Speaker 1: At around six am on October twenty fifth, nineteen eighty six,
Speaker 1: and twenty five year old woman was abducted by a
Speaker 1: stranger at a bus stop, assaulted, raped and sodomized, then
Speaker 1: dragged at two different locations where the assault continued. The
Speaker 1: assailant stole her wristwatch and broke her two front teeth. Miraculously,
Speaker 1: the victims survived that a rape kit was performed. However,
Speaker 1: in nineteen eighty six, DNA testing was still in its
Speaker 1: infancy and erology offered little of probated value. The officer
Speaker 1: who eventually made the arrest approach Clarence Harrison, a man
Speaker 1: who had a previous conviction as an accessory to a
Speaker 1: robbery involving a woman at a bus stop. When asked
Speaker 1: about the victim, whom he knew from the neighborhood, Clarence
Speaker 1: said that if he heard anything, then he would forward
Speaker 1: that information to her family, not the police, an answer
Speaker 1: that seemed to annoy the officer. While fabricating a story
Speaker 1: about a confidential informant having seen Clarence selling the victim's wristwatch,
Speaker 1: that officer included Clarence in a BOTO lineup. The assailant
Speaker 1: was a stranger, and the victim knew Clarence, but she
Speaker 1: said that the assailant looked like Clarence. After some time
Speaker 1: and perhaps a great deal of pressure, she eventually identified
Speaker 1: Clarence and sealed his faith. With the advert of DNA
Speaker 1: testing and motions filed to finally uncover the truth, came
Speaker 1: reports that the ripe could had been destroyed. Along with
Speaker 1: it seems Clarence's hope for relief from a life plus
Speaker 1: forty years sentence for a crime he simply did not commit.
Speaker 1: This is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to wrongful conviction. Today's
Speaker 1: story is the story of Clarence Harrison, sentenced to life
Speaker 1: in prison plus forty years. I always wonder about what
Speaker 1: those extra forty years are for. Is that if you
Speaker 1: come back to life, you do another forty It's all crazy,
Speaker 1: But life plus forty years in Georgia and the state
Speaker 1: of Georgia for a crime you didn't commit, Clarence. Before,
Speaker 1: I introduce our other distinguished guest today. First of all,
Speaker 1: I just want to say welcome to the show. I'm
Speaker 1: glad you're here.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Thank you. Van Biden.
Speaker 1: To me and with us is Amy Maxwell. And Amy
Speaker 1: is a Senior District Attorney in the Fulton County District
Speaker 1: Attorney's Office. But before you jump to conclusions, she's actually
Speaker 1: the head of the Fulton County Conviction Integrity Unit and
Speaker 1: the former executive director of the Georgia Innocence Project. And
Speaker 1: what a resume that is. Amy, Welcome to Rafel Conviction.
Speaker 3: Hi, thanks for having me.
Speaker 1: And I read an incredible quote from you, Clarence where
Speaker 1: you had said that, and this is a direct quote.
Speaker 1: After a year or so in prison, you get burned out,
Speaker 1: and you fall off into the system, and you lose
Speaker 1: faith and your hope, and you begin to believe you'll
Speaker 1: never get out. And that happened to me.
Speaker 2: Well, I had been in there a few years. First
Speaker 2: few years, I got strung out on trying to prove
Speaker 2: my answer. But I got burnt out and kind of
Speaker 2: love faith in the system and God and everything, and
Speaker 2: just thought maybe with life selling twenty and plus twenty,
Speaker 2: you know, I was gonna live and die in prison,
Speaker 2: you know. And I tried to, you know, accept that's
Speaker 2: where my life gonna be. So I shipped the outside
Speaker 2: world out. I called it it's so called free world,
Speaker 2: and I called the prison life in my life. That
Speaker 2: was the real world to me.
Speaker 1: It's always amazing to me when when people like you
Speaker 1: were able to come out of that dark spiritual hole
Speaker 1: that you were in and how you did it is
Speaker 1: an amazing part of the story. We're going to get
Speaker 1: to that, but let's go back to the beginning. So
Speaker 1: you born in Georgia. What was your childhood like.
Speaker 2: I am a pretty decent young man growing up. I
Speaker 2: was a cub scout, a boy scout, you know. But
Speaker 2: as I got older in high school, I started doing
Speaker 2: drinking and gama, so I became a post a gammel
Speaker 2: playing cards. I like to play poker, black jack, whatever
Speaker 2: kind of gambler war. I just liked to gammebl sadly say,
Speaker 2: I think they come from cause just don't remember I
Speaker 2: have with my father who ran a boot leg house,
Speaker 2: in a gambler house and got throwed out of school
Speaker 2: because I wasn't doing right in school. Well, I got
Speaker 2: married early, just turned eighteen, had two daughters, and my
Speaker 2: first wife she had a daughter, so I had three girls.
Speaker 1: That's a lot, especially for somebody at a young age.
Speaker 1: And I had my own struggles with gambling and drinking
Speaker 1: as a kid. So I can relate to that, but
Speaker 1: I was very lucky to never get into the type
Speaker 1: of serious trouble that you got into. From what I understand,
Speaker 1: some of the people you were hanging out with at
Speaker 1: the time got you into even more trouble when when
Speaker 1: you were riding around the car unaware of their intentions,
Speaker 1: and one of them popped out of the car and
Speaker 1: robbed a woman at a bus stop there.
Speaker 2: Was in nineteen seventy eight. I didn't commit that crime
Speaker 2: a partner them, did I with him? It's same thing.
Speaker 1: Wait, that's starting to sound like you were wrongfully convicted,
Speaker 1: not once but twice.
Speaker 2: I ain't gonna say I was Ronald convicted because our
Speaker 2: extra with them all I know we were rad Fashion
Speaker 2: stopped the car. I said, Fashion, What you stopping the
Speaker 2: cup for? He said, ricksy elite. I said, may y'all
Speaker 2: be not being breaking nobody how He said, no, may
Speaker 2: no leak there you go back there not a little
Speaker 2: bat Rick stand to partner going there, lady's may y'all
Speaker 2: get that stupid fool. I get out the car, told Rick,
Speaker 2: get it back in the car. You partner going nay thing?
