WEBVTT - #366 Wrongful Conviction: False Confessions - Ricky Davis 0:00:04.440 --> 0:00:06.720 Hi there, it's Lauren I writer, and this time I'm 0:00:06.720 --> 0:00:09.480 here with some really encouraging news for anyone committed to 0:00:09.480 --> 0:00:12.280 true justice in this country. Back in twenty twenty, we 0:00:12.360 --> 0:00:15.480 brought you the story of Ricky Davis, a California man 0:00:15.520 --> 0:00:19.320 who spent fifteen years in prison for murder he didn't commit. 0:00:20.160 --> 0:00:22.560 This is one of those bone chilling cases that reminds 0:00:22.600 --> 0:00:26.360 you a wrongful conviction can happen to anyone. Police were 0:00:26.400 --> 0:00:30.560 allowed to use deceptive interrogation techniques to convince someone they'd 0:00:30.560 --> 0:00:34.480 witnessed a crime when they hadn't been there at all. Thankfully, 0:00:34.560 --> 0:00:38.159 this is changing. In September twenty twenty two, the actual 0:00:38.280 --> 0:00:41.680 murderer was caught. He was convicted of the murder and 0:00:41.760 --> 0:00:45.360 sentenced to fifteen years to life. To help make sure 0:00:45.440 --> 0:00:50.560 this never happens again, California has enacted new legislation. Now 0:00:50.680 --> 0:00:54.160 the state bans police from using the kinds of deceptive 0:00:54.240 --> 0:00:57.760 interrogation tactics that were used to produce the statement the 0:00:57.800 --> 0:01:01.080 convicted Ricky Davis. And this this new law was made 0:01:01.120 --> 0:01:05.039 possible with the support of District Attorney Verne Pearson, the 0:01:05.240 --> 0:01:09.880 very same prosecutor who exonerated Ricky and convicted the real killer. 0:01:10.440 --> 0:01:13.400 We applaud this positive step toward justice, and I hope 0:01:13.400 --> 0:01:17.240 it'll inspire sorely needed changes just like this around the country. 0:01:24.800 --> 0:01:27.760 Welcome to wrongful Conviction, False Confessions. I'm Laura and I 0:01:27.800 --> 0:01:31.560 writer and I'm Steve Dreson. Today we're going to tell 0:01:31.600 --> 0:01:35.080 you about a California man named Ricky Davis. In nineteen 0:01:35.080 --> 0:01:38.360 eighty five, Ricky and his girlfriend Connie found their roommate 0:01:38.480 --> 0:01:42.040 brutally stabbed to death. Without any leads, the case went 0:01:42.160 --> 0:01:46.680 cold for fourteen years. That's when detectives convinced Connie that 0:01:46.760 --> 0:01:50.480 she had repressed memories of Ricky committing the crime. Based 0:01:50.520 --> 0:01:54.280 on Connie's false statement, Ricky spent twelve years in prison 0:01:54.760 --> 0:01:58.520 until very recently when he and his mother Maureen, finally 0:01:58.600 --> 0:01:59.960 had something to be thankful for. 0:02:13.400 --> 0:02:16.600 I think it's important to realize that on the road 0:02:16.680 --> 0:02:20.360 to a wrongful conviction, there's a lot of road kill. 0:02:21.000 --> 0:02:26.000 There's the defendant who gets wrongfully convicted. There's the defendant's 0:02:26.320 --> 0:02:30.200 family who has to live with the fact that their 0:02:30.400 --> 0:02:32.920 loved one is going away for a long period of 0:02:32.960 --> 0:02:34.440 time or sentenced to death. 0:02:34.600 --> 0:02:36.960 Yeah, in this case, it was Ricky's mom Maureene, who 0:02:37.040 --> 0:02:38.400 had to bear the brunt of that pain. 0:02:38.919 --> 0:02:44.920 And then there are witnesses sometimes who are pressured to 0:02:45.160 --> 0:02:46.960 lie to save their own. 0:02:46.840 --> 0:02:50.000 Skin, witnesses like Connie Dahl, and they have. 0:02:49.880 --> 0:02:53.800 To live with the guilt that accompanies that lie. 0:02:54.200 --> 0:02:56.600 Yeah, it's interesting. I mean when you think about Connie 0:02:56.639 --> 0:02:59.680 and Maureene in that courtroom, one woman is being forced 0:02:59.680 --> 0:03:02.200 to talk and one woman is being prevented from talking, 0:03:02.919 --> 0:03:04.720 and of course the two of them have two very 0:03:04.720 --> 0:03:08.280 different stories to tell about who Ricky Davis is and 0:03:08.360 --> 0:03:09.440 what Ricky Davis did. 0:03:09.880 --> 0:03:15.760 And so the notion of powerlessness that Maureen experienced in 0:03:15.800 --> 0:03:19.720 this case is something that we see all the time. 