Speaker 1: Through our social channels. We asked our listeners to name
Speaker 1: some of their favorite episodes, and Bobby Jean Johnson's story
Speaker 1: rose to the top. Here is her heartbreaking story recorded
Speaker 1: in Atlanta at the INNOCENTCE Network conference in twenty nineteen,
Speaker 1: shortly before her untimely passing away later that year. Bobby
Speaker 1: Jean Johnson was given up for adoption at birth and
Speaker 1: later molested while she was in foster care. She ran
Speaker 1: away from that horrible situation and tried to survive as
Speaker 1: a sex worker on the streets of New Orleans. In
Speaker 1: nineteen seventy seven, an antiquities dealer named Arthur Sampson was
Speaker 1: found dead at his Saint Charles Avenue shop. He had
Speaker 1: been shot once in the stomach with a thirty two
Speaker 1: caliber bullet and stabbed over one hundred times. The store
Speaker 1: was ransacked and safe was missing about two thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: A month after the murder, Bobby Jean was writing in
Speaker 1: what she did not know at the time was a
Speaker 1: stolen car with two men when they were pulled over
Speaker 1: by the police for a traffic violation. One of the
Speaker 1: men stashed a knife and a thirty two caliber and
Speaker 1: Bobby Jean's purse. At eighteen years old, Bobby Jean Johnson
Speaker 1: was brought in from violent interrogation that would change the
Speaker 1: course of her already tragic and vulnerable life. This is
Speaker 1: wrongful conviction. Welcome back to wrongful conviction. Today, I have
Speaker 1: a guest who is one of the most extraordinary people
Speaker 1: with one of the most insane stories that I've ever heard.
Speaker 1: And she's also just a beautiful, beautiful person. So, Bobby
Speaker 1: Jean Johnson, Welcome to wrongful conviction. As I always say,
Speaker 1: I'm sorry you're here, but I'm glad you're here and
Speaker 1: everyone will find out why.
Speaker 2: And with her is Kat Forrester.
Speaker 1: Who is the communications director for the Unstan's Project of
Speaker 1: New Orleans, also known as IPNO.
Speaker 2: And Kat, welcome to wrongful conviction.
Speaker 3: Thanks so much to be here.
Speaker 1: So Bobby Jean was freed from prison twenty eighteen after
Speaker 1: serving forty one years in prison for a crime she
Speaker 1: didn't commit. And this case has so many of the
Speaker 1: hallmarks of the causes of wrongful convictions that you know,
Speaker 1: it's almost a clean.
Speaker 2: Sweep, so to speak.
Speaker 1: I mean, there was misconduct, there was a false confession
Speaker 1: that you were tortured into making incompetent defense. It's not
Speaker 1: even that's not even strong enough of a word. And
Speaker 1: we're going to get into that all of that, But
Speaker 1: we're talking about the murder of Arthur Sampson, right, And
Speaker 1: this is an extremely violent crime. This was a white
Speaker 1: man who was an antiquities dealer in New Orleans who
Speaker 1: was shot and stabbed a hundred times. I mean, that's
Speaker 1: a vicious, vicious crime. And just to paint a picture
Speaker 1: for people who are listening, how.
Speaker 4: Tall are you, I'm five feet tall.
Speaker 2: You're five feet tall, and you're not a big one.
Speaker 4: I wasn't that big at the time. I was like
Speaker 4: ninety eight pounds, like, and I will size zero pains.
Speaker 4: I could go my clothes out the children's section.
Speaker 1: So the whole thing makes no sense just on a
Speaker 1: purely physical level. And mister Sampson, I mean, nobody deserves
Speaker 1: to die like he did. But he was a sort
Speaker 1: of a dicey character anyway.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: He was known for bringing sex workers to his home,
Speaker 1: which is one of the reasons why the logical suspect
Speaker 1: would have been this woman who was a sex worker
Speaker 1: who was the last person to see him alive.
Speaker 3: Yeah, she was the last person he was seen with
Speaker 3: by anyone.
Speaker 1: Right, So usually you know, we all watch those crime
Speaker 1: shows on TV, you know, you go down that path
Speaker 1: at least take a look, you know, But that's not
Speaker 1: what happened.
Speaker 4: What year was this byby nineteen seventy seven?
Speaker 2: You were an eighteen year old girl, yeah at the time,
Speaker 2: So what was going on? You were living in New
Speaker 2: Orleans at the time.
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I was like on drugs and stuff, right.
Speaker 4: So one night we was riding in a call. It
Speaker 4: was me and two other dudes were writing in a
Speaker 4: call and it caps the police staptics for a traffic violation.
Speaker 2: Were you were you driving? No?
