Speaker 1: On February first, nineteen ninety seven, in West Memphis, Arkansas,
Speaker 1: a young man named Charles Newsom was fatally shot in
Speaker 1: his car. According to some witnesses, Charles was with two
Speaker 1: others in his car, but only one was ever identified.
Speaker 1: Frederick Tyrone Ellis. Ellis gave inconsistent accounts about the number, location,
Speaker 1: and identities of the assailants, eventually fixing the narrative on
Speaker 1: first four and then three men from a rival neighborhood,
Speaker 1: Antonio Williams, DeMarco Wilson and Kendrick Gillham, who he placed
Speaker 1: outside the vehicle for the shooting. However, the ballistics and
Speaker 1: physical evidence say something different. This is wrathful Conviction. You're
Speaker 1: listening to wrongful Conviction. You can listen to this and
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Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts. Welcome back to Wronful Conviction, where we're going
Speaker 1: to return to West Memphis, Arkansas. Yes, the home of
Speaker 1: the West Memphis three, one of whom Jason Baldwin first
Speaker 1: told our colleague Maggie Freeling about the case we're going
Speaker 1: to be covering today and we're going to link that
Speaker 1: episode of unjustin Unsolved in the episode description. In this
Speaker 1: case involves the same local legal system, as well as
Speaker 1: three co defendants, one of whom Kendrick Gillham, is calling
Speaker 1: in from an Arkansas prison. Ken, thanks for joining us,
Speaker 1: Thank you, you're welcome. Now a second former guest, Marty Tankliffe.
Speaker 1: It was his efforts through the making an ex reclass
Speaker 1: at Georgetown University with Professor Mark Howard that led a
Speaker 1: group of students to reinvestigate the case for Ken. And
Speaker 1: we're joined by one of those former students who is
Speaker 1: currently seeking her master's in investigative journalism, Claudia Mendeweta.
Speaker 2: Welcome, thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: So let's start with Ken's life growing up in this
Speaker 1: small and notorious city of only about twenty five thousand
Speaker 1: people on the west side of the Mississippi River from Memphis, Tennessee,
Speaker 1: called West Memphis.
Speaker 3: My mom she haed me two that twenty fourth, nineteen
Speaker 3: seventy one. You know, I had a pretty normal childhood.
Speaker 3: You know, my mom, she took good care of me
Speaker 3: and my brothers. We come from a big family and
Speaker 3: all of us was closer the neighborhood because I said,
Speaker 3: like from five years old, we would always get together
Speaker 3: on the weekends, all as the summer the school was out.
Speaker 3: We was always somewhere on the bikes together, played football, basketball,
Speaker 3: collecting knes it's, cutting yards together. We had a little
Speaker 3: long services, we hated, you know, we gave some money
Speaker 3: in our pockets, and you know, we all just grew
Speaker 3: up together. You know, we were basically always there for
Speaker 3: each other.
Speaker 1: This group of family and friends lived in the Foxwood
Speaker 1: area of West Memphis and then was a rival neighborhood
Speaker 1: group from about a mile and a half away on
Speaker 1: Eighteenth Street, and Foxwood continued to stick together as the
Speaker 1: kids became teens and as problems became more complicated as
Speaker 1: they were introduced to the drug trade.
Speaker 3: I said, part of the started, I said about ninth grade.
Speaker 3: You know, we started hanging out, chasing girls, drinking girl
Speaker 3: not doing my mom's see. And then like like sixteen,
Speaker 3: I was really like I was just full plays one
Speaker 3: of the streets and I had a partner that I
Speaker 3: used to run with and he'd be setting drugs all
Speaker 3: night and I'd just be running around with him. And
Speaker 3: I was like seventeen when I first got shot. Oh yeah,
Speaker 3: I was like seventeen when I first got shot, So
Speaker 3: I've been shot three other times. The front, it went
Speaker 3: through my tophicals and it came by my shoulders, and
Speaker 3: then I was shot in the stomach and it came
Speaker 3: out my bank. No time I was shot in the
Speaker 3: league in the upper part, almost by my balls. And
Speaker 3: the last time did they take this? Watch the eighteenth
Speaker 3: Street dudes shoot up where I was at. They came
Speaker 3: through three car fee and he watched him shoot it
Speaker 3: us and then he pulled up and shot me. And
Speaker 3: he shot my home boy two mo pans, which added
Speaker 3: to the eleven hands that he was already shot.
Speaker 2: Detective Brian Ridge, who's also a big character in the
Speaker 2: West Memphis three, shot his friend. His friend is kind
Speaker 2: of on the side of the road. Ken is trying
Speaker 2: to take him to the hospital and then he shoots
Speaker 2: Kin so he can't help him.
Speaker 3: Laying on the float bleeding and the police got a
Speaker 3: gun to my head. They shot my mama house up
Speaker 3: to right around the corner. He wants three cars with
Speaker 3: its cas shoot up his house and he didn't pursuit him.
Speaker 1: It seems like Detective Brian Ridge and potentially others were
Speaker 1: at the very least turning a blind eye to the
Speaker 1: Eighteenth Street guys.
Speaker 2: I didn't get any evidence to this, but it was
Speaker 2: something that everyone told me when I was in West Memphis,
Speaker 2: like the people in the A. Treen Street group were
Speaker 2: working with the police to sell drugs. One woman sat
Speaker 2: down at me and she was like, how do you
Speaker 2: think drugs get into West Memphis? Like we don't have
Speaker 2: a port. Police will do a drug bust, and you
Speaker 2: think they're throwing those drugs away, they're not. They're putting
Speaker 2: them right back in circulation.
