 5:24Speaker 3: y'all ain't got to worry about us twin now, as
- 5:26Speaker 3: long as y'all keep you down over there, y'all ain't
- 5:28Speaker 3: got to worry about us the rest nobody. But if
- 5:31Speaker 3: you don't, we'll be to see you. So what happened
- 5:34Speaker 3: was he came told me and I refused to say
- 5:36Speaker 3: a dope.
- 5:37Speaker 1: On him, and it appears that perhaps one of the
- 5:40Speaker 1: more prominent Eighteenth Street guys, Terrence Robinson, may have taken
- 5:44Speaker 1: this deal while Foxwood suffered the consequences.
- 5:47Speaker 3: The girl I was going with her brother, they gave
- 5:50Speaker 3: him the datment. They got my brother on the diapers,
- 5:53Speaker 3: They got Chuck Kirkwood, they got my whole neighborhood on
- 5:57Speaker 3: the diapers. The all the walk probably was left that
- 5:59Speaker 3: didn't get in the diaper with me almoose.
- 6:02Speaker 2: So Terrence Robinson, he's the person who, like we said,
- 6:07Speaker 2: so drugs with the police. He had a cousin called
- 6:09Speaker 2: Daryl Robertson. Darryl gets shot and that's what they try
- 6:13Speaker 2: to put on Ken, but that fails.
- 6:16Speaker 3: He gird order. He got to go write their statement
- 6:20Speaker 3: on me was lyons in kis who had to drop
- 6:23Speaker 3: the jobs. The one was investigated, the same one they
- 6:27Speaker 3: shot me, Brian Reid.
- 6:30Speaker 1: And with the context of this unholy alliance between the
- 6:33Speaker 1: police and Foxwood rivals on Eighteenth Street, tensions flared further
- 6:37Speaker 1: over a dice game in nineteen ninety six involving Ken's
- 6:40Speaker 1: friend Chuck and Terrence Robinson, who was with James Newsom,
- 6:45Speaker 1: the cousin of the victim in this case.
- 6:47Speaker 3: They had a nice game going on in the neighborhood,
- 6:49Speaker 3: Dames Gruesom and Terrence Robinson style Shuton guys Woodhelm. Anyway,
- 6:54Speaker 3: chue k b Terrence Alley's money, so Chump took off
- 6:57Speaker 3: the Wolkin. They pulled up Scot out the car and
- 7:01Speaker 3: hit truck in the face and tried to go on
- 7:04Speaker 3: his pockets and take it money. So this when the
- 7:06Speaker 3: fighter started. And after that we ended up seeing them
- 7:10Speaker 3: at the skating ring. We was going to the back
- 7:12Speaker 3: and they was coming away from the bank, and we
- 7:16Speaker 3: all got to fight New and answered the first justice,
- 7:19Speaker 3: Sire New.
- 7:21Speaker 1: And this kicked off a series of incidents of retaliatory
- 7:25Speaker 1: gun violence leading up to the incident in question on
- 7:29Speaker 1: February first, nineteen ninety seven, which occurred at nine hundred
- 7:32Speaker 1: West McCauley Drive, the Mayfair Apartment complex, which unfortunately was
- 7:37Speaker 1: no stranger to gunfights, and with this ongoing feud between
- 7:40Speaker 1: eighteenth Street and Foxwood, the likely assumption was that someone
- 7:44Speaker 1: from Foxwood was involved in the shooting. Now, the victim
- 7:47Speaker 1: in this case, Charles Newsom, lived there with his parents,
- 7:50Speaker 1: and according to some witnesses, Charles left home with Terrence
- 7:53Speaker 1: Robinson and Frederick Tyrone.
- 7:56Speaker 3: Ellis Caroli said that he was old Charles Newson house
- 7:59Speaker 3: in phil Paul. That's waiting on Charle to take a
- 8:02Speaker 3: shot down and take a bail, and there was the
- 8:04Speaker 3: only way to minches. They walked into the car and
- 8:07Speaker 3: they drove pay us by the manager's office and he
- 8:09Speaker 3: said that he's seen four people out there and they
- 8:13Speaker 3: began shoot this out of the car.
- 8:15Speaker 2: No one is very certain about how many shots were
- 8:17Speaker 2: fired or when the shot hit, but it was basically
- 8:20Speaker 2: a shootout happening. Someone took their hand out of the
- 8:22Speaker 2: windows started shooting back barely.
- 8:24Speaker 3: Said that Chaul made a right old McCarley and he
- 8:28Speaker 3: hit another car and he said chall that he couldn't breathe,
- 8:31Speaker 3: and so ca Ronald said that he scowed it over.
- 8:34Speaker 3: It stuck his leg onder the hands field up and
- 8:36Speaker 3: he drove from the passenger side all the way back
- 8:39Speaker 3: round to the front of the building where he went
- 8:41Speaker 3: and can't help it.
- 8:42Speaker 1: So the cops arrived and according to some witness says,
- 8:45Speaker 1: Terrence Robinson should have been with Ellis to give an account,
- 8:48Speaker 1: but no account has ever been found. Now. Initially Ellis
- 8:53Speaker 1: had said that three or four black males who he
- 8:55Speaker 1: couldn't identify, were shooting from the passenger's side, and that
- 8:59Speaker 1: when Charles was hit, he reached his foot over to
- 9:01Speaker 1: hit the gas to try to flee. But according to
- 9:03Speaker 1: a document that was just recently found, the body was
- 9:07Speaker 1: discovered in a position that really doesn't match his story.
- 9:12Speaker 2: We've gotten various accounts of how the body was found,
- 9:15Speaker 2: but never this one that Charles Newsom was basically turned
- 9:20Speaker 2: back and he was lunged over the driver's seat.
- 9:25Speaker 3: One week with she Seed, somebody had opened the door
- 9:28Speaker 3: and looked at his car, so it was cussin and
- 9:31Speaker 3: he jumped back in the car and.
