Speaker 1: Last time on ear witness.
Speaker 2: She was a very credible witness.
Speaker 3: We believed her. Obviously, we believed her because we convicted him,
Speaker 3: and it was on her testimony.
Speaker 4: The only evidence supposedly they had against was this ear
Speaker 4: witness who had never heard him speak before, who had
Speaker 4: no idea who he was.
Speaker 5: That is extremely strongly evidence Chefish believed. Of course, the
Speaker 5: question becomes, so you believe that evidence? Well to believe
Speaker 5: that evidence, she had to believe it's Ellison.
Speaker 1: And so we're trying to get information on her. Her
Speaker 1: name's Violet Ellison. Do you have an opinion about her
Speaker 1: or have any any information that you could give us
Speaker 1: about her.
Speaker 6: I know she's ververy condicted. She's a very messy lady,
Speaker 6: very messy.
Speaker 5: I tell you one thing about my grandma.
Speaker 7: She is a that's a true scam artist.
Speaker 8: That's a true I hate to see it.
Speaker 7: I know that's my grandmother, but that's a true scam
Speaker 7: auty death.
Speaker 4: And I hate that this man could be innocent and
Speaker 4: for five thousand dollars, he's on this for five hour
Speaker 4: of dollars.
Speaker 1: Near the intersection of Rosa Parks Avenue and Liberty Street
Speaker 1: in Montgomery, Alabama, is a tiny red brick church outside
Speaker 1: Saint Peter Ame. A large white banner is stretched twenty
Speaker 1: five feet across the church's front lawn. The words It's
Speaker 1: not too late to fix this mistake are written across
Speaker 1: the banner in black and red letters. The mistake is
Speaker 1: to forrest Johnson's conviction. The banner was created by an
Speaker 1: organization called Greater Birmingham Ministries. This year, it has traveled
Speaker 1: to eight different churches across Alabama to help raise awareness
Speaker 1: about to Forest's case. Awareness that is growing.
Speaker 5: Holy cow, it's just ridiculous.
Speaker 3: This case is shameful.
Speaker 9: My name is Lindsay Boney. I'm a lawyer at the
Speaker 9: law firm Bradley Ariant Bolt Cummings. When I think about
Speaker 9: this case, it's mind blowing to me.
Speaker 3: My name is Carla Crowder. I'm a lawyer and executive
Speaker 3: director at Alabama Appleseed Center for Law Injustice. This case
Speaker 3: is stunning and this case is heartbreaking.
Speaker 5: My name is Nick Gaety. I have been an active
Speaker 5: lawyer in Birmingham since nineteen sixty four. We can do better,
Speaker 5: and we need to do better.
Speaker 3: Lots of people have known for a very long time
Speaker 3: that this man is innocent. And he's still on death row.
Speaker 3: Why does it take twenty five years?
Speaker 1: These are just a few in the chorus of powerful
Speaker 1: voices calling on the state to fix this. Lawyers from
Speaker 1: all sides of the political spectrum are lending their support,
Speaker 1: along with former prosecutors and judges, as well as Alabama
Speaker 1: churches and faith leaders like Sister Helen Prajean.
Speaker 8: Please God, with these efforts and people hearing this.
Speaker 4: About too Forrest, his life will be saved.
Speaker 1: Even death penalty supporter Bill Baxley, Alabama's former Attorney General,
Speaker 1: has joined the fight.
Speaker 10: I will add my voice or anything I can do,
Speaker 10: because this is a situation that shouldn't be allowed to
Speaker 10: exist another minute.
Speaker 1: When Baxley reviewed to Forrest's case, he was so outraged
Speaker 1: he wrote an op ed in The Washington Post that said,
Speaker 1: an innocent man is trapped on Alabama's death row.
Speaker 10: The only thing that I can see is to why
Speaker 10: this kind of thing happened, was the victim was a
Speaker 10: law enforcement laws.
Speaker 1: To Forrest Johnson now has unpressed, scidented support, and it's
Speaker 1: not just from all these people who believe he's innocent.
Speaker 1: The current District Attorney of Jefferson County along with the
Speaker 1: original prosecutor who sent him to death row. Both now
Speaker 1: say to Forrest Johnson deserves a new trial. So why
Speaker 1: is the State of Alabama still trying to kill him?
Speaker 11: Do you he? My man?
Speaker 12: That's may.
Speaker 5: Sorrows stay.
Speaker 2: List in this bas.
Speaker 4: Tears.
Speaker 5: I want to see.
Speaker 12: Remblation. I want to know who you a'm reation in
Speaker 12: this aspiration to the who's holding the stud.
Speaker 8: Student?
Speaker 7: Who's holding stand?
