WEBVTT - #487 Guest Host Conor Hall with Angel Bumpass 0:00:00.400 --> 0:00:03.400 Hi, It's Connor Hall, the producer for Wrongful Conviction. As 0:00:03.400 --> 0:00:06.480 I mentioned previously, Jason and Kalia ah Lee are on 0:00:06.519 --> 0:00:08.840 their honeymoon, so they're letting me fill in for a 0:00:08.840 --> 0:00:11.680 few more episodes. And again I promise not to screw 0:00:11.720 --> 0:00:18.320 it up. So here we go. On January sixteenth, two 0:00:18.400 --> 0:00:22.279 thousand and nine, sixty eight year old Franklin Bonner was 0:00:22.280 --> 0:00:26.520 found suffocated by duct tape with signs of blunt force trauma. 0:00:27.520 --> 0:00:32.159 His Chattanooga, Tennessee home was ransacked, but no valuables appeared 0:00:32.159 --> 0:00:36.479 to be missing. The duck tape held eleven fingerprints, but 0:00:36.560 --> 0:00:40.480 no hits came up in the national database until nine 0:00:40.520 --> 0:00:43.920 years later when they ran the Prince again and two 0:00:44.000 --> 0:00:47.800 partial prints appeared to match twenty three year old Angel Bumpus, 0:00:48.000 --> 0:00:50.600 who was thirteen years old at the time of the crime. 0:00:51.240 --> 0:00:54.600 Despite a plausible explanation for the presence of her fingerprints 0:00:54.640 --> 0:00:58.440 and an equally implausible theory of her guilt, she was 0:00:58.480 --> 0:01:03.360 sent away for life in prison. And this is wrongful conviction. 0:01:09.440 --> 0:01:12.839 Wrongful conviction has always given voice to innocent people in prison, 0:01:12.880 --> 0:01:16.520 and now we're expanding that voice to you. Call us 0:01:16.800 --> 0:01:20.080 at eight three three two o seven four six sixty six, 0:01:20.120 --> 0:01:22.560 and tell us how these stories make you feel and 0:01:22.600 --> 0:01:24.959 what you've done to help the cause, even if it's 0:01:25.000 --> 0:01:27.760 something as simple as telling a friend or sharing on 0:01:27.840 --> 0:01:31.080 social media, and you might just hear yourself in a 0:01:31.120 --> 0:01:34.880 future episode call us eight three three two oh seven 0:01:35.000 --> 0:01:36.000 four six sixty six. 0:01:45.560 --> 0:01:48.480 Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction, where we have a story 0:01:48.520 --> 0:01:53.800 that's just so ridiculous for so many reasons. Uh. You know, 0:01:54.080 --> 0:01:57.360 first and foremost, how young the accused was at the 0:01:57.440 --> 0:02:01.120 time of the crime. However, the details of the crime 0:02:01.160 --> 0:02:04.000 make it even less plausible. And to help explain it all, 0:02:04.240 --> 0:02:07.840 we welcome defense attorney Bill Massey, thank you, and of 0:02:07.880 --> 0:02:11.960 course the still relatively young woman who endured this insanity 0:02:12.000 --> 0:02:16.200 in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Angel Bumpus, thank you for joining us. 0:02:16.480 --> 0:02:18.240 You're welcome, thanks for having me. 0:02:18.440 --> 0:02:20.120 So can you tell us a little bit about, you know, 0:02:20.200 --> 0:02:21.239 growing up in Chattanooga. 0:02:21.720 --> 0:02:25.919 When I was in Chattanooga, I lived with my grandparents, 0:02:26.000 --> 0:02:30.280 Chryl Bumpus and Bayliss Smith. And I mean, it's not 0:02:30.280 --> 0:02:33.239 nothing exciting to tell. At that point in their life 0:02:33.440 --> 0:02:36.760 when I was around, they were already well off into 0:02:36.800 --> 0:02:40.160 their forties and fifties. My grandma, she stayed home all day, 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:43.040 could clean. My granddad went to work, came home. I 0:02:43.120 --> 0:02:45.320 was a good student. I won a lot of awards 0:02:45.400 --> 0:02:49.919 and different things. And like I was in eighth grade, 0:02:49.960 --> 0:02:52.880 I believe so long ago even when it happened, Like 0:02:53.080 --> 0:02:56.200 I didn't watch the news growing up as a kid, 0:02:56.360 --> 0:02:58.960 so I didn't even know anything about it. Like the 0:02:59.040 --> 0:03:02.000 knowledge I have is from when I got the discovery. 