Speaker 1: In roommates. Chris Ochoe and Richard Danziger worked at two
Speaker 1: different Pizza Hut locations in Austin, Texas. When a robbery, rape,
Speaker 1: and murder occurred at another location in the early morning
Speaker 1: hours of October twenty four, Nancy Dupriest led in a
Speaker 1: man disguised as a repairman, who would later admit to
Speaker 1: committing the crime alone. However, before this spontaneous admission of guilt,
Speaker 1: the lack of forced entry led police to focus on
Speaker 1: other Pizza Hut employees. Several were brought to a notorious interrogator,
Speaker 1: Detective Hector Polanco, including Chris Ochoa. As we commonly see
Speaker 1: in pattern and practice from investigators all over the country,
Speaker 1: Polanco lied about crime scene evidence, polygraph results, and made
Speaker 1: threats of the death penalty and prison rape. To coerce
Speaker 1: a statement from a frightened young man, Chris gave ball
Speaker 1: statements implicating himself and Richard Danziger to avoid Polanco's threats
Speaker 1: of a death sentence. The prosecution passed off primitive and
Speaker 1: in conclusive DNA test results, as well as dubious hair
Speaker 1: microscopy as evidence of guilt, but Chris's false confession was
Speaker 1: really all they needed to set both of them away
Speaker 1: for life. Both Chris and Richard languished in prison until
Speaker 1: the Wisconsin in this project was finally able to present
Speaker 1: modern DNA test results that only corroborated with the real
Speaker 1: rapist and killer had been confessing to multiple authorities as
Speaker 1: early as This is Wrongful Conviction. Welcome back to Wrongful
Speaker 1: Conviction today's episode. I guess if you were to say,
Speaker 1: can you point to a case that highlights everything that's
Speaker 1: wrong with our system, you could easily say, let's talk
Speaker 1: about the case of Chris Ochoa, sometimes referred to is
Speaker 1: the Pizza Hut case. But we have the man here
Speaker 1: today himself in person with us, Chris o Choa. I'm
Speaker 1: very honored to have you here today on the show.
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me, Jason. Joining us today is
Speaker 1: John Pray. John is a retired clinical professor at the
Speaker 1: University of Wisconsin Law School, was a driving force in
Speaker 1: the exoneration of Christo Choa and has been a force
Speaker 1: for good for many years for many different innocent people.
Speaker 1: So John, I'm very very grateful to you for being
Speaker 1: here today as well. Thanks for having ma'am. I'm happy
Speaker 1: to be here and this case, like many of our cases,
Speaker 1: involves a young man Chris, who was twenty two years
Speaker 1: old at the time, who had never had any real issues,
Speaker 1: was an honor student editor of the high school literary magazine.
Speaker 1: Sort of a mild manner guy. You're still a mild
Speaker 1: matter guy, Chris, wasn't you day amazingly unless you give
Speaker 1: me an according well said so, Chris says, as I mentioned,
Speaker 1: was a good kid, and I'm gonna say it, twenty
Speaker 1: two years old, you still a kid. But there were
Speaker 1: forces of evil that were overwhelming in this instance, right,
Speaker 1: Not just the evil that was perpetrated on the victim
Speaker 1: in this case, in what is a grotesque crime by
Speaker 1: anybody's definition, but also the evil compounded on itself by
Speaker 1: virtue of the fact that Detective Hector Polanco was the
Speaker 1: detective who railroaded Chris, who allowed the actual perpetrator to
Speaker 1: remain free. It's hard to overstate the misdeeds that he committed,
Speaker 1: not just in your case, but in many others. John,
Speaker 1: Can you tell us about this Polanco character and what
Speaker 1: his history tells us? And this is even before Chris
Speaker 1: ever had the misfortune of coming onto his radar. We
Speaker 1: didn't know about Mr. Polanco until we got involved with
Speaker 1: Chris's case, of course, But I think while we were
Speaker 1: investigating that we had learned that he had had a
Speaker 1: history of playing somewhat loose with the facts. I guess
Speaker 1: you could say on some other cases, Yeah, I mean
Speaker 1: he his name featured prominently and in the most sinister
Speaker 1: ways in the cases of Alan Cauzy, Bruce Bowser, Richard
Speaker 1: osaz A d A, a Nigerian student who falsely confessed
Speaker 1: if I remember right. One of them was called the
Speaker 1: Yogurt Shop cases. I think he had been instrumental in
Speaker 1: creating some false confessions in that case. The infamous Yogurt
Speaker 1: Shop murders took place in December, where four girls were
Speaker 1: murdered and the crime remained unsolved for eight years, And
Speaker 1: that's when police announced the rest of four suspects who
Speaker 1: had come under the radar after very suspicious confessions that
Speaker 1: were very similar to Chris's and that were not coincidentally
Speaker 1: conducted by Detective Polanco. So we knew that he had
Speaker 1: some kind of history, and we do know that he
Speaker 1: was in charge of the case for Chris and led
Speaker 1: that interrogation. There were other people in the room at
Speaker 1: the same time, but I think he was the I
Speaker 1: think he called himself the bogey man. Let's just say
Speaker 1: that Chris, being sort of a mild mattered honor student,
Speaker 1: was not prepared in any way when he was interrogated
Speaker 1: by Detective Polanco. Now let's go back to the crime itself, Okay,
Speaker 1: because this crime I think really shocked the local community.
Speaker 1: And and brace yourself from October twenty year old girl
Speaker 1: that Nancy the priest was working alone in a Pizza
Speaker 1: Hut restaurant in Austin, Texas, and it was during her
Speaker 1: shift that the store was robbed. The Pizza Hut was robbed,
Speaker 1: and she was tied up with her bra raped and
Speaker 1: then shot in the head. Now, when this happened, you,
Speaker 1: of course lived in the area. Where were you and
Speaker 1: your co defendant, Richard Danzigerham talking about? Of course, where
Speaker 1: were you guys? And when did you first hear about this? Well,
Speaker 1: me and Richard worked at different pizza Hut when the
Speaker 1: crime happened. So when that crime happen, Richard was late
Speaker 1: for a shift at his Pizza Hut. So they called
Speaker 1: the apartment and I didn't answer the phone. One of
Speaker 1: my other roommates answered it. You know, I heard the phone,
Speaker 1: I rolled back to sleep, and then I woke up
Speaker 1: and I turned on the news, and that's when I
Speaker 1: saw the coverage. So I was shocked as much as
Speaker 1: everybody else in Austin, and particularly that I was an
Speaker 1: employer another pizza hut, and police they began investigating pizza
Speaker 1: Hut workers because they believed I don't know whether they
Speaker 1: had reason to believe it, but they did believe that
Speaker 1: a master key was used to gain entry to the restaurant.
