Speaker 1: It's Saturday night. You're in your front yard working on
Speaker 1: your moped. Your dad is sitting on the picnic bench
Speaker 1: chatting with you as you install a new starter. You
Speaker 1: and your friend Alan saved up all year so you
Speaker 1: could eat buy a bike. Neither one of them is
Speaker 1: in great condition, but now that school is out you
Speaker 1: have all summer to fix them up. After a little while,
Speaker 1: your friend Shanta arrives at your house and he says, hey,
Speaker 1: Alan's bike has a flat. He wants us to come
Speaker 1: help him fix it, and you're thinking again, his bike
Speaker 1: is always breaking down. It's always got some kind of problem.
Speaker 1: At first, you were a little jealous of Alan's red
Speaker 1: raz but that guy keeps getting flats. You pat the
Speaker 1: seat on your brown moped. It's pretty ugly, but at
Speaker 1: least it's faithful. You ask your dad if it's cool
Speaker 1: if you go over to Alan's grandmother's to get the bike.
Speaker 1: He looks at his watch and says, well, it's pretty late,
Speaker 1: but hurry up, go get it and you can bring
Speaker 1: it back here to work on it. When you and
Speaker 1: Shanty get to Alan's, shanty heads inside to help Alan
Speaker 1: with the bike. Another flat. You say, when Alan comes
Speaker 1: out of his house. Don't even start, Alan says, tossing
Speaker 1: you a can of soda. You hang out for a bit,
Speaker 1: and then the three of you start walking Alan's bike
Speaker 1: towards your house. You're teasing Alan about how often is
Speaker 1: moped as problems when a green sedan coming from the
Speaker 1: opposite direction stops right next to you. The man driving
Speaker 1: the car leans out the window and says, hey, you
Speaker 1: guys have any dope nah? Alan says, we don't mess
Speaker 1: with that ship. Yell at the guy, hey, man, get
Speaker 1: out of here, and the green car speeds off. You
Speaker 1: walk a bit further down the block, and then you
Speaker 1: hear shots ring out. Oh shit. All three of you
Speaker 1: start frantically running down the street and don't look back.
Speaker 1: You don't stop running until you get back to your house.
Speaker 1: You look around, making sure no one's shooting at you,
Speaker 1: and then you catch your breath. You chante and Alan
Speaker 1: talk about the gunshots for a few minutes. It's not
Speaker 1: that out of the ordinary in this neighborhood, but still
Speaker 1: it's always scary as ship when it happens. The adrenaline
Speaker 1: finally wears off and you start working on Alan's bike.
Speaker 1: There's a nail in the tread of the tire. You
Speaker 1: pull it out, plug the hole, and let the glue set.
Speaker 1: After pumping up the tire and giving it a few
Speaker 1: good pushes, Alan grabs his bike and begins to walk
Speaker 1: it back down the street towards his grandmother's house. Once
Speaker 1: Alan gets to his street, he sees the green car
Speaker 1: that stopped to ask for drugs, but now it's front
Speaker 1: end is just demolished. It's smashed into the side of
Speaker 1: a house a few doors down from his grandmother's. There's smoking, chaos,
Speaker 1: and police just everywhere. Over the next few days, you
Speaker 1: expect to see Alan riding his red raz after all,
Speaker 1: the tire is fixed, but you don't see him around
Speaker 1: the neighborhood. A week passes, you knock on his door
Speaker 1: and his grandmother tells you that the man in the
Speaker 1: green car had been shot. The cops asked Alan to
Speaker 1: come to the police station to help with the investigation.
Speaker 1: She expected Alan to be home that same night, but
Speaker 1: he's being held in jail. She's afraid and confused, and
Speaker 1: suddenly so are you. A few weeks later, you're in
Speaker 1: your backyard throwing a tennis ball against the side of
Speaker 1: your house. Worrying about Alan, wondering if he's okay. Out
Speaker 1: of the corner of your eye, you see some people
Speaker 1: walking towards you, and it's four police officers. At first
Speaker 1: you freeze, overcome with fear, and then you take off.