Speaker 3: The girl I was going with but I had the
Speaker 3: kids buy they pulled upon her brother over at the
Speaker 3: gas station one day and he was saying that they
Speaker 3: pulled up on him and said, Hey, you need to
Speaker 3: go talk to Kendrick. We got something for you, and
Speaker 3: y'all ain't got to worry about us twin now, as
Speaker 3: long as y'all keep you down over there, y'all ain't
Speaker 3: got to worry about us the rest nobody. But if
Speaker 3: you don't, we'll be to see you. So what happened
Speaker 3: was he came told me and I refused to say
Speaker 3: a dope.
Speaker 1: On him, and it appears that perhaps one of the
Speaker 1: more prominent Eighteenth Street guys, Terrence Robinson, may have taken
Speaker 1: this deal while Foxwood suffered the consequences.
Speaker 3: The girl I was going with her brother, they gave
Speaker 3: him the datment. They got my brother on the diapers,
Speaker 3: They got Chuck Kirkwood, they got my whole neighborhood on
Speaker 3: the diapers. The all the walk probably was left that
Speaker 3: didn't get in the diaper with me almoose.
Speaker 2: So Terrence Robinson, he's the person who, like we said,
Speaker 2: so drugs with the police. He had a cousin called
Speaker 2: Daryl Robertson. Darryl gets shot and that's what they try
Speaker 2: to put on Ken, but that fails.
Speaker 3: He gird order. He got to go write their statement
Speaker 3: on me was lyons in kis who had to drop
Speaker 3: the jobs. The one was investigated, the same one they
Speaker 3: shot me, Brian Reid.
Speaker 1: And with the context of this unholy alliance between the
Speaker 1: police and Foxwood rivals on Eighteenth Street, tensions flared further
Speaker 1: over a dice game in nineteen ninety six involving Ken's
Speaker 1: friend Chuck and Terrence Robinson, who was with James Newsom,
Speaker 1: the cousin of the victim in this case.
Speaker 3: They had a nice game going on in the neighborhood,
Speaker 3: Dames Gruesom and Terrence Robinson style Shuton guys Woodhelm. Anyway,
Speaker 3: chue k b Terrence Alley's money, so Chump took off
Speaker 3: the Wolkin. They pulled up Scot out the car and
Speaker 3: hit truck in the face and tried to go on
Speaker 3: his pockets and take it money. So this when the
Speaker 3: fighter started. And after that we ended up seeing them
Speaker 3: at the skating ring. We was going to the back
Speaker 3: and they was coming away from the bank, and we
Speaker 3: all got to fight New and answered the first justice,
Speaker 3: Sire New.
Speaker 1: And this kicked off a series of incidents of retaliatory
Speaker 1: gun violence leading up to the incident in question on
Speaker 1: February first, nineteen ninety seven, which occurred at nine hundred
Speaker 1: West McCauley Drive, the Mayfair Apartment complex, which unfortunately was
Speaker 1: no stranger to gunfights, and with this ongoing feud between
Speaker 1: eighteenth Street and Foxwood, the likely assumption was that someone
Speaker 1: from Foxwood was involved in the shooting. Now, the victim
Speaker 1: in this case, Charles Newsom, lived there with his parents,
Speaker 1: and according to some witnesses, Charles left home with Terrence
Speaker 1: Robinson and Frederick Tyrone.
Speaker 3: Ellis Caroli said that he was old Charles Newson house
Speaker 3: in phil Paul. That's waiting on Charle to take a
Speaker 3: shot down and take a bail, and there was the
Speaker 3: only way to minches. They walked into the car and
Speaker 3: they drove pay us by the manager's office and he
Speaker 3: said that he's seen four people out there and they
Speaker 3: began shoot this out of the car.
Speaker 2: No one is very certain about how many shots were
Speaker 2: fired or when the shot hit, but it was basically
Speaker 2: a shootout happening. Someone took their hand out of the
Speaker 2: windows started shooting back barely.
Speaker 3: Said that Chaul made a right old McCarley and he
Speaker 3: hit another car and he said chall that he couldn't breathe,
Speaker 3: and so ca Ronald said that he scowed it over.
Speaker 3: It stuck his leg onder the hands field up and
Speaker 3: he drove from the passenger side all the way back
Speaker 3: round to the front of the building where he went
Speaker 3: and can't help it.
Speaker 1: So the cops arrived and according to some witness says,
Speaker 1: Terrence Robinson should have been with Ellis to give an account,
Speaker 1: but no account has ever been found. Now. Initially Ellis
Speaker 1: had said that three or four black males who he
Speaker 1: couldn't identify, were shooting from the passenger's side, and that
Speaker 1: when Charles was hit, he reached his foot over to
Speaker 1: hit the gas to try to flee. But according to
Speaker 1: a document that was just recently found, the body was
Speaker 1: discovered in a position that really doesn't match his story.
Speaker 2: We've gotten various accounts of how the body was found,
Speaker 2: but never this one that Charles Newsom was basically turned
Speaker 2: back and he was lunged over the driver's seat.
Speaker 3: One week with she Seed, somebody had opened the door
Speaker 3: and looked at his car, so it was cussin and
Speaker 3: he jumped back in the car and.
Speaker 1: Drove around the bend, which makes you think that whoever
Speaker 1: drove the car out of there made room for himself
Speaker 1: by pushing Charles over the seat, or perhaps Charles had
Speaker 1: even lunged back there, since the shot may well have
Speaker 1: come from inside the car, But unfortunately the state of
Speaker 1: the physical evidence hasn't made anything clearer. It appears, in fact,
Speaker 1: that Charles Dusom's car had been involved in previous shootouts
Speaker 1: and plenty of damage to the out side of the car.
