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Speaker 1: I fell into the hands of a corrupt detective.

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Speaker 2: I was naive enough to believe that I would be

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Speaker 2: able to just present all of my proof of actual innocence,

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Speaker 2: that they would investigate adequately, and so that I wouldn't

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Speaker 2: be going to prison because I was a good person.

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Speaker 2: I hadn't done anything wrong.

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Speaker 1: In the back of your mind, you say, well, when

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Speaker 1: we go to a hearing or we go to court,

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Speaker 1: the truth will come out. The prosecution from day one

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Speaker 1: knew I was innocent and let forced testimony go uncorrected

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Speaker 1: from the lower courts all the way up to the

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Speaker 1: United States Supreme Court.

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Speaker 3: You have someone with a badge with ultimate and really,

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Speaker 3: in that moment, unchecked authority.

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Speaker 2: Don't presume that people are guilty when you see them

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Speaker 2: on TV, because it may just be a dirty da

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Speaker 2: that is trying to rise upward.

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Speaker 4: This is wrongful conviction.

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Speaker 3: Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flomm. Today's guest

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Speaker 3: as someone fans of the show will recognize, jeff Dskovic.

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Speaker 5: Jeffrey Deskovich spent more than a decade in prison for

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Speaker 5: the rape and murder of a classmate. It was a

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Speaker 5: crime he did not commit.

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Speaker 6: A sixteen year old is arrested for rape and murder.

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Speaker 6: He's grown by police and given a lie detector test,

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Speaker 6: and eventually the police talk him into a false confession.

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Speaker 6: Even though DNA did not link him to the crime.

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Speaker 6: He served sixteen years in prison before new testing shows

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Speaker 6: another man committed that crime.

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Speaker 5: In January two thousand and six, the Innocence Project convinced

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Speaker 5: prosecutors to take another look at DNA evidence. New testing

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Speaker 5: technology cleared Dskovic of the nineteen eighty nine crime, identifying

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Speaker 5: the real killer and releasing Dskovic into a world he

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Speaker 5: no longer knew. Today, Deskovic is a free man.

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Speaker 4: Jeff, welcome back to Wrongful Conviction.

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Speaker 7: Thanks for having me, Jason. It's always a pleasure.

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Speaker 3: And Jeff was here before with Amanda Knox and jareded

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Speaker 3: Adams when we did a very special Wrongful Christmas where

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Speaker 3: he spoke so eloquently about what it was like being

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Speaker 3: locked up in a maximum security prison on the holidays

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Speaker 3: when everyone else is out celebrating in the world's going

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Speaker 3: on without you. But this time I'm really glad to

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Speaker 3: have you here, Jeff, because your story is so important

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Speaker 3: and so I want to get right back into that

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Speaker 3: you grew up in White Plains.

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Speaker 7: No, I grew up in Peakskill in west Chester County.

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Speaker 7: My case happened in White Plains. That's the county court.

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Speaker 3: People are going to scratch their heads or shake their

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Speaker 3: heads when I say this. Right, in your case, DNA

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Speaker 3: evidence was presented at the trial that proved scientifically, with

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Speaker 3: no doubt that you could not have been the perpetrator

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Speaker 3: of the beating, rape and murder of the fifteen year

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Speaker 3: old victim, Angela Correa. There is no way on God's

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Speaker 3: green earth that you could have been the perpetrator, and

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Speaker 3: yet you were convicted anyway. And that's what makes it

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Speaker 3: just I want to shake up the whole justice system

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Speaker 3: and go, wait, that's not possible. It can't happen. And

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Speaker 3: you were basically a child when this happened.

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Speaker 7: I was. I was sixteen years old when I was arrested,

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Speaker 7: and by the time the trial happened and I was

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Speaker 7: wrongfully convicted, I was seventeen. So yes, I was a child,

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Speaker 7: and I had very small awareness of what was going on,

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Speaker 7: totally dependent on the lawyer, who was inept. In a

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Speaker 7: lot of ways, It's fair to say that I was

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Speaker 7: particularly vulnerable it's.

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Speaker 3: Such a tragic thing that happened to start with. And

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Speaker 3: this was a young girl who was in your school.

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Speaker 3: Were you in tenth grade at the time. I was,

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Speaker 3: so you were in tenth grade. She was in tenth grade.

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Speaker 4: Yeah.

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Speaker 7: She was in two of my classes as a freshman

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Speaker 7: and one as a sophomore. She was an immigrant from Columbia.

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Speaker 7: She'd been in the country for about a year and

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Speaker 7: a half. She lived a very very sheltered life, as

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Speaker 7: I understand, in which she never went outside unless she

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Speaker 7: was with her older sister or with her parents. And

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Speaker 7: this one particular day, she received a assignment in her

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Speaker 7: photography class to take some pictures of some foliage. The

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Speaker 7: teacher assigned male students with the female students. You're like

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Speaker 7: a buddy system for you know, safety, And this male

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Speaker 7: student who was assigned to her played hooky on the assignment.

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Speaker 7: And so when Angela went to her house with her sister,

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Speaker 7: her sister went to the restroom, and when she came

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Speaker 7: back out, Angela decided to venture out on her own

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Speaker 7: that one day to take the pictures, and unfortunately, that

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Speaker 7: proved to be her last day.

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Speaker 4: It's unbelievable.

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Speaker 3: I mean, it's really an incredible story, right, the one

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Speaker 3: day this poor little girl decides to you know, be brave,

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Speaker 3: right right, So she ends up brutally beaten, raped and strangled, right, yes,

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Speaker 3: And this must have caused pandemonium in the community.

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Speaker 7: It absolutely did. There hadn't been a murder and big

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Speaker 7: skill for about twenty years, and the whole city virtually

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Speaker 7: shut down. I mean parents were coming right to the

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Speaker 7: high school dropping their kids off and picking them up.

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Speaker 7: There was repeated town hall meetings, a mayor and police

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Speaker 7: were attending and giving safety tips, and people were vocalizing concerns.

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Speaker 3: And well, yeah, there was a monster on the loose

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Speaker 3: exactly right, a real monster there was. And so yeah,

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Speaker 3: as a parent, I would certainly be doing the same thing.

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Speaker 3: I wouldn't let my kid out of my sight until

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Speaker 3: this thing was resolved. So this creates, as we know,

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Speaker 3: a lot of pressure right on law enforcement. They got

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Speaker 3: to get this thing off their desks. Who knows what

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Speaker 3: could happen, right, There's going to be articles written, there's

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Speaker 3: going to be TV, there's going to be all that stuff.

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Speaker 3: Right when you have a high profile case, especially involving

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Speaker 3: a child in a community where murder hasn't happened in

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Speaker 3: twenty years. It's a pressure cooker, So how the hell

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Speaker 3: did they end up picking on you. I didn't know

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Speaker 3: you when you were sixteen, but I can imagine that

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Speaker 3: you would be an extremely unlikely candidate for a brutal

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Speaker 3: crime like this one.

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Speaker 7: Yeah, I would agree with that so well. When I

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Speaker 7: was sixteen, I kind of lived a double life in

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Speaker 7: a sense, in the sense that in school I was quiet,

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Speaker 7: I was to myself. I was a little bit withdrawn

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Speaker 7: because I wasn't really familiar with those kids and I

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Speaker 7: didn't quite fit in with them. But after school, in

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Speaker 7: the apartment building where I lived at, which coincidentally was

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Speaker 7: right across the street from the high school, I was

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Speaker 7: kind of like the life of the party. So myself

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Speaker 7: and one other boy that lived there, I mean, there

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Speaker 7: was a big group of kids that lived near complex

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Speaker 7: and in the areas around it, and pretty much whatever

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Speaker 7: I would suggest would mostly be what we would do.

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Speaker 7: I mean, we would swim, we would play basketball, ride bikes,

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Speaker 7: play Monopoly, video games, movies. We made up some games.

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Speaker 7: We made up a game that was like baseball, except

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Speaker 7: it was played with a tennis racket and a tennis ball,

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Speaker 7: and the ball had to be thrown a certain way,

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Speaker 7: and I was a different person there. So the police

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Speaker 7: story is that in the course of interviewing students from

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Speaker 7: the high school, some of them told the police, Hey,

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Speaker 7: you might want to talk to Jeff because he's quiet

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Speaker 7: and to himself. So originally the police looked at the

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Speaker 7: victim's stepdad, who was married to the victim's mother, but

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Speaker 7: at some point he realized that he was a suspect,

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Speaker 7: and he hired a retired New York City detective to

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Speaker 7: investigate the crime, and so that persuaded them to move

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Speaker 7: off of him. Then they looked at another youth in

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Speaker 7: the high school and they started using interrogative tactics, which

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Speaker 7: they would use on me later on. But the difference

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Speaker 7: is that he had a stepfather in the home, and

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Speaker 7: so the stepfather went down to the police station and

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Speaker 7: broke up the interrogation, and they initially wouldn't let him

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Speaker 7: in the room, but he broke up the interrogation and

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Speaker 7: he got his steps on an attorney, and so that

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Speaker 7: was the end of that. I, on the other hand,

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Speaker 7: didn't have a step father in the home, so there

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Speaker 7: wasn't anybody to intervene for me.

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Speaker 4: It was just you and your mother at the.

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Speaker 7: Time, myself, my mother, and I lived with my grandmother

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Speaker 7: and then I had a younger brother. So the police

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Speaker 7: story is that some of the kids in the school

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Speaker 7: told them that they might want to talk to me,

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Speaker 7: and their other theory as to why they focused it

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Speaker 7: on me, they said that my emotional reaction to the

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Speaker 7: victim having been murdered was disproportionate to what my actual

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Speaker 7: relationship with there was, which was to say there was

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Speaker 7: no relationship. I mean, I knew her name, she knew mine.

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Speaker 7: We weren't even on a high by basis. So her

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Speaker 7: being murdered it kind of struck me because that was

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Speaker 7: really my first encounter with death. I thought that was

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Speaker 7: something that happens to people at the end of life.

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Speaker 7: I had a chance to briefly get to know the family.

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Speaker 7: I went to the wick and people were invited back

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Speaker 7: to their house, to the Korea household, to have coffee

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Speaker 7: and talk to the family, and there was cookies and stuff,

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Speaker 7: and so I guess you could say, you might say

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Speaker 7: I was kind of a sensitive, sentimental type of person,

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Speaker 7: and so it kind of touched me.

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Speaker 3: A little by the way you might say you were

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Speaker 3: a normal type of person, right, And it always boggles

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Speaker 3: my mind how these authority figures suddenly become expert psychiatrists

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Speaker 3: or psychologists, and we see it over and over again.

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Speaker 3: He acted too sad, he didn't act sad enough, he

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Speaker 3: was too upset, not upset enough. He ran into the fire,

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Speaker 3: he didn't. You know, there's all these cases where that

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Speaker 3: becomes a factor. When it is it's ridiculous. Nobody knows

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Speaker 3: how anyone is going to react in times of trauma.

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Speaker 3: And I would say, like I said that, your reaction

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Speaker 3: sounds to me like a sensitive person who is just

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Speaker 3: experiencing something in their own community with somebody that's an

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Speaker 3: innocent young girl.

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Speaker 4: Of course you're upset.

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Speaker 7: Yeah, I agree with you completely, you know, And I

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Speaker 7: want to add that this really shook up the whole

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Speaker 7: city to the point that free mental health counseling was

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Speaker 7: offered to anybody in the city who wanted it. So

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Speaker 7: this affected many people emotionally.

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Speaker 3: Had you ever been in trouble before, No, never been

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Speaker 3: in trouble. So the cops at some point they come

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Speaker 3: and pick you up. But your interrogation is really at

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Speaker 3: the root of the entire problem, and it is it

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Speaker 3: is a perfect example of everything that's wrong with interrogation

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Speaker 3: techniques in this country even today.