Speaker 1: He took Alan for no reason. What's going to stop
Speaker 1: them from grabbing you and doing the same thing. But
Speaker 1: you're fourteen years old. They're bigger than you, faster, and
Speaker 1: there's more of them. They catch up, grab you and
Speaker 1: put you in handcuffs. Your first thought is I'm gonna disappear,
Speaker 1: just like Alan. You're putting an interrogation room. You tell
Speaker 1: the officers what happened that night, the night the guy
Speaker 1: in the green car got shot, how you and Allen
Speaker 1: told him to go away. But they don't want to
Speaker 1: hear the truth. They don't want to hear anything you're
Speaker 1: telling them. One of the detectives scoots his seat closer
Speaker 1: to you. We know Alan did this. His hands tested
Speaker 1: positive for gunpowder residue. You know what that is, Son,
Speaker 1: We know he was involved. You're gonna tell us what
Speaker 1: Alan did. You're gonna tell us that Alan had the gun,
Speaker 1: that you saw that gun, and that what he did
Speaker 1: is he went up to that car that stopped and
Speaker 1: he talked to the guy in the car, and the
Speaker 1: next thing you knew was you heard gunshots and you
Speaker 1: saw Alan running. And I'm gonna tell you something you
Speaker 1: don't tell us exactly that here's what's going to happen.
Speaker 1: You're going to get charged with murder. You got that.
Speaker 1: You know how much power these guys have. They already
Speaker 1: have Alan, who knows what they're gonna do to you.
Speaker 1: You're petrified. The walls feel like they're closing in on you.
Speaker 1: You figure, I should just tell these guys what they
Speaker 1: want to hear. Then my parents can help sort this
Speaker 1: out later. So you do what they say. You make
Speaker 1: up a story, one that sounds like what they want
Speaker 1: to hear, and they record it. You'll tell them anything
Speaker 1: just to get out of that room. Before letting you go,
Speaker 1: the cops tell you you're gonna have to testify it
Speaker 1: Alan's trial. We'll see you. Then. A few weeks pass,
Speaker 1: and you're relieved when school starts again. Maybe this will
Speaker 1: distract you from thinking about Alan, from the feeling that
Speaker 1: it's your fault. He's still sitting in jail. The day
Speaker 1: of Alan's trial, you and Schante decide you're not going
Speaker 1: to show up. You're not going to testify against your friend,
Speaker 1: lie again and dig a deeper hole for Alan. But
Speaker 1: the cops show up at your school and they bring
Speaker 1: you both to court. At Alan's trial, an officer takes
Speaker 1: the stand and says that he personally collected samples from
Speaker 1: Alan's hands. He swabbed the front and back of them
Speaker 1: with Q tips and then tested those Q tips to
Speaker 1: see if there was gunpowder residue present. The officer testifies
Speaker 1: the defendant's right hand tested positive for antimony and bari um,
Speaker 1: two chemical elements that are present in gunpowder residue. There
Speaker 1: is no doubt in my mind that the defendants shot
Speaker 1: the gun that was used in this homicide. This is insane.
Speaker 1: You think you know and didn't have a gun. He
Speaker 1: was with you when those shots rang out. How can
Speaker 1: they just make this stuff up. When you're on the
Speaker 1: witness stand, you glance over at the jury. They're all
Speaker 1: sitting forward, staring right at you, through you. It seems.
Speaker 1: The prosecutors start asking all of these questions. Your answers
Speaker 1: are all over the place. They barely make sense. You
Speaker 1: were told to tell lies, but It's hard to keep
Speaker 1: it all straight because none of what you're testifying to
Speaker 1: actually happened. But at seventeen years old, Alan is convicted
Speaker 1: of murder and sentenced to fifteen years to life in prison.
Speaker 1: The gunshot residue that the police and prosecutor's claim was
Speaker 1: found on Alan's hand is the only physical evidence linking
Speaker 1: him to the crime. The story you just heard is
Speaker 1: based on the true events of Raymond Carl Alan Warren's trial.
Speaker 1: He was convicted of murder based on faulty gunshot residue evidence.
Speaker 1: The police also coursed as two friends, Shanta and Antonio,
Speaker 1: into giving false testimony saying that Alan committed the crime.
