WEBVTT - #030 Jason Flom with Angel Gonzalez 0:00:04.080 --> 0:00:05.880 I think we have the best legal system. 0:00:05.880 --> 0:00:08.960 It's just the people that implement it. They get lost 0:00:09.000 --> 0:00:11.479 along the way and forget what their job really is. 0:00:13.119 --> 0:00:15.800 He just kept on trying to remind me that who 0:00:15.880 --> 0:00:19.040 was in authority, who was in control, and how easy 0:00:19.079 --> 0:00:23.360 it was for my body to be found in any 0:00:23.440 --> 0:00:24.760 alley of New York City. 0:00:25.800 --> 0:00:28.479 It's a tough prison when you have the guards going 0:00:28.520 --> 0:00:31.880 against you because they are the biggest gang in the prison. 0:00:33.120 --> 0:00:35.280 They do that. They'll give a guy a life sentence 0:00:35.440 --> 0:00:37.560 and go home in eat spaghetti like it was nothing. 0:00:38.960 --> 0:00:41.120 And anybody that said, well, why would you confess to 0:00:41.280 --> 0:00:43.959 something that you didn't do? My question to them will 0:00:44.000 --> 0:00:46.920 be why wouldn't you confess when somebody's threatening to kill 0:00:46.920 --> 0:00:51.040 your life? The judge, he said, how you feel? I said, 0:00:51.040 --> 0:00:53.480 I'm okay. He said, well, the days you're lucky day 0:00:54.560 --> 0:00:55.280 you're going home. 0:00:56.840 --> 0:01:17.280 This is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with 0:01:17.400 --> 0:01:20.440 Jason Flam Today. I have a guest who I've wanted 0:01:20.440 --> 0:01:22.600 to have on the show ever since. I saw a 0:01:22.640 --> 0:01:25.880 picture of him having his first meal after he was 0:01:25.920 --> 0:01:28.160 released after twenty years in prison, and he had this 0:01:28.280 --> 0:01:31.560 smile on his face that was just pure joy. It 0:01:31.640 --> 0:01:34.360 looked like. So we'll hear more about that, and I 0:01:34.400 --> 0:01:35.200 want to welcome you. 0:01:35.280 --> 0:01:38.600 Angel Gonzalez, Wakegan man who spent the last two decades 0:01:38.640 --> 0:01:42.000 in prison, could soon be set free. New DNA evidence 0:01:42.040 --> 0:01:45.679 identifies two other men who committed the nineteen ninety four 0:01:45.800 --> 0:01:48.000 rape and kidnapping he was imprisoned for it. 0:01:48.120 --> 0:01:51.160 Sell Us exonerated by DNA evidence that showed he couldn't 0:01:51.160 --> 0:01:53.240 have been one of the two men who kidnapped and 0:01:53.320 --> 0:01:55.600 raped the woman in Walkeegan in nineteen ninety four. 0:01:55.840 --> 0:01:58.960 In two thousand and one, DNA testing identified one male 0:01:59.080 --> 0:02:02.600 profile that did not match Gonzales, and just last week, 0:02:02.680 --> 0:02:05.080 further testing pointed to an additional man. 0:02:05.360 --> 0:02:07.800 It wasn't until lawyers from an innocence project took up 0:02:07.840 --> 0:02:09.919 his case and a change in leadership in the Lake 0:02:09.919 --> 0:02:13.119 County States Attorney's Office that DNA testing was conducted. 0:02:13.280 --> 0:02:16.160 The forty one year old initially confessed to the crime 0:02:16.200 --> 0:02:20.040 after a lengthy police interrogation, and the victim identified him 0:02:20.160 --> 0:02:23.640 at the time, but Gonzalez has long maintained his innocence. 0:02:23.880 --> 0:02:27.240 His attorney say Gonzalez head in alibi and no criminal history, 0:02:27.440 --> 0:02:30.359 and after a lengthy interrogation, he signed a confession written 0:02:30.360 --> 0:02:33.520 by Wakegan police in English, despite only speaking Spanish at 0:02:33.560 --> 0:02:33.880 the time. 0:02:34.040 --> 0:02:37.400 Freedom for a Man released Brockrison after serving nearly twenty 0:02:37.440 --> 0:02:40.400 one years for a crime he did not commit. On 0:02:40.560 --> 0:02:44.160 Hell Gonzalez walked out of the Dixon Correctional Facility. 