- 9:33Speaker 1: Drove around the bend, which makes you think that whoever
- 9:36Speaker 1: drove the car out of there made room for himself
- 9:39Speaker 1: by pushing Charles over the seat, or perhaps Charles had
- 9:42Speaker 1: even lunged back there, since the shot may well have
- 9:46Speaker 1: come from inside the car, But unfortunately the state of
- 9:49Speaker 1: the physical evidence hasn't made anything clearer. It appears, in fact,
- 9:53Speaker 1: that Charles Dusom's car had been involved in previous shootouts
- 9:58Speaker 1: and plenty of damage to the out side of the car.
- 10:01Speaker 1: Two bullets were pulled from the car ceiling that aren't
- 10:03Speaker 1: part of the record in this case, as well as
- 10:05Speaker 1: two bullet holes the police claimed had penetrated the interior
- 10:09Speaker 1: and were related to this particular shooting. Now, how did
- 10:12Speaker 1: they know that, We don't know. We have no idea.
- 10:15Speaker 1: But maybe they said that because Charles Newsom was only
- 10:18Speaker 1: shot twice, once in the right forearm and once in
- 10:22Speaker 1: the right upper back.
- 10:23Speaker 3: They said on a two bullet hole put an interior
- 10:25Speaker 3: to the car, the one that hate him in the
- 10:27Speaker 3: foot hall. People said to have come through the wandle,
- 10:32Speaker 3: the very top, the back windle. You supposed in they
- 10:35Speaker 3: head one. They went to the trunk. They said that
- 10:39Speaker 3: a blizzard went to the trunk, went to the back seat,
- 10:42Speaker 3: to the back of the drama seat, kicked him in
- 10:45Speaker 3: the right upper side of his back.
- 10:47Speaker 1: But a picture of the open trunk showed no damage
- 10:50Speaker 1: at all to the car stereo speakers that covered the seatbacks.
- 10:54Speaker 1: So the prosecutor actually motioned to have that photo barred
- 11:00Speaker 1: from evidence. I'm just gonna pause there for a second. Ah, Yeah,
- 11:07Speaker 1: which you know, my spidy senses are telling me that
- 11:10Speaker 1: an independent investigation of the vehicle would have been prudent
- 11:15Speaker 1: and necessary.
- 11:16Speaker 2: So the car gets sold immediately that.
- 11:20Speaker 3: We used to call it through the marble, And I
- 11:22Speaker 3: guess she got rid of it because Hassan got killed
- 11:25Speaker 3: in it. The dude that bought the car, he said
- 11:27Speaker 3: there was no bullet hole in the back of the
- 11:30Speaker 3: drive of seat this compa.
- 11:32Speaker 2: But I spoke to someone who spoke to the guy
- 11:33Speaker 2: who bought the car, and he says there were no
- 11:36Speaker 2: back seats.
- 11:37Speaker 1: So no driver's seat, bullet hole, no back seats to
- 11:40Speaker 1: even confirm or deny the alleged trunk bullet path. Somebody
- 11:44Speaker 1: had gotten rid of them, right. But the state's theory
- 11:46Speaker 1: becomes even more unbelievable when you consider the bullet's trajectory
- 11:52Speaker 1: through Charles Newsom's body.
- 11:55Speaker 3: They said it a bullet What do the prong? What
- 11:58Speaker 3: do the back seat went through the back of the drivers,
- 12:02Speaker 3: hit him in the right upper side, open back, and
- 12:05Speaker 3: terminated in the lower left front.
- 12:08Speaker 2: It's a downward trajectory, Pully.
- 12:10Speaker 3: Wouldn't they hate him? They put no down will pay him?
- 12:14Speaker 3: Would would have would break to a person.
- 12:17Speaker 2: In my eyes, the fatal shot has to have come
- 12:20Speaker 2: from inside the car based on the ballistics. There is
- 12:23Speaker 2: no other way it could have happened.
- 12:46Speaker 1: The ongoing inter neighborhood gun violence had both the police
- 12:50Speaker 1: and alleged witnesses speculating about Foxwood, specifically about Ken Gillum
- 12:55Speaker 1: and Antonio Williams, which wasn't that wild of an idea,
- 12:59Speaker 1: can considering Ken's alibi because Ken was at his girlfriend,
- 13:03Speaker 1: Tarshalla Flores, his home with his two kids, one of
- 13:07Speaker 1: whom was nicknamed Pooh, and sometime before the shooting took place,
- 13:11Speaker 1: some Foxwood guys that stop by.
- 13:14Speaker 2: So Ken's girlfriend her two brothers are the big drug
- 13:17Speaker 2: dealers in West Memphis. They were Flores, so that house
- 13:20Speaker 2: was kind of where they all hang out. That's where
- 13:22Speaker 2: they sold drugs from. It was kind of like the
- 13:24Speaker 2: meeting point. So that's why these people came over.
- 13:27Speaker 3: They were come, roll Waters over, We're going to get Charles.
- 13:31Speaker 3: Tasha dude like no, you better come get your dad.
- 13:35Speaker 3: And stupid dad trying to go a wag to jail.
- 13:37Speaker 3: So he running there, grabbed my lead, hold on my lead,
- 13:41Speaker 3: was like, Mane, look, man I'm street. I ain't gonna
- 13:43Speaker 3: I'm sorry cute my partners called me. He was like, hey, Mane,
- 13:50Speaker 3: they can't shot Nane and know your name the firm name.
- 13:53Speaker 3: Come home. He said, you might want to get your
- 13:55Speaker 3: keys and stuff I have to have. I'm here and
- 13:57Speaker 3: it's going to be for shooting.
- 13:59Speaker 1: So you might be thinking, wait a minute, does Ken
- 14:03Speaker 1: actually know who did it?
- 14:05Speaker 3: See the parties? They didn't do it.