Speaker 1: I'm Beth Shelburn. This is ear witness, Chapter eight, Bondage
Speaker 1: to the law. Okay, how are you?
Speaker 3: I'm alright, I'm good.
Speaker 12: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I'm meeting with District Attorney Danny Carr, but not at
Speaker 1: his office in the courthouse. We're at the barber shop
Speaker 1: he owns in Birmingham's Insley community, where he grew up.
Speaker 6: From the Ansley community where we are today. I'm matriculated
Speaker 6: through the Birmingham City school system.
Speaker 1: The barbershop is old school tile floors, posters of hairstyles
Speaker 1: on the walls, and a sign advertising ten dollars haircuts?
Speaker 1: Can you talk while he's buzzing? I don't normally interview
Speaker 1: prosecutors while they're getting a haircut, but Danny car as
Speaker 1: a busy man. In twenty eighteen, when he was elected
Speaker 1: District Attorney of Jefferson County, he became the first black
Speaker 1: man to hold the position. He now runs the same
Speaker 1: office that argued for to Forest Johnson to be sentenced
Speaker 1: to death for Deputy Bill Hardy's murder. But Danny Carr
Speaker 1: wasn't part of to Forest's prosecution. He wasn't even a
Speaker 1: lawyer yet when it happened. Danny Carr is different from
Speaker 1: other das in a number of ways. He ran as
Speaker 1: a change maker. He put together the first conviction review
Speaker 1: unit in Jefferson County. The unit's job is to review
Speaker 1: cases where the DA's office might have made some mistakes.
Speaker 1: He's one of only three black das among the forty
Speaker 1: two across Alabama. He grew up in a community that's
Speaker 1: been impacted by crime and mass incarceration. His family has
Speaker 1: also been a victim of violence. The year he was
Speaker 1: hired as a young prosecutor, Danny's younger brother, Jackxton, was murdered.
Speaker 1: Danny named his barbershop D and Jay in his brother's memory.
Speaker 1: D for Danny, J for Jackston. Can you kind of
Speaker 1: walk me through your involvement in the to Forest Johnson case.
Speaker 1: When did you first become aware of it?
Speaker 6: I became aware of it when I was an assistant
Speaker 6: DA conversations about it, but I didn't know true in
Speaker 6: the facts of it. I just overheard different conversations varying
Speaker 6: opinions about it. And then what happened.
Speaker 1: Once Danny was elected as DA, he started hearing more
Speaker 1: about to Forest's case as a possible wrongful conviction, and
Speaker 1: the year after Danny was elected, to Forest's case was
Speaker 1: back in court. This was the hearing I covered the
Speaker 1: first time I reported on to Forest's case, where his
Speaker 1: attorneys argued that Violet Ellison testified in pursuit of the
Speaker 1: reward money and the state hid it. I saw Danny
Speaker 1: Carr at the hearing, but he told me he wasn't
Speaker 1: ready yet to comment on the case.
Speaker 6: It's that I didn't know, you know, who was tending
Speaker 6: truth of what was right what was wrong. I just
Speaker 6: listened and it was apparent that if some of that
Speaker 6: stuff was true, then it was concerning.
Speaker 1: So after the hearing, Danny decided to conduct a full
Speaker 1: review of to Forrest's conviction. For nine months, he read
Speaker 1: through the trial transcripts as well as the documents that
Speaker 1: prosecutors had claimed were misfiled. He was troubled by the
Speaker 1: five thousand dollars reward payment given to Violet Ellison that
Speaker 1: the jury didn't even know was a possibility.
Speaker 6: Well, if that information was not disclosed, then the process
Speaker 6: was flawed, and the process was flawed, and then the
Speaker 6: end result is not truly the end result, because to
Speaker 6: get to the end result, the process has to be fair.
Speaker 1: Danny also talked to people involved, including alibi witnesses, but
Speaker 1: perhaps the most significant person, Danny Carr consulted the original prosecutor,
Speaker 1: Jeff Wallace, the same prosecutor who asked two juries to
Speaker 1: sentence to Forrest to death. It turns out Jeff Wallace
Speaker 1: had his own questions about the credibility of his star witness,
Speaker 1: Violet Ellison, going back fifteen years.
Speaker 5: I observed something that triggered in my mind, indeed to
Speaker 5: report this to the defense. I don't know if you
Speaker 5: know about that or not. What did you observe after
Speaker 5: the conviction and somebols.
Speaker 1: Several years after to Forrest was convicted, Jeff said he
Speaker 1: was passed through a courtroom during a trial of a
Speaker 1: drug dealer. Jeff Wallace wasn't prosecuting the case. He just
Speaker 1: needed to ask the bailiff a question.
