WEBVTT - #106 Jason Flom with Nick Yarris Pt. 1 0:00:02.240 --> 0:00:05.760 On December fifteenth, nineteen eighty one, Linda may Craig, a 0:00:05.800 --> 0:00:08.879 sales associate at the Tri State Mall in Claymont, Delaware, 0:00:09.000 --> 0:00:11.119 was abducted in her car at the end of her shift. 0:00:11.680 --> 0:00:15.120 After not arriving home hours after she was due, her 0:00:15.200 --> 0:00:19.759 husband called the police. Her body was found the following day, beaten, stabbed, 0:00:19.800 --> 0:00:22.320 and raped in a church parking lot about a mile 0:00:22.320 --> 0:00:24.840 and a half away from where her car had been discovered. 0:00:26.320 --> 0:00:29.680 Nikiaris was a troubled young man with serious substance abuse 0:00:29.720 --> 0:00:34.040 issues growing up in southwest Philadelphia. One fateful night, he 0:00:34.120 --> 0:00:36.559 was pulled over for a traffic violation in a stolen 0:00:36.640 --> 0:00:39.080 car while high on meth, and he got into an 0:00:39.120 --> 0:00:44.280 altercation with the arresting officer, whose gun accidentally discharged. While 0:00:44.280 --> 0:00:47.240 in jail and facing a laundry list of charges, Yarras 0:00:47.240 --> 0:00:50.000 spotted a newspaper article about Linda may Craig and tried 0:00:50.040 --> 0:00:53.960 to trade false information for leniency. But what authorities discovered 0:00:53.960 --> 0:00:56.680 his trickery. They turned the charges and the tables on him. 0:00:56.800 --> 0:01:01.280 Manipulating false witness testimonies, hiding or dishing the case history, 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:04.360 and using some misleading rology in order to pin the 0:01:04.440 --> 0:01:08.200 rape and murder on Nick. The biological evidence, as it 0:01:08.240 --> 0:01:10.760 turned out, that was used to convict him, though, would 0:01:10.760 --> 0:01:14.120 one day be the same evidence that would set him free. Now. 0:01:14.760 --> 0:01:17.000 I'm not even going to try to summarize the rest 0:01:17.000 --> 0:01:19.440 of Nick's story here. It's why we're splitting this episode 0:01:19.480 --> 0:01:22.319 into two parts, which are both available now. But to 0:01:22.400 --> 0:01:25.679 compare Nick's story to a roller coaster ride of twists 0:01:25.680 --> 0:01:28.320 and turns would feel like a compliment to roller coasters, 0:01:28.400 --> 0:01:31.039 or it would be actually under selling the story of 0:01:31.160 --> 0:01:34.920 Nick Yaris. As one journalist put it, nick Yaris is 0:01:34.959 --> 0:01:39.080 living one of the greatest stories ever told. And this 0:01:39.920 --> 0:01:51.880 is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason 0:01:51.880 --> 0:01:55.120 Flamm that's me today. I have a guest whose name 0:01:55.200 --> 0:01:58.120 you will remember and whose story you won't forget. First 0:01:58.200 --> 0:02:00.560 of all, thank you for flying all the way across 0:02:00.600 --> 0:02:03.240 the country from the Great Northwest. Nick Yarris is here. 0:02:03.360 --> 0:02:06.040 Nick welcome, Thank you everyone. I really appreciate that. 0:02:06.280 --> 0:02:08.640 And as I always say, I'm sorry you're here, but 0:02:08.760 --> 0:02:11.880 I'm happy you're here. So I often feel that each 0:02:11.960 --> 0:02:15.560 time I meet someone a member of the exonerated community, 0:02:15.600 --> 0:02:17.400 and I interview them, I feel like I thought I 0:02:17.440 --> 0:02:20.960 had heard everything, but now I'll just have to reevaluate. 