WEBVTT - #326 Jason Flom with Octavius Williams 0:00:02.200 --> 0:00:04.840 In the fall of twenty ten, a Cleveland high school 0:00:04.880 --> 0:00:08.400 basketball phenom named Octavius Williams had just begun his junior 0:00:08.480 --> 0:00:12.119 year when his younger sister turned ten. Their father and 0:00:12.200 --> 0:00:14.720 his father's girlfriend threw a big party at their apartment 0:00:14.800 --> 0:00:19.840 to celebrate on Halloween, bringing their blended family together. As 0:00:19.960 --> 0:00:22.600 day turned into night, the children's party turned into an 0:00:22.600 --> 0:00:25.600 adult party, and as things wound down, a fight began 0:00:25.680 --> 0:00:29.800 outside between members of either family. Two people drew guns, 0:00:29.880 --> 0:00:32.880 and one man, Dennis Cole, ended up in the hospital 0:00:33.159 --> 0:00:36.600 paralyzed from the waist down. Police were told that the 0:00:36.600 --> 0:00:39.000 shooter was a young black man who had already fled 0:00:39.000 --> 0:00:39.680 the scene. 0:00:40.360 --> 0:00:40.920 When they went. 0:00:40.880 --> 0:00:43.680 Upstairs to speak with the partygoers in the apartment, they 0:00:43.760 --> 0:00:47.480 found and arrested a young black man, seventeen year old 0:00:47.560 --> 0:00:52.800 Octavius Williams. The victim eventually stabilized and identified Octavius from 0:00:52.800 --> 0:00:57.200 a photo array. Despite conflicting accounts of what happened during 0:00:57.240 --> 0:01:00.440 the shooting, it appears the state had cleared they got 0:01:00.440 --> 0:01:18.800 there man. But this is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to 0:01:18.840 --> 0:01:23.640 wrongful conviction. Today's story. Well, I'll just say Shakespeare could 0:01:23.680 --> 0:01:27.360 have written this one, and it would rank up there 0:01:27.360 --> 0:01:29.560 with some of the crazy plot twists and some of 0:01:29.600 --> 0:01:32.399 his best work. And you're going to find out why 0:01:32.720 --> 0:01:37.400 as we go along in today's episode. And without further ado, 0:01:37.680 --> 0:01:40.959 I want to introduce our guests, who have two guests today, 0:01:41.200 --> 0:01:45.520 the man himself who lived through this absolutely bizarre and 0:01:45.600 --> 0:01:51.760 insane sequence of events, Octavius Williams. Octavius, I'm happier here, 0:01:51.760 --> 0:01:54.720 but I'm sorry if you're here because of what happened 0:01:54.720 --> 0:01:56.880 to you that brought you to this point. But anyway, 0:01:56.920 --> 0:01:58.120 welcome to Wrongful Conviction. 0:01:58.320 --> 0:02:00.360 It's a pleasure to be here, for sure. Thank you 0:02:00.360 --> 0:02:00.960 for having me. 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:04.880 With Octavius is Joanna Sanchez. And Joanna is the director 0:02:04.880 --> 0:02:07.120 of the Wrongful Conviction Project at the office of the 0:02:07.160 --> 0:02:09.880 Ohio Public Defender. So I imagine, Joanna, you have your 0:02:09.880 --> 0:02:13.000 hands full and I'm glad that you are here to 0:02:13.080 --> 0:02:16.440 share with us about this incredible story. So welcome to 0:02:16.480 --> 0:02:20.160 the show. Thanks so much for having us and this story. 0:02:20.200 --> 0:02:22.880 This is a relatively recent case compared to some of 0:02:22.919 --> 0:02:25.639 the cases. Listen, we have cases back from the seventies, 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:29.040 but this one, this one happened just I mean, it's 0:02:29.040 --> 0:02:30.440 a short time ago. It's also a long time we 0:02:30.520 --> 0:02:33.440 go twenty eleven. Of course, this is Cuyahoga County and 0:02:33.480 --> 0:02:36.040 we've heard that name again and again on this podcast. 