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:24.000 I mean, while the trial is happening, there's nothing that 0:03:24.040 --> 0:03:28.400 Maureene can do to stop the train from running over 0:03:28.440 --> 0:03:29.280 her son. 0:03:29.280 --> 0:03:32.080 And Connie's being forced to drive that train. She's a 0:03:32.160 --> 0:03:40.119 victim here too. Today's story starts in El Dorado Hills, California, 0:03:40.240 --> 0:03:43.120 an upper class suburb about twenty miles east of Sacramento. 0:03:43.840 --> 0:03:47.600 In so many ways, El Dorado Hills epitomizes the American dream. 0:03:48.040 --> 0:03:51.000 It's filled with expensive homes that back up onto lush 0:03:51.040 --> 0:03:54.680 golf courses, its shopping centers are filled with luxury stores 0:03:54.720 --> 0:03:58.600 and fancy restaurants. It's families, by and large, live lives 0:03:58.600 --> 0:04:03.560 of privilege and peace. Ricky Davis's story is still unfolding today, 0:04:03.720 --> 0:04:07.760 but it began back in nineteen eighty five. Ricky was 0:04:07.760 --> 0:04:10.360 twenty years old. He lived in El Dorado Hills and 0:04:10.400 --> 0:04:14.240 a large home on Stanford Lane along with his mom, Maureen. 0:04:15.200 --> 0:04:18.240 Now Ricky and Maureen were pretty different from their wealthy neighbors. 0:04:18.600 --> 0:04:21.320 Maureen had been a teenage mom by the time she 0:04:21.400 --> 0:04:24.120 turned twenty. She was raising Ricky and his three sisters 0:04:24.160 --> 0:04:28.200 in southern California without much support from their dad. Maureen 0:04:28.320 --> 0:04:31.359 worked to pay the bills by waitressing. She and Ricky 0:04:31.400 --> 0:04:33.880 had come to El Dorado Hills just a few years 0:04:33.960 --> 0:04:38.279 before our story begins. Ricky's grandmother, a successful business woman, 0:04:38.320 --> 0:04:41.040 had recently moved to the area, and she bought the 0:04:41.120 --> 0:04:44.400 house on Stanford Lane for them. This family might not 0:04:44.400 --> 0:04:47.040 have been classic El Dorado Hills, but they were close 0:04:47.120 --> 0:04:52.799 knit and loving. No secrets, no drama, no lies. Ricky 0:04:52.839 --> 0:04:55.799 had a nineteen year old girlfriend, Connie Dahl, who spent 0:04:55.880 --> 0:04:59.000 plenty of nights at the Stanford Lane house. Now Ricky's 0:04:59.000 --> 0:05:02.800 mom Maureene wasn thrilled with Ricky and Connie's relationship because 0:05:02.839 --> 0:05:06.559 Connie had a pretty serious meth habit. Ricky smoked pot, 0:05:06.640 --> 0:05:09.840 It's true, but he wasn't into harder stuff, and Maureen 0:05:09.960 --> 0:05:14.359 worried that Connie would drag Ricky into trouble. But unlike Ricky, 0:05:14.600 --> 0:05:17.440 Connie didn't have a stable home. Sometimes she had no 0:05:17.520 --> 0:05:20.400 home at all and slept in her car. Once she 0:05:20.440 --> 0:05:23.200 and Ricky started dating, Connie often spent the night at 0:05:23.279 --> 0:05:27.040 Rickey's house, climbing in his bedroom window after Maureen was asleep. 0:05:28.360 --> 0:05:32.080 One Friday in nineteen eighty five, July fifth, the Stanford 0:05:32.160 --> 0:05:35.960 Lane house gained two more residents. Ricky's grandmother was in 0:05:36.000 --> 0:05:38.600 the real estate business, and she'd recently learned that one 0:05:38.600 --> 0:05:42.240 of her employees needed a temporary place to stay. Fifty 0:05:42.320 --> 0:05:45.039 four year old Jane Hilton had been fighting with her 0:05:45.120 --> 0:05:48.640 husband over money, and those fights had apparently turned violent. 0:05:49.240 --> 0:05:52.200 When Ricky's grandmother found out about this, she offered Jane 0:05:52.240 --> 0:05:55.960 and her thirteen year old daughter Autumn a spare bedroom 0:05:56.080 --> 0:05:59.000 on Stanford Lane as a safe harbor. They moved in 0:05:59.120 --> 0:06:02.360 on Friday, July fifth, but that harbor wasn't quite as 0:06:02.360 --> 0:06:06.240 safe as it seemed. The next day, Saturday, July sixth, 0:06:06.360 --> 0:06:09.159 the house emptied out, at least for the most part. 0:06:09.560 --> 0:06:11.720 Ricky's mom, Maureen, took off in the middle of the 0:06:11.800 --> 0:06:14.720 day to go camping with her boyfriend. In the evening, 0:06:14.839 --> 0:06:17.400 Ricky and his girlfriend Connie headed out to a party. 