WEBVTT - #572 Guest Host Kemba Smith with Leon Benson 0:00:02.640 --> 0:00:05.880 In the early morning hours of August eighth, nineteen ninety eight, 0:00:06.240 --> 0:00:10.920 shots rang out in downtown Indianapolis. Casey Shane, a young 0:00:11.000 --> 0:00:13.040 man who had been known to frequent a gay bar 0:00:13.080 --> 0:00:15.800 in the area, was found dead in the driver's seat 0:00:15.840 --> 0:00:20.520 of his truck. A young woman who was delivering newspapers 0:00:20.560 --> 0:00:23.680 in the area witnessed the shooting. She described the gunman 0:00:23.760 --> 0:00:27.080 to police as a dark skinned black man wearing a 0:00:27.120 --> 0:00:30.720 black shirt and jogging pants with three white stripes down 0:00:30.760 --> 0:00:35.120 the sides. Later, in a photo array and a live lineup, 0:00:35.520 --> 0:00:39.360 she picked out Leon Benson. Leon lived a few blocks 0:00:39.360 --> 0:00:41.800 from the shooting and was known to police as a 0:00:41.880 --> 0:00:48.199 drug dealer. When Leon was arrested a week later, he 0:00:48.360 --> 0:00:51.280 insisted he had nothing to do with the shooting. He'd 0:00:51.320 --> 0:00:54.040 been in a building across the street that night and 0:00:54.200 --> 0:00:57.480 dozens of people had seen him there. But at trial, 0:00:57.760 --> 0:01:00.600 the young woman who had identified Leon from the lineup 0:01:00.840 --> 0:01:04.600 did so again in front of a jury with convincing certainty. 0:01:05.440 --> 0:01:08.160 She had seen the shooter with her own eyes, she 0:01:08.280 --> 0:01:13.160 told the court, and she pointed at Leon Benson. But 0:01:13.360 --> 0:01:31.240 this is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to wrongful conviction. I'm 0:01:31.400 --> 0:01:38.240 kimbas Smith. Criminal justice advocate, formerly incarcerated individual, presidential clemency recipient, 0:01:38.360 --> 0:01:42.240 and author and executive producer. And I'm sitting in today 0:01:42.280 --> 0:01:45.360 for Jason Flahm, who is a good friend, longtime supporter, 0:01:45.840 --> 0:01:51.520 and I'm excited today to be here with Leon Benson. Hi. Leon, 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:53.800 thanks for being on Wrongful Conviction. 0:01:54.160 --> 0:01:55.560 Hey, thank you for having me. 0:01:56.080 --> 0:01:59.320 And we also have us Laura Basilon from the University 0:01:59.320 --> 0:02:01.640 of San Francis Go School of Law, where she is 0:02:01.640 --> 0:02:05.280 the director of the Criminal, Juvenile Justice and Racial Justice 0:02:05.320 --> 0:02:06.360 Clinic Programs. 0:02:06.600 --> 0:02:07.400 Welcome, Laura. 0:02:07.560 --> 0:02:09.120 Thank you so much for having us. 0:02:09.160 --> 0:02:11.400 And thank you so much for your passion and the 0:02:11.400 --> 0:02:15.320 work that you do. Leon. So what was most interesting 0:02:15.560 --> 0:02:19.119 to me about your case was that during that particular 0:02:19.160 --> 0:02:22.519 time when you are arrested in nineteen ninety eight, there 0:02:22.600 --> 0:02:25.160 was this big, you know thing already with the war 0:02:25.200 --> 0:02:27.840 on drugs, but there was an influx now black and 0:02:27.880 --> 0:02:31.000 brown people going into the system. And so my case 0:02:31.200 --> 0:02:34.000 was a drug case, a crack case. And so I 0:02:34.080 --> 0:02:38.760 know with my case, the prosecution withheld discovery information and 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:43.320 just to read all the many errors that transpired with 0:02:43.680 --> 0:02:46.400 your trial, it just really struck a chur with me, 0:02:46.480 --> 0:02:48.799 and not to mention. I used to live in Indianapolis 0:02:49.320 --> 0:02:53.080 as well, so I'm really excited to just dive in. 0:02:53.960 --> 0:02:56.560 Can you tell us about your life before all of 0:02:56.560 --> 0:03:00.600 this happened. You know, where you're from, where you grew up, 0:03:01.000 --> 0:03:03.280 anything about your family life. 0:03:03.240 --> 0:03:06.440 You know, first and foremost, I'm from Flint, Michigan, and 0:03:06.480 --> 0:03:08.760 I'm proud to say that. You know, Flint is a 0:03:08.760 --> 0:03:12.760 blue collar community, you know, the underdog. You know, we 0:03:12.880 --> 0:03:16.960 got that fighting spirit. I think I had a great childhood. 