0:02:36.080 --> 0:02:40.440 That's sort of a hotbed of wrongful convictions. And I 0:02:40.480 --> 0:02:44.160 want to go back Octavius to before this horrible night 0:02:44.320 --> 0:02:47.080 where what started off as sounds like a joyous occasion 0:02:47.160 --> 0:02:52.800 turned into this tragedy left some body paralyzed and put 0:02:52.840 --> 0:02:56.280 your life on paralysis. Really, I mean, it's an awful 0:02:56.320 --> 0:03:00.520 scenario all the way around. But your life before that 0:03:00.760 --> 0:03:03.160 was full of promise. Tell us a little bit about 0:03:03.160 --> 0:03:06.560 the family dynamic and what was your life like growing up? 0:03:06.560 --> 0:03:07.920 What were you into. 0:03:07.800 --> 0:03:09.840 On my life, he was said, like a regular life. 0:03:09.919 --> 0:03:12.280 Like you know, my parents wise, everything was cool, even 0:03:12.320 --> 0:03:14.280 though they was divorced. If we was living on the 0:03:14.320 --> 0:03:16.360 West side, my dad was doing the West side. It 0:03:16.440 --> 0:03:18.160 was just we was always close, you know, so it 0:03:18.240 --> 0:03:21.520 was never a split time in between that we didn't 0:03:21.560 --> 0:03:22.079 see each other. 0:03:22.680 --> 0:03:24.880 Like I said, everything was cool. It was two households. 0:03:24.919 --> 0:03:26.320 I always used to go to my dad house a 0:03:26.320 --> 0:03:28.480 lot because we had a different bond than me and 0:03:28.560 --> 0:03:30.640 my mom. Other than that, they decided to send me 0:03:30.639 --> 0:03:32.800 to my own school because I guess they seen that 0:03:32.840 --> 0:03:35.760 I had a different potential than my other siblings. 0:03:35.880 --> 0:03:39.360 I understand you were like a super talented basketball player. 0:03:39.400 --> 0:03:42.240 Is that right? Yeah? And still is, But like that 0:03:42.400 --> 0:03:43.280 was my passion. 0:03:43.320 --> 0:03:46.560 Anybody in my family tell I was a golden ticket. 0:03:46.640 --> 0:03:47.360 Let them tell it. 0:03:47.520 --> 0:03:51.600 Before I was incarcerated, I was attending this school called 0:03:51.600 --> 0:03:54.000 Margaret Island is on Chester. They gave me a shot 0:03:54.040 --> 0:03:55.800 to be on their team, and I took it. Didn't 0:03:55.800 --> 0:03:57.920 though I was at good, you know, but you know, 0:03:58.120 --> 0:04:01.480 just enough to be scouted, you know when and out 0:04:01.480 --> 0:04:04.320 of nowhere, it just taken away, you know. 0:04:05.200 --> 0:04:07.160 So you were you were in eleventh grade when this 0:04:07.400 --> 0:04:10.560 when this, uh yeah, when it heard, Well, you were 0:04:10.600 --> 0:04:12.760 coming up in your reputation. I mean, if it's reached 0:04:12.800 --> 0:04:15.600 all the way up to New York on twenty twenty three, 0:04:16.080 --> 0:04:19.480 there must have been some excitement around your potential. So 0:04:19.600 --> 0:04:22.160 tell us a little bit about what happened that night. 0:04:22.600 --> 0:04:23.880 How did you end up at this party? 0:04:24.000 --> 0:04:24.159 Was it? 0:04:24.240 --> 0:04:25.400 Whose house was it at? 0:04:25.560 --> 0:04:29.599 My dad was Ardentary and his girlfriend Consula. They threw 0:04:29.600 --> 0:04:32.160 a party from my little sister. It was her birthday, 0:04:32.200 --> 0:04:35.039 like literally like about your birthday, but we threw it 0:04:35.080 --> 0:04:38.560 on Halloween. She was turning seeing. Somehow, some way it 0:04:39.000 --> 0:04:42.400 ended up an adult party at nighttime. Every brought everybody 0:04:42.440 --> 0:04:45.640 together like everything was cool, everything was cordial. You know, 0:04:45.680 --> 0:04:48.120 everybody was having a good time. You know, there was 0:04:48.160 --> 0:04:52.320 never no problems between the families, you know what I'm saying. 0:04:52.320 --> 0:04:54.599 But some way, somehow, out of nowhere, at the end 0:04:54.600 --> 0:04:57.359 of the party, as things were settling down, all the 0:04:57.360 --> 0:04:58.840 altercation and stuff start happening. 