Speaker 1: I'm Jason Flam. Through this podcast, I aim to highlight
Speaker 1: how frequently our criminal legal system shatters the lives of
Speaker 1: innocent people, whether junk science has introduced at trial, police
Speaker 1: or prosecutor, a misconduct or simply a misidentification. Each story
Speaker 1: is devastating on its own, but when we zoom out
Speaker 1: and take in the sheer breadth of the issue, we
Speaker 1: can see a pattern forming across our entire system. Who
Speaker 1: better to take us on that journey than the brilliant
Speaker 1: journalists and writers who regularly cover these stories. Kathleen Peterson
Speaker 1: was found by her husband, Michael Peterson, bleeding and struggling
Speaker 1: to breathe at the bottom of a staircase. It was
Speaker 1: the middle of the night on a summer ninth two one.
Speaker 1: Michael called one and held her as she lay dying.
Speaker 1: When emergency services arrived, there was blood all over the walls,
Speaker 1: the floor, and on Michael's clothing, which led Durham Police
Speaker 1: Detective Art Holland to quickly assume this was a murder.
Speaker 1: Michael became a suspect in Kathleen's death, and Durham Police
Speaker 1: pursued this theory to the exclusion of all other evidence.
Speaker 1: After a highly publicized trial, Peterson was convicted and sentenced
Speaker 1: to life in prison without parole. His attorney, David Rudolph,
Speaker 1: was able to overturn the conviction eight years later, and
Speaker 1: Michael was released. After waiting for a new trial for
Speaker 1: five years and after turning seventy years old, Michael was
Speaker 1: tired of fighting. He decided to take an Alford plea,
Speaker 1: a plea where the defendant maintains his innocence but admits
Speaker 1: that the evidence presented could result in a jury finding
Speaker 1: him guilty. This is probably a case you've heard about
Speaker 1: and might already have an opinion on. There is a
Speaker 1: popular Netflix documentary called The Staircase, and this year HBO
Speaker 1: produced a mini series of the same name. But despite
Speaker 1: all that coverage and drama, Michael Peterson has refused to
Speaker 1: speak to the media about the case until recently, and
Speaker 1: that's why we wanted to speak with him today to
Speaker 1: give him the opportunity to tell his side. It's an
Speaker 1: important story that highlights so many of the problems with
Speaker 1: the American criminal justice system. This is wrongful conviction. Good afternoon.
Speaker 1: I'm Sonia Peiffer. I'm a criminal defense and civil rights
Speaker 1: attorney based in Toronto, Ontario and Charlotte, North Carolina and
Speaker 1: co host of the podcast Abuse of Power on Audible.
Speaker 1: And I'm David Rudolph. I'm also the co host of
Speaker 1: Abuse of Power with Sonia, who is my wife and
Speaker 1: law partner. Yes, for those who don't know, we are married.
Speaker 1: And we met while I was a television reporter and
Speaker 1: Raleigh Durham assigned to cover the Peterson case and you
Speaker 1: were representing Michael, and Michael is here with us today
Speaker 1: to talk about this case that really changed all of
Speaker 1: our lives. Hi, Michael Peterson, I'm in Durham, North Carolina,
Speaker 1: almost seventy nine years old. Uh, still a felon and
Speaker 1: still a writer. Let's jump right in, Michael, because you
Speaker 1: mentioned two things that I think people know about you already,
Speaker 1: That you're a writer and that, yes, you are a
Speaker 1: convicted felon. But before we talk about how you moved
Speaker 1: to Durham and then met Mary Kathleen, you had a
Speaker 1: whole other life. I don't think a lot of people
Speaker 1: know about who Michael Peterson was before all of this.
Speaker 1: Can you talk a little bit about how you grew up.
Speaker 1: I was born in Tennessee. I think I stayed there
Speaker 1: maybe four weeks. Uh, my father is a military officer.
Speaker 1: We moved. I don't think I stayed in a particular
Speaker 1: grade more than one year. It was very what can
Speaker 1: I say, transient childhood, but very fulfilling, and I loved it.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't trade it for anything, because I lived in
Speaker 1: so many different places. So you went to Duke for
Speaker 1: undergrad I mean I have to ask tar heels or devils.
Speaker 1: Oh please, you do not want to profanity relation a
Speaker 1: podcast here. So after university you enrolled in the military,
Speaker 1: and by this point you had also married your first wife, Patty,
Speaker 1: and you and Patty also lived overseas. Tell me about
Speaker 1: that part of your life. Uh, well, she is military also,
Speaker 1: and uh god. We lived Germany with Japan, traveled everywhere
Speaker 1: together for many, many many We were married twenty five
Speaker 1: years and she unfortunately last year massive heart attack, very
Speaker 1: very very sad day. Yeah, I'm sorry about that. I
Speaker 1: did hear about that, and I know David spoke to you.
Speaker 1: But yeah, you and Patty have a special relationship. And
Speaker 1: then you and Patty had two kids together. Tell me
Speaker 1: about your two sons, Clayton and Todd. They were both
Speaker 1: born in Germany. So I want to talk about Germany
Speaker 1: because as we continue talking today, that's going to resurface
Speaker 1: as as you know well when it comes to your trial.
Speaker 1: But in Germany, you and Patty became parents a second time.
Speaker 1: Um explained to our listeners who George and Elizabeth Ratliffe
Speaker 1: are and how it came to be that you and
Speaker 1: Patty were the guardians of their daughters. When we first
Speaker 1: met Liz, oh she was a teacher and Patty was
Speaker 1: a teacher, and they became very very close friends. And
Speaker 1: then we met George and he really was a wonderful guy.
Speaker 1: George died in three He was on a mission uh
Speaker 1: the invasion of Granada and he died. And then Liz
Speaker 1: was left with two very small, very small children, and
Speaker 1: she had a nobody knew at the time, a serious
Speaker 1: medical condition. She was suffering from von Villa Brown's disease.
Speaker 1: And I think that the stress of raising two small children,
Speaker 1: the loss of her husband, it was it was too
Speaker 1: much for her. And she died. And unknown to me,
Speaker 1: the military flew up and said, did you know that
Speaker 1: George had asked you to adopt his children or take
Speaker 1: care of the children if anything had happened to him,
Speaker 1: and I said, no, George and talked to me about that.
Speaker 1: He said, well, it's in the will and I said okay.
Speaker 1: So then and Liz had the same will, and when
Speaker 1: she died in nineth I became the defect of guardians
Speaker 1: of Margaret and Martha. You and Patty were still together
Speaker 1: at the time, Is that right? Oh? Yes? Yes? What
Speaker 1: was it like bringing those two young girls into your family?
