WEBVTT - #201 Jason Flom with Dewey Bozella 0:00:02.120 --> 0:00:05.800 On June fourteenth, nineteen seventy seven, ninety two year old 0:00:05.920 --> 0:00:09.320 Jay Emma Crapser was found tied up and suffocated in 0:00:09.360 --> 0:00:12.319 her Poughkeepsie, New York apartment. Police thought she had walked 0:00:12.360 --> 0:00:14.840 in on a burglary and rounded up the young guys 0:00:14.880 --> 0:00:19.079 in nearby Mansion Park, including Lamar and Stanley Smith, and 0:00:19.160 --> 0:00:21.919 a new guy from Brooklyn who had spent time in Juvie, 0:00:22.160 --> 0:00:26.760 a budding boxer named Dewey Bosella. After being falsely told 0:00:26.760 --> 0:00:30.400 that Dewey had implicated them, the Smith brothers returned false 0:00:30.400 --> 0:00:34.040 accusations against Dewey and fifteen year old Wayne Moseley. When 0:00:34.080 --> 0:00:37.320 police tried to turn the miner on his alleged accomplice, 0:00:37.479 --> 0:00:40.880 Wayne Moseley refused to lie, and the Smith brother's word 0:00:41.200 --> 0:00:44.520 was not enough for a grand jury indictment. Six years 0:00:44.520 --> 0:00:47.919 and two eerily similar crimes later, one of which was 0:00:48.000 --> 0:00:51.920 properly attributed to brothers Donald and Anthony Wise, the DA 0:00:52.120 --> 0:00:56.720 continued his relentless pursuit of Dewey Bosella for Emma Crapser's murder, 0:00:57.040 --> 0:01:01.400 despite compelling evidence to the contrary, in including Donald Wise's 0:01:01.440 --> 0:01:05.480 fingerprint at the scene. Finally, with Lamar Smith and Wayne 0:01:05.480 --> 0:01:08.840 Moseley in custody for separate crimes, the DA had the 0:01:08.959 --> 0:01:12.680 leverage he needed to coerce testimony and send Dewey Bosella 0:01:12.640 --> 0:01:16.880 away for over twenty six years. However, the fight in 0:01:17.040 --> 0:01:20.600 this boxer proved to be just too big, a fight 0:01:21.040 --> 0:01:24.360 that would one day see the inside of a professional 0:01:24.400 --> 0:01:43.080 boxing ring. This is Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm. Welcome 0:01:43.120 --> 0:01:45.840 back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm. That's me. I'm 0:01:45.880 --> 0:01:50.080 your host, and today I am so excited because we 0:01:50.280 --> 0:01:53.280 have a guest. We have a lot of first today. 0:01:53.680 --> 0:01:56.600 Our guest is Dewey Bosella. And Dewey is our only 0:01:56.680 --> 0:02:01.080 guest who speaks besides English, Arabic and japan Ease. He's 0:02:01.120 --> 0:02:04.280 the only one who has won an eSPI Award. He's 0:02:04.320 --> 0:02:09.040 the only one who won a professional boxing match in 0:02:09.120 --> 0:02:13.160 his fifties. After he was released from prison after twenty 0:02:13.200 --> 0:02:17.160 six years of wrongful incarceration. Without further ado, let me 0:02:17.200 --> 0:02:20.800 introduce to you my friend Dewey Bosella. Dewey, welcome to 0:02:20.880 --> 0:02:21.600 Ronfuel Conviction. 0:02:22.080 --> 0:02:23.240 Thank you appreciate it. 0:02:23.360 --> 0:02:25.800 Dewey, I have to say if and I know you 0:02:25.880 --> 0:02:27.480 have your own book, and we'll talk about this. But 0:02:27.520 --> 0:02:29.560 if I was going to write a book about your life, 0:02:29.600 --> 0:02:32.880 I would probably call it unbreakable, because you have been 0:02:32.960 --> 0:02:37.920 through experiences even beyond your Roffl incarceration, that would have 0:02:38.000 --> 0:02:42.040 broken almost any mere mortal. From the time you were 0:02:42.080 --> 0:02:46.880 a kid, you experienced extreme hardship. I mean, can you 0:02:46.960 --> 0:02:49.480 talk about your upbringing in Brooklyn? 0:02:49.639 --> 0:02:53.880 It was me and my forder brothers and one system. 