WEBVTT - Amanda Knox Navigates Labyrinths 0:00:02.400 --> 0:00:05.600 I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Hear's the Thing 0:00:06.040 --> 0:00:11.639 from iHeart Radio. In two thousand and nine, Amanda Knox 0:00:11.760 --> 0:00:15.360 was sentenced to twenty six years in prison for a 0:00:15.400 --> 0:00:20.360 crime she didn't commit. You probably remember her case. Amanda 0:00:20.440 --> 0:00:23.440 was a foreign exchange student in Perugia, Italy in two 0:00:23.480 --> 0:00:27.480 thousand and seven when her roommate Meredith Kercher was raped 0:00:27.800 --> 0:00:31.480 and murdered. Despite a lack of physical evidence linking her 0:00:31.480 --> 0:00:34.800 to the crime, Knox spent almost a decade of her 0:00:34.840 --> 0:00:38.960 life stuck in the maze of the Italian criminal justice system. 0:00:39.720 --> 0:00:43.080 Amanda Knox is thirty three now and lives in Seattle. 0:00:43.800 --> 0:00:47.840 Last year, she and her husband launched a podcast called Labyrinths. 0:00:48.280 --> 0:00:51.280 In December, they put out a special episode to mark 0:00:51.320 --> 0:00:56.120 the release from prison of Meredith Kircher's actual killer, Rudy Gaday. 0:00:57.040 --> 0:01:01.880 Well, thank you for being here on this labyrinth with me. 0:01:04.400 --> 0:01:07.920 Should he have gotten a life sentence, I don't think so. 0:01:08.880 --> 0:01:12.320 I would not wish an unreasonably harsh sentence on anyone. 0:01:13.080 --> 0:01:17.720 I would wish them only true rehabilitation. Gooday's lawyers say 0:01:17.800 --> 0:01:22.040 he's well along that path. Maybe so, But I do 0:01:22.160 --> 0:01:25.720 know one thing. So long as he refuses to admit 0:01:25.760 --> 0:01:30.760 his crimes to show true regret, I will continue to 0:01:30.880 --> 0:01:35.559 unjustly bear his infamy, be held accountable for the Kircher's grief, 0:01:36.319 --> 0:01:40.000 be shamed for not showing remorse for good Day's crime. 0:01:40.959 --> 0:01:43.840 He could end all that in a second. 0:01:45.560 --> 0:01:48.680 Amanda Knox knows what it's like to be stuck inside 0:01:49.200 --> 0:01:50.960 someone else's preconception of you. 0:01:52.040 --> 0:01:55.200 So the work that I'm doing now is I'm a podcaster, 0:01:55.400 --> 0:01:59.120 I'm a journalist. I very often, especially in my journalism 0:01:59.160 --> 0:02:02.800 and focusing on on criminal justice issues, not just wrongful 0:02:02.800 --> 0:02:06.760 conviction issues, but more broad criminal justice issues. I'm on 0:02:06.800 --> 0:02:09.320 the board of the Frederick Douglass Project, which is working 0:02:09.400 --> 0:02:13.360 to build bridges between the incarcerated population and the non 0:02:13.360 --> 0:02:18.600 incarcerated population. So I'm deeply interested in that divide. But 0:02:18.800 --> 0:02:22.840 my podcast work, and Labyrinths being the podcast that I've 0:02:22.919 --> 0:02:25.880 devoted so much energy and love into this past year, 0:02:27.320 --> 0:02:33.960 is about how people navigate being lost. We just had 0:02:34.000 --> 0:02:38.360 a twelve episode season that concluded on January first with 0:02:38.480 --> 0:02:41.160 an interview with LeVar Burton, which was super fun and. 0:02:41.080 --> 0:02:43.120 You discussed what with him. For example, we. 0:02:43.040 --> 0:02:46.560 Talked about his career and how he could have done 0:02:47.120 --> 0:02:49.920 a lot of different things, how he was on the 0:02:49.960 --> 0:02:53.320 path to becoming a Catholic priest except that this one 0:02:53.360 --> 0:02:56.079 thing happened, and then he very well could have gone 0:02:56.120 --> 0:02:59.200 into politics except that this thing happened. So we had 0:02:59.240 --> 0:03:01.480 this really fun and we actually had a lot of 0:03:01.480 --> 0:03:04.160 fun with that episode because Chris and I decided to 0:03:04.600 --> 0:03:08.040 become super nerdy and go sci fi, and we created 0:03:08.080 --> 0:03:12.400 alternate dimensions where like we talked to Catholic priest LeVar 0:03:12.400 --> 0:03:14.919 Burtons and politician LeVar Burton. 