Speaker 4: I wasn't driving right. And at the time when the
Speaker 4: police stopped us, one of the dudes that was in
Speaker 4: the call with me threw the knife in the gun
Speaker 4: in my person. So because I know, I didn't have
Speaker 4: no knife and gun in my purse. So when the
Speaker 4: police pulled all my stuff out my person, he said, oh,
Speaker 4: we got a knife in the gun. I said, that
Speaker 4: is not for me. But they took us to Homicide
Speaker 4: Armed Division and they put us in different rooms and
Speaker 4: kept questioning us in questions, and I kept telling them
Speaker 4: I don't know nothing about it. I don't even know
Speaker 4: where his place is at. And I heard his man
Speaker 4: and so one of the dudes, the dude that put
Speaker 4: the gun in the knife, didn't make a statement and said,
Speaker 4: when y'all stopped us, I put that knife in that
Speaker 4: gun and Bible jeans, that's not us. I did that,
Speaker 4: And he made a statement. They just ignored the statement.
Speaker 1: I mean, Kat, do you think they knew at the
Speaker 1: time that it has the wrong person, but they just
Speaker 1: wanted to clean up the case and that was what
Speaker 1: was really going on.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think so.
Speaker 5: I mean, I think they had a pretty viable suspect
Speaker 5: and they didn't follow any of the leads and that
Speaker 5: other suspect case. And I think that so often, particularly
Speaker 5: you know, back in the seventies, eighties, nineties in New Orleans,
Speaker 5: particularly with black folks. I think that they, you know,
Speaker 5: the cops got tunnel vision, and you know, when they
Speaker 5: found somebody and it seemed easy enough to pin it
Speaker 5: on that person, you know, even if all the evidence
Speaker 5: in the world pointed to someone else. So often they
Speaker 5: just got tunnel vision and focused on one person and
Speaker 5: you know, force their theory of the case to fit
Speaker 5: to that person.
Speaker 1: So they knew, they knew that this guy had come
Speaker 1: forward who admitted that he had a classy guy. By
Speaker 1: the way the cops coming, he's put in his knife
Speaker 1: and he's gone to your purse. I mean, that's a
Speaker 1: hell of a thing. And when you were arrested, and
Speaker 1: if you're okay even talking about it, I mean, what
Speaker 1: I've read about the interrogation that you went through, this
Speaker 1: is like something out of a you know, a bad movie,
Speaker 1: or out of torture that you read about in a
Speaker 1: foreign country or Abu grabe, you know, or something like that.
Speaker 2: But I mean, you went to the police station and
Speaker 2: what happened, And.
Speaker 4: Then they put us in separate rooms. And they kept
Speaker 4: throwing pictures in front of me, and they said this
Speaker 4: is him and this is I said, well, I've never
Speaker 4: seen that man before. Guy, Yeah, the dead man, Arthur Samson.
Speaker 4: And then one hit me in my face. He said, no,
Speaker 4: listack to the other room. So when they took me
Speaker 4: to the other room, they still was asking me. So
Speaker 4: when I kept saying I don't know. I can't tell
Speaker 4: you nothing. I don't know, he said, oh, you're gonna know,
Speaker 4: and he called me a black bee and he put
Speaker 4: my hand, got me to the back behind his like
Speaker 4: wooden chair and put a plastic bag over my head.
Speaker 4: The chair fell backwards and they started kicking me in
Speaker 4: my ribs and all over and hit me. And he
Speaker 4: kept saying, black b Yeah, you're gonna tell us because
Speaker 4: we know you know, we know you know, he said,
Speaker 4: because let me tell you. He said, ain't number of
Speaker 4: police officers in this in the station right here, and
Speaker 4: we could kill you and your family would never know
Speaker 4: nothing about you. So I'm scared at that, and so
Speaker 4: he said, come on, we're going back in there by
Speaker 4: the time, he said, and you're gonna put and if
Speaker 4: you'd known't, you'll get some more. And I was scared
Speaker 4: of that. I was crying and everything. I had five
Speaker 4: police officers standing up behind me and one sitting down
Speaker 4: who had the tapecader and he said, now you ready,
Speaker 4: I said, I don't know now he said. He turned
Speaker 4: the tape off and he said, you're going to repeat
Speaker 4: what I say. He turned the yeah and told me that.
Speaker 4: So I was so scared. I did everything they was
Speaker 4: telling me to put on tape. I put on tape,
Speaker 4: but it was a lie. I did it because I
Speaker 4: was scared well.
Speaker 2: Yeah, you had a very good reason to be scared.
Speaker 4: I mean, I was hurting everywhere, and even after the
Speaker 4: JL fell backward, they was kicking me in my ribs
Speaker 4: and everything. It was horrible.
