Speaker 1: The Innocence Network is alusiffiliation of independent innocence organizations, and
Speaker 1: each year, members of these organizations, as well as the
Speaker 1: hundreds of exneries who they've helped free, gather for the
Speaker 1: Innocence Network Conference, and our team was honored to join
Speaker 1: them for their twenty two gathering in Arizona. On May
Speaker 1: twenty third, nineteen ninety one, in the Roxbury section of Boston,
Speaker 1: two men entered Kenneth McLean's home to settle a drug dispute.
Speaker 1: When he escaped, one of the men vainly shot him
Speaker 1: in the street. Two teenage witnesses, neither of whom had
Speaker 1: seen the assailed faces, described the men as black and
Speaker 1: that the shooter had a lock of hair growing down
Speaker 1: the name of his neck. One of the witnesses, Derek Hobson,
Speaker 1: considered the victim to be like an uncle to him.
Speaker 1: When he viewed a photo line up in front of
Speaker 1: the grieving family, only one of the men pictured, Robert Foxworth,
Speaker 1: had hair that fit Derek's description of the shooter. Robert
Speaker 1: was not in the area at the time of the
Speaker 1: crime and had no connections to the victim, but a
Speaker 1: known entity of the police as a drug dealer. After
Speaker 1: Derek tried to recant his identification at a pre trial hearing,
Speaker 1: the state knew that they needed to strengthen their case.
Speaker 1: They picked up a drug dealer named Troy Logan, who
Speaker 1: had been bragging about being the actual shooter. Logan agreed
Speaker 1: to give a statement implicating Robert instead, and they were
Speaker 1: tried together along with the third man, Ronnie Christian. With
Speaker 1: logan statement and Derek Hobson's coerced identification, the other men
Speaker 1: were acquitted and Robert was sent away for life. A
Speaker 1: few years later, one of Logan's co conspirators gave a
Speaker 1: detailed description of the crime, exonerating Robert in front of
Speaker 1: members of the prosecutor's office and federal agents. Yet the
Speaker 1: fight for Robert's freedom had only just begun. This is
Speaker 1: wrongful conviction. Welcome back to wrongful Conviction. Today's episode is
Speaker 1: a searing indictment of a system that I think we
Speaker 1: all grew up thinking and hoping was better than it is.
Speaker 1: And when I say that, this is a grotesque example
Speaker 1: of just how easy it is to send a man
Speaker 1: away forever on the flimsiest of evidence came and call
Speaker 1: it evidence with a callous disregard for the rights, the
Speaker 1: hopes and dreams of that individual has happened in Massachusetts,
Speaker 1: and we have the man here himself in person. We're
Speaker 1: here at the Innocence Network conference in Phoenix, Arizona, and
Speaker 1: all the way from Boston, Massachusetts is Robert Foxworth. So Robert, welcome,
Speaker 1: Thank you very much. I appreciate it. I would say
Speaker 1: I'm sorry you're here because of what it took for
Speaker 1: you to be here, but I am very happy and
Speaker 1: honored that you're here to share your story and with
Speaker 1: him his attorney, Amy Belger. Amy is a sole practitioner
Speaker 1: and a post conviction attorney. Welcome, thank you for being here.
Speaker 1: Thank you, Robert. We always like to start with a
Speaker 1: little background. Where did you grow up and that did
Speaker 1: you have happy childhood? Oh? Yeah, I had a good childhood.
Speaker 1: Had you know My dad had his own barber shop
Speaker 1: in my mom was in the medical field, and the
Speaker 1: area was good. It was a good place to grow up.
Speaker 1: I did have a solid family like that, a lot
Speaker 1: of love dea. But at some point I guess I
Speaker 1: took the wrong turn in life and started run in
Speaker 1: the streets selling drugs. But you're not gonna get any
Speaker 1: judgment here about drug use or or dealing. I mean,
Speaker 1: we here at wrong for conviction and myself personally, we
Speaker 1: believe that everyone should be free to do with their
Speaker 1: own body whatever they choose, as long as they're not
Speaker 1: causing harm to other fully self sufficient excutero living humans
Speaker 1: and certainly using our dealing drugs is not murder, which
Speaker 1: is the crime that we're here to discuss. However, it
Speaker 1: was drug dealing that made you have known into the police.
