Speaker 1: Hey there, folks. He has been on death row for
Speaker 1: thirty six years. But in the next week, one of
Speaker 1: two things is going to happen. He's either going to
Speaker 1: get a new trial or he is going to walk
Speaker 1: out of prison. And with that, welcome to this episode
Speaker 1: of Amy and TJ Presents. We don't get these everyday rogue.
Speaker 1: So we're talking about a guy who's been on death
Speaker 1: row for a long time and the clock is ticking,
Speaker 1: something's going to happen.
Speaker 2: That's right. This is one of Alabama's longest serving death
Speaker 2: row inmates, sixty three year old Michael Sockwell. Yes, he's
Speaker 2: been on death row for thirty six years. He's been
Speaker 2: on death row since nineteen ninety after he was convicted
Speaker 2: of killing a sheriff's deputy. His name was Isaiah Harris.
Speaker 2: But this is now a situation in which prosecutors, yes,
Speaker 2: have days to make a decision whether or not to
Speaker 2: retry Michael Sockwell. And this has serious implications in terms
Speaker 2: of the prosecutorial conduct and how they seeded the jury
Speaker 2: in Michael Sockwell's case.
Speaker 1: Let's be clear here, folks. We have seen a bunch
Speaker 1: of cases where the guilt or innocence of someone on
Speaker 1: death row is questioned. We've seen cases where they say
Speaker 1: circumstances are a little different and maybe the sentence need
Speaker 1: to be changed. That is not the conversation we're having here.
Speaker 1: No one's beating a drama and saying this man is
Speaker 1: innocent and we have evidence he needs to be off
Speaker 1: death row. What they're saying here, robe is he never
Speaker 1: got a fair trial in the first place.
Speaker 2: Correct, And we should point out Sockwell does maintain his innocence.
Speaker 2: He says he did not commit this crime. He actually
Speaker 2: has the finger pointed at someone specifically who he says,
Speaker 2: in fact, did the killing. But you are correct. This
Speaker 2: is not an issue of guilter innocence. This is an
Speaker 2: issue of who was seated on the jury and why
Speaker 2: and a DA who apparently had a quote significant history
Speaker 2: of refusing to seat black jurors on the jury.
Speaker 1: Big no, No, We've seen a lot of movies and
Speaker 1: actually we've seen a lot of actual trials. Lawyers get
Speaker 1: a lot of leeway and saying I don't want that
Speaker 1: juror for whatever reason. Sometimes you just get a strike.
Speaker 1: You just say nope, nope, nope, like yourself out. Sometimes
Speaker 1: you have to give a reason. You can't give a
Speaker 1: reason of they black, they gotta go right, that's not allowed.
Speaker 2: Yes, and specifically, this DA we're talking about. Her name
Speaker 2: is Ellen Brooks, but she in this case in particular,
Speaker 2: and there are other cases that the courts have cited,
Speaker 2: she struck eighty percent of qualified black prospective jurors, and
Speaker 2: qualified being the key. There was no other reason to
Speaker 2: disqualify them. They had preconceived notions, they were against the
Speaker 2: death penalty, they knew too much about the case. They
Speaker 2: didn't think they could be unbiased. No, none of that.
Speaker 2: Those are the reasons why you can strike a juror.
Speaker 2: You cannot strike a juror because they look like your defendant.
Speaker 2: And that's essentially what she put in her notes, that
Speaker 2: she struck a jurors specifically because he had the same
Speaker 2: he was the same race, the same sex, and the
Speaker 2: same age as the defendant.
Speaker 1: That'd be the exact guy what went on my jury, right,
Speaker 1: and that is the exact person this prosecutor did not want. Again,
Speaker 1: you can not do that. So roads they have been
Speaker 1: fighting and fighting and fighting for this guy for years.
Speaker 1: His attorney's happened. Finally in appeals court last year last
Speaker 1: summer stepped in voted. I think the vote was two
Speaker 1: to one, but saying yeah, his rights were violated, this
Speaker 1: guy should get a new trial, or you need to
Speaker 1: let him out of prison. Now that was last summer
Speaker 1: roadse But they gave a date and a deadline that
Speaker 1: now is it's knocking on the door.
