Speaker 1: Hey guys, it's Laura and I writer. Welcome to a
Speaker 1: special bonus episode of Wrongful Conviction, False Confessions. We've gotten
Speaker 1: an overwhelming response to this week's story about Daniel Viegas
Speaker 1: and to the video we posted on Instagram and Twitter
Speaker 1: showing the moment he learned the jury's verdict, so we're
Speaker 1: releasing a bonus episode a conversation I had with Daniel
Speaker 1: when I sat down with him in Austin, Texas two
Speaker 1: months ago. You know, after everything we've been through together,
Speaker 1: Daniel is not just a former client, he's a friend.
Speaker 1: We talked about what it was like waiting for the
Speaker 1: jury to announce its verdict, how he'd prepared his children
Speaker 1: for the possibility he might not be coming home, and
Speaker 1: how it feels to finally focus on the future. If
Speaker 1: you haven't heard his full story, it's right here in
Speaker 1: the podcast feed, just under this bonus episode. And if
Speaker 1: you've yet to watch Daniel's exoneration video, check it out
Speaker 1: on Instagram at un Full Conviction. It's an incredible opportunity
Speaker 1: for all of us to bear witness to freedom. Daniel.
Speaker 1: I'm so glad you're here with us today. Yes, I'm
Speaker 1: glad to be here too, Thank you. Yeah, So tell
Speaker 1: me what's going on for you right now in your life.
Speaker 1: You've been out how many years? Six years? Now? Six years?
Speaker 1: And tell me what you're doing with your life. At
Speaker 1: this point in the stage in my life, it's you know,
Speaker 1: we're not dealing with the hecticness of trial and all
Speaker 1: that stuff. So now I'm focusing on what I'm going
Speaker 1: to do for the future. So you were acquitted about
Speaker 1: fourteen months ago, and so you've had that time to
Speaker 1: finally move on from this case. That's dog you your
Speaker 1: whole life exactly right. So what have you what have
Speaker 1: you been doing? Are you working? Yes, I'm working with
Speaker 1: Membella Contractors do their deliveries with Membella Contractors. So this
Speaker 1: is John Benbella's Yeah, John Embella that helped me out
Speaker 1: to Yeah, so you're working with John BenBella all these years.
Speaker 1: You know, John Embella is like a family member. You know,
Speaker 1: he didn't just help get me free, you know, he's
Speaker 1: always been there for me, you know, like a backbone
Speaker 1: and a counselor. You know, he's always been someone that
Speaker 1: I can go to, you know, for anything, you know,
Speaker 1: even if it's just to hang out. You've been a
Speaker 1: counselor yourself too. You're telling me before we sat down,
Speaker 1: y that you know, you're working at Membella Construction doing
Speaker 1: deliveries and things for them, but you're also working with
Speaker 1: a lot of the other guys. Yes, work there. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we do construction, so it's a lot of you know,
Speaker 1: you're gonna have a lot of comics and stuff there.
Speaker 1: So a lot of these guys, you know, they got
Speaker 1: problems and issues, and you know they look up to me.
Speaker 1: So Membella hires people who used to be incarcerated. It's
Speaker 1: a lot of folks there. And these guys, you know,
Speaker 1: just like anybody getting out of prison, have their struggles,
Speaker 1: you know, the situation when they get out. Stuff they
Speaker 1: have to figure out, and they come to you exactly,
Speaker 1: you know, and they come to me and ask me,
Speaker 1: you know, from my advice, you know, because one of
Speaker 1: the hardest things to transition into you know, what we
Speaker 1: call the free world is you know, we have to
Speaker 1: leave everything in prison behind us. And a lot of
Speaker 1: times a lot of people can do that because you're
Speaker 1: so used to you know, thinking and moving in that way,
Speaker 1: so it's it's hard to put that behind you and
Speaker 1: then live basically a whole different life. It's hard. I
Speaker 1: mean I don't never, like I always tell her, but
Speaker 1: I don't think it'll ever get away from us, That
Speaker 1: it won't ever escape us and we'll always have it.
Speaker 1: But the good thing is that as time progresses, you know,
Speaker 1: as we grow, it's a lot easier to deal with.
Speaker 1: Like before, you will get mad and it was so
Speaker 1: hard for you to calm down. After a while, when
Speaker 1: you're start getting mad, you'll start catching yourself going through
Speaker 1: the stages of going from zero to a hundred, and
Speaker 1: you can stop it before it goes to a hundred?