Speaker 1: I think it was more of a strain on Patty,
Speaker 1: and that's I think, really essentially what broke up our
Speaker 1: marriage as that Patty, and I don't mean this in
Speaker 1: any negative way whatsoever, she felt it would be better
Speaker 1: if others raised Margaret and Martha one of their relatives,
Speaker 1: and so I said, no, I'll keep the children, and
Speaker 1: so I raised them, and then I met Kathleen and
Speaker 1: that became another journey. Let's talk about Kathleen. How did
Speaker 1: you two meet? Uh? Kathleen was when we came back
Speaker 1: from Germany with the two girls. Uh. They were four
Speaker 1: and five at the time, I think, and Kathleen and
Speaker 1: her husband, uh Fred were living down the block in
Speaker 1: another house and I we met at Margaret's fifth birthday party.
Speaker 1: Because Caitlin was the same age, and we just became
Speaker 1: very close after that, more and more close. And you
Speaker 1: mentioned Caitlin. Caitlin is Kathleen's daughter from her first marriage, right, correct,
Speaker 1: And that's Caitlin Atwater. And how did your relationship with
Speaker 1: Kathleen developed? Uh, well, it's one of these neighborhood stories.
Speaker 1: And uh, we just saw more of each other and
Speaker 1: realized that we were very much suited for one another.
Speaker 1: And over time your relationship really became something quite special.
Speaker 1: I mean, something that I think other people would say
Speaker 1: they envied in a relationship. Would you agree with that? Oh?
Speaker 1: I think so. I mean we had a great, great relationship.
Speaker 1: She was, Oh god, she was well sexual and funny
Speaker 1: and smart. She was used to say that, for God's sake,
Speaker 1: don't tell anybody your college board scores. I don't want
Speaker 1: anybody know living for someone so stupid. Uh, And it
Speaker 1: was just fun. Every day with her was fun. So David,
Speaker 1: I want switch and and talk with you now. And
Speaker 1: moved to Kathleen's death and so it was called a crime.
Speaker 1: But let's start with the death. On December ninth, two
Speaker 1: thoe when Kathleen was found by Michael and Michael, I'll
Speaker 1: ask you about that in a little bit. But December night,
Speaker 1: two thousand one, Kathleen is found inside the home she
Speaker 1: shared with Michael and Forest Hills. Can you talk about
Speaker 1: what was known at that time and initially how the
Speaker 1: discovery of Kathleen's body was treated. I think initially, at
Speaker 1: least in the press, it was just treated as a
Speaker 1: prominent author's wife was found dead in their home. And
Speaker 1: I don't think initially, at least for the public, Uh,
Speaker 1: there was any connection to it being a crime that
Speaker 1: changed relatively quickly. And David, I'm going to ask you
Speaker 1: to describe the scene a little bit, because, as we'll
Speaker 1: talk about later, what the scene looked like became a
Speaker 1: fact that really influenced investigators. So could you describe that, sure,
Speaker 1: because it was a horrendous looking scene. Uh, you know
Speaker 1: when you walked in, and I did early on to
Speaker 1: meet with Michael. We did not meet in a diner
Speaker 1: eating a pistronomy sandwich, as the HBO series indicated. But
Speaker 1: when I when I came in, uh, you know, Michael
Speaker 1: showed me the scene and there was blood all over
Speaker 1: the walls and all over the floor, you know, dried blood. Uh.
Speaker 1: And you know, the immediate reaction when you saw that
Speaker 1: was Wow, something really terrible happened here. But you know
Speaker 1: what I didn't realize when I first saw that, and
Speaker 1: obviously what the police didn't realize when they saw it,
Speaker 1: was that the scalp bleeds incredibly. It is the most
Speaker 1: vascarrized part of a human body. And so when somebody
Speaker 1: is bleeding out from deep wounds in their scalp, there
Speaker 1: is a massive amount of blood. And the massive amount
Speaker 1: of blood was not indicative of what caused the wounds.
Speaker 1: It was just indicative of the fact that the wounds
Speaker 1: bled a lot, that she was conscious for some period
Speaker 1: of time. Uh, and therefore there was blood all over.
Speaker 1: But when you first looked at it, Uh, it looked
Speaker 1: like a crime scene. I mean it did. And Michael,
Speaker 1: you were the first one to see that scene. What
Speaker 1: do you remember about walking upon that scene that the
Speaker 1: blood seemed Kathleen there, what do you remember about that?
Speaker 1: When I came into these we had been at the
Speaker 1: pool and then I came into the house. Uh. She
Speaker 1: had a teleconference next morning, So I stayed outside with
Speaker 1: the dogs for a while and then came in and
Speaker 1: then I went to go in the back staircase and
Speaker 1: there she was lying there at the bottom of the stairs,
Speaker 1: and I, you know, I saw the blood, but I
Speaker 1: was not it didn't I didn't focus so much on
Speaker 1: the blood as I focused on Kathleen lying on the ground.
Speaker 1: And that's when I called nine one one and infamous
Speaker 1: one one call, and you know, I said, she fell
Speaker 1: down the stairs. And people asked me afterwards, but why
Speaker 1: do you think she fell down the stairs as well?
Speaker 1: If you find somebody at the bottom of the stairs,
Speaker 1: or obvious thought is that she must have fallen. And
Speaker 1: that's what I did think. Was it surreal though? I
Speaker 1: mean to come upon that after you had had this
Speaker 1: evening together by the pool, I mean will describe that
Speaker 1: it was one of those what you know, what what's
Speaker 1: going on? What happened? Uh? There' she was talking and alive,
Speaker 1: and then suddenly I walked in and she's she was dying.
Speaker 1: She was still breathing faintly, faintly, and you know, I've
Speaker 1: seen enough death in Vietnam to know that she was dying.
Speaker 1: And so I, as you know, I put her down
Speaker 1: and rand to the call one ran to open the
Speaker 1: door for them, and uh and then was holding her
Speaker 1: when E MT. Came in and surreal, well just shocking,
Speaker 1: I think it's a better word. And so you just
Speaker 1: described you coming to Kathleen and holding Kathleen and calling
Speaker 1: Niman one. So you yourself, of course you're you're now
Speaker 1: covered in blood, right, yeah, I suppose. I mean again,
Speaker 1: the blood was not a significant thing, you know, to me?
Speaker 1: That was it. I mean was significant was that Kathleen
Speaker 1: was dying. David, Let's let's talk now about the investing gaistion. Right,
Speaker 1: So we we sort of set that scene. Michael calls nine.