0:02:21.520 --> 0:02:26.440 But Nick's story is so far off the rails. He's 0:02:26.480 --> 0:02:28.840 the only guy to start with this. He's the only 0:02:28.919 --> 0:02:33.360 guy to have escaped from death row and then turned 0:02:33.400 --> 0:02:37.280 himself in and then ultimately been exonerated. He's the first 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:40.840 person in America to ever request his DNA to be 0:02:40.919 --> 0:02:43.320 tested from death Row, and of course that's what led 0:02:43.360 --> 0:02:49.600 to his wrongful conviction being overturned. He's got so many 0:02:49.840 --> 0:02:52.640 unique aspects to his story and his character. I just 0:02:52.680 --> 0:02:55.560 want to let the interview go. So here we go. Nick. 0:02:56.160 --> 0:02:58.600 First of all, let's go back to the beginning. Where 0:02:58.600 --> 0:02:59.359 did you grow up? 0:03:00.520 --> 0:03:02.720 I was raised in Southwest Philadelphia. 0:03:03.080 --> 0:03:07.800 My family lived in a small area of the Eastwick 0:03:07.880 --> 0:03:12.720 section Southwest Philadelphia, and I was in a working class neighborhood. 0:03:13.000 --> 0:03:15.919 You had a difficult childhood from everything I've read. 0:03:16.160 --> 0:03:20.080 Yeah, so the problem with everything was in timing. And 0:03:20.120 --> 0:03:22.000 I'm sure you're old enough to remember this. 0:03:22.240 --> 0:03:25.279 I was part of that wave. 0:03:25.320 --> 0:03:29.760 Of children that came in the sixties, and in nineteen 0:03:29.800 --> 0:03:34.160 sixty eight my entire life changed because not was it 0:03:34.520 --> 0:03:38.120 related to the assassination of Martin Luther King, but I 0:03:38.160 --> 0:03:42.040 always equate that because all I remember was that summer 0:03:42.280 --> 0:03:46.280 was the fires and Camden and all of these upheaval 0:03:46.320 --> 0:03:49.520 and I wasn't allowed to be friends with Roderick Jones, 0:03:49.560 --> 0:03:53.680 my buddy from first grade, and that was the summer 0:03:54.240 --> 0:03:58.240 that I had to deal with after a terrible incident 0:03:58.520 --> 0:04:03.640 that spring where I was in my neighborhood and as 0:04:03.680 --> 0:04:06.800 a seven year old boy, I was let out from 0:04:06.840 --> 0:04:10.520 school to go to a dental appointment and I had 0:04:10.520 --> 0:04:13.760 my school clothing on when my mother told me as 0:04:13.840 --> 0:04:15.840 I left the house that day that she really didn't 0:04:15.880 --> 0:04:18.840 want me to get thirty. But I went running off 0:04:18.880 --> 0:04:22.960 with my childhood friend, Jocko, who was a medium sized 0:04:23.000 --> 0:04:26.880 pood on, my best friend in life, and I ended 0:04:26.960 --> 0:04:30.239 up in a small area behind my neighborhood that was wooded, 0:04:31.560 --> 0:04:34.920 and as I walked down the path, I didn't notice, 0:04:34.960 --> 0:04:37.520 but there was a boy there about twenty years old, 0:04:38.560 --> 0:04:39.280 and I knew. 0:04:39.040 --> 0:04:39.640 Who he was. 0:04:39.800 --> 0:04:43.240 He was a very aggressive male. I seen him beat 0:04:43.320 --> 0:04:46.680 up adults and I was very afraid of him, and 0:04:46.720 --> 0:04:50.120 he knew that he played upon that. And as I 0:04:50.400 --> 0:04:54.760 found myself alone with this individual, he commanded my attention 0:04:54.839 --> 0:04:56.839 and he told me to come to him and come 0:04:56.880 --> 0:04:59.880 over here, because he wanted me to stand before him, 0:05:00.480 --> 0:05:03.400 and he had a cigarette in his mouth. I remember 0:05:03.600 --> 0:05:06.760 distinctly how he took the cigarette from his mouth and 0:05:06.800 --> 0:05:09.520 he wanted me to take a puff at his cigarette. 0:05:09.880 --> 0:05:12.640 And when I did, I got all lightheaded from the 0:05:12.800 --> 0:05:17.880 tobacco entering my lungs. And basically at that moment, that's 0:05:17.920 --> 0:05:23.000 when he launched the sexual assault upon me. And in 0:05:23.040 --> 0:05:26.440 frustration and anger, he got all scared and he picked 0:05:26.480 --> 0:05:28.960 up a fieldstone and he beat my head in with it. 0:05:30.600 --> 0:05:34.039 I remember only bits and pieces when I came to, 0:05:34.200 --> 0:05:37.960 and I was terrified. I couldn't find my dog, Jocko. 