Speaker 1: Two bullets were pulled from the car ceiling that aren't
Speaker 1: part of the record in this case, as well as
Speaker 1: two bullet holes the police claimed had penetrated the interior
Speaker 1: and were related to this particular shooting. Now, how did
Speaker 1: they know that, We don't know. We have no idea.
Speaker 1: But maybe they said that because Charles Newsom was only
Speaker 1: shot twice, once in the right forearm and once in
Speaker 1: the right upper back.
Speaker 3: They said on a two bullet hole put an interior
Speaker 3: to the car, the one that hate him in the
Speaker 3: foot hall. People said to have come through the wandle,
Speaker 3: the very top, the back windle. You supposed in they
Speaker 3: head one. They went to the trunk. They said that
Speaker 3: a blizzard went to the trunk, went to the back seat,
Speaker 3: to the back of the drama seat, kicked him in
Speaker 3: the right upper side of his back.
Speaker 1: But a picture of the open trunk showed no damage
Speaker 1: at all to the car stereo speakers that covered the seatbacks.
Speaker 1: So the prosecutor actually motioned to have that photo barred
Speaker 1: from evidence. I'm just gonna pause there for a second. Ah, Yeah,
Speaker 1: which you know, my spidy senses are telling me that
Speaker 1: an independent investigation of the vehicle would have been prudent
Speaker 1: and necessary.
Speaker 2: So the car gets sold immediately that.
Speaker 3: We used to call it through the marble, And I
Speaker 3: guess she got rid of it because Hassan got killed
Speaker 3: in it. The dude that bought the car, he said
Speaker 3: there was no bullet hole in the back of the
Speaker 3: drive of seat this compa.
Speaker 2: But I spoke to someone who spoke to the guy
Speaker 2: who bought the car, and he says there were no
Speaker 2: back seats.
Speaker 1: So no driver's seat, bullet hole, no back seats to
Speaker 1: even confirm or deny the alleged trunk bullet path. Somebody
Speaker 1: had gotten rid of them, right. But the state's theory
Speaker 1: becomes even more unbelievable when you consider the bullet's trajectory
Speaker 1: through Charles Newsom's body.
Speaker 3: They said it a bullet What do the prong? What
Speaker 3: do the back seat went through the back of the drivers,
Speaker 3: hit him in the right upper side, open back, and
Speaker 3: terminated in the lower left front.
Speaker 2: It's a downward trajectory, Pully.
Speaker 3: Wouldn't they hate him? They put no down will pay him?
Speaker 3: Would would have would break to a person.
Speaker 2: In my eyes, the fatal shot has to have come
Speaker 2: from inside the car based on the ballistics. There is
Speaker 2: no other way it could have happened.
Speaker 1: The ongoing inter neighborhood gun violence had both the police
Speaker 1: and alleged witnesses speculating about Foxwood, specifically about Ken Gillum
Speaker 1: and Antonio Williams, which wasn't that wild of an idea,
Speaker 1: can considering Ken's alibi because Ken was at his girlfriend,
Speaker 1: Tarshalla Flores, his home with his two kids, one of
Speaker 1: whom was nicknamed Pooh, and sometime before the shooting took place,
Speaker 1: some Foxwood guys that stop by.
Speaker 2: So Ken's girlfriend her two brothers are the big drug
Speaker 2: dealers in West Memphis. They were Flores, so that house
Speaker 2: was kind of where they all hang out. That's where
Speaker 2: they sold drugs from. It was kind of like the
Speaker 2: meeting point. So that's why these people came over.
Speaker 3: They were come, roll Waters over, We're going to get Charles.
Speaker 3: Tasha dude like no, you better come get your dad.
Speaker 3: And stupid dad trying to go a wag to jail.
Speaker 3: So he running there, grabbed my lead, hold on my lead,
Speaker 3: was like, Mane, look, man I'm street. I ain't gonna
Speaker 3: I'm sorry cute my partners called me. He was like, hey, Mane,
Speaker 3: they can't shot Nane and know your name the firm name.
Speaker 3: Come home. He said, you might want to get your
Speaker 3: keys and stuff I have to have. I'm here and
Speaker 3: it's going to be for shooting.
Speaker 1: So you might be thinking, wait a minute, does Ken
Speaker 1: actually know who did it?
Speaker 3: See the parties? They didn't do it.
Speaker 1: Now, Remember, the bullet trajectory supports that the fatal shot
Speaker 1: had to have come from inside the car, and soon
Speaker 1: after the shooting, the police had more support for a
Speaker 1: close range gunshot. According to a report summarizing the Arkansas
Speaker 1: Crime Labs gunshot residue analysis that was entered into evidence
Speaker 1: of trial, Charles Newsom's jacket had quote one perforating hole
Speaker 1: in the upper right back with residues relating to a
Speaker 1: firearm discharge end quote.
Speaker 2: The only way that Newsom would have residue on the
Speaker 2: jacket was that if the shot had come from close range.
Speaker 1: But despite that, the state continued to build this sort
Speaker 1: of wild narrative about shooters outside the car, which centered
Speaker 1: and relied on l his statements.
Speaker 3: Carol Ali said that I don't know who did it.
Speaker 3: That's the first statement. The second statement was gave a
Speaker 3: couple of hours a capt there, and he said that
Speaker 3: Gilby and Williams did it. Five days later, he gave
Speaker 3: a third statement saying four people did gil them Willison, Willis,
Speaker 3: and Jackson. But Ronald Jackson was found out to be
Speaker 3: in Kentucky, so they know that was another lie.
