Speaker 1: In the early nineties, the crack epidemic was in full swing,
Speaker 1: and violence between rival gangs, the Red Top Crew and
Speaker 1: the Yellow Top Crew, among others, gripped Harlem and other
Speaker 1: parts of the city. On June tenth, a slender light
Speaker 1: skined man in his forties with a gray ponytail rolled
Speaker 1: up to a building on West one thirty fifth Street
Speaker 1: and open fire, wounding fifteen year old Henry Gomez and
Speaker 1: killing eighteen year old Many Kintero. The case went cold
Speaker 1: for two years. Then two members of Yellow Top joint
Speaker 1: forces with a corrupt detective and officer team to bring
Speaker 1: a close to this case in exchange for leniency in
Speaker 1: their own cases. Officer A. J. Molino had been involved
Speaker 1: in dealing at some point himself. The detective was Mark Tabbin's,
Speaker 1: the same one responsible for Danny ring Kohn's ronfl conviction
Speaker 1: in the bungling of another Red Top Crew shooting in
Speaker 1: the Bronx, These members of Yellow Top made up a
Speaker 1: story that Pablo for and As had been hired by
Speaker 1: Red Top to carry out the June tenth shooting. Then
Speaker 1: Tabbans and Molino used misleading identification tactics to trick or
Speaker 1: coerce several teenage eye witnesses to build what they knew
Speaker 1: was a farcical case. The prosecution followed suit to turn Pablo,
Speaker 1: a stocky, darker skin two year old with short black hair,
Speaker 1: into this slender forty something light skin shooter with a
Speaker 1: gray ponytail. Pabo spent almost twenty five years behind bars,
Speaker 1: and it took nearly a decade and a half of
Speaker 1: pro bono work from legal giant Paul Weiss to win
Speaker 1: his freedom. This is Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flomer. Welcome
Speaker 1: back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason flam that's me. I'm
Speaker 1: your host, and today I want to introduce first the
Speaker 1: atturn any who spent thousands of hours pro bono on
Speaker 1: this case. So Dave Brown, thanks for being here on
Speaker 1: the show today, Thanks for having me Jason and with us,
Speaker 1: of course, is the person who endured this nightmare that
Speaker 1: you're about to hear about and lived to tell the story.
Speaker 1: So now it's my great privilege to introduce you to
Speaker 1: Pablo Fernandez. Pablo, thank you for being here with us today.
Speaker 1: And this story goes back to the early nineties. Pablo,
Speaker 1: you came from the Dominican Republic right, And you ended
Speaker 1: up as a teenager in Upper Manhattan at the height
Speaker 1: of the crack epidemic. What what was it like growing
Speaker 1: up in that crazy time that we've heard so much about.
Speaker 1: It was a way deeper about the day cry. Every
Speaker 1: day we walking in this dree to see the house
Speaker 1: in it bottled the crack of the flow. You see
Speaker 1: a lot of cracking people walking in the three like.
Speaker 1: Gunshots could be heard regularly around the clock, not just
Speaker 1: at nighttime in those days. And you had a police
Speaker 1: force that is out of control as well. And Dave
Speaker 1: take us back to the original crime and how this
Speaker 1: turned into this terribly flawed case and ultimately wonwerful conviction.
Speaker 1: The crime in question took place on June tenth. It
Speaker 1: was a drive by shooting where a car drives down
Speaker 1: undred thirty fIF street, stops, The gunman gets out for
Speaker 1: just a few seconds for the passenger side fire. Several
Speaker 1: shots kills Mann Kintaro, wounds Henry Gomez, jumps back in
Speaker 1: the car and the car drives away. A number of
Speaker 1: Fie witnesses saw that shooting. They called in to nine
Speaker 1: one one with descriptions. Some of them were interviewed by
Speaker 1: the police either that evening or in the days that followed,
Speaker 1: and they all described the shooter as having light skin,
Speaker 1: in his thirties or forties, tall, thin build, gray or
Speaker 1: salt and pepper hair pulled back in a ponytail. And
Speaker 1: Pablo looked nothing like that description. He was twenty years old,
Speaker 1: so he had short, dark hair, stock build, He had
Speaker 1: never worn his hair long, much less in a ponytail.
