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Speaker 2: Enjoy the episode Campsite Media. At a court hearing less
Speaker 2: than a week after September eleventh, the judge overseeing a
Speaker 2: Ma'am Jamil Alamine's case gave both sides a chance to
Speaker 2: speak at length. Reading the transcript of the hearing, the
Speaker 2: lofty lefelanguage that we often hear in court rooms, it
Speaker 2: seemed even more elevated that day, like everyone was speaking
Speaker 2: for posterity, calling on their deepest beliefs to make sense
Speaker 2: of the events. Jack Martin, the lead defense attorney for
Speaker 2: a Ma'am Jamil, he stepped up to the podium facing
Speaker 2: the judge. He noted for the record that in the
Speaker 2: aftermath of nine to eleven, there had been a tacks
Speaker 2: on Muslim Americans and that maschids across the country had
Speaker 2: been desecrated and defiled. As lawyers, Martin said, we must
Speaker 2: be realists. We must recognize that our judicial system is
Speaker 2: far from perfect, hardly immune from the temper of the times.
Speaker 2: He asked that the trial be postponed. In court, a
Speaker 2: Maam Jamil usually wore a white thobe and a coofe,
Speaker 2: but at this hearing he chose to wear his jail clothes,
Speaker 2: apparently so he wouldn't attract threats and his Muslim garb.
Speaker 2: He stepped up to the podium. I stand ready and
Speaker 2: seeking resolution of an unjust situation. He said, I am
Speaker 2: innocent of all of your charges. A Maam Jamille said
Speaker 2: he wanted the trial to move forward despite the Islamophobic
Speaker 2: fervor in America, but he would submit to his lawyer's
Speaker 2: recommendations that it be postponed. Then he used the moment
Speaker 2: to speak his mind. He had been silent from addressing
Speaker 2: the public by a gag order, but the judge let
Speaker 2: him talk over the prosecutor's objections. His remarks were grandiose
Speaker 2: and prophetic at times. He seemed to be talking about
Speaker 2: himself like a martyr. I am told that a trial
Speaker 2: at this time is not wise. He said that fear
Speaker 2: of silenced reason, that the cry for vengeance is too loud,
Speaker 2: that the thirst for blood must be quenched, that the
Speaker 2: orgy of murder must be played out, that all the
Speaker 2: people must be made to eat and drink of it.
Speaker 2: If your trying and killing me satisfies your taste for
Speaker 2: the Muslim blood and spares the life of Muslim women
Speaker 2: and children. Though I do not complain about my situation,
Speaker 2: I'm advised that because of patriotism in this country, I
Speaker 2: am unable to have a fair trial. Shouldn't it be
Speaker 2: the opposite in a land that has said that freedom
Speaker 2: is the pinnacle of its moral argument, that life, liberty,
Speaker 2: and the pursuit of happiness is its banner of moral authority,
Speaker 2: that justice is its master virtue, the scales upon which
Speaker 2: is weighed its law and order. Or is that just
Speaker 2: a dream speech. At one point, AmAm Jamil apparently turned
Speaker 2: away from the judge and faced the prosecutor's table as
Speaker 2: if speaking to them. The judge told a manage Meil
Speaker 2: to face her. He continued, justice in law marches to
Speaker 2: two different drummers. Justice in law are two different in
Speaker 2: distinct conversations. I'm reminded that freedom is not free. I'm
Speaker 2: reminded of a quote from Huey P. Long, who was
Speaker 2: once governor of Louisiana, when he was asked would fascism
Speaker 2: come to America, and he replied, yes, fascism will come
Speaker 2: to America, but it will be called patriotism. Imagine a
Speaker 2: kind of justice built on a divine awareness that knows
Speaker 2: people's true intentions and sees the causes and effects of
Speaker 2: people's actions across vast histories. AmAm Jamil evoked the justice
Speaker 2: like this that day in court, with all of its
Speaker 2: religious overtones. He seemed to say, if it is justice
Speaker 2: in this grander, all knowing sense, that I be executed
Speaker 2: even though I am innocent, I accept my faith. Not
Speaker 2: only that, hurry up and get on with it. But
Speaker 2: there was also a contradiction. He believed that a court
Speaker 2: of law could set him free if only people would
Speaker 2: consider the facts as he saw them. From Camside Media,
Speaker 2: Tenderfoot TV, and iHeart podcasts, This is Radical, I'm Mostly
Speaker 2: Secret Episode four, Look a Man in his Eyes. The
Speaker 2: prosecution like a Ma'am Damiel's defense team didn't think a
Speaker 2: fair trial would be possible. The judge agreed, and she
Speaker 2: postponed the case until January of two thousand and two.