Speaker 1: So the mention of Ronald Jackson was just ignored while
Speaker 1: the focus remained on the other three. And it seems
Speaker 1: to Marco Wilson, who happens to be Ken's cousin, by
Speaker 1: the way, was seen at Mayfair that night by a
Speaker 1: man named Mark Welch.
Speaker 2: Oh my god. The Marco is like, that's the whole
Speaker 2: other thing, Like he's not even in this friend group.
Speaker 2: He was in his girlfriend's apartment because they had a
Speaker 2: newborn child, and he just walked down because he heard shots.
Speaker 2: So Mark Welsh how he plays into the story. He
Speaker 2: just goes like, I was there, I was in the
Speaker 2: apartments and I saw the Marco was standing outside. He
Speaker 2: looked at you take it. So that's how de Marco
Speaker 2: comes into the whole thing.
Speaker 1: So DeMarco's name was added to Ellis's third statement, and
Speaker 1: they picked up Ken a few days later, but he
Speaker 1: was in charged yet.
Speaker 3: They took me the Jones brou to take a lot
Speaker 3: to take the cares. But the man said exploit. You
Speaker 3: said no, you paid to answer. Did you have anything
Speaker 3: to do with it? You said no, you paid answer me.
Speaker 3: Do you know anything about it? And you said no,
Speaker 3: and until you were sure, you lying. So I said,
Speaker 3: you said, I passed on not being there, and I
Speaker 3: passed not having anything new with it, right? He said, yes,
Speaker 3: said well I did. I'm innocent, so may leave me
Speaker 3: along because I need shit. But it's you one that
Speaker 3: you know something about it. I said that ain't my job.
Speaker 3: I don't work for the police.
Speaker 2: You don't want to mess with these people. So he
Speaker 2: was not going to start pointing fingers and get potentially
Speaker 2: retaliation from someone.
Speaker 3: He ended up let me go.
Speaker 1: Since Ken was not going to give them any information,
Speaker 1: especially since he hadn't actually seen anything, they continue to
Speaker 1: build the narrative. In his third statement, Ellis mentioned two
Speaker 1: alleged witnesses who he said were just happened to be
Speaker 1: driving by, Darnell Troop and Kevin Johnson. Troop gave a
Speaker 1: statement about having heard the shots, while Johnson said that
Speaker 1: he saw Antonio DeMarco and Ken by the manager's office
Speaker 1: and that one of them had had a rifle.
Speaker 2: It's funny to read their interrogation transcript because the police goes,
Speaker 2: you saw these people standing on Wes McCauley, right. Kevin
Speaker 2: Johnson goes, right, it sounded like a rifle, right, yes, right.
Speaker 2: So the police is literally the way they're framing their
Speaker 2: questions is with the information they need.
Speaker 3: And this Johnson and three of the witnesses and say, hey,
Speaker 3: all three of them, Hey, they job just dismissed. Ten
Speaker 3: years after apposition.
Speaker 2: These three witnesses got their charges dropped on February two
Speaker 2: thousand and eight, all of them, and all of them
Speaker 2: but one has now come forward and basically said I
Speaker 2: was lying and I was offered something to lie. Kevin
Speaker 2: Johnson said that he got drugs in exchange for that testimony.
Speaker 2: So they all have their charges dropped the same month,
Speaker 2: the same year, and some even the same day. You know,
Speaker 2: and for people who are not like super familiar with
Speaker 2: what this means, like this highly suggests they were cop informants,
Speaker 2: because cops were holding these convictions over their heads until
Speaker 2: they didn't need them anymore.
Speaker 3: This endless get out in an abandoned house Will fifty
Speaker 3: seven thousand, three ninety seven dollars two ketos and what
Speaker 3: if I am a second or two or three gone?
Speaker 3: He got five years of total c which he had
Speaker 3: to do ten months, and he could get out on it.
Speaker 2: So Ellis, for example, he testified in like five or
Speaker 2: six criminal cases, like a bunch of them, always saying
Speaker 2: whatever the police needed him to say.
Speaker 1: And those weren't the only deals to be had. Ken
Speaker 1: was offered ten years with just two years to the
Speaker 1: parole board. Now, call me crazy, but it sounds to
Speaker 1: me like they may not have really thought he did
Speaker 1: it if they're offering him two years for a crime
Speaker 1: this serious but okay. But Ken refused the deal. What
Speaker 1: guilty guy refuses that deal, that's the best deal they're
Speaker 1: ever going to get. But Ken refused, So they bolstered
Speaker 1: their case with a jail house snitch named Jeff Cayton. Now,
Speaker 1: fun fact, one of the investigators in West Memphis at
Speaker 1: the time, a guy named Mike Allen. Well, he's the
Speaker 1: current sheriff of Crittendon County and he's now married to
Speaker 1: Jeff's sister. Anyway, Jeff gave a statement saying that in
Speaker 1: jail he's actually married to the jail house nitch's sister.
Speaker 1: Just when you think you've heard everything on the wrongful
Speaker 1: conviction that you can hear it, then you hear stuff
Speaker 1: like this. Anyway. Jeff gave a statement saying that in
Speaker 1: jail he'd overheard Ken just rambling on and on about
Speaker 1: the shooting.
Speaker 3: Jeff Kate says that the prosecutor, fran Thorne want to
Speaker 3: him to say it. He's hurt me and tay you
Speaker 3: saying that I killed somebody and he's saying the people.
