WEBVTT - #175 Wrongful Conviction: False Confessions - Ray McCann 0:00:03.400 --> 0:00:06.360 Welcome to Wrongful Conviction, False Confessions. I'm Laura and I 0:00:06.400 --> 0:00:10.399 writer and I'm Steve Drissen. Today we'll tell you about 0:00:10.400 --> 0:00:14.240 a Michigan murder case with an unusual suspect, a small 0:00:14.240 --> 0:00:18.759 town police officer named Ray McCann. After Ray helped investigate 0:00:18.800 --> 0:00:22.160 the disappearance of a little girl, he was wrongfully accused 0:00:22.200 --> 0:00:24.959 of her murder, cops turned on one of their own 0:00:25.079 --> 0:00:27.720 in one of the worst cases of tunnel vision we've seen. 0:00:28.480 --> 0:00:31.840 In pursuit of their only suspect, police turn Ray's whole 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:46.920 life into an interrogation room. 0:00:47.280 --> 0:00:49.559 One of the things we've tried to do this season 0:00:49.880 --> 0:00:53.520 is to show that you don't need a full confession 0:00:53.800 --> 0:00:58.800 in order to bring charges against somebody. A false admission 0:00:58.880 --> 0:01:02.840 that implicates you in the crime, or a false statement 0:01:02.880 --> 0:01:06.920 of fact, a lie in this case could bring the 0:01:06.959 --> 0:01:11.160 weight of the system down against an innocent person. And 0:01:11.640 --> 0:01:16.920 all of that stems from what happens in the interrogation room. 0:01:17.160 --> 0:01:20.080 Police have so much power over what you say in 0:01:20.120 --> 0:01:22.600 the interrogation room and the way in which what you 0:01:22.680 --> 0:01:25.880 say can be used against you in court. It's that 0:01:26.120 --> 0:01:28.800 power and the misuse of that power that's what Ray 0:01:28.840 --> 0:01:29.720 McCann's case. 0:01:29.600 --> 0:01:33.240 Is all about We've seen tunnel vision in other cases, 0:01:33.280 --> 0:01:38.520 but I've never seen tunnel vision that was this extreme, 0:01:39.520 --> 0:01:46.120 this longstanding, and that included coercion both in and outside 0:01:46.480 --> 0:01:47.840 of the interrogation room. 0:01:47.960 --> 0:01:51.840 You have the police officers lying, right. The police officers 0:01:51.840 --> 0:01:54.400 don't get charged. It's Ray who gets charged. I mean, 0:01:54.400 --> 0:01:56.200 this is asymmetric warfare. 0:01:56.000 --> 0:01:59.160 Right, And it becomes even more asymmetrical when they charge 0:01:59.200 --> 0:02:03.360 him with perjury. Ray mccannn a reserve police officer who 0:02:03.520 --> 0:02:05.760 all he wanted to do was assist police. All he 0:02:05.840 --> 0:02:09.160 wanted to do was to be a police officer. They 0:02:09.240 --> 0:02:10.480 ran him over like a truck. 0:02:15.160 --> 0:02:18.960 Today's story starts in Constantine, Michigan, a small town of 0:02:19.000 --> 0:02:21.560 two thousand people in the southern corner of the state. 0:02:22.280 --> 0:02:25.880 Constantine is an old fashioned dairy farming community, the kind 0:02:25.880 --> 0:02:28.919 of place that looks like time stopped a half century ago. 0:02:29.400 --> 0:02:32.400 The town's historic main street is lined with shops that 0:02:32.440 --> 0:02:36.120 have been kept immaculate for decades. Annual events like the 0:02:36.120 --> 0:02:39.720 car show and barbecue cookoff are marked on everyone's calendar. 0:02:40.600 --> 0:02:42.640 But in the autumn of two thousand and seven, this 0:02:42.720 --> 0:02:45.119 Michigan town was hit by a crime that no one 0:02:45.160 --> 0:02:49.079 could have expected. It was November eighth, four forty five, 0:02:49.120 --> 0:02:53.040 in the afternoon, only an hour before sunset. Eleven year 0:02:53.040 --> 0:02:55.920 old Jody Perrick left her friend's house on her bike 0:02:56.360 --> 0:02:58.840 and headed for dinner at home a half mile away. 0:02:59.440 --> 0:03:02.280 But when Joe he didn't arrive on time, her mom 0:03:02.400 --> 0:03:06.360 called the police, and words spread fast. As the sun 0:03:06.400 --> 0:03:09.839 went down and temperatures plummeted too, it seemed like the 0:03:09.880 --> 0:03:14.440 whole town was out searching for Jody. Joining the search 0:03:14.560 --> 0:03:17.960 was Ray McCann, a forty year old family man born 0:03:18.000 --> 0:03:21.799 and raised in Constantine. Ray was a reserve police officer 0:03:21.880 --> 0:03:24.560 who hoped one day to join the Michigan State Police. 