Speaker 1: In the summer of nineteen ninety five, twenty one year
Speaker 1: old single mom Christine Bunch was living in a trailer
Speaker 1: in Greensburg, Indiana, with her three year old son Tony.
Speaker 1: In the early morning hours of July thirtieth, an electrical
Speaker 1: fire began between the roof and the ceiling tiles. When
Speaker 1: the fire caused one of the ceiling tiles to fall
Speaker 1: in Tony's bedroom, a cloud of carbon monoxide gas killed
Speaker 1: the little boy before the fire even could. Christine awoke
Speaker 1: in a carbon monoxide haze, desperately trying to save Tony.
Speaker 1: After failed attempts at extinguishing the fire, she ran for help.
Speaker 1: Then she smashed Tony's bedroom window, but it was too late.
Speaker 1: She was barefoot, homeless, and deep in despair. Arson investigator
Speaker 1: Brian Frank used what is widely now known as junk
Speaker 1: science to point the blame for Tony's death squarely at Christine.
Speaker 1: So six days after losing her three year old boy
Speaker 1: and nearly everything she ever had, Christine lost her freedom
Speaker 1: as well. With no potential alibi or eyewitnesses, the state
Speaker 1: easily sealed Christine's fate with the testimony of Brian Frank
Speaker 1: and ATF forensic analyst William Kinnard. Christine gave birth to
Speaker 1: her son, Trent, just a few months after being sent
Speaker 1: to prison and a decade passed before her attorney and
Speaker 1: a team from the Center on Wrongful Convictions at Northwestern
Speaker 1: University uncovered an egregious Brady violation and blatantly false testimony,
Speaker 1: freeing Christine after seventeen years, one month and sixteen days
Speaker 1: behind bars. This it's Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flom. Welcome
Speaker 1: back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flom. That's me, of course,
Speaker 1: and today you're going to hear a story that's as
Speaker 1: heartbreaking and tragic as it was preventable, and it's a
Speaker 1: remarkable look inside the systemic flaws as well as human
Speaker 1: errors that lead to wrongful convictions. And in this particular case,
Speaker 1: we're going to be telling the story and hearing the
Speaker 1: story of one of my absolute favorite human beings, a
Speaker 1: personal hero of mine, who is doing amazing, amazing things
Speaker 1: in the world right now, today and every day. And
Speaker 1: so I am thrilled and honored to have with us
Speaker 1: on the show today, Christine Bunch, Thank you so much.
Speaker 1: I'm happy to be here and with Christine as someone
Speaker 1: whose name you'll probably recognize, Ron Safe for Ron is
Speaker 1: a former US attorney turned corporate lawyer turned justice fighter,
Speaker 1: and you'll recognize him because he was a huge part
Speaker 1: of the exoneration of Julie Ray, an episode that I'll
Speaker 1: never forget, and I hope, if I haven't heard it,
Speaker 1: that you'll go back and take a listen. Anyway, Ron,
Speaker 1: welcome back to be here. Thank you, Jason. So let's
Speaker 1: get right into it. Christine, you grew up in Indiana, right,
Speaker 1: I did. Things took a crazy turn one my parents divorced,
Speaker 1: but for the most part I was happy and it
Speaker 1: was good. Now, at the time of this unimaginable tragedy,
Speaker 1: you were just a young mother living in a trailer,
Speaker 1: working hard, going to school, just starting your life, just
Speaker 1: twenty one years old, right, that's correct. I was working
Speaker 1: and going to school, and I had a beautiful three
Speaker 1: year old son named Tony. And then the worst nightmare
Speaker 1: that any parent can possibly have or wake up to
Speaker 1: in a cold sweat, and some of us probably have
Speaker 1: had that experience, but it actually happened to you. And Ron,
Speaker 1: can you tell us about that awful morning of June thirtieth,
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety five. What happened was Christine and Tony had
Speaker 1: gone to sleep together on a couch in the living
Speaker 1: room area of the trailer. Before Christine woke up, Tony
Speaker 1: had moved to the front room, which was a separate
Speaker 1: room from the living room. Christine awoke to a sound
Speaker 1: and a small fire. She was disoriented, but she saw
Speaker 1: the small fire and she tried to put it out
Speaker 1: with a pillow and couldn't do that, so she tried
Speaker 1: to smother the fire with a blanket, and that didn't
Speaker 1: work either. Carbon monoxide is intoxicating. Christine was undoubtedly affected
Speaker 1: by this carbon monoxide. She's trying to put out the fire.