- 14:09Speaker 1: Now, Remember, the bullet trajectory supports that the fatal shot
- 14:13Speaker 1: had to have come from inside the car, and soon
- 14:16Speaker 1: after the shooting, the police had more support for a
- 14:19Speaker 1: close range gunshot. According to a report summarizing the Arkansas
- 14:23Speaker 1: Crime Labs gunshot residue analysis that was entered into evidence
- 14:27Speaker 1: of trial, Charles Newsom's jacket had quote one perforating hole
- 14:33Speaker 1: in the upper right back with residues relating to a
- 14:37Speaker 1: firearm discharge end quote.
- 14:41Speaker 2: The only way that Newsom would have residue on the
- 14:45Speaker 2: jacket was that if the shot had come from close range.
- 14:50Speaker 1: But despite that, the state continued to build this sort
- 14:54Speaker 1: of wild narrative about shooters outside the car, which centered
- 14:59Speaker 1: and relied on l his statements.
- 15:01Speaker 3: Carol Ali said that I don't know who did it.
- 15:04Speaker 3: That's the first statement. The second statement was gave a
- 15:08Speaker 3: couple of hours a capt there, and he said that
- 15:11Speaker 3: Gilby and Williams did it. Five days later, he gave
- 15:14Speaker 3: a third statement saying four people did gil them Willison, Willis,
- 15:20Speaker 3: and Jackson. But Ronald Jackson was found out to be
- 15:23Speaker 3: in Kentucky, so they know that was another lie.
- 15:27Speaker 1: So the mention of Ronald Jackson was just ignored while
- 15:31Speaker 1: the focus remained on the other three. And it seems
- 15:34Speaker 1: to Marco Wilson, who happens to be Ken's cousin, by
- 15:37Speaker 1: the way, was seen at Mayfair that night by a
- 15:40Speaker 1: man named Mark Welch.
- 15:41Speaker 2: Oh my god. The Marco is like, that's the whole
- 15:43Speaker 2: other thing, Like he's not even in this friend group.
- 15:46Speaker 2: He was in his girlfriend's apartment because they had a
- 15:49Speaker 2: newborn child, and he just walked down because he heard shots.
- 15:53Speaker 2: So Mark Welsh how he plays into the story. He
- 15:55Speaker 2: just goes like, I was there, I was in the
- 15:57Speaker 2: apartments and I saw the Marco was standing outside. He
- 15:59Speaker 2: looked at you take it. So that's how de Marco
- 16:01Speaker 2: comes into the whole thing.
- 16:03Speaker 1: So DeMarco's name was added to Ellis's third statement, and
- 16:06Speaker 1: they picked up Ken a few days later, but he
- 16:08Speaker 1: was in charged yet.
- 16:09Speaker 3: They took me the Jones brou to take a lot
- 16:11Speaker 3: to take the cares. But the man said exploit. You
- 16:15Speaker 3: said no, you paid to answer. Did you have anything
- 16:18Speaker 3: to do with it? You said no, you paid answer me.
- 16:21Speaker 3: Do you know anything about it? And you said no,
- 16:25Speaker 3: and until you were sure, you lying. So I said,
- 16:28Speaker 3: you said, I passed on not being there, and I
- 16:30Speaker 3: passed not having anything new with it, right? He said, yes,
- 16:33Speaker 3: said well I did. I'm innocent, so may leave me
- 16:37Speaker 3: along because I need shit. But it's you one that
- 16:39Speaker 3: you know something about it. I said that ain't my job.
- 16:42Speaker 3: I don't work for the police.
- 16:44Speaker 2: You don't want to mess with these people. So he
- 16:46Speaker 2: was not going to start pointing fingers and get potentially
- 16:50Speaker 2: retaliation from someone.
- 16:52Speaker 3: He ended up let me go.
- 16:54Speaker 1: Since Ken was not going to give them any information,
- 16:56Speaker 1: especially since he hadn't actually seen anything, they continue to
- 17:00Speaker 1: build the narrative. In his third statement, Ellis mentioned two
- 17:03Speaker 1: alleged witnesses who he said were just happened to be
- 17:06Speaker 1: driving by, Darnell Troop and Kevin Johnson. Troop gave a
- 17:10Speaker 1: statement about having heard the shots, while Johnson said that
- 17:13Speaker 1: he saw Antonio DeMarco and Ken by the manager's office
- 17:17Speaker 1: and that one of them had had a rifle.
- 17:19Speaker 2: It's funny to read their interrogation transcript because the police goes,
- 17:23Speaker 2: you saw these people standing on Wes McCauley, right. Kevin
- 17:27Speaker 2: Johnson goes, right, it sounded like a rifle, right, yes, right.
- 17:32Speaker 2: So the police is literally the way they're framing their
- 17:35Speaker 2: questions is with the information they need.
- 17:38Speaker 3: And this Johnson and three of the witnesses and say, hey,
- 17:42Speaker 3: all three of them, Hey, they job just dismissed. Ten
- 17:46Speaker 3: years after apposition.
- 17:48Speaker 2: These three witnesses got their charges dropped on February two
- 17:52Speaker 2: thousand and eight, all of them, and all of them
- 17:56Speaker 2: but one has now come forward and basically said I
- 17:59Speaker 2: was lying and I was offered something to lie. Kevin
- 18:03Speaker 2: Johnson said that he got drugs in exchange for that testimony.
- 18:07Speaker 2: So they all have their charges dropped the same month,
- 18:11Speaker 2: the same year, and some even the same day. You know,
- 18:13Speaker 2: and for people who are not like super familiar with
- 18:16Speaker 2: what this means, like this highly suggests they were cop informants,
- 18:20Speaker 2: because cops were holding these convictions over their heads until
- 18:24Speaker 2: they didn't need them anymore.
- 18:25Speaker 3: This endless get out in an abandoned house Will fifty
- 18:30Speaker 3: seven thousand, three ninety seven dollars two ketos and what
- 18:35Speaker 3: if I am a second or two or three gone?
