WEBVTT - #043 Jason Flom with Michelle Murphy 0:00:02.040 --> 0:00:05.760 Back in twenty seventeen, I recorded in an episode with 0:00:05.800 --> 0:00:09.920 Michelle Murphy and Michelle was wrongfully convicted of the murder 0:00:09.960 --> 0:00:13.400 of her baby, Trevor, of fifteen week old boy. She 0:00:13.680 --> 0:00:19.200 was egregiously framed and served twenty years to the day 0:00:19.600 --> 0:00:22.919 in prison of a life sentence. Upon her release, a 0:00:23.120 --> 0:00:25.959 judge said through tears that in his four decades on 0:00:26.000 --> 0:00:28.440 the bench, it was the worst miscarriage of justice he'd 0:00:28.480 --> 0:00:32.479 ever seen. She's been fully exonerated, and she is an 0:00:32.520 --> 0:00:37.800 extraordinary person who is full of life, very brilliant, and 0:00:38.080 --> 0:00:43.520 is working at the Bail Fund in Oklahoma helping two 0:00:43.880 --> 0:00:48.880 free other women from sentences they don't deserve and getting 0:00:48.880 --> 0:00:50.240 them back home with their. 0:00:50.120 --> 0:00:51.479 Families where they belong. 0:00:52.760 --> 0:00:56.760 Sad news is that in twenty eighteen March of twenty eighteen, 0:00:56.840 --> 0:00:59.560 she lost a lawsuit that she filed against the city 0:00:59.600 --> 0:01:03.680 of tall for violating her civil rights. There are ongoing 0:01:03.720 --> 0:01:07.360 developments and hopefully this wrong will be eventually righted. But 0:01:07.360 --> 0:01:10.440 it's shocking to say that now, almost five years since 0:01:10.480 --> 0:01:13.679 her release, she has gotten nothing from the state of 0:01:13.680 --> 0:01:19.319 Oklahoma or anyone else for her twenty years of wrongful incarceration. 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:25.800 Her daughter from whom she was taken at the age 0:01:25.840 --> 0:01:30.000 of seventeen. When this tragedy happened, she was taken directly 0:01:30.080 --> 0:01:34.160 to interrogation. She was interrogated for nine hours, without an attorney, 0:01:34.760 --> 0:01:38.280 without a parent. It was an illegal interrogation, and from 0:01:38.280 --> 0:01:41.640 that interrogation she was taken to jail and never saw 0:01:41.680 --> 0:01:46.120 her daughter again. The good news is that in twenty eighteen, 0:01:46.959 --> 0:01:51.320 in May, she was reunited with her daughter, and I 0:01:51.480 --> 0:01:56.760 was there. It was an unbelievably emotional scene. Her daughter, 0:01:56.840 --> 0:02:00.440 not twenty five, has a daughter of her own, and 0:02:00.560 --> 0:02:03.080 so there's still a lot of healing to be done. 0:02:03.760 --> 0:02:07.160 But Michelle is one of the strongest and bravest people 0:02:07.200 --> 0:02:09.840 I've ever known, and you have to hear her story 0:02:09.840 --> 0:02:15.560 to believe it. Michelle Murphy Wrongful Conviction Shout out to Michelle. 0:02:21.520 --> 0:02:24.760 I fell into the hands of a corrupt detective. 0:02:26.160 --> 0:02:28.960 I was naive enough to believe that I would be 0:02:29.000 --> 0:02:32.000 able to just present all of my proof of actual innocence, 0:02:32.000 --> 0:02:34.520 that they would investigate adequately, and so that I wouldn't 0:02:34.520 --> 0:02:36.120 be going to prison because I was a good person. 0:02:36.160 --> 0:02:37.160 I hadn't done anything wrong. 0:02:38.240 --> 0:02:40.040 In the back of your mind, you say, well, when 0:02:40.040 --> 0:02:42.760 we go to a hearing, we go to court, the 0:02:42.800 --> 0:02:45.760 truth will come out. The prosecution from day one knew 0:02:45.800 --> 0:02:50.000 I was innocent and let forced testimony go uncorrected from 0:02:50.120 --> 0:02:52.440 the lower courts all the way up to the United 0:02:52.480 --> 0:02:53.880 States Supreme Court. 0:02:55.080 --> 0:03:00.520 You have someone with a badge with ultimate and in 0:03:00.560 --> 0:03:02.119 that moment unchecked authority. 