0:02:54.240 --> 0:02:56.680 As we were growing up, things were pretty good except 0:02:56.680 --> 0:03:01.519 for my father. My father was just boot at eight 0:03:01.600 --> 0:03:05.120 years old. My father turned my whole life around, as 0:03:05.120 --> 0:03:08.040 well as my brothers and my one sister at that 0:03:08.080 --> 0:03:11.840 particular time. One day, we was in the backyard and 0:03:11.919 --> 0:03:14.919 we were playing, and I came inside of the house 0:03:14.960 --> 0:03:19.760 and heard a lot of hollering and screaming, and my 0:03:19.800 --> 0:03:22.280 father was beating up on my mother and my He 0:03:22.320 --> 0:03:23.720 was being up on my mother. I did the best 0:03:23.760 --> 0:03:25.400 I could do as a kid. I ran over and 0:03:25.400 --> 0:03:28.320 granted round the laid. He took me and threw me 0:03:28.400 --> 0:03:30.280 across the room like I was a piece of trash 0:03:30.280 --> 0:03:33.200 and continued to beat up on my mother. My mother 0:03:33.240 --> 0:03:36.560 went to the hospital. Me and my brothers we went 0:03:36.560 --> 0:03:39.400 in the foster homes and group homes, and things were 0:03:39.440 --> 0:03:40.040 never the same. 0:03:40.640 --> 0:03:44.119 Yeah, I'm sure they weren't. And your mother died, and 0:03:44.200 --> 0:03:47.040 you witnessed that as an eight year old boy. Your 0:03:47.240 --> 0:03:50.080 father abandoned all six of you and went to live 0:03:50.120 --> 0:03:52.920 with your half siblings. You didn't even know you had, 0:03:53.400 --> 0:03:56.200 one of whom Tony became important later on down the line. 0:03:56.240 --> 0:03:59.440 But first you and your five full siblings were shuffled 0:03:59.440 --> 0:04:02.240 between I put foster homes and group homes until you 0:04:02.280 --> 0:04:05.640 were all finally placed together again a few years later 0:04:05.680 --> 0:04:08.440 with the Coleman family. Then after all that, you moved 0:04:08.440 --> 0:04:10.560 to Queens. You all moved to Queen's and spent a 0:04:10.560 --> 0:04:14.120 good five or six years together with just at least 0:04:14.160 --> 0:04:17.680 a shred of normalcy. But in high school I understand 0:04:18.000 --> 0:04:21.080 you started drinking, smoking, hanging out with some not so 0:04:21.160 --> 0:04:24.279 great people, and pretty soon you ended up dropping out 0:04:24.320 --> 0:04:28.280 and moving upstate just after another tragedy struck. 0:04:28.760 --> 0:04:32.440 Yeah, I was sixteen years old and I got into 0:04:32.480 --> 0:04:34.719 a fight with a guy by name is Standy Jackson. 0:04:35.360 --> 0:04:37.039 When I got into a fight with Stanley Jackson, I 0:04:37.080 --> 0:04:40.960 got the best of him. He didn't like that. Him 0:04:40.960 --> 0:04:43.600 and a guy by name of Barty driving the bicycle 0:04:43.600 --> 0:04:46.400 and they see my brother at a party and Andrew 0:04:46.440 --> 0:04:51.240 Jackson High School, and Stanley wouldn't stabbed my brother to death. 0:04:51.640 --> 0:04:53.360 He stabed him in the heart and in the back 0:04:53.520 --> 0:04:58.840 and then murdered my brother. So me, you know the 0:04:58.920 --> 0:05:00.920 Kota streets, I won to get him. I wanted to 0:05:00.920 --> 0:05:03.320 get him for what he did to my brother. And 0:05:03.360 --> 0:05:06.960 because of that, my older brother Tony, so he said, listen, man, 0:05:07.000 --> 0:05:09.680 once you come up here to upstate New York, you know, 0:05:09.839 --> 0:05:11.600 to see where you're going. Man, if you stay down 0:05:11.640 --> 0:05:14.080 in New York, you don't mind it, you know, in 0:05:14.080 --> 0:05:17.040 a bad situation. I said, okay, I'll give it a try. 0:05:17.560 --> 0:05:21.360 Because my true intensor, I wanted to kill him for 0:05:21.480 --> 0:05:24.200 what he did to my brother. He should have came 0:05:24.200 --> 0:05:27.159 after me. He should have came after my brother. So 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:30.559 when I moved up to Poughkeepsie, New York, my older 0:05:30.600 --> 0:05:33.119 brother he said to me, once you go back to school. 