- 18:37Speaker 3: He got five years of total c which he had
- 18:41Speaker 3: to do ten months, and he could get out on it.
- 18:43Speaker 2: So Ellis, for example, he testified in like five or
- 18:46Speaker 2: six criminal cases, like a bunch of them, always saying
- 18:49Speaker 2: whatever the police needed him to say.
- 18:51Speaker 1: And those weren't the only deals to be had. Ken
- 18:54Speaker 1: was offered ten years with just two years to the
- 18:57Speaker 1: parole board. Now, call me crazy, but it sounds to
- 19:00Speaker 1: me like they may not have really thought he did
- 19:02Speaker 1: it if they're offering him two years for a crime
- 19:04Speaker 1: this serious but okay. But Ken refused the deal. What
- 19:10Speaker 1: guilty guy refuses that deal, that's the best deal they're
- 19:13Speaker 1: ever going to get. But Ken refused, So they bolstered
- 19:18Speaker 1: their case with a jail house snitch named Jeff Cayton. Now,
- 19:22Speaker 1: fun fact, one of the investigators in West Memphis at
- 19:25Speaker 1: the time, a guy named Mike Allen. Well, he's the
- 19:28Speaker 1: current sheriff of Crittendon County and he's now married to
- 19:31Speaker 1: Jeff's sister. Anyway, Jeff gave a statement saying that in
- 19:35Speaker 1: jail he's actually married to the jail house nitch's sister.
- 19:38Speaker 1: Just when you think you've heard everything on the wrongful
- 19:40Speaker 1: conviction that you can hear it, then you hear stuff
- 19:42Speaker 1: like this. Anyway. Jeff gave a statement saying that in
- 19:45Speaker 1: jail he'd overheard Ken just rambling on and on about
- 19:49Speaker 1: the shooting.
- 19:50Speaker 3: Jeff Kate says that the prosecutor, fran Thorne want to
- 19:53Speaker 3: him to say it. He's hurt me and tay you
- 19:56Speaker 3: saying that I killed somebody and he's saying the people.
- 20:00Speaker 3: And they said they wouldn't send him to the penitentiary.
- 20:02Speaker 3: They sent him to boot camp on ninety They put
- 20:05Speaker 3: under the head like a little army thing and they
- 20:07Speaker 3: get help. So they sent him to boot camp two
- 20:11Speaker 3: weeks prior to trial. We went to trial November fourth
- 20:16Speaker 3: through November nineteen ninety seven, and on the sand he
- 20:20Speaker 3: said he didn't get a deal. He said that he
- 20:24Speaker 3: heard me say that I shot the gas car with
- 20:26Speaker 3: a shotgun. It wasn't no shotgun.
- 20:28Speaker 1: Fair saying, you know it's wild that with all of
- 20:32Speaker 1: the shellcasings from this incident and others at Mayfair, they
- 20:36Speaker 1: still couldn't find one shotgun shell that would have made
- 20:41Speaker 1: Caton's testimony make sense. And by the way. He later
- 20:44Speaker 1: recanted his statement as well, in case this wasn't screwed
- 20:48Speaker 1: up enough. Next up, Darnell Troop said he had heard
- 20:52Speaker 1: the shots while he drove by with Kevin Johnson, who
- 20:55Speaker 1: took the stand as well.
- 20:57Speaker 3: He said that him had done their troop in the
- 21:00Speaker 3: car together passing by, and he said, we shooting a
- 21:03Speaker 3: noosel white car with nucl Carl Purple and he seeing
- 21:08Speaker 3: me Williams Willison and Jarry Johnson and the man duke officer.
- 21:12Speaker 1: So Kevin Johnson, who later recanted, offered an entirely new
- 21:16Speaker 1: person into the narrative, just out of thin air. A
- 21:18Speaker 1: guy named Jerry Johnson appears in this narrative who also
- 21:21Speaker 1: ended up having a solid alibi like Ronald Jackson had
- 21:25Speaker 1: had from Elis's third statement.
- 21:27Speaker 3: Now and it's his first two statements. They were with
- 21:31Speaker 3: hal from us until the first day of trial. I mean,
- 21:35Speaker 3: they caught that man in so many lines. They tell
- 21:38Speaker 3: me your first statement, why didn't you just kill them?
- 21:40Speaker 3: Who did it? Oh Man? I just want to saying
- 21:43Speaker 3: that to me. You know what I'm saying. It wasn't
- 21:45Speaker 3: not your second statement you said kill them Williams eating
- 21:48Speaker 3: oh Man? I just gave him a little some some
- 21:52Speaker 3: Come on, man, do you remember sitting you've seen him
- 21:55Speaker 3: up at the passengers? No, I ain't say it for
- 21:58Speaker 3: they be a video statement said, yes about the passage
- 22:00Speaker 3: of the one. But what kind of guns did you see?
- 22:02Speaker 3: Two them head night rifle, pink kaylight guns that one
- 22:05Speaker 3: of them made the head guns. Do you remember saying
- 22:07Speaker 3: that you see they hey cawon guns. No, I don't know.
- 22:11Speaker 3: So they pade a video statement, ye say, hey, holme guns.
- 22:14Speaker 3: Then what about the fourth person? I'm just probably mistinking
- 22:16Speaker 3: about deal? But so you for sure about these three? Yeah,
- 22:20Speaker 3: I'm sure who had what guns? Oh? Man, I couldn't
- 22:23Speaker 3: feel it was too dull.
- 22:25Speaker 1: For the record, it was eight pm in February, the
- 22:27Speaker 1: area wasn't well lit, so it probably was too dark
- 22:31Speaker 1: for anyone to have seen what they claimed to have seen.