0:03:15.080 --> 0:03:15.919 He's so talented. 0:03:16.000 --> 0:03:18.200 Yeah, he's a sweetheart. He was so nice. 0:03:18.520 --> 0:03:20.160 But we cover a lot of ground in the in 0:03:20.200 --> 0:03:23.880 the season, and we go from anywhere from like super 0:03:23.960 --> 0:03:27.960 super dramatic stories, like we interviewed Samantha Geimer, who was 0:03:28.200 --> 0:03:32.960 the fourteen year old girl who was raped by Roman Polanski. Yeah, 0:03:33.000 --> 0:03:36.600 and how like interestingly speaking of you know, people using 0:03:37.400 --> 0:03:41.160 individual human beings like worst experiences of their lives as 0:03:41.560 --> 0:03:45.920 entertainment that they're entitled to and as a profit making machine. 0:03:45.960 --> 0:03:47.000 Like that was her story. 0:03:47.040 --> 0:03:50.840 And she didn't react the way or didn't want the 0:03:50.880 --> 0:03:54.800 things that people expected a rape victim to want, and 0:03:54.840 --> 0:03:58.760 so they vilified her because she actually wanted some kind 0:03:58.800 --> 0:04:04.600 of amicable result with Polanski, and they themselves found ambicable 0:04:04.680 --> 0:04:09.640 resolutions behind closed doors, while the rest of society was 0:04:09.680 --> 0:04:13.680 still trying to churn up this like victim and villain narrative. 0:04:13.920 --> 0:04:16.839 What's the name of the podcast Labyrinths Labyrinths. 0:04:17.240 --> 0:04:21.640 There's actually a really awesome comic that was drawn and 0:04:21.800 --> 0:04:25.280 came out shortly after I got out of prison, which 0:04:25.320 --> 0:04:30.880 showed me escaping the labyrinth of the Italian criminal justice system, 0:04:31.200 --> 0:04:33.480 and I felt that that was a really beautiful metaphor. 0:04:34.040 --> 0:04:38.080 And what I've found is that not only is my 0:04:38.440 --> 0:04:41.360 own case, you know, it's remarkable and unique in a 0:04:41.400 --> 0:04:43.919 lot of ways, but it's also totally not remarkable and 0:04:44.000 --> 0:04:46.240 unique in the sense that it has all the telltale 0:04:46.279 --> 0:04:49.400 signs of wrongful convictions that happen here in the United States. 0:04:49.800 --> 0:04:53.720 But also like the feeling of going through that experience 0:04:53.760 --> 0:04:57.760 of being lost and feeling like there's this overpowering force 0:04:57.839 --> 0:05:01.120 that's like you can't actually navigate and you're sort of 0:05:01.160 --> 0:05:03.320 like on this journey and you don't know how it's 0:05:03.360 --> 0:05:07.360 going to end. That's an experience that lots of people have. 0:05:07.880 --> 0:05:11.640 I remember going back to school and taking a poetry class, 0:05:11.640 --> 0:05:13.760 and there was a girl in my poetry class who 0:05:13.880 --> 0:05:16.360 was really clicking with my poetry. And I wasn't, you know, 0:05:16.440 --> 0:05:20.480 writing explicitly like I'm Amanda Knox. I was in prison 0:05:20.480 --> 0:05:22.440 for crime I didn't commit. It was more just like 0:05:22.640 --> 0:05:27.360 very emotional. And eventually one day she figured out who 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:31.000 I was and she said, oh my god, you're Amanda Knox. 0:05:31.080 --> 0:05:33.279 And I was like, oh, no, Like what Google rabbit 0:05:33.279 --> 0:05:36.400 hole has she gone down now? And instead she said, no, No, 0:05:36.440 --> 0:05:39.680 you don't understand. I was gang raped when I was sixteen, 0:05:40.160 --> 0:05:44.600 and the feeling of what you went through feels like 0:05:44.920 --> 0:05:48.839 what I went through when I was gang raped at sixteen. 0:05:49.360 --> 0:05:50.600 And I was like wow. 0:05:51.040 --> 0:05:55.600 So the fact that like I sit in this very 0:05:55.680 --> 0:05:59.760 weird position where I'm a not very usual wrongfully convicted 0:05:59.760 --> 0:06:03.400 person in what way, Well, I'm female, for one thing. 0:06:03.400 --> 0:06:05.160 Who's usually wrongfully convicted. 