WEBVTT - #032 Jason Flom with Crystal Weimer 0:00:04.040 --> 0:00:05.840 I think we have the best legal system. 0:00:05.840 --> 0:00:08.080 It's just the people that implement it. 0:00:08.200 --> 0:00:09.720 They get lost along the way and. 0:00:09.720 --> 0:00:11.480 Forget what the job really is. 0:00:13.080 --> 0:00:15.760 He just kept on trying to remind me that who 0:00:15.840 --> 0:00:19.000 was in authority, who was in control, and how easy 0:00:19.040 --> 0:00:23.320 it was for my body to be found in any 0:00:23.360 --> 0:00:24.720 alley of New York City. 0:00:25.760 --> 0:00:28.440 It's a tough prison when you have the guards going 0:00:28.480 --> 0:00:31.840 against you because they are the biggest gang in the prison. 0:00:33.080 --> 0:00:33.640 They do that. 0:00:33.640 --> 0:00:36.000 They'll give a guy a life sentence and go home 0:00:36.040 --> 0:00:37.520 in East Spaghetti like it was nothing. 0:00:38.920 --> 0:00:41.080 And anybody that said, well, why would you confess to 0:00:41.200 --> 0:00:43.920 something that you didn't do? My question to them will 0:00:43.960 --> 0:00:46.839 be why wouldn't you confess when somebody's threatening to kill 0:00:46.880 --> 0:00:47.280 your life? 0:00:48.760 --> 0:00:51.599 The judge, he said, how you feel? I said, I'm okay. 0:00:51.880 --> 0:00:53.519 He said, well the day as you're lucky, day you 0:00:54.680 --> 0:00:55.120 go home. 0:00:57.800 --> 0:01:16.679 This is wrongful Conviction. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with 0:01:16.840 --> 0:01:20.560 Jason Flomm. Today we have a very special episode. We 0:01:20.600 --> 0:01:25.880 have two fabulous Pennsylvania ladies. Our very special guest is 0:01:25.959 --> 0:01:30.480 Krystal Weimer, who is an ax hoonery from Western Pennsylvania. 0:01:31.319 --> 0:01:35.040 January two thousand and one, someone killed Curtis Hath outside 0:01:35.080 --> 0:01:37.920 his Fayette County home. He had been beaten and shocked 0:01:37.959 --> 0:01:41.199 after being convicted of plotting the murder that spanned three 0:01:41.319 --> 0:01:45.000 towns in Fayette County. Crystal was behind bars for twelve 0:01:45.120 --> 0:01:48.320 years at the time. They said her teeth led. 0:01:48.160 --> 0:01:48.600 Them to her. 0:01:49.000 --> 0:01:51.320 A dental impression was taken over teeth, and they were 0:01:51.320 --> 0:01:54.320 compared to a picture of a bite mark on the 0:01:54.400 --> 0:01:58.440 victim's body, which we're found to be a match. Actually, 0:01:58.800 --> 0:02:02.320 that's not true. Scientific expert who testified to all of 0:02:02.360 --> 0:02:06.200 that in court later said it was junk science and 0:02:06.320 --> 0:02:06.960 he was wrong. 0:02:07.200 --> 0:02:11.120 At today's post conviction relief Act, doctor Constantine car Zulas 0:02:11.200 --> 0:02:14.120 testified that a bitemarked fan on the victim's hand was 0:02:14.160 --> 0:02:17.560 Weimer's due to a bitemark analysis that he now considers 0:02:17.560 --> 0:02:21.760 to be junk science. After doctor Carzulas testified and without 0:02:21.800 --> 0:02:25.640 hearing any further testimony, President Judge John Wagner granted a 0:02:25.720 --> 0:02:26.919 retrial for Wimer. 0:02:27.120 --> 0:02:29.640 It was Crystal who started her own path to freedom, 0:02:29.760 --> 0:02:33.480 acting as her own attorney, filing paperwork. The Pennsylvania Innocence 0:02:33.560 --> 0:02:36.600 Project and the Jones Day Law Firm got involved. They 0:02:36.680 --> 0:02:40.560 found other problems with the police investigation and the prosecution 0:02:41.120 --> 0:02:44.440 and convinced to judge she is not the killer. Weimer's 0:02:44.440 --> 0:02:47.400 attorneys believe the real killer has never been caught. 