WEBVTT - #511 Jason Flom with Louis Costilla, Jr. 0:00:02.279 --> 0:00:05.320 On the morning of August fourth, nineteen ninety two, the 0:00:05.400 --> 0:00:08.560 body of thirty one year old Vernon Huggins was discovered 0:00:08.600 --> 0:00:13.880 in a park on the north side of Toledo, Ohio. Oddly, 0:00:14.520 --> 0:00:18.160 from when the case opened until that December, there appeared 0:00:18.200 --> 0:00:23.080 to be no investigative record until an alleged anonymous tip 0:00:23.239 --> 0:00:26.040 led to witnesses who claimed to have seen a wooden 0:00:26.079 --> 0:00:31.160 club wielding white supremacist gang bragging about the crime. Then 0:00:31.840 --> 0:00:35.239 one young man signed a statement making him part of 0:00:35.320 --> 0:00:40.600 the Loathsome group, before immediately denying the statement he just signed, 0:00:41.000 --> 0:00:45.519 but it was already too late for him and four others, 0:00:46.159 --> 0:00:51.760 including twenty year old Lewis Costilla. This is Wrongful Conviction. 0:00:57.040 --> 0:00:59.920 You're listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen to this 0:01:00.120 --> 0:01:02.680 and all the Lava for Good podcasts one week early 0:01:02.760 --> 0:01:06.080 and ad free by subscribing to Lava for Good Plus 0:01:06.400 --> 0:01:17.240 on Apple Podcasts. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction, where we're 0:01:17.240 --> 0:01:21.480 heading to Toledo, Ohio to cover the investigation and prosecution 0:01:21.640 --> 0:01:26.360 of five young men Ismael and Lorenzo Vasquez, Joseph Ercard, 0:01:27.040 --> 0:01:30.920 Eric Mish, and our guest today, Lewis Castilla and if 0:01:31.000 --> 0:01:34.399 names like Castilla and Vascaz don't exactly sound like they 0:01:34.440 --> 0:01:38.160 fit into a white supremacist group to you, Well, you 0:01:38.240 --> 0:01:43.160 might not be the only one. So lewis welcome and 0:01:43.240 --> 0:01:45.679 joining him is his post conviction attorney, a partner with 0:01:45.720 --> 0:01:49.960 the Ohio defense firm Don Malarchick. Thanks for joining us. 0:01:50.440 --> 0:01:52.720 Sure now, Lou, I want you to take us back 0:01:52.720 --> 0:01:54.800 to your beginnings in Toledo, Ohio. 0:01:55.520 --> 0:01:58.000 Yeah. I was born and raised in the north side 0:01:58.000 --> 0:02:01.040 of Toledo. That guy the three brothers, and I wouldn't 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:03.240 say baby sister, but she ain't a baby no more so. 0:02:03.640 --> 0:02:05.440 When I was thirteen years old, man I lied on 0:02:05.480 --> 0:02:08.720 application to get a child. I was at dishwasher, spaghetti 0:02:08.760 --> 0:02:11.480 where else. So I worked because that's how my dad 0:02:11.560 --> 0:02:13.400 raised me. It might not have been around a lot, 0:02:13.600 --> 0:02:15.240 but I know he loved me. But that man got 0:02:15.320 --> 0:02:19.280 up every day at work. Just family life was. I mean, 0:02:19.440 --> 0:02:22.160 I love my parents, okay, love them both to death, 0:02:23.360 --> 0:02:25.960 but I had to grow up quick. I mean my 0:02:26.040 --> 0:02:29.359 dad's problems, my maya or problems, and as a kid, 0:02:29.440 --> 0:02:32.800 I didn't realize adult problems. I was dealing with them, 0:02:32.880 --> 0:02:36.239 just didn't realize them. So I just I ran the streets. 0:02:36.560 --> 0:02:38.680 I mean, I wasn't out there running the streets like 0:02:38.720 --> 0:02:39.120 they said. 0:02:39.160 --> 0:02:39.520 I was. 0:02:39.840 --> 0:02:42.480 Okay, But I mean I just I was irresponsible as 0:02:42.480 --> 0:02:45.840 a kid. Okay. I snuck around, snuck out at night, 0:02:46.320 --> 0:02:48.800 we'd go sit forty ounces with the friends. But I 0:02:48.880 --> 0:02:51.280 was happy. I wasn't out there beating nobody up and 0:02:51.280 --> 0:02:53.160 doing the things that they did. But like the whole 0:02:53.240 --> 0:02:55.960 trying to say I was part of a white supremacist group, 0:02:56.200 --> 0:02:58.560 trust me, if the Toledo police had to describe me, 0:02:58.639 --> 0:03:00.600 the last thing they would describe me as was a 0:03:00.600 --> 0:03:03.880 white supremacist. Just that's not who I was. All I 0:03:03.960 --> 0:03:07.840 know is the cops in Toledo didn't like me. Okay, 0:03:08.120 --> 0:03:10.320 they would stop us all the time because of my 0:03:10.400 --> 0:03:12.800 last name. Now, like I said, I wasn't no Angel. 