Speaker 1: She can't find the fire extinguisher. She knows where the
Speaker 1: fire extinguisher is, she can't find it. So by that time,
Speaker 1: the fire had grown into a wall between wean her
Speaker 1: and Tony, and she could not get to him. So
Speaker 1: she frantically went out of the trailer, tried to get help,
Speaker 1: and then tried to break the window into the front
Speaker 1: room so that she could get to Tony, but it
Speaker 1: was too late, and Tony had perished. It's impossible to
Speaker 1: even conceive of the horror and the panic in a
Speaker 1: time like that, even if you didn't have kids, like
Speaker 1: waking up to a fire. Christine, what are your memories
Speaker 1: of that awful night now twenty five years ago. I
Speaker 1: think the thing that sits with me the most is
Speaker 1: it was just normal. I came home from school, and
Speaker 1: I got Tony from the babysitter, and we went home
Speaker 1: and we cooked, and I think we watched some TV
Speaker 1: and did some laundry, and we fell asleep. I'd read
Speaker 1: him a story and he wasn't feeling really well, and
Speaker 1: we fell asleep on the couch under the air conditioner,
Speaker 1: and everything just seemed normal. You didn't realize that you
Speaker 1: were going to wake up in your whole world would
Speaker 1: be turned upside down. Yeah. I mean, your whole world
Speaker 1: was really destroyed at a time when the community and
Speaker 1: the system should have been coming to help you in
Speaker 1: every conceivable way. Instead, you were exposed to and victimized
Speaker 1: by the worst that the system and our society has
Speaker 1: to offer. And it's so important that you're here now
Speaker 1: because this arson quote unquote science that they used in
Speaker 1: order to frame you and wrongfully convict you for a
Speaker 1: crime that never even happened is something that we need
Speaker 1: to focus on because we need awareness among everyone, because someday, you,
Speaker 1: the listener, may find yourself on a jury and you
Speaker 1: may be presented with this same sort of junk science.
Speaker 1: So fire investigation was an apprentice art. They were what
Speaker 1: was regarded as common knowledge and industry standards that were
Speaker 1: passed down from generation to generation. Virtually none of those
Speaker 1: conventional wisdom were true, and when tested by scientific principles,
Speaker 1: they were all debunked. Unfortunately that came too late for Christine.
Speaker 1: And this starts with a fire investigator named Brian Frank.
Speaker 1: So what Frank did was the day of this fire,
Speaker 1: and keep in mind this trailer was completely incinerated. He
Speaker 1: comes into the trailer and just plucks things out of
Speaker 1: thin air. He says, oh, this, this is a burn
Speaker 1: pattern on the floor. That's evidence of a liquid with
Speaker 1: the accelerant, like gasoline. Oh, there's a V pattern on
Speaker 1: the wall. That is fire burns up in a V pattern.
Speaker 1: And therefore, because there were two of these, there were
Speaker 1: two points of origin. A normal accidental fire will have
Speaker 1: one point of origin. Sometimes if a fire is intentionally set,
Speaker 1: it will have two points of origin. Says oops, here
Speaker 1: the fire burned down. That is a sign of a
Speaker 1: liquid accelerant. For all of these reasons, I conclude this
Speaker 1: was not an accidental fire. This was intentionally set because,
Speaker 1: as you said at the beginning, Jason, unlike many crimes
Speaker 1: like a robbery or a fraud or a murder, the
Speaker 1: question in an arson is was a crime even committed?
Speaker 1: And upon that threshold question rests the lives of hundreds
Speaker 1: of people, including Christine. Here's what's absolutely nuts is that
Speaker 1: to become a licensed arson investigator, one who can testify
Speaker 1: in court, you can take a forty hour correspondence course.
Speaker 1: It takes fifteen hundred hours in some places to become
Speaker 1: a manicurist. You can't get a barber's license in less
Speaker 1: than six months. It's the idea that they've been relying
Speaker 1: on these Charlottean's you'd be better off consulting with psychics
Speaker 1: or even just guessing. And in Christine's case, there are
Speaker 1: so many other problems, right. There's tunnel vision with holding
Speaker 1: of a sculptory evidence, there's multiple incompetent investigators who pass
Speaker 1: themselves off as experts, and then it goes downhill from there.
Speaker 1: So there you are outside the house and in minutes,
Speaker 1: in moments, your life has gone from a good life
Speaker 1: full of love and hope to the worst imaginable scenario.
Speaker 1: You're just in shock, and you don't really believe what
Speaker 1: people are telling you because they kept telling me, no,
Speaker 1: you can't go in, and no we couldn't get hit
Speaker 1: him and know he's got alive. And of course, as apparent,
Speaker 1: you don't want to believe that. People on the outside
Speaker 1: want to look at it and say, well, if this
Speaker 1: was done differently, or if you had acted this way.
Speaker 1: And I mean, for myself, I have played it over
Speaker 1: and over and over and over again in my mind.
Speaker 1: I still every day that I wake up play it
Speaker 1: over in my mind, and I don't know how to
Speaker 1: come up with a different scenario. When you're in that
Speaker 1: moment and the terror paralyizes you, you don't know what
Speaker 1: you would do. So it's easy to stand outside and
Speaker 1: say this should have never happened, and somebody has to
Speaker 1: be blamed, right, because the alternative is incomprehensible to most
Speaker 1: people why an innocent baby would be taken from us. Christine,
Speaker 1: six days in hell, right, six days for you between
Speaker 1: the fire and the loss of your child and the
Speaker 1: time that you're arrested what were those six days? Like?
