Speaker 1: This call is from a correction facility, and it's subject
Speaker 1: to monitoring and recording.
Speaker 2: Impact ere and it hasn't been easy.
Speaker 3: One hundred years. That's man.
Speaker 4: I'm a kid.
Speaker 1: I didn't do anything, you know, and uh, you know
Speaker 1: that was Ah, that was real painful, man, No, because
Speaker 1: my life was discarded as if you know, like I
Speaker 1: was a piece of trash or something, you know, one
Speaker 1: hundred years and I had dreams and I wanted to
Speaker 1: do things I wouldn't.
Speaker 3: Commit in crimes. You know.
Speaker 1: I was a very good young man.
Speaker 5: That is what happens in so many cases. The cops
Speaker 5: have a hunch because they're so smart at the scene,
Speaker 5: they have a hunch, and once they act on that hunch,
Speaker 5: they sort of developed tunnel vision and they take off
Speaker 5: marching in the wrong direction. And that happens in so
Speaker 5: many of these wrongful convictions.
Speaker 6: They open it to cell door and I'll walk downstairs.
Speaker 2: And I actually walked downstairs to be outside. It felt
Speaker 2: very strange to be, like I said, to be walking
Speaker 2: without those shackles on my feet. I thought it was
Speaker 2: a dream. But then again it wasn't a dream.
Speaker 7: This is wrong for conviction. Welcome back to wrong for conviction.
Speaker 7: My guest this week is Messiah Johnson. And Messiah, first
Speaker 7: of all, welcome to the show.
Speaker 4: Thanks for having me. It's a pleasure being here.
Speaker 3: So Messiah, this case and let's go back. It's a
Speaker 3: Virginia case.
Speaker 4: It is.
Speaker 3: You came from Norfolk.
Speaker 7: Yes, and this goes back to late nineties, right, Yes,
Speaker 7: it goes back.
Speaker 6: To December nineteenth, nineteen ninety seven. The crime actually happened
Speaker 6: on December fifth, nineteen ninety seven.
Speaker 4: The nineteenth was the day of my rest.
Speaker 7: This was an arm robbery of a hair salon in
Speaker 7: Norfolk in which nobody was hurt. That doesn't make it right,
Speaker 7: Don't get me wrong. I'm not in favor of armed
Speaker 7: robberies by any stretch of the imagination. But nonetheless, this
Speaker 7: is a robbery that you had nothing to do with.
Speaker 7: You had alibis, there was no physical evidence connecting you
Speaker 7: to it. And first of all, set the table for
Speaker 7: us here. How old were you at the time, what
Speaker 7: were you doing, and how was your life.
Speaker 4: I was twenty four years old at the time.
Speaker 6: I was working for a government funded program.
Speaker 4: It was a letterbatement program.
Speaker 6: I happened to be one of the people who were
Speaker 6: educated in the field very early on.
Speaker 3: So you were helping to get lead out of housing.
Speaker 6: Housing and I got a biochemical certificate from ODU in
Speaker 6: this field, and at the time of my arrest, I
Speaker 6: was actually writing a proposal to hud Homes for like
Speaker 6: five million dollars to kind of extend our licenses to
Speaker 6: other states and kind of setting myself up for.
Speaker 4: My career in this field.
Speaker 6: And then of course this happened and it kind of
Speaker 6: just obliviated everything that I had planned for my life.
Speaker 3: I'm sitting here with you now. We had dinner last night.
Speaker 7: Here you are in a blue suit, you know, with
Speaker 7: a tie and looking the part of somebody who would
Speaker 7: be doing exactly what you described like doing actually very
Speaker 7: good work helping people. And you know, if people want
Speaker 7: to go to my Instagram, it's at it's Jason Fomm
Speaker 7: you'll see pictures that I posted with Messiah and you'll
Speaker 7: see what I mean. You know, you look like an
Speaker 7: upstanding citizen like anybody else. And yet if you've been
Speaker 7: through this unbelievable or deal twenty years in prison. It's
Speaker 7: so strange because aside from the fact that there was
Speaker 7: no evidence taking physical appearances aside, you just wouldn't seem
Speaker 7: to fit any sort of profile of somebody that would
Speaker 7: commit an arm robbery when you've got this whole other life.
Speaker 7: I mean, that's not a thing. It's just not a thing.
Speaker 3: But okay, let's go back to it.
Speaker 7: So this robbery takes place, yes, and they're out obviously
Speaker 7: looking for suspects. And how did it end up that
Speaker 7: you even got on the radar.
Speaker 6: That's a good question, because I didn't really understand it
Speaker 6: until I actually went to trial in August the following year.
Speaker 6: I try to take you back to the day I
Speaker 6: was arrested on the nineteenth of December. It really was
Speaker 6: a typical day in the life of any young man
Speaker 6: my age from where I'm from. A couple of friends
Speaker 6: hanging out. It was on a Friday, early in the day.
Speaker 6: I had you made arrangements to see a friend of mine,
Speaker 6: a lady friend of mine, later on in the night.
Speaker 6: But prior to that, another friend of mine, he and
Speaker 6: I decided to go up to shoot pool conversed with
Speaker 6: some other friends, and we were doing that and it
Speaker 6: kind of got to the time where I was about
Speaker 6: to go to see this lady friend, and so I
Speaker 6: made a phone call.
Speaker 4: While I was in the club. It was a little
Speaker 4: bit too noisy. She couldn't hear me.
Speaker 6: So I said, look, I'm gonna step outside across the
Speaker 6: street and make this phone call so you can hear me,
Speaker 6: you know, just to let her know I was on
Speaker 6: my way. And then he and I were gonna part ways.
Speaker 6: And so as I was walking out of the club,
Speaker 6: it was several officers coming in and the phone booth
Speaker 6: was directly across the street.
Speaker 4: We walked across the street. I didn't see any.
Speaker 6: Cops, so they must have been hiding around the building
Speaker 6: and the dark or something like that, because, you know,
Speaker 6: as soon as I picked up the phone, you know,
Speaker 6: everything about my life kind of changed in an instance,
Speaker 6: because all I could hear was screeching tires, flashing lights
Speaker 6: and sirens, and in that moment.
Speaker 4: It was difficult the process was what was happening.
Speaker 6: But from behind the lights, you know, before my eyes
Speaker 6: really had a chance to adjust, you could really hear
Speaker 6: the demands of put your hands up, and so you
Speaker 6: don't really have time to process that. So I just complied,
Speaker 6: not really knowing what was going on, and I did
Speaker 6: so because you know, once my eyes were able to adjudge.