- 22:33Speaker 1: But at this point, despite the inconsistencies and discrepancies, the
- 22:37Speaker 1: jury heard three witnesses named the three co defendants without
- 22:40Speaker 1: any context of the deals they'd made with the prosecutor's office,
- 22:44Speaker 1: and in addition, they were able to keep Ken's alibi
- 22:47Speaker 1: witness Tarshalla Flores, off the stand.
- 22:51Speaker 3: They come in with two bullet pips did they said
- 22:53Speaker 3: they found and Tasha mulg House is doing a drug
- 22:56Speaker 3: grade six months after the murder, and they said that
- 23:01Speaker 3: these bullets had the same lot number on them as
- 23:04Speaker 3: the one found that the scene. So she didn't testify
- 23:07Speaker 3: for me because they were trying to act like I
- 23:10Speaker 3: had something to do that I had and I had
- 23:12Speaker 3: something to do with anything. I was in jail for
- 23:14Speaker 3: six months, So y'all raided their house. Lot number on
- 23:17Speaker 3: the back of the bullets don't mean nothing. This just
- 23:20Speaker 3: a year that there was manufactured. And I can bet
- 23:22Speaker 3: you this, if you had any other ak shootings or
- 23:26Speaker 3: sk shooting jails frown, you gonna have the same lot
- 23:29Speaker 3: number because all the drug dealers went to the same
- 23:31Speaker 3: place and bought the bullets. And that was Red Barn.
- 23:34Speaker 1: Again, this is important context that the jury never heard. Now.
- 23:38Speaker 1: The prosecutors also called Detective Brian Ridge to discuss his
- 23:43Speaker 1: magic curving bullet theory, and he came.
- 23:47Speaker 3: In with a homemade picture that he drew up. He
- 23:49Speaker 3: took a box car, a juvenile picture that a five
- 23:53Speaker 3: year old could have drew and it had the diresion
- 23:56Speaker 3: that he think says that the bullet went, bullet hole
- 24:01Speaker 3: hit the car on the tube. The hole was supposedly
- 24:05Speaker 3: gonna traded the inuitor. The picct them was hit in
- 24:09Speaker 3: the right four hall. Now, bullet people said to have come.
- 24:14Speaker 1: Through the window, which is plausible. The bullet could have
- 24:18Speaker 1: struck his forearm as he held the steering wheel, or
- 24:20Speaker 1: perhaps he raised his arm defensively at some point and
- 24:24Speaker 1: it was struck. But then the only other possible entry
- 24:27Speaker 1: point that they claimed was through the trunk, which they
- 24:30Speaker 1: said traveled through the back seat and driver's seat to
- 24:33Speaker 1: hit Charles. And remember we mentioned that the prosecutor already
- 24:37Speaker 1: objected to admitting the picture of the open trunk into evidence.
- 24:41Speaker 3: They come into court with the photos showing a bulletholes
- 24:44Speaker 3: of the car. Right, So now they come to the
- 24:48Speaker 3: bullet hole in the back of the driver's seat. Guess
- 24:51Speaker 3: what it can't be found. And two it was like, well,
- 24:53Speaker 3: they said, well you had this morning, didn't He said, yeah, hey,
- 24:56Speaker 3: but you've seen the lost from the police station.
- 24:59Speaker 1: The cool This is now like the dog ate my homework.
- 25:04Speaker 1: And then, to make matters worse, the state's next witness,
- 25:07Speaker 1: Kevin Mainhardt, testified about the gun that was alleged to
- 25:11Speaker 1: have been used, in this case an sk rifle, which
- 25:14Speaker 1: was helpful with demonstrating that the bullet could have made
- 25:17Speaker 1: it through all of those different objects, but not with
- 25:20Speaker 1: the downward trajectory.
- 25:22Speaker 3: Easy, it will go straight through them, hold over them.
- 25:25Speaker 3: So I wanted to hit some redit and take them down.
- 25:27Speaker 1: Will pay up?
- 25:29Speaker 3: This can't make confense.
- 25:30Speaker 1: So through their own witnesses, the state had just contradicted
- 25:34Speaker 1: their own narrative and they were about to do it again.
- 25:37Speaker 1: While presenting the medical evidence, they entered a number of
- 25:40Speaker 1: documents into evidence, including a report summarizing the Arkansas Crime
- 25:44Speaker 1: Labs gunshot residue analysis. Now, importantly, the gunshot residue of
- 25:49Speaker 1: the victim's hands was not submitted, and we'll get to
- 25:53Speaker 1: that in a minute. So at trial, one of the
- 25:55Speaker 1: things this summary report said was that Newsom's hands negative
- 26:01Speaker 1: for gunshot residue, and they put the medical examiner, doctor
- 26:05Speaker 1: Frank Peretti, on the stand.
- 26:07Speaker 2: Probably the most insane part of this trial is that
- 26:09Speaker 2: they never get a ballistics expert to come testify. They
- 26:12Speaker 2: get a medical examiner, and this was a doctor that
- 26:15Speaker 2: infamously also testified in the West Memphis three trial. So
- 26:18Speaker 2: he's testifying in Ken's case, and he says, basically, I
- 26:23Speaker 2: don't have qualifications to do this. The just says it's okay,
- 26:26Speaker 2: go on, go on. And what he says in trial
- 26:29Speaker 2: is that there was no close range firing because he
- 26:34Speaker 2: didn't see residue on the.
- 26:37Speaker 1: Victim, and he specifically mentions the victim's skin, and this
- 26:41Speaker 1: is something he can speak to as an expert. There
- 26:43Speaker 1: are ways to optically examine for residue or that can
- 26:47Speaker 1: be stippling, which is the burn pattern one can expect
- 26:50Speaker 1: with close range gunshots. But the victim was wearing three
- 26:53Speaker 1: layers that night, remember it was February, a shirt, an undershirt,
- 26:56Speaker 1: and a jacket. And the report from the Arkansas Crime
- 26:59Speaker 1: Lab says that is residue relating to firearm discharge around
- 27:03Speaker 1: the hole in the right upper back.