Speaker 1: And of course, where this starts to, you know, really
Speaker 1: go downhill fast, is that a few days later, an
Speaker 1: employee at the pizza hut saw you, Chris and Richard,
Speaker 1: who was only an eighteen year old kid at this time, right,
Speaker 1: eating pizza, drinking beer in the restaurant and and raising
Speaker 1: a toast, or so they thought to the victim in
Speaker 1: this case, in her honor, and you guys worked at
Speaker 1: different pizza huts in the area. And so this was
Speaker 1: when detectives had this sort of Eureka moment or whatever.
Speaker 1: I decided that you must be good for it, because otherwise,
Speaker 1: why else would you be acting this way. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is obviously nothing like evidence so what happened next?
Speaker 1: Several days later to Austin detectives went to the Pizza
Speaker 1: Hut where I worked at in downtown Austin. It was
Speaker 1: not Polunco. It was some white detective and this female
Speaker 1: spanding detective has showed up. They wanted to ask me
Speaker 1: questions about burglary, so they drove me to the police station.
Speaker 1: They asked me some maybe two three questions about some burglary,
Speaker 1: which was nothing, but it didn't take about five minutes,
Speaker 1: and then they shifted me to what I now know
Speaker 1: is the interrogation room. After they left, then barges in
Speaker 1: Hector Bolanco, and he looks me up and down. Look,
Speaker 1: I mean, he looks me from head to toe and
Speaker 1: he tells me, do you know what they called me
Speaker 1: on the street in Spanish? And I have no idea.
Speaker 1: So that he tells me that they call him the boogeyman.
Speaker 1: I guess he's trying to still fearing me. Then he
Speaker 1: starts asking me questions about the pizza hut robbery and
Speaker 1: I tell him I don't know anything about it, and
Speaker 1: then he starts launching into this if you know something
Speaker 1: about his crime or this murder or his robbery and
Speaker 1: if you don't cooperate with us, you're gonna get the
Speaker 1: death penalty. He started using the death penalty from right
Speaker 1: off the top. If you don't tell us, you're gonna die.
Speaker 1: And I mean, it was relentless, and I kept saying,
Speaker 1: I don't know what you're talking about. If I knew what,
Speaker 1: I would certainly cooperate, But I don't know anything. And
Speaker 1: this this interrogating, it took hours. He would walk out
Speaker 1: and then another detective, the Paul good Cop actri Belaysia
Speaker 1: start saying, Hey, my partner's are hothead. Just tell us
Speaker 1: what you know and then you can go home. He
Speaker 1: walks out and walks Polanco again starts threatening me with
Speaker 1: the death penalty. At some point he walks out and
Speaker 1: a female expanded detective, and this is I think a
Speaker 1: couple of hours into the interrogation, asked what do you
Speaker 1: think I can have an attorney? And she said no,
Speaker 1: she got ripset. You can't have one, so you're officially charged.
Speaker 1: So we all know that that's not right. But at
Speaker 1: that time she walked out and Polanco walks back in
Speaker 1: starts threatening me with a death penalty again. She grabbed
Speaker 1: my arm tapped my arm, the needles gonna go in
Speaker 1: one of those veins or something like that. I'm gonna
Speaker 1: make sure I'm there to see it. And it took hours,
Speaker 1: and at some point they just broke me down. Polanco
Speaker 1: had to say, you know, I'm getting tired of your bullshit.
Speaker 1: I'm just gonna put your jail and in there. You're
Speaker 1: gonna be freshman for the prisoners because you're young. I
Speaker 1: know you don't have a record. He even knew how
Speaker 1: to have a record when he turned the prison house right.
Speaker 1: That was the end of my rope. I told him,
Speaker 1: what do you want me to say? I wanted it over.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to go home. That first interrogation, they
Speaker 1: were fixated on Richard Danziger. They said that Richard Danziger,
Speaker 1: did you come back and tell you? So the first
Speaker 1: statement that they forced me into signing was that Richard
Speaker 1: did it and he came home from the apartment and
Speaker 1: told me. And then they gave you a confession to sign.
Speaker 1: And here's the crazy thing. They didn't even need to
Speaker 1: write the confession because this Polanco, the detective, has used
Speaker 1: the same exact confession on two previous suspects. All he
Speaker 1: was doing was whiting out the names, just white it
Speaker 1: out and didn't put in the name Chris Ochola signed here.
Speaker 1: I mean, this is madness, this is America, right. And
Speaker 1: so they brought Richard and he said he had to
Speaker 1: face his accuser. He took me to see him. Shortly
Speaker 1: that after they pulled me out, and then I asked,
Speaker 1: can I go home now? And they said no, we're
Speaker 1: afraid for your safety. He just gave a statement against Richard.
Speaker 1: He could hurt you. We're gonna put you up at
Speaker 1: a hotel in Austin. Polancoin mentioned DNA, some new science
Speaker 1: and I can tell if you're there, you're not. Said
Speaker 1: we need you to give blood samples, hair samples. Of course,
Speaker 1: the DNA at the time and then the eight was
Speaker 1: not as advanced as it is now. But I say, sure,
Speaker 1: that's gonna, you know, help you show that I wasn't there.
Speaker 1: So they took me to the hospital. I gave them
Speaker 1: blood samples, hair sample. That cooperative. They did do a
Speaker 1: rape kid unfortunately this was late eighties. They did do
Speaker 1: some DNA analysis. However, it was not the kind of
Speaker 1: DNA analysis that later proved Chris's innocence and Richard's innocence.