Speaker 1: What were you doing? I went with my parents to
Speaker 1: plan a funeral, and my mom and dad really went
Speaker 1: through how the service was going to be, and I
Speaker 1: just remember sitting there and crying, and then I told
Speaker 1: him that I wanted a song played something that I,
Speaker 1: you know, sang with Tony, and he said, we can
Speaker 1: play whatever you want, and then I had to go
Speaker 1: get clothes to where to a funeral. At that time,
Speaker 1: I was still walking around barefoot because I'd literally lost everything,
Speaker 1: and everybody was trying to comfort you and give you advice,
Speaker 1: and it just doesn't comfort you. So you feel more
Speaker 1: alone than ever because you don't want to hurt their feelings,
Speaker 1: but everything they're saying to you doesn't penetrate. The police
Speaker 1: didn't help because they followed me everywhere I went and
Speaker 1: talked to everybody after I left, and they even showed
Speaker 1: up and my son's funeral and burial. They came to
Speaker 1: me before I even got out of the hospital and
Speaker 1: told me that it was an arson. They literally wanted
Speaker 1: a list of all my family and friends, anybody that
Speaker 1: could have possibly done it. Then they come back to
Speaker 1: me and saying, no, you're you're the person you're under
Speaker 1: arrest for this, and in a small town, once they
Speaker 1: make or arrest and put a headline on the paper
Speaker 1: in a small community, in that community's mind, you're guilty.
Speaker 1: So now you're arrested. How long were you held before
Speaker 1: the trial? Were you able to bail out? I was
Speaker 1: in there from July sixth to October mid October, I
Speaker 1: bonded out on a fifty thousand dollars cash bond. I
Speaker 1: tell my son Trent all the time that he's the
Speaker 1: miracle that saved me. But when I got out, I
Speaker 1: certainly didn't care if I lived or died, and so
Speaker 1: I was drinking and doing a lot of self medicating
Speaker 1: because I just didn't want to feel anymore. And in
Speaker 1: the midst of that, I started getting sick and that's
Speaker 1: when I discovered I was pregnant. Yeah, and that's the
Speaker 1: worst possible scenario. Although now, as you said, it turns
Speaker 1: out to be the thing that saved you. And we'll
Speaker 1: get into more of that later. But Ron, this trial
Speaker 1: is full of I mean again, it's horseshit. The stuff
Speaker 1: that they were spewing from the stand. It began with
Speaker 1: the prosecutors standing in front of the jury and saying
Speaker 1: motive is not an element of the crime. We don't
Speaker 1: have to prove motive. People tend not to commit crimes
Speaker 1: for no reason. And of course they investigated Christine and
Speaker 1: her motive for this crime, and they found that she
Speaker 1: was a good, loving, caring, wonderful mother, and that she
Speaker 1: and Tony had a beautiful relationship. Everybody said that universally,
Speaker 1: And so they're left with telling the jury, Okay, Christine
Speaker 1: committed this horrific crime for no reason, but we don't
Speaker 1: have to prove motive. Then their case depended one hundred
Speaker 1: percent on this quote unquote expert testimony, because Christine didn't
Speaker 1: set this fire, so of course nobody saw her set
Speaker 1: the fire, nobody saw her prepare to set the fire,
Speaker 1: nobody heard her talk about setting the fire, nobody afterwards.
Speaker 1: There was no physical evidence, no forensic evidence, nothing. Of course,
Speaker 1: the trailer wasn't insured, she lost all of her possession,
Speaker 1: she lost, of course, the person who meant most to
Speaker 1: her in the world. So they were left with this
Speaker 1: expert testimony, these absurd fire investigation myths, which should have
Speaker 1: and could have been dispelled by a defense attorney or
Speaker 1: competent defense expert. But there was something else that was
Speaker 1: critical in this trial that would have been difficult for
Speaker 1: a defense attorney to combat. And I have to tell
Speaker 1: the audience that this critical evidence becomes just as important
Speaker 1: later to proving Christine's innocence as it was in getting
Speaker 1: her convicted. But go ahead, Ron. They took ten samples
Speaker 1: from the trailer, from the floor of the trailer, from
Speaker 1: the carpet of the trailer, from Christine's nightgown, and they
Speaker 1: tested it for various accelerants. There was no gasoline. There
Speaker 1: was no inflammatory substance of any kind on Christine's nightgown,
Speaker 1: even though they said that she would splash this accelerant
Speaker 1: all around. But there were two positive samples. And those samples,
Speaker 1: by the way, we're given to the Bureau of Alcohol,
Speaker 1: Tobacco and Firearms atf who federally investigates arson crimes, and
Speaker 1: they have special laboratories, and they did gas chromatography on
Speaker 1: these samples, and they presented evidence at trial that there
Speaker 1: were two positive tests for what they called a heavy
Speaker 1: petroleum distolate like jet fuel or something else specifically not kerosene,
Speaker 1: and that was found in the living room area and
Speaker 1: critically in the front room, the room where Tony was found. Now,