Speaker 1: In fact, you were even known to the detective in
Speaker 1: this very case, Detective Flynn, who it's fair to say
Speaker 1: probably was not so fond of you, which is really
Speaker 1: the only motive I've been able to surmise for why
Speaker 1: you were targeted for a crime you were not in
Speaker 1: the area to even commit if you had wanted to,
Speaker 1: and had no connection to whatsoever. I mean, did you
Speaker 1: even know the victim? I never met this dude a
Speaker 1: day in his life. I would have never known him
Speaker 1: if I met him. Okay, so Amy, can you give
Speaker 1: us the details of this horrible scenario. I mean, it
Speaker 1: starts off with two men and one driver. They pulled
Speaker 1: up to the house of Kenneth McLean. The two were
Speaker 1: led into the home by his eight year old daughter,
Speaker 1: so they may have known her. And it appears that
Speaker 1: this was drug related. From all that we can tell
Speaker 1: from the investigation, it was a drug related dispute between
Speaker 1: the deceased man whose name was Kenneth McClean and the
Speaker 1: per portraders of this crime. In this eight year old child,
Speaker 1: you know, witnessed this unfold before her eyes, and those
Speaker 1: men took vengeance on her father and at first abused
Speaker 1: him in an upstairs part of the house, and he
Speaker 1: escaped and came running out onto the street unclothed with
Speaker 1: electrical tape near his mouth and his wrists, and they
Speaker 1: shot him in broad daylight. Yeah, it's like something out
Speaker 1: of a Tarantino movie. Right. They stripped this man of
Speaker 1: everything but his sweatshirt, bound him with tape, and somehow
Speaker 1: or other he was able to break free and make
Speaker 1: a run for his very life. But of course he
Speaker 1: had very little chance as these men were armed, and
Speaker 1: tragically he was killed. Had you been made aware of
Speaker 1: this crime, was it big news in the area. It's
Speaker 1: from another part. It's from Roxbury. Was matdipeon delicous and
Speaker 1: rock from Madapeans and Roxbury's the other. But it was
Speaker 1: on the news and everyone heard about it. It made
Speaker 1: They had him labeled as a drug dealer. So and
Speaker 1: the Boston Police put out an ap B. They were
Speaker 1: looking for three black men. Quote that I read was
Speaker 1: one black, dark skin no further descriptions. Number two black
Speaker 1: male six ft to six found about twenty five years old,
Speaker 1: with medium curly hair and a long curl down the
Speaker 1: center of his hair, down the nape of his neck.
Speaker 1: That remember that detail, the long curl that's going to
Speaker 1: come into play. Shortly wearing a red sweatshirt, a red
Speaker 1: shirt and blue jeans. He was the one that fired
Speaker 1: the shots. According to a witness, there in a red
Speaker 1: Toyota or red Ford escort, four doors being operated by
Speaker 1: a dark skin black male. Now, these descriptions came from
Speaker 1: some neighborhood kids. Yes, his name was Derek Hopson. Their
Speaker 1: description initially, they had said, if I'm not mistaken, that
Speaker 1: they couldn't see the faces of the individuals that were
Speaker 1: running away as they were walking to go to play
Speaker 1: basket ball whatever they were doing. And of course that
Speaker 1: changed over time, and that should give everybody pause. And
Speaker 1: these kids were friends of the man who was murdered. Yes,
Speaker 1: they were close friends and I think distant family members.
Speaker 1: He said he's like uncle toon. Okay, So they have
Speaker 1: these descriptions and the hairstyle, how did that play into
Speaker 1: your misidentification or, as we find out later, coerced false identification?
Speaker 1: Mom My hairstyle at the time, I got curly hair.
Speaker 1: I used to leave it was a tale. The popular
Speaker 1: hairs to everyone was so you have a tail on
Speaker 1: the back end that do you can brayed? So okay.
Speaker 1: So this was a popular hairstyle at the time. So
Speaker 1: not exactly a defining characteristic, right, It's not like a
Speaker 1: birth mark or a lazy eye or something, right, but
Speaker 1: you were known to police and had that hairstyle. So
Speaker 1: then a few weeks go by and then there's this
Speaker 1: alleged tip from a confidential informant that names you along
Speaker 1: with three others. The fact that it was a documented
Speaker 1: anonymous call that put Robert's name in the case, we
Speaker 1: were never able to source that anywhere. And now that
Speaker 1: we know what we know about the way the Boston
Speaker 1: Police detectives gathered evidence or put a case together to
Speaker 1: convict him, you know, we don't believe that ever took
Speaker 1: place we don't believe that phone call ever came. It
Speaker 1: seems like they were doing what was unfortunately prevalent in
Speaker 1: the police departments all across this country and the quote
Speaker 1: unquote tough on crime era, and as in many cases,
Speaker 1: it's hard to discern what is real and what is fabricated,
Speaker 1: as it means to another end when we consider the source. Now. Nevertheless,
Speaker 1: this alleged confidential informant tip seemed to contain at least
Speaker 1: some credible information. It named Ronnie Christian, one of Robert's
Speaker 1: co defendant who is believed to have at least known
Speaker 1: the victim in this case, another guy named Steven Seewee,
Speaker 1: as well as a guy named Hoosie Joiner whose name
Speaker 1: will definitely come up later, so remember that name. But
Speaker 1: before we get ahead of ourselves, it was this alleged
Speaker 1: tip that police claimed at the time informed their decision
Speaker 1: to put Robert's picture into a photo lineup for the
Speaker 1: fifteen year old witness Derek Hobson to view. They brought
Speaker 1: him inside the victim's household, the victims family and showed
Speaker 1: him pitches and me and told him that I was
Speaker 1: the one that did it. You were the only one
Speaker 1: in the lineup with a deal. Right, So here's the
Speaker 1: one identifying factor that the kids seemed to be sure of,
Speaker 1: and they're gonna put you in there with the only
Speaker 1: thing that they have to cling onto him. And Derek
Speaker 1: was fifteen years old when they did that. They pulled
Speaker 1: him off the street into a home, you know, of
Speaker 1: the grieving victims family and directed him to identify Robert.
Speaker 1: We see suggestive lineups and show ups and photo arrays
Speaker 1: all the time, but this would fall into the category
Speaker 1: of extremely suggestive para fair and even the fifteen year
Speaker 1: old child witness was trying to message to the detectives
Speaker 1: I'm only able to identify the hairstyle in the beginning.