0:02:49.639 --> 0:02:50.960 Crystal, Welcome to the show. 0:02:51.400 --> 0:02:51.800 Thank you. 0:02:51.960 --> 0:02:56.480 And with Crystal is her fabulous lawyer, Neila M. Sangvie, 0:02:56.600 --> 0:02:59.400 who is the legal director of the Pennsylvania Innists Project, 0:02:59.560 --> 0:03:01.960 and really looking forward to hearing from you and learning 0:03:01.960 --> 0:03:04.360 from the first time we've had some from the Pennsylvanian 0:03:04.360 --> 0:03:06.720 Instance Project on the show. So welcome, Thanks for happy 0:03:06.720 --> 0:03:10.680 to be here. So, Crystal, your story is insane, even 0:03:10.760 --> 0:03:15.880 by our very lofty standards of insanity. Here at wrongful conviction. 0:03:16.600 --> 0:03:20.520 You had the whole pot pirie of causes of wrongful conviction. 0:03:20.560 --> 0:03:24.520 I mean, your case involved false confession by a co defendant, 0:03:24.560 --> 0:03:29.560 It involved police and prosecutoral misconduct. It involved bitemark evidence, 0:03:29.600 --> 0:03:33.120 which we know is put it politely, horseshit right. And 0:03:33.200 --> 0:03:38.200 there's more. It's a fascinating study and terrifying study into 0:03:38.400 --> 0:03:41.160 just how many things can go wrong. So let's go 0:03:41.320 --> 0:03:44.600 back to two thousand and one and even before you 0:03:44.640 --> 0:03:47.560 grew up in Pennsylvania. Yes, and what was that like? 0:03:47.600 --> 0:03:49.000 What was your We always like to spend a few 0:03:49.000 --> 0:03:52.720 minutes talking about what life was like before this catastrophe happened. 0:03:53.120 --> 0:03:53.760 It was good. 0:03:53.920 --> 0:03:56.840 I used to work at a plan in newsday and 0:03:57.280 --> 0:04:00.840 assembling TVs and radios and things of that nature. 0:04:01.200 --> 0:04:03.320 And I was working three on, three. 0:04:03.120 --> 0:04:06.920 Off, two one two off days, twelve hour shifts. I 0:04:07.000 --> 0:04:10.320 was a single mother, raising my children by myself. 0:04:10.400 --> 0:04:11.200 What are their names? 0:04:11.560 --> 0:04:16.200 My oldest is Rose, she was ten, Miranda was seven, 0:04:16.760 --> 0:04:20.159 and the baby was Bridget and she was four. The 0:04:20.279 --> 0:04:23.920 high life of my life was them raising them and 0:04:23.960 --> 0:04:27.000 making sure they were off to school and went to work, 0:04:27.040 --> 0:04:30.160 and was living life on an everyday basis. 0:04:30.440 --> 0:04:32.800 Not an easy life by any stretch, right, working a 0:04:32.960 --> 0:04:36.400 difficult job, but a good job, and still raising three kids. 0:04:36.440 --> 0:04:38.839 And I have so much respect for single moms everywhere 0:04:38.960 --> 0:04:41.839 I see the amount of work that goes into raising children. 0:04:41.880 --> 0:04:44.040 It's incredible. So the idea that you were able to 0:04:44.080 --> 0:04:46.919 hold it together, you know, while working, is really my 0:04:46.960 --> 0:04:51.000 hat's off to you. So how could this have possibly happened? 0:04:51.040 --> 0:04:53.880 How could you sort of, I guess you could call 0:04:53.920 --> 0:04:58.520 a typical American, right, working, raising children, living sort of 0:04:58.520 --> 0:05:02.280 a regular type of place, right, How could you become 0:05:02.800 --> 0:05:06.680 ensnared in this craziest possible situation. 0:05:07.160 --> 0:05:10.200 I don't even have the answers. I don't know how 0:05:10.200 --> 0:05:11.839 to even say how it all began. 0:05:12.040 --> 0:05:15.039 Or let me give some details to the audience and then, Neil, 0:05:15.120 --> 0:05:16.800 if you could jump in any time you want. So, 0:05:17.600 --> 0:05:20.599 this was a case where a guy named Curtis Hayth 0:05:20.920 --> 0:05:24.400 was murdered outside his apartment building around four am on 0:05:24.520 --> 0:05:28.640 January twenty seventh of two thousand and one. And I 0:05:28.680 --> 0:05:31.800 guess the only reason that it even any attention was 0:05:31.800 --> 0:05:33.880 paid to you in the first place was because that 0:05:34.120 --> 0:05:36.440 night you had been at a party with him, right, 0:05:36.640 --> 0:05:39.360 with a lot of other people. Yes, attending a party 0:05:39.360 --> 0:05:43.880 with somebody and murdering them or very different legally. 