0:05:38.200 --> 0:05:43.159 I kept screaming his name over and over, and I 0:05:43.240 --> 0:05:46.400 knew that I had to go back home. And I 0:05:46.440 --> 0:05:48.480 remember the warm blood on the front of my head, 0:05:49.520 --> 0:05:54.520 and I had this huge, huge hematoma across the front, 0:05:54.560 --> 0:05:58.640 so that it was like a porpoise head man, and 0:05:58.839 --> 0:06:04.200 I couldn't hardly see. Everything was like those frosted glasses 0:06:04.279 --> 0:06:07.880 you see when someone's close to a window and everything's 0:06:07.920 --> 0:06:12.719 all fogged up. And I stumbled home and my mother 0:06:12.880 --> 0:06:15.839 was there, and she was horrified, and she said Nikki 0:06:15.880 --> 0:06:19.400 would happen, and It was then that I had to 0:06:20.760 --> 0:06:23.760 recall for her the lie that he kept telling me 0:06:24.480 --> 0:06:27.960 while he put his trousers on, that I should tell 0:06:28.000 --> 0:06:30.359 my parents I fell off a wall and a shopping 0:06:30.400 --> 0:06:35.280 cart fell on my head. I told the story to 0:06:35.320 --> 0:06:37.600 my mom, and she didn't care about any of it, 0:06:39.040 --> 0:06:41.000 and I remember it. I just got rushed to the 0:06:41.000 --> 0:06:47.880 Willseye Hospital in Philadelphia and they treated me there for 0:06:48.040 --> 0:06:52.760 the brain swelling, and I was taken home that night. 0:06:53.960 --> 0:06:58.960 And I remember the only thing that to this day 0:06:59.040 --> 0:07:01.680 this still sticks out, is that Jocko would leave me 0:07:01.720 --> 0:07:08.080 alone my dog when I got home, just wouldn't stuck. 0:07:09.279 --> 0:07:12.200 So the dog could run home, as if to try 0:07:12.200 --> 0:07:14.280 to get help for you. Is that right? 0:07:14.880 --> 0:07:16.760 It seemingly was that way to me. 0:07:17.280 --> 0:07:21.800 That's a horrible, horrible story. It probably I'm going to 0:07:21.920 --> 0:07:25.000 guess that it had something to do with the fact 0:07:25.000 --> 0:07:27.520 that you ended up getting caught up with some drugs 0:07:27.520 --> 0:07:33.000 and alcohol. Anybody probably would having endured such a traumatic situation. 0:07:33.920 --> 0:07:37.880 And so as a teenager, fast forwarding about a decade, 0:07:38.120 --> 0:07:41.000 you were involved with some petty crimes. Is that right? 0:07:41.040 --> 0:07:42.720 I mean, you weren't. You were no angel. Let's just 0:07:42.760 --> 0:07:43.280 say right. 0:07:43.400 --> 0:07:45.840 I grew up in a neighborhood where stealing cars was 0:07:46.080 --> 0:07:50.280 part of the fun. Man like it was culture. You know, 0:07:50.360 --> 0:07:53.640 the seventies were different. In nineteen seventy eight, seventy nine, 0:07:54.320 --> 0:07:56.520 as a long haired kid that hung out with his 0:07:56.520 --> 0:07:58.800 friends and got high, because I found out that as 0:07:58.800 --> 0:08:03.120 long as I got high, I wasn't afraid. And it 0:08:03.200 --> 0:08:06.840 was a terrible thing that I didn't respect anything I 0:08:06.920 --> 0:08:12.160 spoke guttural. I was very silly, and I think what 0:08:12.280 --> 0:08:16.720 did my head in was I was eighteen years old 0:08:17.680 --> 0:08:21.600 and I was standing by Cobbs Creek Park and I 0:08:21.640 --> 0:08:25.400 saw my attacker. It's the first time I seen him 0:08:25.480 --> 0:08:29.800 alone since I got out of the juvenile correctional system 0:08:29.840 --> 0:08:33.880 where I learned how to box and everything. Now I'm 0:08:33.880 --> 0:08:36.760 six to two, I weigh close to two hundred and 0:08:36.760 --> 0:08:42.959 ten pounds. I've been trained to fight. I'm eighteen years old. Man, 0:08:43.000 --> 0:08:48.600 I'm not no kid anymore. And I seen him. He's 0:08:48.640 --> 0:08:54.880 coming from Darby, Pennsylvania, across the creek. He's got a 0:08:55.320 --> 0:08:57.640 quart of beer in his hands, and he's walking up 0:08:57.679 --> 0:09:02.880 towards me. Now five foot eight, one hundred and fifty 0:09:02.920 --> 0:09:07.440 five pounds. Maybe he ain't no big, scary dude. 