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Speaker 1: We originally aired the following episode on February twenty, twenty seventeen.

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Speaker 1: It was only our twelfth episode. Peter Pringle was a

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Speaker 1: death row ex Honery in Ireland, and you'll hear all

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Speaker 1: about that situation just after this, But he actually ended

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Speaker 1: up marrying a death row ex Hognerie out of Florida,

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Speaker 1: a wonderful human named Sunny Jacobs. They're both wonderful people,

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Speaker 1: or were. Unfortunately, Peter Pringle passed away on December thirty first,

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Speaker 1: twenty twenty two, New Year's Eve, at their home in

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Speaker 1: Clinic Muran Costello, County, Galway. Peter devoted himself tirelessly to

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Speaker 1: his family, to his beloved animals, and most of all

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Speaker 1: to helping other ex houneries get back on their feet

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Speaker 1: and find their footing through meditation, yoga, diet. He just

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Speaker 1: was a guy who never stopped giving back. And I'm

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Speaker 1: honored to have known you, Peter, and I hope you're

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Speaker 1: in a better place. He survived by his wife, Sonny,

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Speaker 1: daughter Anna, and sons Thomas and John, as well as

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Speaker 1: their twelve grandchildren. Rest in peace and power, Peter Pringle.

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Speaker 2: With the police banging on the door, open up.

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Speaker 3: The choice to be in that lineup was the last

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Speaker 3: choice I made as a free man.

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Speaker 4: A year later, I ended up writing the system.

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Speaker 1: I'm going to be one of those people who everyone

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Speaker 1: in the world is going to think.

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Speaker 3: As a monster or suspect as a monster for the

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Speaker 3: rest of my life, and I'm just going to have

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Speaker 3: to come to peace with that.

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Speaker 2: Somebody was able to look at my picture in a

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Speaker 2: database and say that I was somewhere where I definitely was.

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Speaker 4: I overheard three of the jailers discussing what part they

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Speaker 4: might have to play in my hanging. They had been

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Speaker 4: told that two prison officers would have to participate in

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Speaker 4: my execution. Now I walked back inside that prison for

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Speaker 4: the last time. Man all held broke loose.

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Speaker 1: But this is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction

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Speaker 1: with Jason Fomm. Today's guest is a dear friend of

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Speaker 1: mine and an extraordinary person, Peter Pringle.

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Speaker 3: Pringle was accused of participating in a murder of two

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Speaker 3: police officers following a bank robbery in Ireland.

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Speaker 1: After his conviction, he was sentenced to.

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Speaker 4: Death by hanging, and the police officer who had lied

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Speaker 4: to get me convicted was now a retired detective superintendent.

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Speaker 4: He had been promoted up to the top just.

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Speaker 3: Days before a noose was to be tied around his neck.

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Speaker 3: Peter learned that our Land's president had commuted his sentence

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Speaker 3: to forty years without pole.

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Speaker 4: It faced the forty years, which wasn't the possibility for

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Speaker 4: me at the time. I could kill myself, which at

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Speaker 4: the time was a reasonable.

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Speaker 1: I was, Peter, what an extraordinary story. So happy to

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Speaker 1: have you here. You're also the first guest on wrongful

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Speaker 1: conviction who's not born in America.

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Speaker 4: Thank you. It's an honor to be here. Thank you

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Speaker 4: very much.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, I was just saying, it's exciting that you're here because,

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Speaker 1: as I said, we're taking it international now, right. You're

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Speaker 1: as Irish as Irish can be. So Peter, let's go

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Speaker 1: back to the we're talking. This is a very interesting

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Speaker 1: time right when things were going sort of crazy in

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Speaker 1: your home country, right, So bring us back to what

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Speaker 1: was give us the climate.

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Speaker 4: In the What happened was in nineteen eighty there was

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Speaker 4: a bank robberty in Ireland, which the police say was

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Speaker 4: carried out by two three men rather and the getaway car,

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Speaker 4: traveling across country small country roads, collided with a police

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Speaker 4: car at a small crossroads.

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Speaker 1: It sounds like a movie. Yeah.

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Speaker 4: Well, and this is now the police version of events

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Speaker 4: because it goes I wasn't there, so I really can't

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Speaker 4: give you the I can give you what I think

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Speaker 4: is the accurate event of what happened because of my

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Speaker 4: later investigations. But there was the two cars collided, there

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Speaker 4: was an exchange of going far and two police officers

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Speaker 4: were killed, and the three raiders escaped cross country.

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Speaker 1: With three bank crappers. Yeah, and where did this happen?

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Speaker 4: In a town called Balhadrin and County ross Common in Ireland.

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Speaker 1: But at the time you were far away.

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Speaker 4: I was in a different region, different county altogether.

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Speaker 1: That's an important detail.

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Speaker 4: Yeah. So that evening one man was arrested not too

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Speaker 4: far away and he had a bullet wound in his chest.

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Speaker 4: And the following morning a second man was arrested and

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Speaker 4: the third man escaped cross country and two after the crime,

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Speaker 4: a police officer managed to catch the man that were chasing,

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Speaker 4: actually caught hold of him and was the only police

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Speaker 4: officer to see the man when the man wasn't wearing

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Speaker 4: a mask. But the man struggled and got away from

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Speaker 4: the police officer ran away across the fields, stole a

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Speaker 4: car and escaped again, and apparently he passed through the

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Speaker 4: town where I was and got away again from the police,

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Speaker 4: and twelve days after the crime, they arrested me and

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Speaker 4: brought me in and framed me up for the crime

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Speaker 4: I hadn't committed.

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Speaker 1: Now there's a backstory there too, right, there was a

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Speaker 1: reason they wanted you, right, you were known to the

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Speaker 1: cops and you were a person that they would have

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Speaker 1: liked to pin something on, and this was sort of

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Speaker 1: a con.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, well, I was known in the context that I

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Speaker 4: was a political activist. I'd been a political activist from

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Speaker 4: the time I was sixteen years of age, and I'd

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Speaker 4: been involved with the IRA and I had been interned

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Speaker 4: when I was eighteen years of age. From nineteen fifty

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Speaker 4: seven to fifty nine, I was imprisoned in a prison

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Speaker 4: camp on the Courra in Ireland without interment. It means

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Speaker 4: that you're imprisoned without any charge or trial on suspicion.

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Speaker 4: So they had this background. They classified me as a subversive,

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Speaker 4: so it was handy for them to get me off

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Speaker 4: the streets. That's the way they saw it. But at

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Speaker 4: the time, at the crime happened. I had a very

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Speaker 4: serious alcohol problem, and I was on a binge. I

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Speaker 4: was drinking, and I had been drinking with buddies for days

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Speaker 4: and days and days. And then they told me that

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Speaker 4: they thought the police might be looking for me. I

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Speaker 4: said for what. So I decided, well, you know, I'd

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Speaker 4: have to come off the drink and go and go

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Speaker 4: to the police and find out what this is all about.

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Speaker 4: But before that happened, I had come off the drink.

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Speaker 4: But before I could go to them, they found me

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Speaker 4: in the house of a friend and arrested me and

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Speaker 4: took me in.

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Speaker 1: They found you in the house of friends. So you

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Speaker 1: were on this binge, yeah, knowing you're you're someone who's

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Speaker 1: prone to extremes, right.

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Speaker 4: Some days I've been drinking.

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Speaker 1: Twelve days of drinking. Well that's a lot of drinking. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: And I imagine this is this is not casual drinking.

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Speaker 4: This is no this was serious alcoholic drinking. Yes. And

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Speaker 4: I've been a fisherman you see at sea, which probably

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Speaker 4: saved me because when you go to see in a trawler,

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Speaker 4: you don't drink. There's no drinking a boat. And so

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Speaker 4: I only drank when when I got Ashore, which was

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Speaker 4: a different story. And at the time of my arrest,

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Speaker 4: I was a skipper of a boat carrying cargo out

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Speaker 4: to the Arten Islands, which are three islands off the

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Speaker 4: west coast of Ireland at all Away, off Galway Bay

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Speaker 4: and habited islands. So my job was to carry different

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Speaker 4: cargoes on the ship boat out of the islands of

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Speaker 4: landed safety and bring the boat back safely. That was

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Speaker 4: my job at the time.

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Speaker 1: Now, just to give some context, Peter looks like the

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Speaker 1: skipper of a boat. He's very tall and strong and

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Speaker 1: very well built. I mean, he's got long flowing hair.

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Speaker 1: You know. For someone like me who grew up in Manhattan,

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Speaker 1: what would I know about skippers of boats? Right? We

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Speaker 1: have rowboats in Central Park here. That's about it. But

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Speaker 1: in any case, yes, he very much looks the part.

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Speaker 1: So you were, so this was your job at the time.

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Speaker 4: That was my job, And as luck would have it,

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Speaker 4: I took the day off work the day that the

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Speaker 4: robbery happened. I went on a binge and they used

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Speaker 4: that against me as I had taken the day off

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Speaker 4: work to go and commit the robbery, which hadn't happened.

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Speaker 4: But anyway, when I was arrested and I was taken

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Speaker 4: to the police station. And that's a funny thing about

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Speaker 4: that too, because after twelve days on drinking, you know,

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Speaker 4: I was entering into detox because this was the first

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Speaker 4: day I hadn't drank. And when they arrested me and

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Speaker 4: took me into the police card, two detectives each side

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Speaker 4: of me, I had to shiver it and they said

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Speaker 4: I was shivering because of fear, because of gilt ski.

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Speaker 4: I was shivering because I was after a binge. But

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Speaker 4: when they got me into the police station, they first

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Speaker 4: thing they did was strip me naked and a team

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Speaker 4: of detectives walked around and inspected my body, which I

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Speaker 4: found to be very weird, and they all looked very disappointed,

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Speaker 4: and I didn't know why. I later discovered they were

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Speaker 4: disappointed because I didn't have a bullet wound. Because remember

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Speaker 4: the guy that they arrested that had been shot told

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Speaker 4: him that his friend had also been shot, so they

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Speaker 4: were looking to see had I a bullet wound, And

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Speaker 4: when I didn't have a bullet wound, that looked pretty disappointed.

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Speaker 4: But that didn't stop them framing me up. So I

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Speaker 4: was arrested at three o'clock on a Saturday afternoon, and

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Speaker 4: at four o'clock this commenced interrogations. And I was interrogated

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Speaker 4: from four pm Saturday afternoon until four point thirty a m.

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Speaker 4: On Sunday morning, twelve and a half hours. Yeah, there

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Speaker 4: was a break when I had a visit, two breaks

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Speaker 4: when I had two short visits with my lawyers in

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Speaker 4: the middle, but that was twelve hours.

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Speaker 1: Basically, Chris, you and two detectives in the room had that.

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Speaker 4: May and the team of detectives they were coming in

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Speaker 4: relays of twos and trees and interrogating and you know,

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Speaker 4: with the occasional beating in the thrown in for good

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Speaker 4: measure because two colleagues had been killed and they were very,

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Speaker 4: very angry. And so then at four am in the morning,

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Speaker 4: I was brought down into a dirty cell and put

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Speaker 4: into a dirty cell, and a police officer was outside

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Speaker 4: with a baton and it's the solid door, and they

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Speaker 4: closed the door and then he was outside banging on

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Speaker 4: the metal door with his baton so that I couldn't

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Speaker 4: fall asleep. And then at eight am they took me

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Speaker 4: out of the cell and at eight thirty recommenced interrogations

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Speaker 4: and I was interrogated from eight thirty am on Sunday

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Speaker 4: morning right through until four thirty am on Monday morning.

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Speaker 1: Wow, so that's another twenty hours.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, And during that day it's very interesting actually in

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Speaker 4: the afternoon that was on the Sunday what we're known

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Speaker 4: in Ireland as the Heavy Gang. These were the Serious

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Speaker 4: Crime Squad who had a terrible reputation. They took over

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Speaker 4: the police station and they allowed they let all the

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Speaker 4: local police go off to a football match or something,

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Speaker 4: and so the only people in the police station with

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Speaker 4: me on Sunday afternoon were the Serious Crime Squad and

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Speaker 4: Special Branch. And at one point in the afternoon I

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Speaker 4: was being interrogated and I was they when they beat you,

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Speaker 4: they make sure not to leave mark, so you get

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Speaker 4: kidney punches. They I'd be standing while they'll be questioning

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Speaker 4: me and one would come behind me with his pistol

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Speaker 4: and you know, whack you in the in the kidneys,

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Speaker 4: which is very very painful. And are they take their

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Speaker 4: boots and rask them down along my shins, you know,

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Speaker 4: along the shin bone, along the skin to tear the skin.

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Speaker 4: Stuff like that. You wouldn't think about a stamp on

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Speaker 4: your toes. These are big, heavy men, you know, and

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Speaker 4: you're you're wearing a pair of canvas shoes that they've

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Speaker 4: given me. And at one point that I knew I

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Speaker 4: needed a break. This was you know, I knew I was.

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Speaker 4: I was getting very tired of this. So I said

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Speaker 4: I wanted to use the toilet, and they said you're

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Speaker 4: not going to use the toilet. You're not going to

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Speaker 4: use the toilet, you know, because they use fierce language,

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Speaker 4: you know. And I waited a little while and then

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Speaker 4: I said to the inspector who was conducting matters, I said,

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Speaker 4: it's like this now. I said, if you don't let

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Speaker 4: me use the toilet, I said, I'm going to piss

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Speaker 4: on the floor here in this office. They went there

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Speaker 4: and he said, well he would too. He would too

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Speaker 4: to be you know. So with that they left the

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Speaker 4: room and they called in two other detectives and they

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Speaker 4: left the room, and after about ten minutes they were

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Speaker 4: told they could take me out of the toilet. So

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Speaker 4: the two detectors took me out. I was in front,

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Speaker 4: walked out the door, down the corridor and turned right

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Speaker 4: along a long corridor, and about halfway down this corridor

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Speaker 4: there's an alcove to a staircase going stairs ways gone up.

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Speaker 1: And the.

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Speaker 4: Men's room was on the left, near the opposite that

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Speaker 4: that's alcove. And at the end of the corridor the

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Speaker 4: door was open out onto the car park and the street.

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Speaker 4: And I'm walking now, but you know, you can imagine

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Speaker 4: I'm sort of hypertense because of all that's happening, and

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Speaker 4: I'm walking down along the corridor, and I had the

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Speaker 4: door open because they wanted me to make a run.

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Speaker 1: For it so they could show you.