0:06:05.520 --> 0:06:08.600 People who are usually wrongfully convicted tend to be, especially 0:06:08.600 --> 0:06:13.920 in this country, tend to be young men from impoverished 0:06:13.960 --> 0:06:16.440 backgrounds and young men of color. 0:06:16.760 --> 0:06:18.480 And that's because they can't afford a good defense. 0:06:19.160 --> 0:06:20.480 I mean, that's part of it. 0:06:20.960 --> 0:06:24.000 There's also a lot of biases that go into it. 0:06:24.400 --> 0:06:28.960 There's a lot of sort of hysteria around youth culture, 0:06:29.320 --> 0:06:32.359 like even just issues with like gangs. That's an issue 0:06:32.360 --> 0:06:34.440 where it's like, you know, a lot of people don't 0:06:34.480 --> 0:06:37.680 understand that kids just by virtue of living in a 0:06:37.720 --> 0:06:41.640 neighborhood are sort of associated with gangs, even if they 0:06:41.720 --> 0:06:44.719 have never committed a crime. And so suddenly you're like 0:06:44.800 --> 0:06:47.760 in a gang book and you're identifiable as a gang member. 0:06:47.800 --> 0:06:50.880 But that's only because you happen to live in that neighborhood, 0:06:50.880 --> 0:06:53.120 and you happen to associate with a number of people 0:06:53.120 --> 0:06:56.080 who also live in that neighborhood. You know, those kinds 0:06:56.080 --> 0:06:59.359 of things. But the major thing is that the criminal 0:06:59.440 --> 0:07:02.120 justice system is a system that was built by men 0:07:02.480 --> 0:07:06.120 for men, because the vast majority of people who are 0:07:06.200 --> 0:07:10.200 committing crimes are men, and for someone like me to 0:07:10.280 --> 0:07:13.280 be put through the criminal justice system as a defendant 0:07:13.440 --> 0:07:16.760 is highly unusual. I come from a middle class background, 0:07:16.800 --> 0:07:20.680 I come from an educated background. I have no history 0:07:20.920 --> 0:07:24.120 of you know, behavioral problems or anything like that. Like 0:07:24.240 --> 0:07:27.720 I'm usually what I mean, actually, usually the victims of 0:07:27.760 --> 0:07:31.920 crimes also happen to be young men of color. But generally, 0:07:31.920 --> 0:07:34.960 when you think of someone like me the media presents 0:07:34.960 --> 0:07:38.800 someone like me as a crime victim, and for me 0:07:39.000 --> 0:07:41.760 to be in a position of being able to both 0:07:42.360 --> 0:07:45.720 sympathize with what it is like to be a young 0:07:45.760 --> 0:07:49.360 woman who is victimized by a man, and to be 0:07:49.480 --> 0:07:52.560 able to sympathize with the experience of young men who 0:07:52.600 --> 0:07:57.040 are being put through this incrediblely unfair criminal justice process 0:07:57.320 --> 0:08:00.200 that puts me in a unique position to like build bridges, 0:08:00.560 --> 0:08:05.640 and I kind of view my work as bridge building 0:08:06.080 --> 0:08:09.760 as like acknowledging the complex humanity of people on both 0:08:09.800 --> 0:08:14.800 sides of the equation and being able to bring nuance 0:08:14.920 --> 0:08:17.720 back into the true crime genre, which I tend to 0:08:17.840 --> 0:08:24.240 feel has been more dominated by scandalous, salacious, black and 0:08:24.280 --> 0:08:28.520 white presentations of stories as opposed to more complicated ones. 0:08:28.760 --> 0:08:31.320 And a lot of times, like a lot of people 0:08:31.400 --> 0:08:35.360 reach out to me thinking that I am going to 0:08:35.480 --> 0:08:39.080 be able to understand their humanity in a way that 0:08:39.160 --> 0:08:42.960 other people just don't or refuse to, and so a 0:08:43.000 --> 0:08:45.120 lot of the stories that I end up talking about 0:08:45.120 --> 0:08:46.680 are just people who've reached out to me. 0:08:47.240 --> 0:08:48.679 So you're not somebody who people are coming to you 0:08:48.760 --> 0:08:50.480 and going I need you to fix this for me. 0:08:50.920 --> 0:08:52.320 I mean a lot of people reach out to me 0:08:52.360 --> 0:08:54.640 asking me to fix things for them, But the truth 