Speaker 1: Eight minutes later, paramedics show up. And then what Well,
Speaker 1: after the paramedics showed up, First of all, there was
Speaker 1: no U protecting the scene. People were walking in and out.
Speaker 1: The police showed up. Uh, and Art Holland has said
Speaker 1: that he walked into the scene and immediately came to
Speaker 1: the conclusion that this was a crime. You know, he
Speaker 1: reacted to the amount of blood at the scene, and
Speaker 1: so we have a classic case of confirmation bias and
Speaker 1: tunnel vision. He immediately forms his conclusion that there's a
Speaker 1: murder here, that there's a crime here. Who's the only
Speaker 1: person in the house. Well, it's Michael Peterson. Uh, you know,
Speaker 1: the the assumption in these situations is that the spouse
Speaker 1: must be the perpetrator, and that's where they went. It
Speaker 1: was supposed to be an investigation of what happened here,
Speaker 1: and instead there was an assumption about what happened, and
Speaker 1: then the focus became Michael is the perpetrator because there
Speaker 1: was no one else to blame. And I want to
Speaker 1: break down for listeners, UH, what you said about tunnel
Speaker 1: vision and confirmation bias, because those are two different things,
Speaker 1: but they really work hand in hand. Right, So tunnel vision,
Speaker 1: that's what you're talking about. Art Holland comes in, he
Speaker 1: sees blood. In his mind, he thinks this is a homicide,
Speaker 1: so now he is focused only on that homicide. Everything
Speaker 1: else is blacked out, Like when you enter a tunnel
Speaker 1: confirmation bias is then processing all of that information that
Speaker 1: you find through that lens through that tunnel vision lens.
Speaker 1: And that is the way the investigation continued, not just
Speaker 1: with Art Holland, right, but then they have a so
Speaker 1: called blood spot expert I hate to even use that word,
Speaker 1: in Dwyane Deaver, who also shows up on the scene. Right, Well,
Speaker 1: he shows up that very night a little bit later
Speaker 1: on uh, and he's infected by art Holland's tunnel vision
Speaker 1: and art Holland's confirmation bias. So he's there not to
Speaker 1: really explore what the blood spatter means, assuming that one
Speaker 1: can even get any sort of information from that that's worthwhile.
Speaker 1: He's there to again assist art Holland improving that this
Speaker 1: was a murder and that Michael Peterson did it, and
Speaker 1: so he engages in what he calls pulling strings. David,
Speaker 1: let me ask you to explain that pulling strings and
Speaker 1: point of origin. I know it's very familiar to you,
Speaker 1: but explain for our listeners what that means, what it
Speaker 1: is that Dwyne Deaver was trying to eve. When you
Speaker 1: have a massive blood spatter and you're trying to determine
Speaker 1: from where that spatter originated, UH, you can take a
Speaker 1: look at the angles of the spatter on the walls
Speaker 1: and work backwards from there with various spatter UH selections
Speaker 1: and try to find what is called an area of origin.
Speaker 1: And that's the best that you can do. The science
Speaker 1: is absolutely clear that yes, you can do that to
Speaker 1: find an area of origin, but you can't do that
Speaker 1: to find a specific point of origin. The area of
Speaker 1: origin is gonna be like twelve by eighteen inches. And
Speaker 1: the problem was, if he had done that properly, the
Speaker 1: area of origin would have been the walls and the
Speaker 1: and the steps. Well, that wouldn't have helped our Holland's
Speaker 1: case at all. So instead, what he had to do
Speaker 1: is find what he called points of origin, and that
Speaker 1: was the first step in in essence, framing Michael Peterson
Speaker 1: for this murder. And when we talk about origin, a
Speaker 1: point of origin or an area of origin, what you're
Speaker 1: talking about is impact. If it were a fall at
Speaker 1: what point on the stairs at her head hit at
Speaker 1: what place on the wall, that's what you're talking about,
Speaker 1: right exactly where did the blood start to flow. And
Speaker 1: you mentioned Art Holland coming back with a search warrant,
Speaker 1: that's another thing falling right into his tunnel vision. And
Speaker 1: this is where he he went out and he got
Speaker 1: a search war right away that evening, that very evening,
Speaker 1: right oh, within within an hour, within less than an hour,
Speaker 1: that's where he was headed. So let's talk about the injuries, David,
Speaker 1: because of course there wasn't autopsy, and the autopsy found
Speaker 1: that this was blunt force trauma. Actually not the autopsy initially, Uh,
Speaker 1: what debor Ratish found initially was that the cause of
Speaker 1: death was a loss of blood exanguination. And then we
Speaker 1: found out later from going through the file. Uh, the
Speaker 1: chief medical examiner came in and essentially told her, no,
Speaker 1: you need to put on the autopsy that the cause
Speaker 1: of death was blunt force trauma. That was not the
Speaker 1: cause of death. We all agree that would cause Kathleen's
Speaker 1: death was the loss of blood. So why all of
Speaker 1: a sudden do we have blunt forced trauma as the
Speaker 1: cause of death. That is a question that I don't
Speaker 1: think has ever been satisfactorily answered. Well, and you know,
Speaker 1: you talk about tunnel vision, you talk about it infecting
Speaker 1: other people. This is yet another example. So initially Deborati
Speaker 1: says cause of death is blood loss. Then she later
Speaker 1: changed it to blunt force trauma. But there were problems
Speaker 1: with that being the cause of death, right because blunt
Speaker 1: force trauma usually has some well known associated conditions, right
Speaker 1: like subdural hematoma edema. None of that existed here. Kathleen
Speaker 1: didn't have any of the injuries that are normally associated
Speaker 1: with blunt forced trauma. She had no injuries to her brain,
Speaker 1: There was no subdual, There were no contusions to the brain,
Speaker 1: there were no fractures on her arms. Uh, there was
Speaker 1: nothing that was consistent with blunt force trauma. So when
Speaker 1: you look at that, you say to yourself, Okay, how
Speaker 1: is that possible? How is it possible that none of
Speaker 1: the things that I know as a lawyer are normally
Speaker 1: associated with blunt forced trauma are there? And so I say, okay, well,
Speaker 1: let's take a look at all the autopsies going back
Speaker 1: ten years and see if we can find even one other,
Speaker 1: even one other which had none of those injuries. And
Speaker 1: so that's what we did, and in fact, there was
Speaker 1: not a single other blunt forced trauma death that didn't
Speaker 1: have at least one and often several of those kinds
Speaker 1: of injuries. Kathleen Peterson was the only case in the
Speaker 1: previous ten years where they claimed blunt forced trauma was
Speaker 1: the cause of death, but there were none of those
Speaker 1: associated injuries. And we'll talk about the trial in a
Speaker 1: little bit, but back to the investigation. Michael, do you
Speaker 1: remember talking to investigators that night on December nine? Oh? Yes,
Speaker 1: I mean right away. Uh, you know, they came in
Speaker 1: and my son Tad arrived with his girlfriend Pigment. At
Speaker 1: the party, they sept rated everybody and it was Todd
Speaker 1: who instantly simply because of that and also the way
Speaker 1: that they were just acting, he picked up right away.