Speaker 2: A Mam Jamil's trial was scheduled to begin nearly two
Speaker 2: years after the shootout in the West End. When people
Speaker 2: are charged with crimes, most eventually plead guilty. I watched
Speaker 2: this play out countless times when I was covering the
Speaker 2: courts for the New York Times. But in death penalty
Speaker 2: cases like a Ma'am jimials, the option of negotiating a
Speaker 2: pleading was essentially taken off the table. Even defendants who
Speaker 2: knew they fucked up and were inclined to take responsibility,
Speaker 2: they could still be sentenced to death, so they would
Speaker 2: end up in court defending their lives, working with their
Speaker 2: lawyers to pull some kind of story together for the jury.
Speaker 2: Who has the winning story? That's not necessarily the same
Speaker 2: question as whose story is the most true? I wonder
Speaker 2: if seeking the death penalty if it can actually hide
Speaker 2: more truth than it reveals. The lead prosecutor for the
Speaker 2: Fulton County District Attorney's Office was a man named Robert McBurney.
Speaker 2: A man who had devoted his working life to the
Speaker 2: criminal court system.
Speaker 3: It's not perfect. Their biases and plenty of examples where
Speaker 3: because of someone's race or lack of means or gender
Speaker 3: that things went horribly wrong, and we need to stay
Speaker 3: focused on those and do what we can to correct them.
Speaker 3: But by and large, once you get into court, so
Speaker 3: it's not saying on the policing side say, once you
Speaker 3: get into court, we've got a system that works pretty well.
Speaker 2: Not long after he finished law school back in the nineties,
Speaker 2: McBurnie took a job with the Fulton County DA. A
Speaker 2: few years later, he left to join a private law firm,
Speaker 2: but he realized it wasn't his thing.
Speaker 3: And I got a call from the lead investigator on
Speaker 3: the Olamine case in the District Attorney's office and said, hey,
Speaker 3: would you come back if I could get you on
Speaker 3: the Olamine case. And I thought that I'd be interesting
Speaker 3: the fascinating case, lots of moving parts. Fbis involved this
Speaker 3: and that, and so I kicked it around for a
Speaker 3: little bit, and I missed being a prosecutor. I like
Speaker 3: being a prosecutor, And so I returned to the DA's
Speaker 3: office and picked that up.
Speaker 2: AmAm Jamil's case was the biggest of mcburney's relatively young career.
Speaker 2: Prosecuting a single case became his full time job. He
Speaker 2: could hardly have stepped into a role with higher stakes.
Speaker 2: There would be two phases to the trial. In the
Speaker 2: first phase, a jury would decide if mam Jamil was
Speaker 2: innocent or guilty, and if they convicted him, then in
Speaker 2: a second phase, the same jury would choose whether he
Speaker 2: should spend the rest of his life in prison or
Speaker 2: if the State of Georgia should execute him. A mam
Speaker 2: Jamil's lead attorney, Jack Martin, He said that because it
Speaker 2: was a death penalty trial, he and the defense team
Speaker 2: they had to adjust their strategy.
Speaker 4: Do you have to worry not only about what he
Speaker 4: can do to gain a client acquitted, but also what
Speaker 4: happens if he gets convicted? How do we make sure
Speaker 4: you don't get the death penalty?
Speaker 2: If the defense were to take a big risk, like
Speaker 2: putting forward a theory that was too outlandish or a
Speaker 2: witness who wasn't totally credible, they might lose the trust
Speaker 2: of the jury. And then if a man Jamil got convicted,
Speaker 2: the jury might not believe defense lawyers When they argue
Speaker 2: that a Mam Jamil should keep his life. Let me
Speaker 2: set the scene for you a little. The courtroom was
Speaker 2: a modern looking one, tan carpeted floors, brown theater style
Speaker 2: seats in the gallery, not the old Hartwood benches, computer
Speaker 2: monitors on the tables. A Maam Jamil and his white
Speaker 2: thob and coofy sat at a table next to his
Speaker 2: legal team. The lawyers wore suits and ties. A man
Speaker 2: Jamil's wife Karema and their young son Kyrie. They sat
Speaker 2: close to each other behind the defense table. Members of
Speaker 2: the Weston Mass Gifts showed up two. The courtroom was full.
Speaker 2: You knew court was officially in session each day When
Speaker 2: the bailiffs commanded all rise, everyone in the courtroom was
Speaker 2: expected to stand up and share respect when the judge entered.
Speaker 2: Same thing when the jury walked in. But a Mam
Speaker 2: Jamil wouldn't do it.
Speaker 4: He said, this is contrary to my religion. Don't stand
Speaker 4: for anybody but Dalla. And the judge was spuried accommodating
Speaker 4: about that. She said, that's no big deal, you don't
Speaker 4: have to stand.