0:03:17.280 --> 0:03:21.160 I mean I didn't know I was poor anything like that. 0:03:21.680 --> 0:03:24.160 I was very creative growing up. I was able to 0:03:24.160 --> 0:03:28.160 see a diverse crowd of people and culture at a 0:03:28.160 --> 0:03:33.519 young age. And you know, I participated in sports, played basketball, 0:03:33.639 --> 0:03:35.640 you know, things like that, you know, typical things of 0:03:35.720 --> 0:03:39.240 a kid. So I did have an affinity for hip hop, 0:03:39.680 --> 0:03:43.640 but I also started to have an affinity for you know, 0:03:44.000 --> 0:03:47.320 the fast life, fast money, things like that. You know, 0:03:47.360 --> 0:03:51.760 growing up, I was a typical kid who experienced gang violence, 0:03:52.280 --> 0:03:54.760 experience street violence, things like that. 0:03:55.440 --> 0:03:55.600 You know. 0:03:55.640 --> 0:03:59.640 I eventually moved to Detroit when I was seventeen and 0:04:00.040 --> 0:04:02.840 and love Detroit. You know, I made my bones in 0:04:02.920 --> 0:04:07.360 Detroit very early. You know, fair feeling Puritan. You know, 0:04:07.560 --> 0:04:11.760 at this point, it seems like a very typical urban background. 0:04:12.440 --> 0:04:15.160 As I reflect back on my life, I see a 0:04:15.160 --> 0:04:17.880 lot of things that could have been a lot better, 0:04:18.440 --> 0:04:20.880 but they could have been a lot worse too, you know. 0:04:21.320 --> 0:04:23.919 And at the time that this incident happened, what was 0:04:23.960 --> 0:04:25.039 going on in your life? 0:04:25.600 --> 0:04:29.320 In August eighth, for nineteen ninety eight, I was twenty 0:04:29.320 --> 0:04:33.200 two years old, and at the time, what was happening 0:04:33.240 --> 0:04:36.159 for me in my life? It was like, you know, 0:04:36.320 --> 0:04:40.000 the the hip hop stuff that was going on with Tupac, 0:04:40.360 --> 0:04:42.320 you know, in Bigie master P. 0:04:42.640 --> 0:04:43.920 You know, this was the backdrop. 0:04:44.160 --> 0:04:47.159 You know. I was in Indianapolis, Indiana. I had come 0:04:47.240 --> 0:04:50.080 down there, not to sell drugs or anything like that. 0:04:50.200 --> 0:04:53.400 I came down there as a professional painter, home renovator. 0:04:53.560 --> 0:04:56.600 I was able to renovate like eighty homes before I 0:04:56.640 --> 0:04:59.560 was laid off, and you know, unfortunately, you know, I 0:04:59.600 --> 0:05:02.200 got back into the street life. So the area I 0:05:02.320 --> 0:05:05.040 was in, it was a transit area in the near 0:05:05.120 --> 0:05:08.440 downtown area Indianapolis. It was a lot going on. It 0:05:08.520 --> 0:05:11.520 was very transit, very moving, and this was one of 0:05:11.520 --> 0:05:14.359 the reasons that attracted me to this particular part of 0:05:14.400 --> 0:05:18.600 the city of Indianapolis because it reminded me of Detroit and. 0:05:18.600 --> 0:05:21.240 Flynt And this was also the neighborhood where the crime 0:05:21.279 --> 0:05:24.279 took place. Laura, can you tell us something about the 0:05:24.360 --> 0:05:27.080 area kind of set the stage for what happened that night? 0:05:27.880 --> 0:05:31.559 Indianapolis, the downtown part of it where this crime took place, 0:05:31.680 --> 0:05:35.640 was fairly violent. It was known for a place where 0:05:35.680 --> 0:05:40.760 you could buy and sell drugs, and as Leon also indicated, 0:05:41.040 --> 0:05:43.679 was this interesting mix where this is the late nineties, 0:05:43.720 --> 0:05:46.640 there was a lot of homophobia, and it was also 0:05:46.680 --> 0:05:49.960 a place where people who were gay could go to bars, 0:05:50.000 --> 0:05:54.520 including the Varsity Lounge and meet other people who were gay. 0:05:55.080 --> 0:05:57.320 The victim in the case was twenty five year old 0:05:57.360 --> 0:06:00.640 Casey Shane. He was from Plainville, which was middle class 0:06:00.640 --> 0:06:04.400 subourbon community about twenty miles outside of Indianapolis. What was 0:06:04.440 --> 0:06:05.880 he doing downtown that night? 