0:02:43.680 --> 0:02:48.320 Tonight, twenty years after entering prison. Gonzalez, he's free. 0:02:48.639 --> 0:02:49.520 Welcome to the show. 0:02:49.800 --> 0:02:51.040 Thank you for having here. 0:02:51.080 --> 0:02:55.120 And we have another special guest today, the director of 0:02:55.200 --> 0:02:58.520 post conviction litigation at the Innocence Project, Vanessa Podkin. 0:02:58.840 --> 0:02:59.760 Thank you for having me. 0:03:00.040 --> 0:03:03.280 We're here to talk about a case that is troubling 0:03:03.280 --> 0:03:08.560 in so many ways in that it has elements of misconduct, 0:03:09.200 --> 0:03:12.720 it has elements of a thing called the show up. Right, 0:03:12.720 --> 0:03:14.440 when we talk about the show up which is something 0:03:14.480 --> 0:03:17.160 we haven't really focused on the show before, and various 0:03:17.200 --> 0:03:20.880 other things, Miranda right, come into play how those were administered. 0:03:21.360 --> 0:03:23.720 But before we get into all of that, let's go 0:03:23.919 --> 0:03:26.040 back to nineteen ninety four. 0:03:26.600 --> 0:03:29.120 I was leaving at the time in waki And, Illinois, 0:03:29.160 --> 0:03:33.280 which is about forty five mins north of Chicago, Lake. 0:03:33.120 --> 0:03:35.600 County, Right, and you were how old were you at 0:03:35.640 --> 0:03:36.000 the time? 0:03:36.240 --> 0:03:38.360 I was around twenty. 0:03:38.400 --> 0:03:40.680 Right, so just getting started on your life. 0:03:40.360 --> 0:03:44.720 Just getting started planning on getting married. Well, this's American dream, 0:03:45.240 --> 0:03:49.119 finally start planning for starting a family. At the time, 0:03:49.240 --> 0:03:52.920 talk to my ex girlfriend father and mother and us 0:03:53.040 --> 0:03:56.480 if we could marry, and they have I guess, And 0:03:56.560 --> 0:03:59.640 so it was met out of time and to save 0:03:59.680 --> 0:04:02.200 a little money and find a place to move. So 0:04:02.320 --> 0:04:04.840 everything seems like it was they were supposed to be 0:04:05.040 --> 0:04:07.320 for any normal person to get married and move on 0:04:07.360 --> 0:04:07.800 in life. 0:04:07.920 --> 0:04:11.000 Yeah, and it's actually a very honorable to go to 0:04:11.040 --> 0:04:14.160 the father and ask permission and everything else. On July 0:04:14.440 --> 0:04:18.440 tenth of nineteen ninety four, everything was sort of typical. 0:04:18.839 --> 0:04:21.880 I imagine for you you were visiting your girlfriend. 0:04:21.560 --> 0:04:26.920 Right, Yeah, they we went out, stopped by her friend's 0:04:26.920 --> 0:04:31.120 house and decided to go eat something, and we went 0:04:31.160 --> 0:04:34.200 out and eat on a fast food restaurant. After they 0:04:34.279 --> 0:04:38.839 we went to her sister's apartment. So we went there 0:04:38.880 --> 0:04:43.040 and watched movie Tonight. And that's what this or what 0:04:43.200 --> 0:04:43.919 crime happened. 0:04:44.279 --> 0:04:50.800 So unbeknownst to you, in the same apartment complex, something 0:04:50.920 --> 0:04:54.360 terrible was taking place, right, and Vanessa wantly turned to 0:04:54.400 --> 0:04:56.000 you for a minute, do you want to talk about 0:04:56.000 --> 0:04:56.920 the crime itself? 0:04:57.320 --> 0:04:59.880 Absolutely so. There was a woman who lived in this 0:05:00.120 --> 0:05:03.800 same kind of small apartment building who was at her house. 0:05:03.880 --> 0:05:07.760 She heard somebody buzzing her doorbell, went downstairs, and there 0:05:07.800 --> 0:05:10.360 were who she would later describe as two Latino men 0:05:10.400 --> 0:05:13.880 who abducted her into a vehicle and drove her to 0:05:13.960 --> 0:05:17.719 two different locations in the neighborhood where they sexually assaulted her. 0:05:18.200 --> 0:05:21.080 And ultimately she was able to escape, and she was 0:05:21.200 --> 0:05:25.680 very dazed and traumatized by the incident, understandably so, and 0:05:25.960 --> 0:05:28.479 ultimately made her way to seven eleven, where she was 0:05:28.520 --> 0:05:31.760 able to summon the police and they brought her