Speaker 4: It was three or four guns in my face.
Speaker 6: I remained calm because I didn't want to do anything
Speaker 6: that would cause me to be possibly shit anything like that.
Speaker 6: And so we were asked to put our hands up,
Speaker 6: which we did, and we were placed in handcuffs, this friend,
Speaker 6: me and one other friend. And you know, I didn't
Speaker 6: realize at the time, only after studying the law that
Speaker 6: this is where the miscourage of justice began to make
Speaker 6: manifest against me, because I was sat down on the
Speaker 6: curve with handcuffs on, in between two police cars and
Speaker 6: the Neil versus bigg As. If you understand you know
Speaker 6: the citation law, it tells you that any person that
Speaker 6: is singly displayed in handcuffs is presumed to be the
Speaker 6: person who did the crime of when you're doing a
Speaker 6: show up. And so we finally got a chance to
Speaker 6: look at the case later on and realized that the
Speaker 6: person who initially I didn't know he was with the
Speaker 6: officers as we were leaving out.
Speaker 3: Of the club.
Speaker 6: He was with them. Oh, and so once they put
Speaker 6: us in handcuffs, he told the police that, you know, well,
Speaker 6: one of the other victims that I work with is
Speaker 6: at his shop and so instead of the police just
Speaker 6: going back to get him to do a show up,
Speaker 6: he actually took the person who initially identified me back
Speaker 6: there with him and allowed them to ride in the
Speaker 6: car together. As they were riding in the car together,
Speaker 6: it's easy for him to say that he is right there, right, so.
Speaker 7: They could share the information set already seen you, Yeah,
Speaker 7: and we've seen this time and again. Of course, that's
Speaker 7: going to increase exponentially the percentage of people who are
Speaker 7: going to identify that suspect. We know from research, even
Speaker 7: when somebody sees a person in the defendant's box, just
Speaker 7: a normal person off the street who's now adjure that
Speaker 7: eighty percent of people have a natural proclivity to think
Speaker 7: that that person must be guilty, because otherwise what would they.
Speaker 3: Be doing there.
Speaker 7: But then when you take that, and then you add
Speaker 7: to it someone who's been a victim and a person
Speaker 7: in handcuffs on the street with the police, it's almost
Speaker 7: like a fata complete Like it would be strange for
Speaker 7: them not to identify you. They would have to be like,
Speaker 7: I don't know, it have to be something bizarrely, you'd
Speaker 7: have to be the wrong race or something. Anyway, there's
Speaker 7: a lot of factors that go to that.
Speaker 3: So it at this.
Speaker 7: Point did you realize how dire the situation was or
Speaker 7: did you feel like they just made a mistake and
Speaker 7: I'm going to go home after this gets sorted out.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 6: Prior to the show up, you know, there was a
Speaker 6: moment where one of the officers, I was like, yeah,
Speaker 6: I'm a little confused, officer, what is this about? And
Speaker 6: he was cordial, Well, you're a suspect and of crime.
Speaker 6: What crime could that have been? We've been here the
Speaker 6: majority of the night, the day and night, so what
Speaker 6: are you talking about? And he was like, well, I
Speaker 6: let the detectives share that with you when you go downtown.
Speaker 6: So it was already they had already made a decision.
Speaker 6: It was a predetermined idea that I was going downtown regardless,
Speaker 6: you know, even prior to the show up. At least
Speaker 6: that's what it seemed like to me.
Speaker 7: So now they take you downtown, and they brought your friends.
Speaker 7: What was your friend's name? His name was Mondelle, And
Speaker 7: so you and Mondel both got taken downtown. We did
Speaker 7: interrogate it separately as soon, of.
Speaker 6: Course, you know it's the whole you know, we're going
Speaker 6: to put him in this very cold cell. And those
Speaker 6: of us who have been locked up, you always know,
Speaker 6: you always put in a very ice cold cell and
Speaker 6: it's so cold that you're in the fetal position just.
Speaker 4: To keep warm.
Speaker 6: And so I've studied a lot of cases, and I
Speaker 6: can always see why people really just want to just
Speaker 6: get away from the police station and they just kind
Speaker 6: of just say, you know, I did it just to
Speaker 6: get away from the circumstances because of the process. It's
Speaker 6: very harsh on a person when you're in that very
Speaker 6: cold sale and then they bring you out and.
Speaker 3: They held you in this freezing cell for how long?
Speaker 4: A few hours?
Speaker 3: Wow? Then you're going to be interrogated. Yes, but you
Speaker 3: never confessed.
Speaker 4: I didn't have any knowledge of what they were talking about.
Speaker 7: Right, But we know that a lot of people do
Speaker 7: confess in those circumstances, as you just said, just to
Speaker 7: go home, even if.
Speaker 3: They don't know what they're talking about. Yes, yes, but
Speaker 3: you did not know.
Speaker 6: They bought me out after that and began the good cop,
Speaker 6: bad cop thing. And the first thing I said was, look,
Speaker 6: before you ask me any questions, I want to make
Speaker 6: a phone call to an attorney. A practitioner of Islam
Speaker 6: and a righteous and I'm civilized. So whatever you accuse
Speaker 6: me of, you know you have the wrong person. I
Speaker 6: don't know anything about a robbery or any other crime,
Speaker 6: and so I didn't know it was dire until, you know,
Speaker 6: he got very upset. I think the fact that he
Speaker 6: automatically thought I was a Muslim. He began to talk
Speaker 6: about being a Muslim to me, and that's not what
Speaker 6: I am. I was a practice of Islam. My culture
Speaker 6: is a five percent nation of gods and earths. And
Speaker 6: I didn't really want to get into a dialogue with
Speaker 6: him about that. But then he said, well, you don't
Speaker 6: have to talk to me. You're gonna end up with
Speaker 6: fifty felonies. And then that's when it kind of began
Speaker 6: to that tense stuff.
Speaker 4: I was, you know, concerned. Then I said, what do
Speaker 4: you mean.
Speaker 6: He said, yeah, we're gonna be typing up about fifty
Speaker 6: felonies against you. And in the state of Virginia, that's
Speaker 6: one of the states that can stack charges. So for
Speaker 6: every individual robbery, I got an abduction charge, a firearm
Speaker 6: for deduction, and a firearm for the robbery. So I
Speaker 6: ended up with forty three felonies. Most of them current
Speaker 6: life sentences.
Speaker 7: Based on the one crime that they suspected you of
Speaker 7: doing exactly. I don't even know what to say about
Speaker 7: that I turned one of the forty three. That math
Speaker 7: is just as fuzzy as.
