Speaker 1: A note for listeners, this episode contains discussion of suicide.
Speaker 1: Please listen with caution and care. In May of two
Speaker 1: thousand eight, Ashley and Albert devil Bot welcomed their first baby, girl,
Speaker 1: Mackenzie Leilani. The devil Bots were a successful military couple
Speaker 1: stationed in Fort Benning, Georgia, and the birth of their
Speaker 1: daughter filled them with more joy than they ever imagined.
Speaker 1: Once they brought baby Mackenzie home from the hospital, the
Speaker 1: new parents put her to bed and went to sleep.
Speaker 1: In the early morning hours, Ashley and Albert woke up
Speaker 1: to find Mackenzie in distress. Concerned, they took her back
Speaker 1: to the hospital. Maybe a couple of hours later. The
Speaker 1: doctor comes in and told that she passed, and my
Speaker 1: egg mouther hit the floor. He started crying and screaming
Speaker 1: of rolland and I just kind of sat there looking
Speaker 1: at the wall. And then I looked at the doctor
Speaker 1: and said, go get my baby ready so we can
Speaker 1: take your home. I think I was just in the
Speaker 1: nile and shop because you just didn't tell me that
Speaker 1: my daughter. We did, and then Columbu's police department showed up,
Speaker 1: and that's when everything pretty much went to hell. My
Speaker 1: name is Ashley Jordan's. I spent twelve years and two
Speaker 1: months in the Georgia Department of Corrections prison system. Ropefully
Speaker 1: convicted the recurme that I did not commit from love
Speaker 1: of for good. This is wrongful conviction with Maggie Freeling today.
Speaker 1: Ashley Jordan's actually Jordan was born in Laurel, Mississippi, on
Speaker 1: May thirteenth, nine four, to Brenda Dolores Jones and Thurman
Speaker 1: Jordan's sr oh Astley. Growing up, let me tell you
Speaker 1: about the little Poe. That's a nickname Poe. That's Ashley's mom, Brenda.
Speaker 1: She was question. She was a sweet little girl. They
Speaker 1: never had to get no whippers for nothing. She was
Speaker 1: shod and you know I didn't take much to herd
Speaker 1: of feeding. Ashley grew up with three brothers in a
Speaker 1: military family. After just a few years in Mississippi, Ashley's
Speaker 1: dad moved their family to Detroit, Michigan. Ashley adored her dad.
Speaker 1: My dad was very hands on with us. He always
Speaker 1: made sure we we showed love to each other as
Speaker 1: brothers and sisters. He helped pray with us at night.
Speaker 1: Ashley's family loved any excuse to get together, standon is
Speaker 1: very big, and they like to cook out a lot,
Speaker 1: so there's a cook out for every thing. We love
Speaker 1: to get together and eat. So that's one of the
Speaker 1: fondest memories I have growing up is being able to
Speaker 1: get together with our family memberis and we eat and
Speaker 1: have a good time. But behind closed doors, family life
Speaker 1: wasn't as picture perfect as it seemed. My childhood life
Speaker 1: with my mom and dad, Mary was very I like
Speaker 1: to call it chaotic. It was just a lot of
Speaker 1: It was always a lot of arguing going on. My
Speaker 1: mom was a heavy drinker um and my dad wasn't,
Speaker 1: so a lot of times that was a problem because
Speaker 1: they bumped heads with a lot of things. Her parents
Speaker 1: marriage eventually fell apart, so Ashley's mom packed up and
Speaker 1: moved with the kids back to their home state. So
Speaker 1: we moved back to Mississippi in my mom got a
Speaker 1: job and pretty much just settled us there. I don't
Speaker 1: think we understood as kids that we were gonna be
Speaker 1: living in in in Mississippi. I believe that we were
Speaker 1: just going to visit and we're gonna make home to Detroit.
Speaker 1: But we started registering for school. It just kind of
Speaker 1: came out of nowhere. Where we had to start over
Speaker 1: again as kids. Brenda worked hard as a single parent
Speaker 1: to make ends meet. She and Ashley are close now,
Speaker 1: but at the time, Ashley wanted to get out of
Speaker 1: that situation. To be honest with you, I didn't want
Speaker 1: to say my mom anyway at that time because of
Speaker 1: her drinking. Um, I just didn't like it. All my
Speaker 1: other friends their moms did drink like that, So I
Speaker 1: saw a difference in that pattern. Like I said, she
Speaker 1: was a great mother when it came to taking care
Speaker 1: of us. It's just the drinking was very it put
Speaker 1: it put a strain on me in our relationship. Early on,
Speaker 1: Ashley opted to leave her mom's house and instead live
Speaker 1: with her grandparents. However, things weren't much better. Once she
Speaker 1: made the move. She started to notice similarities between her
Speaker 1: grandfather's be savior and her mother's My grandfather, her dad
Speaker 1: was a heavy drinker, heavy drinker, was put in lightly.