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Speaker 4: Yeah, And when I got just at this alcohol, a

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Speaker 4: detective standing in the alcohol that I couldn't see put

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Speaker 4: his foot out to trip me. But I was so

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Speaker 4: hypertense I saw it and I lift him. I stepped

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Speaker 4: over his foot, and the detective behind me says, ah,

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Speaker 4: you won't catch Peter like that. And with that, the

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Speaker 4: guy that had tried to trip me says, I'll fucking

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Speaker 4: catch me, he says, and he cocked a noozy submachine gun.

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Speaker 4: He said, I'll kill the bastard. And I got on

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Speaker 4: a merciful push in my back and I was propelled

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Speaker 4: through the door of the men's room and up against

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Speaker 4: the wall to the side, and the detective behind me,

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Speaker 4: who was a special Branch detective, shielded my body, put

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Speaker 4: his hands up like that. She lied my body and

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Speaker 4: said into my ears, say nothing, say nothing, Say nothing,

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Speaker 4: And he said to his college shut that door, and

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Speaker 4: they shut the door. And there was a big for

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Speaker 4: already going on out in the hallway. The guy with

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Speaker 4: a gun was wanting to get at me. And the

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Speaker 4: next thing we heard a torretive voice saying, what's going

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Speaker 4: on here? And then hand me that weapon and then

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Speaker 4: to somebody has take care of that weapon, and he says,

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Speaker 4: you to my office, and I gather what happened to

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Speaker 4: as a superintendent came in and saw what was going

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Speaker 4: on and stopped it. But in the toilet, the detective

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Speaker 4: that was protecting me still covered my back, covered me

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Speaker 4: with his body, which is a very brave thing to do,

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Speaker 4: because that other lunatic was going to shoot me. And

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Speaker 4: then when everything out quiet and down, he says to me,

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Speaker 4: I need to have a pin out too, he says,

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Speaker 4: after all that, and so that was it and I

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Speaker 4: was brought back and the interrogations continued.

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Speaker 1: I mean, we've heard these stories from people who were

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Speaker 1: wrongfully arrested and subjected to awful interrogations in America. And

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Speaker 1: we don't really know much about the audience here because

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Speaker 1: we haven't covered it in any detail what goes on overseas,

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Speaker 1: but it sounds every bit as bad as anything that

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Speaker 1: goes on in America. And of course we do know that,

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Speaker 1: as you pointed out, when police officers are killed, they

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Speaker 1: get crazy, they get into an irrational state, and they

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Speaker 1: probably do things that there they wouldn't normally do normally do,

286
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Speaker 1: that's correct, And so you were subject to I mean

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Speaker 1: from I'm just trying to do the math, like almost

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Speaker 1: forty hours of interrogation thus far, and I'm guessing that

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Speaker 1: there was well we know that you didn't get any sleep.

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Speaker 1: I'm sure you weren't given anything to eat.

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Speaker 4: Well, no, they would bring along a coup of tea

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Speaker 4: or something like that, you know, maybe a sandwich, you know.

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Speaker 1: Right, so they okay, so the at least you had

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Speaker 1: that going for yourself. But that which is better than

295
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Speaker 1: you would have thought based on the way they're treating you. Right,

296
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Speaker 1: But then again, they like to do that, right, They

297
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Speaker 1: like to pull you in a little bit and then

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Speaker 1: put you back out right and do that whole like

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Speaker 1: psychological torture thing as well, Jennifer.

300
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Speaker 4: When I was put into the cell down on Monday

301
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Speaker 4: morning at four point am on Monday morning, I was

302
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Speaker 4: taken out again at eight o'clock and I was interrogated

303
00:16:07,600 --> 00:16:09,760
Speaker 4: then til noon on Monday, and then I was taken

304
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Speaker 4: under an armed desk card of perlice to Dublin and

305
00:16:13,440 --> 00:16:15,920
Speaker 4: brought before the Special Criminal Court, where I was charged

306
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Speaker 4: with capital model and robbery.

307
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Speaker 1: But you never confessed, absolutely not.

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Speaker 4: I should tell you this one. My father was a policeman.

309
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Speaker 4: My father had been a police officer. Yeah, and at

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Speaker 4: the time when I was a young man, and he

311
00:16:32,400 --> 00:16:36,840
Speaker 4: knew of my involvement with the Republican movement, and he

312
00:16:36,960 --> 00:16:39,520
Speaker 4: tried to talk me out of it, of course, and

313
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Speaker 4: he said to me at one stage he said to me,

314
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Speaker 4: if you're going to stay with these people that you're

315
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Speaker 4: involved in now, he said, I want to tell you

316
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Speaker 4: to give you some advice. He says, if you're ever

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Speaker 4: arrested by that crowd. And I said, what crowd? He said,

318
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Speaker 4: that crowd in the castle, Dublin Castle was the center

319
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Speaker 4: for the Special Branch, and he was referring to a

320
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Speaker 4: special Branch. He said, if they deal with political matters.

321
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Speaker 4: He says, if you're arrested, don't answer any questions. He said,

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Speaker 4: give them me your name, address, and date of bert

323
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Speaker 4: and say nothing else. And I said, why that, he says,

324
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Speaker 4: because no matter what you say, they'll twist it and

325
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Speaker 4: use it against you. So when I was arrested, and

326
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Speaker 4: that was my policy when I had been arrested many

327
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Speaker 4: times before, because if anything happened in the area that

328
00:17:24,280 --> 00:17:26,360
Speaker 4: I was in, they would do a sort of round

329
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Speaker 4: up the usual suspects. Anything political happened, I didn't mean,

330
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Speaker 4: and they'd pulled me in and they questioned me, and

331
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Speaker 4: I'd say nothing, and they'd released me and that was

332
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Speaker 4: the end of it. So I knew about the procedures

333
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Speaker 4: when I was arrested, but they brought me before the

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Speaker 4: Special Criminal Court which was established for the trial of

335
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Speaker 4: political offenses, which is a tribunal of three judges, no jury,

336
00:17:51,280 --> 00:17:53,800
Speaker 4: and there I was charged and remandement custody to the

337
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Speaker 4: maximum security prison where I was put. And in truth,

338
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Speaker 4: when I got to the maximum security prison, that even

339
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Speaker 4: on the Monday evening, and I was That was kind

340
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Speaker 4: of interesting too, because when I was brought into what

341
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Speaker 4: they call reception in the prison. I was stripped, of course,

342
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Speaker 4: they stripped out to you're going into the prison, and

343
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Speaker 4: there was a senior chief officer what they call the

344
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Speaker 4: chief officer there, Jaylor, and they handed me prison clothes.

345
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Speaker 4: I said them, They said, you have to put them on.

346
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Speaker 4: You have to wear prison clothes. I said, no, I'm

347
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Speaker 4: a political prisoner. I don't wear prison clothes. And they said,

348
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Speaker 4: but you have to, that's it. No, I said, I'm

349
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Speaker 4: not wearing. No, I want my own clothes back. And

350
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Speaker 4: I said, if you don't give me my own clothes,

351
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Speaker 4: I'll go naked.

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Speaker 1: How did they respond to that.

353
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Speaker 4: And they said what Well, some of them wanted to

354
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Speaker 4: beat me up again. You see. I wanted to beat

355
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Speaker 4: me up. And the chief said no, no, no, don't

356
00:18:40,920 --> 00:18:43,640
Speaker 4: do that. He said, are you serious? I said, of course,

357
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Speaker 4: I'm serious. I said, I'm a politicod prisoner. I'm not

358
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Speaker 4: wearing prison clothes. And he said, give me fucking clothes.

359
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Speaker 4: So I got my clothes and I was brought into

360
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Speaker 4: the prison wing where I was where everybody else was

361
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Speaker 4: not wearing their own clothes too, because it was a

362
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Speaker 4: politic good wing. You see. I was put into a

363
00:19:01,000 --> 00:19:04,200
Speaker 4: cell and I can tell you this much to get

364
00:19:04,200 --> 00:19:08,480
Speaker 4: into that prison cell with a clean bed, even though

365
00:19:08,480 --> 00:19:11,520
Speaker 4: it's a narrow, army type of bed, take off my

366
00:19:11,520 --> 00:19:13,159
Speaker 4: clothes and get into the bed and sleep. It was

367
00:19:13,280 --> 00:19:18,199
Speaker 4: such a relief after forty eight harrowing hours and me

368
00:19:18,920 --> 00:19:21,359
Speaker 4: I was detoxing during all this time that I was

369
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Speaker 4: in the police station, and there I was. And then

370
00:19:23,520 --> 00:19:25,720
Speaker 4: three months later I was given a copy of the

371
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Speaker 4: Book of evidence, and I saw in the book of

372
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Speaker 4: evidence where one detective sergeant was claiming that on the

373
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Speaker 4: Monday morning that would have been after thirty four hours

374
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Speaker 4: of interrogation, I had supposedly suddenly blurted out these words.

375
00:19:39,960 --> 00:19:42,320
Speaker 4: I know that you know I was involved, but on

376
00:19:42,400 --> 00:19:44,720
Speaker 4: the advice of my solicitor, I'm saying nothing, and you'll

377
00:19:44,720 --> 00:19:46,760
Speaker 4: have to and you'll have to prove it all the way.

378
00:19:48,200 --> 00:19:50,760
Speaker 4: I'd never spoken those words, because, as I said, all

379
00:19:50,800 --> 00:19:52,560
Speaker 4: I gave was my name, addressed, date of bed and

380
00:19:52,560 --> 00:19:53,960
Speaker 4: if I wanted to use the toilet, I said, I

381
00:19:53,960 --> 00:19:54,680
Speaker 4: want to use the toilet.

382
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Speaker 1: So for thirty four hours of them interrogating you and

383
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Speaker 1: alternately beating you and witching people and going in and

384
00:20:01,800 --> 00:20:04,720
Speaker 1: out and depriving you of sleep and everything else, all

385
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Speaker 1: you gave them was your name.

386
00:20:06,840 --> 00:20:10,040
Speaker 4: Address, and birth day of parrot and to say to them,

387
00:20:10,400 --> 00:20:12,080
Speaker 4: I am innocent of what you're accused me of.

388
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Speaker 1: So your dad's advice really stuck with.

389
00:20:15,119 --> 00:20:17,359
Speaker 4: You absolutely because he knew, I mean, he was a

390
00:20:17,359 --> 00:20:18,400
Speaker 4: police officer.

391
00:20:18,200 --> 00:20:21,000
Speaker 1: Right, which is an iron ironic twist. It is a thing, right,

392
00:20:21,040 --> 00:20:22,960
Speaker 1: the fact that your dad was a police officer and

393
00:20:23,000 --> 00:20:25,520
Speaker 1: you end up being accused of killing two police officers

394
00:20:25,560 --> 00:20:28,880
Speaker 1: and then tortured by police officers. Yeah, it's very strange.

395
00:20:29,000 --> 00:20:32,720
Speaker 1: Life is very strange, and your story is particularly insane.

396
00:20:33,520 --> 00:20:35,919
Speaker 1: So and what an odd thing to just reflect for

397
00:20:35,920 --> 00:20:39,440
Speaker 1: a second on the fact that you were just expressing

398
00:20:39,800 --> 00:20:41,840
Speaker 1: how you felt the sense of relief and you almost

399
00:20:41,880 --> 00:20:44,480
Speaker 1: sounded joyful at the idea that you were being put

400
00:20:44,520 --> 00:20:47,320
Speaker 1: into a cell in a maximum security prison just because

401
00:20:47,359 --> 00:20:50,080
Speaker 1: you had just been through this unbelievable ordeal.

402
00:20:50,400 --> 00:20:52,359
Speaker 4: Because I was away from the ardel, you see, right,

403
00:20:52,359 --> 00:20:54,640
Speaker 4: I was safe from it. That's why I could relax.

404
00:20:54,440 --> 00:20:56,680
Speaker 1: I know. But you got to understand, like for anyone

405
00:20:56,680 --> 00:20:59,920
Speaker 1: else you know who's in society to hear that or

406
00:21:00,119 --> 00:21:03,000
Speaker 1: me right now, to go to think of how that

407
00:21:03,119 --> 00:21:07,439
Speaker 1: could be that you could actually feel happy about being

408
00:21:07,640 --> 00:21:12,040
Speaker 1: an innocent person put into a tiny cell with a

409
00:21:12,080 --> 00:21:14,960
Speaker 1: hard cut. But then again it was the best thing

410
00:21:15,000 --> 00:21:17,719
Speaker 1: you had seen in at least forty eight hours. Yes, right,

411
00:21:17,720 --> 00:21:18,760
Speaker 1: I could get some sleeps, so.

412
00:21:18,760 --> 00:21:20,600
Speaker 4: My mind didn't go to that fact that I was

413
00:21:20,600 --> 00:21:23,080
Speaker 4: in the maximum security prisoner, that I was accused wrongly.

414
00:21:23,800 --> 00:21:27,240
Speaker 4: At that stage my exhaustion, all I wanted was rest.

415
00:21:27,440 --> 00:21:29,320
Speaker 4: And then a funny thing happened the following morning. I

416
00:21:29,320 --> 00:21:31,399
Speaker 4: woke up at seven o'clock in the following morning. The

417
00:21:31,440 --> 00:21:33,199
Speaker 4: cell I was in was on the ground floor, and

418
00:21:33,240 --> 00:21:35,480
Speaker 4: I woke up the following morning at seven o'clock to

419
00:21:35,480 --> 00:21:39,160
Speaker 4: hear a voice outside the cell in the prison yard

420
00:21:39,200 --> 00:21:44,600
Speaker 4: outside the cell screaming, Jesus help me, help me, help me.

421
00:21:44,680 --> 00:21:47,160
Speaker 4: Oh Jesus Christ helped me. Like I heard a scream,

422
00:21:47,200 --> 00:21:48,800
Speaker 4: and I thought, oh my god, what's going on here?

423
00:21:48,800 --> 00:21:50,879
Speaker 4: Because I didn't know. I thought maybe some prisoner was

424
00:21:50,920 --> 00:21:53,720
Speaker 4: being battled or something. And then I heard other voice saying,

425
00:21:53,760 --> 00:21:55,480
Speaker 4: come on, come on, come on, you know the cut

426
00:21:55,480 --> 00:21:57,640
Speaker 4: that down, come on, And there was a whole commercial

427
00:21:57,720 --> 00:22:00,359
Speaker 4: going on outside in the prison yard. I didn't know

428
00:22:00,359 --> 00:22:02,960
Speaker 4: what it was, and I thought, really, I'm in a

429
00:22:03,040 --> 00:22:05,480
Speaker 4: right hell hale here this is this is a prisoner

430
00:22:05,600 --> 00:22:06,360
Speaker 4: being battered.

431
00:22:06,440 --> 00:22:06,639
Speaker 1: You know.