Speaker 3: It could be. So how long were you interrogated for?
Speaker 6: You know, the records show that I was brought out
Speaker 6: to be interrogated and not said that I didn't know anything,
Speaker 6: and then I was taken right back to my cell,
Speaker 6: which is not the truth. You know, you would have
Speaker 6: to look at the time frame. You know, from the
Speaker 6: time I was down at the police operation Center until
Speaker 6: the time I was actually taken to the jail, which
Speaker 6: was about seven to eight hours, and so I was
Speaker 6: taken out of that cell on three different occasions to
Speaker 6: the interrogation room.
Speaker 3: Did you get your phone call?
Speaker 4: I never got the phone call.
Speaker 6: And actually, if you look at my pre trial records,
Speaker 6: it will tell you that Messiah requests a phone call
Speaker 6: and we tell him a phone call is not one
Speaker 6: of his rights. But he left out the fact that
Speaker 6: I requested a phone call to talk to an attorney.
Speaker 7: So I'm guessing that you probably should have said I
Speaker 7: want an attorney and then they stop questioning you. Right,
Speaker 7: if you say I want to call an attorney, that's
Speaker 7: not the same saying I want an attorney present.
Speaker 6: They did stop questioning me, and once I requested that,
Speaker 6: they stopped questioning me and took me back to the
Speaker 6: cell of the final time.
Speaker 3: And then you were held for almost a year before
Speaker 3: your trial, Is that right?
Speaker 6: Just about nine months exactly. And I went to my
Speaker 6: first trial in August.
Speaker 7: And tell me about that. Because you didn't have a
Speaker 7: quarter pointed attorney.
Speaker 6: I did initially, which was the foundation of the injustice.
Speaker 6: Once I got into the courtroom, I had an attorney
Speaker 6: by the name of Andrew Sebbak. And during preliminary hearing
Speaker 6: in the cells, it's verly packed. Everybody's waiting to go
Speaker 6: for their hearing, and so several lawyers are coming talking.
Speaker 6: He comes in to speak to me, and you know,
Speaker 6: the first thing he says was, my name is Andrew Sabbak,
Speaker 6: so forth and so on. He said, now, look, what
Speaker 6: can you tell me about this crime, which was perplexing
Speaker 6: to me. And I was like, look, I don't know
Speaker 6: anything about this crime. I'm not guilty of it, but
Speaker 6: I want to make sure that when you go in here,
Speaker 6: you separate the witnesses and you, you know, make sure
Speaker 6: that they understand that I have anything to.
Speaker 4: Do with this.
Speaker 3: Okay.
Speaker 4: He leaves, comes back.
Speaker 6: And it's as if he didn't hear anything I said.
Speaker 6: You know again, he was asking me. He said, well,
Speaker 6: when you and your friend committed this crime, and then
Speaker 6: my antennas went up immediately, what are you talking about?
Speaker 6: I just told you I didn't have anything to do
Speaker 6: with this crime. And so this man actually went into
Speaker 6: this courtroom without a stenographer, which was one of my
Speaker 6: first requests because I figured that something was wrong. And
Speaker 6: when I walked into the courtroom, there was no sonographer.
Speaker 6: So my initial reaction to him was where's the sonographer?
Speaker 6: This guy told me, well, it's too late to get
Speaker 6: one now we're already in here. And so I was frustrated,
Speaker 6: and I was speaking kind of loud, and the deputy
Speaker 6: was saying, look, you have.
Speaker 4: To keep it down.
Speaker 6: We're about to courts givery be in sessions. So I said, okay.
Speaker 6: He separated the witnesses. These witnesses described two different people.
Speaker 6: One said this guy had on camouflage from head to toe.
Speaker 6: Once said he had on a blue jacket. It was
Speaker 6: the kind of evidence that you simply just get up
Speaker 6: and say you're on are based on the evidence, asked
Speaker 6: for the charge to be dismissed. But at the end
Speaker 6: of everything, you know, simply said that's all I have, Yanna.
Speaker 4: The courtroom was dumbfounded.
Speaker 6: The judge had to look over top of his glass
Speaker 6: and say that's it. And he said, oh, other than
Speaker 6: the fact that we asked for a bond.
Speaker 7: Obviously, now you're extremely knowledgeable about the law, but at
Speaker 7: the time you weren't.
Speaker 3: I'm assuming right.
Speaker 4: No, I wasn't knowledgeable the law. But you know, when
Speaker 4: you're being wrong?
Speaker 3: What was your reaction? Did you like elbow im like yo?
Speaker 6: I actually did, And the deputy had to step in
Speaker 6: again and say, look, you have to relax, like I'm
Speaker 6: saying to him, what are you doing?
Speaker 2: Man?
Speaker 4: What happened?
Speaker 6: And so I didn't want to put up a fuss
Speaker 6: in the courtroom. I knew that the judge knew that
Speaker 6: something was wrong, but I made a phone call to
Speaker 6: him when I got back to the jail.
Speaker 4: We got on the phone, I said, look, what did
Speaker 4: you do to me in courtroom today? Man?
Speaker 6: You didn't have a sonographer? I said, are you working
Speaker 6: with the Commonwealth or something, and you know, he said,
Speaker 6: there's other people that feel like you may have committed
Speaker 6: this crime. And so my suggestion to you is you
Speaker 6: don't want me on your case, I would suggest you
Speaker 6: get me off. And that basically told me that he
Speaker 6: was somehow working and with the police department or the
Speaker 6: Commonwealth attorney. And we found out years later that he
Speaker 6: was actually this barred because he was dealing with a
Speaker 6: mental deficiency.
Speaker 3: Wow.
Speaker 6: And so when I went to court to get him
Speaker 6: off for my case, the judge gave me a five
Speaker 6: minute speeches in the transcripts about how this is a
Speaker 6: good attorney, and I said, you're honest. He told me
Speaker 6: he was working with the Commonwealth in so many words,
Speaker 6: and then he asked the attorney like, do you what
Speaker 6: do you say to this man who's accusing you of
Speaker 6: working with the comonwealth. He said, well, am I getting
Speaker 6: a check from the Commonwealth, And the judge that that's
Speaker 6: not what I'm asking you. He actually speak to him
Speaker 6: and his chambers and removed them offrom my case. It
Speaker 6: was then that I hired an attorney.
Speaker 7: But at this point this was still part of the
Speaker 7: initial phase, or had you already been convicted.
Speaker 4: No, this was preliminary hearing.
Speaker 3: So okay.
