Speaker 1: On July tenth, sixteen year old Raymond Ellen Warren and
Speaker 1: two friends were walking down Kilmer Street in Dayton, Ohio.
Speaker 1: A car swerved up and the driver asked them for drugs,
Speaker 1: but they were not drug dealers. The trio continued on
Speaker 1: to one of the friends houses to fix a flat
Speaker 1: tire on Raymond's motorized scooter. They heard gunshots in the
Speaker 1: distance behind them. After fixing the flat, Raymond rode back
Speaker 1: to his grandmother's on Kilmer Street, where he saw that
Speaker 1: a car had crashed into one of her neighbor's houses.
Speaker 1: The driver had been fatally shot a roll of counterfeit
Speaker 1: bills laid next to him. When questioned by cops on
Speaker 1: the scene, Raymond told them about the drug solicitation. He
Speaker 1: was then taken to the station to give a statement.
Speaker 1: After submitting to a gunshot residue test, he was released.
Speaker 1: The palm of his non dominant hand tested positive for
Speaker 1: two elements associated with gunplay. According to what was considered
Speaker 1: reliable science at the time, the presence of those elements
Speaker 1: could mean one of only three things that Raymond had
Speaker 1: either fired a gun, handle ammunition, or was the victim
Speaker 1: of gun violence. This gave police more than enough confidence
Speaker 1: to coerce the two other children with the threat of
Speaker 1: their own prosecution, to implicate their friend. The same strain
Speaker 1: of expert testimony presented at his trial had been heard
Speaker 1: by countless juries for decades that at least a decade
Speaker 1: more thereafter, until some startling realizations about the reliability of
Speaker 1: gunshot residue testing were finally made. This his wrongful conviction.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction today. We've got a junk
Speaker 1: science case out of Ohio gunshot residue testing case to
Speaker 1: be exact, but with the information that they had, many people,
Speaker 1: investigators and law enforcement included, probably thought they had the
Speaker 1: right guy, not like some of our other cases where
Speaker 1: there was still plenty of reasonable doubt or even knowledge
Speaker 1: to the countrary. And our guest was just a sixteen
Speaker 1: year old boy at the time, and he joins us
Speaker 1: now from a correctional facility in Ohio. Raymond Allen Warren,
Speaker 1: Welcome to Wrongful Conviction. Okay, thank you, Brad, and I
Speaker 1: a want to thank everyone there the podcast. You're very welcome,
Speaker 1: and joining Raymond today is his fierce advocate that our
Speaker 1: listeners might remember from the gunshot residue episode of Wrongful
Speaker 1: Conviction Junk Science in which they actually touched on Raymond's
Speaker 1: case while discussing the issue at large. We're gonna have
Speaker 1: that episode linked in our bio. I implore you to
Speaker 1: go and check it out. It's an eye opener. She
Speaker 1: is the director of the Wrongful Conviction Project at the
Speaker 1: office of the Ohio Public Defender Joanna Sanchez. Welcome to
Speaker 1: the show. Thanks for having me. You're welcome, all right. So, Raymond,
Speaker 1: you've been in prison going on. Jesus, I hate to
Speaker 1: even say this, but you've been in prison for twelve years,
Speaker 1: longer now than you were a lot live before all
Speaker 1: of this happened. That's just nuts. But can you tell
Speaker 1: us a bit about your first sixteen years of life
Speaker 1: before this tragedy. As you said, it was a sixteen
Speaker 1: years old. I primarily grew up in Dane, Ohio, back
Speaker 1: and forth from Kentucky as well. I have a lot
Speaker 1: of family down there and uh the Blue Report. Um,
Speaker 1: I had a good childhood. I would say three younger
Speaker 1: brothers at the time. I have five old brothers now.
Speaker 1: And I understand you were really into like working on
Speaker 1: cars and stuff like that. I grew up basically tell
Speaker 1: yourself part as a kid and the older I got.
Speaker 1: Um I started working vehicles right before this incarceration, like
Speaker 1: maybe like a year year and a half. I had
Speaker 1: learned to paying cards, so that was something that I
Speaker 1: was doing it on a regular basis. Um I didn't
Speaker 1: even started to make a little money at and UH.
Speaker 1: I was you know, probably considered probably the neighborhood mechanic.
Speaker 1: Anybody needed something done to their car, I was there
Speaker 1: to do it. Just kids trying to figure stuff out.
Speaker 1: So it sounds like you had a lot of stuff,
Speaker 1: you know, figured out go in the right direction anyway,
Speaker 1: and you had a talent and a passion for something
Speaker 1: that could have earned you a good living. So now
Speaker 1: we get to the faithful day of July tenth ur
Speaker 1: and there was a scooter you were working on. Was
Speaker 1: it your scooter or did it belong to one of
Speaker 1: your friends? Well, the scooter belong to me. I had
Speaker 1: a flat tire. It was at my grandmother's house where
Speaker 1: I was staying. We had to take it to Antonio's house,
Speaker 1: where we basically kept all the tubs and we'd accumulated
Speaker 1: chant and Antonio had arrived that evening to help me
Speaker 1: moving from our grandmother's house to Antonio's house. Deficit to
Speaker 1: Me and m Chante were basically pushing the scooter. He
Speaker 1: was steering it and I was looking up the back
Speaker 1: of the scooter because as I had a flat you
Speaker 1: couldn't move it any other way. Antonio was riding alongside
Speaker 1: of the street when the car pulled up. Um guy
Speaker 1: in the car asked us or someone in the car
Speaker 1: asked us we had these drugs, I said, but nothing
Speaker 1: happening and we don't got nothing. Antonio said something I
Speaker 1: don't remember exactly what, cursing them out, and they kept going.
