Speaker 1: On June seventeenth, two thousand and seven, at around two
Speaker 1: thirty a m bars emptied out into the streets of Camden,
Speaker 1: New Jersey amid the crowd in the parking lot of
Speaker 1: the seventh and Cane Lounge. Gunshots struck twenty four year
Speaker 1: old Tierra Presley and thirty two year old Adrian Jackson,
Speaker 1: but only Jackson survived and he was unable to offer
Speaker 1: any leads. About six months later, Jackson was secretly recorded
Speaker 1: speculating about the identity of his assailants, narrowing his suspects
Speaker 1: to someone called Baby Jay and later another called Papa smurfh,
Speaker 1: which led police to Madford Younger and Anthony Parker, the
Speaker 1: latter of whom was acquitted, but two jail house informants
Speaker 1: claimed that Madford Younger had admitted to being one of
Speaker 1: the shooters, sending him away for a minimum of sixty
Speaker 1: six years. This is wrongful conviction. You're listening to Wrongful Conviction.
Speaker 1: You can listen to this and all the Lava for
Speaker 1: Good podcasts one week early and ad free by subscribing
Speaker 1: to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Welcome back
Speaker 1: to Wrongful Conviction, where we've got a New Jersey case.
Speaker 1: There haven't been many of those featured here, but that's
Speaker 1: about to change. And calling in to tell his story
Speaker 1: from a New Jersey correctional facility, Manfred Younger, Manfred, thanks
Speaker 1: for joining us.
Speaker 2: Thank you, man I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: And joining Manford to help him tell this insane story
Speaker 1: is a voice you're going to recognize. Justin Bonas, who's
Speaker 1: been spending a great deal of time in Manfred's hometown
Speaker 1: of Cambden, New Jersey, where he's uncovered quite a few
Speaker 1: cases in a town that has a history of poverty
Speaker 1: and corruption from law enforcement all the way up to
Speaker 1: mayors who had promised urban renewal and economic revitalization.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because there's no improvement ever in Camden. I think
Speaker 3: at one point they had four straight mayors that were
Speaker 3: federally indicted. And then there's a period from like nineteen
Speaker 3: ninety to twenty thirteen when the Camden County Police Department
Speaker 3: was so corrupt. Camden is basically taken over by the
Speaker 3: county in twenty twelve. Right before there was a takeover,
Speaker 3: there were like sixty homicides in a city that's only
Speaker 3: like seventy five eighty thousand people the most and they
Speaker 3: weren't solving them, and then the ones that they were solving.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of wrongful convictions, but there is a
Speaker 3: sweet spot that I'm working on from like ninety nine
Speaker 3: to like twenty eleven, and the show starts for real
Speaker 3: with Martin Devlin, him and his partner Chuck Bentham. I
Speaker 3: come to Camden from Phillya and what Devlin became a supervisor.
Speaker 3: There's a pattern of single photo identifications and jailhouse informants.
Speaker 1: Which is exactly what we're dealing with in this case.
Speaker 1: In our audience, you may recall Detective Martin Devlin from
Speaker 1: some Philly cases that we covered, Jimmy Dennis, Tony Wright,
Speaker 1: Walter Ogrod, Troy Coleman. And after playing his trade in
Speaker 1: Philadelphia for twenty five long years, he crossed over the
Speaker 1: bridge into one of the most impoverished cities in all
Speaker 1: of America, Camden, New Jersey, where he continued his career
Speaker 1: as an investigator in the Camden County Prosecutor's Office. While
Speaker 1: Manfred was growing up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I grew up in the city of Canaden then
Speaker 2: with my mom and my sister and my father. My
Speaker 2: father named Manfred J. Younger Jenior. So my name Manfred J.
Speaker 2: Younger Junior. So I got the baby J after my father.
Speaker 2: I grew up playing community football and stuff that was good.
Speaker 2: But we grew up hard city of Canda and the poverty.
Speaker 2: It's messed up out there. We ain't have hot water.
Speaker 2: We had to heat the house up with the oven,
Speaker 2: boil hot water on the stove. You know, wear each
Speaker 2: other clothes where your friends clothed. When it rained, when
Speaker 2: it's a thunderstorm or snowstorm, it come through the ceiling.
Speaker 2: It was bad in Camden. Ninety five percent of the
Speaker 2: people is poor. Because of our population, it's only seventy
Speaker 2: thousand people. We get overlooked. The only reason why we
Speaker 2: get noticed is because the crime rate. Other than that,
Speaker 2: we don't have nothing. Your mom and them had to
Speaker 2: have money though, like growing up. If not, you had
Speaker 2: to go to the streets. It ain't excuse, but time
Speaker 2: get hard, desperation and that's when I went to the streets.
Speaker 1: By Manfred's perspective, dealing drugs and carrying a gun was
Speaker 1: necessary for survival in Camden, all of which made him
Speaker 1: vulnerable to prosecution as well as violence. Street violence and
Speaker 1: one of the victims in this case, Adrian Jackson, Well,
Speaker 1: he was in the same boat, although he wasn't exactly
Speaker 1: Anfred's contemporary.
Speaker 3: Adrian Jackson is significantly older than Manfred, younger by a lot.
Speaker 3: Everyone believed that Adrian Jackson was the target. He has
Speaker 3: issues with older people in the drug world and Camden,
Speaker 3: who Manfred had some type of affiliation with, But there
Speaker 3: was never any real connection here.
Speaker 2: I ain't never hang with him and not like that.
Speaker 2: All them god older than me.