Speaker 7: So now we're dealing with an attorney who is mentally impaired. Yes,
Speaker 7: doesn't have a stenographer in the courtroom, which alone should
Speaker 7: be impossible. I mean, that can't happen. And then you
Speaker 7: have a judge who's looking over his glasses at him
Speaker 7: and going on really, dude, like really, And then they
Speaker 7: have been working with the commonwealth against your best interest.
Speaker 7: And above all, you had an attorney who is coming
Speaker 7: to you ignoring everything you're saying time and time again,
Speaker 7: and going tell me how about how you robbed this
Speaker 7: place and who'd you do it with and all this
Speaker 7: other stuff. And you had to be looking forward to
Speaker 7: having your day in court and having an attorney who's
Speaker 7: got your back, who's going to go up there and
Speaker 7: tell the truth and make this go away.
Speaker 4: You know.
Speaker 6: My family and now decided that we didn't have a
Speaker 6: lot of money. We decided that we would get an attorney.
Speaker 6: We considered a seasoned attorney who had a name for
Speaker 6: himself and who had been, you know, practicing.
Speaker 4: Law for some time.
Speaker 3: And then what happened.
Speaker 6: We went into court on August nineteenth, nineteen ninety eight, Now, initially,
Speaker 6: before we even went in, several people who were victims said, look,
Speaker 6: I can't identify anybody. These guys had on a mask,
Speaker 6: they were covered up completely. There's no way I can
Speaker 6: come in here and identify anybody. And so for every
Speaker 6: person that came in and it said that those charges
Speaker 6: were dropped. And then we went through the trial and
Speaker 6: one of the things that he asked when one of
Speaker 6: the witnesses got on stand was did you see any photographs?
Speaker 6: And the witnesses said yes. The detective came by my
Speaker 6: place of residence and showed me some photographs. He said, well,
Speaker 6: how many food residents you see? He said, well, she said,
Speaker 6: I saw a book of about sixty photographs where I
Speaker 6: picked out a person that I thought may have been
Speaker 6: the person. And then my lawyer immediately asked for a
Speaker 6: mistrial because we hadn't seen any photographs, and the Commonwealth
Speaker 6: claimed she didn't know anything about it, and so the
Speaker 6: next day the mistrial was granted. And I really didn't
Speaker 6: want the mistrial. I wanted to go through with this
Speaker 6: trial because I felt like I had a jury of
Speaker 6: my peers. And what I mean by that is that
Speaker 6: the majority of the jury was black, which is unusual,
Speaker 6: you know, and of a certain age, closer to my age.
Speaker 6: And while I was sitting in the cellar loane, my
Speaker 6: lawyer came back and said, look, they're offering you a
Speaker 6: plea deal. I said, well, why are you bringing it
Speaker 6: to me? I'm innocent. There's no way I'm taking a
Speaker 6: plea deal.
Speaker 3: What was the play?
Speaker 4: Three years?
Speaker 3: Three years? You know.
Speaker 6: Once I didn't take that plea deal, this became about
Speaker 6: malicious prosecution, and she knew it was really no evidence,
Speaker 6: you know, reliable evidence, which we found out later on.
Speaker 6: I'm locked up because I wear glasses.
Speaker 3: Because of the one of the robbers had glasses on.
Speaker 7: That's it, yeah, because I mean, how can you possibly
Speaker 7: have my witness identification when you mean it's hard enough
Speaker 7: in this situation, a violent, chaotic situation to identify anybody
Speaker 7: if they don't have a mask but wear a mask,
Speaker 7: Come on, I mean that's crazy. But now you've refused
Speaker 7: the plea deal. Now they're out for blood because you
Speaker 7: had the audacity to reject the plea deal for crimeun
Speaker 7: and commits exactly, So it goes to trial. And how
Speaker 7: did it end up going so wrong?
Speaker 6: I testified my witness testified my alibi witnesses.
Speaker 4: There were no contradictions.
Speaker 6: And it's hard to explain my lawyer, you know, it
Speaker 6: was really no pretrial investigation by him where I expected
Speaker 6: for him to give me one hundred percent. It was
Speaker 6: as if I was only getting like ninety percent from him,
Speaker 6: just enough for him to be able to say to
Speaker 6: the ball I did my job.
Speaker 4: But when you look at it.
Speaker 6: More closely, you understand that there were a lot of
Speaker 6: things that he didn't do that he could have done.
Speaker 6: I know that by the time the evidence, this was
Speaker 6: what really stood out to my attorneys. By the time
Speaker 6: they had heard two days a trial, when they were
Speaker 6: time to go in and make a decision, a question
Speaker 6: came out from the jury. That question was who positively
Speaker 6: identified Massiah went and where this was? After all the
Speaker 6: evidence was presented to them. The case was just that
Speaker 6: confusing that they couldn't remember who identified me positively went
Speaker 6: and where. And the judge just said, you have to
Speaker 6: go from your own recollection. I can't tell you that,
Speaker 6: And so they went in. They went in there for
Speaker 6: about forty five minutes, not long My lawyer came back
Speaker 6: to tell me, he said, look.
Speaker 4: It's not good. They found you guilty, and I was
Speaker 4: I was stunned. I couldn't believe it. Man, it was.
Speaker 6: I don't know, it's hard to explain. It's sort of
Speaker 6: a haze. And as I was sitting there, you know,
Speaker 6: at the jury began reading off how much time for
Speaker 6: each charge that I was convicted of, and they were saying,
Speaker 6: you know, seven seven, five, five five, And it was
Speaker 6: a moment where my attorney looked at me.
Speaker 4: And said, well, how much is that?
Speaker 6: And I was just like, man, you have the penning paper,
Speaker 6: you're not adding this up. I after the first five years,
Speaker 6: you know, I didn't hear anything else.
Speaker 3: And so how many charges were you convicted of?
Speaker 4: Twenty six charges?
Speaker 7: Twenty six charges for allegedly walking into a beauty salon,
Speaker 7: holding up the place, and not even whoever it was
Speaker 7: that did this didn't actually hurt anybody, right, No, I
Speaker 7: mean it's a violent crime because there was a weapon involved,
Speaker 7: so act you know, legally speaking, it's a violent crime.
Speaker 7: But I do think there's an important distinction when no
Speaker 7: one was hurt. Obviously, it's traumatic for the victims in
Speaker 7: this case to have gone through this, and there's I
Speaker 7: don't want to diminish that in any way. But at
Speaker 7: the same time, it's bizarre when you know that murderers
Speaker 7: get fifteen years, right, and around the world the most
Speaker 7: you can get in most civilized countries is fifteen years
Speaker 7: no matter what you've done, right.
Speaker 3: But here you have a crime.