Speaker 1: He was an alcoholic. So I've seen the pattern of
Speaker 1: where my mom where the filtered on into her. So
Speaker 1: in the house of my grandmother, we dealt with a
Speaker 1: lot of the same chaos. At the same time she
Speaker 1: was facing these family troubles, Ashley It was also maturing
Speaker 1: and learning to live her own life. Here's Brenda again,
Speaker 1: and she grow up and got older. She still coming
Speaker 1: out of it and still a door that She became
Speaker 1: machill leaders school stuff like that, played basketball Northeast Jones Tigers. Yes,
Speaker 1: Lady Tigers. M Yeah, she was a basketball players, chill
Speaker 1: leader with the fast sixty legs. Yes. Ashley also loved school.
Speaker 1: She was smart and ambitious. She even had a career
Speaker 1: picked out for herself, one that she admits was inspired
Speaker 1: by her own unique smile. You see, not have a
Speaker 1: gap between my teeth, and I've always been very fond
Speaker 1: of teeth. I like teeth and how they look, and
Speaker 1: I wanted to be orthodonas but Ashley wound up on
Speaker 1: a different path. The turning point came one day when
Speaker 1: she was out shopping with a friend and we were
Speaker 1: shopping at a place that was right next door to
Speaker 1: the the the recruiting office for the all of the
Speaker 1: branches in the military, and it was a recruiter setting
Speaker 1: outside smoking a cigarette. Ashley was impressed by his uniform.
Speaker 1: She told him he looked spiffy, and he said, you
Speaker 1: want one? I said whatever, And before I knew it.
Speaker 1: I was sitting in his office looking at brochures. In
Speaker 1: my family, they always encourage you go to college, go
Speaker 1: to college, and I thought, you know what, I've just
Speaker 1: been in twelve years in school. I don't want to
Speaker 1: go to college at He's not right there. I did.
Speaker 1: She did want to get a college education eventually, so
Speaker 1: Ashley was sold on the idea that the military would
Speaker 1: finance her ambition. And all that can people was pay
Speaker 1: for college. Pay for college. I didn't tell anybody I
Speaker 1: was joining got into my mom. I didn't tell anybody.
Speaker 1: I just kept a secret. After high school graduation in
Speaker 1: two thousand two, Ashley's friends started going off to college
Speaker 1: and my mom came on three one day and she said, so,
Speaker 1: where do you guy going on? And I said what
Speaker 1: do you mean? She said, are you going to school
Speaker 1: or you're gonna start working or something? And I was like, well,
Speaker 1: I got something else playing. She said like what, Because
Speaker 1: you haven't said anything to me. I looked at One
Speaker 1: day my baby came home. She came home from work
Speaker 1: say she was gonna join the arm I said a
Speaker 1: whole On the day she told Brenda the news, Ashley
Speaker 1: brought an army recruiter to her mom's house to meet
Speaker 1: and talk about her plans. So he comes walking up
Speaker 1: the driveway and she looked at me and she just
Speaker 1: thoughted ring me and she was so excited. Said are
Speaker 1: you happy? And she said, yes, I'm happy. She said,
Speaker 1: this is a great career. My mom was the most
Speaker 1: supportive person I had in my army career. Ashley originally
Speaker 1: joined as part of the Army Reserve and wound up
Speaker 1: stationed in South Korea in two thousand seven. She soon
Speaker 1: worked her way up to sergeant. Ashley loved the military,
Speaker 1: and after only three months in South Korea, she was
Speaker 1: about to find another love. Tell me how you meet Albert?
Speaker 1: But my first time, I was actually going into my
Speaker 1: barracks room for the first time, and he walked by
Speaker 1: and I complimented his calf muscles. He got some nice
Speaker 1: cat muscles, and he looked at me and was looking
Speaker 1: at me like this girl was weird. Albert devil Budd
Speaker 1: was a mail clerk in Ashley's unit. She would often
Speaker 1: see him around. He was Lord Reagan and I was
Speaker 1: I ranking, So he just kind of kept it professional,
Speaker 1: going back and forth and beyond. Every guy at that
Speaker 1: unit was trying to get my attention to talk to me,
Speaker 1: but he wasn't and that kind of intrigued me. So
Speaker 1: I started to like him and I kind of went
Speaker 1: after him um and one day I stopped and talking
Speaker 1: to him and we started watching DVDs together and we
Speaker 1: realized we had that we love the same kind of
Speaker 1: movies and the same kind of music, and that's kind
Speaker 1: of where the conversation started. And so I knew we
Speaker 1: were going on our first date. So besides his cabs,
Speaker 1: what else did you like about him when he dressed?
Speaker 1: I have this I love the way he dressed, and
Speaker 1: I realized that he was really nice, like beyond just
Speaker 1: being a soldier, he was a really nice guy. There's
Speaker 1: was a whirlwind romance. You know, it was kind of quick,
Speaker 1: but I don't have a time limit on love. I'm
Speaker 1: gonna say that I'm the kind of person that I is.