Speaker 1: Adrian Jackson had also cooperated in a case in the
Speaker 1: late nineties, so there were motivated parties on the night
Speaker 1: that he was shot, none of whom were Manfred, and
Speaker 1: along with Jackson, an innocent young woman named Tiera Presley
Speaker 1: had also been shot. It was a Saturday night, June
Speaker 1: sixteenth into the early hours of June seventeenth, two thousand
Speaker 1: and seven, when both victims were out on the town
Speaker 1: with Tiera's cousin, Tia Hannah.
Speaker 3: They're at a place called Seventh and Caine and what
Speaker 3: they would consider the downtown area of Camden, New Jersey,
Speaker 3: at around two thirty in the morning is when they
Speaker 3: leave out of the bar.
Speaker 1: Last call is two am. In New Jersey, so everyone
Speaker 1: else was leaving with them, emptying out into this dirt
Speaker 1: parking lot next to the bar that was adjacent to
Speaker 1: the projects. Now it was a warm night where folks
Speaker 1: were already hanging out in front of their buildings as.
Speaker 3: Well, and Adrian Jackson is talking to Tierra and Tia,
Speaker 3: I guess walked off a little bit with another woman
Speaker 3: named Maisha Ronett Brown. It's not well lit, and two
Speaker 3: men came out of nowhere and fired a lot of shots.
Speaker 3: Presley was hit six seven times. Jackson was hit over
Speaker 3: ten times. The way he shot it, it's very difficult
Speaker 3: to determine whether he could have seen it because he's
Speaker 3: like shot in the side and then he's like spun
Speaker 3: around when.
Speaker 2: He shot Tia.
Speaker 1: Hannah and a man named John Freelan ushered Tiara into
Speaker 1: her car and drove it to the hospital curiously, though
Speaker 1: without Adrian Jackson.
Speaker 3: Yeah, Jackson stays at the scene and he's just standing
Speaker 3: there and people are like freaked out. His adrenaline had
Speaker 3: kicked in so much. And then at some point I
Speaker 3: think he sits down and passes out or something, and
Speaker 3: then he gets picked up an ambulance takes him to
Speaker 3: the hospital.
Speaker 1: So by the time police had arrived, the crowd had dispersed,
Speaker 1: including Maisha Runnett Brown and her boyfriend Richard Barge, who
Speaker 1: becomes important later, but for now, the police forego a
Speaker 1: vigorous canvas for eyewitnesses and instead they hope to speak
Speaker 1: with the victims as well as Tia Hannah.
Speaker 3: Jackson lived amazingly. Tierra dies. Unfortunately, this was an innocent
Speaker 3: girl that was killed. Everybody knew that this was a
Speaker 3: very big deal. These are not people that didn't want
Speaker 3: to cooperate. But Tia Hannah tells the Prosecutor's office investigator
Speaker 3: Diane Wilson, over and over again, I can't make an
Speaker 3: idea right and Jackson, I mean, it's only by the
Speaker 3: grace of God that Dismand's alive. I mean, he's spun
Speaker 3: around like a top. He was in the hospital for
Speaker 3: over a month before he became coherent to speak. And
Speaker 3: I mean, Adrian Jackson's a criminal. Okay, he has a
Speaker 3: terrible background, but let me be clear with you. Adrian
Speaker 3: Jackson cooperated before, so this is not a guy that's
Speaker 3: apprehensive to talk to the police. And Adrian Jackson tells them, look,
Speaker 3: I was drunk when I came out, I don't know
Speaker 3: who shot me, and he's like, you seem like you
Speaker 3: don't believe me. If I knew who it was, I
Speaker 3: would tell you.
Speaker 1: And so without any legitimate leads, the investigation kind of
Speaker 1: switched course. It changed tactics right around the same time
Speaker 1: that Manford was arrested for an unrelated matter on July fifteenth,
Speaker 1: two thousand and seven, possession of an illegal firearm.
Speaker 2: I'm from the city of Camden, so I got caught
Speaker 2: with a weapon. That's the only way you know how
Speaker 2: to protect yourself. I was in the corner store against
Speaker 2: something to eat, and then the cops ran in there
Speaker 2: because they were doing the search of like a drug area,
Speaker 2: and then they searched me, and I had a gun
Speaker 2: on me. I didn't have it legally. So anytime say
Speaker 2: a fahamicide happened or shooting happened, and you might get
Speaker 2: locked up with drugs or whatever. Being as duff you
Speaker 2: from that area where it happened, they would try to
Speaker 2: question you and get you to act like you know something.
Speaker 2: You see you know what I'm saying. And Diane Wilson,
Speaker 2: she comes in there, I don't know her she don't
Speaker 2: know me, so being a dawn young she probably figured like, oh, well,
Speaker 2: he might want to get out of this case. So
Speaker 2: she started asking me about crime around the area and
Speaker 2: not just this murder, several murders, and I'm like, man
Speaker 2: I don't know nothing. So that was my first running
Speaker 2: with her. So now that's where she was familiar with
Speaker 2: the name baby j But I had bailed out from
Speaker 2: that weapon Chuck. I came back home three days after
Speaker 2: I was home. I had another case out in another county,
Speaker 2: Gloucester County. I had drugs that time, and I plared
Speaker 2: guilty to probation in ninety days cent So I went
Speaker 2: to Gloucester County for like seventy two days. Then I
Speaker 2: came home September twenty four.
Speaker 1: And while Manford was still in Gloucester County jail on
Speaker 1: the drug charge, Diane Wilson interviewed Adrian Jackson again on
Speaker 1: September sixth, two thousand and seven.
Speaker 3: They press him again, okay, and I believe they actually
Speaker 3: dropped Manfred's name and nickname, which is baby j The
Speaker 3: important part about that nickname is there's five other Baby
Speaker 3: James in Camden. Jackson again tells them I don't know
Speaker 3: who shot me, okay, And the date of that second
Speaker 3: interview for Adrian Jackson is a very big deal.