0:04:59.040 --> 0:05:02.599 Yeah, this started at a Halloween party in twenty ten. 0:05:02.960 --> 0:05:08.040 So Octavius's dad, Arden, and Arden's girlfriend Kenzuela were hosting 0:05:08.040 --> 0:05:10.279 a party at their house. They had about thirty to 0:05:10.360 --> 0:05:13.680 forty family members there and as the party starts to 0:05:13.720 --> 0:05:17.200 wind down, going to about midnight, a bit of a 0:05:17.240 --> 0:05:20.400 conflict erupts and so no one really knows like why 0:05:20.440 --> 0:05:23.080 the fight started. It's a verbal fight kind of. The 0:05:23.120 --> 0:05:25.240 two sides of the family are arguing a bit. At 0:05:25.279 --> 0:05:28.400 that point, Octavius and his dad and some others are 0:05:28.520 --> 0:05:31.640 upstairs in their apartment and this is happening down in 0:05:31.640 --> 0:05:36.440 the backyard behind the apartment. So Octavius's dad goes downstairs 0:05:36.600 --> 0:05:39.560 the backyard. He confronts one of the men, Larry, who's 0:05:39.640 --> 0:05:43.480 kind of causing some of the problems, and Larry shoots 0:05:43.480 --> 0:05:47.320 a gun and he starts shooting towards Arden, so Arden 0:05:47.680 --> 0:05:51.640 ducks down. There's guns firing, and then when the shooting stops, 0:05:51.880 --> 0:05:56.039 a man named Dennis Cole, who was Consuela's cousin, and 0:05:56.080 --> 0:06:00.280 her other cousin, Cedric Johnson, are both shot and Dennis 0:06:00.279 --> 0:06:02.400 been shot in the chest in the back, and the 0:06:02.440 --> 0:06:05.160 police come and they say, you know who shot you 0:06:05.279 --> 0:06:09.800 and he can't say at that time more than juvenile blackmail. 0:06:10.440 --> 0:06:12.279 And you know, there's quite a few people at the 0:06:12.279 --> 0:06:15.839 party that match that description, but some of the other 0:06:15.880 --> 0:06:17.920 individuals who had been at the party by the point 0:06:17.960 --> 0:06:20.920 the police get there, they've already left. And so at 0:06:20.960 --> 0:06:23.159 that point there's a lot of people out there just 0:06:23.240 --> 0:06:25.960 yelling names and saying, you know, was it this person 0:06:26.080 --> 0:06:27.839 was at that person? And so the police at some 0:06:27.920 --> 0:06:31.320 point hear in the name Tate, and that's Octavius's nickname, 0:06:31.960 --> 0:06:34.640 and so I think that sets them on the path 0:06:34.720 --> 0:06:39.000 toward Octavius. The police they go upstairs and Octavius is 0:06:39.080 --> 0:06:41.599 upstairs in the apartment. He's in the bedroom with a 0:06:41.600 --> 0:06:44.400 bunch of the kids who are there, and they're like, hey, 0:06:44.560 --> 0:06:47.400 this guy matches the description in the sense that he's 0:06:47.760 --> 0:06:50.240 a seventeen year old black kid, and so they test 0:06:50.320 --> 0:06:54.520 him for gunshot residue. It comes back negative. They look 0:06:54.600 --> 0:06:58.520 for guns weapons on him, they find nothing. By this point, 0:06:58.640 --> 0:07:00.960 they've heard that the person actually did the shooting has 0:07:01.000 --> 0:07:03.920 left the party. But even with all of that, they decide, 0:07:04.200 --> 0:07:07.280 let's arrest him, and so they arrested Octavius and take 0:07:07.360 --> 0:07:08.200 him to the police station. 0:07:08.680 --> 0:07:10.960 They didn't know that I was underage. They took me 0:07:11.000 --> 0:07:14.800 straight to the adult jail. I know, I was scared shitless. 0:07:15.320 --> 0:07:16.840 They didn't even ask my age and none of that. 0:07:16.880 --> 0:07:20.840 They just straight took me to the big house until 0:07:20.840 --> 0:07:23.360 they realized that when they read my social that I 0:07:23.440 --> 0:07:27.240 was a juvenile. Then I had to sit there for 0:07:27.280 --> 0:07:29.960 a little bit before they transferred me back to the 0:07:30.000 --> 0:07:32.560 juvenile You know, they had you stripped down all this. 0:07:33.320 --> 0:07:36.200 I mean I felt violidd no lie, I never stood 0:07:36.280 --> 0:07:37.560 negad in front of a man before. 0:07:38.320 --> 0:07:41.280 I mean, you were still a child, just a junior 0:07:41.280 --> 0:07:45.360 in high school, thrust into a very adult situation. And 0:07:45.400 --> 0:07:48.960 despite the negative GSR test no weapons on you, hearing 0:07:49.000 --> 0:07:51.280 that the shooter had already left the party, they just 0:07:51.320 --> 0:07:54.680 went ahead and booked you anyway, And meanwhile, the victim, 0:07:54.720 --> 0:07:58.240 Dennis Cole, was at the hospital. He had stabilized by now, 0:07:58.280 --> 0:07:59.920 and he had seen his shooter. 