Speaker 3: And they said they wouldn't send him to the penitentiary.
Speaker 3: They sent him to boot camp on ninety They put
Speaker 3: under the head like a little army thing and they
Speaker 3: get help. So they sent him to boot camp two
Speaker 3: weeks prior to trial. We went to trial November fourth
Speaker 3: through November nineteen ninety seven, and on the sand he
Speaker 3: said he didn't get a deal. He said that he
Speaker 3: heard me say that I shot the gas car with
Speaker 3: a shotgun. It wasn't no shotgun.
Speaker 1: Fair saying, you know it's wild that with all of
Speaker 1: the shellcasings from this incident and others at Mayfair, they
Speaker 1: still couldn't find one shotgun shell that would have made
Speaker 1: Caton's testimony make sense. And by the way. He later
Speaker 1: recanted his statement as well, in case this wasn't screwed
Speaker 1: up enough. Next up, Darnell Troop said he had heard
Speaker 1: the shots while he drove by with Kevin Johnson, who
Speaker 1: took the stand as well.
Speaker 3: He said that him had done their troop in the
Speaker 3: car together passing by, and he said, we shooting a
Speaker 3: noosel white car with nucl Carl Purple and he seeing
Speaker 3: me Williams Willison and Jarry Johnson and the man duke officer.
Speaker 1: So Kevin Johnson, who later recanted, offered an entirely new
Speaker 1: person into the narrative, just out of thin air. A
Speaker 1: guy named Jerry Johnson appears in this narrative who also
Speaker 1: ended up having a solid alibi like Ronald Jackson had
Speaker 1: had from Elis's third statement.
Speaker 3: Now and it's his first two statements. They were with
Speaker 3: hal from us until the first day of trial. I mean,
Speaker 3: they caught that man in so many lines. They tell
Speaker 3: me your first statement, why didn't you just kill them?
Speaker 3: Who did it? Oh Man? I just want to saying
Speaker 3: that to me. You know what I'm saying. It wasn't
Speaker 3: not your second statement you said kill them Williams eating
Speaker 3: oh Man? I just gave him a little some some
Speaker 3: Come on, man, do you remember sitting you've seen him
Speaker 3: up at the passengers? No, I ain't say it for
Speaker 3: they be a video statement said, yes about the passage
Speaker 3: of the one. But what kind of guns did you see?
Speaker 3: Two them head night rifle, pink kaylight guns that one
Speaker 3: of them made the head guns. Do you remember saying
Speaker 3: that you see they hey cawon guns. No, I don't know.
Speaker 3: So they pade a video statement, ye say, hey, holme guns.
Speaker 3: Then what about the fourth person? I'm just probably mistinking
Speaker 3: about deal? But so you for sure about these three? Yeah,
Speaker 3: I'm sure who had what guns? Oh? Man, I couldn't
Speaker 3: feel it was too dull.
Speaker 1: For the record, it was eight pm in February, the
Speaker 1: area wasn't well lit, so it probably was too dark
Speaker 1: for anyone to have seen what they claimed to have seen.
Speaker 1: But at this point, despite the inconsistencies and discrepancies, the
Speaker 1: jury heard three witnesses named the three co defendants without
Speaker 1: any context of the deals they'd made with the prosecutor's office,
Speaker 1: and in addition, they were able to keep Ken's alibi
Speaker 1: witness Tarshalla Flores, off the stand.
Speaker 3: They come in with two bullet pips did they said
Speaker 3: they found and Tasha mulg House is doing a drug
Speaker 3: grade six months after the murder, and they said that
Speaker 3: these bullets had the same lot number on them as
Speaker 3: the one found that the scene. So she didn't testify
Speaker 3: for me because they were trying to act like I
Speaker 3: had something to do that I had and I had
Speaker 3: something to do with anything. I was in jail for
Speaker 3: six months, So y'all raided their house. Lot number on
Speaker 3: the back of the bullets don't mean nothing. This just
Speaker 3: a year that there was manufactured. And I can bet
Speaker 3: you this, if you had any other ak shootings or
Speaker 3: sk shooting jails frown, you gonna have the same lot
Speaker 3: number because all the drug dealers went to the same
Speaker 3: place and bought the bullets. And that was Red Barn.
Speaker 1: Again, this is important context that the jury never heard. Now.
Speaker 1: The prosecutors also called Detective Brian Ridge to discuss his
Speaker 1: magic curving bullet theory, and he came.
Speaker 3: In with a homemade picture that he drew up. He
Speaker 3: took a box car, a juvenile picture that a five
Speaker 3: year old could have drew and it had the diresion
Speaker 3: that he think says that the bullet went, bullet hole
Speaker 3: hit the car on the tube. The hole was supposedly
Speaker 3: gonna traded the inuitor. The picct them was hit in
Speaker 3: the right four hall. Now, bullet people said to have come.
Speaker 1: Through the window, which is plausible. The bullet could have
Speaker 1: struck his forearm as he held the steering wheel, or
Speaker 1: perhaps he raised his arm defensively at some point and
Speaker 1: it was struck. But then the only other possible entry
Speaker 1: point that they claimed was through the trunk, which they
Speaker 1: said traveled through the back seat and driver's seat to
Speaker 1: hit Charles. And remember we mentioned that the prosecutor already
Speaker 1: objected to admitting the picture of the open trunk into evidence.
Speaker 3: They come into court with the photos showing a bulletholes
Speaker 3: of the car. Right, So now they come to the
Speaker 3: bullet hole in the back of the driver's seat. Guess
Speaker 3: what it can't be found. And two it was like, well,
Speaker 3: they said, well you had this morning, didn't He said, yeah, hey,
Speaker 3: but you've seen the lost from the police station.