Speaker 7: In which nobody was hurt and forgetting the fact that
Speaker 7: for a second that you were innocent. So they convicted
Speaker 7: you on twenty six counts, but they ended up sentencing
Speaker 7: you when they edded up the fives and the sevens
Speaker 7: and everything else.
Speaker 4: One hundred and thirty two years, one hundred and thirty
Speaker 4: two years.
Speaker 6: So and in Virginia, for those who don't know, you know,
Speaker 6: and you know, nineteen ninety five, it took away the
Speaker 6: ability to have parole available to you. In addition to
Speaker 6: that in that statue, there's an additional statute that says
Speaker 6: you also have to serve eighty five percent of your time.
Speaker 6: So what I received was equivalent to the deathcinis. Well, yeah,
Speaker 6: to live the rest of your life in prison and
Speaker 6: then die there.
Speaker 7: Yeah, they abolished parl in nineteen ninety five in Virginia,
Speaker 7: which is incomprehensible to me. But the idea that they
Speaker 7: sentenced you to life in prison.
Speaker 3: After offering you three years.
Speaker 7: Also, like, how was there even a universe in which
Speaker 7: you could say, well, as a society, we were good
Speaker 7: with you doing three years for this, but because you
Speaker 7: exercised your constitutional right to a trial, you get one
Speaker 7: hundred and thirty two years.
Speaker 4: Yeah.
Speaker 6: It was devastating for me and my family. And I
Speaker 6: can tell you that it was a moment where I
Speaker 6: was at the jail after I happened sentenced, and my
Speaker 6: oldest daughter, who was about seven at the time, she
Speaker 6: came to see me, and you know, she's an intelligent
Speaker 6: young lady, and she asked me, she said, Dad, oh,
Speaker 6: do you really have one hundred and thirty two years
Speaker 6: or do in prison? And I said yes, And you know,
Speaker 6: her response was, you can't even live that one. There
Speaker 6: was a moment, you know, which was really important to
Speaker 6: me while I was being sentenced. I didn't drop my head,
Speaker 6: but I think one of my family friends must have
Speaker 6: noticed that maybe I was about to. She actually stood
Speaker 6: up in court, you know, and said, look, hold your
Speaker 6: head up, We're not going to give up. And it
Speaker 6: was in that moment that very early for me. In
Speaker 6: that moment that I realized that I was going to
Speaker 6: have to continue fighting.
Speaker 4: And so.
Speaker 6: After that, I just knew it was time for me
Speaker 6: to get back to business of fighting for my freedom.
Speaker 6: When you get in prison, when you really understand that
Speaker 6: they've decided that they want to take your life.
Speaker 4: Because everything about my life changed. The way I walk, talk, you.
Speaker 6: Know, everything, the movements, how long got that be on
Speaker 6: the phone? Who I can call, what kind of foods
Speaker 6: to eat, what kind of medical care? Everything changed completely,
Speaker 6: and so I decided that I didn't want that to
Speaker 6: be my life. And so what I did was I
Speaker 6: looked at the contrast to myself in prison, and the
Speaker 6: contrast is most of us have who are doing time
Speaker 6: with that has that amount, have fallen into despair and
Speaker 6: given up because Virginia has made it extremely difficult for
Speaker 6: you to get out of prison. Once you're in prison,
Speaker 6: everything is contingent on newly discovered evidence, but a lot
Speaker 6: of people are not aware of the anti terrorism effected.
Speaker 4: Definitely. I speak about this all the time.
Speaker 6: That Bill Clinton acted basically is telling you that once
Speaker 6: your direct appeal is over where you have representation, that
Speaker 6: you are required to file a HAB's corpus within a year.
Speaker 6: So you're expected a law student. How long does it
Speaker 6: take that person to graduate? Eight years well, including college
Speaker 6: yees seven or whatever. You're required to have that knowledge
Speaker 6: and represent yourself pro se with inadequate information and materials.
Speaker 4: And if you don't, then after that.
Speaker 6: Year, you judicially bought from being able to present legitimate
Speaker 6: claims your custuals vice being vilid.
Speaker 4: It's just ridiculous.
Speaker 7: The idea that we would want to keep anybody in
Speaker 7: prison one day after we find out that they're innocent,
Speaker 7: regardless of whatever procedural you know, it's nuts, right, And
Speaker 7: the fact that we want to deny somebody like yourself
Speaker 7: the opportunity to present newly discovered evidence is completely illogical too.
Speaker 7: And you really said it best. I mean when you
Speaker 7: talk about the idea that, yeah, you're right, you're given
Speaker 7: a year for a lot of people who hadn't been
Speaker 7: to college to learn everything you would have learned in
Speaker 7: college plus law school. Not everything, but all the most
Speaker 7: important things are going to help you in your defense.
Speaker 7: Then figure out how to file these papers and find
Speaker 7: the evidence that's been hidden from you in the first place.
Speaker 7: That would have been much easier to find an original trial,
Speaker 7: And then file it, and then it's much harder for
Speaker 7: a pro say emotion to succeed in a motion that's
Speaker 7: filed by an attorney in.
Speaker 3: The free world.
Speaker 7: So it's really a shame that that law has prevented
Speaker 7: so many other people from getting out that deserve to
Speaker 7: get out.
Speaker 4: I will say this.
Speaker 6: I know I hear the terminology mass incarceration quite often,
Speaker 6: but with this law, and especially with the laws in
Speaker 6: the state of Virginia, you know, this is more along
Speaker 6: the lines of judicial genocide. This is not mass incarceration.
Speaker 6: You're talking about taking away generations of individuals and never
Speaker 6: giving them a second chance back out of society. And
Speaker 6: it's targeted with disenfranchised, mainly blacks and Latinos.
Speaker 7: Yeah, they make it easy to get in and really
Speaker 7: hard to get out, I mean almost impossible.
Speaker 6: Unfortunately, I began to study the law. You know, I
Speaker 6: did a lot of research on my own case, and
Speaker 6: you know, when I come through the transcripts just to
Speaker 6: see how many because I could remember all these contradictions,
Speaker 6: I ended up with nine pages of conflicting testimony was
Speaker 6: just mind blowing to me. It was one of the
Speaker 6: things I presented to the Innocent Project and to other organizations.
Speaker 6: I did a lot of research and I painted a
Speaker 6: very clear picture of my innocence with all the research
Speaker 6: I had done, and began presenting it, and I was
Speaker 6: turned down by quite a few post conviction organizations. And
Speaker 6: then the innocence projects began to materialize.