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Speaker 7: It is. There was a six week run up to

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Speaker 7: that day, so I had an interaction with the police

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Speaker 7: from the time they initially intercepted me on my way

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Speaker 7: to the high school up until the day of the

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Speaker 7: Cours false confession, which half the time they would talk

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Speaker 7: to me as if I was a suspect, and then

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Speaker 7: half the time they would talk to me pretending like

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Speaker 7: they needed my help to solve the crime. They would

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Speaker 7: say things like, the kids won't talk freely around us,

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Speaker 7: but they will around you. Let us know if you

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Speaker 7: hear any rumors. They made me the center of attention.

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Speaker 7: They would ask me opinion questions and then it's exciting, right, yeah,

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Speaker 7: congrat It was congratulate made my opinions being correct. My

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Speaker 7: fantasy childhood career was actually to be a cop. So

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Speaker 7: this unexpected early opportunity to do this quasi police work,

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Speaker 7: you know, was part of how they pulled the wool

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Speaker 7: over my eyes, along with my age, so that was sixteen.

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Speaker 7: They used to buy pizza and listen, I grew up

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Speaker 7: in a single parent household as well, as we mentioned,

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Speaker 7: and that directly intersected with a good cop, bad cop routine,

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Speaker 7: and then I started looking up to the cop who

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Speaker 7: was pretending to.

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Speaker 4: Be my friend as a father figure.

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Speaker 7: As a father figure, yeah exactly.

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Speaker 3: I mean again, you were sixteen, so okay, so they're

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Speaker 3: sort of sort of spinning this web and seducing you

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Speaker 3: and trying to get you to say something that would

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Speaker 3: be incriminating. Now we know that's what they were doing, right.

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Speaker 7: Yeah, exactly. And so finally at the end, they told

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Speaker 7: me that they received some new tip that was in

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Speaker 7: the police file and they wanted to share that with me,

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Speaker 7: but to do that I would first have to take

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Speaker 7: and pass a polygraph. So help us, to help you,

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Speaker 7: to help us type of logic was employed. So instead

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Speaker 7: of going to the school the next day, I instead

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Speaker 7: went to the police station where I thought the polygraph

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Speaker 7: was gonna happen, because through the rumor mill of the

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Speaker 7: city I had heard that other people had been polygraphed

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Speaker 7: at the police station. But actually they drove me from Peakskill,

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Speaker 7: which was in Westchester County. They drove me forty minutes

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Speaker 7: away out of county to the town of Brewster, which

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Speaker 7: is in Putnam County. So they drove me to Brewster

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Speaker 7: to this polygraph as former Putnam County Sheriff's investigator Daniel Stevens,

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Speaker 7: and he was an officer, but he was dressed as

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Speaker 7: a civilian, and he never identified himself as a cop,

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Speaker 7: and he never read me my Miranda warning, so I

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Speaker 7: thought that he was a civilian. So he gave me

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Speaker 7: this manual to look at about how the polygraph works,

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Speaker 7: and it had a lot of really big words in

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Speaker 7: it that were beyond my comprehension, but I didn't care

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Speaker 7: because I was there to help the police, so who

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Speaker 7: cares what the thing says, or so I thought. They

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Speaker 7: put me into a small room and the polygraph is.

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Speaker 7: Stevens became like a virtual coffee dispenser. I mean, I

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Speaker 7: must have drank six or seven cups, and no sooner

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Speaker 7: would I put the cup down than the cup would

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Speaker 7: be halfway filled up. And you know, he's giving me

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Speaker 7: another one. And it seems pretty clear in hindsight that

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Speaker 7: the purpose of that was to get your nervous, make

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Speaker 7: me nerve right, exactly right. So once he finished the

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Speaker 7: coffee routine, then he straps me into the polygraph machine,

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Speaker 7: which was fairly heavy, so you know, now I'm kind

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Speaker 7: of immobilized. It's a very small room, and that's when

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Speaker 7: he launches into his third degree tactics. So he invaded

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Speaker 7: my personal space. He raised his voice at me. He

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Speaker 7: kept asking me the same questions over and over again.

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Speaker 7: And keep in mind that I'm not used to interacting

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Speaker 7: with adult males and the way he's conducting himself, and

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Speaker 7: he's kind of a mountain of a man, and I'm sixteen,

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Speaker 7: like maybe one hundred and forty pounds, so can wet,

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Speaker 7: you know. So it's really frightening. So each hour that

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Speaker 7: goes by, my fear is increasing in proportion to the time.

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Speaker 7: So Stevens kept that up for about six or seven hours.

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Speaker 7: Towards the end of the interrogation, that's when he said

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Speaker 7: to me, I guess by then he was just frustrated

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Speaker 7: by not having been able to get me to confess

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Speaker 7: to that point, he said, what do you mean you

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Speaker 7: didn't do it? You just told me through the polygraph

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Speaker 7: test results that you did. We just want you to

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Speaker 7: verbally confirm it. So when he said that to me,

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Speaker 7: that really shot my fear through the roof. And at

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Speaker 7: that moment, the officer who was I've been pretending to

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Speaker 7: be my friend. He came in the room and told

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Speaker 7: me that the other officers were going to harm me,

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Speaker 7: that he was holding them off, but he couldn't do

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Speaker 7: so any longer, that I had to help myself. And

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Speaker 7: then he added that if I did as he as

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Speaker 7: they wanted, that not only would they stop what they

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Speaker 7: were doing, but that I could go home afterwards, that

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Speaker 7: I was not going to be arrested. Being young, naive,

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Speaker 7: frightened sixteen years old in fear of my life because

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Speaker 7: the fact that I didn't know where I was, and

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Speaker 7: that I knew that nobody else did either, that loomed

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Speaker 7: very large in my mind.

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Speaker 4: It's incredible.

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Speaker 3: I mean, it's total disorientation, right, I mean, yes, I mean,

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Speaker 3: and it's you.

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Speaker 4: Know, it's diabolical.

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Speaker 3: But if what you want is a false confession, this

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Speaker 3: would be the way to do it.

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Speaker 7: Textbook, this is the way to do it. Yeah. And

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Speaker 7: then I was emotionally overwhelmed also, and then there's the

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Speaker 7: push pull dynamic, you know, there's the possibility of harm.

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Speaker 7: But then he's thrown me this false life preserver and

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Speaker 7: I took out which he offered. I made up a

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Speaker 7: story based on information which they had given me that

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Speaker 7: day and in the six weeks run up to that day,

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Speaker 7: and by the time it was all said and done,

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Speaker 7: I had collapsed on the floor, curled up into a

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Speaker 7: fetal position, crying uncontrollably. Obviously I was arrested.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, the whole thing was a lie. It's

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Speaker 3: like a fucking charade, right, And it was easy for them.

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Speaker 3: I mean, the miracle is that you didn't confess sooner. Actually,

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Speaker 3: And you know, it's interesting, Jeff, We know that false

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Speaker 3: confessions happened typically much later like yours, and you were

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Speaker 3: among the most vulnerable people that's ever been put into

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Speaker 3: this position, being that you were alone, you had no

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Speaker 3: way out, you had no way to get home. You

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Speaker 3: were in tenth grade, I mean tenth grade. You don't

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Speaker 3: know what the fuck you're doing. When you're in tenth grade.

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Speaker 3: You're just a child, and you had a very real

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Speaker 3: concern that you were going to be beaten up or worse.

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Speaker 4: Right, you know, the fact that you were able to.

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Speaker 3: Hang on for you know, almost nine hours in this

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Speaker 3: situation is a testament to your strength, even in this

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Speaker 3: most terrifying situation that you found yourself in. So now

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Speaker 3: you're expecting to go home because that's what they told you. Yes,

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Speaker 3: but they lied again. Yes, and so you signed this

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Speaker 3: piece of paper.

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Speaker 7: No. Let mean there was no sign confession. I never

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Speaker 7: signed a confession, and there was no audio or video tap.

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Speaker 7: It was just the cops word as to what happened.

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Speaker 7: And as a result of that, when we got to court,

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Speaker 7: they conveniently left out the threat and the false promise.

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Speaker 4: Wow.

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Speaker 3: I mean, it's actually strange, Jef, that they wouldn't have

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Speaker 3: just put a piece of paper in front of you,

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Speaker 3: because at this point you would have signed anything.

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Speaker 4: You would have said that you stole the mona.

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Speaker 7: Lisa, Right, Yeah, sure, yeah, of course, I mean whatever

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Speaker 7: opinion for a pound. Look, man, I ready decide. I

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Speaker 7: wanted to get the hell out of here. Tell you

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Speaker 7: what you want to say. Yeah, this is the next

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Speaker 7: thing you want me to say. Come on, get me

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Speaker 7: out of you make good on your end? Yeah you

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Speaker 7: want this extra thing? Come on, you got it? Can

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Speaker 7: you honor your word? Down?

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Speaker 3: So now you're arrested and the nightmare really begins, right,

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Speaker 3: because you're as unprepared for this situation as someone can be. Right,

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00:18:07,480 --> 00:18:10,320
Speaker 3: you have no experience with criminal justice. You're not a

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Speaker 3: big guy. You're not a tough guy. You're not emotionally

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Speaker 3: developed to a point that you could be in any way,

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Speaker 3: you know, steal yourself for what's going on. You're not

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Speaker 3: educated enough to understand the proceedings. You don't have a

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Speaker 3: family that's able to hire, for lack of a better word,

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Speaker 3: a dream team to help you, and so arrested in

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Speaker 3: nineteen ninety and now you're held in jail.

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Speaker 4: I am a waiting trial.

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Speaker 7: I was in jail for like thirty five days, and

357
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Speaker 7: then I got bailed out. I got bailed out. At

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Speaker 7: the time, my mother was dating a business person, Jack Ecashan,

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Speaker 7: who had a carpet store, Acusian Carpets, and he was

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Speaker 7: willing to bail me out, which he was hammered in

361
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Speaker 7: the newspaper for just the fact of bailing me out,

362
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Speaker 7: and he lost quite a bit of customer as a

363
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Speaker 7: result of doing that.

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Speaker 4: Well, that's innocent until proven guilty, right.

365
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Speaker 7: So they say not so much.

366
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Speaker 3: So much so even he's tard by this, yes, reputation

367
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Speaker 3: that you have. And now you go home. You're not

368
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Speaker 3: in school anymore, right, You've been kicked out of schools.

369
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Speaker 7: So yeah, they would not allow me to go back

370
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Speaker 7: to school until the case was resolved. And you know,

371
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Speaker 7: I naively thought, you know, when I got bailed at,

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Speaker 7: I was going to go back to my life. But

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Speaker 7: there was no going back to it ever.

374
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Speaker 4: So what did you do? Just stay in the house.

375
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Speaker 7: I stayed in the house. Yeah, I mean I was

376
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Speaker 7: afraid to go out, to be frank with you, that

377
00:19:35,040 --> 00:19:38,000
Speaker 7: was a pariah. And the parents of my former friends

378
00:19:38,040 --> 00:19:40,439
Speaker 7: would not allow them to play with me, of course,

379
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Speaker 7: and even if they had, I doubt very many of

380
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Speaker 7: them would have wanted to anyway, because they thought I

381
00:19:45,760 --> 00:19:48,480
Speaker 7: was guilty, because that's what the headlines and everything else

382
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Speaker 7: was saying. And I couldn't go to school, I couldn't

383
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Speaker 7: do anything. So yeah, I just I stayed in my house.