0:06:06.480 --> 0:06:10.240 Our operating theory has always been that Casey Shane was 0:06:10.279 --> 0:06:14.719 there that night in that particular part of Indianapolis because 0:06:14.760 --> 0:06:17.560 he had visited the Varsity Lounge, and we know he 0:06:17.600 --> 0:06:21.000 had visited that bar in the past because witnesses had 0:06:21.040 --> 0:06:24.880 identified him as being there, and there's fairly strong evidence 0:06:24.880 --> 0:06:28.440 at this point to suggest that he was gay, but 0:06:28.560 --> 0:06:32.200 also closeted for the reasons that you might expect, which 0:06:32.240 --> 0:06:35.440 is that very very few people, even in extremely liberal places, 0:06:35.480 --> 0:06:39.080 which Indianapolis was not, were out of the closet at 0:06:39.080 --> 0:06:42.279 that point in time. And so our theory is that 0:06:42.360 --> 0:06:45.080 he went out that night and went to the Varsity 0:06:45.279 --> 0:06:48.640 and had a few drinks and maybe had an interaction 0:06:48.960 --> 0:06:51.920 with someone there and then maybe arranged to meet them 0:06:51.960 --> 0:06:55.760 a couple of blocks away, which is where the actual 0:06:55.839 --> 0:06:57.000 crime itself occurred. 0:06:57.480 --> 0:07:01.800 With all of that, can you run downologically the night 0:07:02.000 --> 0:07:04.880 of August eighth, nineteen ninety eight. 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:09.240 Yeah, So it was a fairly ordinary night in that 0:07:09.520 --> 0:07:12.680 Leon was hanging out at a place called the Priscilla Apartments, 0:07:12.720 --> 0:07:14.520 which was also known as Little Vietnam. 0:07:14.880 --> 0:07:17.560 It was a building that I sow drugs out of, 0:07:18.120 --> 0:07:21.200 and at this particular point of the night, I'd been 0:07:21.240 --> 0:07:24.320 out there all day. So I came back to my 0:07:24.440 --> 0:07:27.120 headquarters was this building, and I was in the back 0:07:27.160 --> 0:07:29.600 of the buildings and by the steps, and I was 0:07:29.640 --> 0:07:33.080 there with Timothy Gaither with a whole bunch of other people, 0:07:33.400 --> 0:07:37.960 and you know, it was beer drinking, we smoking, and. 0:07:37.840 --> 0:07:41.520 Then around a little after three o'clock in the morning, 0:07:41.800 --> 0:07:44.760 there was this sound of gunfire. 0:07:44.400 --> 0:07:49.360 And we heard shots like by pa and it was 0:07:49.440 --> 0:07:50.800 like they were so close. 0:07:51.400 --> 0:07:53.880 And one of Leon's friends, Miss Shirley, who had just 0:07:53.920 --> 0:07:58.920 gone outside, saw what they believed to be this black 0:07:59.280 --> 0:08:02.920 pickup truck parked kind of idling outside across the street, 0:08:03.040 --> 0:08:05.240 and there was a man in the truck in the 0:08:05.240 --> 0:08:08.920 front seat who wasn't moving, and there was a man 0:08:08.960 --> 0:08:12.480 on the sidewalk who had fired multiple times into the vehicle, 0:08:12.520 --> 0:08:16.400 then walked away, walked back and fired again. And this 0:08:16.600 --> 0:08:21.720 was just a completely shocking, seemingly out of nowhere shooting, 0:08:22.080 --> 0:08:26.000 and from Leon's perspective, all he heard were the shots. 0:08:26.360 --> 0:08:28.760 You know, I stay in the back of the building 0:08:28.880 --> 0:08:30.760 for maybe twenty. 