Speaker 1: In the fall of two thousand ten, Cleveland High School
Speaker 1: basketball phene Nomini Octavius Williams had just begun his junior
Speaker 1: year when his younger sister turned ten, Their father and
Speaker 1: his father's girlfriend through a big party at their apartment
Speaker 1: to celebrate on Halloween, bringing their blended family together. As
Speaker 1: day turned into night, the children's party turned into an
Speaker 1: adult party, and as things wound down, a fight began
Speaker 1: outside between members of either family. Two people drew guns,
Speaker 1: and one man, Dennis Cole, ended up in the hospital
Speaker 1: paralyzed from the waist down. Police were told that the
Speaker 1: shooter was a young black man who had already fled
Speaker 1: the scene. When they went upstairs to speak with the
Speaker 1: partygoers in the apartment, they found and arrested a young
Speaker 1: black man, seventeen year old Octavius Williams. The victim eventually
Speaker 1: stabilized and identified Octavius from a photo array. Despite conflicting
Speaker 1: accounts of what happened during the shooting, it appears the
Speaker 1: state had clear of They got their man. But this
Speaker 1: is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to wrongful conviction. Today's story. Well,
Speaker 1: I'll just say Shakespeare could have written this one, and
Speaker 1: he would rank up there with some of the crazy
Speaker 1: plot twists and some of his best work. And you're
Speaker 1: going to find out why as we go along in
Speaker 1: today's episode. And without further ado, I want to introduce
Speaker 1: our guests. With two guests today, the man himself who
Speaker 1: lived through this absolutely bizarre and insane sequence of events,
Speaker 1: Octavius Williams. Octavius um happier here, but I'm sorry, do
Speaker 1: you hear, because of what happened to you that brought
Speaker 1: you to this point. But anyway, welcome to Wrongful Conviction.
Speaker 1: There's a pleasure of being here for sure. Thank you.
Speaker 1: With Octavias is JOANNEA. Sanchez and Joanna is the director
Speaker 1: of the Wrongful Conviction Project at the office of the
Speaker 1: Ohio Public Defender. So I imagine, Joanna, you have your
Speaker 1: hands full and I'm glad that you are here to
Speaker 1: share with us about this incredible story. So welcome to
Speaker 1: the show. Thanks so much for having us and this story.
Speaker 1: This is a relatively recent case compared to some of
Speaker 1: the cases listening. We have cases back from the seventies, um,
Speaker 1: but this one, this one happened just I mean, it's
Speaker 1: a short time ago. It was also a long time
Speaker 1: ago two thousand and eleven. Of course, this is Kuya
Speaker 1: Hooga County, and we've heard that name again and again
Speaker 1: on this podcast as sort of a hotbed of wrongful convictions.
Speaker 1: And I want to go back Octavia's two before this
Speaker 1: Horrible Night, where what started off as sounds like a
Speaker 1: joyous occasion turned into this tragedy left some body paralyzed
Speaker 1: and and and put your life on paralysis. Really, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's an awful scenario all the way around. But your life,
Speaker 1: for that was full of promise. Tell us a little
Speaker 1: bit about the family dynamic and what was your life
Speaker 1: like growing up? What we what were you into on
Speaker 1: my life? He was saying, like a regular life, like
Speaker 1: you know, my parents was. Everything was cool, even though
Speaker 1: they was divorced and he was doing on the west
Speaker 1: side of my dad was doing the west side. It
Speaker 1: was just we was always close, you know, so it
Speaker 1: was never a split time in between that we didn't
Speaker 1: see each other. Like I said, everything was cool. It
Speaker 1: was two households obvious. Used to go to my dad
Speaker 1: house a lot because we had a different bond than
Speaker 1: me and my mom. Other than that, they decided to
Speaker 1: send me to my own school because I guess they've
Speaker 1: seeing that I had a different potential than my other siblings.
Speaker 1: I understand you were like a super talented basketball player,
Speaker 1: is that right? Yeah? And still is, But like that
Speaker 1: was my passion. Anybody my family say I was a
Speaker 1: golden ticket. Let let them tell it. Before I was accostrated,
Speaker 1: I was attending this school called Margaret Island is on Chester.
Speaker 1: They gave me a shot to be on their team,
Speaker 1: and I took it. Then though, I was that good,
Speaker 1: you know, but you know, just enough to be scouted,
Speaker 1: you know, when and out of nowhere, it just it
Speaker 1: take it away, you know. So you were you were
Speaker 1: in the eleventh grade when this when this, uh, when
Speaker 1: it's her, Well, you were coming up in your reputation.