0:05:33.200 --> 0:05:35.360 I said, Tony, don't make your time. I'm not going 0:05:35.400 --> 0:05:38.080 back to school. He said, well, you know, do something 0:05:38.240 --> 0:05:39.520 if you don't want to do something. So I said, 0:05:39.520 --> 0:05:42.200 I went and I got involved into a program to 0:05:42.200 --> 0:05:45.080 where I became a carpenter, and I got a job 0:05:45.240 --> 0:05:48.840 in Poughkeepsie, New York. Massive Square Park in Poughkeepsie was 0:05:48.880 --> 0:05:52.320 to hang out for everybody that was supposed to be 0:05:52.400 --> 0:05:55.680 hit at that particular time. So I just turned seventeen. 0:05:55.880 --> 0:05:58.160 I'm hanging out in Everything that I did in New 0:05:58.240 --> 0:06:01.520 York was in that park. So one time I got 0:06:01.560 --> 0:06:03.760 into a fight and I beat the dude. I whipped 0:06:03.760 --> 0:06:05.800 the dudes, but the we called me whipping the dudes. 0:06:05.839 --> 0:06:08.720 But everybody said, yo, they dude, ain't happening. And so 0:06:09.040 --> 0:06:11.400 that's when I started getting around guys who was supposed 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:13.760 to be you know, thugs and all that stuff. 0:06:14.520 --> 0:06:18.400 Coincidentally, you're up there in the area where Floyd Patterson, 0:06:18.440 --> 0:06:21.839 the heavyweight champion of the world, had recently converted a barn, 0:06:22.400 --> 0:06:25.479 an old barn in Newpaulse, which is nearby, into a 0:06:25.560 --> 0:06:26.760 center for at risk youth. 0:06:27.040 --> 0:06:29.479 Floyd Patterson I first met him. It was because of 0:06:29.520 --> 0:06:34.000 a there God dared me. He said, you're always fighting 0:06:34.040 --> 0:06:36.320 it and all this, man, but you ain't gonna go 0:06:36.400 --> 0:06:38.880 up no dead, no Floyd Partison camp. I said, what? 0:06:39.600 --> 0:06:41.560 So I went up to Floyd passon camp on the there. 0:06:42.120 --> 0:06:44.440 When I got up there, The first thing I did is, 0:06:44.480 --> 0:06:46.600 you know, I lied to Floyda. I told Floyda to 0:06:46.680 --> 0:06:49.880 have three fights, and I didn't have three fights. You know. 0:06:50.279 --> 0:06:51.919 I was talking about fights out in the streets. I 0:06:51.920 --> 0:06:54.880 thought I knew everything, and Floyd put me out there. 0:06:54.960 --> 0:06:56.360 He put me up with a guy by the name 0:06:56.400 --> 0:06:59.160 of Danny. Here it is, I'm weighing like close to 0:06:59.160 --> 0:07:01.920 one hundred and ninety, you know, he's a Walter Way. 0:07:02.240 --> 0:07:04.440 And I didn't know who Danny was. I went out 0:07:04.440 --> 0:07:07.520 there and I hit Danny with a lucky punch and 0:07:07.640 --> 0:07:11.560 I rocked him, and right behind that, Floyd said, cut loose. 0:07:12.080 --> 0:07:14.200 He hit me with a body shot. The body shot 0:07:14.640 --> 0:07:17.640 knocked the mouth piece out my mouth, and then hit 0:07:17.720 --> 0:07:20.040 me with another shot in my chest. And he ain't 0:07:20.120 --> 0:07:23.560 hit me to the face yet. And I caught you, 0:07:23.560 --> 0:07:25.160 you know, because the wind was knocked out of me 0:07:25.280 --> 0:07:28.120 and the bell rang. When the bell rang, I got 0:07:28.160 --> 0:07:29.680 out out of the ring. I said, oh hey, no, 0:07:29.840 --> 0:07:32.280 I said, I'm out of here. So Floyd said, what 0:07:32.320 --> 0:07:33.000 was wrong, was wrong? 0:07:33.160 --> 0:07:33.400 Was wrong? 0:07:33.520 --> 0:07:35.400 Was wrong? I said, no, I'm all right, right right, 0:07:35.440 --> 0:07:37.760 I'm not take the gloves off. Take the gloves off, 0:07:38.040 --> 0:07:41.040 Take the gloves off. So he took the gloves. Where 0:07:41.080 --> 0:07:43.280 you're going, when you're gone, when you're going with I said, 0:07:43.400 --> 0:07:45.760 I'll be back from whereverybody, I'll be back. I'll be back. 0:07:46.160 --> 0:07:49.440 When I got up out of there, that changed my 0:07:49.480 --> 0:07:52.600 whole life. Why because all he did was in with 0:07:52.600 --> 0:07:54.880 a body punch in the chest shot. He didn't even 0:07:54.880 --> 0:07:56.680 go to the head. Yet. I'm one hundred ninety pounds 