Speaker 1: Alan is now in his forties and he is still
Speaker 1: in prison. He's been there for over twenty five years,
Speaker 1: serving a sentence of fifteen to life for a murder
Speaker 1: he did not commit. I'm Josh Dubin, civil rights and
Speaker 1: criminal defense attorney and innocence ambassador to the Innocence Project
Speaker 1: in New York. Today, on Wrongful Conviction Junk Science, we
Speaker 1: examine gunshot residue evidence. As listeners to the show, you've
Speaker 1: probably heard how coerce confessions are used to convict innocent
Speaker 1: people on another podcast in our feed, wrongful conviction and
Speaker 1: false Confessions. Now, the coerse confessions of Shanta and Antonio
Speaker 1: were certainly factors in convicting Alan at his trial, but
Speaker 1: today our focus is on faulty forensic science and gunshot
Speaker 1: residue certainly has its issues that began almost a century
Speaker 1: ago when three dozen former Brooklyn Navy yard workers found
Speaker 1: themselves irreparably poisoned by the asbestos they used in the
Speaker 1: construction of the battleships that won World War Two. Perry
Speaker 1: Whites and Arthur Luxembourg literally putting everything on the line
Speaker 1: to successfully represent them. Since then, they've championed the rights
Speaker 1: of over fifty thousand regular Americans injured through the negligence
Speaker 1: and malfeasance of mainly large corporations. Their ability to level
Speaker 1: the playing field against seemingly insurmountable odds has led them
Speaker 1: to litigate against opponents as diverse as Big Pharma all
Speaker 1: the way to those responsible for rendering the water of Flint,
Speaker 1: Michigan undrinkable. Whites and Luxembourg ticket personally when there's a
Speaker 1: miscarriage of justice anywhere and there for they feel a
Speaker 1: sense of responsibility to support Bronthol conviction podcasts. You can
Speaker 1: learn more about them by visiting whites lux dot com.
Speaker 1: That's w e I t z l u x dot com.
Speaker 1: In three, a group of American police officers from several
Speaker 1: departments gathered in a lab at the police headquarters in
Speaker 1: Mexico City. They were there to observe Teodoro Gonzalez demonstrate
Speaker 1: his new technique for testing gunpowder residue. The test became
Speaker 1: known by many names, the dermal nitrate tests, the glove tests,
Speaker 1: but my favorite might be the paraffin gauntlet test. The
Speaker 1: officers watched his Gonzalez poured white hot liquid paraffin wax
Speaker 1: over the fingers, hands, and risks of his lab assistant.
Speaker 1: A glimmer of discomfort flashed across the assistant's eyes as
Speaker 1: the hot wax code at his skin. Next, Gonzalez delicately
Speaker 1: wrapped the layer of cotton around the assistance fingers and hands.
Speaker 1: Layer after layer of wax, then cotton were added until
Speaker 1: gloves began to form while the paraffin cooled. Gonzalez explained
Speaker 1: that after a suspect fires a gun, the gunpowder residue
Speaker 1: becomes embedded deep in the pores of the skin. Even
Speaker 1: weeks after a gun is fired. The hot melted paraffin
Speaker 1: will open up the pores mixed with the oils and
Speaker 1: the skin and caused the pores to discharge the gunpowder
Speaker 1: residue trapped within them. Part of this experiment included Gonzalez's
Speaker 1: assistant firing a gun and then washing his hands prior
Speaker 1: to them being wrapped. The American officers noted the advantage
Speaker 1: of this technique, suspects couldn't simply wash their hands and
Speaker 1: avoid detection. Gonzalez delicately peeled the gloves from the hand
Speaker 1: ends of his assistant and then took them over to
Speaker 1: the lab table and gently laid them down. He measured
Speaker 1: a small beaker of a chemical solution that contains sulfuric
Speaker 1: acid dropped by drop, he coated the interior of the
Speaker 1: gloves with the mixture. Minutes later, dark blue specs the
Speaker 1: size of pinpoints began to form, and Gonzalez explained that
Speaker 1: these blue dots indicated the presence of dermal nitrates from
Speaker 1: gunpowder residue. The police officers hurdled around the paraffin gloves
Speaker 1: to see for themselves. After that, it took only a
Speaker 1: few years for the paraffin test to become widely used
Speaker 1: in police departments across the United States. Within three years
Speaker 1: of gonzalez demonstration, it was used as forensic evidence in
Speaker 1: the murder trial of James L. Westwood in Pennsylvania. At
Speaker 1: his trial, the state called expert witnesses who testified the
Speaker 1: gunpowder residue was present on Westwood's hands, indicating that it
Speaker 1: was he who shot and killed his wife. But Westwood's
Speaker 1: defense attorney called his own expert witness, a chemist who
Speaker 1: had conducted his own study and found that thirteen different
Speaker 1: substances could also cause the blue dots to appear on
Speaker 1: the paraffin gloves. He cited things like ordinary soot, certain
Speaker 1: brands of toothpaste, tobacco cigars, cigarette ashes, and different types
Speaker 1: of matches, but none of that evidence mattered for the jury.
