Speaker 1: Hey, Oh my god, I'm so excited.
Speaker 2: I'm not ready for you.
Speaker 3: I thought I want to talk about that's bullshit.
Speaker 4: We don't need setup.
Speaker 2: This is okay, That's what I thought.
Speaker 5: One afternoon, I see a white envelope sitting in my
Speaker 5: mailbox in Brooklyn, stamped in red letters. It says mailed
Speaker 5: from a state correctional institution, and on the top left
Speaker 5: of the envelope, I see his name, Oh Journey. I
Speaker 5: had to call Kelsey right away. She was back in
Speaker 5: her home state of North Carolina after months of living
Speaker 5: between Florida and Brooklyn, reporting on the Leo Schofield case
Speaker 5: with me. Okay, it looks like it's it's on prison
Speaker 5: paper and it's not the original thing.
Speaker 6: I said, Okay, just read it.
Speaker 1: Jesus Christ, oh.
Speaker 2: My God, says I want you to know that Polk
Speaker 2: County gave me a call about you. I don't think
Speaker 2: you can come see me. Who knows what will happen?
Speaker 2: And that is sad when they can't see that.
Speaker 7: I have kept my damn mouth shut for thirty one
Speaker 7: years Schofield case.
Speaker 2: Let's say he should be out. I've thought about writing
Speaker 2: my story that no one wants to hear. I just
Speaker 2: don't really know how gotta go Jay.
Speaker 8: Scott moment.
Speaker 5: That has my field.
Speaker 8: Sut sory in this vass.
Speaker 9: To see gralation, brag desbish to the world.
Speaker 2: Solding, s.
Speaker 5: To the word solding, So.
Speaker 10: Things Bone Valley, Chapter eight.
Speaker 5: Dear mister King, I'd started writing Jeremy because honestly, I
Speaker 5: didn't know what else to do. After working on this
Speaker 5: story for a year, the evidence I'd seen pointed more
Speaker 5: and more towards Jeremy Scott as Michelle Schofield's killer. So
Speaker 5: I sent my letters out hoping that Jeremy might decide
Speaker 5: to open up to me, to converse in a way
Speaker 5: that he hadn't with the lawyers, investigators, and cold case
Speaker 5: detectives who read him his rights and make him swear
Speaker 5: under oath. I just want to have a conversation with him,
Speaker 5: to hear the story he says that no one wants
Speaker 5: to hear. But we need to back up for a
Speaker 5: minute to September of twenty nineteen, about ten months before
Speaker 5: I got Jeremy's letter. So we're here at the Tampa
Speaker 5: Law Center in Tampa, Florida. We're here for the second
Speaker 5: DCA Oral Arguments after studying every detail of Leo's case
Speaker 5: over the past year. This is the first legal proceeding
Speaker 5: we get to see for ourselves the deciding factor. But
Speaker 5: this moment, this particular appeal, is everything for Leo. This
Speaker 5: could really kill all his chances of going forward at
Speaker 5: this moment, and I think this is almost like his
Speaker 5: last chance. The reason we're here is because the judge
Speaker 5: in the last hearing denied Leo a new trial, even
Speaker 5: after watching Jeremy Scott confess to killing Michelle Schofield in court. So,
Speaker 5: in spite of the forensic evidence linking Jeremy Scott to
Speaker 5: the crime scene, and despite the fact that there is
Speaker 5: still no physical evidence and no direct evidence tying Leo
Speaker 5: Schofield to the murder of his wife, a single judge
Speaker 5: ruled that Jeremy Scott was not credible and his confession
Speaker 5: to killing Michelle was not believable. But Leo those lawyers
Speaker 5: appealed the judge's decision and won.
Speaker 2: So.
Speaker 5: Now, almost two years after Jeremy Scott confessed on the stand,
Speaker 5: Leo was given another chance to make his case in
Speaker 5: court to argue that he deserves a new trial. This
Speaker 5: hearing will be before a panel of three judges seated
Speaker 5: on the Second District Court of Appeal. It's about to
Speaker 5: start when we see Leo's wife Chrissy and their daughter
Speaker 5: Ashley walk through the door.
Speaker 4: Yeah, you know what you're like, trying to get somewhere
Speaker 4: on time. Oh yeah, don't get stressed.
Speaker 1: But you made it.
Speaker 5: Everything's fine. They're just starting to see people. So you
Speaker 5: guys are in great shape. How are you am I today?
Speaker 11: Hmmm, I don't I don't know if I have a
Speaker 11: word for it.
Speaker 5: Actually, just.
Speaker 8: Hopeful.
Speaker 11: Hopeful, Yeah, that's probably.
Speaker 5: The best word. At Leo's last hearing, Chrisy witnessed how
Speaker 5: Jeremy Scott withstood the prosecutor's verbal abuse. How by the
Speaker 5: end of his testimony, Jeremy maintained that it was he
Speaker 5: alone who killed Michelle Schofield back in February of nineteen
Speaker 5: eighty seven. Some of his last words in court that
Speaker 5: day were, I killed her.
Speaker 11: It's maddening that we are still here all these years later,
Speaker 11: and I was thinking about it's been two years since
Speaker 11: I got the call about the confession. Two years. He
Speaker 11: described in detail what he did, how he did it,
Speaker 11: what he was thinking when he did it, what Michelle
Speaker 11: was saying when he killed her two years later and
Speaker 11: we're still talking about this.
Speaker 5: If these three judges don't grant Leo a new trial,
Speaker 5: it will become even harder for him to successfully appeal
Speaker 5: to a higher court and get another opportunity to prove
Speaker 5: his innocence. Leo isn't allowed here to watch the hearing,
Speaker 5: and he won't find out how it went until he
Speaker 5: calls Chrissy later in the day. How are Leo's spirits lately?
Speaker 11: He's hopeful, but he's also afraid. He's afraid that we'll
Speaker 11: get more of the same. He's afraid that he'll disappoint
Speaker 11: his family. When I think about that is when I
Speaker 11: get choked up, because he doesn't disappoint us. But so
Speaker 11: that's where he is.
Speaker 12: So that's that I think we should go in.
Speaker 5: The room is more like a lecture hall than a courtroom,
Speaker 5: but there's a tenseness in the air. More than a
Speaker 5: dozen people have come in support of Leo. They are
Speaker 5: all aware that this may be Leo's last chance for justice.
Speaker 13: You know my name is, said Seth Miller from the
Speaker 13: Edison's Project Flores, my co counsel mis Stolen, who will
Speaker 13: not arguing.
Speaker 5: Today, First, Leo's attorney, Seth Miller from the Innocence Project
Speaker 5: of Florida, gets up and begins his oral argument about
Speaker 5: the new evidence of Jeremy Scott's confession to killing Michelle.
Speaker 5: He only has twenty minutes to present his case, but
Speaker 5: the judges can interrupt at any point to ask questions.
Speaker 7: We have additional fact.
Speaker 5: That Seth brings up. How there are certain details Jeremy
Speaker 5: knows that only the murderer could know, how Jeremy's story
Speaker 5: is consistent with the forensic evidence, and how Michelle was
Speaker 5: found in the same spot that Jeremy used to take
Speaker 5: his girlfriend Jamie Nellams. But just a minute into his argument,
Speaker 5: the judges are already interrupting with questions, and before long
Speaker 5: they veer away from Jeremy Scott's confession and instead dredge
Speaker 5: up the same so called evidence from the original trial,
Speaker 5: like Leo's father's weird behavior.
Speaker 13: His ex girlfriend Jamie Nellens testified that he used to
Speaker 13: bring her to.
Speaker 14: Then few mornings after the incident, the defendant's father had
Speaker 14: a premonition that that's where the body was and led
Speaker 14: police to that location.