0:07:56.800 --> 0:07:59.080 one hundred and forty seven or a little bit more 0:07:59.240 --> 0:08:01.680 at that particular, I didn't know at that time he 0:08:01.720 --> 0:08:03.960 was ready number one in the world. Floyd came up. 0:08:04.000 --> 0:08:07.800 I mean, he said, uh, do you know you just sport? No, 0:08:07.880 --> 0:08:12.160 he said, he's been number one in the world. Man, listen, 0:08:12.240 --> 0:08:16.880 who shit? And never after that day forward, after that experience, 0:08:17.520 --> 0:08:18.680 took boxing as a joke. 0:08:19.200 --> 0:08:21.960 No, that would wake anybody up. And what an introduction 0:08:22.080 --> 0:08:25.160 it was. But now, just when things you know may 0:08:25.160 --> 0:08:27.080 have been taking a turn for the better, as your 0:08:27.080 --> 0:08:30.320 first exposure to boxing, which became such a huge part 0:08:30.360 --> 0:08:32.840 of your life and which you excel at and have 0:08:32.920 --> 0:08:36.439 been recognized. Now finally, all these years later, June fourteenth, 0:08:36.520 --> 0:08:40.720 nineteen seventy seven, this is the night when ninety two 0:08:40.800 --> 0:08:44.840 year old Emma Crapser was brutally murdered in her apartment. 0:08:44.960 --> 0:08:50.080 She was tied up and suffocated. She had linen stuffed 0:08:50.120 --> 0:08:53.840 in her mouth and down her throat. And this was 0:08:53.880 --> 0:08:58.360 a crime that obviously horrified local residents and for which 0:08:58.400 --> 0:09:01.200 there was a lot of pressure on the authorities to 0:09:01.280 --> 0:09:04.920 make arrests. And the police came up with a theory, 0:09:05.640 --> 0:09:08.360 right They said that missus Scrapser had walked in on 0:09:08.440 --> 0:09:11.199 a burglary in progress and paid with her life. So 0:09:11.360 --> 0:09:13.360 they went around and picked up some kids they knew 0:09:13.400 --> 0:09:15.480 were tough kids or whatever that hung out in the 0:09:15.520 --> 0:09:18.959 park Manchester Square Park, and they were well aware of 0:09:19.360 --> 0:09:22.320 you Dewey, obviously because coming up from the city and 0:09:22.360 --> 0:09:26.040 everything else. They decided they would focus their investigation on 0:09:26.080 --> 0:09:28.760 the new kid in town who they knew was a 0:09:28.800 --> 0:09:31.720 bit of a brawler and a tough kid. And they 0:09:31.760 --> 0:09:36.440 started by questioning two brothers, Lamar and Stanley Smith, And 0:09:36.840 --> 0:09:40.040 originally they denied any knowledge the crime. The interrogators told 0:09:40.080 --> 0:09:43.520 them though, that you Dewey had identified them as the murders. 0:09:43.520 --> 0:09:44.959 But that wasn't true, was it. 0:09:45.720 --> 0:09:48.559 No, it was far from the truth. I had no 0:09:48.640 --> 0:09:51.120 knowledge of the crime. And what made them even say 0:09:51.160 --> 0:09:55.280 something like that was the beginning of them framing me. 0:09:55.679 --> 0:09:58.400 Right. So, Lamar Smith told the cops that he saw 0:09:58.480 --> 0:10:00.360 you and another guy named Wayne Moseley, he was just 0:10:00.360 --> 0:10:05.040 fifteen years old, on Missus Scrapser's porch trying to break in. 0:10:05.520 --> 0:10:07.480 So they're just coming up with stories out of thin air. 0:10:07.800 --> 0:10:11.680 Stanley Smith told police that he saw you, Wayne Moseley, 0:10:11.720 --> 0:10:14.520 and a third guy together in the park on the 0:10:14.600 --> 0:10:17.920 day of the murder. And then you and Wayne Moseley 0:10:18.040 --> 0:10:21.920 were arrested for the burglary and murder. But Moseley was 0:10:21.960 --> 0:10:23.840 a miner. He was, like I said, he's only fifteen, 0:10:23.920 --> 0:10:25.520 so he wasn't gonna be They weren't gonna be able 0:10:25.520 --> 0:10:27.480 to charge him as an adult, so they they wanted 0:10:27.520 --> 0:10:29.600 to get him to plead guilty right and testify to 0:10:29.679 --> 0:10:32.840 your involvement. But to his great credit a fifteen year 0:10:32.880 --> 0:10:35.560 old