Speaker 1: Westwood was convicted of the first degree murder of his
Speaker 1: wife and sentenced to life in prison. By seven A
Speaker 1: wider study concluded that rust, colored fingernail polish, and residue
Speaker 1: from evaporated urine, soap, and tap water would all test positive.
Speaker 1: Contact with any of these objects would create blue dots
Speaker 1: to appear on the gloves and a paraffin test. The
Speaker 1: paraffin test is no longer being used today, and the
Speaker 1: signs behind testing gunshot residue has changed. By the time
Speaker 1: Allen was arrested in it's sixteen years old, officers used
Speaker 1: a new version of the test. It's called the atomic
Speaker 1: absorption test, but that test has many of the same
Speaker 1: reliability problems as the paraffin glove. None of the evidence
Speaker 1: that was used to convict Alan has withstood the test
Speaker 1: of time. The test used to indicate that he had
Speaker 1: gunshot residue on his hands is no longer considered reliable.
Speaker 1: So joining us today is Joanna Sanchez and she's from
Speaker 1: the Wrongful Conviction Project at the Office of the Ohio
Speaker 1: Public Defender and we're super excited to have her today.
Speaker 1: She's currently representing Alan, whose story we talked about at
Speaker 1: the beginning of this episode. Now, al A's full name
Speaker 1: is Raymond Carl Allan Warren, and Joanna might refer to
Speaker 1: him as either Alan or Raymond, but don't get confused, okay,
Speaker 1: because Raymond and Allan are the same person. So Joanna,
Speaker 1: it's great to have you here today, and I'd like
Speaker 1: you to start by telling us a little bit about Alan.
Speaker 1: What was he like as a sixteen year old living
Speaker 1: in Dayton, Ohio. Alan was, by all accounts, a normal teenager.
Speaker 1: He had a few brothers and he's very close with them.
Speaker 1: He was close with his mother, very close to his grandmother,
Speaker 1: you know, had lots of friends in the neighborhood, would
Speaker 1: spend time with them. Alan loves working on cars, so
Speaker 1: that was something he's spent a lot of time doing,
Speaker 1: both fixing cars and painting them, playing basketball. And now
Speaker 1: you know, I've known him now for six years. He's
Speaker 1: a very engaging, caring person, very talkative, has strong relationships
Speaker 1: with his family and friends. Still, Okay, so I want
Speaker 1: to get into the details of the crime a little bit.
Speaker 1: So police officers arrive on Allen Street the night when
Speaker 1: he had been fixing his moped and this green car
Speaker 1: had crashed into the side of a house and the
Speaker 1: driver is shot. So what what makes them even decide
Speaker 1: to go after Alan as a suspect in the first place.
