Speaker 1: In Derek and Nancy Haysen were found brutally stabbed to
Speaker 1: death in their Bedford County, Virginia home. When their daughter,
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Haysen became a prime suspect, She and her boyfriend
Speaker 1: Yen z Ring, the son of a German diplomat, fled
Speaker 1: together on an international run from this double homicide. When
Speaker 1: Authoris caught up with them in London. YenS followed through
Speaker 1: on his promise in this scenario to use his diplomatic
Speaker 1: community in order to save the love of his life,
Speaker 1: Elizabeth from the electric chair, so he falsely confessed to
Speaker 1: the murders. Now, YenS had type OH blood and this
Speaker 1: was before DNA testing, so the type O blood founded
Speaker 1: the scene only served to corroborate his involvement, leading to
Speaker 1: his conviction. Elizabeth was convicted as an accessory. When that
Speaker 1: type of blood that convicted YenS was finally tested for DNA,
Speaker 1: it excluded him as the source. However, this was still
Speaker 1: not enough for the Commonwealth of Virginia to admit their
Speaker 1: mistake and set him free. On February fourth, two thousand nineteen,
Speaker 1: we released an interview with ensuring along with two of
Speaker 1: his most ardent supporters, the legendary author and former defense
Speaker 1: attorney and Innocence Project board member John Grisham, and Albemarle County,
Speaker 1: Virginia Sheriff Chip Harding. Since then, as many of you
Speaker 1: now know, the ensuring situation has improved immensely. In this episode,
Speaker 1: we will re release much of the original interview along
Speaker 1: with some new content, including an excerpt from an interview
Speaker 1: that I did with Dr Phil in which we spoke
Speaker 1: with YenS again from Buckingham Correctional Facility. We will of
Speaker 1: course keep you updated on this ongoing story. This is
Speaker 1: Wrongful Conviction. Hello, this is a prepaid get it calm
Speaker 1: from an inmate in Virginian Department of Corrections, Buckingham Correctional
Speaker 1: to accept it call press zero. This call is from
Speaker 1: a correction fatility and it's sometime you launitoring and recording.
Speaker 1: Thank you for Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flam.
Speaker 1: It's me, I'm your host, and today we have an
Speaker 1: episode that is uh going to rock your world. Um.
Speaker 1: We have three guests today. UM, I'm gonna save the
Speaker 1: best for last, but we have John Grisham in the
Speaker 1: studio with us. John, Welcome, delighted, to be here and
Speaker 1: Sheriff Chip Harding of albam Moyle County. Yes, Sir, going
Speaker 1: to be here, Virginia. And on the phone is Yen
Speaker 1: sirring one of the most remarkable people I know and
Speaker 1: one of the most extraordinary cases of injustice that we've
Speaker 1: ever covered on this show. So Yen's I always say,
Speaker 1: I'm I'm happy you're here, but I'm sorry you're here.
Speaker 1: Thank you for having me. I really appreciate the station
Speaker 1: and John as well. So this is a case that
Speaker 1: takes us back to the eighties, believe it or not, Um,
Speaker 1: a case that has all the makings of a John
Speaker 1: Grisham novel. Actually, um, because this goes back to Yen's
Speaker 1: when you were first an exchange student from Germany, a
Speaker 1: brilliant young scholar. From everything I'm told, there is a
Speaker 1: Jefferson scholar a freshman at the University of Virginia. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and do you want to take us back there and
Speaker 1: tell us how this started? Sure? Um, this was in
Speaker 1: the five Um. I arrived at the University of Virginia
Speaker 1: at a freshman, became prest new students there, and I
Speaker 1: messed a young woman there who was two and a
Speaker 1: half years older than I was, and we were both
Speaker 1: in the same plamatory. She had entered the University Lake
Speaker 1: because she had had an adventurous um she had gone
Speaker 1: to an English boarding school and run away with her
Speaker 1: girlfriends Europe, things like that, And so he came to
Speaker 1: u V a m private bit older than the rest
Speaker 1: of us in that dormitory. And I was, um, not
Speaker 1: an American citizen. My father was a German diplomat. That's
Speaker 1: why I was living in the United States. And her
Speaker 1: family came from South Africa and from Canada. So we
Speaker 1: were drawn to each other as being um foreigners, um
Speaker 1: not you know, not Americans. And in the course of
Speaker 1: that false semester we fell in love. And you know,
Speaker 1: it was quite surprised to everybody else from the dormatory
Speaker 1: because she was very experienced and very mature, and I was,
Speaker 1: I guess a nerd uh and uber nerd and virgin
Speaker 1: to boot it. So she was my christ girlfriend. You're
Speaker 1: a German uber version nerd. It's quite a combination against
Speaker 1: And she was a beautiful young woman, striking woman, um
Speaker 1: who you know, anyone in your situation would have probably
Speaker 1: fallen head over heels for considering the circumstances, but it
Speaker 1: was of course a faithful star across love affair, yes,
Speaker 1: and it was a very short little love affair as well.
Speaker 1: Um three months after we started dating, or maybe four months,
Speaker 1: we went to washing DC spend a weekend together, and
Speaker 1: in the course of that weekend, she told me that
Speaker 1: she was still using drugs, which he had previously told
Speaker 1: me he had to stop doing, and that she needed
Speaker 1: to use our rental car to run some drugs from
Speaker 1: us DC to her dealer, who was also the university
Speaker 1: student back in Charlottesville. And I wanted to come along,
Speaker 1: but she wouldn't let me because she said that I
Speaker 1: was such a nerd, no ruth, you would want to
Speaker 1: be business around me. Um. So she drove off in
Speaker 1: the car by herself and came back eight hours later
Speaker 1: and told me she had killed her parents, and she
Speaker 1: said the drugs had me to do it and they
Speaker 1: had deserved it anyway, and if I didn't help her,
Speaker 1: she would be executed. She would be back then they
Speaker 1: used the elected to she said that they would fry her.
Speaker 1: She said that I should be her alibi until the police.
Speaker 1: She would with me in Washington, and I told her
Speaker 1: that that would never ever work, because the police never
Speaker 1: believe boyfriends or husbands or wives and people like that.
Speaker 1: So I came up with this brilliant idea, UM based
Speaker 1: on Charles Dickens a Tale of Two Cities of all things. Um,
Speaker 1: I would take the blame for her. I would take
Speaker 1: the rap for her and save her life. That was
Speaker 1: based on a character in this Chirst novel, UM Sydney Carton,
Speaker 1: who did that in the In this novel, the difference
Speaker 1: was that in the novel a particular character actually did
Speaker 1: get existed. Whereas my father was a German diplomat, I
Speaker 1: thought I had diplomatic community. I thought that I could
Speaker 1: take the blame for her crime. And all that would
Speaker 1: happen with me was about the sent back to Germany
Speaker 1: and put in prison there in intuvenile prison for about
Speaker 1: ten years. And I thought that giving ten years of
Speaker 1: my life was worth saving r life from the electric two. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it's sort of a twisted nobility. People do crazy things
Speaker 1: for love all the time. And we were talking about
Speaker 1: this earlier again, and I said that such a strange
Speaker 1: fate that you happen to have only been with one
Speaker 1: woman and she turned out to be the devil. The
Speaker 1: devil is a little oversimplified. She was later diagnosed with
Speaker 1: a very severe personality disorder, so he actually had serious
Speaker 1: mental health issues. And of course they she claimed that
Speaker 1: her mother had sexually appeased her listen the knowledge and
Speaker 1: cooperation of her father, and you know, there's there's some
Speaker 1: indications that was that may have actually been true. Ums,
Speaker 1: we'll never know for sure. Now, she was a troubled
Speaker 1: young woman. As things developed, you initially were not suspects,
Speaker 1: but then at some point you decided to make a getaway.