Speaker 1: The cool This is now like the dog ate my homework.
Speaker 1: And then, to make matters worse, the state's next witness,
Speaker 1: Kevin Mainhardt, testified about the gun that was alleged to
Speaker 1: have been used, in this case an sk rifle, which
Speaker 1: was helpful with demonstrating that the bullet could have made
Speaker 1: it through all of those different objects, but not with
Speaker 1: the downward trajectory.
Speaker 3: Easy, it will go straight through them, hold over them.
Speaker 3: So I wanted to hit some redit and take them down.
Speaker 1: Will pay up?
Speaker 3: This can't make confense.
Speaker 1: So through their own witnesses, the state had just contradicted
Speaker 1: their own narrative and they were about to do it again.
Speaker 1: While presenting the medical evidence, they entered a number of
Speaker 1: documents into evidence, including a report summarizing the Arkansas Crime
Speaker 1: Labs gunshot residue analysis. Now, importantly, the gunshot residue of
Speaker 1: the victim's hands was not submitted, and we'll get to
Speaker 1: that in a minute. So at trial, one of the
Speaker 1: things this summary report said was that Newsom's hands negative
Speaker 1: for gunshot residue, and they put the medical examiner, doctor
Speaker 1: Frank Peretti, on the stand.
Speaker 2: Probably the most insane part of this trial is that
Speaker 2: they never get a ballistics expert to come testify. They
Speaker 2: get a medical examiner, and this was a doctor that
Speaker 2: infamously also testified in the West Memphis three trial. So
Speaker 2: he's testifying in Ken's case, and he says, basically, I
Speaker 2: don't have qualifications to do this. The just says it's okay,
Speaker 2: go on, go on. And what he says in trial
Speaker 2: is that there was no close range firing because he
Speaker 2: didn't see residue on the.
Speaker 1: Victim, and he specifically mentions the victim's skin, and this
Speaker 1: is something he can speak to as an expert. There
Speaker 1: are ways to optically examine for residue or that can
Speaker 1: be stippling, which is the burn pattern one can expect
Speaker 1: with close range gunshots. But the victim was wearing three
Speaker 1: layers that night, remember it was February, a shirt, an undershirt,
Speaker 1: and a jacket. And the report from the Arkansas Crime
Speaker 1: Lab says that is residue relating to firearm discharge around
Speaker 1: the hole in the right upper back.
Speaker 2: But the medical examiner is literally saying the shot was
Speaker 2: coming from fifteen twenty minutes away, like the bullet came
Speaker 2: from outside the car. While there's information that there's primer
Speaker 2: residue on the victim, and this is pointed out by
Speaker 2: either Antonio or DeMarco's lawyer and they were like, look,
Speaker 2: this is impossible. There's an inconsistency. The state is saying
Speaker 2: that there's primary residue on the victim, and yet the
Speaker 2: medical examiner is saying that there's no evidence of close
Speaker 2: range shooting. This is impossible, But that juror who's not
Speaker 2: an expert on ballistics doesn't understand that. I mean, I
Speaker 2: had to study this to understand it. If it was
Speaker 2: just said to me like this, I would't understand it either.
Speaker 1: And it seems that this case required at least a
Speaker 1: ballistics expert to further explain this to the jury, but
Speaker 1: that didn't happen before they went to deliberate.
Speaker 3: Grandma sheen howl in the bathroom. Oh wait, it needs
Speaker 3: out security chamber. So he was gonna help to the prosecutors,
Speaker 3: and they said he told the prosecutors. He said, hey, man,
Speaker 3: y'all cases, y'all need to do something. Now.
Speaker 2: We've gotten a hold of one of those jurors. And
Speaker 2: he said it's a long time ago, man, I don't remember,
Speaker 2: but he's he was very clear. He was like, when
Speaker 2: the jurors were deliberating, one of the prosecutors walks into
Speaker 2: the jury room and they say something to the jurors
Speaker 2: that's tempering with their decision, and then.
Speaker 1: Those jurors returned with their verdict. All three men were
Speaker 1: convicted of first degree murder and given life sentences without
Speaker 1: the possibility of parole.
Speaker 3: There's a lot of mind and a lot of disbelieve.
Speaker 3: It was like it was like took my life? Did't know?
Speaker 3: Do I just you know? It's that you just game
Speaker 3: his plain because you need to make you feel so mad.
Speaker 3: You'll be like talking him to make rail. You know
Speaker 3: what I'm saying in the politration. You have to sit
Speaker 3: here and wait and wait and hold some chime. And
Speaker 3: now I gotta try to find a lawyer that'll take you.
Speaker 3: I need help. It's hard, man, it is hard. You
Speaker 3: don't know the feeling. Man. I lost my brother, my all,
Speaker 3: my grandpa was gone. I even lost some grandchild since
Speaker 3: up in the hero my brother was murdered, my grandma
Speaker 3: died in the same man that help put me here
Speaker 3: preached to help her. What kind of shit is this?
Speaker 3: What kind of sh is this?
Speaker 1: One of the investigators on this case, Detective On, became
Speaker 1: a preacher and as luck would have it, or fate
Speaker 1: or whatever irony whatever you want to call this, when
Speaker 1: Ken was allowed to attend her funeral. Who the fuck
Speaker 1: do you think he saw there?
Speaker 3: He couldn't even look at me. I was sitting on
Speaker 3: the part road. Every time he looked over there, and
Speaker 3: he put his head down. He put his head down.