Speaker 1: So I think it's a matter of circumstance. The boys,
Speaker 1: they worked on their scooters for a period of time
Speaker 1: after they heard the gunshots, and then in order to
Speaker 1: go home, Alan had to essentially go through the crime
Speaker 1: scene because it happened on the street he was living
Speaker 1: on with his grandma's. So Alan that night told the
Speaker 1: police about this encounter with the victim, and the police
Speaker 1: asked him if he was willing to come down to
Speaker 1: police station to give a statement. So he voluntarily went
Speaker 1: to the police station and also voluntarily submitted to a
Speaker 1: gunshot residue test. And the result of that gunshot residue
Speaker 1: test was that Alan tested negative on his left hand
Speaker 1: even though he's left handed, and the palm of his
Speaker 1: right hand, though, tested positive for two elements that are
Speaker 1: known to be in gunshot resdue And I honestly think
Speaker 1: once that gunshot residue test came back, they just became
Speaker 1: las or focused on Alan. So tell us a little
Speaker 1: bit about that test. What exactly did gunshot residue testing
Speaker 1: entail at the time when Alan went down to that
Speaker 1: police station. So, gunshot residue testing, the idea behind it
Speaker 1: is that one of the person shoots a firearm, particles
Speaker 1: will be admitted that will land on their clothing or
Speaker 1: their hands or their face, and that those particles can
Speaker 1: then be tested. You can't see them, but they can
Speaker 1: be tested and tell the police something about whether the
Speaker 1: person being tested might have shot a firearm. All gunshot
Speaker 1: residue testing is not a simple yes or no test.
Speaker 1: This is gunshot residue or it's not. What it's really
Speaker 1: testing for is the elements that are known to make
Speaker 1: up gunshot residue, so specific sickly, they test for three
Speaker 1: elements in most circumstances, and that's lead, barium, and antimony.
Speaker 1: In Raymond's case, they actually only tested for two of
Speaker 1: those elements, and what they used was an atomic absorption test,
Speaker 1: which is now largely out of use, and that's because
Speaker 1: it has a high risk of producing false positives. So
Speaker 1: the reason the a test is unreliable is because it
Speaker 1: tests for elements that are also present in items that
Speaker 1: are completely unrelated to guns. So as a result, a
Speaker 1: person who's never touched or been near a gun put
Speaker 1: falsely test positive. So Joanna, give us an example. What
Speaker 1: are some things that Alan might have touched that would
Speaker 1: make him test positive for gunshot residue. Brake linings are
Speaker 1: one example of an item that has the same elements
Speaker 1: as gunshot residue. And on the night of the shooting,
Speaker 1: as we know, Raymond, who frequently was working on cars,
Speaker 1: had contact with brake linings while he fixed his motorized scooter.
Speaker 1: So the A A test as used in Raymond's case
Speaker 1: is problematic because we can't know if those two elements
Speaker 1: came from gunshot residue or if they came from brake
Speaker 1: linings or some other substance that has those same elements
Speaker 1: as gunshot residue. So you mentioned that the A A test,
Speaker 1: the atomic absorption test that was used on Allen, is
Speaker 1: not really considered anymore to be dependable, but they're still
Speaker 1: using gunshot residue as a form of evidence, just with
Speaker 1: new tests. Has signs progressed in any significant way since
Speaker 1: the A test, gunshot residue testing generally has progressed somewhat.
Speaker 1: The A test is no longer really in favor because
Speaker 1: of its limitations, and there was a switch over in
Speaker 1: the mid two thousand's to a test called S C
Speaker 1: M E D S, and that test was better and
Speaker 1: that it not only would tell an analyst whether those
Speaker 1: elements were present, but also could tell them the shape
Speaker 1: and size of the elements and sort of how they
Speaker 1: functioned together, whether they were fused, whether they were the
Speaker 1: shape of a sphere, all things that would be important
Speaker 1: for distinguishing between gunshot residue and let's say another substance.
Speaker 1: And so in order for an analyst to have any
Speaker 1: confidence that something is actually gunshot residue, they'd need to
Speaker 1: do that sort of morphological analysis and also compare all
Speaker 1: of the elements in that gunshot residue example with all
Speaker 1: of the elements in other substances so that they can
Speaker 1: actually eliminate other items. Okay, So that sounds like it
Speaker 1: does have the potential to be more accurate tests because
Speaker 1: you're able to look at the residue under a microscope
Speaker 1: and tell that the molecules actually come from a gun
Speaker 1: and can't be from anywhere else. But is this a
Speaker 1: perfect fix? Even if that's done properly, there's still a
Speaker 1: second issue with gunshot residue testing, and that's the reason
Speaker 1: why a scientific commune has really pulled back from this testing,
Speaker 1: and that issue is contamination. So gunshot residue is incredibly transferable.