432
00:22:07,200 --> 00:22:09,240
Speaker 4: It was only afterwards when the cell or opened I

433
00:22:09,280 --> 00:22:12,040
Speaker 4: heard that actually it was a prison officer had had

434
00:22:12,240 --> 00:22:16,640
Speaker 4: a nervous breakdown in the heard and they were trying

435
00:22:16,640 --> 00:22:17,280
Speaker 4: to take them away.

436
00:22:18,160 --> 00:22:19,479
Speaker 1: That was your first morning.

437
00:22:19,680 --> 00:22:23,159
Speaker 4: That was my first morning experience in the maximum security prison.

438
00:22:23,200 --> 00:22:25,399
Speaker 1: What was the name of the prison, port Lesha prison.

439
00:22:25,440 --> 00:22:27,400
Speaker 4: It was in the Midlands for prison.

440
00:22:27,480 --> 00:22:29,359
Speaker 1: So yeah, well, welcome to port Leicia.

441
00:22:29,720 --> 00:22:32,119
Speaker 5: Yeah, it was known it's known colloquially as the bark

442
00:22:32,840 --> 00:22:42,040
Speaker 5: the Yeah.

443
00:22:42,920 --> 00:22:46,240
Speaker 1: So at this point, had you already been sentenced?

444
00:22:46,400 --> 00:22:48,360
Speaker 4: No, no, just accused.

445
00:22:48,880 --> 00:22:51,320
Speaker 1: They've thrown you into this prison while you await your trial.

446
00:22:51,440 --> 00:22:53,400
Speaker 4: That's right. And I was swing. There was no such

447
00:22:53,400 --> 00:22:55,600
Speaker 4: thing as putting me in with other people and romand

448
00:22:55,600 --> 00:22:57,960
Speaker 4: I was put in with people that had already been convicted.

449
00:22:58,080 --> 00:22:59,760
Speaker 4: It was a politic good wing. So the way it

450
00:23:00,080 --> 00:23:03,639
Speaker 4: worked there, in one way, it was a tough place

451
00:23:03,680 --> 00:23:03,919
Speaker 4: to be.

452
00:23:04,440 --> 00:23:07,240
Speaker 1: So let's go forward to the trial and the conviction,

453
00:23:07,359 --> 00:23:10,040
Speaker 1: because there's so much more to your story. So the

454
00:23:10,119 --> 00:23:11,800
Speaker 1: trial takes, how long does it take to get to

455
00:23:11,880 --> 00:23:12,240
Speaker 1: the trial?

456
00:23:12,320 --> 00:23:14,760
Speaker 4: Okay, Well, three months after I was arrested, I got

457
00:23:14,760 --> 00:23:16,359
Speaker 4: a copy of the Book of evidence, and when I

458
00:23:16,359 --> 00:23:18,400
Speaker 4: read the book of evidence, I saw where the detective

459
00:23:18,440 --> 00:23:22,560
Speaker 4: sergeant was claiming that after thirty four hours of interrogation,

460
00:23:22,600 --> 00:23:24,600
Speaker 4: I had suddenly blurted out these words, that did I

461
00:23:24,600 --> 00:23:26,280
Speaker 4: say to them already? I know you know yeah, which

462
00:23:26,320 --> 00:23:28,879
Speaker 4: I never said. And the first time I came across

463
00:23:28,880 --> 00:23:30,600
Speaker 4: these words was when I read the book of evidence,

464
00:23:30,920 --> 00:23:33,159
Speaker 4: and that was the principal evidence against me.

465
00:23:33,960 --> 00:23:37,440
Speaker 1: You're so called confession, my so called oral confession.

466
00:23:38,200 --> 00:23:40,199
Speaker 4: So when we went to try now the two other

467
00:23:40,240 --> 00:23:43,440
Speaker 4: people had been arrested, the three of us were tried together, right,

468
00:23:44,040 --> 00:23:47,800
Speaker 4: So the trial took twenty three court days over six weeks,

469
00:23:48,400 --> 00:23:50,520
Speaker 4: and for the first twelve days of the trial, my

470
00:23:50,640 --> 00:23:54,359
Speaker 4: name wasn't even mentioned, apart from the fact the chargers

471
00:23:54,359 --> 00:23:56,440
Speaker 4: were read out to me. After that, my name wasn't

472
00:23:56,480 --> 00:23:58,160
Speaker 4: mentioned for twelve days. So I'm sitting in the dock.

473
00:23:58,600 --> 00:24:02,760
Speaker 4: It's surreal as if I'm one of the audience, because

474
00:24:02,840 --> 00:24:05,160
Speaker 4: they're talking about stuff about these other guys and nothing

475
00:24:05,200 --> 00:24:07,320
Speaker 4: about me. And then after twelve days they went to

476
00:24:07,359 --> 00:24:10,719
Speaker 4: my case, and when my case was then opened, they

477
00:24:10,720 --> 00:24:14,040
Speaker 4: opened the case against me. The police officer who had

478
00:24:14,080 --> 00:24:18,359
Speaker 4: captured the guy they were chasing, whom they claimed was me,

479
00:24:18,560 --> 00:24:20,280
Speaker 4: went in the witness box and he was asked to

480
00:24:20,280 --> 00:24:22,000
Speaker 4: see the man again, and he said, yes, he's in

481
00:24:22,040 --> 00:24:24,040
Speaker 4: the court and can you point him out? And he said, yes,

482
00:24:24,280 --> 00:24:26,119
Speaker 4: I'm sitting in the docks. So he pointed to a

483
00:24:26,160 --> 00:24:28,800
Speaker 4: man in the public gallery, standing in the public gallery,

484
00:24:28,800 --> 00:24:32,359
Speaker 4: and he says, that's him standing up there. And it

485
00:24:32,440 --> 00:24:36,640
Speaker 4: was really bizarre because the public gallery in the court

486
00:24:36,680 --> 00:24:40,040
Speaker 4: was packed, but all the people standing beside this man

487
00:24:40,080 --> 00:24:42,439
Speaker 4: moved away from him and somehow found space, and he

488
00:24:42,520 --> 00:24:44,480
Speaker 4: was left standing like this on his own, like something

489
00:24:44,480 --> 00:24:46,480
Speaker 4: you can see in the movies, you know, And the

490
00:24:46,520 --> 00:24:51,639
Speaker 4: whole courtroom started laughing. It seemed so funny. But I

491
00:24:51,760 --> 00:24:54,560
Speaker 4: was convicted. They never stopped that man, they never arrested him,

492
00:24:54,560 --> 00:24:55,560
Speaker 4: They allowed him leave the court.

493
00:24:55,800 --> 00:24:57,480
Speaker 1: Is it your belief that was actually the guy?

494
00:24:57,600 --> 00:24:57,719
Speaker 5: Oh?

495
00:24:57,760 --> 00:25:00,359
Speaker 4: Well, the police officer who had caught him in spoke

496
00:25:00,400 --> 00:25:02,720
Speaker 4: to him, said that was actually the guy, and he

497
00:25:02,800 --> 00:25:04,960
Speaker 4: had the and he knew I was in the dock.

498
00:25:05,000 --> 00:25:06,200
Speaker 4: He knew I was the accused.

499
00:25:06,200 --> 00:25:10,000
Speaker 1: And it's interesting and bizarre, though we've seen this before,

500
00:25:10,080 --> 00:25:12,760
Speaker 1: that the actual killer would come to the courtroom to

501
00:25:12,800 --> 00:25:13,680
Speaker 1: watch the proceedings.

502
00:25:13,720 --> 00:25:14,880
Speaker 4: Right, apparently he did.

503
00:25:15,000 --> 00:25:17,359
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is a phenomenon that happened. It's so weird.

504
00:25:17,680 --> 00:25:19,560
Speaker 4: And so he was allowed to leave the court. And

505
00:25:19,640 --> 00:25:22,160
Speaker 4: I was convicted on the evidence of the detective sergeant

506
00:25:22,200 --> 00:25:24,399
Speaker 4: that had spoken those words I told you about that.

507
00:25:24,480 --> 00:25:26,840
Speaker 4: I never said, right, and that was the evidence of

508
00:25:27,040 --> 00:25:28,480
Speaker 4: which I was convicted and sentence death.

509
00:25:28,560 --> 00:25:30,640
Speaker 1: Did your attorney bring up the fact that the other

510
00:25:30,920 --> 00:25:33,720
Speaker 1: defendant had said that you had the guy?

511
00:25:33,840 --> 00:25:36,760
Speaker 4: But he said to me afterwards, what that evening? He

512
00:25:36,840 --> 00:25:39,840
Speaker 4: said to me, Now I should explain the situation in

513
00:25:39,880 --> 00:25:43,879
Speaker 4: the Special Priminent court, not like in America. I was

514
00:25:43,960 --> 00:25:48,160
Speaker 4: the accused of not allowed sippy side these lawyers. Okay,

515
00:25:48,400 --> 00:25:55,480
Speaker 4: So you have the tribunal, the registrar, the solicitors, the barristers,

516
00:25:56,280 --> 00:26:01,600
Speaker 4: the journalists, and then behind una raised slightly elevated the dock.

517
00:26:02,000 --> 00:26:05,879
Speaker 4: I'm sitting in the dock, so I am about I

518
00:26:05,920 --> 00:26:08,879
Speaker 4: suppose I'm about the equivalent of about six rows of

519
00:26:08,960 --> 00:26:13,240
Speaker 4: seats behind my lawyers, and they're facing the opposite direction

520
00:26:13,320 --> 00:26:16,199
Speaker 4: from me. They're facing the court as I am, so

521
00:26:16,240 --> 00:26:19,040
Speaker 4: I can only see their backs and I can't consult

522
00:26:19,080 --> 00:26:22,040
Speaker 4: with them. And the only time I can consult with

523
00:26:22,080 --> 00:26:25,359
Speaker 4: them is when the trial that day is over. So

524
00:26:25,440 --> 00:26:27,920
Speaker 4: when I raised the matter with my lawyers at the time,

525
00:26:28,000 --> 00:26:30,120
Speaker 4: they told me, oh, well, you can't be convicted now,

526
00:26:30,160 --> 00:26:32,440
Speaker 4: as the detective has said, the police officer has made

527
00:26:32,440 --> 00:26:35,119
Speaker 4: that identification, there's no way you can be convicted. And

528
00:26:35,200 --> 00:26:37,240
Speaker 4: I thought, okay, I knew nothing about the law at

529
00:26:37,280 --> 00:26:37,640
Speaker 4: the time.

530
00:26:37,920 --> 00:26:41,280
Speaker 1: Well it seems logical though, understand it says, yeah, the

531
00:26:41,280 --> 00:26:44,320
Speaker 1: guy's here, there, he is, he is, and you're going okay.

532
00:26:44,080 --> 00:26:46,520
Speaker 4: Yeah, good. But the thing about it is, if that

533
00:26:46,600 --> 00:26:49,440
Speaker 4: had happened in the North of Ireland, if my lawyers

534
00:26:49,480 --> 00:26:51,800
Speaker 4: had been any good, they would have asked for a

535
00:26:51,840 --> 00:26:55,920
Speaker 4: mistrial straight away. They would ask for the dismissal straight away.

536
00:26:55,960 --> 00:27:01,480
Speaker 4: But they didn't. And actually, my senior counsel, who didn't

537
00:27:01,480 --> 00:27:03,480
Speaker 4: even turn around to look at this man and didn't

538
00:27:03,520 --> 00:27:06,240
Speaker 4: even turn around to look what the police officer pointed to.

539
00:27:07,040 --> 00:27:09,960
Speaker 4: He said to the police officer, so you've identified the

540
00:27:10,040 --> 00:27:13,960
Speaker 4: defendant as the man, and the police officer said yes.

541
00:27:15,560 --> 00:27:18,600
Speaker 4: And then the prosecution council stood up and he said,

542
00:27:18,640 --> 00:27:20,720
Speaker 4: in fairness to the accused, my lords, he said, I

543
00:27:20,760 --> 00:27:23,040
Speaker 4: have to point out, he said that this witness was

544
00:27:23,080 --> 00:27:27,439
Speaker 4: shown a photograph of the accused before the trial, and

545
00:27:27,440 --> 00:27:32,320
Speaker 4: they're not allowed to do that, you see, So then

546
00:27:32,480 --> 00:27:34,919
Speaker 4: that meant that his evidence was disallowed.

547
00:27:35,880 --> 00:27:38,840
Speaker 1: Oh so his evidence of having pointed out the actual killer,

548
00:27:38,840 --> 00:27:40,960
Speaker 1: who we believe is the actual killer, was disallowed because

549
00:27:41,000 --> 00:27:43,200
Speaker 1: of that, but not your false confession. Were you able

550
00:27:43,240 --> 00:27:44,520
Speaker 1: to testify in your defense?

551
00:27:45,160 --> 00:27:47,560
Speaker 4: No, my lawyer said there had no evidence against me

552
00:27:47,640 --> 00:27:49,919
Speaker 4: and that if I went into the witness box it

553
00:27:49,960 --> 00:27:53,600
Speaker 4: would mitigate against me and that the state would pull

554
00:27:53,680 --> 00:27:55,600
Speaker 4: me apart. And I wasn't afraid to go into the

555
00:27:55,600 --> 00:27:57,080
Speaker 4: witness box. In fact, I wanted to go into the

556
00:27:57,080 --> 00:28:00,440
Speaker 4: witness box, but my lawyer's misdirected me and said, no,

557
00:28:00,920 --> 00:28:02,639
Speaker 4: there's no evidence against you, so there's no need for

558
00:28:02,640 --> 00:28:03,680
Speaker 4: you to go into the witness box.

559
00:28:04,240 --> 00:28:08,639
Speaker 1: So again another common factor that we see, well, a

560
00:28:08,680 --> 00:28:12,160
Speaker 1: couple of common factors that we see in these wrongful convictions.

561
00:28:12,520 --> 00:28:19,000
Speaker 1: You're a victim of police misconduct, prosecutorial misconduct, and incompetent

562
00:28:19,040 --> 00:28:23,840
Speaker 1: defense attorneys, and ultimately you're convicted and sentenced to death.

563
00:28:24,560 --> 00:28:27,120
Speaker 1: Let's talk about that moment, and then let's move forward

564
00:28:27,160 --> 00:28:31,160
Speaker 1: to the craziness that happens on the eve of your execution. Right.