Speaker 1: There is there, and I'm gonna go for it. So
Speaker 1: we met, we started dating August two thousand and seven.
Speaker 1: We got engaged September two thousand seven, and we got
Speaker 1: married over nine, two thousand and seven, and the couple
Speaker 1: had more good news while still in Korea. After their engagement,
Speaker 1: Ashley found out she was pregnant. I threw the pretty
Speaker 1: segess in space and she looks, look look, and he
Speaker 1: looked at me. He's like, what does this mean. Let's
Speaker 1: say that means we're pregnant. So we were super excited
Speaker 1: to be having a baby. She and Albert wanted to
Speaker 1: have their baby in the States, so Ashley was able
Speaker 1: to get an honorable discharge. I want to be a
Speaker 1: hands on mom. I don't want to be thinking that
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be shipped here and shipp there and my
Speaker 1: kids are being transferred from here to there. I just
Speaker 1: didn't want to deal with that. I'd rather be at
Speaker 1: home with my kids. Before coming to South Korea, Albert
Speaker 1: had served in Iraq. The newlyweds didn't want to worry
Speaker 1: about him being deployed again, so they found a military
Speaker 1: base where Albert could be on active duty without being
Speaker 1: marshaled out. So that's how we wind up in Georgia
Speaker 1: because that was the only due to station that was
Speaker 1: offering him a non deployable status where he wouldn't miss
Speaker 1: the baby's birth or I wouldn't be left alone. By
Speaker 1: March two thousand eight, the young couple was back in
Speaker 1: the States, getting ready for the birth of their baby.
Speaker 1: A few months later, Albert was asleep and Ashley was
Speaker 1: beside him in bed, watching TV and eating. Let me
Speaker 1: tell you what I was eating. I had a tray
Speaker 1: full of food. I had chocolate chip cookies, two peanut
Speaker 1: butter and jelly son, which is a glass of milk,
Speaker 1: a bowl of cereals, and grapes and strawberries. And I
Speaker 1: was sitting there in the band eating and I was
Speaker 1: watching George Lopez laughing, and I started having contractions and
Speaker 1: they got so bad that at one point I slung
Speaker 1: my fists over on the bed because the contraction hit
Speaker 1: me so hard, and I hit him and he said,
Speaker 1: what's wrong, and I say, I think I'm having the baby.
Speaker 1: They headed to Martin Army Community Hospital. We're on. Ashley
Speaker 1: gave birth to a baby girl, Mackenzie Leilanie. Ashley had
Speaker 1: always loved the name Mackenzie, and Leilani was chosen by Albert,
Speaker 1: who is pullowen. I've had Mackenzie name picked out since
Speaker 1: the ninth grade. I was super excited to nake my
Speaker 1: daughter McKenzie. So her limitle name was Leilanie and it
Speaker 1: means beautiful flower and pull Owen culture. After two and
Speaker 1: a half days in the hospital, Ashley and Albert were
Speaker 1: able to take Mackenzie home. As for many new parents,
Speaker 1: their first evening home was nerve wracking. I was afraid
Speaker 1: to go to sleep. My mind Frank kept thinking, if
Speaker 1: you go to sleep, something's gonnapp She's gonna roll over,
Speaker 1: she's gonna smother. I don't know, it was just very conscious.
Speaker 1: I was scared. My mom, of course, you know, advice
Speaker 1: from older people was saying, actually, you can go to sleep,
Speaker 1: and Albert was already asleep preparing to go back to work,
Speaker 1: so Ashley relented and tried to get some sleep herself
Speaker 1: with Mackenzie in the bassinet next to the bed. In
Speaker 1: the early morning hours of June one, Ashley and Albert
Speaker 1: were both sleeping fitfully. We were tussling in the bed
Speaker 1: and we both woke each other up, and we both
Speaker 1: were dreaming. And I looked at him, he looked at me.
Speaker 1: I said, I just had the craziest dream, and he
Speaker 1: said me too. And then they heard Mackenzie fussing in
Speaker 1: her bassonet. I said, well, is your turn the feeder?
Speaker 1: So he was getting the bottle ready and I was
Speaker 1: getting wrapped beast and that, I said, I was. I
Speaker 1: would tell him by my dream. I said, I was
Speaker 1: dreaming I was falling to the elevator shaft, I said,
Speaker 1: but when I got to the bottom, I woke up.
Speaker 1: He said, Oh my god, I was dreaming I was
Speaker 1: falling off a cliff, he said, but when I got
Speaker 1: to the bottom, I woke up. I said, that's crazy.
Speaker 1: And we just started feeder and then I noticed the
Speaker 1: lump on her head and I said, what is that.