0:06:18.080 --> 0:06:20.479 Even thirteen year old Autumn left the house to meet 0:06:20.520 --> 0:06:23.839 up with some new friends, three teenage boys she'd met 0:06:23.880 --> 0:06:28.320 earlier that day. For her part, Autumn's mom, Jane, stayed home. 0:06:29.240 --> 0:06:32.360 Ricky and Connie got back at around three thirty Sunday morning. 0:06:32.880 --> 0:06:35.560 When they arrived at the house, they found Autumn outside 0:06:35.920 --> 0:06:39.320 standing alone in the front yard. Autumn told them she'd 0:06:39.320 --> 0:06:42.600 been home for an hour, but she hadn't gone inside yet. 0:06:42.720 --> 0:06:45.119 She was worried about getting in trouble with her mom 0:06:45.279 --> 0:06:47.960 for being out too late, she said, and she was 0:06:48.000 --> 0:06:51.159 hoping Ricky and Connie would go inside with her. The 0:06:51.200 --> 0:06:55.800 three go in together upstairs, there's no sign of Autumn's mom, Jane, 0:06:56.279 --> 0:06:59.160 so Ricky and Connie leave Autumn in her room and 0:06:59.200 --> 0:07:02.560 had forbid themsels. But as they walked down the hall, 0:07:03.040 --> 0:07:06.520 Ricky spots blood on the carpet outside the master bedroom. 0:07:06.760 --> 0:07:10.800 Where his mom, Maureen usually sleeps. She's on a camping trip, 0:07:10.880 --> 0:07:15.000 he reminds himself. He pushes the door open and finds 0:07:15.000 --> 0:07:20.000 a nightmare. It's not his mom, but Autumn's mom, Jane Hilton. 0:07:20.880 --> 0:07:23.680 She's lying on the bed wearing only a nightgown, and 0:07:23.720 --> 0:07:28.680 she's clearly dead. Jane's been stabbed thirty nine times and 0:07:28.840 --> 0:07:32.400 is covered in blood. She's got defensive wounds up and 0:07:32.440 --> 0:07:35.640 down her arms. One of her fingernails is missing, and 0:07:35.720 --> 0:07:39.240 her hand is clutching a tuft of someone's hair. There's 0:07:39.280 --> 0:07:41.480 even a bite mark on the back of her left shoulder. 0:07:42.640 --> 0:07:45.840 Ricky and Connie were horrified. They called the police, who 0:07:45.920 --> 0:07:49.040 arrived and interviewed both of them on the spot. Ricky 0:07:49.040 --> 0:07:51.360 and Connie told the police they'd been at a party 0:07:51.440 --> 0:07:54.920 all night and it was pretty easy to corroborate their story. 0:07:55.520 --> 0:07:58.680 The hood of Ricky's car was still warm, suggesting he 0:07:58.760 --> 0:08:01.600 and Connie were being on it about only recently getting 0:08:01.640 --> 0:08:04.960 back to the house, and thirteen year old Autumn told 0:08:05.040 --> 0:08:08.240 police she'd seen Ricky and Connie arrive home and gone 0:08:08.240 --> 0:08:11.000 in with them. To these officers at the scene, it 0:08:11.040 --> 0:08:14.400 seemed pretty clear that Ricky and Connie were innocent, so 0:08:14.560 --> 0:08:17.160 clear that the police didn't bother to interview the other 0:08:17.200 --> 0:08:20.000 people who'd been with them at the party. Of course, 0:08:20.120 --> 0:08:24.120 those people would have been alibi witnesses. Instead, police moved 0:08:24.160 --> 0:08:27.520 on to check out the obvious suspect, Jane's husband, the 0:08:27.520 --> 0:08:30.040 guy with whom she'd been fighting, but he seemed to 0:08:30.080 --> 0:08:32.960 have an alibi two he'd apparently spent the evening at 0:08:32.960 --> 0:08:36.360 a local restaurant. So next the police tried to find 0:08:36.400 --> 0:08:38.880 the three teenage boys Autumn had been hanging out with 0:08:39.000 --> 0:08:43.200 earlier that night. Problem was, Autumn only knew first names 0:08:43.200 --> 0:08:47.280 for two of them, Michael and Calvin. After scanning through 0:08:47.280 --> 0:08:50.360 a few yearbooks from local high schools, the detectives came 0:08:50.440 --> 0:08:54.520 up with nothing. Unfortunately, that was it for the investigation. 