Speaker 1: It was a more primitive form called d QU alpha,
Speaker 1: and it showed that one in six Hispanic Americans could
Speaker 1: have done this, and Chris was among the one in
Speaker 1: the six, and so they used that as some degree
Speaker 1: of evidence. They also had a hair that was found
Speaker 1: on the body of Nancy DePriest and they looked through
Speaker 1: a microscope with that hair and they said that is
Speaker 1: consistent with the hair of Richard, And they made a
Speaker 1: big deal out of that, showing it looks like his hair,
Speaker 1: it is his hair. And you know, they didn't have
Speaker 1: the benefit of DNA analysis that hair, which would later
Speaker 1: show that it excluded Richard. You know, the technology improved later,
Speaker 1: but at the time they made a bigger deal out
Speaker 1: of that hair than was justified. So they're coercing you
Speaker 1: with threats of prison, rape, and the death penalty while
Speaker 1: also using the junk science of hair microscopy, which don't
Speaker 1: even get me started on how subjective and meaningless, utterly
Speaker 1: meaningless that is. But not only that, they're using this
Speaker 1: primitive DNA testing acting like being able to say that
Speaker 1: you and the actual assailant fall into the same six
Speaker 1: percent of the Mexican population which basically comes down to
Speaker 1: about one in six Mexicans. I mean, it's unbelievable that
Speaker 1: this was even considered or elderly passed as evidence. But okay,
Speaker 1: so now they've got the statement about Richard out of you,
Speaker 1: but they're still only halfway done. So it's a Friday
Speaker 1: and they basically kidnapped you call it what it is,
Speaker 1: and put you up at a hotel for the for
Speaker 1: the weekend. I mean, you could have left, but you
Speaker 1: didn't know that, right, I mean, that's that's another sort
Speaker 1: of sick thing about this. And now Monday rolls around
Speaker 1: and they've got even more dirty tricks up their sleeve.
Speaker 1: So comes Monday and the other detective Malaysia show up
Speaker 1: to the hotel room, take me and want to take
Speaker 1: me back to the station to ask me more questions.
Speaker 1: But then they said that they wanted me to take
Speaker 1: a polygraph test. Sure I was a Wian. Took to
Speaker 1: polygraph test. They said, I registered deception. I see, I
Speaker 1: was an a kid. I don't know. It's a stress
Speaker 1: test and not a life detective test. They said, we
Speaker 1: think you were in there. I think the main purpose
Speaker 1: of a live detective test is whatever it might yield,
Speaker 1: they are going to go back to the suspect and say, well,
Speaker 1: you failed it, and now we have that against you,
Speaker 1: and it just gives them a reason to say, well,
Speaker 1: I guess maybe I should confess because apparently they think
Speaker 1: I was lying. But part of their technique is to
Speaker 1: make lies about the evidence they have, and they try
Speaker 1: to convince you that they know you're guilty, that your
Speaker 1: your only way out of it is to confess. And
Speaker 1: I think when someone I think it could be anybody,
Speaker 1: but especially young people or people who are an a
Speaker 1: is confronted with a detective saying we have evidence that
Speaker 1: isn't true, but you don't know that, and your only
Speaker 1: way out of this is to confess, and that's the
Speaker 1: only way your life is going to be spared or
Speaker 1: you're not gonna be thrown into a jail cell as
Speaker 1: fresh meat. And in this case, my understanding is not
Speaker 1: only did they do all the things that you talked about, Chris,
Speaker 1: but also Polanco through a chair at you showed you
Speaker 1: photographs of death row where you're gonna end up if
Speaker 1: you didn't confess. And there's a quote from him that
Speaker 1: sends the chills up my spine where he said quote,
Speaker 1: we're going to charge you with this crime, whether you
Speaker 1: had anything to do with it or not, because this
Speaker 1: is a real big case and they want somebody. So
Speaker 1: now Polanco wants me to say that I was in
Speaker 1: the Pizza Hut with Richard allegedly saying that I and
Speaker 1: Richard ray Nancy the priest and that we did all
Speaker 1: kinds of horrible thing. But so he started taping it.
Speaker 1: He said, now, when you walked to the Pizza hunt
Speaker 1: with Richard, was there an item that what was in there?
Speaker 1: I didn't know, and I would stop and stutter, and
Speaker 1: he would say, well, was it third an apron there?
Speaker 1: It's oh, yeah, that was an apron. So he would
Speaker 1: stop the tape, rewind it, and then I would repeat
Speaker 1: what he wanted me to say, and he said, well,
Speaker 1: will tell us what color the apron was as a
Speaker 1: while black or red, I don't know. I kept guessing
Speaker 1: the whole colored spectrum. So I got it right that
Speaker 1: he would stop the tape and rewind it and recorded,
Speaker 1: you know, he will coach me on what saying. So
Speaker 1: the tape of that led statement he was feeding me
Speaker 1: all the details to the state offered to give you
Speaker 1: a life sentence. What a great deal that is for something,
Speaker 1: for doing nothing, for having a toast basic right right.
Speaker 1: So the offer to give you a life sense if
Speaker 1: you could deplete guilty and testify against Richard. And your alternative,
Speaker 1: of course, was to face the death penalty. So after
Speaker 1: to twelve hour interrogation session, think about how long that
Speaker 1: is to be stuck in an airless room. I'll talk
Speaker 1: to the audience now. Of course, with these people who
Speaker 1: are literally trying to take your life away from you.
Speaker 1: You signed the confessions which were totally concocted by the police,
Speaker 1: and with the white out and the whole thing. I mean,
Speaker 1: did you even have an attorney at this point when
Speaker 1: those statements are signed? I never had an attorney. I
Speaker 1: didn't get an attorney until I was actually charged and waned,
Speaker 1: and I believe the magistrate she asked me, do you
Speaker 1: have an attorney with social So I do not, because
Speaker 1: do you know what you're charged with? You shocked recess
Speaker 1: to court checked me into her chambers, and I remember
Speaker 1: she calling somebody I know, the d A. I don't
Speaker 1: know what she'd called. She was up said why has
Speaker 1: this man not been afforded an attorney yet? That's when
Speaker 1: the attorney stepped in the defense attorneys. I was appointed
Speaker 1: defense attorney, and I told him exactly what I'm telling you,
Speaker 1: how these statements came about. And she said, there's no
Speaker 1: way an innocent person would give such a detailed confession.