back 0:05:31.800 --> 0:05:35.320 to the apartment where they started to investigate the crime, 0:05:35.520 --> 0:05:38.800 and later her boyfriend, the victim's boyfriend, came on the 0:05:38.880 --> 0:05:41.679 scene and started talking to the police and trying to 0:05:41.720 --> 0:05:44.360 see if he could be helpful in any way. 0:05:44.760 --> 0:05:48.719 Right, and that's where this starts to unravel, because you 0:05:49.520 --> 0:05:53.160 just wrong place, wrong time. Were in the apartment complex 0:05:53.760 --> 0:05:56.520 at some point you got into your car, right, presumably 0:05:56.600 --> 0:05:58.719 to go back to your place, that's correct. 0:05:58.760 --> 0:06:01.360 How do we watch a movie and we're about to 0:06:01.480 --> 0:06:04.719 wrap it up and go home, and when we walked 0:06:04.760 --> 0:06:07.560 up the apartment if you can run it correctly. There 0:06:07.560 --> 0:06:10.239 were some squad cars on the left side of the building, 0:06:10.720 --> 0:06:14.520 and you know, a small town like well, something obviously happened. 0:06:14.520 --> 0:06:17.200 Maybe who knows in the building. It's an apartment building. 0:06:17.560 --> 0:06:21.040 They didn't really are business, so we don't stay or ask. 0:06:21.200 --> 0:06:23.200 We just got in the car and decide to leave. 0:06:23.240 --> 0:06:26.560 And I drove to the gas station, put on some gas, 0:06:26.560 --> 0:06:28.560 and went on my way to drop off my girlfriend. 0:06:28.600 --> 0:06:31.640 And next thing you know, I was pull over. Right 0:06:31.680 --> 0:06:34.040 after I drop off my girlfriend now her house, I 0:06:34.160 --> 0:06:36.839 was pulled over, and I had no clue why it happened. 0:06:37.120 --> 0:06:40.880 And what we know that happened is that the victim's 0:06:40.880 --> 0:06:44.760 boyfriend saw your car, maybe out the window or whatever 0:06:44.800 --> 0:06:47.880 it was, and for some reason or other, this triggered 0:06:48.040 --> 0:06:49.960 something in him to think that this might be I 0:06:50.000 --> 0:06:52.400 don't know how he would have had any idea that 0:06:52.440 --> 0:06:55.880 this car was in some way related to her abduction 0:06:56.040 --> 0:07:00.240 and rape, but obviously he was wrong. But nonetheless, that's 0:07:00.279 --> 0:07:03.080 what led the police to go looking for you, is 0:07:03.120 --> 0:07:06.000 that he had seen the car and somehow made some 0:07:06.400 --> 0:07:08.160 assumption he saw the. 0:07:08.080 --> 0:07:11.040 Car, and the victim had given a very rough description 0:07:11.120 --> 0:07:13.800 of a large, dark sedan that was that she was 0:07:13.800 --> 0:07:17.800 abducted in and he's outside, the victim's boyfriend with the police, 0:07:17.960 --> 0:07:21.800 and from a distance sees Angel in his car, which 0:07:21.880 --> 0:07:24.680 was a dark car, driving off, and the victim's boyfriend 0:07:24.720 --> 0:07:27.679 says to the police, Hey, that car doesn't belong here. 0:07:27.760 --> 0:07:29.240 So it's one of these things that. 0:07:29.400 --> 0:07:31.440 You know, this is a car that's not usually seen 0:07:31.480 --> 0:07:35.480 in the apartment complex. And since Angel leaves, the police 0:07:35.520 --> 0:07:38.440 just write down the license plate number, and then that's 0:07:38.440 --> 0:07:40.400 why he's later stopped. 0:07:40.040 --> 0:07:42.000 You know, some time and some miles away. 0:07:42.320 --> 0:07:44.280 But of course, you know, when Angel's driving away from 0:07:44.320 --> 0:07:47.120 the scene, his girlfriend's sitting in the front seat with him. 0:07:47.240 --> 0:07:49.800 You know, he's taking his girlfriend home. They've just left 0:07:49.960 --> 0:07:54.440 the girlfriend's sister's house. And even from an investigative perspective 0:07:54.560 --> 0:07:57.520 at the time, what sense would it make for the 0:07:57.520 --> 0:08:00.840 perpetrator to return to the area an hour or two 0:08:00.960 --> 0:08:04.240 later from the same place that