Speaker 1: I mean, if it's reached all the way up to
Speaker 1: New York one, there must have been some excitement around
Speaker 1: your potential. So tell us a little bit about what
Speaker 1: happened that night. Why how did you end up at
Speaker 1: this party? Was it? Whose house was it at? My
Speaker 1: dad was Ardenterian, his girlfriend Consuela. They threw a party
Speaker 1: from my little sister. It was her birthday, like literally
Speaker 1: like about your birthday. But we threw it on Halloween.
Speaker 1: She was turning seeing. Somehow, some way, it ended up
Speaker 1: an adult party at nighttime. Every brought everybody together, like
Speaker 1: everything was cool, Everything was cordial. You know, everybody was
Speaker 1: having a good time. You know, there was never no
Speaker 1: problems between the families, you know what I'm saying. But
Speaker 1: some ways, somehow, I don't nowhere. At the end of
Speaker 1: the party, as things were settling it down, all the
Speaker 1: alter care and stuff start happening. Yeah, this started at
Speaker 1: a Halloween party in two thousand and ten. So Octavius's dad,
Speaker 1: Arden and Arden's girlfriend Kenezuela, We're hosting a party at
Speaker 1: their house. They had about thirty to forty family members
Speaker 1: there and as the party starts to wind down, going
Speaker 1: to about midnight, a bit of a conflict erupts, and
Speaker 1: so no one really knows like why the fight started.
Speaker 1: It's a verbal fight kind of. The two sides of
Speaker 1: the family are arguing a bit. At that point, Octavius
Speaker 1: and his dad and some others are upstairs in their
Speaker 1: apartment and this is happening down in the backyard behind
Speaker 1: the apartment. So Octavius's dad goes downstairs the backyard. He
Speaker 1: confronts one of the men, Larry who's kind of causing
Speaker 1: some of the problems, and Larry shoots a gun and
Speaker 1: he starts shooting towards Arden, so Arden ducks down. There's
Speaker 1: guns firing, and then when the shooting stops, a man
Speaker 1: named Dennis Cole, who was Conezuela's cousin, and her other cousin,
Speaker 1: Cedric Johnson, are both shot and Dennis has been shot
Speaker 1: in the chest in the back, and the police come
Speaker 1: and they say, you know who shot you? And he
Speaker 1: can't say at that time more than juvenile blackmail. And
Speaker 1: you know, there's quite a few people at the party
Speaker 1: that match that description, but some of the other individuals
Speaker 1: who had been at the party by the point the
Speaker 1: police get there, they've already left. And so at that
Speaker 1: point there's a lot of people out there just yelling
Speaker 1: names and saying, you know, was that this person was
Speaker 1: at that person? And so the police at some point
Speaker 1: here in the name Tete and that's octavius nickname, and
Speaker 1: so I think that sets them on the path towards Octavius.
Speaker 1: The police they go upstairs and Octavius is upstairs in
Speaker 1: the apartment. He's in the bedroom with a bunch of
Speaker 1: the kids who are there and they're like, hey, this
Speaker 1: guy matches the description in the sense that he's a
Speaker 1: seventeen year old black kid, and so they test him
Speaker 1: for gunshot residue. It comes back negative. They look for
Speaker 1: guns weapons on him, they find nothing. By this point,
Speaker 1: they've heard that the person actually did the shooting has
Speaker 1: left the party. But even with all of that, they
Speaker 1: decided let's arrest him, and so they arrested Octavius and
Speaker 1: take him to the police station. They didn't know that
Speaker 1: I was under age. They took me straight to the
Speaker 1: adult jail. I know, I was scared shitless. They didn't
Speaker 1: even ask my age and know that they just straight
Speaker 1: took me to the big house until they realized that
Speaker 1: whenever in my social that I was a juvenile. Then
Speaker 1: I had to sit there for a little bit before
Speaker 1: they transferred back to the juvenile. You know, they had
Speaker 1: you stripped down all this, I mean I was I
Speaker 1: felt volid it. No, I never still negdi in front
Speaker 1: of a man before. I mean, you were still a child,
Speaker 1: just a junior in high school, thrust into a very
Speaker 1: adult situation. And despite the negative GSR test, no weapons
Speaker 1: on you. Hearing that the shooter had already left the party.