Speaker 2: The courtroom was tense, even more so than a typical
Speaker 2: trial nine eleven wasn't that far off. The gallery was
Speaker 2: full of people from a community that was wary of
Speaker 2: law enforcement, and the Sheriff's office responsible for security in
Speaker 2: the court building. It was the same office that Deputy
Speaker 2: Kinchen had worked for and Deputy English was still working for.
Speaker 2: The judge must have sensed this. She ordered that if
Speaker 2: law enforcement came to the trial of Spectators, they couldn't
Speaker 2: wear their uniforms. But that didn't stop the new Black
Speaker 2: Panther Party from showing up one day wearing all black fatigues,
Speaker 2: and so when it was time for opening statements, this
Speaker 2: was how the courtroom felt when Robert mcfernie and his
Speaker 2: team laid out their case.
Speaker 4: For the jury.
Speaker 2: The prosecution argument began with a recitation of some of
Speaker 2: what English called out as he lay in the field
Speaker 2: next to the mast it please don't shoot me anymore.
Speaker 2: Don't shoot me anymore. From there their argument went like this.
Speaker 2: Kenchin and English were just doing their job. They went
Speaker 2: to the West End with a warrant to arrest them,
Speaker 2: Ma'am Jamil, And when Kenchin pulled her car up in
Speaker 2: front of Amm Jamil's black Mercedes and the deputies got
Speaker 2: out a Mam Jamil fired at the deputies. Here's the prosecutor,
Speaker 2: Robert McBurney.
Speaker 3: He produced not a small gun but an assault rifle,
Speaker 3: killed one deputy and severely injured another. We know where
Speaker 3: Kinchin was. He didn't get very far and English was
Speaker 3: able to testify as to where he started and then
Speaker 3: he collapsed in the field over by the mass.
Speaker 2: Jit At the hospital, English had idea to Mam Jamil
Speaker 2: in a photo lineup and that was still his story.
Speaker 2: Then there was the state's physical evidence. Dozens of shell
Speaker 2: casings and bullets were recovered from the scene in the
Speaker 2: West End, and after AmAm Jamil was arrested in Loudon County, Alabama,
Speaker 2: FBI agents found guns in the woods, presumably that AmAm
Speaker 2: Jamil had dropped while fleeing federal agents. Ballistics analysts found
Speaker 2: that those guns matched bullets that killed Kenchin and wounded English,
Speaker 2: and there was more physical evidence from Lowndes County.
Speaker 3: He fled in a Mercedes that was found in Alabama
Speaker 3: with bullet holes that were consistent with his gun as
Speaker 3: well as the deputy's guns.
Speaker 2: So for McBurnie and his prosecution team, the physical evidence
Speaker 2: clearly matched English's testimony.
Speaker 3: Based on the entrance wounds for Kinschin, the entrance wounds
Speaker 3: for English, all of the bullet holes in the Mercedes.
Speaker 3: It really wasn't all that controversial as to who was
Speaker 3: standing where. What was controversial was who was the person
Speaker 3: standing next to the Mercedes, And I don't think that
Speaker 3: was controversial. That was Alaman.
Speaker 2: It was a strong case, but there were still opportunities
Speaker 2: for the defense to create doubt in the minds.
Speaker 5: Of the jury.
Speaker 2: AmAm Dmil's defense team. Their strategy was to point out
Speaker 2: all the inconsistencies in the prosecution's case to show their
Speaker 2: evidence was flawed. I hardly need to remind you in
Speaker 2: this trial episode of the podcast that the prosecution needed
Speaker 2: to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a Maam Jamil
Speaker 2: shot Deputy Kenchin and Deputy English, and that a Maam
Speaker 2: Jamil's lawyers they didn't need to prove he was innocent.
Speaker 2: They just needed to create enough doubt in the minds
Speaker 2: of the jury. Really, even one juror to pull off
Speaker 2: that argument. It required a good amount of skepticism, especially
Speaker 2: of law enforcement. A Maam Jamil's lawyers they were defense attorneys,
Speaker 2: so sure they were inclined to be skeptical of official accounts.
Speaker 2: But the defense team's investigator, wa Tani tahimba his skepticism.
Speaker 2: It was on a whole another level. Whata Tani and
Speaker 2: a Maam Jamil are around the same age. Watani spent
Speaker 2: time in Los Angeles when he was young.
Speaker 6: I was directly impacted by the Watch rebellion. You know,
Speaker 6: the National Guard was like an occupying army for us.
Speaker 6: Became very obvious that we were oppressed. Put guns on
Speaker 6: ers and tell us to go back in the house
Speaker 6: with dusted don curfew. All those kind of things raised
Speaker 6: your consciousness. And so I was a young man coming
Speaker 6: up into my consciousness. In the nineteen.