0:03:03.600 --> 0:03:06.280 Don't presume that people are guilty when you see him 0:03:06.280 --> 0:03:09.360 on TV, because it may just be a dirty DA 0:03:09.560 --> 0:03:11.239 that is trying to rise upward. 0:03:12.160 --> 0:03:15.680 Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flomp. I'm actually 0:03:16.160 --> 0:03:18.840 almost at a loss for words already today because one 0:03:18.880 --> 0:03:21.680 of my favorite humans is here in the studio with us. 0:03:22.120 --> 0:03:26.440 Michelle Murphy, the only female ax honery in the history 0:03:26.440 --> 0:03:27.240 of Oklahoma. 0:03:28.360 --> 0:03:31.040 Twenty years in prison for a crime she didn't commit. 0:03:31.160 --> 0:03:34.720 On September twelfth, nineteen ninety four, Murphy's fifteen week old son, 0:03:34.800 --> 0:03:38.640 Travis was found debt his throat slit. One year later, 0:03:38.720 --> 0:03:41.400 Murphy was found guilty of murder received a life sentence 0:03:41.480 --> 0:03:44.560 without the possibility of parole. This morning at Tulsa County 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:48.160 judge dismissed Mischelle Murphy's conviction. Prosecutors asked for the conviction 0:03:48.240 --> 0:03:50.680 to be vacated because of new evidence they just became 0:03:50.720 --> 0:03:53.839 aware of. It involves DNA evidence. They say it wasn't 0:03:53.880 --> 0:03:57.200 available twenty years ago. Murphy's attorneys, however, say the Ditrich 0:03:57.200 --> 0:04:00.120 attorney's office always had the evidence and it was im 0:04:00.160 --> 0:04:03.080 Haarriss himself who applied to jurors twenty years ago. The 0:04:03.120 --> 0:04:05.080 blood the crime scene belonged to Murphy. 0:04:05.320 --> 0:04:09.480 After two decades in prison, including four years of legal work, Murphy, 0:04:09.520 --> 0:04:11.520 now thirty seven, gets a second. 0:04:11.280 --> 0:04:12.160 Chance at life. 0:04:12.800 --> 0:04:15.480 Michelle welcome, Thank you. Yeah, it's good to you. Hear. 0:04:15.960 --> 0:04:20.919 And with Michelle is her attorney, Shannon McMurray, and is 0:04:20.960 --> 0:04:24.240 working on her civil suits. So Shannon, welcome to ronful conviction. 0:04:24.400 --> 0:04:24.760 Thank you. 0:04:25.400 --> 0:04:31.120 So Michelle, your case is really it's just beyond I mean, 0:04:31.160 --> 0:04:33.640 your case is so extreme that the judge in your 0:04:33.640 --> 0:04:37.760 original hearing said that in his more than four decades 0:04:37.800 --> 0:04:41.600 on the bench, it was the most terrible miscarriage of 0:04:41.680 --> 0:04:44.239 justice he'd ever seen. But let's go back to the beginning. 0:04:44.240 --> 0:04:47.839 You were born in Tulsa, Yes, that's great. And what 0:04:48.000 --> 0:04:51.600 was your upbringing like? You had a difficult childhood. 0:04:51.200 --> 0:04:51.560 Did you not? 0:04:52.279 --> 0:04:52.559 Yes? 0:04:52.680 --> 0:04:57.200 I did. I was brought up in poverty stricken projects, 0:04:57.320 --> 0:05:00.960 and welfare. I was in and out of foster homes. 0:05:01.200 --> 0:05:04.320 I went through pretty much every form of abuse you 0:05:04.360 --> 0:05:05.200 can think of as. 0:05:05.040 --> 0:05:08.520 A child, and then you ended up at the age 0:05:08.560 --> 0:05:12.400 of seventeen with two kids, right, yeah, which may not 0:05:12.520 --> 0:05:16.640 be as unusual in Oklahoma, but certainly in many parts 0:05:16.680 --> 0:05:19.080 of America, people be like, wow, that's you know, that's 0:05:19.080 --> 0:05:22.599 pretty crazy. And you had a difficult relationship with the 0:05:22.680 --> 0:05:24.040 father of your children. 0:05:23.720 --> 0:05:28.919 As well, right, It was a dysfunctional relationship, but I 0:05:28.960 --> 0:05:31.640 had kicked him out, and I was raising my kids 0:05:31.640 --> 0:05:34.760 on my own because that's all I wanted was kids 0:05:34.760 --> 0:05:36.440 in my own to raise. 