0:03:02.120 --> 0:03:03.120 That's the knowledge that I have. 0:03:03.560 --> 0:03:06.880 And the crime in question occurred on January sixteenth, two 0:03:06.960 --> 0:03:09.680 thousand and nine. The victim was a sixty eight year 0:03:09.720 --> 0:03:13.079 old man named Franklin Bonner, who was known locally as 0:03:13.120 --> 0:03:16.400 the lottery Man, alluding to the numbers game that he operated. 0:03:16.680 --> 0:03:19.480 He was also alleged to sell some wheed on the side, 0:03:19.960 --> 0:03:22.760 none of which should have gotten him killed, but being 0:03:22.840 --> 0:03:26.080 known to have extra cash on hand may have played 0:03:26.080 --> 0:03:26.440 a role. 0:03:27.040 --> 0:03:31.200 January sixteen, two thousand and nine, mister Bonner was in 0:03:31.280 --> 0:03:35.600 his home. His wife came home and had lunch with him, 0:03:36.080 --> 0:03:39.120 and then left back to work. When she came back 0:03:39.160 --> 0:03:42.960 home a little after five in the afternoon, she found 0:03:43.080 --> 0:03:47.120 him taped to the chair, duc taped and the chair 0:03:47.280 --> 0:03:51.680 turned over. His head was completely encircled in duct tape. 0:03:51.920 --> 0:03:55.360 She called the police. The police came, the man had suffocated. 0:03:55.640 --> 0:03:59.480 They removed the tape from and they found fingerprints on 0:03:59.520 --> 0:04:02.800 the inside the tape around the face, and there was 0:04:02.840 --> 0:04:06.600 another on the tape beside the leg to the chair, 0:04:07.160 --> 0:04:11.080 and they sent them off for identification, but there were 0:04:11.080 --> 0:04:11.840 no hits. 0:04:12.080 --> 0:04:16.000 There were eleven fingerprints, some of them only partial. There 0:04:16.000 --> 0:04:19.600 were also signs of blunt force trauma, but no implements 0:04:19.600 --> 0:04:21.200 were cataloged or found. 0:04:21.640 --> 0:04:26.880 And the house had been ransacked, but strangely, very little 0:04:27.040 --> 0:04:30.200 was missing. There was jewelry in his pocket and in 0:04:30.200 --> 0:04:32.840 the home, as well as money and guns. 0:04:33.240 --> 0:04:37.080 Perhaps something very specific was taken, but we're not sure what, 0:04:37.240 --> 0:04:40.760 if anything. There were also no eyewitnesses to potential intruders, 0:04:40.800 --> 0:04:43.520 so the police looked at the Bonner's landline for recent 0:04:43.600 --> 0:04:46.839 callers and found a number associated with the Bumpuses. 0:04:47.440 --> 0:04:50.760 Carl Fields, I believe, was the lead investigator at the time, 0:04:51.000 --> 0:04:54.560 and he said that he saw that call number, they 0:04:54.680 --> 0:04:57.760 ran it and that it came back to Shirley Bumpus, 0:04:57.800 --> 0:05:01.080 which is the grandmother of Angel. So he went over 0:05:01.120 --> 0:05:04.080 there the next day to talk to the Bumpuses. And 0:05:04.279 --> 0:05:09.039 he says that she told him she had gone over 0:05:09.240 --> 0:05:13.240 to the Bonner home to buy some marijuana. 0:05:13.480 --> 0:05:15.960 It was no secret that the Bonners and Bumpuses knew 0:05:16.000 --> 0:05:19.760 each other. According to Angel's grandfather, Bayliss, he had even 0:05:20.040 --> 0:05:22.440 done odd jobs for the Bonners on occasions, so it 0:05:22.480 --> 0:05:26.120 wasn't strange that their number appeared on the Bonners call log. 0:05:26.680 --> 0:05:29.480 When we got the discovery the AT and T call log, 0:05:29.520 --> 0:05:32.039 it shows that my grandmother hadn't even called that day. 0:05:32.400 --> 0:05:34.799 So that's just something that they just were saying. 0:05:35.320 --> 0:05:38.840 But that's what got them on to the Bumpus household. 0:05:39.279 --> 0:05:43.080 The previous district attorney, Neil Pinkston, he did not like 0:05:43.120 --> 0:05:46.640 my grandmamma, like they had history. Like he was also 0:05:46.800 --> 0:05:49.720 on the case of my uncle who was murdered. And 0:05:49.720 --> 0:05:52.599 that's how I know, like how victims are getting treated 0:05:52.720 --> 0:05:55.200 and how they were treating the victim of this case. 0:05:55.240 --> 0:05:57.640 They don't treat my family how they were treating the victim. 