Speaker 7: And we're talking about the University of Virginia in It's
Speaker 7: this project to do incredible work they do. Yeah, and
Speaker 7: I've been down there and I know the people there,
Speaker 7: and I encourage anyone listening to support them. You can
Speaker 7: just google University of Virginia in It's Project. It's a
Speaker 7: great organization to hear more about that.
Speaker 6: One of the people that I had a pleasure of
Speaker 6: speaking to was did your in Right? And I'm smiling
Speaker 6: now because I think about the first time I met
Speaker 6: Deddre in Right, and she and I had a conversation
Speaker 6: and even though we were having a conversation about my case,
Speaker 6: it was a personal conversation too, about character and family
Speaker 6: and you know, just my how much loss I had
Speaker 6: endured and.
Speaker 3: So how many years have you been there by this.
Speaker 4: Point fourteen fifteen years?
Speaker 3: And Deirdre is the director right of this.
Speaker 6: She is director of the Innocent Project at UVA School
Speaker 6: of Law and runs the pro bono clinic.
Speaker 7: So for you, that's when things started to take a
Speaker 7: turn in the right direction.
Speaker 4: It did.
Speaker 6: She understood immediately once I presented those things to her,
Speaker 6: and she's impeccable in her investigation skills. She knew exactly
Speaker 6: how she wanted to, you know, go about getting the
Speaker 6: necessary information. Her and her students went out. They utilized
Speaker 6: the Freedom Information Act and found out that this guy
Speaker 6: had committed all these robbers around the same time that
Speaker 6: I was arrested. And this is what led them to
Speaker 6: the person who actually committed the crime. They went to
Speaker 6: see him and he basically five minutes into the conversation
Speaker 6: and he was like, I know why you're here. You know,
Speaker 6: they mentioned that, you know, this beauty salon got robbed,
Speaker 6: and he basically said, look, I know what you want.
Speaker 6: I'm the person who did this. He said he didn't
Speaker 6: know that anybody was actually locked up for the crime,
Speaker 6: and had spoke to his spiritual advisors and family member
Speaker 6: was and you know, he wanted to just come clean
Speaker 6: about it.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and it's amazing.
Speaker 7: It's really dramatic because they went to see him and
Speaker 7: they were only given twenty five minutes to talk to him.
Speaker 3: That's correct.
Speaker 7: And in those twenty five minutes they had to somehow
Speaker 7: other earn his trust and get him to confess to
Speaker 7: a crime that you were in prison for.
Speaker 3: And they did.
Speaker 6: And then from there we began to build a case,
Speaker 6: not forward. We started from the back. Once we got
Speaker 6: the confession in Virginia, you know, you don't take it
Speaker 6: directly to the commonwealth because then they're going to go
Speaker 6: to all the witnesses involved. Everybody wants to say, look,
Speaker 6: this guy is trying to say that he didn't have
Speaker 6: anything to do with it. They're going to get out
Speaker 6: for Davis from those people. But we did that, and
Speaker 6: by the time we presented that to the courts, we
Speaker 6: got denied by the same judge who initially refused to
Speaker 6: give me a sentence reduction.
Speaker 4: But he was still on the bench. I think he's
Speaker 4: still present now.
Speaker 6: Because of Virginia law after that year, you're not allowed
Speaker 6: to file a habeas corpus second and success of Hay's corpus.
Speaker 6: So he denied us, and so mcculloff was in office
Speaker 6: at the time, right And.
Speaker 7: This gets a really interesting part of the story too,
Speaker 7: because Governor mccauliffe, who I've become very friendly with. To
Speaker 7: his credit, he had this sense of outrage when I
Speaker 7: was talking to him about these crazy sentences that Virginia
Speaker 7: was handing out to people. You know, we talked about
Speaker 7: Travion Blount, and we talked about Letting Singleton, and we
Speaker 7: talked about some of these other people that were doing
Speaker 7: these literally like mind blowing sentences, and you were certainly
Speaker 7: one of them. I mean, like, your sentence is so nuts.
Speaker 7: And he fortunately was in a position to do something
Speaker 7: about it. So how did that come down?
Speaker 6: So to me, he was very forward thinking governor, and
Speaker 6: he had made public comments about how far behind gen
Speaker 6: you was compared to other states in the criminal justice system.
Speaker 6: And so we as a whole thought that it was
Speaker 6: best for us to put together a petition for clemency
Speaker 6: while he was in office, before he left, and so
Speaker 6: we did that.
Speaker 3: And that's basically like buying a lottery t it is.
Speaker 3: It is.
Speaker 4: I say that all the time.
Speaker 6: It is very difficult because they usually deal with those
Speaker 6: things after you've exhausted all your remedies. And because we
Speaker 6: had this newly discovered evidence, we were able to still
Speaker 6: go to the federal courts, which we're getting ready to
Speaker 6: do now because we're still pending. And so on the
Speaker 6: day that he was leaving, on the day before, we
Speaker 6: were asking, you know, has he ruled on the side
Speaker 6: his petition yet, and he's like, no, but he's getting
Speaker 6: to it and he'll get to it before he leaves.
Speaker 4: And you know, Diezer was.
Speaker 6: Calling periodically every hour. You know, I think we're going
Speaker 6: to get it. We're not sure yet. You know, I
Speaker 6: tried to call this person. They said, yeah, they're looking
Speaker 6: at it right now. So the day of I think,
Speaker 6: no more than an hour after he was supposed to
Speaker 6: be leaving office, we get the call, you know, and
Speaker 6: they said, you've been granted a conditional pardon with the
Speaker 6: absolute aspect of the part and still pending. You know,
Speaker 6: the outcome of the investigation. That was a wonderful feeling.
Speaker 6: Man to hear that.
Speaker 3: Who called it recalled me right.
Speaker 4: We were just related. We were overjoyed, you said.
Speaker 6: We Deirdre and the whole team, everybody, you know, the
Speaker 6: jigu and right and Jennifer Gibvens who was another attorney there,
Speaker 6: also a director. They had been coming to the prison
Speaker 6: regularly and calling for me. They assisted me and aided
Speaker 6: me in ways, you know. And anybody who who's represented
Speaker 6: by them will tell you they go above and beyond
Speaker 6: with their representation and helping you not only with the
Speaker 6: legal aspect, but personal things that you be going through
Speaker 6: in prison.
Speaker 4: It's rare you see somebody who does that, you know.
Speaker 6: With all the way pro say throughout you know, but
Speaker 6: this was a collective effort of all of us.
Speaker 3: What was the reaction in the prison when you got
Speaker 3: this news? Were people wow, jealous? Were they happy? What
Speaker 3: was the reaction of the other char The majority.