Speaker 5: Is what really bothers me listening to the judges questions,
Speaker 5: is that Leo Senior's story about a vision from God
Speaker 5: continues to be treated as a fact in this case,
Speaker 5: as if he woke up that morning with a premonition
Speaker 5: and then led police to some random ditch in Polk
Speaker 5: County where Michelle's body just happened to be. That's not
Speaker 5: what happened. Leo Senior had been searching for Michelle for
Speaker 5: nearly three days and nights. He didn't lead police to
Speaker 5: the body. He found her body, then flagged down a
Speaker 5: passing trucker who alerted the police. And it wasn't until
Speaker 5: after the police showed up that he claimed to have
Speaker 5: had this clairvoyant vision from God. It was a story
Speaker 5: told by a distraught and troubled man. And so, with
Speaker 5: only twenty precious minutes to argue his case, Seth gets
Speaker 5: stuck explaining Leo's father's premonition instead of arguing to the
Speaker 5: judges why Jeremy Scott's confessions deserve to be considered by
Speaker 5: a new jury at a new trial. Impact and that's
Speaker 5: all Leo and his lawyers are asking for. They're not
Speaker 5: asking for Leo to walk out of prison today. They're
Speaker 5: just asking for a new jury to decide his fate.
Speaker 5: After Seth takes a seat, the attorney for the state
Speaker 5: makes his argument, and it's basically this, Jeremy Scott is
Speaker 5: not credible and nothing he says should be believed. But
Speaker 5: there is one time the state says that you can
Speaker 5: believe Jeremy when he says he didn't kill Michelle.
Speaker 13: His version of events, which was deemed credible by his
Speaker 13: court in twenty ten, that he stole the stereo equipment
Speaker 13: and found the abandoned car and did not kill michelle'sko field,
Speaker 13: matches much more logically with the evidence known in the
Speaker 13: case than his version of events.
Speaker 5: This is the preposterous position the state is forced to
Speaker 5: defend that a man who has confessed to three different
Speaker 5: murders in Polk County that he is forensically linked to
Speaker 5: is suddenly nothing more than a car stereo thief. It's
Speaker 5: like they're refusing to acknowledge the fact that the State
Speaker 5: Attorney's office has already prosecuted Jeremy Scott twice for murder.
Speaker 13: If this court does not have any further questions, I
Speaker 13: would ask that you affirm the trial court's denial of
Speaker 13: the motion for newly discovered evidence thank you very much.
Speaker 5: The hearing doesn't last long, about thirty minutes, and then
Speaker 5: it's over. We all walk out into the lobby and
Speaker 5: don't know how to feel. It's hard to read what
Speaker 5: the judges are thinking, and Leo's family wants to remain optimistic.
Speaker 5: But now the waiting begins. For the next eight months.
Speaker 5: We will all wake up in the morning and refresh
Speaker 5: the second DCA's website to see if their decision has
Speaker 5: been posted online, to see if the court has ruled
Speaker 5: that Leo should be granted a new trial.
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Speaker 16: Bone Valley is sponsored by Stand Together. Stand Together is
Speaker 16: a philanthropic community that partners with America's boldest change makers
Speaker 16: to tackle the root causes of our country's biggest problems,
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Speaker 16: Was using drugs and alcohol to numb the pain he
Speaker 16: was trying to numb childhood trauma. In his early twenties,
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Speaker 5: And criminal justice.
Speaker 16: To learn more about addiction and the War on drugs,
Speaker 16: listen to the War on.
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Speaker 5: While Leo and his family wait for the judges to
Speaker 5: release their decision about whether or not Leo will be
Speaker 5: granted a new trial, Leo has one other chance for freedom,
Speaker 5: not through a new trial that will allow him to
Speaker 5: clear his name, but through parole. Parole is basically the
Speaker 5: state way of saying you committed a crime, served your sentence,
Speaker 5: and kept out of trouble in prison, so as long
Speaker 5: as you keep checking in with us now and again,
Speaker 5: we no longer think you're a present danger to society.
Speaker 5: But parole is not ideal for Leo because even if
Speaker 5: it's granted, he'll still be a convicted murderer in the
Speaker 5: eyes of the state. On the other hand, if he's paroled,
Speaker 5: he'd at least eventually be home with his family. In
Speaker 5: a lot of ways, Leo is the perfect candidate for parole.
Speaker 5: He's a model inmate who's obtained multiple college degrees and
Speaker 5: leads the prison ministry program God behind Bars.
Speaker 17: I've graduated college, I've gotten awards from the toast Masters.
Speaker 17: I can't do anything else. There's nothing else to do here.
Speaker 17: I've been the pastor of the Messionic community here since
Speaker 17: twenty eleven. I invented programs to graduate from and.
Speaker 5: Leo hasn't had a single disciplinary infraction in fourteen years.
Speaker 5: In fact, over his thirty years in prison, he's been
Speaker 5: written up just five times, and only for minor infractions,
Speaker 5: like once he missed a day of work because of
Speaker 5: an injury and another time he handed out one of
Speaker 5: Chrissy's mary K Cosmetics cards to a corrections officer he
Speaker 5: was friendly with. In addition to presenting their prison records,
Speaker 5: inmates are expected to show that they'd be a benefit
Speaker 5: to society and that they'd have stable housing and jobs.
Speaker 5: Leo has all of that lined up. He has dozens
Speaker 5: of letters of support from friends and family, and even
Speaker 5: corrections officers who have known him for years. Leo even
Speaker 5: has a letter of support from Michelle's brother Jesse. Sam
Speaker 5: Chrisy got in touch with him after the fingerprints and
Speaker 5: Michelle's car were matched to Jeremy Scott and Chrissy started
Speaker 5: sending Jesse documents, so.
Speaker 18: I read through it and I was like, dang man,
Speaker 18: this stuff's pretty substantial. Fingerprints was a big deal. Jeremy's
Speaker 18: history was a big deal. By the fact that he
Speaker 18: had murdered other people and that he was around that
Speaker 18: same area frequently was a big deal. And and a
Speaker 18: lot of that stuff just started adding up.
Speaker 5: Do you believe that Jeremy Scott killed your sister? I
Speaker 5: think so.
Speaker 18: I think he did. Yeah, And I think that Leo's
Speaker 18: been wrongfully in prison this whole time.
Speaker 5: And you know, it's it.
Speaker 18: It bothers me. It makes me sad, you know that
Speaker 18: they won't try to pursue the evidence that's boiled up
Speaker 18: after all these years and at least process it, you know,
Speaker 18: and then we'll all know, you know, if he did
Speaker 18: or not. I mean, dude, we're all just searching for
Speaker 18: the answer, you know, So why wouldn't we pursue it?
Speaker 6: Yeah, the parole hearing, it started pretty early in the morning.
Speaker 6: Got there, saw Chrissy and Ashley and you know, the
Speaker 6: whole gang.
Speaker 5: It's January eighth, twenty twenty, about four months after the
Speaker 5: second DCA hearing that would determine whether or not Leo
Speaker 5: will get a new trial, but there's still no decision
Speaker 5: in time for Leo's parole hearing. I had something scheduled
Speaker 5: that day, so Kelsey made arrangements to fly down to
Speaker 5: Tallahassee to cover the hearing herself, and I knew Kelsey
Speaker 5: was kind of nervous about this trip.
Speaker 6: Texted Gilbert, I said, don't see Hill yet.
Speaker 5: Jerry Hill was John Aguero's boss at the time of
Speaker 5: Leo's trial back in nineteen eighty nine. He's a tough
Speaker 5: talking law and order prosecutor who ran unopposed in his
Speaker 5: last seven elections. Parole is different from Leo's other hearings
Speaker 5: because a representative from the state doesn't have to be there.
Speaker 5: But Jerry Hill in his office have made a point
Speaker 5: of showing up to these hearings. Even though he retired
Speaker 5: in early twenty seventeen after serving thirty two years as
Speaker 5: state attorney, he still drives hours to attend these parole hearings,
Speaker 5: and he's taken a special interest in Leo's case. We
Speaker 5: tried emailing Jerry Hill, but we received no response. We
Speaker 5: had a lot of questions and since nobody from the
Speaker 5: state Attorney's office would agree to be interviewed. We knew
Speaker 5: our only chance to talk to Jerry Hill might be
Speaker 5: after the hearing, and with me unable to attend, Kelsey
Speaker 5: was going to have to be the one to try
Speaker 5: to corner him support.