Speaker 1: Actually called the hospital and spoke to a doctor about
Speaker 1: the lump of Mackenzie's forehead, but the doctor said she
Speaker 1: was fine. So then we tried to feed her and
Speaker 1: she was like she was gasping for air, like she
Speaker 1: just looked she just couldn't breathe. And I called him
Speaker 1: back and said, we're bringing her in. And by this
Speaker 1: time we're hysterical because she doesn't look good. She looks
Speaker 1: like she's turning colors, and we're we left everything at
Speaker 1: this array, and we looked at such a her. We
Speaker 1: left our cell phones at the house. Within minutes, Mackenzie
Speaker 1: had taken a turn for the worst, and we get
Speaker 1: to the hospital and before he didn't even stopped the car.
Speaker 1: I was jumping out and I ran the tide of
Speaker 1: the Mercy room and I threw her out at the
Speaker 1: nurse and I said, please help my baby. Something wrong.
Speaker 1: This episode is underwritten by A I G, a leading
Speaker 1: global insurance company. A I G is committed to corporate
Speaker 1: social responsibility and to making a positive difference in the
Speaker 1: lives of its employees and in the communities where they
Speaker 1: work and live. In light of the compelling need for
Speaker 1: pro bono legal assistance, and in recognition of A i
Speaker 1: g s commitment to criminal and social justice reform, the
Speaker 1: A i G pro Bono Program provides free legal services
Speaker 1: and other support to underrepresented communities and individuals. Ashley called
Speaker 1: her mom from the hospital to tell her what was happening.
Speaker 1: Brenda and her husband had already planned to come meet
Speaker 1: Mackenzie the following day, but now she was racing to
Speaker 1: get to the hospital. We just trying to get them,
Speaker 1: trying to get the fens that could and see just
Speaker 1: as a babe ONEm on the way. We're errating, We're scare.
Speaker 1: We don't know what's going on. A couple of hours
Speaker 1: passed as the new parents waited anxiously for news of
Speaker 1: their baby. Finally, a doctor came to tell Ashley and
Speaker 1: Albert that Mackenzie had passed away. Albert collapsed on the floor.
Speaker 1: He started crying and screaming and rolling and I just
Speaker 1: kind of sat there looking at the wall. And then
Speaker 1: I looked at the doctor and said, go get my
Speaker 1: baby ready so we could take your home. I think
Speaker 1: I was just in denial and shock because you just
Speaker 1: didn't tell me that my daughter was dead, and I
Speaker 1: just didn't want to believe it. And then almost immediately
Speaker 1: after Albert and Ashley heard the news about their baby girl,
Speaker 1: personnel from the military showed up, and I was a
Speaker 1: little weird about why they were there. And then Columbus
Speaker 1: Police department showed up, and that's when everything pretty much
Speaker 1: went to hell. And in my mind frame, I was like, no,
Speaker 1: this is not This is not normal. Nobody calls the
Speaker 1: police when somebody passed it away. This is not normal.
Speaker 1: She wasn't murdered. Why are they here? And when they
Speaker 1: separated us, and the kind of questions they would asking
Speaker 1: in the way the detective was looking at me, that's
Speaker 1: when I was I said, they think we've done this.
Speaker 1: Police took note that Albert was devastated, but that Ashley
Speaker 1: wasn't showing as much emotion. And at that time, I
Speaker 1: just lost the baby, and um, I don't know how
Speaker 1: to grieve. At this point, it was just kind of unbelief,
Speaker 1: like this was it was like a nightmare happening before
Speaker 1: my eyes. But at that point police took Ashley back
Speaker 1: to her and Albert's apartment to photograph and search their home.
Speaker 1: They began questioning her about what had happened that night,
Speaker 1: where we're where was I? Like? What time I went
Speaker 1: to sleep? How long was Albert to sleep before I
Speaker 1: into sleep? When do we do that day? Who came
Speaker 1: to the house? Things like that, they were asking. Once
Speaker 1: the police were done at the apartment, Ashley and Albert
Speaker 1: were left to process all that had just happened. We
Speaker 1: couldn't even sleep in our room because her room was
Speaker 1: right next to ours with all her stuff, so we
Speaker 1: slept downstairs. We we couldn't go up there. By this point,
Speaker 1: Ashley's mother had arrived. That was just that was two devils.
Speaker 1: That was just oh, that was two months. Oh. And
Speaker 1: I asked me just crying and and Avery. He was
Speaker 1: just screaming that background. She was slowing and he wore,
Speaker 1: you know, asked was slower and he was just screaming,
Speaker 1: the crying, and she said, my mom would go, let
Speaker 1: me go, try to take care of, you know, look
Speaker 1: after him. The next morning, the police called and said
Speaker 1: the preliminary autopsy report was ready and that the couple
Speaker 1: should come to the station. Do you remember when you
Speaker 1: realized that they thought that you and Albert had done this?
Speaker 1: I realized that when he separated us, and then that's
Speaker 1: when interrogation started. Ashley was interrogated by Detective Andrew Tyner.