Speaker 1: They just went ahead and booked you anyway. And meanwhile,
Speaker 1: the victim, Dennis Cole, was at the hospital. He had
Speaker 1: stabilized by now, and he had seen his shooter. Now,
Speaker 1: at the time Dennis Cole was shot, there's a lot
Speaker 1: of problems that would lead to an unreliable identification. So,
Speaker 1: first of all, there's a gun involved in this crime,
Speaker 1: which we know can distract someone from really looking at
Speaker 1: the perpetrator. We also know it was dark, and perhaps
Speaker 1: most significantly, Dennis Cole had a blood alcohol of point
Speaker 1: to seven at the time that this occurred, and so
Speaker 1: he's more than three times the legal limit. And that's
Speaker 1: the circumstances that he's observing this crime. And so Dennis
Speaker 1: Cole was shot in the chest and the back. You know,
Speaker 1: he survived. He was in the hospital for several months.
Speaker 1: He was paralyzed, but he did survive. And so the
Speaker 1: police get there. He gives this description again. This time
Speaker 1: he adds a little bit more details. So he says,
Speaker 1: you know, black male juvenile. It was one of Arden's sons,
Speaker 1: not the one with the hair. And so Arden had
Speaker 1: several sons. Octavius has a few brothers, so a few
Speaker 1: of them are at the party, and Dennis's family says,
Speaker 1: you know, if he says it's the one not with
Speaker 1: the hair, well, then that's Ricky. That's an Octavius, that's Ricky.
Speaker 1: And by this point the police are starting to get
Speaker 1: calls from people saying Ricky Williams committed this crime. That's
Speaker 1: Octavius's older brother. But they still move forward with putting
Speaker 1: Octavius in a photo array and showing it to Dennis Cole.
Speaker 1: The only person who was at the party who's in
Speaker 1: this array is Octavius, and he's heard the name at
Speaker 1: some point in the background, so he identifies him and
Speaker 1: selects him from the photo ray. Right, so they knew
Speaker 1: that the shooter was somebody at the party. The victim
Speaker 1: had identified the shooter as quote, one of Arden's sons,
Speaker 1: not the one with the hair end quote. According to
Speaker 1: the victim's own family, what that meant was that it
Speaker 1: was octavius older brother, Ricky, who looks a lot like
Speaker 1: Octavius and who was also at the party. If they
Speaker 1: had wanted to make a more reasonable photo ration, they've
Speaker 1: included at least Ricky's photo, or perhaps pictures of other
Speaker 1: people who are at the party. I mean, nonetheless, the
Speaker 1: only person in this photo array that was even at
Speaker 1: the party was Octavious. Now, the image of Octavius is
Speaker 1: Ace was the one that Dennis Cole had gotten fixed
Speaker 1: in his mind as the shooter. At some point several
Speaker 1: months later, they'll give Dennis the photo ray that includes
Speaker 1: Ricky Williams. But at that point he's already picked Dr
Speaker 1: Tavius and committed to that identification. So you know, he
Speaker 1: doesn't make the selection at that point either. Well, many
Speaker 1: people think their minds operate more or less like cameras.
Speaker 1: In fact, that's not even close to the truth. And
Speaker 1: our minds played tricks on us in all kinds of ways.
Speaker 1: But among other things, we will start to tailor our
Speaker 1: memory to match influences that are shown to us or
Speaker 1: suggested to us. And so, you know, here's a guy
Speaker 1: who's been through this horrific experience of being shot twice
Speaker 1: and is now laying in this hospital bed and and
Speaker 1: and his as you said, his blood alcohol level, I mean,
Speaker 1: he was really drunk. So that is the beginning of
Speaker 1: his memory sort of fixing itself onto O. Now the
Speaker 1: police have this identification, and they're really not looking at
Speaker 1: anything else. At that point, they're really not considering other leads.
Speaker 1: At trial, there's multiple people who testified that Ricky was
Speaker 1: the person who was responsible for this shooting. Octavius and
Speaker 1: Ricky's little sister, Jessica, was upstairs in the apartment. You know,
Speaker 1: here's like this fight going on in the backyard. So
Speaker 1: she looks out to see what's going on and she
Speaker 1: sees Ricky back there with a gun. There's another young
Speaker 1: boy upstairs, Reginald Ward, he's fourteen years old. He's actually
Speaker 1: the victim's cousin, and he looks out also and here's
Speaker 1: the fight, and he sees Dennis Cole go up to
Speaker 1: Ricky punch him in the face, and then Ricky shoot him.
Speaker 1: So there are people who are on the scene that
Speaker 1: night who know that Ricky Williams was responsible for this.