0:05:43.480 --> 0:05:46.159 Speaking, right, I mean, I think what the police did 0:05:46.279 --> 0:05:49.720 made sense because when this man died, they wanted to know, okay, 0:05:49.800 --> 0:05:52.279 who else saw him, what was he doing? So it 0:05:52.320 --> 0:05:54.520 actually kind of made sense as a starting point for 0:05:54.560 --> 0:05:56.839 the investigation to talk to everybody he'd been with. But 0:05:56.880 --> 0:06:00.640 then obviously things took a wrong turn from that point on. 0:06:01.279 --> 0:06:03.480 Right, So, Crystal, you and a friend had given him 0:06:03.520 --> 0:06:05.960 a ride home from the party around ten o'clock. 0:06:05.680 --> 0:06:07.719 Right, Yeah, it was me and my cousin. 0:06:07.800 --> 0:06:10.120 God could, yes, but then you went back to the party. 0:06:10.720 --> 0:06:13.160 I went back to uniont where I was. 0:06:13.560 --> 0:06:16.400 Right, and he was murdered six hours later or so, 0:06:16.880 --> 0:06:19.640 at four o'clock in the morning. And by that time, 0:06:19.720 --> 0:06:22.599 I'm assuming you were home asleep with your kids. Right, 0:06:22.920 --> 0:06:26.080 So how did this start to go wrong? Because it 0:06:26.120 --> 0:06:27.680 took a long time. I mean, this kid, this was 0:06:27.720 --> 0:06:29.600 a cold case, right, you know? Right? 0:06:29.680 --> 0:06:34.040 They investigated for about a year after mister Hayes murder 0:06:34.080 --> 0:06:36.400 and really didn't have any leads. They questioned Crystal and 0:06:36.400 --> 0:06:39.000 a lot of other people, but didn't really have any leads. 0:06:39.000 --> 0:06:40.920 And then about a year into it, they brought in 0:06:40.960 --> 0:06:44.760 a Pennsylvania State trooper from the Cold Case Squad to 0:06:44.800 --> 0:06:47.440 try to investigate more. Because this is a relatively small 0:06:47.480 --> 0:06:50.000 town and an unsolved Thomas side is kind of big news, 0:06:50.520 --> 0:06:52.480 So they brought in the cold case squad and it's 0:06:52.520 --> 0:06:54.960 at that point that they started looking into the potential 0:06:55.080 --> 0:06:58.000 bitemark evidence that really became a lynchpin of the case 0:06:58.040 --> 0:06:59.920 against Crystal as things went. 0:06:59.800 --> 0:07:02.560 For so the victim had been bitten. 0:07:02.440 --> 0:07:04.880 Well supposedly, we don't based on what we know now, 0:07:04.880 --> 0:07:07.200 are not even sure whether it was a human bitemark. 0:07:07.279 --> 0:07:10.240 There was an oval shaped bruise on the victim's hand 0:07:10.440 --> 0:07:13.760 that was not identified as a bitemark during the autopsy. 0:07:14.280 --> 0:07:16.720 But when this person from the cold case squad came 0:07:16.760 --> 0:07:19.280 in and was looking at the autopsy photographs, she saw 0:07:19.320 --> 0:07:21.240 it and said, well, I think this is a bitemark, 0:07:21.280 --> 0:07:24.680 even though she was not a dentist or an odentologist 0:07:24.760 --> 0:07:27.920 by training, and then started looking at it from that angle. 0:07:28.520 --> 0:07:32.520 So the trained mortician or corner right, the. 0:07:32.480 --> 0:07:35.240 Forensic pathologist right that did the autopsy. 0:07:35.160 --> 0:07:37.920 Wasn't able to see a bitemark and clearly was looking 0:07:37.960 --> 0:07:39.480 for any signs that they could find because it was 0:07:39.480 --> 0:07:40.760 a murder, right right. 0:07:40.840 --> 0:07:43.200 And we looked into this when we were investigating the case. 0:07:43.240 --> 0:07:45.200 What do you look for in an autopsy? And if 0:07:45.200 --> 0:07:47.520 you're a forensic pathologist, bite marks are one of the things, 0:07:47.600 --> 0:07:50.000 even at that time, that you were supposed to look 0:07:50.000 --> 0:07:53.040 for and account for and preserve in a certain way 0:07:53.120 --> 0:07:55.200 if you saw it. And the pathologist did none of 0:07:55.200 --> 0:07:56.040 those things, right. 