0:03:25.080 --> 0:03:27.639 He wasn't a full fledged cop, but he was allowed 0:03:27.680 --> 0:03:30.680 to carry a badge and do basic police work like 0:03:30.800 --> 0:03:34.360 making traffic stops and searching for missing people. In this 0:03:34.440 --> 0:03:38.520 particular missing person case, Ray's son was good friends with Jody, 0:03:38.920 --> 0:03:41.320 so Ray didn't have to be asked twice to help 0:03:41.360 --> 0:03:44.760 look for her. Along with many of his neighbors, Ray 0:03:44.880 --> 0:03:47.480 threw on a coat and went out to look for Jody. 0:03:47.920 --> 0:03:51.200 He searched high and low at the baseball field, at 0:03:51.200 --> 0:03:54.840 the Dollar General, even at a local riverside walking trail 0:03:55.000 --> 0:03:58.720 called the tumble Dam Path. Others searched elsewhere, but no 0:03:58.880 --> 0:04:02.720 luck for anyone, no Jody. Around ten thirty at night, 0:04:02.920 --> 0:04:05.200 Ray met up with Jody's mom to talk about where 0:04:05.240 --> 0:04:08.480 they should look next. That's when Ray McCann asked if 0:04:08.480 --> 0:04:12.360 anyone had searched the cemetery. No one had, so Jody's 0:04:12.360 --> 0:04:15.320 mom headed that way, followed by Ray in another car. 0:04:16.240 --> 0:04:20.039 The cemetery is where they found Jody. She'd been sexually 0:04:20.120 --> 0:04:23.880 assaulted and strangled to death. Her bike was lying next 0:04:23.880 --> 0:04:27.800 to her on the ground. Jody's mom bent down tried 0:04:27.839 --> 0:04:30.640 to embrace her daughter's body, but Ray knew this was 0:04:30.680 --> 0:04:34.640 a crime scene that shouldn't be disturbed. He gently guided 0:04:34.640 --> 0:04:37.320 her away from Jody's body and sat her down in 0:04:37.360 --> 0:04:41.200 her car. The police arrived quickly at the scene, but 0:04:41.279 --> 0:04:44.760 as they hunted for leeds, they locked almost immediately onto 0:04:44.839 --> 0:04:47.960 Ray McCann as a suspect because Ray had been the 0:04:48.000 --> 0:04:52.159 person who suggested searching the cemetery. Based on that coincidence, 0:04:52.279 --> 0:04:56.600 police questioned Ray that night. He adamantly denied involvement in 0:04:56.640 --> 0:05:00.880 this horrible crime. Somehow, though reserve off Sir Ray McCann 0:05:01.040 --> 0:05:05.440 became the sole suspect, the only person police focused on 0:05:05.839 --> 0:05:07.560 for the next five years. 0:05:08.240 --> 0:05:11.320 When someone discovers a body, they're going to be a 0:05:11.360 --> 0:05:14.640 person of interest in a police investigation because of their 0:05:14.760 --> 0:05:18.960 proximity to the crime. It's a basis for wanting to 0:05:19.080 --> 0:05:22.640 question somebody about what they were doing on the evening 0:05:22.680 --> 0:05:26.640 in question. But they focused on him as the sole 0:05:26.760 --> 0:05:31.839 and exclusive suspect, and they did so because they grew desperate. 0:05:32.520 --> 0:05:37.400 This is a crime that is absolutely devastating to this community, 0:05:37.520 --> 0:05:42.440 and police did everything in their power to close that 0:05:42.720 --> 0:05:44.760 vice on Ray. 0:05:45.680 --> 0:05:48.400 Now, it's not like there was any evidence against Ray. 0:05:48.839 --> 0:05:52.240 Police compared Ray's DNA to the DNA left on Jody's body, 0:05:52.440 --> 0:05:56.200 but it didn't match. No physical evidence implicated him, and 0:05:56.240 --> 0:05:59.920 no eyewitnesses had identified him. But as Jody's murders sat 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:04.280 unsolved for years, pressure escalated on the authorities to come 0:06:04.360 --> 0:06:07.039 up with a culprit. After a new police chief was 0:06:07.040 --> 0:06:10.920 elected in twenty ten, new investigators were assigned to the case, 0:06:11.360 --> 0:06:15.200 and they immediately doubled down on prime suspect Ray McCann. 