he just abducted somebody 0:08:04.240 --> 0:08:06.360 from when the police are around, you know, it'd make 0:08:06.360 --> 0:08:09.600 a little sense that the perpetrator would return. But nonetheless, 0:08:09.960 --> 0:08:13.200 acting only on the suspicion the boyfriend's suspicion that the 0:08:13.240 --> 0:08:16.200 car didn't belong there, they pulled the Angel over. 0:08:16.600 --> 0:08:19.480 Right he was Hispanic. That was close enough in this case, 0:08:19.760 --> 0:08:23.600 and then starts the process that we talk about a 0:08:23.600 --> 0:08:26.119 lot on the show, which is unique in this case 0:08:26.240 --> 0:08:28.640 just because of the fact that Angel was read his 0:08:28.760 --> 0:08:31.360 Miranda rights in a language he didn't speak very well 0:08:31.360 --> 0:08:33.960 at the time. Right, he was read them in English 0:08:34.320 --> 0:08:36.400 when your English was not good at that time. And 0:08:36.440 --> 0:08:40.000 now you speak fluently obviously, But did you understand at 0:08:40.040 --> 0:08:42.200 the time what they were telling you? 0:08:42.520 --> 0:08:44.439 Not at all. I don't have no no clue what 0:08:44.640 --> 0:08:47.400 was going on. When I got pulled over, it was well, 0:08:47.520 --> 0:08:50.160 some kind of traffic problem, something wrong with the car 0:08:50.320 --> 0:08:53.160 had lighter, But I don't have no clue on what 0:08:53.200 --> 0:08:56.439 was going on until they bringing temporary to the courtroom 0:08:56.640 --> 0:08:59.440 after I went for a bond hearing. There's one kind 0:08:59.440 --> 0:09:02.319 of stun to what was going on, and you kind 0:09:02.320 --> 0:09:05.080 of want to scream if it wasn't me, but you 0:09:05.080 --> 0:09:07.000 don't steal, like, well, there's got to be some kind 0:09:07.000 --> 0:09:10.640 of confusion. He's going to be meta day suntil they said, well, 0:09:10.880 --> 0:09:11.439 there's not a. 0:09:11.400 --> 0:09:15.600 Guy, because this is America, America, this isn't that don't 0:09:15.600 --> 0:09:17.520 happen in America. But so when you were read you 0:09:17.520 --> 0:09:20.920 were Miranda rights in the language that you didn't understand 0:09:21.000 --> 0:09:23.480 or speak very well, and you didn't at that time 0:09:23.600 --> 0:09:26.920 know why you were there, right, right, So let's think 0:09:26.920 --> 0:09:29.120 about that for a second. Right, if someone gets picked 0:09:29.200 --> 0:09:32.079 up and thinks that they're there for whether you speak 0:09:32.080 --> 0:09:34.400 English or not, and no matter if they read it 0:09:34.400 --> 0:09:38.000 to you in Portuguese, the fact is that if you 0:09:38.440 --> 0:09:40.199 are picked up and you think that it's just a 0:09:40.240 --> 0:09:43.319 minor violation of something that you're going to go to 0:09:43.360 --> 0:09:46.200 traffic court or whatever might be, why would you need 0:09:46.240 --> 0:09:48.080 a lawyer. I mean, you wouldn't even want a lawyer 0:09:48.160 --> 0:09:50.079 and pay for a lawyer, and you wouldn't want to 0:09:50.080 --> 0:09:51.720 wait for a lawyer. You probably want to get it 0:09:51.720 --> 0:09:53.760 done and so you could go home. But it worked 0:09:53.760 --> 0:09:57.480 the next day. So it's a very bad moment in 0:09:57.600 --> 0:10:01.600 time when you don't have that you need in order 0:10:01.640 --> 0:10:04.200 to make a decision that is actually life or death. 0:10:04.840 --> 0:10:09.719 But you're just being given totally in complete information, if 0:10:09.760 --> 0:10:13.160 any at all, and you're being read something you don't understand. 0:10:13.400 --> 0:10:15.880 So yeah, it's not set up to get to a 0:10:16.000 --> 0:10:19.640 very good conclusion. It's not set up to protect the 0:10:19.679 --> 0:10:20.959 person who's meant. 