565
00:28:31,240 --> 00:28:33,840
Speaker 4: Yeah, Well, when the case was over, when the prosecution

566
00:28:33,920 --> 00:28:36,840
Speaker 4: case in the defense case was finished, the court reserved

567
00:28:36,920 --> 00:28:40,280
Speaker 4: judgment to the following day and we were brought back

568
00:28:40,320 --> 00:28:43,080
Speaker 4: to the prison to be brought up the following day

569
00:28:43,120 --> 00:28:47,720
Speaker 4: to hear their judgment. When we were convicted and so.

570
00:28:47,440 --> 00:28:49,560
Speaker 1: So you had been convicted in that sentenced No, I

571
00:28:49,600 --> 00:28:51,280
Speaker 1: hadn't been convicted. Oh oh, so you had to go

572
00:28:51,520 --> 00:28:54,440
Speaker 1: You had to go back to the prison and wait there, wonder.

573
00:28:54,280 --> 00:28:56,280
Speaker 4: Off the court as to whether they were going to

574
00:28:56,280 --> 00:28:57,040
Speaker 4: convict or not.

575
00:28:57,800 --> 00:28:59,400
Speaker 1: That's a long night and it was.

576
00:28:59,720 --> 00:28:59,880
Speaker 3: It was.

577
00:29:00,000 --> 00:29:02,320
Speaker 4: It's pretty clear that they were going to convict the

578
00:29:02,320 --> 00:29:05,240
Speaker 4: other two guys because there was evidence against them. But

579
00:29:05,280 --> 00:29:07,640
Speaker 4: there was no The only evidence against me was the

580
00:29:07,640 --> 00:29:11,800
Speaker 4: word of this police officer, which I had disputed, and

581
00:29:11,880 --> 00:29:13,800
Speaker 4: plus the fact that the other police officer I had

582
00:29:13,800 --> 00:29:18,680
Speaker 4: identified the actual culprit who was not me. So when

583
00:29:18,720 --> 00:29:20,680
Speaker 4: we went up the following day anyway, they convicted me

584
00:29:21,880 --> 00:29:25,080
Speaker 4: and they sentenced me to death, and the sentence went

585
00:29:25,160 --> 00:29:29,160
Speaker 4: like this. The presiding member of the court said, you

586
00:29:29,200 --> 00:29:31,320
Speaker 4: should be taken from this court to the place in

587
00:29:31,360 --> 00:29:34,520
Speaker 4: which you were last held. And this was now on

588
00:29:34,560 --> 00:29:37,320
Speaker 4: the twenty seventh of November nineteen eighty and on the

589
00:29:37,400 --> 00:29:39,880
Speaker 4: nineteen day of November nine and the year of Our

590
00:29:39,920 --> 00:29:42,200
Speaker 4: Lord nineteen eighty you should be made to suffer debt

591
00:29:42,240 --> 00:29:46,440
Speaker 4: by execution in the manner prescribed by law. And then

592
00:29:46,480 --> 00:29:49,720
Speaker 4: and you're also sentenced to fifteen years imprisonment for the robbery.

593
00:29:50,840 --> 00:29:54,960
Speaker 4: My inner response at the time was, this is crazy.

594
00:29:55,080 --> 00:29:57,560
Speaker 4: If I'm going to be executed in three weeks time,

595
00:29:58,160 --> 00:30:00,800
Speaker 4: I can't save the fifteen years. And if I'm going

596
00:30:00,800 --> 00:30:02,720
Speaker 4: to say out the fifteen years, I can't be executed

597
00:30:02,840 --> 00:30:05,160
Speaker 4: three weeks time. But that was the way my head

598
00:30:05,320 --> 00:30:08,120
Speaker 4: was around the whole time. And then I was taken

599
00:30:08,160 --> 00:30:11,800
Speaker 4: down underneath the courtroom to the cells. I was putting

600
00:30:11,800 --> 00:30:13,520
Speaker 4: the cell, and then my lawyers come down to see

601
00:30:13,520 --> 00:30:16,160
Speaker 4: me in this alcove that was there, and I was

602
00:30:16,160 --> 00:30:18,000
Speaker 4: brought out to the alcohol to meet with my lawyers.

603
00:30:18,000 --> 00:30:22,560
Speaker 4: But the senior lawyer hadn't yet come. And when he

604
00:30:22,600 --> 00:30:25,320
Speaker 4: came in a few moments later and he came up

605
00:30:25,320 --> 00:30:28,280
Speaker 4: to me, he was weeping. He was crying, he was

606
00:30:28,320 --> 00:30:32,880
Speaker 4: in tears. And I found myself in this bizarre situation

607
00:30:33,000 --> 00:30:35,520
Speaker 4: that I was standing up with my arm around. His

608
00:30:35,640 --> 00:30:39,000
Speaker 4: name is Seamus Egan. The lawyer. My arm was around

609
00:30:39,080 --> 00:30:41,440
Speaker 4: him and I was saying, it's okay, it's okay, don't worry,

610
00:30:41,440 --> 00:30:43,840
Speaker 4: which we haven't appealed, don't worry, and he's crying his

611
00:30:43,880 --> 00:30:45,400
Speaker 4: eyes out, and I think it was.

612
00:30:47,000 --> 00:30:50,360
Speaker 2: This is weird, go backwards, this is this is about face.

613
00:30:50,440 --> 00:30:52,480
Speaker 4: Yeah, he should be consoling me and I, you know,

614
00:30:52,600 --> 00:30:56,360
Speaker 4: whereas I'm consoling him. And so I was brought back

615
00:30:56,360 --> 00:30:57,960
Speaker 4: to the prison. Now, when I was brought back to

616
00:30:58,000 --> 00:31:01,360
Speaker 4: the prison, now I'm a sentence I condemn prisoner, right,

617
00:31:01,760 --> 00:31:05,320
Speaker 4: so I'm put in a death cell. And at first,

618
00:31:05,400 --> 00:31:06,880
Speaker 4: actually they didn't put me in a death cell. They

619
00:31:06,920 --> 00:31:09,200
Speaker 4: put me in an isolation area. And they put me

620
00:31:09,200 --> 00:31:12,080
Speaker 4: in an ordinary cell in an isolation area with two

621
00:31:12,200 --> 00:31:15,280
Speaker 4: jailers in this stale seal with me. And that night

622
00:31:15,480 --> 00:31:19,400
Speaker 4: there was no sleep because these guys were sitting reading papers, rustling, talking,

623
00:31:19,440 --> 00:31:22,080
Speaker 4: you know, and I couldn't get to sleep until eventually

624
00:31:22,160 --> 00:31:23,800
Speaker 4: during the night I sat up and I said to

625
00:31:23,840 --> 00:31:25,480
Speaker 4: them and I said, now listen here to me, you guys,

626
00:31:27,200 --> 00:31:30,239
Speaker 4: the chief has told me that in this situation that

627
00:31:30,280 --> 00:31:33,800
Speaker 4: I mean, I can have whatever jailer's I want with me,

628
00:31:34,680 --> 00:31:38,200
Speaker 4: and unless you pair be totally quiet, I'm going to

629
00:31:38,280 --> 00:31:41,720
Speaker 4: ask for you every night, and they went, oh, jeess,

630
00:31:41,800 --> 00:31:44,320
Speaker 4: don to that, and they were as quite as lambs,

631
00:31:44,520 --> 00:31:45,400
Speaker 4: and I got through the night.

632
00:31:45,440 --> 00:31:47,080
Speaker 2: But then the follow that was a very good reverse

633
00:31:47,120 --> 00:31:47,960
Speaker 2: psychology there.

634
00:31:48,040 --> 00:31:50,600
Speaker 1: Yeah. Yeah, well it's almost it's sort of like an

635
00:31:50,640 --> 00:31:52,400
Speaker 1: active rebellion, I guess in a certain way.

636
00:31:52,440 --> 00:31:54,360
Speaker 4: And also I'm a bit rebellious.

637
00:31:54,320 --> 00:31:57,400
Speaker 1: And an element of controlling your own situation which is

638
00:31:57,440 --> 00:31:58,760
Speaker 1: completely out of your control.

639
00:31:59,200 --> 00:32:02,240
Speaker 4: Yeah, And then then I protested the following day and

640
00:32:02,280 --> 00:32:05,880
Speaker 4: they put us into a they created what they called

641
00:32:05,880 --> 00:32:09,360
Speaker 4: the death cell, which was a larger cell, and the

642
00:32:09,440 --> 00:32:11,680
Speaker 4: three condemned prisoners were put in there, and I had

643
00:32:11,800 --> 00:32:13,040
Speaker 4: bed down again in the wall.

644
00:32:13,280 --> 00:32:16,200
Speaker 1: You and the other two the natural bankroppers, Yeah, yeah, yeah,

645
00:32:16,480 --> 00:32:18,960
Speaker 1: you didn't know until that point, right, No, well I.

646
00:32:19,000 --> 00:32:22,760
Speaker 4: Knew one of them previously because I knew them from drinking,

647
00:32:23,680 --> 00:32:26,120
Speaker 4: but otherwise I didn't know them. And of course it's

648
00:32:26,160 --> 00:32:29,000
Speaker 4: often asked to me, why didn't they say you weren't

649
00:32:29,040 --> 00:32:31,800
Speaker 4: with them? And the fact of the matter is each

650
00:32:31,840 --> 00:32:35,280
Speaker 4: of them were conducting a defense of not guilty. They

651
00:32:35,280 --> 00:32:38,200
Speaker 4: were pleading not guilty, and if they were had said

652
00:32:38,200 --> 00:32:39,960
Speaker 4: that I wasn't with them. That would prove that they

653
00:32:39,960 --> 00:32:44,280
Speaker 4: were guilty, and the charge carried a mandatory death sentence.

654
00:32:44,800 --> 00:32:45,840
Speaker 1: So they had nothing to lose.

655
00:32:46,080 --> 00:32:48,640
Speaker 4: They weren't going to They were just trying to save

656
00:32:48,680 --> 00:32:52,560
Speaker 4: their own next and I understood that. But anyway, in

657
00:32:52,600 --> 00:32:55,160
Speaker 4: that condemned cell that was I was in there on

658
00:32:55,320 --> 00:32:58,480
Speaker 4: the twenty seventh of November and about a week before

659
00:32:58,560 --> 00:33:01,680
Speaker 4: Christmas of that year in ninety eight, the way the

660
00:33:01,760 --> 00:33:05,360
Speaker 4: rule was, the condemned prisoner wasn't allowed to speak to

661
00:33:05,360 --> 00:33:08,280
Speaker 4: any of the prisoners, and the jailers were told not

662
00:33:08,280 --> 00:33:12,560
Speaker 4: to speak the condemned prisoner for their own protection, because

663
00:33:13,120 --> 00:33:15,920
Speaker 4: if a jailer, like a prison guard, gets to like

664
00:33:15,960 --> 00:33:18,560
Speaker 4: a condemned prisoner or have respect for a condemned prisoner,

665
00:33:18,560 --> 00:33:20,680
Speaker 4: it would be very difficult for them to participate in

666
00:33:20,720 --> 00:33:24,880
Speaker 4: cold bloodedly taking that person's life, which is logically true.

667
00:33:25,880 --> 00:33:28,600
Speaker 4: But on this particular occasion, about a week before Christmas,

668
00:33:28,600 --> 00:33:31,320
Speaker 4: I overheard three of the jailers discussing what part they

669
00:33:31,400 --> 00:33:32,600
Speaker 4: might have to play in my hanging.

670
00:33:33,320 --> 00:33:33,440
Speaker 1: Now.

671
00:33:33,480 --> 00:33:35,480
Speaker 4: They were sitting as close as I am to you, Jason,

672
00:33:35,680 --> 00:33:37,480
Speaker 4: and they were discussing this as if I wasn't there,

673
00:33:38,360 --> 00:33:41,360
Speaker 4: as if I wasn't a human being. They had been

674
00:33:41,440 --> 00:33:44,560
Speaker 4: told that two prison officers would have to participate in

675
00:33:44,600 --> 00:33:47,880
Speaker 4: my execution, and they were very concerned to know would

676
00:33:47,920 --> 00:33:50,080
Speaker 4: bonus they would receive for doing this job, because of

677
00:33:50,080 --> 00:33:53,360
Speaker 4: course it was outside of their normal work, and what

678
00:33:53,520 --> 00:33:55,640
Speaker 4: role they would have to play. And the role they

679
00:33:55,640 --> 00:33:58,120
Speaker 4: would have to play, they said, was that when my

680
00:33:58,200 --> 00:34:00,560
Speaker 4: body would go down to the trap door of the gallows,

681
00:34:01,040 --> 00:34:04,600
Speaker 4: there would be two prison officers underneath, and each one

682
00:34:04,600 --> 00:34:06,520
Speaker 4: would have to pull on one of my legs to

683
00:34:06,520 --> 00:34:07,640
Speaker 4: make sure my neck was broken.

684
00:34:09,480 --> 00:34:11,880
Speaker 1: You know, I'm almost never at a loss for words,

685
00:34:11,920 --> 00:34:14,640
Speaker 1: but I don't even know what to say about that.

686
00:34:14,640 --> 00:34:15,319
Speaker 1: That's a whole note.

687
00:34:15,320 --> 00:34:16,960
Speaker 4: Well, I didn't know what to say about it either,

688
00:34:17,160 --> 00:34:20,200
Speaker 4: but I was already angry over what they had done

689
00:34:20,239 --> 00:34:23,600
Speaker 4: to me. But this made me enraged, but in a

690
00:34:23,719 --> 00:34:26,000
Speaker 4: funny kind of way, and if it's are kind of way,

691
00:34:26,840 --> 00:34:30,560
Speaker 4: it helped me because it forced me to face the

692
00:34:30,600 --> 00:34:35,040
Speaker 4: reality straight in front of me that I was likely

693
00:34:35,080 --> 00:34:37,120
Speaker 4: to be hanged. How old were you at the time,

694
00:34:37,560 --> 00:34:43,000
Speaker 4: forty one? And facing that reality, to my surprise, I

695
00:34:43,080 --> 00:34:47,040
Speaker 4: discovered that I wasn't afraid to die, but what I

696
00:34:47,160 --> 00:34:49,680
Speaker 4: was afraid of was that I might not be able

697
00:34:49,680 --> 00:34:54,080
Speaker 4: to die with dignity. I was terribly afraid that they

698
00:34:54,160 --> 00:34:58,319
Speaker 4: might succeed in taking away my human dignity, and I

699
00:34:58,400 --> 00:35:01,319
Speaker 4: determined I wouldn't have let them do that. Now they

700
00:35:01,360 --> 00:35:04,520
Speaker 4: had imprisoned me physically, but they couldn't imprison my mind,

701
00:35:04,600 --> 00:35:07,520
Speaker 4: or my heart or my spirit. And so I determined

702
00:35:07,520 --> 00:35:09,600
Speaker 4: that it was in those realms of myself I would

703
00:35:09,600 --> 00:35:11,160
Speaker 4: exist while I was in that situation.