Speaker 1: We continue along our path to Antonios house. We arrived
Speaker 1: at the corner of Kilmer in late View when we
Speaker 1: heard gun shots. We immediately like took our right. We
Speaker 1: were pushing the scooter and I lived at the backup
Speaker 1: and me and say we're doing our best to book
Speaker 1: you Alan to get to Antonio's house. And when we
Speaker 1: arrived at Tonio's house, we basically dropped the scooter. We'll
Speaker 1: have to realize was anybody shooting at us and realize
Speaker 1: it was safe. Started working on the scooter right and
Speaker 1: specifically we're fixing a flat tire. The way that the
Speaker 1: scooter is made, you have to take the breaks and
Speaker 1: the wheel off before you can get to the action tire,
Speaker 1: as well as lift of the month off of the wheel. Will.
Speaker 1: It's not like tired like a car or something. It's
Speaker 1: a lot different. You have to really take all everything
Speaker 1: apart on the back of the scooter. So yeah, we're
Speaker 1: absolutely working with the grape components, a muffler, everything that
Speaker 1: was attached to that WILL. So at this point you
Speaker 1: have no idea what happened back there on Kilmer Street,
Speaker 1: but just that it was smart to not be anywhere
Speaker 1: around it and you were able to fix your flat. Now,
Speaker 1: before we get into the specific of the crime itself,
Speaker 1: I want to turn to Joanna. So, Joanna, one of
Speaker 1: the things that I found fascinating about some of the
Speaker 1: issues that you and Josh Stuben discussed on wrongful Conviction
Speaker 1: junk science was that things like cigarette ash, drive urine,
Speaker 1: and so many other you know, substances, even household substances,
Speaker 1: can cause a false positive on a gunshot residue or
Speaker 1: GSR test. Can you explain how that happens? Sure, So
Speaker 1: GSR tests don't actually test for a unique substance known
Speaker 1: as gunshot residue. What they're really testing for our elements
Speaker 1: that are known to be present in gunshot residue. And
Speaker 1: the test using Raymond's case was an atomic absorption test.
Speaker 1: It's not really used anymore because it has limited utility,
Speaker 1: but it was testing for two elements bari um and antimony,
Speaker 1: and those two elements exist in our atmosphere. They're found
Speaker 1: in things like fireworks, matches, some types of batteries, lubricating greases,
Speaker 1: and particularly relevant here in brake pad dust. So if
Speaker 1: somebody's had contact with any of those substances, they potentially
Speaker 1: could test positive for barri um and antimony and give
Speaker 1: a false positive on a gunshot residue test. Right, So,
Speaker 1: as Raymond just said and his friends confirmed, so it's
Speaker 1: undisputed that they had fixed a flat that night, handled
Speaker 1: the brake pads and other components. But we haven't even
Speaker 1: gotten to why all of this matters yet. So it
Speaker 1: turns out that this guy, Wendell Simpson was driving around
Speaker 1: Kilmer Street that night, and there may or may not
Speaker 1: have been a gold Buick either following him or just
Speaker 1: cruising the area. Now it's believed that the gunshots heard
Speaker 1: earlier by Raymond and his friends had killed this guy,
Speaker 1: Wendell Simpson. His body was found in the front seat
Speaker 1: of his car, which had crashed into a house five
Speaker 1: Kilmer Street, just up to block from Raymond's grandmother's house.
Speaker 1: There was a crowbar on the floor as well as
Speaker 1: the role of counterfeit bills encircled by two real dollar
Speaker 1: bills on the front seat. Three shells were also recovered
Speaker 1: from the scene, one on the right rear floorboard, one
Speaker 1: on the right side of the driver's seat, and another
Speaker 1: new left front tire. And it appears that there were
Speaker 1: some witnesses or perhaps even potential suspects for this crime.
Speaker 1: So there are two young men who are there at
Speaker 1: the scene as well, Andre Wright and Stanley Williams, and
Speaker 1: what they indicate to the police is that they saw
Speaker 1: Wendel Simpson's car crashed um into the house on Kilmer Street,
Speaker 1: and so they pull their car up and park across
Speaker 1: the street. They're driving a gold Buick and what they
Speaker 1: indicate is that they went to Mr simpsons car multiple times,
Speaker 1: first to put it in park, then to turn off
Speaker 1: the engine, and they plan to leave the scene, but
Speaker 1: the police got there before they could, and so they
Speaker 1: tell the police. At this story, they tell them that
Speaker 1: they are just in the neighborhood kind of cruising around
Speaker 1: that night. The police take them to the station, but
Speaker 1: they don't fingerprint them, they don't test them for guns residue,
Speaker 1: and then they just let them go. Now, we're not
Speaker 1: trying to implicate other potentially innocent people here, of course not.
Speaker 1: But that interaction is at the very least remarkable considering
Speaker 1: what happened to Raymond, who at this time had just
Speaker 1: fixed the flat tire, went to a nearby gas station
Speaker 1: and was heading back to Grandma's house on Kilmer Street.
Speaker 1: When I arrived at my grandmother's house, there was some
Speaker 1: kind of commotion at the top of the block and
Speaker 1: there were policing, fire trucks and all kinds of stuff
Speaker 1: out there. Um A detective approached me while I was
Speaker 1: putting the school on my grandmother's porch and asked me
Speaker 1: had I seen anything. I didn't really know what he
Speaker 1: was talking about. He asked me about the street. See
Speaker 1: what he was he was talking about. So I walked
Speaker 1: with him with the scooter up the street. He asked
Speaker 1: me if I had seen the vehicle, and I said
Speaker 1: I don't know. I'm sure. I said that vehicle did
Speaker 1: drive by us we were walking to and told us.
Speaker 1: He asked me what was what was I going? Um,
Speaker 1: SO was going to visit my sitter, And he asked
Speaker 1: me if I would go downtown with him and give
Speaker 1: further detail about where I was who I was with.