0:06:19.440 --> 0:06:22.360 Over the next few years, police interrogated Ray more than 0:06:22.440 --> 0:06:26.799 twenty times. Again and again, police asked him to describe 0:06:26.800 --> 0:06:29.520 what he did on the night of Jody's disappearance, where 0:06:29.560 --> 0:06:33.560 he searched, who he talked to. During these interrogations, police 0:06:33.600 --> 0:06:38.479 gradually but relentlessly upped the ante. The evidence against you 0:06:38.560 --> 0:06:39.600 was insurmountable. 0:06:39.800 --> 0:06:45.720 They told him, we know scientifically that you touched her body. 0:06:46.040 --> 0:06:50.800 Oh God, no, I did not, and your people whatever, 0:06:50.800 --> 0:06:54.239 you can think that out of thinking that it's. 0:06:54.120 --> 0:06:57.159 Proven now, that was a lie. But these kinds of 0:06:57.200 --> 0:07:01.200 lies can be extremely coercive, even on a cop, even 0:07:01.240 --> 0:07:02.480 on someone like Ray McCann. 0:07:02.880 --> 0:07:05.200 You guys can do all you're talking and talking to 0:07:05.240 --> 0:07:07.800 talk and talking, but you know what, I did my 0:07:07.920 --> 0:07:08.520 job that night. 0:07:09.040 --> 0:07:11.320 I wish I knew what half dor because then I 0:07:11.320 --> 0:07:12.840 guess we wouldn't be having this conversation. 0:07:13.680 --> 0:07:16.920 The way they questioned Ray was for one purpose, and 0:07:16.960 --> 0:07:21.840 one purpose only, to get him to give them information 0:07:22.000 --> 0:07:24.480 that they could use to charge him with this prayer. 0:07:24.600 --> 0:07:26.080 And Ray called them out about that. 0:07:25.960 --> 0:07:27.440 Too, over and over again. 0:07:27.560 --> 0:07:28.760 I don't know what you're trying to do. Give me, 0:07:28.800 --> 0:07:31.280 Confessa something I didn't they have no power of, and now. 0:07:31.160 --> 0:07:32.160 You guys are doing in the air. 0:07:32.800 --> 0:07:34.559 That's the thing. He knew exactly what they were doing. 0:07:34.960 --> 0:07:35.559 He's a cop. 0:07:35.720 --> 0:07:38.080 You want me to admit to something I didn't do, 0:07:38.240 --> 0:07:39.360 I'm not gonna do it. 0:07:39.560 --> 0:07:41.840 You want a confession that I can't give you. I 0:07:41.840 --> 0:07:43.920 didn't find or I didn't put it there, didn't kill her. 0:07:44.160 --> 0:07:44.520 I did. 0:07:45.000 --> 0:07:47.720 But the more Ray insisted on his innocence, the more 0:07:47.760 --> 0:07:52.000 police became obsessed with proving him guilty. Here's the really 0:07:52.040 --> 0:07:56.320 twisted thing. Their obsession began to spread beyond the interrogation room. 0:07:56.720 --> 0:07:59.440 They blamed Ray for Jody's death in the local media, 0:07:59.680 --> 0:08:04.280 ruined his reputation, and they viciously attacked his personal life. 0:08:04.920 --> 0:08:08.200 Police tracked down Ray's friends and relatives and worked to 0:08:08.280 --> 0:08:11.960 turn them against him. Police told Ray's family that physical 0:08:12.000 --> 0:08:15.720 evidence DNA proved he had killed Jody, even though that 0:08:15.840 --> 0:08:19.559 wasn't true, and they went even further for no clear reason. 0:08:19.640 --> 0:08:23.000 They told Ray's wife that he'd been unfaithful. They falsely 0:08:23.040 --> 0:08:25.840 told Ray's teenage son, the one who'd been friends with 0:08:25.920 --> 0:08:28.440 Jody when he was younger, that his dad was a 0:08:28.520 --> 0:08:31.560 drug addict. They also told the boy that his dad 0:08:31.680 --> 0:08:35.240 was visiting online chat rooms the worst kind I guess 0:08:35.400 --> 0:08:38.120 that these cops could imagine. Just listen to this. 0:08:38.800 --> 0:08:44.959 The computer shows activity in a chat room regularly of 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:51.319 gay nature, homosexual behavior, talking about how this man on 0:08:51.600 --> 0:08:55.640 man sexual encounter is going to go, and then how 0:08:55.679 --> 0:08:56.120 it did go. 0:08:57.000 --> 0:09:00.280 There's been no signs of any of that personally from that, 0:09:00.360 --> 0:09:01.800 I haven't seen anything like that. 0:09:01.920 --> 0:09:03.960 Okay, is there any part of you at all that 0:09:04.080 --> 0:09:07.280 questions your dad's sexuality. 