kid, he refused to do that. And there was 0:10:35.600 --> 0:10:38.880 no evidence whatsoever linking either of you to the crime 0:10:39.120 --> 0:10:42.200 other than the word of the Smith brothers. So and 0:10:42.240 --> 0:10:44.160 a grand jury, they always say grand jury will indet 0:10:44.200 --> 0:10:47.440 a ham sandwich. The grand jury refused to indict you. 0:10:47.520 --> 0:10:49.600 That says a lot, right, Yeah. 0:10:49.880 --> 0:10:51.880 You got to remember when they arrested me, I was 0:10:51.960 --> 0:10:55.120 both bost been hold for three days, but they kept 0:10:55.160 --> 0:10:58.199 me for twenty eight days to win. A judge told 0:10:58.240 --> 0:11:02.160 the prog attorney let him go, and so I was 0:11:02.280 --> 0:11:04.800 released on what they call the not bound bell, which 0:11:04.840 --> 0:11:07.600 means there was no evidence, nothing pointed to me at all. 0:11:08.440 --> 0:11:11.120 And for the next five and a half close to 0:11:11.160 --> 0:11:14.280 six years, nothing happened on the case, and then the 0:11:14.360 --> 0:11:18.800 case was reopened. In nineteen eighty three, Wayne Mosley and 0:11:18.920 --> 0:11:23.920 Lamar Smith were in Downstate correctional facility for crimes that 0:11:24.000 --> 0:11:27.960 they have committed, and the prosecut attorney he said, listen, 0:11:28.559 --> 0:11:30.840 I'll make a deal with both of y'all to testify 0:11:30.840 --> 0:11:33.480 against Dewey base Out and Wayne. This is what I'll 0:11:33.520 --> 0:11:36.720 do for you. I'll get all your charges drop and 0:11:36.760 --> 0:11:40.000 get you out of jail. Lamar, I'll get you early parole. 0:11:40.160 --> 0:11:43.880 And both of them agreed. However, because to them being 0:11:43.960 --> 0:11:47.280 by law what they considered accompasses and saying that they 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:50.800 were there at the scene of the crime and another 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:56.000 collaborate witness, which was Stanley. But Stanley had no involvement 0:11:56.120 --> 0:11:58.600 of the crime at all, so that's what made his 0:11:58.800 --> 0:12:05.320 testimony so pure than the other su and because Stanley 0:12:05.320 --> 0:12:08.680 Smith collaborating with his brother, the mass Smith, that was 0:12:08.720 --> 0:12:11.679 the beginning of I got sent in twenty years to life. 0:12:12.040 --> 0:12:14.440 But something happened at your trial that should have certainly 0:12:14.480 --> 0:12:16.880 placed enough reasonable doubt in the state's case, if not 0:12:17.040 --> 0:12:22.120 actually completely obliterated and knocked down this ridiculous house of cards. 0:12:22.160 --> 0:12:26.040 Now for contexts, between nineteen seventy seven and your trial 0:12:26.040 --> 0:12:29.000 in nineteen eighty three, there had been two incidents that 0:12:29.080 --> 0:12:32.600 were eerily similar to Emma Crapster's murder. And I say 0:12:32.640 --> 0:12:35.360 incidents because a victim in one of them survived to 0:12:35.520 --> 0:12:40.880 identify Donald and Anthony Wise as the perpetrators. Anthony Wise's girlfriend, 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:44.920 Madeline Dixon South, testified at your trial that she witnessed 0:12:44.920 --> 0:12:49.760 Donald and Anthony Wise heading into Emma Crapser's house and 0:12:49.960 --> 0:12:53.480 testified to how they said that they had gained entry 0:12:53.520 --> 0:12:54.360 through a window. 0:12:54.840 --> 0:12:57.040 She said that they told me that jam a christ 0:12:57.080 --> 0:13:00.640 from murder. And because of what she said, the Federal 0:13:00.679 --> 0:13:04.440 Brewer investigation went back inside the house and found the 0:13:04.440 --> 0:13:06.040 Stringer print the inside window. 