Speaker 1: So I didn't mind, I don't care, So being that
Speaker 1: I do to help, I absolutely good. They handcuffing and
Speaker 1: placed me in a backup police card. So, Okay, you
Speaker 1: were trying to help, right, and you had already explained
Speaker 1: where you had been. But maybe it was that you
Speaker 1: potentially had contact with this vehicle before the shooting. So
Speaker 1: at this point you didn't know that you had any
Speaker 1: reason to be scared, but the handcuffs certainly could have
Speaker 1: been some kind of indication. So now they take you
Speaker 1: down to the station. How did that go when you
Speaker 1: got there? Um? It took me to a room and
Speaker 1: took the handcuffs off of me, and I was in
Speaker 1: there for quite some time. The light was turned off
Speaker 1: and I started to nod off on the table a
Speaker 1: little bit when a detective came in the room and
Speaker 1: started asking me questions. At first, it was you know,
Speaker 1: it's just asking me questions about who I was with,
Speaker 1: where I was, had I seen the vehicle, And like
Speaker 1: I said, I wasn't for sure that I had seen
Speaker 1: that particularly able, But I told you about the vehicle
Speaker 1: that had approach, told him about my friends that I
Speaker 1: was with Tony on shanty as well as you're going
Speaker 1: to face the school. Was anything was wrong with it?
Speaker 1: So gay his story. I told him exactly where I was,
Speaker 1: who I was with. He voluntarily waves his rights, he
Speaker 1: agrees to give a statement, and he agrees to this
Speaker 1: gunshot residue test. I haven't done anything wrong with guns,
Speaker 1: it right, Since, after all, you hadn't fired a gun.
Speaker 1: You had every reason to be confident that you wouldn't
Speaker 1: test positive because nobody, I mean, let's not forget no
Speaker 1: one at the time understood that these tests could easily
Speaker 1: result in false positives. So that night, Raymond was released
Speaker 1: to his grandma and went home thinking, probably thinking he
Speaker 1: was safe. So the gunshot residue test comes back and
Speaker 1: they detect antimony and bury him on the palm of
Speaker 1: Raymond's right hand. It's not on the back of his
Speaker 1: right hand, it's not anywhere on his left hand. It's
Speaker 1: just on the palm. Raymond is left handed, so it's
Speaker 1: on his non dominant hand that they find these two elements.
Speaker 1: This is what's weird about this. So it was only
Speaker 1: on the palm, not on the backside, where you might
Speaker 1: expect it more likely to be. I mean, you can
Speaker 1: just hold your hand up and mimic a firing motion
Speaker 1: and you'll see what I'm talking about. And on the
Speaker 1: non dominant hand. You would expect it to be on
Speaker 1: his dominant hand, and the fact that it's not, I
Speaker 1: think is indicative that it's contamination, either from the break
Speaker 1: pads or potentially because he has handcuffed, he's in a
Speaker 1: police cruiser, he's taken down to the police station, he's
Speaker 1: in the interrogation room. Those are all surfaces that we
Speaker 1: know are contaminated with gunshot residue. So not only had
Speaker 1: he been working with brake pads that night, there was
Speaker 1: also a tremendous amount of opportunities for touch transfer, which
Speaker 1: is why it is widely accepted now that GSR testing,
Speaker 1: or more specifically, the atomic absorption test that was used
Speaker 1: in this case, is almost entirely meaningless. In fact, the
Speaker 1: only reasonable use it has is in the scenario where
Speaker 1: the suspect hasn't had the opportunity to vigorously wash their hands.
Speaker 1: Then are tested and the absence of the elements associated
Speaker 1: with gun use could be exculpatory, as we've pointed out
Speaker 1: before on the show, very different than it being used
Speaker 1: as in an inculpatory manner as it was here. That's
Speaker 1: what we know now. But back then, with this positive
Speaker 1: GSR test, Raymond's fate was I hate to say it,
Speaker 1: but it was pretty much sealed at that time. They
Speaker 1: believed that antimony and barium are very unique to gunshot residue,
Speaker 1: So if somebody tests positive for those elements, the belief
Speaker 1: is that it means they fired a weapon, they were
Speaker 1: a victim of a shooting, or they handled ammunition. So
Speaker 1: those results were in and the police are like, whoa,
Speaker 1: We've got our guy here. So you had mentioned Antonio
Speaker 1: and Schanta and you're statement. So the police go to
Speaker 1: Antonio's home a few weeks after the shooting, multiple police cards,
Speaker 1: multiple police officers, and they pull up on Antonio. He's
Speaker 1: in his front yard and they say, we want to
Speaker 1: take you down to the police station to talk to
Speaker 1: you about this crime. He asks to go tell his parents.
Speaker 1: They're in the house and the police won't let him.
Speaker 1: So this fourteen year old boys being escorted to the
Speaker 1: police station. His parents don't know about it. He gets there,
Speaker 1: he asks to call his mom. They say no, and
Speaker 1: what they tell him is that we'll let you go
Speaker 1: home once you make a statement. And so they interview
Speaker 1: him for a lengthy period of time. It appears without
Speaker 1: recording it. All we have is a recording of the
Speaker 1: last five to ten minutes of his statement. And what
Speaker 1: Antonio testifies to at various points during the proceedings, including
Speaker 1: in in Raymond's juvenile proceedings, is that the police told
Speaker 1: him they were looking to put this crime on him
Speaker 1: if he didn't implicate Raymond. And so what he did
Speaker 1: was he gave a statement. In the record statement, you
Speaker 1: can tell that it's practiced. He seems like he's reading
Speaker 1: a script. At one point he stops and because in
Speaker 1: this little room, he's clearly at least two police officers there,
Speaker 1: one is sitting right up against him. They're very close
Speaker 1: to one another, and Antonia sort of running quickly through
Speaker 1: what happened this night, and at one point stops and
Speaker 1: looks to somebody off Cameron says, oh, I messed up
Speaker 1: as I was welcome back, going back to home. Um,
Speaker 1: this guy had pulled up Allan's right behind us house.
Speaker 1: You drank a pop. So it appears that he's talked
Speaker 1: to them for a lengthy period of time and then
Speaker 1: it was told, you know, to give this very short
Speaker 1: statement implicating Raymond. Yeah, and no one really picked up
Speaker 1: on this flub. That illustrates that he was just repeating
Speaker 1: the story that they had developed. He had been coerced
Speaker 1: into doing so by the threat of his own wrongful prosecution.