0:10:20.800 --> 0:10:24.120 To protect absolutely, and you have compounded the fact that 0:10:24.240 --> 0:10:27.800 Angel and his family recently had emigrated here, he wasn't 0:10:27.800 --> 0:10:32.559 familiar with the US system and barely spoke the language, 0:10:32.640 --> 0:10:36.920 so all of those barriers also existed, and he's not 0:10:37.040 --> 0:10:40.520 being given information as to what happened or why he's 0:10:40.559 --> 0:10:41.400 being questioned. 0:10:41.720 --> 0:10:43.679 Police did say to him, where. 0:10:43.440 --> 0:10:46.720 Were you, and he explains where he was. He says 0:10:46.760 --> 0:10:50.440 that keeps with his girlfriend, that they went to the 0:10:50.480 --> 0:10:54.839 girlfriend's sister's house. And at some point during this interrogation, 0:10:55.040 --> 0:11:00.880 which lasted many hours, police actually stopped and went out 0:11:01.200 --> 0:11:05.840 to follow up a bit on Angel's alibi. 0:11:06.160 --> 0:11:07.160 But they didn't. 0:11:07.000 --> 0:11:10.200 Follow up on the alibi in order to see if 0:11:10.200 --> 0:11:12.280 he could be exonerated and you know, whether or not 0:11:12.320 --> 0:11:13.280 he committed the crime. 0:11:13.960 --> 0:11:15.760 They actually used it. 0:11:16.000 --> 0:11:20.240 They used it as a tool to trick him, you know, 0:11:20.320 --> 0:11:24.320 into trying to give an inculpatory statement. And so they 0:11:24.360 --> 0:11:26.160 went back to him and they lied to him and 0:11:26.200 --> 0:11:29.600 they said, we looked into your alibi and it didn't 0:11:29.640 --> 0:11:33.280 pan out. Nobody's supporting your alibi, which was just a lie. 0:11:33.640 --> 0:11:37.320 But of course, as you know, it's completely constitutional and 0:11:37.440 --> 0:11:41.120 acceptable for police to lie to a suspect and to 0:11:41.320 --> 0:11:43.320 say they have fingerprints or you know, say that they 0:11:43.360 --> 0:11:46.160 have evidence that they don't have in order to try 0:11:46.200 --> 0:11:48.800 to get the suspect to confess. We call it the 0:11:48.800 --> 0:11:52.520 false evidence ploy. It's a huge problem in false confession 0:11:52.600 --> 0:11:56.920 cases because, in a sense is a risk factor for 0:11:57.000 --> 0:12:00.640 false confessions. You think, oh, this will sort itself out later. 0:12:01.160 --> 0:12:03.200 You don't ask for the lawyer because you know you 0:12:03.200 --> 0:12:05.120 didn't do it, and you just want to You're not 0:12:05.120 --> 0:12:07.000 thinking I need to protect my rights. I just want 0:12:07.000 --> 0:12:08.720 to tell you, and once I give my side of 0:12:08.720 --> 0:12:10.960 the story, you'll understand you have the wrong person. 0:12:11.240 --> 0:12:13.040 And of course it doesn't end that way. 0:12:13.120 --> 0:12:17.559 Right, and it's it's legally acceptable but morally reprehensible. Absolutely, 0:12:17.679 --> 0:12:21.720 And he had all the information at his disposal, so 0:12:22.320 --> 0:12:26.280 he would have had every reason to believe that he 0:12:26.360 --> 0:12:29.800 would have been protected by the truth. But that's unfortunately, 0:12:29.800 --> 0:12:32.000 as we know, that's not how it works in too 0:12:32.040 --> 0:12:35.199 many cases. And his is really a perfect example that 0:12:35.520 --> 0:12:38.600 there was another factor too, which was sleep. Right, because 0:12:38.600 --> 0:12:40.560 you were there for quite a while, right, you're picked 0:12:40.600 --> 0:12:44.040 up at night, right, so you're probably a little tired, right, 0:12:44.679 --> 0:12:49.360 stressed obviously from the situation. How long did this go 0:12:49.440 --> 0:12:51.679 on for and how and what effect did that have 0:12:51.800 --> 0:12:55.439 on your ability to make you know, reasonable decisions. 