Speaker 1: And the case went cold, we believe because the police
Speaker 1: failed to follow up on leads. They sent officers who
Speaker 1: didn't speak Spanish to conduct interviews in the neighborhood around
Speaker 1: where the shooting took place, and they just came back
Speaker 1: and reported, well, we couldn't communicate with some of the
Speaker 1: witnesses because they spoke Spanish, um, and just we think
Speaker 1: there was no serious effort to really solve this time,
Speaker 1: so the case goes cold. Approximately two years later, NYPD
Speaker 1: officers engaged in a really brazen and corrupt scheme to
Speaker 1: manufacture evidence against Pablo, faced with the facts that he
Speaker 1: bore no resemblance to the shooter and there was never
Speaker 1: any physical or forensics or ballistic evidence that connected him
Speaker 1: to the crime, and there was absolutely no motive for
Speaker 1: him to committed the crime. But let me start with
Speaker 1: the police officers who were the primary architects of this.
Speaker 1: To falsely incriminate Pablo, NYPD officer Albert Molino, he went
Speaker 1: by a j who had ties to the drug trade
Speaker 1: himself from before he went to the police academy, and
Speaker 1: also Detective Mark Tebbans. Our audience might remember Mark Tabbans
Speaker 1: from another case that we covered recently, Danny Rink Cohn case,
Speaker 1: and of course all the corrupt tactics that he used
Speaker 1: to make that preposterous case stick as well. The corrupt
Speaker 1: and unconstitutional tactics that they used were not unique to them.
Speaker 1: I mean these were commonplace in MYPD homicide and serious
Speaker 1: felony investigations during the early mides, and the way they
Speaker 1: constructed this false case was based on perjured testimony. At
Speaker 1: the center of this corrupt investigation were two members of
Speaker 1: the Yellow Top Crew, who were rivals of the Red
Speaker 1: Top Crew. Now, in those days, of course, the crews
Speaker 1: were named after the colored caps of the crack files
Speaker 1: that they sold. Those Yellow Tops had two motives to
Speaker 1: give up seemingly useful but false information to the police.
Speaker 1: One was to help their own charges and the other
Speaker 1: was to try to inflict damage on their arrivals, the
Speaker 1: Red Top Crew, and these two individuals that worked with
Speaker 1: Malino and Tabins were Raymond Dilley Rivera and the leader
Speaker 1: of the Yellow Top Crew, whose name was Martin Chango
Speaker 1: Maheas now Maheis was known in the streets to be
Speaker 1: a crazy, violent drug dealer, and he was arrested in
Speaker 1: June charged with three counts of murder, one kind of
Speaker 1: attempted murder, and multiple drug conspiracy charges, and he was
Speaker 1: facing potential life in prison, so he decided that he
Speaker 1: would cooperate with the Manhattan DA's office and testify against
Speaker 1: other people to get a lighter sentence. He put away
Speaker 1: dozens of people who worked for him, and around that time, Rivera,
Speaker 1: who was one of the chief lieutenants in the Yellow
Speaker 1: Top Crew, came into the Benhanda DA's office and he
Speaker 1: confessed that he had committed more than five hundred felonies,
Speaker 1: including assaults, robberies, and attempted murder. He was never charged
Speaker 1: for any of those crimes. So somehow Melino and Tepens
Speaker 1: urged these two cooperators, Miheis and Rivera to say that
Speaker 1: they knew Pablo had been hired to do this shooting
Speaker 1: for the leader of the Red Top crew. They said
Speaker 1: that they saw Pablo being paid money to do the
Speaker 1: shooting about and one of them said that after the
Speaker 1: shooting he saw Pablo come back and meet with the
Speaker 1: person who had hired him to do the shooting and
Speaker 1: take out a shell casing and say this is the
Speaker 1: bullet that killed Cantaro. They said that they knew that
Speaker 1: Pablo war disguise like a wig or he painted his hair,
Speaker 1: and of course we would have also had to believe
Speaker 1: that he had a makeup artist on hand who could
Speaker 1: have changed his skin color. But you can't be stocky
Speaker 1: and pretend you're skinny. That doesn't work. None of this
Speaker 1: was true. And then early detective Tibbins and Officer Malino
Speaker 1: found two eyewitnesses who had seen the shooting. Now, when
Speaker 1: these kids saw the shooting, they were approximately thirteen years old,
Speaker 1: and both of them were cousins of Manicin Taro. One
Speaker 1: of them his name was Hickliffe Rosario and the others
Speaker 1: name was George Rosario, and both of them had reported
Speaker 1: seeing a light skin shooter, you know, long gray hair,
Speaker 1: thirties or forties do the killing. But they were pressured
Speaker 1: by Molino and Tebbans to falsely identify Pablo as the shooter,
Speaker 1: in part because the police just kept pointing to pictures
Speaker 1: of Pablo over and over and over, saying this shooter.