Speaker 1: I would never forgive him because he caught me a monster,
Speaker 1: and he said the preliminary I've talked to results said
Speaker 1: that she died from blunt force trauma to the head
Speaker 1: and she had multiple score fractures, and that we did it.
Speaker 1: Ashley and Albert were adamant they had nothing to do
Speaker 1: with Mackenzie's death and had no idea what happened to her.
Speaker 1: Yet they were held and interrogated for hours. No mind
Speaker 1: you on postpartum. I just had a baby. I am Margine,
Speaker 1: and my breast of filling up with milk, and they
Speaker 1: just set them interrogating me for hours and wouldn't give
Speaker 1: me any feminine hygiene products, and I was bleeding from
Speaker 1: having the baby, and they just sat there and kept
Speaker 1: interrogating me, and so I didn't understand what was happening.
Speaker 1: So I just assumed that I would go home, like
Speaker 1: I just thought that we would go home. I didn't
Speaker 1: think it would be what happened for sure, but we
Speaker 1: didn't go home. And eventually the detectives tried to turn
Speaker 1: Ashley and Albert against each other. If one of y'all
Speaker 1: just say y'all did it, because both of y'all gonna
Speaker 1: go to jail, and both of you'all gonna go to prison.
Speaker 1: But if one of y'all just say y'all did it,
Speaker 1: then one of y'all can go home and help fight
Speaker 1: for the other way. That's what they told us. But
Speaker 1: they made sure nothing was recording when they did that.
Speaker 1: And he was about to say he did it just
Speaker 1: so and go home and won't go to jail, and
Speaker 1: I looked at him and I grabbed his hand and
Speaker 1: I said, no, you're not. You will not lie for
Speaker 1: these people. He said, but I don't want you to
Speaker 1: go to jail, said, I don't care. We're gonna go
Speaker 1: together then, and that's just what it's gonna be, I said,
Speaker 1: because we didn't do anything wrong. Ashley and Albert were
Speaker 1: arrested that same day. Did you think it was possible
Speaker 1: that they could have done this at all? Did that?
Speaker 1: Did you think that was possible? Oh? No, baby, I
Speaker 1: never even think twice, not even for a split sucker,
Speaker 1: that they dune something to that baby. That's like, oh
Speaker 1: that we was the only child and they had everything
Speaker 1: going for them. How you say they had everything going
Speaker 1: for them. Ashley was charged with malice murder, felony murder,
Speaker 1: and cruelty to children in the first degree. And it
Speaker 1: was the most humiliating experience is being booked into the
Speaker 1: county jail. They strip you of everything that was ever yours.
Speaker 1: I'm bleeding from having a baby. They don't provide you
Speaker 1: with any type of extra clothing. They just give you.
Speaker 1: They give you their uniform and I said, well, I
Speaker 1: don't have any underwear and I'm bleeding. But it was like, so,
Speaker 1: we don't provide that. And they sent me in a
Speaker 1: cell and a cold sale for hours on concrete, and
Speaker 1: then I got took a mug shot and they put
Speaker 1: me in a suicide sale, and I remember bleeding in
Speaker 1: a lot of my pants. I just feel disgusted. I
Speaker 1: just remember crying and crying in that sale, thinking this
Speaker 1: can't be happening to us, like we didn't we didn't
Speaker 1: do nothing wrong. Alone in the cell, Ashley's mind was racing.
Speaker 1: I started thinking about him. I started thinking about our daughter.
Speaker 1: I started thinking about our life and how they were
Speaker 1: portraying us to be. I want to being on top
Speaker 1: of the world. I a marriage, I was mad a baby,
Speaker 1: and then I woke up in the whole robles on
Speaker 1: top of me and I didn't know how to breathe.
Speaker 1: And that then put moment is when I contemplated killing myself.
Speaker 1: I just kept looking around thinking like what can I do?
Speaker 1: How can I do it? Over a year later, on October,
Speaker 1: the trial started. The prosecutor was Sadanna Daily. Ashley and
Speaker 1: Albert each had a separate defense team. One of the
Speaker 1: things that the state really wanted to present was to
Speaker 1: depict Ashley as a cold hearted, really this angry black woman,
Speaker 1: because that's the kind of woman that would harm her
Speaker 1: own child. This is Jimminy Rodgers. She's a criminal defense
Speaker 1: attorney and a doctoral student in criminal justice and criminology
Speaker 1: and has represented Ashley, and so what the jury heard
Speaker 1: was the state saying that Ashley was this cold hearted
Speaker 1: woman who was controlling, controlling of Albert, and that she
Speaker 1: didn't show any our appropriate sadness when her baby died,
Speaker 1: and that whatever was going on, they were trying to
Speaker 1: hide things. And then they presented Dr. Derressol to say
Speaker 1: that there is no way, there's no other way other
Speaker 1: than intentionally an intentional blunt force trauma, that the injuries
Speaker 1: to Mackenzie would have occurred. Dr Laura Derrissau was a
Speaker 1: medical examiner for the Georgia Bureau of Investigation and the
Speaker 1: state's primary witness. She performed the autopsy on Mackenzie the
Speaker 1: day after she died. Dr Derrisau said she found extensive
Speaker 1: fractures on Mackenzie's head and bleeding in the brain, and
Speaker 1: once she saw blood, she deemed this to be a
Speaker 1: homicide and reached out, called out to law enforcement and
Speaker 1: communicated that unless the parents had some other explanation for this,
Speaker 1: then it had to be blunt force trauma, either by
Speaker 1: a series of blows to Mackenzie's head or a crushing
Speaker 1: type of injury. Dr Derrissaw concluded that the injuries happened
Speaker 1: near the time of Mackenzie's death by no more than
Speaker 1: four hours, and the injuries were so traumatic that if
Speaker 1: they had happened during birth, the hospital would have noticed.