Speaker 1: And this is back in the days when for people
Speaker 1: don't remember in the eighties, you can sort of travel
Speaker 1: the world under a different name and it wasn't so
Speaker 1: tightly monitored or regulated. And so you guys went around
Speaker 1: the world and ultimately ended up in England. And that's
Speaker 1: when things began to go wrong, right, because you were
Speaker 1: ultimately arrested for passing bad checks. And then we get
Speaker 1: to the point where the false confessions come in, or
Speaker 1: your false confessions. So the police to both Elizabeth and
Speaker 1: me back from the jail to the police station and
Speaker 1: they actually wrote into the police station lab book that
Speaker 1: I was to be held in Canina Caado. In other ways,
Speaker 1: I was to be isolated from the outside world and
Speaker 1: not give an access to my lawyer. And that's exactly
Speaker 1: what they did for four days. They interrogated me for
Speaker 1: four days, many many hours, dozens and dozens and dozens
Speaker 1: of hours. And then finally on the fourth day, um
Speaker 1: when I decided to keep my promise to Elizabeth that
Speaker 1: I had made fifteen months earlier, and I decided to
Speaker 1: take the blame for what she did. And that's what
Speaker 1: I did. I told them this story that she and
Speaker 1: I had cooked up. And of course that fast confession
Speaker 1: contained many mistakes that the real killer would not have made.
Speaker 1: I described the clothing of one victim incorrectly, and I'm
Speaker 1: placed the other victim in the wrong room. And there
Speaker 1: were numerous mistakes like that, which you know, should have
Speaker 1: learned the police to the fact that I might not
Speaker 1: be telling the truth. In addition to that, of course,
Speaker 1: at that time, the police who were interrogating me were
Speaker 1: in possession of an FBI crime scene profile right one
Speaker 1: of the people invented crime scene profiling, one of the
Speaker 1: leading special agents, and that profile said that the crime
Speaker 1: had been committed by a woman in a close relationship
Speaker 1: to the victims. And of course I was a man,
Speaker 1: and I didn't know that it like the one time
Speaker 1: for twenty minutes, um, so they should have known that
Speaker 1: the story I was telling them was not true. And then,
Speaker 1: of course the other thing that happened is is that
Speaker 1: just a couple of hours after I told the police
Speaker 1: that I did it, Elizabeth told the police that he
Speaker 1: did it. He said, I did it myself. I got
Speaker 1: off on it. I did it myself. I got off
Speaker 1: on it. But by that stage the police had decided
Speaker 1: that I was a guilty one. So they actually let
Speaker 1: her withdraw that confession, which is hilarious in a way
Speaker 1: because um, they found hosting the prince at the time
Speaker 1: scene and not mine, and uh you know, it's, um yeah,
Speaker 1: quite incredible that they let her withdraw that confession, but
Speaker 1: they did, and so they ended up charging me with
Speaker 1: being that and they talked an things that accomplice and
Speaker 1: they took me on trial and convicted me of something
Speaker 1: that I didn't do. And I do want to bring
Speaker 1: John and Chip into the conversation to just to talk
Speaker 1: about this scenario that took place in England and the
Speaker 1: immediate aftermath of it. John you were a criminal defense
Speaker 1: lawyer in your younger years. Yeah, it goes back to
Speaker 1: a confession, false confession. There's no other proof, two convicions
Speaker 1: of the murder, so all they have is a false confession.
Speaker 1: And with any false confession case, what you would hope
Speaker 1: that the authorities do is once they managed to extract
Speaker 1: the confession and whatever technics they used to do that
Speaker 1: is that they will match it up to the physical
Speaker 1: events to see if it in fact matches and false
Speaker 1: confessions virtually never match up because there are too many
Speaker 1: details specifics in the murder, the method of murder, or
Speaker 1: the place, the blood, the blood splattered, the clothing, the room, whatever.
Speaker 1: There's a whole fingerprints, footprints, and there's a long list
Speaker 1: of items that you know. The police go through the investigation,
Speaker 1: and with a false confession, it's usually fairly simple to
Speaker 1: realize once you start matching the confession given by somebody
Speaker 1: who wasn't there, it's impossible for them to remember all
Speaker 1: the details that the real killer would actually know where
Speaker 1: he left the bodies, how he killed him, while you
Speaker 1: know who who did what, what was on the kitchen table,
Speaker 1: what was knocked over, what was spilt? These are all,
Speaker 1: you know, it's a fairly common consense, and in Yen's case,
Speaker 1: you know there were so many discrepancies between his confession
Speaker 1: and the actual physical crime scene. You just want to
Speaker 1: scream and say, why didn't somebody put these together match
Speaker 1: them up? And what frustrates me is when you get
Speaker 1: to trial and you have what you think should be
Speaker 1: a competent defense lawyer who can walk through the confession
Speaker 1: step bust up, bust up, and show the discrepanties between
Speaker 1: the confession and the actual crum scene. I'm not sure
Speaker 1: if this was done or attempted in YenS case, but
Speaker 1: it certainly was not effective. And so that's that's what
Speaker 1: we always start in a false confession case is let's
Speaker 1: match it up with the proof, and it never matches up.
Speaker 1: It never does. And this was a crazy case because,
Speaker 1: on top of all the other factors that led to
Speaker 1: his wrangful conviction, I think there was an inherent bias.
Speaker 1: I can't prove this because of the fact that it
Speaker 1: was Bedford County, which ironically was the county that lost
Speaker 1: more soldiers in World War Two to the Germans per
Speaker 1: capita than anywhere else in the United States. That's why
Speaker 1: the World War Two memorial is there, and so I
Speaker 1: think that there's at least an argument that the odds
Speaker 1: was stacked against the ends from the beginning. UM. I
Speaker 1: want to bring Sheriff Harding into the conversation. UM, Sheriff Harding,
Speaker 1: You've been in law enforcement for several decades, four decades, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, his resume is is nuts when you look
Speaker 1: at the number of a creditations he has, in the
Speaker 1: number of awards he's won, and he's one of the
Speaker 1: most accomplished people in law enforcement the United States. And
Speaker 1: you've dived into this case with all guns blazing, so
Speaker 1: to speak, and you've examined this evidence eighteen ways till Sunday.
Speaker 1: Is it theoretically possible that Jen's committed this crime? Is
Speaker 1: it possible? I mean he could have been dropped down
Speaker 1: with us from a spaceship and done it. But is
Speaker 1: it logical he he was there when these murders occurred?
Speaker 1: Extremely unlikely he was there. There's nothing that puts him
Speaker 1: there other than this false confession. And as John was
Speaker 1: saying earlier, UM, the confession didn't match the crime scene
Speaker 1: when you look at it. I mean, there was some
Speaker 1: huge discrepancies that weren't followed up. You had a young investigator,
Speaker 1: his first homicide case you'd ever investigated, and I'm I'm
Speaker 1: reading the transcript going, you've gotta be kidding me. You
Speaker 1: didn't do any follow up. Plus they didn't take the confession.
Speaker 1: So when he gets the court very skillfully, the prosecutor
Speaker 1: only asked questions that were consistent with the crime scene
Speaker 1: in the event and admitted the inconsistencies. And as John
Speaker 1: was pouring out, he had a very very ineffective defense
Speaker 1: attorney that didn't bring that to the attention of the jury.