0:08:54.640 --> 0:08:56.600 of the matter is, I'm not a lawyer, So like 0:08:56.720 --> 0:08:58.400 a lot of the people who would love for me 0:08:58.440 --> 0:09:00.640 to be able to do something about some one's case, 0:09:01.320 --> 0:09:04.360 like I usually end up being the person who like 0:09:04.440 --> 0:09:08.480 directs them towards the Innocence project that is like closest 0:09:08.520 --> 0:09:12.360 to their location. What I end up doing is I 0:09:12.480 --> 0:09:14.800 try to give a voice to the people who have 0:09:14.840 --> 0:09:17.240 felt like their voice has been stolen from them. And 0:09:17.240 --> 0:09:20.400 once again, it isn't necessarily someone who's been wrongfully convicted. 0:09:20.880 --> 0:09:23.120 Did you come out of this experience when you finally 0:09:23.120 --> 0:09:26.199 were free, did you come out of this with some 0:09:26.360 --> 0:09:31.199 divine ability to tell who's telling the truth and who isn't. 0:09:31.960 --> 0:09:35.679 No, I don't think anyone has that ability. No, they don't, 0:09:36.040 --> 0:09:40.320 absolutely not. I think that what it gave me was 0:09:41.240 --> 0:09:44.760 a perspective that I wouldn't have had otherwise, but also 0:09:44.840 --> 0:09:51.559 a sensitivity to when I view people as being scapegoated, 0:09:52.040 --> 0:09:55.959 whether they did something or not. I am very sensitive 0:09:56.080 --> 0:10:01.080 to when people become ideas of people and not actual people, 0:10:01.440 --> 0:10:03.880 and I can see that happening on a day to 0:10:03.960 --> 0:10:04.600 day basis. 0:10:04.920 --> 0:10:08.199 What was the most consistent idea that you represented the people. 0:10:08.880 --> 0:10:15.880 That Foxynoxy was a drug adult, sexually promiscuous young woman 0:10:16.120 --> 0:10:19.600 who manipulates men to do her bidding. Like there's this 0:10:19.760 --> 0:10:22.280 idea of I think there was also this sense of 0:10:22.360 --> 0:10:25.479 like female jealousy that was imbued in me. So basically 0:10:26.080 --> 0:10:30.920 everything that is stereotypically bad about being a woman was 0:10:30.960 --> 0:10:34.080 sort of put on me. I was made to be 0:10:34.240 --> 0:10:41.400 this like jealous, sexually promiscuous, manipulative, druggy woman, and I 0:10:41.480 --> 0:10:44.600 came to embody that in the minds of people. And 0:10:44.679 --> 0:10:48.800 on the other hand, I also was, you know, portrayed 0:10:48.960 --> 0:10:52.160 as this like saint like damsel in distress, and even 0:10:52.160 --> 0:10:55.000 in the courtroom, people were, you know, presenting me as like, 0:10:55.320 --> 0:10:57.679 on the one hand, she has the face of an angel, 0:10:57.760 --> 0:11:01.200 on the other hand, she's really like devil. And it 0:11:01.320 --> 0:11:06.440 was like, how about I'm neither. I'm just a young 0:11:06.600 --> 0:11:10.079 person who, like my roommate was murdered and I had 0:11:10.120 --> 0:11:12.720 no idea what was going on. And everyone was speaking 0:11:12.720 --> 0:11:14.880 an Italian really fast, and I had no idea what 0:11:14.920 --> 0:11:17.839 was going on, and I got scared and here I am. 0:11:18.520 --> 0:11:21.760 So how much time did you spend in the Italian 0:11:21.800 --> 0:11:23.679 prison total four years. 0:11:23.960 --> 0:11:28.800 My god, So from age twenty to twenty four, I 0:11:28.840 --> 0:11:31.000 spent in a foreign prison. 0:11:30.880 --> 0:11:32.560 And everybody in there with you was Italian. 0:11:32.840 --> 0:11:35.200 Actually, the vast majority of the people who were in 0:11:35.240 --> 0:11:40.000 there were either Nigerian or Roma. 0:11:40.280 --> 0:11:40.720 Interesting. 0:11:40.920 --> 0:11:42.840 I mean, there were plenty of Italians in there, and 0:11:42.880 --> 0:11:46.160 a lot of them were very very poor Italian people 0:11:46.280 --> 0:11:50.000 who had ties to the drug trade and stuff like that. 0:11:50.080 --> 0:11:53.280 A lot and a lot of people in for drug offenses, 0:11:53.320 --> 0:11:55.480 whether they were drug mules or drug dealers. 