Speaker 6: Of people who were happy because they understood my struggle.
Speaker 4: They saw me working.
Speaker 6: There's two different types of people in prison, those who
Speaker 6: working to get out on those who's just waiting for
Speaker 6: something to happen. And while I was in prison, I
Speaker 6: helped a lot of people along the way. Digit and
Speaker 6: Writing Jennifer Gills will tell you, I've read people's cases.
Speaker 4: I've read multiple cases.
Speaker 6: I've done research myself and helped them with their cases,
Speaker 6: file emotions for them.
Speaker 4: But I've also introduced them.
Speaker 6: To Digit and Right and Jennifer Givens and so those
Speaker 6: people and a lot of people I've made quite a
Speaker 6: few friends you can imagine after twenty years, you make
Speaker 6: some friends.
Speaker 4: They were just delated.
Speaker 3: How long did it take you to get out after
Speaker 3: the call?
Speaker 6: They wanted to make you do five months? I did
Speaker 6: four from January to April, right, because they have that
Speaker 6: re entry the reentry program. But I stayed on top
Speaker 6: of the people every day, like, look, you gotta let
Speaker 6: me get this program.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 6: Everything is contingent on me getting out as me complete
Speaker 6: these programs. So they put me to the top of
Speaker 6: the list.
Speaker 7: And you know, so you had one hundred and twelve
Speaker 7: years left to go, and now it turns to four months.
Speaker 3: How did those four months go by? Faster? Slow?
Speaker 6: It went by the same for me. I put myself
Speaker 6: in that kind of mind frame that I don't really
Speaker 6: believe until it actually happens. You know, even though I
Speaker 6: got the pardon with a discretionary release date, you still
Speaker 6: don't believe it till it actually happens. Anybody, I think
Speaker 6: everybody will tell you this. Until you actually cross that threshold,
Speaker 6: you just don't believe it.
Speaker 3: Man.
Speaker 7: And I've seen the video of you walking out of
Speaker 7: prison into the arms of your family and the attorneys
Speaker 7: from the Virginia Insis Project it's a very powerful moving
Speaker 7: thing to see going back to prison for a second
Speaker 7: sometimes like to ask what was the best and the
Speaker 7: worst thing to happen. Was there a moment, even in
Speaker 7: the darkest of times, when there was like a ray.
Speaker 6: Of light or hope mentally and emotionally, you know, there's
Speaker 6: valleys and peaks. You know, you're trying to make sense
Speaker 6: of everything that's happening to you. You know, you want
Speaker 6: to stay within the realm of reality, but that reality
Speaker 6: maybe something that's for the rest of your life. And
Speaker 6: so for me, there was some few dark moments and
Speaker 6: I reached out to you know, Nikki Giovanni. You know,
Speaker 6: she's a renown black activist, scholar, poet, and educator, because
Speaker 6: she had a poem that resonated with me called Quilt
Speaker 6: in the Black Ip And I couldn't find a book anywhere,
Speaker 6: and so I wrote her, and she wrote me back
Speaker 6: and sent me to autograph books, and that kind of
Speaker 6: gave me that there's people out here that still really
Speaker 6: do care, you know. And so there were moments like
Speaker 6: that that really continue to inspire me to, you know,
Speaker 6: fight for my freedom. But I have to say this,
Speaker 6: all of who I am today is a reflection of
Speaker 6: that which has been shaped and moted by my circumstance
Speaker 6: of the last twenty years.
Speaker 4: So I developed a very profound perspective.
Speaker 6: About life that has allowed me to know my purpose,
Speaker 6: and within that purpose, it's really about helping others. And
Speaker 6: so at some point I want to be able to
Speaker 6: develop a nonprofit which i've you know, really developed, and
Speaker 6: it's called the Lion Initiative Liberating Individuals Oppression Now and
Speaker 6: it will have several programs, and they want about educating
Speaker 6: the community about laws and how they can affect change
Speaker 6: through their legislators, people who are supposed to represent them.
Speaker 6: But I learned that a lot of elders in the communities,
Speaker 6: they don't have the education. They want to be educated
Speaker 6: about the law and how they can effectively make change.
Speaker 6: And so that incarceration and prevention with the youth, and
Speaker 6: investigative practices for those who are in prison who don't
Speaker 6: have the money and can't find the resources. Because everything
Speaker 6: in Virginia is based on post conviction investigation, you really
Speaker 6: need that in order for you to even find newly
Speaker 6: discovered evidence.
Speaker 7: Now, I'm glad you brought that up, because that is
Speaker 7: truly what the Virginia Innos's project did. In your case,
Speaker 7: they wasn't really reinvestigated the case. It was never investigated.
Speaker 3: Properly in the first place, exactly.
Speaker 7: And you know, if we had a fair or system,
Speaker 7: we would have defense attorneys, even public defenders, who were
Speaker 7: given enough time to work on each individual case that
Speaker 7: they could at least mount some sort of effective investigation. Obviously,
Speaker 7: they're not going to be able to do, you know
Speaker 7: what a private attorney who is working on just a
Speaker 7: few cases can do, because.
Speaker 3: They're always going to be overwork.
Speaker 7: But we need to reduce that burden because some of
Speaker 7: these guys are working on one hundred cases at the time,
Speaker 7: and there's just no way even the best attorney in
Speaker 7: that situation can't possibly do the most effective job for
Speaker 7: their client.
Speaker 3: And in your case, it was literally your life that
Speaker 3: was hanging in the balance.
Speaker 7: And so forgetting the fact that you had this you know,
Speaker 7: half crazy and competent guy in the first place, I mean, you.
Speaker 3: Had really hit the jackpot of me.
Speaker 7: Between the mistake and eye witnesses and the official misconduct
Speaker 7: and effective assistance of council to show up the I
Speaker 7: mean everything, it's really it's the reverse jackpot. I mean,
Speaker 7: everything that could have gone wrong went wrong, and we
Speaker 7: know what the end result was, and the end result
Speaker 7: of it in some man in prison for twenty years,
Speaker 7: and even then, it's a mereracle that you're here now
Speaker 7: and still fighting, which is great, and I want to
Speaker 7: talk about that too, because you are fighting your case.
Speaker 7: I believe you will prevail, even though it's the tedious
Speaker 7: process and has made it so difficult for federal judges
Speaker 7: to overturn state convictions even when they know it's wrong.
Speaker 7: But that being said, you're also you know, it seems
Speaker 7: to me like you're hitting the ground running, you know,
Speaker 7: not missing a beat. I know you're working now, but
Speaker 7: you have a skill. That's that I want to talk
Speaker 7: about because you know, we don't know who's listening. It
Speaker 7: might be somebody listening who might need some of your talents,
Speaker 7: you know, and talking about graphic design and you know,
Speaker 7: talk about some of that stuff.