Speaker 1: He did the best he could as a child to
Speaker 1: do the right thing in that situation, but as you've
Speaker 1: probably read, with future efforts by the police, his will
Speaker 1: was overborne. Yeah, so Hobson was showing another photo of
Speaker 1: rare week or so later, this time, though, Roberts is
Speaker 1: the only photo present from the first photo lineup, as
Speaker 1: well as again being the only person in the lineup
Speaker 1: with that hairstyle. So super suggestive and we don't know
Speaker 1: anything else about this interaction. But if the first time
Speaker 1: was any indication. Never mind what we know happened later
Speaker 1: at pre trial and at trial and what Derek later
Speaker 1: said as an adult, there was probably a lot of
Speaker 1: pressure and suggestion going on, and Derek Hobbs had again
Speaker 1: identified Robert and you were arrested on July eleven. That's
Speaker 1: six weeks after the crime and almost a month after
Speaker 1: Dark's initial I d in front of the victim's family.
Speaker 1: So it doesn't seem like they were in a big
Speaker 1: hurry here. If they were really convinced that you were
Speaker 1: in credible throughout the public safety, they might have moved
Speaker 1: a little more quickly. No, I mean, I don't mean
Speaker 1: to make light of it, but it seems ridiculous. Did
Speaker 1: you hear that they were looking for you? Did they
Speaker 1: just bust down the door one day? I was sitting
Speaker 1: down watching TV and turned so my girl at the
Speaker 1: time opened the door and they ran in and they
Speaker 1: said put your hands behind it back and they cuffed
Speaker 1: me and put me in the car. And thus begins
Speaker 1: almost thirty years saga. When we went to the motion
Speaker 1: to suppress Aaron, and this witness got up there and
Speaker 1: told the judge and all them listen, it's not him,
Speaker 1: I can't. I let you know, it's curly here in
Speaker 1: the tail. They said, you see the guy in court.
Speaker 1: He says, no, I don't. So we was getting the
Speaker 1: ruling on it in the morning, and I swore I
Speaker 1: was going to win that motion. Yeah. He had faith
Speaker 1: that we had a criminal legal system that was going
Speaker 1: to straighten this out. You know, if we can just
Speaker 1: get into court, we just get in front of a
Speaker 1: judge and that judge understands that this witness is only
Speaker 1: saying that he's recognizing a hairstyle, and you know, the
Speaker 1: legal standard has been explained to Robert right, that it
Speaker 1: was argued correctly to the judge. Right. He had faith
Speaker 1: that this was going to get straightened out. I remember
Speaker 1: losing it always sat with me wrong. It wasn't until
Speaker 1: Amy and John and them came along and finally told
Speaker 1: that they had a hearing without my lawyer's present, and
Speaker 1: it was a judge, the d a police, and the
Speaker 1: witness and then it that's where they told him that
Speaker 1: I had asked the witness and that's why he testified
Speaker 1: like he did at the motion to suppress. The argument
Speaker 1: of the prosecutor was that Robert and people associated with
Speaker 1: Robert were the ones who had intimidated the witness into
Speaker 1: not identifying him, right, I mean talk about projection or
Speaker 1: gas lighting or whatever you want to call it. And
Speaker 1: because as was found out later from Derek as an adult,
Speaker 1: that's precisely what they had been doing at this very
Speaker 1: hearing to him when he was just a fifteen year
Speaker 1: old child. Yes, so you had this escalating pattern of
Speaker 1: the child's witness not testifying definitively against Robert, being taken
Speaker 1: out into the hallway or you know, into the back
Speaker 1: and being threatened, and then coming back in and you know,
Speaker 1: giving more definitive testimony. And when I came in and
Speaker 1: I on motion to suppress, Aaron just threw that out.
Speaker 1: I knew I was going to jail. You know. All
Speaker 1: these years later, on our motion for a new trial
Speaker 1: that we filed in, he came forward and spoke to
Speaker 1: the d a's office and explained all of what happened
Speaker 1: from his perspective now as a grown man, and they
Speaker 1: credited that that this had happened, that these cops did
Speaker 1: do this, and that the prosecutor, the trial prosecutor from
Speaker 1: their office engaged in this misconduct as well. I mean, wow,
Speaker 1: I wish I felt surprised by this, but being surrounded
Speaker 1: by all of these people at the innescence that were
Speaker 1: conference men and women with very similar stories, it just
Speaker 1: puts a very exhausting and depressing fine point on how
Speaker 1: common and not surprising this all is. In fact, that
Speaker 1: they recognized Derek's statement as credible, now that's the surprising part.
Speaker 1: It shouldn't be, but it is so now that they've
Speaker 1: had so much trouble with their only evidence against Robert,
Speaker 1: this misidentification that Derek Copson was so desperately trying to rescind,
Speaker 1: they knew that they had to gather something else against
Speaker 1: Robert to make discharge stick instead of, you know, maybe
Speaker 1: finding the real perpetrator, like what they're paid to do.