704
00:35:11,239 --> 00:35:13,680
Speaker 1: And that's what I did, in the mind, the heart,

705
00:35:13,680 --> 00:35:18,440
Speaker 1: and the spirit. Yeah, and so you came within eleven

706
00:35:18,520 --> 00:35:20,520
Speaker 1: days of being executed.

707
00:35:20,080 --> 00:35:23,160
Speaker 4: That's correct. But before that, my lawyers made an application

708
00:35:23,200 --> 00:35:25,520
Speaker 4: for leave to appeal, which put a stay on the execution.

709
00:35:26,320 --> 00:35:28,960
Speaker 4: But then the appeal court refused my application for leave

710
00:35:29,000 --> 00:35:32,040
Speaker 4: to appeal, so I got no appeal, and they said

711
00:35:32,040 --> 00:35:34,359
Speaker 4: a new day for my execution, which was the eighth

712
00:35:34,440 --> 00:35:38,960
Speaker 4: of June nineteen eighty one. And about two weeks after

713
00:35:39,480 --> 00:35:41,440
Speaker 4: the new date was set, my lawyers come on to

714
00:35:41,480 --> 00:35:45,279
Speaker 4: visit me in the prison and they wanted me to

715
00:35:45,360 --> 00:35:48,239
Speaker 4: allow them to put in a plea for clemency on

716
00:35:48,320 --> 00:35:52,799
Speaker 4: my behalf, and I refused. I said no way, and

717
00:35:52,840 --> 00:35:55,200
Speaker 4: the senior counsel, the guy who had been crying after

718
00:35:55,239 --> 00:35:58,040
Speaker 4: the trial, he was in tears again, you know, very

719
00:35:58,040 --> 00:36:02,040
Speaker 4: emotional man, and he's but they might hang you, Peter Well,

720
00:36:02,080 --> 00:36:03,399
Speaker 4: I said, if they do, it wouldn't be the first

721
00:36:03,440 --> 00:36:06,759
Speaker 4: innocent person they've hanged. But I will not plea for

722
00:36:06,840 --> 00:36:11,200
Speaker 4: clemency for something I didn't do. And I actually asked

723
00:36:11,200 --> 00:36:12,600
Speaker 4: for a piece of paper and I wrote, gave them

724
00:36:12,640 --> 00:36:14,680
Speaker 4: written instructions to that effect, because I was afraid they

725
00:36:14,680 --> 00:36:17,840
Speaker 4: would actually go and do it anyway. Oh yes. The

726
00:36:17,880 --> 00:36:20,839
Speaker 4: reason they said this was that government cabinet had met

727
00:36:21,719 --> 00:36:25,200
Speaker 4: and discussed whether I would be executed or not and

728
00:36:25,320 --> 00:36:27,879
Speaker 4: couldn't come to an agreement about it. And they were

729
00:36:27,880 --> 00:36:30,360
Speaker 4: concerned that the following week the cabinet was going to

730
00:36:30,360 --> 00:36:33,400
Speaker 4: meet again and the cabinet might decide to execute me.

731
00:36:34,320 --> 00:36:36,680
Speaker 4: So they went away very upset, and I went back

732
00:36:36,680 --> 00:36:40,080
Speaker 4: to my cell and the following week when the cabinet met,

733
00:36:40,120 --> 00:36:43,600
Speaker 4: I later learned that the Prime ministers before any discussion

734
00:36:43,600 --> 00:36:47,040
Speaker 4: would happen and said, we're not executing Pringle. It would

735
00:36:47,040 --> 00:36:51,120
Speaker 4: be political suicide. And then they instructed the President to

736
00:36:51,120 --> 00:36:55,360
Speaker 4: commute the sentence, and the President commuted sentence from debt

737
00:36:55,560 --> 00:36:59,440
Speaker 4: to forty years penal servitude without any possibility of parole

738
00:36:59,840 --> 00:37:02,080
Speaker 4: or mission, and I was put out into the general

739
00:37:02,120 --> 00:37:05,319
Speaker 4: prison population where I could talk to people and I

740
00:37:05,320 --> 00:37:06,359
Speaker 4: could exercise the yard.

741
00:37:07,640 --> 00:37:13,239
Speaker 1: So it's almost like a I mean, better than being executed,

742
00:37:13,280 --> 00:37:15,560
Speaker 1: I guess, but not by a whole lot, because essentially

743
00:37:15,560 --> 00:37:17,160
Speaker 1: it's a death sentence. You're forty one years old, you

744
00:37:17,200 --> 00:37:19,480
Speaker 1: got forty years in prison. You're going to die in prison, right,

745
00:37:19,560 --> 00:37:20,759
Speaker 1: that's right. But that's not what.

746
00:37:20,800 --> 00:37:24,200
Speaker 4: Happened, no, because at the time I knew I had

747
00:37:24,239 --> 00:37:26,960
Speaker 4: three options. You know, I could face the forty years,

748
00:37:27,320 --> 00:37:29,880
Speaker 4: which wasn't a possibility for me at the time. I

749
00:37:29,880 --> 00:37:33,520
Speaker 4: could kill myself, which at the time was a reasonable proposition,

750
00:37:34,640 --> 00:37:37,560
Speaker 4: not let them refuse, to allow them to keep me

751
00:37:37,560 --> 00:37:40,239
Speaker 4: for forty years. But then I realized if I did that,

752
00:37:40,520 --> 00:37:43,200
Speaker 4: they'd say I had done it out of given remorse.

753
00:37:43,440 --> 00:37:45,120
Speaker 4: So I couldn't allow that. So I determined I was

754
00:37:45,120 --> 00:37:46,960
Speaker 4: going to try and prove my innocence.

755
00:37:46,840 --> 00:37:50,560
Speaker 1: And ultimately you did, yeah, fifteen years later. So let's

756
00:37:50,600 --> 00:37:52,400
Speaker 1: walk through that because I want to get to the

757
00:37:52,960 --> 00:37:55,560
Speaker 1: next phase of your life, which is so extraordinary.

758
00:37:55,760 --> 00:37:57,560
Speaker 4: Well, I should also tell you that there was no

759
00:37:57,640 --> 00:37:58,960
Speaker 4: law library in the prison.

760
00:37:58,880 --> 00:38:00,600
Speaker 1: So how did you go about innocence.

761
00:38:00,719 --> 00:38:03,600
Speaker 4: I had a friend who worked in the university outside

762
00:38:03,719 --> 00:38:06,120
Speaker 4: and she had access to the law library in the university,

763
00:38:06,520 --> 00:38:09,040
Speaker 4: and I arranged with her to photocopy sections of law

764
00:38:09,040 --> 00:38:11,600
Speaker 4: books and find out which were the best criminal law

765
00:38:11,600 --> 00:38:15,000
Speaker 4: books and constitutional law books and photocopy sections of them.

766
00:38:15,520 --> 00:38:16,800
Speaker 1: You had plenty of time to study.

767
00:38:16,880 --> 00:38:19,200
Speaker 4: Well, then I couldn't study. You see, I left school

768
00:38:19,200 --> 00:38:21,439
Speaker 4: when I was thirteen years of age, and I'd worked

769
00:38:21,440 --> 00:38:24,840
Speaker 4: all my life and had no formal education, and my

770
00:38:24,960 --> 00:38:29,160
Speaker 4: anger was such that I just couldn't read the documents understandable.

771
00:38:29,440 --> 00:38:31,400
Speaker 4: So I determined I had to try and learn how

772
00:38:31,440 --> 00:38:33,520
Speaker 4: to relax. So I got a friend to leave me

773
00:38:33,560 --> 00:38:36,680
Speaker 4: in a little book on yoga with illustrations of the postures,

774
00:38:36,719 --> 00:38:38,799
Speaker 4: and I began to teach myself yoga in the cell

775
00:38:38,880 --> 00:38:42,920
Speaker 4: on my own, and teach myself meditation. And as I

776
00:38:43,040 --> 00:38:46,120
Speaker 4: mastered does two disciplines, my anger got less than I

777
00:38:46,160 --> 00:38:48,520
Speaker 4: was able to study. And I spent my time studying.

778
00:38:48,960 --> 00:38:51,040
Speaker 4: And then what happened was other guys in the prison

779
00:38:51,040 --> 00:38:53,000
Speaker 4: would come to me with their documents, with their cases

780
00:38:53,040 --> 00:38:55,480
Speaker 4: and asked me would I look at their cases? And

781
00:38:56,239 --> 00:38:58,000
Speaker 4: I said, yeah, sure, and I would because it was

782
00:38:58,040 --> 00:39:01,200
Speaker 4: helping them, was also helping me, and so that's what

783
00:39:01,280 --> 00:39:03,680
Speaker 4: I did most of my time in the jail. In

784
00:39:03,719 --> 00:39:08,279
Speaker 4: the prison, I studied law as best I could, and eventually,

785
00:39:08,320 --> 00:39:10,560
Speaker 4: in January of nineteen ninety two, I opened my own

786
00:39:10,600 --> 00:39:12,719
Speaker 4: case on my own behalf in the High Court in

787
00:39:12,800 --> 00:39:14,960
Speaker 4: Dublin under the Irish Constitution. Now I had no money,

788
00:39:15,000 --> 00:39:17,760
Speaker 4: i'd know lawyers, so I had to prepare the case myself,

789
00:39:17,840 --> 00:39:22,520
Speaker 4: filet myself and conduct the case myself, so which meant

790
00:39:22,520 --> 00:39:24,320
Speaker 4: that they had to take me on their armed escort

791
00:39:24,360 --> 00:39:28,080
Speaker 4: of military and police up to the court where I

792
00:39:28,120 --> 00:39:32,200
Speaker 4: represented myself against the top lawyers of the state and

793
00:39:32,239 --> 00:39:36,200
Speaker 4: the case ran from January nineteen ninety two until May

794
00:39:36,280 --> 00:39:40,960
Speaker 4: of nineteen ninety five, where my conviction was overturned. But

795
00:39:41,200 --> 00:39:43,319
Speaker 4: in July of nineteen ninety two I won an order

796
00:39:43,360 --> 00:39:47,160
Speaker 4: for discovery in the High Court. And that's another I'll

797
00:39:47,160 --> 00:39:50,600
Speaker 4: tell you. There's reams to this story that it's kind

798
00:39:50,600 --> 00:39:54,120
Speaker 4: of important to say this one to you. One of

799
00:39:54,160 --> 00:39:57,080
Speaker 4: the cars used in the crime had been stolen in

800
00:39:57,120 --> 00:40:01,720
Speaker 4: Galway on the second of July. The crime happened the seventh.

801
00:40:01,719 --> 00:40:05,080
Speaker 4: It was stolen on the second of July between eleven

802
00:40:05,680 --> 00:40:09,120
Speaker 4: PM and eleven forty five pm from the car park

803
00:40:09,160 --> 00:40:13,160
Speaker 4: of a hotel. Right, and the evidence of the stealing

804
00:40:13,160 --> 00:40:15,800
Speaker 4: of that car was allowed into the trial because the

805
00:40:16,000 --> 00:40:19,439
Speaker 4: court ruled that the stealing of the car formed part

806
00:40:19,520 --> 00:40:22,279
Speaker 4: of the res yestay of the offense, which meant that

807
00:40:22,320 --> 00:40:27,440
Speaker 4: the person who stole the car had done the killing. Right. Okay,

808
00:40:27,640 --> 00:40:30,279
Speaker 4: But on the date that the car was stolen. At

809
00:40:30,280 --> 00:40:32,359
Speaker 4: the time the car was stolen, I was delivering four

810
00:40:32,400 --> 00:40:36,160
Speaker 4: thousand concrete blocks on the art And Islands with fifty

811
00:40:36,400 --> 00:40:41,480
Speaker 4: or more witnesses there. Now, I delivered the concrete bucket.

812
00:40:41,520 --> 00:40:45,200
Speaker 4: But five years after I had been I was imprisoned.

813
00:40:45,840 --> 00:40:47,839
Speaker 4: I got a letter from my former boss, the guy

814
00:40:47,840 --> 00:40:49,759
Speaker 4: who owned a little company that owned the boat that

815
00:40:49,800 --> 00:40:53,359
Speaker 4: I was skippering, asking me if i'd been paid for

816
00:40:53,440 --> 00:40:56,279
Speaker 4: the delivery and for the blocks to the value of

817
00:40:56,320 --> 00:40:58,799
Speaker 4: six hundred pounds, which I didn't know about because that

818
00:40:58,960 --> 00:41:00,719
Speaker 4: wasn't my role. My role was simply to be the

819
00:41:00,719 --> 00:41:03,080
Speaker 4: skipper to take the cargo out. I didn't even know

820
00:41:03,120 --> 00:41:05,719
Speaker 4: what a cost. I wrote back and told him that,

821
00:41:05,760 --> 00:41:08,120
Speaker 4: and he said, no, we believe you, we understand that.

822
00:41:08,160 --> 00:41:11,239
Speaker 4: But he said, the man that you delivered to has

823
00:41:11,280 --> 00:41:14,399
Speaker 4: refused to pay his bill, and five years later, when

824
00:41:14,400 --> 00:41:17,000
Speaker 4: they threatened court action to get the money, he told

825
00:41:17,080 --> 00:41:19,520
Speaker 4: them that he had paid me the money because I'm

826
00:41:19,520 --> 00:41:22,560
Speaker 4: in prison. You see, I'm in prison doing forty years

827
00:41:22,560 --> 00:41:25,560
Speaker 4: for murder capital word than a robbery. So he was

828
00:41:25,560 --> 00:41:28,320
Speaker 4: going to blame me. So I wrote him out of

829
00:41:28,360 --> 00:41:30,600
Speaker 4: the letter saying that of course I'd never done it.