Speaker 2: Sixties, Whatatani joined the Black Power movement, and like a
Speaker 2: Ma'am Jamil, he was surveilled by the FBI. That didn't
Speaker 2: inspire a lot of trust and law enforcement. Watani and
Speaker 2: a Maam Jamil knew each other before this case. In
Speaker 2: the late eighties, Whatatani moved to Atlanta started working as
Speaker 2: a criminal investigator, always on the defense side, the side
Speaker 2: against the state. He worked a lot for my dad. Actually,
Speaker 2: most if not all, of Watani's clients were black. They
Speaker 2: called him unk and he built relationships with them, talked
Speaker 2: about novels with them on occasion. It was sort of
Speaker 2: a continuation of his work in the movement. Months before
Speaker 2: the trial began, whata Tani was doing his thing, interviewing
Speaker 2: potential witnesses and gathering new evidence. He knew that testimony
Speaker 2: from English would be key to the prosecution's case. Remember
Speaker 2: that it was the morning after the shootout, when English
Speaker 2: was still in the hospital recovering from surgery, that a
Speaker 2: detective from the Atlanta Police Department first interviewed him. Watani
Speaker 2: learned that English had received the total of ten milligrams
Speaker 2: of morphine and during the prior twenty four hours he
Speaker 2: had also lost a lot of blood. An expert said
Speaker 2: his mental faculties would have been impaired. But the morning
Speaker 2: after surgery, the detective he decided English was ready to
Speaker 2: tell him what happened the night before an English id
Speaker 2: to man Jamil in the photo lineup. Watani looked for
Speaker 2: any outside information that might have influenced English's id between
Speaker 2: the night he was shot in the West End and
Speaker 2: that morning in the hospital. Almost immediately after the shootout,
Speaker 2: Atlanta's local TV stations they were all over the story.
Speaker 6: The English in the hospital watching the news, and so
Speaker 6: they are talking about Jamil, and he sees the one news.
Speaker 6: So I went to talk to the doctors and people
Speaker 6: in the staff there, and they said they confirmed he
Speaker 6: was watching into television. And then I came back and
Speaker 6: the guy retracted. He says, well, I really can't, can't.
Speaker 6: I don't really.
Speaker 2: Remember now the doctor retracted, Yes.
Speaker 6: Doctor retracted it. One of the sheriffs took the stand
Speaker 6: to testify. She said that when she acad in it,
Speaker 6: she unplugged the television so he would not be able
Speaker 6: to see and and misidentify anybody. So, you know, like
Speaker 6: what gives her the presence of mind? I said, let
Speaker 6: me just unplug this television.
Speaker 2: But Tani didn't tell me the name of the doctor
Speaker 2: who attracted his statement. And I'm not sure that I
Speaker 2: would have gotten a conclusive answer to this question all
Speaker 2: these years later. So it's hard for me to make
Speaker 2: much of this one way or the other, except that
Speaker 2: with Tani, he really did not trust English's identification of
Speaker 2: a man Jamil. At the trial, after both sides gave
Speaker 2: their winning arguments, the prosecution called English to the stand
Speaker 2: their first witness. He sat to the right of the
Speaker 2: judge wearing his tan uniform in a dark brown tie.
Speaker 2: The lead prosecutor, Robert McBurney examined his witness. English rehashed
Speaker 2: his account of that night he and Kinchin were in
Speaker 2: the West End.
Speaker 5: With a warrant.
Speaker 2: They pulled up on a black Mercedes and English asked
Speaker 2: the man getting out of the car to show his
Speaker 2: right hand. Then the man pulled out a rifle and
Speaker 2: started firing. McBurney asked English, what went through your mind
Speaker 2: when you saw that assault rifle pointed at you. English
Speaker 2: lost his composure, started crying, wiped tears from his eyes
Speaker 2: with his thumb in one of his fingers. He took
Speaker 2: a deep breath, um that I was about to die
Speaker 2: when he started shooting. I thought about my kids, thought
Speaker 2: about my wife, and I asked myself as I was running,
Speaker 2: what have I done to deserve this? Holding a clipboard,
Speaker 2: McBurney moved to stand behind the defense table, not far
Speaker 2: from what Tani and behind a Ma'am Jamial who sat
Speaker 2: almost perfectly still expressionless. Is this the man who had
Speaker 2: the assault rifle that night? McBurney asked, as English looked
Speaker 2: at a Mam Jamial. Yes it is, Sir, said English,
Speaker 2: did you see anyone else that night with an assault rifle? No, sir,
Speaker 2: is this the man who fired the assault rifle at you? Yes,
Speaker 2: it is, said English. Jack Martin did the cross examination methodically.