384
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Speaker 7: But that was only for a few weeks. Though I

385
00:19:58,760 --> 00:20:01,240
Speaker 7: tried to kill myself. I felt my life was over.

386
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Speaker 7: And I took an entire bottle of extra strength Title

387
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Speaker 7: and all that had not been used, and I took

388
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Speaker 7: every last pill and I went to sleep, and I

389
00:20:09,560 --> 00:20:11,040
Speaker 7: intended to never wake up again.

390
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Speaker 4: Wow, take them inte to think about that. I didn't

391
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Speaker 4: know that part of your story.

392
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Speaker 3: And Jeff and I've spent a lot of time together

393
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Speaker 3: but they've never shared those details with me.

394
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Speaker 4: It's really hard, hard to deal with.

395
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Speaker 7: My point of mentioning that though, is that that resulted

396
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Speaker 7: in my being involuntarily committed into a mental hospital for

397
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Speaker 7: six months.

398
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Speaker 3: So now the worst is still to come. But you've

399
00:20:39,440 --> 00:20:44,320
Speaker 3: now gone through this crazy rapid decline from a happy,

400
00:20:44,359 --> 00:20:47,600
Speaker 3: go lucky, goofy kid, not a care in the world

401
00:20:47,880 --> 00:20:50,920
Speaker 3: except for maybe a test coming up right, right, or

402
00:20:50,960 --> 00:20:53,159
Speaker 3: maybe you have a date or maybe you don't or whatever.

403
00:20:53,200 --> 00:20:55,560
Speaker 3: You know, all the things you go through in adolescents,

404
00:20:56,040 --> 00:21:00,840
Speaker 3: to being locked in a terrible jail basically being under

405
00:21:00,840 --> 00:21:06,240
Speaker 3: house arrest, being ostracized by your friends and the whole community,

406
00:21:06,920 --> 00:21:11,760
Speaker 3: being pilloried in the newspapers and the media, and now

407
00:21:11,800 --> 00:21:14,920
Speaker 3: you're in a mental institution, and then the trial comes, and.

408
00:21:14,880 --> 00:21:17,600
Speaker 7: Then the trial comes in just before the trial, the

409
00:21:17,680 --> 00:21:22,240
Speaker 7: results of the DNA test comes back from the FBI laboratory,

410
00:21:22,800 --> 00:21:26,240
Speaker 7: which shows that the seamen found in the victim didn't

411
00:21:26,240 --> 00:21:26,720
Speaker 7: match me.

412
00:21:27,040 --> 00:21:28,840
Speaker 4: Right, because remember she was raped, because.

413
00:21:28,640 --> 00:21:31,440
Speaker 7: She was raped. Yes, And by the way, the lieutenant

414
00:21:31,480 --> 00:21:35,239
Speaker 7: who oversaw everything in the letter that he penned to

415
00:21:35,320 --> 00:21:39,399
Speaker 7: the FBI asking them to expedite the testing, he wrote

416
00:21:39,400 --> 00:21:42,240
Speaker 7: in the letter that the DNA testing would either show

417
00:21:42,320 --> 00:21:45,959
Speaker 7: my guilt or it would exonerate me. But when it

418
00:21:46,000 --> 00:21:50,280
Speaker 7: came back and it didn't match me, my lawyer did

419
00:21:50,320 --> 00:21:53,880
Speaker 7: try to get the indictment dismissed against me based on that,

420
00:21:54,040 --> 00:21:55,680
Speaker 7: but the judge denied that motion.

421
00:21:56,720 --> 00:22:02,160
Speaker 3: That alone seems so just incomprehensible to me. I mean,

422
00:22:02,720 --> 00:22:05,520
Speaker 3: that just doesn't make sense. The judge is impartial, right,

423
00:22:05,560 --> 00:22:08,160
Speaker 3: we know the prosecutor has an agenda, but the judge

424
00:22:08,200 --> 00:22:08,720
Speaker 3: is impartial.

425
00:22:09,480 --> 00:22:10,720
Speaker 4: Yeah, I don't know, I don't understand.

426
00:22:10,720 --> 00:22:13,520
Speaker 3: I mean, I know that back then DNA wasn't it

427
00:22:13,640 --> 00:22:15,920
Speaker 3: wasn't as it wasn't.

428
00:22:15,720 --> 00:22:17,960
Speaker 7: As well known. But to be clear, I mean, DNA

429
00:22:18,000 --> 00:22:20,879
Speaker 7: started being used in the court system as early as

430
00:22:20,960 --> 00:22:23,399
Speaker 7: nineteen eighty seven, and this we're on trial now in

431
00:22:23,520 --> 00:22:26,760
Speaker 7: nineteen ninety, so it's been around for three years. So

432
00:22:27,119 --> 00:22:30,720
Speaker 7: while not in currency like now, it is not exactly

433
00:22:30,880 --> 00:22:32,440
Speaker 7: totally unknown.

434
00:22:32,400 --> 00:22:34,359
Speaker 4: Right, and it's perfect I mean.

435
00:22:34,320 --> 00:22:35,720
Speaker 7: Right, it's the gold standard.

436
00:22:35,880 --> 00:22:40,600
Speaker 3: Yeah, so your DNA doesn't match. This is an inconvenient

437
00:22:40,720 --> 00:22:45,600
Speaker 3: truth for the authorities, and the judge allows this, this

438
00:22:45,720 --> 00:22:48,399
Speaker 3: circus to go on. So you go to trial, yes,

439
00:22:48,960 --> 00:22:51,960
Speaker 3: and at the trial was the DNA allowed to be introduced, Yes,

440
00:22:51,960 --> 00:22:52,280
Speaker 3: it was.

441
00:22:52,800 --> 00:22:55,120
Speaker 4: So again, how does it end up that you get

442
00:22:55,119 --> 00:22:56,680
Speaker 4: convicted under these circumstances?

443
00:22:57,040 --> 00:23:01,560
Speaker 7: Sure? So, firstly, as I mentioned, the the cops left

444
00:23:01,560 --> 00:23:05,399
Speaker 7: the threatned false promise out of the story, So I

445
00:23:05,440 --> 00:23:07,960
Speaker 7: mean the story is still there's a lot enough red

446
00:23:08,000 --> 00:23:11,520
Speaker 7: flags pertaining to circumstances around the confession that called into

447
00:23:11,560 --> 00:23:14,960
Speaker 7: a question, but the threatned false promise weren't there. So

448
00:23:15,040 --> 00:23:21,000
Speaker 7: that's one factor. Another factor is there was prosecutorial misconduct

449
00:23:21,080 --> 00:23:24,240
Speaker 7: and fraud by the medical examiner. So in order to

450
00:23:24,359 --> 00:23:29,040
Speaker 7: answer the DNA evidence, the prosecutor got the medical examiner

451
00:23:29,040 --> 00:23:32,560
Speaker 7: to commit fraud. So when an autopsy's done, there's written

452
00:23:32,600 --> 00:23:36,440
Speaker 7: in audio notes which are taken contemporaneously as the findings

453
00:23:36,440 --> 00:23:40,240
Speaker 7: are made. So it was only six months after doing

454
00:23:40,280 --> 00:23:45,439
Speaker 7: that initial autopsy, and only after the DNA result didn't

455
00:23:45,480 --> 00:23:48,960
Speaker 7: match me, that this medical examiner for the first time

456
00:23:49,119 --> 00:23:53,520
Speaker 7: suddenly claimed he suddenly remembers right. Six months later and

457
00:23:54,200 --> 00:23:58,719
Speaker 7: hundreds of autopsies later, he suddenly remembers that he found

458
00:23:58,720 --> 00:24:03,000
Speaker 7: medical evidence to show that the victim had been sexually active,

459
00:24:03,600 --> 00:24:05,919
Speaker 7: which is what opened the door for the prosecutor to

460
00:24:06,119 --> 00:24:10,320
Speaker 7: argue that it didn't matter that the seamen didn't come

461
00:24:10,359 --> 00:24:12,960
Speaker 7: from me. That that didn't mean I was innocent. That

462
00:24:13,160 --> 00:24:17,200
Speaker 7: just meant that she could have had consensual sex close

463
00:24:17,320 --> 00:24:19,600
Speaker 7: enough to the murder and rape so as to explain

464
00:24:19,600 --> 00:24:20,439
Speaker 7: away the DNA.

465
00:24:21,480 --> 00:24:23,440
Speaker 3: But that still wouldn't explain it away. It would just

466
00:24:23,480 --> 00:24:26,000
Speaker 3: explain that there would be a mixture, right, exactly right,

467
00:24:26,040 --> 00:24:28,359
Speaker 3: So that doesn't make any sense. And also, let's just

468
00:24:28,440 --> 00:24:31,880
Speaker 3: reflect for a moment on the other victim in this case,

469
00:24:31,920 --> 00:24:33,879
Speaker 3: and there are more right, Yes, it's not just you

470
00:24:33,960 --> 00:24:36,760
Speaker 3: and Angela, it is not. Let's just reflect for a

471
00:24:36,800 --> 00:24:40,399
Speaker 3: minute that the authorities were willing to go so low.

472
00:24:41,280 --> 00:24:43,000
Speaker 3: They had to know that you were innocent. Yeah, they

473
00:24:43,000 --> 00:24:46,080
Speaker 3: were so determined to convict an innocent boy because you

474
00:24:46,080 --> 00:24:50,679
Speaker 3: were a boy, yes, that they were willing to drag

475
00:24:50,760 --> 00:24:55,920
Speaker 3: the reputation of a fifteen year old girl, yes, through

476
00:24:55,960 --> 00:25:00,000
Speaker 3: the mud, right, and put her family through that whenever

477
00:25:00,160 --> 00:25:02,320
Speaker 3: indication that she was a girl who was like as

478
00:25:02,320 --> 00:25:04,479
Speaker 3: goody two shoes as you could be. You couldn't even

479
00:25:04,560 --> 00:25:06,520
Speaker 3: leave the house by yourself until that one faithful day.

480
00:25:07,080 --> 00:25:11,280
Speaker 3: I mean, it's so disgusting, right, this girl who deserves

481
00:25:11,400 --> 00:25:16,320
Speaker 3: at least to have her reputation protected is dragged.

482
00:25:16,000 --> 00:25:17,520
Speaker 4: Through the mud. It's just disgusting.

483
00:25:28,760 --> 00:25:29,040
Speaker 7: Jeff.

484
00:25:29,119 --> 00:25:31,040
Speaker 3: Let me ask you this, because you've become an expert

485
00:25:31,080 --> 00:25:35,200
Speaker 3: in criminal justice. You've accomplished so much since you've been home,

486
00:25:35,720 --> 00:25:38,200
Speaker 3: in terms of your education, in terms of investigative skills,

487
00:25:38,240 --> 00:25:40,920
Speaker 3: in terms of your advocacy. You are one of the

488
00:25:41,040 --> 00:25:43,960
Speaker 3: top people in the state or dry state, or maybe

489
00:25:43,960 --> 00:25:46,800
Speaker 3: even the country now in terms of your breadth of

490
00:25:46,920 --> 00:25:51,520
Speaker 3: knowledge of how these things work. To your great credit,

491
00:25:52,320 --> 00:25:57,840
Speaker 3: And there was no physical evidence connecting you to this crime, right, correct?

492
00:25:57,920 --> 00:26:03,680
Speaker 3: Is it possible for someone to beat, rape, and strangle

493
00:26:03,720 --> 00:26:06,399
Speaker 3: someone and not leave any physical evidence at the crime scene.

494
00:26:06,720 --> 00:26:08,120
Speaker 4: No, it's impossible.