0:03:13.280 --> 0:03:15.600 I did dumb shit, but that's what we all do. 0:03:15.919 --> 0:03:17.520 I got jumped one time when I was a kid. 0:03:17.600 --> 0:03:19.640 The detectant came told me I had to drop chargers 0:03:19.639 --> 0:03:22.600 and he was gonna charge me. Like I mean, Toledo 0:03:22.840 --> 0:03:24.920 is just I don't even know how to explain it. 0:03:25.280 --> 0:03:26.560 That's just the way them cobs were. 0:03:27.240 --> 0:03:30.519 Sounds like they had a very loose relationship with the truth. 0:03:31.280 --> 0:03:34.800 Which might help explain what happened in the investigation of 0:03:34.880 --> 0:03:37.920 the murder of thirty one year old Vernon Huggins, who 0:03:37.960 --> 0:03:41.560 reportedly had a very volatile relationship with his girlfriend, Emma, 0:03:41.960 --> 0:03:45.120 and then his body was discovered around seven thirty am 0:03:45.320 --> 0:03:48.640 on August fourth, nineteen eighty two in Woodrow Wilson Park 0:03:49.040 --> 0:03:50.240 on the north side of Toledo. 0:03:50.560 --> 0:03:55.440 Vernon is discovered and this bloody bottle was picked up 0:03:55.600 --> 0:04:00.120 near Vernon. But this piece of evidence went untested. It 0:04:00.240 --> 0:04:04.400 stayed in the evidence fault and people are being interviewed 0:04:04.680 --> 0:04:09.440 right away. Vernon's mom says, this must have been Emma's family. 0:04:09.560 --> 0:04:11.880 I mean, she knows how volatile. 0:04:11.520 --> 0:04:12.360 Their history is. 0:04:12.440 --> 0:04:17.200 She knows that this was a really dangerous and violent relationship. 0:04:17.320 --> 0:04:20.880 Vernon's uncles, Nathaniel, saw him, and Nathaniel says he was 0:04:20.920 --> 0:04:25.080 with vern after two am, about three am. Gave him 0:04:25.200 --> 0:04:30.520 sixty bucks, followed him and vern is approached by four 0:04:30.560 --> 0:04:34.440 black males and Nathaniel says they're threatening him, confronting him, 0:04:34.880 --> 0:04:39.200 and they're driving this gray station wagon with tinted windows. 0:04:39.320 --> 0:04:41.360 And he was on the whole other side of town. 0:04:41.800 --> 0:04:43.919 This happened on the east side. They found him in 0:04:43.920 --> 0:04:44.880 the North End Well. 0:04:44.920 --> 0:04:48.640 The murder was initially investigated by Detective Berks, and at 0:04:48.720 --> 0:04:50.520 least one in the group of four was said to 0:04:50.560 --> 0:04:53.279 have been carrying the leg of a wooden chair. Then 0:04:53.640 --> 0:04:56.720 Vernon Huggins somehow went from the east side of Toledo 0:04:56.880 --> 0:05:00.400 across the Maumie River to the North End before or 0:05:00.440 --> 0:05:03.440 after he was beaten to death after three am, and 0:05:03.560 --> 0:05:06.560 his body was found in Woodrow Wilson Park. Now, strangely, 0:05:06.839 --> 0:05:10.640 the police only collected one shoe print, which could indicate 0:05:10.680 --> 0:05:13.200 that the park was not the site of the group assault. 0:05:13.520 --> 0:05:16.920 Either way, there appears to have been promising leads. 0:05:17.320 --> 0:05:21.200 So the real legitimate leads that pointed to Emma's family 0:05:21.400 --> 0:05:27.080 were there that information was available, Unfortunately, nobody followed up 0:05:27.120 --> 0:05:31.200 on that. What happens, unfortunately, is the initial detective who's 0:05:31.240 --> 0:05:35.400 on the case, Detective Berks, is reassigned and all of 0:05:35.440 --> 0:05:39.560 this information that pointed to other individuals is really buried 0:05:39.720 --> 0:05:43.360 and not eventually provided to the defense attorneys. 0:05:43.680 --> 0:05:47.040 The case was reassigned to detectives Robert Lighter and James 0:05:47.040 --> 0:05:50.279 Anderson in December nineteen ninety two, who, instead of following 0:05:50.320 --> 0:05:54.760 Burke's investigation to his logical end came upon an alternate theory. 