0:08:00.400 --> 0:08:03.120 Now, at the time Dennis Cole was shot, there's a 0:08:03.120 --> 0:08:07.720 lot of problems that would lead to an unreliable identification. So, 0:08:07.840 --> 0:08:09.880 first of all, there's a gun involved in this crime, 0:08:10.040 --> 0:08:13.480 which we know can distract someone from really looking at 0:08:13.480 --> 0:08:17.440 the perpetrator. We also know it was dark, and perhaps 0:08:17.480 --> 0:08:20.960 most significantly, Dennis Cole had a blood alcohol of point 0:08:20.960 --> 0:08:23.320 two seven at the time that this occurred, and so 0:08:23.400 --> 0:08:26.320 he's more than three times the legal limit. And that's 0:08:26.440 --> 0:08:30.000 the circumstances that he's observing this crime in. So Dennis 0:08:30.040 --> 0:08:32.720 Cole was shot in the chest, in the back. You know, 0:08:32.840 --> 0:08:35.199 he survived. He was in the hospital for several months. 0:08:35.200 --> 0:08:37.360 He was paralyzed, but he did survive. And so the 0:08:37.400 --> 0:08:40.680 police get there. He gives this description again. This time 0:08:40.720 --> 0:08:42.679 he adds a little bit more detail. So he says, 0:08:42.720 --> 0:08:45.720 you know, blackmail juvenile. It was one of Arden's sons, 0:08:46.000 --> 0:08:48.400 not the one with the hair. And so Arden had 0:08:48.400 --> 0:08:51.000 several sons. Octavius has a few brothers, so a few 0:08:51.080 --> 0:08:53.800 of them are at the party and Dennis's family says, 0:08:53.880 --> 0:08:55.200 you know, if he says it's the one not with 0:08:55.240 --> 0:08:58.120 the hair, well, then that's Ricky. That's not Octavius, that's Ricky. 0:08:58.800 --> 0:09:00.680 And by this point the police are starting to get 0:09:00.679 --> 0:09:03.679 calls from people saying, Ricky Williams committed this crime. That's 0:09:03.679 --> 0:09:08.200 Octavius's older brother. But they still move forward with putting 0:09:08.720 --> 0:09:11.960 Octavius in a photo array and showing it to Dennis Cole. 0:09:12.440 --> 0:09:14.480 The only person who is at the party who's in 0:09:14.520 --> 0:09:17.320 this array is Octavius, and he's heard the name Tate 0:09:17.400 --> 0:09:20.480 at some point in the background, so he identifies him 0:09:20.960 --> 0:09:22.560 and selects him from the photo array. 0:09:23.000 --> 0:09:25.480 Right, so they knew that the shooter was somebody at 0:09:25.480 --> 0:09:28.760 the party. The victim had identified the shooter as quote, 0:09:28.800 --> 0:09:31.920 one of Arden's sons, not the one with the hair 0:09:32.520 --> 0:09:35.320 end quote. According to the victim's own family, what that 0:09:35.400 --> 0:09:38.680 meant was that it was Octavius's older brother, Ricky, who 0:09:38.720 --> 0:09:42.120 looks a lot like Octavius and who was also at 0:09:42.120 --> 0:09:44.679 the party. If they had wanted to make a more 0:09:44.720 --> 0:09:48.360 reasonable photo array, shouldn't they have included at least Ricky's photo, 0:09:48.600 --> 0:09:50.959 or perhaps pictures of other people who were at the party. 0:09:51.240 --> 0:09:54.360 I mean, nonetheless, the only person in this photo array 0:09:54.400 --> 0:09:58.600 that was even at the party was Octavius. Now, the 0:09:58.640 --> 0:10:03.040 image of Octavius's was the one that Dennis Cole had 0:10:03.080 --> 0:10:05.320 gotten fixed in his mind as the shooter. 0:10:05.960 --> 0:10:08.559 At some point several months later, they'll give Dennis a 0:10:08.600 --> 0:10:11.959 photo array that includes Ricky Williams, But at that point 0:10:11.960 --> 0:10:15.680 he's already picked Octaves and committed to that identification. So 0:10:16.400 --> 0:10:18.720 you know, he doesn't make the selection at that point either. 