Speaker 1: So he didn't believe that. You know, they coursed me.
Speaker 1: So at the next quarter appearance, I asked I wanted
Speaker 1: to fire the attorney then, instead of pointing another difference
Speaker 1: attorney who had more experience, and I told him the
Speaker 1: same story when I interviewed with him the first time,
Speaker 1: and I said, isn't it your job, through my innocence,
Speaker 1: you should investigate this. He said, no, my job is
Speaker 1: to save your life in a way, he was right,
Speaker 1: but no, your job is to prove innocence. First, My
Speaker 1: deference attorneys did no investigation. You mentioned law enforcement had
Speaker 1: a theory that a master key was used to get
Speaker 1: into the pizza hut because there was no ivent. It's
Speaker 1: a breaking of an entry into the pizza hut. This
Speaker 1: pizza had two doors. I know the detective wanted me
Speaker 1: to say that we had a master key to get
Speaker 1: into pizza hut and we came into a certain door right.
Speaker 1: I don't know what door it was. But after John
Speaker 1: the Innistence Project investigated the whole thing, it turns out
Speaker 1: that there's no way I could have gone through that
Speaker 1: door that Pollock home. This says no way because that
Speaker 1: key didn't open that door. There's no way because that
Speaker 1: door could not be opened with any key. It was
Speaker 1: just jammed. Had to be open from the inside. Right.
Speaker 1: The classic hallmark of a false confession when the facts
Speaker 1: of the crime scene don't even match the information that
Speaker 1: they're feeding to you had mr start my defense attorney, God,
Speaker 1: let's see how viable this is. Go ask questions. The
Speaker 1: prosecutors should have done that. Your job as an attorney
Speaker 1: is to look at the confession. Does this really match
Speaker 1: the evidence that these guys have? And they don't, But
Speaker 1: the prosecute should be the one. Hey, I can't use this.
Speaker 1: I think the defense attorneys looked at the confession and
Speaker 1: they thought that's the end. There's no point in investigating
Speaker 1: this any further. They did look into, like, I wonder
Speaker 1: if this confession could be suppressed because he did ask
Speaker 1: for an attorney. They didn't look at that. They didn't
Speaker 1: look at the alibi evidence that there was. They didn't
Speaker 1: look at the physical evidence that there was. They just
Speaker 1: saw the confession and said, well, that's he's going to
Speaker 1: be convicted. So my job is to make sure he
Speaker 1: doesn't get the death penalty. So we can do that
Speaker 1: by having Chris plead guilty. And you know when your
Speaker 1: attorney's telling you that Chris believed that. And when I
Speaker 1: called the defense attorney when we were investigating it, this
Speaker 1: is twelve years later, we asked him what he had
Speaker 1: done and he said like, well, did Chris tell you
Speaker 1: that his fingerprints were found on the gun and things
Speaker 1: like that? And I said no, So I go back
Speaker 1: to Chris and say, Chris, you didn't tell us your
Speaker 1: fingerprints are under the gun. And of course it turns
Speaker 1: out that that was just a lie that or that
Speaker 1: he had forgotten that Lanco and made up his own
Speaker 1: evidence to make him think that Chris was guilty. There
Speaker 1: were no finger prints on any gun, so he he
Speaker 1: just I think early on decided my job is to
Speaker 1: keep him from being executed, and therefore we're going to
Speaker 1: push this plea through and get him life in prison.
Speaker 1: And that's exactly what they did. One of the reasons
Speaker 1: I essentially played guilty after a year in jail was
Speaker 1: because apparently my defense attorney and I don't know who
Speaker 1: else was calling my mom pretty much every day telling
Speaker 1: her that she should get me to plead guilty or
Speaker 1: she's gonna lose her son. They're going to murder her son.
Speaker 1: So essentially, my mom got to the point of a stroke,
Speaker 1: was brought up by stress, and at that point I
Speaker 1: called whoever I had to call. He plead guilty. I
Speaker 1: played guilty for my mom. So at that point, the
Speaker 1: d A tells me, Okay, we're really charge you with
Speaker 1: rape and they're trying to get Richard on capital murder.
Speaker 1: So at this point your fate was sealed. Chris. You
Speaker 1: had nobody to to help you. The system had failed
Speaker 1: you and failed as the priest as well in the
Speaker 1: public and her family and everybody else, and you were doomed.
Speaker 1: Part of your deal was that you were basically compelled
Speaker 1: to testify against Danziger. Right you were convicted, as was
Speaker 1: Danziger in February, and both of you were sent to
Speaker 1: life in prison. The moment to get will hit any
Speaker 1: sentence them, it came crushing down. I was like, I
Speaker 1: wasn't shocked. First night in the Texas prison when they
Speaker 1: slammed the door shut the metal Clangston. Once that door slammed,
Speaker 1: that was one night. It's now a crap. I'm in
Speaker 1: here now. This episode is underwritten by global law firm
Speaker 1: Greenberg Traric. Through its pro Boto program, Greenberg Traric leverages
Speaker 1: it's more than lawyers across forty two offices to serve
Speaker 1: the greater good of our communities and provide equal access
Speaker 1: to justice for all. In the field of criminal justice,
Speaker 1: greenbrig Triering attorneys have exonerated and Freedom and in Philadelphia
Speaker 1: represent numerous individuals previously sentenced to life for crimes committed
Speaker 1: as juveniles and resentencing hearings, and received the American part
Speaker 1: Associations Exceptional Service Award for Death Penalty Representation for their
Speaker 1: work on five death penalty cases. GT is reimagining what
Speaker 1: big law can be because a more just world only
Speaker 1: happens by design. As team went on, it felt like
Speaker 1: the world got about me. You know, fewer people, right,
Speaker 1: And I know I tried my best to survive, and
Speaker 1: I know Richard had it worse, but I know at
Speaker 1: some point I had already done ten years. I used
Speaker 1: to see the newspaper, my whole tiny newspaper. All my
Speaker 1: friends from high school had kids and wives had careers,
Speaker 1: and I felt like such a pader through no fall
Speaker 1: in my home. So Christmas Eve, I didn't get a
Speaker 1: Christmas card that year. On time, I had lost hope.