0:08:55.200 --> 0:08:58.959 Without any suspects or solid leads, the case went cold 0:08:59.520 --> 0:09:04.199 for four thirteen years. Fast forward from July nineteen eighty 0:09:04.200 --> 0:09:07.760 five to November nineteen ninety nine. Ricky and Connie had 0:09:07.800 --> 0:09:11.360 broken up long ago. Their relationship ended up lasting less 0:09:11.360 --> 0:09:15.000 than a year. Since then, Connie had continued using meth 0:09:15.320 --> 0:09:18.120 off and on. For his part, Ricky had spent those 0:09:18.200 --> 0:09:20.360 years in and out of prison for a series of 0:09:20.400 --> 0:09:24.640 relatively minor offenses, mostly drug related crimes and robbery, but 0:09:24.800 --> 0:09:27.679 neither of them had ever been involved in anything close 0:09:27.720 --> 0:09:31.640 to murder. In nineteen ninety nine, the El Dorado County 0:09:31.720 --> 0:09:36.480 Sheriff's Office decided to reinvestigate Jane Hilton's killing. Two detectives 0:09:36.480 --> 0:09:39.480 were assigned to this cold case, and they started by 0:09:39.520 --> 0:09:43.200 reviewing old news coverage. Their attention was caught by a 0:09:43.240 --> 0:09:45.640 story that had run in a local newspaper just a 0:09:45.640 --> 0:09:48.760 few days after the murder. A reporter from the paper 0:09:48.760 --> 0:09:51.720 had shown up at the Stanford Lane house. Connie had 0:09:51.760 --> 0:09:53.880 let her in and shown her the room where Jane 0:09:53.920 --> 0:09:56.760 had been killed. The reporter asked a bunch of questions 0:09:56.760 --> 0:09:59.800 about finding the body, and that's when Connie had said 0:09:59.800 --> 0:10:04.240 so thing that struck these new detectives as suspicious. Connie 0:10:04.280 --> 0:10:07.240 had told the reporter that Jane's body had been positioned 0:10:07.240 --> 0:10:10.120 on the bed as though she were sleeping. Whoever had 0:10:10.200 --> 0:10:13.880 killed Jane, Connie speculated, must have moved her body onto 0:10:13.880 --> 0:10:18.320 the bed afterwards. Connie's comment was pretty obviously a guess, 0:10:18.600 --> 0:10:21.440 but the police began wondering if she actually might know 0:10:21.520 --> 0:10:24.480 something about the body being moved. So over the next 0:10:24.559 --> 0:10:28.880 fifteen months. Between November nineteen ninety nine and February two 0:10:28.880 --> 0:10:32.719 thousand and one, the police decided to interrogate Connie on 0:10:32.800 --> 0:10:37.200 three separate occasions. It was all caught on videotape, every 0:10:37.280 --> 0:10:41.040 last word, and that videotape makes it clear the police 0:10:41.080 --> 0:10:44.240 weren't aiming only for Connie. They wanted her to confess 0:10:44.280 --> 0:10:47.200 to being present when Jane died, and they wanted her 0:10:47.240 --> 0:10:50.760 to name her ex boyfriend, Ricky Davis, as the killer. 0:11:01.559 --> 0:11:05.920 The theory was that Jane was brutally beaten and stabbed 0:11:05.920 --> 0:11:09.480 to death by a man, and the man that the 0:11:09.480 --> 0:11:14.000 police officers had in mind was Ricky Davis. Police officers 0:11:14.320 --> 0:11:19.000 often go after ex girlfriends or ex wives on the 0:11:19.040 --> 0:11:22.120 assumption that there was a bad breakup, that there's some 0:11:22.480 --> 0:11:29.040 animists there that may motivate the aggrieved party into revealing 0:11:29.160 --> 0:11:32.520 information that they had been unwilling to reveal at the 0:11:32.559 --> 0:11:35.720 time of the investigation. Hell hath no fury like a 0:11:35.760 --> 0:11:38.480 woman scorned is the thinking here. 0:11:39.360 --> 0:11:42.160 Connie is first brought in for questioning only days after 0:11:42.200 --> 0:11:44.920 the new cops take over the case. At first, she 0:11:44.960 --> 0:11:48.240 insists repeatedly that she had nothing to do with Jane's murder, 0:11:48.360 --> 0:11:51.440 that all she remembers is coming home and finding the body, 0:11:52.040 --> 0:11:55.160 But right away Connie is hit with a barrage of lies. 0:11:55.720 --> 0:11:57.960 Police tell her that a witness had placed her in 0:11:58.080 --> 0:12:01.840 Ricky at the homicide scene, although no one had. Police 0:12:01.840 --> 0:12:05.640 tell Connie that DNA established her presence in Jane's bedroom, 0:12:06.040 --> 0:12:08.960 even though it didn't, and they tell Connie that the 0:12:09.040 --> 0:12:13.840 hares found