Speaker 1: there is reason for there to be kerosene in the
Speaker 1: living room because the prior owners of this trailer testified
Speaker 1: that they had a kerosene heater and that they overfilled
Speaker 1: it from time to time. Kerosene does not evaporate, and
Speaker 1: so even from years before, there would be kerosene in
Speaker 1: the wood. But there's no explanation for a heavy petroleum
Speaker 1: distillate like jet fuel. And there is absolutely no innocent
Speaker 1: explanation for there to be a heavy petroleum distillate in
Speaker 1: the front room Tony's bedroom. And that was critical evidence
Speaker 1: that was not refuted by the defense attorney. And on
Speaker 1: the strength of that expert testimony of end these critical
Speaker 1: lab determinations, Christine was convicted March fourth, nineteen ninety six,
Speaker 1: twenty two years old. Pregnant, Christine is convicted of arson
Speaker 1: and murder. Less than a month later, she's sentenced to
Speaker 1: two concurrent terms, sixty years for murder and fifty years
Speaker 1: for arson. So how pregnant were you Christine at the
Speaker 1: time of this wrongful conviction And what the hell was
Speaker 1: it like giving birth behind bars? I was almost six
Speaker 1: months pregnant. The only thing they don't do to pregnant
Speaker 1: women is make them wearing the belly chain and the
Speaker 1: box because the baby's not a prisoner. But with so
Speaker 1: many pregnant women in there, you don't always get soft
Speaker 1: cuffs for your feet. So I've got deep scars on
Speaker 1: the back of my ankles from wearing those metal shackles.
Speaker 1: And then when I finally went into labor, I didn't
Speaker 1: really know that I was in labor because I was
Speaker 1: just having a backache. So they took me to the
Speaker 1: infirmary and couldn't find a heartbeat. I lost it. I started,
Speaker 1: you know, screaming at them, and so I was handcuffed
Speaker 1: and shackle then taken out into an ambulance. And when
Speaker 1: I got to the hospital, a doctor come in and
Speaker 1: explained that I was having contractions and that's why they
Speaker 1: could here the heartbeat. They determined that I was going
Speaker 1: to have an emergency c section, so they handcuffs and shackles.
Speaker 1: Came home, and I got a metal cuff on my
Speaker 1: angle in the log chain. I got about thirty six
Speaker 1: hours with Trent, and then I was transferred back to
Speaker 1: the facility and my family took him home. The Pacers
Speaker 1: Foundation is a proud supporter of this episode of Rawful
Speaker 1: Conviction and of the Last Mile organization, which provides business
Speaker 1: and tech training to help incarcerated individuals successfully and permanently
Speaker 1: re enter the workforce. The Pacers Foundation is committed to
Speaker 1: improving the lives of Hoosiers across Indiana, supporting organizations that
Speaker 1: are dedicated primarily to helping young people and students. For
Speaker 1: more information on the work of the Pacers Foundation or
Speaker 1: the Last Mile Program, visit Pacers Foundation dot org or
Speaker 1: the Last Mile dot org. This episode is sponsored by AIG,
Speaker 1: a leading global insurance company, and Paul Weiss Rifkin, Wharton
Speaker 1: and Garrison, a leading international law firm. The AIG pro
Speaker 1: Bono Program provides free legal services and other support to
Speaker 1: many nonprofit organizations and individuals most in need, and recently
Speaker 1: they announced that working to reform the criminal justice system
Speaker 1: will become a key pillar of the program's mission. Paul
Speaker 1: Weiss has long had an unwavering commitment to providing impactful
Speaker 1: pro bono legal assistance to the most vulnerable members of
Speaker 1: our society and in support of the public interest, including
Speaker 1: extensive or in the criminal justice area. So the good
Speaker 1: news is that there is actually an equal or greater
Speaker 1: number of heroes in this story than villains Betsy Marks,
Speaker 1: Hillary po Ricks, Jamie McAllister, and the other two actual
Speaker 1: fire science John Dahan and John Mululey, plus the electrical
Speaker 1: engineer Richard Hansen. Then Karen Daniel and Jane Raley, legends
Speaker 1: in the field were on your side. And of course
Speaker 1: Ron himself, Ron Safer, I mean, the fucking cavalry came
Speaker 1: in on this one, right. Can you talk now about
Speaker 1: the process that led seventeen years later to Christine finally
Speaker 1: coming home. Yes, Christine pursued this tirelessly against all odds.
Speaker 1: Found a wonderful local attorney, Hilary bow Ricks, who believed
Speaker 1: in Christine but really did not have the resources to
Speaker 1: take on the awesome power of the state, and a
Speaker 1: supporter of Christine. Wrote a letter to Northwestern Center on
Speaker 1: Wrongful Convictions, and Jane Raleigh, along with Karen Daniel, took
Speaker 1: Christine's case and they disassembled every piece of evidence the
Speaker 1: state put forward. Karen and Jane assembled the world's experts
Speaker 1: on fire science, not the myths of arson investigation, but
Speaker 1: on fire science, to prove first that everything the state
Speaker 1: said was wrong and then second that Christine was innocent.