Speaker 1: And Shanty was faced with the same call it what
Speaker 1: it is, a sophie's choice. Yeah, Shanty. They come to
Speaker 1: his house one morning, it's six thirty in the morning.
Speaker 1: He's sleeping. He'd gone to bed late the night before,
Speaker 1: so he's not on much rest. They take him to
Speaker 1: the police station and they tell him the same thing
Speaker 1: where they'd say, you know, we're looking to talk to
Speaker 1: you about a murder we think you might have been
Speaker 1: involved in. And so ultimately what happens with Shanta, it's
Speaker 1: the police actually write out a statement and that's the
Speaker 1: statement that Shanta signs. He doesn't right it himself. It's
Speaker 1: not a recorded statement. It's a handwriten statement made by
Speaker 1: one of the police officers that he signs, and essentially
Speaker 1: that statement corroborated antonio statement. Both we're towing the line
Speaker 1: for this police narrative, which was that while this is
Speaker 1: the narrative they were putting forth was that while on
Speaker 1: the way to Antonio's house, this encounter with the victim happened.
Speaker 1: He asked for drugs antony. When Shanta kept walking, Raymond
Speaker 1: allegedly went into an alley with the victim, who tried
Speaker 1: to pay with the counterfeit role, and Raymond allegedly shot
Speaker 1: him for it. Raymond allegedly then admitted this to Antonio
Speaker 1: and Jontay. So when were you arrested and were you
Speaker 1: able to bond out? August the nine four, I was
Speaker 1: taking the juvenile custom and juven album custo. You don't
Speaker 1: have a bond or anything like that, which is backwards
Speaker 1: as hell, and even once bound over to the adult courts,
Speaker 1: the bond that they gave me, as I said, for
Speaker 1: steal forth and wasn't able to pay it. And it
Speaker 1: wasn't until these proceedings in which they magically decided that
Speaker 1: a sixteen year old was an adult. Right. That always
Speaker 1: blows my mind. Yeah, they just decided that it's sixteen
Speaker 1: year old was an adult for the purpose of inflicting,
Speaker 1: you know, a much more terrifying and harsh punishment. And
Speaker 1: and that was when you, for the first time you
Speaker 1: found out that your friends had even said these things.
Speaker 1: Wasn't part of that process, but an Tonio was. He
Speaker 1: came to court and made some statements that literally like,
Speaker 1: only why is they telling me a lot? I didn't
Speaker 1: I didn't have opportunity to speak with him. I'm sitting
Speaker 1: there life, like I say, on the balance of people
Speaker 1: made of boss statements, I really don't know what to do.
Speaker 1: This episode is underwritten by A i G, a leading
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Speaker 1: lives of its employees and in the communities where we
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Speaker 1: pro bono legal assistance and in recognition of A I
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Speaker 1: A i G Pro Bono Program provides free legal services
Speaker 1: and other support to underrepresented communities and individuals. So now
Speaker 1: you're set to be tried as an adult. I mean,
Speaker 1: you're a child in a very adult, very real nightmare.
Speaker 1: It's March. You were assigned to public Defenders from the
Speaker 1: Montgomery County Public Defender's Office. The States case really was
Speaker 1: these three pieces of evidence, the alleged gunshot resuue, Antonio's testimony,
Speaker 1: and Shante's testimony. What's interesting is Antonio and Shanta actually
Speaker 1: didn't show up the day they were supposed to testify.
Speaker 1: They were supposed to come down to court. They were
Speaker 1: subpoena and they didn't come. So the next day the
Speaker 1: police actually go out and they arrest them, and they
Speaker 1: bring them down to the court and they hold them
Speaker 1: in jail, and so they're they're understanding is you can
Speaker 1: go home once to testify. So the two of them
Speaker 1: testify against Raymond, and the story that they give is
Speaker 1: that they went to his house, they got his scooter.
Speaker 1: They start going down Kilmer Street toward Antonio's home. Mr
Speaker 1: Simpson approaches them in his car and he's looking for drugs,
Speaker 1: and then Shanta and Antonio continue onto Antonio's house, but
Speaker 1: Raymond goes into the alley with Mr. Simpson. They say
Speaker 1: that then here shots and then Raymond comes up to
Speaker 1: Antonio's house and says, I had to shoot the guy
Speaker 1: because he gave me fake money. Antonio and Shanty both
Speaker 1: also testified that they saw Raymond with a gun the
Speaker 1: day before the shooting. What's interesting also is that Chantey,
Speaker 1: when he's testifying, he actually initially does not testify to
Speaker 1: seeing Raymond with a gun or testified him confessing. He
Speaker 1: only remembers those facts after the police show him the
Speaker 1: handwritten statement that they wrote, and he signed, right, And
Speaker 1: it's hard to remember lies, especially when you weren't even
Speaker 1: the one that initially wrote them. So they have these
Speaker 1: statements from the two kids that would have and should
Speaker 1: have been his alibi witnesses. By the way, both of
Speaker 1: them have since recanted on the record, right, But that
Speaker 1: hasn't really done anything for Raymond thus far. He's still
Speaker 1: right where he is. But back at trial, the defense
Speaker 1: did present two witnesses that shed a lot of doubt
Speaker 1: on the stage case. So there were two people who
Speaker 1: lived in the neighborhood nearby, John and Patricia Moreland, and
Speaker 1: the defense called them and Patricia testified to she was
Speaker 1: kind of walking around the neighborhood at this time. She'd
Speaker 1: gone to her friend's house to get her hair done
Speaker 1: and then was coming home, and so she testified to
Speaker 1: seeing Mr Simpson in his car kind of rolling around
Speaker 1: the block a few times. Her husband, John testified that
Speaker 1: he was in his home he heard the crash, so
Speaker 1: he goes outside to check it out, and at that
Speaker 1: point he sees the gold buick driven by Andre Right
Speaker 1: and Stanley Williams, and to him it looked like the
Speaker 1: buick had potentially been following Mr Simpson's car. So he