830
00:41:30,640 --> 00:41:32,480
Speaker 4: And when the case came for court, the man never

831
00:41:32,520 --> 00:41:35,239
Speaker 4: appeared in court, and the court ruled against him and

832
00:41:35,360 --> 00:41:38,880
Speaker 4: accept my account, and the matter was finished. But I

833
00:41:38,960 --> 00:41:40,959
Speaker 4: went into the book of evidence, and I saw that

834
00:41:41,000 --> 00:41:43,520
Speaker 4: my boss supposedly had made a statement in the book

835
00:41:43,560 --> 00:41:45,600
Speaker 4: of evidence saying I sailed at eleven o'clock in the

836
00:41:45,600 --> 00:41:49,000
Speaker 4: morning and come back at eleven o'clock that night, which

837
00:41:49,000 --> 00:41:52,760
Speaker 4: would have meant I had the possibility of stealing the car. Okay,

838
00:41:53,360 --> 00:41:55,560
Speaker 4: whereas I sailed at four o'clock in the afternoon and

839
00:41:55,600 --> 00:41:57,160
Speaker 4: didn't get back to go with un till two am

840
00:41:57,200 --> 00:42:00,640
Speaker 4: the following morning. Now I knew he had to, and

841
00:42:00,680 --> 00:42:02,359
Speaker 4: I knew as a charge of the accountant he kept

842
00:42:02,360 --> 00:42:03,759
Speaker 4: all records. So I wrote to him and I said,

843
00:42:03,760 --> 00:42:05,600
Speaker 4: if you a record of the sailing on that day,

844
00:42:06,520 --> 00:42:08,560
Speaker 4: and he said he had you sail at four o'clock

845
00:42:08,600 --> 00:42:10,360
Speaker 4: in the afternoon and you got back at two am

846
00:42:10,400 --> 00:42:12,799
Speaker 4: in the morning. So I wrote to him again, I said, well,

847
00:42:12,800 --> 00:42:14,640
Speaker 4: then tell me this, why did you make this statement,

848
00:42:15,320 --> 00:42:16,200
Speaker 4: this false statement?

849
00:42:16,360 --> 00:42:16,839
Speaker 1: What do you say?

850
00:42:17,560 --> 00:42:18,600
Speaker 4: I never made a statement.

851
00:42:19,640 --> 00:42:20,640
Speaker 1: Oh, they made it up.

852
00:42:20,800 --> 00:42:21,400
Speaker 4: They made it up.

853
00:42:21,440 --> 00:42:23,600
Speaker 2: He never made a stake back your conviction.

854
00:42:23,480 --> 00:42:25,799
Speaker 4: To try and keet me convicted. He never made a

855
00:42:25,840 --> 00:42:28,440
Speaker 4: statement and he was never even asked to make a statement.

856
00:42:28,719 --> 00:42:29,160
Speaker 1: Wow.

857
00:42:29,400 --> 00:42:32,760
Speaker 4: And so later when I got a lot more discovery,

858
00:42:32,760 --> 00:42:36,279
Speaker 4: I discovered there were actually twenty three prosecution witnesses in

859
00:42:36,320 --> 00:42:38,759
Speaker 4: the case had never made any statements, although there were

860
00:42:38,760 --> 00:42:42,200
Speaker 4: statements in the book of evidence attributed to them, and

861
00:42:42,239 --> 00:42:44,080
Speaker 4: had he He told me that if he had been

862
00:42:44,080 --> 00:42:45,760
Speaker 4: asked to make a statement, he would have told the truth.

863
00:42:46,640 --> 00:42:48,680
Speaker 4: And had he been asked and made a statement and

864
00:42:48,680 --> 00:42:51,960
Speaker 4: told the truth, I couldn't have been convicted. So I

865
00:42:51,960 --> 00:42:53,799
Speaker 4: asked him, would he make an affidavits? Would he swear

866
00:42:53,800 --> 00:42:56,160
Speaker 4: an affidavit? At that and I drafted and Affidavid sent

867
00:42:56,160 --> 00:42:58,240
Speaker 4: it out to him. He got it notorized and swore

868
00:42:58,320 --> 00:42:59,759
Speaker 4: and sent it back in to me. So when I

869
00:43:00,000 --> 00:43:01,919
Speaker 4: heard in the court and the High Court and looked

870
00:43:01,960 --> 00:43:04,239
Speaker 4: for an order for discovery, and the lawyers for the

871
00:43:04,239 --> 00:43:06,560
Speaker 4: state were saying, ah, he's only fishing. He hasn't got anything.

872
00:43:06,719 --> 00:43:09,960
Speaker 4: I said, yes, I have, and I produced two copies

873
00:43:10,040 --> 00:43:11,719
Speaker 4: of this affidat, and I said, I have here the

874
00:43:11,760 --> 00:43:15,319
Speaker 4: sworn affidavit of a prosecution witness stating clearly that he

875
00:43:15,520 --> 00:43:17,400
Speaker 4: not only did he not make a statement of tribute

876
00:43:17,560 --> 00:43:19,160
Speaker 4: to him, but he was never even asked to make

877
00:43:19,200 --> 00:43:20,640
Speaker 4: a statement. And I offered it to the court and

878
00:43:20,680 --> 00:43:23,920
Speaker 4: the judge woudn't accept it. And I offered it the

879
00:43:23,960 --> 00:43:27,080
Speaker 4: state lawyers and they wouldn't accept it, because of course,

880
00:43:27,080 --> 00:43:28,919
Speaker 4: if they'd accepted it, they would have had to deal

881
00:43:28,960 --> 00:43:29,279
Speaker 4: with it.

882
00:43:29,800 --> 00:43:31,319
Speaker 1: But wouldn't the judge want to deal with it?

883
00:43:31,360 --> 00:43:33,799
Speaker 4: You would think, no, no, no, don't forget. He wasn't

884
00:43:33,840 --> 00:43:35,920
Speaker 4: being I mean, he was looking at me as if

885
00:43:35,960 --> 00:43:36,839
Speaker 4: I was a piece of dirt.

886
00:43:47,680 --> 00:43:48,520
Speaker 1: So what happened there?

887
00:43:49,520 --> 00:43:52,080
Speaker 4: So I won my order for discovery? And then when

888
00:43:52,080 --> 00:43:54,319
Speaker 4: I got my order for discovery, didn't I get a

889
00:43:54,320 --> 00:43:57,360
Speaker 4: photocopy of the notebook of the detective who had claimed

890
00:43:57,400 --> 00:44:01,319
Speaker 4: I'd spoken those words in a particular period interrogation, and

891
00:44:01,360 --> 00:44:03,080
Speaker 4: he has warned us on notes and that he had

892
00:44:03,120 --> 00:44:06,160
Speaker 4: recorded the interrogation and recorded these words. And when I

893
00:44:06,200 --> 00:44:08,200
Speaker 4: got his notebook, I saw in the notebook it's very

894
00:44:08,200 --> 00:44:12,000
Speaker 4: clear he wrote the words in before the period of

895
00:44:12,000 --> 00:44:13,880
Speaker 4: interrogation in which he claimed us said.

896
00:44:15,640 --> 00:44:16,440
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's tricky.

897
00:44:17,320 --> 00:44:20,040
Speaker 4: Well there's nothing against me, and they decided this was

898
00:44:20,280 --> 00:44:20,880
Speaker 4: what I'm going to do.

899
00:44:21,200 --> 00:44:25,600
Speaker 1: I mean, it's a very organized and very insidious, absolutely

900
00:44:25,680 --> 00:44:29,960
Speaker 1: very coordinated. I mean the lengths that they went to

901
00:44:29,320 --> 00:44:33,759
Speaker 1: to get the conviction, to protect the conviction, to basically

902
00:44:33,920 --> 00:44:37,799
Speaker 1: run rough shot over the truth, or extraordinary to still

903
00:44:37,800 --> 00:44:38,040
Speaker 1: at it.

904
00:44:38,000 --> 00:44:39,520
Speaker 4: By the way, which I'll tell you about as we

905
00:44:39,560 --> 00:44:44,280
Speaker 4: get on through this. But in January of nineteen ninety four,

906
00:44:44,520 --> 00:44:46,759
Speaker 4: a human rights lawyer offered me his help. When I

907
00:44:46,800 --> 00:44:48,520
Speaker 4: took it, we got a legal team, we went to

908
00:44:48,560 --> 00:44:51,040
Speaker 4: the Court of Criminal Appeal on the new legislation, and

909
00:44:51,080 --> 00:44:53,759
Speaker 4: the case ran from nineteen ninety four to ninety ninety five.

910
00:44:54,640 --> 00:44:57,759
Speaker 4: And the police officer who had lied to get me

911
00:44:57,800 --> 00:45:01,600
Speaker 4: convicted was now a retired detective superintendent. He had been

912
00:45:01,640 --> 00:45:04,160
Speaker 4: promoted up to the top. By the way, the cops

913
00:45:04,239 --> 00:45:07,840
Speaker 4: who lied in the trial were all promoted, and the

914
00:45:07,880 --> 00:45:10,319
Speaker 4: cop who saved my life and who refused to lie

915
00:45:10,360 --> 00:45:12,280
Speaker 4: in the trial was never promoted.

916
00:45:13,200 --> 00:45:15,040
Speaker 1: Well, I am I not surprised. I mean, this is

917
00:45:15,120 --> 00:45:19,920
Speaker 1: such a web of deceased absolutely lies and bad actors

918
00:45:19,960 --> 00:45:24,200
Speaker 1: and everything else. So your convictions thrown out, your freed right.

919
00:45:24,760 --> 00:45:26,880
Speaker 1: And then you told me a great story about your

920
00:45:26,920 --> 00:45:30,000
Speaker 1: first day on the outside or your first what was

921
00:45:30,040 --> 00:45:32,680
Speaker 1: the first thing you did when you got out?

922
00:45:34,760 --> 00:45:37,600
Speaker 4: Well, when I was released out of the special court,

923
00:45:37,640 --> 00:45:41,960
Speaker 4: out on the street, I was met with a plethora

924
00:45:42,040 --> 00:45:45,439
Speaker 4: of media people with microphones and cameras and ads took

925
00:45:45,520 --> 00:45:49,719
Speaker 4: my face, strong questions at me, and I didn't have

926
00:45:49,800 --> 00:45:53,799
Speaker 4: time to sort of realize that I was free, if

927
00:45:53,840 --> 00:45:55,200
Speaker 4: you know what I mean. I didn't have time to

928
00:45:55,400 --> 00:45:58,680
Speaker 4: let it sink in. And then I was taken by

929
00:45:58,719 --> 00:46:01,560
Speaker 4: my lawyer to the TV station, the national TV station

930
00:46:01,600 --> 00:46:04,320
Speaker 4: where I was. We were interviewed for the news that evening,

931
00:46:04,680 --> 00:46:08,160
Speaker 4: and then my friends organized a party. A bunch of

932
00:46:08,200 --> 00:46:10,680
Speaker 4: people had set up a defense committee for me outside

933
00:46:11,040 --> 00:46:12,920
Speaker 4: and they took a floor of a pub and organized

934
00:46:12,920 --> 00:46:14,600
Speaker 4: a big party. And there was a huge, big party

935
00:46:14,640 --> 00:46:17,200
Speaker 4: going on, and we went to that and that went

936
00:46:17,239 --> 00:46:21,239
Speaker 4: on all that evening and everybody got drunk except me.

937
00:46:21,440 --> 00:46:25,080
Speaker 4: I wasn't drinking, and I stayed with two friends that

938
00:46:25,200 --> 00:46:28,640
Speaker 4: night in their house, and the following morning, when I

939
00:46:28,640 --> 00:46:31,600
Speaker 4: got up, I was the first one up. I went

940
00:46:31,640 --> 00:46:35,000
Speaker 4: down to the kitchen and I went out to the

941
00:46:35,040 --> 00:46:39,280
Speaker 4: back garden, which was a lovely long back garden, and

942
00:46:39,560 --> 00:46:42,200
Speaker 4: the sunwishine was a beautiful day. There were no big

943
00:46:42,239 --> 00:46:45,680
Speaker 4: walls around me. There was flowers and trees and bushes.

944
00:46:45,719 --> 00:46:48,160
Speaker 4: And I walked down the garden and at the bottom

945
00:46:48,160 --> 00:46:50,880
Speaker 4: of the garden there was a big old apple tree,

946
00:46:51,320 --> 00:46:54,320
Speaker 4: really big old gnarled. The other way they'd become gnarled

947
00:46:54,520 --> 00:46:58,399
Speaker 4: apple tree. And I could hear in the distance the sound,

948
00:46:58,440 --> 00:47:01,759
Speaker 4: the background noises of the city. But I went to

949
00:47:01,800 --> 00:47:04,280
Speaker 4: this tree, and I stood with the tree, and I

950
00:47:04,320 --> 00:47:06,640
Speaker 4: realized that and all the time I'd been in jail,

951
00:47:06,680 --> 00:47:08,600
Speaker 4: and all the time the trouble I had gone through,

952
00:47:09,040 --> 00:47:12,000
Speaker 4: this tree was growing in this garden on its own,

953
00:47:13,120 --> 00:47:16,200
Speaker 4: with nature, producing its fruit and shedding its leaves every

954
00:47:16,560 --> 00:47:21,320
Speaker 4: year in year out, doing its own thing, and immune

955
00:47:21,480 --> 00:47:27,200
Speaker 4: from the corruption, the greed, the rat race, the injustices

956
00:47:27,200 --> 00:47:31,279
Speaker 4: and everything else. And I put my arms around the

957
00:47:31,280 --> 00:47:35,040
Speaker 4: trunk of the tree, and I wept and I released

958
00:47:37,320 --> 00:47:40,600
Speaker 4: And that's when I knew for certain I was free.

959
00:47:41,200 --> 00:47:43,320
Speaker 4: That was in May nineteen ninety five.

960
00:47:43,320 --> 00:47:47,320
Speaker 1: So that's twenty one years ago. And then another extraordinary

961
00:47:47,400 --> 00:47:49,879
Speaker 1: thing happened in your life, right, which is something I'm

962
00:47:50,080 --> 00:47:53,840
Speaker 1: very well aware of. Well something or someone say.

963
00:47:54,360 --> 00:47:56,880
Speaker 4: Yeah, well, three years after I got out. And it

964
00:47:57,000 --> 00:47:59,759
Speaker 4: was difficult times for a while after I got out,

965
00:47:59,760 --> 00:48:02,160
Speaker 4: because it's very difficult to fit into society again when

966
00:48:02,160 --> 00:48:05,200
Speaker 4: you're locked up. But I had yoga meditation and I

967
00:48:05,320 --> 00:48:07,759
Speaker 4: used that and a little bit of prayer. And three

968
00:48:07,840 --> 00:48:10,960
Speaker 4: years after, one day I got a phone call from

969
00:48:11,040 --> 00:48:13,920
Speaker 4: an American lady who told me her name was Sunny Jacobs,

970
00:48:14,719 --> 00:48:16,920
Speaker 4: and she told me she was speaking at a meeting

971
00:48:17,000 --> 00:48:19,840
Speaker 4: three days later where I was, and invited me to

972
00:48:19,840 --> 00:48:21,200
Speaker 4: come in here talk. And I said, what are you

973
00:48:21,200 --> 00:48:22,960
Speaker 4: going to talk about? And she said the death penalty.