0:07:56.080 --> 0:07:58.560 So, what I'm trying to wrap myself around here is 0:07:58.600 --> 0:08:01.200 and this is just the first of so many I mean, 0:08:01.280 --> 0:08:03.160 whacky is a weird way to put it, but so 0:08:03.160 --> 0:08:05.600 many whacky things about this case. But I'm trying to 0:08:05.600 --> 0:08:08.040 wrap myself around to the idea that you have a 0:08:08.120 --> 0:08:12.800 trained pathologist forensic pathologist who is examining the body and 0:08:12.840 --> 0:08:15.679 looking with a fine tooth comb or microscope what everyone 0:08:15.680 --> 0:08:18.640 to call it, for any signs of foul play, but 0:08:18.800 --> 0:08:22.600 yet does not see or report anything to do with 0:08:22.600 --> 0:08:26.960 any bite marks. But yet a state trooper. Right, there's 0:08:27.080 --> 0:08:29.840 no training in this area, Right, A lay person is 0:08:29.840 --> 0:08:32.240 going to look at a photograph one dimensional a year 0:08:32.320 --> 0:08:35.240 later and go, I got this. I figured it out 0:08:35.400 --> 0:08:38.719 like some sort of Sherlock Holmes moment and say, oh, 0:08:38.760 --> 0:08:41.319 that's a bite mark. And we know, from having examined 0:08:41.400 --> 0:08:45.440 and uncovered and had to undo cases around the country 0:08:45.640 --> 0:08:49.000 related to bitemark evidence, it is probably the junkiest form 0:08:49.040 --> 0:08:51.560 of science that there is. I mean, there's so many 0:08:51.600 --> 0:08:54.719 cases that we've seen where they don't know whether it's 0:08:54.760 --> 0:08:57.720 a human bitemark, it could be an animal, it could 0:08:57.800 --> 0:09:01.960 be totally something, totally right exactly. So this was the 0:09:01.960 --> 0:09:06.040 beginning of what became a real life nightmare for Crystal. 0:09:06.400 --> 0:09:12.239 So then things start getting really tangled, right, and really complicated, 0:09:12.240 --> 0:09:15.600 because there's a whole cast of characters here that are 0:09:15.640 --> 0:09:19.439 all out for themselves and are all working across purposes 0:09:19.480 --> 0:09:23.640 and all working at trying to well save their own asses, right, right, 0:09:23.720 --> 0:09:26.280 This is where the incentivized witness thing comes into play, right. 0:09:26.400 --> 0:09:27.720 Do you want to talk about that a little. 0:09:27.520 --> 0:09:30.200 Bit now, Yeah, So, the incentivized witnesses in this case, 0:09:30.240 --> 0:09:34.560 it's interesting, actually didn't start even coming forward until Crystal 0:09:34.600 --> 0:09:37.680 had already been arrested and charged with the murder. So 0:09:38.480 --> 0:09:40.880 after this BikeE mark story comes out, they're talking to 0:09:40.880 --> 0:09:42.840 other people and there's a guy in the county jail 0:09:42.920 --> 0:09:46.719 named Joey Stenger who offers to give the police some 0:09:46.800 --> 0:09:51.000 information about Crystal and about this murder, and he's got 0:09:51.040 --> 0:09:52.680 a bunch of charges, so I think he was hoping 0:09:52.760 --> 0:09:55.360 for something, but at this point he wasn't promised anything, 0:09:55.400 --> 0:09:58.880 so it wasn't really incentivized at that point. But he 0:09:59.000 --> 0:10:03.600 essentially confesses to committing the murder and implicates Crystal in 0:10:03.640 --> 0:10:06.319 it with him. So they move forward based on this 0:10:06.360 --> 0:10:10.440 spiite mark evidence, based on this witness Joey Stenger, and 0:10:10.520 --> 0:10:14.199 some other things they had cobbled together. And then years 0:10:14.240 --> 0:10:17.280 after Curtis's deaths in two thousand and four and two 0:10:17.280 --> 0:10:19.600 thousand and five, when Crystal's in the County jail. You 0:10:19.640 --> 0:10:23.160 get other prisoners coming out of the woodwork saying they've 0:10:23.200 --> 0:10:27.839 heard Crystal confess to them, which just seems ludicrous given 0:10:27.960 --> 0:10:29.880 the you know, in particular, the amount of time that 0:10:29.920 --> 0:10:33.280 had passed since the murder, and they, as it turns out, 0:10:33.280 --> 0:10:35.880 we found out much later, we're all asking for deals 0:10:36.360 --> 0:10:38.240 in exchange for implicating Crystal. 