0:05:55.080 --> 0:05:59.240 This idea that this white supremacist group attacked Vernon seemed 0:05:59.240 --> 0:06:02.280 to take foothold in the minds of these detectives. They 0:06:02.279 --> 0:06:05.799 were desperate to solve this homicide. They ignored other evidence, 0:06:05.839 --> 0:06:09.120 they ignored other leads, and most importantly, they ignored the 0:06:09.240 --> 0:06:11.279 lack of any physical evidence at all. 0:06:11.839 --> 0:06:15.120 It's unclear what or who was the source of this 0:06:15.400 --> 0:06:19.520 unsupported new theory. According to them, it was a January 0:06:19.600 --> 0:06:24.240 nineteen ninety three anonymous tip. But interestingly, around that time, 0:06:24.360 --> 0:06:27.280 a man named John Urbina was also arrested on an 0:06:27.360 --> 0:06:31.560 unrelated charge. And lucky for these two gum shoes, they 0:06:31.600 --> 0:06:34.600 had in their custody the bona fide founder of this 0:06:34.800 --> 0:06:38.200 alleged wooden club wielding white supremacist gang. 0:06:38.920 --> 0:06:44.120 Look, there's no such thing. There's no such thing, none whatsoever. Period. 0:06:44.320 --> 0:06:46.520 Let me tell you who Johnny Orbina is. I didn't 0:06:46.600 --> 0:06:49.719 like John or Pina. I whooped his ass twice. Johnny 0:06:49.800 --> 0:06:52.919 Robina is a sex offender. Okay, he touched on a 0:06:52.920 --> 0:06:54.920 little girl in the neighborhood. I was gonna whoop him 0:06:54.920 --> 0:06:56.479 in the county when they put him in the holding tank. 0:06:56.520 --> 0:06:59.240 With me because of who he touched. Okay, they threw 0:06:59.279 --> 0:07:02.080 them charges out because he told his fucking story. And 0:07:02.160 --> 0:07:04.320 now he's doing al wop in Texas for doing the 0:07:04.360 --> 0:07:05.919 same goddamn thing he did here. 0:07:06.240 --> 0:07:10.360 So either Urbina was offering false information about the Vernon 0:07:10.400 --> 0:07:14.440 Huggins murder to escape being a convicted job molester, thereby 0:07:14.520 --> 0:07:17.920 becoming the origin of this unsupported white gang theory, or 0:07:18.600 --> 0:07:22.040 it happened just like these two detectives reported it officially 0:07:22.320 --> 0:07:24.680 that a crime Stoppers tip came in leading to an 0:07:24.680 --> 0:07:27.360 apartment on the North Side rented by a woman named 0:07:27.440 --> 0:07:30.920 Lisa Earle and her roommate Michelle Parkhurst, who claimed to 0:07:30.960 --> 0:07:33.760 have been at John Urbina's house in July of ninety 0:07:33.760 --> 0:07:37.800 two when the gang arrived sometime between midnight and one am, 0:07:37.840 --> 0:07:39.840 bragging about beating up a black man. 0:07:40.280 --> 0:07:42.640 But the problem with all that is she's got the 0:07:42.680 --> 0:07:46.440 wrong day. The detectives are feeding her information, they're telling 0:07:46.480 --> 0:07:49.760 her when it supposedly happens. She's correcting herself. Oh yeah, 0:07:49.760 --> 0:07:52.840 it must have been in August, not in July. It 0:07:52.880 --> 0:07:56.560 doesn't make any sense. And I think they were desperate 0:07:56.640 --> 0:07:58.680 to pin this on somebody. 0:07:58.960 --> 0:08:03.000 Now, according to park Curse twenty sixteen, Alfid David. Those 0:08:03.080 --> 0:08:07.040 somebodies were seventeen year old Joey Hall and twenty year 0:08:07.080 --> 0:08:11.040 old Lou Castilla, the latter of whom Parkhurst was acquainted 0:08:11.080 --> 0:08:13.320 with through her roommate Lisa Earle. 