clenched in Jane's hand belonged to Ricky. Another lie. 0:12:14.240 --> 0:12:17.440 Police had actually lost those hairs. They were never tested 0:12:17.480 --> 0:12:17.800 at all. 0:12:18.440 --> 0:12:20.560 We know that you were present in the house when 0:12:20.559 --> 0:12:24.680 this happened. I know I was not. We already know that. 0:12:25.000 --> 0:12:26.839 What do you mean, Well, like. 0:12:26.840 --> 0:12:29.520 I said, you know, we've got all kinds of physical 0:12:29.559 --> 0:12:34.480 evidence I happened. Yes, Oh my god, there's no way. 0:12:35.240 --> 0:12:39.000 Over time, though, the police's cascading lies begin to break 0:12:39.040 --> 0:12:42.520 Connie down. Like most of us, Connie has no idea 0:12:42.640 --> 0:12:46.240 that police are allowed to lie during interrogations, So after 0:12:46.280 --> 0:12:50.120 hearing all this apparent evidence of her own involvement, Connie 0:12:50.160 --> 0:12:53.400 starts questioning her memory of what happened all those years ago. 0:12:53.880 --> 0:12:57.160 Okay, if I was there, I had no memory of that. 0:12:57.720 --> 0:13:00.280 She's desperately trying to make sense of what they're say saying, 0:13:00.640 --> 0:13:03.920 and eventually tells the investigators that maybe she was there 0:13:04.240 --> 0:13:08.080 and just couldn't remember it. The investigator suggests that Ricky 0:13:08.160 --> 0:13:11.680 had programmed her memory so that Connie would blank out 0:13:11.800 --> 0:13:16.640 her recollections of the crime. She agrees, maybe I have amnesia. 0:13:16.840 --> 0:13:19.400 I couldn't have watched that happen. That would have been 0:13:20.320 --> 0:13:25.160 Oh if I've witness for that happening, that or at 0:13:25.240 --> 0:13:26.880 least you wouldn't I blanked it out. 0:13:28.000 --> 0:13:30.920 They are absolutely confusing the hell out of her. They 0:13:30.960 --> 0:13:36.960 are causing a crisis of confidence where she begins not 0:13:37.040 --> 0:13:40.280 only to doubt her memory, but she can't really distinguish 0:13:40.320 --> 0:13:45.520 between what she actually remembers and what she thinks she 0:13:46.120 --> 0:13:46.880 might remember. 0:13:47.360 --> 0:13:51.320 Investigators warn Connie that if she doesn't somehow recover her memories, 0:13:51.640 --> 0:13:54.600 they might have to interrogate her again, and they say 0:13:54.679 --> 0:13:57.760 that could lead to her arrest. On the other hand, 0:13:57.800 --> 0:14:01.520 they imply that Connie will receive leniency, even immunity from 0:14:01.520 --> 0:14:05.120 prosecution if she provides them with a statement right now. 0:14:05.400 --> 0:14:07.520 Well, first one to jump on the bandwagon, I always 0:14:07.520 --> 0:14:10.160 con sieius ride right. 0:14:10.400 --> 0:14:13.679 And so what happens here is that the police provide 0:14:13.880 --> 0:14:19.920 incentives to adopt their preconceived theory, promises of leniency or 0:14:19.960 --> 0:14:24.120 threats of harm, suggestions that the first person to jump 0:14:24.160 --> 0:14:27.640 on the bandwagon is going to get the best deal, 0:14:28.320 --> 0:14:32.440 and that if she doesn't jump on first, someone else 0:14:32.520 --> 0:14:35.360 is going to take your spot and she's going to 0:14:35.400 --> 0:14:37.440 get punished more severely. 0:14:39.640 --> 0:14:43.640 These tactics work. Connie breaks and agrees to confess, to 0:14:43.680 --> 0:14:47.120 say that she helped Ricky kill Jane, but she has 0:14:47.160 --> 0:14:50.160 no idea what to say about the crime. Remember, Connie 0:14:50.200 --> 0:14:54.560 wasn't actually there to help her out. Investigators feed Connie 0:14:54.600 --> 0:14:58.200 everything they know about Jane Hilton's murder and everything they 0:14:58.240 --> 0:15:02.320 think happened too. Here's the story that Connie ultimately agreed 0:15:02.320 --> 0:15:05.000 to repeat. She said she was there while Ricky and 0:15:05.080 --> 0:15:08.080 Jane were arguing about whether Jane's daughter Autumn could go 0:15:08.120 --> 0:15:12.160 out that night. During the argument, Connie said, Ricky punched 0:15:12.200 --> 0:15:16.720 Jane in the face. The altercation escalated. Eventually, Connie went 0:15:16.760 --> 0:15:20.200 downstairs and acted as a lookout while Ricky stabbed Jane. 0:15:20.800 --> 0:15:23.560 Then Connie said she came back to the room and 0:15:23.640 --> 0:15:25.920 helped Ricky move Jane's body onto the bed. 0:15:27.640 --> 0:15:30.280 So, to me, what makes this case different is that 0:15:30.320 --> 0:15:33.760 we have a sort of recipe, if you will, for 0:15:33.880 --> 0:15:39.120 a persuaded false confession. What's unique about a persuaded false 0:15:39.160 --> 0:15:45.800 confession is that the suspect comes to doubt their own memory. 