Speaker 1: So I made up my mind. I went up to
Speaker 1: my cell and I broke open a razor blade because
Speaker 1: that night I was going through this pain that alcohol
Speaker 1: drug doesn't get rid of the pain. So I want
Speaker 1: to run it up my arm so that I could
Speaker 1: bleed out and just send it. But at that point
Speaker 1: I remember what the nuns told me in technic school
Speaker 1: that I didn't have the right to take anybody's life,
Speaker 1: not even my home, because God gave it to me.
Speaker 1: So by through the razor blade and I flushed it
Speaker 1: and I got through that night. Somehow I grabbed onto
Speaker 1: faith the way I survived, went to school. Music was
Speaker 1: my escape. That's what got me through prison, school, faith
Speaker 1: and the radio. What I think we have to shine
Speaker 1: a light on is the fact that behind the scenes,
Speaker 1: and unbeknownst to you, in February, a man named Akim
Speaker 1: Joseph Areno, a convict who was serving three life sentences
Speaker 1: in the Texas prison for aggravated robbery, wrote a letter
Speaker 1: to the governor, which was George W. Bush at that time,
Speaker 1: and Mr Marino had become a born again Christian who,
Speaker 1: as part of his A A and Narcotics Anonymous program,
Speaker 1: had been obligated to confess right as part of the
Speaker 1: cleansing the twelve step program. Right, and as part of that,
Speaker 1: he felt obligated to confess to the murder that he
Speaker 1: had committed, which was the one that you were charged
Speaker 1: with him, Mr Priest. His letter began it was quote
Speaker 1: re murder confession. You know r E. Colon murder confession.
Speaker 1: In the letter, Mr Marino said, quote my conscience sickens me.
Speaker 1: End quote and he went on to say that he
Speaker 1: alone raped and murdered as the priest, that you and
Speaker 1: Danziger were not involved. Quote I tell you this, sir,
Speaker 1: I did this awful crime and I was alone. Now
Speaker 1: Here's where it gets even deeper, okay. Marino said that
Speaker 1: evidence tying him to the crime and him alone, including
Speaker 1: the victim's keys, could be found at his parents home.
Speaker 1: He said that he had begun writing and confessing to
Speaker 1: the police years earlier, back in nine as well as
Speaker 1: a newspaper and even the a S L you. But
Speaker 1: after getting no response, he was now going all the
Speaker 1: way to the governor Governor Bush to take action. After
Speaker 1: the police received another letter from Marino that contained the
Speaker 1: detailed description of the crime scene, they finally began reinvestigating.
Speaker 1: And when they went to Marino's parents home, what did
Speaker 1: they find? Guess what? They found? The keys, as he
Speaker 1: said they would, as well as the other evidence, including
Speaker 1: bank couches and a pistol. So this should have been
Speaker 1: at that very moment, this should be over. They should
Speaker 1: have come right to the prison apologize to you and
Speaker 1: to Danzinger. I would say they should have just yanked
Speaker 1: you right out of there that day, but you know
Speaker 1: that's not how it works. But that process should have
Speaker 1: been started immediately with urgency, because every day in that
Speaker 1: prison was risking your life and his and his case,
Speaker 1: he almost lost his life. But finally they went to
Speaker 1: Mr Danziger and to you, And unfortunately Danziger had sustained
Speaker 1: permanent brain damage and head injuries while he was in prison,
Speaker 1: uh and was now in a mental institution. A tragedy
Speaker 1: upon another tragedy. But you, Chris, at that time told
Speaker 1: the same story that you had told the trial. At
Speaker 1: that point I knew that there was something going on
Speaker 1: in the case. At some point I I ended the
Speaker 1: interview saying, look, I did this crime. Let me do
Speaker 1: my time. And the only reason I did that to
Speaker 1: his cups told him that as I wanted to throw
Speaker 1: him off the set because I thought, if these guys
Speaker 1: sniff and I'm claiming innocent, what did there's evidence of
Speaker 1: innocence and they go destroy like shdem should kind of
Speaker 1: you know, they were trying to link me and Richard
Speaker 1: to a King Marino. I think they just could not
Speaker 1: get it through their heads that it's possible that Chris
Speaker 1: could have lied in the confession. You would never confess
Speaker 1: to a murder he didn't do. And so their theory
Speaker 1: when Marino came on the scene was that, Okay, it
Speaker 1: must have been three of you, and we know Chris
Speaker 1: confessed that, we know he's did it, we know Danziger
Speaker 1: did it. So if Marino's confessing and he's got the
Speaker 1: gun and he's got the key, I think their mindset
Speaker 1: was now that Marinos saying he did it, Okay, it
Speaker 1: must have been the three. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: they showed me total lineups. I mean, I recognized myself
Speaker 1: in one and I recognized Denziger and the other one.
Speaker 1: But then they showed me another line up. I guess
Speaker 1: what Marino. At that time, I didn't know anybody was confessed.
Speaker 1: I had no idea. They asked me if I reckoned,
Speaker 1: and I didn't recognize anybody on that photo A I
Speaker 1: guess Marina was in there. And and now that I recall,
Speaker 1: the Texas ranger and the cop looked at themselves when
Speaker 1: they saw I didn't recons Marino. And they did do
Speaker 1: some investigation on that to say were they ever in
Speaker 1: the same prison together? Did they have any communication with
Speaker 1: each other? And all of that came out that no,
Speaker 1: there's no way that those people had ever interacted or
Speaker 1: intersected in their lives. So immediately after that, there was
Speaker 1: a friend of mine who was leaving on parole, and
Speaker 1: I told him a little bit about what was going
Speaker 1: on in case. But I told him that I needed
Speaker 1: him to reach out to Barry check and inusis project
Speaker 1: in New York, and he did. I think he e
Speaker 1: mailed them and I think, well, you know, they they
Speaker 1: have a lot of cases, their backlogs, so They emailed
Speaker 1: some addresses of innocence projects at that time in the country.