Speaker 13: We have a number of those people here and I'd
Speaker 13: like to call on.
Speaker 2: Some of them.
Speaker 5: Seth Miller from the Innocence Project makes the case for
Speaker 5: Leo's parole. He has just ten minutes and he has
Speaker 5: to share that time with Leo's family members and people
Speaker 5: whom Leo mentored in the prison, all of whom have
Speaker 5: shown up to speak on his behalf.
Speaker 19: He's a leader, a mentor.
Speaker 15: He encouraged me to participate in programs, and here I
Speaker 15: am today.
Speaker 5: With so many speakers in so little time. Even Chrissy
Speaker 5: and Ashley are given less than a minute to explain
Speaker 5: to the commissioners who they are and why they want
Speaker 5: Leo home.
Speaker 8: Good morning.
Speaker 20: My name is Chrissy Schofield. I've been in prison with
Speaker 20: Leo for about twenty eight years now, and one thing
Speaker 20: that I do know about the Department of Corrections is
Speaker 20: it's not designed to build better men.
Speaker 11: But there are a few that do rise and Leo's
Speaker 11: one of those guys.
Speaker 1: Hi, my name is Ashley.
Speaker 21: All I have to say is I will take advantage
Speaker 21: of every opportunity every family outing, everything that they teach us,
Speaker 21: I will take in just so when my dad gets home,
Speaker 21: we can have the best life that we possibly can.
Speaker 1: That's all I have to say.
Speaker 5: The ten minutes are up. Everyone who speaks on Leo's
Speaker 5: behalf a seat. Then it's the other side's turn.
Speaker 19: Think.
Speaker 6: I look to my right. I glanced up and I
Speaker 6: saw Jerry Hill walking down the aisle approaching the podium.
Speaker 6: So I immediately like stopped breathing for a minute. It
Speaker 6: was just like kind of in shock, like, oh my god,
Speaker 6: he's here.
Speaker 7: Borning commissioners. Jerry Hill on behalf of Brian Haas, the
Speaker 7: state attorney for the.
Speaker 6: Dense Circuit, texted Gilbert again, JK. Hill is here. Gilbert says, Okay,
Speaker 6: stay cool, you got this.
Speaker 5: The next ten minutes of the hearing is supposed to
Speaker 5: be allotted to any of the victims' loved ones who
Speaker 5: want to speak or have a letter read. They usually
Speaker 5: asked the parole board not to release the convicted person
Speaker 5: that's up for parole, but Jesse Michelle's brother had written
Speaker 5: a different kind of letter to the state, and he
Speaker 5: asked for it to be read at the hearing. He wrote,
Speaker 5: I do not have confidence in the conviction of Leo
Speaker 5: Schofield and I support his request for parole. But Jesse
Speaker 5: Salm's letter is never presented. Instead, the retired state attorney
Speaker 5: Jerry Hill uses the time to argue that Leo Schofield
Speaker 5: should never get out.
Speaker 6: Of prison, and he starts talking about the facts of
Speaker 6: the case.
Speaker 7: The defendant's car and his wife's car was abandoned on
Speaker 7: a F four. It was discovered by the father and
Speaker 7: Leo before law enforcement could find it.
Speaker 5: By this point, I was getting used to the state
Speaker 5: twisting the facts and injecting bad evidence into every proceeding.
Speaker 5: But then Jerry Hill takes it to another level. Instead
Speaker 5: of the usual mention of Leo's father's vision from God,
Speaker 5: jerry Hill gets it wrong in a major way.
Speaker 7: Leo said he was driven by an interforce to go
Speaker 7: back to the pit area again. Leo's say that he
Speaker 7: felt drawn to that area and felt that Michelle was
Speaker 7: calling out to him.
Speaker 5: He makes it sound like it was Leo himself who
Speaker 5: had the premonition.
Speaker 7: Leo said he began to search. The closer he got
Speaker 7: to Michelle, the worst's head hurt.
Speaker 5: It's not the job of the three parole commissioners to
Speaker 5: know all the facts of Leo's case. In fact, the
Speaker 5: point of the hearing isn't supposed to be about the
Speaker 5: facts of the case at all. Most of the people
Speaker 5: who are hoping to be granted parole have admitted their
Speaker 5: guilt in the crimes they've been convicted of the point
Speaker 5: of parole is to evaluate how they've conducted themselves in prison,
Speaker 5: to see if the inmate can be safely released back
Speaker 5: into society after having served their minimum sentence. But listening
Speaker 5: to Jerry Hill, these commissioners probably thought it was suspicious
Speaker 5: that the guy who was convicted of killing his eighteen
Speaker 5: year old wife also claimed that a vision from God
Speaker 5: led him to discover her boy. But of course none
Speaker 5: of that ever happened. It wasn't Leo but his father
Speaker 5: who had this supposed vision from God. Maybe it was
Speaker 5: just an honest mistake by a retired state attorney who
Speaker 5: is no longer familiar with the facts of the case
Speaker 5: from back in the nineteen eighties. But these kind of
Speaker 5: misrepresentations happen over and over at every stage of Leo's case,
Speaker 5: from his trial through all his appeals and now parole.
Speaker 5: The state, attorneys, the judges, they just keep getting the
Speaker 5: facts wrong. And it's hard to know if it's just
Speaker 5: carelessness or if the state is intentionally misleading in order
Speaker 5: to keep Leo locked behind bars. Either way, someone's freedom,
Speaker 5: someone's life is on the line. And Jerry Hill isn't
Speaker 5: done with his argument yet.
Speaker 7: I listened to that presentation, how this individual has taken
Speaker 7: advantage of a lot of opportunities, But folks, I got
Speaker 7: to point out an absolute glaring hole in that presentation.
Speaker 7: I didn't hear one word about regret. Sarah wish I
Speaker 7: hadn't done it. I was a different person. Then this
Speaker 7: guy is an unrepentant, jury convicted first degree murderer, proven
Speaker 7: beyond into the exclusion of every reasonable doubt. There's no remorse,
Speaker 7: there's no sorrow. How do you put a man in
Speaker 7: a program, getting him ready to be released into society
Speaker 7: when he can't say I'm sorry, when he can't say
Speaker 7: I did it.
Speaker 12: I know this is a subsequent and I'm sorry. I'm
Speaker 12: so emotional about it.
Speaker 7: I just feel very strongly that this is a cold,
Speaker 7: calculating first degree murder. He's a manipulator and this is
Speaker 7: exactly where we.
Speaker 20: Ought to be.
Speaker 5: After Jerry Hill speaks, the commissioners announced their decision right
Speaker 5: then and there, Leo is denied parole. The commission makes
Speaker 5: it very clear that parole is not a right, but
Speaker 5: quote an active grace of the state. There will be
Speaker 5: no active grace for Leo Schofield.
Speaker 6: You can't really react to the ruling in the room.
Speaker 6: So we all were kind of devastated, but trying to
Speaker 6: hide it a little bit until we got out into
Speaker 6: the lobby. And then we all stepped outside and I
Speaker 6: glanced over and I saw Hill walking out, and I knew.
Speaker 6: I knew that that was my opportunity. It's just like,
Speaker 6: can't hesitate. I just like turned on my heel and
Speaker 6: called out, mister Hill.
Speaker 1: I'm working on a story with Gilbert King about the
Speaker 1: Riosco Field. King, can I ask you a question. Well,
Speaker 1: let's see, this case was originally handled by John Aguero.
Speaker 12: That's correct.
Speaker 1: What do you think when you take on a case
Speaker 1: of his friend so long ago.