Speaker 1: And it would be funny if it wasn't so sick,
Speaker 1: because that's exactly what they did. And of course I'm
Speaker 1: talking about Troy Logan. They also picked up Ronnie Christian,
Speaker 1: who were not sure if he had any involved it,
Speaker 1: but they were picked up in September. The police said
Speaker 1: that Logan identified you from a photo lineup and gave
Speaker 1: a statement, and according to Logan, you accompanied him and
Speaker 1: another man to Kenneth mcclean's house to buy coke. Now,
Speaker 1: you and McClean supposedly argued about a previous deal in
Speaker 1: which McLean allegedly sold you a bad batch. Logan said
Speaker 1: that he left when the fighting started, but that he
Speaker 1: saw you go back inside with a gun and he
Speaker 1: allegedly heard gunshots. So this all sounds like a typical
Speaker 1: course or it said, to buy a statement where a
Speaker 1: witness cops to being there, right because he has to
Speaker 1: under this pressure, but not enough to incriminate himself, right,
Speaker 1: just a safe distance, so to speak. So, I mean,
Speaker 1: did you even know this Troy Logan character. I never
Speaker 1: met the guy, but I don't know. He's from New York.
Speaker 1: He's the New York gang member from the paperwork I see.
Speaker 1: I never met him a day in my life. Okay,
Speaker 1: that's I was getting crazier. I mean, So the state
Speaker 1: filed continuance to delay your trial, Robert, because they wanted
Speaker 1: to try the three of you together. But my whole
Speaker 1: thing is I was ready for trial. They would already
Speaker 1: scheduled the trial date and Logan at that point he
Speaker 1: makes his statement to him saying this that, and they
Speaker 1: preclude my trial basically to try it jointly. But there's
Speaker 1: other evidence that they withheld because it would have killed
Speaker 1: Logan statement. There's a statement from his stepfather who we
Speaker 1: lived with, that outline that he told his stepfather that
Speaker 1: he was the one that did it. So they hid
Speaker 1: that pot from me. Amy looked like about to jump
Speaker 1: out of your skin. So we didn't get that statement
Speaker 1: from Troy logan stepfather until either So they buried it,
Speaker 1: and they buried a lot of exculpatory evidence that incriminated
Speaker 1: Troy Logan. Right because Troy Logan's false statement that he
Speaker 1: gave to the police that implicated Robert was necessary to
Speaker 1: the case. This isn't even disputed. Right. Much of the
Speaker 1: incriminating evidence against Troy Logan was never turned over, but
Speaker 1: a portion of it, the most important, I think, was
Speaker 1: a report that the Anti Gang Violence unit put together
Speaker 1: where they got information that Troy Logan was actually the shooter.
Speaker 1: And if Troy Logan was the shooter, they're trying the
Speaker 1: case to the jury saying Roberts the shooter. They have
Speaker 1: this police report saying that they have a confidential informant
Speaker 1: who has given them information, and they verified the confidential
Speaker 1: informant through you know, other information. It was considered a
Speaker 1: reliable informant who said, you know, Troy Logan is the shooter.
Speaker 1: He's bragging about it all over the streets of Dorchester.
Speaker 1: He shot Kenny McClain. And they didn't turn that over.
Speaker 1: And their motive for doing that appear to be that
Speaker 1: Troy was compromised. Troy had given them information about the
Speaker 1: murder implicated Robert, and they didn't have anything on Robert
Speaker 1: except the fifteen year old with the hairstyle. So it
Speaker 1: wasn't until that that evidence came out that they had
Speaker 1: buried all of that. Right, And when we go back
Speaker 1: to the beginning of the show, and I was talking
Speaker 1: about the flammiest of evidence, like literally, there's the a
Speaker 1: strand of hair, right, and not a strand of hair
Speaker 1: under microscope, just a just a hairstyle. This was the evidence. Yes,
Speaker 1: Now let's talk about the attorney. So many of the
Speaker 1: people we've had on our show had attorneys that were
Speaker 1: not up to the task, and that's being kind. But
Speaker 1: your family hired one of the top guys, is that right? Yeah?
Speaker 1: And I had Willie Davis who tried write the cases before,
Speaker 1: and you had Willie Davis and then Troy Logan, you
Speaker 1: had another guy named William White, and then White actually
Speaker 1: joined Davis' firm. Then the judge ordered you to get
Speaker 1: a new attorney because of this new partnership that these
Speaker 1: guys had forged. The conflict, Yeah, the conflict that that
Speaker 1: created when they conflicted him out. He didn't give us back,
Speaker 1: no money, He just recommended us to another attorney. Okay,
Speaker 1: So the trial itself, there's this guy you never laid
Speaker 1: eyes on in your life, not even from the same city,
Speaker 1: who's outbragging all over town about having done this, and
Speaker 1: you're being put on trial with him, right, Yes, they
Speaker 1: put me in one area up days and put him
Speaker 1: in the other. They brought me down, sat me at
Speaker 1: one table, Ronnie and there, and then Logan over there.
Speaker 1: And you know, ultimately that was a legal issue and
Speaker 1: a legal error, right. And you know, trying Robert along
Speaker 1: with Troy Logan, right, since they had this statement from
Speaker 1: Logan naming Robert is a shooter. Admitting that into evidence
Speaker 1: would have opened Logan up to cross examination. But since
Speaker 1: he's a co defendant, forcing him to take the standard
Speaker 1: trial would be a clear violation of his Fifth Amendment right.