495
00:26:08,560 --> 00:26:11,400
Speaker 7: It's very very close to impossible. And just to delve

496
00:26:11,440 --> 00:26:13,840
Speaker 7: into this a little bit more, one of my statements,

497
00:26:13,880 --> 00:26:17,160
Speaker 7: I said that I hit the victim over the head

498
00:26:17,200 --> 00:26:21,159
Speaker 7: with a gatorade bottle, because gatorade was made in glass bottles.

499
00:26:21,520 --> 00:26:24,119
Speaker 7: But if you look at the types of injuries that

500
00:26:24,160 --> 00:26:27,080
Speaker 7: the victim had on her head, a bottle would not

501
00:26:27,160 --> 00:26:31,080
Speaker 7: be capable of making that type of injury. And on

502
00:26:31,200 --> 00:26:34,119
Speaker 7: top of that, there was no broken glass at the

503
00:26:34,160 --> 00:26:36,760
Speaker 7: crime scene. There was no shards of glass in the body.

504
00:26:37,240 --> 00:26:40,960
Speaker 7: There's no relationship to the physical evidence and the statements

505
00:26:40,960 --> 00:26:42,520
Speaker 7: in the confession at all.

506
00:26:43,000 --> 00:26:48,200
Speaker 3: Right, so there was no physical evidence. No, your confession stunk, yes,

507
00:26:48,280 --> 00:26:51,560
Speaker 3: because you didn't know, right, and there was DNA to

508
00:26:51,600 --> 00:26:54,480
Speaker 3: prove that you didn't do it. Now they conspire somehow

509
00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:58,479
Speaker 3: to drag this girl's reputation into the mud, and in

510
00:26:58,600 --> 00:27:02,919
Speaker 3: order to protect this false narrative that they've created.

511
00:27:03,680 --> 00:27:06,199
Speaker 7: Right, But there's three other things that they did fighting

512
00:27:06,200 --> 00:27:09,720
Speaker 7: the DNA. So taking his law a step further, the

513
00:27:09,840 --> 00:27:14,960
Speaker 7: prosecutor then named another youth by name that he claimed

514
00:27:15,520 --> 00:27:18,639
Speaker 7: probably had had sex with the victim, but he never

515
00:27:18,960 --> 00:27:21,840
Speaker 7: had a DNA test to prove that, and he didn't

516
00:27:21,840 --> 00:27:24,520
Speaker 7: even call him as a witness. He just made the

517
00:27:24,800 --> 00:27:29,040
Speaker 7: unsupported argument to the jury. And then another thing was

518
00:27:29,080 --> 00:27:32,639
Speaker 7: that I later learned through civil litigation that when the

519
00:27:32,720 --> 00:27:35,840
Speaker 7: DNA didn't match me, the police went back out into

520
00:27:35,880 --> 00:27:38,560
Speaker 7: the field and they interviewed seventeen witnesses who knew the

521
00:27:38,600 --> 00:27:42,840
Speaker 7: victim in one capacity or another, and all of them

522
00:27:42,840 --> 00:27:45,280
Speaker 7: told the police that there was no boyfriend, there was

523
00:27:45,320 --> 00:27:50,000
Speaker 7: no consensual sex. But the cops never documented any of

524
00:27:50,040 --> 00:27:52,920
Speaker 7: those interviews so that they didn't have to turn those

525
00:27:53,000 --> 00:27:56,640
Speaker 7: over to my lawyer. And the third thing was that

526
00:27:57,320 --> 00:28:02,760
Speaker 7: the police fabricated and attributed to me. They claimed that

527
00:28:02,880 --> 00:28:06,080
Speaker 7: I said to them speaking in the third person. They

528
00:28:06,119 --> 00:28:08,320
Speaker 7: claimed that I said, well, I don't know if the

529
00:28:08,320 --> 00:28:12,880
Speaker 7: perpetrator ejaculated or not, so that word was not in

530
00:28:12,920 --> 00:28:16,639
Speaker 7: my vocabulary as a sixteen year old, And we proved

531
00:28:16,640 --> 00:28:20,840
Speaker 7: that in the police reports, where they referenced that they

532
00:28:20,880 --> 00:28:24,199
Speaker 7: only came up with that after the DNA didn't match me.

533
00:28:24,280 --> 00:28:28,440
Speaker 7: That was never in their early written reports of the interrogation.

534
00:28:28,600 --> 00:28:32,680
Speaker 7: So they fabricated that to help the prosecutor against the DNA.

535
00:28:32,760 --> 00:28:35,560
Speaker 3: You know what's bothering me greatly Aside from all of

536
00:28:35,600 --> 00:28:38,240
Speaker 3: this right now, Jeff, is the idea that there must

537
00:28:38,240 --> 00:28:41,200
Speaker 3: have been meetings right where they were like, uh oh,

538
00:28:41,320 --> 00:28:45,000
Speaker 3: like at various different stages. Oh, the DNA doesn't match. Oh,

539
00:28:45,040 --> 00:28:47,840
Speaker 3: the witnesses are not connecting any boyfriend.

540
00:28:48,080 --> 00:28:48,440
Speaker 4: Oh.

541
00:28:48,480 --> 00:28:51,440
Speaker 3: Everything that they had said was turning out to be

542
00:28:51,560 --> 00:28:52,080
Speaker 3: not true.

543
00:28:52,480 --> 00:28:52,680
Speaker 4: Right.

544
00:28:53,240 --> 00:28:56,479
Speaker 3: All their theories were going up in smoke, and there

545
00:28:56,560 --> 00:28:58,880
Speaker 3: must have been at some point sit downs where they

546
00:28:58,920 --> 00:28:59,920
Speaker 3: got with the medical EGA.

547
00:29:00,240 --> 00:29:02,480
Speaker 4: I don't know this, I can't prove it, but I'm guessing.

548
00:29:03,680 --> 00:29:07,680
Speaker 7: Examiner testified at that position in the lawsuit. He said

549
00:29:07,680 --> 00:29:09,800
Speaker 7: that the day after the DNA didn't match me, he

550
00:29:09,880 --> 00:29:12,720
Speaker 7: got a phone call from one of three people, and

551
00:29:13,560 --> 00:29:15,800
Speaker 7: he said that they told him that the DNA didn't

552
00:29:15,840 --> 00:29:17,560
Speaker 7: match me, and he had to come up with some

553
00:29:17,680 --> 00:29:19,960
Speaker 7: kind of a theory by which the case against me

554
00:29:20,040 --> 00:29:23,320
Speaker 7: could continue and a conviction could result.

555
00:29:23,600 --> 00:29:29,760
Speaker 3: Unbelievable, I mean, it's unbelievable. I mean, I can't I

556
00:29:29,840 --> 00:29:30,640
Speaker 3: can't fathom it.

557
00:29:31,600 --> 00:29:33,120
Speaker 4: So there you are a trial.

558
00:29:33,400 --> 00:29:35,320
Speaker 7: So that's on the prosecution end, But I want to

559
00:29:35,360 --> 00:29:38,040
Speaker 7: the other part of how I got convicted was the

560
00:29:38,520 --> 00:29:43,000
Speaker 7: public defender, who supposedly was the best lawyer in Legal

561
00:29:43,040 --> 00:29:46,960
Speaker 7: Aid of Westchester. He was terrible. He very rarely met

562
00:29:47,000 --> 00:29:49,840
Speaker 7: with me. Whenever I would try to explain to him

563
00:29:50,160 --> 00:29:52,880
Speaker 7: that I was innocent and what happened in the interrogation room,

564
00:29:52,960 --> 00:29:55,680
Speaker 7: he was always shutting me up. One time he told

565
00:29:55,720 --> 00:29:57,840
Speaker 7: me he didn't care if I was guilty or innocent.

566
00:29:58,560 --> 00:30:02,240
Speaker 7: He never explained to the jury the significance of the

567
00:30:02,320 --> 00:30:05,560
Speaker 7: DNA not matching me. He never used the DNA to

568
00:30:05,680 --> 00:30:08,640
Speaker 7: argue that this so called confession was coerced and false.

569
00:30:09,400 --> 00:30:12,680
Speaker 7: When we hadn't decided if we were going to go

570
00:30:12,760 --> 00:30:16,720
Speaker 7: with a bench trial or a jury trial. He came

571
00:30:16,800 --> 00:30:19,840
Speaker 7: to me one day and told me that the trial

572
00:30:19,920 --> 00:30:22,160
Speaker 7: judge came to him off the record and told him

573
00:30:22,200 --> 00:30:24,080
Speaker 7: to pick a jury because he didn't want to be

574
00:30:24,200 --> 00:30:28,320
Speaker 7: responsible for acquitting me. So my lawyer was supposed to

575
00:30:28,560 --> 00:30:30,840
Speaker 7: put that on the record and asked the judge to

576
00:30:30,880 --> 00:30:34,360
Speaker 7: accuse himself, because that's a prejudicial type of statement. It

577
00:30:34,400 --> 00:30:38,080
Speaker 7: also suggests that the judge is feeling public pressure, because again,

578
00:30:39,320 --> 00:30:44,640
Speaker 7: virtually all of the coverage is guilt presumptive oriented. So additionally,

579
00:30:45,360 --> 00:30:48,000
Speaker 7: my lawyer was not supposed to represent me because of

580
00:30:48,040 --> 00:30:51,880
Speaker 7: a conflict of interest in that this other youth that

581
00:30:51,960 --> 00:30:55,480
Speaker 7: the prosecution was falsely claiming had had sex with the

582
00:30:55,560 --> 00:31:00,560
Speaker 7: victim was represented by another lawyer in legal eight, which

583
00:31:00,600 --> 00:31:04,160
Speaker 7: meant that the defense couldn't ask him to give a

584
00:31:04,240 --> 00:31:07,400
Speaker 7: DNA sample, The defense couldn't subpoena him in order to

585
00:31:07,440 --> 00:31:12,920
Speaker 7: explode the consensual sex theory. Because right and then, the

586
00:31:12,960 --> 00:31:16,080
Speaker 7: best thing or worst thing of all, was when it

587
00:31:16,120 --> 00:31:20,080
Speaker 7: was time to cross examine the medical examiner whose fraud

588
00:31:20,200 --> 00:31:24,080
Speaker 7: was so large in this case, he never even bothered

589
00:31:24,120 --> 00:31:27,520
Speaker 7: to cross examine him. He stood up in open court

590
00:31:27,600 --> 00:31:30,560
Speaker 7: and with a big smile on his face, as if

591
00:31:30,640 --> 00:31:33,200
Speaker 7: him and the medical examiner were great friends from back

592
00:31:33,200 --> 00:31:36,400
Speaker 7: in the day. He said to him, you're going to

593
00:31:36,480 --> 00:31:39,600
Speaker 7: be pleased to know that I don't have a single

594
00:31:39,720 --> 00:31:40,800
Speaker 7: question for you.

595
00:31:41,520 --> 00:31:41,800
Speaker 4: Wow.

596
00:31:42,080 --> 00:31:46,200
Speaker 7: He never interviewed nor presented as a witness my alibi.

597
00:31:46,560 --> 00:31:50,320
Speaker 7: I was actually playing wiffle ball when the crime happened,

598
00:31:51,480 --> 00:31:54,880
Speaker 7: and he wouldn't allow me to testify at the pre

599
00:31:54,960 --> 00:31:58,880
Speaker 7: trial hearing to put the threatned false promise on the record,

600
00:31:59,560 --> 00:32:01,440
Speaker 7: And when it was time for the defense to try

601
00:32:01,480 --> 00:32:03,800
Speaker 7: to put a case on he said to me that

602
00:32:04,200 --> 00:32:06,440
Speaker 7: it wasn't his job to prove that I was innocent.