0:05:57.920 --> 0:05:59.800 So it's like my grandmother, she used to just be 0:05:59.880 --> 0:06:03.279 very very vocal about stuff, and so her and Pinkson 0:06:03.360 --> 0:06:07.680 they have a bad relationship. They was other suspects, but 0:06:07.720 --> 0:06:08.920 they didn't pursue them. 0:06:09.600 --> 0:06:10.960 They ruled them out. 0:06:11.160 --> 0:06:14.720 I feel like I'm sensing there's a little facetiousness in there. 0:06:15.200 --> 0:06:18.520 A man who was doing a federal sentence, Nicholas Cheating, 0:06:18.640 --> 0:06:22.560 when he heard about the incident in Chattanooga. He was 0:06:22.560 --> 0:06:25.760 trying to get a time cut by cooperating with police 0:06:26.279 --> 0:06:30.440 in solving this homicide case and says, hey, I think 0:06:30.520 --> 0:06:34.520 I know who's responsible for this, and that's how they 0:06:34.560 --> 0:06:38.120 got hooked up with Mallory Vaughn. So the detective were 0:06:38.160 --> 0:06:40.599 down I believe they were down there twice and talked 0:06:40.600 --> 0:06:44.159 with him maybe three times. Never mentioned a young girl, 0:06:44.680 --> 0:06:49.080 and the information that he gave was all on Mallory Vaughn. 0:06:49.279 --> 0:06:53.479 But it appears that investigators didn't find nicholas cheating statement 0:06:53.600 --> 0:06:57.520 about Malory Vaughn credible. So this case went cold for 0:06:57.640 --> 0:07:00.000 nine years, and in that time, Angel grew. 0:07:00.920 --> 0:07:04.680 I moved to Kentucky. During my junior year, graduated in 0:07:04.720 --> 0:07:07.160 high school. I was deciding if I was going to 0:07:07.279 --> 0:07:11.040 go to college or not. I actually was supposed to 0:07:11.080 --> 0:07:13.320 go to college in New York. I wanted to be 0:07:13.360 --> 0:07:16.640 a fashion designer and I was going to just go 0:07:16.720 --> 0:07:20.240 to New York and risk it or whatever. But I 0:07:20.360 --> 0:07:22.760 ended up getting pregnant, and I stayed and I ended 0:07:22.800 --> 0:07:25.640 up going to University of Louisville. I still didn't know 0:07:26.360 --> 0:07:28.440 what I wanted to do with my life now being 0:07:28.440 --> 0:07:31.760 a mother, and then eventually I became a single mother. 0:07:31.640 --> 0:07:32.440 Of two kids. 0:07:32.440 --> 0:07:36.200 So I decided that I was just going to go 0:07:36.280 --> 0:07:38.800 and get my nursing degree because my aunt has her 0:07:38.880 --> 0:07:40.760 nursing degree. I have a couple of cousins who have 0:07:40.800 --> 0:07:44.160 their nursing degree, and it just seemed like the most stable. 0:07:43.880 --> 0:07:44.520 Career for me. 0:07:44.880 --> 0:07:48.480 And this is all still between like eighteen and twenty three, 0:07:48.680 --> 0:07:51.080 and so that was pretty much my life when she. 0:07:51.080 --> 0:07:53.920 Was about eighteen or nineteen years old. In twenty fourteen, 0:07:54.600 --> 0:07:55.760 she got a traffic ticket. 0:07:56.280 --> 0:07:59.720 I didn't really know about it, so I didn't pay it, 0:08:00.040 --> 0:08:02.120 and I had got a warrant from not showing up 0:08:02.160 --> 0:08:04.360 to court. Like I didn't know that I could go 0:08:04.440 --> 0:08:07.400 and redocate my case instead of turning myself in. I 0:08:07.400 --> 0:08:09.920 didn't know that, but I went down there. I just 0:08:09.960 --> 0:08:13.360 had to get built in. Ultimately, everything got dismissed in 0:08:14.080 --> 0:08:17.040 tank Care, but my fingerprints were inside of the system 0:08:17.080 --> 0:08:17.360 from that. 0:08:17.640 --> 0:08:20.240 So your prints are in the system in twenty fourteen, 0:08:20.960 --> 0:08:23.520 does anyone know why they decided, you know, to run 0:08:23.560 --> 0:08:25.720 the princes again through APHIS in twenty eighteen. 