Speaker 1: I originally interviewed Raymond Santana on the very first episode
Speaker 1: of Wrongful Conviction, which aired it seems like a long
Speaker 1: time ago on October third of twenty sixteen. I'm so
Speaker 1: excited to see what's happening for my friend Raymond. Not
Speaker 1: only is he now an activist, a clothing designer, and
Speaker 1: an accomplished and celebrated public speaker. He also launched a
Speaker 1: clothing company called Park Madison, NYC in twenty eighteen. And
Speaker 1: Raymond is a course featured in the hit Netflix show
Speaker 1: When They See Us, which prepared on May thirty one,
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen. And it's so great to see him out
Speaker 1: and about in the spotlight, spreading a good word, beaming
Speaker 1: out that positive energy that he has. I also encourage
Speaker 1: you to watch Raymond and I did a speech together.
Speaker 1: If you google my name in Nantucket project, you'll see
Speaker 1: it right away. Raymond, you deserve all the success and more.
Speaker 1: And now please listen to the first episode the premiere
Speaker 1: of Wrongful Conviction with Raymond Santana.
Speaker 2: I came from a beautiful neighborhood. I had a beautiful life.
Speaker 1: I went to sleep because September seventh was the first
Speaker 1: day of my high school year.
Speaker 2: I was going to be a senior. At twenty two,
Speaker 2: I was set to start college.
Speaker 1: I woke up and my life was never the same again.
Speaker 3: Cops came out with guns drawn, and I never saw
Speaker 3: freedom ever since after that.
Speaker 2: It's like roach motw Once you get in, you're not
Speaker 2: get mouthed.
Speaker 1: On April nineteenth, nineteen eighty nine, fourteen year old Raymond
Speaker 1: Santana was arrested and charged with one of the most
Speaker 1: notorious crimes in the history of New York City, the
Speaker 1: rape and brutal beating of a woman who became known
Speaker 1: as the Central Park jogger.
Speaker 2: Five youths were arrested at ninety sixth Street, four between
Speaker 2: fourteen and fifteen years of age.
Speaker 4: Police are still questioning some of them the young suspects.
Speaker 1: They believe were involved in last night's attack. Immediately following
Speaker 1: the crime, New York City police picked up Raymond and
Speaker 1: four other teenage boys. They were interrogated separately. They were
Speaker 1: denied food, water, and access to lawyers, and they were
Speaker 1: held for between fifteen and thirty hours until each of
Speaker 1: them confessed to a crime they did not commit.
Speaker 3: And he says, so where will you? And I said well,
Speaker 3: I saw it from a distance. I was witnessing it,
Speaker 3: and he said that's not good enough. He said, you
Speaker 3: have to place yourself at the scene. You have to
Speaker 3: be right there watching it.
Speaker 1: All five of them were convicted. This is wrongful conviction
Speaker 1: with Jason Flomm.
Speaker 2: Its bad.
Speaker 1: Oh, it's so bad, Raymond. Welcome to the show.
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: Raymond. I want to go back and talk about your
Speaker 1: crazy life story because I lived through it. I'm a
Speaker 1: New Yorker. Yeah, and I remember very well seeing your
Speaker 1: face on the front of every newspaper, and you were
Speaker 1: one of the most hated people in New York City
Speaker 1: at the times.
Speaker 2: That's fair to say, that's correct. You were like the
Speaker 2: face of evil.
Speaker 4: Yes, there is anger over this incident that seems to
Speaker 4: have only grown in the day since the assault occurred.
Speaker 4: I also wanted to take them after they get out
Speaker 4: of Gail and put them in the Gorilla Cajun, the
Speaker 4: Park Zoo, the New Zoo, see if they could survive it.
Speaker 3: I think that's analogous to what they did to her.
Speaker 4: The punishment has to fit the crime.
Speaker 1: Castrate them. They can't only one problem. You didn't do it.
Speaker 2: That's a big problem. That's a big problem.
Speaker 1: But I want to go even further back than that.
Speaker 1: First of all, what's your where are you from? What's
Speaker 1: your family from? Let's talk about your childhood before this
Speaker 1: all came down.
Speaker 3: Yeah, originally I was born in Harlem, moved to the Bronx.
Speaker 2: My dad was from Puerto Rico.
Speaker 3: Mother was born here, she's Puerto Rican and also, and
Speaker 3: my childhood was like any other childhood, right, middle class family.
Speaker 3: Father works you know, at a hospital. He was there
Speaker 3: for about forty four years old total. My mom's was
Speaker 3: a housewife. It was me and my sister growing up.
Speaker 1: So you're growing up. I mean you were fourteen years
Speaker 1: old when this happened, right, correct, Yeah, I mean and
Speaker 1: when I think about how young that is, many of
Speaker 1: the audience have kids, teenage kids. I mean fourteen, you're
Speaker 1: a child. Yes, I mean at fifteen or sixteen, you're
Speaker 1: starting to become moving towards adulthood, right, but at fourteen,
Speaker 1: you're a child. Let's face it.
Speaker 3: At fourteen, you know, my dad wasn't even thinking about
Speaker 3: all right, let me sit them down and fill out
Speaker 3: an application, right, show him how to do that, you know,
Speaker 3: show him how to take a girl on the date,
Speaker 3: like that stuff wasn't even coming in yet.
Speaker 1: That maybe you shaved once by then maybe not even
Speaker 1: you're not going on.
Speaker 2: Dates yet, You're like eighth grader pretty much. Yeah, I
Speaker 2: was about yeah, about yeah, seven seventh day. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So let's go back to the night of this horrendous
Speaker 1: crime and this terrible nightmare that you and the other four,
Speaker 1: the other four guys went through. First of all, you
Speaker 1: didn't know those guys, did you.
Speaker 2: No, I did not.
Speaker 1: So the case, let's talk about the case a little bit.
Speaker 1: So the Central Park jeogra case. The fact is Central
Speaker 1: Park jogger case. This was in the well, I guess
Speaker 1: it was in the early nineties.
Speaker 2: Right, yeah, nineteen eighty nine and eighty nine, right.
Speaker 1: So the crime in New York City was out of
Speaker 1: control at that time. There was a lot of fear,
Speaker 1: a lot of panic, a lot of violence, and this
Speaker 1: case hit all the trigger points because what happened was
Speaker 1: there was a woman, a wealthy woman from the Upper
Speaker 1: East Side, white woman, who was jogging in the park
Speaker 1: at night and was attacked, dragged into the bushes and
Speaker 1: raped and beaten almost to death. This became a huge
Speaker 1: flash point, a lot of pressure on the cops to
Speaker 1: figure this out real quick, right, I imagine the mayor
Speaker 1: everybody must have been calling like get this figured out
Speaker 1: right now. So let's go. Let's go to the night
Speaker 1: of the of the crime. So where were you? What
Speaker 1: were you doing?
Speaker 3: Well, it started out because I lived originally, I lived
Speaker 3: on one hundred and nineteenth Street and like between Lexington
Speaker 3: and Park, right next to the twenty fifth precinct.
Speaker 1: So so ironically yeah right, And so as it turns out.
Speaker 3: Some guys that I went to school with lived in
Speaker 3: tap Houses, which is, you know, roughly about five six
Speaker 3: blocks away, and that night we planned to go to
Speaker 3: Shamberg because there was a party there.
Speaker 1: That's another housing project.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's where Yusuf and Kevin and Corey they live
Speaker 3: over there.
Speaker 2: So so I didn't know these guys.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I didn't know these guys, but there was mutual
Speaker 3: friends within their group and there was mutual friends within
Speaker 3: my group. And that's how we came to meet up
Speaker 3: in front of Shamberg and talk to these guys.
Speaker 1: And then from the now, just so for people who
Speaker 1: are let saying that I don't expect people to know this,
Speaker 1: but Central Park goes from fifty ninth Street to one
Speaker 1: hundred and tenth Street in New York and it goes
Speaker 1: from Fifth Avenue to Central Park West. Yes, this crime
Speaker 1: happened in the northern section.
Speaker 2: Of the park around one hundred and second Street.
Speaker 1: Right, So naturally the cops are up there looking and
Speaker 1: they're looking for, you know, suspects in that area. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but you weren't. I mean, you were still a good
Speaker 1: half a mile away at least from the crime scene
Speaker 1: at this point. So it was at the Schaumberg houses.
Speaker 1: How did let's get to where? How did you get
Speaker 1: picked up? Where'd you guys go from the Chamberg House?
Speaker 1: Why did you happen to be standing somewhere that the
Speaker 1: cops would happen to look at you and say, let's
Speaker 1: grab this guy and the other guys.
Speaker 2: Yeah, So what happened was that we went into the park, right,
Speaker 2: and so me.
Speaker 1: Just looking at something that was yeah, because.
Speaker 2: We was out out there talking.
Speaker 3: There was a bunch of guys, and then guys started
Speaker 3: going into the park in that one hundred and tenth
Speaker 3: street area, right there on the corner, because that's the
Speaker 3: corner of the park.
Speaker 2: They live right across the street from me, and.
Speaker 3: So that was something that they did all the time,
Speaker 3: Like they always went into the park and hung out
Speaker 3: in that corner area on one hundred tenth Street and fifth, Yes,
Speaker 3: one hundred.