Speaker 1: Not beyond a reasonable doubt, beyond any doubt. So first
Speaker 1: they got a former ATF agent and he testified that
Speaker 1: every one of the myths that was used by the
Speaker 1: so called arson investigator Brian Frank was wrong. A V
Speaker 1: pattern does not indicate a point of origin. It indicates
Speaker 1: a point where something burned against a wall. Fire burns
Speaker 1: down not because of a liquid accelerant, but because it's
Speaker 1: seeking oxygen and there was a hole in the trailer.
Speaker 1: So the burn patterns that Frank says indicated that there
Speaker 1: was a liquid accelerant had been disproved. Brian Franks said
Speaker 1: that the fire was hotter because a liquid accelerant was used.
Speaker 1: That is a myth. Controlled experiments prove that fire is
Speaker 1: no hotter. Indeed, the heat depends on what is being burnt.
Speaker 1: So chemistry physics disproved every one of the pieces of evidence.
Speaker 1: But there was one more critical thing that Karen Daniel
Speaker 1: did that was pivotal. She subpoenaed the underlying test data
Speaker 1: that had been used by the ATF lab and all
Speaker 1: of the documents related to those tests, and what that
Speaker 1: bound was stunning. First, she got the actual gas chromatographs,
Speaker 1: so the actual tests and contrary to his testimony, he
Speaker 1: did test against the standard of kerosene, not a heavy
Speaker 1: but kerosene. Then when you look at those actual test data,
Speaker 1: you find that, yes, there was kerosene in the living
Speaker 1: room where the kerosene heater had been years before. But
Speaker 1: then you look at the sample from Tony's bedroom, the
Speaker 1: sample that convicted Christine, and the test was negative for
Speaker 1: any liquid accelerate, kerosene, heavy petroleum distillate, nothing. What's more,
Speaker 1: in that file, there was a draft report that reflected
Speaker 1: accurately the test results, that is, that there had been
Speaker 1: kerosene in the living room and that the sample in
Speaker 1: Tony's bedroom was negative. And then there was a report
Speaker 1: that in handwriting that crossed that out and made that
Speaker 1: test result positive. How that happened, unfortunately, we'll never know
Speaker 1: because by the time we got to the hearing, the
Speaker 1: ATF agent, who is now deceased, was incompetent in an
Speaker 1: assisted living home and could not testify about what happened.
Speaker 1: But what was clear was Christine was convicted based on
Speaker 1: not only faulty but false evidence. So that takes care
Speaker 1: of the state's case. So Christine's team exposed the junk
Speaker 1: science and the outright falsification of the real scientific data
Speaker 1: that led to our conviction. And by the way, these
Speaker 1: are your tax dollars at work. And if you don't
Speaker 1: think this could happen to you, well, don't even get
Speaker 1: me started that there's more to this, and I'm talking
Speaker 1: about what the defenses expert Jamie McCallister testified to about
Speaker 1: how the fire really started. Jamie McCallister, who is expert
Speaker 1: in examining the victim's chemistry and reverse engineering how a
Speaker 1: fire must have started, testified about how this fire started.
Speaker 1: Tony died before the fire got hot. He died of
Speaker 1: carbon monoxide poisoning. There was no burning in his trachea,
Speaker 1: no burning in his lungs, and so he had stopped
Speaker 1: breathing before the fire got hot. His carboxy hemoglobin rate,
Speaker 1: which is what we referred to as carbon monoxide poisoning.
Speaker 1: It's when the carbon monoxide bonds with your blood. The
Speaker 1: hemoglobin was eighty percent. Fifty percent is lethal. So how
Speaker 1: did it get that high? Well, Jamie McCallister testifies that
Speaker 1: controlled experiment show that if the fire had started out
Speaker 1: in the open air of the living room or the bedroom,
Speaker 1: it would have produced a lot of carbon diet oxide
Speaker 1: two oxygen molecules. Because there's a lot of air floating
Speaker 1: around and very little carbon monoxide one oxygen molecule. It
Speaker 1: would have taken ninety minutes for the fire to have
Speaker 1: produced enough carbon monoxide for Tony to have gotten to
Speaker 1: a carboxyhemoglobin rate approaching eighty percent. He would have burned
Speaker 1: to death long before that, and of course his lungs
Speaker 1: and everything else would have burned. That didn't happen. So
Speaker 1: how did this fire happen? Well, as an electrician testified,
Speaker 1: they were electrical wires that were overloaded that ran between
Speaker 1: the roof and the drop down ceiling tiles. There was
Speaker 1: an electrical fire that started that morning. But because there's
Speaker 1: limited oxygen there, what happens is the fire smolders and
Speaker 1: produces a lot of carbon monoxide up in the ceiling. Now,
Speaker 1: eventually the fire gets hot enough so that one of
Speaker 1: the ceiling tiles burns and drops to the floor. That
Speaker 1: undoubtedly is what Christine awakens to. Now, when that happens,
Speaker 1: the carbon monoxide fills the Tony's room like a balloon
Speaker 1: that is letting out its air. Physical tests and chemical
Speaker 1: tests prove within minutes he dies of carbon monoxide poisoning.