0:05:37.240 --> 0:05:39.520 I've pretty much brought up my sisters and my brother, 0:05:39.640 --> 0:05:39.960 so I. 0:05:39.920 --> 0:05:42.360 Wanted to get out there and have my own. 0:05:42.640 --> 0:05:43.880 So I started a little early. 0:05:44.080 --> 0:05:45.599 You raise your sisters and your brothers as well, so 0:05:45.640 --> 0:05:48.479 you were you had experience at this, right, right, Although 0:05:48.480 --> 0:05:51.000 at seventeen, how much experience can you really have? You'd 0:05:51.000 --> 0:05:54.840 been through some crazy stuff already, as you said, every 0:05:54.880 --> 0:05:57.520 kind of abuse and everything else, So I guess you 0:05:57.560 --> 0:05:59.560 were sort of prepared. 0:05:59.720 --> 0:06:02.400 You know, I knew it all, but I was seventeen. 0:06:02.640 --> 0:06:04.960 What seventeen year old doesn't think that they know everything? 0:06:05.120 --> 0:06:08.800 And they're ready to take on the world. All I 0:06:08.880 --> 0:06:12.200 ever wanted was my own kids, and I was ready 0:06:12.200 --> 0:06:15.279 to make it happen, and I did so. 0:06:15.960 --> 0:06:19.760 Now we fast forward to that faithful night we're talking 0:06:19.760 --> 0:06:25.800 about September twelfth, nineteen ninety four, right when you went 0:06:25.839 --> 0:06:28.880 to sleep, probably more or less like any other night, 0:06:29.279 --> 0:06:32.239 you had your two and a half year old daughter 0:06:32.760 --> 0:06:36.560 right right and your baby son, Travis. Can you just 0:06:36.640 --> 0:06:39.360 walk us through what happened that night, because it's, you know, 0:06:39.400 --> 0:06:41.600 it's really the beginning of what is going to be 0:06:42.000 --> 0:06:43.800 an unbelievable saga. 0:06:46.720 --> 0:06:51.640 Well, after I left visiting a friend of mine, I 0:06:51.760 --> 0:06:55.919 went home. I fed Michelle, my daughter, and I fed 0:06:55.920 --> 0:06:58.880 Travis and gave him his little bath and everything else, 0:06:58.920 --> 0:07:02.160 prepared him for sleeping, went to sleep, and I couldn't 0:07:02.200 --> 0:07:04.600 sleep for some reason, so I stayed up and I 0:07:04.640 --> 0:07:08.159 was going through baseball cards that I was trying to 0:07:08.200 --> 0:07:12.200 save for him for his future, because I just wanted 0:07:12.280 --> 0:07:15.480 him to have something that could possibly be a collectible 0:07:15.480 --> 0:07:18.840 one day or something, you know. And I was making 0:07:18.840 --> 0:07:21.840 a list of them and stuff until I finally was 0:07:21.880 --> 0:07:24.680 able to go to sleep. And I can't even remember 0:07:24.680 --> 0:07:27.920 what time it was that I went to sleep, and 0:07:27.960 --> 0:07:35.040 when I woke up, my my lights were on, my 0:07:35.160 --> 0:07:41.280 head was hurting, and I noticed my son wasn't where 0:07:41.320 --> 0:07:44.520 he was when I laid him down to sleep. 0:07:44.880 --> 0:07:47.400 You were sleeping with the kids right at the time. 0:07:48.760 --> 0:07:53.160 My ac from upstairs had fallen out the window, and 0:07:53.240 --> 0:07:55.880 so at that time we were all just sleeping downstairs 0:07:55.880 --> 0:07:59.200 where it would be cooler, and we were sleeping on 0:07:59.240 --> 0:08:01.840 a couch, all three of us. I had a huge 0:08:02.560 --> 0:08:06.760 L shaped couch and so we were all in different 0:08:06.800 --> 0:08:07.880 areas on it asleep. 0:08:08.960 --> 0:08:10.800 And so the first thing you would have noticed when 0:08:10.800 --> 0:08:12.800 you woke up is that your son was missing. I mean, 0:08:12.840 --> 0:08:14.640 because you're I mean, he would have been right in 0:08:14.680 --> 0:08:16.880 your immediate vicinity. He would have been in your eyesighted 0:08:16.880 --> 0:08:17.640 as soon as you woke up. 0:08:17.680 --> 0:08:20.240 So he was gone, right, And my first instinct is 0:08:20.320 --> 0:08:23.720 to look and make sure that they're there and they're 0:08:23.760 --> 0:08:26.080 asleep and they're okay, because I woke up to try 0:08:26.080 --> 0:08:27.480 to go use the restaurroom. 