Speaker 2: You know? All them turned state and I'm the only
Speaker 2: one went to prison.
Speaker 1: I get that you were with them, so technically that
Speaker 1: does make you an accessory. But still you tried to
Speaker 1: stop your friend, maybe even saved that lady's life. I mean,
Speaker 1: there's a case that we made. Then your friends went
Speaker 1: and saved their own asses, turning state's witnesses and putting
Speaker 1: you in prison for almost six years and leaving you
Speaker 1: permanently on the radar of the local police. So now
Speaker 1: we fast forward to nineteen eighty six. You were a
Speaker 1: twenty seven year old young man, and this awful crime
Speaker 1: happens in DeKalb County, Georgia, also to a young woman
Speaker 1: at a bus stop. Amy, can you fill us in
Speaker 1: on the rest of the details, And a warning to
Speaker 1: our audience, this is hard to hear.
Speaker 3: It was the morning of October twenty fifth, nineteen eighty six.
Speaker 3: It was really early in the morning, and the woman
Speaker 3: had just gotten a job at Grady Hospital, which was
Speaker 3: the large public hospital here in Fulton County in Atlanta, Georgia,
Speaker 3: and she was standing at the bus stop waiting for
Speaker 3: the bus, and it was dark outside and it was raining.
Speaker 3: A man walked across the street, walked past her, turned
Speaker 3: around and She didn't actually see him come up, but
Speaker 3: he came up behind her, grabbed her from the back,
Speaker 3: drug her away from the bus stop. He ended up
Speaker 3: actually dragging her to three different locations where he assaulted
Speaker 3: her repeatedly. It was horrific, probably forty five minutes to
Speaker 3: an hour of being constantly abused. He'd abuse her one place,
Speaker 3: he'd drag her someplace else, assault her again. It was
Speaker 3: It was horrible, and he ended up hitting her in
Speaker 3: the face and knocking out some of her front teeth.
Speaker 3: He ends up leaving her. I don't know if he
Speaker 3: thought she was dead or what, but he left her,
Speaker 3: and she's, you know, of course, completely nude. She tries
Speaker 3: to flag down a car. The first car just drives
Speaker 3: right by her, but the second car does stop and
Speaker 3: help her. She ends up going into the hospital. They
Speaker 3: took a sexual assault kit, which of course ends up
Speaker 3: later being extremely important. And as far as how Clarence
Speaker 3: became a suspect, what the police said was that some
Speaker 3: confidential informant had told them that Clarence was trying to
Speaker 3: sell a woman's watch, and one of the very few
Speaker 3: things that the rapist took from this woman was her watch.
Speaker 3: So the police and court say that's how we got
Speaker 3: to Clarence because Clarence was trying to sell a woman's watch.
Speaker 3: Later we find out that wasn't at all true. The
Speaker 3: police officer actually admitted that he made that whole story.
Speaker 1: Up right, and they and they just decided it was him, right,
Speaker 1: the guy who had previously been an accessory of robbing
Speaker 1: a woman at the bus stop. So, Clarence, what were
Speaker 1: you up to on the night before and into that morning?
Speaker 2: I was directly cross street from my home at a
Speaker 2: friend of mine's house. He ran a boot leg house. Well,
Speaker 2: we'd go over there and buy beer and stuff, and
Speaker 2: we usually play cards overout every weekend. Now playing call
Speaker 2: for a few hours there into the ear of the morning,
Speaker 2: elect to getting daybreak, and I told my heye man said,
Speaker 2: if it'd be day Brad gets up in and get
Speaker 2: ready to go home. They had to be around about
Speaker 2: five six o'clock in the morning. And that's how walking
Speaker 2: Old Mount and opening the door. And I've seen a
Speaker 2: guy walking the street in the holler ed methad, Hey
Speaker 2: what your head? Man? He said? He said, we're going
Speaker 2: to the bus stop. I said, the bus stop, I say, man,
Speaker 2: I said, you got a couple out for the bus
Speaker 2: r on man. I said, it's the weekend. If you
Speaker 2: want to man, come over there and stand up on
Speaker 2: the poet. He said no. He said, I guess I'm
Speaker 2: going on the walk. I said, you better start running it.
Speaker 2: I looked like if in the pole down rain. I
Speaker 2: went in the house. So next morning, my mama come
Speaker 2: in the room and wake me up and stuff and
Speaker 2: asked me to go to the store for And as
Speaker 2: I walking back from the store, I see a car
Speaker 2: that looked like a police car. And he stopped me.
Speaker 2: He say, and you cleaning her? I said yeah. He said,
Speaker 2: you living in the house right there? I said yeah.
Speaker 2: He said, did you see anyone go up there street
Speaker 2: last night? I said, I seen somebody go there this morning.
Speaker 2: He said, do you know who you were? I said, now,
Speaker 2: I don't know. I know he ain't from around here.
Speaker 2: I said, what's up? He said, a lady got robbed
Speaker 2: or down philth Avenue victim last night with Dunk. I said, duncan.
Speaker 2: Now you got to be telling my ken and hair
Speaker 2: Dunk and them sister to wear them own the dunkeys
Speaker 2: in the area. I know everybody in the areage like that.
Speaker 2: So he said, well, if you see the guy, let
Speaker 2: me know. I say, well, if I see the guy
Speaker 2: lit ken and hair with them, though, and if they
Speaker 2: want you, they'll let you know like that. He said,
Speaker 2: you ain't gonna tell me. I said, oh, hey, man,
Speaker 2: I don't want to have no dinner with no police.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna tell them and let them tell you that
Speaker 2: said that. They sister. He said, okay, I see as man,
Speaker 2: you're the police. You can do what you want to do. Man,
Speaker 2: I said, I'm going to go on, and I walked on.