Speaker 3: I wanted to get up, but I had respect for
Speaker 3: my grandmama. I wanted to get up, and may y'all
Speaker 3: get this bitch about the art, because the bitch lined
Speaker 3: on me and got me here this pen attention, and
Speaker 3: they put my grandmoma need the car and I walked
Speaker 3: up to him. I said, you lying, talk ass bitch.
Speaker 3: My mama put him away from him. They do this
Speaker 3: shit to you because they could do it. The only
Speaker 3: thing this shit is it's criminals to heal us and
Speaker 3: motherfuckles up.
Speaker 1: The three co defendants had an alleged confession back in
Speaker 1: nineteen ninety nine, but that fell apart before it even
Speaker 1: went to an evidentiary hearing oh.
Speaker 3: Hey hanging down here and told him that he said
Speaker 3: there and took the job, that they were going to
Speaker 3: send him to the road, but that what dude changed took.
Speaker 1: The moment following that, Kevin Johnson came forward in two
Speaker 1: thousand and one claiming that he was offered drugs by
Speaker 1: one of the victim's friends in exchange for this testimony,
Speaker 1: and the team went back to court in two thousand
Speaker 1: and three.
Speaker 3: All two to them the issues was raised. It was
Speaker 3: the same thing they got the Wistmavis three free was
Speaker 3: the same appeal that they used due to the.
Speaker 2: Scientific casting, so they filed a seventeen eighty six years.
Speaker 1: Later in Discovery, they received a hidden gun shot residue.
Speaker 1: Exam of Charles Newsom's hands.
Speaker 2: Turns out there's primar residue in Newsom's hands. The only
Speaker 2: way that Newsom would have primar residue in his hands
Speaker 2: was that if the shot had come from close range.
Speaker 1: But that Charles was in close proximity to gunfire.
Speaker 2: But that didn't go with their story that the shooters
Speaker 2: were from outside the car, so there could have been
Speaker 2: no power anywhere. The evidence would have proven otherwise.
Speaker 3: They denied it because they said that there was no
Speaker 3: new scientific case thing it would have helped us look
Speaker 3: that some of the cases I read. They saying that
Speaker 3: it is not just for real reversal to be game
Speaker 3: when the scene is convicted normally or not normally of
Speaker 3: false evidence, and they know that they conveted me on false.
Speaker 1: Evidence, and so did Jason Baldwin of the West Memphis Three,
Speaker 1: who knew DeMarco Wilson while he was in prison. We'll
Speaker 1: have their stories linked in the episode description, so check
Speaker 1: them out. But upon his release in twenty eleven, he
Speaker 1: eventually began a nonprofit to reinvestigate innocent's claims, and this
Speaker 1: was their very first case. They tracked down witnesses and
Speaker 1: tried to access the old case evidence to test for
Speaker 1: DNA fingerprints, to reconstruct the crime scene, anything, and DeMarco
Speaker 1: went back to court in twenty eighteen.
Speaker 3: They was trying to find out what the evidence was.
Speaker 2: It and the deck on all of it is missing
Speaker 2: and all of the reports are missing too. So not
Speaker 2: only don't we have the shirt, the jacket and the
Speaker 2: car any of that, which is already huge misconduct because
Speaker 2: you're meant to keep evidence from murder case forever, we
Speaker 2: don't even have pictures of it. And when we bring
Speaker 2: Mike Allen to court, they're like, hey, what happened to
Speaker 2: this evidence? He's like it says, I checked it out,
Speaker 2: but it wasn't me. Someone else done it. Someone else
Speaker 2: mus have written my name.
Speaker 1: I don't know where it is so someone just checked
Speaker 1: the evidence out in nineteen ninety seven and it's just gone.
Speaker 2: So I mean very convenient that because if we had
Speaker 2: got evidence, if we could prove that can didn't do it,
Speaker 2: you could do all types of testing. You could test
Speaker 2: the pother again, you could test for DNA, you could
Speaker 2: test all types of things.
Speaker 1: Jason's team made contact with another potential confessor around twenty
Speaker 1: twenty who had contacted law enforcement as early as twenty seventeen,
Speaker 1: who was finally saying something that aligned with the evidence.
Speaker 1: But that person took their own life before swearing under oath.
Speaker 1: Now perhaps this wasn't even the right person, but it
Speaker 1: was a similar tale to the nineteen ninety nine confessor
Speaker 1: that three individuals, potentially the same guys that had stopped
Speaker 1: by Ken's girlfriend Tarsha's earlier that night, had driven up
Speaker 1: next to Newsom's car and opened fire, and then the
Speaker 1: person in the backseat of Newsom's car pulled a gun
Speaker 1: to return fire, and they believed that's how Newsom was
Speaker 1: shot from close range. Maybe that's what Ken meant by
Speaker 1: they didn't do it. Meanwhile, after years of outreach, Ken
Speaker 1: had finally got a response from the making xannery class
Speaker 1: at Georgetown.
Speaker 2: First we got the primer residue analysis, and then we
Speaker 2: finally sent it over to a ballistic expert and he
Speaker 2: was like, this is primary residue, like that shot came
Speaker 2: from inside the car. And then we also have what
Speaker 2: five hundred pages worth of documents. I'm trying to reach
Speaker 2: out to Ken's original attorney, but I sent them to
Speaker 2: Ken and we talked and he was like, I don't
Speaker 2: have any of this, like I never got any of this.
Speaker 1: And they also looked up Jeff Cayton.