Speaker 1: sees the buick come around and turn around and park
Speaker 1: across the street. And what Mr Moreland says is he
Speaker 1: actually sees three people come out of the buick. These
Speaker 1: three men get out of the gold Buick, that they
Speaker 1: go back and forth between their car and Mr Simpson's
Speaker 1: car several times. And then when the police arrived, one
Speaker 1: of these three men has disappeared, and so now there's
Speaker 1: only two men left at the scene. Again, we're not
Speaker 1: saying that these individuals are guilty, but they were not
Speaker 1: ruled out by GSR testing. At the very least, they
Speaker 1: should have been more interesting to the authorities than Raymond
Speaker 1: was to the police at that time. Plus, the Morlands
Speaker 1: did not mention seeing Raymond come and go from the
Speaker 1: scene while they had watched these three men. But now
Speaker 1: here goes the quote unquote expert testimony that sounded very official,
Speaker 1: and this had law enforcement, the prosecutor's office, and everybody
Speaker 1: believing or at least putting forth the narrative that Raymond
Speaker 1: was the actual guy. So the gunshot residue analysts testified
Speaker 1: that he found barriam and antimony on Raymond's non dominant
Speaker 1: hand and that it meant one of those three things
Speaker 1: that he either shot a firearm, was a victim of
Speaker 1: a shooting, or handled contaminated ammunition. I mean, I'm sitting
Speaker 1: there listen to this like lion, like no way, and
Speaker 1: at the same time, I don't have anything to come bad,
Speaker 1: is you know, I like it depend on as my
Speaker 1: lawyers at the time, they didn't know to break past
Speaker 1: and working with vehicles and mottle oil and other things
Speaker 1: like that be something that would cause these readings. I mean,
Speaker 1: the jury is they're hearing from two children who are saying,
Speaker 1: my friend did this. They're hearing from the scientific evidence
Speaker 1: you know back in the sounds like real science, and
Speaker 1: they're being told it could only be one of these
Speaker 1: three things, and two of those things are inculpatory, like
Speaker 1: the idea that he handled ammunition or fired a gun.
Speaker 1: Both of those things aren't good and certainly he wasn't
Speaker 1: a victim of a shooting. So the jury is left
Speaker 1: with very little to go on. But it's they believe
Speaker 1: Chant and Antonio and they believe the science. At that point,
Speaker 1: did you hold out any hope that the jury was
Speaker 1: going to get it right? I thought, see the video
Speaker 1: tape Antonio did, and so like I say that he's
Speaker 1: being forced to say certain things. I thought that the
Speaker 1: truth would come out. I really didn't think like I
Speaker 1: would be sitting here now. I didn't. Verny did come back.
Speaker 1: I was jumper found to the jury members cried said
Speaker 1: certain things, didn't It's like they were kind of bullied
Speaker 1: into the verdict themselves. So I was. I was still
Speaker 1: kind of dull found during the whole process, Like for
Speaker 1: a couple of years. I literally said and waiting like
Speaker 1: every time, like the door was open, like I was
Speaker 1: waiting on the gun gets them and they made no mistake.
Speaker 1: Just as as we discussed, I was a bound over
Speaker 1: ast an adult. Back then, they didn't have juven out
Speaker 1: like blocks or anything like that for individuals who were
Speaker 1: under anything. So I was thought right into the the
Speaker 1: jungle going to speak at a Levan non correctional institution.
Speaker 1: As a kid, I was preyed up on, you know, uh,
Speaker 1: sexually harassed by both inmate sin guards are. Life definitely
Speaker 1: was a dal battle. One still continues to be the
Speaker 1: bout um and it has not been easy. And then
Speaker 1: the very beginning it was. Man, it was a fight
Speaker 1: for my life every day like it was really, like
Speaker 1: I said, just trying to number it, stay out of
Speaker 1: harm's way. One of the things that I've tried to
Speaker 1: make sure that I've done this educating myself and stay
Speaker 1: prepared for when his daughters doing Um. I've required my
Speaker 1: left I just degree with Storis certification and I'm also
Speaker 1: a college now. I was trying to stay busy with
Speaker 1: education as well as physical uh activities, working out things
Speaker 1: like that, Just staying busy with a job, as well
Speaker 1: as staying active in my own legal process, reading the
Speaker 1: documents and things like that that my legal team sends
Speaker 1: me make sure that I'm abreast of the things that
Speaker 1: are being done. Is convicted in five he has a
Speaker 1: direct appeal um. That's unsuccessful, and from that point forward
Speaker 1: he's really on his own, and so he's making every
Speaker 1: effort he can to find an attorney to help him
Speaker 1: challenge his conviction, which is incredibly difficult. He has no money,
Speaker 1: he's incarcerated, and he's by that point seventeen years old.
Speaker 1: So he and his brother's scraped together a little money
Speaker 1: and are able to hire an attorney. And this is
Speaker 1: around n that attorney actually goes out and he gets
Speaker 1: a recantation from Shanta Hunt. So Shante Hunt says, this
Speaker 1: didn't happen the way I said at trial. The police
Speaker 1: terrified me. I was a kid, and I thought that
Speaker 1: they were going to charge me with a murder if
Speaker 1: I didn't implicate Raymond. What really happened is exactly what
Speaker 1: Raymond said, which is, you know, we are approached by
Speaker 1: Mr Simpson, we said no, we don't have drugs, and
Speaker 1: then all three of us go to Antonio's house. We
Speaker 1: are all together when we hear the shots. And so
Speaker 1: he's saying Raymond could not have done this because he
Speaker 1: was with me when we heard the shots. My testimony
Speaker 1: was a lie. So Raymond has that affidavit now, but
Speaker 1: at this point he's run out of money, and so
Speaker 1: this attorney doesn't file it for him because he can
Speaker 1: no longer afford to pay him. So then Raymond he's
Speaker 1: trying to get a new attorney. He's writing probably over
Speaker 1: the years, hundreds and hundreds of letters. In the next
Speaker 1: fifteen years or so, Raymond works with a number of attorneys.