Speaker 1: That's how this fire had to have happened. And thus,
Speaker 1: not only was there no evidence that Christine was guilty
Speaker 1: of an arson, there was conclusive evidence that the fire
Speaker 1: was an accidental fire that took place in the confined
Speaker 1: area of the ceiling, and that Tony died as everybody knew,
Speaker 1: of carbon monoxide poisoning. But in spite of all of this,
Speaker 1: on June eighth of twenty ten, now over fourteen years
Speaker 1: after your conviction, Judge Westhofer denied you a new trial.
Speaker 1: He said, quote, while and this is a quote, while
Speaker 1: miss Bunch had new resources available to her at the
Speaker 1: post conviction hearing, new experts do not create new evidence.
Speaker 1: The issues raised and the conclusions reached, while package differently,
Speaker 1: remained basically the same as they were at trial in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety six end quote. He went on to add
Speaker 1: that he did not believe the ATF documents would have
Speaker 1: changed the outcome of the trial. And I mean it
Speaker 1: was exposed that they falsified the findings and said the
Speaker 1: samples were positive when they weren't. What the actual fuck
Speaker 1: like And this again, if you don't think this can
Speaker 1: happen to you, and of talking to the audience. Now,
Speaker 1: of course you're wrong. A very large percentage of judges
Speaker 1: are elected and others are appointed by elected officials. Either way,
Speaker 1: your decisions in the voting booth are going to determine
Speaker 1: who ends up on the bench. So and my rant
Speaker 1: back to the story. Meanwhile, another Indianapolis lawyer joins the team,
Speaker 1: John Larimore, And then we get to the good stuff.
Speaker 1: Right on July thirteenth, twenty eleven, Ron who's here with
Speaker 1: us now, argued in front of a three member panel
Speaker 1: of the Court of Appeals of Indiana. At the argument itself,
Speaker 1: it was very clear from the questioning of the judges
Speaker 1: that one judge was dead set against us. There was
Speaker 1: nothing I was going to be able to say to
Speaker 1: change his mind. One judge was for us, and no
Speaker 1: matter how incoherently I babbled, he was going to vote
Speaker 1: for us. And so the middle judge, the chief judge,
Speaker 1: held Christine's fate in her hand. Our working theory, and
Speaker 1: it made sense, said, if the court was going to
Speaker 1: reverse this conviction, they would have done it right away
Speaker 1: because they know she's sitting in jail. So we're sitting
Speaker 1: there understanding that the longer this goes on, the more
Speaker 1: likely it is we lost. As time wore on, despair grew,
Speaker 1: and eight of what must have been truly agonizing. Months later, Christine,
Speaker 1: on March twenty first of twenty twelve, in a two
Speaker 1: to one decision, the panel reversed the conviction and granted
Speaker 1: you a new trial, citing the evolution of fire science,
Speaker 1: as well as the fact that the sculptory evidence was
Speaker 1: withheld that quote unquote directly contradicted atf forensic analyst William
Speaker 1: Kinnard's trial testimony. Christine, how did you find out about
Speaker 1: this momentous decision. I got a call to come to
Speaker 1: the counselor's office and my lawyers were on the phone
Speaker 1: to tell me that they had reversed my conviction and
Speaker 1: remanded for a new trial. I started crying, and I
Speaker 1: asked them if they called my son. I wanted him
Speaker 1: to go that I won and I was going to
Speaker 1: come home. So they assured me that yes, they were,
Speaker 1: they were calling him, and I ended up I stayed
Speaker 1: in the counselor's office for like an hour and a
Speaker 1: half because I had back to back calls, and she said,
Speaker 1: you know, she said, we're just gonna make this your day,
Speaker 1: so everybody can call and congratulate you and tell you
Speaker 1: the news, and they were just so happy for me. Ron.
Speaker 1: What about you, what's your recollection of that phone call?
Speaker 1: I cared beyond measure about Christine in this case and
Speaker 1: getting her out of jail, and when it ultimately happened,
Speaker 1: it was as if it was happening to my sister.
Speaker 1: Just the most moving experience. Although the reality comes home
Speaker 1: of Okay, she's not at a jail, she gets a
Speaker 1: new trial, she's still sitting in jail. We got to
Speaker 1: get her out of jail. So almost five months go
Speaker 1: by after March twenty first, twenty twelve and the amazing
Speaker 1: phone call, all the way to August eighth, when the
Speaker 1: Indiana Supreme Court left the Appellate Court's decision undisturbed. And
Speaker 1: then finally about a month after that, September first, twenty twelve,
Speaker 1: seventeen years, one month and sixteen days after you were arrested, Christine,
Speaker 1: you were finally released into the arms of your family.