Speaker 1: And what we learned looking at the trial was that
Speaker 1: the police actually started to get messages and voice mails
Speaker 1: saying hey, Ricky Williams is the one who committed this crime,
Speaker 1: and they don't go out and talk to him. You know,
Speaker 1: they I think they said Davis's family like, hey, let
Speaker 1: let Ricky know we want to talk to him, but
Speaker 1: they didn't actually go find him, or bring him in
Speaker 1: or try to interrogate him or even interview him. They
Speaker 1: just kind of collected that information but still went forward
Speaker 1: investigating and prosecuting Octavius. How lazy can you be that
Speaker 1: you have multiple people coming forward, tips coming in and
Speaker 1: they can't even be bothered to go and speak to him,
Speaker 1: And at that very moment they should have switched course.
Speaker 1: Octavius should have been freed, Ricky should have been arrested,
Speaker 1: and we should never be making this podcast right now.
Speaker 1: But that's, of course not what happened. Octavious. You were
Speaker 1: charged with attempted murder and several other related defenses. All
Speaker 1: of this must have just I mean, how how were
Speaker 1: you able to process this as a seventeen year old kid.
Speaker 1: You're not even a senior in high school, yet you're
Speaker 1: just a child. I didn't process it until I was
Speaker 1: asked the imprison I understand that being a jail is hard,
Speaker 1: but being a jail innocent, though, and you know that
Speaker 1: you are, is way harder, real hard. There's another sick
Speaker 1: aspect of this that I have to focus on, which
Speaker 1: is the fact that Octavius was tried as an adult
Speaker 1: because he turned a came before the trial began. Now,
Speaker 1: how does that make any freakondifference? Right, he was seventeen
Speaker 1: when it happened. If you were so in theory, they
Speaker 1: could this crime could have happened and he was thirteen.
Speaker 1: They could have held him five years until trial and
Speaker 1: then and we've seen that before too, But it's nut.
Speaker 1: You can't both be a child and an adult at
Speaker 1: the same time. But they managed to try him as
Speaker 1: an adult. Anyway. Now, at trial, the victim testified that
Speaker 1: you were the shooter, Octavius, but multiple other witnesses testified
Speaker 1: under oath that you were upstairs in the apartment when
Speaker 1: the fight and the shooting occurred, and the shooting obviously
Speaker 1: with downstairs, and witnesses who watched the fight from the
Speaker 1: window in the apartment testified that Key shot to victim,
Speaker 1: not you. I didn't know that it was him that
Speaker 1: shot anybody. I didn't know that. It was for sure
Speaker 1: hard to process when I when I realized that what
Speaker 1: people were saying that who it was. So the child
Speaker 1: lasted five days, and the jury had a choice between
Speaker 1: the perspective of all these other witnesses who were directly
Speaker 1: contradicting the victim himself, who had by now convinced himself
Speaker 1: that you were the person that had shot him, and
Speaker 1: off they went to deliberate. I just sat there. And
Speaker 1: the reason that I was cool and I was calm
Speaker 1: is because I had I knew that I had to
Speaker 1: keep my composure no matter what the verdict was. But
Speaker 1: I was angry. I'm just very good at keeping it
Speaker 1: to myself. I'm very good at hot in it. But
Speaker 1: when they came up with that verdict, though, I felt
Speaker 1: like my heart stopped, just just just the beat or two.
Speaker 1: But you know, I got I got my my hair back.
Speaker 1: I never thought that I would be the one to
Speaker 1: be and causer ready as a fresh eighteen in there.
Speaker 1: Uh you know, I had to take the scenery in
Speaker 1: and had to get used to me being around a
Speaker 1: lot of older people, a lot of killers, a lot
Speaker 1: of rapists in all this that I'm not used to,
Speaker 1: you know, So I had to adapt to my surroundings.
Speaker 1: And it was kind of hard, you know, because of
Speaker 1: the unexpected fights and stuff like that. Like you know,
Speaker 1: you're seeing movies and things like that, it's not how
Speaker 1: it is, and movies, you know, this really pop off
Speaker 1: like nowhere. So from what I understand, not long after
Speaker 1: your trial concluded, your brother came forward and actually confessed
Speaker 1: to shooting Mr Cole. I believe he even made a
Speaker 1: written statement where he said, and I quote. Shortly after
Speaker 1: the party ended, an argument occurred outside the apartment complex
Speaker 1: between my father, Ardent Terry, and Larry Johnson. They had
Speaker 1: a few words back and forth, but once the argument
Speaker 1: reached the back of the apartment, I was right in
Speaker 1: front of the back door, and all of a sudden,
Speaker 1: Larry Johnson started shooting towards me and my father's direction.