Speaker 5: And as I left the bailiff station, which of course
Speaker 5: in the front of the courtroom, I'm walking out and
Speaker 5: happening to notice in the spectators area on the front
Speaker 5: row the defendant's wife being consoled by our chief witness
Speaker 5: in the Johnson case, in Ellison, Miss Ellison. That's right
Speaker 5: in my mind, that conduct was inconsistent with the picture
Speaker 5: that I had of miss Ellison at the time of trial.
Speaker 5: She seemed to me to be only a mother trying
Speaker 5: to do the best thing for her daughter, and happened
Speaker 5: to overhear a telephone conversation, and that record that the
Speaker 5: notes that she made of that telephone conversation became important
Speaker 5: in the trial of mister john as you know. So
Speaker 5: her credibility as the citizen she was, I think was
Speaker 5: important because she was the case. She is the case.
Speaker 1: To be clear, I'm not sure what consoling a suspected
Speaker 1: drug dealer's wife has to do with Violet Ellison's credibility
Speaker 1: into Forrest's case, but Jeff said it left him with
Speaker 1: an unsettling impression about his star witness, a realization that
Speaker 1: there were things about her he didn't know.
Speaker 11: So.
Speaker 5: Seeing her being so close to the wife of a
Speaker 5: man that everybody knew was a major drug dealer disturbed
Speaker 5: in that image in my mind, I thought, well, I'm
Speaker 5: going to report that to the out side, to the defense.
Speaker 7: And he did.
Speaker 1: In two thousand and seven, Jeff Wallace talked to to
Speaker 1: Forest's legal team about what he saw. They looked into
Speaker 1: the information, but so far it hasn't led to any
Speaker 1: new legal claims for to Forest. Fast forward thirteen years
Speaker 1: and Danny Carr calls on Jeff Wallace to talk about
Speaker 1: the conviction of to Forest Johnson. Jeff shares his concerns
Speaker 1: about Violet Ellison's credibility, and then he does something that
Speaker 1: makes a major impression on Danny. Jeff Wallace says he
Speaker 1: believes to Forest should be granted a new trial. This
Speaker 1: incredible development pushes Danny to take public action.
Speaker 6: Your job is not to get convictions. Your job is
Speaker 6: to seek the truth.
Speaker 1: But Danny has one more important call to make to
Speaker 1: Deputy Bill Hardy's family. He braces himself. It's never easy
Speaker 1: for a prosecutor to talk to a victim's family about
Speaker 1: unsettling the conviction and their loved one's murder. But he
Speaker 1: picks up the phone and calls Deputy Hardy's widow, Patricia
Speaker 1: Diane Hardy.
Speaker 6: And when I called her, she said, look, she said,
Speaker 6: I know your mom. I know you, but knowing since
Speaker 6: she was a little boy, she said, you know, I
Speaker 6: trust you, and whatever decision you make, I'm fine with it.
Speaker 6: But I trust you and you can't get any better.
Speaker 6: Go yeah, And that's what you want from people, period.
Speaker 1: And then Danny Carr does something extraordinary, something that almost
Speaker 1: never happens. He files a brief with the Jefferson County Court,
Speaker 1: writing that his duty to seek justice requires intervention in
Speaker 1: the case of to Forrest Johnson. He asks Judge Pullyam
Speaker 1: to row out to Forrest's conviction and order a new trial,
Speaker 1: and he includes that the original prosecutor, Jeff Wallace, supports
Speaker 1: this call for a new trial. Of all the capital
Speaker 1: murder cases that you've looked at, you've tried, you've been
Speaker 1: familiar with as DA, how do you see this case?
Speaker 1: How would you describe it in the context of all
Speaker 1: the cases you've seen.
Speaker 6: I think it's the worst case.
Speaker 1: I spoke with Jeff Wallace about his support for a
Speaker 1: new trial. I think you joining the district attorney is
Speaker 1: a powerful statement from a former prosecutor in a capital case.
Speaker 1: I can't remember, in my reporting of over twenty years,
Speaker 1: ever seeing that or hearing about it.
Speaker 5: Oh, I'm sure I'm not the first.
Speaker 1: Jeff seemed to want to downplay the significance of his
Speaker 1: support for a new trial. But this is seriously rare.
Speaker 1: I looked for other cases like this and reached out
Speaker 1: to experts who study wrongful convictions. Nobody could remember a
Speaker 1: death penalty case in any state where the original trial
Speaker 1: prosecutor called for a new trial. I interviewed Jeff Wallace
Speaker 1: three different times, with four hours of on the record conversations.
Speaker 1: Jeff was accessible and generous with his time, but he
Speaker 1: was also careful with his words.