603
00:32:06,640 --> 00:32:09,280
Speaker 7: It's up to the prosecution to prove that I was guilty,

604
00:32:09,320 --> 00:32:12,800
Speaker 7: and he didn't think that that had happened, so added

605
00:32:12,880 --> 00:32:17,200
Speaker 7: all up, I was wrongfully convicted of a murder and rape.

606
00:32:18,000 --> 00:32:21,520
Speaker 3: It's unreal. I mean, this stuff goes on in America.

607
00:32:21,800 --> 00:32:26,840
Speaker 3: It's just it's just insane. So you end up getting

608
00:32:26,840 --> 00:32:28,400
Speaker 3: convicted and sentenced.

609
00:32:28,000 --> 00:32:31,960
Speaker 7: To fifteen to life. At the sentencing hearing, I begged

610
00:32:31,960 --> 00:32:34,560
Speaker 7: the judge to overturn the verdict because I was innocent,

611
00:32:34,640 --> 00:32:38,040
Speaker 7: and I referenced the DNA to support my contention, and

612
00:32:38,080 --> 00:32:41,720
Speaker 7: he actually told me on the record, maybe you are innocent,

613
00:32:42,560 --> 00:32:45,200
Speaker 7: conceding that there is a doubt, but the DNA doesn't

614
00:32:45,200 --> 00:32:47,280
Speaker 7: match me. How could there not be a doubt? But

615
00:32:47,760 --> 00:32:50,080
Speaker 7: you might think that he would step up for justice

616
00:32:50,120 --> 00:32:53,960
Speaker 7: and overturn the conviction by reversing any number of rulings

617
00:32:54,000 --> 00:32:56,560
Speaker 7: that he made against me in the course of the trial.

618
00:32:57,160 --> 00:32:59,520
Speaker 7: But he didn't do that. He took the easy and

619
00:32:59,520 --> 00:33:02,880
Speaker 7: politically expedient way out, which was to sentence me to

620
00:33:03,120 --> 00:33:06,000
Speaker 7: a term of imprisonment of fifteen to life.

621
00:33:06,680 --> 00:33:10,480
Speaker 3: Fifteen years to life. Now you're only seventeen at this time,

622
00:33:10,920 --> 00:33:14,520
Speaker 3: so this is basically that's an incomprehensible thing to face

623
00:33:14,560 --> 00:33:16,680
Speaker 3: for anybody, but at least of all for a child.

624
00:33:17,120 --> 00:33:19,000
Speaker 3: And then you end up in some of the worst

625
00:33:19,040 --> 00:33:24,400
Speaker 3: prisons in America, and you go into these places unprepared

626
00:33:24,680 --> 00:33:28,400
Speaker 3: in every imaginable way, and you go in under the

627
00:33:28,400 --> 00:33:31,680
Speaker 3: worst possible circumstance, which is it's someone who's been convicted

628
00:33:31,720 --> 00:33:33,200
Speaker 3: of raping and murdering a child.

629
00:33:33,480 --> 00:33:35,680
Speaker 7: Exactly, how the fuck.

630
00:33:35,520 --> 00:33:41,120
Speaker 4: Did you survive in there? Jeff? How did you keep

631
00:33:41,120 --> 00:33:41,640
Speaker 4: hope alive?

632
00:33:41,880 --> 00:33:43,920
Speaker 7: All right? So, in terms of how how I kept

633
00:33:43,960 --> 00:33:47,719
Speaker 7: hope alive, definitely belief in God was one thing. Another

634
00:33:47,800 --> 00:33:49,840
Speaker 7: thing was I didn't look at it like I was

635
00:33:49,880 --> 00:33:52,120
Speaker 7: doing fifteen to life. I thought I was just doing

636
00:33:52,160 --> 00:33:54,600
Speaker 7: a year or two until the next appeal would be decided,

637
00:33:55,000 --> 00:33:56,960
Speaker 7: which I was sure I was going to win, because

638
00:33:56,960 --> 00:33:59,640
Speaker 7: I knew I was innocent, and I still naively believed

639
00:33:59,640 --> 00:34:04,360
Speaker 7: in this. I found different things to throw myself into mentally.

640
00:34:04,800 --> 00:34:06,640
Speaker 7: I used to go to the law library and learn

641
00:34:06,640 --> 00:34:09,400
Speaker 7: about the laws so I could feel a little bit empowered.

642
00:34:09,960 --> 00:34:13,760
Speaker 7: I used to read nonfiction books. I would cut pictures

643
00:34:13,760 --> 00:34:16,000
Speaker 7: of nature scenes out so I could look at them

644
00:34:16,000 --> 00:34:20,200
Speaker 7: and travel there mentally. But I would play sports like

645
00:34:20,480 --> 00:34:24,040
Speaker 7: ping pong or basketball or chess. I engaged in this

646
00:34:24,120 --> 00:34:26,880
Speaker 7: elaborate delusion, like if I was a professional player and

647
00:34:26,920 --> 00:34:29,160
Speaker 7: so was the other person, and the people on the

648
00:34:29,200 --> 00:34:33,040
Speaker 7: sidelines were the fans. But it was not like kids

649
00:34:33,120 --> 00:34:36,640
Speaker 7: like fantasizing about being a professional athlete. This was more

650
00:34:37,040 --> 00:34:39,719
Speaker 7: like my mind couldn't deal with being there anymore, and

651
00:34:39,719 --> 00:34:42,120
Speaker 7: I had to get out of the prison mentally for

652
00:34:42,200 --> 00:34:47,480
Speaker 7: a couple of hours. By this elaborate delusion. Sometimes I'd

653
00:34:47,480 --> 00:34:50,520
Speaker 7: listen to sports radio, but it wasn't listening to sports radio.

654
00:34:50,600 --> 00:34:54,000
Speaker 7: It was a connection to the outside, and I'm not

655
00:34:54,280 --> 00:34:57,640
Speaker 7: going to the prison assignment in the morning. I'm going

656
00:34:57,719 --> 00:35:01,080
Speaker 7: to work or I'm going to school. It's not the warden,

657
00:35:01,200 --> 00:35:04,680
Speaker 7: it's the superintendent. And you try to it's normal that

658
00:35:04,760 --> 00:35:06,960
Speaker 7: if you're going to make a phone call, it's got

659
00:35:07,000 --> 00:35:10,160
Speaker 7: to be collect or a strip search as the price

660
00:35:10,280 --> 00:35:14,719
Speaker 7: for a visit, and you tried to normalize the madness

661
00:35:14,760 --> 00:35:18,680
Speaker 7: in your own mind. I had to fight off feelings

662
00:35:18,719 --> 00:35:23,439
Speaker 7: of hopelessness, helplessness, thoughts of giving up, suicidal ideations, thoughts

663
00:35:23,440 --> 00:35:26,440
Speaker 7: of suicide came into my mind at times, and so

664
00:35:26,520 --> 00:35:30,960
Speaker 7: this was as much a psychological thing as it was physical.

665
00:35:31,000 --> 00:35:33,920
Speaker 7: I mean, I didn't have the luxury of loosing my

666
00:35:34,040 --> 00:35:37,680
Speaker 7: mind because I knew that, especially when my peals were

667
00:35:37,800 --> 00:35:41,440
Speaker 7: over and exhausted. After I was in for eleven years,

668
00:35:41,480 --> 00:35:44,200
Speaker 7: and they no longer give you a lawyer, and the

669
00:35:44,239 --> 00:35:46,480
Speaker 7: only way back into court is if you can find

670
00:35:46,640 --> 00:35:51,840
Speaker 7: something new that wasn't known previously. So I started writing

671
00:35:52,239 --> 00:35:55,960
Speaker 7: a countless number of letters trying to find a lawyer

672
00:35:56,000 --> 00:35:58,200
Speaker 7: and to investigator to take my case for free, because

673
00:35:58,200 --> 00:36:00,680
Speaker 7: I didn't have any money to hige right.

674
00:36:00,680 --> 00:36:03,040
Speaker 3: And I want to point out a cruel irony here, Jeff,

675
00:36:03,080 --> 00:36:06,960
Speaker 3: which is that for many of the clients of the

676
00:36:06,960 --> 00:36:11,600
Speaker 3: innocence projects or other innocence organizations, the DNA is a

677
00:36:11,600 --> 00:36:15,640
Speaker 3: silver bullet, right, And ultimately, when the DNA gets discovered,

678
00:36:15,680 --> 00:36:17,920
Speaker 3: they get a new trial because it's new evidence. But

679
00:36:17,920 --> 00:36:20,440
Speaker 3: you would already presented the DNA. You would actually shot

680
00:36:20,480 --> 00:36:24,080
Speaker 3: that arrow already, right, And so you're actually fucked because

681
00:36:24,080 --> 00:36:26,360
Speaker 3: of the fact that your timing of it.

682
00:36:26,360 --> 00:36:28,360
Speaker 4: It's so strange, you know that fact.

683
00:36:28,520 --> 00:36:32,319
Speaker 7: See. I used to collect articles on exonerations and that

684
00:36:32,480 --> 00:36:34,520
Speaker 7: used to grate on me though, like all these people

685
00:36:34,560 --> 00:36:37,560
Speaker 7: were going home because of the DNA, and I'm like, well,

686
00:36:37,760 --> 00:36:40,600
Speaker 7: why do I have to be an exception? The DNA

687
00:36:40,640 --> 00:36:44,120
Speaker 7: doesn't match me either. What does it matter when the

688
00:36:44,200 --> 00:36:47,520
Speaker 7: result was actually obtained? I mean, it means the same thing.

689
00:36:48,520 --> 00:36:52,160
Speaker 3: Meanwhile, let's spend a moment talking about.

690
00:36:52,040 --> 00:36:53,359
Speaker 4: The actual perpetrator.

691
00:36:53,560 --> 00:36:57,360
Speaker 3: Yes, because every time and I sound like a broken

692
00:36:57,400 --> 00:37:00,880
Speaker 3: record when I say this, but every time that somebody

693
00:37:00,960 --> 00:37:05,280
Speaker 3: like you gets convicted wrongfully, the actual perpetrator, they stopped

694
00:37:05,320 --> 00:37:05,920
Speaker 3: looking for him.

695
00:37:06,080 --> 00:37:06,319
Speaker 4: Right.

696
00:37:06,520 --> 00:37:09,800
Speaker 3: The case is closed, And in this case, the consequences

697
00:37:09,960 --> 00:37:12,960
Speaker 3: were very real, as they are in most cases when

698
00:37:13,000 --> 00:37:17,600
Speaker 3: these things happen. Right, and I think that the people

699
00:37:17,640 --> 00:37:21,720
Speaker 3: that are responsible for your wrongful conviction, there's an argument

700
00:37:21,760 --> 00:37:26,160
Speaker 3: to say that they are responsible for another tragedy that happen.

701
00:37:26,239 --> 00:37:27,360
Speaker 4: Can you talk about that.

702
00:37:27,280 --> 00:37:31,319
Speaker 7: I can. Yeah, school teacher Patricia Morrison who also had

703
00:37:31,360 --> 00:37:33,879
Speaker 7: a couple of kids. She was from Peak Skill and

704
00:37:34,520 --> 00:37:38,160
Speaker 7: she was killed by the stayed perpetrator, Stephen Cunningham. She

705
00:37:38,320 --> 00:37:41,160
Speaker 7: was killed three and a half years later as a

706
00:37:41,160 --> 00:37:44,319
Speaker 7: result of Cunningham being left free on the street while

707
00:37:44,320 --> 00:37:46,040
Speaker 7: I was doing time for his crime.

708
00:37:46,560 --> 00:37:49,480
Speaker 4: Now you say the real perpetrator, how do we know that?