Speaker 1: And we'll get to why in just a minute. But first,
Speaker 1: around three weeks later, Manford was released from Gloucester County
Speaker 1: and was picked up again three days after his release
Speaker 1: on September twenty seventh, with his friend Jeffrey Jones.
Speaker 2: Well, we got pulled over by Camden County Police. But
Speaker 2: we got to dispatch from the police station where that
Speaker 2: Cox said, I'm behind that vam with baby j and
Speaker 2: them in there. So obviously somebody had to tell him
Speaker 2: about who was in a vam. You give you know
Speaker 2: what I'm saying. He lied on a report and said
Speaker 2: we was driving sad basically like it was a regular
Speaker 2: traffic stop and I had a gun. And then I
Speaker 2: was convicted ready for the drug. Once you get a conviction,
Speaker 2: the state tuned to turn it over to the Fed.
Speaker 2: That's when the Federal could charge you. It's called possession
Speaker 2: of a whitness by previctor seventh and I got locked
Speaker 2: back up September twenty seventh, three days I was home,
Speaker 2: so I had a poll attorney. The first thing he
Speaker 2: said is they don't want you. They want your boy.
Speaker 2: Jones was my cole descendant. They believe that I know
Speaker 2: all this stuff, like I don't know that guy like that.
Speaker 2: So basically he was saying, like, yo, if you give
Speaker 2: up information on him, they'll let you go. So I'm
Speaker 2: just collateral damage. I took a flat rate play sixty
Speaker 2: months for the gun charge. All this was in two
Speaker 2: thousand and seven, and I've never seen the streets again.
Speaker 1: Five years in federal prison was able to eventually morph
Speaker 1: into a much longer state sentence, starting with a man
Speaker 1: named Troy Loan.
Speaker 2: Troy Loan got caught with a gun. He wanted the
Speaker 2: way out of prison, so he told detective Wilson that
Speaker 2: Adrian Jackson told him who did that to him? So
Speaker 2: Roy Long wore a tape recorder on Jackson. On a
Speaker 2: tape recorder, Jackson he ain't say he's seen nobody in
Speaker 2: that he was speculating and they was talking about all
Speaker 2: these other old murders and Jackson admitting to the drug game.
Speaker 2: He's also on wire tap saying that he lied in
Speaker 2: another murder trial and then placed itself at the scene
Speaker 2: of a murder and he wasn't even there. So he's
Speaker 2: already got a pattern of lion fabricating story, but.
Speaker 3: The prosecutor's officer doesn't care about that. And it's this
Speaker 3: is what's so outrageous about this surreptitious audio recording. He's
Speaker 3: going through in his mind who he thinks may or
Speaker 3: may not have done this. So Jackson starts talking about
Speaker 3: the fact that he has beef with these older gentlemen,
Speaker 3: and who is affiliated with these older gentlemen and now
Speaker 3: understand this, he knows a nickname, which is Baby j.
Speaker 3: He admits he doesn't know Baby Jack and in this
Speaker 3: conversation between him and Troy Loan, he said it couldn't
Speaker 3: have been this guy named Sean, so it had to
Speaker 3: be Baby J. And and he mentions that another guys
Speaker 3: a driver. Understand is there were multiple people that watched
Speaker 3: two shooters run from the scene and not get into
Speaker 3: a car. They just ran from a scene, right, So
Speaker 3: he's guessing and by the process of elimination, he says
Speaker 3: it's probably Baby j.
Speaker 1: As we know, Babyjy also happens to be Manfred's nickname,
Speaker 1: but he's not the only Baby Jay in Camden. The
Speaker 1: other nickname Jackson eventually mentioned was Papa Smurf aka Anthony Parker,
Speaker 1: who in turn became Manfred's co defendant.
Speaker 3: Interestingly, with Jackson in the audio to Troy Loan, he
Speaker 3: did not identify Papa Smurf initially Anthony Parker. And again
Speaker 3: this goes to show you that this guy Jackson is
Speaker 3: just guessing.
Speaker 1: And Jackson's unreliability was also made clear by something else
Speaker 1: that he said on this audio recording.
Speaker 3: Jackson specifically says that on September sixth of two thousand,
Speaker 3: thousand and seven, when he came out of the prosecutor's
Speaker 3: office after they're asking him about Manfreed Younger and he
Speaker 3: doesn't know who this is, that he sees baby jack
Speaker 3: driving and he wanted to kill him and doesn't do
Speaker 3: it because it's broad daylight. So there's a huge problem
Speaker 3: with that, which is that Manfred Younger is incarcerated at
Speaker 3: that point, So whoever he saw could not have been
Speaker 3: Baby J or at least a baby J that's Manfred Younger.
Speaker 3: It's impossible.
Speaker 1: This episode of Wrongful Conviction is proudly sponsored by Erase PTSD.
Speaker 1: Now every day, countless individuals face the invisible wounds of
Speaker 1: trauma and PTSD your support empowers us to provide life
Speaker 1: changing treatments like the Stelle Ganglon Block SGB, which inhibits
Speaker 1: nerve impulses and helps to restore hope, reclaim lives, and
Speaker 1: save lives after incurs Together, we can ensure that those
Speaker 1: wrongfully convicted receive the care they need to heal and
Speaker 1: reintegrate into society. Join us in this mission to erase
Speaker 1: PTSD and uplift our communities. Visit erase PTSD now dot org.
Speaker 1: That's erase PTSD now dot org for more information and
Speaker 1: ways to get involved.
Speaker 2: The name BABYJ came up. That's when Diane Wilson went
Speaker 2: full throttle. She called Jackson and said, we got new information.