Speaker 2: Yeah, March eighteen. That is next Wednesday. Depending. I don't
Speaker 2: know when anyone's listening to this, but yes, they got
Speaker 2: a couple of days left to actually pursue a new
Speaker 2: trial or he's released from prison. And initially the DA's
Speaker 2: office said yeah, we're definitely going to pursue knew charges
Speaker 2: were going to retry this case. And yet silence, crickets.
Speaker 1: Have corn, no quiet. Now are you going to go
Speaker 1: through with it?
Speaker 2: You know? I think they have to weigh the expense
Speaker 2: and look, multiple people were convicted for this crime, not
Speaker 2: just Sockwell, including the victim's wife, who police say was
Speaker 2: the mastermind of this killing.
Speaker 1: We've got it. There's got to be a snapped episode
Speaker 1: about this. The murder for hire is what they're saying was, Yes,
Speaker 1: the woman, the wife was behind it. She had the
Speaker 1: death penalty. Initially, I think was ended up that right
Speaker 1: ended up coming back to life in prison. But yes,
Speaker 1: she is serving for this crime. I think that is
Speaker 1: going to be his challenge robed in why this will
Speaker 1: get a new trial, because you're not just this isn't
Speaker 1: just the death penalty phase of it. We're talking about
Speaker 1: a whole new trial.
Speaker 2: Correct.
Speaker 1: So this is the guy you think is a cop killer,
Speaker 1: you got to retry it.
Speaker 2: Yes, So the crime, by the way, Sheriff Sipputy Isaiah Harris,
Speaker 2: he was on his way to work and police say
Speaker 2: that he was shot in the face. This happened in
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty eight. That's how far back this goes. But
Speaker 2: he was shot in the face in a murder for
Speaker 2: higher plot that was arranged by his wife. And yes,
Speaker 2: Harris's wife was convicted. She is now serving life in prison.
Speaker 2: But she was having an affair. She claimed she was
Speaker 2: being abused by her husband and she was having an affair. Now,
Speaker 2: Sockwell says, wasn't me, It was her lover. It was
Speaker 2: her the guy who she was having an affair with.
Speaker 2: That's who killed her husband, not me.
Speaker 1: And that is not what courts have been ruling on.
Speaker 1: They are not listening to his guilt or isn't innocence?
Speaker 1: They are listening to whether or not he got a
Speaker 1: fair trial, and that's the only determination. So rose that. So, yes,
Speaker 1: I think everybody on death row and cell block D
Speaker 1: says they're innocent, right, But so they're not listening to that.
Speaker 1: But the Supreme Court didn't necessarily take up the case.
Speaker 1: So after the court down there ruled he should get
Speaker 1: a new trial to get out of prison, Alabama appealed
Speaker 1: to the Supreme Court. Supreme Court essentially saying, we ain't
Speaker 1: trying to hear it. Yes, So they did not issue
Speaker 1: a ruling, They did not take up the case, and
Speaker 1: in doing so, the only decision that now stands is
Speaker 1: the one that's from that lower court. So, now, prosecutors,
Speaker 1: what you going to do? Yeah, we are literally he's waiting. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he's seven, he's been on death row for thirty six years,
Speaker 1: and he is days away from determining whether or not
Speaker 1: he's going to walk out of that place.
Speaker 2: That's an insane situation. And you know, I actually listening
Speaker 2: or reading the Federal Appeals Court ruling, I mean they
Speaker 2: were very strong in their language talking about the misconduct
Speaker 2: that took place in seeding this jury. They said Alabama
Speaker 2: prosecutors repeatedly and purposefully rejected qualified black jurors. And this
Speaker 2: was their their big statement that stood out. Equal justice
Speaker 2: under law requires a criminal trial free of racial discrimination
Speaker 2: in the jury selection process period, and that is why
Speaker 2: we are where we are today.