0:10:38.559 --> 0:10:42.760 Again, we're supposed to believe that you, in an effort 0:10:42.880 --> 0:10:46.520 to purge your soul, are going up to total strangers 0:10:46.960 --> 0:10:50.040 in the jail and telling each of them your story 0:10:50.080 --> 0:10:54.240 about how you murdered Curtis haythe one night in January 0:10:54.480 --> 0:10:55.680 of two thousand and one. 0:10:55.920 --> 0:10:57.920 Well, the sad part was, I didn't even know a 0:10:57.920 --> 0:11:01.760 lot of the people. I just met them through testimony 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:04.640 or paperwork and stuff to that nature. I didn't I 0:11:04.679 --> 0:11:07.439 never even met him, like want a face to face basis, 0:11:08.160 --> 0:11:10.120 So I didn't even know who most. 0:11:10.000 --> 0:11:10.560 Of them were. 0:11:10.880 --> 0:11:13.600 So what happened here, it sounds to me like is 0:11:14.040 --> 0:11:16.600 going back fifteen years to when all this stuff was 0:11:16.640 --> 0:11:20.360 taking place. Is that, as we see time and again, 0:11:21.040 --> 0:11:25.160 the police and prosecutor came up with a theory and 0:11:25.200 --> 0:11:27.839 then in the absence of any physical evidence, because it 0:11:27.960 --> 0:11:30.240 wasn't any They had to figure out a way to 0:11:30.360 --> 0:11:34.520 convince a jury that you were this cold blooded killer. 0:11:35.080 --> 0:11:38.520 Did you have prior violent arrests in your past? No, 0:11:39.280 --> 0:11:44.640 you never murdered anybody else, never like it can blow 0:11:44.720 --> 0:11:48.000 up anything record. No, No, you weren't like a You 0:11:48.040 --> 0:11:51.480 weren't like a mugger karthif I's kidding, I mean. 0:11:51.360 --> 0:11:53.880 Like I said, you find sense of humor and all 0:11:53.920 --> 0:11:54.920 this madness. 0:11:55.120 --> 0:11:57.960 I tried to because otherwise it's just too depressing. So yeah, 0:11:58.120 --> 0:12:02.240 they would have had without having gone to these lengths 0:12:02.280 --> 0:12:06.120 that they did to fabricate evidence against you. Very hard 0:12:06.120 --> 0:12:08.240 to imagine that the jury would have convicted you, because 0:12:08.280 --> 0:12:11.400 what would they have said, Here's this woman who was 0:12:11.520 --> 0:12:16.240 raising three children, working a job, respectable citizen, with no 0:12:16.400 --> 0:12:20.960 prior history of violence. One day just up and murdered 0:12:21.000 --> 0:12:23.120 this guy at four o'clock in the morning, and we 0:12:23.280 --> 0:12:26.160 have no evidence to show you, but you should take 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:27.680 our word for it. That basically would have been the 0:12:27.679 --> 0:12:29.280 case a judgment. I mean, somebody would have thrown that 0:12:29.280 --> 0:12:31.040 thing out. Our jury would have said, they would have 0:12:31.040 --> 0:12:32.920 taken ten minutes and they would have said, this is ridiculous, 0:12:32.960 --> 0:12:34.120 We're going home. Right. 0:12:34.160 --> 0:12:36.679 And actually the charges against Crystal were thrown out the 0:12:36.800 --> 0:12:38.719 very first time they tried to bring them. This is 0:12:38.720 --> 0:12:41.240 when the additional informants and people start coming in, and 0:12:41.280 --> 0:12:43.880 they charged her again, and it was the second time 0:12:43.880 --> 0:12:46.920 that the charges stuck. So what you're saying actually did 0:12:47.320 --> 0:12:49.720 happen essentially the first time around. 0:12:50.320 --> 0:12:52.960 Yes, that's in two thousand and four, right, which is 0:12:52.960 --> 0:12:55.720 already more than three years after the crime was committed. 