0:12:55.720 --> 0:12:58.960 Well, after I got to the police station. At one 0:12:58.960 --> 0:13:02.760 point you lose track of time. I don't remember exactly 0:13:02.840 --> 0:13:06.040 how many hours, what was day or night anymore. Just 0:13:06.440 --> 0:13:07.920 do what you have to do. Let me get out 0:13:07.960 --> 0:13:10.679 of here. Some tired. I want to go sleep, I 0:13:10.679 --> 0:13:13.000 want to eat, I want to drink something. It is 0:13:13.600 --> 0:13:17.439 something they ill steal. Don't understand myself. Sometimes when you 0:13:17.720 --> 0:13:20.320 is so tired, you just want to everything wain like, 0:13:20.840 --> 0:13:22.360 do what you have to do, Just get me out 0:13:22.360 --> 0:13:22.640 of here. 0:13:23.120 --> 0:13:25.240 Right. Well, that's a common thing too, Vanessa. Right when 0:13:25.280 --> 0:13:29.440 you end up in that tiny room, you're basically trapped. 0:13:29.840 --> 0:13:32.840 You can't go anywhere, you have no access to anyone 0:13:32.880 --> 0:13:36.320 to help you, and you're overmatched, and they have everything 0:13:36.360 --> 0:13:38.480 on their side. They can lie, they can keep you 0:13:38.520 --> 0:13:40.040 awake for as long as they want. They can they 0:13:40.040 --> 0:13:42.600 can make you hungry, they can stress you out, but 0:13:42.640 --> 0:13:45.360 you're already stressed out enough. One of the other aspects 0:13:45.400 --> 0:13:46.800 of the case that I wanted to talk about is 0:13:46.800 --> 0:13:49.680 to show up because one of the reasons that Angel 0:13:50.080 --> 0:13:56.079 was wrongfully identified misidentified was because of the way that 0:13:56.160 --> 0:14:00.000 he was first viewed by the victim right or the witness, 0:14:00.160 --> 0:14:01.920 which I guess was the boyfriend. Can you talk about 0:14:01.920 --> 0:14:02.440 that little bit? 0:14:02.559 --> 0:14:07.560 Absolutely so ironically, he was basically across the street from 0:14:07.800 --> 0:14:10.880 the jail and courthouse on his way home when he 0:14:10.920 --> 0:14:14.600 was pulled over by police. And as he mentioned, he 0:14:14.640 --> 0:14:16.480 didn't know why he was being pulled over. He thought 0:14:16.559 --> 0:14:18.439 was at a traffic stop, you know, where they checking 0:14:18.440 --> 0:14:21.720 his license. He was a bit perplexed as to what 0:14:21.800 --> 0:14:25.360 was going on. And the police called back to the victim, 0:14:25.400 --> 0:14:27.920 who was at the scene with other officers back at 0:14:27.920 --> 0:14:31.040 her apartment complex, and they decided to do what's called 0:14:31.040 --> 0:14:35.520 the show up procedure, and essentially, officers brought the victim 0:14:35.720 --> 0:14:39.240 to the area where they had pulled Angel over, and 0:14:39.600 --> 0:14:43.800 the victim was seated in a patrol car, and they 0:14:44.000 --> 0:14:48.320 brought Angel in handcuffs with an officer standing next to him. 0:14:48.640 --> 0:14:51.760 And this is late at night, and so they have 0:14:51.840 --> 0:14:54.880 their headlights on and so that's the lighting. And they 0:14:54.880 --> 0:14:57.760 take Angel right in front of the car where the 0:14:57.840 --> 0:15:01.440 victim is, and while he's handcuffed and next to an officer, 0:15:01.520 --> 0:15:02.040 they say. 0:15:01.840 --> 0:15:03.760 To her, is this the man? Now? 0:15:04.160 --> 0:15:09.080 It's a highly suggestive procedure, of course, because what's the expectation. 0:15:09.280 --> 0:15:11.720 The expectation is that they caught the guy who did this, 0:15:12.400 --> 0:15:15.880 and those type of procedures show up should only be 0:15:16.040 --> 0:15:21.080 used in very exceptional circumstances, and here there was absolutely 0:15:21.160 --> 0:15:23.480 no excuse to do a show up because. 0:15:23.240 --> 0:15:24.880 They were across the street from the jail. 0:15:25.000 --> 0:15:26.320 They could, you know, if they wanted to do a 0:15:26.360 --> 0:15:28.920 lineup procedure with Angel, they could have said, will you 0:15:28.960 --> 0:15:31.480 come with us over to the jail and put together 0:15:31.640 --> 0:15:34.360 five or six people and got people who matched the 0:15:34.440 --> 0:15:38.040 victim's initial description and done a procedure that would have 0:15:38.040 --> 0:15:41.720 been fair. But they didn't do that, and they conducted 0:15:41.880 --> 0:15:45.440 this highly suggestive procedure and she said, yeah, that's him, 0:15:45.760 --> 0:15:48.600 which was almost inevitable based on the circumstances. 