Speaker 1: The prosecution concluded that, without any other explanation, this was
Speaker 1: a homicide by the only two people who were with
Speaker 1: Mackenzie that night. The state also presented a jailhouse informant,
Speaker 1: Melvin Tarver, who had been in jail at the same
Speaker 1: time as Albert. He testified that on the morning that
Speaker 1: trial was about to start, Albert told him that his
Speaker 1: wife had harmed the baby. Tarver's story was that Albert
Speaker 1: told him he had gone out to get drugs that night,
Speaker 1: and when he returned, the baby wasn't moving. According to Albert,
Speaker 1: he asked Ashley, you know what you did? What did
Speaker 1: you do? And as she says nothing, I just spanked
Speaker 1: her and put her to bed. Tell me about the
Speaker 1: jail house snitch. Can you tell me what you thought
Speaker 1: when you saw them on the stand. I was living.
Speaker 1: I was ready to jump over that table and fight,
Speaker 1: and I'm not a lining person. But when he came
Speaker 1: to the door, I looked at Albert, I said, do
Speaker 1: you know him? He said, no, I don't know him
Speaker 1: at all, and I know he was in line because
Speaker 1: I'm sociable. I'm the person that can walk into a
Speaker 1: room full of strangers and make friends. He's gonna walk
Speaker 1: into the room and sit by himself. He's not talking
Speaker 1: to anybody because he's quiet. He's very humble, very to himself.
Speaker 1: So no, so I didn't believe it. But I was
Speaker 1: so mad because I was looking, what is he? What
Speaker 1: is who is this guy? But what made me mad
Speaker 1: was that the fact that the judge even allowed it
Speaker 1: to happen. Jimminique says that off the bat, Ashley and
Speaker 1: Albert were at a disadvantage. There was a systemic breakdown
Speaker 1: in a fundamentally fair trial for Albert and Ashley. They
Speaker 1: sat in jail for quite some time without proper representation,
Speaker 1: and that sets the stage for what happened with their
Speaker 1: attorneys once they got in court. Ashley hired private attorney
Speaker 1: Sandy Callahan and Albert was appointed Bill Mason, and both
Speaker 1: of these were highly respected attorneys. They had two very
Speaker 1: different perspectives of going into the trial. Albert's attorney's strategy
Speaker 1: was to not challenge the medical evidence to be presented
Speaker 1: by doctor Derrissol and the prosecutor. On the other hand,
Speaker 1: Ashley's attorney wanted and intended to challenge that medical evidence.
Speaker 1: In order to challenge the prosecution's medical evidence, Callahan brought
Speaker 1: in John Plunkett, a forensic expert, to talk about shaking
Speaker 1: baby syndrome or SPS. The science behind this diagnosis was
Speaker 1: starting to be questioned at the time. Experts had found
Speaker 1: other causes or conditions that could mimic symptoms of SPS. Today,
Speaker 1: SBS is acknowledged to be junk science. But there was
Speaker 1: a problem with Plunkett refuting Dr Derrissov. The judge Douglas
Speaker 1: Pullen did not require the prosecution to turn over the
Speaker 1: medical evidence they were going to use at trial, and
Speaker 1: there was no way that the defendant can't prepare a
Speaker 1: defense a medical defense without the evidence that the prosecutor has,
Speaker 1: And because of the collaborative efforts of the judge and
Speaker 1: the prosecutor in the case, the defense was of never
Speaker 1: able to get this information. So at that point Ashley's
Speaker 1: attorney asked for a continuance. Albert's attorney opposed it, and
Speaker 1: the judge, Judge Douglas Poland, denied it and so that
Speaker 1: was the context in which the trial began, so ultimately
Speaker 1: Ashley was unable to have a medical defense. In fact,
Speaker 1: Callahan didn't put on much of a defense for Ashley
Speaker 1: at all. During closing arguments, prosecutor Daily pointed out that
Speaker 1: the defense did not present any evidence contradicting Dr Deissov.