Speaker 2: Chi hell, I got you and how. I told my sister,
Speaker 2: you know what the police had said and asked me. So,
Speaker 2: she said, well you better watch him cause you know
Speaker 2: who that is. I said, yeah, I said, Dawson's like that.
Speaker 2: She said yeah.
Speaker 1: And it turns out that this Dawson guy is the
Speaker 1: same cop who picked you up on that robbery back
Speaker 1: in nineteen seventy eight. Oh yeah, yeah. So what happens next?
Speaker 2: A couple days later, come back to the how. I said, hey,
Speaker 2: he's uh, you see that guy, little man? I said,
Speaker 2: I told you, man, if I see I'm gonna lit
Speaker 2: ken and hair with them, No, you know, I said,
Speaker 2: I don't even know who that dude was. He don't
Speaker 2: love over. He said, so you're not gonna tell me?
Speaker 2: May I tell them? I ain't telling you nothing. He's
Speaker 2: all right, I'm gonna see you. I said, all right,
Speaker 2: I just told you man, you the police do what
Speaker 2: you want to do. He left again. Next time he come,
Speaker 2: they come back with a woman. Said, had a woman
Speaker 2: from my rest for arm rabber. My sister said, can
Speaker 2: I see the one? He said, yes, look at the
Speaker 2: war and said this thing got raped, robbery and kidnapped it.
Speaker 2: I said, who what do I on raping the rod
Speaker 2: like that? And when I said that, my niece came
Speaker 2: out of the room said, claim who you know?
Speaker 3: Ray?
Speaker 2: I said, girl quit being said I ain't raising. Nobody
Speaker 2: left like that, and my sister said it got dunking on.
Speaker 2: She said, I said the only doctor over, that's who
Speaker 2: they got to be talking about. So she said, I'm
Speaker 2: finah calling. So she called the victim and said she
Speaker 2: asked the victoms that you said my uncle the one
Speaker 2: was supposed to rate you. And she told the police
Speaker 2: said she said that she didn't say that he raped them.
Speaker 2: She said there was somebody that looked like him. And
Speaker 2: when my niece told him that he snatched the phone
Speaker 2: from her, when he snapped the phone her, I snapped
Speaker 2: the phone him and told him, no snap, no phone up.
Speaker 2: I said, man, you don't pay no bill. He's I
Speaker 2: told you what you come and go with me. He
Speaker 2: snapped me in, put the handcuffs on me, and took
Speaker 2: me to the police station.
Speaker 1: So you're gonna take it away by the same guy
Speaker 1: who arrested you for the nineteen seventy eight robbery, who
Speaker 1: you haven't been all that helpful to in this incident,
Speaker 1: and the probable cause that they used for the arrest
Speaker 1: want we come to find out was a totally made
Speaker 1: up story about a confidential informant who told them about
Speaker 1: Clarence selling the victims watch. It's too bad that it
Speaker 1: is nineteen eighty six and d theay testing is still
Speaker 1: as fledgling stages, because otherwise we may not be having
Speaker 1: this conversation and you never would have been subjected to
Speaker 1: this misery at all. So is one of the theories
Speaker 1: that it may have been this guy that Clarence saw
Speaker 1: walking down the street at five or six in the morning.
Speaker 3: Well, that's one option. There are some other people that
Speaker 3: were in the neighborhood it could have been. Unfortunately, when
Speaker 3: ultimately the DNA is tested, it doesn't tell us who
Speaker 3: the actual perpetrator was.
Speaker 1: Right, And as Clarence's niece heard over the phone from
Speaker 1: the victim that she said it looked like Clarence, not
Speaker 1: that it was Clarence. And this awful crime definitely happened
Speaker 1: to this poor woman, and this is definitely a stranger
Speaker 1: on stranger crime. The victim did not claim to have
Speaker 1: known the assailant, but she definitely knew Clarence. So what
Speaker 1: happens to turn this towards Clarence in the face of
Speaker 1: this overwhelming evidence of the countrary.
Speaker 3: They ended up getting an identification from the victim. She
Speaker 3: said that she was absolutely certain it was Clarence Harrison.
Speaker 3: And from there it's snowballs.
Speaker 1: And we know that in the heat of the moment
Speaker 1: victims of violent crimes, their perception is notoriously unreliable. Eyewitness
Speaker 1: missed identification, after all, is one of the main causes
Speaker 1: of wrongful convictions. But it's really super odd because the
Speaker 1: victim said she didn't know the assailant, but you knew
Speaker 1: her well.
Speaker 2: But Brudnaym just fad that the victim knew me, so,
Speaker 2: but she said she didn't know the person who committed
Speaker 2: the client. I've been to her house and she'd been
Speaker 2: to Mahal with folk.
Speaker 1: So we don't know what kind of tactics they use
Speaker 1: to make that turnaround come about. But whatever it was,
Speaker 1: it certainly feels like she was re victim. But a
Speaker 1: rape victim identifying you is pretty much all it takes,
Speaker 1: I mean, absent some sort of powerful exculpatory physical DNA
Speaker 1: evidence or something like that. And now comes the arraignment.
Speaker 3: And unfortunately Clarence was poor, right, he didn't have the
Speaker 3: money to hire a lawyer who could jump on the
Speaker 3: case right away. After he was arraigned, the judge literally
Speaker 3: there was a lawyer that was just there in the courthouse,
Speaker 3: and the judge appointed that lawyer the case.
Speaker 2: And the jewid told me that he was assigned him too.
Speaker 2: He said, no, you're run, I got a full case. Low,
Speaker 2: I can't Henley case. He said, well, I'm gonna send
Speaker 2: you to this case. And they were going back and forth,
Speaker 2: so a bencher the jew to sign the man representment,
Speaker 2: and they were talking to the police off were trying
Speaker 2: to tell how I become a suspect? And now he said,
Speaker 2: identified my photograph. He said, how did the big Tom
Speaker 2: identify for prior to the victim identified in the photograph?