0:15:48.800 --> 0:15:52.080 I mean, you'd identify almost anybody at that point because 0:15:52.160 --> 0:15:54.120 it just looks like, well, wait a minute, the guy's 0:15:54.120 --> 0:15:56.800 in handcuffs, the cops got him, he's in my neighborhood. 0:15:57.320 --> 0:15:58.960 You're hispanic, good enough? 0:15:59.200 --> 0:15:59.360 Right? 0:15:59.480 --> 0:16:01.640 Who cares? I mean, so you don't look like the guy, 0:16:01.680 --> 0:16:05.120 but your mind is not right at that point anyway. 0:16:05.840 --> 0:16:11.360 And it's unbelievable that that is accepted procedure because it's 0:16:11.520 --> 0:16:14.640 just begging for mistakes to happen. 0:16:14.400 --> 0:16:17.520 To add insult to injury. They told the victim before 0:16:17.600 --> 0:16:21.400 she viewed Angel, we got somebody who matches the description 0:16:21.560 --> 0:16:24.880 of the person and driving a similar car. 0:16:24.720 --> 0:16:26.480 As you've reported. So we're going to bring you over 0:16:26.520 --> 0:16:26.880 to take. 0:16:26.800 --> 0:16:29.240 A look at him, right done. I mean you had 0:16:29.240 --> 0:16:32.000 no chance at that point in the general was totally stacked 0:16:32.040 --> 0:16:35.920 and you had no chance. In Angel's case, there were 0:16:35.920 --> 0:16:38.560 a lot of irregularities, to put it nicely, in the 0:16:38.600 --> 0:16:42.240 way that his confession was recorded and the way it 0:16:42.280 --> 0:16:44.600 was documented, and if you could just touch on that 0:16:44.640 --> 0:16:46.840 for a second, because it's important for people to know. 0:16:46.880 --> 0:16:48.640 I think people would like to think that when a 0:16:48.680 --> 0:16:51.360 confession is made, it's like the guy just sits there. 0:16:51.400 --> 0:16:53.480 He has a guilty conscience. He goes, I did it. 0:16:53.560 --> 0:16:56.080 I feel bad. I want to tell the truth. But 0:16:56.200 --> 0:16:59.920 in this case, it was fraught with problems and error. 0:17:00.720 --> 0:17:03.880 Right, So they brought Angel in. They had him there overnight. 0:17:03.960 --> 0:17:06.240 He really didn't know what he was there for. You know, 0:17:06.280 --> 0:17:08.399 the next morning, I believe it was, they start the 0:17:08.600 --> 0:17:13.040 formal interrogation process, and you know, at that time, Angel's saying, 0:17:13.400 --> 0:17:15.440 I was with my girlfriend last night. We went and 0:17:15.480 --> 0:17:20.160 saw her sister. He gives his alibi. The officer leaves 0:17:20.200 --> 0:17:22.760 at one point claiming that he's going to go try 0:17:22.800 --> 0:17:25.919 to check out Angel's alibi, and that's when he comes 0:17:25.960 --> 0:17:29.560 back and essentially lies to Angel and says, your albi 0:17:29.640 --> 0:17:33.160 doesn't check out. And you know, when you confront somebody 0:17:33.200 --> 0:17:37.080 with false evidence, people starts to feel overwhelmed and a 0:17:37.119 --> 0:17:40.280 sense of hopelessness, and let me get out of this situation. 0:17:40.480 --> 0:17:44.440 And they keep pressuring him, and basically the officer even 0:17:44.520 --> 0:17:48.360 testified at trial that they told him what happened. 0:17:48.480 --> 0:17:49.360 So they gave. 0:17:49.280 --> 0:17:51.600 Angel the facts of the crime. You know, he didn't 0:17:51.600 --> 0:17:54.240 know the facts, they gave it to him. And all 0:17:54.280 --> 0:17:57.600 this interrogation is happening, in the first instance, in English, 0:17:57.680 --> 0:18:00.959 and he doesn't speak English very well, so they're interrogating 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:04.240 him in English, and then they ask him to write 0:18:04.240 --> 0:18:07.080 out a statement, and so he writes something out in Spanish, 0:18:07.119 --> 0:18:10.000 and though he's been given bits