Speaker 1: Is details that corroberate the confession. At the time of trial,
Speaker 1: the prosecutor pointed out to the jury twenty six times
Speaker 1: that the police found some O type blood at the
Speaker 1: crime scene, and that I was the only person involved
Speaker 1: in the case who had type of blood. The victims
Speaker 1: did not have type of blood, and my girlfriend did
Speaker 1: not have type of blood. The only person involved in
Speaker 1: the case was type old blood was me. Is what
Speaker 1: the prosecutor told the jury twenty six times. And it
Speaker 1: would take another two and a half decades to find
Speaker 1: out to DNA testing that indeed, that word type of
Speaker 1: blood that was left by somebody else. So the fact
Speaker 1: that seemed to corroberate the cons at the time of trial,
Speaker 1: if mouth shown to actually disproved the confession about a
Speaker 1: sheriff harding, what percentage of the population has this type
Speaker 1: of blood? I think it's about isn't it pretty right?
Speaker 1: So I mean that really is I mean, it's a
Speaker 1: ridiculous thing to try to pin anything on, but yet
Speaker 1: the prosecutor mentioned it twenty six time. It's also worth
Speaker 1: mentioning that YenS is lead trial lawyer, was disbarred a
Speaker 1: few years after your wrongful conviction, and he was disbarred
Speaker 1: because of mental illness. Drugs were a factor in all
Speaker 1: of this, and it was shown that he was suffering
Speaker 1: from this during the time of your trial. So it's
Speaker 1: just another important thing to recognize. This is a nightmare
Speaker 1: that no one can imagine living through. Yould, You had
Speaker 1: been in jail in England for quite some time before
Speaker 1: you even came to trial. You had nothing in your
Speaker 1: life experience that would prepare you for any of this,
Speaker 1: and now here you are in the in the grip
Speaker 1: of the justice system in Virginia. It's sort of an
Speaker 1: arch villain, right, And what was this like? For you
Speaker 1: to go through this UM. At that stage, I had
Speaker 1: already been in prison for four years fighting expeditions UM
Speaker 1: from England to the United States. For most of those
Speaker 1: four years I was convinced. Then all my lawyers were convinced,
Speaker 1: and everybody thought that I would definitely be sentenced to death. UM.
Speaker 1: So I spent four years in prison in effect psychologically
Speaker 1: on death row. Everybody, including my own team totally I
Speaker 1: had no chance of avoiding the electric too UM. And
Speaker 1: then at the last minute that was avoided. We were
Speaker 1: an appeal at the European product Human Rights and I
Speaker 1: was brought back to America. And that sort of thing
Speaker 1: hasn't effect on you psychologically living in prison for four
Speaker 1: years believing that you're gonna die O inclusively in the
Speaker 1: electric two. And I got brought back to Virginion. Everybody
Speaker 1: hated me, everybody was convinced ELSs guilty and it was
Speaker 1: really scary and I did not handle it well. I
Speaker 1: did not handle it well. UM. But again you have
Speaker 1: to put it as against the background of my having
Speaker 1: spent three years under comminent threat of death, then coming
Speaker 1: into the ZO atmosphere and having to see Elizabeth Haysten
Speaker 1: a woman that that sacrificed myself for get up understand
Speaker 1: and touched herself and tell all these lives to put
Speaker 1: me away in prison. And when I say that he
Speaker 1: contured herself, that's not just the claim I make. Um.
Speaker 1: Twenty six years later, he actually admitted that in a
Speaker 1: newspaper interviews. He admitted that he touted herself at that trial.
Speaker 1: But at that time nobody knew that and nobody cared.
Speaker 1: They just wanted the witness and she did that job.
Speaker 1: And my own post confession and the blood, that's what
Speaker 1: did me end. Then the sock print, of course, was
Speaker 1: a ridiculous piece of evidence that no no serious person
Speaker 1: should have ever even it shouldn't been allowed in court,
Speaker 1: and it shouldn't have been in the way that was
Speaker 1: done was very devious. Um, and Sheriff Harding, I want
Speaker 1: to talk to you because, UM, it's interesting to me
Speaker 1: that you know, Yen's has assembled this remarkable team and
Speaker 1: it's a great credit to him. And you're an interesting
Speaker 1: character in this because you're a conservative guy or a
Speaker 1: guy who's obviously law and order guy, and yet you
Speaker 1: have devoted yourself selflessly and spent time that you could
Speaker 1: have been doing anything else two hundreds of hours to
Speaker 1: this case. Um, so can you talk about that, and
Speaker 1: then can you talk about the the actual uh forensic evidence? Right. Well,
Speaker 1: his attorney, Stephen Rosenfield, asked me to take a look
Speaker 1: at part of the pardon petition to see if I
Speaker 1: could find a way to strengthen it or to see
Speaker 1: if he's miss missed something in it. And I told
Speaker 1: Steve at the beginning, I felt like Hen's was guilty
Speaker 1: based on everything I've seen. I know Governor Kane had
Speaker 1: tried to send him back to Germany. I was opposed
Speaker 1: to that because I felt like he was guilty. He
Speaker 1: should have been given any special consideration just because he
Speaker 1: was a German. But so Steve gave me the case.
Speaker 1: It won't take about a couple of hours. Well, I
Speaker 1: ended up taking a bunch of stuff home that night.
Speaker 1: My wife thought I lost my mind because I spent
Speaker 1: basically the whole weekend the dining room table covered with
Speaker 1: material that Steve gave me, and I said, oh my god,
Speaker 1: this is nothing like what was represented. And in conclusion, um,
Speaker 1: I interupriting nineteen page letter to the governor breaking down
Speaker 1: the closing arguments of the case. You know, it's the
Speaker 1: strength of the government's case Last might at the Apple
Speaker 1: and I broke that down. And then after that was published,
Speaker 1: I had another investigator work with me for twenty five years, said,
Speaker 1: let me help former FBI agent that I know that
Speaker 1: I worked in another case with jumped in and one
Speaker 1: of the original investment bed for investigator said he felt
Speaker 1: like ends had been railroaded and was in us. And also,
Speaker 1: so the four of us have been working in collectively,
Speaker 1: we've given a couple of thousand hours. And um, you
Speaker 1: want to talk briefly about to forensics. The old blood
Speaker 1: was very powerful, as was mentioned, um, and I will
Speaker 1: say if I was on that jury, I would have
Speaker 1: convicted him based on it the way the evidence was
Speaker 1: represented so skillfully by the prosecutor. The old blood now
Speaker 1: we know absolutely no one can test the fact that's
Speaker 1: not you insure And he's not been detected in the
Speaker 1: crime scene. But two other males, one with a b
Speaker 1: blood and one with old blood, had been detected in
Speaker 1: the crime scene and we have not identified those people.
Speaker 1: In my opinion, Bedford County should consider having an open
Speaker 1: homicide investigation. Then you look at the next piece of
Speaker 1: evidence that was pretty powerful. The Commonwealth um originally got
Speaker 1: a certificate of analysis from the State Bureau of Forensics
Speaker 1: saying that the shoe in sick size was consistent with
Speaker 1: a six and a half to seven and a half
Speaker 1: woman shoe a man five or six. Well, they originally
Speaker 1: had and this just blew my mind. They originally had
Speaker 1: a small female as a prime suspect in this thing.
Speaker 1: And the prosecutor wrote a letter and we got a
Speaker 1: copy of it attached with the draft aff of David
Speaker 1: saying that he wanted this woman's blood, fingerprints and shoe
Speaker 1: impressions because her shoe was consistent with what was in
Speaker 1: the crime scene. Now that you turn and go to trial,
Speaker 1: you don't hear anything. The defense attorney brings nothing up.