0:09:09.760 --> 0:09:10.559 So as he's. 0:09:10.400 --> 0:09:14.280 Walking towards me, I'm getting angrier and angrier. I'm like man, 0:09:16.160 --> 0:09:18.800 And then he saw it, he saw the anger in 0:09:18.880 --> 0:09:25.520 my face, and the strangest thing happened. Man, Instead of 0:09:26.160 --> 0:09:29.679 showing me this snarling, nasty face that beat my head in, 0:09:31.400 --> 0:09:36.680 he cowered. He capitulated, and in this very milk toasting, 0:09:36.800 --> 0:09:40.800 cowardly way, he started to plead with me. Nick Man, 0:09:42.080 --> 0:09:47.800 I'm sorry, man, look, I'm so sorry. I kept looking 0:09:47.840 --> 0:09:51.600 at him and looking at him, and then I had 0:09:51.600 --> 0:09:59.480 this horrifying realization. I turned myself into this bitter, nasty 0:09:59.559 --> 0:10:05.280 person to be just like him. I hated everyone, disrespected everyone, 0:10:05.960 --> 0:10:10.640 I talked like shit. I was so screwed up in 0:10:10.679 --> 0:10:14.760 my head from this incident that I stole a car 0:10:14.800 --> 0:10:17.520 and I ran off to Florida and I did a 0:10:17.559 --> 0:10:19.720 bunch of drugs and I ended up in the Florida 0:10:19.760 --> 0:10:24.400 State Mental Institution over this, and for the very first time, 0:10:25.160 --> 0:10:29.640 I got diagnosed with having a brain injury called a phasia. 0:10:30.679 --> 0:10:33.920 And the doctor said, what kind of drugs you've been taking? 0:10:35.160 --> 0:10:38.720 When I ran through the list of them, mainly being methamphetamine, 0:10:40.160 --> 0:10:43.800 he said, I want to explain something to you. If 0:10:43.840 --> 0:10:49.200 you had a fire and you had napalm, would you 0:10:49.280 --> 0:10:51.880 throw the nate palm on the fire to put it out? 0:10:52.200 --> 0:10:56.480 Because methamphetamine inside your brain is napalm, and you're killing yourself. 0:10:57.040 --> 0:11:02.040 You can't function, you lose folkous. What you do is 0:11:02.280 --> 0:11:06.640 just full of mental destruction. He said, the worst drug 0:11:06.679 --> 0:11:10.120 that you can do in your life is methamphetomye. And 0:11:10.200 --> 0:11:13.760 I said, but I really don't care about myself. He said, 0:11:13.880 --> 0:11:17.720 it shows you arrived in a medical condition in the 0:11:17.800 --> 0:11:22.480 Dade County jail. You weighed one hundred and seventy three pounds, 0:11:22.760 --> 0:11:27.560 You were malnourished, you were uncommunicated. We had to put 0:11:27.559 --> 0:11:29.640 you into restraints. 0:11:30.120 --> 0:11:30.800 They read it all. 0:11:31.760 --> 0:11:36.320 He said, you have a form of a phasia. You 0:11:36.440 --> 0:11:39.960 have a brain disorder in which you were brain scans 0:11:40.040 --> 0:11:43.600 show that you have damage. Have you been in a 0:11:43.679 --> 0:11:47.240 serious automobile accident, because this is likely to be caused 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:52.440 by serious trauma. And I told him, I said no, 0:11:52.720 --> 0:11:54.080 someone hit me in the head when I was a 0:11:54.080 --> 0:11:57.440 boy with a rock. And then he tried to explain 0:11:57.440 --> 0:12:01.800 what a PHASEA was. Get out of the medical institution. 0:12:02.000 --> 0:12:05.880 They send me back to Pennsylvania and in nineteen eighty one. 0:12:06.320 --> 0:12:09.600 I was stable for three months. I had a girlfriend 0:12:09.679 --> 0:12:13.319 named Teresa. I was working at Spencer's Gifts. I wasn't 0:12:13.360 --> 0:12:18.160 doing meth. Everything was cool. Jay I was like, I understand, 0:12:18.240 --> 0:12:20.880 I got a brain disorder. I can't do meth. So 0:12:20.960 --> 0:12:23.280 I tried my best to stay clean. But I'm twenty 0:12:23.360 --> 0:12:27.679 years old, you know. Then I get to like stressing 0:12:27.800 --> 0:12:30.480 with my brothers and fighting in the house and causing 0:12:30.520 --> 0:12:33.560 all kinds of ruckus. And my parents were stressed out 0:12:33.600 --> 0:12:37.720 because both my brothers were on drugs. So Marty's drinking, 0:12:37.840 --> 0:12:41.040 Mikey's drinking, I'm drinking. We're fighting in the house, and 0:12:41.040 --> 0:12:44.400 it's just chaos. Teresa don't really want to be part 0:12:44.440 --> 0:12:44.599 of that. 0:12:44.760 --> 0:12:45.600 She steps out. 