Speaker 1: This was Alabama in the late eighties.
Speaker 2: Yes, yes, and when they talked about and this all
Speaker 2: was detailed in this appellate court ruling. But the da
Speaker 2: Ellen Brooks and we mentioned, they said she had a
Speaker 2: significant history of striking jurors based on their racial basically
Speaker 2: if they were black. Let's just put it, say it
Speaker 2: like it is. And so they said that there were
Speaker 2: several instances of Ellen Brooks striking black jurors. The quote
Speaker 2: was Brooks purposefully struck black jurors in the cases she prosecuted.
Speaker 2: So this was not the only case.
Speaker 1: And it's not just and it's interesting. It was uh no,
Speaker 1: that's the cow My god, Did I really just try
Speaker 1: to recite precedent of Batson, bats and versus Kentucky. You
Speaker 1: are correct that, yes, bats and versus Kentucky is the one.
Speaker 1: It is the President sett in case to where you
Speaker 1: cannot discriminate based on race when it comes to juris
Speaker 1: because not only is it a violation of that defendants right,
Speaker 1: it's actually discrimination against the jury, your discrimination against that
Speaker 1: person for racial reasons. So this is well established and
Speaker 1: this is a major no no. And so Robes it's
Speaker 1: hard to argue with this to say, oh, he's a
Speaker 1: cop killer, just throw away the key. I mean, this
Speaker 1: is sometimes the beauty of our system. Robes that even yes,
Speaker 1: the guy convicted of being a cop killer went on trial,
Speaker 1: got the death penalty, we're determining thirty six years later,
Speaker 1: he wasn't treated fairly in the process. That there's some
Speaker 1: beauty in the system.
Speaker 2: There somewhere Ropes that that could eventually happen for a
Speaker 2: black man in Alabama.
Speaker 1: Yes, the problem is that it happened in the first place.
Speaker 2: Correct. And here there's another interesting twist to this in
Speaker 2: that the jury that convicted him, they voted seven to
Speaker 2: five for life imprisonment, so they voted against the death penalty,
Speaker 2: but the judge overrode the jury's recommendation and handed down
Speaker 2: the death sentence. Anyway, by the way, that is illegal now,
Speaker 2: but it was legal up until twenty seventeen. Alabama was
Speaker 2: the last state in this country to stop that practice
Speaker 2: of a judge being able to overturn a jury's recommendation
Speaker 2: for punishment. And so that happened to him. That couldn't
Speaker 2: happen today. If he were sentenced today, he would have
Speaker 2: gotten the life. He would have gotten life in prison,
Speaker 2: not the death compy.
Speaker 1: It's so it's wild that that was permitted at all.
Speaker 1: The jury decides what it wants to happen, and you're saying, nope,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna do something else. That's just bizarre. And one
Speaker 1: are the others that we've covered a lot of these,
Speaker 1: a lot of death penalty cases Forbes, the other I
Speaker 1: can't remember the states, but some of them even have
Speaker 1: where it doesn't have to be unanimous to get the
Speaker 1: death penalty.
Speaker 2: Correct, you're that it seems like when it's something that significant,
Speaker 2: it should be unanimous, just like the jury's verdict needs
Speaker 2: to be unanimous about guilt or innocence. It seems though,
Speaker 2: that same that same standard should be applied to whether
Speaker 2: or not you live or die.
Speaker 1: Can you imagine you found guilty and the vote was
Speaker 1: seven to.
Speaker 2: Five or something, Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: That's you're mad. I did put you on the spot.
Speaker 2: I don't know. I couldn't remember how many jurors are seated.
Speaker 1: I can see you have the look on your face.
Speaker 1: Is it terrified?
Speaker 2: Is it fourteen?
Speaker 1: I can't remember the idea there. It just that seems
Speaker 1: wild as well. So, yes, that a judge could override
Speaker 1: when a jury said what they wanted to have into
Speaker 1: the man. We should start there even with this case.