Speaker 1: The police officers lied to Hickliff and George Rosario and said,
Speaker 1: you know, even though he may not have been the shooter,
Speaker 1: he had something to do with the crime, so you
Speaker 1: should say that he did. And if you look at
Speaker 1: the picture from Pablo's lineup, they're six men and five
Speaker 1: of them are where white T shirts, and Pablo was
Speaker 1: put in completely different clothes to make it easier for
Speaker 1: the witnesses to falsely incriminate him. I think this is
Speaker 1: something they had done many times before. You would think
Speaker 1: that it would be incredibly difficult to frame an innocent
Speaker 1: person for murder. It almost seemed effortless for these corrupt
Speaker 1: police officers. And Pablo, what was it like going through
Speaker 1: this for you? Did you understand what was going on?
Speaker 1: And the beginning no, I thought I learned a little
Speaker 1: about a little. It was really back from me. I
Speaker 1: just have my song, my first baby to change that
Speaker 1: life that quick like that, that won one second, it's
Speaker 1: really huh they I mean the rack Asylum, you know
Speaker 1: about that dying Rack as Islands, the acquisition that I
Speaker 1: have something that I know that I'm not do my
Speaker 1: son everything I see my son in the coal it
Speaker 1: was it's it's impossible, I think for anyone who hasn't
Speaker 1: been through it to imagine what you went through. I mean,
Speaker 1: you're twenty years old, You're still a kid. Now you're
Speaker 1: thrust into a very adult situation that you didn't cause
Speaker 1: and you didn't create. And I want to just highlight
Speaker 1: one of them. The Innocence Project has led to charge
Speaker 1: along other organizations, to make videotaping of interrogations mandatory, but
Speaker 1: also the photo arrays, line up procedures, all of that,
Speaker 1: anything involving eye witnesses should also be videotaped. That's the
Speaker 1: only way we can clamp down on these type of practices.
Speaker 1: And they're not always as defarious as this one was, right,
Speaker 1: but if they're influencing the witness in any way, the
Speaker 1: jury must know about that. And that brings us to
Speaker 1: the trial, which was Janu And let me start just
Speaker 1: a few weeks before the trial begins. Actually, because it
Speaker 1: appears that Molino and Keven's they knew approaching the trial
Speaker 1: as was a week case. They had two cooperators obviously
Speaker 1: had motives to lie and fabricate evidence, and then you
Speaker 1: had these two teenagers who have been pressured to lie,
Speaker 1: and so it looks like they went out to try
Speaker 1: to bolster this case. And they found two more eyewitnesses
Speaker 1: and one of them, his name is Hayes's. Canela Cannella
Speaker 1: recants in the mid two thousand's, actually, as do the Rosarios,
Speaker 1: but Cannella, when he came forward, he said that he
Speaker 1: had been pressured by the police officers and they showed
Speaker 1: him a picture of Pablo, not even a photo array,
Speaker 1: just a single photograph of Pablo, saying this is the
Speaker 1: person who did the crime. And then they told him
Speaker 1: you don't have to testify in court about the fact
Speaker 1: that you saw this photo. So this witness is found
Speaker 1: two weeks before the trial, right it's now two and
Speaker 1: a half years since he saw the murder, and he
Speaker 1: testifies that he still recognizes Pablo, even though you know
Speaker 1: Pablo supposedly wearing a disguise at the time, and he
Speaker 1: says he's never seen any pictures of Pablo up until then,
Speaker 1: although of course just two weeks before trial started, he
Speaker 1: indeed was something pictures of problem, but that's all covered up.