Speaker 2: You know who did it to you? Jackson stated again,
Speaker 2: I told you I don't know who it was. But
Speaker 2: when she pushed play, he got scared for all the
Speaker 2: criminating statements he made about being a big time drug
Speaker 2: dealer having guns, and he gave the name BABYJ with
Speaker 2: no hairstyle, no nothing, no race, no nothing. So she
Speaker 2: went and got one picture of me and showed him.
Speaker 3: Diane Wilson shows him a photo on some this is
Speaker 3: the guy right? He says, yes.
Speaker 2: They went to him with one photo, not a photo
Speaker 2: or a one photo of me.
Speaker 3: That is the evidence that gets Manfred Younger arrested.
Speaker 1: At this point, it's summer two thousand and eight. Manfred
Speaker 1: was already in federal custody on the September twenty seventh
Speaker 1: the gun charge, and he was brought in for his arraignment.
Speaker 2: I go in the courtroom to get my bill, Diane Wilson,
Speaker 2: get Tia Hannah, and Tia Hannah own words. Diane Wilson
Speaker 2: get her to point me out at her arrangement here.
Speaker 3: She's very adamant that she couldn't make an identification until
Speaker 3: the arraignment. And I mean, come on, the guy's getting
Speaker 3: arraigned for the murder of your cousin, and she's with
Speaker 3: Diane Wilson, Tierra Presley's family, and then all of a sudden,
Speaker 3: out of nowhere, a year and a half later, you say, yay,
Speaker 3: he's the one. So Diane Wilson and the Camdens City
Speaker 3: Police know that they have a really weak case, and
Speaker 3: Devlin is supervising us, and we have a pattern here
Speaker 3: of the then go to the jail house informance, which
Speaker 3: is Jamie Channer and Jamal Gibbs.
Speaker 2: When you go to freederal prison. If you're from Jersey,
Speaker 2: you rolle with Jersey people. If you Muslim, you run
Speaker 2: with the Muslims. If whatever click you run with, that's
Speaker 2: your crew. So amongst your crew, you got people who's
Speaker 2: productive for the people of your crew. And you need
Speaker 2: help with your case, you go to the Muslim power
Speaker 2: leaguer Canner he was our paralleger.
Speaker 3: Jamie Channer was a jail house lawyer that helped manfreed
Speaker 3: with the allevi It's the extradition process for gun charge
Speaker 3: that is totally unrelated. So he sees the probable cause statement,
Speaker 3: the criminal complaint come through, so he knows the name
Speaker 3: of the deceased, and the guy who gets shot doesn't
Speaker 3: know anything other than that.
Speaker 2: He writes Camden County Prosecutor Office and bargain with them
Speaker 2: and say, I know information by the murder, but I
Speaker 2: want three years off. He didn't give the information an
Speaker 2: initial letter. You see what I'm saying. So Diane Wilson
Speaker 2: calls him.
Speaker 3: Jamie Channer says, hey, this guy admitted to this murder
Speaker 3: over and over and over against He's writing letters to
Speaker 3: Diane Wilson, and the information was basically wrong and develops overtime.
Speaker 2: She spoke to that guy five times. If I tell
Speaker 2: you I have a red Mustang today, five years later,
Speaker 2: I should tell you I have a red Mustang. And
Speaker 2: every time he talked to her, he'd come back with
Speaker 2: additional information.
Speaker 1: Even after five conversations, he still got the details wrong.
Speaker 1: In the statement that developed, Channer said that Jackson shielded
Speaker 1: himself behind Presley, which is contradicted by witnesses and the forensics.
Speaker 1: Then he gets the motive wrong as well.
Speaker 2: Channer said it was a gang initiated motive, a blood initiates.
Speaker 2: Diane Wilson stipulated that she know I wasn't blood and
Speaker 2: that wasn't even a motive, but she still allowed him
Speaker 2: to say that in front of a jority.
Speaker 1: Then in comes Jamal Gibbs.
Speaker 3: In October of two thousand and nine. They go get
Speaker 3: Jamal Gibbs, who's a serial cooperator. Now Jamal Gibbs's handler
Speaker 3: is Jim Pizzano, but Jamal Gibbs is very close friends
Speaker 3: with Martin Devlin. I have information from another case that
Speaker 3: Gibbs actually refers to Martin Devlin as Sarge doing an interview.
Speaker 3: The cops know exactly who he's talking about Devlin was
Speaker 3: supervising Manfred Younger's investigation, and Jamal Gibbs is an admitted killer.
Speaker 3: By this point, he's pled guilty. He's looking to get
Speaker 3: out of jail and says, presumably at the behest of Devlin,
Speaker 3: that baby Jay admitted the homicide to.
Speaker 2: Me when I was in the county, I was gonna
Speaker 2: protective cuss to be status. So it's no way we
Speaker 2: can interact, no way.
Speaker 3: The interesting thing about that is by this point Gibbs
Speaker 3: is cooperating against like ten people, So everybody in the
Speaker 3: Camden County jail knows that Jamal Gibbs us a cooperator.
Speaker 2: He was jumping in people cases like anytime your case
Speaker 2: is weak, Jamal Gibbs ended up inside the case to
Speaker 2: coroborate the motive or theory to strengthen the case. Like
Speaker 2: the whole jail knew, stay away from that guy because
Speaker 2: he a lie and fabrication information to get out his
Speaker 2: own murder.
Speaker 3: Why would Manfred Younger tell him he committed a murder.