- 27:06Speaker 2: But the medical examiner is literally saying the shot was
- 27:09Speaker 2: coming from fifteen twenty minutes away, like the bullet came
- 27:12Speaker 2: from outside the car. While there's information that there's primer
- 27:15Speaker 2: residue on the victim, and this is pointed out by
- 27:19Speaker 2: either Antonio or DeMarco's lawyer and they were like, look,
- 27:23Speaker 2: this is impossible. There's an inconsistency. The state is saying
- 27:27Speaker 2: that there's primary residue on the victim, and yet the
- 27:30Speaker 2: medical examiner is saying that there's no evidence of close
- 27:33Speaker 2: range shooting. This is impossible, But that juror who's not
- 27:35Speaker 2: an expert on ballistics doesn't understand that. I mean, I
- 27:38Speaker 2: had to study this to understand it. If it was
- 27:41Speaker 2: just said to me like this, I would't understand it either.
- 27:43Speaker 1: And it seems that this case required at least a
- 27:46Speaker 1: ballistics expert to further explain this to the jury, but
- 27:49Speaker 1: that didn't happen before they went to deliberate.
- 27:53Speaker 3: Grandma sheen howl in the bathroom. Oh wait, it needs
- 27:57Speaker 3: out security chamber. So he was gonna help to the prosecutors,
- 28:01Speaker 3: and they said he told the prosecutors. He said, hey, man,
- 28:04Speaker 3: y'all cases, y'all need to do something. Now.
- 28:08Speaker 2: We've gotten a hold of one of those jurors. And
- 28:10Speaker 2: he said it's a long time ago, man, I don't remember,
- 28:12Speaker 2: but he's he was very clear. He was like, when
- 28:16Speaker 2: the jurors were deliberating, one of the prosecutors walks into
- 28:20Speaker 2: the jury room and they say something to the jurors
- 28:24Speaker 2: that's tempering with their decision, and then.
- 28:28Speaker 1: Those jurors returned with their verdict. All three men were
- 28:32Speaker 1: convicted of first degree murder and given life sentences without
- 28:36Speaker 1: the possibility of parole.
- 28:39Speaker 3: There's a lot of mind and a lot of disbelieve.
- 28:43Speaker 3: It was like it was like took my life? Did't know?
- 28:49Speaker 3: Do I just you know? It's that you just game
- 28:53Speaker 3: his plain because you need to make you feel so mad.
- 28:57Speaker 3: You'll be like talking him to make rail. You know
- 29:01Speaker 3: what I'm saying in the politration. You have to sit
- 29:19Speaker 3: here and wait and wait and hold some chime. And
- 29:24Speaker 3: now I gotta try to find a lawyer that'll take you.
- 29:27Speaker 3: I need help. It's hard, man, it is hard. You
- 29:33Speaker 3: don't know the feeling. Man. I lost my brother, my all,
- 29:37Speaker 3: my grandpa was gone. I even lost some grandchild since
- 29:41Speaker 3: up in the hero my brother was murdered, my grandma
- 29:46Speaker 3: died in the same man that help put me here
- 29:49Speaker 3: preached to help her. What kind of shit is this?
- 29:53Speaker 3: What kind of sh is this?
- 29:56Speaker 1: One of the investigators on this case, Detective On, became
- 30:00Speaker 1: a preacher and as luck would have it, or fate
- 30:05Speaker 1: or whatever irony whatever you want to call this, when
- 30:09Speaker 1: Ken was allowed to attend her funeral. Who the fuck
- 30:12Speaker 1: do you think he saw there?
- 30:14Speaker 3: He couldn't even look at me. I was sitting on
- 30:17Speaker 3: the part road. Every time he looked over there, and
- 30:19Speaker 3: he put his head down. He put his head down.
- 30:22Speaker 3: I wanted to get up, but I had respect for
- 30:25Speaker 3: my grandmama. I wanted to get up, and may y'all
- 30:27Speaker 3: get this bitch about the art, because the bitch lined
- 30:30Speaker 3: on me and got me here this pen attention, and
- 30:33Speaker 3: they put my grandmoma need the car and I walked
- 30:36Speaker 3: up to him. I said, you lying, talk ass bitch.
- 30:39Speaker 3: My mama put him away from him. They do this
- 30:42Speaker 3: shit to you because they could do it. The only
- 30:45Speaker 3: thing this shit is it's criminals to heal us and
- 30:48Speaker 3: motherfuckles up.
- 30:51Speaker 1: The three co defendants had an alleged confession back in
- 30:54Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine, but that fell apart before it even
- 30:57Speaker 1: went to an evidentiary hearing oh.
- 30:59Speaker 3: Hey hanging down here and told him that he said
- 31:02Speaker 3: there and took the job, that they were going to
- 31:03Speaker 3: send him to the road, but that what dude changed took.
- 31:06Speaker 1: The moment following that, Kevin Johnson came forward in two
- 31:10Speaker 1: thousand and one claiming that he was offered drugs by
- 31:12Speaker 1: one of the victim's friends in exchange for this testimony,
- 31:16Speaker 1: and the team went back to court in two thousand
- 31:19Speaker 1: and three.
- 31:20Speaker 3: All two to them the issues was raised. It was
- 31:24Speaker 3: the same thing they got the Wistmavis three free was
- 31:27Speaker 3: the same appeal that they used due to the.
- 31:30Speaker 2: Scientific casting, so they filed a seventeen eighty six years.
- 31:34Speaker 1: Later in Discovery, they received a hidden gun shot residue.
- 31:37Speaker 1: Exam of Charles Newsom's hands.
- 31:39Speaker 2: Turns out there's primar residue in Newsom's hands. The only
- 31:44Speaker 2: way that Newsom would have primar residue in his hands
- 31:48Speaker 2: was that if the shot had come from close range.
- 31:51Speaker 1: But that Charles was in close proximity to gunfire.