0:12:56.160 --> 0:12:59.480 The case was dismissed against you because Beale recanted his 0:12:59.520 --> 0:13:02.120 earlier that you the murder, and he refused to testify. 0:13:02.320 --> 0:13:05.160 He was the very first one that recanted. Joey's singer 0:13:05.320 --> 0:13:08.360 was the second one that recanted his statement. So whenever 0:13:08.559 --> 0:13:13.560 Bill recanted, they released me. But they never released me 0:13:14.240 --> 0:13:17.960 because of prejudice. They just released me and the judge 0:13:17.960 --> 0:13:21.120 gave them the option to refel charges against me for 0:13:21.200 --> 0:13:24.200 the second arrest. So I was begging to go back 0:13:24.240 --> 0:13:28.240 to prison, which is absurd, knowing that they were going 0:13:28.280 --> 0:13:31.000 to do this again to me, just to have a 0:13:31.040 --> 0:13:33.040 trial so I didn't have to go through all this 0:13:33.160 --> 0:13:34.280 again the second time. 0:13:34.480 --> 0:13:36.880 And then who's taking care of your children this well. 0:13:36.800 --> 0:13:40.160 My two oldest daughters were with their grandmother. Whenever all 0:13:40.240 --> 0:13:43.160 this took place, she was putting them off to school 0:13:43.160 --> 0:13:46.120 and making sure they were okay. Well that year, whenever 0:13:46.160 --> 0:13:49.320 I got released, I had three different apartments, Like I 0:13:49.400 --> 0:13:51.760 was trying to come out and get myself back together, 0:13:51.840 --> 0:13:53.000 and here they come again. 0:13:53.640 --> 0:13:54.920 It was just crazy. 0:13:55.520 --> 0:13:58.679 So I couldn't get myself together and make sure I 0:13:58.800 --> 0:14:01.559 was taking care of them, not knowing what they were going. 0:14:01.559 --> 0:14:02.640 To do to me again. 0:14:03.360 --> 0:14:04.920 So I wanted to make sure they were in a 0:14:04.960 --> 0:14:08.760 stable environment, which I left them with their grandparents, not 0:14:08.880 --> 0:14:11.200 knowing if they were going to come rearrest me again 0:14:11.280 --> 0:14:14.240 for the second time, or what was going to occur. 0:14:15.040 --> 0:14:16.880 So I wanted them in a safe environment. 0:14:17.000 --> 0:14:18.600 That's why I left them where they were. 0:14:19.160 --> 0:14:21.680 But even still, the idea, I mean, what is that 0:14:22.000 --> 0:14:25.000 like being locked up for something you didn't do and 0:14:25.040 --> 0:14:28.080 then not being able to tuck your kids in or 0:14:28.480 --> 0:14:31.080 read them a story or you know. I mean, especially 0:14:31.080 --> 0:14:33.720 as they're sort of their only parent and as a mom, like, 0:14:33.880 --> 0:14:35.880 how how did you deal with that when you're in prison? 0:14:35.880 --> 0:14:37.240 How did you keep your sanity? 0:14:38.000 --> 0:14:39.360 It was extremely hard. 0:14:39.760 --> 0:14:42.920 I mean, as far as being depressed and crying all 0:14:42.960 --> 0:14:46.560 the time, emotional. I would go see a therapist and 0:14:46.680 --> 0:14:49.840 the counsel all the time. I tried to go to 0:14:49.840 --> 0:14:53.400 a church. It was just so hard on a daily basis. 0:14:53.760 --> 0:14:56.920 A part of you just gone. Your baby's just gone. 0:14:57.360 --> 0:14:59.520 And no words can even describe that feeling. 0:15:00.120 --> 0:15:02.960 That's horrible. That's the worst feeling in the world. Like 0:15:03.040 --> 0:15:03.760 the babies that. 0:15:03.760 --> 0:15:06.440 You bore, that you were supposed to be secure and 0:15:06.440 --> 0:15:10.080 love and neuturing and mom and make sure their needs 0:15:10.080 --> 0:15:14.400 are met and just quality time, security time, just everything 0:15:14.560 --> 0:15:19.480 just being ripped apart and away from Oh, it is 0:15:19.560 --> 0:15:23.720 this horrible, horrible in my heart and my mind, my emotions. 