Speaker 1: But on that list that they said, I saw the
Speaker 1: Wisconsin Innocence Project and I don't know why I circled
Speaker 1: that Wisconsin. I had no clue even where Wisconsin was
Speaker 1: on the map. I just I just circled it, and
Speaker 1: I wrote a letter. A couple of weeks later, I
Speaker 1: get a phone call from the Wisconsin and it's his project.
Speaker 1: He took my case. This is now June, and this
Speaker 1: is when, of course, in steps the Wisconsin Innocence projectly
Speaker 1: headed by my friend Keith Findley, who people have heard
Speaker 1: his name on the podcast. He's got an incredible reputation,
Speaker 1: has done incredible, incredible work, and of course John Pray
Speaker 1: Wisconsin has the project did get Chris's letter. The thing
Speaker 1: that grabbed our attention was that there was evidence taken
Speaker 1: from the rape kit. Well, now we have some new
Speaker 1: DNA technology, we could re examine the DNA evidence to
Speaker 1: see if Richard and Chris could be excluded. So what
Speaker 1: we did is sent a letter to the authorities in
Speaker 1: Texas saying we are representing Chris or we're looking into
Speaker 1: Chris's case, and we want you to preserve any kind
Speaker 1: of evidence that may have existed. The authorities in Texas
Speaker 1: were cooperative and let's yeah, let's do tests as evidence.
Speaker 1: And so we didn't have to fight for that and
Speaker 1: didn't take too long to have the testing exclude Chris
Speaker 1: and Richard and then match Marino. So at that point
Speaker 1: the case became not too difficult because they realized they
Speaker 1: got the wrong guy. But like I said, they still
Speaker 1: had to investigate whether there was a connection between Marino
Speaker 1: and Chris and Richard. Right, But you and the wisconsinance
Speaker 1: this project knowing that you could have been up against
Speaker 1: a well an unscrupulous prosecutor, you continue to investigate. What
Speaker 1: else did you find out? So what we were doing
Speaker 1: in the meantime, once we had the DNA tests, as
Speaker 1: we were looking at all other aspects of the case
Speaker 1: and calling other witnesses. There was one particular witness who
Speaker 1: said that the police had threatened to take her son
Speaker 1: away if she didn't testify in a certain way, and
Speaker 1: so there were all kinds of things like that. The
Speaker 1: medical examiner, it was very interesting. The medical examiner was
Speaker 1: privy to Chris's confession and so they knew the kind
Speaker 1: of injuries well, one of the things they said in
Speaker 1: the confession was there had been an antal rape. So
Speaker 1: they said, okay, let's let's look for anal tears or
Speaker 1: evidence of an anal rape. Well, it turns out the
Speaker 1: ones the confession is known to be false because the
Speaker 1: DNA proves its faults. You go back to the medical examiner,
Speaker 1: he says, oh, upon second look, I guess that was
Speaker 1: a tear caused by the instruments that were used to
Speaker 1: look in that area instead of oh, this is actual
Speaker 1: evidence of a rape. So you know, when you're doing
Speaker 1: a medical examination and you have a predisposed notion that, oh,
Speaker 1: this was from an anal rape because that's what the
Speaker 1: confession said, Well, then you kind of see what you
Speaker 1: want to see. So there are all kinds of things
Speaker 1: that we could look at later that Once you know
Speaker 1: that that's a false confession, the house of cards falls quickly.
Speaker 1: And Chris, you had mentioned the part of your false
Speaker 1: confession about the alleged master key and how the door
Speaker 1: was actually jammed. It couldn't have been opened by any key, right,
Speaker 1: So just one of the many inconvenient ways in which
Speaker 1: your false confession didn't match reality. What else was learned
Speaker 1: about how Marino gained entry to the pizza hut. What
Speaker 1: was later found out is that Marino said that as
Speaker 1: the priest let him key disguised themselves a repairman or
Speaker 1: something like that. Really, a cursory examination of the evidence,
Speaker 1: the alibis, the physical evidence the keys, would have yielded
Speaker 1: pretty quickly that this has to be a false confession.
Speaker 1: But but that wasn't in the repertoire of the attorneys,
Speaker 1: the police, the judges. No one was thinking of false
Speaker 1: confession as possible. You wouldn't confess to something you didn't do.
Speaker 1: So it turned out that the DNA evidence excluded Richard
Speaker 1: and Chris, but included Marino, and now it was going
Speaker 1: to be respected but confused by the false confession. The
Speaker 1: States still wanted to make sure that there was no
Speaker 1: connection between the guys and Marino before finally letting Chris
Speaker 1: and Richard go, So that took him longer than we
Speaker 1: were comfortable with. It took him a few months. Where
Speaker 1: Chris is sitting in prison where everybody knows he didn't
Speaker 1: do it. So that was agonizing for Chris. I know
Speaker 1: it was agonizing for us. But after a few months
Speaker 1: of figuring out whether any connections at all. They finally
Speaker 1: agreed to throw out this case for both Richard and Chris.
Speaker 1: So in the follow two thousand I think we were
Speaker 1: all certain this was going to happen. We had the
Speaker 1: agreement of the d A, we knew he would be
Speaker 1: getting out, but it was agonizing waiting for several months
Speaker 1: for the actual date. And I just remember being terrified
Speaker 1: that Chris is going to be assaulted by someone else
Speaker 1: in prison, or something's going to happen, and what are
Speaker 1: we waiting for? But we just couldn't get it done
Speaker 1: until January of two thousand one, and that was That
Speaker 1: was a big day in Chris's life, in all of
Speaker 1: our lives, and it was quite a sensation in Austin.