Speaker 2: Tenth and fifth.
Speaker 3: Yeah, so to them that was like their backyard, you know,
Speaker 3: the Shaanberg boys always was in the park. And so
Speaker 3: we did go with the park with them, and then
Speaker 3: from there we wound up traveling to the park. They
Speaker 3: did walk into the park and they wound up traveling
Speaker 3: going south into the park. Now, there was some things
Speaker 3: that happened that night because it was a very large
Speaker 3: group at this time. You know how many kids We're
Speaker 3: talking over thirty kids and this group. I was with
Speaker 3: the group, but I didn't know I didn't know majority
Speaker 3: of them. I knew just the guys that I came with.
Speaker 1: And you were the youngest or one of the youngest.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I was one of the youngest. And so there
Speaker 3: were some guys in there who were rowdy, right, and
Speaker 3: so one guy did get assaulted, who was a Hispanic man,
Speaker 3: and then I think three people got sorted by the reservoir.
Speaker 2: When that happened is when we left the.
Speaker 1: Park.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's in the park. And so when that.
Speaker 3: Last incident happened with those three people is when the
Speaker 3: group left, like the guys who I came with, they
Speaker 3: was like, we're leaving the park. And so as we
Speaker 3: left the park, we was on Central Park West, like
Speaker 3: on around one hundred and second Street, and that's where
Speaker 3: the police came and I got picked up at And
Speaker 3: so the guys who I came with, they had left,
Speaker 3: and so I was there walking with a group of
Speaker 3: people who I didn't know, and so a small group.
Speaker 3: And so when the police did approach, that group scattered,
Speaker 3: and so one of the officers grabbed me, and then
Speaker 3: there was another kid who he grabbed by the name
Speaker 3: of Steven Lopez, who I didn't even know.
Speaker 1: And now they grabbed you because you didn't run, Yeah,
Speaker 1: because I didn't run. And why didn't you run?
Speaker 2: Because I didn't do anything, So there was no reason
Speaker 2: to run. There's a good answer, right, Yeah, I didn't
Speaker 2: do anything. And so and you trusted the cops at
Speaker 2: this point, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3: I never had no dealings with them, I never had
Speaker 3: no bad experience with them, so you know, it was
Speaker 3: no reason for me to run, right, And so you know,
Speaker 3: I just I told himself, well, why are you stopping
Speaker 3: me because I ain't doing anything, and he pulled he
Speaker 3: had to walk, he talking, and he hit me over
Speaker 3: the head with the water talkie. Right, he put me
Speaker 3: on the wall. So I just did in the wall
Speaker 3: and I ain't seen anything. And then he also grafts
Speaker 3: Steve Lopez and put him on the wall. And by
Speaker 3: this time the rest of the group that looked group
Speaker 3: that he was with the scattered.
Speaker 1: Okay, so anyway, so they take so they arrest you.
Speaker 1: Do you know why you're being arrested?
Speaker 2: No, I just plant don't.
Speaker 1: Do you know anything about the Central Park Jograh situation.
Speaker 1: It hadn't even gotten.
Speaker 2: Out yet, No, no, nothing, because.
Speaker 1: We didn't have social media back then. Like that's not
Speaker 1: like you were checking your phone and there's an alert
Speaker 1: that comes in from seeing.
Speaker 2: It wasn't no phone. I didn't have no phone.
Speaker 1: Out, So okay, so now you're just you know what's
Speaker 1: going on now?
Speaker 2: I don't know what's going on now.
Speaker 3: Now there was some instance that happened in the park
Speaker 3: that I saw, but you know, I didn't have nothing
Speaker 3: to do with that. So so to me, it was like,
Speaker 3: you know, it's nothing to worry about at.
Speaker 1: Fourteen, I mean you're probably not in a great position
Speaker 1: to attack anybody anyway, you probably do the one getting
Speaker 1: attack for really.
Speaker 2: I didn't at that point.
Speaker 3: I was, you know, ninety pounds, soaking ninety pounds, yeah,
Speaker 3: you know, I was a small guy.
Speaker 1: So not nothing real scary about ninety pounds. So okay,
Speaker 1: So they take you to the precinct in the park. Right,
Speaker 1: So again for our audience, that precinct is in Central Park.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a Central Park precinct.
Speaker 1: That's what it's called. So they take you to the
Speaker 1: precinct and what happens next, And so I'm there with
Speaker 1: because me and Stephen Lopez we got picked up at
Speaker 1: the same time.
Speaker 3: There's another guy, well, Kevin Richardson gets picked up too,
Speaker 3: right because Officer Powers goes into the park, he chases
Speaker 3: Kevin Richard down. Richardson down, He hits him in the
Speaker 3: face with the helmet, he tackles him, he arrests him.
Speaker 3: And so there's him, and then there's two other guys,
Speaker 3: Lamart McCall and a kid by the name of Clarence.
Speaker 2: So this is the five of us that get picked up.
Speaker 2: And so we're sitting in the precinct together together.
Speaker 3: So you know, you go through like the whole taking
Speaker 3: to the pictures, you know, like the mugshot.
Speaker 2: And stuff like that, and.
Speaker 3: Then they sit us in this room and they say,
Speaker 3: all right, make your phone call and had your parents
Speaker 3: come pick you up. Because originally what we were given
Speaker 3: was disappearance tickets right to appear in family court.
Speaker 2: So so you know, the charges then were.
Speaker 3: Like trespassing, ah, menacing, These are all like misdemeanor charges
Speaker 3: that they gave us. And so then we just had
Speaker 3: to sit and wait until our parents came.
Speaker 2: To pick us up.
Speaker 1: Right, So you called your mom, your dad. I called
Speaker 1: my dad, right, and then you got him on the phone.
Speaker 1: I got him on at least.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, because by that time it was like maybe
Speaker 3: like ten or eleven o'clock at night.
Speaker 1: Right, and yeah, and again no cell phones back then.
Speaker 1: I want to take a picture here, right, So you know,
Speaker 1: if somebody's not home, they answer the phone.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I had to call about two or three time
Speaker 2: because he.
Speaker 1: Was sleep Oh okay, okay, So he answered the phone.
Speaker 1: He must be freaking out.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he's pissed off, you know, And so I told
Speaker 3: him I got to you know, you gotta come down
Speaker 3: and pick me up and uh he speaks to the
Speaker 3: officer off so telling me he got to come pick
Speaker 3: me up. So he says, all right, he doesn't have
Speaker 3: a car, so they sent they supposed to be sending
Speaker 3: the car to pick him up, to come down and
Speaker 3: pick me up.
Speaker 1: And so, uh so you're sitting there for hours and hours, yeah,
Speaker 1: and the time you're probably hungry.
Speaker 2: Yeah, all of us is in the room a little
Speaker 2: bit bigger than this.
Speaker 1: Not in the cell.
Speaker 2: Though, not in the cell is so okay.
Speaker 1: So then so okay, so your dad comes eventually, right.
Speaker 3: Eventually, he don't take no or the parents show up.
Speaker 3: My dad is the last one to come. He shows
Speaker 3: over my grandmother. They get there like maybe three four
Speaker 3: in the morning. So he asks what's going on, So
Speaker 3: they tell him. They explain to him that it's just
Speaker 3: a disappearance ticket. We have to pay a family court.
Speaker 3: They're going to release us. So he goes, okay, So
Speaker 3: he has to go to work. So he tells my grandmother.
Speaker 3: He actually my grandmother to stay. So my grandma said,
Speaker 3: all right, you know, he says he's gonna let him go,
Speaker 3: take him home.
Speaker 2: I deal with him later. So he goes to work.
Speaker 3: My grandmother stays there, and then what happens is that
Speaker 3: they move us out of the small room into the
Speaker 3: waiting area with our parents, and they say like they
Speaker 3: can't let us go because the detectives want to talk
Speaker 3: to us, but they don't say why.
Speaker 1: Now it's three, four or five in the morning. Yeah,
Speaker 1: then you got picked up at at ten or eleven o'clock.
Speaker 1: So now we're talking like, yeah, it's a long night.
Speaker 3: We're talking like five, six in the morning, maybe even seven,
Speaker 3: and so, uh, you know, we don't know what's going on.
Speaker 3: We're just sitting there waiting.
Speaker 1: Have you heard about this central part?
Speaker 2: Jographer? Still don't know anything.
Speaker 1: But you're sure not going to ask a lot of
Speaker 1: questions after you got hit in the head with the radio.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's right, that's right, that's right. That'll and especially
Speaker 3: if you know that I'm gonna be released.
Speaker 1: So you're not gonna make any waves.
Speaker 2: No, you know.
Speaker 3: So we're sitting in this weighting room for hours, and
Speaker 3: detectives come, they talk to Kevin, take Kevin in the room.
Speaker 2: And then he's in there for hours. So we don't
Speaker 2: know what's going on.
Speaker 1: Right now, it's eight o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 2: It's No. By the time they've done with him, it's
Speaker 2: maybe like one two o'clock and the.
Speaker 1: Afternoon, and you're still sitting there, and we're still sitting
Speaker 1: They give you anything to eat, No, we're just sitting there,
Speaker 1: no water or anything.