Speaker 1: So in order to protect everyone's right to a fair trial.
Speaker 1: The prosecution came up with what they probably thought was
Speaker 1: an elegant solution, but in reality it just trampled on
Speaker 1: Robert's rights. That it involved using the name mr X.
Speaker 1: Oh my god, can you elaborate on that Amy Troy
Speaker 1: Logan statement to the police where he was naming Robert,
Speaker 1: you know, as the shooter. The d a's office proposed
Speaker 1: to redact Robert's name and call him Mr X in
Speaker 1: the statement, you know, for the jury. So the statement reads,
Speaker 1: Troy Logan said that, you know, Mr X took a gun,
Speaker 1: went upstairs, shot this victim. Mr X is the one
Speaker 1: who did this, and Troy Logan saw it. And then
Speaker 1: the jury was told Mr X is not Ronnie Christian.
Speaker 1: So by deduction, okay, there's only one other person Mr
Speaker 1: X can be, and their theory of the cases, Robert
Speaker 1: is the shooter. So the judicial system decides that a
Speaker 1: fair trial for Robert is well, we're going to redact
Speaker 1: your name out and we're gonna say mr X, so
Speaker 1: we don't violate your rights, right, Um, but there isn't
Speaker 1: anybody else possibly you could ever deduce was Mr X
Speaker 1: except for Robert. And at the time Robert was tried,
Speaker 1: that was considered a fair trial. Um, there wasn't any
Speaker 1: kind of care and attention systemically to Robert's rights. Robert
Speaker 1: didn't have the advocacy and the representation at the time
Speaker 1: of trial that he should have had. But ultimately the
Speaker 1: argument was put to the judge who certainly knew what
Speaker 1: the law was and didn't do the right thing. So
Speaker 1: the trial itself, how long did it last? About a week?
Speaker 1: It's hard to believe they managed to waste a week
Speaker 1: on this. It's literally nothing to talk about. This crazy
Speaker 1: Mr X, which is like from a bad script. And
Speaker 1: then the witness, it's a courageously doing his best to
Speaker 1: backtrack and saying that he was only eight percent sure
Speaker 1: in his identification. The way they got him to testify
Speaker 1: against Robert is over the lunch break between the morning
Speaker 1: in the afternoon sessions of trial. They put the kid
Speaker 1: into a holding cell at the courthouse and they said
Speaker 1: to him, you either testify that that guy sitting there
Speaker 1: on trial is the guy you saw as the shooter,
Speaker 1: or we're gonna put you in a cell with the
Speaker 1: three defendants on trial who are murderers. And this is
Speaker 1: a young boy. Yeah, he said he saw no way
Speaker 1: out other than to tell the lies that he was
Speaker 1: told to tell, right right. So yeah, as far as
Speaker 1: the defense goes, Robert, did you have an alibi? Did
Speaker 1: you have witnesses? A test upon your behalf? I would
Speaker 1: have gotten on the stand, but the problem was my
Speaker 1: always said it would have hurt me more to left
Speaker 1: him here, my past and my convictions, so I didn't
Speaker 1: get up to here. I didn't get on understand, so
Speaker 1: I didn't really present no trial defense. I just want
Speaker 1: to miss identification and alibi defense. My family members and
Speaker 1: all of them came, but at that point I was
Speaker 1: kind of stuck. And on March thirty one, nineteen, predictably, unfortunately,
Speaker 1: the jury convicted you of second degree murder and sends
Speaker 1: you to life in prison. To add insult to injury,
Speaker 1: Logan was acquitted and Christian received a directed verdict of
Speaker 1: not guilty after the state closed its case. So they
Speaker 1: got it exactly wrong. I mean, it's incredible how they
Speaker 1: how they do this and and lock up the innocent
Speaker 1: man and let the guilty one go and then all
Speaker 1: of us remain in danger. And that's exactly what happened here.
Speaker 1: So that moment when you were convicted. I didn't know it.
Speaker 1: I really didn't know what I was last verdict they said,
Speaker 1: I didn't know it. Ronnie Fishing got generated I think
Speaker 1: earlier that day or the next day, I can't remember.
Speaker 1: And then when they came back, they read logan verdict
Speaker 1: first and they said not guilty. So if my mom
Speaker 1: was sitting in the front row, so when they started
Speaker 1: saying my name, I'm looking around at her. It's that
Speaker 1: I'm not paying attention because I just know I'm not
Speaker 1: going to jam. And when I turned around, I see
Speaker 1: the mails and be like, hey, you gotta turned around
Speaker 1: the couple about it, I said, for what they told me,
Speaker 1: And I know that was a horrible ride in the
Speaker 1: back of that meat wagon. That was a horrible ride.
Speaker 1: When I finally got up there, they bring me to
Speaker 1: a unit called the A A unit and and that's
Speaker 1: basically a segregation unit. So when I walked in, this
Speaker 1: is this is straight on it right here. They had
Speaker 1: trash in the middle of the units, probably halfway to
Speaker 1: your calf, mice running around everywhere. You gotta kick through
Speaker 1: it and go to yourself and lock yourself. And I
Speaker 1: couldn't believe this, which prison was at Walpole. Walpole, remember
Speaker 1: I think I was upstate, probably about sixteen fifteen, eighteen
Speaker 1: months somewhere we got a letter from the federal authorities
Speaker 1: on a freedom of information right request and let outline
Speaker 1: that I wasn't the one that did it. I went
Speaker 1: earl when the lawyer brought me this letter, I said, Oh,
Speaker 1: I'm going home. I remembered that said. I was so happy.