Speaker 5: I still am personally satisfied that the evidence showed to
Speaker 5: Forest Johnson to be yuilty. Of course, my opinion is
Speaker 5: based in a large part on the testimony of the
Speaker 5: Violet Ellison that I saw at trial. But there's a
Speaker 5: in my opinion, there's a reason to look at it again.
Speaker 1: This is what I mean by careful. He says the
Speaker 1: evidence at trial showed to Forrest to be guilty based
Speaker 1: on Violet Ellison's testimony, but he also says the concern
Speaker 1: he had about Violet Ellison's credibility is why he supports
Speaker 1: the call for a new trial. After my first conversation
Speaker 1: with Jeff Wallace in twenty twenty one, I did a
Speaker 1: lot more investigating into Violet Ellison. I asked to speak
Speaker 1: with Jeff again because I wanted to share everything that
Speaker 1: I learned. We also found that, in addition to being
Speaker 1: a witness in this case, Violet Ellison has been a
Speaker 1: witness in four other criminal cases in Jefferson.
Speaker 3: County after Johnson Couch, Before.
Speaker 1: During and after, I tell Jeff about the other cases
Speaker 1: where Violet Ellison was a witness for the state and
Speaker 1: that the defense accused her of lying to police and
Speaker 1: under oath. He listens politely, But what I really want
Speaker 1: is for Jeff Wallace to hear some clips of what
Speaker 1: people are saying about Violet Ellison, the star witness he
Speaker 1: put on the stand, the same witness he now has
Speaker 1: questions about, do you have any interest in listening to
Speaker 1: what we found?
Speaker 5: You don't?
Speaker 1: I find that like astonishing?
Speaker 5: I don't know.
Speaker 1: Can you please, can you explain why you don't want
Speaker 1: to hear.
Speaker 5: What we found. I'm not the prosecuting attorney in the case,
Speaker 5: or for that matter, of the defending attorney. Of course
Speaker 5: I couldn't be. But oh.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but Jeff, I mean, you tried this case and
Speaker 1: you ask the jury to sentence him to death and
Speaker 1: he's on death row.
Speaker 5: That was the state of the evid when I was
Speaker 5: standing on the court.
Speaker 1: Run the evidence hasn't changed in your mind after what
Speaker 1: we've told you.
Speaker 5: No, I think evidence has change, but it's no longer
Speaker 5: my responsibility.
Speaker 1: In a way, He's right. The responsibility of all death
Speaker 1: row cases after conviction falls to Alabama's Attorney General, an
Speaker 1: elected position that represents the entire state, unlike district attorneys
Speaker 1: who represent a single county. The current Attorney General in
Speaker 1: Alabama is Steve Marshall. He could listen to Danny Carr
Speaker 1: and Jeff Wallace and allow a new trial for to
Speaker 1: Forrest Johnson, but instead, the AG's office calls this a
Speaker 1: subjective opinion that does not raise an issue of extraordinary
Speaker 1: public importance or any compelling circumstances. Marshall's office is still
Speaker 1: actively and aggressively fighting to Forest's appeals and seeking his execution.
Speaker 1: These conflicting positions make me think of those big metal
Speaker 1: grain silos that you see in the Midwest, with each
Speaker 1: party in our criminal justice system in its own silo,
Speaker 1: isolated from the opposing view, trapped in their official position.
Speaker 1: I talk with Jeff Wallace about this dynamic. It does
Speaker 1: seem like there are a lot of silos that people
Speaker 1: are in in the system, and they stay in those silos.
Speaker 1: Does that make sense?
Speaker 5: It does? And if a silo is that you cannot
Speaker 5: climb out of, then that's where I am. I've told
Speaker 5: you what I think if it were legal and it
Speaker 5: were presented to me, Uh, would you or would you
Speaker 5: not order a new trial? Mister Wallace, I've signed it
Speaker 5: today and order a new trial. But the thing you're
Speaker 5: calling a silo, my silo is a retired former prosecutor
Speaker 5: who happened to have been in charge of this case
Speaker 5: at one time.
Speaker 1: So why can't you climb out of the silo?
Speaker 5: What silo would I climb into? I can't be a
Speaker 5: depellate judge, I can't be the defendant's attorney. I can't
Speaker 5: be a juror, can't be the defendant.
Speaker 1: What if we just all climb out of our silos,
Speaker 1: and nobody's in a silo anymore. If we're all just
Speaker 1: kind of out in the open.
Speaker 5: Well, the law has set up these silos and the
Speaker 5: law is still in effect.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there's this quote on the outside of the Jefferson
Speaker 1: County Courthouse.
Speaker 5: That we're in bondage to the law in order that
Speaker 5: we may be free.
Speaker 1: That's it. We are in bondage to the law in
Speaker 1: order that we may be free. It's a quote from
Speaker 1: Roman philosopher Cicero. Why do we have to be in
Speaker 1: bondage to something to be free?