0:15:46.640 --> 0:15:49.640 They get to a place where they think the police 0:15:49.640 --> 0:15:53.240 officers are telling me I committed this crime. They're telling 0:15:53.280 --> 0:15:56.840 me they have evidence that proves that I committed this crime, 0:15:57.840 --> 0:16:01.240 but why can't I remember it? And when a suspect 0:16:01.280 --> 0:16:05.640 gets to that place of uncertainty, the police officers provide 0:16:06.040 --> 0:16:10.560 an answer. The events that you saw were so traumatic 0:16:10.840 --> 0:16:15.480 that they caused you to repress these memories, and so 0:16:15.520 --> 0:16:23.360 the interrogation becomes an exercise in pulling these memories out 0:16:23.400 --> 0:16:28.240 of the suspect's mind. But they're not real memories. They 0:16:28.320 --> 0:16:29.479 don't exist. 0:16:30.200 --> 0:16:34.680 At times, Connie's language reveals her own uncertainty. Even while 0:16:34.720 --> 0:16:35.960 she's confessing. 0:16:36.040 --> 0:16:39.000 I think I did that, I probably did that. I 0:16:39.080 --> 0:16:43.680 seem to remember that. There's a tentativeness that you wouldn't 0:16:43.760 --> 0:16:47.960 have if they were real memories, and we see that 0:16:48.400 --> 0:16:50.640 throughout Connie's interrogation. 0:16:51.360 --> 0:16:54.760 Telling LYE, when Connie's not fed information, she can't get 0:16:54.800 --> 0:16:57.920 anything about the story right. She's not able to tell 0:16:57.960 --> 0:17:00.840 the police what the murder weapon looked like where Ricky 0:17:00.920 --> 0:17:02.800 got it or how he disposed of it. 0:17:03.360 --> 0:17:09.400 The detectives are shaping her memories. They are feeding her 0:17:09.520 --> 0:17:14.640 facts and their final story here is really their story. 0:17:14.680 --> 0:17:19.480 It's their preconceived theory of the crime come to life 0:17:19.840 --> 0:17:22.000 through the words of Connie Doll. 0:17:22.880 --> 0:17:26.440 Strangely enough, the police don't arrest anyone right away. Instead, 0:17:26.480 --> 0:17:30.159 they leave Connie alone for a while and interview Ricky himself. 0:17:30.560 --> 0:17:34.880 He vehemently denies any involvement whatsoever. So the police come 0:17:34.920 --> 0:17:37.919 back to Connie in January two thousand to see if 0:17:37.960 --> 0:17:40.760 she can give them any more information, and they remind 0:17:40.800 --> 0:17:43.639 her that the more details she can provide, the better 0:17:43.680 --> 0:17:48.159 off she'll be. During this interrogation, officers play Connie the 0:17:48.200 --> 0:17:51.560 crime scene video that was recorded the night Jane died 0:17:51.880 --> 0:17:55.280 to see if they can quote refresh her memory. Now. 0:17:55.359 --> 0:17:59.280 I've seen this video myself, and it's horrifying. It's almost 0:17:59.320 --> 0:18:02.960 totally sign Island. As the videographer walks from room to room, 0:18:03.400 --> 0:18:06.359 ending up in the bedroom where Jane died, the camera 0:18:06.440 --> 0:18:11.240 documents every wound, every injury, from her missing fingernail to 0:18:11.320 --> 0:18:14.480 her eyes which were still open. It's the kind of 0:18:14.520 --> 0:18:17.040 crime scene that makes even people who see this all 0:18:17.119 --> 0:18:21.720 the time sick to their stomachs. Connie watches the video 0:18:22.240 --> 0:18:24.840 and agrees to add more detail to her story. She 0:18:24.960 --> 0:18:28.080 says she heard Jane plead for her life, but Ricky 0:18:28.080 --> 0:18:31.639 didn't listen. She says she heard Jane make gurgling noises 0:18:31.800 --> 0:18:35.399 as Ricky stabbed her, and after the attack, Connie says 0:18:35.520 --> 0:18:39.600 