Speaker 1: It's so bad because you can do nothing. You can
Speaker 1: say nothing. It's like if somebody pointing you and you
Speaker 1: can do nothing. Everything was lying problem. When the jury
Speaker 1: came back. What was that moment like when it told
Speaker 1: me that I'm guilty? Um Man, I thought I want
Speaker 1: to die. I feel my body like like I hold
Speaker 1: in a thousand pounds my back. I looking bad to
Speaker 1: see my family and all my family was prying. I
Speaker 1: was crying. I was prying. I can't hold it when
Speaker 1: you know that you he knowsing and they find you
Speaker 1: guilty or something that you want to confront doing if
Speaker 1: a year this, this is crazy. I lost my family
Speaker 1: with my song. I love everybody. This episode is underwritten
Speaker 1: by the A i G pro Bono Program. He I
Speaker 1: G is a leading global insurance company, and for over
Speaker 1: a decade, the A I G pro Bono Program has
Speaker 1: provided thousands of hours of free legal services and other
Speaker 1: support to nonprofit organizations and individuals most in need. More recently,
Speaker 1: the program added criminal and social justice reform as a
Speaker 1: key pillar of its mission. The case against Pablo really
Speaker 1: began fall apart just a few days after the trial,
Speaker 1: when the d A's office came to Publo's trial council
Speaker 1: and said, we've had to arrest Officer A. J. Malino
Speaker 1: because we discovered that he was under investigation by the
Speaker 1: New York State Troopers for dealing large amounts of cocaine
Speaker 1: to undercover cops a few years prior, right before he
Speaker 1: went into the police academy, and for some reason that
Speaker 1: investigation installed, but it was reopened during the trial. Malino
Speaker 1: was arrested right after the trial, but the d a's
Speaker 1: office never follows up to prosecute him, and after about
Speaker 1: five years the case is dismissed for failure to prosecute. Now,
Speaker 1: it's my theory that somebody who's dealing large amounts of
Speaker 1: drugs and it goes into the police academy does not
Speaker 1: stop after they've become a police officer. And we'll see
Speaker 1: what comes to lighten Pablo's civil case, but I think
Speaker 1: this was likely a corrupt officer through and through again.
Speaker 1: We know during this time there were other officers in
Speaker 1: up to Manhattan who were dealing drugs themselves, providing protection
Speaker 1: to drug dealers, robbing drug dealers and signed the drugs themselves,
Speaker 1: and you know, Molino certainly seems to fit that pattern. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And one would think that that would cause an immediate
Speaker 1: reopening of the case or retrial or something. But of
Speaker 1: course we know that it took the most twenty five
Speaker 1: years for this to be resolved and thousands of hours
Speaker 1: of pro bono legal work from you and your team
Speaker 1: at Paul Weiss. You know, it's one of the things
Speaker 1: that gives me hope, just the fact that there are
Speaker 1: people like you and firms like Paul Weiss and so
Speaker 1: many others that provide almost limitless resources of human talent
Speaker 1: to help someone like Pablo get out of what is
Speaker 1: almost impossible morass. Dave, you didn't get involved to two
Speaker 1: thousand five, but talk to us about this crazy appellate process.
Speaker 1: The next major event occurs in two thousand two. Hicklov
Speaker 1: and George Rosario both recanted their trial testimony and they
Speaker 1: met with a lawyer who was representing Pablo at the time,
Speaker 1: and they provided sworn testimony stating that Melino and others
Speaker 1: had pressured them to falsely identify Pablo as the shooter.
Speaker 1: The Hicklov stated that he was positive that Pablo had
Speaker 1: not shot Kintaro. George said that he never would have
Speaker 1: identified Pablo as the shooter if he had not been
Speaker 1: told by the police that Pablo was involved, and that
Speaker 1: he had been pressured to identify Pablo after being shown
Speaker 1: Pablo's picture again. The impellate courts did not consider this
Speaker 1: evidence enough to free public. The next year, in two
Speaker 1: thousand three, Henry Gomants, of the second victim of the shooting,
Speaker 1: he provided sworn testimony that Pablo was not the man
Speaker 1: who shot him and didn't look like the shooter. That
Speaker 1: is not enough either. Now, in two thousand five, my
Speaker 1: law firm got involved. One of the top law firms,
Speaker 1: not in the city, in the world comes in, you know,
Speaker 1: to the rescue. How did his case land on your radar? Now,
Speaker 1: we do a lot of pro bono work at Paul Wise,
Speaker 1: including criminal defense work, criminal justice reform work. But your
Speaker 1: question indicated, you know, why, of all of the thousands
Speaker 1: and thousands of criminal defendants in the New York State system,
Speaker 1: how do we get involved in Populo's case. Well, there
Speaker 1: was a Yale law student named Andrew Goldstein who, because
Speaker 1: of a program at the law school became aware of
Speaker 1: this case, and then he came to Paul Wise for
Speaker 1: our summer associate program, which lasts about eight to ten weeks.