974
00:48:23,040 --> 00:48:25,000
Speaker 4: I said, yes, I'm interested in that. I'll come along,

975
00:48:25,680 --> 00:48:27,960
Speaker 4: and I brought two friends and I went along and

976
00:48:28,200 --> 00:48:30,560
Speaker 4: it was a room above a public course. At one

977
00:48:30,600 --> 00:48:32,719
Speaker 4: o'clock on a Friday, I went up to the room.

978
00:48:32,760 --> 00:48:35,520
Speaker 4: There was nobody there, and after a few minutes the

979
00:48:35,560 --> 00:48:37,560
Speaker 4: door opened to the fire side of the room, and

980
00:48:37,640 --> 00:48:40,719
Speaker 4: this little woman walked in and I walked over to

981
00:48:40,719 --> 00:48:44,439
Speaker 4: her and I said, you must be Sunny Jacobs, and

982
00:48:44,520 --> 00:48:47,600
Speaker 4: she looked up at me with a big smile, and

983
00:48:47,640 --> 00:48:51,280
Speaker 4: that's how we met. And I listened to her story

984
00:48:51,480 --> 00:48:54,960
Speaker 4: and I was hugely emotionally upset by listening to it,

985
00:48:55,560 --> 00:48:57,359
Speaker 4: and I knew I had to talk with her. And

986
00:48:57,440 --> 00:48:59,200
Speaker 4: I said to her, I need to talk with you,

987
00:48:59,239 --> 00:49:00,560
Speaker 4: and she said, got to be good. I needed to

988
00:49:00,640 --> 00:49:04,000
Speaker 4: talk with you too. But she said, I'm leaving in

989
00:49:04,040 --> 00:49:07,839
Speaker 4: an hour. This was on a Friday. I said, where

990
00:49:07,840 --> 00:49:09,799
Speaker 4: are you going? She says, I have to go to

991
00:49:09,880 --> 00:49:12,080
Speaker 4: Cork for the annual General Meeting of Amnesty into an

992
00:49:12,160 --> 00:49:14,640
Speaker 4: Irish section of Amnist International. I should be there at

993
00:49:14,640 --> 00:49:17,480
Speaker 4: eight o'clock tomorrow evening. I said, stay over with me,

994
00:49:17,600 --> 00:49:19,359
Speaker 4: I said, and I guarantee I'll get you down there.

995
00:49:20,440 --> 00:49:22,800
Speaker 2: And so she went how far away was Cork for

996
00:49:23,560 --> 00:49:24,040
Speaker 2: our drive?

997
00:49:25,000 --> 00:49:28,719
Speaker 4: And she went to Mary Lawler, who was the General

998
00:49:28,800 --> 00:49:32,240
Speaker 4: Secretary of Amnesty at the time, and asked Mary, because

999
00:49:32,239 --> 00:49:34,480
Speaker 4: of course she was unsure about whether she should go

1000
00:49:34,560 --> 00:49:38,640
Speaker 4: with a stranger in the strange country. And Mary knew

1001
00:49:38,680 --> 00:49:40,880
Speaker 4: me and knew my story, and she said, oh, that's wonderful.

1002
00:49:40,880 --> 00:49:43,520
Speaker 4: Thank you. Peter yeah, yeah, great. So we transferred Sunday's

1003
00:49:44,040 --> 00:49:47,000
Speaker 4: case from her car into my audio loppy and she

1004
00:49:47,040 --> 00:49:48,960
Speaker 4: stayed in my house that night. In the following morning,

1005
00:49:49,200 --> 00:49:51,200
Speaker 4: we went to my friend on a cafe and go away.

1006
00:49:51,200 --> 00:49:53,200
Speaker 4: We went to his place for breakfast. He asked us

1007
00:49:53,200 --> 00:49:56,759
Speaker 4: to come for breakfast and he said to me, are

1008
00:49:56,800 --> 00:49:58,759
Speaker 4: you driving her down the Cork? And I said yeah.

1009
00:49:58,800 --> 00:50:00,600
Speaker 4: He said, you can't go drive sbody to Cork and

1010
00:50:00,600 --> 00:50:01,960
Speaker 4: dot your lopy. He said here, and he reached his

1011
00:50:01,960 --> 00:50:03,239
Speaker 4: hand in his pocket and he gave me the keys

1012
00:50:03,280 --> 00:50:06,360
Speaker 4: of his Mercedes. He said, just get it back to

1013
00:50:06,360 --> 00:50:09,800
Speaker 4: me tomorrow morning. So I drove Sunny down the Cork

1014
00:50:10,200 --> 00:50:13,040
Speaker 4: in the Mercedes. We traveled in style. And as we

1015
00:50:13,040 --> 00:50:17,520
Speaker 4: were on the car fairly crossing the river, Shannon eating

1016
00:50:17,600 --> 00:50:20,080
Speaker 4: a pack lunch which he'd made up for us, she

1017
00:50:20,239 --> 00:50:22,200
Speaker 4: said to me, what's your interest in all of this?

1018
00:50:23,040 --> 00:50:24,840
Speaker 4: And I told her that I too had been wrongly

1019
00:50:24,840 --> 00:50:27,359
Speaker 4: convicted and sentenced to death, and she said, you seem

1020
00:50:27,360 --> 00:50:29,879
Speaker 4: to got through very well. She said, then, how did

1021
00:50:29,920 --> 00:50:32,719
Speaker 4: you get through so easy so well? And I said,

1022
00:50:33,000 --> 00:50:33,920
Speaker 4: yoga and meditation.

1023
00:50:34,200 --> 00:50:35,480
Speaker 1: First of all. By the way, this is a hell

1024
00:50:35,520 --> 00:50:36,880
Speaker 1: of a first date. I got to give it up

1025
00:50:36,920 --> 00:50:38,160
Speaker 1: to you for a guy who had been in prison

1026
00:50:38,200 --> 00:50:41,520
Speaker 1: for fifteen years, you got game, okay, And so so

1027
00:50:41,640 --> 00:50:44,319
Speaker 1: that yeah, it's extraordinary, as I keep using that word

1028
00:50:44,320 --> 00:50:46,000
Speaker 1: because I don't know what else other words. You use

1029
00:50:46,600 --> 00:50:49,440
Speaker 1: the fact that Sonny, of course, had also been sentenced

1030
00:50:49,480 --> 00:50:53,560
Speaker 1: that for a similar crime that happened a continent away,

1031
00:50:54,360 --> 00:50:58,040
Speaker 1: five six thousand miles from where you were charged and convicted.

1032
00:50:58,120 --> 00:51:01,440
Speaker 1: She was charged and convicted. Both of you were actually

1033
00:51:01,600 --> 00:51:05,600
Speaker 1: and absolutely innocent, and you served similar amounts of time

1034
00:51:05,640 --> 00:51:08,319
Speaker 1: in prison. She actually a little bit longer than you,

1035
00:51:09,080 --> 00:51:11,920
Speaker 1: and both of you had more in common than that, right,

1036
00:51:12,200 --> 00:51:15,640
Speaker 1: both were committed to a lifestyle of meditation and yoga.

1037
00:51:15,880 --> 00:51:20,040
Speaker 1: You're vegetarians, right, So it's sort of the universe organizing

1038
00:51:20,080 --> 00:51:21,439
Speaker 1: itself in a way, that is.

1039
00:51:21,719 --> 00:51:23,839
Speaker 4: It was inevitable that we should come together, if you.

1040
00:51:23,760 --> 00:51:27,000
Speaker 1: Think about serendipity as synchronisy and everyone cause metaphysics. So

1041
00:51:27,040 --> 00:51:28,719
Speaker 1: then you drive her there.

1042
00:51:28,680 --> 00:51:30,600
Speaker 4: We drive her there and to Cork.

1043
00:51:30,840 --> 00:51:31,320
Speaker 1: To Cork.

1044
00:51:31,480 --> 00:51:34,200
Speaker 4: Now, Amnesty had got us two rooms in a hotel

1045
00:51:34,239 --> 00:51:36,920
Speaker 4: across from the hotel where the convention was, and each

1046
00:51:36,960 --> 00:51:40,520
Speaker 4: of us lay on a bed separately, and for three

1047
00:51:40,560 --> 00:51:44,400
Speaker 4: and a half hours. We discussed forgiveness. Well that was

1048
00:51:44,440 --> 00:51:48,799
Speaker 4: the key forgiveness. And then I brought her back to

1049
00:51:48,840 --> 00:51:51,080
Speaker 4: her room and she said to me, would I call

1050
00:51:51,120 --> 00:51:52,840
Speaker 4: her when as I leave at six in the morning,

1051
00:51:52,840 --> 00:51:54,439
Speaker 4: Would I call her in the morning. I said yes,

1052
00:51:54,920 --> 00:51:56,360
Speaker 4: So on the morning I knocked on her door and

1053
00:51:56,400 --> 00:51:58,200
Speaker 4: she got up and we said goodbye to each other

1054
00:51:58,320 --> 00:52:01,760
Speaker 4: and we'd keep in touch. I had got my friend's

1055
00:52:01,760 --> 00:52:04,560
Speaker 4: car and drop back to go away.

1056
00:52:04,320 --> 00:52:07,200
Speaker 1: Did you guys kiss or was there any physical interaction?

1057
00:52:07,560 --> 00:52:08,240
Speaker 1: Hold hands?

1058
00:52:09,200 --> 00:52:09,640
Speaker 4: Exactly?

1059
00:52:09,680 --> 00:52:11,640
Speaker 6: What happened was.

1060
00:52:10,960 --> 00:52:11,960
Speaker 1: A perfect gentleman.

1061
00:52:13,880 --> 00:52:16,160
Speaker 6: He said to me, I don't want you to think

1062
00:52:16,239 --> 00:52:19,799
Speaker 6: I'm not attracted to you, but I'm in a kind

1063
00:52:19,840 --> 00:52:23,919
Speaker 6: of a relationship, and I like to try to leave

1064
00:52:23,960 --> 00:52:28,120
Speaker 6: an honorable life. And that's what clicked in my mind,

1065
00:52:28,160 --> 00:52:30,319
Speaker 6: because at that point in my life I had no

1066
00:52:30,560 --> 00:52:35,600
Speaker 6: time for bs, you know, and so that impressed me.

1067
00:52:36,160 --> 00:52:38,359
Speaker 1: How long have you been out of prison by this time?

1068
00:52:38,920 --> 00:52:40,880
Speaker 6: I was out three years?

1069
00:52:41,000 --> 00:52:44,080
Speaker 4: It's almost yeah, three years you were Oh he.

1070
00:52:44,000 --> 00:52:46,160
Speaker 1: Was out eight Right, so you've been sex and you've

1071
00:52:46,160 --> 00:52:47,600
Speaker 1: been out three Okay, fine, that's nothing.

1072
00:52:47,680 --> 00:52:49,400
Speaker 4: But we joke and say, you see that she's five

1073
00:52:49,480 --> 00:52:51,879
Speaker 4: years older than me, right, think I got it five

1074
00:52:51,960 --> 00:52:53,120
Speaker 4: years out before.

1075
00:52:52,840 --> 00:52:55,640
Speaker 1: Me and anyway, okay, so then it was what happened.

1076
00:52:55,640 --> 00:52:58,200
Speaker 6: And then we hadn't made any arrangement, but when he

1077
00:52:58,560 --> 00:53:01,120
Speaker 6: got home he called me, and that's I knew that

1078
00:53:01,239 --> 00:53:02,520
Speaker 6: it had clicked for him too.

1079
00:53:03,400 --> 00:53:08,280
Speaker 1: So then you ultimately were married, yea, which is onto

1080
00:53:08,320 --> 00:53:11,160
Speaker 1: my favorite part of the story actually, But what.

1081
00:53:11,080 --> 00:53:15,200
Speaker 4: We'd actually did was about ten years ago. We decided

1082
00:53:15,239 --> 00:53:18,040
Speaker 4: that we were going to exchange vows to each other,

1083
00:53:18,840 --> 00:53:21,839
Speaker 4: and we bought two clad of rings and on the

1084
00:53:21,920 --> 00:53:23,919
Speaker 4: winter salts it's the shortest day of the year, because

1085
00:53:23,920 --> 00:53:25,560
Speaker 4: Sonny said we should do it on the shortest day

1086
00:53:25,560 --> 00:53:27,480
Speaker 4: of the year because we don't have a long engagement.

1087
00:53:28,160 --> 00:53:30,279
Speaker 4: We gave rings to each other in the morning, and

1088
00:53:30,320 --> 00:53:32,719
Speaker 4: we were engaged in the evening, and we went down

1089
00:53:32,719 --> 00:53:37,000
Speaker 4: to the seashore with our dogs and we exchanged vows

1090
00:53:37,040 --> 00:53:39,399
Speaker 4: on the seashore in the evening time, and the sun

1091
00:53:39,480 --> 00:53:41,160
Speaker 4: and the moon were both in the sky at the

1092
00:53:41,200 --> 00:53:44,319
Speaker 4: same time, which we thought was very auspicious. And then

1093
00:53:44,480 --> 00:53:47,399
Speaker 4: what happened. We were having some difficulty when we'd leave

1094
00:53:47,440 --> 00:53:50,200
Speaker 4: the country coming back because we were given to Sonny

1095
00:53:50,280 --> 00:53:52,360
Speaker 4: hassle about whether she could come back into the country

1096
00:53:52,440 --> 00:53:54,440
Speaker 4: or not. And this was because she was with me,

1097
00:53:54,600 --> 00:53:57,080
Speaker 4: you see. So we decided we were going to get married.

1098
00:53:57,280 --> 00:54:01,120
Speaker 4: But getting married in Ireland is much more aureocratically difficult

1099
00:54:01,160 --> 00:54:04,080
Speaker 4: than it is in America. And we found out that

1100
00:54:04,160 --> 00:54:06,160
Speaker 4: you could apply in New York and get a license

1101
00:54:06,400 --> 00:54:10,640
Speaker 4: and get married the next day. But we had no

1102
00:54:10,680 --> 00:54:14,920
Speaker 4: money to come to New York. So now at that stage,

1103
00:54:15,040 --> 00:54:19,000
Speaker 4: by the way, we were existing on my state pension,

1104
00:54:19,040 --> 00:54:23,040
Speaker 4: which is like very small. So the theater that had

1105
00:54:23,080 --> 00:54:26,759
Speaker 4: put on The Exonerated the film called contacted us. They

1106
00:54:26,760 --> 00:54:29,600
Speaker 4: were doing a producers weekend and they wanted us to

1107
00:54:29,600 --> 00:54:31,760
Speaker 4: come and speak at two dinners that they were hosting.