Speaker 2: All right, when we come back, we're going to tell
Speaker 2: you what the reaction was from the Sockwell camp to
Speaker 2: the Supreme Court's decision, and what may happen next. Welcome
Speaker 2: back everyone to this episode of Amy and TJ Presents.
Speaker 2: We are following a court case that is thirty six
Speaker 2: years in the making and only has a few days
Speaker 2: left for us to know what is going to happen next.
Speaker 2: We are talking about a case out of Montgomery County, Alabama,
Speaker 2: where sixty three year old Michael Sockwell has been on
Speaker 2: death row since nineteen ninety. He was convicted for a
Speaker 2: nineteen eighty eight killing of a sheriff's deputy. It was
Speaker 2: a murder for hire. The sheriff deputy's wife is behind bars.
Speaker 2: She was convicted initially to the death penalty, but I
Speaker 2: ended up getting life in prison, and now we have
Speaker 2: a The Supreme Court decided not to listen to the
Speaker 2: State of Alabama's appeal to a lower court's ruling that said,
Speaker 2: guess what, the DA acted improperly when seeding this jury.
Speaker 2: And this DA has a history of acting improperly. When
Speaker 2: I say improperly, she has a significant history of striking
Speaker 2: black jurors for black defendants. That's a big no no.
Speaker 1: We've seen attorneys question potential jurors before this process. I
Speaker 1: only imagine this one. She doesn't have to ask questions. Nope, nope, nope,
Speaker 1: black black, black, bye bye bye. Like that seems they
Speaker 1: are actually saying, that's all she was doing. You don't
Speaker 1: have to I'm saying, not literally, but quite frankly, don't
Speaker 1: need to ask them questions about their background. I don't need
Speaker 1: to look at the questionnaire. That's a black person. There's
Speaker 1: a black person. There's a black person. Don't want you
Speaker 1: on my jerry.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And in her notes she said it, there was
Speaker 2: no denying it, that there was no other reason to
Speaker 2: not seat them, and so they were all qualified to
Speaker 2: sit on that jury based on the questions they were asked.
Speaker 2: And that's the point, and she struck. There were ten
Speaker 2: potential black durers left to be seated. She struck eight
Speaker 2: of them for no reason other than the fact that
Speaker 2: they were black. You can't do that. And so yes,
Speaker 2: the court finally, thirty six years later, I guess this
Speaker 2: all this decision initially happened last summer in June of
Speaker 2: twenty twenty five. But they said, hey, okay, prosecution, you
Speaker 2: now have a timeline by March eighteenth. Either you start,
Speaker 2: or you retry this man, or you let him go.
Speaker 2: So Michael Sockwell either gets a new trial as of
Speaker 2: March eighteenth or he gets out of jail.
Speaker 1: They have to they have to try him. That you
Speaker 1: have to. They have to ropes. This is a guy
Speaker 1: that Nope, they're not saying is possibly innocent. Are you
Speaker 1: really going to say, okay, that was enough years. You
Speaker 1: serve thirty six and that was enough for killing a.
Speaker 2: Copy I agree from just from so many different points
Speaker 2: of view, they have to retry this case.
Speaker 1: Now, remind me where's this happening?
Speaker 2: Montgomery County, Alabama. And they said when, Yes, when, when
Speaker 2: this decision came down by the lower court, It was
Speaker 2: a federal court in June. The Montgomery County Prosecute the
Speaker 2: DA's and they said, Okay, we are absolutely going to
Speaker 2: retry this case. But they have not officially commented since
Speaker 2: the Supreme Court refused to hear the state's appeal, so
Speaker 2: we don't know. They haven't made another announcement since June
Speaker 2: of twenty twenty five as to what they're going to do.
Speaker 2: Maybe they were banking on the fact that the Supreme
Speaker 2: Court was going to back them up and throw out
Speaker 2: the Appellate Court's decision, but that did not happen, and
Speaker 2: so now the ball is literally in their court. And
Speaker 2: Michael Sockwell's defense lawyers had this to say when the
Speaker 2: Supreme Court decided not to rule or not to look
Speaker 2: into the Appellate Court's decision, they said, we appreciate the
Speaker 2: Supreme Court's decision. Michael has been denied his right to
Speaker 2: a fair trial for more than thirty five years, will
Speaker 2: continue to fight for his freedom.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen we've been looking at and covering the story.