0:08:27.400 --> 0:08:29.080 Right and there's nowhere he could have gone. It was 0:08:29.120 --> 0:08:32.160 only fifteen weeks solds now that he walked somewhere, and 0:08:32.960 --> 0:08:33.640 I just. 0:08:34.520 --> 0:08:39.120 I started panicking because I was like, where's where's my baby? 0:08:39.280 --> 0:08:46.160 You know, my front door was open and my closest 0:08:46.200 --> 0:08:49.600 friends lived right behind me at that time, so I 0:08:49.640 --> 0:08:53.320 went to go out the back door and that's when 0:08:53.320 --> 0:08:54.319 I found Travis. 0:08:56.960 --> 0:08:57.880 He was in the kitchen. 0:08:58.400 --> 0:09:00.560 Yeah, in a pull of his own blood. 0:09:01.200 --> 0:09:04.679 It's the ultimate nightmare of anybody who's ever had a child. 0:09:05.440 --> 0:09:06.480 So what did you do? 0:09:08.160 --> 0:09:15.800 I freaked out. I went to my friends to get help. 0:09:16.200 --> 0:09:20.920 And it's the last time I got to see my daughter, 0:09:22.240 --> 0:09:25.880 and it was the last time I felt complete half 0:09:25.880 --> 0:09:26.760 of my kids. You know. 0:09:29.559 --> 0:09:34.600 After I went to my friends and they seen what 0:09:34.720 --> 0:09:37.960 had happened with Travis, they went and they called the police, 0:09:38.840 --> 0:09:43.480 and then they came out and I was in a 0:09:43.480 --> 0:09:47.520 police car. I remember sitting there and people just kept 0:09:47.520 --> 0:09:51.000 coming up to the car asking me what was going on. 0:09:51.960 --> 0:09:57.960 And eventually they took me to the police station where 0:09:58.720 --> 0:10:03.160 an officer of the law, if you could call him that, 0:10:03.720 --> 0:10:07.679 interrogated me. And it wasn't so much an interrogation, it 0:10:07.760 --> 0:10:12.040 was more like a browbeating, like he told me I 0:10:12.080 --> 0:10:14.679 had done this, and this is what I did and 0:10:14.720 --> 0:10:17.040 how I did it, and why I did this and 0:10:18.200 --> 0:10:21.040 just and all I could say was I didn't do it. 0:10:21.960 --> 0:10:24.640 There's so many things wrong with this story, even just 0:10:24.679 --> 0:10:27.800 this beginning part of the story, because it's illegal in 0:10:27.840 --> 0:10:31.560 Oklahoma for a seventeen year old you're a minor to 0:10:31.600 --> 0:10:35.080 be interrogated without an adult in the room, a guardian 0:10:35.640 --> 0:10:38.000 or an attorney, right, But that didn't. 0:10:37.760 --> 0:10:41.400 Stop them at that time in Oklahoma. It was not proper. 0:10:42.000 --> 0:10:44.640 It's legal today, they've changed the law. But what they 0:10:44.640 --> 0:10:48.120 did to Michelle is nothing less than despicable. 0:10:48.240 --> 0:10:50.640 But why would they do this? And here you were 0:10:50.760 --> 0:10:53.920 just an innocent child. I mean, you're still a child. 0:10:54.320 --> 0:10:59.160 And they interrogated you for seven fucking hours, and that 0:10:59.440 --> 0:11:04.240 is a long long time, particularly when you are in 0:11:04.400 --> 0:11:08.480 such a fragile state, right and you're seventeen, you have 0:11:08.480 --> 0:11:12.360 an eighth grade education, you're totally overmatch. You've apparently been 0:11:12.400 --> 0:11:14.400 hitting the ad right because you wake up with this 0:11:14.440 --> 0:11:19.920 horrible headache. And yet they really didn't manage to extract 0:11:19.920 --> 0:11:23.560 the confession from you. Seven hours and they finally get 0:11:23.600 --> 0:11:26.439 you to say they say, you said something that was 0:11:26.559 --> 0:11:30.000 sort of