0:08:31.040 --> 0:08:33.719 Thirty minutes, so I left out that back part of 0:08:33.800 --> 0:08:37.920 the door and went to my apartment that was also 0:08:37.960 --> 0:08:44.439 in that direction, going like several blocks away, and he kind. 0:08:44.280 --> 0:08:47.559 Of went about his evening and then only later realized 0:08:47.840 --> 0:08:50.960 that it was this young white man who was in 0:08:50.960 --> 0:08:52.920 the neighborhood and this was a really big deal that 0:08:52.960 --> 0:08:56.040 he had essentially been executed in his car, and the 0:08:56.080 --> 0:09:00.000 police just came in kind of swarmed into the neighborhood 0:09:00.200 --> 0:09:03.120 and essentially shut down business as usual there for a 0:09:03.160 --> 0:09:07.640 while because they were extremely intent on finding someone to arrest. 0:09:08.040 --> 0:09:11.440 That went on about my business and it was a 0:09:11.480 --> 0:09:14.880 parade of police, you know, later on that day, and 0:09:14.920 --> 0:09:17.840 I didn't come back to the area for several days. 0:09:18.280 --> 0:09:20.120 I think there was a lot of pressure in this 0:09:20.240 --> 0:09:23.160 case because the suspect who had been seen by witnesses 0:09:23.240 --> 0:09:26.880 was black, the victim was white. I think that cross 0:09:27.000 --> 0:09:30.280 racial nature put extra pressure on the police, and there 0:09:30.320 --> 0:09:32.160 was just a lot of heat in the neighborhood in 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:34.199 the next couple of weeks, and a lot of, as 0:09:34.200 --> 0:09:36.640 I said, pressure on the police to solve this crime 0:09:36.800 --> 0:09:39.080 and really get someone in custody and charge them. 0:09:39.440 --> 0:09:44.120 So Leon was nowhere around he heard the shot. What 0:09:44.400 --> 0:09:49.600 led to this investigation? How did they even connect Leon 0:09:49.760 --> 0:09:51.000 to the case? 0:09:52.240 --> 0:09:56.960 Initially, the police were given leads that the person who 0:09:57.040 --> 0:10:00.360 committed the shooting was a man named Joseph Webster, and 0:10:00.679 --> 0:10:03.800 they had that information because there was talk in the 0:10:03.800 --> 0:10:07.160 streets that it was Joseph Webster, and there was other information, 0:10:07.559 --> 0:10:10.880 including from a man named Dakaria Fulton who had actually 0:10:10.920 --> 0:10:13.800 witnessed the shooting, that Joseph Webster had committed that crime, 0:10:14.120 --> 0:10:17.440 but it so happened that a young woman named Christy 0:10:17.520 --> 0:10:20.800 Schmidt was there at the scene. She was a white woman. 0:10:21.200 --> 0:10:23.280 Her reason for being in the neighborhood was that she 0:10:23.360 --> 0:10:26.520 was delivering newspapers. So for your younger listeners back in 0:10:26.559 --> 0:10:28.400 the day, you would put a quarter in a box, 0:10:28.800 --> 0:10:31.920 you'd open the box and you would pull out a newspaper, 0:10:31.920 --> 0:10:34.080 and Christy was the person who would stack those newspapers, 0:10:34.080 --> 0:10:35.599 and that's what she was doing. She was in the 0:10:35.600 --> 0:10:37.120 middle of doing that when she heard the shots and 0:10:37.160 --> 0:10:39.920 she looked up and saw the shooter. And her initial 0:10:39.960 --> 0:10:41.760 description she said, he never got into the light, and 0:10:41.760 --> 0:10:43.960 recall it's very dark at three o'clock in the morning. 0:10:44.160 --> 0:10:46.640 She was one hundred and fifty feet away, a full 0:10:46.679 --> 0:10:50.400 block away, and according to the lead detective, a man 0:10:50.480 --> 0:10:54.720 named Alan Jones, when she was given different mugshots to 0:10:54.760 --> 0:10:58.200 look at, she was given Joseph Webster's mugshot, and she 0:10:58.280 --> 0:11:02.360 said that it was not Joseph Webster, and then detective 0:11:02.440 --> 0:11:06.040 Jones showed her a picture of Leon and Christy Schmidt 0:11:06.120 --> 0:11:09.360 said that his face leapt off the page and that 0:11:09.840 --> 0:11:12.400 she was certain that this was the person. That this 0:11:12.559 --> 0:11:16.040 was the shooter, and when that happened, the entire trajectory 0:11:16.040 --> 0:11:17.319 of the case changed. 