Speaker 12: I think John was a brilliant prosecutor and that he
Speaker 12: was spot on.
Speaker 6: He could probably tell how nervous I was. My hands
Speaker 6: might have been shaking a little bit. I wish it
Speaker 6: hadn't been so obvious that I was nervous, But to
Speaker 6: some degree, I think maybe that worked in my favor.
Speaker 6: I think maybe it disarmed him a little bit, and
Speaker 6: I was able to kind of gain my confidence back
Speaker 6: when I realized how little he knows about this case.
Speaker 6: And what did you think when you first learned that
Speaker 6: the fingerprints in michelle'skoe Fields car were identified to Jeremy Scott?
Speaker 12: I thought Jeremy Scott was a thief.
Speaker 1: Your office prosecuted him twice for murder?
Speaker 12: Didn't it since then? Not before then? Not at that time?
Speaker 12: Subsequent long suchan.
Speaker 1: Poel Johnson murder was in eighteen eighty five, that was
Speaker 1: after I believe, No, that was before Michelle's murder was
Speaker 1: at eighty seven.
Speaker 12: Okay, you may be right. It doesn't add Did you
Speaker 12: hear the transcript? Did you see the judge's findings? All
Speaker 12: he's a liar. He offered to sell his testimony for
Speaker 12: one thousand dollars. That's hardly a basis for suggesting that
Speaker 12: he's the actual murderer.
Speaker 1: Couldn't he be a stereo thief and the actual murderer.
Speaker 12: Now that's a theoretical question, and I guess in theory
Speaker 12: the answer is, of course he could be.
Speaker 1: I mean, it shouldn't it be your responsibility to investigate.
Speaker 7: Wait a minute, we have investigated this thing upside down.
Speaker 7: Leo'scholfield is a cold blooded murderer, and if I have
Speaker 7: my way, he'll never get out of prison.
Speaker 1: Right now, Leo's case is being reviewed by the Second DCA.
Speaker 1: If they were to reverse the lower court's opinion, would
Speaker 1: you try him again?
Speaker 12: Oh, let me tell you, I'm not too worried about that.
Speaker 12: We're not gonna have to try him again.
Speaker 8: You wouldn't do that, Oh.
Speaker 7: We'll try him again if he were to get off me.
Speaker 7: Let me tell you right now, he's a killer. And
Speaker 7: unless you want to take him home, will you, then
Speaker 7: he's where he ought to be.
Speaker 1: Thank you very much.
Speaker 6: All of the stuff that I've read before that i'd
Speaker 6: read in transcripts, just how the state talks about Leo
Speaker 6: in his case, I think maybe i'd kind of been
Speaker 6: telling myself like, oh, you know, they can't be that bad, right,
Speaker 6: Like I see the words on the page.
Speaker 1: But it just can't be that bad.
Speaker 6: I've been listening to Jerry Hill. It's just like, oh gosh, no,
Speaker 6: it really is that bad.
Speaker 1: It's really worse.
Speaker 22: Now.
Speaker 17: I think Jerry Hill he had an opportunity to be
Speaker 17: the hero, and they can still be the hero. I
Speaker 17: don't want money, I don't want fame, I don't want
Speaker 17: any of this stuff. I just want justice for my
Speaker 17: dead wife. That's what I want. Give that to me
Speaker 17: and I'll put my mom over your shoulder and say
Speaker 17: you're the hero. You're the frigging hero.
Speaker 19: Just do what's right.
Speaker 17: Do what's right, because you're never going to give me justice.
Speaker 12: Never.
Speaker 17: You can't give me back thirty four years. You can't
Speaker 17: give Michelle back her life. The least you can do
Speaker 17: when you say that you care about her is do
Speaker 17: the right thing by her. Because this is not it.
Speaker 17: This is definitely not it.
Speaker 5: After Leo learns he's been denied parole, he sends Chrissy
Speaker 5: an email through the prison system's computers. As usual, it's
Speaker 5: Leo who is trying to buoy everyone's spirits. Leo writes,
Speaker 5: I'm so sorry you have to deal with this. I
Speaker 5: was so hopeful that it was going to be different
Speaker 5: this time. I'm just sorry.
Speaker 2: I love you.
Speaker 5: A few months after Leo was denied parole, I go
Speaker 5: to my computer and there it is the second DCA's decision.
Speaker 5: Leo is also denied a new trial. His chances of
Speaker 5: proving his innocence and getting out of prison and having
Speaker 5: a normal life with his family they're pretty much gone.
Speaker 5: I text Chrissy, I text Judge Scott Cupp. I struggle
Speaker 5: to imagine what this will do to Leo. All he
Speaker 5: can do now is wait for yet another parole hearing,
Speaker 5: where yet again, the state will argue that he's not
Speaker 5: worthy of freedom because he isn't sorry for killing Michelle,
Speaker 5: and Leo will refuse to express remorse because he's always
Speaker 5: maintained his innocence. The timing of the second DCA's decision
Speaker 5: not to grant Leo a new trial, it couldn't be worse.
Speaker 5: COVID is in full swing and Chrissy and Ashley are
Speaker 5: not allowed any in person visits with Leo. Also, during
Speaker 5: this time, Leo's mom passes away and Leo witnesses an
Speaker 5: inmate gets stabbed to death.
Speaker 17: I mean, it really is shocking to me that we
Speaker 17: can get dis and not get any relief at all,
Speaker 17: you know, and then the reality is settling in that
Speaker 17: the the nightmare scenario that I could die in here,
Speaker 17: you know, and and that's just too heavy for me.
Speaker 5: Kelsey, I that's gonna be the straw that breaks my back.
Speaker 17: I can't do that. I just I'm not gonna give
Speaker 17: him another thirty I don't want to.
Speaker 22: I don't.
Speaker 19: I would feel totally wrong to allow that. I would
Speaker 19: rather end it myself. That's the gospel truth. I'm not
Speaker 19: gonna let my wife my daughter suffer through this crap anymore.
Speaker 12: I'm not. I'm just not gonna do it.
Speaker 17: So we're not gonna l anticipate it going that way.
Speaker 17: I'm believing I'm willing to take anything that allows me
Speaker 17: to go home and take care of my wife and daughter,
Speaker 17: short of admitting to something I didn't do.
Speaker 5: As Leo struggles to keep hope, I think about all
Speaker 5: the work Kelsey and I have put into this case.
Speaker 5: Nobody around Leo will ever say it, but we can
Speaker 5: feel it. They're putting all their hopes in our investigation,
Speaker 5: our story about Leo's case, and because I'm also very
Speaker 5: aware of the mountains that must be moved in order
Speaker 5: to overturn a wrongful conviction. I always make sure to
Speaker 5: temper any expectations. Telling Leo's story, no matter how truthfully
Speaker 5: and persuasively, is simply not a realistic path toward gaining
Speaker 5: his freedom. But there's no denying it. Our investigation, our story,
Speaker 5: might just be Leo's last hope, his last chance to
Speaker 5: convince people that he was wrongly convicted of murdering his wife,
Speaker 5: and that Jeremy Scott is Michelle's true murderer. We've seen
Speaker 5: how the State of Florida's false narrative has defined Leo's case.
Speaker 5: At the very least, we want to correct this narrative.
Speaker 5: Kelsey and I are thinking about where to look next,
Speaker 5: and there's one stone we've left unturned. We start thinking
Speaker 5: more and more about Jeremy Scott. Maybe he has more
Speaker 5: to say. We have to try to talk to him.
Speaker 5: So I write a letter to Jeremy and mail it
Speaker 5: off to him, and when I don't hear from him,
Speaker 5: I write another. I tell him that I'm an author
Speaker 5: and that I've been investigating the Leo Schofield case, and
Speaker 5: that I'm interested in his dealings with the State Attorney's office.