Speaker 5: And Jason, I just wanted to say that, like, the
Speaker 5: world had not been kind to Bobby Jean before this
Speaker 5: all happened. You know, she had had a really tough
Speaker 5: up upbringing, and it makes so much sense that she
Speaker 5: would do anything to kind of survive, right this, this
Speaker 5: brutal police interrogation, and thank you about me.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I just feel like.
Speaker 5: The world had not been kind to her, had not
Speaker 5: offered her a lot of hope.
Speaker 3: And I, you know, I.
Speaker 4: Think because I was I was given away when my
Speaker 4: mama had me, and I had to go on like that.
Speaker 4: It was like I was scaring all world with my huldren.
Speaker 6: So I just got out there and I just wanted
Speaker 6: somebody to love me, and I just.
Speaker 4: Wanted to be accepting and stuff. So whatever it took
Speaker 4: for me to do that, I did it.
Speaker 3: And she was she was a young a young girl,
Speaker 3: as you keep kind of pointing out, you know, who was.
Speaker 5: Doing the best she could with what she had. And
Speaker 5: then and then this thing happened to her, right.
Speaker 2: Yeah, then this thing happened.
Speaker 1: This is you know, there's been too many of these
Speaker 1: cases where we've learned that the officers have threatened to
Speaker 1: kill the person unless they confess. Johnny Encapier is one
Speaker 1: Daniel Villegas in Texas. There's too many of these. And
Speaker 1: you know, Johnny says to me, he was on the
Speaker 1: podcast and he said, people asked me why would I confess?
Speaker 1: And he was eighteen, like you were, and he says,
Speaker 1: why wouldn't I confess?
Speaker 2: He goes, I wanted to live, you know.
Speaker 4: What I want? I just want I want to live.
Speaker 1: I was a young girl eighteen. You're really more of
Speaker 1: a child than a woman. I mean at that point,
Speaker 1: you know, I mean, we know that the adolescent brain
Speaker 1: doesn't fully develop.
Speaker 2: Until you're twenty five.
Speaker 1: And here you are not just a young girl, but
Speaker 1: a little girl, right, ninety eight pounds, like you said,
Speaker 1: in a room full of big, tough guys who you
Speaker 1: would want to think are going to protect you, right,
Speaker 1: And in fact they're threatening in a very real way.
Speaker 2: Right.
Speaker 1: It's not like it doesn't sound like an empty threat
Speaker 1: when they're putting a plastic bag over here, and being
Speaker 1: you and kicking you. I mean, so, I don't think
Speaker 1: there's any question, And I think it's so important that
Speaker 1: you're here, and I really appreciate you.
Speaker 2: I know it's difficult for you. I can see how
Speaker 2: difficult it.
Speaker 1: Is, but it's so important for the public to understand
Speaker 1: that these false confessions happened for a variety of reasons.
Speaker 1: Not everybody's tortured, but a lot of people are psychologically coerced,
Speaker 1: or they're tricked, or.
Speaker 2: They're you know, confused.
Speaker 1: So yeah, in your situation, I don't think anyone would
Speaker 1: probably behave any differently than you did. But then what
Speaker 1: a difficult thing to live with too, because knowing as
Speaker 1: you're going to prison for the rest of your life
Speaker 1: that you are in a certain way responsible because you know,
Speaker 1: you admitted something that you didn't do.
Speaker 2: But her confession didn't match the facts of the case anyway.
Speaker 3: No, she I mean she got a lot of it wrong.
Speaker 1: I mean, she didn't get much of it right actually,
Speaker 1: And that's also a typical thing in these false confession cases.
Speaker 1: After torturing her for hours, the police were able to
Speaker 1: extract the taped confession that was riddled with inconsistencies, According
Speaker 1: to that false confession, Bobby Jean and a woman named
Speaker 1: Kimberly Leagun had met Samson in the French Quarter. Legan
Speaker 1: solicited him for sex. Then when he brought them back
Speaker 1: to his store, and again back to the false narrative
Speaker 1: that she created just to make the torture.
Speaker 2: Stop, she said, Bobby herself shot.
Speaker 1: Him once in the chest and once in the head,
Speaker 1: and then her friend Legan stabbed him over one hundred times.
Speaker 1: Then they robbed his store and sped off in a
Speaker 1: stolen Pontiac Grand Prix. Now for the actual facts, Arthur
Speaker 1: Samson was shot only once in the stomach, Bobby Jean
Speaker 1: described Samson as being twenty years younger and a half
Speaker 1: foot taller than he was. And lastly, the Pontiac Grand
Speaker 1: Prix would not have made a good getaway car, as
Speaker 1: it was not stolen until hours after the murder. The
Speaker 1: man who had stashed the thirty two caliber revolver a
Speaker 1: Knight for her purse, had made a statement admitting to
Speaker 1: just that, but that fact was inconvenient to the prosecution's
Speaker 1: narrative and was therefore hidden from the defense. All of
Speaker 1: this could have been brought up during trial if Bobby
Speaker 1: Jean had adequate counsel. However, with no family and no
Speaker 1: backup whatsoever, Bobby Jean didn't have a chance in help.