she saw Ricky covered in blood. The police still don't 0:18:39.680 --> 0:18:43.320 arrest Connie, but they also don't leave her alone. Instead, 0:18:43.359 --> 0:18:45.680 they come back a third time in two thousand and 0:18:45.720 --> 0:18:49.200 one to try to get even more details. This time, 0:18:49.320 --> 0:18:52.000 detectives tell her that she'll either be charged with a 0:18:52.080 --> 0:18:56.600 misdemeanor accessory type thing, or she'll go down as a 0:18:56.640 --> 0:18:59.840 full blooded half partner in the murder. It all de 0:19:00.359 --> 0:19:04.639 on her credibility. Now. Connie's got two young children. The 0:19:04.680 --> 0:19:07.600 police tell her that if she continues to cooperate, she'll 0:19:07.640 --> 0:19:10.600 be able to go home to her kids. But they 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:13.960 warn her saying I don't know isn't going to help 0:19:14.000 --> 0:19:14.560 you at all. 0:19:15.000 --> 0:19:19.160 They bring up the subject of her children repeatedly throughout 0:19:19.200 --> 0:19:23.879 the interrogation, and the message to Connie is crystal clear, 0:19:24.520 --> 0:19:27.480 if I don't tell them what they want to hear, 0:19:28.200 --> 0:19:30.959 I'm going to lose my children, so they play on 0:19:31.040 --> 0:19:34.960 her emotions as a mother. These kinds of tactics are 0:19:35.200 --> 0:19:39.240 very common when a woman is a suspect or a witness, 0:19:39.440 --> 0:19:43.880 because police officers know that most women would walk across 0:19:44.240 --> 0:19:47.480 a field of glass in order to protect their children. 0:19:48.000 --> 0:19:52.000 To satisfy her interrogators, Connie adds another detail to her story, 0:19:52.240 --> 0:19:55.040 and it's a big one. She wasn't just a lookout. 0:19:55.119 --> 0:19:58.040 She says she was in the room during the murder 0:19:58.080 --> 0:20:01.199 and tried to intervene. And remember that bite mark on 0:20:01.240 --> 0:20:04.040 the back of Jane's shoulder. Connie ends up saying she 0:20:04.320 --> 0:20:08.120 was responsible for it, that she accidentally bit Jane during 0:20:08.119 --> 0:20:14.320 the struggle. Finally, Connie's story was good enough. On May 0:20:14.359 --> 0:20:17.879 twenty first, two thousand and two, based only on Connie's confession, 0:20:18.280 --> 0:20:22.479 the El Dorado County District Attorney's office filed murder charges 0:20:22.560 --> 0:20:26.320 against Ricky Davis. And here's the thing. When those cops 0:20:26.359 --> 0:20:29.359 told Connie she wouldn't be charged, turns out they were 0:20:29.440 --> 0:20:34.640 lying again. Connie was charged with murder II as an accomplice. 0:20:34.680 --> 0:20:37.520 A few months later, prosecutors told Connie that if she 0:20:37.640 --> 0:20:41.160 agreed to testify against Ricky a trial. She could plead 0:20:41.200 --> 0:20:44.800 guilty to manslaughter and get a huge reduction in her sentence. 0:20:45.200 --> 0:20:48.879 They decide exactly how much of her reduction. After she testified, 0:20:49.600 --> 0:20:53.560 With no good options left, Connie pled guilty and agreed 0:20:53.720 --> 0:21:02.400 to take the stand. 0:21:06.119 --> 0:21:07.800 I didn't like her to start with. 0:21:08.520 --> 0:21:12.640 That's Maureen Klein, Ricky Davis's mother. Remember, she's always had 0:21:12.680 --> 0:21:15.440 an opinion about Ricky's ex girlfriend, Connie. 0:21:15.800 --> 0:21:20.040 Ricky and I have always been very close. He had 0:21:20.080 --> 0:21:24.320 a horrible father, so I think the closeness was because 0:21:24.480 --> 0:21:28.040 I was all Ricky really had. Even as a teenager, 0:21:28.160 --> 0:21:31.480 he would call me his best friend. So this situation 0:21:31.800 --> 0:21:33.359 was extremely devastating. 0:21:34.040 --> 0:21:36.480 In two thousand and two, Maureen learned that Ricky was 0:21:36.480 --> 0:21:40.000 being charged with murdering Jane Hilton, based on the testimony 0:21:40.040 --> 0:21:43.800 of a girl he dated fourteen years ago. Mariene couldn't 0:21:43.840 --> 0:21:47.080 believe it. She knew her son was no killer and 0:21:47.119 --> 0:21:50.000 the police had seemed to acknowledge his and Connie's innocence 0:21:50.119 --> 0:21:53.919 years ago. As she processed the news, Maureen struggled to 0:21:54.000 --> 0:21:56.360 understand why Connie would falsely confess. 