Speaker 1: They bring in a non qualified individual to testify. He
Speaker 1: did a what we like to refer to as a
Speaker 1: magic trick, created an over the lay of impression of
Speaker 1: Yen's foot and staid it basically fits like a glove,
Speaker 1: reminds you of O J. And he was even instructed
Speaker 1: he could not testify as an expert. But when you
Speaker 1: look at the closing arguments of the prosecutor, he says
Speaker 1: he can only fit one man, one man in the
Speaker 1: world could and he points a yensering and we know
Speaker 1: that's hoop law, that's junk evidence. And the same the
Speaker 1: same man that that put this on in front of
Speaker 1: the jury, Robert halott Um, did the same thing in
Speaker 1: another case where a man was given the death penalty,
Speaker 1: and thank god it took a few years. He did
Speaker 1: not get executed. DNA prude, He absolutely didn't do it.
Speaker 1: So you have here, you have the same junk science
Speaker 1: being used again. There was a juror that gave an
Speaker 1: affidavit to the attorneys and said it was tied six
Speaker 1: six in the jury room. They wanted to take a
Speaker 1: look at the sock and shoe evidence again and he
Speaker 1: said that's what turned the tide. And we know now
Speaker 1: that's ludicrous. Um, they're really two parts. You've got a
Speaker 1: false confession and you also have a false alibib. You've
Speaker 1: got Elizabeth who claimed she stayed at the hotel room
Speaker 1: and when Yenz came back. She said, Yenz comes back
Speaker 1: that night after midnight and a sheet covered in blood
Speaker 1: from head to toe in the rental vehicle, and YenS
Speaker 1: asked her to clean it up with Coca cola. Yet
Speaker 1: that vehicle was tested with lumin all and I've never
Speaker 1: had a case where blood had been present even bleacher
Speaker 1: gotten it all out, no indication of any blood at all,
Speaker 1: and was testimony from the folks to the rental agency
Speaker 1: that the car was an Imaculica edition, no signs of
Speaker 1: any Coca Cola. We have since learned and digging in
Speaker 1: the little limited information we can see, um that there
Speaker 1: was actually blood found in the trap of the shower
Speaker 1: of the master bedroom and that share wall illuminated like
Speaker 1: fourth of julyas so it gives us the impression as
Speaker 1: investigators at least one of the participants in this homicide
Speaker 1: took a shower, So why would he be covered in
Speaker 1: blood from head to toe. It's impossible, Sheriff Hardy, on
Speaker 1: top of all the other evidence and FBI agents like
Speaker 1: Ed Saulsback who came forward and others to say that
Speaker 1: there had been evidence that had been hidden or or
Speaker 1: not turned over and not disclosed in the way that
Speaker 1: the law mandates that it must be. There's also the
Speaker 1: uh in chapter eighteen of the book, A far, far
Speaker 1: Better Thing. There's the story of the car in the
Speaker 1: woods right, which would again, if you would think that
Speaker 1: this alone would be enough to send Yends home. Um,
Speaker 1: you know, and I'm going to quote from the book again.
Speaker 1: Uh you know. In two thousand and eleven, Tony of
Speaker 1: you Can, in the retired of a Lynchburg area auto
Speaker 1: transmission Stops, said that three to five months after the
Speaker 1: murder car was towed into his shop for repairs, it's
Speaker 1: undercarriage matted with grass and mud, as if it had
Speaker 1: been sitting in the woods for a while. The tow
Speaker 1: truck driver told Buchanan the two door chevel they belonged
Speaker 1: to quote some college kids. And here's the important part.
Speaker 1: He said in this one statement that when he looked inside,
Speaker 1: he saw that the floorboard on the driver's side was
Speaker 1: quote full of dried blood. Beside the console between the
Speaker 1: front seats, also covered and dried blood, was a single
Speaker 1: edged hunting type knife, the same type that was used
Speaker 1: to kill the Hasoms. Now I'm sitting here, I've got
Speaker 1: chills just reading that. And you know, he this same
Speaker 1: guy testified or swore and affidated that the Ends was
Speaker 1: not one of the people that returned the car. Elizabeth
Speaker 1: was one and somebody else was the other. But yet
Speaker 1: here we go again. Yeah, he claianced, just a shame.
Speaker 1: So much time has passed. He claimed that he called
Speaker 1: and spoke to Ricky Gardner, who was leading vest together
Speaker 1: now chief Deputy in Bedford, and told him about this.
Speaker 1: Gardner Di Nazette says it didn't happen. Um, so so
Speaker 1: much time has passed. Some of the investigators did work
Speaker 1: that lead, and we kind of ran it out because
Speaker 1: time time was not on our side. We tried to
Speaker 1: find any documentation with material checks and all that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff. The banks just don't have it from back
Speaker 1: in that. But if they've been followed up home properly
Speaker 1: at the time, same way, if they had sent investigators
Speaker 1: to the hotel they'd stayed at, it had cleared it
Speaker 1: up right away that YenS was there. She wasn't. It
Speaker 1: was his story of what he purchased was consistent with
Speaker 1: the hotel bill which she said she purchased when she
Speaker 1: stayed there was very inconsistent way over with the bill
Speaker 1: showed in it. And there were three or four more
Speaker 1: things that Elizabeth says that occurred. We can disprove with
Speaker 1: her alibi. But you know, the bottom line is that
Speaker 1: most frustrating for me is everything that has come out
Speaker 1: of that woman's mouth. It's provable that she's lying, where
Speaker 1: it's highly suspects she's lying. We've looked very hard and
Speaker 1: everything at YenS has said, and we have not caught
Speaker 1: him in a lie. We were talking about a case
Speaker 1: in which a couple was brutally murdered, stabbed multiple times,
Speaker 1: each of them very bloody crime scene, rich with biological
Speaker 1: evidence from the actual killers. In theory, you also had
Speaker 1: a logical explanation for this in that Elizabeth had said
Speaker 1: multiple times that she had been sexually abused by her mother,
Speaker 1: that her father may have been involved in this in
Speaker 1: some way. There was a clear motive in that sense.
Speaker 1: We had drugs, which no one ever claimed that you
Speaker 1: were on drugs, but we know that she was doing
Speaker 1: hard drugs and that she was running with a very
Speaker 1: nefarious crew back then and would have had access to
Speaker 1: the type of people who might commit a murder like this.
Speaker 1: People who knew you back then, including some people for
Speaker 1: law enforcement, said that it was even Elizabeth said, it
Speaker 1: was ludicrous to think that you could have committed a
Speaker 1: brutal crime like this because you're not a physically imposing guy.
Speaker 1: It have had to overpower two adults. None of it
Speaker 1: ever made any sense, and there should have been should
Speaker 1: have been relatively simple. And now, of course, so many
Speaker 1: people have weighed in on this, including Chuck Read, one
Speaker 1: of the original investigators in the case, who has said
Speaker 1: in emphatic terms that it could not have been you,
Speaker 1: that he doesn't believe it was you. And yet we
Speaker 1: still find ourselves in this situation where we're still all
Speaker 1: trying to get you out. It's been very, very difficult
Speaker 1: for me, especially over the last two and a half
Speaker 1: years since the parting petition was submitted based on the
Speaker 1: DNA evidence. It's been really difficult for me because for
Speaker 1: thirty years we thought there was no DNA evidence in
Speaker 1: this case that could prove my innocence. And then after
Speaker 1: it was actually I on the phone worked my lawyer,
Speaker 1: Steve Rosenfield, flipping through some old forensics I found, and
Speaker 1: you know, that's what the Parton depiction is based on.