Speaker 1: What was that like, Well, I mean, when you first
Speaker 1: walk out, I think all you're looking at is the
Speaker 1: dream finally happened, and I have so many possibilities. After
Speaker 1: that initial who wears off, then you're left with all
Speaker 1: of these fears and insecurities. It was great walking out
Speaker 1: and seeing everyone, but then you know, I'm facing another
Speaker 1: murder trial, so we have to start preparing for that.
Speaker 1: And I have, you know, my son, who I have
Speaker 1: to provide a home for, and I have to make
Speaker 1: sure that he has everything he needs. He's just sixteen,
Speaker 1: so I don't have a driver's license, I don't have
Speaker 1: any kind of ID, I don't have Wrinter's history credits
Speaker 1: for all of these things. I don't even know where
Speaker 1: I'm going to get a job after seventeen years. So
Speaker 1: fear starts to take you over, and I think that
Speaker 1: at first I was just like, I'm not going to
Speaker 1: make it. There's no way I'm going to be able
Speaker 1: to make it. And that first night, my son was
Speaker 1: showing me on his laptop how to set up a
Speaker 1: Facebook account. And while I'm looking at it, I see
Speaker 1: that he has the Appellate Court site bookmarked, and I said,
Speaker 1: why do you have that? And he looked at me
Speaker 1: and he said, because I checked every day to see
Speaker 1: if they made a decision, and you were coming home
Speaker 1: and I started crying and I said, you know, I said,
Speaker 1: I've been so worried and so unsure, but hearing that
Speaker 1: you believed in me and we're just waiting for me
Speaker 1: to come home. I can make it through anything. Then
Speaker 1: another and a long line of amazing developments in your
Speaker 1: case happened just before Christmas, which must have made that
Speaker 1: time of year even sweeter. The prosecution finally came around
Speaker 1: to their senses and dropped the charges, which brings us
Speaker 1: to your next struggle, compensation for all that lost time.
Speaker 1: And of course no amount of money could be enough
Speaker 1: to repay what you lost, but you had an uphill
Speaker 1: battle and a unique struggle just to even get compensation.
Speaker 1: Can you fill us in on that. Yes, So, like everyone,
Speaker 1: I filed a civil suit. Clearly people are protected, so
Speaker 1: you have to break through immunity to try to sue.
Speaker 1: The issue is the ATF chemist is deceased, so I
Speaker 1: didn't have a leg to stand on, and that was
Speaker 1: ultimately dismissed. Compensation. I have been working since I've been out,
Speaker 1: and while I've helped pass new legislation in three different
Speaker 1: states working with the Innocence Project, this past year we
Speaker 1: passed compensation in Indiana, and then when my civil suit
Speaker 1: was dismissed, I applied for the compensation. You know, it
Speaker 1: was I think, very surreal to receive a letter from
Speaker 1: them saying that just because my conviction was reversed and
Speaker 1: I wasn't retried did not mean that I was actually innocent.
Speaker 1: And it really, I mean it hurt my feeling because
Speaker 1: I testified before these legislators three separate occasions. The senators
Speaker 1: and representatives that pass this bill used my case to
Speaker 1: pass this compensation bill, and then you're going to basically
Speaker 1: retry me all over again. So are they really trying
Speaker 1: to relitigate this case? No, they are not. But as
Speaker 1: you go through the process, you fill out a compensation
Speaker 1: application and then they review it. So for them, they
Speaker 1: reached out to the prosecutor, and the prosecutor said, you know, no,
Speaker 1: we didn't have evidence at the time to retry this,
Speaker 1: but you know, we aren't going to say we made
Speaker 1: a mistake. They never want to say they made a mistake.
Speaker 1: So I had to reach out to everyone I knew,
Speaker 1: the Center on Wrongful Convictions with you know, the amazing
Speaker 1: Laura and I writer and Steve Drisen, Ron Safer and
Speaker 1: all of them wrote letters and admitted the evidence that
Speaker 1: was used to exonerate me in order to show them
Speaker 1: that I am innocent and worthy of this compensation. Twenty
Speaker 1: five years after the fact, they are reviewing the application.
Speaker 1: They've been reviewing it since November. Yeah, well, let's hope
Speaker 1: they come to their senses and come to the right decision,
Speaker 1: because I think the right thing to do is clear
Speaker 1: to everyone who's listening and to anyone with a heart
Speaker 1: and a soul. So let's get to what you're doing now.
Speaker 1: You started an organization called just Is for just Us.
Speaker 1: Just is just like it sounds because the situation just is,
Speaker 1: and then it's for just us, which means all of
Speaker 1: us exoners. Justice for just Us was started by myself
Speaker 1: and another exonrere that came from the Center on Wrongful
Speaker 1: Convictions and one and I just basically wanted to address
Speaker 1: what it was like because when people walk out, you
Speaker 1: don't have a toothbrush, you don't have the basic necessities.