Speaker 1: It's very easy to pick it up by touching a
Speaker 1: surface that's contaminated with gunshot residue. So if I were
Speaker 1: to shoot a gun and shake your hand, you could
Speaker 1: very likely test positive for gunshot residue, and with that
Speaker 1: that creates just too big of a risk for environmental contamination.
Speaker 1: And what it means is that, you know, people who
Speaker 1: touch the back of police cars, handcuffs, police officers, police stations,
Speaker 1: there's a good chance they could pick up gunshot residue
Speaker 1: from those surfaces, even though they themselves never touched a gun.
Speaker 1: And we know that happened in Raymond's case because he
Speaker 1: was transported to the police station in the back of
Speaker 1: a police car and then held in an interrogation room
Speaker 1: for several hours before he was actually tested. If on
Speaker 1: the call before that police officer had taken somebody who
Speaker 1: shot a gun down to the police station, that person
Speaker 1: could have left gunshot residue there and then Alan gets
Speaker 1: in the car and picks it up. And there have
Speaker 1: been studies across the country that show that kind of
Speaker 1: thing occurs. So there is a study in Colorado where
Speaker 1: they tested I think forty police cars or excuse me,
Speaker 1: twenty six police cars, and they found gunshot residue particles
Speaker 1: and fourteen of them. So this kind of transference is
Speaker 1: very common unfortunately, So in you know, in hearing this,
Speaker 1: I gotta tell you this is like, it's startling, it's scary,
Speaker 1: and you initially start to think, well, how many people
Speaker 1: might have been wrongfully convicted when the evidence in their
Speaker 1: case was just gunshot residue on their hands. Um, I
Speaker 1: mean you have to admit it's pretty compelling evidence for
Speaker 1: people that don't know otherwise. And I mean when I
Speaker 1: mean for people that don't know otherwise, I'm talking about jurors.
Speaker 1: So with that in mind, how big of a role
Speaker 1: did faulty gunshot residue evidence playing Alan's case? The gunshot
Speaker 1: residue evidence here was critical in Allen's trial. The examiner
Speaker 1: when he testified, what he said was that this positive
Speaker 1: test means one of three things. Either Allan shot a gun,
Speaker 1: Alan was a victim of a shooting, or Alan handled ammunition.
Speaker 1: But we know he wasn't a victim, and both of
Speaker 1: the other options still implicate him, whether he's shooting a
Speaker 1: gun or handling ammunition. What the examiner left out is
Speaker 1: the fourth possibility that this is contamination and the fifth possibility,
Speaker 1: which is that it's not gunshot residue at all. It
Speaker 1: could just be barrium and antimony on Alan's hands as
Speaker 1: a result of him having contact with brake linings earlier
Speaker 1: that night, and that is the entire scope of the
Speaker 1: physical evidence in this trial. So it as a result
Speaker 1: of this gets gunshot residue evidence, Allan gets sentenced to
Speaker 1: fifteen years to life. He's only seventeen years old. I mean,
Speaker 1: what options did he have to seek recurs How would
Speaker 1: one go about proving that gunshot residue evidence is false.
Speaker 1: It's incredibly difficult for anybody who's incarcerated to collect the
Speaker 1: evidence or knowledge necessary to file a new trial motion
Speaker 1: or raise a claim that they were wrongfully convicted. So
Speaker 1: part of that is he's locked inside, so he can't
Speaker 1: go out and conduct any sort of investigation. He lacks
Speaker 1: the funds, so he doesn't have the ability to hire
Speaker 1: an attorney or an investigator or an expert witness to
Speaker 1: go get this evidence. Alan was challenged and that he
Speaker 1: couldn't even get the records in his case, So if
Speaker 1: he wanted to write a motion for a few years,
Speaker 1: he did not even have a copy of his transcript
Speaker 1: that would have helped him to do that. So there
Speaker 1: are so many barriers. He's a smart guy, but he's
Speaker 1: not an attorney. I mean, that's why we say people
Speaker 1: should have attorneys to litigate these complex issues is incredibly difficult,
Speaker 1: and it's all the more so for somebody who's a
Speaker 1: teenager and they're incarcerated. They don't have access to these things.