Speaker 1: A half years later, we cannot get anybody to backed
Speaker 1: on it, and that's you know, and then and then
Speaker 1: nobody going to listen more accept it or do anything
Speaker 1: about it. Maybe you guys can try to give me
Speaker 1: some insight as to why this case is such a
Speaker 1: difficult one to resolve in the face of such overwhelming
Speaker 1: evidence of innocence. How do you explain this touch on
Speaker 1: I can't explain it, and I think you know, Jason
Speaker 1: from your working in the innocence world. It's as frustrating
Speaker 1: as this is, it's not unusual. We We've had cases
Speaker 1: before where we have to fight tooth and nail to
Speaker 1: obtain DNA testing for one of our clients, and we
Speaker 1: get the DNA testing, all the objections of the local
Speaker 1: prosecutors and local law enforcement. We get the DNA testing,
Speaker 1: It clears our clients, slash inmate, whatever, and so he's cleared, Okay.
Speaker 1: Then it takes a year procedurally to get him out.
Speaker 1: Oftentimes the prosecutor will say, well, I don't really believe
Speaker 1: the DNA results. We're gonna try you again, and so
Speaker 1: they bring him back to the local jail where they
Speaker 1: can keep him forever again. As frustrating as it is,
Speaker 1: I'm ashamed to say, it's not that unusual. Most frustrating
Speaker 1: for me is the law enforcement. I'm in law enforcement,
Speaker 1: and I hope I'm respecting law enforcement. I'm a sitting sheriff,
Speaker 1: and yet the sitting sheriff in Bedford County refuses to
Speaker 1: meet with me and even discuss the case. The lead
Speaker 1: investigator won't meet with the four of us who have
Speaker 1: given thousands of hours pro bono. We don't have anything
Speaker 1: in it. We're just looking for justice. We asked for
Speaker 1: one hour and he says he doesn't have time. However,
Speaker 1: we do have him caught on videotape saying a few
Speaker 1: years ago, this happened, thirty years ago, he was convicted
Speaker 1: in court. Why do we need to go any further
Speaker 1: than And I think that's the attitude, which is it's
Speaker 1: really shut down from an investigative standpoint. We've not had
Speaker 1: access to the investigative files or any further testing because
Speaker 1: I'm out of my jurisdiction and getting absolutely no cooperation
Speaker 1: from Bedford. Yeah, they won't even allow you to test
Speaker 1: the DNA of two guys that we know are in
Speaker 1: for committing similar crimes in another county in Virginia, who
Speaker 1: we don't. We have no idea whether they committed this
Speaker 1: crime or not, but there's there's some reason to believe
Speaker 1: that they were. These two guys knife demand multiple times
Speaker 1: to death within a few days, and that far from
Speaker 1: the Haysome residents, whether those victims were located, and these
Speaker 1: two folks, one of them at least was accord to
Speaker 1: his background, and we've read was involved in in heavy
Speaker 1: drugs and the Lynchburg area, as we believe Elizabeth was.
Speaker 1: She was admitted heroin user. And there there DNA should
Speaker 1: be in the data bank. They're both doing life for
Speaker 1: that murder, and we simply ask, would you take those
Speaker 1: profiles compare them to the crime scene, and the state
Speaker 1: says can't do it that jurisdiction where the offense occurred.
Speaker 1: They have to request it into our knowledge. They're not
Speaker 1: doing anything, which is just remarkable, right when you think
Speaker 1: about the idea that they just refused to test something
Speaker 1: that can only prove like one or another, either these
Speaker 1: guys did it or they didn't. Why wouldn't we want
Speaker 1: to know? We want to know from investigative standpoint, do
Speaker 1: we want to keep following those two guys as a
Speaker 1: lead or can they be excluded based on the DNA
Speaker 1: very somebody would take about three or four minutes to
Speaker 1: compare those barcodes. It's so frustrating. I'm used to working
Speaker 1: in my own jurisdiction. If I want something tested. I
Speaker 1: asked Glad to do it. They do it. If I
Speaker 1: want to search one, I get it. If I have
Speaker 1: witnesses and we have two or three people that need
Speaker 1: to be interview in this case, they refuse to cooperate whatsoever.
Speaker 1: I don't have any grandeur authority to serve as a
Speaker 1: peno on them. So it's I really feel for the
Speaker 1: Innocence project. I see what they go through now now
Speaker 1: that I'm on the other side. Defense, I feel like
Speaker 1: you're operating with both hands tied behind your back. Everything's
Speaker 1: working against you. So you gotta put a lot more
Speaker 1: work and effort into it than you really should and
Speaker 1: try to get to the truth, which we all should want.
Speaker 1: But apparently we don't all always want the truth and justice.
Speaker 1: Something I want to touch on before I turn over
Speaker 1: to John for a second, which is that back in
Speaker 1: two thousand and eight or nine, with the support of
Speaker 1: Bishop Sullivan and other luminaries both religious and political figures,
Speaker 1: Governor Kane granted a conditional pardon. I guess you would
Speaker 1: say that would have allowed you to go back to Germany,
Speaker 1: and then as literally as you were packing your bags,
Speaker 1: the new governor came in. Governor McDonald, and he revoked
Speaker 1: for the first time and then two and thirty four
Speaker 1: year history of Virginia, he revoked the previous governor's order
Speaker 1: and decided that you would be kept in prison. I
Speaker 1: think in Yan's case, though we are pressing ahead cautiously
Speaker 1: optimistic that the right people are listening to us. We
Speaker 1: are almost sanctimonious in our belief that we are right
Speaker 1: and we're not going to stop, slow down, or be quiet.
Speaker 1: And you know, we have several avenues left. It's not
Speaker 1: hopeless by any means. We don't view it as hopeless.
Speaker 1: We we think we can smell victory. John was just
Speaker 1: thinking about the multiple avenues available. Um, most innozens cases
Speaker 1: have only one real option, and that's a pardon, and
Speaker 1: that's usually a full part, and that makes it very
Speaker 1: difficult because somebody has to admit that they made a
Speaker 1: terrible mistake. My case is a little bit unusual that
Speaker 1: the state actually has three options. They have the option
Speaker 1: of an absolute pardon, which would be to declare my
Speaker 1: innocence and actually admit what really happened, which was that
Speaker 1: this is a wrongful conviction, but they have to put up.
Speaker 1: They have a conditional pardon which would be not to
Speaker 1: say I'm actually innocent, just to say there's a lot
Speaker 1: of questions and a lot of doubts, you can't be sure,
Speaker 1: and then there's a third option. And that so one
Speaker 1: of mystifying things about my case in comparison to other cases.
Speaker 1: They have a whole smogus board of options from part absolute, part,
Speaker 1: additional part, and then and they're choosing not to exercise
Speaker 1: any of these options. Probably. I recently met Dr Phil, who,
Speaker 1: before he became the TV star that's known in love
Speaker 1: by millions, had been putting his various degrees in psychology
Speaker 1: and medicine to good use in his jury consultancy, business
Speaker 1: courtroom sciences. Dr Phil, as you know, advocates for the
Speaker 1: wrongly convicted. He's been doing it for a long time, so,
Speaker 1: as you can imagine, we hit it off and decided
Speaker 1: to sit down for an interview. The crazy thing was,
Speaker 1: during that interview, Yen's happened to call me, as he
Speaker 1: did over the last several years, not infrequently. When he called,
Speaker 1: it turned out to be a really uh powerful meeting
Speaker 1: of the minds, and we sensed immediately that Dr Phil
Speaker 1: might be able to help him and us work through
Speaker 1: this parole board stalemate that we've been stuck in for
Speaker 1: such an interminably long time. Pater, you've been in how
Speaker 1: long now? Thirty three years, six months and thirty days?