like, you know, well, maybe I could have 0:11:30.320 --> 0:11:33.719 accidentally dropped a knife for what. 0:11:33.760 --> 0:11:37.199 He had guided me to say. The investigator was guiding 0:11:37.280 --> 0:11:40.560 me and things that I needed to say this is 0:11:40.640 --> 0:11:44.120 how I did it, And I was more like asking 0:11:44.200 --> 0:11:47.160 him a question as to instead of making a statement, 0:11:47.280 --> 0:11:49.280 I was asking him that's what he wanted to hear, 0:11:49.400 --> 0:11:52.160 because because I wanted to see my daughter. I wanted 0:11:52.160 --> 0:11:54.440 to make sure my daughter was okay. I wanted to 0:11:54.520 --> 0:11:55.320 hold my daughter. 0:11:56.400 --> 0:11:59.480 He made false promises. Just say it was an accident. 0:12:00.120 --> 0:12:01.880 Just say this, and you'll get to go home, and 0:12:01.920 --> 0:12:04.080 you'll get to see your daughter. We'll get you counseling, 0:12:04.120 --> 0:12:06.520 we'll get you therapy. You just need to say it 0:12:06.559 --> 0:12:09.640 this way. When he didn't like what Michelle said, he 0:12:09.679 --> 0:12:15.120 would start the recording over again. Michael Lee William was 0:12:15.760 --> 0:12:21.800 very likely the person who decapitated Travis and left him 0:12:22.160 --> 0:12:25.720 dead in Michelle's kitchen. There was no knife, no weapon 0:12:25.760 --> 0:12:29.480 ever found, absolutely no blood evidence on Michelle. They never luminalled. 0:12:29.760 --> 0:12:33.000 There were five separate sets of fingerprints that they never tested. 0:12:33.360 --> 0:12:36.200 They didn't test the screen door for fingerprints. They didn't 0:12:36.280 --> 0:12:39.480 test a chair that was seemed like blocking the front 0:12:39.520 --> 0:12:42.199 screen door and it had blood on it. There was 0:12:42.240 --> 0:12:46.600 an open back window that they've later admitted William could 0:12:46.600 --> 0:12:51.679 have crawled through. There's so many inconsistencies between his interviews 0:12:51.720 --> 0:12:55.120 and his testimony at preliminary hearing, and then after preliminary hearing, 0:12:55.559 --> 0:12:59.480 he was found hung quite suspiciously and dead. So the 0:12:59.559 --> 0:13:03.240 only person who really knows the truth is dead. After 0:13:03.320 --> 0:13:06.960 he testified and what the preliminary hearing, judge pulled the 0:13:07.000 --> 0:13:10.600 prosecutor and the defense attorney in after the preliminary hearing 0:13:10.640 --> 0:13:14.119 and said, you need to seriously consider him as the suspect. 0:13:14.200 --> 0:13:16.400 Well, I was reading about this, Shannon, and I found 0:13:16.400 --> 0:13:21.480 it absolutely extraordinary that the judge at your preliminary hearing 0:13:22.120 --> 0:13:26.240 was Judge Messler, And in an interview he called this 0:13:26.360 --> 0:13:29.880 case and I'm quoting, the biggest miscarriage of justice end 0:13:29.960 --> 0:13:31.760 quote that he had ever been connected to, and he 0:13:31.800 --> 0:13:33.000 was holding back tears when. 0:13:32.840 --> 0:13:33.320 He said it. 0:13:34.080 --> 0:13:36.200 What does that tell you about I mean, for a 0:13:36.360 --> 0:13:39.479 judge who'd been on the bench for over four decades 0:13:39.520 --> 0:13:42.640 to say something that holding back tears, this is where 0:13:42.640 --> 0:13:45.560 it really gets me. And I've never heard this before. 0:13:45.600 --> 0:13:47.720 At one point during this preliminary hearing, which is when 0:13:47.720 --> 0:13:51.160 this should have stopped, he actually called the attorneys to 0:13:51.200 --> 0:13:56.040 his chambers to ask if the quote unquote witness who 0:13:56.040 --> 0:13:58.480 we now know was almost. 0:13:58.120 --> 0:14:01.000 Certainly the perpetrator murderer. 