Speaker 5: I send him a self address, stamped envelope and some
Speaker 5: extra papers so he can write me back. I know
Speaker 5: he's been contacted by journalists in the past and that
Speaker 5: he doesn't respond, so my hopes are pretty low, but
Speaker 5: there's not much else I can do. It's the spring
Speaker 5: of twenty twenty and COVID is stopping us from traveling
Speaker 5: down to Florida. Sitting in my office in Brooklyn, I
Speaker 5: feel powerless. But the one thing I can do is
Speaker 5: write to Jeremy. So I keep at it, just hoping
Speaker 5: he'll change his mind and write back.
Speaker 2: Oh he shouldn't, Jeremy.
Speaker 5: And seven months later, I see that first letter sitting
Speaker 5: in my mailbox.
Speaker 2: She says, I want you to know that Polk County
Speaker 2: gave me a call about you. I don't think you
Speaker 2: can come see me. Who knows what will happen? And
Speaker 2: that is sad when I have kept my damn mouth
Speaker 2: shut for thirty one years. Schofield case. Let's say he
Speaker 2: should be out. I've thought about writing my story that
Speaker 2: no one wants to hear. I just don't really know how.
Speaker 2: Gotta go.
Speaker 1: Jay Scott, Well, okay, I.
Speaker 2: Think he's looking to as again.
Speaker 4: He got a call.
Speaker 1: It sounds like Peulk County made him believe that he
Speaker 1: is not allowed to talk to us, which they can't do.
Speaker 5: No, they can't, and that's why we're going to figure
Speaker 5: out what they did. We file a record request to
Speaker 5: find out who might have called him, but we're informed
Speaker 5: by the Florida Department of Corrections that they can't release
Speaker 5: those records. So I write Jeremy another letter. I want
Speaker 5: to see if he'd agree to a visit from us.
Speaker 5: I want him to know that I'm eager to hear
Speaker 5: his story, that I'm interested in anything and everything he
Speaker 5: has to say. I also send him a pre written
Speaker 5: consent letter. If he signs, it will allow me to
Speaker 5: visit and record an interview with him. It's not long
Speaker 5: before he sends the form back to me, signed, but
Speaker 5: the prisons in Florida are still locked down due to COVID.
Speaker 5: And then, once the Department of Corrections lifts the COVID
Speaker 5: restrictions about six weeks later, we find out that Jeremy
Speaker 5: has been placed in disciplinary confinement, so we can't visit
Speaker 5: him until he returns to general population, and who knows
Speaker 5: when that will be. As the months pass, we're constantly
Speaker 5: checking his status, there's no change, and he stops writing. Still,
Speaker 5: we wanted to find a way to get someone to
Speaker 5: look into Jeremy Scott. We felt we had some pretty
Speaker 5: compelling evidence linking Jeremy to the murder of cab driver
Speaker 5: Joseph Lavere back in nineteen eighty seven. It didn't feel
Speaker 5: right just sitting on what we'd collected, so I reached
Speaker 5: out to one of my contacts at the State Attorney's
Speaker 5: Office in the Ninth Circuit. That's the office that handles
Speaker 5: all the cases in Osceola County, including the murder of
Speaker 5: Joseph Lavere. It seemed like there had to be fingerprints
Speaker 5: and potential sources of DNA from the taxi that could
Speaker 5: be tested. And if it turns out that Jeremy is
Speaker 5: forensically linked to a fourth murder, the murder of Joseph Lavere,
Speaker 5: the state's narrative that Jeremy is just a car stereo
Speaker 5: thief who had nothing to do with the murder of
Speaker 5: Michelle Schofield would look even more preposterous. But we're in
Speaker 5: a weird position. We'd collected so much information about what
Speaker 5: the State Attorney's office in Polk County had done wrong
Speaker 5: in failing to properly investigate Jeremy Scott, and now we
Speaker 5: were thinking about going to a neighboring county state attorney's
Speaker 5: office pointing out yet another failed investigation. We don't know
Speaker 5: how they're going to react, but we decide it's what
Speaker 5: we have to do. We managed to get a meeting
Speaker 5: lined up with the state Attorney's office in the Ninth
Speaker 5: Circuit and we presented our case over a zoom call.
Speaker 4: Okay, excellent.
Speaker 5: So I'm just going to talk to you a little
Speaker 5: bit about why I'm doing this and what I've learned
Speaker 5: and why I'm really getting.
Speaker 12: In touch with you.
Speaker 5: But I go through the whole thing. How while working
Speaker 5: on Leo's story, we came across the Lavere case. We
Speaker 5: tell them that Jeremy's girlfriend, Jamie, said that Jeremy made
Speaker 5: a spontaneous confession decades ago to getting away with killing
Speaker 5: a taxi cab driver, and how we think we've linked
Speaker 5: that spontaneous confession to the murder of Joseph Lavere, an
Speaker 5: Ossiola County homicide that's still unsolved. It had been over
Speaker 5: three decades since this office handled the case, and filed
Speaker 5: charges against dan Odie, the man who has tried twice
Speaker 5: and eventually acquitted. The folks were talking to weren't there
Speaker 5: at the time, so we tell them a bit about
Speaker 5: dan Odie and some of the accusations of police corruption
Speaker 5: that were exposed in court during his case.
Speaker 4: I know it was a lot to sort of absorb,
Speaker 4: and like I said, I'll hand over any documents, recordings,
Speaker 4: anything you think that might be helpful to you.
Speaker 5: They seem to understand how this investigation relates back to
Speaker 5: Leo's case.
Speaker 23: I just wondered if whole County wouldn't be cana frustrated
Speaker 23: a little bit to look at Jermaine's God. But they
Speaker 23: know that we're look at him or cold case, and
Speaker 23: I think it's with Scott absolutely.
Speaker 5: We tell them that we're hoping to meet with Jeremy.
Speaker 5: We're just waiting for him to get out of disciplinary confinement.
Speaker 3: You have every right as a citizen to engage other citizens,
Speaker 3: who include people who are in custody. But I think
Speaker 3: if if law enforcement's going to try to work this case,
Speaker 3: I would think they would want to be part of
Speaker 3: that conversation.
Speaker 8: If you're willing to extend that to the agency.
Speaker 5: They're basically saying that they can't stop us from meeting
Speaker 5: with Jeremy, but they'd rather we don't. It could interfere
Speaker 5: with an investigation. In other words, let the cops do
Speaker 5: their job. I'm happy to step back and see what
Speaker 5: comes of their work. It could mean justice in a
Speaker 5: decade's old cold case, and it could also bring renewed
Speaker 5: attention to Leo's case.
Speaker 4: I just sort of want to see this move forward
Speaker 4: because I feel very strongly that Jeremy Scott is the suspect.
Speaker 5: We're hopeful that someone is finally going to investigate Jeremy's.
Speaker 24: It's nice to you.
Speaker 2: Thank you very much.
Speaker 5: I really appreciate it.
Speaker 4: I'll be in touch.
Speaker 5: I'll send my PowerPoint and i'll send documents and recordings.
Speaker 5: A few weeks later, we get a second letter from Jeremy.
Speaker 5: It's been seven months since the first one. I call
Speaker 5: Kelsey right away. She was sitting in a parking lot
Speaker 5: in Durham, North Carolina, trying to get the internet set
Speaker 5: up in her new apartment. So I record the call
Speaker 5: on my end or I think I do, okay, So
Speaker 5: I completely fucked that up and forgot to press record.
Speaker 5: That's what happens when you're not here. I have to
Speaker 5: do shit on my own and it doesn't work out
Speaker 5: as well as when you're here.
Speaker 12: So there we go.
Speaker 5: Yes, no, it doesn't happen to you, but it happens
Speaker 5: to me. Okay, So here it is. Okay. This letter
Speaker 5: dated March sixth, twenty twenty one, and it's from Jeremy,
Speaker 5: and he says, dear mister King, I don't know what
Speaker 5: it is that you want to know about Polk County prosecutors.