0:08:13.680 --> 0:08:15.920 Look, the only reason I went to Lisa Earl's house 0:08:16.200 --> 0:08:18.760 is because I was doing her, simple as that. Okay. 0:08:18.840 --> 0:08:21.440 Michelle Parker's mom is the one that called crime starver 0:08:21.800 --> 0:08:24.760 and she ain't none but a fucking crackhead. Okay, Michelle 0:08:24.760 --> 0:08:26.400 Parker's done guy. All of her kids too. 0:08:26.840 --> 0:08:31.520 Parkhurst twenty sixteen, Alfid David continued that she was noticeably 0:08:31.560 --> 0:08:34.320 pregnant at the time and had already lost custody of 0:08:34.360 --> 0:08:37.760 her first son, and then these detectives threatened her with 0:08:37.880 --> 0:08:41.280 murder charges if she didn't cooperate, at which point she 0:08:41.480 --> 0:08:44.400 said the wrong month as well as the wrong time, 0:08:44.679 --> 0:08:48.280 between midnight and one am, when Vernon was last seen 0:08:48.320 --> 0:08:51.760 alive around three am, and it appears that the police 0:08:51.760 --> 0:08:56.160 suggested that perhaps the group arrived in a gray Chevy Nova. 0:08:56.960 --> 0:08:59.800 Evidently Michelle knew I drove that great Nova. It used 0:08:59.840 --> 0:09:02.040 to be my mom's car. It was always parked right 0:09:02.080 --> 0:09:04.680 down the street. From her, and I bought the car. Okay, 0:09:04.679 --> 0:09:06.319 but the car was a piece of shit and it 0:09:06.440 --> 0:09:09.240 set in my mother in law's backyard. It wasn't even 0:09:09.280 --> 0:09:12.760 fucking running in July, let alone August. But why would 0:09:12.800 --> 0:09:15.000 they say we're looking for a great nova? Why not 0:09:15.040 --> 0:09:18.880 a blue nova? Unless you read some shit that suggested 0:09:18.920 --> 0:09:20.160 something great. 0:09:19.960 --> 0:09:23.120 Like the gray station wagon from the initial investigation. So 0:09:23.440 --> 0:09:27.319 that's three falsehoods for Parkhurst. And that theme continued when 0:09:27.320 --> 0:09:30.160 they visited Joey Hall, who also chose to be a 0:09:30.200 --> 0:09:34.440 witness rather than a co defendant, giving many inconsistent statements 0:09:34.440 --> 0:09:37.600 that ultimately allowed him a vantage point for the fatal beating. 0:09:37.880 --> 0:09:41.160 And this is where Ismael and Lorenzo v Aska has 0:09:41.280 --> 0:09:41.960 first come out. 0:09:42.480 --> 0:09:45.080 Listen, Joey Hall just got out a juvie. His ass 0:09:45.080 --> 0:09:47.880 got locked right back up after this dude got killed. 0:09:48.240 --> 0:09:50.360 So the only thing I could think of, man, is 0:09:50.400 --> 0:09:52.400 he did that shit to get his ass out of trouble. 0:09:52.920 --> 0:09:55.960 And Derbino was no different now. Not only did he 0:09:56.000 --> 0:09:59.440 claim to have founded this wooden club wielding white supremacist group, 0:10:00.040 --> 0:10:02.959 also said the wrong month and time, a July night 0:10:03.120 --> 0:10:07.600 between midnight and two am. Despite these numerous inconsistencies and 0:10:07.679 --> 0:10:10.800 falsehoods in their statements. Arrest warrants were signed for Lou 0:10:11.040 --> 0:10:14.600 Joe Rickard who went by CJ, and then the Vasquez brothers, 0:10:15.320 --> 0:10:17.280 and all of them were charged with murder. 0:10:17.840 --> 0:10:20.520 When they came and got me, I was working and 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:22.920 they slammed me up against the wall. At the time, 0:10:23.120 --> 0:10:25.559 I was on back child support, so I thought that's 0:10:25.600 --> 0:10:27.720 what it was. And then when they told me murder, 0:10:27.760 --> 0:10:29.800 I'm like, yeah, y'all got to be fucking tripping. I 0:10:29.800 --> 0:10:32.080 ain't killed nobody. I thought it was a fucking joke. 0:10:32.520 --> 0:10:34.640 So but yeah, I think me and CJ was the 0:10:34.640 --> 0:10:35.760 first two to be arrested. 0:10:35.960 --> 0:10:40.800 Meanwhile, Urbina, allegedly on his own, also named a sixteen 0:10:40.880 --> 0:10:43.960 year old kid named Eric Mish who was brought down 0:10:44.000 --> 0:10:46.560 to the precinct where he was adamant that he knew 0:10:46.640 --> 0:10:47.640 nothing about the crime. 0:10:48.360 --> 0:10:51.080 The detectives then take him out of the police department, 0:10:51.240 --> 0:10:54.280 drive him over the crime scene. They're showing him where 0:10:54.320 --> 0:10:58.200 this stuff happened, and the detectives start really feeding him 0:10:58.320 --> 0:11:02.319 this fake story of and Joe and everybody else's involvement. 