709
00:37:49,880 --> 00:37:52,600
Speaker 7: Well, here, great, that's a great question. I'm so glad

710
00:37:52,640 --> 00:37:57,879
Speaker 7: you asked. Because the DNA matched him because he got

711
00:37:57,920 --> 00:38:01,160
Speaker 7: caught for the second murder, which resulted in his being

712
00:38:01,239 --> 00:38:04,600
Speaker 7: incarcerated and having to give up a DNA sample which

713
00:38:04,640 --> 00:38:07,000
Speaker 7: was put into the data bank. And so when I

714
00:38:07,080 --> 00:38:11,880
Speaker 7: eventually got the further testing with the Innocence Projects help,

715
00:38:12,600 --> 00:38:17,279
Speaker 7: it matched him. Then he subsequently confessed not just to

716
00:38:17,320 --> 00:38:21,360
Speaker 7: the authorities, but also to a reporter on video camera

717
00:38:21,920 --> 00:38:24,600
Speaker 7: in the prison visiting room. That video is available on

718
00:38:25,080 --> 00:38:27,680
Speaker 7: the internet. So, just to be clear, there's no coerced

719
00:38:28,040 --> 00:38:31,400
Speaker 7: false confession there an he played guilty in court.

720
00:38:31,600 --> 00:38:32,680
Speaker 4: When did this happen?

721
00:38:33,280 --> 00:38:36,920
Speaker 7: That happened that him being caught for the original crime

722
00:38:37,800 --> 00:38:40,719
Speaker 7: that happened twelve and a half years after he killed

723
00:38:40,719 --> 00:38:43,040
Speaker 7: a second victim, So there was a point in time

724
00:38:43,080 --> 00:38:47,520
Speaker 7: we were both concurrently in the same prison system, although

725
00:38:47,560 --> 00:38:48,840
Speaker 7: not in the same prison.

726
00:38:49,320 --> 00:38:49,680
Speaker 4: Wow.

727
00:38:49,719 --> 00:38:55,240
Speaker 3: So Patricia Morrison, yes today, would be probably lost sitting

728
00:38:55,239 --> 00:38:58,160
Speaker 3: around with her grandchildren, you know, probably be a retired

729
00:38:58,160 --> 00:39:00,760
Speaker 3: school teacher by now having a nice life. Her children

730
00:39:00,760 --> 00:39:03,560
Speaker 3: would have grown up as they deserve too, as everyone

731
00:39:03,560 --> 00:39:06,640
Speaker 3: deserves to with their mother. The rest of her family

732
00:39:07,080 --> 00:39:09,960
Speaker 3: wouldn't have gone through this horrendous loss.

733
00:39:10,680 --> 00:39:12,440
Speaker 4: And none of it had to happen, you.

734
00:39:12,400 --> 00:39:15,120
Speaker 3: Know, except for the fact that they went on this

735
00:39:15,760 --> 00:39:19,640
Speaker 3: crazy witch hunt to convict you, Jeffrey Deskovic, of a.

736
00:39:19,680 --> 00:39:21,000
Speaker 4: Crime that they knew you didn't commit.

737
00:39:21,080 --> 00:39:29,680
Speaker 3: It's a tragic, tragic byproduct of this horrible malfeasance coordinated

738
00:39:29,680 --> 00:39:33,160
Speaker 3: in this case that resulted in you enduring the nightmare

739
00:39:33,200 --> 00:39:34,879
Speaker 3: that none of us who haven't been through it could

740
00:39:34,880 --> 00:39:53,520
Speaker 3: ever imagine. You, somehow or other, managed to find this

741
00:39:54,080 --> 00:40:01,239
Speaker 3: extra layer of strength and courage to persevere, to not

742
00:40:01,360 --> 00:40:05,520
Speaker 3: give up, and to ultimately win right to be and

743
00:40:05,560 --> 00:40:08,480
Speaker 3: to be vindicated. Correct, We've talked about some of the

744
00:40:08,560 --> 00:40:10,880
Speaker 3: darkest moments that anyone could imagine.

745
00:40:11,440 --> 00:40:13,520
Speaker 4: Is there a flip side to it? Was there a.

746
00:40:13,520 --> 00:40:18,400
Speaker 3: Moment of joy ecstasy when you were finally vindicated and freed?

747
00:40:19,080 --> 00:40:21,640
Speaker 7: Yeah, I mean it was. It was a surreal moment.

748
00:40:21,840 --> 00:40:25,840
Speaker 7: I have to say. The luncheon afterwards was surreal. And

749
00:40:26,239 --> 00:40:29,960
Speaker 7: after that is where reality, you know, the reality hit

750
00:40:30,000 --> 00:40:31,759
Speaker 7: the road, the retires hit the road. How do you

751
00:40:31,760 --> 00:40:33,839
Speaker 7: want to phrase it. It'd be great to say there

752
00:40:33,880 --> 00:40:37,440
Speaker 7: was this great party, this raucous party that lasted to

753
00:40:37,480 --> 00:40:40,839
Speaker 7: the crack of dawn, But in reality, who was there

754
00:40:40,880 --> 00:40:43,399
Speaker 7: to socialize or party with? I mean, I had long

755
00:40:43,440 --> 00:40:47,120
Speaker 7: since lost track with my connection with my old friends

756
00:40:47,160 --> 00:40:51,040
Speaker 7: and my extended family, and everybody was virtual stranger, even

757
00:40:51,080 --> 00:40:54,480
Speaker 7: my immediate family very very limited visiting, so I couldn't

758
00:40:54,560 --> 00:40:57,920
Speaker 7: relate to the people there. I felt out of place

759
00:40:57,920 --> 00:41:00,759
Speaker 7: and I couldn't really communicate with them, and that's when

760
00:41:00,800 --> 00:41:05,160
Speaker 7: a lot of my difficulties post exoneration started happening.

761
00:41:05,719 --> 00:41:10,400
Speaker 3: You talked very beautifully about your mindset of being able

762
00:41:10,440 --> 00:41:15,480
Speaker 3: to escape the walls by having these almost out of

763
00:41:15,480 --> 00:41:18,520
Speaker 3: body experiences, these mental exercises that you put yourself through

764
00:41:18,719 --> 00:41:22,520
Speaker 3: to transport yourself to a happier place. Were there any

765
00:41:22,520 --> 00:41:24,280
Speaker 3: friendships that you developed in prison?

766
00:41:24,800 --> 00:41:31,560
Speaker 7: Yeah, I would like to remember Exgonnery, Frank Sterling, Mike Roberts,

767
00:41:31,960 --> 00:41:35,640
Speaker 7: and Sammy Swift. So those are the three people that

768
00:41:35,680 --> 00:41:36,919
Speaker 7: I want to give a shout out.

769
00:41:37,120 --> 00:41:40,719
Speaker 3: So, yeah, you came out into a world that had

770
00:41:40,840 --> 00:41:43,799
Speaker 3: changed a lot. You literally had spent half of your

771
00:41:43,880 --> 00:41:45,960
Speaker 3: life in prison. You were arrested when you were sixteen

772
00:41:46,040 --> 00:41:48,840
Speaker 3: and you were exonerated when you were thirty three. So

773
00:41:49,000 --> 00:41:52,560
Speaker 3: all those years when everybody else was developing their career,

774
00:41:52,640 --> 00:41:57,279
Speaker 3: getting their education, developing their social networks, their relationships, or

775
00:41:57,320 --> 00:42:00,879
Speaker 3: even starting families, you were stuck in hell.

776
00:42:01,160 --> 00:42:04,480
Speaker 7: Actually right, Yeah fair to say, yeah, exactly right, as

777
00:42:04,520 --> 00:42:07,960
Speaker 7: well as everybody was, you know, incrementally adjusting as technology

778
00:42:08,000 --> 00:42:10,560
Speaker 7: would come out. When I came out, I never saw

779
00:42:10,560 --> 00:42:14,719
Speaker 7: a cell phone, GPS, the Internet hadn't been invented, all

780
00:42:14,719 --> 00:42:17,719
Speaker 7: these different ways of banking, culture had changed. I was

781
00:42:17,760 --> 00:42:20,560
Speaker 7: totally a fish out of water. I didn't fit or

782
00:42:20,600 --> 00:42:21,480
Speaker 7: belong anymore.

783
00:42:22,280 --> 00:42:25,080
Speaker 3: You talked about the things that you did to survive

784
00:42:25,120 --> 00:42:28,640
Speaker 3: in prison and the friendships that you developed, the people

785
00:42:28,719 --> 00:42:32,080
Speaker 3: who were able to be a support system for you

786
00:42:32,840 --> 00:42:36,200
Speaker 3: and you for them. Is it as bad as everybody

787
00:42:36,239 --> 00:42:38,600
Speaker 3: thinks it is. I want to give people an idea

788
00:42:38,840 --> 00:42:41,239
Speaker 3: of what this experience is really like, because we don't

789
00:42:41,239 --> 00:42:43,080
Speaker 3: do prison in America like they do in the rest

790
00:42:43,080 --> 00:42:46,440
Speaker 3: of the Western world. We focus so much on punishment

791
00:42:46,640 --> 00:42:49,799
Speaker 3: and basically in a lot of ways, torture, where in

792
00:42:49,840 --> 00:42:52,120
Speaker 3: other Western countries they focus on rehabilitation.

793
00:42:53,040 --> 00:42:54,839
Speaker 7: Yeah, so I think that the image that a lot

794
00:42:54,840 --> 00:42:58,600
Speaker 7: of people have in their mind, I think they overdramatized

795
00:42:58,640 --> 00:43:01,440
Speaker 7: the gang thing, and they think that that everyone just

796
00:43:01,880 --> 00:43:05,200
Speaker 7: is raping each other all day, every day. And I

797
00:43:05,239 --> 00:43:07,640
Speaker 7: think that some of it is it's not as bad

798
00:43:07,719 --> 00:43:10,080
Speaker 7: as they make it seem. But then in other ways

799
00:43:10,160 --> 00:43:14,480
Speaker 7: it's much worse than what people imagine. I mean, there

800
00:43:14,560 --> 00:43:17,239
Speaker 7: was three or four stabbings or cuttings every every day

801
00:43:17,280 --> 00:43:19,440
Speaker 7: in Helmira where I was, and there was plenty of

802
00:43:19,840 --> 00:43:24,480
Speaker 7: gang activity and lots of violence that didn't involve weapons.