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:48.520 So I go back to stee on cars and doing 0:12:48.559 --> 0:12:54.720 meth again. On December fourth, nineteen eighty one, two Philadelphia 0:12:54.760 --> 0:12:57.240 police officers pulled me over and they beat me up 0:12:57.280 --> 0:13:00.760 and mashed my mouth up with a Beaverdale blackjack. But 0:13:00.840 --> 0:13:02.880 that didn't stop me. The next week, I went out 0:13:02.880 --> 0:13:07.920 and stole another car. But this time it's December nineteenth, 0:13:08.360 --> 0:13:11.480 nineteen eighty one, and I'm driving in the city of Chester. 0:13:12.400 --> 0:13:15.640 It's twelve o'clock one o'clock in the morning and I 0:13:15.679 --> 0:13:19.040 went through a stop sign. The cop pulls out, and 0:13:19.080 --> 0:13:22.600 my heart's racing. Man, I'm high on meth. I just 0:13:22.640 --> 0:13:25.040 took a hell of a beaten two weeks three weeks 0:13:25.040 --> 0:13:27.400 ago from the police for this same shit. 0:13:29.840 --> 0:13:32.400 I don't know what to do. I just panicked. 0:13:33.200 --> 0:13:35.520 The next thing I know, this police officer comes up 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:38.320 and starts beating on the window. I'm boom, boom, get 0:13:38.360 --> 0:13:41.480 out of the car. But in my head, I swear 0:13:41.520 --> 0:13:43.960 to God, I can't make no sense to nothing. My 0:13:44.040 --> 0:13:48.439 heart's racing. I'm so high on meth I I can't move. 0:13:49.040 --> 0:13:54.720 I'm panicky. You know that's scared panicky. The dude rips 0:13:54.760 --> 0:13:57.200 the door open, and when he did, I realized the 0:13:57.320 --> 0:14:00.200 radio was still blasted. I'm so high on it, even 0:14:00.200 --> 0:14:03.160 though the radio's on it. He rips me out of 0:14:03.200 --> 0:14:05.559 the car, pushes me back. 0:14:06.040 --> 0:14:08.360 Didn't you see me? Why didn't you stop all this? 0:14:09.000 --> 0:14:09.959 I can't stay. 0:14:09.840 --> 0:14:11.960 I'm trying to talk to him, and that's when he 0:14:12.040 --> 0:14:14.760 foe armed me. And he took his right forearm and 0:14:14.840 --> 0:14:17.760 put it under my chin and pushed my neck backwards 0:14:17.760 --> 0:14:19.520 on the roof of the car so that my head's 0:14:19.560 --> 0:14:22.280 now being pushed against it and I'm choking, you know, 0:14:23.200 --> 0:14:25.680 And that was it, Like I snapped, and I pushed 0:14:25.680 --> 0:14:27.800 his arm away with my left hand and flung it 0:14:27.840 --> 0:14:30.560 off me, and he grabbed his stick in a flash 0:14:30.680 --> 0:14:31.440 my right. 0:14:31.240 --> 0:14:33.320 Hand so fast. I can't explain it. 0:14:33.840 --> 0:14:37.520 When you're high on methamphetamine and your adrenal glands kick in, 0:14:38.760 --> 0:14:42.240 the things that happen are just in flashes. I reached 0:14:42.240 --> 0:14:45.280 out and like a nanosecond just took a stick off him, 0:14:45.640 --> 0:14:48.280 and he looked at me incredulously and he went whew. 0:14:48.720 --> 0:14:50.840 And then he reached down with his right hand and 0:14:50.880 --> 0:14:52.480 pulled his gun out. And when I seen him going 0:14:52.520 --> 0:14:54.920 for the gun, I reached out with both hands and 0:14:55.000 --> 0:14:58.400 put my hands on his hand and pushed downwards so 0:14:58.480 --> 0:15:00.240 that the barrel went away from us, you know. 0:15:01.120 --> 0:15:05.440 And as I did that was it. Boom, big loud explosion. 