Speaker 1: He said, Dad, they're trying to get you. And that
Speaker 1: didn't make any sense to me. Number one, I was
Speaker 1: in shock in Suitland. But why so he called my
Speaker 1: brother who was an attorney in Reno and uh for
Speaker 1: which later it was like, oh, we had lawyered up.
Speaker 1: But my brother Bill talked to Holland and said, do
Speaker 1: not question Michael Peterson. I would have been happy to
Speaker 1: answer anything. I had to cooperate. That's on the reason
Speaker 1: why not. And Holland kept trying to do that, put
Speaker 1: his arm around me, and Todd said no, Dad, no, nope,
Speaker 1: don't talk not just snap me out of it. And
Speaker 1: I realized, oh, yeah, they really are definitely out to
Speaker 1: get me. So let's talk about your arrest now. Because
Speaker 1: it wasn't immediate. I mean, this was December nine two one,
Speaker 1: But sounds like you were well aware that eyes were
Speaker 1: on you. Tell me about when you got arrested. What happened.
Speaker 1: David wanted me to go to Charlotte at least get
Speaker 1: out of Durham because he knew the arrest was coming,
Speaker 1: but all I could think of was the rap Ruth
Speaker 1: case in which he had fled. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: I said, no, if they're going to arrest me, they're
Speaker 1: gonnaarrest me, and I'll surrender if this is what they want.
Speaker 1: So I made a decision that I would go to
Speaker 1: the courthouse and surrender. Uh for that, and I was
Speaker 1: but in jail for two weeks. David, what do you
Speaker 1: remember about that, because by now you were hired, right.
Speaker 1: I was hired relatively early on, before the case even
Speaker 1: went to a grand jury. What I was originally talking
Speaker 1: to Michael about was the fact that I was afraid
Speaker 1: that the police are going to just swoop in before
Speaker 1: we had a chance to arrange a surrender. Because surrenders
Speaker 1: get arranged. I was able to reach the district Attorney's office.
Speaker 1: We were able to arrange a time for Michael to
Speaker 1: to show up and surrender himself. In part, the reason
Speaker 1: to do that is because it helps to set up
Speaker 1: the bail situation, and eventually we were able to get
Speaker 1: a judge to set a bond from Michael that Michael
Speaker 1: could make, which is an enormously helpful thing. If your
Speaker 1: client is in it makes the case much more difficult
Speaker 1: to defend. So December two thousand one is when Michael
Speaker 1: was charged with first degree murder and then released in January.
Speaker 1: So now it is January two thou two. The trial
Speaker 1: is a little more than a year in two thousand three, David,
Speaker 1: can you talk about the two theories at trial? What
Speaker 1: was the States case? What was your case? Our case
Speaker 1: was sort of set from the very beginning when Michael
Speaker 1: Uh said she's fallen down the stairs, because that was
Speaker 1: the logical conclusion. Everything that Michael told me from the
Speaker 1: first day that I met him always checked out, and
Speaker 1: so yeah, I would go and talk with Michael and
Speaker 1: he says, well, you know, we were watching a movie
Speaker 1: America Sweethearts, and we get the receipt from Blockbuster which
Speaker 1: shows that he rented that movie that day. He says, well,
Speaker 1: Todd and his UH and his friend the doctor, stopped
Speaker 1: by the house around ten o'clock on their way to
Speaker 1: a party. So I called the doctor and she confirms
Speaker 1: everything was exactly normal. They were watching a movie. Everything
Speaker 1: was absolutely normal. Michael was normal, Kathleen was normal. There
Speaker 1: was no tension uh, you know, Michael tells me that
Speaker 1: he had a wonderful relationship with Kathleen. We interview all
Speaker 1: of their friends, every single one of them confirms that.
Speaker 1: So literally every fact that Michael told me I was
Speaker 1: able to confirm. So for me, that was the end
Speaker 1: of the matter. It was okay, she fell down the stairs.
Speaker 1: And for me, it was then a question of how
Speaker 1: do we explain all the blood to a jury because
Speaker 1: that was the big problem. The police, of course, had
Speaker 1: their own theory, and that was that Michael somehow beat
Speaker 1: her to death, although they didn't have a murder weapon
Speaker 1: for probably a year. Uh so their theory had had
Speaker 1: its problems. Of course, our problem was the amount of
Speaker 1: blood and the spread of the blood over the walls.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about the States case. Let's first start
Speaker 1: with Dwayne dr because I think it's fair to say
Speaker 1: that Dever was the lynchpin for the state. Would you
Speaker 1: agree with that, No doubt about it. I mean, Deva
Speaker 1: was the person who he was the only person who
Speaker 1: could put a weapon in Michael's hand as explaining the
Speaker 1: injuries and the blood. That's what he was there for.
Speaker 1: And indeed he was the person who established that it
Speaker 1: was first degree because his opinion was that there was
Speaker 1: some period of time between the first blows and the
Speaker 1: what he described as the second blows. So that's where
Speaker 1: the state argued the premeditation occurred. So Devera was responsible
Speaker 1: for the overall theory, uh, and for the specific theory
Speaker 1: regarding first degree. He was. He was. He was their
Speaker 1: case too create what he called experiments, which weren't experiments
Speaker 1: at all. They were attempts to recreate certain facts that
Speaker 1: he saw in the scene, uh in a way that
Speaker 1: would implicate Michael. They were almost cartoonish when you first
Speaker 1: looked at him, but they videotaped these, and the police
Speaker 1: uh obviously relied on him. The d A rel I
Speaker 1: mean in d A showed them a trial, which was
Speaker 1: sort of a surprise to me because I found them
Speaker 1: to be almost laughable. But but apparently the jury didn't well.