0:11:02.720 --> 0:11:06.680 And they are lying to Eric who's sixteen and saying 0:11:06.760 --> 0:11:08.720 we know you were there. We've got proof that you 0:11:08.800 --> 0:11:10.880 were there, we got witnesses that you were there. You know, 0:11:10.920 --> 0:11:13.040 you don't want to go down alone on this. You 0:11:13.040 --> 0:11:15.400 don't want to be in prison. So you're fifty years old. 0:11:15.600 --> 0:11:17.959 Until he was fifty, they said the same shit to me. 0:11:17.960 --> 0:11:21.280 Too, And they are literally coercing a sixteen year old 0:11:21.360 --> 0:11:25.959 kid into saying a statement that's complete bullshit. What's also important, 0:11:26.000 --> 0:11:28.679 I think is the detectives were with him for hours 0:11:28.720 --> 0:11:32.240 and hours, feeding him there what they call pre thoughts 0:11:32.520 --> 0:11:34.480 about their theory of the case. 0:11:34.800 --> 0:11:38.120 So they made a twenty one minute long recording running 0:11:38.200 --> 0:11:41.160 through the narrative as if Eric was there as a 0:11:41.200 --> 0:11:42.760 witness to the fatal beating. 0:11:43.120 --> 0:11:45.560 You can hear him trying to make this shit up 0:11:45.559 --> 0:11:48.680 as he's going along, and they're having him correct his 0:11:48.800 --> 0:11:51.920 story as he's making it up, and he's saying, in 0:11:52.000 --> 0:11:53.880 his mind, if I can tell these guys what I 0:11:53.920 --> 0:11:56.400 know they want to hear, maybe I can go home today. 0:11:56.720 --> 0:11:59.680 So he does go home with the expectation that he'd testify, 0:11:59.800 --> 0:12:03.360 but he recanted the following day, so he was arrested, 0:12:03.800 --> 0:12:06.040 and meanwhile they offered lou a plea deal. 0:12:06.480 --> 0:12:09.679 It was an involuntary man slaughter in the commission of 0:12:09.679 --> 0:12:12.400 a flonious assault, which we call for ten to twenty 0:12:12.400 --> 0:12:14.720 five and I'm not going to lie. I thought about 0:12:14.720 --> 0:12:16.320 it like man, because I didn't know what the hell 0:12:16.400 --> 0:12:18.320 was going on. But then the next day I called 0:12:18.360 --> 0:12:19.920 my attorney, I said, man, I can't do this. I 0:12:19.920 --> 0:12:22.160 didn't do nothing, but they told us, if you don't 0:12:22.200 --> 0:12:24.720 take this deal, we're going to read indict you on 0:12:24.760 --> 0:12:27.280 AG murder AG robbery. I'm like, how in the hell 0:12:27.320 --> 0:12:29.840 are you gonna do that? Where they used Air's confession, 0:12:30.080 --> 0:12:32.360 and that afternoon the sheriff came up and say, here's 0:12:32.360 --> 0:12:34.840 your reindictment papers, AG murder, AG robbery. 0:12:35.080 --> 0:12:39.000 Joe Rickard, Ismael and Venzo Vasquez and Eric Misch also 0:12:39.080 --> 0:12:43.480 received aggravated murder and aggravated robbery chargers. And somewhere along 0:12:43.520 --> 0:12:46.640 the way, a woman named Rosemary Nell came forward with 0:12:46.679 --> 0:12:49.720 a wooden club that was allegedly left at her home 0:12:49.800 --> 0:12:53.600 by CJ aka Joe Rickard, which was entered into evidence 0:12:53.720 --> 0:12:56.120 not as a murder weapon, but as an example of 0:12:56.160 --> 0:12:59.080 what might have been used and with what Lou and 0:12:59.160 --> 0:13:03.679 CJ knew about johnre being as tendencies toward children. They 0:13:03.720 --> 0:13:06.240 were paired off for a trial without John or being 0:13:06.240 --> 0:13:08.120 a testifying in June of ninety three. 0:13:08.600 --> 0:13:11.760 Park Hurst was really the person who put all this 0:13:12.120 --> 0:13:16.240 together for the prosecution. She talks about seeing Joe and 0:13:16.360 --> 0:13:21.760 Lou and others bragging about supposedly jumping some black guy. 0:13:22.120 --> 0:13:25.760 But again she's got the wrong dates. She's thinking that 0:13:25.800 --> 0:13:29.280 this happened in July. The detectives are correcting her and 0:13:29.320 --> 0:13:31.840 feeding her that this happens in August. 