Speaker 2: We're just sitting there, just sitting there, just sitting there for.
Speaker 1: A long time, to just sit there.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: And so after Kevin is I remember them taking Kevin
Speaker 3: out of the room and they don't let him come
Speaker 3: and sit with us.
Speaker 2: They you know, they take him.
Speaker 3: Straight out straight at the awe the office, and he leaves,
Speaker 3: he leaves the precinct, and so they called me in
Speaker 3: next and so I'm sitting there with my grandmother.
Speaker 2: So the detective he know, he uh heuh.
Speaker 3: He introduced himself as a detective from Bertha or Royal.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 3: He's in the room and and he says, you know, Raymond, uh,
Speaker 3: we just want to sit down and talk to you
Speaker 3: about some of the events that happened that night. And
Speaker 3: so I go, okay, you know, you know, what do
Speaker 3: you want to know? And so we go into the
Speaker 3: whole lot of question of who I was with, who
Speaker 3: I came with, what did I see, where was I at?
Speaker 2: Stuff? Like that, what time did I leave? How did
Speaker 2: I get picked up?
Speaker 3: And so, you know, he doesn't he doesn't say anything
Speaker 3: to me about the jagga for a while. He talks
Speaker 3: about just what happened that night, what did I see
Speaker 3: and who was I with?
Speaker 2: Right?
Speaker 3: And so I tell him that, yeah, I did see, uh,
Speaker 3: these guys assault you know, the homeless man, and I
Speaker 3: did see some of these guys throw at jaggas who
Speaker 3: were running on the reservoir and and there was one
Speaker 3: kid who did as salt one of the jaggas. And
Speaker 3: and based on that assault is when I decided that
Speaker 3: it was time for me to leave the park. And
Speaker 3: so that line of question, it goes on for hours,
Speaker 3: and then you know, he gets he he you know,
Speaker 3: he says to me, well, what happened to the jaga?
Speaker 3: And I said, well, what jogga? What are you talking about?
Speaker 3: And he says the woman? And I say what woman?
Speaker 3: I never saw a woman? And he said, so you
Speaker 3: didn't see the woman jogging in the park And I
Speaker 3: said no, and I said, the only woman I saw
Speaker 3: was when we first entered the park, there was a
Speaker 3: guy walking with his girlfriend and he walked through the
Speaker 3: through the group and everybody moved out the way and
Speaker 3: let him in her pass.
Speaker 2: And I said, that's the only woman I saw. There
Speaker 2: was no other woman.
Speaker 3: And so we went back and forth about that for
Speaker 3: a little bit, right, because he kept trying to, you know,
Speaker 3: you know, asking me the same questions. You didn't see
Speaker 3: a woman, jaga, woman was raped And I'm like, no,
Speaker 3: there was no woman raped that night. I didn't see
Speaker 3: anything like that. And he said, yeah, of course there was.
Speaker 3: And I'm like, no, there wasn't. And so from there
Speaker 3: that's when the line of questions starts to change. Now
Speaker 3: things get a little more scary.
Speaker 1: Still, just the one detective and you in the room. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and your grandmother, yeah, and my grandmother. But but your
Speaker 1: grandmother she didn't speak good English.
Speaker 2: She didn't speak She couldn't carry a conversation.
Speaker 3: She knew curse words, right, she could sit there and
Speaker 3: curse you out in English words, but she couldn't carry
Speaker 3: a conversation.
Speaker 1: That's kind of funny about yeah.
Speaker 3: It is, especially when she used to say it.
Speaker 1: It's interesting, right, I mean, your case was based on
Speaker 1: a false confession. People. I've been working on innocent issues
Speaker 1: for twenty years, and one of the things people always
Speaker 1: ask you about how could anybody confess through crime they
Speaker 1: didn't commit. Yeah, it seems crazy. Why would somebody do that?
Speaker 1: You basically fucking yourself like totally yeah, right, And I
Speaker 1: understand it. But to the audience, I think a lot
Speaker 1: of people probably wanted the same thing. Why the hell
Speaker 1: would anybody do that? I mean, you have to be
Speaker 1: nuts to do that, right, but you're not nuts. That
Speaker 1: will seem nuts at all from it. So the very
Speaker 1: large percentage, well, first of all, the first two hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty DNA exonerations, forty of them involved false confessions,
Speaker 1: So it's a very big number. And we know that
Speaker 1: of those, a very large percentage of those involve teenagers
Speaker 1: because we know that there's a thing called course compliant confessions, right,
Speaker 1: where you're basically being convinced that something good is going
Speaker 1: to happen for you if you say what the detective
Speaker 1: wants to hear, right, that you're going to get to
Speaker 1: go home, or you're going to get better treatment, or
Speaker 1: you're going to get something. And there's this thing called
Speaker 1: the read method, right, which was developed in Chicago by
Speaker 1: this guy named Reid and working with a psychologist I
Speaker 1: think he was a detective where they basically talk you into,
Speaker 1: you know, in a very sort of smooth way. They
Speaker 1: get you to tell a story that they want to hear,
Speaker 1: which may may have no relation to the truth, but
Speaker 1: it makes their jobs easier exactly. And then there's a
Speaker 1: lot of gray areas outside of that too that lead
Speaker 1: to false confessions, including you know, force threats, other things.
Speaker 1: But so in your case, because it's you know, obviously,
Speaker 1: that's what it came down to. It's the most powerful
Speaker 1: thing to a jury too, when you hear a false
Speaker 1: confession and you're in a jury. And we've seen cases,
Speaker 1: many cases where it was DNA that proved that the
Speaker 1: guy couldn't have been the guy that did it in
Speaker 1: the first place, presented to the jury and the jury
Speaker 1: was like, they, I don't know, the guy said he
Speaker 1: did it, so there must be some crazy other explanation
Speaker 1: because I'm gonna I'm not gonna look at the science.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to believe science. It's almost like that
Speaker 1: Chris rock line, right, he says, when you when you
Speaker 1: if you walk in, if your girlfriend walks in on
Speaker 1: you with another woman and it catches you in the act,
Speaker 1: you go, who are you gonna believe me or you're
Speaker 1: lying eyes right, So it's almost like that. But anyway,
Speaker 1: so back to this, So, so you're so now you're
Speaker 1: you're there. You've got to be getting feeling desperate by now.
Speaker 1: You've got to be exhausted, confused, tired, yes, definitely, definitely,
Speaker 1: and over and you're overmatched.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: They've got they've got the whole way to the New
Speaker 1: York City Police Department behind him, right, and they've got detectives,
Speaker 1: experienced detectives. And you've got your grandmother who can only
Speaker 1: speak English curse words. Yeah, right, and that's basically the team,
Speaker 1: that team Santana, right now, that's it, right, You're a
Speaker 1: fourteen year old, ninety pounds kid. Yeah, and grandma, who
Speaker 1: you know, may whip out a little English turets, but
Speaker 1: other than that, she's speaking Spanish and this and then
Speaker 1: this interrogation is not being conducted in Spanish. So okay,
Speaker 1: So so now it's you've been there for fourteen fifteen hours?
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah, and now how does it turn? How does
Speaker 1: he get you into this? How do they convince you
Speaker 1: to confess to this? Scribe?
Speaker 3: All right, So what happens is that the line of
Speaker 3: questions starts to become a little more forceful, right, you know,
Speaker 3: he starts to get frustrated, He starts to get upset
Speaker 3: at me. You know, he says that I'm not telling
Speaker 3: him what it is that he wants to hear. He
Speaker 3: says that I'm holding stuff back. You know, even when
Speaker 3: my grandmother intervenes, he tells his Spanish and I'm not
Speaker 3: telling him everything that he feels like I'm hiding things.
Speaker 3: And so, you know, you have to look at the
Speaker 3: dynamics of the situation and understand that I was a kid,
Speaker 3: I was fourteen.
Speaker 2: I never had no involvement with the law.
Speaker 3: You know, He's a seasoned veteran detectives who do this
Speaker 3: daily and so and he wants a confession, and he
Speaker 3: wants a confession.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: By now, this case is on the front page of
Speaker 1: the newspaper. Yeah, it's the number one thing in New
Speaker 1: York City. And the press made you guilty. The whole
Speaker 1: New York City was convinced that these were the guys.
Speaker 1: You saw their pictures everywhere. Of course, they took the
Speaker 1: scariest pictures they could find of you, guys, right, make
Speaker 1: you look like criminals, and plastered those everywhere, and so yeah,
Speaker 1: you were, you were public enemy number one at this point.
Speaker 3: At this point, yeah, and so he knew that even
Speaker 3: there was a pressure with them to get this confession.
Speaker 3: And so so for me, what happened was that there's
Speaker 3: a knock at the door. Right, So there comes a
Speaker 3: knock at the door, and this detective comes in who
Speaker 3: speaks Spanish, and he talks to my grandma mother and
Speaker 3: he says, listen, can you step outside? Another guy and uh,
Speaker 3: he asks my grandmother can she? Can she step outside?