- 31:55Speaker 2: But that didn't go with their story that the shooters
- 31:57Speaker 2: were from outside the car, so there could have been
- 31:59Speaker 2: no power anywhere. The evidence would have proven otherwise.
- 32:03Speaker 3: They denied it because they said that there was no
- 32:07Speaker 3: new scientific case thing it would have helped us look
- 32:11Speaker 3: that some of the cases I read. They saying that
- 32:14Speaker 3: it is not just for real reversal to be game
- 32:18Speaker 3: when the scene is convicted normally or not normally of
- 32:24Speaker 3: false evidence, and they know that they conveted me on false.
- 32:28Speaker 1: Evidence, and so did Jason Baldwin of the West Memphis Three,
- 32:32Speaker 1: who knew DeMarco Wilson while he was in prison. We'll
- 32:35Speaker 1: have their stories linked in the episode description, so check
- 32:38Speaker 1: them out. But upon his release in twenty eleven, he
- 32:41Speaker 1: eventually began a nonprofit to reinvestigate innocent's claims, and this
- 32:46Speaker 1: was their very first case. They tracked down witnesses and
- 32:49Speaker 1: tried to access the old case evidence to test for
- 32:51Speaker 1: DNA fingerprints, to reconstruct the crime scene, anything, and DeMarco
- 32:56Speaker 1: went back to court in twenty eighteen.
- 32:59Speaker 3: They was trying to find out what the evidence was.
- 33:01Speaker 2: It and the deck on all of it is missing
- 33:04Speaker 2: and all of the reports are missing too. So not
- 33:07Speaker 2: only don't we have the shirt, the jacket and the
- 33:11Speaker 2: car any of that, which is already huge misconduct because
- 33:14Speaker 2: you're meant to keep evidence from murder case forever, we
- 33:17Speaker 2: don't even have pictures of it. And when we bring
- 33:21Speaker 2: Mike Allen to court, they're like, hey, what happened to
- 33:23Speaker 2: this evidence? He's like it says, I checked it out,
- 33:26Speaker 2: but it wasn't me. Someone else done it. Someone else
- 33:29Speaker 2: mus have written my name.
- 33:30Speaker 1: I don't know where it is so someone just checked
- 33:33Speaker 1: the evidence out in nineteen ninety seven and it's just gone.
- 33:38Speaker 2: So I mean very convenient that because if we had
- 33:41Speaker 2: got evidence, if we could prove that can didn't do it,
- 33:43Speaker 2: you could do all types of testing. You could test
- 33:45Speaker 2: the pother again, you could test for DNA, you could
- 33:47Speaker 2: test all types of things.
- 33:49Speaker 1: Jason's team made contact with another potential confessor around twenty
- 33:52Speaker 1: twenty who had contacted law enforcement as early as twenty seventeen,
- 33:56Speaker 1: who was finally saying something that aligned with the evidence.
- 33:59Speaker 1: But that person took their own life before swearing under oath.
- 34:03Speaker 1: Now perhaps this wasn't even the right person, but it
- 34:06Speaker 1: was a similar tale to the nineteen ninety nine confessor
- 34:09Speaker 1: that three individuals, potentially the same guys that had stopped
- 34:12Speaker 1: by Ken's girlfriend Tarsha's earlier that night, had driven up
- 34:16Speaker 1: next to Newsom's car and opened fire, and then the
- 34:19Speaker 1: person in the backseat of Newsom's car pulled a gun
- 34:22Speaker 1: to return fire, and they believed that's how Newsom was
- 34:25Speaker 1: shot from close range. Maybe that's what Ken meant by
- 34:29Speaker 1: they didn't do it. Meanwhile, after years of outreach, Ken
- 34:32Speaker 1: had finally got a response from the making xannery class
- 34:36Speaker 1: at Georgetown.
- 34:37Speaker 2: First we got the primer residue analysis, and then we
- 34:40Speaker 2: finally sent it over to a ballistic expert and he
- 34:42Speaker 2: was like, this is primary residue, like that shot came
- 34:44Speaker 2: from inside the car. And then we also have what
- 34:48Speaker 2: five hundred pages worth of documents. I'm trying to reach
- 34:51Speaker 2: out to Ken's original attorney, but I sent them to
- 34:53Speaker 2: Ken and we talked and he was like, I don't
- 34:55Speaker 2: have any of this, like I never got any of this.
- 34:58Speaker 1: And they also looked up Jeff Cayton.
- 35:00Speaker 2: He's been trying to come forward for a while because
- 35:02Speaker 2: he's dying now with cirrhosis, and now he called us
- 35:05Speaker 2: and he goes, I need to clear my consciousness, like
- 35:08Speaker 2: I need to right this wrong. And he had years
- 35:11Speaker 2: in prison and he basically said, the officers told me
- 35:14Speaker 2: a story, and they said, you tell that on the
- 35:16Speaker 2: stand and you'll go to boot camp. You get off
- 35:18Speaker 2: with this up on the wrist, like you're good. So
- 35:21Speaker 2: that's exactly what happened to him. Kevin Johnson, Jeff Kayton
- 35:24Speaker 2: have recanted, and someone else, Paul Hunt, has come forward
- 35:28Speaker 2: and said I was jeff cell mate, and he confessed
- 35:31Speaker 2: to me many times to falsely testifying in that trial.
- 35:34Speaker 2: So that's corroborated. And then we have someone who has
- 35:38Speaker 2: now come forward and said the people who actually were
- 35:41Speaker 2: shooting at Newsom drove the car to my house and
- 35:43Speaker 2: confessed to me. Him and the three other guys confessed
- 35:46Speaker 2: to her, And that was not Ken Gillim. And this
- 35:49Speaker 2: woman had never spoken until I called her a few
- 35:54Speaker 2: months ago because someone gave me her name.