Speaker 1: Good lord? What's the stumbling block with the appellate courts,
Speaker 1: with the people that have the ability to grant clemency?
Speaker 1: What do they tell you is the reason you're still
Speaker 1: in jail? Um, that's one of the problems. We're not
Speaker 1: getting any communication. The problem is is that from the
Speaker 1: very beginning, from THEES, this was a very high profile crime,
Speaker 1: so a lot of politicians used it in political campaigns
Speaker 1: to get themselves elected and re elected basically by beating
Speaker 1: up on me. The last instance of that was in
Speaker 1: late so that lasted for twenty nine years. Um. One
Speaker 1: politician after another try to curry the voters favor by
Speaker 1: saying that yanswering is a monster. And then after thirty years,
Speaker 1: the DNA comes out and the DNA shows that the
Speaker 1: very same blood samples that they used to convict me
Speaker 1: with at my trial, once they've been DNA tested, turned
Speaker 1: out to be somebody else's blood, not mine. And everybody
Speaker 1: in Virginia who has been beating up on me all
Speaker 1: the politicians has been beating up on me for all
Speaker 1: these decades. Now looks stupid and it's very, very difficult
Speaker 1: to admit you've made a mistake. And that appears to
Speaker 1: be the problem in Virginia. If if, if they admit
Speaker 1: that I'm innocent, and they're basically admitting that a long
Speaker 1: line of politicians going back to the which is dead wrong.
Speaker 1: That being said, yes, I don't want to leave this out.
Speaker 1: We feel like there's light at the very near end
Speaker 1: of the tunnel. Potentially we won't believe it till we
Speaker 1: see it. But you know, John Grisham has made this
Speaker 1: a very personal cause, arguably the most prominent Virginian of
Speaker 1: these times, and so have so many others. Uh. And
Speaker 1: the Parole Board is actually run by Adrian Bennett, who
Speaker 1: is a you know, by I think by anybody's definition,
Speaker 1: she's a person who believes in in fairness. Um. And
Speaker 1: now the whole state has gone blue. Uh. So we're
Speaker 1: post election and we're all hoping that Governor Northam is
Speaker 1: going to do the right thing and that either the
Speaker 1: Parole Board will see clear to send the ends back
Speaker 1: to Germany to live out his days making speeches, writing
Speaker 1: books as he does contributing to society. I've made the
Speaker 1: point again and again that in these thirty three plus
Speaker 1: years in prison, and how many fractions have you had, none,
Speaker 1: not not one, not a single infraction in thirty three
Speaker 1: and a half years. That's virtually impossible. You must not
Speaker 1: go to the TV room at night. I work out
Speaker 1: a lot. You know, I've been told it's either unique
Speaker 1: or nearly unique by prison staff members. But of course
Speaker 1: you know that's all well and good. Ultimately, what really matters, though,
Speaker 1: is you know I didn't do this. I did not
Speaker 1: kill Derrek and Nancy Hayson. I didn't find out about
Speaker 1: it then, so afterwards, you know, my only role in
Speaker 1: this was this terrible mistake of trying to save Elizabeth's
Speaker 1: life from execution back then in the electric chair. The
Speaker 1: key reason to let me go is not because I
Speaker 1: didn't break any prison rules. The key reason to let
Speaker 1: me go it's because I did not do this. It's
Speaker 1: not just me saying it, it's the DNA saying. We
Speaker 1: have two national experts and a bunch of law enforcement
Speaker 1: officers who have looked at the DNA and the evidence
Speaker 1: in this case, and they've all come to the same conclusion.
Speaker 1: It wasn't me. The evidence pointed to other men who
Speaker 1: have not been identified. There's blood and DNA from two
Speaker 1: other men at that crime scene, as well as Elizabeth's
Speaker 1: fingerprints and her sad friend of hers, and and of
Speaker 1: course she said she did it. That's obviously not been enough.
Speaker 1: What do you think's missing? No, I mean, I think
Speaker 1: in any other state that would have been enough. If
Speaker 1: there's not in any other state, you're in this state.
Speaker 1: What do you think's missing? Um? Political courage? And I
Speaker 1: think now after the election on November five, when the
Speaker 1: Democrats took over the General Assembly here in Virginia, there's
Speaker 1: no longer any reason for the Democratic and the Democratic
Speaker 1: Parole Board for fear releasing me. And I hope that
Speaker 1: will happen soon. It's been a long time. My petition
Speaker 1: has been pending for more than three years, so it's
Speaker 1: time to make a decision. Well, it's way past time
Speaker 1: to make a decision. But can I give you a
Speaker 1: couple of thoughts about this? Oh, I just say this
Speaker 1: from having been in the system for a long long time.
Speaker 1: What has to happen is we've got to find a
Speaker 1: way to give them a face saving way out of this,
Speaker 1: a face saving way to say yes instead of no.
Speaker 1: Now you're before the pardoning parole board, right, what is
Speaker 1: the narrative to them where their currency is met in
Speaker 1: saying okay, enough enough, too much is too much? This
Speaker 1: is too much. We need to turn this man loose.
Speaker 1: What is an air that they've not heard before? Because
Speaker 1: you've got to give these people something to hang their
Speaker 1: heat on so they can defend it when they're asked
Speaker 1: questions about it, so there is a public position they
Speaker 1: can take its face saving. This is a high profile case,
Speaker 1: which is sweet poison. This high profile and everybody knows
Speaker 1: about it. That's a good news. Everybody knows about it,
Speaker 1: that's a bad news. We've gotten to a place now,
Speaker 1: I believe where Republican governors have granted dozens or even
Speaker 1: hundreds of clemencies and pardons. President Obama and his last
Speaker 1: flourish they're granted seventeen hundred and there's not a peep
Speaker 1: from any side. There's nobody going, oh, these crazy people
Speaker 1: are letting all these nobody. It's not a thing anymore.
Speaker 1: I don't think it's even makes you know in the end,
Speaker 1: this case, because it was a high profile case maybe
Speaker 1: it makes the news for a day or two. And
Speaker 1: let me just interrupted briefly and say that they're locking
Speaker 1: us up for count While they're doing that, I want
Speaker 1: to address deep briefly Dr Phill's questions about a narrative
Speaker 1: that could be used to change people's mind. None of
Speaker 1: the people who are making decision today are in any
Speaker 1: way responsible for the mistakes that were originally made thirty
Speaker 1: three years ago. Um, they're fixing the problem. And the
Speaker 1: United States has advanced in those thirty three years and
Speaker 1: the issue of wrongtal convictions is now much more widely understood.
Speaker 1: Back then, the idea that somebody in this might get
Speaker 1: convicted would seems far fetched. I think nowadays it is
Speaker 1: much more widely accepted. The other thing is is that
Speaker 1: there have been some high profile wroncal convictions here in
Speaker 1: Virginia prior to mine, most recently the Norfolk four case
Speaker 1: which received national attention, which also involved false confessions and
Speaker 1: d n A. And I think that's the narrative that
Speaker 1: I think they can hang their hat on in this
Speaker 1: particular case. In this case, all they really had was
Speaker 1: my false confession and the type of blood at the
Speaker 1: crime scene and the prosecutor told the jury twenty six
Speaker 1: times that the only person who could have left that
Speaker 1: type of blood was the answering and he made a
Speaker 1: mistake because they simply didn't have DNA back then. Thirty
Speaker 1: years later, the DNA test that type of blood and
Speaker 1: it turns out it's somebody else's. It was not possible
Speaker 1: to know this back then. They did the best they could.