Speaker 3: And he's talking to her span he takes out in
Speaker 3: the hallway and he closes the door, and at that
Speaker 3: point the line of question becomes a little more harsher, right,
Speaker 3: it becomes stop lying to me, You're gonna give me
Speaker 3: what I want. And in that same instance, as she
Speaker 3: goes out, another detective comes in, and so the third
Speaker 3: one third third guy, right, real tall detective, slim guy.
Speaker 3: And he comes in and he's making small talk with
Speaker 3: a royal and I'm just sitting in a chair.
Speaker 2: I don't know what's going to happen.
Speaker 3: And then he gives me this look and he says,
Speaker 3: what the fuck are you looking at?
Speaker 2: Right? And you know, there's an apartment that wants to say
Speaker 2: who me? But I don't say shit. I just stay quiet.
Speaker 3: And then and and then he makes like this step
Speaker 3: towards me, right, and I go, oh shit, this guy's
Speaker 3: about to kick my ass. Right, But at that moment,
Speaker 3: there's the knock. Right the door opens, my grandmother walks in,
Speaker 3: this detective walks out, and so my grandmother sits down,
Speaker 3: and I'm like, woof, you know, I just got saved, right,
Speaker 3: And so you know, a royal starts from the top. Okay,
Speaker 3: who were you with? What did you do? What did
Speaker 3: you see? What's going on? And I give him the
Speaker 3: same story, you know, during this line of question. It
Speaker 3: goes on for a couple of hours. Then it comes
Speaker 3: another knock at the door. So now the same knock comes,
Speaker 3: the same detective comes in talking Spanish, speaking Spanish to
Speaker 3: my grandmother.
Speaker 2: So he says, is this is scumback? Who did it?
Speaker 3: And Arroyo says yeah, But he's not giving us what
Speaker 3: we want to hear.
Speaker 2: And so.
Speaker 3: He pulls his chair really close up and he sits
Speaker 3: down and he starts to talk in my ear, and
Speaker 3: he's talking real forcefully, and he's not really loud, but
Speaker 3: you know, I could just I could feel the pressure
Speaker 3: on my ear from him talking. And he says, you
Speaker 3: know you fucking did it, You know you did it.
Speaker 3: You're going to jail, and that's he starts to talk.
Speaker 3: Then a royal starts to yell at me. So I
Speaker 3: got them coming from two different angles, right, and I
Speaker 3: could just sit in the chair and freeze because I
Speaker 3: don't know what to do, right, and so there is
Speaker 3: nothing to do, and so he's yelling in my ear
Speaker 3: and he says, you're going to jail, You're going to prison,
Speaker 3: you fucking did it. And then Royo is yelling at me,
Speaker 3: and that not comes right, and detective lets my grandmother
Speaker 3: back in, and at that point I start to cry
Speaker 3: a little bit, right, So now right, this guy gets up,
Speaker 3: he walks right out. So my grandmother comes in. She
Speaker 3: sits down, and now she looks at me, and she
Speaker 3: can see like something is wrong, right, and she sees
Speaker 3: the tears, but she don't know because she doesn't see
Speaker 3: anything else happening. She just sees me, right, and then
Speaker 3: she goes, well, what's going on? And the royal says, no,
Speaker 3: you know, like I told you before, you know, we
Speaker 3: just feel like he's not telling us everything.
Speaker 2: He's holding something.
Speaker 3: And then he says, well, let's start from the top
Speaker 3: once again, Raymond, tell me who were you with and
Speaker 3: what did you see? And were going through the whole story.
Speaker 3: And by this time I'm kind of beat down. I
Speaker 3: haven't slept, I haven't ate nothing, and so I'm just
Speaker 3: sitting there and I'm talking to him, and then comes
Speaker 3: the knock one more time. Right, the same detective comes in.
Speaker 3: He says, MS, Cologne, can you come out? And she
Speaker 3: gets up right, She gets up and she walks out
Speaker 3: and the door closes. He starts talking to me, and
Speaker 3: then he gets frustrated. Right, Detective Royal gets frustrated. He
Speaker 3: starts cursing at me. You're gonna fucking tell me what
Speaker 3: I want. I'm tired of this shit, and he bangs
Speaker 3: on the table, you know, really hard.
Speaker 2: And at this point he lunges at me, right, and
Speaker 2: I go, shit, this is it. I'm gonna die, right,
Speaker 2: And it's precinct.
Speaker 3: And so when he lunges at me, somebody stops him, right,
Speaker 3: So the whole time there was a detective behind who
Speaker 3: I didn't see. He stops him, right. He says, what
Speaker 3: the fuck are you doing? Starts cursing, Oh, what the
Speaker 3: fuck is going on? You gotta give him a classic technique,
Speaker 3: good cop.
Speaker 1: Bad fourteen years old. I don't know that everybody watches listening. Now,
Speaker 1: you don't know all You're scared. Ship is out of
Speaker 1: your mind.
Speaker 2: See side, Lord Nord, I don't know this stuff. And
Speaker 2: he kicks you. Get out the room, Get out the room.
Speaker 2: Get the fuck. Royal gets up, leaves out.
Speaker 3: The guy closes the door, right, And at that moment,
Speaker 3: I'm like, who, whoever this guy is? He just saved
Speaker 3: my life, right, he's your friend, he's my friend, and
Speaker 3: you know, and her hope I have Now I have
Speaker 3: a little hope.
Speaker 2: He says, hey, you know, Raymond, you don't know me.
Speaker 3: I'm detective hard again, right, and and I hear what's
Speaker 3: going on, and you know it's a serious case, serious crime.
Speaker 3: And he goes into like he pictures it so well
Speaker 3: where he's like, you know, you're a good kid.
Speaker 2: You know, I know you ain't do this.
Speaker 3: But these kids stay at these other precints and they're saying,
Speaker 3: you did it.
Speaker 2: And I don't want you to go to jail. You know,
Speaker 2: you got to help me. Here. I'm trying to help you.
Speaker 3: You want to go home, right, he just saved you,
Speaker 3: maybe just save your life and tell you a terrific guy.
Speaker 2: He's that's the proof. He just saved me from getting
Speaker 2: killed in the priests. So I'm like, yeah, he has
Speaker 2: my best interest at heart. Yep, you know.
Speaker 1: And he says, you know, I need you to help me.
Speaker 1: You got to give me this point. You're like, I
Speaker 1: want to help this guy. Yeah, this guy's gonna get
Speaker 1: me out of it.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: So what does he needs you to do?
Speaker 3: So so he pulled out this picture of Kevin Richison
Speaker 3: and he says, do you know this guy? And I
Speaker 3: said no, And he said, well, this is Kevin and
Speaker 3: you see the scratch on his face And I said yeah,
Speaker 3: because he had a munk shot. You can see it,
Speaker 3: you know, you can see it. And he says, well
Speaker 3: that that scratch came from the job when she was
Speaker 3: fighting them off. Now I know, we know he's going
Speaker 3: to jail, right, you can't do nothing about that. But
Speaker 3: I don't want you to go to jail. So you
Speaker 3: got to give me something. You got to help me here, right,
Speaker 3: I'm trying to help you. You got to help me, you
Speaker 3: want to go home, right, you got to help me.
Speaker 3: And then he just left the picture that he sat
Speaker 3: back and he just waited, he just he just got quiet,
Speaker 3: you know. And as a fourteen year old kid, I'm
Speaker 3: sitting there saying, I don't even know this guy, right,
Speaker 3: but I'm trying to get this pressure to stop, because
Speaker 3: if this guy leaves the room, then I got to
Speaker 3: deal with these detectives coming back in here again, and
Speaker 3: this is all going to start all over again.
Speaker 2: It's never gonna end.
Speaker 3: And so you know, for me, you know, I'm a
Speaker 3: fourteen year old kid, right, what do we do at fourteen?
Speaker 3: We know how to lie to our parents, all right,
Speaker 3: And so that's what.
Speaker 2: King to mind. My king of mind was lie, you know.
Speaker 3: And so I said, well he did it, and so
Speaker 3: I said, well he did it and he said he
Speaker 3: did what? And I said, well he raped a woman?
Speaker 3: And he said, all right, what else did he do?
Speaker 3: What did you see him do?
Speaker 1: Here's a clip of Raymond's confession which was used at
Speaker 1: trial times. He was.
Speaker 2: Kept smacking.
Speaker 3: And so I actually sat there and fabricated the story
Speaker 3: just involving Kevin Richardson, right, because in my mind, that's
Speaker 3: the only picture you gave me, so he's the rapist.
Speaker 1: Well, and you're going home.
Speaker 2: And I'm going home and I'm lying.
Speaker 3: But so what you figured ou out later on, So
Speaker 3: what happened was that he said, okay, so what did
Speaker 3: you see him do? So I said, I saw Kevin
Speaker 3: struggling with this woman and he took it down and
Speaker 3: he said, did you see him rape? And I said yeah.
Speaker 3: And then he said, well, what about Antroon mccraig. And
Speaker 3: I go, well, I don't know who Antroon McCrae is.