Speaker 2: He said, well, he went through hundreds of police truck.
Speaker 2: He said, well, prior to that, how did the defender
Speaker 2: become a suspect? Then he said somebody defender had a
Speaker 2: past similarity offense? And I told him, I said, well, indeed,
Speaker 2: kind of case where y'all saying rapiers and all this
Speaker 2: old stuff. Don't y'all for their fisical ebdence and stuff
Speaker 2: like that? There, I didn't do some type of testing thing.
Speaker 2: So Jeorge said, so, what you requesting blood simptom? I said,
Speaker 2: I'm requesting whatever testing you need to prove my answer
Speaker 2: because they ain't dead nothing. So Jeorge said, well, I'm
Speaker 2: gonna recommend that you would do blood testings since your bone,
Speaker 2: I said, said, who are born? I said, I don't
Speaker 2: want no bond with y'all. Let me go, because I
Speaker 2: ain't dead, nohing. But I didn't. I ain't meaning to
Speaker 2: turn the bone.
Speaker 1: Now.
Speaker 2: I want him to know that I ain't done anything,
Speaker 2: you know. But he took that like I was denying
Speaker 2: the bone and stuff, so they denied me a bone.
Speaker 1: So you've got a lawyer who's argued that he has
Speaker 1: a full case load and doesn't even have the time
Speaker 1: to take your case on. Well, at least he was
Speaker 1: honest about it. But it didn't matter. Your trial happened
Speaker 1: only about three months later, so there was no chance
Speaker 1: for any real investigation to bolster your defense, and none
Speaker 1: was done.
Speaker 2: Well, you know, the sayd Poe with my lawyer, because
Speaker 2: when I first come in in the courtroom and I
Speaker 2: wassuring the lawyer, the peoples in the courtroom who was
Speaker 2: at being a house wore the one were playing cord
Speaker 2: that could testify. And lawyer told me said, well, his
Speaker 2: defense wasn't to prove my owns. His defense was allowed
Speaker 2: the state the opportunity to prove me guilty, you know.
Speaker 2: And I said, prove me guilty? I said, well, are
Speaker 2: you gonna prove me giltfu where you canna prove I
Speaker 2: ain't do it? He said, he didn't do it an
Speaker 2: investigation to prove my owns. His investigation was allowed the
Speaker 2: state the opportunity to prove me guilty.
Speaker 1: Wow, that's so, that's why.
Speaker 2: The number of the people who were at the court
Speaker 2: game were called other than the one the state called.
Speaker 1: The state also called the victims brothers, who confirmed that
Speaker 1: the assailant was supposed to have been a stranger and
Speaker 1: that you were not a stranger. Then you had the
Speaker 1: logical testing, which really your only hope there is that
Speaker 1: the actual perpetrator has a different blood type from you
Speaker 1: and the victim. But in this case, the rology expert
Speaker 1: testified some misleading nonsense that he was able to exclude
Speaker 1: like twelve percent of people and Clarence could not be excluded,
Speaker 1: which sounds like something, but if you just take a
Speaker 1: second and rewind this, you'll realize that it simply means
Speaker 1: that Clarence was one person in eighty eight percent of
Speaker 1: the male population who could not be excluded, right, so
Speaker 1: basically almost everybody could not be excluded. It's a ridiculous statement,
Speaker 1: but it was effective. I'm not sure how much difference
Speaker 1: it would have made with the victim having identified him.
Speaker 3: The jury had a witness that took the stand and
Speaker 3: said that is absolutely him, and we had evidence that said, yeah,
Speaker 3: he could have been. He was in that eighty eight
Speaker 3: percent of the population. He wasn't excluded there, and that
Speaker 3: was enough for the jury.
Speaker 1: Clarence, how long did the jury deliberate and what was
Speaker 1: going on through your mind? Now we're up. This is
Speaker 1: March eighteenth, nineteen eighty seven.
Speaker 2: I think it was less than two hours. But I
Speaker 2: was believing in the system at time. I really believed
Speaker 2: that the system worked and that it was impossible for
Speaker 2: them to find me guilty. It wasn't about two hours.
Speaker 2: They called me back up staff. When I got up there,
Speaker 2: they said they found me guilty. And then George, something
Speaker 2: sends you the life plus twenty plus twenty. But I'm
Speaker 2: standing around. I'm looking for this hero to come and
Speaker 2: correct this air, you know, because somebody always come and
Speaker 2: correctly when they do wrong like this. But then I
Speaker 2: turned around. When I looked back, I saw my mom crying.
Speaker 2: And when I see my mother crying, and I realized
Speaker 2: these folk one took my life away. Well, when I
Speaker 2: first entered in the prison system up, I got a
Speaker 2: letter from some uh intern from Century Ministry. They thought
Speaker 2: I was a classic case of wrongful conviction. So they
Speaker 2: told me, said, well, there's a new study being done
Speaker 2: called DNA, and they suggested that I can tell my
Speaker 2: turning to a quest to have all the eldescemac case
Speaker 2: preserved and save future DNA testing. Well Man Turner wrote
Speaker 2: me back and said that the district Turner said that
Speaker 2: all the Eldence Macca been removed and destroyed.
Speaker 1: Yeah, we've heard that one before, but okay for the
Speaker 1: time being. What else were you up to? Well?
Speaker 2: Prior to that, I had been trying to work on
Speaker 2: my own case, reading them, trying going back and forth
Speaker 2: over my transcript, trying to reading and stuff. Once did
Speaker 2: I seen a guy working on another guy case and
Speaker 2: asked him what he was doing. They told me he
Speaker 2: was a chaining lawyer. Said he was pretty good. His
Speaker 2: name was Robert Burston. The guy was very good with
Speaker 2: briefs and haby corpy and asked him look at mine.
Speaker 2: He told me, if I help him, I told him, yeah,
Speaker 2: so hed him. Transcript be too. I say, man, hold
Speaker 2: of man, I can't read that good. Now you want
Speaker 2: me to read it something? He said? I tell you what, then,
Speaker 2: if you go back to school up there and learn
Speaker 2: how to read and stuff, I'm gonna help you get out.