0:09:07.040 --> 0:09:09.760 Or what you're saying is absolutely honest to God? 0:09:09.920 --> 0:09:10.240 True? 0:09:10.520 --> 0:09:12.520 I can tell you that it is your computer. I 0:09:12.559 --> 0:09:13.240 took it off there. 0:09:13.320 --> 0:09:16.280 Yeah, then yeah, of course it's going to make me 0:09:16.360 --> 0:09:19.760 question it. None of this was honest to God true. 0:09:20.120 --> 0:09:22.840 The cops were lying again, and that's bad enough, But 0:09:22.920 --> 0:09:25.600 the fact that they equated visiting gay chat rooms with 0:09:25.720 --> 0:09:28.400 raping and killing an eleven year old girl, I'm sorry, 0:09:28.400 --> 0:09:32.040 but that's beyond offensive in any event. Until Ray confessed, 0:09:32.200 --> 0:09:35.520 police were hell bent on taking his life apart peace 0:09:35.679 --> 0:09:38.800 by piece, and I guess this cop thought that telling 0:09:38.880 --> 0:09:42.040 Ray's teenage son that his dad was gay would be 0:09:42.080 --> 0:09:43.320 a good way to accomplish that. 0:09:44.040 --> 0:09:52.079 Their purpose was to make life for Ray McCann in Constantine, Michigan, unendurable, 0:09:53.040 --> 0:09:57.000 to make his life so miserable and so painful that 0:09:57.320 --> 0:09:59.640 they could bring him to a place where he could 0:09:59.679 --> 0:10:02.360 confess to killing Jody Parrick. 0:10:03.000 --> 0:10:07.880 Despite all this, years go by and Ray doesn't confess. Finally, 0:10:07.960 --> 0:10:11.800 the cops had to plan. They'll file charges against Ray 0:10:11.960 --> 0:10:14.520 and see if that gets him to admit guilt. An 0:10:14.520 --> 0:10:17.559 officer is caught saying as much during a taped interview 0:10:17.640 --> 0:10:20.640 with Ray's wife. He's going to have to be charged. 0:10:20.760 --> 0:10:24.560 The officer says, he'll get so scared he'll talk. It 0:10:24.640 --> 0:10:25.719 may just come to that. 0:10:26.360 --> 0:10:29.840 At a certain point in time, they should have realized 0:10:30.040 --> 0:10:33.199 that Ray had nothing to do with this, and there 0:10:33.200 --> 0:10:36.280 were all kinds of reasons for them to believe that, 0:10:36.480 --> 0:10:40.800 beginning with the DNA evidence, But they didn't care one 0:10:40.840 --> 0:10:44.720 bit about Ray. This was the first time that I 0:10:44.800 --> 0:10:49.839 had seen tunnel vision so take over law enforcement officers 0:10:50.160 --> 0:10:53.400 that they were willing to sacrifice the life of another 0:10:53.520 --> 0:10:55.920 officer to close a case. 0:10:57.200 --> 0:11:00.240 Now, the police didn't have any evidence against Ray would 0:11:00.240 --> 0:11:03.000 allow them to charge him with murder, so they came 0:11:03.080 --> 0:11:07.240 up with a different plan and different charges. In twenty twelve, 0:11:07.400 --> 0:11:11.640 police served Ray mccannn with an investigative subpoena requiring him 0:11:11.679 --> 0:11:14.920 to answer questions yet again about the night Jody disappeared. 0:11:15.000 --> 0:11:18.959 Five years earlier because of the subpoena, though this time 0:11:19.200 --> 0:11:21.120 Ray had to give answers under oath. 0:11:21.760 --> 0:11:25.280 Ray did bring a lawyer with him. By this point 0:11:25.280 --> 0:11:29.640 in time, Gray's reputation in the community was so damaged, 0:11:29.800 --> 0:11:33.320 so tarnished. He couldn't go anywhere without people looking at 0:11:33.400 --> 0:11:37.800 him as if he had killed Jody Parrick. So the 0:11:37.920 --> 0:11:40.240 lawyer advised him to go in and talk to the 0:11:40.280 --> 0:11:42.840 authorities as a way to maybe put an end to this. 0:11:45.160 --> 0:11:48.560 The police's subpoena strategy worked. It did put an end 