Speaker 1: Neither the defense attorney nor the judge stop the prosecutor
Speaker 1: when she shifted the burden too the devil Bots, saying
Speaker 1: they had the responsibility to present some evidence that this
Speaker 1: was not homicide, and they would have, but they don't
Speaker 1: have any evidence. And then they ended by arguing and
Speaker 1: closing that the state didn't even have to prove, really
Speaker 1: what we consider proof beyond a reasonable doubt. At the
Speaker 1: end of any trial, if there's a doubt, the jury
Speaker 1: must acquit. The prosecution's burden was to prove beyond any
Speaker 1: doubt that Albert and Ashley were guilty. But in her
Speaker 1: closing argument, Daily shifted the meaning of reasonable doubt, and
Speaker 1: she goes on and says, this means we don't have
Speaker 1: to prove that ninety percent. You don't have to be
Speaker 1: ninety percent sure, you don't have to be eighty percent sure.
Speaker 1: You don't have to be fifty one percent sure. It
Speaker 1: does not mean to a mathematical certainty. The fifty one
Speaker 1: percent sure is so offensive because it simply means that
Speaker 1: this prosecution doesn't have to present and doesn't have to
Speaker 1: meet any Burthen. Either Ashley nor Albert's attorneys objected to
Speaker 1: that misrepresentation of reasonable doubt, and Daily went on to
Speaker 1: make other misstatements and inaccuracies that the defense failed to
Speaker 1: object to as well. After a short four day trial,
Speaker 1: on October nine, Ashley and Albert were convicted of all
Speaker 1: three charges and sentenced to life in prison. When Ashley
Speaker 1: got to prison, she had no hope left. I will
Speaker 1: try to commit suicide, and in I tried to take
Speaker 1: all my appeals, and I had saw my medicine, and
Speaker 1: I tried to do it again, but a friend walked
Speaker 1: in and stopped me. Ashley knew she needed to create
Speaker 1: a routine if she wanted to survive, so she got
Speaker 1: a job and started making friends and taking courses and classes.
Speaker 1: One thing I learned while I was there was to
Speaker 1: stack your paper. And people say stack your paper your money.
Speaker 1: I think, no, stack your resume. In two thousand nine,
Speaker 1: Ashley's team moved for a new trial, arguing ineffective assistance
Speaker 1: of counsel based largely on a failure to present medical evidence,
Speaker 1: rebutting the state's case. A few years later, in Jimmy
Speaker 1: Nique came on Ashley's case, they were only arrested because
Speaker 1: there was a lack of the ability for them, as
Speaker 1: parents to explain what happened to their child. They were
Speaker 1: then denied the opportunity to have a full medical analysis
Speaker 1: of their case to get a fair day in court.
Speaker 1: That day finally came Judge Arthur Smith the Third heard
Speaker 1: medical testimonies from defense experts who concluded that Mackenzie's injuries
Speaker 1: likely happened before birth. After years of appeals being denied,
Speaker 1: finally on February, the Georgia Supreme Court vacated their convictions
Speaker 1: based on in effective assistance of counsel at trial. Tell
Speaker 1: me about when you found out Ashley and Albert we're
Speaker 1: going to get out. Oh I fat miss why. I
Speaker 1: just called me and told me. She told me. I
Speaker 1: dropped the phone. Brenda couldn't wait to tell her daughter
Speaker 1: the good news. She called me and I said, well, Astley,
Speaker 1: I said, y'all, convicion has been overturn sleety I heard
Speaker 1: h was she's she's screamed. She just just recism. She's
Speaker 1: a runnest, greedest Thanka. She comes a thank you ze,
Speaker 1: thank you ze Thanka. After their release, the current district
Speaker 1: Attorney Mark Jones apologized publicly to the devil Bots on
Speaker 1: behalf of the court. In his apology, Joan said, there
Speaker 1: is now quote mounting medical evidence that says the child
Speaker 1: was born this way. Ashley was finally free, but although
Speaker 1: she and Albert stayed in touch during their imprisonment and
Speaker 1: we're able to see each other occasionally, the trauma they
Speaker 1: had endured was too much for their marriage. While they
Speaker 1: were still incarcerated, Albert asked for a divorce. He was
Speaker 1: so busy fight for his life. How do you fight
Speaker 1: for your marriage to stay when you're trying to fight
Speaker 1: for your life? He said, he didn't even know me,
Speaker 1: no more of a wife. He didn't even remember me
Speaker 1: as that person. What did that feel like when he
Speaker 1: said when he said that, devastate? I was devastated. I
Speaker 1: felt less than I felt ugly because of course I
Speaker 1: can't dress up. It looked nice like I would if
Speaker 1: we were home, So whever time he saw me. I
Speaker 1: had on a jail uniform that was dirty and dingy.
Speaker 1: My hair wasn't comb like I like it in and
Speaker 1: it just looks awful. So I felt like maybe he
Speaker 1: thought I was ugly now, and maybe he couldn't remember
Speaker 1: what I looked like before this because all he see
Speaker 1: is this. So a lot of things ran through my mind.