0:11:17.520 --> 0:11:20.840 So you're saying this key witness pointed out Leon on 0:11:20.920 --> 0:11:24.120 a lineup, despite having only seen the shooter in the 0:11:24.240 --> 0:11:26.840 dark of night for a few seconds and from one 0:11:26.920 --> 0:11:28.640 hundred and fifty feet away. 0:11:28.880 --> 0:11:31.800 And she said, initially to the detective on the scene, 0:11:32.040 --> 0:11:35.319 Detective Leslie van Buskirk, he had a dark complexion. And 0:11:35.360 --> 0:11:37.520 of course, as you can see all too clearly because 0:11:37.559 --> 0:11:40.120 we're all looking at each other and these little zoom pictures, 0:11:40.200 --> 0:11:42.760 Leon is very light complexed. There were a lot of 0:11:42.800 --> 0:11:47.000 things that didn't make any sense about her description, which 0:11:47.000 --> 0:11:52.160 also evolved and became increasingly specific and dramatic over time. 0:11:52.600 --> 0:11:55.079 And I want to point out too that study after 0:11:55.160 --> 0:11:59.640 study has shown the unreliability of cross racial identification. They've 0:11:59.679 --> 0:12:02.360 been found to be less accurate than just taking a 0:12:02.360 --> 0:12:05.480 wild guess. So, Laura, was there anything else about the 0:12:05.480 --> 0:12:08.280 photo identification or the lineup that seems sketchy. 0:12:08.800 --> 0:12:12.480 Yes, there's a lot of opaqueness around that. They never 0:12:12.559 --> 0:12:15.480 recorded that interview. We have no idea what detective Jones 0:12:15.520 --> 0:12:18.840 said to her. We don't know if suggestive language was used. 0:12:18.880 --> 0:12:20.920 We don't know how many pictures she actually looked at. 0:12:20.960 --> 0:12:22.880 She does not have a clear memory of that at 0:12:22.880 --> 0:12:25.319 the time. And so once they had this woman as 0:12:25.360 --> 0:12:28.720 their witness, they built the entire case around that, which 0:12:28.760 --> 0:12:31.760 meant essentially that they developed tunnel vision, and it really 0:12:31.800 --> 0:12:36.040 became about propping up her account and making everything revolve 0:12:36.080 --> 0:12:38.760 around and reinforce what she was saying. And every time 0:12:38.800 --> 0:12:41.680 they received a piece of information that pointed away from 0:12:41.720 --> 0:12:45.240 Leon and toward Joseph Webster, they would bury it in 0:12:45.280 --> 0:12:47.200 the file and not turn it over. 0:12:47.520 --> 0:12:50.480 And another thing, there was another witness who came forward 0:12:50.520 --> 0:12:53.440 as well, a neighborhood guy named Donald Brooks who had 0:12:53.440 --> 0:12:55.920 previously gotten into a beef with Leon, I think over 0:12:55.960 --> 0:12:59.160 a drug deal gone sour. He told detective Jones that 0:12:59.200 --> 0:13:02.920 the shooter was a guy named Detroit, which was Leon's nickname. 0:13:03.320 --> 0:13:06.160 Donald Brooks later went back on a statement, but we'll 0:13:06.200 --> 0:13:09.480 hear more about that later. Leon. All of this came 0:13:09.520 --> 0:13:11.720 as a surprise to you because you were arrested on 0:13:11.760 --> 0:13:15.080 the fourteenth of August, about a week after the shooting happened. 0:13:15.280 --> 0:13:17.280 But originally you thought they were picking you up for 0:13:17.320 --> 0:13:17.840 something else. 0:13:17.920 --> 0:13:25.400 Right that day, I was still in my drug business 0:13:25.840 --> 0:13:28.719 at the time. You know, my run in with authorities 0:13:28.920 --> 0:13:33.200 was I got caught with possession of cocaine and so 0:13:33.280 --> 0:13:36.600 I was on a misdemeanor probation charge. So when the 0:13:36.640 --> 0:13:39.599 police rolled up on me and Shirley now sitting on 0:13:39.679 --> 0:13:43.760 the stool, they said I had a warrant for possession 0:13:43.800 --> 0:13:47.920 of cocaine and probation violation, and you know, I was 0:13:48.040 --> 0:13:51.080 arrested for that. We went to the police station and 0:13:51.120 --> 0:13:54.240 they tain me to the wall in the room. 