Speaker 1: And shortly after, Dennis Cole ran at me and punched
Speaker 1: me in the eye, and I pulled out my gun
Speaker 1: and shot him out of fear for me and my
Speaker 1: family's lives because shots were being fired at us first.
Speaker 1: And quote, Wow, that's a pretty detailed confession. And this
Speaker 1: all happened within a month or so of your trial,
Speaker 1: while you were being processed into Toledo Correctional where you'd
Speaker 1: spend a long stretch. So when you heard about this confession, like,
Speaker 1: I can't even imagine, like, what was your reaction? I was,
Speaker 1: I was, oh man, and I didn't know anything about it.
Speaker 1: Oh man, I was, I was pissed, like I was
Speaker 1: really I was really pissed like Peru, because if the
Speaker 1: people would have done what this we're supposed to do,
Speaker 1: then maybe that would have made it, all of it.
Speaker 1: It's a little correctional inscision. Oh yeah, I was. I was.
Speaker 1: I was for sure that was that was passed. I
Speaker 1: was angry with you that all of this could have
Speaker 1: been avoided. Did you have an attorney at that time,
Speaker 1: and if so, I imagine you were on the phone
Speaker 1: with with him or her in seconds, going hey, get
Speaker 1: me out of here. This is right. I tried. I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna say that in reply to my messages or whatnot,
Speaker 1: but it took weeks for me to get something back
Speaker 1: from them, you know, when they have all of this
Speaker 1: in the front of them. Yeah, that sly seems like
Speaker 1: one of these situations where the doors should just swing
Speaker 1: open and you should come running out into the sunshine.
Speaker 1: But of course that's not the way it works. Joanna,
Speaker 1: how did you get involved? And this must have blown
Speaker 1: your mind when you heard that there was this detailed
Speaker 1: confession as well as all this other evidence pointing to
Speaker 1: actual innocence. Octiv is applied to our project. I think
Speaker 1: around two thousand and twelve, and so we had a
Speaker 1: couple of students assigned to it and they started looking
Speaker 1: into it, and you know right away there's red aggs
Speaker 1: for us. So the first is that the only evidence
Speaker 1: that implicates him is this eyewitness identification, that it's just
Speaker 1: plagued with problems. And then there's no physical evidence, and
Speaker 1: we've got these witnesses at trial who are saying Ricky
Speaker 1: Williams did the crime. So we started investigating, and the
Speaker 1: focus of our investigation was really too confirm some of
Speaker 1: the things that happened at trial. To go out and
Speaker 1: talk to Reginald Ward and Schifond to English and Jessicatian say,
Speaker 1: you know, is what you testified to it trial true?
Speaker 1: And then we wanted to consult with an eyewitness identification
Speaker 1: expert and make sure that what we thought we were
Speaker 1: seeing about the identification that we were correct and that
Speaker 1: there were all these problems, right, these are all the
Speaker 1: issues that could have and should have already been known
Speaker 1: at the time of trial. But then there's this confession
Speaker 1: from Ricky Williams. We actually went and talked to Ricky.
Speaker 1: We sent out an investigator before we had ever seen
Speaker 1: the affidavit that he had already signed, and so our
Speaker 1: investigator goes to talk to Ricky, and Ricky immediately starts
Speaker 1: talking about that night and says, hey, I committed this crime.
Speaker 1: And so he signs an affidavit right there in front
Speaker 1: of our investigator, going through everything that happened that night,
Speaker 1: which matches up exactly with what the witnesses said, which
Speaker 1: is that there was this fight and Dennis Cole punched
Speaker 1: Ricky and Ricky shot him. And so once we got
Speaker 1: that confession, yeah, of course we thought we had it
Speaker 1: locked up. This is this is as clear evidence as
Speaker 1: we could get that Octavius has been telling us the
Speaker 1: truth this whole time. He didn't commit this crime, and
Speaker 1: we thought that it was clear he was innocent and
Speaker 1: that he should be released. But of course the wheels
Speaker 1: of justice turned quickly when we're processing somebody into the system,
Speaker 1: but when we're trying to right those wrongs, they turned
Speaker 1: at his nail's pace. And this is a dramatic example
Speaker 1: of it, because even in a case like this, where
Speaker 1: it couldn't be more obvious and had I'm going to say,
Speaker 1: if the police had done their jobs in the first place,
Speaker 1: if they had just gotten interviewed Ricky. They probably would
Speaker 1: have seen a bruise if he was punched in the eye.