Speaker 5: They lied told me what they were gonna help me,
Speaker 5: but that never happened. That's why I told the whole
Speaker 5: truth about Leo Schofield. And I had also told them
Speaker 5: things that a killer would know. Leo didn't kill his wife.
Speaker 19: I did.
Speaker 5: That taxi cab driver that was shot by a three
Speaker 5: point fifty seven gun. They didn't want to hear what
Speaker 5: I had to say, that taxi cab driver. This is
Speaker 5: stunning to me. I never mentioned the cab driver in
Speaker 5: my letters. I was very intentional about that. I didn't
Speaker 5: want to confront him about the murder of Joseph Lavere
Speaker 5: because I was worried Jeremy might shut down and I'd
Speaker 5: lose the opportunity to sit with him in person. But
Speaker 5: how do we have this letter from him? And he's
Speaker 5: bringing up the cab driver murder completely unprompted. Jeremy goes
Speaker 5: on to write about his release from prison in nineteen
Speaker 5: eighty six. That was after his acquittal in the Jewel
Speaker 5: Johnson murder and after he served a few months on
Speaker 5: the arson charge. Following his release, he stays with his
Speaker 5: mother in Perry, Florida, until January, then with an uncle
Speaker 5: in Osceola County, just over the Polk County line. I
Speaker 5: keep reading anyway, while I was staying there, I took
Speaker 5: money and a big knife, not just any kind. That
Speaker 5: was the one use on Michelle. I took off in
Speaker 5: February nineteen eighty seven, went to Lakeland, Florida. I stole
Speaker 5: the gun after Michelle was killed, maybe a week or two.
Speaker 5: I can tell you the gun belonged to a cop.
Speaker 5: I saw a picture in the house which is winter Haven.
Speaker 5: Leo Schofield and myself had the same prosecutor the same
Speaker 5: Now he ain't anywhere to be found. He lied to me,
Speaker 5: So I know there's people who have wanted to do story.
Speaker 5: I can't get money for this but if you or
Speaker 5: any of them are willing to send me paper stamps,
Speaker 5: I'm on CM two right now. CM two is the
Speaker 5: second level of close management. It's basically solitary confinement. That's
Speaker 5: why we haven't been able to visit him yet. Turns
Speaker 5: out Jeremy ended up there because corrections officers found a
Speaker 5: makeshift weapon in his shoe. They said they found a
Speaker 5: knife on me. I got to live that way. I
Speaker 5: am a walking dead man. I've been running for the
Speaker 5: last twenty years. I never stay in one place too long.
Speaker 5: They almost got me once. If you don't want the
Speaker 5: whole truth about Leo and cab driver, I will sail
Speaker 5: say my whole story to whoever will pay in stamps.
Speaker 5: I ain't asking for money, just a few books of stamps,
Speaker 5: or Leo will never be free. I will be waiting.
Speaker 5: I think it's time for to talk about it. I
Speaker 5: am safe in CM. I'll wait to hear from you.
Speaker 5: Jeremy Scott. He confessed to killing that cab driver. We
Speaker 5: didn't know what to expect from Jeremy, but in this
Speaker 5: letter he just confessed to two murders. We weren't surprised
Speaker 5: by his confession to killing Michelle Schofield because he'd confessed before.
Speaker 5: But this cab driver murder confession is shocking to read,
Speaker 5: and it's hard to wrap my head around why Jeremy
Speaker 5: brings this up. It's almost like he knows it's something
Speaker 5: that will eventually catch up with him. And he mentions
Speaker 5: the gun, which had always been a lingering question in
Speaker 5: my mind. The details he provides might even be information
Speaker 5: we can corroborate, like was there a gun reported stolen
Speaker 5: from a house in winter Haven around that time? If
Speaker 5: I can keep Jeremy corresponding with me, who knows what
Speaker 5: other details he might bring up. His writing is a
Speaker 5: little disjointed, but not too difficult to read. More importantly,
Speaker 5: it seems like he has a lot more to say,
Speaker 5: and he seems willing to say it. And so after
Speaker 5: we get this letter, we decide we need to turn
Speaker 5: over a copy to our contacts at the State Attorney's
Speaker 5: office in the Ninth Circuit. This letter seemed to validate
Speaker 5: everything we've just presented to them. This letter could even
Speaker 5: qualify as new evidence in the thirty four year old
Speaker 5: unsolved homicide of cab driver Joseph Laverere. We were hoping
Speaker 5: they'd move fast and compare the physical evidence it's recovered
Speaker 5: from the taxi to Jeremy fingerprints, DNA, any of it
Speaker 5: might have given us some answers. But a few weeks pass,
Speaker 5: and then a few more, and we hear nothing. It
Speaker 5: seems that the State Attorney's office isn't doing anything else
Speaker 5: to look into Jeremy Scott. So we spend the next
Speaker 5: few weeks agonizing about whether to stay in contact with Jeremy.
Speaker 5: Kelsey and I talk it over, and after waiting and
Speaker 5: waiting for some news or an update from the state,
Speaker 5: we decide, fuck it. I'm writing back to Jeremy Scott.
Speaker 5: I don't care if the state attorney doesn't want us
Speaker 5: talking to him. This time, I ask more specific questions,
Speaker 5: but still I avoid asking any direct questions about the
Speaker 5: cab driver murder. I'm trying to walk the line and
Speaker 5: not do anything to compromise the state's investigation, if there
Speaker 5: even is one. So I asked Jeremy about Michelle Schofield
Speaker 5: and the prosecutor John Aguero, and I send Jeremy some
Speaker 5: postage stamps. We discuss this too. Stamps are a sort
Speaker 5: of currency in the prison system, and we don't want
Speaker 5: Jeremy to think we're compensating him in exchange for his correspondence.
Speaker 5: On the other hand, he's basically in lockdown in close management,
Speaker 5: with time on his hands, and if he's bored and
Speaker 5: he finally wants to tell his story, I want to
Speaker 5: hear from him. Then finally we get an update from
Speaker 5: the State Attorney's office. They tell us that they want
Speaker 5: us to take our evidence to the Osciola County Sheriff's Office,
Speaker 5: the agency that originally handled the Joseph Lavere murder. So
Speaker 5: once again we compile all the evidence we have and
Speaker 5: on June twenty second, twenty twenty one, we show up
Speaker 5: in Kassimi to do our presentation. We are heading to
Speaker 5: the Osiola County Sheriff's Office for our big meeting, and
Speaker 5: so we've been trying to get this meeting for months.
Speaker 5: Just a few hours before our meeting, they email me
Speaker 5: saying they don't want us to record.
Speaker 1: How are you feeling it's this?
Speaker 5: I think, I mean, I feel pretty good that they're
Speaker 5: gonna have to do something about this. I don't think
Speaker 5: they can just blow us off. But I don't know
Speaker 5: what kind of worries me is. This is a dirty case,
Speaker 5: and they have to know it. If they look into
Speaker 5: it a little bit, they have to see it.
Speaker 1: All right, Well, it's about time to go in, right,
Speaker 1: all right, let's do it, Okay, I'm going to turn
Speaker 1: this off a degree after.
Speaker 5: We're brought inside to a conference room. About a half
Speaker 5: dozen people are there, and I set up my PowerPoint
Speaker 5: to display a big screen. I have police reports with
Speaker 5: witness descriptions and a sketch of the alleged suspect in
Speaker 5: the Joseph Lavere murder, a thin man around five foot ten,
Speaker 5: much closer to Jeremy's appearance than six foot four, two
Speaker 5: hundred and thirty five pound Dan Odie, who has tried
Speaker 5: twice for the murder. I also present records that show
Speaker 5: that fingerprints were lifted from the car, and I show
Speaker 5: them a photograph of a baseball cap that was found
Speaker 5: in the back seat of the cab, which police believed
Speaker 5: the suspect left behind. It's the same evidence I'm hoping
Speaker 5: they'll dig up from some storage locker and start analyzing.