Speaker 1: And then when the judge denied the U thirty he
Speaker 1: didn't put nothing behind it. But the letter didn't have
Speaker 1: an affidavit supporting it, but originally was from the United
Speaker 1: States Attorney's Office outlining who did it and how they
Speaker 1: did it. Yeah, there was a federal debriefing of somebody
Speaker 1: who was involved in this murder, you know, another a
Speaker 1: person that was never a suspect and never brought to trial.
Speaker 1: He was a federal informant, and and through that debriefing process,
Speaker 1: the federal agents, you know, will say, do you have
Speaker 1: any other information you know on any other cases right
Speaker 1: that you want to give us? Because they're sitting there
Speaker 1: in this prophet session with them and they have immunity,
Speaker 1: and so the guy says, yeah, that Kenneth mclein murder.
Speaker 1: You guys, you convicted the wrong guy, Okay, And the
Speaker 1: reason I know you did is because I was there
Speaker 1: for the planning of it. I was involved in this right,
Speaker 1: and that was a right. And they turned it over
Speaker 1: to Earl Howard, your trial attorney, who didn't make effective
Speaker 1: use of it. Right, And then years later, you know,
Speaker 1: the Suffolk County District Attorney's office didn't do anything about it.
Speaker 1: You know, they've already declared that person to be a
Speaker 1: reliable and formant because they're using his testimony to you know,
Speaker 1: convict other people. Right, they've already decided he's reliable, but
Speaker 1: they did not act, and they knew it was true.
Speaker 1: Then they knew it was true because everything in that
Speaker 1: statement that he made match the evidence from the gun
Speaker 1: to the person who were in the car, the people
Speaker 1: that were named in prior proceedings. Everything that he gave
Speaker 1: in that rundown outlined who did it and it hates.
Speaker 1: He said they had a thirty six tech nine millimeter
Speaker 1: ballistics of the States said, that's what it was. He said,
Speaker 1: with three dudes that got in the car, and needs
Speaker 1: of the dudes, both of them dudes T level who
Speaker 1: no one never knew, and he sent forman said they
Speaker 1: were in the car. Now. He gave all this to
Speaker 1: the state without knowing anything about my case at the time,
Speaker 1: so it just took that from the state and matched
Speaker 1: it to this point. Because I didn't appeal on my
Speaker 1: case in ninety three. I didn't appeal my case then,
Speaker 1: so it was nothing on the books for you to
Speaker 1: read or understand anything. He just gave a statement and
Speaker 1: outline how his involved moment wasn't who would have acted.
Speaker 1: And when we got that statement, that's when we started
Speaker 1: comparing it and it matched up. And that guy's name
Speaker 1: was Hughes join them. And you know there were Boston
Speaker 1: Police detectives and an a d A from Suffolk County
Speaker 1: who were sitting there in the room, the two agencies
Speaker 1: that were responsible for convicting him, and they didn't turn
Speaker 1: that information over. You were let down to betrayed, screwed
Speaker 1: over by not just the people that were against you,
Speaker 1: but the people that were supposed to be protecting him.
Speaker 1: I thought the same thing. Actually, my same attorney that
Speaker 1: sold me out to try I had the same attorney
Speaker 1: on appeal. I got the wrong end of his stick
Speaker 1: by him all day Robert's trial attorney did not perfect
Speaker 1: his appellate rights and did not exhaust all of his
Speaker 1: claims in the state court before the time ran out
Speaker 1: for him to do so, it was his attorney dropped
Speaker 1: the ball, and so Robert's first post conviction lawyers John
Speaker 1: and Lynda Thompson, who had the case for twenty years, right,
Speaker 1: I only came in at the tail end the last
Speaker 1: five years. They had the case for twenty years. So
Speaker 1: they're trying to to exhaust his state claims and bring
Speaker 1: it up to federal court, but it took years to
Speaker 1: do that. By the time they do that they bring
Speaker 1: it up to federal court, the law had changed and
Speaker 1: made statements like the Mr. Xt statement inadmissible to convict
Speaker 1: somebody with evidence like that. I think the district court
Speaker 1: judge and federal court who actually heard this the first
Speaker 1: time on the habeas petition, did say that that was
Speaker 1: insufficient evidence to convict Robert, and she let Robert out
Speaker 1: honest day, right then, and she did vacate the conviction
Speaker 1: saying that evidence is insufficient to have convicted him of
Speaker 1: this murder. But unfortunately the first Circuit Court of Appeals
Speaker 1: reversed her decision and put the conviction back, and then,
Speaker 1: of course our s j C. Massachusetts let that stand.
Speaker 1: Our Supreme Judicial Court ruled that because the law at
Speaker 1: the time of Robert's trial was that that was good evidence,
Speaker 1: that that was good evidence, and that they weren't going
Speaker 1: to return his conviction even though he had suffered this
Speaker 1: injustice of not having his appellate rights perfected when they
Speaker 1: should have been, and if he had he would have
Speaker 1: had the benefit of that law. It was just another
Speaker 1: gross injustice. John and Linda Thompson, you know, they got
Speaker 1: him out and then they watched him return to prison.