0:11:57.040 --> 0:12:02.040 Amanda Knox, if you like crime drama where the defendant 0:12:02.080 --> 0:12:06.000 is falsely accused, that listened to my conversation with filmmaker 0:12:06.080 --> 0:12:11.559 Joe Berlinger. Berlinger directed the Paradise Lost series of documentaries 0:12:11.840 --> 0:12:13.960 about the trial of the West Memphis three. 0:12:14.640 --> 0:12:18.800 I mean, here you have allegedly a crime by three 0:12:18.840 --> 0:12:23.400 teens who are not professional killers, who brought, according to 0:12:23.440 --> 0:12:26.200 the prosecutor, three little boys out into the woods and 0:12:26.280 --> 0:12:28.880 slaughtered them to death in this savage beating, and yet 0:12:28.880 --> 0:12:31.160 there was no blood found at the crime scene. And 0:12:31.200 --> 0:12:33.360 then you look at the confession, and the confession is 0:12:33.440 --> 0:12:37.760 riddled with inconsistencies and problems coaching and coaching. So within 0:12:37.840 --> 0:12:39.640 months we knew that something was amiss. 0:12:40.880 --> 0:12:44.720 Hear more of my conversation with Joe Berlinger at Here's 0:12:44.760 --> 0:12:49.079 the Thing dot Org. After the Break, Amanda Knox describes 0:12:49.200 --> 0:12:52.640 the toll that her long wait for justice had on 0:12:52.720 --> 0:13:04.560 her family. I'm Alec Baldwin and you're listening to Here's 0:13:04.600 --> 0:13:09.040 the Thing. After her release from prison, Amanda Knox wrote 0:13:09.040 --> 0:13:12.800 a memoir titled Waiting to be Heard. A few years later, 0:13:13.160 --> 0:13:18.320 Netflix released a documentary called Simply Amanda Knox. However, she's 0:13:18.440 --> 0:13:22.440 resisted offers to participate in a feature film based on 0:13:22.520 --> 0:13:23.280 her experience. 0:13:24.240 --> 0:13:27.880 I actually very much pushed back against that. I mean, 0:13:27.920 --> 0:13:31.240 there's kind of a film that's sort of a narrative 0:13:31.400 --> 0:13:33.000 version of it. 0:13:33.000 --> 0:13:34.640 It's not worth watching. It's really bad. 0:13:35.120 --> 0:13:37.720 I Mean, what I thought that the documentary did that 0:13:37.920 --> 0:13:42.240 a film couldn't do was it allowed everyone to sort 0:13:42.280 --> 0:13:47.000 of present their own thoughts in perspective about what happened. 0:13:47.640 --> 0:13:51.360 And it didn't claim to be Like, it didn't have 0:13:51.440 --> 0:13:55.600 a scene where I either kill or don't kill Meredith 0:13:55.679 --> 0:13:59.520 Kircher right, Like the problem with having a film be 0:13:59.600 --> 0:14:01.920 about it is you're making some sort of you're taking 0:14:01.960 --> 0:14:05.360 some stance about reality that is built up of a 0:14:05.400 --> 0:14:10.880 lot of claims of reality, but not necessarily reality, And 0:14:11.240 --> 0:14:14.840 in a situation where so much judgment is attached to that, 0:14:15.080 --> 0:14:19.960 I found that that was inevitably going to be flawed. 0:14:20.480 --> 0:14:26.800 Whereas a documentary that genuinely allows everyone to portray what 0:14:27.080 --> 0:14:29.960 they experienced and what they think about what. 0:14:29.960 --> 0:14:31.920 They experienced and the facts as they know. 0:14:32.080 --> 0:14:34.320 And the facts as they know them is going to 0:14:34.480 --> 0:14:38.320 be closer to the truth and also is going to 0:14:38.360 --> 0:14:41.600 present the crux of this issue, which is that people 0:14:41.680 --> 0:14:45.160 are making claims about reality that they can't actually you know, 0:14:45.280 --> 0:14:50.120 like sustain with evidence, what do we actually know? I 0:14:50.200 --> 0:14:53.560 want to preserve this sense of like, well, you know, 0:14:53.640 --> 0:14:57.000 the person who actually committed this crime, Rudy Gaudet, who 0:14:57.320 --> 0:15:00.360 no one ever talks about, is not someone and who's 0:15:00.400 --> 0:15:04.520 forthcoming with what actually happened. We have the evidence of 0:15:04.600 --> 0:15:07.600 him at the crime scene, of him interacting with Meredith's 0:15:07.600 --> 0:15:10.200 body and leaving his fingerprints and footprints in her blood. 