Speaker 5: Either we have laws or we don't. Which way do
Speaker 5: you want it?
Speaker 1: I guess one thing that we've been thinking about is like,
Speaker 1: what is the cost of that bondage? And is it
Speaker 1: that sometimes you end up with situations like this?
Speaker 5: I sure hope not. But the law is the law. No,
Speaker 5: one don't want to present me that piece of paper
Speaker 5: and ask me whether I would order a new trial.
Speaker 5: I'm in bondage to the law.
Speaker 1: You may see Jeff Wallace's support for a new trial
Speaker 1: as a half measure. He could call the case an
Speaker 1: injustice and take more accountability for his role into Forrest's conviction,
Speaker 1: but a trial prosecutor saying anything that calls a conviction
Speaker 1: into question is exceptional. There's no incentive for Jeff Wallace
Speaker 1: to say a word, no framework for prosecutors to voice doubt,
Speaker 1: or space for regrets to count, and yet Jeff Wallace
Speaker 1: still chose to speak up when he didn't have to
Speaker 1: say anything at all. In this project, we tried to
Speaker 1: answer the question of how an innocent man ended up
Speaker 1: on death row. We laid bare an investigation that was
Speaker 1: rushed to conclusion by tunnel vision and pressure to convict someone, anyone,
Speaker 1: for the murder of a deputy sheriff. This case shows
Speaker 1: us how young, marginalized people like Yolanda Chambers can be exploited,
Speaker 1: and how money is wielded as an incentive for vulnerable
Speaker 1: people to become ensnared with law enforcement. It also demonstrates
Speaker 1: the terrible consequences for people who can't afford to pay
Speaker 1: for the best criminal defense. So far, the courts have
Speaker 1: said there was nothing illegal about what the state did,
Speaker 1: presenting five different theories about who committed the murder, and
Speaker 1: paying the key witness behind closed doors, only admitting to
Speaker 1: this payment seventeen years later. This is how our system works.
Speaker 1: According to the courts that have examined to Forrest Johnson's conviction,
Speaker 1: it's not broken. It's working exactly as designed.
Speaker 10: They say that you presumed innocent until proven guilty, and that.
Speaker 1: Is the law former Attorney General Bill Baxley.
Speaker 10: But deep down, people don't believe somebody is innocent until
Speaker 10: they've proven guilty beyond regional doubt. They think that they
Speaker 10: had to do something or they wouldn't have been arrested
Speaker 10: and wouldn't have been indiced, and wouldn't be there.
Speaker 9: Not only do they presume people guilty, but they look
Speaker 9: at these people as expendable.
Speaker 1: Richard Jeffy, who represented Ardregis Ford, when.
Speaker 9: The system failed to Forrest Johnson, it betrayed all of us.
Speaker 9: To fores Johnson is as innocent as anyone could possibly be.
Speaker 9: Deputy Hardy would never want the wrong person to be
Speaker 9: convicted for his murder.
Speaker 1: After Jeffy's client, Ordregus Ford was acquitted, he lived a
Speaker 1: quiet life, mostly in Atlanta. His mother, Joyce Ford said
Speaker 1: to Forrest's conviction wade on her son.
Speaker 8: He never talked about it. He was strong. He never
Speaker 8: talked about it, but you know, you know he would
Speaker 8: get quiet at times. He will be rolling in the wheelchairs,
Speaker 8: go sit quiet with his head. Now, you know it
Speaker 8: took him a while to try to overcome it. You
Speaker 8: never overcome it, but so you know he had his days,
Speaker 8: you know, through it all, through the grace of God
Speaker 8: it too. It was a long, hard bell But I
Speaker 8: would never wish that on a mother.
Speaker 1: Ardregis died from health issues in twenty twenty one. His mom,
Speaker 1: Joyce Ford, died less than a year after we recorded
Speaker 1: this interview. I've been reporting onto Forest's case since twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1: I've interviewed dozens of people, but the one person I'd
Speaker 1: still most like to talk to is the very person
Speaker 1: I can't reach. Alabama's prison system doesn't allow people on
Speaker 1: death row to talk to journalists. To Forest's family has
Speaker 1: shared dozens of digital photos with me that I've kept
Speaker 1: in a folder on my laptop. There's to Forest as
Speaker 1: a baby wearing a tiny suit, as a skinny kid
Speaker 1: wearing a bow tie, and so many photos from visits
Speaker 1: at Holman Prison with his arms around his family. And
Speaker 1: I know the closest I can get to him is
Speaker 1: through the people he loves the most, his kids.