0:11:48.600 --> 0:11:51.400 to the harassment, but not the end Ray had hoped for. 0:11:51.920 --> 0:11:57.160 After the interview, on July seventeenth, twenty fourteen, prosecutors accused 0:11:57.240 --> 0:12:00.800 Ray McCann of lying under oath and charged him with 0:12:01.000 --> 0:12:04.840 five counts of perjury. He was arrested and thrown into 0:12:04.880 --> 0:12:18.240 the local jail. So did Ray McCann lie under oath. 0:12:19.120 --> 0:12:22.240 Four of the five perjury charges were based on incredibly 0:12:22.280 --> 0:12:26.120 minor inconsistencies between the details Ray remembered about the knight 0:12:26.200 --> 0:12:29.240 Jodi died five years earlier, and the details that other 0:12:29.280 --> 0:12:30.120 people remembered. 0:12:30.360 --> 0:12:32.880 You know, what stands out to me in this story 0:12:33.200 --> 0:12:37.320 is how a completely innocent man who is just out 0:12:37.400 --> 0:12:40.840 trying to help got caught up in this web of 0:12:40.960 --> 0:12:45.240 lies that was spun by the detectives. It's unbelievable that 0:12:45.240 --> 0:12:47.600 that could have happened and frightening. 0:12:49.920 --> 0:12:53.120 That's Ken Colker, a journalist based in Grand Rapids, Michigan. 0:12:53.400 --> 0:12:55.920 He's been covering Ray McCann's case for years. 0:12:56.240 --> 0:12:59.800 I'm an investigative reporter, so my job is to just 0:13:00.480 --> 0:13:04.000 sniff around and look for things that seem wrong. You know, 0:13:04.040 --> 0:13:08.839 the perjury charges seemed totally unfounded. I mean, if somebody 0:13:08.920 --> 0:13:10.840 asked me what I had for lunch, I might say 0:13:10.840 --> 0:13:14.160 taco bell, but maybe it wasn't and is that really 0:13:14.160 --> 0:13:14.840 a lie. 0:13:15.840 --> 0:13:19.480 Here's one example of what Ray was charged with under oath. 0:13:19.600 --> 0:13:22.240 Ray McCann said that at one point while he was searching, 0:13:22.520 --> 0:13:25.400 he saw Jody's mom with a blonde haired kid, and 0:13:25.440 --> 0:13:28.440 he thought Jody had been found. He testified that he 0:13:28.520 --> 0:13:31.280 said to Jody's mom, oh good, you found her. 0:13:32.040 --> 0:13:32.240 Now. 0:13:32.320 --> 0:13:35.400 Everyone agreed that a local seventh grader with blonde hair 0:13:35.520 --> 0:13:38.680 named Katie was with Jody's mom during the search, but 0:13:38.800 --> 0:13:42.680 Jody's mom couldn't remember whether five years earlier Ray had said, 0:13:42.760 --> 0:13:45.800 oh good, you found her. One of these perjury charges 0:13:45.920 --> 0:13:49.880 was based on this so called discrepancy. Here's another example. 0:13:50.200 --> 0:13:53.560 Police told Ray they found his DNA on Jody's body, 0:13:54.000 --> 0:13:57.120 even though that was a lie. In a desperate attempt 0:13:57.160 --> 0:14:00.920 to provide some explanation, Ray made a guest. Yes, he 0:14:01.040 --> 0:14:04.040 thought back to the moment he and Jody's mom discovered 0:14:04.040 --> 0:14:07.360 her little girl's body. He remembered guiding Jody's mom away 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:11.240 and helping her sit down in her car. Maybe sometime 0:14:11.360 --> 0:14:14.040 later the mother had been grieving over her daughter's body. 0:14:14.080 --> 0:14:17.920 He said, maybe his DNA had been transferred from Jody's 0:14:17.920 --> 0:14:21.320 mom to the little girl. But five years after the fact, 0:14:21.640 --> 0:14:25.320 Jody's mom didn't remember Ray pulling her away, or taking 0:14:25.320 --> 0:14:27.640 her to the car, or much of anything else from 0:14:27.640 --> 0:14:31.400 that terrible moment. So the cops charged Ray with another 0:14:31.520 --> 0:14:32.680 count of perjury. 