Speaker 1: Never mind that he didn't even have an opportunity to
Speaker 1: do so. Thankfully, other guys came forward to Manfred's attorney
Speaker 1: took discredit Gibbs, which became part of trial strategy when
Speaker 1: Manfred and his co defendant Anthony Parker were tried in
Speaker 1: March twenty eleven, where the state had about five main witnesses,
Speaker 1: including Tia Hannah, who had previously id'd Manfred at his arrangement.
Speaker 3: She recance the idea trial.
Speaker 2: A prosecutor to try to get her to say with me.
Speaker 2: Tia said, I don't know. I didn't see the guy's face,
Speaker 2: but she's seen the description of brownskin guy with sure hair.
Speaker 2: So the prosecutor say, point to the brownskin guy.
Speaker 1: Point to the brownskin guy.
Speaker 2: My lawyer. He object. Even the judge said that that
Speaker 2: was wrong. It was petering over the line.
Speaker 3: And then she gives an affidavit recanting the ID and
Speaker 3: saying this is my cousin. They basically coerced me into
Speaker 3: making any identification in this case.
Speaker 1: John Frehlan also testified about trying Tierra Presley to the
Speaker 1: hospital and how Tia Hannah had said even then that
Speaker 1: she couldn't identify the shooter.
Speaker 3: Hannah's essentially eliminated, but again the jury sees her point
Speaker 3: Manfred out in the courtroom.
Speaker 1: The state also presented Troy Loan, who spoke about recording
Speaker 1: Jackson's speculation about his shooters naming Baby J. Then Adrian
Speaker 1: Jackson id'd Manfred as Baby J from the stand.
Speaker 3: What the jury never hears is that on September sixth
Speaker 3: of two thousand and seven, when Adrian Jackson says he's
Speaker 3: leaving the prosecutor's office and says that he sees manfre
Speaker 3: Younger and wanted to kill him, that could not have
Speaker 3: been man for Younger because Manfred Younger was incarcerated. It's
Speaker 3: my belief that the attorney did not present that information
Speaker 3: because he did not want to admit that his client
Speaker 3: had a criminal record in front of the jury. But
Speaker 3: that's a huge piece of evidence that Adrian Jackson did
Speaker 3: not know who Manfred Younger was and his identification is
Speaker 3: wholly unreliable.
Speaker 1: Then Adrian Jackson idd Anthony Parker as Papa Smurf. But
Speaker 1: the attorneys did cross examine Jackson about not being able
Speaker 1: to identify his assailants for his first three interviews.
Speaker 3: The evidence against Anthony Parker was strictly Adrian Jackson, and
Speaker 3: that's it. And look at who got acquitted and who
Speaker 3: got convicted. It's my belief that's why the jailhouse informants
Speaker 3: were so critical in this case. I mean they were
Speaker 3: mentioned in the opening statement, and then they were mentioned
Speaker 3: a lot in summation by the prosecutor.
Speaker 1: And the jailhouse informants were focused solely on Manfred. As
Speaker 1: we already said, Jamie Lee Channer's statement was unsupported by reality.
Speaker 1: Manfred was not a blood and was not ordered by
Speaker 1: the Bloods to kill Jackson. Diane Wilson stipulated to that. Additionally,
Speaker 1: Jackson had not used Presley as a human shield, there
Speaker 1: was no getaway driver, and he also said that Manfred
Speaker 1: did the shooting alone.
Speaker 2: It's just shocking that you a lie like that. Even
Speaker 2: the ballistics show two shooters, two different guns, two different
Speaker 2: shell cases. All the witnesses say two shooters, but he
Speaker 2: lie and say I did it myself. Like the physical
Speaker 2: evidence outweighed what he talking about.
Speaker 3: Jamie Lee Channer even admitted in his own trial testimony
Speaker 3: that after Manfred Younger left the federal facility that he
Speaker 3: was in, he was getting more information to give to
Speaker 3: the prosecutor. Are you kidding me? That means that he
Speaker 3: presumably was being fed information from the prosecutor's office. The
Speaker 3: whole purpose of a jail house informant is the person
Speaker 3: says out of their mouth that they committed this crime. Right,
Speaker 3: it's called this statement against penal interest. It goes against
Speaker 3: the defendant's interests to admit to committing a crime. So
Speaker 3: therefore it is assumed that those statements are reliable. The
Speaker 3: problem with that is when you have a witness that
Speaker 3: has a tremendous incentive to lie about what that person said.
Speaker 2: The prosecutor lied, said she didn't give them nothing. He
Speaker 2: lied and said he was coming ford protect the public,
Speaker 2: but all alone he got a favor.
Speaker 3: Right after Manfred Younger gets sentenced, the prosecutor in the
Speaker 3: case writes a letter to a federal judge saying he
Speaker 3: provided substantial assistance give him a time cut. But Jamie
Speaker 3: Channer says, I didn't get anything for my testimony.
Speaker 1: And without this an even more impeachment evidence that was
Speaker 1: discovered after trial, Channer's testimony appeared believable, as did Jamal Gibbs,
Speaker 1: who also claimed to have received nothing in return when
Speaker 1: he testified that he knew Presley from high school and
Speaker 1: press Gibbs about the senseless killing.
Speaker 2: They used the professional snitch Jamal Gibbs to come up
Speaker 2: with a theory and a motive to inflame the jury.
Speaker 1: The theory was that Jeffrey Jones, Manfred's co defended from
Speaker 1: the federal gun charge, ordered him to kill Jackson for
Speaker 1: some slight and that Jackson grabbed Presley again with the
Speaker 1: unsupported human shield narrative, and Gibbs alleged that when pressed further,
Speaker 1: Manford responded, and this is a quote, fucked that bitch.
Speaker 1: She all out there in the way, man, she got
Speaker 1: to get handled. Eighty crippling crazy. They can get it, man,
Speaker 1: it don't even matter.