Speaker 1: What do you tell yourself to stop it? Personally? Like
Speaker 1: I always check myself. You know, it's not that bad,
Speaker 1: you know, look at the bigger pitcher. Well, and you're not.
Speaker 1: You're not dealing with it alone either, right, you got
Speaker 1: John Midilla, but you've also got a wonderful family. Oh yes,
Speaker 1: you know, like my wife too, I mean everyone for her.
Speaker 1: I mean I don't know what I would have done, yeah,
Speaker 1: she she When I first came out, you know, basically
Speaker 1: a forty year old with a sixteen year old mentality,
Speaker 1: you know, got locked that when I was a kid.
Speaker 1: So I never really grew up. I wasn't never had
Speaker 1: a structure. I never I never really came out and was,
Speaker 1: you know, have my own family or anything. You know.
Speaker 1: So coming down and and and dealing with society as
Speaker 1: an adult was very, very very very hard, you know,
Speaker 1: because it was so much I didn't know, and it
Speaker 1: was so frustrating because everybody knows that like second nature,
Speaker 1: and you feel like you're out of the loop. You
Speaker 1: feel like an alien, like you got dropped into another planet.
Speaker 1: Yeah right, you know. So Amanda has always been there too,
Speaker 1: like she's always all right, you got your wallet, you
Speaker 1: got your keys, you got yeah, those basic things of life.
Speaker 1: But the stuff you forget right when you've been locked
Speaker 1: away for so long exactly exactly Manda's watching mature. Hey man,
Speaker 1: we all need somebody like Amanda exactly. Trust men. And
Speaker 1: you have a beautiful You've got a beautiful family. You've
Speaker 1: got kids. Yes, we have four kids. I have my
Speaker 1: oldest daughter who's twenty five, Priscilla, and then my daughter
Speaker 1: who's tan Kayla that's Amanda's daughter, and my stepdaughter, and
Speaker 1: then we have two kids together. Once for Le's plicitly,
Speaker 1: I know Jude and then um named after your dad.
Speaker 1: You're named after my dad and a man of the brother.
Speaker 1: And then we have the little little baby, the little rugrat.
Speaker 1: We have the newest addition to the family. That's Emory Hope.
Speaker 1: She's the hell Raiser. There you go, how old she's
Speaker 1: going on two years old in a couple of months,
Speaker 1: she's almost two. And but that's the little hill Raiser. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's great, that's great. So you know, what would you
Speaker 1: tell your kids? You know, some of them are obviously
Speaker 1: too young to talk about what happened, But what do
Speaker 1: you tell your kids who are old enough to start
Speaker 1: to think about what happened to you? What do you
Speaker 1: tell them about what happened to you? You know, I
Speaker 1: really don't try to focus so much of what happened
Speaker 1: to me, but what they can do now to avoid that,
Speaker 1: you know, like I always tried to tell them, you know,
Speaker 1: like you know, when they get first, I'm always trying
Speaker 1: to time. You know, it's not that bad. You know,
Speaker 1: you're you're you're you're getting too caught up in this
Speaker 1: little drama going on at school or whatever, and it's
Speaker 1: not that tough. You know, it's not gonna be the
Speaker 1: end of the world. And you know, I just try
Speaker 1: to give them my perspective as far as you know,
Speaker 1: thinking of how to deal with problems and stuff and
Speaker 1: issues that come in their life. And that's mostly what
Speaker 1: I focus on, because I feel like, you know, life
Speaker 1: is ten percent of what happens, how you react to that.
Speaker 1: I don't want to so much teach him about my
Speaker 1: experience as much as teach him about how to deal
Speaker 1: with your problems now from that experience. So let me
Speaker 1: talk to you a little bit about what it was
Speaker 1: like to to walk out of prison six years ago.
Speaker 1: Right you were released un bond. H he released un bonds.
Speaker 1: And you know, when I talked to my other clients
Speaker 1: who have come out of prison, you know, people always
Speaker 1: have stories about the little things, the things they didn't
Speaker 1: realize they missed until they were back out and they
Speaker 1: remembered things right that they've missed for so long. What
Speaker 1: were those things for you? Those things you didn't realize
Speaker 1: that you've been missing. Smell, you know, the way the
Speaker 1: pavement of the street smell. You know, we take that
Speaker 1: again after a while you're walking and you know, especially
Speaker 1: people living downtown or whatever. You know, they don't even
Speaker 1: smell the roses no more. And that's one of the
Speaker 1: main things that a lot of us when we come out,
Speaker 1: we notice these smells because we've been smelling nothing but
Speaker 1: disinfected our whole life. So you know, you have actual nature,
Speaker 1: and you have like payment, you have like you know,
Speaker 1: the birds chipping, and then you have cars and you
Speaker 1: have like horns, and you know, it's a whole different
Speaker 1: orchestra of music, and so to speak, compared to prison,
Speaker 1: where it's nothing but just a lot of yelling and screaming.