Speaker 1: Back in the they did the best they could with
Speaker 1: the technology they had. All they had was blood typing.
Speaker 1: But now they have new technology, DNA, and it turns
Speaker 1: out that yes, that was type of blood at the
Speaker 1: crime scene, but it was not my type of blood,
Speaker 1: the population of type of blood. But the DNA is different.
Speaker 1: It's somebody else's blood. So that's the narrative that I
Speaker 1: would say can swing this. That's pretty damn compelling. Ultimately,
Speaker 1: every we wrongful conviction is about admitting that somebody screwed
Speaker 1: up big time, and you know, there's only so far
Speaker 1: you can help them with that. They're gonna happen. Man
Speaker 1: up and and and admit that. But the people who
Speaker 1: are being asked to fix the problem now, we're not
Speaker 1: the people who made a mistake back then. This is
Speaker 1: a governor who was in college when I was in college. Okay,
Speaker 1: he was a few years ahead of me, but he's
Speaker 1: not responsible to what happened back then. He was going
Speaker 1: to med school when all when my life was exploding.
Speaker 1: Thank you for using TTL, and now I can share
Speaker 1: with you some really, really incredible news. The Ends sing
Speaker 1: has finally been granted parole. I heard this news. I
Speaker 1: was on a train to Delaware to give a talk
Speaker 1: about Criminals us AS Reform, and I got a call
Speaker 1: about five o'clock in the afternoon. Now, I had recently
Speaker 1: done an interview with Rolling Stone Magazine and at the
Speaker 1: very end of the interview, the reporter asked me, do
Speaker 1: you ever cry? And I said, truthfully, no, only at
Speaker 1: the movies. Well, I'm not ashamed to tell you now
Speaker 1: that I didn't make it through that phone call without
Speaker 1: breaking down. And um, it's funny because I called the
Speaker 1: sheriff not too long at first, I called Amanda Knox.
Speaker 1: And Amanda his course has done work on behalf of
Speaker 1: Yen's for quite a while now and did a whole
Speaker 1: season of her podcast, The Truth about True Crime on
Speaker 1: The Ends Are in Case. And I called Amanda and
Speaker 1: we cried together end to such a special person. And
Speaker 1: I mean every you know, everyone who's instance deserved to
Speaker 1: get out as soon as possible. It's just like this.
Speaker 1: I mean, I've just been on the other you know,
Speaker 1: end of the line again talking about the day that
Speaker 1: he gets out and like knowing that, like I know
Speaker 1: what it feels like to like fantasize about that day
Speaker 1: and not knowing it it's going to happen. And I
Speaker 1: didn't know what was gonna happen for him. Um wow.
Speaker 1: And now and now you know, he has asked me
Speaker 1: to you know, be his tame sister, which is amazing
Speaker 1: because I'm way younger than him. But it's like he
Speaker 1: said it, like I'm gonna need you to be my
Speaker 1: big sister and helped walk me through this like process
Speaker 1: of being a free person. And I was like, dude,
Speaker 1: I'm there. And now I guess it's really exciting. I
Speaker 1: think that he may end up getting you know, pardons
Speaker 1: um parts from the outside of the side. Yes, he
Speaker 1: has so much more life than he can live. He
Speaker 1: can fight the fight from out here now and he
Speaker 1: can do it with help and he cannot be alone.
Speaker 1: It's it's a big difference. So yeah, I'm just so
Speaker 1: excited for him, um, getting him out with what needed
Speaker 1: to happen. I can't remember that on my friends. Yes here, Amanda,
Speaker 1: where are you right now? Um? I'm actually standing outside
Speaker 1: of the Ailetic Club. I was about to go jog
Speaker 1: on the elliptical one like now, I don't even know
Speaker 1: what the fucking do with myself. Okay, UM, well, if
Speaker 1: you get any news, let me know. Called me, I'll call.
Speaker 1: I'll serve you in an advice versa. Okay, because I'm
Speaker 1: so so happy for him, and I just hope that
Speaker 1: he's okay right now and and that he's not alone
Speaker 1: right now. M hm. You know. Rachel Ryan is one
Speaker 1: of the hosts of Small Town, Big Crime, a deep
Speaker 1: dive cerio podcast about Yen Zering and the Hasten murders,
Speaker 1: including an investigation into the two unknown sources of DNA
Speaker 1: at the crime scene. You can find it wherever you
Speaker 1: get your podcast, but don't wait, subscribe now. She was
Speaker 1: just about to interview Chip Harding when the news had
Speaker 1: started trickling into us and the details were still a
Speaker 1: little unclear. The sound was rolling on Chip as he
Speaker 1: took my call. I don't put my phone over here.
Speaker 1: Thanks than Ja. You know, it's kind of breaking right now.
Speaker 1: I've called rosen Field. He hadn't heard barn of that
Speaker 1: just sort of thing and you got that. Um okay, oh,
Speaker 1: you know he's been for roll and being that both
Speaker 1: he turned out ice and be deported. I guess she's
Speaker 1: going back to Canada, I guess, and he'll be going
Speaker 1: back to Germany and Steve Rosendale Nan didn't notified with
Speaker 1: so Ens knows, I mean, because she's gonna thank you
Speaker 1: from you and so I guess he's been too old.
Speaker 1: It's kind of odd way to handle something like this,
Speaker 1: but it's still keep it as a secret right now. No, No,
Speaker 1: it's it's the Yeah, they associated press as it now
Speaker 1: and it's confirmed. Yeah, poor, Oh my god, it's incredible.
Speaker 1: Watch and I'm actually I'm talking to you Jack because
Speaker 1: I spirst spoken to Amanda. I don't know. It's literally
Speaker 1: client like a baby. Yeah, where you gonna get beat?
Speaker 1: They get rid of interview me on camera soon. Let
Speaker 1: me come help see you a little while. Baby, Are
Speaker 1: you feel right? I'm astantic? I mean, what a great
Speaker 1: thing happened. He's been locked up in thirty three years. Um,
Speaker 1: he's missed his twenties, his thirties, in his forties, so
Speaker 1: it's time. It's time to let him go. Um. Now
Speaker 1: she's also been granted parole. We understand. I understand she
Speaker 1: has been granted parole, and you know, as a law
Speaker 1: enforcement author, I don't I don't have any objection to
Speaker 1: that either. If she was in fact, um sexually abused
Speaker 1: by her mom, you know, if that was the case.
Speaker 1: I think if it had gone that route back when
Speaker 1: she originally went to trial, this whole thing went to
Speaker 1: turn that differently than it did. I mean, this came
Speaker 1: out in sort of a stream. I mean, this was
Speaker 1: reported by the media before you were notified. Was Yeah.
Speaker 1: I immediately I got a call from someone in the
Speaker 1: media asking my reaction, and I didn't know to what,
Speaker 1: and he told me, and I immediately called his primary attorney,
Speaker 1: Stephen Rosenfield, who's given probably four thousand hours on his case,
Speaker 1: and he had not heard. So we were quite shocked
Speaker 1: that it came out through the media first. But we're
Speaker 1: not complaining because it appears he's going one hole and
Speaker 1: that is I mean, you've put years in hours how long? Yeah,
Speaker 1: I've probably put it a thousand hours in on it. Now.