Speaker 13: Podcast and I've been, you know, writing about your dad's
Speaker 13: case for about two years now, so I'm so happy
Speaker 13: to finally see y'all and meet y'all and you get
Speaker 13: to hang out with you.
Speaker 1: Especially in October of twenty twenty one, I asked to
Speaker 1: Forest kids if we could all get together and talk.
Speaker 1: So we meet up on a Saturday afternoon at his
Speaker 1: oldest daughter, Shanee Pool's place. It's a light filled condo
Speaker 1: in downtown Birmingham. Her golden doodle named Banks, meanders around
Speaker 1: wagging his tail at everyone, and his kids immediately start
Speaker 1: to share memories of their dad.
Speaker 8: I remember going and real Eliza how short he was
Speaker 8: though he's so short when we took a picture on
Speaker 8: side of each other.
Speaker 2: He's so short, you like tower omer daddy, and I'm
Speaker 2: his same height. I'm Shane Pool. I am the oldest
Speaker 2: daughter of the Forest.
Speaker 1: Shane has his smile.
Speaker 5: I'm Maurice Myers, and I'm the four oldest, the farest.
Speaker 1: His son Maurice Myers has his eyes and nose.
Speaker 7: I'm Tremayan Pierre. I'm the oldest cub.
Speaker 1: His oldest child, Tremaine Perry has his voice and laugh.
Speaker 2: And I'm a curriolalla in him the baby cub.
Speaker 1: And Akiria, who goes by Muffin. His youngest looks like
Speaker 1: she could be a twin to t Forest and his
Speaker 1: younger years. To Forest has one other son named Robbie Foster,
Speaker 1: but he was unable to join us for this gathering
Speaker 1: because he was living in Colorado at the time. He
Speaker 1: also looks like his father's twin. An inside joke is
Speaker 1: these siblings all share a common attribute from their dad.
Speaker 5: My head. Man.
Speaker 7: We all got these big heads.
Speaker 1: If you haven't known, forehead.
Speaker 7: That's what's really big, is the forehead. He blessed us
Speaker 7: all that. That's why I grew my hat. So I
Speaker 7: know I was the oldest old I saw maybe a
Speaker 7: lot more than they did, you know what I mean,
Speaker 7: But it I knew what was going on, like when
Speaker 7: I stopped seeing 'em. You know what I'm saying, Cause
Speaker 7: they told me, like right off the bat, So how
Speaker 7: old were you when he bru about six or seven?
Speaker 1: Okay, this is Tremaine, the oldest cub.
Speaker 7: I was getting ready to to ask my mom to
Speaker 7: take me into my pop's house, like I wanna go,
Speaker 7: s I wanna go with my daddy. This weekend, and
Speaker 7: she's like, you won't be able to go this weekend
Speaker 7: cause you won't he not gonna be there, So like,
Speaker 7: what you mean, well, he at I wait on to
Speaker 7: come back. She's like, Nah, it might be a minute
Speaker 7: before he come back. And that's when I end up
Speaker 7: calling my grandma and she just let me know what
Speaker 7: was going on just right then, and that, like that
Speaker 7: kid kind of killed my spirits, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 7: I don't. I'm thinking like if he ain't did nothing
Speaker 7: wrong and while he gone, I could never get an
Speaker 7: answer for that. Nobody could ever answer that, you know
Speaker 7: what I'm saying. So just knowing that this man is
Speaker 7: setting behind bars twenty plus years for something that he
Speaker 7: didn't do, like that's heartbreaking.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 7: Yeah, you are to think about how life would be
Speaker 7: if it hadn't happen, if things could be reversed. You
Speaker 7: think about a lot of stuff, but you can never
Speaker 7: get that, you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Shaney also remembers trying to put the pieces together about
Speaker 1: why she had to go to the prison to see
Speaker 1: her dad.
Speaker 2: So I'm home with my mom and there I go
Speaker 2: visit my dad. But I didn't realize that that was
Speaker 2: normal until we get into grade school and I see
Speaker 2: children with their two parents home, and so now I'm like, okay,
Speaker 2: this is something that's not This is not adding up,
Speaker 2: something is not right, so you know, help me understand
Speaker 2: what's happening. And then it's like, okay, well he's away,
Speaker 2: but he's innocent, So what is innocent mean.
Speaker 3: I'm a kid.
Speaker 2: I don't understand what that means. He's there for something
Speaker 2: that he didn't do. Okay, well, why can't he just
Speaker 2: come home then? And so then I begin to get
Speaker 2: frustrated with him because I'm like, okay, well, if you
Speaker 2: didn't do it, then you could just come home. But
Speaker 2: clearly it doesn't work that way.
Speaker 5: And then as I got.