Speaker 1: It's a beautiful orchestra of music, but hard to get
Speaker 1: used to it first too. It's not so much it's
Speaker 1: hard to get used to it, just it's hard to
Speaker 1: concentrate on something now because you're so focused on on
Speaker 1: on hearing every sound and everything. It's amazing, amazing, every
Speaker 1: sound from the orchestra of life. I think that's gorgeous.
Speaker 1: So I want to take you back for a moment too,
Speaker 1: if I can um that moment fourteen months ago when
Speaker 1: you were acquitted. It's your third trial right over the
Speaker 1: course of twenty plus years, and this was this was
Speaker 1: the moment of your vindication. Yes, um, it's an incredible
Speaker 1: moment for us all to listen to. When you were
Speaker 1: sitting there at in that courtroom. You know, Amanda and
Speaker 1: your family members are right behind you, all your supporters
Speaker 1: are right behind you. You were sitting there with your
Speaker 1: lawyers and the judge read out the verdict. Can you
Speaker 1: tell me what it was like waiting for that verdict?
Speaker 1: That was excruciating pain that I would not wish on anybody.
Speaker 1: That was terrible. But you know when I was going
Speaker 1: through that, you know, when they was in the back
Speaker 1: of side of the courthouse and I was like having
Speaker 1: an intimate moment with my daughter, my youngest daughter. She
Speaker 1: was at that time, she was about six months and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, I really I didn't think, you know, I
Speaker 1: know she understand what I'm saying. So I was just
Speaker 1: praying that you know, that Parmarama experience happens during this
Speaker 1: It's true where you live your whole life flashes before
Speaker 1: you get out of your body and see yourself exactly.
Speaker 1: So I figured, you know, if if anything, you know,
Speaker 1: I'll talk to her and she will remember that on
Speaker 1: that day when she you know, because I couldn't, you know,
Speaker 1: there's no other she was too young, So I was
Speaker 1: just explaining to her. You know, I'm just telling you, you
Speaker 1: you know, baby, you know I'm not guilty, just saying
Speaker 1: who I am. People gonna tell you stuff about me,
Speaker 1: and I'm just like explaining things to that, you know
Speaker 1: that I'm hoping one day she'll she'll kind of remember that,
Speaker 1: she'll come back to that. And uh, I did this
Speaker 1: to each of my kids. I set each of them
Speaker 1: downs by themselves and I would explain things to him
Speaker 1: and and that was my last one. And right when
Speaker 1: I was doing that, they tell us that the verdict
Speaker 1: is on. We got the verdict, and I'm like, holy crap.
Speaker 1: So I were running into the courthouse. And then the thoughts,
Speaker 1: like I said, since I was having that intimate moment
Speaker 1: where her, you know, one of the thoughts that came
Speaker 1: into my mind that were more prevailing than anyone. I
Speaker 1: was thinking to myself, and did we make the right decision,
Speaker 1: you know, not accepting the offer plea? And I was like,
Speaker 1: I know in my heart, you know that we made
Speaker 1: the right decision, and I know Amanda stands by me
Speaker 1: on that, but I was saying, did we actually do
Speaker 1: it the right decision for our kids? You know, even
Speaker 1: if you know you're right, you know, are we making
Speaker 1: a right decision? Because this is my kids right exactly.
Speaker 1: And if you look at the video, you'll see me
Speaker 1: and my Lord's talking and you see me shaking me
Speaker 1: and that's when I was telling them, you know, I'm pleading, man,
Speaker 1: tell me we made the right decision here, that we
Speaker 1: made the right decision not only for on me, but
Speaker 1: did we make the right decision for my children? You know?
Speaker 1: Did we fight this on on prior? Did we fight
Speaker 1: this for justice? You know, you you second guess everything
Speaker 1: at that moment, you know, and then you second guess,
Speaker 1: you know everything that trials coming through your head and
Speaker 1: you're like, man, we should have done this, We should
Speaker 1: have done that. You know that was coming to your thoughts,
Speaker 1: and that's killing you too. So you got all these
Speaker 1: it's like a million thoughts just blazing down on you.