Speaker 2: Martin had English recount his memories of the shootout, but
Speaker 2: Martin tried to undermine his credibility. He read back to
Speaker 2: English inconsistencies between his testimony and statements he had made
Speaker 2: to law enforcement. One of the inconsistencies was that English
Speaker 2: said he prided himself on his marksmanship, and he was
Speaker 2: sure he shot a man Jamial. But remember when a
Speaker 2: man Jamial was arrested in Alabama, he was uninjured. And
Speaker 2: then in an interview with a detective, English said this
Speaker 2: about his encounter with the shooter. Quote, my mom always
Speaker 2: told me, look a man in his eye, Always look
Speaker 2: a man in his eyes. I looked him in his eyes.
Speaker 2: I remember them, gray eyes. I remember that face, that
Speaker 2: cold face. So I couldn't forget that. But a man
Speaker 2: Jamil didn't have gray eyes. His eyes were brown. English
Speaker 2: stood to reenact the details of his encounter with the shooter.
Speaker 2: When Martin asked about the shooter's eye color, English insisted
Speaker 2: that Mamjamial was wearing yellow glasses, suggesting that was the
Speaker 2: reason he thought of Mam Jamial's eyes were gray. Martin
Speaker 2: pointed out that and the statements English gave to detectives
Speaker 2: he didn't mention anything about yellow glasses. Martin kept pressing
Speaker 2: the point, and the prosecutor mcburniey he objected, claiming Martin
Speaker 2: was being argumentative. Eventually, Martin moved on. Wa Tani watched
Speaker 2: English's testimony from the defense table.
Speaker 5: Did the English.
Speaker 2: Testimony is that memorable to you at all? Or do
Speaker 2: you remember how you were feeling about that?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 6: I thought he was lying, but that was my good feeling. Yeah,
Speaker 6: I mean he saw him on television and he looked
Speaker 6: at this stuff, and they say, I'll never forget those
Speaker 6: gray eyes. I believe that's what happened. And they use
Speaker 6: the gray eyes to try to emphasize, Oh, yeah.
Speaker 5: It's him, because it's so unique that a black person
Speaker 5: would have great because it's unforgettable.
Speaker 6: On the paper.
Speaker 2: But that thing, what you saw ful the paper, what
Speaker 2: Tani is talking about. He means the warrant. On the warrant,
Speaker 2: a man Jamil's eye color was listed incorrectly, as so
Speaker 2: English's whole story about his mama telling him to look
Speaker 2: a man in the eyes sounds kind of funny. It
Speaker 2: created a suspicion that he might have been trying to
Speaker 2: pin the shooting on a man Jamial. After English's testimony
Speaker 2: later in the trial, the prosecution called the ballistics analyst
Speaker 2: from George's crime lab to the witness stand. McBurney questioned
Speaker 2: the analyst he held up the nine milimeters pistol and
Speaker 2: the Ruger Many fourteen semi automatic rifle found close to
Speaker 2: where a Mam Jamial was captured. The rifle was a
Speaker 2: unique and powerful gun. Even though it was semi automatic,
Speaker 2: it could still be fired rapidly, and it had a
Speaker 2: retractable stock so it could be compact fired from the
Speaker 2: hip or extended and fired like a rifle typically is
Speaker 2: from the shoulder. The analyst said that a bullet from
Speaker 2: the rifle must have hit Kinchin with the caveat that
Speaker 2: if there was another ruger Many fourteen at the scene,
Speaker 2: she couldn't tell the difference between the two, and the
Speaker 2: analyst testified that a bullet from the pistol the same
Speaker 2: one Bernie held up in the courtroom, that it hit
Speaker 2: Deputy Kenchin.
Speaker 5: Period.
Speaker 2: Here's the defense attorney Jack Martin.
Speaker 4: The gun evidence was very problematic for us. It was
Speaker 4: a difficult thing for us to overcome. But you know,
Speaker 4: we had some explanations for it, but it was more difficult,
Speaker 4: including why would he take it all the way to Alabama.
Speaker 2: Ama Jimil's defense team had argued before the trial that
Speaker 2: the ballistics evidence shouldn't be included at all, but the
Speaker 2: judge decided to allow it. Now, all they could do
Speaker 2: was cross examine the analysts. It got really technical about
Speaker 2: gas projection and surface markings, that type of stuff. But
Speaker 2: the thing is, there are serious questions about the veracity
Speaker 2: of the kinds of ballistics evidence that was presented.
Speaker 4: To say that this gun is the gud who fired
Speaker 4: this book is very, very difficult. There were questions about
Speaker 4: whether this was a valid conclusion from a scientific point
Speaker 4: of view.