Speaker 1: Granted they couldn't have gotten maybe the gunshot residue, because
Speaker 1: if they couldn't have found him that night, it would
Speaker 1: have been washed away. But this would have been a
Speaker 1: very simple case to solve, had people been interested in
Speaker 1: really solving it as opposed to just putting a black
Speaker 1: body behind bars. So it was submitted for review by
Speaker 1: the Conviction Integrity Unit of the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's Office,
Speaker 1: and they, as I understand it, conducted an extensive investigation.
Speaker 1: So around the time that we had collected all of
Speaker 1: the evidence in this case, michael'malley had come into office,
Speaker 1: and part of his campaign had been to take this
Speaker 1: Conviction Integrity Unit and really put some resources behind it
Speaker 1: and make it a legitimate unit. So that's why we
Speaker 1: submitted Octavius case. In our mind, it was like, this
Speaker 1: is clear as day. Let's show them the evidence and
Speaker 1: try to work together. And as you said, for two
Speaker 1: and a half years they investigated this case. They talked
Speaker 1: to all sorts of witnesses, they tested evidence, We let
Speaker 1: them look at the defense files, they talked to Octavius,
Speaker 1: and in fact, a prosecutor and I actually went out
Speaker 1: and interviewed Ricky Williams together, and Ricky confessed on tape
Speaker 1: to a prosecutor. And after wrapping up what they say,
Speaker 1: we're several years of investigative work on the story behind
Speaker 1: octavius conviction. The see i use Internal Review Board cast
Speaker 1: a majority vote in favor of what the criminal justice
Speaker 1: system calls and our audience is very familiar with those
Speaker 1: words exoneration and actual innocence. The see i use Independent
Speaker 1: Review Panel concurred with it. Get this a unanimous vote.
Speaker 1: They said that Octavius Williams was innocent of this crime.
Speaker 1: There two panels, one internal, one made of community members,
Speaker 1: as you said, voted in favor of exoneration. And so
Speaker 1: once we heard that news, were of course elated. We
Speaker 1: think this is that we think Octavius is coming home
Speaker 1: help be exonerated. And then we learned that the elected prosecutor,
Speaker 1: Michael O'Malley wouldn't agree to exoneration. So rather than letting
Speaker 1: activa Is out and agreeing to move the court to
Speaker 1: dismiss the charges, he agreed to let him out, but
Speaker 1: not to clear the case. And so in Ohio. That's
Speaker 1: called judicial release. So in December of two, nineteen, Octavius
Speaker 1: gets to go home after serving about ten eleven years
Speaker 1: in prison, but still has this attempted murder charge hanging
Speaker 1: over his head. It's nuts the fact that he went
Speaker 1: against the unanimous recommendation of his own unit that he
Speaker 1: had so highly touted during his campaign. I can't even
Speaker 1: begin to speculate what his motives are. There's a quote
Speaker 1: where he said, what is justice in this case? I
Speaker 1: think in this particular case, we did the best we could.
Speaker 1: I think we did what was right end quote. What
Speaker 1: in the world is he talking about? And what would
Speaker 1: he possibly have been motivated by to still want to
Speaker 1: deny justice and what is probably one of the easiest
Speaker 1: exoneration cases he's ever going to see. Nonetheless, on December Octavis,
Speaker 1: you were free to go, but you weren't declared innocent.
Speaker 1: So this must have been as joyous as it must
Speaker 1: have been to finally walk out into the free air.
Speaker 1: Must have been bitter sweet. No, yeah, it was. It
Speaker 1: was to know that I was at home. It was
Speaker 1: more sweet than bitter, though, you know, because I was
Speaker 1: actually outside of that place. Again. You know what I'm saying,
Speaker 1: and then as I said it realized I still have
Speaker 1: the same thing had on my head. So not that
Speaker 1: messages with my future job wise, I can't get a
Speaker 1: good job with the top one Fetterly, you have to
Speaker 1: really put your neck out there. I hope that it
Speaker 1: don't get cut off a note for you to make
Speaker 1: his meet. The fact that they made you wear an
Speaker 1: ankle monitor and I have a thirty day curfew and
Speaker 1: two years on probation is really rubbing salt in the wound.
Speaker 1: And I think it's insulting not just to you, but
Speaker 1: to the public um and to the members of the
Speaker 1: board who you know, who carefully considered this case, to
Speaker 1: the people who worked two and a half years to
Speaker 1: investigate this case. It's yeah, it's an it's all to
Speaker 1: all of those people and to everyone who cares about
Speaker 1: justice that they would double down, so to speak, on
Speaker 1: this wrongful conviction. And one other thing that's happened recently,
Speaker 1: this just occurred in November of last year, is that
Speaker 1: all of the community members of the Conviction Integrity Unit resigned.