0:13:06.080 --> 0:13:10.760 See. And what's so completely fucking nuts doing and just 0:13:10.960 --> 0:13:14.480 sad is that despite all of this, the prosecutor was 0:13:14.520 --> 0:13:18.720 still able to cloud the jurors minds enough with Wayne 0:13:18.800 --> 0:13:21.600 Moseley Lamar and Stanley Smith and a bunch of other 0:13:21.840 --> 0:13:24.880 non evidence bullshit that the jury was somehow able to 0:13:25.000 --> 0:13:27.680 just gloss over ignore whatever you want to call it, 0:13:27.720 --> 0:13:30.880 Madeline Dixon South's testimony and Donald Wise's fingerprint. 0:13:31.040 --> 0:13:37.000 Before I got sentenced, the prosecuted attorney did everything that 0:13:37.080 --> 0:13:39.920 he wasn't supposed to do. He took evidence and put 0:13:39.920 --> 0:13:42.199 it inside the jury room. When the judge told him 0:13:42.200 --> 0:13:44.440 not to do it, he did it anyway. All the 0:13:44.480 --> 0:13:47.880 things that showed it I was innocent, you know, he 0:13:48.200 --> 0:13:51.360 made sure never made it inside the jury room. That's 0:13:51.360 --> 0:13:52.360 how bad he wanted me. 0:13:52.880 --> 0:13:56.880 So six years they spent putting together this false narrative 0:13:57.120 --> 0:14:00.800 just in order to get a conviction of the guy 0:14:00.840 --> 0:14:03.760 who they just sort of decided one day was picked 0:14:03.760 --> 0:14:06.480 out of a hat. I was going to take the 0:14:06.520 --> 0:14:09.480 fall for this murder rap and that was you. How 0:14:09.520 --> 0:14:11.920 long did the trial take? First of all, no more 0:14:11.920 --> 0:14:14.280 than two weeks, So you're a two week trial, the 0:14:14.360 --> 0:14:17.559 jury goes out. Did you think doing that they were 0:14:17.559 --> 0:14:20.000 going to come back and that the justice would be served? 0:14:20.000 --> 0:14:21.040 And they would see the truth. 0:14:22.360 --> 0:14:25.840 At first, yes, in my mind, I didn't see anything 0:14:25.920 --> 0:14:28.200 that pointed to me. So when they came back with 0:14:28.280 --> 0:14:31.800 the verdict of guilty, I fell to the floor slot 0:14:31.880 --> 0:14:35.800 of crime. How could you convict me? There was nothing, 0:14:36.280 --> 0:14:41.000 nothing pointage of me, you know. So it took another 0:14:41.120 --> 0:14:43.160 turn on my life to where I had to like, 0:14:43.400 --> 0:14:47.040 you know, I had to become like another person because 0:14:47.080 --> 0:14:49.720 now I'm setting twenty years of life and I'm wondering 0:14:50.280 --> 0:14:52.160 how what I'm going to deal with twenty years of 0:14:52.240 --> 0:14:56.120 life or crime I didn't commit. You know. I looked 0:14:56.160 --> 0:15:01.400 at the jury, and the jury, even men, five women, 0:15:02.040 --> 0:15:05.920 they all started crying. I said, it's too late. It's 0:15:05.960 --> 0:15:10.560 too late. You convicted. You know, it's too late. It's 0:15:10.600 --> 0:15:11.080 too late. 0:15:18.960 --> 0:15:21.640 The Pacers Foundation is a proud supporter of this episode 0:15:21.680 --> 0:15:24.480 of Rafel Convision with Jason Flam and of the Last 0:15:24.480 --> 0:15:28.080 Mile organization, which provides business and tech training to help 0:15:28.200 --> 0:15:33.360 incarcerated individuals successfully and permanently re enter the workforce. The 0:15:33.400 --> 0:15:36.520 Pacers Foundation is committed to improving the lives of Hoosiers 0:15:36.560 --> 0:15:41.240 across Indiana, supporting organizations that are dedicated primarily to helping 0:15:41.320 --> 0:15:44.640 young people and students For more information on the work 0:15:44.680 --> 0:15:48.200 of the Pacers Foundation or the Last Mile program, please 0:15:48.320 --> 0:15:52.400 visit Pacersfoundation dot org or the Lastmile dot org. 0:15:59.080 --> 0:16:02.200 I wasn't need the need a week and I watched 0:16:02.240 --> 0:16:04.800 a guy get stabbed in the eye and his eyeball 0:16:04.880 --> 0:16:07.920 came out in front of my face, and I was like, 0:16:08.120 --> 0:16:14.240 holy shit, after a riot and b blocker. Not only 0:16:14.320 --> 0:16:16.600 that a guy but I knew by the name of Slim. 0:16:17.040 --> 0:16:20.240 I wasn't even there, like I said, the week he 0:16:20.360 --> 0:16:25.200 got murdered, and I was like, what the fuck did 0:16:25.200 --> 0:16:27.760 I get myself into? How the the fuck am I 0:16:27.800 --> 0:16:31.920 gonna deal with this? And so my whole attitude changed. 