Speaker 1: And so he fought on his own for years and
Speaker 1: years to try to challenge his conviction. That kind of changes,
Speaker 1: an evolution with gunshot residue was happening, but he didn't
Speaker 1: He did not really know that. He didn't have access
Speaker 1: to forensic science articles or expert witnesses, so he wasn't
Speaker 1: even aware that that was necessarily an issue in his case.
Speaker 1: And eventually in Shanta, Hunt gave a statement and said,
Speaker 1: I lied because I was scared. Alan was with us
Speaker 1: when we heard the shots, so he could not have
Speaker 1: shot the victim. And in two thousand eight, Antonio gave
Speaker 1: a very similar statement saying, again, I was scared and
Speaker 1: this is a lie, and I did not come award
Speaker 1: for all these years because I was scared of perjury charges.
Speaker 1: Now the Innocence Project has become involved in Allen's case,
Speaker 1: and you and your co council are fighting to get
Speaker 1: Alan justice. But as our listeners know by now, as
Speaker 1: I'm sure you and I can agree, this problem is
Speaker 1: so much bigger than Allen's case. What needs to happen,
Speaker 1: in your opinion, to make sure things like gunshot residue
Speaker 1: evidence stop being used to convict innocent people so that
Speaker 1: this doesn't happen again and again and again. I think
Speaker 1: police officers and lab examiners should be careful about when
Speaker 1: they do gunshot residue testing and only do it in
Speaker 1: the very optimal circumstances, if at all. I think there
Speaker 1: are some police officers who feel that it's just a
Speaker 1: piece of the puzzle and it's a helpful tool in
Speaker 1: the investigation. But I think the risk with that is
Speaker 1: that it leads to tunnel vision. You know, wants to
Speaker 1: have that piece of evidence to become fixated on a suspect,
Speaker 1: and our our courts are judges, need to look at
Speaker 1: it critically as well. The court is the gatekeeper of
Speaker 1: expert testimony and forensic evidence that comes in, and what
Speaker 1: we're seeing is that some courts are limiting what can
Speaker 1: be said about gunshot rest of evidence, but they're still
Speaker 1: allowing it in. And I think at some point we
Speaker 1: hit a breaking point where the risk of prejudice for
Speaker 1: this evidence outweighs the benefit of it because it is
Speaker 1: so unreliable in so many different aspects. That are we
Speaker 1: risking swaying the jury with evidence that really isn't reliable
Speaker 1: enough and shouldn't be presented at all. All Right, So
Speaker 1: that certainly addresses what people involved in the justice system
Speaker 1: can do. But what can everyday people do. We have
Speaker 1: a lot of our listeners asking us, you know, what
Speaker 1: can I do to help? So please tell them things
Speaker 1: they can do to make sure that this kind of
Speaker 1: junk science stops being used and it gets out of
Speaker 1: our criminal justice system once and for all. I think
Speaker 1: the biggest thing is people sharing this information and sharing
Speaker 1: podcasts like this, sharing when somebody's exonerated based on forensic
Speaker 1: evidence that we now know has been discredited. Because the
Speaker 1: more people that know about this, I think the more
Speaker 1: the system will improve. I think the impact of sharing
Speaker 1: this podcast and sharing his story is that more people
Speaker 1: hear about it, and then they take that knowledge with
Speaker 1: them when they vote, and they take that knowledge with
Speaker 1: them when they interact with public officials and ask them,
Speaker 1: how do you approach wrong for convictions? How do you
Speaker 1: approach forensic science? Are their laws in place that allow
Speaker 1: for these convictions to be challenged appropriately. And I think
Speaker 1: having the knowledge that's gained from listening to a podcast
Speaker 1: like this equips people with the sort of the talking
Speaker 1: points and the ability to ask those questions of public officials.
Speaker 1: So tell us a little bit about where Allen is
Speaker 1: now and what options are left for him. At this point,
Speaker 1: Alan had litigated emotion asking for a new trial, and
Speaker 1: we stepped into that litigation on his behalf in two
Speaker 1: thousand and fourteen, and it's kind of been up and
Speaker 1: down through the courts over several years. But earlier this
Speaker 1: year the Supreme Court of Ohio decided not to take
Speaker 1: his case. So where we're at is we continue to
Speaker 1: fight for him, and we believe strongly in his innocence
Speaker 1: and that he was wrongfully convicted, and so we're moving forward.