Speaker 1: And they resigned because for the past couple of years
Speaker 1: they hadn't been given any cases and because they had
Speaker 1: met with the prosecutor and talked about what they wanted
Speaker 1: their role to be, and they believed in the mission
Speaker 1: of the Conviction Directory Unit and wanted to be able
Speaker 1: to use that unit to achieve justice for people and
Speaker 1: didn't feel that they were being given the opportunity to
Speaker 1: do that. And and so they resigned. And there's no
Speaker 1: longer any community members of the unit at this point. Wow,
Speaker 1: that's powerful statement. I can send you their resignation letter
Speaker 1: which has you know, all the reasons why they resigned. Yeah,
Speaker 1: everyone be on the lookout for that on our Instagram.
Speaker 1: I mean, how in the world could the community members
Speaker 1: of the Cuyahoga County ce IU not be given any
Speaker 1: cases at all to review for years, just not even
Speaker 1: given them at all to even review. From what we
Speaker 1: know about that town, there should be somewhere between a
Speaker 1: steady flow and an avalanche of cases, because it's about
Speaker 1: as corrupt as it gets. So we for a full
Speaker 1: exoneration in octavious case. And maybe this episode will serve
Speaker 1: to shine some light on the Cuyahoga CiU and the
Speaker 1: wishes of those community members. We'd hate to think that
Speaker 1: the CiU over there is just a bunch of window dressing,
Speaker 1: something to be talked about around election time. Let's go
Speaker 1: ahead and hold Michael Maalley accountable. And speaking of accountability,
Speaker 1: I'm guessing that the decision to leave this conviction hanging
Speaker 1: over Octavius head means that they never went after Ricky.
Speaker 1: Is that accurate? That's right? So Ricky has never been
Speaker 1: charged with this offense. He's incarcerated for another offense, so
Speaker 1: shooting that occurred about a year after the events that
Speaker 1: gave rise to this case. But this is a person
Speaker 1: who's confessed over and over that he shot an individual
Speaker 1: on October thirty one, two thousand ten, and he's never
Speaker 1: been charged with that crime. I can't even begin to
Speaker 1: imagine what the hell anybody's thinking. I mean, if they
Speaker 1: were prosecuting Ricky, they certainly would use these confessions as
Speaker 1: proof to get their conviction. I mean, it's the most
Speaker 1: compelling evidence that he committed this crime. But when we're
Speaker 1: talking about using it to exonerate Octavious, it's not good enough.
Speaker 1: Of course, It's an infamous double standard that we see
Speaker 1: over and over again all through our criminal legal system.
Speaker 1: So where are we at in that fight? He's free,
Speaker 1: But that doesn't mean you guys are just gonna give
Speaker 1: up on his full exoneration. After Octavius was released, we
Speaker 1: still went ahead and filed emotion seeking a new trial,
Speaker 1: And the basis of that was the fact that Ricky
Speaker 1: has confessed all of these times and the report of
Speaker 1: an Eyewinness identification expert really talking about the problems with
Speaker 1: Dennis Cole's identification. So we filed that at the beginning
Speaker 1: of Then the pandemic hits, so things really slowed down
Speaker 1: in the courts for quite a long time, and eventually
Speaker 1: last May we had hearing on the motion, and so
Speaker 1: right now we're waiting on a decision on that's been
Speaker 1: pending for about seven months. But if that's granted, the
Speaker 1: impact of that will be that octavius conviction will be vacated.
Speaker 1: And at that point, if if we do achieve that,
Speaker 1: we hope that Michaelmalley will dismiss the charges and that
Speaker 1: help be exonerated. Well, let's hope that we don't see
Speaker 1: a judge willing to ignore this clear case of innocence,
Speaker 1: as Mr O'Malley seems so comfortable in doing before him. Now,
Speaker 1: in the meantime, with this conviction still hanging over your head.