Speaker 1: I never forget that time. I never I was out.
Speaker 1: It seemed like eighteen months later. I just got off
Speaker 1: for boo boo boo boom, and I opened it in
Speaker 1: the U. S. Monshould say, you're going never forget that there.
Speaker 1: It's unreal. It is. And John and Linda they fought
Speaker 1: the case all those years, even after they didn't give up,
Speaker 1: they were resolved to have him come back out again,
Speaker 1: and thank god he did so with a little break
Speaker 1: in the middle. You endured almost three decades, but ultimately
Speaker 1: justice delayed was not denied. How did how did you
Speaker 1: get him how's he here? How did you do it?
Speaker 1: As I said before, John and Linda never gave up
Speaker 1: on the case, trying to get the d A's office
Speaker 1: to give them access to discovery that they knew was
Speaker 1: there that was withheld because the informant, who's the joiners
Speaker 1: that I sat down, I told them they have all
Speaker 1: the paperwork. You know, they were trying trying to get
Speaker 1: the discovery, trying to get the information, and it just
Speaker 1: got tiring. John Thompson wrote me a letter in January.
Speaker 1: I knew of him by reputation, and he knew me
Speaker 1: sort of the same way, and he said, I have
Speaker 1: an innocent client, and I know you have a heart
Speaker 1: for innocence work. And John Thompson is one of the top,
Speaker 1: if not the top appellate practitioner in Massachusetts. And you know,
Speaker 1: as soon as I saw the return address on the
Speaker 1: envelope of the letter, I'm like, whatever he wants for me,
Speaker 1: I'm going to do it right. So um, you know,
Speaker 1: that's how I became involved in the case. He didn't
Speaker 1: really need my legal mind, right, he needed my support
Speaker 1: and he needed somebody to come in, you know, to
Speaker 1: sort of be aggressive about the fact that they weren't
Speaker 1: turning over the discovery actually calling it what it is.
Speaker 1: This is prosecutorial misconduct. This is an ethical violation that
Speaker 1: you haven't turned it over, and I'm going to tell
Speaker 1: everybody if you don't give it to me. And then finally,
Speaker 1: once we had it, we were able to put the
Speaker 1: claim together and between John's efforts and my efforts, you know,
Speaker 1: to try to get the information that went on for
Speaker 1: twelve years, right when they had the documents the whole
Speaker 1: time and they weren't turning them over. I talked to John,
Speaker 1: I remember he said. He asked me if I knew Amy.
Speaker 1: I said no, He's all I'm going to reach out
Speaker 1: this then, and I said, okay, since he came, came
Speaker 1: and it's yeah, I've seen documents that I would have
Speaker 1: never got a lot of them documents, and I know
Speaker 1: that for a fact, and you would have probably died
Speaker 1: in prison. I U a certain point. You know, that's
Speaker 1: what that's the pillar size of a basketball. And anybody
Speaker 1: who got a lot of time in there tell you
Speaker 1: it took years to get that pill down. When you know,
Speaker 1: you take a regular pilly swallowing, that's it. But when
Speaker 1: you're swallowing that pill that you know what, I'm never
Speaker 1: going home. This is where I'm going to be for
Speaker 1: the rest of my life. Every day you're trying to
Speaker 1: take a little gulp to get it down, and then
Speaker 1: after finally sat down in here, Okay, this is me.
Speaker 1: It's where I'm gonna be at. So when the lawyers
Speaker 1: come on board and they litigated and they get you
Speaker 1: that relief and they pulled that ball out of this
Speaker 1: like you go on in life, but you always feel
Speaker 1: it down there. Nothing's gonna ever fill that spot where
Speaker 1: that ball was at. Well. I mean, that's that's heavy.
Speaker 1: It's powerful, and I don't think anyone who doesn't know
Speaker 1: that on the level that you do could ever truly
Speaker 1: understand it. And look, thankfully you're on the other side
Speaker 1: of that basketball sized pill, and in no small part
Speaker 1: through the work of Amy John and Linda Thompson, your
Speaker 1: own hard work and perseverance most of all encourage And
Speaker 1: I also have to mention my empathy and all of
Speaker 1: this for Derek Hobson. I mean, he was coerced as
Speaker 1: a terrified child to play a part in your wrongful conviction.