0:10:19.600 --> 0:10:23.240 Well, many people think their minds operate more or less 0:10:23.280 --> 0:10:26.960 like cameras. In fact, that's not even close to the truth. 0:10:27.160 --> 0:10:30.080 And our minds played tricks on us in all kinds 0:10:30.080 --> 0:10:33.960 of ways. But among other things, we will start to 0:10:34.120 --> 0:10:38.360 tailor our memory to match influences that are shown to 0:10:38.480 --> 0:10:42.160 us or suggested to us. And so, you know, here's 0:10:42.160 --> 0:10:44.880 a guy who's been through this horrific experience of being 0:10:44.880 --> 0:10:48.320 shot twice and is now laying in this hospital bed 0:10:48.320 --> 0:10:51.080 and his as you said, his blood alcohol level, I mean, 0:10:51.120 --> 0:10:55.720 he was really drunk. So that is the beginning of 0:10:55.760 --> 0:11:01.680 his memory sort of fixing itself onto Now. 0:11:01.480 --> 0:11:06.080 The police had this identification, and they're really not looking 0:11:06.120 --> 0:11:08.640 at anything else at that point. They're really not considering 0:11:08.679 --> 0:11:12.560 other leads. At trial, there's multiple people who testified that 0:11:12.679 --> 0:11:16.400 Ricky was the person who was responsible for this shooting Octavius. 0:11:16.480 --> 0:11:19.680 And Ricky's little sister, Jessica, was upstairs in the apartment. 0:11:19.800 --> 0:11:22.319 You know, here's like this fight going on in the backyard, 0:11:22.360 --> 0:11:24.640 so she looks out to see what's going on and 0:11:24.679 --> 0:11:27.840 she sees Ricky back there with a gun. There's another 0:11:27.960 --> 0:11:31.600 young boy upstairs, Reginald Ward, he's fourteen years old. He's 0:11:31.640 --> 0:11:35.160 actually the victim's cousin, and he looks out also and 0:11:35.240 --> 0:11:38.960 here's the fight, and he sees Dennis Cole go up 0:11:38.960 --> 0:11:41.280 to Ricky punch him in the face, and then Ricky 0:11:41.320 --> 0:11:44.160 shoot him. So there are people who are on the 0:11:44.240 --> 0:11:47.360 scene that night who know that Ricky Williams was responsible 0:11:47.400 --> 0:11:50.280 for this. And what we learned looking at the trial 0:11:50.440 --> 0:11:53.559 was that the police actually started to get messages and 0:11:53.679 --> 0:11:56.719 voice mails saying, hey, Ricky Williams is the one who 0:11:56.720 --> 0:12:00.400 committed this crime, and they don't go out and talk 0:12:00.520 --> 0:12:02.960 to him, you know, they I think they said Doctavius's 0:12:03.040 --> 0:12:05.280 family like, hey, let Ricky know, we want to talk 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:07.640 to him, but they didn't actually go find him or 0:12:07.640 --> 0:12:10.600 bring him in or try to interrogate him or even 0:12:10.640 --> 0:12:13.960 interview him. They just kind of collected that information but 0:12:14.080 --> 0:12:18.320 still went forward investigating and prosecuting Octavius. 0:12:18.640 --> 0:12:23.160 How lazy can you be that you have multiple people 0:12:23.240 --> 0:12:26.240 coming forward, tips coming in and they can't even be 0:12:26.400 --> 0:12:29.240 bothered to go and speak to him. And at that 0:12:29.520 --> 0:12:32.840 very moment they should have switched course. Octavius should have 0:12:32.840 --> 0:12:35.640 been freed, Ricky should have been arrested, and we should 0:12:35.640 --> 0:12:38.720 never be making this podcast right now. But that's, of 0:12:38.760 --> 0:12:43.160 course not what happened. Octavius. You were charged with attempted 0:12:43.240 --> 0:12:47.760 murder and several other related defenses. All of this must 0:12:47.800 --> 0:12:51.520 have just I mean, how were you able to process 0:12:51.520 --> 0:12:54.000 this as a seventeen year old kid. You're not even 0:12:54.040 --> 0:12:56.439 a senior in high school yet you're just a child. 0:12:57.400 --> 0:13:01.480 I didn't process it until I was estually in prison. 