Speaker 1: I know it's been tough looking for work. You don't
Speaker 1: have a go fund me or anything like that, but
Speaker 1: I'm sure there are members of our audience would like
Speaker 1: to help in your job search. I mean, I hope. So,
Speaker 1: if there's somebody in the area that's got something, what
Speaker 1: kind of work are you looking for. I'm been looking
Speaker 1: for demolition. I'm looking for factory jobs. You know, I've
Speaker 1: just got my tullowder license. You know. Also, that's basically
Speaker 1: what I'm looking for. You still live in the Cleveland area, Yeah,
Speaker 1: all right, So construction and factory type work in the
Speaker 1: Cleveland area will have ways that our audience can reach
Speaker 1: out to you just by simply going to the link
Speaker 1: in our bio. So if you're somebody who's got an idea,
Speaker 1: don't stop listening right now, put it on pause, and
Speaker 1: go right to the link in the bio and and
Speaker 1: reach out. And also, if anyone with a law degree
Speaker 1: or some clout in the Cleveland area who wants to
Speaker 1: offer their help in bringing about Octavius is full exoneration,
Speaker 1: please do reach out as well. And with that we
Speaker 1: come to my favorite part of the show, of course,
Speaker 1: it's called closing arguments, and it works like this. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna turn my microphone off, leave my headphones on, of course,
Speaker 1: kick back in my chair, and close my eyes and
Speaker 1: just listen to any other thoughts you want to share
Speaker 1: with me and our amazing audience. Joanna, let's start with you,
Speaker 1: and then of course we'll have Octavio's close out the show.
Speaker 1: Thank you for having us today and for sharing this story.
Speaker 1: I think Octavius's case is a really sad example of
Speaker 1: how hard it can be for the wrongfully convicted to
Speaker 1: obtain relief and to get justice. As we talked about today,
Speaker 1: his case is really straightforward. We know who did it.
Speaker 1: We've got multiple confessions from Key, we've got the conviction
Speaker 1: Integrity Unit saying he should be exonerated, and still here
Speaker 1: he sits with this hanging over his head. It's sad,
Speaker 1: it's discouraging. It's the role of a prosecutor to seek justice,
Speaker 1: not to maintain convictions, and that's not what happened here.
Speaker 1: But we're thankful for the opportunity to shina light on
Speaker 1: octivius case, and we're still fighting. You know. We filed
Speaker 1: a motion for new trial after he got out, and
Speaker 1: that's still pending. We're waiting for a decision on that,
Speaker 1: so that hopefully in the in the coming months and years,
Speaker 1: Octavius can move forward with his life and nothing will
Speaker 1: ever make him home, nothing will ever give him those
Speaker 1: ten years back or change what happened to him. But
Speaker 1: while he's home, he hasn't gotten the true justice he deserves,
Speaker 1: and our hope is that one day we can't accomplish
Speaker 1: that for him. Yeah, man, how can you say that
Speaker 1: you will free someone if you still have something hanging
Speaker 1: over someone's head. How was that necessarily free? It's not free.
Speaker 1: Send me Labory. You took me out of one hail
Speaker 1: whole to make me feel that I'm free, But at
Speaker 1: the same time, I'm not. A lot of it still
Speaker 1: hurts to this day. Sometimes I don't speak about it,
Speaker 1: you know what I'm saying, because I'm a type of person.
Speaker 1: You know how a man is to keep it to
Speaker 1: themselves and try to deal with it theirself. That's just me.
Speaker 1: Sometimes I have a hard time. Sometimes I don't mental
Speaker 1: state wise. You know, some people, I might look normal
Speaker 1: all this and on the outside, but you know, it's
Speaker 1: a lot going on in my in my mind because
Speaker 1: I can't get out there. It's and everywhere I turned
Speaker 1: I could hear and see something that reminds me of it.
Speaker 1: The other day, I went to the mall with my
Speaker 1: girl and we went there and I started getting anxious
Speaker 1: because it was a lot of people in there, and
Speaker 1: my hands started sweating. I started. I didn't know that
Speaker 1: they still had that type of effect on me. This
Speaker 1: was years later. It's not easy for the ones that
Speaker 1: I've been there and constrated for a long time to
Speaker 1: just adapt to what's going on. I'm still adapting. Um,
Speaker 1: It's it's hard. I know that for sure. Sometimes you
Speaker 1: have your mom is where you're you're happy, you're things
Speaker 1: feel easy or would not just set the But a
Speaker 1: lot of times it's just you don't know really what's
Speaker 1: going on. You're just You're just in the world, just
Speaker 1: the piece on the chessboard, wait for your move. Thank
Speaker 1: you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. I'd like to thank
Speaker 1: our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Clyburne, and Kevin Ortis.
Speaker 1: With research by Lila Robinson. The music in this production
Speaker 1: was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
Speaker 1: Be sure to follow us on Instagram. At Wrongful Conviction,
Speaker 1: on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction podcast, and on Twitter at
Speaker 1: wrong Conviction, as well as at Lava for Good. On
Speaker 1: all three platforms, you can also follow me on both
Speaker 1: TikTok and Instagram at it's Jason flom ronvul Conviction is
Speaker 1: a production of Lava for Good Podcasts and association with
Speaker 1: Signal Company Number one