Speaker 1: Now you're taking to jail. Yeah, how long did you
Speaker 1: have to wait for your trial?
Speaker 4: Eighteen months?
Speaker 2: Eighteen months in jail?
Speaker 1: And I know how bad that must have been, because jail's,
Speaker 1: I mean anywhere are terrible, but in New Orleans it's infamous.
Speaker 4: It is.
Speaker 1: Yeah, your trial was. It was like a combination of
Speaker 1: a bad dream and a bad joke. It was because
Speaker 1: the people who are supposed to be defending you did
Speaker 1: nothing of the sort.
Speaker 2: Yeap, And can you talk about that?
Speaker 1: Yeah?
Speaker 4: I can't doing my trial. My lawyer wouldn't let me
Speaker 4: get on a standing and talking my own defense. He
Speaker 4: fell asleep during the trial.
Speaker 2: Your lawyer was asleep.
Speaker 4: Yeah, he fell asleep during the I had to wake
Speaker 4: him up. And he didn't do no opening statements.
Speaker 2: No opening statement and statements, no clothing statement.
Speaker 4: And one of the jurors stood up in state till
Speaker 4: the jews. I can I give miss Johnson a fair
Speaker 4: truck because I had a relationship with this man, the
Speaker 4: judge said, be seated with the victim. Yeah, and he
Speaker 4: and now I know because when I was in prison,
Speaker 4: I took fair leave and I graduated from it. But
Speaker 4: my lawyer should have called a mistrial when that juror
Speaker 4: stood up and he didn't say not a word, and.
Speaker 3: The judge said, just let's let's please proceed.
Speaker 1: I mean, I've I've been doing this work for over
Speaker 1: twenty five years, and I've heard a lot of stories.
Speaker 2: I've never heard that before.
Speaker 1: I mean, I've heard stories of jurors that had but
Speaker 1: I never heard a juror actually stand up in a mid.
Speaker 4: She she raised her hand and she said, I can
Speaker 4: I get this lady a fair trial because I had
Speaker 4: a relationship with mister Samson.
Speaker 1: And so your lawyer was asleep, you're waking him up.
Speaker 1: He made no opening statement, he made no closing statement,
Speaker 1: and he didn't object.
Speaker 4: To that lady didn't call a mistrial.
Speaker 2: Didn't call him miss trial.
Speaker 5: He made one objection throughout the trial, to the admission
Speaker 5: of a photograph. He has a total of eight cross
Speaker 5: examination questions, the majority of which dealt with the ballistics
Speaker 5: of the gun. No opening and no closing, and he
Speaker 5: presented no case theory. He essentially did nothing except Jacob
Speaker 5: Evan sid Do.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean he didn't defend you so much as
Speaker 2: process you.
Speaker 4: Right, Even when I was in jail when they accurring
Speaker 4: him to me, he never came seeing me. The only
Speaker 4: time I seen him was a court and sometimes when
Speaker 4: they would have court dates for me, but he wouldn't
Speaker 4: be there, so they would postpone it to another day.
Speaker 2: Oh so that's why I took eighteen months to get
Speaker 2: to trial. Yeah, because he wouldn't show up.
Speaker 4: He wouldn't show up.
Speaker 2: Did at any point did you request a different lawyer?
Speaker 2: Did you even know that you? I didn't know.
Speaker 4: I was young and I didn't know, and you probably.
Speaker 2: I mean I would think in that situation, you know
Speaker 2: nothing about the law, right And I would.
Speaker 1: Think again, in that situation, that you would be worried
Speaker 1: if you did request, Well, then you're going to upset
Speaker 1: the only guy who's on your side right now. Did
Speaker 1: you have any family in the courtroom with you or
Speaker 1: anything like that.
Speaker 2: No, nobody? Did you all alone?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 2: Jesus Christ.
Speaker 3: It took them less than an hour to come back
Speaker 3: with a guilty verdict.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 4: So when I got to prison, at first, I was
Speaker 4: because I was angry. I was angry and I was hurt.