0:13:02.360 --> 0:13:05.559 I understand that being a jail is hard, but being 0:13:05.640 --> 0:13:07.800 a jail innocent, though, and you know that you are, 0:13:08.080 --> 0:13:10.240 is way harder, real hard. 0:13:11.240 --> 0:13:13.640 There's another sick aspect of this that I have to 0:13:13.640 --> 0:13:17.280 focus on, which is the fact that Octavius was tried 0:13:17.400 --> 0:13:21.920 as an adult because he turned eighteen before the trial began. Now, 0:13:22.960 --> 0:13:25.920 how does that make any freakingdifference. Right, he was seventeen 0:13:26.000 --> 0:13:29.600 when it happened, So in theory they could this crime 0:13:29.679 --> 0:13:31.200 could have happened when he was thirteen. They could have 0:13:31.200 --> 0:13:33.640 held him five years until trial, and we've seen that 0:13:33.720 --> 0:13:36.640 before too, but it's nuts. You can't both be a 0:13:36.720 --> 0:13:38.600 child and an adult at the same time. But they 0:13:38.720 --> 0:13:42.520 managed to try him as an adult anyway. Now, at trial, 0:13:43.520 --> 0:13:46.800 the victim testified that you were the shooter, Octavius, but 0:13:47.040 --> 0:13:51.160 multiple other witnesses testified under oath that you were upstairs 0:13:51.200 --> 0:13:53.640 in the apartment when the fight and the shooting occurred, 0:13:53.840 --> 0:13:57.440 and the shooting obviously was downstairs, and witnesses who watched 0:13:57.440 --> 0:13:59.679 the fight from the window in the apartment testified that 0:14:00.080 --> 0:14:01.480 Key shot the victim, not you. 0:14:02.559 --> 0:14:06.360 I didn't know that it was him that shot anybody. 0:14:06.440 --> 0:14:09.040 I didn't know that. It was for sure hard to 0:14:09.040 --> 0:14:12.400 process when when I realized that what people were saying 0:14:12.440 --> 0:14:13.280 that who it was. 0:14:13.760 --> 0:14:17.679 So the trial lasted five days, and the jury had 0:14:17.720 --> 0:14:21.920 a choice between the perspective of all these other witnesses 0:14:22.040 --> 0:14:26.880 who were directly contradicting the victim himself, who had by 0:14:26.960 --> 0:14:29.840 now convinced himself that you were the person that had 0:14:29.840 --> 0:14:33.040 shot her, and off they went to deliberate. 0:14:33.440 --> 0:14:34.160 I just sat there. 0:14:34.240 --> 0:14:35.840 And the reason that I was cool and I was 0:14:35.840 --> 0:14:37.760 calm is because I had I knew that I had 0:14:37.800 --> 0:14:41.680 to keep my composure no matter what the verdict was. 0:14:42.200 --> 0:14:43.520 But I was angry. 0:14:43.720 --> 0:14:46.000 I'm just very good at keeping it to myself. I'm 0:14:46.080 --> 0:14:49.160 very good at hotting it. But when they came up 0:14:49.160 --> 0:14:52.720 with that verdict, though, I felt like my heart stopped 0:14:52.760 --> 0:14:55.880 just the beat or two. But you know, I got 0:14:55.880 --> 0:15:13.000 I got my air back. Never thought that I would 0:15:13.040 --> 0:15:17.880 be the one to be incarcerated. As a fresh eighteen 0:15:17.960 --> 0:15:22.040 in there, you know, had to take the scenery in 0:15:22.080 --> 0:15:25.360 and had to get used to me being around a 0:15:25.360 --> 0:15:29.640 lot of older people, a lot of killers, a lot 0:15:29.640 --> 0:15:32.680 of rapists, and all this that I'm not used to, 0:15:32.880 --> 0:15:35.760 you know, So I had to adapt to my surroundings. 0:15:35.800 --> 0:15:37.720 And it was kind of hard, you know, because of 0:15:37.760 --> 0:15:39.920 the unexpected fights and stuff like that. You know, you're 0:15:39.920 --> 0:15:42.680 seeing movies and things like that, It's not how it 0:15:42.760 --> 0:15:43.280 is in movies. 0:15:43.320 --> 0:15:46.080 You know, these really pop off lot nowhere. 0:15:47.200 --> 0:15:49.880 So from what I understand, not long after your trial concluded, 0:15:49.960 --> 0:15:54.880 your brother came forward and actually confessed to shooting mister Cale. 0:15:55.240 --> 0:15:56.040 I believe he. 0:15:56.120 --> 0:15:59.760 Even made a written statement where he said and I quote. 0:16:00.360 --> 0:16:03.280 Shortly after the party ended, an argument occurred outside the 0:16:03.280 --> 0:16:07.200 apartment complex between my father, Ardent Terry, and Larry Johnson. 