Speaker 3: And he said, well, ray, you know he was there
Speaker 3: and I said he was. He said yeah, he said,
Speaker 3: you know, we know he was there and I said, okay,
Speaker 3: well you know antrom was holding her arm.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: Now, by the way, what's crazy about all of this,
Speaker 1: on top of all the other stuff that's crazy about
Speaker 1: all of this, which is everything, is that so we
Speaker 1: of course find out later that the woman was that
Speaker 1: was raped by one guy and one guy only, and
Speaker 1: that they knew this. So here they are right. If
Speaker 1: they got the right guy among the five of you,
Speaker 1: they still got four guys that they know that they
Speaker 1: could not possibly have had anything to do with this.
Speaker 2: That's correct.
Speaker 1: But they have no problem with that.
Speaker 2: But they have no problem with that.
Speaker 1: They sleep at night, they go home their families, everything's fine.
Speaker 1: I never understand that. You don't understand that. So now
Speaker 1: they got the two guys, they got you identifying the
Speaker 1: two guys in.
Speaker 3: There, and then the third with is Stephen Lopez. So
Speaker 3: they say, well what about Steven. I go, wow, No,
Speaker 3: I don't know Stephen. He said, well, he was there,
Speaker 3: you know, he got to put him in there. He
Speaker 3: was there.
Speaker 1: And so at this point, you're already deep into this
Speaker 1: tale of lying through your teeth anyway, You're like, and
Speaker 1: you're more and more tired and hungry and everything else.
Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, well Steven Lopez. You know, I didn't know Steven.
Speaker 3: Stephen was sitting out in the waiting area and I
Speaker 3: didn't know who he was. And he said, well, we
Speaker 3: know Steven did it. And he said, you know this woman,
Speaker 3: you know, she lost a lot of blood and we
Speaker 3: don't know she's going to be and we knew that
Speaker 3: she had all these injuries on it, and it had
Speaker 3: to come from somewhere. So he said it had to
Speaker 3: come from either rock, a brick, or a pipe, right,
Speaker 3: And so this is what he told me. So he
Speaker 3: actually gave me options to choose which one and then
Speaker 3: I said a brick And he said, well, who used
Speaker 3: the brick? And I said Steven Lopez, And so that
Speaker 3: became the brick that was introduced later on in the.
Speaker 2: Case, which we know there never even was a brick.
Speaker 1: Then, yeah, exactly, the prosecutor brought in the brick that
Speaker 1: she said was used to bash the woman's head in
Speaker 1: the job is headed into the trial, right, Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: that's correct.
Speaker 3: What happened is that she, uh, you know, because of
Speaker 3: my statement said it was a brick that was used,
Speaker 3: she brought the brick in during the trial and she
Speaker 3: presented the brick and she says that this is the
Speaker 3: brick that was used in the assault on the jograph.
Speaker 2: She held she held the brick up and powerful for jury.
Speaker 1: Right.
Speaker 3: No, definitely, and the and the brick also the next
Speaker 3: day it was on the front of the New York
Speaker 3: news day. You know, a brick, A brick had his
Speaker 3: own front page each cover on the news and said
Speaker 3: this was the brick that was used in the Jagga case.
Speaker 3: And so when they did the reinvestigation years later and
Speaker 3: they test the brick.
Speaker 2: There was no blood on it. There was nothing on
Speaker 2: the brick.
Speaker 1: So they just found a brick somewhere and just who
Speaker 1: knows where they.
Speaker 2: Got it from.
Speaker 3: That could have been on the way from the prosecutor's
Speaker 3: office come to the courthouse.
Speaker 2: And he picked it up and said, this is it
Speaker 2: right here.
Speaker 1: Yeah, she probably had it on her desk like a
Speaker 1: paperweight for a while. She's so proud of it, right,
Speaker 1: So ridiculous. It's so fucking ridiculous, the fact that she
Speaker 1: would hold up a brick when there was no brick.
Speaker 1: I mean, we're in imagination land now, like deep into
Speaker 1: like I mean, that's kind of psychotic. But yeah, I
Speaker 1: just I mean, at that point, yeah, you're you're screwed.
Speaker 1: The jury scenes that and they're like, that's the that's
Speaker 1: the brick.
Speaker 2: That's the brick.
Speaker 1: That poor woman, these scary kids, a poor woman with
Speaker 1: a brick. Oh my god.
Speaker 2: Yeah, this fight was fixed from the beginning.
Speaker 1: This fight was fixed. Talk about a brick ship house.
Speaker 1: That's not a great analogy, but you know what I'm saying.
Speaker 3: Yeah, And so afterwards, you know, he wrote everything down
Speaker 3: and then he said, you know, all right, you did great.
Speaker 3: Sign it and then I signed it, and then he said,
Speaker 3: well I need two I needed two more things for
Speaker 3: me and then and then you're good to go. And
Speaker 3: I said, well what and he said, I usually give
Speaker 3: it the same statement that you have here in front
Speaker 3: of you, give this to another detective and then do
Speaker 3: the video tape.
Speaker 2: And I said, all right.
Speaker 3: It was fine because in my mind, you know, this
Speaker 3: was the guy who saved me, right, and so he
Speaker 3: was making sure that I was going to go home.
Speaker 1: Right. This is going to be evidence of you not
Speaker 1: doing it right. Yeah, in your in your twisted mind
Speaker 1: at this point, which has been jumbled up in twenty
Speaker 1: different ways, you're thinking, oh great, this is going to
Speaker 1: be more evidence that will prove that I didn't do it.
Speaker 1: So how did they even now? It seems like if
Speaker 1: I'm listening to the podcast, I'm saying, well, okay, but
Speaker 1: you didn't really say anything that you did it. So
Speaker 1: where's the confession coming? Right? And so and this was
Speaker 1: really one. When I heard you speak last time, I
Speaker 1: was really it really hit me hard. I've been thinking
Speaker 1: about it a lot. So how did they get you
Speaker 1: to place yourself? I mean, you saw it, right, but
Speaker 1: that's not a crime. Witnessing a crime.
Speaker 2: It's not a crime.
Speaker 1: You didn't go to prison for witnessing a crime. Now, okay, okay,
Speaker 1: So so how's it now? It goes now, it goes
Speaker 1: downhill fast?
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, what happens is that?
Speaker 3: And even the way he did it, you know, he said, listen,
Speaker 3: He said, okay, So, so you saw Kevin rape the woman.
Speaker 3: You saw Steve Lopez hit her with the brick, and
Speaker 3: you saw Arou McCray was holding her right, And he said,
Speaker 3: so where were you? And I said, well, I saw
Speaker 3: it from a distance. I was witnessing it. And he
Speaker 3: said that's not good enough and I said, what do
Speaker 3: you mean is not? He said, you know, you can't
Speaker 3: sit there and witness it from a distance because it's questionable. Right,
Speaker 3: it's nighttime. How did you see Kevin, you know, having
Speaker 3: sex with this woman? He said, you have to place
Speaker 3: yourself at the scene. You have to be right there
Speaker 3: watching it, right, And I said okay, And he said
Speaker 3: that's the only way it's going to be believable.
Speaker 1: Did he offer you anything to eat or drink it?
Speaker 2: This time?
Speaker 1: And even the nice guy didn't.
Speaker 2: Even nice guy didn't do that.
Speaker 3: Nice guy came in and said, this is it right here,
Speaker 3: and and and so, but.
Speaker 1: You can see now, you can see daylight. You're like,
Speaker 1: I'm going to.
Speaker 2: Get out of here.
Speaker 1: I'm almost done.
Speaker 2: I'm almost done. I'm almost done, you know.
Speaker 3: Like like Kevin said in the film, he said, at
Speaker 3: this point, you just have to sell it. And so
Speaker 3: he says, you have to place yourself right there. You
Speaker 3: have to see everything in order to say that you
Speaker 3: saw it.
Speaker 2: You know, where were you?
Speaker 3: And I said, well, I was there and he said, okay,
Speaker 3: where And I said I was on the side and
Speaker 3: he said, what did you do? And then I said,
Speaker 3: well I reached over and I grabbed the Jagger's breast
Speaker 3: and he said that's all you did, right And I
Speaker 3: said that's all I did.
Speaker 2: And he said, okay, all right, and so.
Speaker 1: And what what possessed you to say that? Because that
Speaker 1: you kind of pulled that one out of the I
Speaker 1: did what you told twenty lies already I did.
Speaker 3: I did and and and it came from me, uh
Speaker 3: wanted to be believed that I was at the scene,
Speaker 3: and then me saying well, this was a lesser role, right,
Speaker 3: like yeah, because I couldn't say that I held her
Speaker 3: because I said Antron, did it.
Speaker 1: Have you even grabbed a woman's breast by this point
Speaker 1: in your life, maybe.
Speaker 2: Maybe not a woman, a girl. So yeah, so you
Speaker 2: made this up, right, just to add.
Speaker 3: A little yeah, because I couldn't couldn't ability. I said,
Speaker 3: Kevin raped that, and I already said Steve hit it
Speaker 3: with the brick, and I race said, Atron held her.
Speaker 1: And you you know, I think a lot of people
Speaker 1: don't realize that once you say that, you're just as
Speaker 1: guilty as everybody else. Now it's you know, it's a
Speaker 1: exactly part of the group. Even though you didn't play,
Speaker 1: You didn't implicate yourself in in hitting her or raping
Speaker 1: her or strangling her or doing anything like that. But
Speaker 1: now you're guilty as everybody now, guilty everybody they got
Speaker 1: you know, now they got me. So now what happens?