Speaker 1: And when you say laughable, I mean, look, I know
Speaker 1: this is not a laughing matter. But seriously, he had
Speaker 1: like a foam skull, and he put a sponge on
Speaker 1: top of the skull and climbed up a ladder and
Speaker 1: put like the skull up top and then dropped it
Speaker 1: after putting some red stuff on the sponge to see
Speaker 1: what would happen right exactly exactly, and of course that
Speaker 1: that experiment didn't go well for him, uh, because it
Speaker 1: didn't prove what he wanted it to prove. His big success,
Speaker 1: his huge success was quote proving that the blood spatter
Speaker 1: on the inside of Michael's shorts came from a blow
Speaker 1: to the head. And and he spent hours trying to
Speaker 1: create that, uh situation. And when he was finally able
Speaker 1: to after multiple attempts, you see his assistant in the
Speaker 1: background doing a little you know, victory dance like she
Speaker 1: scored a touchdown in a football game. And and that was,
Speaker 1: you know, the tip off to me that this was
Speaker 1: all about proving a certain thing, not about finding out
Speaker 1: what happened. So we can call that junk science, no doubt.
Speaker 1: Absolutely there was also debor ratish. We talked about what
Speaker 1: she found in the autopsy, and you press entered her
Speaker 1: at trial with volume upon volume upon volume of the
Speaker 1: autopsies from blunt forced trauma depths over the previous ten years,
Speaker 1: none of which looked anything like Kathleen. So I think
Speaker 1: those are sort of, let's call them the heavyweights, the
Speaker 1: state expert types, But there were other critical pieces of
Speaker 1: evidence that came into the trial that were entirely unfair,
Speaker 1: as later acknowledged by the judge. And let's start with Germany. So, Michael,
Speaker 1: earlier we talked about Elizabeth Ratliffe and George Ratliffe, and
Speaker 1: you mentioned that Elizabeth passed away. One thing I have
Speaker 1: come to just get my hairs up about is every
Speaker 1: time someone says Elizabeth Ratliffe was found at the bottom
Speaker 1: of the staircase, the fact of the matter is that's
Speaker 1: not quite true. I was a reporter. I went to Germany.
Speaker 1: I saw that condor or that little home. You walk
Speaker 1: in the door, there's a little step up and then
Speaker 1: there's a staircase. And she was found like on that
Speaker 1: little step up. So she could have been walking in
Speaker 1: the door and fall down. I mean, there was there
Speaker 1: was no evidence that she fell down the stairs. But
Speaker 1: yet you did have this death in Germany, a woman
Speaker 1: that you knew, whose children you were now raising, and
Speaker 1: she was someone who I believe you were one of
Speaker 1: the first people to see upon her death. Is that right?
Speaker 1: Her nanny was the first one. She had been going
Speaker 1: for the weekend and came back to the house and
Speaker 1: opened the door and found Liz there, and she immediately
Speaker 1: ran over to our house. We lived a hundred two
Speaker 1: hundred yards away. I was asleep. Patty was getting up
Speaker 1: because Patty and Liz were going to go to school
Speaker 1: together and drive together. So Patty, uh was you? Woke
Speaker 1: me up and said something happened to Liz. So Patty
Speaker 1: ran over first, and then I was maybe three four
Speaker 1: minutes later I came on the scene. And let's talk
Speaker 1: about the scene. The fact that there was no blood,
Speaker 1: the fact that there was no evidence of an intruder.
Speaker 1: This was not a scene at all like the scene
Speaker 1: where Kathleen was found. Fair oh, fair right. And what
Speaker 1: had happened right away was the Barbara, who was the nanny,
Speaker 1: called German and the German police immediately came along with
Speaker 1: a medical doctor, and the German doctor did a spinal
Speaker 1: tap and the German doctor said, this woman had a stroke.
Speaker 1: And then the body was brought to Frankfort Gentle Medical
Speaker 1: Center and the thoughts topsy was done on Liz, and
Speaker 1: the pathologist there said that she had had a stroke.
Speaker 1: So at the time, and because Liz had been complaining
Speaker 1: for days, and he even called her mother and said
Speaker 1: this I'm having the worst headaches I've had in my life.
Speaker 1: So when it was said that she had a stroke,
Speaker 1: everyone accepted, well, of course she had a stroke. Uh,
Speaker 1: And that's what I and everybody believed at the time.
Speaker 1: And then the prosecution finds out about this. Now, first
Speaker 1: of all, David, you were aware of this when you
Speaker 1: started representing Michael. This This didn't get thrown on you
Speaker 1: by either the media or the prosecution. You were well
Speaker 1: aware of this when before Michael's trial, right, you know,
Speaker 1: it was it was always stroke. But Ron Jarette, who
Speaker 1: was a former police officer, as soon as he learned
Speaker 1: that she her body had been found where it was,
Speaker 1: he said, the police are going to try to use this,
Speaker 1: the d A is going to try to use this.
Speaker 1: And so literally within the first few months of us
Speaker 1: being involved, Ron and I flew to Germany, UH and
Speaker 1: we investigated it. We spoke with the prosecutor, we spoke
Speaker 1: with the doctor, we spoke with the Army c I
Speaker 1: D agent, We got his report, we look through the
Speaker 1: German files. Everyone agreed. So so the first issue is that, yes,
Speaker 1: the state learned about this. Yes, the state tried to
Speaker 1: get in and they did get it in at trial,
Speaker 1: and you were therefore forced to rebut all of this evidence,
Speaker 1: Let's talk about those witnesses that the state brought forth.
Speaker 1: First of all, who were they and how were they
Speaker 1: treated by the prosecution when they showed up in Durham, David. Well, Uh,
Speaker 1: they consisted I believe, of three women. Uh, one of
Speaker 1: whom Barbara Magnino was the nanny who never ever raised
Speaker 1: anything about Liz's death being suspicious. But now, of course,
Speaker 1: in retrospect, given Kathleen's death, she's convinced that there must
Speaker 1: have been something going on, and she now remembers all
Speaker 1: this blood all over. And then there was another witness,
Speaker 1: Mary Beth Burner I think was her name, Uh, and
Speaker 1: she came in. She had initially given a statement to
Speaker 1: Art Holland which was didn't even mention Michael when she
Speaker 1: talked about the death of of Liz, didn't even mention him.
Speaker 1: Now she comes in and she's had what as she
Speaker 1: calls it, flashbacks, uh, where she sees blood all over
Speaker 1: and Michael's acting suspicious and Michael calls it a stroke
Speaker 1: before the doctor gets there. Uh. And and all of
Speaker 1: this nonsense interrupted just one thing on that on the witnesses.
Speaker 1: Those were friends of mine and Patti's, and to this day,
Speaker 1: I do not understand why they did that. I mean,
Speaker 1: they just totally made up that blood stuff. And it
Speaker 1: was one of the more heartbreaking things to Patty that
Speaker 1: her friends had said that I don't know where and
Speaker 1: this was twenty years later, and it was all false.