Speaker 2: You're like that, I said, ain't no problem, do so
Speaker 2: I ques add My counsel put me back in school.
Speaker 2: It wasn't that I couldn't read it, just as I
Speaker 2: never exercised. Because after I got back in school, I
Speaker 2: ended up getting my ged in nine months got into
Speaker 2: a college program. During that time I was in college,
Speaker 2: I started helping him out and stuff, and he told
Speaker 2: me about para legal course that I could take through
Speaker 2: the mail, and I was reading open transfor going through
Speaker 2: the books and stuff working on the case. After all this,
Speaker 2: I learned how to shepherd the edication and stuff like
Speaker 2: the guy worked on the writing brief and stuff. And
Speaker 2: from that point on I got dog gonna learn how
Speaker 2: to try to get out. Well, that didn't help all.
Speaker 2: I know. My mother passed. When my mother passed the
Speaker 2: DNA ben to that, I gave up. So I except
Speaker 2: that I was gonna spend the rest of my life
Speaker 2: in prison.
Speaker 1: You know, Clarence, My understanding is that you found hope
Speaker 1: in a very unexpected and sort of serendipitous right, which
Speaker 1: was when another prisoner was talking to his girlfriend and
Speaker 1: handed you hit the phone. And this was when you
Speaker 1: were really in the dark place, as you described, right,
Speaker 1: And on the phone was the girlfriend's mother, whose name
Speaker 1: was Evonne Zeller's. I would love if you could just
Speaker 1: share a little bit about that.
Speaker 2: Yes, I started putting down poker games in the dumb
Speaker 2: tour stuff. You know, guys play poking stuff. One of
Speaker 2: the guys that man, said, how about how I knit
Speaker 2: my mother in love? Man, she's trying to jone with.
Speaker 2: I said, hey, man, I said, ain't you know I
Speaker 2: don't have the most so called free world folks like that?
Speaker 2: He had me in the phone thing. I get on
Speaker 2: and I start. I said, what's up, little lady? I said,
Speaker 2: what's your problem? She said, what's your problem? And I
Speaker 2: started teasing with the having phone, you know, and all
Speaker 2: of a sudden, you know, I'm talking, and she said, man,
Speaker 2: you crazy? Man. I said, ain't crazy? You crazy? You know,
Speaker 2: I'll tell you what. She said, what's your EM number?
Speaker 2: What you want my numbers? I'm gonna write you, and
Speaker 2: you're gonna write me. Well, she started sending me these
Speaker 2: Bible scriptures, and she was coming to business stuff. She
Speaker 2: was witnessing to me. She wasn't trying to date me
Speaker 2: anything like that, but she was trying to witness to
Speaker 2: me with Bible scripture. And one day I was sitting
Speaker 2: there playing poke and stuff. Now and they had put
Speaker 2: the new dudes in the room. He was a Christian,
Speaker 2: always reading the Bible in the room stuff, and I
Speaker 2: be damned there every day. So one day I asked
Speaker 2: him what she could send me them? Scripture she wants
Speaker 2: you to reply back to. I said, how you gonna
Speaker 2: reply back to this? He said, you got to read
Speaker 2: the Bible. I knew it was a trick somewhere, you know,
Speaker 2: So I had to do. I said, I do you
Speaker 2: reply to the things? He told me how they do
Speaker 2: and things. So I started reading a little bioul scripture
Speaker 2: and writing. All of a sudden she come and visit
Speaker 2: me and tell me about the new program they got
Speaker 2: called the George Anderson Project. She said, matter of fact,
Speaker 2: what you in for by send them a transcript? That's
Speaker 2: me who they're talking about. They said, I supposed did it.
Speaker 2: They don't say you did that, they said, the lady said,
Speaker 2: or somebody. They don't say who did it. I said,
Speaker 2: I know they trying to say I did that. She said, Man,
Speaker 2: you know what, I'm gonna get you a lawyer. I said, now,
Speaker 2: you superwoman, you already got two jobs, always talking about
Speaker 2: your bill thing. Now you want to get another job
Speaker 2: for me? And sure, enough she got a third job
Speaker 2: washing dishes, and she had that lawyer and I told
Speaker 2: him I wanted him to find the DNA evidence in
Speaker 2: my cake. He went on and we looked for it.
Speaker 2: He said, well, there was no evidence of the evidence
Speaker 2: being destroyer, and if there was no record the evidence
Speaker 2: ex this, well Lloyd kept looking for it. That's when
Speaker 2: I wrote the George Enson Project. When they found evidence,
Speaker 2: it was a whole new ball game.
Speaker 1: You know, yep, a whole new ball game. It was.
Speaker 1: So I think it's safe to say that Yvonne was
Speaker 1: able to rekindle your hope and the story, your faith
Speaker 1: and focus on freedom and amy. The Georgia Innos project
Speaker 1: was brand new at that time, right, So tell us
Speaker 1: about taking Clarence's case and what it took to get
Speaker 1: him out.
Speaker 3: Clarence was the twenty first letter we received. So he
Speaker 3: wrote us very very very early and getting it started,
Speaker 3: and every one of his letters was compelling. From the beginning.
Speaker 3: He wrote very specific, very detailed information, explaining, you know,
Speaker 3: like this is what they said, this is what was real,
Speaker 3: this is where I was, this is And then he
Speaker 3: started sending us bus schedules that he had gotten, diagrams
Speaker 3: of the scenes. I mean, this man clearly was trying
Speaker 3: to figure out how he ended up in prison. So
Speaker 3: we started looking at the case and it was a
Speaker 3: really odd case and at many many points we could
Speaker 3: have just said no, like he had had an appeal,
Speaker 3: he had had DNA testing done. But it was weird
Speaker 3: because they said they could not test the evidence because
Speaker 3: of the way the slide had been stained, and that
Speaker 3: made no sense to us. And we asked experts and
Speaker 3: they're like, uh, that's not a thing. You know, We've
Speaker 3: been staining slides the same way since we started stating slides.