0:15:10.240 --> 0:15:11.000 We know that. 0:15:11.920 --> 0:15:14.920 Do we have a camera on the wall where we 0:15:15.000 --> 0:15:18.440 see him doing it or we're in his mind nor. 0:15:18.280 --> 0:15:22.200 He confesses, right, And the imagine for you you want 0:15:22.200 --> 0:15:24.440 to avoid that where they're going to leave it Gray 0:15:24.640 --> 0:15:27.560 whether you really killed this girl or not. You know, 0:15:27.560 --> 0:15:29.440 a feature film is always going to be like, well, 0:15:29.680 --> 0:15:32.320 you know, yeah, that's a fear I would have. 0:15:32.680 --> 0:15:32.920 Yeah. 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:36.640 That's the unfortunate thing about true crime in general is 0:15:36.720 --> 0:15:41.400 there is this sort of temptation to treat it fundamentally 0:15:41.440 --> 0:15:45.040 as an entertainment product. And due to that, like the 0:15:45.080 --> 0:15:47.920 thing that is most entertaining is when people can walk 0:15:47.960 --> 0:15:51.360 away from the movie and just argue about it. You know, like, 0:15:51.480 --> 0:15:53.640 if I feel this way about the case, you feel 0:15:53.640 --> 0:15:56.720 that way about the case, and you know, now we 0:15:56.760 --> 0:15:59.240 can argue about it because it's unclear. And I think 0:16:00.120 --> 0:16:03.960 one of my big frustrations with my own case was 0:16:04.040 --> 0:16:07.600 that the prosecution, first of all, but also just people 0:16:07.600 --> 0:16:11.480 in general, always wanted to have this attitude of well, 0:16:11.520 --> 0:16:15.200 the defense says this, and the prosecution says that, and 0:16:15.240 --> 0:16:17.920 so you know, there must be some sort of truth 0:16:18.040 --> 0:16:22.320 in between. Amanda must be guilty of something. We're not 0:16:22.400 --> 0:16:24.840 quite sure what it is, but she must be guilty 0:16:24.880 --> 0:16:28.320 of something. And that's actually like one of the major 0:16:28.360 --> 0:16:32.080 reasons why I was retried and reconvicted. I don't know 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:35.040 if you knew that or maybe you followed that in 0:16:35.200 --> 0:16:38.360 the documentary, but like in Italy, the double jeopardy laws 0:16:38.360 --> 0:16:38.960 aren't the same. 0:16:39.320 --> 0:16:40.760 And so when the. 0:16:40.760 --> 0:16:44.720 Sort of whole forensic case against me came crashing down 0:16:44.880 --> 0:16:50.720 after my acquittal, I was retried again but on behavioral evidence. 0:16:50.760 --> 0:16:54.200 So basically the prosecution said, sure, we can't actually place 0:16:54.200 --> 0:16:55.920 her at the crime scene, but she just. 0:16:56.240 --> 0:16:58.480 Didn't act like an I was. 0:16:58.960 --> 0:17:01.880 Yeah, was just something like, we can't be totally wrong, 0:17:01.960 --> 0:17:04.240 so like something's got to be there. And I was 0:17:04.400 --> 0:17:07.840 reconvicted on that, like just on that sort of sense 0:17:07.880 --> 0:17:09.760 that there must be something there. 0:17:09.920 --> 0:17:11.879 Yeah, we don't have the evidence yet, but we're going 0:17:11.920 --> 0:17:12.840 to find it, trust me. 0:17:12.960 --> 0:17:15.119 Yeah, like there's some you know, I just got a 0:17:15.240 --> 0:17:18.199 vibe and they bought that. And it wasn't until the 0:17:18.240 --> 0:17:21.560 Supreme Court and I was on trial for eight years, 0:17:22.160 --> 0:17:24.720 and it wasn't until the court swooped in and was like, 0:17:24.800 --> 0:17:25.680 where's the evidence. 0:17:25.720 --> 0:17:27.320 There's literally no evidence. 0:17:27.600 --> 0:17:30.480 Explain to people who don't know what are the extradition 0:17:30.600 --> 0:17:32.879 arrangements between Italy and the United States that they try 0:17:32.920 --> 0:17:34.560 to have you extra died it because when you were 0:17:34.560 --> 0:17:35.600 convicted again. 