Speaker 1: They never got to grieve for their child, and then
Speaker 1: we're left to sit in prison for years, the prime
Speaker 1: years of their lives while they waited hoping to get justice.
Speaker 1: The Devil Box can never go back. They can never
Speaker 1: go back and recover the years that they lost. But
Speaker 1: Ashley is trying. She moved into her own place, started working,
Speaker 1: is in school for health administration and management, and has
Speaker 1: made friends with her neighbor, Miss Jackie. We kind of
Speaker 1: bonded because she lost the child too. She lost her son,
Speaker 1: and we bonded off dealing with that as a whole
Speaker 1: as mother's. Like the rest of her large family, Ashley
Speaker 1: loves to cook and share meals. One day, Ashley was
Speaker 1: bringing over food to Miss Jackie, so I will just
Speaker 1: cook all this food like I had a big family
Speaker 1: living here with me, and I would take your food too,
Speaker 1: and that day Miss Jackie was with her daughter, Frieda,
Speaker 1: a sergeant in the military. When she met Freda, Ashley
Speaker 1: felt herself opening up to love again. I enjoyed being
Speaker 1: a wife. I enjoyed being a mom. I enjoyed that
Speaker 1: life and I wanted it back. But I just didn't
Speaker 1: know how I wanted it back because I was so
Speaker 1: afraid of people. I was afraid to trust people. I
Speaker 1: was afraid to be around people. And I looked up
Speaker 1: freed to one day and I was like, this is happening.
Speaker 1: We started talking, I guess talking in March, and I
Speaker 1: actually to marry me October one. Now actually is making
Speaker 1: a family with Frieda and Frieda's son. Everything is still
Speaker 1: so new to me and I'm learning, but I'm so
Speaker 1: glad that I have a partner that's willing to be
Speaker 1: patient with me and kind with me and loving with
Speaker 1: me and let me be a mother and additional mother
Speaker 1: to her son. Ashley is also focused on advocating for
Speaker 1: reform within the prison system. I'm using what happened to
Speaker 1: me as a beacon for goodness and for positiveness, because
Speaker 1: even though I was innocent, a lot of my friends
Speaker 1: are guilty and they have to do their time, but
Speaker 1: they still deserve to be treated with humane conditions and
Speaker 1: respecting dignity. And that's not what's happening in the prisons.
Speaker 1: But I would have never known that unless this happened
Speaker 1: to me. Ashley applied for compensation for her wrongful conviction
Speaker 1: from the state of Georgia. In Georgia, a specific bill
Speaker 1: has to be passed for each individual, and Ashley's bill
Speaker 1: for compensation was denied in two thousand twenty one. I
Speaker 1: asked Ashley if she has anything she'd like to say
Speaker 1: to listeners, and she does. If anybody's listening, mass' registered
Speaker 1: to vote. And I say this because there's over a
Speaker 1: hundred and ninety thousand people on parole and to say
Speaker 1: to Georgia and they're not allowed to vote. There's over
Speaker 1: nineteen thousand people that are on probation in Georgia and
Speaker 1: they're not allowed to vote. They get out of Prayerson
Speaker 1: after they're saved their time successfully, they pay taxes in
Speaker 1: the state that they're not allowed to even vote for
Speaker 1: the leadership over them in the actual state. So if
Speaker 1: you don't vote for anybody else, vote for those who
Speaker 1: can't vote for themselves. And that's all I gotta say.
Speaker 1: To help support the cause of ex offender voting rights,
Speaker 1: go to Women on the Rise g A dot org
Speaker 1: or the Southern Center for Human Rights at s c
Speaker 1: h R dot org. You'll find all those links in
Speaker 1: our bio. Next time, Unwrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling Charles Jackson.
Speaker 1: They put their guns on me. They asked me for
Speaker 1: my driver's license, shaw my name is, I guess just
Speaker 1: him and locked me up. So I had none to
Speaker 1: worry about because I didn't do anything. Three four days later,
Speaker 1: you know I was tired with murder. Thanks for listening
Speaker 1: to Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling. Please support your local
Speaker 1: innocence organizations and go to the links in our bio
Speaker 1: to see how you can help. I'd like to thank
Speaker 1: our executive producers Jason Flam and Kevin Wurtas, as well
Speaker 1: as our senior producer Annie Chelsea, producer Lila Robinson, and
Speaker 1: story editor Sonya Paul. The show is edited and mixed
Speaker 1: by Annie Chelsea, with additional production by Jeff Cleburne and
Speaker 1: Connor Hall. The music in this production is by three
Speaker 1: time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph be sure to follow
Speaker 1: us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful
Speaker 1: Conviction Podcast, and on Twitter at wrong Conviction, as well
Speaker 1: as at Lava for Good. On all three platforms, you
Speaker 1: can also follow me on both Instagram and Twitter at
Speaker 1: Maggie Freeling. Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling is a production
Speaker 1: of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with Signal Company
Speaker 1: Number one