0:08:25.800 --> 0:08:31.040 If I remember from discovery that his granddaughter called and 0:08:31.080 --> 0:08:34.240 wanted to see if they had any new evidence. 0:08:35.000 --> 0:08:40.160 APHIS, the Automated Fingerprint Identification system marked angels prints as 0:08:40.360 --> 0:08:44.680 a potential match for two partial prints. I'd like to 0:08:44.720 --> 0:08:48.280 direct you to our coverage of fingerprint analysis on Junk Science. 0:08:48.480 --> 0:08:51.280 It'll be linked in the episode description, where we discuss 0:08:51.320 --> 0:08:55.720 how fingerprint analysis is subjective in nature, performed by flawed 0:08:55.760 --> 0:08:59.760 human beings on prints that are pulled from non uniform services. 0:09:00.120 --> 0:09:03.520 There is also disagreement among the analyst community as to 0:09:03.600 --> 0:09:06.680 how many points of correlation need to line up between 0:09:06.720 --> 0:09:10.400 two prints in order to be considered a match. Again, 0:09:10.559 --> 0:09:13.960 Angel's prints were flagged as a potential match to two 0:09:14.200 --> 0:09:18.080 partial prints by APHIS, but then it was an analyst 0:09:18.160 --> 0:09:21.200 who said that this print pulled from a material as 0:09:21.200 --> 0:09:25.080 elastic as duct tape, could be called a quote unquote match. 0:09:25.559 --> 0:09:29.320 Angel was pulled into this because of that fingerprint. That's 0:09:29.360 --> 0:09:34.040 truly the only piece of evidence that they had on her. 0:09:34.640 --> 0:09:38.040 Additionally, her grandfather said that he had done odd jobs 0:09:38.040 --> 0:09:40.280 for the Bonners, and he later testified that the duct 0:09:40.280 --> 0:09:43.680 tape likely belonged to him, which is a plausible explanation, 0:09:43.920 --> 0:09:48.000 but coming from a loved one, it's easily explained away. Nevertheless, 0:09:48.040 --> 0:09:50.679 the fingerprint match that the partial print was enough for. 0:09:50.679 --> 0:09:53.840 An arrest warrant, and that was Joan of twenty eighteen. 0:09:54.200 --> 0:09:56.679 They knocked on a door, opened the door, and I 0:09:56.720 --> 0:09:59.720 mean and they were very hostile in their home and 0:09:59.720 --> 0:10:02.120 their on their hips and stuff. They were asking me 0:10:02.160 --> 0:10:04.200 who's inside of the house, and I'm like, it's just 0:10:04.280 --> 0:10:07.640 me and my kids are sleeping. This was a Kentucky officer. 0:10:07.640 --> 0:10:09.360 He was like, well, can I search your house? And 0:10:09.400 --> 0:10:12.000 I thought maybe they were looking for someone, and so 0:10:12.120 --> 0:10:14.520 I allowed them to come in. All of a sudden, 0:10:14.559 --> 0:10:19.520 it's like teen officers and some detectives from Tennessee scattered 0:10:19.559 --> 0:10:22.520 inside of my apartment. They're not telling me why they're here. 0:10:23.080 --> 0:10:25.600 They're just telling me to get my kids somewhere if 0:10:25.640 --> 0:10:28.640 somebody can come pick up my kids. And they're like, oh, yeah, 0:10:28.640 --> 0:10:30.280 we have a warrant for you. So I just I 0:10:30.360 --> 0:10:32.679 get my aunt to come and get my kids, and 0:10:32.920 --> 0:10:35.640 I just leave with them. I was very naive about 0:10:35.880 --> 0:10:38.960 the legal system, and so I'm thinking this is a mistake, 0:10:39.040 --> 0:10:41.200 whatever it is, and I'm just going to bond out 0:10:41.640 --> 0:10:43.680 and be out in a couple hours. So I didn't 0:10:43.800 --> 0:10:45.880 think that I was going to be locked up for 0:10:45.920 --> 0:10:47.000 thirteen days. 0:10:47.640 --> 0:10:51.080 Angels age at the time of the crime thirteen and 0:10:51.120 --> 0:10:54.000 then her age at the time of arrest twenty three, 0:10:54.200 --> 0:10:57.760 presented the state with a challenge. This was technically a 0:10:57.840 --> 0:11:01.040 juvenile case, but she couldn't be booked into juvenile facility 0:11:01.080 --> 0:11:03.640 at twenty three, so Angel had to wait in jail 0:11:03.720 --> 0:11:07.200 until her case was bound over into adult court before 0:11:07.240 --> 0:11:11.400 bonding out in preparation for trial. Meanwhile, it appears that 0:11:11.480 --> 0:11:15.040 after nine years of ignoring Nicholas Cheating as someone who'd 0:11:15.040 --> 0:11:17.559 say anything for a time cut, all of a sudden, 0:11:17.720 --> 0:11:21.400 his word is seen as credible enough to arrest Mallory Vaughan. 