Speaker 2: Ballistics just happens to be something I know a little
Speaker 2: bit about. When I was an investigative reporter at Pro Publica,
Speaker 2: I worked on a team looking into the validity of
Speaker 2: the so called forensic sciences. The project eventually ran under
Speaker 2: the headline The Real CSI, which was meant to be
Speaker 2: a corrective to how CSI and other crime dramas hold
Speaker 2: out ballistics analysis and other methods as infallible truth. The
Speaker 2: work was inspired by a huge report put out by
Speaker 2: the National Academy of Sciences on ballistics analysis. The Academy concluded, quote,
Speaker 2: the decision of the tool mark examiner remains a subjective
Speaker 2: decision based on unarticulated standards and no statistical foundation. The
Speaker 2: report went on to say that it has never been
Speaker 2: conclusively proven that a particular gun leaves unique markings on
Speaker 2: the bullets at fires. But according to Jack Martin, it
Speaker 2: was always going to be tough to convince the jury
Speaker 2: that this evidence wasn't reliable. Do you think from your
Speaker 2: experiences as a lawyer, do juries tend to believe ballistics evidence?
Speaker 4: Yeah, and they shouldn't.
Speaker 2: This kind of ballistics evidence matching a bullet or a
Speaker 2: shell casing to a particular gun. It's still widely admissible
Speaker 2: in US courts. But after three weeks of testimony and
Speaker 2: cross examinations and objections and squabbling over evidence, there was
Speaker 2: almost time to turn the case over to the jury.
Speaker 2: In my reporting on this story, I swung back and
Speaker 2: forth between thinking maybe a Mama Jemil didn't shoot those
Speaker 2: deputies and yes, he definitely did. One bit of information
Speaker 2: would lead me one way, and then another would turn
Speaker 2: me around in the uncertainty. And when I was thinking
Speaker 2: I'd never get to the bottom of what happened, I
Speaker 2: figured that maybe the story I was supposed to tell
Speaker 2: was more about a Maam Jimil himself. Who was this
Speaker 2: man who I encountered as a kid, who people believed
Speaker 2: was even capable of shooting two cops. But then I
Speaker 2: would get sucked back into an obsessive and maybe even
Speaker 2: a foolish desire to figure out what actually happened that night.
Speaker 2: We all know that the facts at any trial are
Speaker 2: subject to dispute, but it's also the case that so
Speaker 2: many facts are never even considered. Prosecutors and defense lawyers
Speaker 2: construct narratives out of little slivers of life. As the
Speaker 2: trial neared its climax, there were still unanswered questions on
Speaker 2: both sides. That's a big part of why I got
Speaker 2: sucked into this case. So much had been left off
Speaker 2: the table. When I interviewed Watani Tahimba about his work
Speaker 2: as an investigator and about a Ma'am Jamil's trial, it
Speaker 2: was the first time in my reporting that I felt
Speaker 2: close to hearing for myself some straight up truth about
Speaker 2: that night, not close enough to actually uncover the information itself.
Speaker 2: I just detected that something real was there. It was
Speaker 2: a little jolt that said keep on digging. But Tani
Speaker 2: and I were talking about how as an investigator he
Speaker 2: works closely, almost intimately, with truth that goes unsaid.
Speaker 5: I don't know who I was talking to about this recently,
Speaker 5: but it was I think maybe it was my wife actually,
Speaker 5: and she was saying, do you think that defendants tell
Speaker 5: the truth to their lawyers? And it's the same kind
Speaker 5: of thing. Do they tell the truth to their investigators?
Speaker 2: My answer to her was not all the time, Like.
Speaker 6: I don't know in fact, and I don't always ask them,
Speaker 6: see I don't. I don't ever ask them did you
Speaker 6: do this? I never asked that, you know, say that's
Speaker 6: what the police say, that's what the state was saying,
Speaker 6: we got some problems here. This is the area that
Speaker 6: we definitely got some issues here, you know, so we
Speaker 6: do it like that. But I've had can't say give
Speaker 6: me a whole story, say what do you think about that?
Speaker 4: Said?
Speaker 2: What do I think about that?
Speaker 4: Said?
Speaker 6: What do you think about that? That kind of intue me,
Speaker 6: it's your story. I'm not help you to do this.
Speaker 6: You tell me your story. I'll show you where your
Speaker 6: stuff is bad. You know, we tighten it up. But yeah,
Speaker 6: so yeah, it's interesting in it. It's it's none of
Speaker 6: them are there saying? You know?
Speaker 5: It would have been that same kind of scenario with
Speaker 5: the Mam Jamil. It wouldn't have been like, did you
Speaker 5: do this?
Speaker 6: Well, I mean we have a relationship. I could ask
Speaker 6: me to, but I wouldn't do that.