Speaker 4: That's when I was starting. I started fighting, and all
Speaker 4: this it didn't matter no more because I had It
Speaker 4: was like, well, Baptisia, you got a life sentence. Now
Speaker 4: it's nothing you could do. You're going to die in
Speaker 4: this prison. But then I started praying and praying and praying,
Speaker 4: and one of the last fight I had, I remember
Speaker 4: I was in that cell. I just fell to my
Speaker 4: knees and I said, God, just take my life. I'm
Speaker 4: tired of living like this. Take my life and do
Speaker 4: what you want to do with it. And from that
Speaker 4: day to this one, I ain't been the same. I
Speaker 4: grew up, I got more mature, and I did everything
Speaker 4: I could do. They was offering the g so I know,
Speaker 4: I had been out of school a few months and stuff,
Speaker 4: and I got in this trouble because I know I
Speaker 4: was a small girl. I had just I hadn't graduated.
Speaker 4: I dropped out at the eleventh grade. And so I
Speaker 4: took the GD and I passed the GED. The it
Speaker 4: was giving grants out for introduction in the business Payroll
Speaker 4: Accountant and PA league. First I took the pay legal
Speaker 4: one and I passed with a full PARANORL. Yeah, wow.
Speaker 4: And I studied hard, or I studied hard because I
Speaker 4: wanted it and I wanted I did everything I could
Speaker 4: to rehabilitate myself in every kind of way. It was
Speaker 4: nothing I didn't do positive in jail. I had fights
Speaker 4: in jail because I was small, and they thought I
Speaker 4: was scared of him, but I wasn't. And I had
Speaker 4: fights with quite a few people. But I grew and
Speaker 4: I matured. I did everything I know to do right.
Speaker 4: I was a law curt and all this in the prison.
Speaker 4: When I got into the old the law library, I
Speaker 4: started writing to everybody to try to help me. One
Speaker 4: day my sister said, just send me all your papers.
Speaker 4: I'm go an bring into an innocent project. And when
Speaker 4: I sent them all to it, they got them and
Speaker 4: they started working on my case immediately. Every two weeks
Speaker 4: they would be up there to see me and they
Speaker 4: tell me how the case was gone or whatever. And
Speaker 4: then the day, oh, I went to court on the seventh.
Speaker 4: I didn't even know I had a court On the
Speaker 4: day of they said, they said, VI Johnson getting ready
Speaker 4: to got a court trip. I said, court trip. Don't
Speaker 4: y'all have never taken me back to court? So I
Speaker 4: didn't know what was going on, so I said okay,
Speaker 4: And when I got dressed, they brought me in the
Speaker 4: court house and all of them was in the courtroom
Speaker 4: for me. All lawyers, yes, but all my lawyers walked
Speaker 4: up with me to the podium when I had to
Speaker 4: do the plea and everything.
Speaker 1: For many long years, both the Promise of Justice Initiative
Speaker 1: and the Innocence Project of New Orleans worked tirelessly on
Speaker 1: Bobby Jane's case, investigating leads, studying theden and identifying the
Speaker 1: inconsistencies in her violently coursed false confession to eventually force
Speaker 1: the District Attorney's office to offer.
Speaker 2: A plea deal.
Speaker 1: The deal was this, her first degree murder conviction and
Speaker 1: life sentence would be vacated, but Bobby jan had to
Speaker 1: plead guilty to manslaughter and armed robbery in order to
Speaker 1: be re sentenced to time served. Her attorneys also had
Speaker 1: to drop any claims that the DA's office did not
Speaker 1: turn over exculpatory evidence. This was not the outcome that
Speaker 1: they or anyone who cared about Bobby Jean had hoped for,
Speaker 1: but it was the only one that.
Speaker 2: Would set her free.
Speaker 1: It's really sort of the last miserable aspect of this
Speaker 1: case is the fact that even after all these years,
Speaker 1: and even after it's been proven that you had nothing
Speaker 1: to do with this, they still wouldn't admit their mistake,
Speaker 1: right because they wanted to maintain the conviction. They want
Speaker 1: to make sure you didn't get anything for it. So
Speaker 1: the DA's office in New Orleans forced you to take
Speaker 1: a plea just to sort.
Speaker 4: Of so it would be free as the work was
Speaker 4: the only way. You say, you take this feek or
Speaker 4: you stay in prison.
Speaker 2: Right, I think anybody would do what you did.
Speaker 1: And Cat, I want you to jump in here anytime,
Speaker 1: because I know you're intimately familiar with this case, and
Speaker 1: I know how proud you are of the work that
Speaker 1: as I am as a supporter of and It's Project
Speaker 1: New Orleans. I'm so proud of the work that they did,
Speaker 1: and I'm so happy. I mean, I saw those pictures
Speaker 1: when and I posted on my Instagram, which is at
Speaker 1: It's Jason Flamm as people know, but I posted the
Speaker 1: pictures of Bobby Jean walking out of prison that day,
Speaker 1: and I just my heart was breaking or floating.
Speaker 2: I was breaking.
Speaker 1: My heart was breaking, and I was floating in the air,
Speaker 1: and it was a whole crazy thing. Can you shine
Speaker 1: some light on this cat, because this case is bizarre
Speaker 1: even by our standards.