0:16:07.760 --> 0:16:10.640 They had a few words back and forth, but once 0:16:10.680 --> 0:16:12.720 the argument reached the back of the apartment, I was 0:16:12.800 --> 0:16:14.280 right in front of the back door, and all of 0:16:14.320 --> 0:16:17.000 a sudden, Larry Johnson started shooting towards me in my 0:16:17.080 --> 0:16:21.120 father's direction, and shortly after, Dennis Cole ran at me 0:16:21.200 --> 0:16:23.960 and punched me in the eye, and I pulled out 0:16:24.000 --> 0:16:25.920 my gun and shot him out of fear for me 0:16:26.000 --> 0:16:28.840 and my family's lives because shots were being fired at us. 0:16:28.880 --> 0:16:34.840 First end quote. Wow, that's a pretty detailed confession. And 0:16:35.200 --> 0:16:37.320 this all happened within a month or so of your trial, 0:16:37.560 --> 0:16:42.040 while you were being processed into Toledo Correctional where you'd 0:16:42.080 --> 0:16:46.840 spend a long stretch. So when you heard about this confession, 0:16:47.680 --> 0:16:50.160 I can't even imagine, Like, what was your reaction. 0:16:50.520 --> 0:16:53.760 Was I was, oh man, and I didn't know anything 0:16:53.760 --> 0:16:54.880 about it. Oh man, I was. 0:16:54.920 --> 0:16:57.440 I was pissed, like I was really, I was really 0:16:57.480 --> 0:17:00.280 fucking pissed, like parru because if the people would have 0:17:00.320 --> 0:17:02.880 done what this were supposed to do then maybe not 0:17:02.880 --> 0:17:03.680 wouldn't have made it all. 0:17:03.680 --> 0:17:06.200 It's a Toldo correctial decision. Oh yeah, I was. 0:17:06.240 --> 0:17:08.000 I was for sure deviast. That was because I was 0:17:08.040 --> 0:17:10.840 angry as hell that all of this could have been avoided. 0:17:11.680 --> 0:17:13.960 Did you have an attorney at that time, and if so, 0:17:14.040 --> 0:17:16.400 imagine you were on the phone with him or her 0:17:16.640 --> 0:17:18.920 in seconds, going hey, get me out of here. 0:17:19.040 --> 0:17:20.960 This is right. I tried. 0:17:21.640 --> 0:17:23.320 I'm not going to say that in reply to my 0:17:23.359 --> 0:17:26.520 messages or whatnot, but it took weeks for me to 0:17:26.520 --> 0:17:28.720 get something back from them, you know, when they have 0:17:28.840 --> 0:17:30.359 all of this in front of them. 0:17:30.720 --> 0:17:33.399 Yeah, it seems like one of these situations where the 0:17:33.440 --> 0:17:36.160 doors should just swing open and you should come running 0:17:36.200 --> 0:17:38.720 out into the sunshine. But of course that's not the 0:17:38.720 --> 0:17:42.320 way it works. Joanna, how did you get involved? And 0:17:42.520 --> 0:17:44.280 this must have blown your mind when you heard that 0:17:44.320 --> 0:17:46.600 there was this detailed confession as well as all this 0:17:46.680 --> 0:17:49.040 other evidence pointing to actual innocence. 0:17:49.320 --> 0:17:53.360 Octavius applied to our project, I think around twenty twelve, 0:17:53.600 --> 0:17:56.520 and so we had a couple of students assigned to 0:17:56.560 --> 0:17:58.879 it and they started looking into it, and you know 0:17:59.000 --> 0:18:01.960 right away there's red flo for us. So the first 0:18:02.040 --> 0:18:05.360 is that the only evidence that implicates him is this 0:18:05.840 --> 0:18:09.879 eyewitness identification that has just plagued with problems. And then 0:18:09.960 --> 0:18:13.760 there's no physical evidence, and we've got these witnesses at 0:18:13.800 --> 0:18:17.280 trial who are saying Ricky Williams did the crime. So 0:18:17.600 --> 0:18:21.080 we started investigating, and the focus of our investigation is 0:18:21.119 --> 0:18:24.840 really to confirm some of the things that happened at trial, 0:18:24.920 --> 0:18:27.119 to go out and talk to Reginald Ward and Chaffon 0:18:27.200 --> 0:18:29.399 to English and Jessicatarian say, you know, is what you 0:18:29.480 --> 0:18:32.720 testified to a trial true? And then we wanted to 0:18:32.760 --> 0:18:36.040 consult with an eyewitness identification expert and make sure that 0:18:36.119 --> 0:18:38.919 what we thought we were seeing about the identification that 0:18:38.960 --> 0:18:41.760 we were correct, and that there were all these problems. 