Speaker 2: Ma'am Jamil had pleaded not guilty. He said he was innocent,
Speaker 2: but he didn't have an alibi. So if he didn't
Speaker 2: shoot the deputies, then who did? It would have had
Speaker 2: to be someone else, someone who with Tani would have
Speaker 2: wanted to talk to as an investigator. Would you have
Speaker 2: been previous conversations with the Mam Jamil the client himself,
Speaker 2: to kind of give you guidance about where you should
Speaker 2: go or not.
Speaker 6: Go as an investigator? You know, yeah, we have privileged
Speaker 6: conversations with our client as well as with the other attorneys.
Speaker 2: And did he point you in one way or the other.
Speaker 6: We have privileged conversations.
Speaker 3: I can't say.
Speaker 2: Right that right there, that's it there's something there. Who
Speaker 2: knows Maybe wa Tani doesn't even know what it is.
Speaker 2: There's some truth there, even if it's unset. The prosecution
Speaker 2: left some big questions out there too. Robert McBurnie and
Speaker 2: his team, they decided not to explain why they thought
Speaker 2: a man Jimial shot the deputies. They had no obligation
Speaker 2: to describe a motive.
Speaker 3: Certainly, it was a topic of interest amongst those of
Speaker 3: us on the prosecution team of why someone who at
Speaker 3: that point in his life had become a community icon
Speaker 3: and was revered or feared pick your term in the
Speaker 3: West End, why not simply go with these deputies to
Speaker 3: deal with a stolen car allegation and be done with it.
Speaker 2: Mcburnie's theory was that a Mam Jamil had something in
Speaker 2: the trunk of the Mercedes guns, maybe that he didn't
Speaker 2: want English and kinsin to find when they pulled up
Speaker 2: on him.
Speaker 3: That's as good as it got. It was senseless regardless.
Speaker 3: It really doesn't matter what was in the trunk to
Speaker 3: shoot to kill two deputies who are simply doing their job.
Speaker 3: And there was nothing in this case about you know,
Speaker 3: these deputies were approaching him aggressively or he was defending
Speaker 3: himself that that was never the defense, because of course
Speaker 3: he didn't do it was the defense.
Speaker 2: But those are all things that did not come up
Speaker 2: at the trial. As the time approached for closing arguments
Speaker 2: and the defense was finishing with their witnesses, a man
Speaker 2: Jamil and his lawyers had to decide if he should testify.
Speaker 2: Based on the Constitution the Fifth Amendment, it was his
Speaker 2: right to refuse to take the stand, and if he
Speaker 2: decided not to McBurney in the prosecution, they weren't allowed
Speaker 2: to bring it up. Jack Martin worried that if a
Speaker 2: Mam Jamial testified, the armed robbery conviction he caught in
Speaker 2: New York in the seventies would come up and the
Speaker 2: jury would hold it against him. So in the end,
Speaker 2: a Mam Jamil didn't take the stand. McBurney gave his
Speaker 2: closing argument. First, he ran through the case the prosecution
Speaker 2: had laid out during testimony, and then McBurney said to
Speaker 2: the jury, I want to leave you with a few
Speaker 2: questions you should have for the defendant. He was using
Speaker 2: a PowerPoint presentation and he put up a slide.
Speaker 3: The label of the slide was questions for the Defendant
Speaker 3: and It was basically, how can you explain all these things?
Speaker 3: And then it rattled off some questions, how do you
Speaker 3: explain the shellcasing on the Mercedes? How do you explain
Speaker 3: the bullet taken out a Deputy Kinchin that matches this gun.
Speaker 3: It basically thinks that you cannot explain.
Speaker 4: I was amazed and it just troubled me, and it
Speaker 4: sort of the thought crossed my mind, said they must
Speaker 4: be fairly desperate to be making that type of argument.
Speaker 2: Jack Martin objected. He asked for a mistrial because of
Speaker 2: Mamjamial's Fifth Amendment rights were violated. The judge said no,
Speaker 2: and McBurney changed the title of that slide. Then the
Speaker 2: judge explained to the jury that a Mam Jamial had
Speaker 2: no obligation to testify, that the jury shouldn't draw any
Speaker 2: conclusion from a man Jamial's choice not to take the stand.
Speaker 2: McBurney finished the first part of his argument, and then
Speaker 2: it was the defense's turn. They said that English's idea
Speaker 2: of a Mammed Meal didn't hold up, that a Mam
Speaker 2: Jamil didn't have gray eyes and he wasn't shot like
Speaker 2: English said he was. And the defense pointed out the
Speaker 2: link between the bullets, the guns, and a man demial.