0:11:22.160 --> 0:11:25.160 The co defendant, asked for a speedy trial, and my 0:11:25.320 --> 0:11:29.400 attorneys would not get our trials separated, like they would 0:11:29.400 --> 0:11:31.640 not fight to get it separated for whatever reason. 0:11:31.920 --> 0:11:35.000 And so now you've got a co defendant. That's how old. 0:11:35.720 --> 0:11:38.000 I believe he's older than my mom. 0:11:38.160 --> 0:11:39.600 He was forty eight. 0:11:39.960 --> 0:11:41.640 Yeah, he's like double my age. 0:11:41.880 --> 0:11:44.280 So he was twenty eight when you were thirteen. 0:11:44.600 --> 0:11:44.840 Yeah. 0:11:45.520 --> 0:11:50.080 Uh, And he says he didn't know Angel Boppas, and 0:11:50.160 --> 0:11:51.960 Angel says she doesn't know him. 0:11:52.240 --> 0:11:54.760 Yeah, it'd be really fucking weird if he knew her. 0:11:55.280 --> 0:11:57.520 Creepy, you know how they connected the two of. 0:11:57.440 --> 0:12:01.840 Them Facebook Facebook out on my profile. He was friends 0:12:01.880 --> 0:12:04.760 with a family member who was also older than me. 0:12:05.120 --> 0:12:07.280 Yeah, but it was a friend ten years later and 0:12:07.280 --> 0:12:08.640 I'm back when this occurred. 0:12:20.080 --> 0:12:22.880 You're listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen to this 0:12:23.000 --> 0:12:25.640 and all the Lava for Good podcasts one week early 0:12:25.760 --> 0:12:29.120 and ad free by subscribing to Lava for Good Plus 0:12:29.400 --> 0:12:30.520 on Apple Podcasts. 0:12:36.720 --> 0:12:39.960 Their theory in this case was that Angel came home 0:12:40.000 --> 0:12:45.559 from school, she went over to where Melory Vaughn stayed, 0:12:46.080 --> 0:12:49.439 and that there were trails through the woods that led 0:12:49.480 --> 0:12:52.840 to mister Botterer's home, and that they went down those 0:12:52.880 --> 0:12:56.440 trails and committed this act. Now, there's no proof of 0:12:56.480 --> 0:13:01.760 that whatsoever anywhere from anywhere else other than them saying it. 0:13:02.120 --> 0:13:05.400 Yeah, this prosecutor is a very active. 0:13:05.160 --> 0:13:09.240 Imagination, definitely, because I lived across the highway, so even 0:13:09.280 --> 0:13:11.480 if it was I would still have to cross the 0:13:11.520 --> 0:13:13.000 busy highway to get there. 0:13:14.080 --> 0:13:18.120 So in addition, to dodging cars to cross a busy highway. 0:13:18.400 --> 0:13:20.800 There was a narrow window in which this could have 0:13:20.840 --> 0:13:24.640 even happened. Angel was at school until three pm, and 0:13:24.760 --> 0:13:27.120 Linda Bonner found her husband at five pm. 0:13:27.640 --> 0:13:28.319 My attorney. 0:13:28.480 --> 0:13:33.680 They hired a private investigator and he actually determined that 0:13:33.840 --> 0:13:36.200 I was at school. It shows that I wrote the boss, 0:13:36.240 --> 0:13:39.480 I don't have any absence on that day the timeframe, 0:13:39.600 --> 0:13:42.080 I will have only had twenty minutes to commit the 0:13:42.120 --> 0:13:43.959 crime and get back home. 0:13:44.240 --> 0:13:47.160 The trial began at the end of September twenty nineteen, 0:13:47.679 --> 0:13:51.520 and to support this implausible narrative involving a five foot tall, 0:13:51.760 --> 0:13:55.200 eighty pound thirteen year old beating and duct taping an 0:13:55.240 --> 0:13:57.880 adult man to a chair, they had to give her 0:13:57.880 --> 0:14:01.080 an accomplice who was strong enough to do Franklin Bonner 0:14:01.160 --> 0:14:04.760 and maneuver his body around. So Nicholas Cheating took the 0:14:04.800 --> 0:14:06.720 stand to implicate Mallory Vaughan. 