Speaker 3: It doesn't prevent testing. So we're like, okay. And then
Speaker 3: the district's attorney had reported that the evidence had been destroyed,
Speaker 3: that it was gone. But there were things that bothered us,
Speaker 3: and we knew that there was the potential just because
Speaker 3: you say you destroyed it, you got to prove to
Speaker 3: me you've destroyed it, right, You got to have a
Speaker 3: piece of paper show me you've destroyed it. So we
Speaker 3: just kept on and kept on, and one afternoon I
Speaker 3: sent an intern, Laura of Aducci. I'll never forget Laura.
Speaker 3: She went to the DA's office and I said, just
Speaker 3: go look and see you know what kind of documents
Speaker 3: they have, you know, just go through their file. And
Speaker 3: I get a call from her. She says, Amy, there
Speaker 3: is a brown paper bag in here and it's marked evidence.
Speaker 3: She goes, I can't really feel and I'm not trying
Speaker 3: to do anything, but it feels like that, you know,
Speaker 3: there may be slides and things in here, and I'm like,
Speaker 3: this was my very first case, right, So I'm thinking,
Speaker 3: oh my god, they're going to try to hide this
Speaker 3: because they've already said it was destroyed. They're going to
Speaker 3: destroy it. What am I going to do? So I said,
Speaker 3: just put the lid on, don't say anything, and get
Speaker 3: back over here quick. So she did, and we immediately
Speaker 3: typed up the motion to have it tested, and at
Speaker 3: that point the DA realized, oh my gosh, we really
Speaker 3: do have the evidence, and they did not oppose testing.
Speaker 3: We sent it to a private lab, and after they
Speaker 3: did their testing, the order said that the lab was
Speaker 3: supposed to tell both parties, and the head of the
Speaker 3: lab thought that meant he had to tell us both
Speaker 3: at the same time. So he called me and he said,
Speaker 3: I think you need to go to the DA's office.
Speaker 3: I've got the test results, and I'm like, well, tell
Speaker 3: me what they are. He goes, no, I have to
Speaker 3: tell you both. At the same time, I'm like, oh
Speaker 3: my gosh, tell me right now, what is it? He goes, Amy,
Speaker 3: I would hurry to the DA's office. I'm like, okay,
Speaker 3: I'm on my way. So we called the DA and
Speaker 3: you know, he had his people in the office with us,
Speaker 3: and we get on the phone and the doctor said, yeah,
Speaker 3: Clarence Harrison is absolutely excluded. And I looked over and
Speaker 3: the DA's face just dropped, and I think that, never, ever, ever,
Speaker 3: ever did he think this could happen. And he asked
Speaker 3: a thousand questions, and of course, you know, there's it's
Speaker 3: clear the DNA's not Clarence's. So this was up Tuesday,
Speaker 3: and I said, I'm going to do a press confidence
Speaker 3: on Friday'll y'all decide what you want to do. So
Speaker 3: I get back and I don't know what's going to happen, right,
Speaker 3: So I called the folks up in New York at
Speaker 3: the Innocence Project and I said, how long is it
Speaker 3: going to take me to get him out of prison?
Speaker 3: And Clarence was one hundred and fifty first DNA exonery
Speaker 3: and they said it's going to take you anywhere between
Speaker 3: six months and two years. And I thought, right, all right, fine,
Speaker 3: and so we went down until Clarence and I warned
Speaker 3: him it was going to take a very long time
Speaker 3: to get him out of prison. And it did not a.
Speaker 2: Name your excitement about the resort.
Speaker 3: You ruined it for me, Clarence, you ruined it.
Speaker 1: Wait, so he ruined it almost if there's something that
Speaker 1: couldn't be ruined, how doubt did he ruin it?
Speaker 3: Well, that's because Clarence ruined my big moment. So we
Speaker 3: actually convinced the Department of Corrections to let us take
Speaker 3: a video camera. So we go down and we're meeting
Speaker 3: in this lovely conference room and I said, Clarence, we
Speaker 3: got the test results back, and he goes okay, and
Speaker 3: mind you, the video cameras go in the whole time.
Speaker 3: He's like okay, and I'm like, are you ready to
Speaker 3: hear the results? And he's like yeah, And I said,
Speaker 3: well it absolutely excludes you, and he goes okay, no,
Speaker 3: no reaction, nothing. I'm like, Clarence, do you understand it
Speaker 3: proves that you're innocent? He goes okay and I'm like, uh,
Speaker 3: and I'm thinking to myself, did I miss that? He
Speaker 3: might be like, I'm not intellectually, you know, there might
Speaker 3: be some problems. I'm like, he does he understand me?
Speaker 3: And I said, Clarence, do you understand He goes Amy,
Speaker 3: he goes that test was for you. I've always known
Speaker 3: I was innocent. So I have the world's most boring
Speaker 3: video of telling Clarence he's innocent.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I was happy. I would happy for you, and I
Speaker 2: would happen that now somebody knew that I hadn't committed.
Speaker 2: You know, just that alone was enough for me.
Speaker 1: And you were just cool as a cucumber, even though
Speaker 1: you were getting the best I mean, other than maybe
Speaker 1: the birth of your kids just had to be the
Speaker 1: best news you'd ever gotten in your life.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and the one didn't go back to my selle.
Speaker 2: When I got back to the drum and I told you, hey, y'all,
Speaker 2: I'm finglee y'all. Now, I told y'all, I'm prove it
Speaker 2: ain't com meet the crime. The whole dorm lit up
Speaker 2: and just started celebrating stuff. We had a little part
Speaker 2: in the Dumber Tour. You know, all the guy were
Speaker 2: happy for me and stuff.
Speaker 1: You know.