0:16:32.560 --> 0:16:36.720 The little attitude was don't touch me, don't put your 0:16:36.760 --> 0:16:41.160 hands on me, don't be around me. I'm not trying 0:16:41.200 --> 0:16:43.120 to get cut, I'm not trying to get stabbed. I'm 0:16:43.120 --> 0:16:46.800 not gonna let nobody hurt me. And from this day forward, 0:16:46.880 --> 0:16:49.480 I don't give a damn who you are if you 0:16:49.560 --> 0:16:51.280 try to hurt me, I'm a dude. I gotta do 0:16:51.360 --> 0:16:56.520 the spot. And that was my attitude and I lived 0:16:56.560 --> 0:17:00.480 like that for over twenty six and a half years. 0:17:01.600 --> 0:17:05.840 Whoa I mean, it's I mean, that's a hell of 0:17:05.880 --> 0:17:08.639 a first week in a place that could just as 0:17:08.680 --> 0:17:13.560 easily be called hell. And you were at New York's 0:17:13.560 --> 0:17:17.000 infamous Sing Sing Correctional facility, where you needed to be 0:17:17.160 --> 0:17:21.639 hard to survive, but you also underwent a really incredible 0:17:21.680 --> 0:17:23.320 transformation while inside. 0:17:23.720 --> 0:17:26.960 What happened with me when I was inside Sing Sing 0:17:27.040 --> 0:17:31.399 State Penitentiary. One day I come from the yard and 0:17:31.440 --> 0:17:34.840 I was finished working out, and guy by name of 0:17:34.880 --> 0:17:37.320 Sharie walked up to me and he said that I 0:17:37.400 --> 0:17:43.480 was fronting and fronting inside the state penitentiary. Almost it's 0:17:43.600 --> 0:17:46.560 like a call out, you know, like you know, you're punk, 0:17:46.680 --> 0:17:49.160 all these other things that go along with it. But 0:17:49.200 --> 0:17:52.080 he didn't mean it like that. You know. I took 0:17:52.119 --> 0:17:54.320 it the wrong way. And I said, yo, yo, yo, 0:17:54.440 --> 0:17:58.560 what's going on? You know? He said, no, man, I 0:17:58.600 --> 0:18:00.880 just need to talk. I need to build. I said, okay. 0:18:01.080 --> 0:18:03.960 So the correction officer said, lock in, lock in, lock 0:18:04.040 --> 0:18:07.120 in another man, Bucky, you know. He said, you keep 0:18:07.160 --> 0:18:11.760 lock keep lock me and I'm inside myself for twenty 0:18:11.760 --> 0:18:14.359 three hours, well one hour wreck so I'm I'm in 0:18:14.400 --> 0:18:17.679 there twenty four hours a day. And it was just 0:18:17.720 --> 0:18:20.159 this one keep like that turned my whole life around, 0:18:21.359 --> 0:18:24.119 because I asked the guy who's supposed to have been 0:18:24.119 --> 0:18:27.600 my friend for a cigarette. He said he didn't have it, 0:18:28.160 --> 0:18:29.520 and I said, man, name, it is right there in 0:18:29.560 --> 0:18:31.960 your pocket. Man, why are you acting like that with me? Man? 0:18:32.119 --> 0:18:34.920 You know how I am man. You know what kind 0:18:34.960 --> 0:18:37.720 of person I am. Man. So he reached the side 0:18:37.720 --> 0:18:39.480 of his pocket. And the way he gave it to me, 0:18:39.560 --> 0:18:40.840 the way he gave it to me, I didn't. I 0:18:40.880 --> 0:18:43.840 didn't like it at all, but I took it because 0:18:43.880 --> 0:18:50.399 I needed it. And when I took the cigarette, my 0:18:50.480 --> 0:18:53.760 whole life changed. That was my minimum office. That was 0:18:53.800 --> 0:18:56.280 the beginning. I wasn't even in sing sing no more 0:18:56.320 --> 0:18:59.760 than the year and a half at the most. And 0:19:00.320 --> 0:19:02.679 I looked at the cigarette, and I looked at my life, 0:19:04.600 --> 0:19:07.520 and then I said, look at you, man, let's fucking 0:19:07.560 --> 0:19:10.119 look at you. You became fuck with savage that they 0:19:10.160 --> 0:19:14.160 were talking about. You became exactly the person they were 0:19:14.240 --> 0:19:18.320 fucking talking about. You got mind underneath your bed, that 