0:21:57.640 --> 0:22:02.640 Connie had problems obviously and she let the detectives talk 0:22:02.680 --> 0:22:05.280 her into believing that she had something to do with 0:22:05.280 --> 0:22:08.080 the murder. I was very angry at Connie, and I 0:22:08.280 --> 0:22:12.000 couldn't believe that she was lying this out not lying. 0:22:12.920 --> 0:22:16.840 I don't understand how somebody could convince you that you 0:22:17.400 --> 0:22:19.920 participated in a murder that you didn't. 0:22:20.119 --> 0:22:23.240 The idea that Connie would confess to a murder she 0:22:23.320 --> 0:22:28.600 didn't commit, it was impossible for Maureen to believe. I 0:22:28.720 --> 0:22:33.360 understand and sympathize with Maureen about her anger towards Connie, 0:22:33.840 --> 0:22:37.760 But Connie's a tragic victim in this too. She didn't 0:22:37.800 --> 0:22:41.800 start out by naming Ricky Davis as a murderer, and 0:22:41.840 --> 0:22:45.520 it was only the lies and the manipulation by the 0:22:45.600 --> 0:22:48.840 detectives in that cold case squad that gave her really 0:22:48.920 --> 0:22:52.720 no choice but to change her story in ways that 0:22:52.880 --> 0:22:55.840 pleased them, or else she was going to lose her kids. 0:22:56.600 --> 0:23:00.359 After Ricky was charged, Maureen sat down and watched Connie's 0:23:00.359 --> 0:23:04.360 interrogation videos. As Maureen watched, she began to see how 0:23:04.400 --> 0:23:08.439 police manipulated Connie. She started realizing that the problem was 0:23:08.560 --> 0:23:11.000 much bigger than her son's ex girlfriend. 0:23:11.720 --> 0:23:14.359 Connie did stay in the starting of one of the 0:23:14.560 --> 0:23:17.440 interviews that she had been up on MES for twenty 0:23:17.520 --> 0:23:21.600 four hours prior, so that in itself, I would think 0:23:21.720 --> 0:23:27.280 they wouldn't have interviewed her at that time, but they did. Anyway, 0:23:27.440 --> 0:23:30.159 she would say exactly what they actually sold it to. 0:23:30.480 --> 0:23:33.200 You could tell that they would turn off the recording 0:23:33.280 --> 0:23:36.680 and get her back on track. They did tell Connie 0:23:36.720 --> 0:23:40.200 that once Ricky was convicted that she would go free, 0:23:40.240 --> 0:23:44.480 and I guess they threatened her with her children and stuff. 0:23:44.800 --> 0:23:48.440 I didn't believe anything would come of it because I 0:23:48.520 --> 0:23:51.200 knew Ricky had no part of it. I knew he 0:23:51.240 --> 0:23:51.760 was innocent. 0:23:52.320 --> 0:23:54.879 Maureen was right that Ricky was innocent, but she was 0:23:54.920 --> 0:23:57.960 wrong that nothing would come of Connie's story. In June 0:23:57.960 --> 0:24:01.760 two thousand and five, Ricky went on for Jane Hilton's murder. 0:24:02.240 --> 0:24:06.399 Prosecutors called Connie Dahl as their star witness. From his 0:24:06.480 --> 0:24:10.359 seat at the defense table, Ricky watched Connie testify. He 0:24:10.400 --> 0:24:13.320 hadn't seen her in almost twenty years, and he couldn't 0:24:13.320 --> 0:24:16.240 believe what he was hearing. Connie knew he was innocent. 0:24:16.520 --> 0:24:20.320 The two of them had discovered Jane's body together somehow, 0:24:20.320 --> 0:24:24.199 though the system had put them on opposite sides. For 0:24:24.280 --> 0:24:26.879 her part, Maureen sat in the front row of the courtroom, 0:24:27.240 --> 0:24:31.520 right behind Ricky as prosecutors told the jury an unthinkable 0:24:31.560 --> 0:24:32.760 story about her son. 0:24:33.240 --> 0:24:36.400 The way they portrayed him, like he was some vicious animal, 0:24:36.840 --> 0:24:40.320 that was hard to take. I was surprised that the 0:24:40.400 --> 0:24:44.280 jurors believed Connie. To me, she didn't sound very credible. 0:24:44.400 --> 0:24:47.359 The way she answered was what she was told to say, 0:24:48.320 --> 0:24:52.240 but they did believe her. Obviously, I couldn't say anything. 0:24:52.320 --> 0:24:56.280 At times, I wanted to yell out or react, but 0:24:56.600 --> 0:24:58.680