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:56.360 And I just fell asleep. I fell out. 0:13:58.600 --> 0:14:02.000 And then I was awakened. I don't know for how long. 0:14:02.200 --> 0:14:04.720 It was cold as hell in there. And they came, 0:14:04.840 --> 0:14:08.520 you know, Detective Jones and Van Buskirk, and it was 0:14:08.559 --> 0:14:09.320 interrogate me. 0:14:09.400 --> 0:14:11.719 They told me like, hey, what do you know. 0:14:11.679 --> 0:14:15.000 About this murder? And instantly for me, I felt like 0:14:15.920 --> 0:14:20.680 this is a game. I was nowhere around, no murder scene. 0:14:20.840 --> 0:14:23.440 I got nothing to do with this stuff. I just 0:14:23.520 --> 0:14:26.480 held my own But I thought it was a joke 0:14:26.560 --> 0:14:28.960 that they had come to me about a murder, and 0:14:29.120 --> 0:14:32.880 even saying that somebody'd seen me do it. It was laughable. 0:14:33.400 --> 0:14:38.640 It was laughable. My biggest mistake was not asking for 0:14:38.680 --> 0:14:58.800 a lawyer. You know, twenty twenty, hindsight is always there. 0:14:59.120 --> 0:15:01.440 But you know, when I start to understand the law, 0:15:01.960 --> 0:15:05.520 I realized that most people like me at the time, 0:15:05.640 --> 0:15:10.480 you know, twenty two year old, uneducated. Of course, you know, 0:15:10.000 --> 0:15:14.120 you had this notion that if you say, get a lawyer, 0:15:14.200 --> 0:15:17.200 as if it's saying you guilty, you know, the system 0:15:17.280 --> 0:15:19.800 say you're innocent, to proven guilty. 0:15:20.160 --> 0:15:21.480 But it was quite the opposite. 0:15:21.520 --> 0:15:21.800 For me. 0:15:22.080 --> 0:15:26.400 It was guilty and to proven innocent. So I didn't 0:15:26.400 --> 0:15:29.880 know this at the time. So I'm volunteering my location 0:15:30.600 --> 0:15:34.200 where I was at, and I find out later that 0:15:34.240 --> 0:15:38.000 you know, the detective, you know, manipulated you know, this information. 0:15:38.680 --> 0:15:40.239 You know, he omitted. 0:15:41.040 --> 0:15:43.600 Out of forty people in the building, you only can 0:15:43.640 --> 0:15:45.640 find two people who said they didn't see me. 0:15:46.000 --> 0:15:50.280 And I gave you at least ten twelve apartment numbers. 0:15:49.960 --> 0:15:53.760 Of people that see me right right, and even worse, 0:15:53.920 --> 0:15:57.600 even worse because I gave up that information. You know, 0:15:57.680 --> 0:16:01.240 I wasn't thinking that people even in the building that 0:16:01.320 --> 0:16:03.600 they had seen me that day would probably be like, 0:16:03.720 --> 0:16:06.200 I don't want to get involved. I'm no, but I 0:16:06.200 --> 0:16:08.880 didn't see nothing what you're talking about. And they was 0:16:09.000 --> 0:16:11.680 right to feel like that you know at the time. 0:16:11.760 --> 0:16:14.840 You know, so as bad as it sounds, you know, 0:16:14.880 --> 0:16:18.360 a lot of us play this game with the system. 0:16:18.440 --> 0:16:20.880 And I'm talking to my people that's out there, you know, 0:16:20.920 --> 0:16:23.120 in the street life or whatnot. You know, on one hand, 0:16:23.280 --> 0:16:25.560 we want to, you know, be out there doing our 0:16:25.600 --> 0:16:28.920 thing in the dark, selling drugs, you know, moving the 0:16:28.960 --> 0:16:31.280 things that we do. But then on the other hand, 0:16:31.760 --> 0:16:33.640 we wanted to we still want to trust it. We 0:16:33.720 --> 0:16:35.720 don't trust the police, but we want to trust the 0:16:35.720 --> 0:16:36.880 police at the. 0:16:36.840 --> 0:16:39.000 Same time, you know, come save me right, you know. 0:16:39.560 --> 0:16:43.080 And I was in that type of frame of mind 0:16:43.120 --> 0:16:47.320 at that time, and honestly, as a citizen, whether whether 0:16:47.360 --> 0:16:51.560 I was an accused drug dealer, accused murderer, accused robber, 0:16:51.920 --> 0:16:58.400 or whatnot, the law in the system suposed to be impartial. 