0:15:05.520 --> 0:15:09.080 Man, the gun goes off, and I'm just I can't 0:15:09.120 --> 0:15:14.600 believe this, Jason. I went from being high in a 0:15:14.720 --> 0:15:18.080 stolen car driving down the street, thinking about how can 0:15:18.120 --> 0:15:20.440 I get out of this crazy stuff at my house, 0:15:20.480 --> 0:15:23.840 and the next thing I know, his cops got his 0:15:23.960 --> 0:15:25.760 arm on my throat and his gun just went off. 0:15:27.160 --> 0:15:31.200 So I put my hands up. I said, okay, okay. 0:15:31.920 --> 0:15:34.840 He put the gun under my chin. He forced me 0:15:34.840 --> 0:15:38.160 into the car. Then he sat down and he composed 0:15:38.240 --> 0:15:42.520 himself for a minute, and I watched as like he 0:15:42.680 --> 0:15:46.800 thought about this. Then he snatched up the microphone from 0:15:46.800 --> 0:15:50.880 within the car and he starts yelling shots, fire shots, fire, help, help. 0:15:50.880 --> 0:15:54.920 He's attacking me as if I'm whipping his ass. I'm like, 0:15:56.080 --> 0:15:58.560 I can't even believe that this man is now in 0:15:58.600 --> 0:16:01.360 front of my face making this up. And then he 0:16:01.360 --> 0:16:03.880 puts the phone down. He goes, oh, and he could 0:16:03.880 --> 0:16:06.760 sell the car, and he's waiting and a paddy wagon 0:16:06.840 --> 0:16:08.760 shows up and there's four. 0:16:08.560 --> 0:16:09.760 Cops in it. 0:16:09.920 --> 0:16:11.640 They ripped me out of the backseat of the car. 0:16:11.840 --> 0:16:15.480 I ain't even in handcuffs. Boom boom, boom, boom boom 0:16:15.520 --> 0:16:17.680 to the ground, Beat me down, Stop me down. He 0:16:17.720 --> 0:16:19.880 already told him he had my gun. He tried to 0:16:19.960 --> 0:16:23.520 kill me. He beat the shit out on me, put 0:16:23.560 --> 0:16:24.080 me in jail. 0:16:25.040 --> 0:16:27.280 At that time, you were charged with stealing a car. 0:16:27.440 --> 0:16:29.960 Right they didn't even know it was stolen. This was 0:16:29.960 --> 0:16:35.120 a traffic incident. I was originally charged with aggravated assault 0:16:35.520 --> 0:16:39.800 resisting arrest. Attempted murder on a police officer, possession of 0:16:39.840 --> 0:16:43.400 a firearm by a convicted felon, and for kidnapping of 0:16:43.440 --> 0:16:44.720 that police officer. 0:16:44.560 --> 0:16:48.320 As well as reckless endangerment and robbery. I mean, it's 0:16:48.360 --> 0:16:51.960 a lot. And so this is where things get really nuts. 0:16:52.280 --> 0:16:55.560 I mean, in case your story wasn't already crazy enough 0:16:55.600 --> 0:16:59.800 for three podcasts, because it is now, you come up 0:17:00.080 --> 0:17:03.160 with what must have seemed like at the time a 0:17:03.240 --> 0:17:05.679 good idea to get yourself out of what is an 0:17:05.720 --> 0:17:08.560 impossible situation. With all these charges hanging over your head. 0:17:08.600 --> 0:17:11.280 You're looking at potentially spending the rest of your life 0:17:11.280 --> 0:17:13.119 in prison. We would have to say that it was 0:17:13.160 --> 0:17:15.600 your fault you were driving high and that you were 0:17:15.600 --> 0:17:18.440 in a stolen car, But the rest of it sounds 0:17:18.480 --> 0:17:21.080 like you were basically trying to save your own life 0:17:21.840 --> 0:17:25.880 and ended up in a situation that spiraled way out 0:17:25.920 --> 0:17:29.439 of control. Adrenaline, drugs, all kinds of things. And we 0:17:29.480 --> 0:17:33.200 know in those days that Philadelphia police were notorious. In fact, 0:17:33.240 --> 0:17:38.760 they were instructed, even ordered to use extreme violence against suspects. 0:17:39.200 --> 0:17:41.880 It was the era of Frank Rizzo, who was the. 0:17:42.400 --> 0:17:44.760 Two weeks before I got arrested by this police officer 0:17:44.920 --> 0:17:48.000 Rizzo himself. No, it was the police officers that he created, 0:17:48.040 --> 0:17:50.920 the highway patrol officers, right, the brutal ones you're talking 0:17:50.920 --> 0:17:52.680 about with the jack boots and the berets. 