0:14:01.280 --> 0:14:04.400 William Michael Lee if he had an attorney, And when 0:14:04.400 --> 0:14:07.959 the prosecutor asked why, Judge Messler responded, and I'm quoting, 0:14:08.559 --> 0:14:11.560 because that's the murderer of this baby, and everybody in 0:14:11.600 --> 0:14:14.280 the courtroom knows it except you apparently. 0:14:16.679 --> 0:14:18.160 Wow. You know, like. 0:14:19.880 --> 0:14:25.120 You would hope that at that point somebody would have said, Okay, 0:14:26.120 --> 0:14:27.760 we're done, that's enough. 0:14:28.240 --> 0:14:28.920 We could stop. 0:14:28.960 --> 0:14:33.480 Now, we can shift our focus. You sit there and go, wait, 0:14:33.520 --> 0:14:37.440 wait a minute, stop like something, just stop, right, You 0:14:37.440 --> 0:14:41.000 have that feeling like this has to This can't be right. 0:14:41.080 --> 0:14:42.680 It can't be that the judge. 0:14:42.880 --> 0:14:47.360 Said something so strong and so profound, and yet everybody 0:14:47.400 --> 0:14:49.920 felt fine just going ahead with this. Let's not call 0:14:49.920 --> 0:14:52.600 it a prosecution. Let's call it a persecution, right, because 0:14:52.880 --> 0:14:55.240 and that's really what was happening. It wasn't an interrogation 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:59.040 that Michelle endured. It was like a witch hunt, basically. 0:14:59.200 --> 0:15:04.720 And it's so nuts because this kid who was another neighbor, right, 0:15:05.120 --> 0:15:08.720 and who hadn't made unwanted sexual advances towards. 0:15:08.480 --> 0:15:12.320 You, right. And it gets worse. 0:15:12.200 --> 0:15:15.240 And worse as this unravels because of the fact that 0:15:15.680 --> 0:15:19.400 there was evidence that was not allowed in court. Because 0:15:19.600 --> 0:15:22.400 the kid's self asphyxiated and hung himself between the time 0:15:22.400 --> 0:15:23.880 of your arrest and the time of the trial. 0:15:24.800 --> 0:15:26.000 It's all just totally bizarre. 0:15:26.080 --> 0:15:29.960 But the testimony was not allowed that was going to 0:15:30.000 --> 0:15:32.840 be presented that he had decapitated a cat, that he 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:35.120 had shown up at school the day of the murder, 0:15:35.240 --> 0:15:38.360 joyful and talking about how he had, you know, exacted 0:15:38.360 --> 0:15:43.480 some revenge on you and other details. Yeah, right, So, 0:15:43.960 --> 0:15:45.600 I mean that would have been the end of the 0:15:45.600 --> 0:15:47.880 trial right there. Right, it would have been like, oh, 0:15:48.560 --> 0:15:51.680 I mean, any jury, I don't care, any jury is 0:15:51.680 --> 0:15:52.720 going to hear that stuff. 0:15:52.720 --> 0:15:53.360 And there was more. 0:15:53.640 --> 0:15:55.400 There was a psychologist who had said that he was 0:15:55.400 --> 0:15:57.640 ten years old, he had examined him, and that he 0:15:57.680 --> 0:16:01.760 had shown when he feels rejected that he had violent tendencies. 0:16:01.840 --> 0:16:05.040 I mean, this is textbook, right, That's exactly what happened. 0:16:05.320 --> 0:16:09.840 He had this rejection, and obviously he was pretty twisted 0:16:09.920 --> 0:16:13.920 considering the way he died, right. Self asphyxiation is a 0:16:13.920 --> 0:16:16.480 bizarre thing at any age, but the fact that he 0:16:16.600 --> 0:16:19.360 was doing that when he was fourteen or fifteen when 0:16:19.400 --> 0:16:22.600 he died is really it takes it to a whole 0:16:22.640 --> 0:16:27.600 other level. So there's just so many bad actors in 0:16:27.640 --> 0:16:34.200 this particular play. So back to this crazy judicial nightmare 0:16:34.400 --> 0:16:34.920 of yours. 