0:16:58.160 --> 0:17:02.240 And I was feeling like that, but that wasn't the case. 0:17:03.000 --> 0:17:05.760 But you did eventually hire a lawyer to represent you, 0:17:05.960 --> 0:17:08.600 a man named Timothy Miller. How did he feel about 0:17:08.600 --> 0:17:09.520 your chances? 0:17:09.880 --> 0:17:11.920 So he came to me and I gave him a 0:17:11.960 --> 0:17:14.000 little run down. He's like, yeah, yeah, man, I already 0:17:14.080 --> 0:17:16.480 know that. Man, we're going to get this case dismissed. 0:17:16.880 --> 0:17:18.880 You know, I just want twenty thousand. 0:17:19.359 --> 0:17:21.359 You might not have to pay the whole thing because 0:17:21.359 --> 0:17:23.719 we'd get this dismissed. Just give me a five thousand 0:17:23.760 --> 0:17:27.680 dollars retainer and you know we would go from there. Man, hey, 0:17:27.760 --> 0:17:29.480 I absolutely believe you right. 0:17:29.960 --> 0:17:32.119 And then your trial was set for May of nineteen 0:17:32.200 --> 0:17:36.159 ninety nine in Marion County Superior Court. So, Leon, what 0:17:36.280 --> 0:17:39.359 were you actually feeling as the trial date was approaching? 0:17:39.960 --> 0:17:42.320 You know, I had a lot of different emotions. You know, 0:17:42.880 --> 0:17:46.520 I was very nervous. I had never been to trial before, 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:50.879 so at this point, me feeling like it was laughable 0:17:51.400 --> 0:17:55.680 was over with. I'm going to trial. I'm like, oh, man, oh, 0:17:55.760 --> 0:17:57.040 they for real? 0:17:57.240 --> 0:17:57.480 You know. 0:17:58.200 --> 0:18:00.280 So the state had a couple of our witness says 0:18:00.640 --> 0:18:03.200 Christy Smidt, who pitched you out of the lineup as 0:18:03.200 --> 0:18:05.720 the shooter, and Donald Brooks, who had given your name 0:18:05.760 --> 0:18:08.760 to the police. But at trial, Donald try to recant 0:18:08.800 --> 0:18:11.919 a statement saying he didn't remember what he'd said to 0:18:11.960 --> 0:18:14.880 the detective Jones, and he didn't remember seeing you near 0:18:14.920 --> 0:18:17.439 the truck. And not only that, you knew that your 0:18:17.480 --> 0:18:21.240 defense attorney had an acepisleeve, a man named Dakaria Fulton, 0:18:21.720 --> 0:18:24.280 Laura can you tell us about Dakaria and why he 0:18:24.320 --> 0:18:25.920 was so crucial to the defense. 0:18:26.280 --> 0:18:30.720 Basically, Leon, Joseph Webster, and Dakaria were all drug dealers 0:18:30.760 --> 0:18:33.359 in this area. They didn't work together, but they also 0:18:33.440 --> 0:18:36.159 weren't enemies. He didn't really have anything against anybody. He 0:18:36.280 --> 0:18:38.200 just told Detective Jones exactly. 0:18:37.800 --> 0:18:38.439 What he saw. 0:18:38.600 --> 0:18:41.040 What had happened was, he was in his apartment a 0:18:41.080 --> 0:18:43.080 couple of blocks away. He decided he wanted to go 0:18:43.200 --> 0:18:45.359 smoke a blunt. He needed some rolling papers. He starts 0:18:45.400 --> 0:18:49.480 walking towards the seven eleven and just by happenstance, he's 0:18:49.560 --> 0:18:52.800 literally across the street and he looks and he sees 0:18:52.960 --> 0:18:56.240 Casey Shane's park car, and he sees this man standing 0:18:56.240 --> 0:18:58.920 by the car, and he watches this interaction go down, 0:18:59.200 --> 0:19:02.040 and he's pretty close. He's much much closer than Christy 0:19:02.080 --> 0:19:05.639 Schmidt ever was. And he recognizes the guy as Joseph 0:19:05.640 --> 0:19:09.200 Webster because he's wearing these very distinct Adidas jogging pants 0:19:09.200 --> 0:19:11.320 block with three white stripes down the side, but also 0:19:11.359 --> 0:19:13.520 because he and Joseph Webster had run into each other 0:19:13.600 --> 0:19:15.960 earlier that day, and Joseph Webster had been carrying a 0:19:16.000 --> 0:19:18.880 gun and showed it to Takaria, who told Webster, you're 0:19:18.880 --> 0:19:20.560 a fool. You need to put that gun away. And 0:19:20.600 --> 0:19:24.439 so it was this very clear, strong identification from someone 0:19:24.480 --> 0:19:28.240 who knew everyone new Leon, knew Joseph Webster and really 0:19:28.240 --> 0:19:30.400 didn't have any skin in the game. And that statement 0:19:30.440 --> 0:19:32.280 did get turned over to Timothy Miller. 