0:13:32.080 --> 0:13:34.800 They get Hall and it's more of the same. 0:13:34.920 --> 0:13:36.959 Joey Hall, he couldn't point to what the murder happened 0:13:36.960 --> 0:13:39.880 at my trial. Prosecution had to fucking showing And her 0:13:39.920 --> 0:13:43.120 and Joey couldn't even agree on whether I drove or 0:13:43.120 --> 0:13:46.000 we walked, because she said we walked, Joey said we drove. 0:13:46.200 --> 0:13:49.520 These are folks who weren't sober when all these events occurred. 0:13:49.559 --> 0:13:53.560 They're talking about it months later. And the glaring thing 0:13:53.720 --> 0:13:57.640 is what was absent from the trial any physical evidence 0:13:57.720 --> 0:14:00.439 at all. I mean, this was a vicious attack by 0:14:00.600 --> 0:14:05.520 supposedly five guys who all took turns whaling on mister Vernon, 0:14:05.679 --> 0:14:08.959 and there's just no physical evidence at all, nothing at all. 0:14:08.960 --> 0:14:12.880 Plus, I'm not saying that shoeprint evidence is positive of anything, 0:14:13.400 --> 0:14:16.360 but how the hell would they only collect one shoe 0:14:16.360 --> 0:14:20.120 print from a group assault in an outdoor setting like 0:14:20.200 --> 0:14:20.640 a park. 0:14:20.880 --> 0:14:22.440 I had nothing else to do in prison but to 0:14:22.440 --> 0:14:24.680 look at shit. Okay, so I looked at the weather. 0:14:24.880 --> 0:14:27.720 It was raining that night, a light rain, and one 0:14:27.760 --> 0:14:30.840 fucking shoe print, But you got five of us. What 0:14:30.920 --> 0:14:33.040 did I do? Hold them all on my fucking shoulders. 0:14:33.280 --> 0:14:36.480 In addition, the state presented medical experts, one of whom 0:14:36.520 --> 0:14:39.520 testified that the injuries were more consistent with a baseball 0:14:39.560 --> 0:14:42.720 bat leaning away from the thin wooden club that was 0:14:42.760 --> 0:14:45.840 turned in by Rosemary Nell, which could have been corroborated 0:14:45.880 --> 0:14:50.520 by Nathaniel Huggins. But all of Burke's evidence pointing toward 0:14:50.560 --> 0:14:52.600 a group of men with a wooden chair leg on 0:14:52.640 --> 0:14:55.160 the east side of Toledo around three am had been 0:14:55.240 --> 0:14:58.760 hidden from the defense, making a path for the false 0:14:58.840 --> 0:15:02.800 narrative about a white supremisist gang attacking with these thin 0:15:02.880 --> 0:15:05.600 wooden clubs around midnight on the north end. 0:15:06.160 --> 0:15:09.640 I think the jury got caught up in the brutality 0:15:09.760 --> 0:15:12.080 of the crime, this idea that this was a white 0:15:12.080 --> 0:15:16.360 supremacist Act and without the evidence that shows that they 0:15:16.360 --> 0:15:18.960 were lying. The defense attorneys were kind of fighting with 0:15:19.080 --> 0:15:20.520 two hands tied behind their back. 0:15:20.760 --> 0:15:22.720 I was young and dumb man. I was still believing 0:15:22.760 --> 0:15:25.160 in the system. I didn't kill nobody. As far as 0:15:25.200 --> 0:15:28.080 my defense goes, there wasn't nothing really presented. When the 0:15:28.120 --> 0:15:30.920 state was done, my attorney was like, they didn't prove nothing, 0:15:31.040 --> 0:15:33.440 and again I knew what they were saying was lives. 0:15:33.680 --> 0:15:36.000 I even asked the deputy sheriff that was walking me 0:15:36.040 --> 0:15:38.240 back and forth, Hey, you think they don't find me guilty? 0:15:38.640 --> 0:15:40.680 He said, if they believe that girl, they don't find 0:15:40.720 --> 0:15:43.040 you guilty. If they don't, you'll walk out of here. 0:15:43.160 --> 0:15:44.800 And I was trying to convict it in less than 0:15:44.800 --> 0:15:47.320 twenty four hours. I mean, this shit was a joke. 0:15:56.440 --> 0:15:59.600 This episode of Wrongful Conviction is proudly sponsored by Erase 0:15:59.640 --> 0:16:04.560 pt Now. Every day, countless individuals face the invisible wounds 0:16:04.560 --> 0:16:08.240 of trauma and PTSD. Your support empowers us to provide 0:16:08.280 --> 0:16:12.520 life changing treatments like the Stelli Ganglion Block SGB, which 0:16:12.560 --> 0:16:16.320 inhibits nerve impulses and helps to restore hope, reclaim lives, 0:16:16.400 --> 0:16:20.760 and save lives after incarceration. Together, we can ensure that 0:16:20.800 --> 0:16:24.200 those wrongfully convicted receive the care they need to heal 0:16:24.360 --> 0:16:27.520 and reintegrate into society. Join us in this mission to 0:16:27.560 --> 0:16:32.440 erase PTSD and uplift our communities. Visit erase PTSD now 0:16:32.560 --> 0:16:37.040 dot org. That's erase PTSD now dot org for more 0:16:37.080 --> 0:16:39.160 information and ways to get involved. 