Speaker 3: Yeah. Absolutely.
Speaker 5: So it was a case that we worked on for
Speaker 5: several years. One of the attorneys in our office, Schrell Arnold,
Speaker 5: worked on it for a long time and it ended
Speaker 5: up being the Promise of Justice initiative, incredible organized in
Speaker 5: New Orleans who ended up freeing Bobby Jean and walking
Speaker 5: her out of prison. But we were there because she was,
Speaker 5: you know, the first female client who we'd really worked
Speaker 5: on her case for for for a long time and
Speaker 5: had a really good lead.
Speaker 3: And part of that is.
Speaker 5: Because, as you know, Jason, I'm sure you know, women
Speaker 5: aren't often sentenced to life in prison or long prison sentences,
Speaker 5: which is what HYPNO does is free innocent life sentence prisoners,
Speaker 5: and women so often are caught up in things that
Speaker 5: men do right there, or they harm or.
Speaker 3: Kill their domestic abusers.
Speaker 5: And so this was you know, really exciting for us,
Speaker 5: I think because it was the first time that we'd
Speaker 5: worked with a woman for a number of years, and
Speaker 5: of course Bobby Jane is just incredible, and you know,
Speaker 5: I think having her come home, I actually came and
Speaker 5: hung out with her in Atlanta when she got home,
Speaker 5: and we went to the aquarium and started learning how
Speaker 5: to use a cell phone's as I think, we showed
Speaker 5: you some pictures and it was a.
Speaker 3: Really incredible moment.
Speaker 5: I can't imagine being incarcerated for forty one years.
Speaker 2: No, I mean, when you.
Speaker 1: Put that in context, that's I mean, you were only
Speaker 1: eighteen at the time, so that's twice as long as
Speaker 1: you had been alive, plus another five years. I mean,
Speaker 1: it's it's impossible I think for anybody to comprehend who
Speaker 1: hasn't been through it.
Speaker 2: Jesus, who was president when you went to prison?
Speaker 4: I don't remember. I don't know.
Speaker 2: We have to look Jimmy Carter was president.
Speaker 4: Okay, that's got Yeah. I mean it's a lot time.
Speaker 1: Most of the people who are listening to the show
Speaker 1: weren't born yet, and everything was different, and then you
Speaker 1: come out into a world where everybody's walking around typing
Speaker 1: on their phones, going everywhere, like there's just everything is different.
Speaker 4: When I am my first phone in my hand, I
Speaker 4: was like, oh my god, kid, she had assumed me everything.
Speaker 4: I had to turn it on and everything.
Speaker 3: First thing she wanted was an Instagram account.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, what is your Instagram account?
Speaker 4: I don't know.
Speaker 3: She doesn't know, Bobby Jean, twenty eighteen.
Speaker 2: So you walk out, I mean, what a difference.
Speaker 1: You go in as a scared, brutalized young nineteen twenty
Speaker 1: year old woman by the eighteen when you went to jail,
Speaker 1: and you come out as an accomplished, mature, fifty nine
Speaker 1: year old woman. You walk out into a world that
Speaker 1: looks almost nothing like it did when you went in.
Speaker 4: It was New Orleans. Don't look nothing like it did
Speaker 4: when I went in.
Speaker 2: I mean I almost.
Speaker 4: Forgot the names of the streets that I definitely looked at.
Speaker 4: To me, yeah, I had five five of my Lowys
Speaker 4: with me, and it was just, I don't know. It
Speaker 4: was a feeling I never had before.
Speaker 6: I used to pray every night, God, you my only witness,
Speaker 6: and you know I didn't kill nobody, Just open these
Speaker 6: doors and help me.
Speaker 3: Every night I pray that in my robe.
Speaker 4: It was so hard for me.
Speaker 2: Here we are at the Innocence Network conference.
Speaker 1: By the way, how about this conference, Bobby, It's amazing.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So we're here at the Ennistance Never conference with about
Speaker 1: two hundred designeries and six hundred.
Speaker 2: People, activists, social.
Speaker 1: Workers, civilians who want to get involved.
Speaker 2: Two of them are in the room with us right now.
Speaker 1: We have lawyers here, we have experts on everything from
Speaker 1: you know, false confessions to uh, you name it, and uh,
Speaker 1: it's an awesome, awesome thing. I mean, people are connected
Speaker 1: and strategizing and coming up with best practices and helping
Speaker 1: each other. And yeah, I mean we have we have
Speaker 1: thirty five new xuneries here that were on stage last
Speaker 1: night singing and dancing and it was some crazy scene. Man,
Speaker 1: it's amazing, including you. Yeah, I was, Yeah, I saw
Speaker 1: you up there.