Speaker 1: I haven't seen much of a drumbeat of anybody saying
Speaker 1: he's innocent to saying he's going to get a chance
Speaker 1: to present some new evidence that something is going to change.
Speaker 1: That's not that drum beat, correct.
Speaker 2: Well from Michael Sockwell, there is. He's claiming it was
Speaker 2: the wife's lover who actually killed the sheriff's deputy, not him.
Speaker 1: So the guy on trial is blaming somebody else. That's
Speaker 1: a new one. I'm saying, this is not that when
Speaker 1: it's not that thing. There have been plenty where there
Speaker 1: are questions. Even Hell, we've seen some of the families
Speaker 1: of the victims come forward and defend the defendant to
Speaker 1: a certain this is nothing along those lines. But he
Speaker 1: has denied a fair trial. Thirty six later, years later,
Speaker 1: we're trying to right or wrong. The wrong shouldn't have
Speaker 1: happened in the first place. Sure, but I mean you
Speaker 1: have to look at our system and go, Okay, this
Speaker 1: is how it's supposed to work exactly.
Speaker 2: And look, Michael Sockwell, as you point out, might still
Speaker 2: be convicted for this crime, and almost certainly will be.
Speaker 2: But will he get the death penalty? And that's the
Speaker 2: other big question because again, the jury that was initially seated,
Speaker 2: the jury that they say now was unfairly placed. The
Speaker 2: racial makeup, I believe was ten white jurors two black
Speaker 2: jurors that they voted against the death penal. They voted
Speaker 2: for life imprisonment, and it was the judge who gave
Speaker 2: him that death send. So at the very least, this
Speaker 2: new trial would actually be the difference between life or death.
Speaker 2: It might not be the difference between freedom and incarceration.
Speaker 2: But certainly he has a shot at he's sixty five
Speaker 2: years old, at growing old behind bars and potentially getting out.
Speaker 2: That's still on the table, on.
Speaker 1: The table, he has three options. But yeah, you're probably
Speaker 1: right that continue to have he'll get off death row, right,
Speaker 1: he will get I will imagine death row jury already
Speaker 1: didn't want him on death row, so here we are
Speaker 1: these years later. So yes, to that point, it's significant.
Speaker 1: It's significant this, this decision or lack of one by
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court might have just saved this man's life.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that is a very good way to put it.
Speaker 2: And we will of course continue to follow this story
Speaker 2: because yes, we are days away from getting an answer
Speaker 2: from Alabama's prosecution or Montgomery County curatorial team to see
Speaker 2: whether or not they will. I don't know how do
Speaker 2: you get a new trial. You just say we're now
Speaker 2: officially recharging or we're going to give him a new trial.
Speaker 2: I don't know what the announcement.
Speaker 1: Is, all right. The amount of paperwork, oh my goodness,
Speaker 1: assume and things that have to be filed to get
Speaker 1: this done and a judge has to sign off on it.
Speaker 1: But they'll get it done. But this is we are
Speaker 1: days away. We are going to find out, and wrote
Speaker 1: we are not used to in cases like this. The
Speaker 1: clock is usually ticking on the execution, correct, the clock
Speaker 1: is ticking on is the governor going to step into
Speaker 1: the Supreme Court going to step all those things? Now,
Speaker 1: it's rare that the clock is ticking because we're waiting
Speaker 1: on the prosecution to do something. Yeah, in a death
Speaker 1: row case?
Speaker 2: Right, But we wait, all right, we wait and we
Speaker 2: will watch and we will keep you all updated. Thank
Speaker 2: you though for listening to us. As always, I made
Speaker 2: Wroteboch alongside TJ. Holmes. We will talk to you soon.