0:16:45.080 --> 0:16:48.000 Me CJ Doctor in June of ninety three. My sentence 0:16:48.080 --> 0:16:50.840 was fifteen in life. Even when I first went to prison, 0:16:50.920 --> 0:16:53.600 I still had a little bit of belief, like, Okay, 0:16:53.600 --> 0:16:57.360 I got these appeals, somebody gonna see something somewhere, and 0:16:57.440 --> 0:17:01.160 I set my appeals attorney a letter, I'm innocent. I 0:17:01.160 --> 0:17:04.159 didn't kill nobody, and she sent me letter back. Somebody 0:17:04.160 --> 0:17:06.720 ain't gonna do whether you're innocent of Gilts. It's whether 0:17:06.720 --> 0:17:09.600 he was given a fair trial. So I accepted that. 0:17:10.160 --> 0:17:15.119 So Joe and Lou they're convicted. Eric is bound over. 0:17:15.280 --> 0:17:19.520 He's tried as an adult, and they introduced this false confession, 0:17:20.280 --> 0:17:24.840 and Eric's convicted. The Vasquez brothers are seeing how all 0:17:24.920 --> 0:17:28.080 this unfolds, and they talk to their lawyer and they 0:17:28.119 --> 0:17:31.560 work out a deal and they offer an Alfred plea, 0:17:31.600 --> 0:17:34.679 And Alfred plea is a denial that you did anything wrong. 0:17:35.040 --> 0:17:37.760 It doesn't admit that you committed a crime, but it said, look, 0:17:37.800 --> 0:17:42.480 I'm not risking it. I've seen two juris convict innocent men, 0:17:43.080 --> 0:17:45.160 and I don't have any faith in the system at all. 0:17:45.320 --> 0:17:48.280 I'll take my chances with the parole board and take 0:17:48.280 --> 0:17:52.119 a lesser sentence. And the Vasquez brothers pled guilty and 0:17:52.200 --> 0:17:56.720 avoided the two trials that lou Joe and. 0:17:57.000 --> 0:17:58.040 Mitch got convicted of. 0:17:58.760 --> 0:18:02.680 So Eric got twenty the life, while Ismail and Lorenzo 0:18:02.800 --> 0:18:04.200 got fifteen to life. 0:18:04.840 --> 0:18:07.720 When Melon Lorenzo came through, they got shipped somewhere else. 0:18:08.080 --> 0:18:13.280 But from ninety three to ninety eight, yeah, Me, CJ 0:18:13.400 --> 0:18:15.639 and Misch was all in the same person. And ninety 0:18:15.640 --> 0:18:18.600 five my last appeals was exhausted. So I did what 0:18:18.640 --> 0:18:20.920 I had to do to survivor life. Since I'm under 0:18:20.920 --> 0:18:22.720 the old law, so I knew I was going to 0:18:22.800 --> 0:18:25.160 board and tenure. But I wasn't stupid enough to think 0:18:25.160 --> 0:18:26.879 they was gonna let me go home. I knew they 0:18:26.920 --> 0:18:29.440 was gonna give me time, so I just I did 0:18:29.480 --> 0:18:31.560 what I had to do to survive. O three was 0:18:31.560 --> 0:18:34.320 my first time going to board. They gave me five years, 0:18:34.680 --> 0:18:37.600 went back. You know, eight, they gave me three more, 0:18:38.160 --> 0:18:41.520 they gave me five three three three three. Yeah, they 0:18:41.520 --> 0:18:43.000 gave me eighteen years and flops. 0:18:43.359 --> 0:18:46.159 And during that time it appears that Eric Mish was 0:18:46.200 --> 0:18:49.920 the most active in post conviction litigation, garnering the support 0:18:50.040 --> 0:18:53.560 of the Wrongful Conviction Project of the Ohio Public Defender's Office, 0:18:53.840 --> 0:18:56.840 led by a friend of our show, Joanna Sanchez. 0:18:57.600 --> 0:19:03.000 Joanna Sanchez is an incredible, amazing, tenacious, badass lawyer. The 0:19:03.119 --> 0:19:06.640 problem is you're making multiple public records requests and you're 0:19:06.640 --> 0:19:09.200 starting to kind of pull it the thread and you're 0:19:09.200 --> 0:19:12.439 getting new and different information kind of piecemeal. It's not 0:19:12.600 --> 0:19:15.600 all delivered at once. It's coming through, there's more and 0:19:15.640 --> 0:19:16.359 more information. 