Speaker 1: He every once in a while is able to scrape
Speaker 1: together enough money to hire someone. In you know, the
Speaker 1: mid two thousands, he did that and somebody filed an
Speaker 1: unsuccessful procedural motion. He's out there still trying to get
Speaker 1: Antonio and see if he's willing to recant. But Antonio
Speaker 1: is really hard to find. He's changed his last name,
Speaker 1: he's incarcerated for a period of time. So it's not
Speaker 1: until two thousand and eight that Antonio comes forward and
Speaker 1: also recants his testimony. Well, I was very fortunate to
Speaker 1: run into a guy who was going home New Astonio,
Speaker 1: and I was also in contact with the Project and
Speaker 1: they were helping me as well. They were investigating my case.
Speaker 1: I related information to New Hobby as a project, and
Speaker 1: they were able to obtain an affidavit or truth from
Speaker 1: Audio Johnson Ross and he says the same thing, which
Speaker 1: is I was a scared kid. My testimony was not true.
Speaker 1: I thought they were going to charge me with this murder,
Speaker 1: and I didn't come forward sooner because I was scared
Speaker 1: I would be charged with perjury. So Raymond now has
Speaker 1: both of these affidavits, and it's really a series of
Speaker 1: mishaps at that point. He's got one organization that's working
Speaker 1: for him. But then they lose his file and sort
Speaker 1: of don't do anything on the case for a while.
Speaker 1: They then find it and sort of reopened his case
Speaker 1: and then close it. So he's, you know, he thinks
Speaker 1: something's going to happen, and then it doesn't. They then
Speaker 1: referred his case to another attorney who basically ignores him,
Speaker 1: you know, and she would later tell us that she
Speaker 1: handled this worse than any other matter in her career.
Speaker 1: It really does take a village. So he's had Shante's
Speaker 1: affidavit since, and almost ten years went by before you
Speaker 1: caught up with Antonio. The clock is ticking on all
Speaker 1: of this newly discovered evidence and all of these attorneys
Speaker 1: that Raymond simply doesn't have the means to maintain. This
Speaker 1: just screws him over even more than the system already
Speaker 1: has which is hard to believe or even imagine. But
Speaker 1: is that accurate. That's definitely, and I have not been
Speaker 1: a good and learned I'm not an attorney. Don't play
Speaker 1: one on TV. Yeah, I hear that I'm not either, Raymond.
Speaker 1: A lot of people think I am, but I'm definitely
Speaker 1: not alert. I'm not even a college graduate. But anyway,
Speaker 1: it's not exactly like you had the benefit of having
Speaker 1: gone to law school. So the nightmare continued. It was
Speaker 1: literally a nightmare at the time. I really didn't know
Speaker 1: what to do with So it was just trying to
Speaker 1: understand the legal process and really put together something on
Speaker 1: my home and get filed myself, which I eventually did.
Speaker 1: I found motion. So two thousand thirteen, Raymond filed his motion.
Speaker 1: At the time, there was that an unwritten rule, but
Speaker 1: a rule that a lot of the courts had adopted
Speaker 1: that once a person discovers new evidence, they have an
Speaker 1: obligation to present to the court within a reasonable period
Speaker 1: of time. And so when Raymond filed his motion in
Speaker 1: two thousand thirteen, because he had had the affidavits for
Speaker 1: several years at that point and hadn't filed them, which
Speaker 1: the reason he hadn't filed is because he was thinking
Speaker 1: he was having all these attorneys who are going to
Speaker 1: do it for him, who ultimately did not. But the
Speaker 1: court determined that by the time he did file them
Speaker 1: in two thousand thirteen, he was out of time, that
Speaker 1: like an unreasonable amount of time had passed, and so
Speaker 1: they denied his motion as untimely. And the term unreasonable
Speaker 1: seems like a like a conveniently flexible term, but it
Speaker 1: seems like if a person's freedom is at stake and
Speaker 1: they're presenting the truth, I mean, any amount of time
Speaker 1: should be within reason, that's right. There's really not at
Speaker 1: that time a lot of guidance on what is a
Speaker 1: reasonable period of time. So there's cases where five years
Speaker 1: is determined to be reasonable, in cases where four months
Speaker 1: is determined to be unreasonable. So it's really hard to
Speaker 1: judge what will be deemed timely or untimely. I mean,
Speaker 1: you have these guys Antonio and Shante coming forward to
Speaker 1: their own peril and detriment, admitting to perjury, which carries
Speaker 1: up five to ten years sentence in Ohio, I believe,
Speaker 1: and yet they're gonna go ahead, thought about the authorities
Speaker 1: and tell an innocent man, Yeah, but you know nothing
Speaker 1: to see here. Too bad for you. An unreasonable amount
Speaker 1: of time has passed. Now, had he also supported those
Speaker 1: recantations with the evolving science on GSR? Or was that
Speaker 1: not until you all got involved in two thousand fourteen
Speaker 1: when Raymond initially filed his pro say motion, he doesn't
Speaker 1: know about the gunshot residue evidence. He doesn't have an
Speaker 1: understanding of this evolving science, so his motion was focused
Speaker 1: just on these two recantations. We stepped in for the appeal,
Speaker 1: and we actually were successful on appeal in the sense
Speaker 1: that we were allowed to go back to the trial
Speaker 1: court because the trial court had not let Raymond file
Speaker 1: a reply once the state opposed this motion, so we
Speaker 1: were sent back down to the trial court to give
Speaker 1: us the opportunity to reply. And at that point, now
Speaker 1: he has us as counsel, we asked to amend his
Speaker 1: initial motion, and so without amendment, we added in information
Speaker 1: about gunshot residue And what had happened in the years
Speaker 1: since his conviction is that the scientific community had really
Speaker 1: started to study gunshot residue evidence, and the FBI held
Speaker 1: a massive symposium in two thousand five where they looked
Speaker 1: at all sorts of studies regarding contamination and alternative sources
Speaker 1: for these two elements, such as breakpads and and they
Speaker 1: came up with a lot of best practices things that
Speaker 1: should be done to make the results more reliable. But
Speaker 1: the big takeaway from the symposium was that really the
Speaker 1: probative value of gunshot residue is negligible if there's any
Speaker 1: at all, because it's so transferable, there's so much risk
Speaker 1: for contamination. The results of a gunshot residue a positive
Speaker 1: tester's is truly meaningless. And as a result of that symposium,
Speaker 1: a lot of labs actually stopped doing gunshot residue testing altogether.