0:14:07.120 --> 0:14:09.720 Yeah, he just was saying the the co defendant, that 0:14:10.360 --> 0:14:12.920 he picked him up and he had money and he 0:14:13.040 --> 0:14:15.960 usually never has money, and he said that he told 0:14:16.040 --> 0:14:19.680 him that he did it, and something about a lottery man. 0:14:20.080 --> 0:14:21.640 He should have be going to hit a lick on 0:14:21.680 --> 0:14:24.440 the lottery man, and then he showed up the next 0:14:24.520 --> 0:14:26.320 day with money, and of. 0:14:26.280 --> 0:14:29.080 Course this twenty eight year old called up his trusted 0:14:29.120 --> 0:14:32.560 thirteen year old partner in crime, who he found on Facebook, 0:14:32.840 --> 0:14:36.360 to hit a lick on the lottery man. Cool story, 0:14:37.160 --> 0:14:41.000 I guess Nicholas Cheating recognized how ridiculous that sounded, so 0:14:41.080 --> 0:14:44.560 he denied ever hearing anything about Angel Bumpis, as in 0:14:44.640 --> 0:14:47.120 her co defendant. He denied knowing her at all, and 0:14:47.200 --> 0:14:49.760 perhaps in an attempt to make it seem more plausible, 0:14:49.800 --> 0:14:52.520 the state alluded to other potential accomplices. 0:14:52.960 --> 0:14:56.480 The district attorneys, they just kept insinuating that the case 0:14:56.560 --> 0:15:00.440 was in closed and insinuating that more people were going 0:15:00.520 --> 0:15:02.840 to get arrested and more people were going to be 0:15:03.400 --> 0:15:06.600 punished for the crime. And I don't want to bash anybody, 0:15:06.680 --> 0:15:09.680 but the attorneys that I hired, they did not fight 0:15:09.720 --> 0:15:13.440 for me. There were no objections. They weren't even paying attention, 0:15:13.560 --> 0:15:16.720 Like one of the attorneys were just taxing the entire time. 0:15:16.920 --> 0:15:19.800 The other attorneys, she wasn't prepared. She was trying to 0:15:19.800 --> 0:15:23.080 write her closing statement, not listening. And then they didn't 0:15:23.080 --> 0:15:25.680 get pictures of me when I was thirteen, So like, 0:15:26.080 --> 0:15:28.800 it's literally a grown woman on trial, and I looked 0:15:28.960 --> 0:15:31.040 very different from when I was thirteen. 0:15:30.960 --> 0:15:34.280 Right, because the judge denied to admit your eighth grade 0:15:34.480 --> 0:15:36.520 graduation picture into evidence. 0:15:36.760 --> 0:15:40.440 And that's because those attorneys stay in properly put in 0:15:40.520 --> 0:15:42.320 the evidence in a timely manner. 0:15:42.400 --> 0:15:46.240 I really think that the jury was just confused. 0:15:46.000 --> 0:15:49.040 Or maybe they weren't. When the charges are aggravated robbery 0:15:49.240 --> 0:15:52.000 and felony murder with the specter of a larger group. 0:15:52.200 --> 0:15:55.160 They just needed to prove that she had some involvement 0:15:55.200 --> 0:15:57.800 in the actions that eventually led to mister Bonner's death. 0:15:58.360 --> 0:16:02.120 So they met that low ball with this partial fingerprint 0:16:02.320 --> 0:16:06.000 and without challenging if it even was her fingerprint. There 0:16:06.040 --> 0:16:11.240 was a plausible explanation offered by Angel's grandfather. Unfortunately, defendant's 0:16:11.280 --> 0:16:14.560 loved ones are typically easy to impeach or explain away. 0:16:15.000 --> 0:16:17.480 I knew that the district attorney had made their case, 0:16:18.000 --> 0:16:22.280 and like, while we were waiting for deliberation, we went 0:16:22.320 --> 0:16:25.280 to this bar. The attorneys they all got drinks and 0:16:25.280 --> 0:16:27.760 they're like, oh, Angel, get a drink. And then like 0:16:28.680 --> 0:16:31.600 the female she asked me, She's like, do you want 0:16:31.640 --> 0:16:33.360 to get in the car, and just go to Mexico, 0:16:33.760 --> 0:16:36.040 and like, I don't know if she was joking or not, 0:16:36.080 --> 0:16:38.400 but like in that moment, my heart dropped and I. 0:16:38.400 --> 0:16:40.480 Just felt like I'll often to be found guilty. 0:16:41.360 --> 0:16:44.880 And they also told me that if the co defendant 0:16:44.960 --> 0:16:47.800 was found not guilty, then I will be found not guilty. 