- 35:56Speaker 1: So potentially there's a connection between Ken's story, this witness
- 36:00Speaker 1: and the three men from the other confessions. In the meantime,
- 36:03Speaker 1: Claudia and the team which includes TOMMYA. Hayes and Brandon T.
- 36:06Speaker 1: Ham while they're not giving up.
- 36:08Speaker 2: We're in touch with the crime scene reconstruction expert and
- 36:11Speaker 2: also a handwriting expert because we believe some of the
- 36:15Speaker 2: signatures about medical reports and ballistics reports and all of
- 36:20Speaker 2: that has been forged from the beginning. The one thing
- 36:22Speaker 2: can always said to me is look at the ballistics.
- 36:25Speaker 2: It doesn't make sense. It does not make sense. It
- 36:27Speaker 2: could not have happened like that. So they were looking
- 36:29Speaker 2: for the shirt, the jacket, and the car, any of that.
- 36:33Speaker 2: So in the West Memphis Street trial, they also said
- 36:35Speaker 2: it was all gone, and then it was actually all
- 36:38Speaker 2: in the West Memphis Police Department. So when I was
- 36:41Speaker 2: in Arkansas, I went there. I mean my two colleagues,
- 36:44Speaker 2: we drove there and we asked for it. But you
- 36:47Speaker 2: can only access that type of evidence if you're a lawyer.
- 36:52Speaker 1: No, perhaps a lawyer or a crime scene reconstruction expert.
- 36:55Speaker 1: Anyone listening would like to offer their help, anyone out
- 36:59Speaker 1: there who would like to speak, it's never too late,
- 37:01Speaker 1: And if so, we're going to leave ways that you
- 37:03Speaker 1: can contact Claudia in the episode description, where you can
- 37:06Speaker 1: also find the documentary that they made for Ken's case.
- 37:09Speaker 1: And with that we're going to go to closing arguments.
- 37:12Speaker 1: This is the part of the show that I always
- 37:14Speaker 1: look forward to, where first of all, I thank you
- 37:17Speaker 1: from the bottom of my heart on behalf of our
- 37:19Speaker 1: whole team. And now I'm going to kick back in
- 37:20Speaker 1: my chair with my headphones on, just close my eyes
- 37:23Speaker 1: and listen to anything else you want to share with
- 37:26Speaker 1: me and our incredible audience. So Claudia, why don't you
- 37:30Speaker 1: go first and then just hand the mic off to Ken.
- 37:34Speaker 2: Ken was guilty way before he ever stepped foot in
- 37:38Speaker 2: that court. The police wanted a conviction, and they went
- 37:41Speaker 2: to any lengths until they got it. And there's just
- 37:45Speaker 2: no way that physically, the ballistics makes sense. There is
- 37:50Speaker 2: no way that shot came from outside of the car.
- 37:52Speaker 2: And there is no testimony still holding that hasn't been
- 37:56Speaker 2: recanted or proven to be coerced except the testimony of
- 38:00Speaker 2: someone who has a personal stake in this case, someone
- 38:04Speaker 2: who gave various different testimonies that don't corroborate with each other.
- 38:08Speaker 2: Ken has been in jail for twenty nine years, and
- 38:10Speaker 2: twenty nine years later, there is the testimony of one
- 38:13Speaker 2: person who's a cop informant, and that's what's keeping him
- 38:16Speaker 2: in jail, and we just got to get him out.
- 38:19Speaker 2: It's time. He hasn't seen his kids in early thirty years.
- 38:23Speaker 2: He's fifty six now, he hasn't had a life. He
- 38:26Speaker 2: went to jail when he was in his twenties. And
- 38:28Speaker 2: he's not guilty, and everyone knows he's not guilty. He's
- 38:32Speaker 2: a victim of a town and a system that has
- 38:37Speaker 2: never been held accountable for what they've done. And it's enough.
- 38:42Speaker 3: Well, like I said, it's just how he did about it,
- 38:47Speaker 3: because they can't for getting away with it. I'm wondering
- 38:50Speaker 3: why Alcatol doesn't have a CiU unit. He may he
- 38:57Speaker 3: of me that you can. Don't think that Alkassol has
- 39:01Speaker 3: also convicted people. Come on, man, I only know maybe
- 39:08Speaker 3: two people. They had been cleared of it, of crime
- 39:11Speaker 3: they didn't committed. That's the one thing I've ever heard of.
- 39:16Speaker 3: I know John Brown, and if I'm not mistaken, it
- 39:19Speaker 3: was Rodney break. Yeah. I'm not going to say. You know,
- 39:23Speaker 3: I'm looking forward to turn it into the help of
- 39:25Speaker 3: this case and take this case because I know Arkansas
- 39:28Speaker 3: needs to be exposed to this. You know, they need
- 39:30Speaker 3: to really be exposed.
- 39:37Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Ron for Conviction. You can
- 39:39Speaker 1: listen to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts
- 39:42Speaker 1: one week early and ed free by subscribing to Lava
- 39:45Speaker 1: for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I want to thank
- 39:48Speaker 1: our production team, Connor Hall and Kathleen Fink, as well
- 39:51Speaker 1: as my fellow executive producers Jeff Kempler, Kevin Watis, and
- 39:54Speaker 1: Jeff Cleiber. The music in this production was supplied by
- 39:57Speaker 1: three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Rowse. Be sure to
- 40:00Speaker 1: follow us across all social media platforms at Lava for
- 40:03Speaker 1: Good and at Wrongful Conviction. You can also follow me
- 40:06Speaker 1: on Instagram at it's Jason Flamm. Wrongful Conviction is a
- 40:09Speaker 1: production of Lava for Good Podcasts and association with Signal
- 40:12Speaker 1: Company Number One. We have worked hard to ensure that
- 40:15Speaker 1: all facts reported in this show are accurate. The views
- 40:17Speaker 1: and opinions expressed by the individuals featured in this show
- 40:20Speaker 1: are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of
- 40:23Speaker 1: Lava for Good.