Speaker 1: And when he came in, he said, can I get
Speaker 1: some support from Paul Wise to help me on Pablo's case?
Speaker 1: And and we said sure. We thought this was going
Speaker 1: to be something that we helped Andrew Goldstein with for
Speaker 1: a summer. Well, that summer lasted fourteen years. Andrew ended
Speaker 1: up coming to the firm as an associate where he
Speaker 1: worked on the case, and then he left us after
Speaker 1: about four or five years, and he became a prosecutor
Speaker 1: in the U. S. Attorney's Office in the Southern District,
Speaker 1: and he went on to work on Bob Mueller's team
Speaker 1: a few years ago and is now back in private practice.
Speaker 1: And just so overjoyed that the case that he brought
Speaker 1: in as a law student ended with such a great result,
Speaker 1: even though it took just such a long time for
Speaker 1: justice to be delivered. What did it mean to you
Speaker 1: when Dave and his team first got involved with your
Speaker 1: case and to have their support, And how did that
Speaker 1: feel the lawyer that I have it before uh Da
Speaker 1: even the thing came. They told me listen, you look,
Speaker 1: you got the best loyal United States, and maybe in
Speaker 1: the world, you got one of the best loyal And
Speaker 1: I was so happy, my family too, because you know,
Speaker 1: I wouldn't be in the best hang that I can be.
Speaker 1: That's that's the only way I came home. And I
Speaker 1: want to get to that, you know, the good part,
Speaker 1: your freedom. So let's go right back to that post
Speaker 1: conviction history. In two thousand five, Paul White took the case,
Speaker 1: and then there was another rectation in two thousand ten.
Speaker 1: Two thousand ten, Hans was Cannella Rekns and again that
Speaker 1: motion is denied. One of the reasons that the New
Speaker 1: York State judge said that this witness was not to
Speaker 1: be believed because he said, well, he was trying too
Speaker 1: hard to be convincing when he recanted, which is just
Speaker 1: such a ridiculous and bizarre thing to say. And with
Speaker 1: lost in all the state court appeals in the federal
Speaker 1: district court, and now we're going up to the federal
Speaker 1: appeals court, and we knew that if we lost, it
Speaker 1: was over. We would have only had the ability to
Speaker 1: appeal to the Supreme Court. And there was almost a
Speaker 1: zero chance that they would ever have taken this case.
Speaker 1: So this was really our last stopped and this is
Speaker 1: really the case. It shows you the value of perseverance. Well,
Speaker 1: it certainly does, because in February, the U. S. Court
Speaker 1: of Appeals for the Second District finally overturned the conviction,
Speaker 1: ruling that it was unconstitutional and citing the state courts
Speaker 1: denial as an quote unquote an unreasonable determination on the
Speaker 1: grounds that Cannela was and again him quota here trying
Speaker 1: too hard to be convincing end quote. So now the
Speaker 1: conviction is overturned, but the indictment still stands because there's
Speaker 1: no statute of limitations on murder, and the d A
Speaker 1: comes you with the deal, right to go free immediately
Speaker 1: if you plead guilty to manslaughter. But yet on the
Speaker 1: other hand, they could still retry you. You had twenty
Speaker 1: five to life, so parole was just around the corner.
Speaker 1: But there's no guarantee you there either, because who knows,
Speaker 1: Like if you wouldn't have admitted guilt, if you had
Speaker 1: refused the deal, you might still be sitting in prison today.
Speaker 1: I understand, but he's never passed from my mind to
Speaker 1: take any deal with him. From the beginning, I will
Speaker 1: fire for my freeing. So after all this year working
Speaker 1: in my k in the right to be free to
Speaker 1: brew my you know, say, I'm not gonna take nothing
Speaker 1: for these people, nothing, you know. At first, we on
Speaker 1: the defense team thought, there's no way that as Opicer
Speaker 1: is going to retry this case. Hickla Rosario has recanted,
Speaker 1: George Rosario has recanted, Hayes's Cannella has recanted. We learned
Speaker 1: that Rivera was a quadriplegic and gravely ill, not even
Speaker 1: able to speak. And then Maheas was a drug dealer
Speaker 1: who had served in signifficant amount of time in prison,
Speaker 1: and there was absolutely no case left. And so during
Speaker 1: the spring of the d a's office was making one
Speaker 1: disclosure after another to us. Has showed that the case
Speaker 1: was even worse than we had known. But we contacted
Speaker 1: Martin Maheias and he made some incredible disclosure to us.