Speaker 6: That it was a trade that was available at substage
Speaker 6: to state prison communication. Graphic loss and design is the
Speaker 6: re entry process. And so I finally made it into
Speaker 6: the class and became proficient, but I'm still a feeling
Speaker 6: and so every time I go to fill out applications,
Speaker 6: so forth and so on.
Speaker 3: You gotta check the box.
Speaker 4: You check the box.
Speaker 7: But if people want to, if they need somebody to
Speaker 7: do some design work for them or something like that,
Speaker 7: whether they're in Virginia or even something you could do
Speaker 7: on the web, how could they reach out to you?
Speaker 6: My Gmail is los Sean three sixty s l O
Speaker 6: R D s h I n E.
Speaker 3: It's l O R D s h I n E
Speaker 3: three sixty at gmail dot com.
Speaker 4: That's correct. I'm on Facebook, Instagram.
Speaker 3: What's your Instagram?
Speaker 4: Oh, Messiah Alidah, So.
Speaker 3: It's Messiah Emmy s s I A H.
Speaker 4: A L A D A R L A space and
Speaker 4: then Johnson.
Speaker 7: Okay, Messiah, it's easy, I think once you type in
Speaker 7: Messiah and then A A L A D A R
Speaker 7: and then underscore Johnson. So, Messiah, I want to, of
Speaker 7: course thank you for coming and being here and compare
Speaker 7: this insane story. And I think a lot of people
Speaker 7: are going to take something out of it that's going
Speaker 7: to be meaningful to them, not least to which is
Speaker 7: your spirit, which remains, you know, just so positive and
Speaker 7: it's quite remarkable. I want to make sure we ask you,
Speaker 7: is there anyone else that you want to thank, Do
Speaker 7: you want to shout out your girls?
Speaker 6: Yes, I couldn't be here today without all the love
Speaker 6: and support that I received from my family and friends.
Speaker 6: It was an arduous journey and it still is because
Speaker 6: I'm still fighting for exoneration. I need to be vindicated
Speaker 6: for all the stuff that you know I've been through.
Speaker 6: But they have truly been an inspiration to me, and
Speaker 6: I just couldn't have done it without them and all
Speaker 6: of the students that help work on this case. Of course,
Speaker 6: did your in right, her family, Jennifer Givens, her family,
Speaker 6: the media who eventually began reporting the true story, and
Speaker 6: I don't know the list I can go on forever.
Speaker 6: Yourself for having me here today and allowing me to
Speaker 6: share this story and this truth, because ultimately, I hope
Speaker 6: that this inspires somebody, whether you're a prisoner in prison
Speaker 6: and feel like you're hopeless, these stories and I've listened
Speaker 6: to a lot of your podcasts.
Speaker 4: They are inspiring.
Speaker 6: Even though I've gone through my own set of circumstances,
Speaker 6: those podcasts are still inspiring to me. For me to
Speaker 6: continue fighting for myself from others.
Speaker 3: That means a lot.
Speaker 4: I mean, no you're You're genuine.
Speaker 6: I met you a few months back, and I always
Speaker 6: want to know if somebody is genuine, you know, especially
Speaker 6: if you haven't gone through these set of circumstances. And
Speaker 6: you are the real deal man, And I appreciate everything
Speaker 6: that you're doing because you could be doing so many
Speaker 6: other things, but to have somebody at some point inspire
Speaker 6: you and then for you to take on this cause. Man,
Speaker 6: it's truly important man, for society. And I'm with you, man, well,
Speaker 6: thank you man.
Speaker 3: That means a lot.
Speaker 7: And now after I collect myself, I want to honor
Speaker 7: our tradition here at Wrongful Conviction, and our listeners know
Speaker 7: this is the part of the show where I get
Speaker 7: to uh to basically sign off. But before I do that,
Speaker 7: and what I mean by that, I don't mean sign off,
Speaker 7: So don't don't true now because it's the best part
Speaker 7: of the show. But I want to, of course thank
Speaker 7: you again Messiah Johnson for coming in and sharing your
Speaker 7: story with us. I want to apologize to you for
Speaker 7: what society America, Virginia you know, put you through. But
Speaker 7: I know the best has yet to come for you,
Speaker 7: and I'm looking forward to a friendship and watching you,
Speaker 7: you know, succeed beyond everybody's wildest expectations.
Speaker 3: So I get to.
Speaker 7: Turn the microphone, my microphone off and leave yours on
Speaker 7: for any closing thoughts that you have.
Speaker 6: I don't know if you know Melvin Van Peebles, Mario
Speaker 6: van People's father, well, he said he had a friend
Speaker 6: that had three partners. They all went out to a
Speaker 6: club one day and all three of them got locked up.
Speaker 6: Two of them got out on bail, went home. His
Speaker 6: friend got out the next day, and by the time
Speaker 6: he got there, his friends had split up his property
Speaker 6: in his house as if he was never coming back.
Speaker 6: And he said, this is basically the mentality of society
Speaker 6: about prisoners. And so you have to know that that
Speaker 6: mentality won't bring about a change. You know, you have
Speaker 6: to know that these laws can affect you, either directly
Speaker 6: or indirectly in some form of fashion if.
Speaker 4: You're not involved.
Speaker 6: I hope that me coming here today, like I said,
Speaker 6: inspires others to continue fighting for themselves and others. It
Speaker 6: is truly a necessity that we begin to educate ourselves.
Speaker 6: So my plea to everybody is begin educating yourself, begin
Speaker 6: getting behind these causes of criminal justice. Reform so we
Speaker 6: can bring about a true balance back in society.
Speaker 3: Thank you for listening.
Speaker 7: This has been an amazing experience for me and I
Speaker 7: hope for you too. We'll see you next week. I'm
Speaker 7: wrong for Conviction. Don't forget to give us a fantastic review.
Speaker 7: Wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 3: It really helps.
Speaker 7: And I'm a proud donor to the Enesis Project, and
Speaker 7: I really hope you'll join me in supporting this very
Speaker 7: important cause and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions. Go
Speaker 7: to Innocentsproject dot org to learn how to donate and
Speaker 7: get involved. I'd like to thank our production team, Connor
Speaker 7: Hall and Kevin Wortis. The music in the show is
Speaker 7: by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure
Speaker 7: to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on
Speaker 7: Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm
Speaker 7: is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association
Speaker 7: with Signal Company Number one