0:16:48.160 --> 0:16:50.840 So they read his verdict first. 0:16:50.600 --> 0:16:53.160 And it's not guilty, so I have a little bit 0:16:53.160 --> 0:17:11.600 of hope. But then I get guilty. So I went 0:17:11.680 --> 0:17:15.639 to Silverdale and then I went to Tennessee Prison for Women. 0:17:16.359 --> 0:17:19.399 I got written up on my first day because I 0:17:19.600 --> 0:17:23.720 refused medical things. And it's just like I guess back then, 0:17:24.000 --> 0:17:26.639 I just wanted to hold on to whatever rights that 0:17:26.720 --> 0:17:28.800 I did have, and I knew that I didn't have 0:17:28.880 --> 0:17:32.520 to do anything medical because they couln't force medical stuff 0:17:32.560 --> 0:17:34.680 on you even if you're a prisoner. 0:17:34.720 --> 0:17:36.520 And yeah, so they wrote me up. 0:17:36.680 --> 0:17:41.240 I went to segregation for forty days upon arrival, very 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:44.639 tough time. Couldn't use the phone, couldn't write letters, couldn't 0:17:44.640 --> 0:17:47.280 do anything. Then I got out and I would just 0:17:47.320 --> 0:17:49.920 call home a lot. Because it's also happened during COVID, 0:17:49.960 --> 0:17:52.400 so there was no visits or anything like that. 0:17:52.960 --> 0:17:55.480 Now, how old were your two little ones at. 0:17:55.440 --> 0:17:58.400 The time, they had just turned five and four. 0:17:59.359 --> 0:18:00.960 Jeezus, that really sucks. 0:18:01.320 --> 0:18:01.600 It was. 0:18:02.280 --> 0:18:05.679 It was very traumatic experience going to prison. Like I 0:18:05.760 --> 0:18:08.679 literally don't know how people do that. I mean I 0:18:08.760 --> 0:18:11.560 did it, but like I can see how people like 0:18:11.680 --> 0:18:15.080 they go insane, they start using drugs and just all 0:18:15.119 --> 0:18:17.600 of that, because that's all you see in prison is 0:18:17.720 --> 0:18:21.560 drug use and just a lot of stuff. Guards doing stuff, 0:18:21.560 --> 0:18:25.000 they shit in and it's sad. But I had a 0:18:25.000 --> 0:18:27.600 lot of support, not only for my family, but from 0:18:27.600 --> 0:18:29.320 millions of people all over the world. 0:18:29.680 --> 0:18:34.040 Well, Angel was being prosecuted. An e crime docuseries Accused 0:18:34.200 --> 0:18:36.760 Guilty or Innocent picked up on the story, and the 0:18:36.800 --> 0:18:40.520 coverage garnered a great deal of support for Angel. Meanwhile, 0:18:40.560 --> 0:18:43.679 the sentence she was given, considering all the strides that 0:18:43.720 --> 0:18:46.920 had been made over the previous two decades around life 0:18:46.960 --> 0:18:50.600 sentences for juveniles amounting to cruel and unusual punishment, it 0:18:50.600 --> 0:18:53.880 appeared that Angel's situation might have been unconstitutional. 0:18:55.200 --> 0:18:57.600 Oh you had sixty years because it was two felony, 0:18:57.720 --> 0:18:59.680 so you automatically get a life sentence. 0:19:00.119 --> 0:19:02.600 I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, But if they 0:19:02.640 --> 0:19:05.960 believe themselves, this is a crime that was committed when 0:19:06.000 --> 0:19:09.359 she was thirteen, and by twenty eighteen, the Supreme Court 0:19:09.359 --> 0:19:14.040 had already ruled mandatory life sentences for juveniles unconstitutional. 0:19:14.520 --> 0:19:17.359 Well, there's been a case recently that laid out the 0:19:17.440 --> 0:19:19.719 law here for Tennessee. It said, I mean, I know 0:19:19.760 --> 0:19:22.040 the Eighth Amendment. You can't sen uce a juvenile to 0:19:22.160 --> 0:19:25.720 life and not take into account the maturity that they 0:19:25.840 --> 0:19:28.840 had at the time of the offense, or any of 0:19:28.880 --> 0:19:34.160 their upbringing or anything like that. You can't foreclose the 0:19:34.200 --> 0:19:38.040 future on a juvenile like that. And so they said, 0:19:38.119 --> 0:19:41.439 you know, at twenty five years, then you've got to 