Speaker 1: So J for J for short. You know, we're helping
Speaker 1: with boxes. If somebody reaches out and says, hey, I
Speaker 1: need an outfit, I need basic hygienes, we put that
Speaker 1: together We've helped take some exonorees to the Innocence conference,
Speaker 1: sent out gas cards, cash cards, and we've paid rents,
Speaker 1: we've paid bills, and our organization allows healthcare providers to
Speaker 1: donate services so they can get a dental visit or
Speaker 1: some counseling sessions or a physical things that are desperately
Speaker 1: needed when you return. It's such an important thing, you know.
Speaker 1: I've tried to devote myself to doing as much as
Speaker 1: I can to help people coming out of the system,
Speaker 1: because it's exactly as you described. It's like I call
Speaker 1: it the second punishment. And what I mean by that
Speaker 1: is most people coming out have no support whatsoever. They
Speaker 1: may get forty dollars in a bus ticket and then
Speaker 1: you know, not even a good luck. So there are
Speaker 1: a number of wonderful organist stations doing this work, and
Speaker 1: I encourage everyone to support just is for just Us.
Speaker 1: So please everyone scroll down on the episode description and
Speaker 1: get involved with Justice for just Us. And now this
Speaker 1: is a part of the show, of course that we
Speaker 1: call closing Arguments. So first of all, thank you to
Speaker 1: our phenomenal guests today. The closing argument segment works like this,
Speaker 1: I turn off my microphone, kick back in my chair,
Speaker 1: leave my headphones on. Sometimes I close my eyes, and
Speaker 1: we're going to let each of you have the final
Speaker 1: word on whatever you want to talk about. So let's
Speaker 1: go to run first, and then Christine, you can just
Speaker 1: take us out. Well, first of all, thanks so much
Speaker 1: Jason for telling this story, for telling the other stories.
Speaker 1: It is so critically important to raise public awareness of
Speaker 1: these wrongful convictions. We have the best criminal justice system
Speaker 1: in the world, but it is run by human being,
Speaker 1: and human beings are flawed. They make mistakes, they at
Speaker 1: times act intentionally maliciously. When that happens, it takes enormous
Speaker 1: resources to get the system back on track, and so
Speaker 1: few people are able to afford those resources or are
Speaker 1: given those resources. So what has to happen is everybody
Speaker 1: involved in the system. Prosecutors, judges, jurors have to have
Speaker 1: an open mind. They have to be persons of goodwill.
Speaker 1: We as citizens have to hold them accountable that their
Speaker 1: jobs are not to get convictions, their jobs are to
Speaker 1: do justice, and we have to insist on that. We
Speaker 1: have to enter that jury box as citizens, giving credence
Speaker 1: to the presumption of innocence, that our constitution requires. They're
Speaker 1: not words. They are a critical concept. But if we
Speaker 1: don't pay attention to it, if we don't honor it,
Speaker 1: then wonderful people like Christine will have their lives robbed
Speaker 1: from them, losing decades that nobody can give back to them.
Speaker 1: And so this is a call to action. We have
Speaker 1: to be more active, we have to be more responsible.
Speaker 1: We have to be accountable and make sure that everybody
Speaker 1: in the system is accountable. Christine, when I go speak
Speaker 1: to the community and tell them how they can help
Speaker 1: with JAY or Jay, or how they can help the
Speaker 1: Innocence Project, or how they can step up and make
Speaker 1: changes within our system. Because it is a great system.
Speaker 1: It is designed to work, and we have to take
Speaker 1: responsibility and make sure it works. So I know that
Speaker 1: everybody is sitting there saying I don't have money to donate,
Speaker 1: but everybody does have to step up and say I
Speaker 1: have something to give here, I can vote. I get
Speaker 1: to educate myself so that when I'm sitting on a jury,
Speaker 1: I know what I'm listening to because the CSI you
Speaker 1: watch on TV that's not always accurate. So really learning
Speaker 1: about these issues, really raising your voice and saying you know,
Speaker 1: we need to change some things. That's how we make
Speaker 1: the world better. And I encourage all of you to
Speaker 1: learn about this and figure out if you can help
Speaker 1: by voting, by sharing our stories, by talking to an axonary,
Speaker 1: by just being there. Don't forget to give us a
Speaker 1: fantastic review wherever you get your podcasts, it really helps.
Speaker 1: And I'm a proud donor to the Innocence Project, and
Speaker 1: I really hope you'll join me in supporting this very
Speaker 1: important cause and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions. Go
Speaker 1: to Innocence Project dot org to learn how to donate
Speaker 1: and get involved. I'd like to thank our production team,
Speaker 1: Connor Hall and Kevin Words. The music in the show
Speaker 1: is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be
Speaker 1: sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and
Speaker 1: on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason
Speaker 1: Flam is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts and
Speaker 1: association with Signal Company Number one