Speaker 2: He's been trying to come forward for a while because
Speaker 2: he's dying now with cirrhosis, and now he called us
Speaker 2: and he goes, I need to clear my consciousness, like
Speaker 2: I need to right this wrong. And he had years
Speaker 2: in prison and he basically said, the officers told me
Speaker 2: a story, and they said, you tell that on the
Speaker 2: stand and you'll go to boot camp. You get off
Speaker 2: with this up on the wrist, like you're good. So
Speaker 2: that's exactly what happened to him. Kevin Johnson, Jeff Kayton
Speaker 2: have recanted, and someone else, Paul Hunt, has come forward
Speaker 2: and said I was jeff cell mate, and he confessed
Speaker 2: to me many times to falsely testifying in that trial.
Speaker 2: So that's corroborated. And then we have someone who has
Speaker 2: now come forward and said the people who actually were
Speaker 2: shooting at Newsom drove the car to my house and
Speaker 2: confessed to me. Him and the three other guys confessed
Speaker 2: to her, And that was not Ken Gillim. And this
Speaker 2: woman had never spoken until I called her a few
Speaker 2: months ago because someone gave me her name.
Speaker 1: So potentially there's a connection between Ken's story, this witness
Speaker 1: and the three men from the other confessions. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: Claudia and the team which includes TOMMYA. Hayes and Brandon T.
Speaker 1: Ham while they're not giving up.
Speaker 2: We're in touch with the crime scene reconstruction expert and
Speaker 2: also a handwriting expert because we believe some of the
Speaker 2: signatures about medical reports and ballistics reports and all of
Speaker 2: that has been forged from the beginning. The one thing
Speaker 2: can always said to me is look at the ballistics.
Speaker 2: It doesn't make sense. It does not make sense. It
Speaker 2: could not have happened like that. So they were looking
Speaker 2: for the shirt, the jacket, and the car, any of that.
Speaker 2: So in the West Memphis Street trial, they also said
Speaker 2: it was all gone, and then it was actually all
Speaker 2: in the West Memphis Police Department. So when I was
Speaker 2: in Arkansas, I went there. I mean my two colleagues,
Speaker 2: we drove there and we asked for it. But you
Speaker 2: can only access that type of evidence if you're a lawyer.
Speaker 1: No, perhaps a lawyer or a crime scene reconstruction expert.
Speaker 1: Anyone listening would like to offer their help, anyone out
Speaker 1: there who would like to speak, it's never too late,
Speaker 1: And if so, we're going to leave ways that you
Speaker 1: can contact Claudia in the episode description, where you can
Speaker 1: also find the documentary that they made for Ken's case.
Speaker 1: And with that we're going to go to closing arguments.
Speaker 1: This is the part of the show that I always
Speaker 1: look forward to, where first of all, I thank you
Speaker 1: from the bottom of my heart on behalf of our
Speaker 1: whole team. And now I'm going to kick back in
Speaker 1: my chair with my headphones on, just close my eyes
Speaker 1: and listen to anything else you want to share with
Speaker 1: me and our incredible audience. So Claudia, why don't you
Speaker 1: go first and then just hand the mic off to Ken.
Speaker 2: Ken was guilty way before he ever stepped foot in
Speaker 2: that court. The police wanted a conviction, and they went
Speaker 2: to any lengths until they got it. And there's just
Speaker 2: no way that physically, the ballistics makes sense. There is
Speaker 2: no way that shot came from outside of the car.
Speaker 2: And there is no testimony still holding that hasn't been
Speaker 2: recanted or proven to be coerced except the testimony of
Speaker 2: someone who has a personal stake in this case, someone
Speaker 2: who gave various different testimonies that don't corroborate with each other.
Speaker 2: Ken has been in jail for twenty nine years, and
Speaker 2: twenty nine years later, there is the testimony of one
Speaker 2: person who's a cop informant, and that's what's keeping him
Speaker 2: in jail, and we just got to get him out.
Speaker 2: It's time. He hasn't seen his kids in early thirty years.
Speaker 2: He's fifty six now, he hasn't had a life. He
Speaker 2: went to jail when he was in his twenties. And
Speaker 2: he's not guilty, and everyone knows he's not guilty. He's
Speaker 2: a victim of a town and a system that has
Speaker 2: never been held accountable for what they've done. And it's enough.
Speaker 3: Well, like I said, it's just how he did about it,
Speaker 3: because they can't for getting away with it. I'm wondering
Speaker 3: why Alcatol doesn't have a CiU unit. He may he
Speaker 3: of me that you can. Don't think that Alkassol has
Speaker 3: also convicted people. Come on, man, I only know maybe
Speaker 3: two people. They had been cleared of it, of crime
Speaker 3: they didn't committed. That's the one thing I've ever heard of.
Speaker 3: I know John Brown, and if I'm not mistaken, it
Speaker 3: was Rodney break. Yeah. I'm not going to say. You know,
Speaker 3: I'm looking forward to turn it into the help of
Speaker 3: this case and take this case because I know Arkansas
Speaker 3: needs to be exposed to this. You know, they need
Speaker 3: to really be exposed.
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Ron for Conviction. You can
Speaker 1: listen to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts
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Speaker 1: for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. I want to thank
Speaker 1: our production team, Connor Hall and Kathleen Fink, as well
Speaker 1: as my fellow executive producers Jeff Kempler, Kevin Watis, and
Speaker 1: Jeff Cleiber. The music in this production was supplied by
Speaker 1: three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Rowse. Be sure to
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Speaker 1: Good and at Wrongful Conviction. You can also follow me
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Speaker 1: Lava for Good.