0:14:33.120 --> 0:14:36.080 What's interesting is that Ray McCann was a reserved police 0:14:36.080 --> 0:14:39.200 officer and for some reason they turned on him. That's 0:14:39.240 --> 0:14:42.880 the suspect they're focused on. So they're just hammering and 0:14:42.960 --> 0:14:47.160 hammering and telling him far more lies than they claim 0:14:47.400 --> 0:14:48.440 he told them. 0:14:48.960 --> 0:14:53.160 Ray's history as a police officer may have offered him 0:14:53.760 --> 0:14:58.080 some protection against a false confession, but it couldn't protect 0:14:58.120 --> 0:15:02.320 him against another weapon in the police officers arsenal, the 0:15:02.360 --> 0:15:06.160 weapon of perjury. In Ray's case, they turned a series 0:15:06.200 --> 0:15:11.200 of inconsistencies in his statements over a five year period 0:15:11.520 --> 0:15:18.720 into perjurious lies. The penalties for perjury in Michigan are extreme, 0:15:19.400 --> 0:15:22.440 and they charged him with five counts of perjury. 0:15:22.880 --> 0:15:26.760 So under investigative subpoena, especially in a murder case, telling 0:15:26.800 --> 0:15:29.600 a lie of police is actually punishable by up to 0:15:29.680 --> 0:15:32.760 life in prison. The punishment is as bad as if 0:15:32.760 --> 0:15:33.920 you committed the crime. 0:15:34.640 --> 0:15:38.720 Four of those five charges were based on ridiculous inconsistencies, 0:15:39.000 --> 0:15:42.080 like the ones we've talked about. The fifth charge, though, 0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:45.760 was different. The fifth charge was based on Ray's sworn 0:15:45.920 --> 0:15:50.120 statement that he'd searched for Jody near that riverside walking trail, 0:15:50.360 --> 0:15:51.480 the tumble Dam path. 0:15:51.920 --> 0:15:54.840 They claimed, well, that's a lie, because we've got video 0:15:55.200 --> 0:15:58.880 showing that nobody went to the tumble Dam that time 0:15:58.920 --> 0:16:00.880 of night. We don't see your car, we don't see 0:16:00.880 --> 0:16:04.280 your headlights or whatever. There was a video camera on 0:16:04.400 --> 0:16:08.280 this nearby creamery that supposedly was aimed right at the 0:16:08.320 --> 0:16:11.640 tumble Dam. And the quote unquote lie that they got 0:16:11.720 --> 0:16:14.080 him on was the fact that he said he was 0:16:14.120 --> 0:16:16.800 at the tumble Dam, but the surveillance video proved he 0:16:16.880 --> 0:16:17.440 wasn't there. 0:16:18.120 --> 0:16:21.880 Police claimed that video proved Ray was lying. In fact, 0:16:21.920 --> 0:16:24.920 an officer even took the stand at Ray's first court 0:16:24.960 --> 0:16:29.120 hearing and swore that this video proved Ray had committed perjury. 0:16:29.840 --> 0:16:32.520 For his part, Ray couldn't figure it out. He knew 0:16:32.560 --> 0:16:34.520 he'd gone to the tumble Dam path that night to 0:16:34.560 --> 0:16:38.640 search for Jody. But his trial approached and five possible 0:16:38.720 --> 0:16:43.240 life sentences loomed, Ray finally broke He didn't confess to 0:16:43.360 --> 0:16:48.480 killing Jody. Instead, on March twentieth, twenty fifteen, he pled 0:16:48.520 --> 0:16:51.400 no contest to that fifth perjury charge. 0:16:51.840 --> 0:16:56.080 A no contest plea is an admission that the state 0:16:56.280 --> 0:17:00.720 has sufficient evidence against you to convict you. As a 0:17:00.720 --> 0:17:04.920 matter of law, it's treated within the system just as 0:17:04.960 --> 0:17:06.800 any other guilty plea would be treated. 0:17:07.320 --> 0:17:10.879 For that plea of no contest to perjury, Ray received 0:17:10.880 --> 0:17:14.480 a sentence of twenty months in prison. In exchange, the 0:17:14.520 --> 0:17:18.160 state dropped the other four charges. They hadn't gotten Ray 0:17:18.160 --> 0:17:21.199 for murder, but they'd gotten him for something, and I 0:17:21.240 --> 0:17:28.160 guess that was good enough. Fast forward five months after 0:17:28.240 --> 0:17:32.080 Ray entered his plea to August twenty fifteen, Ray was 0:17:32.119 --> 0:17:36.560 in prison serving his perjury sentence, and every day was horrific. 