Speaker 1: And then you wanted to judge your hep and tell
Speaker 1: you not guilty and guilty and you wait for the
Speaker 1: jury to come in an order and you're just sitting
Speaker 1: there dying. I mean, so you're sitting there in that moment,
Speaker 1: waiting for the verdict to come back, and you're thinking
Speaker 1: back on the offered play on that decision, which which
Speaker 1: Amanda guided you, through which Jason Baldwin from The West
Speaker 1: Member three guided you threat um and then the verdict
Speaker 1: comes back, yes, not guilty exactly. And it was not
Speaker 1: before he said not guilty. I already knew when he said, um,
Speaker 1: he said it was a form B, right, and I
Speaker 1: already had had the pizza paper, you know, like Form
Speaker 1: A was guilty, Form B was not guilty. You know.
Speaker 1: So when I had the paper in front of me
Speaker 1: and then I heard form B, I right away looked
Speaker 1: at the pizza paper. I said, oh, it's not guilty.
Speaker 1: But it was just a couple of seconds, like you're saying,
Speaker 1: you know, and that's when I just it was like
Speaker 1: I was, like I said, I was so tense. I
Speaker 1: mean that time period, that whole year was probably the
Speaker 1: worst year in my life. And uh, I was so
Speaker 1: tense that when that verdict not guilty happened, it was
Speaker 1: just like you know, like a ball full of rubber
Speaker 1: rubber bands. It was like you just take one in it,
Speaker 1: I'll just fall apart. And that's exactly what happened, you know,
Speaker 1: that not guilty just pulled that one string and everything
Speaker 1: fell apart. And I just hit the ground. I hit
Speaker 1: the table with my hand. It didn't even hurt Tilly here.
Speaker 1: On the next thing, I was just so you know,
Speaker 1: out of there. Yeah, yeah, And you got out of there,
Speaker 1: didn't you right away? As soon as you could. Never
Speaker 1: to return. We left too fat that Like, as I
Speaker 1: was telling me and a man that we had all
Speaker 1: this little speech that we're going to do afterwards, you know,
Speaker 1: to the news or whatever. And when that man said,
Speaker 1: the judge said, you know what, not guilty. You are
Speaker 1: free to go there. You are no longer under any
Speaker 1: conditions of this court anymore. Yeah, that whole speech that
Speaker 1: we had, it was out my head. I totally forgot.
Speaker 1: I ran out that courtroom. I was like, I grabbed
Speaker 1: a man. I was like, let's go and get me
Speaker 1: out of here. But you are actually going to be
Speaker 1: in the courtroom again, I think in a couple of days. Right,
Speaker 1: what's your plan for when you're here in Austin. I'm
Speaker 1: here ofting. I want to go to the capitol, and
Speaker 1: I want to go see the courts of criminal Appeals
Speaker 1: and I would love to see if I can talk
Speaker 1: to one of the judges. So you want to go
Speaker 1: to the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. This is the
Speaker 1: courts that affirmed your grant of a new trial, that
Speaker 1: affirmed your conviction being thrown out. Um, and you want
Speaker 1: to just go in that building. Tell me why. One
Speaker 1: of the main things I want to go because when
Speaker 1: we're going to courts criminal peal, they're telling us about
Speaker 1: the judges and they were saying that we have to
Speaker 1: get a majority rule, and they were saying three of
Speaker 1: the judges were not going to go for us. They
Speaker 1: never go for the inmate. And they were like, so
Speaker 1: don't even worry about those three. We know we're not
Speaker 1: going to get them. But at the end of the day,
Speaker 1: you know, we had an anonymous vote. Even the judges
Speaker 1: that they said we're not going to vote voted, and
Speaker 1: that was like the first time it happened in Texas history.
Speaker 1: So that's what I was like, you know, maybe I
Speaker 1: won't be able to talk to judge, but I would
Speaker 1: love to, you know, ask you know what what made
Speaker 1: this case so different that all you are in agreement
Speaker 1: with it? What was so special that shot to your faith?
Speaker 1: You know? What was it? Do you think it will
Speaker 1: still be worthwhile to go there even if you can't
Speaker 1: talk to the judges just to be in the building.