Speaker 2: It wasn't as convincing as it might seem. Then McBurney
Speaker 2: had a chance to deliver a final closing speech. He
Speaker 2: rebutted the defense arguments point by point, and he approached
Speaker 2: the climax of his argument. You watched what happened in
Speaker 2: this courtroom. Who wouldn't stand up for you? Don't stand
Speaker 2: for him. The defendant is guilty of the murder of
Speaker 2: Deputy Ricky Kinchin. McBurney said, he's guilty of each and
Speaker 2: every count in the indictment, and you need to hold
Speaker 2: him accountable. Don't stand for him. Remember that a Ma'am Jamil,
Speaker 2: unlike many others in the courtroom, hadn't risen. When the
Speaker 2: judge and jury entered for religious reasons, Martin objected to
Speaker 2: mcburney's language and again asked for a mistrial. The judge
Speaker 2: denied the request, but she did tell the jury that
Speaker 2: a Maam Jamial's beliefs shouldn't be held against him. The
Speaker 2: jury was sent away to deliberate. These days, McBurney is
Speaker 2: one of the most well known judges in Georgia. He
Speaker 2: oversaw a special grand jury's investigation and to alleged election
Speaker 2: interference by former President Donald Trump. I asked McBurnie whether
Speaker 2: he went too far in his closing argument. A district
Speaker 2: court judge went as far as saying that it was
Speaker 2: a I think serious and repeated constitutional violation the argument
Speaker 2: that you made. And I don't think that you've had
Speaker 2: the opportunity to kind of state publicly what you were
Speaker 2: thinking and your thoughts about how it went down, But
Speaker 2: we would love to hear that.
Speaker 3: Sure, So my friends like to bring this one up
Speaker 3: all the time. I made a mistake. It was an honest,
Speaker 3: good faith mistake, and I own it, and I have
Speaker 3: been owning it for many years now. But it was
Speaker 3: a mistake as opposed to an attempt to get the
Speaker 3: jury to think about Wait a minute, Alameine didn't testify.
Speaker 3: They knew that that would have been the most fascinating
Speaker 3: part of the trial is to have this very charismatic, silent,
Speaker 3: brooding person testify, and he didn't. But I didn't talk
Speaker 3: about that in my closing I shouldn't have talked about it.
Speaker 3: And that was a very long answer, but it's just
Speaker 3: to emphasize how I think in the grand scheme of things,
Speaker 3: minor my mistake was.
Speaker 2: The defense team and the district court judge. I mentioned
Speaker 2: they didn't consider the mistake to be so minor. I
Speaker 2: also asked mc bernie about his reference to a man
Speaker 2: Jamil not standing during the trial. That wasn't a mistake,
Speaker 2: he said, not at all.
Speaker 3: I don't owe him respect. I treated him as I
Speaker 3: ought to, and he got a phenomenal defense team, great judge,
Speaker 3: and a very very fair trial. The fact that I
Speaker 3: didn't hold his hand and tell him I thought he
Speaker 3: was a swell guy. I don't lose sleep over that one.
Speaker 2: After less than a day of deliberation, the jury found
Speaker 2: a man Jamil guilty on all accounts. But the trial,
Speaker 2: it wasn't over yet. A man Jamil and his defense team,
Speaker 2: they still had to fight to keep him alive.
Speaker 7: And now you have to come in front of that
Speaker 7: same jury and say, Okay, let's assume you got it right.
Speaker 7: Let's assume you made the correct decision. I have a
Speaker 7: second argument for you. He should live.
Speaker 2: That on the next episode of Radical. Radical is a
Speaker 2: production of Camside Media, Tenderfoot TV, and iHeart Podcasts. Radical
Speaker 2: was reported and written by Johnnykauffman and me Mosey's Secret
Speaker 2: Johnnykaufman is our senior producer. Sheba Joseph is our associate producer.
Speaker 2: Editing by Eric Benson, Johnny Kaufman, Emily Martinez and Matt Cher.
Speaker 2: Fact checking by Sophie Hurwitz, Kayln Lynch and Layla Dos.
Speaker 2: Original music by Kyle Murdoch and by Ray Murray of
Speaker 2: Organized Noise. Sound design and mixing by Kevin Seaman. Recording
Speaker 2: by Ewan led trom Ewen and Sheba Joseph. Campside Media's
Speaker 2: operations team is Doug Slaywan, Ashley Warren, Elijah Papes, Destiny Dingle,
Speaker 2: and Sabina Mera. The executive producers at Campside Media are
Speaker 2: Josh Dean Vanessa, Gregoriatis, Adam Hoff, and Matt Cher. For
Speaker 2: Tenderfoot TV, executive producers are Donald Albright and Paine Lindsay.
Speaker 2: The executive producers at iHeart Podcasts are Matt Frederick and
Speaker 2: Alex Williams, with additional support from Trevor Young,