Speaker 2: But uh, I thought I was gonna wait six months
Speaker 2: to two you and thing. But on that Friday they
Speaker 2: called me and told me I had to go down
Speaker 2: to Kodak scared to break something because I didn't know
Speaker 2: what to spect on the outside world. I didn't have
Speaker 2: no time. Ain't nobody cheting me upen to get out?
Speaker 2: You know, three days, I don't even know where I'm
Speaker 2: gonna leave up to sleep.
Speaker 3: That Thursday, without telling me, the District Attorney's office arranged
Speaker 3: to have Clarence brought back to the Cab County. So
Speaker 3: on Friday, when we had our press conference, the District
Speaker 3: Attorney's office stood next to me and said, yes, this
Speaker 3: is an innocent man. We're going to get him out
Speaker 3: of prison. Everything happened so very fast. So within seven
Speaker 3: days Clarence was out of prison.
Speaker 1: What an amazing thing. And for such a guy as Clarence,
Speaker 1: it's really it's just awesome, and it's it's why we
Speaker 1: do this work. Let's face it, the victories are few
Speaker 1: and far between, and we know we're in for a
Speaker 1: disappointment after disappointment and the system is stacked against us.
Speaker 1: But when we win, man, it's a, it's a it's
Speaker 1: an incredible, incredible feeling. And then then then this takes
Speaker 1: a romantic twist, right yep.
Speaker 2: When I got out standing on their coat room when
Speaker 2: they released me from from jail, I'm standing up there
Speaker 2: with all the report. They asked me what type of
Speaker 2: meal and stuff I want? Not told him I wanted
Speaker 2: me a full collar, green comb bread, fried chicken, macaron
Speaker 2: che tastes it I would name it at all. I
Speaker 2: wanted it too, and uh, they asked me something. I said, Well,
Speaker 2: as a first of all, I got to find me
Speaker 2: a job because I don't even know where I'm gonna
Speaker 2: sleep at it. And I hope if I find you
Speaker 2: a job, it paid me a note so I can
Speaker 2: marriage a little later right here. So I started picking
Speaker 2: at her, but I was just teasing wood because we
Speaker 2: never chalked for no relationship. She was always there witnessing
Speaker 2: to me. So I said, I said, hopefully I'll make
Speaker 2: them no money. I can buy the pretty little lady
Speaker 2: on rain and she hope she are married. Well, sure enough,
Speaker 2: the republic herried that man. We got all kind of
Speaker 2: got the wind dress. The rains.
Speaker 3: Atlanta came through for you and donated everything.
Speaker 2: Seventeen days after I was at least I were married.
Speaker 3: You were, and you're still married, aren't.
Speaker 2: You're still married and crowded be mayried seventeen years, but
Speaker 2: I was locked up seventeen years and now I've been
Speaker 2: married seventeen years. Well a lot back up, wasn't.
Speaker 1: Again, Clarence. You didn't just stop what was being declared
Speaker 1: in this You saw it for the state to make
Speaker 1: things right.
Speaker 2: Well, my intention was I wanted to buy a lawsuit
Speaker 2: for my wronging imprisonment. I had these lawyers, and I
Speaker 2: wanted to find out how I got involved in the
Speaker 2: king because I was told that, you know, I'm about
Speaker 2: to try to prove my answer, you know, before you
Speaker 2: can buy it in type of laws, so that it
Speaker 2: was deliberate and intentionally. I said, yeah, with delivery intention
Speaker 2: how they gonna came No way had it been in
Speaker 2: the liber because you know, I wasn't at the scene.
Speaker 2: So the lawyer, I said, got to get the victim
Speaker 2: to admit that it was a mistaken out damn case.
Speaker 2: I said, well, name senter of the case. Thing, Well,
Speaker 2: victim identifies somebody. They not gonna go back on their
Speaker 2: word because they don't live with that, just as long
Speaker 2: as I don't live with being fout to look cute.
Speaker 2: So that ain't gonna help, I said, but I want
Speaker 2: the officers. I really believe this man delivery intention that
Speaker 2: made me that suspect. And I was chelling Bill Mitchell,
Speaker 2: who was my atturney, and I was cheering him. I said,
Speaker 2: the man heim the one who responds to me being
Speaker 2: in He said, well, not hardly with a police officer
Speaker 2: gonna be any help. I said, well, he's a police officer.
Speaker 2: And one thing about a police offer their erica. They
Speaker 2: think they can't be church. He said, what you mean,
Speaker 2: because he erico ning up and he gonna meet and
Speaker 2: say he did it. He might tell you what the attitude,
Speaker 2: but he arakor enough to do it here think so,
Speaker 2: I said, I know so, and sure enough he did it.
Speaker 2: Seem there was no unidentified person. Say he's done that
Speaker 2: because I had a smart amount.
Speaker 1: Because you had a smart mouth, right, and he ended
Speaker 1: up in prison all those years for basically talking back.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's unbelievable, yep.
Speaker 2: But see the theory of that. By me having a
Speaker 2: smart amount, that the whole because when you came behind me,
Speaker 2: you already knew who I was, knew where I lived
Speaker 2: and everything, so you came looking for me that very morning,
Speaker 2: so he already had none made me a suspect because
Speaker 2: I had a pride offense for raw female of a
Speaker 2: bus stop and the victim got raped at a bus stop,
Speaker 2: and he was the police officer who arrested me back then,
Speaker 2: so he figured I was locked up for that, that
Speaker 2: I had committed this crime, and he was gonna make
Speaker 2: me be that person.
Speaker 1: Right. He had a with you since nineteen seventy eight
Speaker 1: in a crime where you were an unwilling accessory to
Speaker 1: a robbery, so he was already barking up your tree
Speaker 1: before you ever even talked back to him on that
Speaker 1: fateful morning of October twenty fifth, nineteen eighty six. So
Speaker 1: your presence in the photo lineup and everything that followed
Speaker 1: was all this one police officer wanting desperately to send
Speaker 1: a convicted felon back to prison, and he did for
Speaker 1: almost eighteen long years. So you ultimately received compensation in
Speaker 1: two thousand and nine, although nothing would ever repay what
Speaker 1: this guy stole from you, and it was only a
Speaker 1: million dollars for lost wages, much of which is gone
Speaker 1: by now. So from what I understand, you've been advocating
Speaker 1: for exoneries to receive social security with Senator Osov right, incredible.