Speaker 1: So we amended Raymond's motion to include all of that
Speaker 1: information in addition to Antonio and Shaunta's recandations, and we
Speaker 1: also included a lot of information about why it took
Speaker 1: Raymond so long to present this evidence to the court.
Speaker 1: And so we went through and we got alfi davits
Speaker 1: from a lot of the attorneys that had represented him,
Speaker 1: and we included a lot of information about, you know,
Speaker 1: what this delay was and what the reason was was
Speaker 1: that he was relying on counsel. So we presented all
Speaker 1: of that to the trial court. His motion was denied again,
Speaker 1: and again they ruled it the delay in presenting this
Speaker 1: new evidence was unreasonable. So at that point we appealed again,
Speaker 1: and the appellate court reversed again, and what they said
Speaker 1: was that the trial courts should have had a hearing
Speaker 1: on Raymond's motion. So we go back to the trial courts.
Speaker 1: At that point, we have a multiple day evidentiary hearing,
Speaker 1: and the focus of this hearing is actually not on
Speaker 1: the new evidence. This hearing is entirely focused on whether
Speaker 1: Raymond filed this evidence within a reasonable period of time,
Speaker 1: right seemingly based on an arbitrary opinion, not on any
Speaker 1: concrete metric. So never mind that all of this has
Speaker 1: to do with these lawyers and Raymond's inability to financially
Speaker 1: maintain counsel. That's not a good enough reason. So he's
Speaker 1: denied again. At that point, we appealed again, and this
Speaker 1: time we lost the appeal. So he appealed to the
Speaker 1: Ohio Supreme Court and um they declined to take jurisdiction
Speaker 1: over Raymond's case, So at that point we had lost
Speaker 1: that issue. What's notable is about two years after that denial,
Speaker 1: in the hospital court in a different case, the court
Speaker 1: actually ruled that this reasonable time filing requirement was not
Speaker 1: anywhere in any rule or statue, and that courts shouldn't
Speaker 1: be applying it to defendants when they discover new evidence.
Speaker 1: And that was that was in March of the this year.
Speaker 1: As we're recording two and typical of our system, I'm
Speaker 1: going to go out on a limb and say that
Speaker 1: they will not be reconsidering cases that have already been decided,
Speaker 1: even if only several months had passed since that ruling.
Speaker 1: You know, this reminds me of how they sometimes make
Speaker 1: laws or change laws, but don't change them retroactively to
Speaker 1: correct all the injustice that has come before, which would
Speaker 1: seem like a no brainer, right, They just do it
Speaker 1: going forward. So it's like, how do you like to
Speaker 1: be the last person convicted under an old law that
Speaker 1: now the government has said is not a correct law.
Speaker 1: It's not it's not even a legal sentence anymore. And
Speaker 1: yet there you there, you stay. It doesn't make any sense.
Speaker 1: It's it's one of the most maddening things to me
Speaker 1: about our system. But anyway, another crazy thing to realize
Speaker 1: is that you all picked up his case in two
Speaker 1: thousand fourteen, and in eight years, we've only resolved the
Speaker 1: question that the courts didn't want to hear his claims
Speaker 1: of innocence because of an arbitrary time are yeah, mind you,
Speaker 1: no court has ever heard the merits of his claims
Speaker 1: of innocence, which, as you've heard here today, are extremely powerful.
Speaker 1: And this is the American appellate system in action. Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: they haven't even heard the evidence about the evidence. As
Speaker 1: I have something they care about, they don't care about,
Speaker 1: like said, the file that's right. Due to these procedural
Speaker 1: barriers and the time limitations on filing motions, over these years,
Speaker 1: no court has ever spent the time to look at
Speaker 1: these affidavits, to look at the gunshot reside evidence, and
Speaker 1: to actually determine whether it points to Raymond's innocence. And
Speaker 1: so we've spent all of this time, all of these resources,
Speaker 1: all of these years of litigation, really just focusing our
Speaker 1: energy on this timing question instead of what I think
Speaker 1: is the much more important question, which is do we
Speaker 1: have an innocent man who's been sitting there in prison
Speaker 1: for the last twenty seven years. All you need is
Speaker 1: really two brain cells to rub together and you could
Speaker 1: see this right, So where do we go from here.
Speaker 1: What we're working on right now is we we filed
Speaker 1: an application for DNA testing last year in the trial
Speaker 1: court and there were three shell casings found at the
Speaker 1: scene to in Mr Simpson's car, one just outside of
Speaker 1: the driver's side door, and so we asked for touch
Speaker 1: DNA testing on those shell casings. If that information came
Speaker 1: back and excluded Raymond as the source of the DNA
Speaker 1: on those shell casings, or even a step further pointed
Speaker 1: to a known individual as the source of the DNA,
Speaker 1: when you couple that information with Antonio and Shante's recantations
Speaker 1: and what we now know about gunshot residue, would be
Speaker 1: very compelling evidence of Raymond's innocence. And so we've asked
Speaker 1: for that DNA testing. Our application was denied, and so
Speaker 1: what we're doing right now is we're appealing that denial.
Speaker 1: The other thing is that Raymond is up for parole
Speaker 1: early next year, and he's been up for parole multiple times.
Speaker 1: He's always maintained his innocence before the parole board, and
Speaker 1: he's always been denied or continue knewed for several more years.