Speaker 1: We told our investigator, you know, when I was cooperating
Speaker 1: with the police, I was supposed to go back to
Speaker 1: the Rikers Island after I testified or after I met
Speaker 1: with the d a's office, But Molino and Tabbins would
Speaker 1: take me all around the city. We would go to
Speaker 1: Dallas barbecue. We would get drunk. They would take me
Speaker 1: to visit girlfriends, take me shopping. I was drinking a
Speaker 1: lot at the time. I was drunk when I testified.
Speaker 1: I viewed Tebbins as a friend, basically indicating that he
Speaker 1: would have done anything to please the police. He also
Speaker 1: said the police had given him marijuana to sell in prison.
Speaker 1: I mean, this was just, you know, amazing to us.
Speaker 1: And we got similar disclosures from the Manhattan DIA's office
Speaker 1: about miheis in July of information to show that mahe
Speaker 1: has said, I'm not going to testify for you again.
Speaker 1: The police told me to lie in the trial. I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna testify again. So then we learned just some
Speaker 1: shocking information about Raymond Rivera. Raymond Rivera said that he
Speaker 1: saw Pablo two days before the murder and that he
Speaker 1: witnessed pub of being hired to shoot Kintaro. Now, at
Speaker 1: this time, according to what the d a's office disclosed
Speaker 1: to us, Rivera could not have been in Upper Manhattan
Speaker 1: witnessing Pablo or anybody else being paid to do this
Speaker 1: murder because during this time, Rivera was actually incarcerated in
Speaker 1: state prison more than three hundred miles away. From New
Speaker 1: York City, and that meant that his testimony was just
Speaker 1: outright perjury. He could not have been in New York,
Speaker 1: he could now have been in Manhattan. They were prison records,
Speaker 1: new York State records that showed that he was incarcerated
Speaker 1: at the time. And when these disclosures came out, the
Speaker 1: d a's office decided to stop fighting the case, and
Speaker 1: Pablo was first released on bail in August, and then
Speaker 1: in September of the d a's office asked the trial
Speaker 1: court to dismiss the case against Pablo. In September, two
Speaker 1: days before his birthday, Pablo walked out of Manhattan Criminal Court.
Speaker 1: Finally a freeman. The day that you've been waiting for
Speaker 1: for twenty five years has finally come. You're innocent. Your
Speaker 1: lawyers know you were innocent the whole time, your family
Speaker 1: do you're innocent the whole time. Now everyone knows, the
Speaker 1: court has said it. What was that moment like when
Speaker 1: you were finally declared actually innocent and set free? Wow?
Speaker 1: It was an amazing day. He was. It was he
Speaker 1: was my day every day. I was thinking in that
Speaker 1: day and I know that one day you're going to come.
Speaker 1: And that was the date. I was so happy that
Speaker 1: the trew came out and that I was re free.
Speaker 1: But in the same way, I feel a little bad.
Speaker 1: My father passed away when I was in jail two
Speaker 1: d and fourteen, and one of the things that I
Speaker 1: wanted is to see my family, my then my father.
Speaker 1: They see my freedom, they see me out or my father,
Speaker 1: and how a portunity to see me. He knows that
Speaker 1: I know from the beginning, I can show him, you know,
Speaker 1: my FREEO. I feel happy that I'm free, b in
Speaker 1: the same in the same time, I feel little. I
Speaker 1: don't know how to say, but I'm feeling my father,
Speaker 1: my my hall, that I can see him, that I
Speaker 1: can hold her no and show him no. I hear
Speaker 1: with you again. The good news is your home now.
Speaker 1: Um they're never going back. And Pablo, I have to
Speaker 1: ask how, I mean people out here in the free
Speaker 1: world trying to find love, going everywhere, looking on lyne on, here,
Speaker 1: on there, going out, and you found love from behind
Speaker 1: the walls of prison. I mean, you're a charming guy,
Speaker 1: but still that's amazing. Can you explain? We know he
Speaker 1: shad the folk outside before I get locked up. When
Speaker 1: I get Lato in jail, a friend of mine. He
Speaker 1: was my white Tania best friend brother. We see that
Speaker 1: we from the same area, and we started talking about people,
Speaker 1: and when I mentioned Litania, so he said, listen, my
Speaker 1: sister is Tanya Strengths. So the same day he called,
Speaker 1: so he sistered that I was here, and next day
Speaker 1: I got a visit Fontania. Since that day we together.