0:19:41.440 --> 0:19:44.679 be able to look and see if they've engaged in 0:19:44.760 --> 0:19:50.320 rehabilitative efforts. But the parole board can make that decision, and. 0:19:50.320 --> 0:19:53.840 We know that parole boards are typically filled with political appointees, 0:19:53.880 --> 0:19:55.639 so it's hard to know if we can count on 0:19:55.680 --> 0:19:59.200 that protocol. Either way, she was re sentenced the first 0:19:59.200 --> 0:20:02.080 in a series of victories that happened, I believe, quicker 0:20:02.119 --> 0:20:04.919 than any case we've ever covered. You know, that's not 0:20:04.960 --> 0:20:08.400 to say that four years is somehow nothing. Just take 0:20:08.440 --> 0:20:11.080 a second to think about the length of one month 0:20:11.200 --> 0:20:15.240 or one year. I mean, would you accept being kidnapped 0:20:15.240 --> 0:20:18.119 away from your life, your children, your loved ones for 0:20:19.000 --> 0:20:22.000 any amount of time. So we can only be grateful 0:20:22.040 --> 0:20:25.400 that this injustice was undone with the urgency that all 0:20:25.400 --> 0:20:26.480 innocent people deserve. 0:20:26.960 --> 0:20:29.480 So Angela had hired me then to tried to get 0:20:29.520 --> 0:20:32.159 her a new trial. The judge allowed me to come 0:20:32.200 --> 0:20:36.120 into the case. We ordered transcripts, and prior council got 0:20:36.160 --> 0:20:38.760 me their files, and we went to work. 0:20:39.080 --> 0:20:42.720 Bill was able to point out multiple errors in Angel's trial, 0:20:42.840 --> 0:20:47.639 outlining ineffective assistance of council claims and constitutional violations. Judge 0:20:47.640 --> 0:20:51.359 Tom Greenholtz noted that Angel's eighth grade yearbook photos should 0:20:51.400 --> 0:20:54.280 not have been excluded from evidence, that her council failed 0:20:54.280 --> 0:20:56.560 to not only admit it in a timely fashion, but 0:20:56.600 --> 0:20:59.320 also failed to object to the ten years too late 0:20:59.359 --> 0:21:03.399 Facebook between angels relative and Mallory Vaughan, as well as 0:21:03.440 --> 0:21:06.159 to the specter of this larger group alleged to have 0:21:06.240 --> 0:21:09.359 been involved with the crime, among so many others. Greenholts 0:21:09.400 --> 0:21:12.600 finally ruled that the evidence was insufficient to establish that 0:21:12.680 --> 0:21:15.680 a robbery had even been committed, and without the robbery, 0:21:16.200 --> 0:21:18.760 there's no felony murder. They'd have to prove that she 0:21:18.920 --> 0:21:21.760 did it, and the theory was literally that this eighty 0:21:21.800 --> 0:21:24.600 pound thirteen year old could not have physically committed this 0:21:24.680 --> 0:21:26.440 crime without extensive help. 0:21:27.000 --> 0:21:29.920 After the judge ruled in our favor, the next thing 0:21:29.960 --> 0:21:32.760 we did was asked for a bond. The judge was 0:21:32.760 --> 0:21:36.440 not going to approve the source of income until the 0:21:36.640 --> 0:21:40.160 entire amount of premium was paid on the bond, which 0:21:40.200 --> 0:21:42.800 was going to be the following week, and so we 0:21:42.880 --> 0:21:46.959 had really been anticipating Angel getting out. I know she was, 0:21:47.480 --> 0:21:50.359 and we were very disappointed. But about that time I 0:21:50.440 --> 0:21:53.640 felt a tug on my jacket and I turned around 0:21:53.680 --> 0:21:57.280 and it was the bonds lady and she said, Bill, 0:21:57.680 --> 0:22:00.120 there is a gentleman in the back there wants to 0:22:00.160 --> 0:22:02.720 talk with you. So I said, judge, would you excuse 0:22:02.760 --> 0:22:05.080 me just a moment. She said sure. I went back 0:22:05.560 --> 0:22:08.720 and he said I want to make her bond. Said, well, great, 0:22:08.840 --> 0:22:11.080 why are you doing this? And he said, I'll follow 0:22:11.160 --> 0:22:13.679 this case is that started, and I believe she is 0:22:13.800 --> 0:22:16.880 probably not guilty. So I asked him some other questions 0:22:16.920 --> 0:22:20.200