803
00:43:24,800 --> 00:43:28,200
Speaker 7: The guards were very disrespectful, and most of them, not

804
00:43:28,200 --> 00:43:30,359
Speaker 7: not all of them, they were very disrespectful and just

805
00:43:30,760 --> 00:43:33,239
Speaker 7: you know, the medical care was terrible. The food was

806
00:43:33,320 --> 00:43:37,920
Speaker 7: terrible as well. So I would describe it as a

807
00:43:37,960 --> 00:43:41,960
Speaker 7: NonStop obstacle course, featuring the guards, civilians and inmates. All

808
00:43:42,040 --> 00:43:45,799
Speaker 7: is obstacles to the main objective, which was to try

809
00:43:45,840 --> 00:43:48,719
Speaker 7: to prove your innocence and regain your freedom. It was

810
00:43:48,960 --> 00:43:51,640
Speaker 7: every day a living hell without a doubt, and to

811
00:43:51,680 --> 00:43:54,239
Speaker 7: stay alive, to stay alive. Yeah, every time I left

812
00:43:54,239 --> 00:43:56,759
Speaker 7: my cell, I never knew if I was gonna make

813
00:43:56,800 --> 00:44:00,000
Speaker 7: it back. When I arrived in Elmira, the guards asked me,

814
00:44:00,080 --> 00:44:02,759
Speaker 7: you want to go into protective custody because of you

815
00:44:03,040 --> 00:44:05,359
Speaker 7: know your charges and how young you are, and this

816
00:44:05,400 --> 00:44:07,960
Speaker 7: increases the likely of you being a victim. And I

817
00:44:08,000 --> 00:44:10,919
Speaker 7: asked them, well, well what's that and they explained to me, well,

818
00:44:10,960 --> 00:44:12,800
Speaker 7: you know you would be in your cell like twenty

819
00:44:12,800 --> 00:44:15,279
Speaker 7: three hours a day, and you know you wouldn't go

820
00:44:15,320 --> 00:44:17,640
Speaker 7: to programs, but then again, nobody would be able to

821
00:44:17,680 --> 00:44:20,520
Speaker 7: harm you. And I quickly, on the spot, I made

822
00:44:20,520 --> 00:44:23,600
Speaker 7: the decision. Imagine making this decision, going down this line

823
00:44:23,640 --> 00:44:26,759
Speaker 7: of reasoning, right at seventeen years old. I just thought

824
00:44:26,760 --> 00:44:30,000
Speaker 7: to myself, you know what, I'm already here. I'm not

825
00:44:30,120 --> 00:44:33,400
Speaker 7: going to agree to make my time even worse. So

826
00:44:33,560 --> 00:44:36,560
Speaker 7: I'm not taking this protective custody. I'm going to go

827
00:44:36,680 --> 00:44:39,120
Speaker 7: to general population. I'm going to take my chances, and

828
00:44:39,160 --> 00:44:41,640
Speaker 7: you know what if somebody kills me, well, I guess

829
00:44:41,640 --> 00:44:44,160
Speaker 7: I don't have to worry about doing this life sentence

830
00:44:44,200 --> 00:44:46,680
Speaker 7: that I've been given for a crime I didn't commit.

831
00:44:47,760 --> 00:44:51,360
Speaker 3: Well, I mean, it's unbelievable. So you come out, Jeff,

832
00:44:51,840 --> 00:44:57,400
Speaker 3: finally exonerated. You've proven what you've known all along. But

833
00:44:57,480 --> 00:44:59,080
Speaker 3: now you face a whole other.

834
00:44:58,920 --> 00:44:59,879
Speaker 4: Set of obstacles.

835
00:45:00,120 --> 00:45:04,680
Speaker 3: How did you transform yourself because at one point you

836
00:45:04,680 --> 00:45:05,600
Speaker 3: were almost homeless?

837
00:45:05,800 --> 00:45:09,080
Speaker 7: Correct, yes, exactly. I almost went to a homeless shelter.

838
00:45:09,200 --> 00:45:09,400
Speaker 2: You know.

839
00:45:09,719 --> 00:45:12,799
Speaker 7: I lost the temporary apartment that this religious community was

840
00:45:12,800 --> 00:45:15,560
Speaker 7: putting me up in. Nobody would take me in. Thank

841
00:45:15,600 --> 00:45:18,640
Speaker 7: god for Mercy College, which had given me a scholarship

842
00:45:18,719 --> 00:45:22,680
Speaker 7: to finish the bachelor's degree because I was thirty credits

843
00:45:22,719 --> 00:45:25,800
Speaker 7: short of that at the time that former governor of

844
00:45:25,800 --> 00:45:28,520
Speaker 7: Attack he had cut the funding for that. So that

845
00:45:28,600 --> 00:45:31,160
Speaker 7: made its way into the newspaper, and so Mercy College

846
00:45:31,160 --> 00:45:33,080
Speaker 7: gave me the scholarship and the meal plan. And when

847
00:45:33,080 --> 00:45:36,279
Speaker 7: I lost the housing, they allowed me to stay in

848
00:45:36,320 --> 00:45:39,160
Speaker 7: the dorms. You know, I was never able to obtain

849
00:45:39,200 --> 00:45:42,880
Speaker 7: gainful employment because I didn't understand the technology. All the

850
00:45:42,880 --> 00:45:45,920
Speaker 7: potential employers wanted somebody who could hit the ground running

851
00:45:46,000 --> 00:45:49,520
Speaker 7: rather than some little bit of patience on the job training.

852
00:45:49,880 --> 00:45:53,080
Speaker 7: I did get a job as a weekly columnist, but

853
00:45:53,120 --> 00:45:55,279
Speaker 7: the problem was that it was a weekly newspaper, and

854
00:45:55,320 --> 00:45:58,640
Speaker 7: so they only wanted one article a week. You know.

855
00:45:58,680 --> 00:46:00,680
Speaker 7: I was making like two and fifty as an article,

856
00:46:00,719 --> 00:46:03,200
Speaker 7: which is really good, but that was the only income

857
00:46:03,200 --> 00:46:05,759
Speaker 7: I could count on per month while I started doing

858
00:46:05,760 --> 00:46:09,759
Speaker 7: speaking engagements, but that's almost like being an actor or

859
00:46:09,920 --> 00:46:11,719
Speaker 7: you only get paid if you get booked, and that

860
00:46:11,800 --> 00:46:15,319
Speaker 7: wasn't consistent, so, you know, it was very tight financially,

861
00:46:15,360 --> 00:46:17,520
Speaker 7: and then I had to deal with all these the

862
00:46:17,560 --> 00:46:21,440
Speaker 7: psychological after effects of my experience and then the technology,

863
00:46:21,520 --> 00:46:25,200
Speaker 7: and then just being just straight up lonely and depressed

864
00:46:25,239 --> 00:46:28,520
Speaker 7: because there was no social circle that I had and

865
00:46:28,560 --> 00:46:31,359
Speaker 7: I wasn't able to make another one.

866
00:46:31,640 --> 00:46:34,200
Speaker 3: You really were alone in the world in a lot

867
00:46:34,280 --> 00:46:39,440
Speaker 3: of ways. But somehow or other, you have transformed yourself

868
00:46:39,880 --> 00:46:46,799
Speaker 3: literally figuratively, physically, mentally, spiritually, and I think everybody can

869
00:46:46,880 --> 00:46:47,719
Speaker 3: learn from that.

870
00:46:47,800 --> 00:46:48,160
Speaker 6: I have.

871
00:46:48,600 --> 00:46:50,440
Speaker 3: I mean, I've learned a lot from hanging out with you,

872
00:46:50,560 --> 00:46:52,520
Speaker 3: and we've had a lot of laughs over the last

873
00:46:52,520 --> 00:46:55,359
Speaker 3: several years. But you're doing so much good stuff now

874
00:46:55,400 --> 00:46:58,680
Speaker 3: and you're taking your experience and applying it in the

875
00:46:58,680 --> 00:47:00,839
Speaker 3: real world in a way that's already having a very

876
00:47:00,840 --> 00:47:01,600
Speaker 3: positive impact.

877
00:47:01,640 --> 00:47:02,600
Speaker 4: And talk a little.

878
00:47:02,400 --> 00:47:05,680
Speaker 3: Bit, Jeff about your education and your goals and what

879
00:47:05,719 --> 00:47:07,920
Speaker 3: you're doing now with your foundation. You've been able to

880
00:47:07,960 --> 00:47:10,600
Speaker 3: help exonerate other people. How incredible is that. I mean,

881
00:47:10,640 --> 00:47:12,080
Speaker 3: that's got to be a it is.

882
00:47:12,280 --> 00:47:15,759
Speaker 7: A story book. It is. It's beside myself about that.

883
00:47:15,960 --> 00:47:16,799
Speaker 7: It's incredible.

884
00:47:17,280 --> 00:47:17,360
Speaker 6: Now.

885
00:47:17,440 --> 00:47:19,080
Speaker 3: I can see how you're lighting up right now, talk

886
00:47:19,120 --> 00:47:21,080
Speaker 3: about it. I've seen you around those guys, and it

887
00:47:21,160 --> 00:47:23,600
Speaker 3: is the best feeling. It's why all of us in

888
00:47:23,600 --> 00:47:26,520
Speaker 3: this movement through what we do, because it's an unbelievably

889
00:47:26,560 --> 00:47:29,640
Speaker 3: great feeling to be able to see somebody like you,

890
00:47:30,400 --> 00:47:32,799
Speaker 3: thanks to the help of the Innis Project and other

891
00:47:32,880 --> 00:47:36,799
Speaker 3: great organizations, be able to come out and get your

892
00:47:36,840 --> 00:47:38,000
Speaker 3: life back on track.

893
00:47:38,360 --> 00:47:42,000
Speaker 7: Sure. So from finishing the bachelor's at Mercy College, I

894
00:47:42,040 --> 00:47:45,120
Speaker 7: then graduated with John Jay College of Criminal Justice, got

895
00:47:45,120 --> 00:47:48,680
Speaker 7: the master's degree with my master's thesis on raful Conviction

896
00:47:48,880 --> 00:47:52,439
Speaker 7: Courses and other Reforms, and I'm in my second year

897
00:47:52,480 --> 00:47:55,440
Speaker 7: now at the Elizabeth Hopp School of Law at Pace University.

898
00:47:56,520 --> 00:48:00,160
Speaker 7: So in terms of my foundation, after being home for

899
00:48:00,239 --> 00:48:03,279
Speaker 7: five years, very difficult five years, as we've went over,

900
00:48:03,960 --> 00:48:07,840
Speaker 7: I was able to receive some financial compensation and I

901
00:48:07,920 --> 00:48:11,600
Speaker 7: decided I wanted to go from being an individual advocate.

902
00:48:11,640 --> 00:48:13,880
Speaker 7: I mean do I used to. I was doing presentations

903
00:48:13,960 --> 00:48:18,239
Speaker 7: and doing media interviews and lobbying elected officials and going

904
00:48:18,320 --> 00:48:21,880
Speaker 7: to legislative hearings. And it was part of the effort

905
00:48:21,920 --> 00:48:25,319
Speaker 7: where we fought off capital punishment reinstatement efforts in two

906
00:48:25,360 --> 00:48:28,400
Speaker 7: thousand and seven in collaboration with New Yorkers against the

907
00:48:28,440 --> 00:48:31,800
Speaker 7: death penalty, and I was involved in the successful campaign

908
00:48:32,000 --> 00:48:35,520
Speaker 7: repealing the death penalty in Connecticut. So doing all of

909
00:48:35,560 --> 00:48:40,160
Speaker 7: that as an individual advocate and it wasn't enough. I

910
00:48:40,160 --> 00:48:42,960
Speaker 7: wanted to get into the exoneration game. You know. I

911
00:48:43,040 --> 00:48:45,839
Speaker 7: was tired of helping out on cases on the peripheral

912
00:48:45,880 --> 00:48:48,799
Speaker 7: and I wanted to be more directly involved. So when

913
00:48:48,840 --> 00:48:52,960
Speaker 7: I received some compensation, I decided to take things to

914
00:48:53,000 --> 00:48:55,560
Speaker 7: the next level open a nonprofit. So I committed a

915
00:48:55,560 --> 00:48:58,080
Speaker 7: million and a half dollars of that compensation and we

916
00:48:58,480 --> 00:49:02,440
Speaker 7: opened a Jeffrey Deskovic Foundation for Justice, and our goal

917
00:49:02,600 --> 00:49:05,759
Speaker 7: is to exonerate innocent people both in DNA and non

918
00:49:05,840 --> 00:49:10,839
Speaker 7: DNA cases with the policy change component to it. Our

919
00:49:11,040 --> 00:49:14,719
Speaker 7: first ex honery was William Lopez, so we helped exonerate

920
00:49:14,800 --> 00:49:18,640
Speaker 7: collaboratively along with his pre existing attorneys, Richard Levitt and

921
00:49:18,680 --> 00:49:21,319
Speaker 7: Yvon Shefvers. We did the investigative work. It's kind of

922
00:49:21,360 --> 00:49:23,320
Speaker 7: like a building is built and it's missing a section

923
00:49:23,400 --> 00:49:26,640
Speaker 7: and we helped put the section in. So Bill was

924
00:49:26,680 --> 00:49:28,560
Speaker 7: in for twenty three and a half years in a

925
00:49:28,600 --> 00:49:32,600
Speaker 7: wrongful conviction case in Brooklyn, and so that was our

926
00:49:32,640 --> 00:49:36,480
Speaker 7: first success. A second exoneration was William Hahey. That was

927
00:49:36,520 --> 00:49:40,000
Speaker 7: totally in house, traveling, collaborative. So William Hawhey did eight

928
00:49:40,080 --> 00:49:43,640
Speaker 7: years and four months on an arson case in Putnam County.