Speaker 3: And so then he said, okay, you did good. You know,
Speaker 3: you know, he tells me he wants me to go
Speaker 3: to another pre stint. He wants me to tell the
Speaker 3: same story to this other detective. And and then that's
Speaker 3: what I do. So they picked me up. They take
Speaker 3: me to another precinct where I sit in the in serogation.
Speaker 1: Room with the TV cameras now waiting for you and
Speaker 1: things like that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well we come out when we go to the presst,
Speaker 3: this camera's there.
Speaker 2: He says.
Speaker 3: Look, just walk right in. Don't look at the cameras,
Speaker 3: just keep walking right in. But I still don't know
Speaker 3: what's going on.
Speaker 1: Yeah, because I'm trying to paint a picture for the ey.
Speaker 1: He's like, if you didn't live in New York back then,
Speaker 1: you can't imagine. This was really one of the most
Speaker 1: notorious crimes in New York history. That means, yeah, and
Speaker 1: that's a lot of history there, but it was I mean,
Speaker 1: it crystallized, like I said, everybody's fears of these predators
Speaker 1: roaming in the park, these scary minority kids who were
Speaker 1: like super predators.
Speaker 2: They that's where the term came from, super predators, right.
Speaker 3: They are often the kinds of kids that are called
Speaker 3: super predators. No conscience, no empathy. We can talk about
Speaker 3: why they ended up that way, but first we have
Speaker 3: to bring them to heal.
Speaker 4: There is anger over this incident that seems to have
Speaker 4: only grown in the days since the assault occurred.
Speaker 2: For a city that has been simmering for years over
Speaker 2: the issue of race, This vicious.
Speaker 1: Crime with young black defendants and a white female victim.
Speaker 1: Brings the issue to the boiling point.
Speaker 4: And these kids should be made examples for the rest
Speaker 4: of the country that if you do a crime, you're
Speaker 4: gonna get convicted. If you're guilty, you're either going to
Speaker 4: jail or you're gonna hang.
Speaker 1: So this point, every cameras out everybody, but you still
Speaker 1: don't know.
Speaker 2: You still don't know.
Speaker 1: You don't know, so you're like, okay, so you go
Speaker 1: through the cameras.
Speaker 3: So we go to another Priesson and I meet Detective
Speaker 3: Mike Shean. Right, Mike Shean was part of Homicide North
Speaker 3: detective squad, went on years of being movies and be
Speaker 3: a reporter for several different news stations. And so are
Speaker 3: going to meet him and we go in the room
Speaker 3: and he says, look, you know you spoke the heart
Speaker 3: again already and I said yeah. He says, so you
Speaker 3: know what we're gonna do here, right, And I said yeah.
Speaker 3: He said, all right, Well just tell me the same
Speaker 3: thing you told hard again and I write it down
Speaker 3: and tig and win so, you know, but because I'm
Speaker 3: selling it, that first statement with Hardigain maybe two and
Speaker 3: a half pages, right, this statement turns into like five, right.
Speaker 1: Because now you're embellishing the story.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because now he's pulling details and stuff and he's
Speaker 3: asking me stuff and I'm just making stuff up as
Speaker 3: we go along.
Speaker 1: Well, at this point it's easy work for him. Yeah,
Speaker 1: he could have said he could have said that you
Speaker 1: that you could have kidnapped the Lindbergh baby.
Speaker 3: And I could have been like, yeah, that was really yeah,
Speaker 3: yeah that happened the same night.
Speaker 1: Yeah yeah I did that, the Manton murders. Yeah I
Speaker 1: was out there in California. Yeah yeah yeah, health skeleter
Speaker 1: and all that stuff. That was you. He would have
Speaker 1: been like, yeah, can I go home now?
Speaker 2: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: And can I get a sandwich at least? So give
Speaker 2: me a sandwich while I'm telling you this story.
Speaker 1: Right, So you would have confessed anything.
Speaker 2: I would have confessed anything.
Speaker 1: And so at this point he's got you, now you
Speaker 1: So let's just fast forward a little bit. Okay, So
Speaker 1: now you're all of this is done, yeah right, and
Speaker 1: you're taking away to jail yeah too, spot for the
Speaker 1: detention center, right and so, and you have a sense
Speaker 1: it's dangerous, definitely, and you're okay, so now how long
Speaker 1: did it take to.
Speaker 2: Get to trial. It took us about a year, almost
Speaker 2: almost about a year and a half.
Speaker 1: So you're in jail for a year and a half
Speaker 1: way in for trial. Yeah, and were the other kids
Speaker 1: in the same jail with you.
Speaker 3: At this point everybody started to get bailed out, so
Speaker 3: it was all of us that came in together and
Speaker 3: we got split up. And then what happened was abody,
Speaker 3: So Kevin got built out, YUSUF got built out, Steven
Speaker 3: Lopez got built out, and Troum McCrae got built out,
Speaker 3: and then I was the last one, and then Corey
Speaker 3: was on regulars.
Speaker 2: Island, so he got bailed out. I didn't get bailed out.
Speaker 2: I mean the bail must have been high, No, it was.
Speaker 3: It started about two or fifty thousand, and then as
Speaker 3: the months went on it got lowered to one fifty,
Speaker 3: then one hundred and fifty thousand, and then it finally
Speaker 3: went down to twenty five thousand. And this was the
Speaker 3: time when Al Sharpton was raising money to get everybody out, okay,
Speaker 3: but I don't know what happened when it came to
Speaker 3: me getting out.
Speaker 2: The money wasn't raised, okay, So that's weird too. But
Speaker 2: mm hmm.
Speaker 1: So so then you go to trial.
Speaker 2: So they're going to trial, do you think did you think.
Speaker 1: You were going to be uh convicted?
Speaker 3: No, because at this point the DNA evidence is there.
Speaker 3: Nothing matches, right. You know, they took handprints, footprints, they
Speaker 3: took hair samples, they took blood samples.
Speaker 2: It took all of our clothes.
Speaker 3: And they sent it to the lab and nothing matches, right,
Speaker 3: So so you know, there's the hope. All right, there's
Speaker 3: no physical evidence to prove that we did anything.
Speaker 2: And so who's your lawyer?
Speaker 3: I had a lawyer by the name of Peter Rovera
Speaker 3: from the Bronx. He was originally handling my father's divorce
Speaker 3: paperwork and then he became a lawyer.
Speaker 1: Right, so you got a divorce lawyer.
Speaker 2: I got a divorce lawyer, and fight for your life,
Speaker 2: to fight for my life. And you know, let's just.
Speaker 1: Think about that for a second. Divorce lawyers aren't even
Speaker 1: good at divorces exactly, know what I mean. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't know how many of you out there have
Speaker 1: been through that, but I have. I don't want to
Speaker 1: denigate that. By the way, A lot of good divorce
Speaker 1: lawyers out there too, so I don't mean to, you know,
Speaker 1: but the fact is that's that's crazy.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: So, but he was confident, you felt.
Speaker 3: You know, you know, when I looked back at it,
Speaker 3: there was a lot of things that I felt that
Speaker 3: he could have did that he didn't do.
Speaker 2: He didn't fight enough, you know.
Speaker 3: And when you tried together, I believe we were No
Speaker 3: it was me Achoon, McCrae and used to Salam tried together.
Speaker 3: And it's a media circus. Yeah, oh, definitely. By this
Speaker 3: time the articles are being written. Within the first two weeks,
Speaker 3: there were four hundred articles written about us, dissecting our lines.
Speaker 1: And again you got Trump saying you guys should be executed.
Speaker 1: He went out of his way. Then the ad came
Speaker 1: out of it, took out an ad.
Speaker 3: Yeah, he put eighty five thousand dollars on the ad,
Speaker 3: and the major four made the newspapers calling for the
Speaker 3: death penalty.
Speaker 1: You better believe that. I hate the people that took
Speaker 1: this girl and raped her brutally. You better believe it
Speaker 1: because he's a he's an expert on this stuff.
Speaker 2: Yeah right, yeah, okay, so he.
Speaker 1: Would have executed all five of you guys anyway. I
Speaker 1: don't think he would have lost any sleep over No.
Speaker 2: I believe you know.
Speaker 3: I mean even years later when we got exonerated and
Speaker 3: we went through the lawsuit, he said, you know, it
Speaker 3: was the biggest heights in New York City history, right,
Speaker 3: you know you know?
Speaker 1: So okay. So so you're now you're going through this
Speaker 1: trial on the circus the whole thing. You've been in
Speaker 1: jail for at this point a year and a half, yeah,
Speaker 1: which is as a fifteen and a half year old kid, Yeah,
Speaker 1: a pretty big percentage of your life. So now you're
Speaker 1: there and you're still expecting the justice is going to
Speaker 1: be done. That's right, because you didn't do anything.
Speaker 2: That's right. And you got DNA and I got DNA
Speaker 2: now so.
Speaker 1: You got all this forensic evidence. Yeah, and you're ready
Speaker 1: to go home. Now it's going to be fixed. And
Speaker 1: then the verdict comes in.
Speaker 3: Then the vertic comes in. And the first trial, the
Speaker 3: first charge was a hip murder and they said not guilty,
Speaker 3: said okay, and then from there the rest of the
Speaker 3: charges was all guilty.