Speaker 5: And I have tape of Jeremy's brother, Royal Dean Scott,
Speaker 5: saying he remembers talking to Jeremy about the cab driver,
Speaker 5: and how Jeremy left Osceola County shortly after the incident.
Speaker 5: I'd heard about the cab driver uh Man Robb, and
Speaker 5: I remember him saying something about it and that he had.
Speaker 7: To leave for the law.
Speaker 5: Then I have Jeremy's letter mentioning how he got the
Speaker 5: gun and how he has more to say about that killing.
Speaker 5: I stole the gun after Michelle was killed, maybe a
Speaker 5: week or two. I can tell you the gun belonged
Speaker 5: to a cop. I think it's time for to talk
Speaker 5: about it. I'll wait to hear from you, Jeremy Scott.
Speaker 5: It seems like the main person we're trying to convince
Speaker 5: in this meeting is Major Wiley Black. He's the head
Speaker 5: of criminal investigations. To get to that position, Major Black
Speaker 5: has put in a lot of years with the sheriff's office.
Speaker 5: This gives us pause because this case has a lot
Speaker 5: to do with possible corruption within this sheriff's office. It's
Speaker 5: likely that Major Black both knew and worked with Deputy
Speaker 5: Buddy Shepherd that was the detective accused of threatening to
Speaker 5: take the children away from you. Young mother is in
Speaker 5: Intercession City. Unless they testified against dan Odie, we try
Speaker 5: our best to brush past the Buddy Shepherd accusations. We
Speaker 5: don't want them focusing on that now. We want them
Speaker 5: to be compelled to act because of the evidence we
Speaker 5: present and the opportunity to close a thirty four year
Speaker 5: old unsolved murder. So we show them what we have.
Speaker 5: They make photocopies of Jeremy's letters, We answer a few questions,
Speaker 5: and then it's over. Kelsey tells me to stay quiet
Speaker 5: until she can get the microphone out.
Speaker 1: How do you think that went?
Speaker 5: I don't think it went very well at all. What
Speaker 5: do you think, really?
Speaker 6: Yeah, why do you say that?
Speaker 5: I think they were engaged, they were listening. But I
Speaker 5: think the homicide detective Wiley Black, I think he to me,
Speaker 5: I felt like he was signaling that this case is
Speaker 5: going nowhere. Did you get that?
Speaker 1: I don't know, I thought he. I mean he said
Speaker 1: he was going to into the evidence. I think he
Speaker 1: was being realistic that it very likely could not exist
Speaker 1: at this point.
Speaker 5: But the fingerprints we know exist. I mean, they have
Speaker 5: copies of those prints and those can be at least
Speaker 5: be run. As we're getting ready to leave the parking
Speaker 5: lot at the Sheriff's office, it begins to rain like
Speaker 5: it does almost every summer afternoon in central Florida. The
Speaker 5: darkening sky matches our mood. I just got the feeling
Speaker 5: that this is going to die right here. This is
Speaker 5: a little frustrating because you can see the black hole
Speaker 5: sort of develop. I'm not encouraged at all by this.
Speaker 5: So we just have to like strategize about how to
Speaker 5: next steps and when do we start doing our own investigation.
Speaker 1: I mean, they didn't tell us to not go and
Speaker 1: talk to Jeremy, so yeah, there's that.
Speaker 5: I think that's what we have to do now.
Speaker 2: I just I just.
Speaker 1: I don't know. But it's freaking hot in this car.
Speaker 1: So you've got any of this? Is well, do you
Speaker 1: have any final thoughts?
Speaker 5: Yeah? I want to keep investigating this, and I want
Speaker 5: to talk to some of these witnesses that I've been
Speaker 5: steering clear of. And I want to start asking Jeremy
Speaker 5: in letters about that taxi cab driver. There could be
Speaker 5: something there. I don't want to stop on this Jeremy
Speaker 5: thing now. I just feel like, what are we gonna do?
Speaker 15: Right?
Speaker 1: Well, at least we got some free coffee out of that.
Speaker 5: Right, Yeah, free coffee. Nice ride through Intercession City all right,
Speaker 5: let's get out of here.
Speaker 2: All right.
Speaker 5: We follow up with Major Wilie Black, who was sitting
Speaker 5: in the room with us, but our emails go unanswered.
Speaker 5: Weeks go by, and there doesn't seem to be any
Speaker 5: forward movement on the case. I get the sense that
Speaker 5: the Osceola County Sheriff's Office doesn't want this case reopened.
Speaker 24: Hey you there, yeah in.
Speaker 25: Here, ooks, are you recording?
Speaker 24: Yes, recording.
Speaker 5: Now we get another letter from Jeremy.
Speaker 22: All right, I'm opening this one. Feels this one feels
Speaker 22: a little thicker.
Speaker 24: I don't know why. Oh lord, Okay, okay, this was
Speaker 24: said on May sixte.
Speaker 5: Dear mister King, I received your letter along with ten stamps. First,
Speaker 5: let me tell you why I ask for stamps. It's
Speaker 5: the only way I can buy soap and food back
Speaker 5: here on CM. I don't have anyone to help me.
Speaker 5: I just want you to understand why I ask for stamps.
Speaker 5: I really don't have shit to do. I read when
Speaker 5: I can find books. I don't get any mail, not
Speaker 5: unless it's from you. Now about some of the things
Speaker 5: that you asked me about, Yes, John Aguero did prosecute
Speaker 5: both me and Leo, And yes, mister John Aguero did
Speaker 5: lie to me. They took me to see mister Aguero's
Speaker 5: office and he told me that Leo Lawyer wants to
Speaker 5: talk with me. Jeremy starts writing about that meeting he
Speaker 5: had with Aguero alone in his office after the fingerprints
Speaker 5: in the Mazda were identified killed. It sounds like Aguero
Speaker 5: was telling Jeremy that Leo and his father were bad
Speaker 5: guys who not only killed Michelle, but may have killed
Speaker 5: other girls too, and that Aguero needed Jeremy's help to
Speaker 5: keep Leo locked up. I think this is why Jeremy
Speaker 5: says things like I don't know what else Leo has done,
Speaker 5: but in this one he's innocent me. He went on
Speaker 5: talking about how he will be sitting on my parole,
Speaker 5: how he can write on my behalf. All I had
Speaker 5: to do is keep on saying how my fingerprint was
Speaker 5: in the car. At the time, I really thought he
Speaker 5: was gonna help me. I have heard a state attorney
Speaker 5: has help inmates before, and plus my grandma was still alive.
Speaker 5: But you were right, it was just me and John Aguero.
Speaker 5: Jeremy seems to be saying that Aguero was trying to
Speaker 5: cut a deal with him. Aguero would help Jeremy with
Speaker 5: his parole. If Jeremy stuck to the story about how
Speaker 5: is Prince ended up in Michelle's car, and after seeing
Speaker 5: how much sway the state attorney had over Leo's case,
Speaker 5: it makes sense why Jeremy might buy into this. It
Speaker 5: might have been Jeremy's only chance of being released from
Speaker 5: prison and spending any time on the outside with his grandmother.
Speaker 5: Jeremy goes on to mention a visit from some guy
Speaker 5: Leo's attorneys sent to speak to him, sounds like private
Speaker 5: investigator Pat McKenna. First, I wouldn't talk to him because
Speaker 5: everyone been lying to me. Then I heard that John
Speaker 5: Aguero died, so all these years later, I told myself
Speaker 5: that I will tell everything, and I did, but nobody
Speaker 5: believe me. I don't know what else I can do.
Speaker 5: I was telling the truth, nothing but the truth. And
Speaker 5: then he writes, I'm going to give you something. Okay,
Speaker 5: I'm going to give you something. Now Jeremy really has
Speaker 5: my attention. He sets up the night of Michelle's murder.
Speaker 5: It was raining most of the night. I just off
Speaker 5: I four went down North Comby where I used to live.
Speaker 5: Once I got off Comby Road, and head to Lakeland.