0:16:35.120 --> 0:16:35.960 Right, So. 0:16:37.720 --> 0:16:43.160 They decide to proceed even though everybody knows that you're innocent, 0:16:43.560 --> 0:16:47.240 and they just went ahead anyway, which is shocking. So 0:16:47.360 --> 0:16:50.800 what happens next? Now you're in jail awaiting trial. Right, 0:16:50.840 --> 0:16:52.520 they didn't let you see your baby. They lied to 0:16:52.560 --> 0:16:54.760 you in the interrogation room. You're in jail. 0:16:55.320 --> 0:16:57.920 I was put in a cell by myself because I 0:16:57.960 --> 0:17:01.280 was seventeen, with a barrier front of my door until 0:17:01.320 --> 0:17:03.880 I turned eighteen. Even though I was being charged as 0:17:03.920 --> 0:17:07.360 an adult, I was still treated as a juvenile. And 0:17:07.600 --> 0:17:10.960 I didn't get out. I didn't get out but for 0:17:11.040 --> 0:17:15.520 an hour day after everybody else was locked down and 0:17:15.960 --> 0:17:16.960 have access. 0:17:16.600 --> 0:17:19.520 To the phone, so the shower, what have you. And 0:17:19.560 --> 0:17:21.359 it was only for an hour at a time. 0:17:21.960 --> 0:17:23.160 You're in solitary confinement. 0:17:23.680 --> 0:17:25.240 Yeah, that's correct, right. 0:17:25.080 --> 0:17:28.480 No, nobody bothered to think that she needed a psychologist, 0:17:28.680 --> 0:17:31.399 any sort of counseling after what you've been through. 0:17:31.480 --> 0:17:35.080 I mean, okay, I can't I can't even process that. 0:17:36.160 --> 0:17:38.919 And meanwhile, are you even aware of what's going on 0:17:38.960 --> 0:17:40.040 with your daughter at this point? 0:17:40.040 --> 0:17:40.960 Has anybody told you. 0:17:41.000 --> 0:17:42.879 I couldn't get any answers from anybody. 0:17:43.760 --> 0:17:46.280 Did you have parents that you could talk to or anybody? 0:17:46.440 --> 0:17:46.680 Mother? 0:17:47.040 --> 0:17:48.240 But she didn't know either. 0:17:49.040 --> 0:17:52.480 Well, they just denied her access as well because of 0:17:52.680 --> 0:17:55.440 things that had happened to me in her care as 0:17:55.440 --> 0:17:55.879 a child. 0:17:56.560 --> 0:17:58.640 They kept her out of the loop too. 0:18:00.320 --> 0:18:03.000 My entire family was anyone visiting you. 0:18:04.880 --> 0:18:08.920 I got a few visits from family, but they were 0:18:09.000 --> 0:18:11.000 in the dark just as much as I was. 0:18:11.440 --> 0:18:15.040 And we find out later that your daughter was adopted 0:18:15.080 --> 0:18:19.720 by close friends of the prosecutor, right, correct, which again 0:18:20.040 --> 0:18:23.879 just adds a layer to this that is off the 0:18:24.000 --> 0:18:26.600 fucking wall. I mean, it's just like I mean, it 0:18:26.680 --> 0:18:29.679 just doesn't make any logical sense. And then you go 0:18:29.720 --> 0:18:33.240 to trial. You turned eighteen in prison, right, the worst 0:18:33.280 --> 0:18:33.880 eighteenth parent? 0:18:34.359 --> 0:18:34.560 Yeah? 0:18:34.640 --> 0:18:34.960 Ever? 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:37.960 Spent some of the best birthdays or supposed to be 0:18:38.000 --> 0:18:39.800 the best birthdays in jail or prison. 0:18:40.680 --> 0:18:43.439 And back then, you know, I've been a lawyer now 0:18:43.480 --> 0:18:46.080 twenty some years, but I was an intern for the 0:18:46.119 --> 0:18:48.240 Public Defender's Office and would have to go to the 0:18:48.280 --> 0:18:53.639 adult detention center, and these women and men were either 0:18:53.680 --> 0:18:56.760 in cages or in a bunk or so to speak, 0:18:57.119 --> 0:19:00.199 lying on top of each other, roaches, rats, my it 0:19:00.320 --> 0:19:08.040 was despicable, and this smell was unfathomable. I mean I 0:19:08.080 --> 0:19:10.480 would throw up in my mouth every time. 0:19:10.920 --> 0:19:12.040 It was just awful. 