Speaker 1: Let's talk about the experience and and and you know,
Speaker 1: the tension and just thinking about you in that courtroom
Speaker 1: and waiting for that verdict. And the stomach and the
Speaker 1: pain and the everything. I can't even That's why I
Speaker 1: do this work that I do, because I can't imagine
Speaker 1: what it's like to go through this. Nobody can if
Speaker 1: you haven't been through it. I'm amazed you're here smiling, laughing.
Speaker 1: You know, got your Park Madison shirt. Yeah, yeah, fashion
Speaker 1: line Park Madison, NYC. I want to put it a
Speaker 1: plug for that. So now you're now you're off the prison,
Speaker 1: and then the crazy thing happens. Right You're you're in
Speaker 1: prison for seven years, you serve ye, you're a juvenile.
Speaker 1: Was the most they could give you, and then you
Speaker 1: get out. Then I get out. Now you're out, and
Speaker 1: you're thinking, Okay, now I can start my life. Got it.
Speaker 1: Associate's degree while you're in prison, that's correct. Right, So
Speaker 1: you're like you do, bettering yourself, doing the best you
Speaker 1: could while you're in there, that's correct. And then which
Speaker 1: prison were you in?
Speaker 3: They shipped me to go Secure Sensor and I served
Speaker 3: five years there and then they shipped me the downstair
Speaker 3: correction and then I got released from there.
Speaker 1: I mean, you say so casually the five years there
Speaker 1: like five years? Imagine five years at the holiday inn
Speaker 1: would be torture, right, I mean, and this is not
Speaker 1: the holiday in this is we're talking violence, terrible food, loneliness,
Speaker 1: all the stuff, noise, all the stuff that goes with it.
Speaker 1: So you get out and now you find out that
Speaker 1: your prospects for getting employment are basically zero.
Speaker 3: Like I filled out separate applications, nobody will hire me.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 3: There's that question that says, how you have been convicted
Speaker 3: of a crime, and you go yes and don't even
Speaker 3: get a called back, and then somebody said, well, just
Speaker 3: put we'll discuss upon interview. And then I said, all right,
Speaker 3: let's try that, and so you will discuss the point interview.
Speaker 3: And then they call you in and say, well you
Speaker 3: went to jail and yeah for what?
Speaker 1: Right?
Speaker 2: Oh, now you know and you're a register registered sex offender.
Speaker 3: And then if somebody does say, okay, well you know what,
Speaker 3: you went to jail for rape, things happen, Well what happened?
Speaker 2: And then you go to Centrapauk jagged.
Speaker 1: Cakes and they're like, okay, okay, well we're just closing
Speaker 1: up for the day. We'll get back here as soon
Speaker 1: as we can.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because now you're a level three or level one
Speaker 3: like you're like the highest level of a sex offender
Speaker 3: there is.
Speaker 1: And so that's so there's nobody's hiring.
Speaker 2: Nobody's hiring nobody.
Speaker 1: So you still got to feed yourself somehow.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So what happens is that at this point I just
Speaker 3: for me because now it started to take a toll
Speaker 3: on me, right that I was in society. I had
Speaker 3: nine o'clock curfew, seven o'clock curfew. I couldn't get a job.
Speaker 3: You know, these characteristics that are bring with me from
Speaker 3: prison were starting the surface now, the pent up aggression,
Speaker 3: not wanting to be around a lot of people in
Speaker 3: the room, not want to be around kids, not want
Speaker 3: to be around a woman by myself, right because people
Speaker 3: start to look at that walking on the eighth shows
Speaker 3: on a daily.
Speaker 1: Basis, all for your cop you gotta be yeah yeah, yeah.
Speaker 1: So so you got a lot of PTSD type syndrome
Speaker 1: symptoms and then and then so you got mixed up
Speaker 1: in drugs a little bit.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, So for me, what happened was that, you know,
Speaker 3: you know, these guys on the corner, they get a
Speaker 3: lot of money.
Speaker 2: I can see it every day.
Speaker 3: They're sitting there and they're doing what they don't have
Speaker 3: to do it, and and and in my mind they
Speaker 3: was like, well, you know what, I don't have to
Speaker 3: fill out an application for that, right, Oh you have
Speaker 3: to go to a job interview.
Speaker 2: I could just come out there doing it.
Speaker 1: Now. By the way, you have to understand, I believe
Speaker 1: that drugs should be legal, and it should be decriminalizing, taxed,
Speaker 1: and regulated. I've been working in that field for twenty
Speaker 1: four years, even longer than this, so you're gonna find
Speaker 1: me very sympathetic on this particular subject, you know. But
Speaker 1: that being said, so you got arrested.
Speaker 3: Yeah, oh yeah, So I got arrested with UH and
Speaker 3: I was charged with criminal possession with the intent to distribute.
Speaker 3: And so you know, for me, you know, I had
Speaker 3: a high bail, right, I had a parole hold, and
Speaker 3: I knew I was guilty of this case. So it
Speaker 3: wasn't you know, it wasn't about sitting there fighting the system.
Speaker 3: It was just about give me something that I can
Speaker 3: handle because I knew I was guilty.
Speaker 1: And now you're an adult, and now you've been through
Speaker 1: the system, and there's nothing they can sure you that
Speaker 1: you haven't already seen. That's correct, right, not as scary.
Speaker 3: Not as scary, right, And so you know, they gave
Speaker 3: me a three and a half to seven year sentence
Speaker 3: and I said, all right, I'll gladly take that because
Speaker 3: I was guilty.
Speaker 1: And this is where it gets really interesting. So you're
Speaker 1: back in prison, this time for something you did do
Speaker 1: and a crazy thing happens.
Speaker 3: Yeah, crazy guy named Athias Rays, guy named Tayus Rayes
Speaker 3: who's serving the thirty three and a third to life
Speaker 3: year sentenced for murder and several rapes. It's sitting in
Speaker 3: prison with Cory Wires. You know, Corey Wi, one of
Speaker 3: my cou defends who was at this point, he's in
Speaker 3: his thirteen and a half year right, never been released,
Speaker 3: you know, never, no programs, no nothing, he's just been
Speaker 3: in prison. And he sees Corey in the yard walking around,
Speaker 3: and he approaches Corey, right, And he doesn't tell Corey
Speaker 3: that he's the person who committed the crime. But what
Speaker 3: he does is he engages in the conversation with Corey
Speaker 3: because back in nineteen nine they was on the same
Speaker 3: housing unit, right, and they had a fight over the TV.
Speaker 2: And so he comes to Corey and he says, hey,
Speaker 2: you remember me.
Speaker 3: Corey says, you know the looks out of him, says
Speaker 3: we had a fight in eighty nine over the TV,
Speaker 3: and Corey says, yeah, I remember you. And from there
Speaker 3: he starts to tell Corey how his faith in religion
Speaker 3: has changed and how he's trying to be better and
Speaker 3: do better things in life, and they engage in a dialogue,
Speaker 3: and based on that dialogue, he never told Corey he
Speaker 3: was the person who committed the jogger case.
Speaker 2: He didn't do that.
Speaker 3: He just spoke to Corey and the conversation made him
Speaker 3: feel a certain type of way that he felt he
Speaker 3: had to do something.
Speaker 2: And so that's where it started.
Speaker 3: Where he actually went and he talked to the prison
Speaker 3: chaplain and this was the first person that he told that,
Speaker 3: you know, somebody's in this prison for a crime that
Speaker 3: I know I did, and they've been here all this
Speaker 3: time and they're innocent.
Speaker 2: And then that's how the ball starts to roll.
Speaker 1: This is the first time you've heard me shut up,
Speaker 1: because I'm just sitting here trying to like process this right.
Speaker 2: And this guy, like, he didn't just tell the story once.
Speaker 3: He told it over and over and over, even until
Speaker 3: it got to Albany and they had to send an investigator.
Speaker 3: DA's office had to send somebody to go talk to
Speaker 3: him and he told them the story.
Speaker 2: And so when he was the sole perpetrator, and he was.
Speaker 3: The sole perpetrator, he was known as the East Side slasher.
Speaker 3: All his crimes he committed by himself. All his victims
Speaker 3: had the same kind of injuries.
Speaker 1: And he had been under investigation prior to the Central
Speaker 1: Park geography.
Speaker 3: That's correct, he committed a rape in Central Park. Two
Speaker 3: days before the rape went the Jagga.
Speaker 1: And they had some information that they were looking at
Speaker 1: him as a aspect.
Speaker 3: He had a scar on his chin. The lady who
Speaker 3: he raped in Essential Park two is before I did
Speaker 3: him as having a scar on the chin. So one
Speaker 3: of the detectives who was looking for him, they went
Speaker 3: to the hospital and they find out who was the
Speaker 3: last person that has stitches and they foundmentaies rares And
Speaker 3: so this information came to uh Linda Festin, who was
Speaker 3: ahead of This information came to Lynda Feresti, who was
Speaker 3: the head of the sex crimes unit. Around the same
Speaker 3: time that the DNA evidence from our.
Speaker 2: Case came back.