Speaker 1: So in addition to the evidence the state brought in
Speaker 1: about Elizabeth Ratliffe, including much of the false evidence, they
Speaker 1: brought in another piece of the state's case that I think,
Speaker 1: uh was really prejudicial, and it has been acknowledged as such,
Speaker 1: was your bisexuality Michael and these emails that were found.
Speaker 1: They said it countered your argument that he had a
Speaker 1: perfect relationship with Kathleen, right, Like, that was the the
Speaker 1: legal basis forgetting it in. That was the That was
Speaker 1: the legal basis for getting it in, according to the judge.
Speaker 1: But by the time fred and Black got up in
Speaker 1: her closing argument, there was nothing about that. It was
Speaker 1: all about how you know, what Michael was doing was
Speaker 1: pure t filth uh and uh and how he was
Speaker 1: a pervert. Uh. And that was the argument. And that's
Speaker 1: really why they put it in, right, And that's what
Speaker 1: you do right when your your other evidence is weak.
Speaker 1: So let's talk about your case though, because you also
Speaker 1: put on a case. Just quickly run through for me
Speaker 1: who you put on and why what your goal was
Speaker 1: put it on a defense case? Sure? Well, our defense
Speaker 1: was to counter the expert evidence. Uh. And so we
Speaker 1: had we had two blood spatter crime scene people, Henry
Speaker 1: Lee and his associate, who contradicted Dwayne Deaver's testimony. And
Speaker 1: we had a biomechanical expert who was an expert in
Speaker 1: head injuries. Uh. And he testified about how this could
Speaker 1: have happened. And indeed, we had an animation to show
Speaker 1: how this could have happened because it was difficult to
Speaker 1: picture how the falls took place without having seen it. Uh.
Speaker 1: And so that's what we did, and I thought it
Speaker 1: was a very persuasive animation to explain the injuries on
Speaker 1: Kathleen's head. So again those injuries that was problematic for
Speaker 1: the state, as well as the fact that they didn't
Speaker 1: have a murder weapon until, as you put it, maybe
Speaker 1: a year later, which they determined to be a blowpoke,
Speaker 1: which by the way, they didn't even have to show
Speaker 1: the jury at the beginning of the trial, right, right,
Speaker 1: they came in with the with the Candicees blowpoke and said,
Speaker 1: see this is what Michael had in his house. Uh.
Speaker 1: It's mysteriously missing. Uh. And it was always there before,
Speaker 1: according to Candice. Uh, and now it's missing. And this
Speaker 1: must be the murder weapon because it's light and it's stiff,
Speaker 1: and it wouldn't crack her skull or cause brain injuries,
Speaker 1: but it would cause the kind of UH injuries to
Speaker 1: the scalp that she had. That was Debora radish Is testimony,
Speaker 1: which was completely false, as we proved later on when
Speaker 1: we were able to actually find the blowpoke in a
Speaker 1: corner where the police had put it, not recognizing that
Speaker 1: it was even relevant. At the time you mentioned Candice
Speaker 1: and Michael, you had mentioned Candice as well. Candas Zamperini
Speaker 1: was Kathleen's sister. She became a very important person in
Speaker 1: this case in terms of UH. I would say a
Speaker 1: player for the prosecution. Would that be a good way
Speaker 1: to characterize her? What was your relationship with Candice before Michael.
Speaker 1: There was a lot of jealousy between the sisters, Uh
Speaker 1: and I can many times they came to visit us
Speaker 1: and we go up to visit I can remember a
Speaker 1: couple of times they would be fighting and uh, her
Speaker 1: husband and I would just sort of rolled our eyes
Speaker 1: and oh my god. Um. But it was a good relationship.
Speaker 1: And when Kathleen died, she was right there. She took
Speaker 1: over everything, arranged funeral, cemetery, plot everything, um. And then
Speaker 1: it became very bad because the police convinced her that
Speaker 1: I had killed Kathleen, and I understood that. Why then
Speaker 1: her sentiments changed and she really hated me in the
Speaker 1: same sense if somebody had come to me and said
Speaker 1: the police had said, oh, this person killed your brother,
Speaker 1: well I would have hated that person, no question about that. Michael,
Speaker 1: you said, the police convinced Candice that you killed Kathleen,
Speaker 1: But it was actually the prosecutors and not just Candice
Speaker 1: but also Caitlin, Kathleen's daughter. What the prosecutors did was
Speaker 1: flat out wrong. It was improper. I mean, the prosecution
Speaker 1: essentially formed team State of North Carolina using Kathleen's own ken. Yes,
Speaker 1: so so initially Candice was very supportive of Michael, as
Speaker 1: was Caitlin. Both of them said to me, there's no
Speaker 1: way that Michael would have done this, no way. Indeed,
Speaker 1: Caitlin was the family spokesperson when Michael was first lead
Speaker 1: out of jail, and she said that to the media.
Speaker 1: Uh so what change? What change was the police and
Speaker 1: prosecutors brought them in, showed them the photographs and had
Speaker 1: Deboradish explained to them that these were clearly the result
Speaker 1: of an attack, a homicidal attack, and that changed everything.
Speaker 1: So let's go back to the trial. The state puts
Speaker 1: on their case, you put on your case, they rebut
Speaker 1: you rebut right, and then the jury goes out and
Speaker 1: they deliberate for a week. So Michael, I want to
Speaker 1: talk about when the jury returned and what it was
Speaker 1: like for you when you heard the verdict. Well, again,
Speaker 1: it had been days and days that they were out
Speaker 1: and we had to stay in the courtroom. So Margaret
Speaker 1: and Martha and Todd and Clayton, we were all there together,
Speaker 1: and I don't think I'm going to be convicted. I
Speaker 1: just don't think it's going to happen. And of course,
Speaker 1: the next day when they came in and I stood
Speaker 1: up and they said guilty, it was shocked, It really was.
Speaker 1: But you know, it's not the first shock I've had
Speaker 1: in my life, and so I immediately thought of my children, oh,
Speaker 1: oh god, what this does to them after all that
Speaker 1: they've suffered and lost, you know. So I turned to
Speaker 1: them and I said it's okay. So uh. It wasn't
Speaker 1: later when I was locked up in a cell in
Speaker 1: the basement, Oh my god, what happened? You know, I've
Speaker 1: lost my family, I've lost my everything, everything, And then
Speaker 1: it really hit. At the time, it was like just
Speaker 1: getting to blow guilty and let's talk about prison. I mean,
Speaker 1: you went from um, you know, that blow in the
Speaker 1: courtroom and the shock and trying to process with your
Speaker 1: family two then immediately being taken to prison. What was
Speaker 1: that experience like? Prison was? I think for me a
Speaker 1: little different in the fact that I was really famous.