0:18:41.640 --> 0:18:44.159 Right, These are all the issues that could have and 0:18:44.320 --> 0:18:47.119 should have already been known at the time of trial. 0:18:47.840 --> 0:18:51.600 But then there's this confession from Ricky Williams. 0:18:52.280 --> 0:18:54.720 We actually went and talked to Ricky. We sent out 0:18:54.720 --> 0:18:59.119 an investigator before we had ever seen the affidavit that 0:18:59.160 --> 0:19:02.000 he had already signed. And so our investigator goes to 0:19:02.040 --> 0:19:05.439 talk to Ricky and Ricky immediately starts talking about that 0:19:05.560 --> 0:19:08.520 night and says, hey, I committed this crime, and so 0:19:08.640 --> 0:19:11.680 he signs an affidavit right there in front of our investigator, 0:19:11.840 --> 0:19:15.200 going through everything that happened that night, which matches up 0:19:15.359 --> 0:19:17.560 exactly with what the witnesses said, which is that there 0:19:17.640 --> 0:19:21.000 was this fight and Dennis Cole punched Ricky and Ricky 0:19:21.240 --> 0:19:25.200 shot him. And so once we got that confession, yeah, 0:19:25.240 --> 0:19:28.080 of course we thought we had it locked up. This 0:19:28.920 --> 0:19:32.000 is as clear evidence as we could get that Octavius 0:19:32.040 --> 0:19:33.840 has been telling us the truth this whole time. He 0:19:33.840 --> 0:19:36.639 didn't commit this crime, and we thought that it was 0:19:36.760 --> 0:19:38.960 clear he was innocent and that he should be released. 0:19:39.520 --> 0:19:42.400 But of course the wheels of justice turned quickly when 0:19:42.440 --> 0:19:46.840 we're processing somebody into the system, but when we're trying 0:19:46.880 --> 0:19:51.280 to right those wrongs, they turn at his nails pace. 0:19:51.640 --> 0:19:54.080 And this is a dramatic example of it, because even 0:19:54.160 --> 0:19:56.600 in a case like this, where it couldn't be more 0:19:56.680 --> 0:19:59.560 obvious and had I'm going to say, if the police 0:19:59.600 --> 0:20:02.159 had done there jobs in the first place, if they 0:20:02.160 --> 0:20:04.879 had just gone and interviewed Ricky, they probably would have 0:20:04.880 --> 0:20:08.119 seen a bruise if he was punched in the eye. Granted, 0:20:08.160 --> 0:20:10.600 they couldn't have gotten maybe the gunshot residue, because if 0:20:10.640 --> 0:20:12.520 they couldn't have found him that night, it would have 0:20:12.520 --> 0:20:16.560 been washed away. But this would have been a very 0:20:16.600 --> 0:20:20.560 simple case to solve, had people been interested in really 0:20:20.640 --> 0:20:23.280 solving it, as opposed to just putting a black body 0:20:23.840 --> 0:20:26.879 behind bars. So it was submitted for review by the 0:20:26.880 --> 0:20:31.880 Conviction Integrity Unit of the Cuyahoga County Prosecutor's Office, and they, 0:20:32.080 --> 0:20:34.960 as I understand it, conducted an extensive investigation. 0:20:35.320 --> 0:20:38.439 So around the time that we had collected all of 0:20:38.440 --> 0:20:41.600 the evidence in this case, Michael Mallley had come into office, 0:20:41.680 --> 0:20:44.719 and part of his campaign had been to take this 0:20:44.800 --> 0:20:47.879 conviction Teger unit and really put some resources behind it 0:20:47.920 --> 0:20:50.600 and make it a legitimate unit. So that's why we 0:20:50.640 --> 0:20:53.399 submitted Octavius's case. In our mind, it was like, this 0:20:53.480 --> 0:20:56.679 is clear as day. Let's show them the evidence and 0:20:56.840 --> 0:20:59.920 try to work together. And as you said, for two 0:21:00.000 --> 0:21:03.040 two and a half years they investigated this case. They 0:21:03.080 --> 0:21:06.480 talked all sorts of witnesses, they tested evidence, We let 0:21:06.520 --> 0:21:09.640 them look at the defense files, they talked to Octavius, 0:21:10.200 --> 0:21:12.720