Speaker 1: It was a very exciting day with the Pact court
Speaker 1: room and dozens of news people and photographers. I remember
Speaker 1: vividly when I was there. I said I was free
Speaker 1: to leave. I guess I was shocked. The bailiff had
Speaker 1: to tell you, you know, you can't walk up the
Speaker 1: door now. And I remember going on to see a
Speaker 1: cameras and I I hearing my mom was there and
Speaker 1: I became very good friends well an in this project
Speaker 1: did with the mother of net See the priest, Nnette Pop.
Speaker 1: I got to speak to her, I got, I hugged her.
Speaker 1: I you know it was I guess bitter sweet than
Speaker 1: I got out, but you know, share her daughter's gone.
Speaker 1: But I remember she was happy for me and she
Speaker 1: gave me a welcome home gift. You watched present time
Speaker 1: means nothing and there's no time. She said, Now time
Speaker 1: matters to you. I had support from my family. I
Speaker 1: think the was project and John Pray did an excellent
Speaker 1: job of keeping me grounded. Jumping really forward to just
Speaker 1: to say how instrumental John has been in my life.
Speaker 1: I know when I got accepted to law school in Wisconsin,
Speaker 1: I went up there to try to find an apartment,
Speaker 1: and you know, I had a lot of advice from
Speaker 1: mother's mentors. But when I went to get my first
Speaker 1: apartment in Madison, remember John Pray went with me. He
Speaker 1: read over the lease, he looked sculpted out walking distance
Speaker 1: from the law school and from the bars, because I
Speaker 1: I did, in turn with the judge before I went
Speaker 1: to law school, and he said, you know, in law
Speaker 1: school you're probably gonna drink. So I was suggesting in
Speaker 1: an apartment walking distance to the bars, so you can
Speaker 1: stumble home. But but John was very, very instrumental in
Speaker 1: helping me. One other thing I wanted to double back on.
Speaker 1: I'm really glad Chris brought up Janette Pop, but I
Speaker 1: think it bears just a little bit more explanation. Janette
Speaker 1: Pop is the mother of the victim of Nancy Depris.
Speaker 1: In this case, she very early on identified with Chris,
Speaker 1: and one might say, well, why would she do that.
Speaker 1: Chris was convicted of killing her daughter, but she recognized
Speaker 1: that it was a false confession. And what what pained
Speaker 1: her so much was that for twelve years, while Chris
Speaker 1: was in prison, she was under the mistaken belief that
Speaker 1: her daughter had been tortured, had been raped multiple times
Speaker 1: in this restaurant, and that was the story from the
Speaker 1: confession that she believed. And it turns out when we
Speaker 1: got the true story, what came. Marino said. A murder
Speaker 1: is a murder, and that can't be sugarcoated. But the torture,
Speaker 1: the multiple rapes, did not occur. It was a shot
Speaker 1: to the back of the head. And so this suffering
Speaker 1: that she had lived with and thought of her daughter's
Speaker 1: last hour of life of being an utter hell was
Speaker 1: what tortured her, and when she realized that it's because
Speaker 1: of this coerced false confession, that made her believe that,
Speaker 1: you know, it just it just with such a relief
Speaker 1: to her that her daughter had not undergone the kinds
Speaker 1: of things that had been coerced from that confession. And
Speaker 1: that's one reason why Jeanette Pop was such a strong
Speaker 1: ally of Chris and Richard. So Chris, as we wanted
Speaker 1: down the show here, is there anything you want to
Speaker 1: ask our audience, anything they can do for or with you,
Speaker 1: or an issue that you'd like to highlight. I think
Speaker 1: my biggest thing is donating to the Wisconsin Thisss Project.
Speaker 1: They're the reason why I'm here outside. But right now,
Speaker 1: what's on the forefront of my mind is, uh, the
Speaker 1: Melissa Lucio case out of Texas. When I saw that documentary,
Speaker 1: all right, I just I got floored. She's innocent, plain
Speaker 1: and simple. Support Melissa Lusia. She's got just days till
Speaker 1: she's executed. She's murdered. I'm not gonna say executed murdered.
Speaker 1: That's what I asked the people to watch that documentary. Donate,
Speaker 1: bring away earness and social media right now, there's a
Speaker 1: petition that was sent to the governor for clemency from Alasa.
Speaker 1: Seo put pressure on Texas too. It really really irritates
Speaker 1: me and upsets me. This happened in two thousand and seven. Texas,
Speaker 1: the whole country at two thousand and they know what
Speaker 1: mistakes they've done, what they do to people, and yet
Speaker 1: Texas has not learned their less at all, and they
Speaker 1: don't care all the pain that we exonaries have gone through. No,
Speaker 1: we testify in Congress and we do stuff like this
Speaker 1: so that others won't go through it. Yet Texas assists
Speaker 1: on doing the same thing over and over and over again,
Speaker 1: and until we get rid of these people working the system,
Speaker 1: our system is not gonna work. It works if you
Speaker 1: have people that adjoin it for the right reasons, not
Speaker 1: to get power, not to get money for apparently, from
Speaker 1: the Melissall sale case, I see that's pretty obvious it
Speaker 1: was all about power and position. Chris, we'll have the
Speaker 1: same action steps here that we did last week for Melissa.
Speaker 1: She's scheduled for execution. I hate saying these words on April.
Speaker 1: This is not a drill, this is real. So please
Speaker 1: join us in saving her from imminent danger. We'll have
Speaker 1: the Wisconsin HUISNS project linked in the bio as well.
Speaker 1: Please donate to help them continue the great work that
Speaker 1: they do, just like they did for Chris and so
Speaker 1: many others. And now, as we go to the closing
Speaker 1: of our show, which is called Closing Arguments, this is where,
Speaker 1: of course I'm gonna thank you for joining us today
Speaker 1: and sharing Chris's story with us. And now I'm just
Speaker 1: gonna turn my microphone off, leave my headphones on, and
Speaker 1: just focus on the sound of your voice, says you
Speaker 1: leave us with any and all final thoughts you want
Speaker 1: to share now, John, no offense, but we're gonna say
Speaker 1: the best for last. And of course our guest of honor,
Speaker 1: Chris Ocella, is the man. So please started off for
Speaker 1: us and then let Chris take us out. Well, I
Speaker 1: don't know how long you want me to go on.