Speaker 1: Everybody had watched this even in prison. They were watching
Speaker 1: court TV into the news, so everybody knew who I
Speaker 1: was when I got there, and the fact that I
Speaker 1: was old sixty eight or something that now you're fifty,
Speaker 1: you fifty eight, I felt like sixty eight. I taught
Speaker 1: G E d Uh for a couple of years, earning
Speaker 1: a dollar a day and got seventy five guys their
Speaker 1: G E. D S. I was doing everything I could
Speaker 1: to stay busy and keep my mind off the the
Speaker 1: tragedy of losing you know, my children and everything. So again, life,
Speaker 1: you know, whether it's war or anything, it's pretty much
Speaker 1: what you make of it. And I decided right away, well, okay,
Speaker 1: this is it. I'll just make the best of it.
Speaker 1: And so I did. And in meantime, on the outside,
Speaker 1: there's the appeal process going on. David, can you just
Speaker 1: briefly walk us through direct appeal post conviction what happened? Yeah, Well,
Speaker 1: on the direct appeal, we were pretty confident because, uh,
Speaker 1: number one, they had introduced evidence pursued to a search
Speaker 1: warrant which was completely insufficient. Uh. FREDA. Black had made
Speaker 1: arguments and closing that were completely improper. So we were
Speaker 1: optimistic that the verdict was going to be reversed. And
Speaker 1: then they decided, well all of that was just harmless error,
Speaker 1: that that wouldn't have affected the verdict. And then what
Speaker 1: happened was that Dwayne Deaver was exposed as a fraud,
Speaker 1: not in this case, but in the Greg Taylor case. Uh.
Speaker 1: And once that happened, then I saw an avenue for
Speaker 1: a post conviction petition that would succeed because Dwayne Deaver
Speaker 1: was in fact the lynchpin of the case. And so
Speaker 1: that's where we went. And so when you say Dwayne
Speaker 1: Deaver was exposed to be a fraud, I mean, let's
Speaker 1: put a fine point on that, right, he it was
Speaker 1: more than being a fraud. I mean he was not
Speaker 1: passing confirmatory reports on it was preliminary reports. He was
Speaker 1: doing these made up experiments. I mean, explain what you
Speaker 1: mean by that? Well, yeah, I was being too kind.
Speaker 1: He was a liar. Uh, he was. He was someone
Speaker 1: who was hiding exculpatory evidence. Uh. He was in essence
Speaker 1: setting up people by his lab results in case after
Speaker 1: case after case, to the extent that the State of
Speaker 1: North Carolina had to hire two former FBI agents to
Speaker 1: come in and audit the lab. And as a result
Speaker 1: of that, they shut down the blood spatter uh division
Speaker 1: of the lab because it was rife with with inaccuracies.
Speaker 1: And so once we had all of that, uh, we
Speaker 1: were able to go back. And you know, Michael had
Speaker 1: from the start was in favor of the documentary being
Speaker 1: made because he felt like it would um level the
Speaker 1: playing field. I don't mean to speak for you, Michael,
Speaker 1: but uh, you know I think that was your Your
Speaker 1: thought was that, hey, having these these UH Award winning,
Speaker 1: Academy Award winning documentarians there would keep things a little
Speaker 1: bit more honest. We were able to get all the
Speaker 1: clips from the French filmmakers of Diverse testimony, and that
Speaker 1: had a very visceral effect, I think on the judge,
Speaker 1: because it's one thing to read it in a transcript,
Speaker 1: it's quite another thing to watch this guy on the
Speaker 1: witness stand where you're the judge and he's lying to
Speaker 1: you and to the jury, and that was extremely powerful.
Speaker 1: So I think in fact, Michael's instinct of having those
Speaker 1: filmmakers there is what ultimately enabled us to get him out.
Speaker 1: And ultimately what your motion was, your motion for a
Speaker 1: new trial was based on the fact that there had
Speaker 1: been false and misleading testimony, fabricated evidence, and Michael deserved
Speaker 1: a new trial, exactly, exactly right. What's so interesting about
Speaker 1: that is a lot of times in cases of wrongful convictions,
Speaker 1: we looked to the thing that made a difference. Right,
Speaker 1: it was DNA testing. It was a tape that turned
Speaker 1: up and someone saw the real perpetrator or someone finally confessed.
Speaker 1: And hear what I hear both of you saying, is
Speaker 1: it was the documentary. So Hudson's ruling. Mike, what was
Speaker 1: that like? What was it like to hear him say
Speaker 1: you get a new trial? What was that like? Oh,
Speaker 1: it's like being resurrected almost. I'm not sure how Lazarus felt,
Speaker 1: but you know, when you're gone and have lost everything
Speaker 1: and suddenly someone returns your life to you. And there
Speaker 1: were my children in court and it was there, and
Speaker 1: oh my god, it was It was just it wasn't
Speaker 1: vindication so much as it was just getting life back.
Speaker 1: And at the time, I mean, everyone was ready to
Speaker 1: dismiss the charges. I think, if I remember right, Judge
Speaker 1: Hudson was ready to do it. Frankly, I think the
Speaker 1: d A was. But then in step Candice Sambourini and
Speaker 1: her sister. What what happened then? David? Everyone was was
Speaker 1: done with this case, you know, and and everybody realized
Speaker 1: that the trial hadn't been fair, that this Germany stuff
Speaker 1: should have never come in. That was a force, that
Speaker 1: the sexuality stuff should have never come in. Uh. They
Speaker 1: now didn't have the blood spatter expert anymore. I mean,
Speaker 1: how are they going to proceed that? They had no
Speaker 1: evidence at that point. So I think Judge Hudson fully
Speaker 1: expected the prosecutors say we don't have enough to proceed.
Speaker 1: I think the d A was hoping to say that. Uh.
Speaker 1: But Candice and Laurie, the two sisters, were adamant that
Speaker 1: they objected to that. But the d A was not
Speaker 1: willing to do the right thing over the objections of
Speaker 1: these two women. And when you watch Candice's venom at
Speaker 1: at the ultimate Alfred Plea hearing, I guess you can
Speaker 1: sort of understand why, because she was she was beyond
Speaker 1: beyond the pale in in how venomous she was. So
Speaker 1: after the new trial is granted, of course, the state
Speaker 1: appealed and lost their appeal, and and oftentimes what happens
Speaker 1: is then everything's dismissed. That didn't happen here. You mentioned
Speaker 1: the Alfred plea. Michael talked to me a little bit
Speaker 1: about why you were okay with an Alfred plea and
Speaker 1: how it was explained to you. Well, when I got
Speaker 1: out of prison, I believe I was sixty eight at
Speaker 1: the time, uh, and I weren't ankle brace looked for
Speaker 1: two years. So I lived with us for the longest time,
Speaker 1: and I'm getting older and older. Someone. It finally came
Speaker 1: when David worked out this Alferd plea, and again I
Speaker 1: wasn't convinced that the jury would find me not guilty. Again.