Speaker 5: I stop at a gas station. I can't remember the name.
Speaker 5: I knew it was raining. I was sick and cold, wet.
Speaker 5: There was a woman on the phone talking. She thought
Speaker 5: I was waiting on the phone. When she got off,
Speaker 5: she asked me if I was lost. I told her yes,
Speaker 5: and hadn't any way to get back to the place
Speaker 5: I was staying. She had a little car. She was
Speaker 5: nice and offered me a ride. So we went back
Speaker 5: down Cumby Road, going out by I four Underpath. I
Speaker 5: told her she could pull in there. There's little trees,
Speaker 5: a little road with a creak in it.
Speaker 2: I know it well.
Speaker 5: So she pulled in. Then she said there's no one here.
Speaker 5: I pulled a knife out. She went crazy, tried to
Speaker 5: push the gas, but I threw the car in park.
Speaker 5: When I first read this letter to Kelsey, this detail
Speaker 5: hit hard.
Speaker 25: Michelle tried to put the car and drive like it
Speaker 25: makes me sick, and that.
Speaker 22: You would have sucked up the car. That like that
Speaker 22: that's the reason it wasn't working. He sucked it up
Speaker 22: by doing it.
Speaker 5: Yeah, she tried to open the car door. That's when
Speaker 5: I lost it. I didn't remember how many times I
Speaker 5: stab I get out the car, went over where she
Speaker 5: was laying out the car door. She had opened it.
Speaker 5: I look at her, not knowing what.
Speaker 12: I just did.
Speaker 5: I was just pulling the knife so I could robbed her.
Speaker 5: I went look around for something to hide her. I
Speaker 5: found something looked like a big bag. I lay it out.
Speaker 5: Then I put her on the bag and rolling her
Speaker 5: up in it. Then took her down by the creek.
Speaker 5: I found a place where I could push her in,
Speaker 5: then cover her with wood trash. I don't understand why
Speaker 5: there was no blood in the car. She was stab
Speaker 5: in the car, not her trailer. I only took ten
Speaker 5: dollars that was on herd take any rings or anything else.
Speaker 22: I only took ten dollars that was on her, you
Speaker 22: know what, Like he took the bills the coins like
Speaker 22: they're fucking in the road, right, I mean, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 22: it's close enough to whatever. Thirteen dollars, you know what
Speaker 22: I mean?
Speaker 25: Also, I was never clear whether she had used the
Speaker 25: the tip money to buy the coke and the gas
Speaker 25: and the phone call. Oh, like, I don't know if
Speaker 25: it had been thirteen dollars.
Speaker 22: Holy shit. Yeah, that's amazing because she says what twee dollars,
Speaker 22: a gas and a coke. Yeah, there's no fucking way
Speaker 22: he knows that. Wow.
Speaker 5: I got back in the car, put it in drive,
Speaker 5: took off on I four. The car started slowing down.
Speaker 5: It wasn't out of gas. I don't know why. It
Speaker 5: just died on me. I pull it along the road,
Speaker 5: park in the rain started stopping. It was close to midnight.
Speaker 5: No car were on I four, so that when I
Speaker 5: start cleaning up most of my prints and if there
Speaker 5: were blood, I cleaned it up. That when I tried
Speaker 5: to pull the radio and speaker out, they didn't tell
Speaker 5: people about that. Once I cleaned the car, I left
Speaker 5: the keys and locked the door. That's when I went
Speaker 5: up BY four. There is an overpath, there was a
Speaker 5: store and there was dumpster there. I threw the knife
Speaker 5: and something. I just can't remember what it was. I
Speaker 5: know that I cleaned the car with it. Jeremy goes
Speaker 5: on to write that he went back to Kassimi, breaking
Speaker 5: into homes, moving back and forth between Osceola and Polk
Speaker 5: Counties in March. He was eventually arrested for the murder
Speaker 5: of Donald Moorehead in November of nineteen eighty eight, a
Speaker 5: year and a half after Michelle Schofield and Joseph Lavere
Speaker 5: were killed. That's when he first meets his prosecutor, John Aguero.
Speaker 5: It wasn't, Jeremy continues in his letter. I told John
Speaker 5: Aguero he knew from the start Leo didn't kill her.
Speaker 5: Why was her car was on I four stuff missing
Speaker 5: out of the car, and why was my print was
Speaker 5: in it? Just like the taxicab driver.
Speaker 19: What am I to do?
Speaker 5: I'm been telling the truth. I don't know what else
Speaker 5: to do. I really want this to go away, but
Speaker 5: it won't. There's so much shit I need to tell,
Speaker 5: but I don't know how to put it. I will
Speaker 5: tell you this, even though John Aguero died, he knew
Speaker 5: from the start that I was the one who killed
Speaker 5: not Leo, mister king, I still would like to know
Speaker 5: how or who got you to write me. I hope
Speaker 5: to hear from you soon. I hope you can understand
Speaker 5: my letter. I ain't good at painting putting words together.
Speaker 5: Thank you so much for the stamps. Hope to hear
Speaker 5: from you soon. There's so much I need to tell
Speaker 5: right soon. Jeremy L. Scott ps. Why did the state
Speaker 5: attorney call me told me if I talk with you
Speaker 5: that I will be in trouble. Tell me what's going on.
Speaker 22: Holy fuck, oh man, Oh god, damn it, God fucking
Speaker 22: damn it. This is unbelievable. There's something fucking unbelievably sincere
Speaker 22: that comes across in that letter. I don't know what
Speaker 22: to think. Man, that that was really fucking powerful.
Speaker 25: For some reason, Yeah, that only makes me want to
Speaker 25: the fact that this guy is still saying the ship
Speaker 25: and his story makes so much sense.
Speaker 5: And it's just like knucking that to be done about it.
Speaker 22: And he's also saying like, I think I'll be out
Speaker 22: of here in June.
Speaker 5: By out of here he means out of close management,
Speaker 5: out of solitary. Once he's back in general population, we
Speaker 5: can schedule our interview with him. What I want to
Speaker 5: talk to him.
Speaker 22: I mean, honestly, I don't give a shit about those
Speaker 22: stamps anymore. Let them I'm just fucking keeping this guy talking.
Speaker 22: And if they say you gave him stamps so he
Speaker 22: bought soap, I'll go fuck you. He can have soap.
Speaker 25: Seriously, I don't have any hesitation keep sending him stand.
Speaker 6: That he can only buy.
Speaker 22: So For Jesus Christ, I think fuck it. I'm just
Speaker 22: I'm done with these I'm just done with asking permission
Speaker 22: to like reopen this case.
Speaker 24: Hey be there, yeah, right here, what's going on?
Speaker 22: So I just got off the phone with Paul Walker
Speaker 22: at the Department of Corrections and he said that Jereney
Speaker 22: is now in general population.
Speaker 25: Oh my god.
Speaker 24: So yeah, and so he's eligible for visitors again.
Speaker 22: But Jesus, finally some good news.
Speaker 19: I hope this.
Speaker 22: I just hope this holds.
Speaker 5: You know, after three years of investigating Leo's case, We're
Speaker 5: finally going to meet Jeremy's got Bone Valley is a
Speaker 5: production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with Signal
Speaker 5: Company Number One. Our executive producers are Jason Flam and
Speaker 5: Kevin Wordiska Kornhaber is our senior producer. Britz Spangler is
Speaker 5: our sound designer. Roxandra Guidy is our editor. Fact checking
Speaker 5: by Maximo Anderson. Our producer and researcher is Kelsey Decker.
Speaker 5: Our theme song, The One Who's Holding the Stars, is
Speaker 5: performed by Lee Bob and The Truth. It was written
Speaker 5: by Leo Schofield and Kevin Herrick in Florida's Hardy Correctional Institution.
Speaker 5: Bone Valley is written and produced by me Gilbert King.
Speaker 5: You can follow the show on Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter
Speaker 5: at lava for Good to See