1108
00:54:32,560 --> 00:54:34,400
Speaker 4: And suddenly said, oh, we wanted to go to New

1109
00:54:34,480 --> 00:54:35,719
Speaker 4: York to get married, and they said, you got to

1110
00:54:35,719 --> 00:54:37,839
Speaker 4: get married in New York. We'll host the wedding. So

1111
00:54:37,880 --> 00:54:40,319
Speaker 4: they hosted the wedding. They brought us to New York

1112
00:54:40,360 --> 00:54:43,240
Speaker 4: and they follow us open a hotel and they hosted

1113
00:54:43,280 --> 00:54:45,600
Speaker 4: the wedding. So there were about one hundred and twenty

1114
00:54:45,600 --> 00:54:47,319
Speaker 4: one hundred and thirty people at the wedding. We only

1115
00:54:47,400 --> 00:54:50,080
Speaker 4: knew six or seven of them, and none of our

1116
00:54:50,080 --> 00:54:54,000
Speaker 4: family were there. It was so funny it was hilarious. Brookshields,

1117
00:54:54,360 --> 00:54:58,240
Speaker 4: Amy Irving, Marlo Thomas, and Stockard Channing were at the wedding.

1118
00:54:58,280 --> 00:55:02,040
Speaker 4: They were four people actress who had played Sonny in.

1119
00:55:02,040 --> 00:55:06,080
Speaker 1: The play of the Exoneration extraordinary play. Yeah, and Sunny

1120
00:55:06,160 --> 00:55:08,520
Speaker 1: story is one of six that are profiled in this

1121
00:55:08,920 --> 00:55:13,600
Speaker 1: remarkable play in which so many incredible actresses have portrayed you.

1122
00:55:14,520 --> 00:55:15,960
Speaker 1: And so they showed up at the wedding. So you

1123
00:55:16,000 --> 00:55:18,560
Speaker 1: have this sort of celebrity wedding which adds a certain

1124
00:55:18,600 --> 00:55:20,600
Speaker 1: element of strangeness to the whole thing.

1125
00:55:20,800 --> 00:55:22,840
Speaker 4: The best part of it was that when Sonny was

1126
00:55:22,880 --> 00:55:25,680
Speaker 4: asked do you take this man to be your lawfully

1127
00:55:25,719 --> 00:55:31,400
Speaker 4: whether husband, the four actresses step forward and said, with Sonny, we.

1128
00:55:31,320 --> 00:55:36,560
Speaker 1: Do hilarious, that's amazing, Oh my god, funny. So you

1129
00:55:36,600 --> 00:55:39,120
Speaker 1: may actually be married to five women at this point.

1130
00:55:39,280 --> 00:55:42,160
Speaker 1: Hard to say, and I'm not judging you. I'm just

1131
00:55:42,200 --> 00:55:44,800
Speaker 1: saying you might want to have somebody look into it.

1132
00:55:45,400 --> 00:55:50,280
Speaker 1: So there's a wonderful announcement if you google Peter Pringle

1133
00:55:50,320 --> 00:55:53,680
Speaker 1: and Sonny Jacob's wedding. My belief I can't prove this

1134
00:55:53,760 --> 00:55:56,080
Speaker 1: is that you're the only two Death Row ex hogneries

1135
00:55:56,080 --> 00:56:00,759
Speaker 1: who have ever been married after exonerations, because there are

1136
00:56:00,840 --> 00:56:04,320
Speaker 1: very few women who've been sentenced to death and even

1137
00:56:04,520 --> 00:56:08,000
Speaker 1: many fewer who have been exonerated. So you really, you

1138
00:56:08,080 --> 00:56:10,880
Speaker 1: really hit the jackpot. And so I do want to

1139
00:56:10,880 --> 00:56:15,560
Speaker 1: put in a plug because now Sonny and Peter operate

1140
00:56:15,880 --> 00:56:21,680
Speaker 1: a phenomenal organization called the Sunny Sanctuary and it is

1141
00:56:22,000 --> 00:56:24,399
Speaker 1: sort of a haven or whatever you want to call

1142
00:56:24,440 --> 00:56:29,080
Speaker 1: it where they bring a newly exonerated people over to

1143
00:56:29,680 --> 00:56:33,560
Speaker 1: the coast of Ireland and help them reintegrate, right this

1144
00:56:33,640 --> 00:56:36,080
Speaker 1: is probably the best word, and get their get their

1145
00:56:36,120 --> 00:56:39,200
Speaker 1: lives back, and get their their spirits back, so to speak.

1146
00:56:39,280 --> 00:56:41,640
Speaker 4: Right, Yeah, it's kind of healing from the inside out.

1147
00:56:42,480 --> 00:56:46,040
Speaker 4: We helped them to release the anger and business that

1148
00:56:46,080 --> 00:56:48,040
Speaker 4: they carry over what was done to them.

1149
00:56:48,360 --> 00:56:51,080
Speaker 1: And paint the picture of the Sunny Sanctuary for people

1150
00:56:51,080 --> 00:56:53,120
Speaker 1: out there who can't really visualize.

1151
00:56:53,200 --> 00:56:58,319
Speaker 4: Okay, well we managed. We managed to rent a three

1152
00:56:58,360 --> 00:57:02,160
Speaker 4: bedroom house on four acres on the side of a

1153
00:57:02,239 --> 00:57:05,279
Speaker 4: hill overlooking a lake and there's there's hazel woods down

1154
00:57:05,320 --> 00:57:09,040
Speaker 4: to the lake and each bedroom is on sweet so

1155
00:57:09,080 --> 00:57:11,800
Speaker 4: they have every person that comes has their own bathroom

1156
00:57:11,840 --> 00:57:15,239
Speaker 4: and toilet and it's on the coast it's four miles

1157
00:57:15,239 --> 00:57:17,600
Speaker 4: from the sea, but it's it's only just a bit

1158
00:57:17,720 --> 00:57:20,800
Speaker 4: above the lake, and it's in a very it's at

1159
00:57:20,840 --> 00:57:23,120
Speaker 4: the end of the road. The nearest store is six

1160
00:57:23,200 --> 00:57:23,800
Speaker 4: miles away.

1161
00:57:24,160 --> 00:57:25,800
Speaker 1: There's more than a few animals there.

1162
00:57:26,080 --> 00:57:28,320
Speaker 4: Oh, yes, we have. Let us see now, we have

1163
00:57:28,440 --> 00:57:32,400
Speaker 4: three cats and four dogs, four hens and five.

1164
00:57:32,240 --> 00:57:35,560
Speaker 1: Goats, and aparture in a pear tree.

1165
00:57:35,480 --> 00:57:38,840
Speaker 4: Something like that. I jokingly call it the menagerie. Sometimes

1166
00:57:38,840 --> 00:57:41,920
Speaker 4: we milk the goats and Sunny processes the milk, and

1167
00:57:41,920 --> 00:57:45,840
Speaker 4: Sunny makes wonderful goats cheese, three different types of goat cheese.

1168
00:57:46,360 --> 00:57:49,160
Speaker 4: So we also have what they call a polytunnel, which

1169
00:57:49,200 --> 00:57:52,800
Speaker 4: is the equivalent of a greenhouse, where we grow around vegetables.

1170
00:57:53,080 --> 00:57:55,680
Speaker 4: So when people come to us, we feed them on

1171
00:57:55,840 --> 00:57:59,560
Speaker 4: an organic food and organic free range of eggs, and

1172
00:57:59,600 --> 00:58:04,040
Speaker 4: they have milk and cheese, homemade goat cheese, organic goat cheese.

1173
00:58:04,840 --> 00:58:07,080
Speaker 1: And do you teach them meditation yoga?

1174
00:58:07,240 --> 00:58:10,640
Speaker 4: Yes, yes, we share with them. We don't conduct therapies

1175
00:58:10,680 --> 00:58:14,560
Speaker 4: as such. But what happens is that when they come

1176
00:58:14,560 --> 00:58:17,920
Speaker 4: at first, they will tell us what has happened to them,

1177
00:58:18,280 --> 00:58:21,480
Speaker 4: They release the things they need to release, and then

1178
00:58:21,520 --> 00:58:23,800
Speaker 4: we can share with them how we dealt with the

1179
00:58:23,880 --> 00:58:27,800
Speaker 4: issues that are causing them problems and open the way

1180
00:58:27,840 --> 00:58:31,480
Speaker 4: for them to the realization that actually they're more than

1181
00:58:31,600 --> 00:58:35,600
Speaker 4: just an ex honery. They're not just a person who's

1182
00:58:35,600 --> 00:58:37,760
Speaker 4: been in prison. They're more than that. The fact that

1183
00:58:37,760 --> 00:58:39,680
Speaker 4: they were wrongfully in prison is just an episode in

1184
00:58:39,720 --> 00:58:43,080
Speaker 4: their life, and it's an episode they can put behind

1185
00:58:43,160 --> 00:58:45,960
Speaker 4: them now. It always travels with them, but they don't

1186
00:58:45,960 --> 00:58:48,000
Speaker 4: have to live in the past, and they have an

1187
00:58:48,000 --> 00:58:51,240
Speaker 4: opportunity of realizing them themselves as full human beings. And

1188
00:58:51,280 --> 00:58:53,840
Speaker 4: we bring them out and socialize with our friends, and

1189
00:58:53,880 --> 00:58:57,919
Speaker 4: we go to events and to the theater, and so

1190
00:58:57,960 --> 00:59:01,560
Speaker 4: they get a chance to mingle with people as ordinary people.

1191
00:59:01,680 --> 00:59:05,640
Speaker 1: It's so inspiring to me and to many of us

1192
00:59:05,720 --> 00:59:09,360
Speaker 1: who work in the innocence movement that a very large

1193
00:59:09,400 --> 00:59:14,760
Speaker 1: percentage of xuarees are driven to help others who have

1194
00:59:14,800 --> 00:59:20,240
Speaker 1: gone through a similar ordeal. And so it's I think

1195
00:59:20,280 --> 00:59:23,600
Speaker 1: the most powerful thing I've witnessed, and I was asked

1196
00:59:23,600 --> 00:59:28,000
Speaker 1: this question yesterday, is the coming together of xenaies and

1197
00:59:28,040 --> 00:59:32,720
Speaker 1: the sharing of the experiences and the healing that comes

1198
00:59:32,760 --> 00:59:37,400
Speaker 1: from that and from being with others who are the

1199
00:59:37,440 --> 00:59:41,920
Speaker 1: only people alive who can possibly begin to understand what

1200
00:59:41,960 --> 00:59:43,960
Speaker 1: you've been through. Even though every situation is unique and

1201
00:59:44,000 --> 00:59:47,680
Speaker 1: every story is unique, but still the experience is more

1202
00:59:47,840 --> 00:59:53,680
Speaker 1: similar than not. And it's so wonderfully inspiring to hear

1203
00:59:53,720 --> 00:59:56,880
Speaker 1: the stories, both of your stories and the fact that

1204
00:59:56,920 --> 01:00:02,120
Speaker 1: they're now one, and what you've done and how you've

1205
01:00:02,160 --> 01:00:07,000
Speaker 1: turned this unimaginable set of circumstances into such a force

1206
01:00:07,040 --> 01:00:10,840
Speaker 1: for positivity and change and good is something that I

1207
01:00:10,880 --> 01:00:14,880
Speaker 1: think everyone who's listening and so many others are going

1208
01:00:14,880 --> 01:00:18,760
Speaker 1: to be affected by, and it's inspiring me and so

1209
01:00:18,760 --> 01:00:21,720
Speaker 1: many others to want to do more and help more,

1210
01:00:22,160 --> 01:00:24,280
Speaker 1: or as many as we possibly can. I should say

1211
01:00:24,360 --> 01:00:26,840
Speaker 1: before we have to wrap this up, if any of

1212
01:00:26,840 --> 01:00:30,640
Speaker 1: you are listening now and haven't heard the Sunny Jacob's episode,

1213
01:00:30,920 --> 01:00:34,840
Speaker 1: I strongly encourage everyone to check out the Sunny Jacob's episode.

1214
01:00:35,040 --> 01:00:37,880
Speaker 1: But before we sign off, Peter, are there any last

1215
01:00:37,920 --> 01:00:40,080
Speaker 1: words that you'd like to share with the audience?

1216
01:00:40,440 --> 01:00:45,560
Speaker 4: Learn not to carry anger. Anger is a national natural phenomenon.

1217
01:00:45,600 --> 01:00:47,920
Speaker 4: We get angry, I get angry, everybody gets angry, but

1218
01:00:48,000 --> 01:00:52,800
Speaker 4: don't hold it. Don't hold it. Don't hate because hate

1219
01:00:52,880 --> 01:00:57,200
Speaker 4: consumes the hater and anger consumes the angry person that

1220
01:00:57,280 --> 01:01:01,520
Speaker 4: doesn't consume the person you're angry against, and it damage

1221
01:01:01,520 --> 01:01:04,240
Speaker 4: your held. Let it go and try and be into

1222
01:01:04,240 --> 01:01:08,440
Speaker 4: spirit of forgiveness, because that's where your real strength is.

1223
01:01:09,320 --> 01:01:11,440
Speaker 4: Our real strength is in the fact that we decided

1224
01:01:11,520 --> 01:01:16,120
Speaker 4: we would move towards healing and forgiveness and echo of

1225
01:01:16,160 --> 01:01:21,280
Speaker 4: all those negative emotions. And I wish everyone the best.

1226
01:01:28,040 --> 01:01:31,120
Speaker 1: Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. I'd like to

1227
01:01:31,160 --> 01:01:34,880
Speaker 1: thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Cliburn, and Kevin Wardis,

1228
01:01:35,000 --> 01:01:38,080
Speaker 1: with research by Lyla Robinson. The music in this production

1229
01:01:38,240 --> 01:01:41,600
Speaker 1: was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.

1230
01:01:41,720 --> 01:01:45,200
Speaker 1: Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction,

1231
01:01:45,480 --> 01:01:49,200
Speaker 1: on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast, and on Twitter at

1232
01:01:49,240 --> 01:01:52,360
Speaker 1: wrong Conviction, as well as at Lava for Good. On

1233
01:01:52,480 --> 01:01:55,439
Speaker 1: all three platforms. You can also follow me on both

1234
01:01:55,480 --> 01:01:59,640
Speaker 1: TikTok and Instagram at It's Jason plom Raeful Conviction is

1235
01:01:59,680 --> 01:02:02,280
Speaker 1: a product action of Lava for Good Podcasts and association

1236
01:02:02,360 --> 01:02:08,400
Speaker 1: with Signal Company Number one