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, burned once, you're a little early.
Speaker 1: The second time I was with my children, you know,
Speaker 1: a life, I was writing, everything was good. Did I
Speaker 1: want to risk that. I did not want to go
Speaker 1: through that for myself or especially for my children. And
Speaker 1: then to bring my grandchildren into the help, we'd still
Speaker 1: be fighting this thing. So no, just just ended. David.
Speaker 1: Just for the listeners, just break down an Alford plea,
Speaker 1: Why it exists, what it means? Yeah, well, uh, what
Speaker 1: it is is a way of resolving the case without
Speaker 1: the defendant admitting to the essential facts. So it's it's
Speaker 1: essentially a mechanism where everybody can declare victory or defeat equally. Uh,
Speaker 1: and the case just ends. And Michael was adamant about
Speaker 1: two things. Number one was that he would never say
Speaker 1: that he had killed Kathleen. Absolutely would never say anything
Speaker 1: close to that. And number two, he would not go
Speaker 1: back into incarceration even for ten minutes. In other words,
Speaker 1: he had to be released and the case had to
Speaker 1: be over right then and there. He wasn't going to
Speaker 1: go back to the jail to be processed. Those were
Speaker 1: my marching orders. And and once the prosecution agreed to
Speaker 1: both of those things, as I said to Michael, Okay,
Speaker 1: so if we go back to trial and you're found
Speaker 1: not guilty, is that going to change anybody's mind who
Speaker 1: has already decided you're guilty. No. If you take an
Speaker 1: offered play, is that going to convince anybody who believes
Speaker 1: you're innocent that you're guilty. No, So there was no
Speaker 1: practical reason to go back to trial. Nothing would change
Speaker 1: at that point. And as Michael said, he was older,
Speaker 1: he had grandchildren, and it was time to put this
Speaker 1: to rest. And so, Michael, what have you been doing
Speaker 1: with your life since finally putting this to rest? I've
Speaker 1: been writing, written god to four books, five books? Uh,
Speaker 1: you know, since then, since I got out, I've traveled
Speaker 1: and planned to do more of it and plan to
Speaker 1: continue writing. I told my children over and over, Hey,
Speaker 1: don't hate. That's just the most useless, destructive emotion that
Speaker 1: you can have. So just get over and live the
Speaker 1: life that you can now. I mean, you got today,
Speaker 1: so uh live today. And that's you know what I've
Speaker 1: been doing. What about you know a closing argument for
Speaker 1: listeners here, what do you want to say to folks,
Speaker 1: Michael about your experience about your case? Can they learn
Speaker 1: from it? What? What would you want to leave people with?
Speaker 1: I think what what to me boils down to as
Speaker 1: a matter of having an open mind. You know, back
Speaker 1: in the old days, Uh, you know, if if if
Speaker 1: the police had arrested somebody or shot somebody, well they
Speaker 1: were right, of course, you know, we just believed that then. Uh,
Speaker 1: and I probably did myself as a you know, rich
Speaker 1: white guy. We don't believe that anymore. At times have changed.
Speaker 1: What you believe isn't necessarily true. What you've been told
Speaker 1: isn't necessarily true. You need to think. And people aren't
Speaker 1: really comfortable with that. They like the oh no, it's
Speaker 1: got to be this way or that way. Uh, this
Speaker 1: kirk of guardian either or well it really isn't that.
Speaker 1: It's all sort of gray. So think and keep an
Speaker 1: open mind. And David, what about you? You know? I
Speaker 1: mean On Abusive Power Are podcast, we talked about a
Speaker 1: lot of the issues that were at play in this case,
Speaker 1: all sorts of misconduct, junk science, tuntle vision and confirmation bias,
Speaker 1: all of that. What in Michael's case, in this experience,
Speaker 1: what's the what's the word? What's the thought you want
Speaker 1: to leave with listeners? What Michael's case illustrates is how
Speaker 1: fundamentally flawed the criminal justice system is and has someone
Speaker 1: like Michael, who never had done anything criminal in his
Speaker 1: life could suddenly find himselves convicted of first degree murder
Speaker 1: and sentenced to life in prison based on the testimony
Speaker 1: of Dwayne Deaver. UH is a wake up call. And
Speaker 1: and so what I've tried to do since then is
Speaker 1: to broaden my message, you know, not just to talk
Speaker 1: to juries in particular cases, but through to the podcast,
Speaker 1: through a book I've just written, UH to to try
Speaker 1: to educate people about the flaws in the system. And
Speaker 1: as Michael said, you need to keep an open mind
Speaker 1: because things are not always as they seem. UH. And
Speaker 1: indeed there's lots and lots of gray in the world
Speaker 1: and in the criminal justice system. Thank you for listening
Speaker 1: to Wrongful Conviction. I'm your guest host, Sonia Peiffer. I'd
Speaker 1: like to thank our executive producers Jason Flam and Kevin Wardis.
Speaker 1: The senior producer for this episode is Jackie Polly and
Speaker 1: our producers are Lila Robinson and Jeff Clyburne. Our editor
Speaker 1: is Alexandra Guidi. The music in this production is by
Speaker 1: three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. You can find
Speaker 1: the podcast I Make with David Abusive Power on Audible
Speaker 1: That's at Audible UK. Follow the show on Twitter at
Speaker 1: Abuse of Power pod. You can follow me on Instagram
Speaker 1: at Sonia Feiffer and on Twitter at Fife for Sonia.
Speaker 1: David is on both platforms as David S. Rudolph. Be
Speaker 1: sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction, on
Speaker 1: Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast, and on Twitter at wrong Conviction,
Speaker 1: as well as at Lava for Good on all three platforms.
Speaker 1: Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts
Speaker 1: in association with Signal Company Number one. Next week, on
Speaker 1: the guest hosted episode of Wrongful Conviction, Pulitzer Prize finalist
Speaker 1: and co host of the podcast ear Hustle arl On
Speaker 1: would my friend, Irlan Woods is going to talk to
Speaker 1: an axonre Ee that he met while still serving time
Speaker 1: at San Quentin Prison. Rlon will talk with Karamut Connley
Speaker 1: about the wild twists and turns of the California justice
Speaker 1: system and their shared experience of life behind bars. This
Speaker 1: is a must listen episode. Tune in next week. It's
Speaker 1: going to be Monday in the Wrong Conviction Podcast feed