Speaker 5: How to feel to be up there, Bobby Jane, It
Speaker 5: was a feel good they feel good.
Speaker 2: For you to connect with the other exogneries. What is
Speaker 2: that experience?
Speaker 4: It's just like because I just thought, I said, I
Speaker 4: know that many people there's both convictions and it made
Speaker 4: me feel good to know that I was I was.
Speaker 4: I wasn't the only one.
Speaker 2: Oh no, hell no.
Speaker 4: But I didn't know at the time, but it really
Speaker 4: felt good. And to know how much loved show we
Speaker 4: showed each other.
Speaker 2: M hmm. Yeah, we ain't done yet. We're going to
Speaker 2: be loving on you.
Speaker 1: For the well, for the rest of the time, but
Speaker 1: especially the lass next twenty four hours that we're all
Speaker 1: going to be here together. It's going to be a
Speaker 1: amazing and I know that people are are so glad
Speaker 1: that you're here.
Speaker 4: It's amazing.
Speaker 1: It's amazing, right, Yes, yeah, I mean, I'm so honored
Speaker 1: to be here and be a part of this movement.
Speaker 1: I will tell anybody who's listening that, you know, I
Speaker 1: call it selfish altruism because I consider it a privilege
Speaker 1: and an honor to get to be around people like
Speaker 1: yourself and to be able to make some small difference
Speaker 1: is you know, it's the most rewarding thing in my life.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, obviously you know I'm a father
Speaker 1: and that's a tremendously important thing to me. But beyond that,
Speaker 1: it's the most important work that I can imagine being
Speaker 1: involved with. And you're living proof of it. And here
Speaker 1: we are celebrating you and celebrating freedom and working on
Speaker 1: getting the next people out and and so now you're
Speaker 1: living in Georgia, yes.
Speaker 2: And what gives you joy?
Speaker 4: Now?
Speaker 2: Do you have any joy in your life now?
Speaker 4: I have enjoy my life now because it's like living
Speaker 4: where I live. I can come and go with that. Please.
Speaker 4: Anybody could come get me and like take me wherever
Speaker 4: they want to take me, Like if they want to
Speaker 4: take me out there or whatever, I could do it.
Speaker 4: And they have a lot of activities because I'm because
Speaker 4: I'm because of my age, they have a lot of
Speaker 4: activities for old and I always attended. They have church service.
Speaker 4: I always attended and they treat me good.
Speaker 3: And what is it that you do once a month,
Speaker 3: Bobby Jean, Oh.
Speaker 4: I'll go to Georgia's Innocent Project. I'm a member of
Speaker 4: the George's Innocent Project and I never missed a meeting.
Speaker 4: I'm always there. Yeah.
Speaker 5: They're really lovingly taken her into the exonery meetings that
Speaker 5: happen once a month there so she gets to hang
Speaker 5: out with other wrongfully incarcerator to people who live in Georgia.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I see you got the shirt on you go?
Speaker 4: Where the Georgia Innocent Project shirt? I say, yeah, I
Speaker 4: don't have one for all if.
Speaker 3: No wear the Judge one, I need to get your
Speaker 3: adjuster shirt.
Speaker 4: I know I don't have a justice shirt. I need one.
Speaker 2: I think we can arrange that. Okay, you got that one,
Speaker 2: I got it? Okay, perfect teamwork. Makes the dream work.
Speaker 1: So this is the part of the show that is
Speaker 1: my favorite part because this is the part of the
Speaker 1: show where I get to first of all, I thank.
Speaker 4: You, we thank you for having.
Speaker 1: Me, Bobby Jean Johnson, and Kat Forrester. Thank you for
Speaker 1: coming and sharing, especially you, Bobby, obviously Bobby Jeen for
Speaker 1: I know how difficult it is to talk about these things,
Speaker 1: and it's so important that you're here. So you know,
Speaker 1: thank you on behalf of me and all my listeners
Speaker 1: and everybody in the Innocence Network. And then this is
Speaker 1: the part where I get to stop talking, and I
Speaker 1: turned it over to YouTube fabulous ladies for final closing thoughts,
Speaker 1: and I think we should we should finish with you, Bobby,
Speaker 1: because I want to hear anything you have to say,
Speaker 1: any anything at all about any subject. But first, Kat,
Speaker 1: what what are your closing thoughts.
Speaker 3: I'm just so glad that we have to get her home.
Speaker 5: And I was thinking about it because we were at
Speaker 5: the aquarium last night for the Innocence Network dinner, and
Speaker 5: we went to the aquarium right after she got out,
Speaker 5: and to see the joy on her face, you know,
Speaker 5: at like, you know, seeing very cool fish was just unparalleled,
Speaker 5: and I'm just so glad to have been able to
Speaker 5: experience that with her and to see, you know, how
Speaker 5: many new things she gets to explore in this life
Speaker 5: now that she's a free, a free woman.