Speaker 1: Older, even though their father wasn't at home to Forrest's
Speaker 1: kids didn't stop seeing him. They would get in the
Speaker 1: car with their grandmother, Donna, to Forrest's mother to make
Speaker 1: the two hundred and ten mile drive from Birmingham to
Speaker 1: Holman Prison, three hours each way.
Speaker 11: I just remember I always riding there's all right, and
Speaker 11: I was so young, I was like, it's almost like
Speaker 11: you're driving the floora going down.
Speaker 7: There is in the middle of nowhere is no really
Speaker 7: no roll like to lead to anywell out there. Yeah,
Speaker 7: we took those trips.
Speaker 1: In Alabama, visits with men on death row are done
Speaker 1: in the visiting yard, the same area to Forrest met
Speaker 1: with his attorney Tie. It's called the yard, but it's indoors,
Speaker 1: like a big cafeteria lined with vending machines and Grandma.
Speaker 2: So what I remember is quarters. Grandma used to have a.
Speaker 7: Sage, the freezer, bags full of cords and nickels, all
Speaker 7: the change we can get.
Speaker 1: But before they got into the prison to see their
Speaker 1: dad with the big bag of quarters so everyone could
Speaker 1: get their favorite snacks and candy from the prison yard
Speaker 1: vending machines. To four kids had to go through prison
Speaker 1: security where guards searched them and patted them down.
Speaker 2: Look at thinking back on them up. And I didn't
Speaker 2: really think about this until now, just kind of how
Speaker 2: violating it kind of was with them because they had
Speaker 2: to search us like the same way. Yeah, and we
Speaker 2: were children basically touching all.
Speaker 12: Love you, and I was just like, this is a
Speaker 12: little weird.
Speaker 5: I'm not comfortable with your touching me.
Speaker 11: I mean, I'm just a kid, I'm not bringing nothing
Speaker 11: in you.
Speaker 5: So it was just real violating.
Speaker 11: I was like, I really don't want to come back,
Speaker 11: but I want to so I can see my dad.
Speaker 1: I just don't want you to touch me.
Speaker 2: But and we couldn't, you know, touch him whenever we
Speaker 2: were in there. So of course, you know, you want
Speaker 2: to sit on your dad's lap, you want to lay
Speaker 2: on them and hug on them, and you can't do that.
Speaker 2: You have to keep your distance from each other. And
Speaker 2: like Tremaine said, there's never enough time. It always seems
Speaker 2: like it's just we just got here, turn back around
Speaker 2: and get on the road trip again.
Speaker 1: The visits were just a few hours once a month
Speaker 1: at most, but it's where and how they got to
Speaker 1: know their father. Their relationships with their father are marked
Speaker 1: by both his absence and his presence. They admire his strength,
Speaker 1: the way he loves to hear about their lives when
Speaker 1: they talk on the phone, and how he never makes
Speaker 1: them feel like their problems are small.
Speaker 2: When he calls you and you just want to talk
Speaker 2: about the good things. And he's lived these life tuus,
Speaker 2: these alles, So now what's really going on? Like I
Speaker 2: can hear it in your voice, okay, princess, So I'm
Speaker 2: not right. And I'd never like to tell him anything
Speaker 2: bad because he's just there's nothing that he could do.
Speaker 2: But he's like, this is my way of being a
Speaker 2: father to you. This is how I can parent you.
Speaker 2: To allow me to do that, And then you feel
Speaker 2: so much better after you talk to him about it.
Speaker 1: Oh, he's gonna make you laugh.
Speaker 2: He's gonna make you laugh.
Speaker 5: I'd be like, Okay, I'm not mad anymore. Yeah, thank you.
Speaker 2: Right, And then it's hard to be mad, you know,
Speaker 2: it's hard to be angry or mad or kind of
Speaker 2: self sulk.
Speaker 1: Because and you think about his situation, right, and he.
Speaker 2: Always asks, so what you eat? I never want to
Speaker 2: tell him what I ate for dinner, never because it's
Speaker 2: I hate telling.
Speaker 7: I know he can't eat the same, you know what
Speaker 7: I'm saying.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but he wants to know what you made.
Speaker 2: He wants to know or he wants like what we
Speaker 2: did today, Like if you if you would be on
Speaker 2: the phone with Tremado Maurice. Yeah, I talked to Tremaana Maurice,
Speaker 2: uh the other day and they were out somewhere, but
Speaker 2: he won't say they were.
Speaker 1: He like we were so like he's.