Speaker 1: What would what would it be just to be in
Speaker 1: the building, just to be in the building if they
Speaker 1: would let me walk into the when where they actually
Speaker 1: make decisions. I would you like to just sit there,
Speaker 1: you know, and just I think this is where they
Speaker 1: made decisions on letting you go. Yeah, you know, it
Speaker 1: would be awesome. This is where it all turned around. Yeah,
Speaker 1: this is the place I used to curse that every
Speaker 1: every Wednesday, waiting for the answer. Daniel, I just want
Speaker 1: to ask you, you know, what is what's your what
Speaker 1: are your hopes for the future that I'm not totally
Speaker 1: certain about that right now, I haven't figured out where
Speaker 1: my direction is actually going to go. Because one thing
Speaker 1: I've I've realized about life is that I have my plans,
Speaker 1: but the universe has its own plans, and somehow another
Speaker 1: I always end up doing what the universe wants me
Speaker 1: to do rather than what I want to do. So
Speaker 1: I'm trying to figure out my nick and right now,
Speaker 1: you know, meanwhile, I'm just trying to do as much
Speaker 1: I can to help you know, other people try to
Speaker 1: figure out what my my true calling is going to be. Well,
Speaker 1: one day at a time is pretty good right now.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much for sitting down with me. It's
Speaker 1: been an absolute pleasure. Daniel Viegas, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 1: Oh and also like thank you for helping me on
Speaker 1: my appeal. I mean, Laura, she's on my case. It's
Speaker 1: just so it's it's so bad as it's so awesome
Speaker 1: to have all you guys with us. But you know,
Speaker 1: you guys never get the things, you know, and that's
Speaker 1: one thing that you know, I want to really focus,
Speaker 1: you know, I want to really you know, put out
Speaker 1: there two about our lawyers. And you know that that
Speaker 1: help us because you gotta understand that normally with a
Speaker 1: client and and the lawyer situation goes once the court
Speaker 1: is over, you're not going to see that lawyer hardly
Speaker 1: ever again, you know. And in this situation with a
Speaker 1: round for conviction, we are so close to our lawyer.
Speaker 1: We're so close to you guys. You guys become a family.
Speaker 1: You know that even when we come out, you don't
Speaker 1: give up on It's not like okay, well we got
Speaker 1: your free by I have a good life. You guys
Speaker 1: are they're helping us thought. You guys are still there
Speaker 1: making sure that you know, we're we're we're being entered
Speaker 1: back into society, but successfully, you know, and that you
Speaker 1: guys need to get them. Thanks for that, because I
Speaker 1: don't feel like you guys get the things for that.
Speaker 1: I don't feel like the networks get the things that
Speaker 1: the innocent networks, that all these different organizations that work
Speaker 1: so hard to get us free, because when we get free,
Speaker 1: the game is not over yet. We still it's still
Speaker 1: a whole new game. Now. Now the game is how
Speaker 1: do we get this man who's been locked up for
Speaker 1: twenty years in prison? Then nothing else but how to
Speaker 1: be an amen? How do we get him to become
Speaker 1: a productive member in society. And that's what you guys
Speaker 1: do too. Well, that's what you've done. So congratulations on that.
Speaker 1: All right. We believe in you, you believe in us.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much, Daniel, Thanks for listening to the special
Speaker 1: bonus episode of Wrongful Conviction, False Confessions. You can listen
Speaker 1: to Daniel's story right here in this feed and come
Speaker 1: back on Wednesday to hear our next door read about
Speaker 1: a California man who was wrongfully convicted of terrorism based
Speaker 1: on a confession about and I kid you not pole
Speaker 1: vaulting Ninja Turtles. Wrongful Conviction, False Confessions is a production
Speaker 1: of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with Signal Company
Speaker 1: Number One and PRX Special thanks to our executive producer
Speaker 1: Jason Flom and the team at Signal Company Number One,
Speaker 1: Executive producer Kevin Wardenes, Senior Producer and Pope, and additional
Speaker 1: production and editing by Connor Hall. Special thanks to jog
Speaker 1: Hammer for additional script editing and for wrangling and writing
Speaker 1: like a madwoman. Our music was composed by j Ralph.
Speaker 1: You can follow me on Instagram or Twitter at Laura
Speaker 1: ni Writer, and you can follow Steve on Instagram at
Speaker 1: Steven Drizzen or on Twitter at s Risen. For more
Speaker 1: information on the show, visit Wrongful Conviction podcast dot com
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