Speaker 4: Yeah, it was amazing to me. Because the aquirm I
Speaker 4: would always see to the show it on TV. I
Speaker 4: used to say, I want to go there. I want
Speaker 4: to go there. So when Kad had me, she said,
Speaker 4: you want to go to the a Querrum. And when
Speaker 4: she did it, it was like a joy, A lot
Speaker 4: of joy just jumped on my face. I said, yeah,
Speaker 4: I want to go. I want to go, Kid, I
Speaker 4: want to go see him. And when I came, it
Speaker 4: was so beautiful. I just it was so amazing out here. Well,
Speaker 4: Kat led me all the way through and she was there.
Speaker 4: If Noah has been there for me, I could call
Speaker 4: them at any given time or whenever, and if it's
Speaker 4: a problem I have, they will do their best to
Speaker 4: fix it or if I like I sometimes I used
Speaker 4: to get depressed and stuff and I used to call
Speaker 4: them and talk. And Angelique has been marvelous. Oh my god,
Speaker 4: she has been great.
Speaker 3: Client services specialists.
Speaker 4: Yes, she has been great, no matter what. If she
Speaker 4: can't call me back. At the time, she text me
Speaker 4: back and say, I'll call you in a few minutes.
Speaker 4: Just hold on. And but then it has been great
Speaker 4: and it's and I'm happy to be home.
Speaker 6: I'm happy. I'm happy, more happy now than I've ever
Speaker 6: been in my life. I didn't I never knew so
Speaker 6: much love and stuff, but no I do. And it's
Speaker 6: it's great. It's just that they took a lot of
Speaker 6: away from me. They took everything away from me for
Speaker 6: nothing but something I didn't even do. I lost everything.
Speaker 6: All my youth was gone. And I just want to
Speaker 6: thank you Jason for having me.
Speaker 1: Wow, we're gonna be here for you too. You have
Speaker 1: a whole bit new family now. You got eight hundred
Speaker 1: family members here now, and you've got a lot more
Speaker 1: that are listening to the show. And so you're you're
Speaker 1: a brave and strong and amazing woman, and we're gonna
Speaker 1: support you in.
Speaker 2: Every way we can.
Speaker 1: So so again, thank you for being here, Thanks again
Speaker 1: for listening.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna go try to recover. That's what I'm gonna do.
Speaker 2: And uh and and we'll see you next week. I'm
Speaker 2: wrong for conviction.
Speaker 1: I have some devastating news to share. Bobby Jean Johnson,
Speaker 1: who I recorded this haunting episode with, passed away. It
Speaker 1: was unexpected. I'm no doctor, but I can say that
Speaker 1: she died of the abuse and neglect that she suffered
Speaker 1: at the hands of the State of Louisiana during her
Speaker 1: forty one years of wrongful incarceration. Bobby was an angel
Speaker 1: on earth. She was just a beautiful, damaged soul who
Speaker 1: wanted nothing but to be loved and to help others.
Speaker 1: And she was out less than eighteen months when she died.
Speaker 1: And I bring that up because it's a sort of
Speaker 1: a hidden and horrible truth. I don't know the statistics nationally,
Speaker 1: but in the state of Louisiana, approximately twenty percent of
Speaker 1: xaneries die within eighteen months of their release from prison.
Speaker 1: It's really hard for me to process this one. We
Speaker 1: were planning Bobby's birthday party when we got the news.
Speaker 1: She had called me and said that she called me
Speaker 1: mister Jay. She called me, she called me mister Jay.
Speaker 1: She goes, you know, my birthday's coming up, and she
Speaker 1: said I've met in her little voice because you know,
Speaker 1: she's only about ninety something pounds, and she said, you know,
Speaker 1: I've never had a happy birthday, and you know, that
Speaker 1: really just messed my head up, as you can imagine.
Speaker 1: So we began planning myself. Stacy Ryan, who mentored her
Speaker 1: hero of the band, a wonderful rock and roll band
Speaker 1: that I work with from Atlanta. We all were putting
Speaker 1: our resources together and planning a big, beautiful birthday celebration
Speaker 1: for her in Atlanta. And you know, just a week
Speaker 1: before it was supposed to happen, we got the news
Speaker 1: that she was gone. So, Bobby Jean, You're gone but
Speaker 1: never forgotten, rest in power. Thank you for listening to
Speaker 1: Wrongful Conviction. I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall,
Speaker 1: Jeff Clyburn, and Awardis with research by Lyla 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 Flam.
Speaker 1: Wrongful Conviction is the production of Lava for Good podcast
Speaker 1: and association with Signal company number one