Speaker 1: I'm not looking for any credit this. Tons of people
Speaker 1: have given this young man hundreds and hundreds and hundreds
Speaker 1: of hours what cause I believe, Yeah, it's an emotional thing.
Speaker 1: Thank you so much. I am beyond happy to announce
Speaker 1: that Yen's is officially out of ice custody and out
Speaker 1: of custody period, and he's finally back home in his
Speaker 1: home country of Germany, which he hasn't seen or, come
Speaker 1: to think of it, he hasn't even seen it. Tree
Speaker 1: ponder that for a second of any kind since, And
Speaker 1: just to put some context behind that, the fucking Berlin
Speaker 1: Wall was up the last time he was there, and
Speaker 1: we were all smacked ab in the middle of the
Speaker 1: threat of full scale nuclear war between the United States
Speaker 1: and Russia. But anyway, YenS is finally able to make
Speaker 1: the most of his life, and I know that all
Speaker 1: of us that have played roles large and small in
Speaker 1: his newfound freedom can't wait to celebrate with him. I'll
Speaker 1: leave you with the remainder of our original interview, and
Speaker 1: of course the closing arguments, which I must say sounds
Speaker 1: a hell of a lot better coming from what we
Speaker 1: now know is a Freeman's mouth. I had a really
Speaker 1: really la who was essentially the spark like you mentioned,
Speaker 1: But I also had really really fantantic lass writing for me,
Speaker 1: including um Foremark Deputy Attorney General Deale, Star Marshall Um
Speaker 1: also Deal doll And who's in the movie, and for
Speaker 1: Steve Rosensfield who is stuff with me for I don't
Speaker 1: know so many years, and Steve Hawton. You know, there's
Speaker 1: you know, lawyers have a lot of blame, but there
Speaker 1: are some really really human beings looking as lawyers. And
Speaker 1: then you know, i'd be stopping wonderful people like you
Speaker 1: and and n Prisham and and not seen, you know,
Speaker 1: people who really have no impertinent better things to do
Speaker 1: with our life to worry about me, you know, stepping
Speaker 1: into my life and trying to help me. That's the
Speaker 1: really really impot that's given me hope, and it gives
Speaker 1: me hope. Yeah, trying to hold on a little while longer. Um,
Speaker 1: you see what it This can be resolved in some
Speaker 1: way super fun before days, you know. Um, For I
Speaker 1: can tell you exactly eleven thousand, nine hunty five days, okay,
Speaker 1: eleven thou um every two years, eight months and a
Speaker 1: long days and it hasn't been easy, but that's just
Speaker 1: stared me. He's won for people behind me. You do
Speaker 1: have an extraordinary team, including the leaders of Germany past
Speaker 1: and present. I want to tell the audience there's there's
Speaker 1: the movie Killing for Love and the book is a
Speaker 1: far far better thing by Yenser and Bill Sizemore, A
Speaker 1: far far better thing. Um. And then this is part
Speaker 1: of the show that we've become known for. It's I
Speaker 1: think everyone's favorite part of the show, it's mine. And
Speaker 1: this is a part of the show where I get
Speaker 1: to thank our guests. UM. In this case, of course
Speaker 1: John Grisham, John, thanks for being here. And Sheriff Harding,
Speaker 1: Sheriff Chif Harving album Wall County. Of course you, Yen's
Speaker 1: thanks for participating in this and sharing your thoughts and
Speaker 1: experience and educating our audience. I want to turn it
Speaker 1: over to each of you just for brief closing thoughts,
Speaker 1: and of course we'll end with you Yen. Um anyway, John, Um,
Speaker 1: final thoughts as far as uh yeah, I've said it before,
Speaker 1: These rawful confection stories are always compelling and tempting from
Speaker 1: my point of view. Two what about them? To tell
Speaker 1: the fantastic stories as said as they are, uh, but
Speaker 1: to also hopefully raise awareness. I hope there's a happy ending.
Speaker 1: We believe there's gonna be a happy ending because we're
Speaker 1: all working hard with the game plan to get YenS
Speaker 1: out and they getting back to Germany, and Jens and
Speaker 1: I have this, uh kind of a running gag that
Speaker 1: one day soon we're gonna be drinking a beer together
Speaker 1: in Munich of october Fest I'm coming to and by
Speaker 1: the way, he gonna have the same deal. So you know,
Speaker 1: I don't I don't want to make you not feel special,
Speaker 1: but we got the same We're all invited. We're all
Speaker 1: invited to october Fest. That's right, um, Sheriff Harding final thoughts.
Speaker 1: Until I got involved in this kind of work, I
Speaker 1: always thought that you were found guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
Speaker 1: But it looks like in America, once you're found guilty,
Speaker 1: to be found innocent or pardon, it almost has to
Speaker 1: be your innocent beyond a shadow of a doubt. The
Speaker 1: standard is way too high. It's shameful for me to
Speaker 1: have fifty years in the justice system and to see
Speaker 1: the pushback, not just in this case, but I think
Speaker 1: I've read three or four cases from prosecutors and law
Speaker 1: enforcement that don't man up and step up and admit
Speaker 1: they make mistakes and seek the truth. And no one
Speaker 1: has ever held accountable in the first two cases that
Speaker 1: Brandon Garrett examined, UH, in many cases prosecutors withheld exculpatory evidence,
Speaker 1: so did law enforcement. And that one single case that
Speaker 1: one officer ever go to trial or spend one day
Speaker 1: in jail. So we can't police ourselves. How do we
Speaker 1: anticipate the public is going to have the confidence in
Speaker 1: us to police them? And now, UM, saving the best
Speaker 1: for last again, your final thoughts, UM, I think it's
Speaker 1: important for your audience, UM, to realize that they are
Speaker 1: estimated one hundred thousands LU convicted. First, there's in the
Speaker 1: United States. Um, that's a small city, and I'm far
Speaker 1: from the only one. I'm I'm really, really so grateful
Speaker 1: to the three of you, John Vision to Parting, and
Speaker 1: Taste from for drawing attention to my case. But let's
Speaker 1: not forget the other victims of miscarriages of justice. One
Speaker 1: of the things that I really would hope for is
Speaker 1: that if I'm ever released, I can maybe help draw
Speaker 1: attention to all those other people and work towards systemic
Speaker 1: changes so that things like this don't happen to other
Speaker 1: people in YouTube. This is, you know, something to think about.
Speaker 1: There's a hundred thousands innocent people and driven in the
Speaker 1: United States. Um, somebody should be really and the audience
Speaker 1: take them flowing. I want to thank you for getting
Speaker 1: this opportunity to speak today talk about my case. Thank you. Yes,
Speaker 1: you have all my respect. I look forward to working
Speaker 1: with you and I'll see you for October Fest. Don't
Speaker 1: forget to give us a fantastic review. Wherever you get
Speaker 1: your podcasts, it really helps. And I'm a proud donor
Speaker 1: to the INNESSS Project and I really hope you'll join
Speaker 1: me in supporting this very important cause and helping to
Speaker 1: prevent future wrongful convictions. Go to Innocence Project dot org
Speaker 1: to learn how to donate and get involved. I'd like
Speaker 1: to thank our production team, Connor Hall and Kevin Wardis.
Speaker 1: The music on the show is by three time Oscar
Speaker 1: nominic composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on
Speaker 1: Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on fcebook at Rnful Conviction
Speaker 1: podcast Rnful Conviction with Jason flam is a production of
Speaker 1: Lava for Good podcasts and association with signal company Number
Speaker 1: one