Speaker 2: Man.
Speaker 1: Fuck her end quote, which is incredibly inflammatory, obviously, but
Speaker 1: Manfred's lawyer had seven rebuttal witnesses, including Milton Gardner and
Speaker 1: Brian Montinez.
Speaker 3: Milton Gardner testifies that Gibbs is lying what they call
Speaker 3: jumping on people's cases, that this is a practice of
Speaker 3: his of finding people's cases and getting on them from
Speaker 3: a time cut. And we have information that Gibbs was
Speaker 3: also getting discovery from the prosecutor's office, presumably Martin Devlin,
Speaker 3: to make his trial testimony more accurate, and that Gibbs
Speaker 3: was recruiting other people. Brian Montinez testified that he was
Speaker 3: approached by Jamal Gibbs that Gibbs was actively seeking cooperators
Speaker 3: and Montonez knew Martin devil because Gibbs.
Speaker 1: It's discovered later that even more witnesses had discredited Gibbs.
Speaker 1: That didn't make it into the defense trial strategy, but
Speaker 1: at least some damage was done.
Speaker 3: The prosecutor harped on the credibility of Jamie Lee Channer
Speaker 3: and Jamal Gibbs over and over again because the identification
Speaker 3: in the case was so weak.
Speaker 2: At the time. You believe like these guys ain't got
Speaker 2: no credibility. The jury didn't believe Jackson. I had to
Speaker 2: read backs on channering Gibbs. I trusted the process, thinking
Speaker 2: that the process was fair, but it obviously is not. Basically,
Speaker 2: they went with Channer and Gibbs. Then that's when they
Speaker 2: came back with the guilty verdict. I didn't even go
Speaker 2: in there. I was in a bullpen because something had
Speaker 2: happened with the sheriff's officers. So my lawyer basically came
Speaker 2: back and told me the news.
Speaker 1: Manfred received two consecutive census sixty years for the murder
Speaker 1: and eighteen years for the attempted murder a seventy eight
Speaker 1: year sentence with parole eligibility after sixty six years, and
Speaker 1: the sentence began while he was serving out his five
Speaker 1: year federal sentence.
Speaker 2: Most of my time I stayed in the county because
Speaker 2: I had the court situation with this case. So the
Speaker 2: time almost up anyway. You believe that the pill process
Speaker 2: take like a year eighteen months, but I had time anyway.
Speaker 3: So that's how I looked at it, like I'll be.
Speaker 2: Back on a pill. So then after that I came
Speaker 2: here from Camden County. I'm in New Jersey State Prison
Speaker 2: now MAXIM Secure facility and federal prison. You get to
Speaker 2: go out all day from six thirty am to nine pm.
Speaker 2: You out the room, but here you lock down all day.
Speaker 2: Basically you get yard every other day. You get to shower,
Speaker 2: you get to use the Kia is the size of
Speaker 2: a bathroom, smaller than the bathroom. For by success, I
Speaker 2: work out, listen to music, talk to my family, watch TV.
Speaker 2: For the first and most part followed the law. It's
Speaker 2: hard man. A lot of gods lose their mind down here.
Speaker 2: It's a rough spot. But you just got the only
Speaker 2: focus is to get out of jail. When I came here,
Speaker 2: my mind frame, like I said, you be thinking, you
Speaker 2: trust the process because you innocent, So you get a
Speaker 2: lawyer on direct to tell automatically God that don't know
Speaker 2: no better leave it up to the lawyer and they
Speaker 2: don't do no research. But I still was young, so
Speaker 2: I came down here playing basketball, running around. So my
Speaker 2: mind frame was let the lawyer do everything till then
Speaker 2: as I got older and start figuring her out. Now
Speaker 2: I helped myself help the lawyer. I cut my TV
Speaker 2: off and went through all my trial transcripts and stuff.
Speaker 2: That's when I started finding new evidence that wasn't presented
Speaker 2: that trial that basically shows and proved that I've been framed.
Speaker 1: That One major development was Richard Barge. Not only was
Speaker 1: he another Jamal Gibbs victim, but he also was an
Speaker 1: eyewitness who had come forward to Manfred's attorney pre trial.
Speaker 2: When we were in the county back in two thousand
Speaker 2: and nine. He was like, yo, man, tell you a
Speaker 2: lawyer to contact me. Man, you ain't do that shit.
Speaker 2: So I told my lawyer about it. So he went
Speaker 2: to see Richard Barge.
Speaker 3: And he tells them that he was out there that
Speaker 3: night with a woman who Tia Hannah says is at
Speaker 3: the scene.
Speaker 1: And that girlfriend was Maisha Brown, the person Tia Hannah
Speaker 1: was next to when the shots rang out.
Speaker 3: He says that man for Younger isn't one of the shooters,
Speaker 3: that he was actually standing in the general vicinity of
Speaker 3: where Adrienne Jackson and Tierra Presley were standing when the
Speaker 3: shots rang out, and he knows Manford Younger, and he
Speaker 3: says that Younger is not one of the shooters. Unfortunately,
Speaker 3: man for Younger's lawyer never calls Richard Barge.
Speaker 2: My lawyer was like, well, I believe he was there,
Speaker 2: but the jury might not believe him because both of
Speaker 2: y'all got Jamal gar.
Speaker 1: Gates, which seems like a colossal lapse in judgment considering
Speaker 1: what Jamal Gibbs testified to in Barge's trial.
Speaker 3: In Richard Barge's case, he actually testified that Richard Barge
Speaker 3: admitted to a homicide via sign language, but.
Speaker 1: When this ineffective council claim was presented at a post
Speaker 1: conviction hearing, Manford's attorney was also called to the stand,
Speaker 1: where he had trouble recalling his interaction with Richard Barge
Speaker 1: or with Manfred about using barge.