0:19:18.560 --> 0:19:22.440 reaf on top of your fucking goddamn bunk. What's wrong 0:19:22.560 --> 0:19:25.480 with you? Man? At least out in the streets you 0:19:25.480 --> 0:19:27.760 were trying to go to school. You ain't doing shit 0:19:27.920 --> 0:19:32.160 in here. You're doing absolutely nothing with your life. Man, 0:19:32.920 --> 0:19:36.840 let's look at you. And then I asked myself one question, 0:19:39.359 --> 0:19:40.520 and I said, if they were to let you go 0:19:40.720 --> 0:19:45.080 right now, what would your life be like? And I 0:19:45.080 --> 0:19:48.080 ain't like the answer. The answer was I would be 0:19:48.080 --> 0:19:58.719 a bum. And so I just turned my life around. 0:19:59.240 --> 0:20:04.160 I just u said, damn, man, you know you lost 0:20:04.160 --> 0:20:08.439 your mother, your father don't and this family don't give 0:20:08.480 --> 0:20:10.760 a shit about you. You don't know where none of 0:20:10.800 --> 0:20:17.320 your brothers and your sisters. Is that what are you 0:20:17.359 --> 0:20:22.199 gonna do? Man? I took the reef I had and 0:20:22.240 --> 0:20:25.920 I gave it away. The people thought I fucking flipped. 0:20:26.680 --> 0:20:30.240 They thought I bunked out. I took the wine underneath 0:20:30.240 --> 0:20:32.560 my bed, I started giving it away. I mean, you 0:20:32.600 --> 0:20:35.840 are right, you are right. I mean you want it 0:20:36.080 --> 0:20:37.480 if you don't want it. I was dumping in the 0:20:37.520 --> 0:20:41.920 fucking toilet bow that day forward. I just never looked back. 0:20:42.600 --> 0:20:47.879 That was back in nineteen eighty five September twenty seven. 0:20:49.119 --> 0:20:51.840 That's why I hang out with Shereef. From that day forward, 0:20:51.920 --> 0:20:55.440 I got involved in every different program you could think about. 0:20:56.520 --> 0:21:00.159 I got fifty two certificates, I got my back, had 0:21:00.200 --> 0:21:02.399 done my master degree. After twenty six and a half 0:21:02.520 --> 0:21:04.280 years run the prison walls. 0:21:05.160 --> 0:21:07.880 It's pretty incredible transformation. And do we I'm gonna talk 0:21:07.880 --> 0:21:08.840 about you in the third person. 0:21:08.880 --> 0:21:09.080 Do we. 0:21:09.160 --> 0:21:12.720 Also became the boxing champion at Singh Sing and he 0:21:12.840 --> 0:21:16.680 became such a legendary fighter in there that they brought 0:21:16.720 --> 0:21:19.560 in a guy who went on to become the WBA 0:21:19.680 --> 0:21:21.720 Champion of the world to fight him. 0:21:23.280 --> 0:21:25.680 If he didn't come out, I was gonna win. Man. 0:21:25.760 --> 0:21:28.840 I had cracked his ribs in the second round. He's 0:21:28.840 --> 0:21:31.560 the tough son of a gun. Lula Valley was a 0:21:31.560 --> 0:21:33.880 guy man that I had the utmost respect for. I'm 0:21:33.880 --> 0:21:36.000 glad that he went on had and won. They had 0:21:36.080 --> 0:21:39.000 him win the championship fight. What it was like was 0:21:39.040 --> 0:21:42.040 an experience to make me really truly understand that the 0:21:42.080 --> 0:21:46.399 potential was there, the understanding of what I could have 0:21:46.400 --> 0:21:50.320 done with my life if I chose to take a 0:21:50.359 --> 0:21:53.240 deal laid on down the line, I could have done that. 0:21:53.720 --> 0:21:56.879 Finally, in nineteen ninety you were granted a new trial 0:21:57.040 --> 0:22:01.399 on the grounds that the prosecutor had used his remptory challenges, 0:22:01.440 --> 0:22:03.919 which is, for those people who may be new to 0:22:03.960 --> 0:22:07.399 the show, that prosecutor is allowed to exclude certain jurors 0:22:07.440 --> 0:22:09.720 off for no reason, just because he wants to exclude 0:22:09.760 --> 0:22:12.159 them from serving on the jury. And he had used 0:22:12.240 --> 0:22:16.919 these challenges to systematically remove all black jurors, ending up 0:22:16.960 --> 0:22:19.640 for the all white jury, hardly a jury of your peers. 0:22:19.680 --> 0:22:22.080