0:17:52.760 --> 0:17:55.040 Yeah, sort of a gestapo that used to patrol the 0:17:55.080 --> 0:17:58.040 Philadelphia area. And of course Rizzo went on to be 0:17:58.080 --> 0:18:01.600 the mayor. It's really a dark chapter and not only 0:18:01.760 --> 0:18:19.440 Pennsylvania history, but American history. On December fifteenth, nineteen eighty one, 0:18:19.520 --> 0:18:22.760 Linda May Craig, a sales associate the Tri State Mall 0:18:22.960 --> 0:18:25.679 in Claymont, Delaware, was abducted in her car at the 0:18:25.760 --> 0:18:28.359 end of her shift and after not arriving home, you know, 0:18:28.480 --> 0:18:31.760 hours and hours later, her husband called the police and 0:18:31.840 --> 0:18:34.040 her car was found abandoned on the side of the 0:18:34.119 --> 0:18:39.240 road in Chichester, Pennsylvania. Her body, of course, tragically, was 0:18:39.280 --> 0:18:44.639 found the following day, beaten, stabbed, and raped, and she 0:18:44.760 --> 0:18:47.359 was found in a church parking lot about a mile 0:18:47.359 --> 0:18:49.520 and a half away from where her car had been found. 0:18:50.359 --> 0:18:53.400 The police report stated that she bled out from multiple 0:18:53.440 --> 0:18:56.560 stab wounds to stained to the chest. Really an awful 0:18:56.600 --> 0:18:58.640 crime and an era when crime was high, this one 0:18:58.680 --> 0:19:03.480 would even stand out as a particularly vicious brutal assault. 0:19:03.720 --> 0:19:08.000 So tell us what happened, because you had an idea 0:19:08.080 --> 0:19:11.840 that would take you into a better spot in terms 0:19:11.840 --> 0:19:14.399 of your own charges that you were facing. And actually, 0:19:14.400 --> 0:19:16.520 I think when you came up with, at least on paper, 0:19:16.600 --> 0:19:19.040 must have seemed like an elegant solution, right. 0:19:19.320 --> 0:19:24.600 But that's the thing about being waylaid by a lie. 0:19:24.880 --> 0:19:32.240 From this point on, I bear responsibility. I know what 0:19:32.280 --> 0:19:35.520 he did to me was wrong, and a jury, yes, 0:19:36.000 --> 0:19:38.920 only three months later, I would be found not guilty 0:19:38.960 --> 0:19:41.680 of all the charges by that police officer. 0:19:41.960 --> 0:19:44.440 Not guilty, Wow, that's right. 0:19:44.520 --> 0:19:50.800 But before that I was facing life from his lie. 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:54.960 So in my desperation, the only thing I had in 0:19:55.000 --> 0:19:58.480 myself was a newspaper that had the story of Linda 0:19:58.520 --> 0:20:01.280 May Craig. And I don't know if you've ever been 0:20:01.320 --> 0:20:03.159 locked in a room with a box of toothpaste, but 0:20:03.200 --> 0:20:05.320 you'll read the ingredients over and over, man. And that 0:20:05.440 --> 0:20:10.720 headline kept bugging me, man. And it all started by happenstance. 0:20:12.280 --> 0:20:15.280 A guard walked by and he saw me. He said, boy, 0:20:16.320 --> 0:20:21.679 you don't look right. What's going on. Before that moment, 0:20:22.240 --> 0:20:26.440 in my head, I concocted a stupid, stupid story where 0:20:26.480 --> 0:20:30.040 I was going to tell the police that I possibly 0:20:30.119 --> 0:20:32.720 knew some information about this murder, and that hopes of 0:20:32.800 --> 0:20:36.560 bartering my way out by saying that this guy that 0:20:36.640 --> 0:20:39.199 had died of a drug overdose did it so that 0:20:39.240 --> 0:20:39.840 I could get. 0:20:39.680 --> 0:20:40.280 Out and run. 0:20:40.840 --> 0:20:44.320 This is the thinking of a twenty year old junkie man, 0:20:44.480 --> 0:20:49.320 but I still bear responsibility for it my own this. So, 0:20:49.880 --> 0:20:55.440 this officer standing before my cell says to me, why 0:20:55.480 --> 0:20:59.440 are you so upset? I said, I need to talk 0:20:59.480 --> 0:21:02.919 to somebody. What if I knew about this murder? And 0:21:02.960 --> 0:21:05.640 I held up the newspaper and I said, would they 0:21:05.720 --> 0:21:08.240 let me out? And then he said, what do you know? 0:21:08.280 --> 0:21:12.360 And I told him my story. Oh my god. As 0:21:12.440 --> 0:21:15.639 soon as I finished telling my story, he ran off. 0:21:15.840 --> 0:21:18.200 He went to the sergeant's office and got the sergeant. 