Speaker 2: Yeah, he was old already, he was eighty years old,
Speaker 2: so when he came to the PCR here he was
Speaker 2: even way like off track.
Speaker 1: Nevertheless, the judge decided to err on the side of
Speaker 1: defense council's murky recollection of his final trial after a
Speaker 1: thirty six year career. But this wasn't defense Council's only misstep.
Speaker 1: As we mentioned, counsel never raised the problem with Jackson's
Speaker 1: id illustrated by his alleged spotting of baby Jay on
Speaker 1: September sixth, two thousand and seven, while Manford was incarcerated
Speaker 1: in Gloucester County Jail. So Manfred's PCR motion was denied
Speaker 1: in twenty eighteen. But so much more has been discovered
Speaker 1: since then.
Speaker 3: Number One, that Jamie Lee Channer, who testified a trial,
Speaker 3: he did not receive a benefit, that he was doing
Speaker 3: this out of the kindness of his heart. He absolutely
Speaker 3: received a benefit. He received a time cut, He received
Speaker 3: support from the Camden County Prosecutor's office to get out
Speaker 3: of jail. Jamal Gibbs testified that he was not receiving
Speaker 3: anything for his testimony. Now, this guy played guilty to manslaughter.
Speaker 3: He's a killer. Jamal Gibbs. He pleads guilty to manslaughter.
Speaker 3: At sentencing, the judge is going to hear all the
Speaker 3: cooperation right and consider that in so his trial testimony
Speaker 3: that he's he already received his deal, that he expects
Speaker 3: to get five years. That's what he says. I expected
Speaker 3: a fighter. This guy gets five years for killing a person.
Speaker 3: It turns out he got money and housing for his testimony.
Speaker 1: So he got money, housing and the sweet deal of
Speaker 1: just five years for murder.
Speaker 3: Wow, and what was interesting this guy? As this His
Speaker 3: child's mother comes forward and says that he admitted to
Speaker 3: her that he was lying in cases to get out
Speaker 3: of jail. I forget. What he's saying is why do
Speaker 3: ten when you can lie on ten?
Speaker 2: All this?
Speaker 3: Why do ten when you can lie on a friend
Speaker 3: or something like that. That was his thing, and it's
Speaker 3: come out in the investigation. He did not like man
Speaker 3: for younger. But his baby mother comes forward, provides a
Speaker 3: sworn statement to an investigator, says that he admitted the
Speaker 3: lying in cases to her and that he shot up
Speaker 3: her house because he thought she was talking to the
Speaker 3: Camden County prosecutors. The second he gets out of jail,
Speaker 3: he shoots her house up. She goes to the Camden
Speaker 3: County Prosecutor's office and they bury it. They refuse to
Speaker 3: help her.
Speaker 1: So we've established that Channer and Gibbs were not telling
Speaker 1: the truth and were incentivized to lie. But now there
Speaker 1: are witnesses to corroborate Richard Barge's statement and Man for gennicence.
Speaker 3: There's a gentleman by the name of Antoine Stanley who
Speaker 3: was also out there that night, who said that he
Speaker 3: sees the shooters run up and that Man for Younger
Speaker 3: couldn't have been one of them. He knew Man for
Speaker 3: Younger couldn't be Man for Younger. Another witness, Darryl Debbie,
Speaker 3: Troy Loan's nephew by the way, who actually says that
Speaker 3: Troy Loan suggested to Adrian Jackson that baby Jay was
Speaker 3: the killer.
Speaker 1: And then, of course there's what has come out about
Speaker 1: Martin Devlin in Philadelphia, and it appears that his conduct
Speaker 1: only continued in Camden. The single photo identifications supported by
Speaker 1: incentivized jailhouse snitches.
Speaker 3: It's a pattern in that office that begins to really
Speaker 3: take shape in the nineties. And guess who arrived in
Speaker 3: the nineties Martin Devlin. I mean, they have a pattern
Speaker 3: of saying that if you live in Camden, then you
Speaker 3: know everybody in Camden. Therefore we can just show anyone
Speaker 3: a single photo and let them identify anybody. Everybody knows
Speaker 3: everybody in Camden. If you ask the Camden Police Department
Speaker 3: and the Prosecutor's office, everybody knows everybody. That's just not true,
Speaker 3: it's systemic, it's endemic. Man for Younger, from my investigation,
Speaker 3: is an innocent man that's been sitting in prison for
Speaker 3: fifteen years for crime he didn't commit.
Speaker 2: A murder.
Speaker 3: He didn't commit and this is something he's been fighting
Speaker 3: since day one.
Speaker 1: After Justin picked up Manfred's case at twenty twenty two,
Speaker 1: he shared the case with the New Jersey Attorney General's
Speaker 1: Conviction Review Unit, but they ran into trouble.
Speaker 3: It's actually quite heartbreaking because that cru and New Jersey
Speaker 3: they did not finish their investigation and essentially there's deadlines
Speaker 3: with evidence and it's within a year of me discovering
Speaker 3: the deal that Jamie Channer gets. I had to go
Speaker 3: to the court with that. So I had to essentially
Speaker 3: make a move for Manfred because I can't let a
Speaker 3: Brady claim as strong as what we have with Jamie
Speaker 3: Lee Channer sit that he received a deal when really
Speaker 3: his testimony was he was a saint, you know what
Speaker 3: I mean, like his mother Teresa or something.
Speaker 1: Just a concerned citizen.
Speaker 3: Out of the goodness of his heart. The guy's a liar.
Speaker 3: I couldn't do that. And I've discovered other evidence that
Speaker 3: with Gibbs. I mean, we knew that Gibbs had got
Speaker 3: money in housing.