Speaker 1: I could go on a long time about this, but
Speaker 1: I'll keep it reasonable. Uh. It's an extraordinary story in
Speaker 1: one way, you look at what happened. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: it's not unique. This happens with too much frequency, and
Speaker 1: if we don't learn from these situations, then we're destined
Speaker 1: to continue to repeat them. So it's it's an extraordinary story.
Speaker 1: It shows the weakness of confessions that they can be false.
Speaker 1: It shows the weakness of defense attorneys who don't do
Speaker 1: their job seriously. But it's more than that. It's a
Speaker 1: testament to the strength of Chris and Joe, who endured
Speaker 1: hell for twelve years, the hell of the interrogation room,
Speaker 1: those four days, the hell of going through a trial,
Speaker 1: and then the hell of twelve years of incarceration and
Speaker 1: then you get out. He could have given up, but
Speaker 1: what does he do. He decides to get his education completed.
Speaker 1: He finished his undergraduate degree, then he came to Wisconsin
Speaker 1: law school, went through three years of very hard, difficult work,
Speaker 1: worked in a district attorney's office for a time, worked
Speaker 1: with the Wisconsin Innocence Project. He really endured. I suppose
Speaker 1: you could say, hey, if you can get through prison,
Speaker 1: you can get through law school. And Chris and Dirt
Speaker 1: he's continued to show his dedication to public service and
Speaker 1: making sure these types of things don't happen. So the
Speaker 1: whole thing is really a tribute to Chris and his
Speaker 1: amazing spirit and energy to endure and make life better
Speaker 1: for the rest of us. Thank you John, as I
Speaker 1: said earlier, you know, for the Innocence Project, John Pray
Speaker 1: and busness is projects around the country. Justice, true justice
Speaker 1: wouldn't be accomplished. What I see is the tragic was
Speaker 1: happening to the law enforcement currently. I don't know where
Speaker 1: the disconnect is between law enforcement and normal citizens. When
Speaker 1: I was exonerated, right before I walked out of prisoner,
Speaker 1: I don't know what. Shortly before, my Texas Attorney Bill
Speaker 1: Allison told me, look your case, the justice system fell
Speaker 1: apart at every angle. Everything failed you, and people are
Speaker 1: going to get scared, even people they don't get in trouble,
Speaker 1: they're going to lose faith in the system. And when
Speaker 1: people lose faith in the system, chaos happens. And he said,
Speaker 1: it would be good if you would come out and
Speaker 1: talk that the system is not bad. You gotta perform
Speaker 1: it and there's a lot of things that needs to
Speaker 1: be done so that it work the way it was
Speaker 1: intended to work. He said, But you don't have to.
Speaker 1: You've already done enough, You've done time. You can walk
Speaker 1: away from this. You don't anybody anything. So I decided
Speaker 1: that I would start advocating for the system because in
Speaker 1: the end, it was a judge that it was a
Speaker 1: court that got him exonerated and released me. But me
Speaker 1: and John Pray have talked to law enforcement. I mean,
Speaker 1: we have talked to these guys and academies and that
Speaker 1: are beat up. The look, you gotta be real careful
Speaker 1: in your investigations because once you said those recommended charges
Speaker 1: of the DA, you're already skewing the ball. The defense
Speaker 1: attorney will started looking at at a certain way. You're
Speaker 1: accused of something that you didn't do, but you're just
Speaker 1: the mere accusations that will take snowball effect. And I
Speaker 1: personally have told law enforcement, you guys have a big
Speaker 1: job to do, but you guys can't be rushing what
Speaker 1: you do. You gotta be careful because your people are
Speaker 1: They're not gonna trust you anymore. And these real convictions
Speaker 1: keep mapping, they're gonna lose it. But fast forward two
Speaker 1: George Floyd. That only exposed what all of us and
Speaker 1: then advocate were wrongfully convicted for justice. It only confirmed
Speaker 1: what we already know. These cops beat kill the man
Speaker 1: on camera and the only reason we know because we
Speaker 1: have video. But now you see in the news officer
Speaker 1: response to a call, he gets shot, and now the
Speaker 1: law enforcement is crying all they're they're attacking us, and
Speaker 1: but they failed to realize they're the reason that that
Speaker 1: is happening, because society has lost all faith and trust
Speaker 1: in law enforcement. Now you have chaos and the only
Speaker 1: message got law enforcement, you gotta get it together. Stop
Speaker 1: blaming somebody else. I'm speechless in a sense. And it
Speaker 1: hurts all of us ex onrees over where. Don't know
Speaker 1: how many of us are there now we're in the thousands.
Speaker 1: We saw that law enforcement would get direct together, courts prosecutor.
Speaker 1: It has gotten worse. So our suffering essentially has been
Speaker 1: in vain the evidences and listen to see it still haven't.
Speaker 1: I hope that the public. Eight, let's start electing d
Speaker 1: a's that are going to do the right thing. Just
Speaker 1: start getting police chiefs that are gonna do the writing.
Speaker 1: And we're not I'm not advocating for not arresting folks.
Speaker 1: You know you still have your you know you gonna
Speaker 1: rust back people. There's some people imprison that I met
Speaker 1: that I don't want my family around them. Well let's
Speaker 1: get it right. Thank you for listening to wrongful conviction.
Speaker 1: I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff
Speaker 1: Clyburne and Kevin Wardis, with research by Lila Robinson. The
Speaker 1: music in this production was supplied by three time OSCAR
Speaker 1: nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on
Speaker 1: Instagram at Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction podcast,
Speaker 1: and on Twitter at wrong Conviction, as well as at
Speaker 1: Lava for Good. On all three platforms, you can also
Speaker 1: follow me on both TikTok and Instagram at It's Jason
Speaker 1: flom Wrangful Conviction is a production of Lava for Good
Speaker 1: Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number one h