0:19:32.560 --> 0:19:35.760 Like a week before the first trial. You know, Timothy 0:19:35.800 --> 0:19:40.960 Miller had finally given me the January nineteen ninety nine 0:19:40.960 --> 0:19:47.360 discovery supplement, and in this it had Dakaria Fulton's statement, 0:19:47.480 --> 0:19:50.480 and I looked, I'm like, oh, man, this guy's saying 0:19:50.520 --> 0:19:51.520 he's seen it right. 0:19:51.960 --> 0:19:55.320 I'm like, man, look, hey, I'm not Finn go home, right. 0:19:55.640 --> 0:19:58.200 So I go back to the sale block and I'm 0:19:58.240 --> 0:20:00.359 showing them. I'm like, look, man, I told ju man, 0:20:00.359 --> 0:20:02.280 look they got the witness right there, like we giving 0:20:02.280 --> 0:20:04.520 each other hog find Like, bro, man, you going home. 0:20:04.840 --> 0:20:08.040 So I go to the first trial that Karl wasn't there. 0:20:08.720 --> 0:20:11.200 Just the mere mention of him is what got a 0:20:11.280 --> 0:20:13.520 hung jury. In my opinion, I was able to listen 0:20:13.680 --> 0:20:16.440 from the hold and sell to the jury pool coming 0:20:16.480 --> 0:20:19.199 out and them saying, you know, where's that other guy on? 0:20:20.000 --> 0:20:21.800 They mentioned him? But where is he at. 0:20:22.280 --> 0:20:25.359 In the first trial, the jury hung sex to sex, 0:20:25.880 --> 0:20:27.680 so it was a split vert. There were six people 0:20:27.720 --> 0:20:30.000 who did not think there was enough evidence to convict. 0:20:30.440 --> 0:20:34.200 I say this all the time that my trial wasn't 0:20:34.240 --> 0:20:36.719 a trial really of Leon Benson, but it was a 0:20:36.760 --> 0:20:43.520 trial of urban America against America, because everybody in my 0:20:43.640 --> 0:20:47.800 trial was people who were from the streets, people of color, 0:20:48.320 --> 0:20:52.680 and our challenge was these people in us. 0:20:53.080 --> 0:20:54.040 That's how I felt. 0:20:54.240 --> 0:20:58.119 It was a clear line drawn, and I got the 0:20:58.240 --> 0:21:01.040 raff of a lie that energy. 0:21:02.040 --> 0:21:04.960 I felt some nasty energy in there. It was nasty. 0:21:05.400 --> 0:21:08.080 But when they came back and said a mistrial, I 0:21:08.200 --> 0:21:11.080 wasn't necessarily relieved. I was glad not to hear a 0:21:11.080 --> 0:21:14.159 guilty verdict, but I was figuring, like, oh, once we 0:21:14.200 --> 0:21:15.880 get to Cary Fault, I'm out of here. 0:21:16.400 --> 0:21:19.800 So then there was a second trial about six weeks later, 0:21:19.880 --> 0:21:21.400 in July of nineteen ninety nine. 0:21:21.720 --> 0:21:23.840 There were some major differences though, between the first and 0:21:23.840 --> 0:21:26.280 the second trial, and I think maybe the biggest one 0:21:27.119 --> 0:21:29.960 was that in the first trial, Timothy Miller called a 0:21:30.000 --> 0:21:33.600 guy named Tim Gaither who alibied Leon because he had 0:21:33.600 --> 0:21:35.960 been sitting next to him inside the building when the 0:21:35.960 --> 0:21:39.600 shots were fired, and so that really did establish an alibi, 0:21:39.640 --> 0:21:42.399 and it's consistent with what Leon had always said. And 0:21:42.440 --> 0:21:44.359 in the second trial, and we don't know why he 0:21:44.440 --> 0:21:47.320 didn't call him. I think one of the things that 0:21:47.440 --> 0:21:51.280 is completely frustrating and not explicable is that he never 0:21:51.359 --> 0:21:53.520 called Fulton, not in the first trial and not in 0:21:53.560 --> 0:21:56.359 the second trial. In the second trial, he also didn't 0:21:56.359 --> 0:21:59.879 call Timothy Gaither and so Leon didn't have an alibi, 0:22:00.080 --> 0:22:04.800