0:21:18.600 --> 0:21:21.119 And then I realized I did it. I had already 0:21:21.160 --> 0:21:25.040 committed to this. I'm stuck now way out there. They 0:21:25.080 --> 0:21:27.520 came back. They took me to the warden's office. They 0:21:27.520 --> 0:21:30.000 took me out of solitary confinement. They bought me a soda, 0:21:30.400 --> 0:21:32.440 They sat me down. They told me what a wonderful 0:21:32.440 --> 0:21:35.119 citizen I was, what a huge break this was. They 0:21:35.160 --> 0:21:37.280 can't believe their luck. This is such a great thing 0:21:37.320 --> 0:21:40.000 you're doing. Nick, Look at you. You're not a bad kid. 0:21:40.040 --> 0:21:43.160 You were doing some drugs. Let's talk to the police officer. 0:21:43.640 --> 0:21:48.439 Get the officer on the phone. Oh yeah, look, the 0:21:48.520 --> 0:21:52.360 police came, the detectives. They told me all these wonderful things. 0:21:52.440 --> 0:21:55.119 I told my story that this dude in Philly that 0:21:55.200 --> 0:21:58.080 I knew named Jimmy did the murder and that they 0:21:58.080 --> 0:22:02.080 could just go get him and be all said. They 0:22:02.080 --> 0:22:04.080 took me out of solitary confinement. They put me in 0:22:04.119 --> 0:22:07.000 general population. They told me I had a our hearing 0:22:07.000 --> 0:22:07.560 in three days. 0:22:07.600 --> 0:22:10.119 I was going to be released. Jason, I thought this 0:22:10.160 --> 0:22:11.000 shit was real. Man. 0:22:11.480 --> 0:22:14.720 Yeah, I'm sitting there for three days. And they came 0:22:14.760 --> 0:22:18.359 back and they said, Jimmy Chris Boys, the man that 0:22:18.400 --> 0:22:21.200 you accused of telling you that he committed this murder, 0:22:21.200 --> 0:22:25.760 is not guilty. He has an alibi. He's at work. 0:22:25.760 --> 0:22:28.320 When I heard he was at an alibi, I said, what, 0:22:30.119 --> 0:22:30.760 but he's dead. 0:22:30.800 --> 0:22:32.120 They said, what do you mean, he's dead? 0:22:33.160 --> 0:22:35.239 And that's when they knew that I was making up 0:22:35.280 --> 0:22:38.120 the story. And it turns out it was his brother Joey, 0:22:38.280 --> 0:22:42.520 not Jimmy, that died. The junkie that told me the 0:22:42.520 --> 0:22:45.399 story got it wrong, and I based my story on 0:22:45.480 --> 0:22:48.280 a lie, and now the cops are looking at me 0:22:48.400 --> 0:22:51.920 like you came here with a story. So we went 0:22:52.000 --> 0:22:55.399 and talked to your girlfriend and she said that you 0:22:55.400 --> 0:22:58.240 were a weirdo man, you were acting all weird. So 0:22:58.359 --> 0:23:01.760 we just we put two together and I said, what 0:23:01.760 --> 0:23:04.640 do you mean? They said, well we figured it out. 0:23:04.800 --> 0:23:06.760 You went out and killed Missus Craig because she looks 0:23:06.800 --> 0:23:09.679 like your girlfriend. You were upset with her and you 0:23:09.720 --> 0:23:12.800 wanted to punish a woman. Isn't that why you did it? Nick? 0:23:13.840 --> 0:23:16.320 And I looked at him, like, are you crazy? Why 0:23:16.320 --> 0:23:18.200 would I go out and kill some lady I don't 0:23:18.240 --> 0:23:23.120 even know? And they said, well, we have an inmate 0:23:23.920 --> 0:23:26.440 back in the jail. Who's going to say to that 0:23:26.600 --> 0:23:29.400 you confessed to the rape and murder of Missus Craig. 0:23:29.440 --> 0:23:30.600 What do you got to say about that? 0:23:31.400 --> 0:23:33.160 I said what they. 0:23:33.160 --> 0:23:37.960 Said, Yeah, Charles Michael Catalino said, did you confess to him? 0:23:38.400 --> 0:23:39.400 I said, who's this guy? 0:23:41.240 --> 0:23:45.760