Speaker 1: We're hoping to find new evidence or hoping that a
Speaker 1: new avenue of relief opens up that allows Alan to
Speaker 1: challenge his conviction and hopefully one day go home. Look, Joanna,
Speaker 1: I um, my heart sort of you know, aches for
Speaker 1: you and for Alan really because I have been there before.
Speaker 1: I know that when cases you know, don't work out,
Speaker 1: you know, on our initial first try or first fifteen
Speaker 1: tries and go the way we need them to go,
Speaker 1: because our clients are innocent, and we know they're innocent.
Speaker 1: It can be so frustrating. What's your reaction when you
Speaker 1: have setbacks like this. I know that I've I've wept
Speaker 1: on my wife's shoulder before, I know that I have
Speaker 1: punched walls. I've had the spectrum of emotions. But you know,
Speaker 1: tell me a little bit about what it's like for
Speaker 1: you when you know you're faced with setbacks like this,
Speaker 1: and you know what it's like with Alan still sitting
Speaker 1: in prison. I think the important thing we do is
Speaker 1: we kind of keep moving forward and keep thinking about
Speaker 1: our clients, keep thinking about Alan and what he's going through.
Speaker 1: And it's so important that we stay in the fight
Speaker 1: and continue to be a voice for those people. And
Speaker 1: I hope one day it's not this way. But I
Speaker 1: know for me, I look at all the two thousand
Speaker 1: plus exonerations that we know about, and I see that
Speaker 1: those are never easy, right. They come after set back,
Speaker 1: and people have to try multiple different times, multiple different ways,
Speaker 1: And so I hope that at some point in time
Speaker 1: it doesn't have to be that way. But at least
Speaker 1: for now, I know that it's absolutely worth it to
Speaker 1: keep fighting for this person and to keep hoping that
Speaker 1: one day something we do works and somebody pays attention
Speaker 1: and that he gets the justice he's do. You know,
Speaker 1: I tell people all the time that these wrongful convictions
Speaker 1: are super difficult. You have to fight tall odds, You
Speaker 1: have to keep on fighting forward in the face of
Speaker 1: constant rejection from appellate courts. And if you're not willing
Speaker 1: to deal with setbacks, if you can't pick yourself up
Speaker 1: and dust yourself off and keep charging up that steep slope,
Speaker 1: you're really in the wrong business. And it really does
Speaker 1: take a team effort. So the more you can share
Speaker 1: these stories, the better off we're all going to be,
Speaker 1: because there's power in numbers, and there's power in a
Speaker 1: collective message. So I hope you will do just that.
Speaker 1: Please share our podcast and take action, whether it be
Speaker 1: writing your local judges as I often implore you all
Speaker 1: to do, or ensuring that when you vote, you were
Speaker 1: voting for those judges and the jurisdiction which you live
Speaker 1: that actually have the qualifications and the temperament to be
Speaker 1: open minded and thorough such that they won't blindly accept
Speaker 1: that legal precedent equates to reliability. Sometimes bad science remains
Speaker 1: in our system of justice because it goes unchallenged. It's
Speaker 1: up to all of us to shine a bright light
Speaker 1: on these junk sciences and force a reckoning. Kay Next week,
Speaker 1: we'll explore the junk science of tool mark identification with
Speaker 1: science journalist Tim Ricorreth. Wrongful Conviction Jung Science is a
Speaker 1: production of Lava for Good Podcasts and association with Signal
Speaker 1: Company Number One. Thanks to our executive producer Jason Flom
Speaker 1: and the team, it's Signal Company number One executive producer
Speaker 1: Kevin Wardis and senior producers Karen corn Haber and Brit Spangler.
Speaker 1: Our music was composed by j Ralph. You can follow
Speaker 1: me on Instagram at dubin dot. Josh followed the Wrongful
Speaker 1: Conviction podcast on Facebook and on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction
Speaker 1: and on Twitter at wrong Conviction