0:15:24.200 --> 0:15:26.520 I don't even know how I cope and dealt with it. 0:15:26.640 --> 0:15:27.000 I just. 0:15:28.600 --> 0:15:29.040 I don't know. 0:15:29.120 --> 0:15:31.320 I just try one day at a time. I just 0:15:31.480 --> 0:15:33.360 kept praying. I didn't know what else to do. But 0:15:33.440 --> 0:15:37.240 it pushed me to be persistent. Knowing I was innocent 0:15:37.320 --> 0:15:40.240 and I was wrong. Then I was coming home, So 0:15:40.280 --> 0:15:44.080 it pushed me even more so to fight and take 0:15:44.120 --> 0:15:46.440 a stand for what I believe in. And I knew 0:15:46.440 --> 0:15:48.760 in my heart I was going to come home. I 0:15:48.840 --> 0:15:50.360 just didn't know when or how long. 0:15:50.840 --> 0:15:53.400 Well I'm getting the chills thinking about this. So you 0:15:53.400 --> 0:15:56.560 were rearrested in September of two thousand and four, and 0:15:56.600 --> 0:15:59.400 you went to trial. Yes, and you were represented by 0:15:59.440 --> 0:16:02.160 a public deffect at the time. Yes, right. They have 0:16:02.200 --> 0:16:04.920 a lot of respect for lawyers in general. But we 0:16:04.960 --> 0:16:07.960 do know that the public defender situation in this country 0:16:08.040 --> 0:16:10.240 is a crisis, nothing less than a crisis. We have 0:16:10.880 --> 0:16:14.560 a situation, I think in every state where they are underpaid, 0:16:14.760 --> 0:16:18.680 they're overburdened, they're overworked. Some of them are incompetent, but 0:16:18.800 --> 0:16:21.560 many of them are very competent, but they have an 0:16:21.560 --> 0:16:25.680 impossible task. So if you're in this situation and don't 0:16:25.720 --> 0:16:28.480 have money to defend yourself, and sometimes even if you do, 0:16:29.440 --> 0:16:32.960 you have really a snowballs chance in hell of getting justice, 0:16:33.200 --> 0:16:36.120 and you now go to trial, it must have seemed 0:16:36.160 --> 0:16:36.800 like a circus. 0:16:37.880 --> 0:16:38.920 It was a circus. 0:16:38.960 --> 0:16:41.520 I was just in awe with all these people coming 0:16:41.520 --> 0:16:44.840 on and stand and testifying, and I was just like, 0:16:45.000 --> 0:16:48.480 what where did this come from? I'm shaking my head 0:16:48.480 --> 0:16:49.880 and looking like wow. 0:16:50.320 --> 0:16:52.640 And Neilon. Not only were they coming in and saying 0:16:52.680 --> 0:16:54.960 a bunch of stuff that wasn't true, but they were 0:16:54.960 --> 0:16:58.240 also changing their lives. There were different lives on different days, 0:16:58.360 --> 0:17:01.400 right from the same person. The stinger guy changed his 0:17:01.480 --> 0:17:04.520 story again and again, I mean doesn't at some point 0:17:04.560 --> 0:17:07.640 somebody go, wait a minute, this guy is totally full 0:17:07.680 --> 0:17:10.159 of shit, right, I mean that forgive my language, but 0:17:10.240 --> 0:17:12.640 I mean he just kept coming up with new lies. 0:17:12.920 --> 0:17:15.600 Yeah. By our account, by the time we got through 0:17:15.880 --> 0:17:18.439 the trial, the post conviction procedure and we're looking at 0:17:18.440 --> 0:17:21.959 a potential new trial, Stanger had given about fifteen different 0:17:22.000 --> 0:17:25.800 accounts of the events, and there were changes every time. 0:17:26.160 --> 0:17:30.080 So you wonder how the jury could believe this guy, 0:17:30.119 --> 0:17:32.879 which they really had to do because he was the 0:17:32.920 --> 0:17:36.280 only evidence that claimed to have firsthand knowledge of Crystal 0:17:36.320 --> 0:17:37.439 being at the scene, which of. 0:17:37.440 --> 0:17:38.600 Course was not true. 0:17:38.880 --> 0:17:40.920 But the jury really had to believe him, and they did, 0:17:40.960 --> 0:17:43.040 which I think just shows you that if it's the 0:17:43.080 --> 0:17:46.359 prosecution putting up the witness, sometimes that's really all you 0:17:46.400 --> 0:17:49.160 need and it doesn't matter that much what they say. 0:17:49.920 --> 0:17:52.280 He admitted that he was coached by the police, right, 0:17:52.320 --> 0:17:54.680 which is again it's a fact. I think most people 0:17:54.680 --> 0:17:56.800 sit there and go, well, that can't happen. That's not allowed. 