Speaker 1: But our hope is that you know now that he's
Speaker 1: done twenty seven years in prison, that he will be
Speaker 1: released on parole and can continue fighting for his innocence
Speaker 1: from the outside. Yeah, And unfortunately, maddeningly, parole boards almost
Speaker 1: always demand an emission of guilt, which Raymond of course
Speaker 1: has not done, even though he's been eligible now for
Speaker 1: almost ten years, since two thousand thirteen, and he has
Speaker 1: no plan of changing that. And as an innocent man,
Speaker 1: neither he nor any other innocent person should have this
Speaker 1: crazy condition right to admit guilt to a crime that
Speaker 1: didn't commit. Are there any other avenues other than where
Speaker 1: you found denial so far? The other notable thing right
Speaker 1: now in Ohio is that over the last couple of years,
Speaker 1: the Ohio Supreme Court convened a task force to study
Speaker 1: wrongful convictions and post conviction review and they were looking
Speaker 1: at a lot of different factors. How do we prevent
Speaker 1: wrongful convictions? You know, how do we better train police, attorneys, prosecutors.
Speaker 1: But one big aspect of the task force was how
Speaker 1: do we change our court rules and laws to ensure
Speaker 1: that there is a pathway to relief for innocent people,
Speaker 1: people like Raymond who have the evidence but they're running
Speaker 1: into procedural barriers, running into timelines, and the result of
Speaker 1: that task forces work were several recommendations to amend court
Speaker 1: rules and to amend legislation, and so one of the
Speaker 1: big things that we're hoping will happen in the near
Speaker 1: future is that those recommendations are adopted so that people
Speaker 1: like Raymond have options to litigate their case and to
Speaker 1: not have what happened to him occur, which is that
Speaker 1: you have this evidence, but no one's ever actually looked
Speaker 1: at it. So we're glad that someone really has Raymonds
Speaker 1: back here as he continues his fight. Is there anything
Speaker 1: our audience can do to help? Yeah, I like the
Speaker 1: audience and support me as much as possible. Anything that
Speaker 1: you see our website on the free raymomd website, supporting
Speaker 1: our petitions side anything they can do to pus to
Speaker 1: judge to the right thing, to letting my case process
Speaker 1: through because I miss the Actually I've proved my innocence
Speaker 1: shouldn't be sitting here. That's what the worst would be
Speaker 1: doing to support it. Well, we're going to have the
Speaker 1: action steps linked in the bio. So please, whatever you're
Speaker 1: doing right now, unless you're driving, stop and scroll down.
Speaker 1: Sign the petition, check out his site to stay up
Speaker 1: on developments in the case, and let's keep the pressure on.
Speaker 1: And that brings us now to my favorite part of
Speaker 1: the show, where first of all, I thank you all
Speaker 1: for joining us, and Raymond for sharing your story. And
Speaker 1: now I'm just going to turn my microphone off, kick
Speaker 1: back in my chair and just listen to anything you
Speaker 1: feel is left to be said. Let's kick it off
Speaker 1: with Jolanna and Raymond. You take us off into the sunset, please, Well,
Speaker 1: thank you very much for having me and Raymond here
Speaker 1: and for telling his story. I think we're at a
Speaker 1: really critical moment where the public is really paying attention
Speaker 1: to wrongful conviction. You know, they're really aware that it happens,
Speaker 1: and I think motivated to do what they can to
Speaker 1: prevent them from occurring. And a lot of these conversations
Speaker 1: center around preventing wrongful convictions, which is absolutely critical. You know,
Speaker 1: how do we reform I witnessed identification procedures, how do
Speaker 1: we address false confessions, Brady violations, misconduct. There's another part
Speaker 1: of this story, though, which is that after somebody is
Speaker 1: wrongfully convicted, we have this whole process that they have
Speaker 1: to follow. To try to get relief, and the rules
Speaker 1: that are in place and the procedures that they have
Speaker 1: to follow often prevent them from having their cases heard
Speaker 1: and make it incredibly difficult for an innocent person to
Speaker 1: get relief. And so I encourage people to pay attention
Speaker 1: to that aspect of wrongful convictions. And when you think
Speaker 1: about those rules and those laws that govern these cases,
Speaker 1: think about the actors who control those the prosecutors, the
Speaker 1: local judges, the state legislators. Those are the people who
Speaker 1: have the power to create pathways to relief for people
Speaker 1: like Raymond Warren, particularly here in Ohio, as we are
Speaker 1: grappling with those issues right now through the Supreme Court
Speaker 1: Task Force on Wrongful Convictions, And our hope is that
Speaker 1: some of the reforms that were recommended by that task
Speaker 1: Force are enacted so that people like Raymond can have
Speaker 1: their freedom restored one day. First off, I'm gonna thank
Speaker 1: you Jay Blow allowed me to do a sye saying,
Speaker 1: I hope the words know that I'm in here something
Speaker 1: I need to do. This can happen to any of
Speaker 1: you or any of your children, because I was a
Speaker 1: child when that's happened. You're not hearing my evidence and
Speaker 1: hearing to prove my innocence doesn't miss the filing them
Speaker 1: a lot. I need your help right now. The justice
Speaker 1: system has their knee on it. I'm dying. I need
Speaker 1: something I didn't do. So anybody's listening to this support me,
Speaker 1: and I decided the petition for showing up at those
Speaker 1: support roles. You're showing up to the places I need
Speaker 1: your help. Anybody that does support me and get out there, HILP.
Speaker 1: I want to thank you right now and I want this.
Speaker 1: You know it's night or the end. There's a lot
Speaker 1: of things in life like it's happen. That's an experience.
Speaker 1: Like you said, I'm see seeing you old people in
Speaker 1: here in this room above Washington grew up. That sucks.
Speaker 1: God sucks as well. Does it be over with? Thank
Speaker 1: you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. I'd like to thank
Speaker 1: our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Clyburne, and Kevin Wardis.
Speaker 1: With research by Lila Robinson. The music in this production
Speaker 1: was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
Speaker 1: Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction,
Speaker 1: on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast, and on Twitter at
Speaker 1: Wrong Conviction as well as at Lava for Good on
Speaker 1: all three platforms. You can also follow me on both
Speaker 1: TikTok and Instagram at it's Jason Flow. Rangful Conviction is
Speaker 1: a production of Lava for Good podcasts and association with
Speaker 1: Signal Company Number one