0:17:37.000 --> 0:17:41.000 He was a suspected child rapist and killer, and he 0:17:41.080 --> 0:17:44.640 talked about, you know what other prisoners do to child 0:17:44.760 --> 0:17:48.399 rapists and killers. He got dragged off of his bunk 0:17:48.720 --> 0:17:52.159 one night, got smashed over the head with what he 0:17:52.200 --> 0:17:56.040 thinks was a padlock, and somebody tried to gouge his 0:17:56.119 --> 0:17:59.760 eyes out. I mean, that's what happened to the poor 0:17:59.800 --> 0:18:00.679 guy in prison. 0:18:03.080 --> 0:18:06.760 While Ray suffered, there was a development. A man named 0:18:06.800 --> 0:18:10.560 Daniel Furlong, who lived one town over from Constantine, lured 0:18:10.560 --> 0:18:13.600 a ten year old girl into his garage and attacked her. 0:18:14.160 --> 0:18:17.040 She escaped, thank god, and was able to lead police 0:18:17.080 --> 0:18:20.360 to Furlong's door. They arrested him and took his DNA 0:18:20.880 --> 0:18:24.480 and what did it match? The DNA left eight years 0:18:24.520 --> 0:18:29.840 earlier on Jody Perick's body. Police questioned Daniel Furlong on 0:18:29.880 --> 0:18:33.959 October eighteenth, twenty fifteen, and he admitted that he'd raped 0:18:34.000 --> 0:18:37.960 and killed Jody. Furlong used to live in Constantine, a 0:18:38.000 --> 0:18:40.880 few blocks away from the Parick family. When he saw 0:18:40.960 --> 0:18:43.720 Jody riding by on her bike, he lured her into 0:18:43.720 --> 0:18:46.639 his garage, just like the other girl. That's where he 0:18:46.720 --> 0:18:50.640 assaulted and killed Jody. And he did it all alone. 0:18:50.680 --> 0:18:53.840 Furlong told investigators he didn't know Ray McCann. 0:18:54.160 --> 0:18:57.960 We saw the videotape of police interviewing Daniel Furlong, and 0:18:58.000 --> 0:18:59.919 they were a lot nicer to him than they were 0:19:00.119 --> 0:19:03.240 to Ray McCann. They asked Furlong, so what did you 0:19:03.280 --> 0:19:05.320 think when you saw that in a newspaper that they 0:19:05.320 --> 0:19:08.160 were focusing on Ray McCann, And he thought, well, I'm 0:19:08.200 --> 0:19:08.720 in the clear. 0:19:09.240 --> 0:19:12.240 So, in other words, the fact that the police had 0:19:12.320 --> 0:19:18.880 pursued this wrongful prosecution of Ray made Furlong feel enough 0:19:19.080 --> 0:19:23.879 comfort to strike again, and that blew me away. 0:19:26.320 --> 0:19:29.840 It was crystal clear Ray McCann was never involved in 0:19:29.920 --> 0:19:33.439 Jody's disappearance. All he did was try to help a 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:37.680 distraught mom find her missing kid. The police's suspicions about 0:19:37.760 --> 0:19:42.360 Ray had been wrong from the start. In November twenty fifteen, 0:19:42.720 --> 0:19:46.840 Daniel Furlong pled guilty to killing Jody Perrick by himself 0:19:47.200 --> 0:19:50.760 and received a sentence of thirty to sixty years, but 0:19:50.840 --> 0:19:54.359 the state wasn't ready to exonerate Ray mc cann. Not yet. 0:19:54.920 --> 0:19:58.440 Ray had been convicted of perjury, and the state insisted 0:19:58.480 --> 0:20:01.600 that even if Ray hadn't committed murder, he had still 0:20:01.680 --> 0:20:02.639 lied under oath. 0:20:03.000 --> 0:20:05.439 I started in this case because we were doing stories 0:20:05.480 --> 0:20:09.400 about the real killer who confessed and was getting sentenced 0:20:09.440 --> 0:20:13.240 to prison, and nobody was talking about what happened to 0:20:13.320 --> 0:20:16.880 Ray McCann. It's like, well, what about this guy who 0:20:16.920 --> 0:20:18.000 had nothing to do with it. 0:20:28.600 --> 0:20:32.040 In December twenty fifteen, Ray was paroled from a Michigan 0:20:32.040 --> 0:20:36.119 prison after serving his sentence. He was still a convicted felon, 0:20:36.359 --> 0:20:38.960 a perjurer in the eyes of the law. It was 0:20:39.040 --> 0:20:42.520 right around that time that his case came across Steve's desk. 0:20:43.160 --> 0:20:45.160 Ray had been out of prison for a few months. 0:20:45.160 --> 0:20:48.800 He was having a hard time reintegrating back in the community. 