0:17:35.400 --> 0:17:37.160 You didn't go back right. 0:17:37.480 --> 0:17:40.280 So the way that it worked was that there is 0:17:40.320 --> 0:17:43.880 an extradition treaty between the United States and Italy, and 0:17:44.119 --> 0:17:46.760 so while I was in trial there, I was in prison, 0:17:47.200 --> 0:17:49.960 and then I was acquitted and I was allowed to 0:17:50.000 --> 0:17:53.360 go home, but I was still on trial, like they 0:17:53.560 --> 0:17:57.240 still pursued a case against me, and I was retried 0:17:57.320 --> 0:18:00.639 in absentia, so they had a whole trial without me 0:18:00.760 --> 0:18:03.040 in Italy while I was here living in the United States. 0:18:03.440 --> 0:18:06.800 And while that was going on, I was meeting with 0:18:06.880 --> 0:18:10.720 lawyers here to see, depending on the outcome of this 0:18:10.840 --> 0:18:14.320 new trial, do I want to make a case to 0:18:14.560 --> 0:18:17.639 at least potentially serve my sentence here in the United 0:18:17.640 --> 0:18:20.040 States so it's less of a burden on my family. 0:18:20.440 --> 0:18:23.639 So here I am like trying to go to college 0:18:23.680 --> 0:18:27.200 and go to school, but also making plans to potentially 0:18:27.280 --> 0:18:30.600 turn myself into the cops in case there's a bad 0:18:30.640 --> 0:18:35.479 outcome in this case, which there was, and I'm trying 0:18:35.480 --> 0:18:37.720 to plan to how am I going to fight my 0:18:37.800 --> 0:18:40.800 case in court here in the US, to just see 0:18:40.840 --> 0:18:42.560 if I can try to serve a sentence here in 0:18:42.600 --> 0:18:44.920 the US as opposed to being trucked all the way 0:18:44.920 --> 0:18:47.560 back to Italy like that was my twenties. 0:18:48.200 --> 0:18:50.159 That doesn't exist, so you can't serve your time in 0:18:50.200 --> 0:18:51.679 the US for a crime in Italy. 0:18:51.720 --> 0:18:55.680 Can you Well, the US has discretion over whether or 0:18:55.760 --> 0:19:00.400 not it actually will fulfill that extradition treaty. It can 0:19:00.760 --> 0:19:03.399 always say, you know what, I don't really care to 0:19:03.680 --> 0:19:04.480 extradite her. 0:19:04.760 --> 0:19:06.120 She's going to stay here in the US. 0:19:06.240 --> 0:19:09.159 But because we want to appease the Italian justice system, 0:19:09.440 --> 0:19:11.520 we're going to hold her here in the US. 0:19:11.560 --> 0:19:12.560 She'll serve her sentence. 0:19:12.680 --> 0:19:15.600 Really, I didn't know that. I went through a divorce 0:19:15.840 --> 0:19:21.040 in California what's been re christened the Parents' Rights movement. 0:19:21.080 --> 0:19:23.919 It was the father's rights movement. Women were favored so 0:19:24.680 --> 0:19:28.120 clearly in courts about custody and so forth. And that's 0:19:28.240 --> 0:19:32.159 slowly changing. But in an analysis that different organizations I 0:19:32.200 --> 0:19:35.200 worked with did, California was ragged at the bottom of 0:19:35.520 --> 0:19:38.399 men's rights. I mean, it was a really, really, really 0:19:38.480 --> 0:19:43.359 because and that breaks down to basically two the haves 0:19:43.359 --> 0:19:46.000 and the have nots. I was in court, and if 0:19:46.000 --> 0:19:47.800 the guy that walks in the room is a gardener 0:19:48.160 --> 0:19:51.040 and he's getting divorced from his wife, the divorce proceedings 0:19:51.040 --> 0:19:54.800 are over in fifteen or twenty minutes. There's no money 0:19:54.840 --> 0:19:58.440 for lawyers to mine and pump out of that situation. 0:19:59.320 --> 0:20:04.520 If a famous whatever, actor, writer, musician, doesn't matter, government official, 0:20:04.840 --> 0:20:08.240 if somebody prominent who was presumed to have the resources 0:20:08.240 --> 0:20:11.040 comes into court, it's like this is a big business. 