Speaker 1: And I've got to imagine that he was carrying around
Speaker 1: a huge amount of guilt, even considering how much he
Speaker 1: pushed back under tremendous pressure. I mean he really did try. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he tried, and um, I think you know, I think
Speaker 1: that bothered him a lot, because since I've been out,
Speaker 1: I took him, went out to eat him and his
Speaker 1: wife and me and my girl, and and he just
Speaker 1: told me, he's all like this bothered me for a
Speaker 1: long time. Even before the district attorney called him forward
Speaker 1: and asked him about the case, he said, when they
Speaker 1: called him forward and asked him about the case after
Speaker 1: almost thirty years, he said, do you want the same
Speaker 1: story or you want the truth? And they said no,
Speaker 1: we want the truth. That's when he told him the
Speaker 1: truth and I was let out. But he told me
Speaker 1: he was seeing a psych service person for many years
Speaker 1: over that because he couldn't sleep in it was nothing
Speaker 1: he could do. Yeah, that's a hell of a thing
Speaker 1: to carry around with you. And it's beautiful actually that
Speaker 1: you connected with him. You know, that says a lot
Speaker 1: about your character, because I think a lot of people
Speaker 1: would all the grudge and be easy to understand why
Speaker 1: they would. So. On December eighteenth, prosecutor's father response in
Speaker 1: suffering superior court that supported a new trial and your
Speaker 1: immediate at least from prison. It's said, and this is powerful,
Speaker 1: and this is a quote in summary, the single identification
Speaker 1: witnesses credible recantation of his identification testimony, the substantial likelihood
Speaker 1: that the unnecessar serially suggestive identification procedure could have resulted
Speaker 1: in a misidentification of the defendant, and the prejudicial impact
Speaker 1: of the manner in which the codefendant statement was presented
Speaker 1: to the jury cast real doubt on the justice of
Speaker 1: the conviction end quote. So District Attorney Rachel Rollins then
Speaker 1: filed an emergency petition on December with the state's Supreme
Speaker 1: Judicial Court, and on December twenty three, the very next day,
Speaker 1: after hearing from the state and your attorney's associate, Justice
Speaker 1: Scott Kafker, ordered you're released from prison that very day.
Speaker 1: And here's an incredible quote from Mr Thompson to a
Speaker 1: great attorney. He said, a tremendous amount of government resources
Speaker 1: goes into convicting people of serious crimes, as it should,
Speaker 1: but there are almost no resources available to people who
Speaker 1: have been wrongfully convicted. We know there are many people
Speaker 1: who been in this situation and has been his character
Speaker 1: and determination that have made the difference. Wow. Okay, so
Speaker 1: the day, what was that moment? Like, I was happy
Speaker 1: I came home, but I came home in the middle
Speaker 1: of COVID wasn't no jobs. Everything we shut down. And
Speaker 1: you know, even though the state they let you out
Speaker 1: after almost thirty years, they just out the door. We
Speaker 1: made a mistake here. They leave out the door. They
Speaker 1: don't give you no type of competence. I mean, if
Speaker 1: you put someone there wrongfully and admitted, and you open
Speaker 1: the door for him, you can't send them home with nothing.
Speaker 1: Just that Some people I had a family, so I
Speaker 1: went there, but some people don't have that. You know.
Speaker 1: That's that's a very important point. And it's something that's
Speaker 1: troubled me for a long long time and it's been
Speaker 1: a significant animize energy trying to, you know, help to
Speaker 1: build ramps for people coming out who don't have that
Speaker 1: access like you did it, you know, because it's it's
Speaker 1: insane like and it's absolutely insane. So we closed our
Speaker 1: show every week the exact same way. This is where
Speaker 1: I first of all, thank you again. I'm gonna turn
Speaker 1: my microphone off, leave yours on, and just kick back
Speaker 1: in my chair and let Amy Ony don't you go first,
Speaker 1: and let Robert take us out for any final thoughts
Speaker 1: you want to share with me in our audience. I'm
Speaker 1: grateful that you know, at long last, the d a's
Speaker 1: office did the right thing and met their obligations and
Speaker 1: turned over the exculpatory evidence that they turned over in
Speaker 1: Robert's case that got us back into court. And I
Speaker 1: have hope going forward that we can have more conviction
Speaker 1: integrity and learn from the wrongful convictions across the nation
Speaker 1: um and recognize the flaws and the system for what
Speaker 1: they are and fix them. And if it were not
Speaker 1: for people opening up their minds and deciding that they're
Speaker 1: going to do the right thing, I'm not sure Robert
Speaker 1: would be here right now. You can have very tenacious advocates,
Speaker 1: but you need all system actors to be honest about
Speaker 1: the past and honest about what needs to be done
Speaker 1: in the present. And so I moved forward, you know
Speaker 1: from Robert's conviction and exoneration with great hope that the
Speaker 1: same relief can come to others. As for me, I'm
Speaker 1: happy to be here. I love Amy, I love John,
Speaker 1: I love Linda. It came into my life and jj
Speaker 1: for the better. I come down here. I was talking
Speaker 1: to all these men women down here that went through
Speaker 1: similar trials and tribulations, and you get a sense of
Speaker 1: understanding that it's kind of like unique class because you
Speaker 1: got the advocates here, you've got the media here, you've
Speaker 1: got the family here. So it was just one big
Speaker 1: happy and joy is. It's like one big family here.
Speaker 1: So I noticed this and I told Amy this today.
Speaker 1: This field, as far as litigate and post conviction appeals
Speaker 1: and actual inns, exenres and all lack is well dominated
Speaker 1: by females. And you know what, we as men have
Speaker 1: to take our hats off to him and say thank
Speaker 1: you very much. There's a lot of males, but then
Speaker 1: you know it's dominated by females. That's because there's no
Speaker 1: manchus in the room when it comes to female They
Speaker 1: just want to get the job accomplished and they have.
Speaker 1: That's why it's so packed down here this year. Thank
Speaker 1: you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. I'd like to thank
Speaker 1: our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Cliver and Kevin Wardis.
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 plom Ralevul Conviction is
Speaker 1: the production of Lava for Good podcasts in association with
Speaker 1: Signal Company Number one m