Speaker 3: It was about six weeks and it came around the
Speaker 3: same time that it came back that said that, uh,
Speaker 3: there was no match, and so she had she had
Speaker 3: the information on her desk, but she chose not to
Speaker 3: either talk to us again. She chose not to entertain
Speaker 3: an alternative theory or on an alternative suspect.
Speaker 2: She just chose to go forward with this case.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's what can't you even say about that? I mean,
Speaker 1: it's like, I'm so angry about it, and I wasn't
Speaker 1: the one who got victimized here, and there's a lot
Speaker 1: of victims here, right, the woman who didn't get justice,
Speaker 1: it's correct, the society who wasn't protected from this guy
Speaker 1: who truly is evil, yes, and then the five of
Speaker 1: you guys, and then your whole families. Yeah right. I
Speaker 1: mean that's the thing, Like, I think people need to
Speaker 1: understand that when we lock up the wrong guy, by definition,
Speaker 1: we stopped looking for the right guy.
Speaker 2: That's correct.
Speaker 1: That guy is then free to go out and commit
Speaker 1: more terrible acts against innocent people.
Speaker 2: Wanted to commit a murder and I think four additional rapes.
Speaker 1: Right, So a murder and four rapes, that's the scorecard
Speaker 1: of If Ferristein would have done her job, which was
Speaker 1: right in front of her. It wasn't tricky, wasn't right,
Speaker 1: It wasn't like this one came with instructions right, And
Speaker 1: all she had to do was look at it and say, yes,
Speaker 1: I'm going to do my job, my sacred duty to
Speaker 1: protect the public and the citizens of which you are one,
Speaker 1: and I'm going to investigate the obvious lead that is
Speaker 1: going to lead me to the right rapist in this
Speaker 1: case and almost kill her. And she didn't do it
Speaker 1: because it was inconvenient in some way, and she probably
Speaker 1: liked all the press she was getting, I'm guessing, and
Speaker 1: as a result, it's really I can't imagine how those
Speaker 1: people must feel that were victims of Rais, knowing that
Speaker 1: he could have been and should have been off the
Speaker 1: street and they and their families never would have had that.
Speaker 1: I can't imagine if it was my daughter, or my sister,
Speaker 1: or my mother or somebody else who he victimized. I
Speaker 1: don't know. I can't. The amount of anger is really
Speaker 1: it's hard to even put it into words.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a there's a report.
Speaker 3: There's a report that's that's done by the DA's office,
Speaker 3: called it Nancy Ryan Report. It's about fifty two pages
Speaker 3: long and it tells you why we're innocent, or the
Speaker 3: evidence in the reinvestigation as to how we're innocent. Reyes
Speaker 3: went on to even solve unsolved crimes.
Speaker 1: Because they yeah, because they never bought it. Look into
Speaker 1: other way. Even though he even though it was in
Speaker 1: a neat pattern, like I said, this one was with it.
Speaker 1: This one came with instructions. So now so okay, so
Speaker 1: now as we're nearing the end of this this show,
Speaker 1: so by some miracle, he ends up in the prison
Speaker 1: with Corey. Yeah, and he has this moment of he
Speaker 1: has this awakening and then he has this moment of
Speaker 1: feeling guilty. He is a bad word in this particular case.
Speaker 1: But and then he uh, he spills the beans.
Speaker 2: He spills the being.
Speaker 1: And now you're in prison and you get the word
Speaker 1: how does this happen? You get the word that you've
Speaker 1: been exonerated.
Speaker 3: Well, you know what happened was they bring me back
Speaker 3: down and they questioned me, right, they questioned me becau
Speaker 3: because it's not that simple for them to just let
Speaker 3: us go to them. Rayes is the sixth man, right
Speaker 3: to them, we knew each other, We was in cohose
Speaker 3: with each other, and so they have to try to
Speaker 3: find a connection, and so they give me all these
Speaker 3: photos to see if I know who he is.
Speaker 2: But I don't know who he is, so I never
Speaker 2: picked him out of a photo.
Speaker 3: And so it's a year long investigation by the DA's
Speaker 3: office before they actually exonerators.
Speaker 1: Wow. Yeah, so they yeah, so they just had to
Speaker 1: string it out even a little bit longer. But then
Speaker 1: you do get exagerate.
Speaker 2: Then I do get it.
Speaker 1: You're in prison.
Speaker 2: So I'm in prison.
Speaker 3: I get the word that I'm exonerating my dad. I'm
Speaker 3: talking to my fault on the phone and he says,
Speaker 3: you know, I said, you know, they keep questioning about
Speaker 3: the old case. And he's like, yeah, because I got
Speaker 3: something to tell you. And I go what, And he says,
Speaker 3: because he's been watching the news and it's all over
Speaker 3: the news and he sees it and this time he's
Speaker 3: he's in touch with the lawyers and he goes, you know,
Speaker 3: they found a guy who did it.
Speaker 2: And and I'm like what and he says.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they found them. You get me come home. And
Speaker 3: I'm like, get the fuck out of here. Like I
Speaker 3: was so institutionalized that I didn't even believe him. I
Speaker 3: hung up the phone on them, and I said, you
Speaker 3: know what, I don't even want to talk to you
Speaker 3: no more. You just ruined my day and I hung
Speaker 3: up the phone on them, right. And it wasn't until
Speaker 3: I actually got the call from my attorneys that yeah,
Speaker 3: you're going to be exonerated.
Speaker 1: Well yeah, and then how long was it before you
Speaker 1: got home?
Speaker 3: We got exonerated December fifth, and then I was home.
Speaker 3: My Lloyd said I'll get you home before Christmas, and
Speaker 3: I was like, yeah, whatever, and he got me home
Speaker 3: December twenty second.
Speaker 1: And you when you did finally get that news that
Speaker 1: you were exonerate, then when you actually believed it, Yeah,
Speaker 1: what happened? Did you collapse? Did you like start crying, laughing, well, jumping?
Speaker 3: I cried when I found out about rays, and but
Speaker 3: I was still in disbelief. And it wasn't until I
Speaker 3: actually got til I got released. They sent me to
Speaker 3: Queensboro and then they released me from there, and then
Speaker 3: for the first time I actually got to see the
Speaker 3: magnitude of of how much cameras and lights, and because
Speaker 3: I never really been in that situation, that was the
Speaker 3: first time for me.
Speaker 2: So it was really overwhelming, like it was like, wow,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: Well, and now let's just talk for a minute about
Speaker 1: what life is like. Now. I know you're doing a
Speaker 1: lot of public speaking, raising awareness, definitely, I know you.
Speaker 1: Everyone knows that there was a settlement. Yes you guys.
Speaker 1: I don't think you could ever pay enough for what
Speaker 1: you've been through. But but you're good now, right, and
Speaker 1: you got some money in the bank.
Speaker 2: Definitely.
Speaker 1: I see you've got good style, right, you got your
Speaker 1: you got your's. You can't see it on the radio,
Speaker 1: but he's looking good and it got a great smile
Speaker 1: and so so. And now now you have a family.
Speaker 3: Yes, my daughter's twelve years old. I've been married now
Speaker 3: two years.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 3: So I'm trying to put the pieces together back slowly
Speaker 3: but surely.
Speaker 1: Sounds like you're doing a hell of a job. And
Speaker 1: I'll tell you something, you know, just just being with
Speaker 1: you and hearing that story and knowing that you've come
Speaker 1: through this with an incredible spirit and with an incredible attitude,
Speaker 1: it's it's really it's an inspiration to so many people.
Speaker 1: I don't think you even know. And now I'm hoping
Speaker 1: that with this runflin Fiction podcast will reach a lot
Speaker 1: more people, many of whom will have heard parts of
Speaker 1: your story or seen the movie again, the Central Park
Speaker 1: five incredible movie. Get a chance to see it, and
Speaker 1: and I'm hoping that again that this will help to
Speaker 1: make a difference in the lives of some other people.
Speaker 1: And you know, I really just appreciate you coming in
Speaker 1: and sharing your story and your strength and hope and
Speaker 1: and and and wisdom, and you know, as a New Yorker,
Speaker 1: I want to apologize to you from all of us
Speaker 1: that you ever had to go through this, and having
Speaker 1: lived through it, I couldn't have known, you know, it
Speaker 1: was so one side of the pressed. I have no idea.
Speaker 1: And now to be sitting here with you now, it's
Speaker 1: really it's kind of a thrill for me, to be honest.
Speaker 1: And yeah, I'm like I said, I just really want
Speaker 1: to thank you for being here on the show.
Speaker 2: Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1: Don't forget to give us a fantastic review. Wherever you
Speaker 1: get your podcasts, it really helps. And I'm a proud
Speaker 1: donor to the Innocence Project, and I really hope you'll
Speaker 1: join me in supporting this very important cause and helping
Speaker 1: to prevent future wrongful convictions. Go to Innocence Project dot
Speaker 1: org to learn how to donate and get involved. I'd
Speaker 1: like to thank our production team, Connor Hall and Kevin Wartis.
Speaker 1: The music in the show is by three time OSCAR
Speaker 1: nominatede composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on
Speaker 1: Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast.
Speaker 1: Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm is a production of Lava
Speaker 1: for Good Podcasts and association with Signal Somebody Number One