0:19:12.080 --> 0:19:14.920 But you had to go out there as a public defender, 0:19:15.240 --> 0:19:17.600 intern or lawyer. We would go out there just to 0:19:17.720 --> 0:19:20.320 check on their well being and we would report the 0:19:20.520 --> 0:19:24.320 conditions and it never changed. I could not even imagine 0:19:24.440 --> 0:19:28.359 having to endure that, even if I did do something wrong, 0:19:28.560 --> 0:19:32.040 but knowing I didn't do anything and being in that 0:19:32.280 --> 0:19:33.680 just it just. 0:19:34.200 --> 0:19:34.760 This is the jail. 0:19:34.800 --> 0:19:37.800 It's unspeakable. That's where Michelle was held right prior to 0:19:37.800 --> 0:19:38.560 the trial. The adult. 0:19:38.720 --> 0:19:43.200 Yes, it was horrible, and that's something that is worth understanding. 0:19:43.520 --> 0:19:46.919 Jails by and large, are worse than prisons for some 0:19:46.960 --> 0:19:48.399 of the reasons that you're talking about. 0:19:48.400 --> 0:19:49.359 There's no recreation. 0:19:49.680 --> 0:19:51.880 Many people are held, as Michelle was, in their cell 0:19:52.000 --> 0:19:55.000 for twenty three hours a day. The lights don't go off, 0:19:55.560 --> 0:20:02.879 they're never cleaned. They're literally breathing grounds for disease, violence, rape, 0:20:03.400 --> 0:20:06.240 because there's so much pressure built up because there's nothing 0:20:06.280 --> 0:20:08.600 to do except for sit there. You've got people in 0:20:08.600 --> 0:20:10.760 there who are innocent, like Michelle. You've got people in 0:20:10.800 --> 0:20:13.000 there who are accused of crimes but can't post bail, 0:20:13.080 --> 0:20:14.480 but they may or may not be innocent. We have 0:20:14.520 --> 0:20:17.320 no idea, and then we have them mixed in with 0:20:17.400 --> 0:20:20.800 violent criminals. It sounds like a more benign word than prison, 0:20:21.320 --> 0:20:23.800 and it's important for people to understand that it's the 0:20:23.840 --> 0:20:24.840 farthest thing from it. 0:20:25.040 --> 0:20:29.639 Well, and then also especially whenever the media crucifies you 0:20:29.800 --> 0:20:32.040 and makes you out to be one of the most 0:20:32.320 --> 0:20:36.840 horrific monsters there is and you're charged with any form 0:20:36.920 --> 0:20:37.119 of a. 0:20:37.160 --> 0:20:39.719 Child crime and they broadcast it. 0:20:39.840 --> 0:20:43.440 These people, these women or men in jail, they see that, 0:20:43.520 --> 0:20:44.880 they watch the news. 0:20:45.280 --> 0:20:46.400 You get taunted. 0:20:47.320 --> 0:20:50.080 You just get fucked with really bad in there, and 0:20:51.480 --> 0:20:52.880 it's twenty four hours. 0:20:53.560 --> 0:20:59.480 You get fucked with, excuse my language, messed with in there. 0:21:00.320 --> 0:21:04.520 And especially for well, the crime that I was charged 0:21:04.560 --> 0:21:12.080 with and the goryinous, the horror of it, and what 0:21:12.119 --> 0:21:14.560 they would say on the news and stuff. People will 0:21:14.560 --> 0:21:17.560 take that and then they twist it and make it 0:21:17.600 --> 0:21:20.320 even worse, as if you could make it any worse. 0:21:20.880 --> 0:21:24.760 But being in there and you're innocent of this as well, 0:21:24.800 --> 0:21:28.240 and you don't know, like me, I. 0:21:28.160 --> 0:21:31.600 Didn't know where my daughter was and just I'm going 0:21:31.680 --> 0:21:35.240 through this, and then I'm having people yelling through the vents, 0:21:35.400 --> 0:21:39.160 hollering at me all the time, calling me a baby killer. 0:21:40.840 --> 0:21:44.280 I got threats all the time. They were going to 0:21:44.320 --> 0:21:47.720 make sure my food had something in it. They were 0:21:47.800 --> 0:21:49.679 gonna do the same thing to me that I had 0:21:49.720 --> 0:21:56.119 supposedly done to my job. I mean, you learn to 0:21:56.200 --> 0:21:59.440 just kind of try to block it out as much 0:21:59.440 --> 0:22:01.800 as you can, but you can't block it all out. 0:22:02.720 --> 0:22:04.680 And it's twenty four hours a day. 0:22:05.320 --> 0:22:09.480 I can't imagine how. It's just bad and worse. And 0:22:09.680 --> 0:22:10.920