Speaker 2: Living through my brothers, like whatever they do, he thinks
Speaker 2: like he's out with them. Yeah, we're human bodies like
Speaker 2: we are have been affected. These are men that missed
Speaker 2: out on their father raising them. These he's missed the
Speaker 2: birth of multiple grandchildren. He's miss milestones us completing college
Speaker 2: and getting our first big girl jobs and purchasing our
Speaker 2: first homes. Like these are really important things that he
Speaker 2: has missed out on. And so you have space and
Speaker 2: you have time between all of us that we literally
Speaker 2: cannot get back. Like there's nothing that we could do
Speaker 2: about it. And so at the least that you could
Speaker 2: do is take uh a be accountable for what was done.
Speaker 2: And I think that that's all we're asking for at
Speaker 2: this point. We're not trying to point the finger at anybody.
Speaker 2: We just we want true justice to be served and
Speaker 2: we just want him to come home and for there
Speaker 2: to be some type of accountability held. And it's frustrating,
Speaker 2: it's disheartening, but it's like, well, we just gotta keep
Speaker 2: fighting because we gotta fight for daddy. We gotta fight
Speaker 2: to get Daddy home. I think we bypassed of pointing
Speaker 2: the finger, and you know, we're still hurting, we're still angry,
Speaker 2: we're still confused. Have said, we have a lot of emotions,
Speaker 2: but we just want him to come home.
Speaker 1: Why is to Forest Johnson still on Alabama's death row?
Speaker 1: Why is he still locked in a cell when so
Speaker 1: many people, including the prosecutor who argued to put him there,
Speaker 1: are calling for a new trial. In early October twenty
Speaker 1: twenty three, the United States Supreme Court announced it would
Speaker 1: not review to Forrest Johnson's case, but to Forest's legal
Speaker 1: team continues to fight for him. They have appeals pending
Speaker 1: in both state and federal courts. This is where we
Speaker 1: find ourselves unable to tell you how this story ends.
Speaker 1: I plan to stay here with de Forest, his family,
Speaker 1: his children, his lawyers, and everyone else who believes in
Speaker 1: him will continue to hold him in the light of truth.
Speaker 11: This is a free call from before.
Speaker 1: An incarcerated individual at Alabama Department of Corrections. That call
Speaker 1: is not private. It will be recorded and maybe Migerg
Speaker 1: you may start the conversation now.
Speaker 2: Hey Daddy, Hey Brinda, Hi, what you doing.
Speaker 4: I'm good day, It.
Speaker 2: Was good long today. Still trying to get used to.
Speaker 1: To Forrest calls his family from prison whenever he can,
Speaker 1: but his oldest daughter, Shaney also keeps his cards and
Speaker 1: letters in a case Swiss shoe box under her bed.
Speaker 2: If I had to describe this card, there is a
Speaker 2: beehive on the front with a few bees buzzing around,
Speaker 2: and it's dated January fifth, two thousand and three.
Speaker 1: Like all the people who love to Forrest Johnson, his
Speaker 1: five kits and fifteen grandkits, his mother Donna, his aunts, uncles,
Speaker 1: and cousins, they read the words he sent them over
Speaker 1: the years when they need to hold him close.
Speaker 2: It reads, I love you and can't wait to see
Speaker 2: you and hold you in my arms again. You underlined
Speaker 2: are the reason Daddy has a spirit to get up
Speaker 2: every day and has hope that there would be a
Speaker 2: better day up ahead for me. And he says, Shaney,
Speaker 2: Daddy wants you to be a good young lady and
Speaker 2: too what your mother asks of you. I love you
Speaker 2: and I hope to see you again real soon.
Speaker 12: Be good?
Speaker 3: All right.
Speaker 1: To learn more about the fight to free to Forest Johnson,
Speaker 1: sign up for updates and learn how you can help,
Speaker 1: visit the website created by Greater Birmingham Ministries for to Forest.
Speaker 1: It's to Forest Johnson dot com and a special thanks
Speaker 1: to the family of to Forest Johnson, who have generously
Speaker 1: shared so much for this series. Ear Witness is a
Speaker 1: production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with Signal
Speaker 1: Company Number One. Executive producers are Jason Flom, Jeff Kempler,
Speaker 1: Kevin Wardis, and me Beth Shelburne. The investigative reporting for
Speaker 1: this series was done by Me and MARAA McNamara. Producers
Speaker 1: are MARAA McNamara, Hannah Beal, and Jackie Polly. Kara Kornhaber
Speaker 1: is our senior producer. Britt Spangler is our sound designer.
Speaker 1: Additional story editing from Marie Sutton, fact checkhelp from Catherine Newhan,
Speaker 1: and special thanks to to Forrest Johnson's legal defense team.
Speaker 1: You can follow the show on Instagram, TikTok, Facebook, and
Speaker 1: Twitter at Lava for Good. To see behind the scenes
Speaker 1: content from our investigation, visit Lava for goood dot com
Speaker 1: slash ear Witness
Speaker 5: M