0:20:49.240 --> 0:20:52.800 The police officers were still suggesting to the general public 0:20:52.920 --> 0:20:56.639 that he knew things about this crime and he had 0:20:56.640 --> 0:20:59.680 spent twenty months locked up for something he didn't do. 0:21:00.600 --> 0:21:03.800 Thank God for Ken Colker for taking the interest to 0:21:03.880 --> 0:21:06.800 tell this story about Ray, because if it wasn't for him, 0:21:07.160 --> 0:21:08.840 I never would have known about the case. 0:21:09.440 --> 0:21:11.159 I had seemed the work done by this Center for 0:21:11.200 --> 0:21:14.280 Wrongful Convictions at Northwestern End I just reached out to 0:21:14.400 --> 0:21:17.240 Steve and said, here's an interesting case. 0:21:17.760 --> 0:21:21.960 I was so angry at what these law enforcement officers 0:21:22.040 --> 0:21:25.360 had done to Ray, and so I called up the 0:21:25.359 --> 0:21:29.439 Michigan Innocence Clinic at the University of Michigan Law School, 0:21:29.840 --> 0:21:32.639 and I said, will you work on this case with me. 0:21:33.280 --> 0:21:36.119 The legal team's task was to prove Ray innocence of 0:21:36.160 --> 0:21:39.199 the only perjury charge he'd been convicted of. That was 0:21:39.240 --> 0:21:41.879 the charge where the police had sworn under oath that 0:21:41.920 --> 0:21:44.800 they had a surveillance tape showing the tumble Dam path, 0:21:45.240 --> 0:21:47.960 a video that they said proved Ray had lied about 0:21:48.000 --> 0:21:51.520 going there to search for Jody Well. Ken Kolker got 0:21:51.560 --> 0:21:53.520 a hold of a copy of that videotape. 0:21:53.840 --> 0:21:58.520 I remember going down to Ray McCann's home and meeting 0:21:58.720 --> 0:22:02.000 Stephen Drisen down there. Yeah, that was like a could 0:22:02.000 --> 0:22:04.840 have been a scene in a movie, actually standing around 0:22:04.840 --> 0:22:07.959 this dining room table with my laptop open watching this 0:22:08.080 --> 0:22:12.359 video that would eventually lead to Ray mccannn's case being dismissed. 0:22:12.920 --> 0:22:16.600 What we saw was that you couldn't see anything from 0:22:16.720 --> 0:22:20.760 the camera footage. It was simply too dark to make 0:22:20.840 --> 0:22:23.920 out what kinds of cars were on the street, whether 0:22:23.960 --> 0:22:25.760 there were any people on the street. 0:22:26.160 --> 0:22:28.400 You couldn't see the tumble dawn path at all, let 0:22:28.400 --> 0:22:31.040 alone who was walking on it. So the legal team 0:22:31.119 --> 0:22:34.000 actually went to the creamery, the business that had taken 0:22:34.040 --> 0:22:37.600 the surveillance video, and looked at their security camera. The 0:22:37.680 --> 0:22:41.040 creamery owner assured them that the camera hadn't been moved 0:22:41.080 --> 0:22:42.719 since the night of Jody's disappearance. 0:22:43.040 --> 0:22:45.960 The video camera wasn't even aimed at the dam The 0:22:46.000 --> 0:22:49.399 surveillance camera that they claimed showed he wasn't there was 0:22:49.440 --> 0:22:52.359 aimed elsewhere. I wish I'd have been the one that 0:22:52.480 --> 0:22:53.080 noticed that. 0:22:53.680 --> 0:22:59.680 Under no circumstances could the creamery camera footage have proven 0:22:59.840 --> 0:23:03.720 that that Ray was not at the tumble damn path. 0:23:03.920 --> 0:23:05.240 The whole damn thing was made up. 0:23:05.320 --> 0:23:09.639 It was a lie. The video was essentially worthless as evidence. 0:23:10.280 --> 0:23:13.359 This video certainly didn't prove that Ray McCann had lied 0:23:13.400 --> 0:23:16.840 under oath. Instead, what it proved was that the police 0:23:16.960 --> 0:23:19.320 were the ones who had lied. In order to convict him. 0:23:19.600 --> 0:23:24.040 Ray's wish had come true. He needed to have some 0:23:24.160 --> 0:23:28.240 kind of evidence to demonstrate that he didn't lie at all, 0:23:28.400 --> 0:23:32.280 but that the police officers were lying, and that camera 0:23:32.320 --> 0:23:33.439 footage proved it. 0:23:35.920 --> 0:23:39.680 Based on that video. Ray's attorneys filed a motion for relief, 0:23:40.000 --> 0:23:43.760 and on December seventh, twenty seventeen, the court threw out 0:23:43.880 --> 0:23:47.679