0:20:11.440 --> 0:20:14.320 So they say to you, Alec Baldwin, your daughter who 0:20:14.320 --> 0:20:16.199 back then she was five years old, she's on the 0:20:16.240 --> 0:20:19.359 other side of this six foot concrete wall. Here's a 0:20:19.400 --> 0:20:23.120 paper clip, start digging, and you're going to start digging 0:20:23.320 --> 0:20:26.400 because if you're a normal human being who has a child, 0:20:26.560 --> 0:20:28.639 you want to be with that child, you want to 0:20:28.720 --> 0:20:31.560 parent that child. I know many people drop out and 0:20:31.600 --> 0:20:33.520 they give up and they write it off and go, 0:20:33.720 --> 0:20:35.639 I'm going to go start another family because they're so 0:20:35.840 --> 0:20:38.840 abused by that system. And so abused was I by 0:20:38.880 --> 0:20:43.400 that that I wrote a book. So I wasn't wrongfully 0:20:43.440 --> 0:20:46.840 convicted of murder in an Italian courtroom. But I was 0:20:46.880 --> 0:20:50.919 somebody who did everything they asked me to do, and 0:20:50.960 --> 0:20:54.520 they just kept punishing me because they knew I was 0:20:54.560 --> 0:20:57.320 going to keep coming. I'm wondering in your case, was 0:20:57.440 --> 0:21:00.960 they're just this driving need for you to share with 0:21:01.040 --> 0:21:04.439 other people what I went through and the lessons of 0:21:04.480 --> 0:21:06.680 that and how you can avoid what I went through. 0:21:07.040 --> 0:21:07.639 Was there some of that? 0:21:08.320 --> 0:21:09.760 Well, first of all, I just want to say that 0:21:09.840 --> 0:21:14.479 I'm really sorry that you went through that. And I 0:21:14.600 --> 0:21:16.560 was going to point out, like, you know exactly what 0:21:16.600 --> 0:21:19.119 it's like to be made to be the center of 0:21:19.160 --> 0:21:22.080 a morality play that people feel like they can just 0:21:22.240 --> 0:21:25.960 you know, keep taking and like profiting from and profiting 0:21:25.960 --> 0:21:29.399 from and profiting from. And I'm sure the tabloids have 0:21:29.520 --> 0:21:32.840 their cut of the pie too, Like I get it, 0:21:32.920 --> 0:21:35.920 Like it's easy to be made the villain of a story, 0:21:36.160 --> 0:21:39.879 especially when you're on trial, especially when you're accused. Yeah, 0:21:39.960 --> 0:21:42.840 like all of the sort of prejudices and stereotypes that 0:21:43.320 --> 0:21:46.400 we associate with people, but we don't say in polite company. 0:21:46.720 --> 0:21:49.560 As soon as you're accused of something and you're in court, 0:21:49.720 --> 0:21:53.639 like everyone feels comfortable bringing those stereotypes and prejudices to 0:21:53.680 --> 0:21:57.159 the table, like it's no, it's always now we're allowed 0:21:57.200 --> 0:21:59.840 to say she's a whore right now? 0:22:00.880 --> 0:22:04.320 When you went to prison, what was the. 0:22:04.280 --> 0:22:07.040 Sentence The first time I was convicted, I was sentenced 0:22:07.040 --> 0:22:11.520 to twenty six years, And when I was reconvicted and resentenced, 0:22:11.600 --> 0:22:14.640 I was sentenced to twenty eight and a half years. 0:22:15.000 --> 0:22:18.920 But to your point previously. I think that especially when 0:22:18.920 --> 0:22:21.560 we're talking about someone like you being in court for 0:22:22.359 --> 0:22:25.840 not you know, a murder, right, like, this is a 0:22:25.880 --> 0:22:29.320 situation where it's and I think it points to the 0:22:29.320 --> 0:22:33.080 fact that, like, this issue is not just about wrongful convictions. 0:22:33.160 --> 0:22:37.240 It's broader than that. It's about judgment. It's about mob 0:22:37.400 --> 0:22:41.920 mentality and mob profit off of an individual human being, 0:22:41.960 --> 0:22:46.800 and it's about the dehumanization of individual human beings for profit. 0:22:47.359 --> 0:22:51.440 That is something that has repercussions, not just in wrongful 0:22:51.440 --> 0:22:55.359 convictions cases where like the stakes are highest because you 0:22:55.359 --> 0:22:57.040 know the prosecutor ultimate. 0:22:56.760 --> 0:22:59.760 Cancel culture, right, the ultimate cancelation. Yes, you're going to 0:22:59.800 --> 0:23:02.600 go to prison for twenty eight and a half years for. 0:23:02.600 --> 0:23:04.480