Speaker 2: We're trying to get a be of so security because
Speaker 2: when guys get out and stuff. I see you every
Speaker 2: guy in that prison, when you go two things and
Speaker 2: now you help the bed and everything, them guys ain't
Speaker 2: in no shape to begun up and trying to work
Speaker 2: and putting no fifteen twenty years in getting overtiredment. They
Speaker 2: won't be able to, you know, because they body broke down.
Speaker 2: But it can't get there pinching and thing because doing
Speaker 2: old year so security have a zero there of income
Speaker 2: ain't being put in there and with that should be replaced.
Speaker 2: The couse. Every inmate that's in the prison system works.
Speaker 2: It's called detail. If you don't have a detail and
Speaker 2: go out to your detail, you'll put in the whole.
Speaker 2: You'll punge for not work. So I'm gonna naby get
Speaker 2: so security. I can't get my retirement. Y'all stole me
Speaker 2: youth and now you don't want to come stay put
Speaker 2: my oldie. You know it missed up.
Speaker 1: It definitely is, you know, And you got me thinking
Speaker 1: i'd imagine that you could fix the social security issue
Speaker 1: through legislation. But if they just ended the loophole in
Speaker 1: the thirteenth Amendment that still allows for the enslavement of
Speaker 1: men and women who are convicted of a crime, well
Speaker 1: then they'd have to pay you for your work as
Speaker 1: well as contribute to Social Security. Right, it'd be two
Speaker 1: problems solved at once.
Speaker 2: You hit red on the mind they would will slay labor,
Speaker 2: but a slay laborer, right.
Speaker 1: You can definitely argue that an ex honery like yourself
Speaker 1: deserves to be taken care of through retirement for the
Speaker 1: rest of your life, as your ability to earn and
Speaker 1: pay into Social Security was. I mean, it was wrongfully
Speaker 1: stolen away through no fault of your own. But ultimately
Speaker 1: the question comes down to does the United States still
Speaker 1: support this sort of secret form of slavery or not.
Speaker 1: It's disgusting that we're still benefiting off of free labor.
Speaker 1: Corporations are, and in some cases taxpayers are, especially considering
Speaker 1: the origins of it all. So I'm glad you have
Speaker 1: Senator asof support. So we'll be on the lookout for
Speaker 1: developments there. In the meantime that Georgia in this project
Speaker 1: has the support fund set up for exuneries, So if
Speaker 1: our listeners would like to help men and women like Clarence,
Speaker 1: we're going to have that linked in the bio, and
Speaker 1: so please do go to the bio now, don't wait
Speaker 1: because you know we all get distracted and send some
Speaker 1: support for some exouneries, even if it's five bucks or
Speaker 1: five million bucks, whatever you got. Just I mean, it's
Speaker 1: hard to think of a better cause. And now we
Speaker 1: turn into closing arguments, where first of all, I thank
Speaker 1: both of you for being here and sharing this remarkable story.
Speaker 1: And then of course I'm going to just shut my
Speaker 1: microphone off, keep my headphones on, and listen carefully to
Speaker 1: anything else you feel is left to be said. So Amy,
Speaker 1: let's start with you and Clarence. Please take us off
Speaker 1: into the sunset.
Speaker 3: I think that Clarence Harrison taught me to never give up.
Speaker 3: Even though he went through dark times, he never gave
Speaker 3: up and he always, always, always tries to give back.
Speaker 3: He's always great to the new axonneries. He loves to
Speaker 3: talk to kids to try to tell them, don't go
Speaker 3: down a path that's going to lead you to being
Speaker 3: where I was. And he's always an inspiration, but I
Speaker 3: think the overriding thing with Clarences never ever give up.
Speaker 2: That do enjoy speaking to kids things and try to
Speaker 2: encourage them, you know they're on the right help and
Speaker 2: stay away from that prison that revolve and though it
Speaker 2: is what I called it, you know, for young peoples.
Speaker 2: You know, my main thing is now focus on is
Speaker 2: uh trying to get some bills passed for other analaries
Speaker 2: for those who was incarcerated wrong with in prison that
Speaker 2: they don't want to have to go through the struggle
Speaker 2: that I had to go through while I'm out, you know,
Speaker 2: I want them to have some type of conversation. I
Speaker 2: definitely want to try to make sure that this so
Speaker 2: security issue is resolved. We need help and we don't
Speaker 2: have it. That's my thing and that's what I'm working
Speaker 2: on now. I want to stay with it. But I've
Speaker 2: been fighting for justice ever since I've been out. Because
Speaker 2: it wasn't for them in terms being there to help
Speaker 2: try to get me out, I wouldn't be out. So
Speaker 2: I would to try to be there when them guys
Speaker 2: get out and them in turn get them out. I
Speaker 2: want to be there. Wouldn't try to help them, you know,
Speaker 2: transition back into society because it was an Axlary that
Speaker 2: help meat transition. Cavin Johnson and my wife name because
Speaker 2: I put a lot leaning on him. You know, it
Speaker 2: went for aiming my wife. I probably would have struggled
Speaker 2: harder than I was scruggling. I'm still with the Ansom
Speaker 2: Project Seem team on eighteen years now. I still fighting Nicole.
Speaker 2: You know. The MS Friday got more peoples out, you know,
Speaker 2: and we thank you Aim for all the support you
Speaker 2: gave us and making what it is today.
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. I'd like to
Speaker 1: thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Cliburn, and Kevin Wardis,
Speaker 1: with research by Lyla 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 Flaum. Ravel Conviction is
Speaker 1: the production of Lava for Good podcast and association with
Speaker 1: Signal Company Number one