Speaker 1: That happened to thousands three Sina means one basis the
Speaker 1: all we call to see me. Yeah, and you two
Speaker 1: got married. She I mean, it's amazing. Really, she stuck
Speaker 1: by you the whole way. It's beautiful and it's just
Speaker 1: got to feel amazing. And I know I speak for
Speaker 1: so many others, all of us here a round for
Speaker 1: connection and everyone in your in your very wide circle.
Speaker 1: Now when I say that, we wish you to all
Speaker 1: the best that life has to offer. Any other news.
Speaker 1: Now I got a new soul. Now come out a
Speaker 1: great stuff. Congratulations to you both. So I mean, there's
Speaker 1: really nowhere left to go after that. So let's just
Speaker 1: end on a high note here and go straight to
Speaker 1: closing arguments, which is of course a segment on the show,
Speaker 1: my favorite segment. When I thank both of you, each
Speaker 1: of you for being here. And then I shut my
Speaker 1: microphone off, just kick back and listen as I hear
Speaker 1: whatever you want to say, whatever you want to talk
Speaker 1: about it. Let's start with David first and leave you
Speaker 1: Pablo for last. Thanks Jason. I just want to say
Speaker 1: that it was such an honor and the privilege to
Speaker 1: represent Pablo, to fight for him, to meet his family,
Speaker 1: his mother, his sisters, other members of his family, his
Speaker 1: wife Tanya, who is just such a lovely, impressive woman.
Speaker 1: I'm just so happy for Pablo Antania. But even though
Speaker 1: twenty four years in prison and fourteen fifteen years of
Speaker 1: their marriage, Pablo was incarcerated, now that they get a
Speaker 1: chance to be together and to have a child together,
Speaker 1: and they have two other children and this will be
Speaker 1: a third, and this is just really wonderful. As I
Speaker 1: said before, it's just so rewarding to do this type
Speaker 1: of work. I would urge every lawyer I know to
Speaker 1: try to get involved in criminal justice reform where it
Speaker 1: doesn't have to be an innocent case. But there's so
Speaker 1: much work that needs to be done around criminal justice reform,
Speaker 1: and especially if you are at a large firm like
Speaker 1: Paul Wise, there's so many resources that you can bring
Speaker 1: to bear. And there's so many wrongs that need to
Speaker 1: be righted, especially in the New York criminal justice system.
Speaker 1: There have been a lot of cases that NYPD has
Speaker 1: been involved in that had terrible, unjust tragic results. In
Speaker 1: these cases can also be a lot of fun. It
Speaker 1: is fun to be on the right side of his
Speaker 1: three and on the right side of justice, and it's
Speaker 1: energizing in the morning to get out and now that
Speaker 1: you're fighting for an innocent person, I want to say
Speaker 1: thank you. I feel so grateful for ord wise everybody
Speaker 1: they're working in the case. That's the only reason I know.
Speaker 1: They know I'm innocing. They do the best. Yes, they
Speaker 1: made my my dream through they made my freedom or
Speaker 1: my family happy. Now I enjoyed my song because then
Speaker 1: and everything because then I feel so happy for then
Speaker 1: grateful my family too, Like we kill like family, my
Speaker 1: family feel like there is my family. I feel like
Speaker 1: they're my family. And thank you for Grammy in the
Speaker 1: program to make that troop come out. You know, I
Speaker 1: know so many people like me innocently. They know how
Speaker 1: the opportunity that I have. It's Brayma, don't forget to
Speaker 1: give us a fantastic review. Wherever you get your podcasts,
Speaker 1: it really helps. And I'm a proud donor to the
Speaker 1: Innocence Project and I really hope you'll join me in
Speaker 1: supporting this very important cause and helping to prevent future
Speaker 1: wrongful convictions. Go to Innocence Project dot org to learn
Speaker 1: how to donate and get involved. I'd like to thank
Speaker 1: our production team, Connor Hall and Kevin Wardis. The music
Speaker 1: in the show is by three time OSCAR nominated composer
Speaker 1: Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on Instagram at
Speaker 1: Wrongful Conviction and on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast. Wrongful
Speaker 1: Conviction with Jason Flam is a production of Lava for
Speaker 1: Good Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number one