0:17:57.000 --> 0:17:59.359 And he admitted that the police told him what to say. 0:17:59.600 --> 0:18:02.320 Yeah, he recanted. He said that they fed him the 0:18:02.359 --> 0:18:03.920 information basically. 0:18:03.760 --> 0:18:06.960 Right, And that's done in ways, both subtle and not 0:18:07.080 --> 0:18:09.360 so subtle. Right. You know. The fact is we see 0:18:09.680 --> 0:18:14.240 in so many of these wrongful convictions police that feed 0:18:14.359 --> 0:18:18.959 information either like I said, sort of artfully right by 0:18:19.280 --> 0:18:23.119 in a suggestive in a roundabout way. In this case, 0:18:23.240 --> 0:18:26.800 it was much more blatant. Right, They just told them 0:18:26.840 --> 0:18:29.920 what they wanted him to say. But jury's I mean, 0:18:29.920 --> 0:18:31.840 sometimes they don't hear that. Sometimes they don't know. If 0:18:31.880 --> 0:18:34.600 it's not videotape, it should be. Videotips should always be videotaped. 0:18:34.600 --> 0:18:37.639 That's one of the things we are working so hard 0:18:37.680 --> 0:18:40.720 on at innocence projects around the country, especially one in 0:18:40.760 --> 0:18:45.159 New York as the mandatory videotaping of interrogation. Strangely enough, 0:18:45.200 --> 0:18:46.359 New York State doesn't have it. 0:18:46.520 --> 0:18:48.560 Yeah, in Pennsylvania we don't have it. A couple of 0:18:48.560 --> 0:18:51.080 counties have started doing it just within the last. 0:18:50.880 --> 0:18:51.400 Year or so. 0:18:52.160 --> 0:18:55.480 In this case, it's interesting one of Joey's statements to 0:18:55.600 --> 0:18:59.040 police was videotaped, but they didn't start the tape until 0:18:59.080 --> 0:19:01.400 after they'd alreadyn talked tucking him for a few hours, 0:19:01.440 --> 0:19:03.840 So by the time he's on the tape, there's a 0:19:03.920 --> 0:19:08.520 relatively for lack of a better word, canned story coming 0:19:08.640 --> 0:19:11.120 from him, so we didn't get to see what went 0:19:11.160 --> 0:19:12.880 into it, which really you want to see the whole 0:19:12.880 --> 0:19:14.680 thing obviously, to see how it unfolded. 0:19:14.880 --> 0:19:16.520 Okay, so let me go to my soapbox here for 0:19:16.520 --> 0:19:18.960 a second. So, Crystal, one of the reasons that I'm 0:19:19.000 --> 0:19:23.520 so happier here is because you literally represent everybody in America. 0:19:23.600 --> 0:19:26.440 I mean, I think it's fair to say that if 0:19:26.440 --> 0:19:28.200 this could happen to you, it could happen to anyone, 0:19:28.520 --> 0:19:31.880 because you just don't fit the profile of somebody who 0:19:31.880 --> 0:19:33.679 would get picked up, you know. And I think there 0:19:33.680 --> 0:19:35.800 are some people who say, well, they must have been 0:19:35.840 --> 0:19:38.160 involved with something else, And people have this different attitudes 0:19:38.200 --> 0:19:41.560 about exonnaies. We know that half of our exanneries had 0:19:41.600 --> 0:19:44.880 no prior record before they were wrongfully arrested and convicted. 0:19:45.400 --> 0:19:49.119 But the fact is that everyone should be concerned and 0:19:49.119 --> 0:19:51.919 everyone should be angry as I am now at the 0:19:52.000 --> 0:19:56.520 idea that we don't have mandatory videotaping of interrogations. It 0:19:56.640 --> 0:20:01.960 is preposterous. What could possibly be the reason why we 0:20:02.000 --> 0:20:04.280 wouldn't want to be able to see what goes on 0:20:04.840 --> 0:20:09.719 inside that interrogation room and know that the person is 0:20:09.840 --> 0:20:13.520 actually the right person. Right. None of us want murderers 0:20:13.560 --> 0:20:17.520 walking the streets. But the idea that we forget as 0:20:17.520 --> 0:20:22.199 a society upon basically arrest and certainly upon incarceration, we 0:20:22.280 --> 0:20:25.040