and pieces from the police, 0:18:10.040 --> 0:18:11.959 he doesn't he didn't do it. So he doesn't know 0:18:12.000 --> 0:18:14.480 the details of the crime. So the statement that he 0:18:14.520 --> 0:18:17.680 writes is just totally irrelevant, you know, it just wouldn't 0:18:17.680 --> 0:18:20.919 hold water. And so at that point, they bring somebody 0:18:20.960 --> 0:18:24.800 in who's Spanish speaking, and you know, interrogate him for 0:18:25.160 --> 0:18:29.400 much more time until they finally produce a statement that's 0:18:29.640 --> 0:18:33.639 written in English typewritten, I believe in English that they 0:18:33.680 --> 0:18:37.199 get him to sign without translating it into Spanish. So 0:18:37.240 --> 0:18:39.520 there's everything is wrong with this interrogation. 0:18:39.840 --> 0:18:42.960 And they didn't videotape the process at all, right, the 0:18:43.000 --> 0:18:45.080 only video that they produced was the video of him 0:18:45.119 --> 0:18:47.000 being read his Miranda rights at a time when he 0:18:47.040 --> 0:18:49.159 didn't understand what the hell they were talking about or 0:18:49.200 --> 0:18:49.960 why he was there. 0:18:50.040 --> 0:18:53.280 So, yeah, and you would hope that the courts would 0:18:53.359 --> 0:18:55.760 look at this and go, wait, there's all kinds of 0:18:55.800 --> 0:18:59.520 problems here. This is yes, it's a confession, but where's 0:18:59.560 --> 0:19:02.560 the where's the beef? You know? 0:19:02.680 --> 0:19:06.040 I think that this happened, you know, in nineteen ninety four, 0:19:06.359 --> 0:19:10.640 and here we are decades later, and we've had three 0:19:10.680 --> 0:19:15.399 hundred and fifty dnaxonerations, and the statistics are one in 0:19:15.560 --> 0:19:20.240 four of those people who were wrongfully convicted falsely confessed 0:19:20.240 --> 0:19:23.680 to crimes that they were completely innocent of. And even 0:19:23.760 --> 0:19:27.200 though we have those numbers and so much has been 0:19:27.240 --> 0:19:31.920 revealed about false confessions, there still is this attitude prevalent 0:19:32.040 --> 0:19:35.199 among courts and people in the system, and even to 0:19:35.240 --> 0:19:37.679 some extent the general public, that if you confessed, you 0:19:37.760 --> 0:19:40.760 did it, and people think. 0:19:40.600 --> 0:19:42.760 Of themselves and whatever strength or. 0:19:42.680 --> 0:19:45.560 Fortitude they think they have, and how they would respond, Oh, 0:19:45.560 --> 0:19:47.880 I would never confess to something I didn't do, even 0:19:47.920 --> 0:19:49.080 if I was interrogated. 0:19:49.600 --> 0:19:52.160 And so we still find that. 0:19:52.160 --> 0:19:55.840 People have trouble believing that somebody would admit to something 0:19:55.920 --> 0:19:58.080 that they didn't do, so they don't give it the 0:19:58.080 --> 0:20:01.040 scrutiny that you're just talking about. You know, nobody stops 0:20:01.040 --> 0:20:03.119 in the system to say, hey, this doesn't make sense. 0:20:03.760 --> 0:20:07.440 And right now, really the only screening that courts do 0:20:07.720 --> 0:20:10.399 for whether a confession should be admitted is whether or 0:20:10.400 --> 0:20:13.200 not it's voluntary. Did you get your miranda rights and 0:20:13.359 --> 0:20:17.679 knowingly waive them? Nobody looks at is this reliable? No 0:20:17.840 --> 0:20:21.320 court is doing a pre screening before trial to say, 0:20:21.400 --> 0:20:24.000 are there too many discrepancies between the facts, This is 0:20:24.119 --> 0:20:27.159 story does not make sense, and if so, we're not 0:20:27.200 --> 0:20:31.160 going to allow this evidence. In and Angel's case happened 0:20:31.200 --> 0:20:35.360 in a jurisdiction Lake County, Illinois, Waukegan that had many 0:20:35.480 --> 0:20:39.240 other wrongful convictions, Some of them false confessions, and of 0:20:39.280 --> 0:20:42.720 course it's Chicago's not too far away with the torture 0:20:42.800 --> 0:20:48.160