Speaker 2: Jamal Gibbs got paid ten thousand dollars in a house,
Speaker 2: and he lied to other cases and they didn't turn
Speaker 2: that over.
Speaker 3: And now we have confirmation of that he cooperated in more.
Speaker 3: I think they mentioned four cases to defense counsel he
Speaker 3: cooperated in. He cooperated in over ten. And that's astounding
Speaker 3: in a place of smallest Camden. I mean, it's like,
Speaker 3: so everybody who committed a murder that was sitting in
Speaker 3: Camden County jail is telling you that they committed the
Speaker 3: murder and.
Speaker 2: Give He just recently recanted to the Attorney General Office
Speaker 2: saying I didn't tell him nothing. He admitted that I
Speaker 2: didn't confess to him. This is new, all this new.
Speaker 3: The plan is the file a PCR based upon actual innocence,
Speaker 3: significant Brady violations based upon what's called the fraud upon
Speaker 3: the court, which is that witnesses lied at trial and
Speaker 3: the prosecutor knew that they lied at trial by the
Speaker 3: prosecutor's own file.
Speaker 1: Is there anything that our audience could do to help
Speaker 1: besides sharing this episode obviously as at least the first step.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I just want y'all to support you. Hear
Speaker 2: what's going on. Everything I'm saying is facts. It's not freestyle,
Speaker 2: and the facts is documented. Everything is on paper.
Speaker 3: Number One, they need to reach out to Matthew Plackin,
Speaker 3: who's the Attorney General about Camden County. Number two, they
Speaker 3: should write the governor. But number three, they need to
Speaker 3: really put pressure on the Camden County Prosecutor's office.
Speaker 2: You could go to my Instagram and check everything out
Speaker 2: free underscore Manfred, and you get to see what your
Speaker 2: own your own eyes.
Speaker 1: Well, we're going to have that length in the episode description,
Speaker 1: and with that we're going to go to closing arguments,
Speaker 1: where first of all, I thank both of you from
Speaker 1: the bottom of my heart for joining us. And now
Speaker 1: I'm just going to kick back in my chair with
Speaker 1: my microphone off and my headphones on and just listen
Speaker 1: to anything else you feel is left to be said.
Speaker 1: Justin You're gonna go first, Manfred, You'll take us off
Speaker 1: ato the sunset.
Speaker 3: Manfred is not the only case like this, okay. I
Speaker 3: represented a gentleman by the name of Tehran Hill who
Speaker 3: was exonerated in twenty twenty one, and Tehran Hill almost
Speaker 3: spot on with manfreed single photo, two jail house informants,
Speaker 3: and through the course of the Attorney General's Conviction Review
Speaker 3: Units investigation determined that the jailhouse informants were unreliable. One
Speaker 3: of them were candidate at trial, and then the identification
Speaker 3: of Tron Hill was unreliable because of the single photo.
Speaker 3: Same thing as man for younger and I have other
Speaker 3: cases in Camden County. This is systemic. What's going on here.
Speaker 3: They took this man and they threw him in the
Speaker 3: garbage camp. His mother is getting up in age. He
Speaker 3: does not want to die in prison. It's heartbreaking, and
Speaker 3: the Canden County Prosecutor's office thinks that people are just
Speaker 3: going to go away. I'm not going away. My name
Speaker 3: is Justin Bonus. Nice to meet you.
Speaker 2: It ain't just me, it's the same pattern with the
Speaker 2: same guy that pops up in everybody case. It's four
Speaker 2: guys down here with me. Now. They got one single
Speaker 2: photo jail house snitch. Richard Barrs one photo with the
Speaker 2: same jail house smich. Jamal gives in about fifteen cases
Speaker 2: murder cases just to save his own behind because he
Speaker 2: had his own murder trial. He got five years for
Speaker 2: his own case, murder at tempted murder, bank robbery, and
Speaker 2: ten thousand doles in the house. Just the fabricate stories
Speaker 2: on innocent people. It's the same pattern, same group of detectives.
Speaker 2: Diane Wilson, James Sossano, Martin Devlin, James Bruno. It's the
Speaker 2: same detectives, same pattern, same wrong doing in the city
Speaker 2: of Camden, New Jersey. All they care about is conviction,
Speaker 2: and the problem is being as though we come from
Speaker 2: a poor, young black community, we don't have the resources,
Speaker 2: or we don't have media attention, or they get away
Speaker 2: with it. And then the judges and the prosecutors, they
Speaker 2: took an oath to do the right thing, but they don't.
Speaker 2: They dirty, they do people wrong. All they care about
Speaker 2: is the conviction, and we don't have no body to
Speaker 2: help with We need all the help we can get,
Speaker 2: any exposure, any help at a city A can.
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen
Speaker 1: to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one
Speaker 1: week early and ad free by subscribing to Lava for
Speaker 1: Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I want to thank our
Speaker 1: production team, Connor Hall and Kathleen Fink, as well as
Speaker 1: my fellow executive producers Jeff Kempler, Kevin Wartis, and Jeff Kleiber.
Speaker 1: The music in this production was supplied by three time
Speaker 1: OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us
Speaker 1: across all social media platforms at Lava for Good and
Speaker 1: at Wrongful Conviction. You can also follow me on Instagram
Speaker 1: at It's Jason Flamm. Wrongful Conviction is a production of
Speaker 1: Lava for Good Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number One.
Speaker 1: We have worked hard to ensure that all facts reported
Speaker 1: in this show are accurate. The views and opinions expressed
Speaker 1: by the individuals featured in this show are their own
Speaker 1: and do not necessarily reflect those of Lava for Good.