929
00:49:44,080 --> 00:49:46,600
Speaker 7: So the place that they brought me to for the polygraph,

930
00:49:46,800 --> 00:49:49,200
Speaker 7: I was able to reach back there. It exonerates somebody there.

931
00:49:49,200 --> 00:49:54,239
Speaker 7: It's a little irony, little extra satisfaction, full circle. Yeah.

932
00:49:54,280 --> 00:49:56,400
Speaker 7: So he was in for eight years. In four months,

933
00:49:56,920 --> 00:49:59,239
Speaker 7: we were able to get four other innocent people out

934
00:49:59,239 --> 00:50:01,520
Speaker 7: through other means, which turned out to be less than

935
00:50:01,520 --> 00:50:05,280
Speaker 7: an exoneration. So Lorenzo Johnson, that was a collaborative effort.

936
00:50:05,280 --> 00:50:08,400
Speaker 7: We did some investigative work. We were able to convince

937
00:50:08,440 --> 00:50:11,360
Speaker 7: the parole board in three other cases that our clients

938
00:50:11,400 --> 00:50:14,560
Speaker 7: were innocent. So that's six people, and you know, we're

939
00:50:14,600 --> 00:50:17,520
Speaker 7: part of the effort that we got the laws changed

940
00:50:18,320 --> 00:50:21,000
Speaker 7: in New York on interrogation and on d reform, although

941
00:50:21,000 --> 00:50:23,560
Speaker 7: they watered that down a bit. And we've been very

942
00:50:23,600 --> 00:50:26,239
Speaker 7: close the last three years working collaboration with the group

943
00:50:26,400 --> 00:50:28,399
Speaker 7: It Can Happen to You, which is a coalition group

944
00:50:28,400 --> 00:50:30,960
Speaker 7: which I'm an advisory board member of trying to pass

945
00:50:31,000 --> 00:50:34,960
Speaker 7: a bill that would create a Commission on Prosecutor Conducts

946
00:50:34,960 --> 00:50:37,279
Speaker 7: to an oversight board for prosecutors.

947
00:50:37,640 --> 00:50:41,520
Speaker 3: So this is all amazing, amazing stuff. It is full

948
00:50:41,520 --> 00:50:44,640
Speaker 3: circle in so many ways. Like most of the other

949
00:50:44,680 --> 00:50:49,160
Speaker 3: exigneries I talked to, you have committed yourself selplessly and

950
00:50:49,239 --> 00:50:53,279
Speaker 3: tirelessly to helping other people avoid the same faith that

951
00:50:53,360 --> 00:50:55,719
Speaker 3: you went through when you could just as easily be

952
00:50:55,880 --> 00:50:59,200
Speaker 3: off doing whatever you want and no one would blame you, right,

953
00:50:59,239 --> 00:51:03,000
Speaker 3: you could be off avctioning, right, But instead you're channeling

954
00:51:03,040 --> 00:51:05,320
Speaker 3: all your energy and your money, your personal money, into

955
00:51:05,920 --> 00:51:09,200
Speaker 3: helping others. And that's that's just a beautiful, amazing thing,

956
00:51:09,200 --> 00:51:10,799
Speaker 3: and it's one of the reasons why I love being

957
00:51:10,840 --> 00:51:13,280
Speaker 3: around you because you're just like a such a great

958
00:51:13,480 --> 00:51:17,080
Speaker 3: positive influence on everybody that you touch. So, Jeff, we

959
00:51:17,160 --> 00:51:20,480
Speaker 3: have a tradition here at Wrongful Conviction, which is that

960
00:51:20,520 --> 00:51:22,920
Speaker 3: at the end of the episode, I like to turn

961
00:51:22,960 --> 00:51:26,719
Speaker 3: the mic over to you for closing thoughts, anything you

962
00:51:26,800 --> 00:51:27,400
Speaker 3: want to share.

963
00:51:28,520 --> 00:51:31,919
Speaker 7: I have a dream. Imagine if there were twenty five

964
00:51:32,000 --> 00:51:35,640
Speaker 7: thousand people in the world who could afford three dollars

965
00:51:35,640 --> 00:51:38,799
Speaker 7: a month on a recurring basis, who felt that it

966
00:51:38,800 --> 00:51:41,880
Speaker 7: would be worth it to sacrifice the three dollars in

967
00:51:42,000 --> 00:51:45,520
Speaker 7: order to play their part in helping to free wrongfully

968
00:51:45,560 --> 00:51:49,200
Speaker 7: convicted people. That's a budget of close to a million dollars.

969
00:51:49,560 --> 00:51:53,560
Speaker 7: If a person goes to Google and types in Deskovic Foundation,

970
00:51:54,080 --> 00:51:57,839
Speaker 7: then Patreon, pht R, e O N A link will

971
00:51:57,840 --> 00:52:00,359
Speaker 7: come up. If they click to that, everything is laid

972
00:52:00,360 --> 00:52:06,080
Speaker 7: out there exactly how the money would go for lawyers, investigators, paralegals,

973
00:52:06,160 --> 00:52:10,640
Speaker 7: other essential personnel to really having a robust entity. If

974
00:52:11,160 --> 00:52:15,279
Speaker 7: we could have these type of results on basically a

975
00:52:15,280 --> 00:52:19,480
Speaker 7: shoe string budget, imagine if we really were armed for bear.

976
00:52:20,680 --> 00:52:24,200
Speaker 7: I need people, obviously who will be willing to part

977
00:52:24,200 --> 00:52:27,440
Speaker 7: with the three dollars, but we also need people to

978
00:52:28,239 --> 00:52:31,880
Speaker 7: help make the campaign go viral. If we could somehow

979
00:52:31,920 --> 00:52:34,279
Speaker 7: do we need volunteers to help do that. If we

980
00:52:34,280 --> 00:52:37,359
Speaker 7: could somehow do that, I mean we could make a

981
00:52:37,400 --> 00:52:41,160
Speaker 7: really big dent. I made the big contribution to the

982
00:52:41,280 --> 00:52:44,480
Speaker 7: organization to give us a running start. We had paid

983
00:52:44,520 --> 00:52:47,960
Speaker 7: staff and we got some good results. Fundraising didn't go

984
00:52:48,000 --> 00:52:50,640
Speaker 7: that well and I had to convert things to where

985
00:52:50,680 --> 00:52:54,600
Speaker 7: we're volunteer entity. Now we have maybe fourteen volunteers, which

986
00:52:54,640 --> 00:52:57,880
Speaker 7: is great, but you need people to go full time

987
00:52:58,160 --> 00:53:00,319
Speaker 7: as opposed to people who are fitting it in in

988
00:53:00,360 --> 00:53:04,600
Speaker 7: between their paid work, you know, their their personal life.

989
00:53:04,960 --> 00:53:08,360
Speaker 7: You know, it's great to bring lawyers into cases and

990
00:53:08,400 --> 00:53:10,920
Speaker 7: connect people with that like we did with Andy Kreevac,

991
00:53:11,040 --> 00:53:14,319
Speaker 7: and bring lawyers into do pro bono work after we've

992
00:53:14,360 --> 00:53:17,440
Speaker 7: screened the case, and yeah, that's nice. But in a

993
00:53:17,440 --> 00:53:20,440
Speaker 7: lot of cases, work that could really be done in

994
00:53:20,480 --> 00:53:23,799
Speaker 7: the course of six months is being done in two

995
00:53:23,880 --> 00:53:27,360
Speaker 7: years because it's being done on the side as paid

996
00:53:27,360 --> 00:53:30,080
Speaker 7: cases are done. So I really would love to be

997
00:53:30,120 --> 00:53:33,920
Speaker 7: able to have a full time paid staff again. You know,

998
00:53:34,000 --> 00:53:37,879
Speaker 7: my mission in life is to fight wrongful convictions, and

999
00:53:37,920 --> 00:53:41,160
Speaker 7: that's that's how it makes sense out of what happened

1000
00:53:41,160 --> 00:53:44,360
Speaker 7: to me. And with that, you know, I want to

1001
00:53:44,760 --> 00:53:46,360
Speaker 7: thank you for having me here. And you know, I

1002
00:53:46,400 --> 00:53:50,719
Speaker 7: think this podcast is an awesome idea and we need

1003
00:53:50,760 --> 00:53:54,319
Speaker 7: to continue to raise awareness and this is certainly one

1004
00:53:54,360 --> 00:53:58,359
Speaker 7: of the methods of doing that. So kudos Case and.

1005
00:53:58,320 --> 00:54:01,400
Speaker 3: Flown right back at you once again. I want to

1006
00:54:01,440 --> 00:54:04,080
Speaker 3: give the website. It's a Deskavic dot org.

1007
00:54:04,120 --> 00:54:04,640
Speaker 4: That's d e.

1008
00:54:04,960 --> 00:54:10,640
Speaker 3: Skovic dot org and go to the website, learn about

1009
00:54:10,640 --> 00:54:14,520
Speaker 3: the mission, get involved. You can help. Everybody can make

1010
00:54:14,520 --> 00:54:18,120
Speaker 3: a difference. It starts right here. So this has been

1011
00:54:18,280 --> 00:54:22,000
Speaker 3: an extraordinary experience for me, and I want to thank

1012
00:54:22,040 --> 00:54:27,000
Speaker 3: our amazing guest, Jeff Deskovic, for sharing his experience, strength

1013
00:54:27,040 --> 00:54:34,440
Speaker 3: and wisdom. Don't forget to give us a fantastic review

1014
00:54:34,480 --> 00:54:36,080
Speaker 3: wherever you get your podcasts.

1015
00:54:36,160 --> 00:54:37,080
Speaker 4: It really helps.

1016
00:54:37,520 --> 00:54:40,360
Speaker 3: And I'm a proud donor to the Ennosis Project and

1017
00:54:40,400 --> 00:54:43,120
Speaker 3: I really hope you'll join me in supporting this very

1018
00:54:43,160 --> 00:54:47,160
Speaker 3: important cause and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions. Go

1019
00:54:47,200 --> 00:54:50,239
Speaker 3: to Innocenceproject dot org to learn how to donate and

1020
00:54:50,280 --> 00:54:53,440
Speaker 3: get involved. I'd like to thank our production team, Connor

1021
00:54:53,480 --> 00:54:56,160
Speaker 3: Hall and Kevin Wartis. The music in the show is

1022
00:54:56,200 --> 00:54:59,239
Speaker 3: by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.

1023
00:54:59,360 --> 00:54:59,719
Speaker 7: Be sure to.

1024
00:54:59,719 --> 00:55:02,839
Speaker 3: Follow hellow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on

1025
00:55:02,880 --> 00:55:07,200
Speaker 3: Facebook at Wrongful Conviction podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm

1026
00:55:07,400 --> 00:55:10,560
Speaker 3: is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts and association

1027
00:55:10,880 --> 00:55:18,319
Speaker 3: with Signal Company Number one