0:19:16.960 --> 0:19:20.920 Unfortunately, early records requests only turned up the initial criminal 0:19:20.960 --> 0:19:24.840 complaint in August of ninety two, along with the investigation 0:19:24.960 --> 0:19:29.600 files starting in that December. Burke's investigated files didn't begin 0:19:29.760 --> 0:19:34.600 to turn up until twenty eighteen. Meanwhile, Michelle Parkhurst had 0:19:34.600 --> 0:19:38.760 recanted in twenty sixteen, saying that when she had been 0:19:38.840 --> 0:19:42.399 interviewed way back in January of ninety three, the police 0:19:42.680 --> 0:19:46.160 had threatened her with murder charges if she didn't name 0:19:46.280 --> 0:19:51.560 their suspects. Joey Hall, John Orbina, and lu Castilla, never 0:19:51.680 --> 0:19:57.440 mentioning Eric Mish. They also mentioned her pregnancy, seemingly implying 0:19:57.560 --> 0:19:59.680 that she would lose custody of her soon to be 0:19:59.760 --> 0:20:02.800 born and Sun and for her cooperation, she was given 0:20:02.880 --> 0:20:05.480 immunity among other temporary benefits. 0:20:05.960 --> 0:20:10.080 The prosecutors then gave her hotels, put her in apartments, 0:20:10.320 --> 0:20:12.920 and once the trialsers over, would they kicked her ass out. 0:20:13.080 --> 0:20:17.680 Then, in twenty eighteen, Joanna Sanchez filed a new records 0:20:17.680 --> 0:20:22.200 request asking specifically for the investigation records from August through 0:20:22.200 --> 0:20:25.560 December nineteen ninety two, which turned up one hundred and 0:20:25.560 --> 0:20:30.719 fourteen pages of Burke's investigation records, including a number of 0:20:30.760 --> 0:20:34.399 alternate suspects, as well as the bloody bottle collected at 0:20:34.400 --> 0:20:35.000 the scene. 0:20:35.160 --> 0:20:38.760 That's a bombshell, And there's a statute in the state 0:20:38.760 --> 0:20:40.439 of Ohio that you can go to the court for 0:20:40.520 --> 0:20:44.840 post conviction relief and request DNA. The state is fighting this, 0:20:45.040 --> 0:20:48.600 the state doesn't want it. The States upholding this wrongful conviction. 0:20:49.080 --> 0:20:52.200 And while Joanna fought for the DNA testing and filed 0:20:52.200 --> 0:20:55.240 a motion for a new trial, all five innocent men 0:20:55.800 --> 0:21:01.160 finally parolled out. Lorenzo was in May twenty fifteen. Cj, Eric, 0:21:01.200 --> 0:21:04.359 and Lou were all released within days of one another 0:21:04.680 --> 0:21:08.640 in April of twenty twenty. While Ismael came home that June. 0:21:09.000 --> 0:21:11.280 Oh, I mean when I actually got the letter shit, 0:21:11.400 --> 0:21:13.760 I cried like a little baby right there to Milly York, 0:21:14.080 --> 0:21:15.919 my wife. Now she was there to pick me up, 0:21:16.080 --> 0:21:20.240 cook the roast, roast, potatoes, carrots. My first day home. 0:21:20.480 --> 0:21:22.879 When we was coming home, I saw Walmart and I 0:21:22.880 --> 0:21:24.280 told her, I said, look, just take me in there 0:21:24.280 --> 0:21:26.160 and get it over with now. I just I made 0:21:26.160 --> 0:21:28.800 sure I was gonna put myself in every position that 0:21:28.880 --> 0:21:31.320 was going to make me uncomfortable, so I wouldn't get 0:21:31.320 --> 0:21:34.040 stuck in a house in a room like I was 0:21:34.080 --> 0:21:36.760 still in prison. I couldn't sleep for two weeks because 0:21:36.800 --> 0:21:39.360 of the new noises. I wasn't used to cars driving by. 0:21:39.800 --> 0:21:42.119 I mean, this woman put up with a whole lot 0:21:42.160 --> 0:21:44.280 of shit in the last four years with me dealing 0:21:44.320 --> 0:21:46.520 with my demons. I still deal with them. They're just 0:21:46.520 --> 0:21:47.720 not as bad as they used to be. 0:21:48.320 --> 0:21:52.160 It never ceases to amaze me how love can still 0:21:52.200 --> 0:21:56.160 find a way even when partners are on opposite sides 0:21:56.280 --> 0:21:57.520