Speaker 1: On May thirty one, Dennis Horton went to his brother
Speaker 1: Lee's home for a Memorial Day weekend cook out. Later
Speaker 1: in the day, they visited their father in North Philadelphia,
Speaker 1: as well as their childhood friend Robert Leaf. Unbeknownst to
Speaker 1: the Hortons, Robert Leaf had committed an armed robbery earlier
Speaker 1: that day in which two women were injured and one
Speaker 1: man was fatally shot. The Hortons pulled up to their
Speaker 1: friend Robert Leaf on the street and made plans to
Speaker 1: watch a basketball game back at Lee's. Robert asked the
Speaker 1: brothers to meet him one block up, where he got
Speaker 1: into their car with a gun. Police had been following
Speaker 1: Robert and immediately pulled them over, where all three men
Speaker 1: were arrested. The two injured women, who initially had said
Speaker 1: that there were only two armed robbers, gave a shaky
Speaker 1: idea of all three men, sending them to trial together.
Speaker 1: Robert Leaf's attorney used confusion amongst the witnesses over the
Speaker 1: identities of the three men to change the narrative from
Speaker 1: Robert Leaf as the shooter to Dennis delivering a lighter
Speaker 1: sentence to the actual culprit. While the Hortons were sentenced
Speaker 1: to life without parole. Years later, a statement by Robert
Speaker 1: Leaf admitting his role and excluding the Horton brothers was unearthed,
Speaker 1: along with the fact that police had identified Robert Leef
Speaker 1: as the shooter from the very start. However, with this
Speaker 1: new evidence being ruled inadmissible on purely procedural grounds, it
Speaker 1: took the tireless advocacy of Pennsylvania Lieutenant Governor John Fetterman
Speaker 1: to win a commutation and release for the brothers after
Speaker 1: nearly three long decades in prison. This is wrongful conviction.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to wrongful conviction. My best advice to you
Speaker 1: right now is fasten your seatbelt because this is going
Speaker 1: to be a crazy ride that you're about to go on.
Speaker 1: But before I introduced the two brothers who were wrongly
Speaker 1: convicted of the same crime together and ended up serving
Speaker 1: almost twenty seven years together in the same cell for
Speaker 1: the crime didn't commit. I just want to say that
Speaker 1: this is Philadelphia in the nineties. You've heard stories on
Speaker 1: here before about Philadelphia and in the nineties, and it
Speaker 1: was it was the time and place where a black
Speaker 1: man had a better chance of getting justice in Philadelphia,
Speaker 1: Mississippi than in Philadelphia Pennsylvania and this is another example
Speaker 1: of that. So without further ado, let me introduced to you.
Speaker 1: I'm so excited to have these guys on the show
Speaker 1: today because there's such inspiring people. Lee and Dennis Horton,
Speaker 1: the brothers Horton. Welcome to Wrong for Conviction. Alright, good afternoon.
Speaker 1: How was everybody doing out there. I'm glad to be here.
Speaker 1: Thank you for brightness on. So let's get right into it.
Speaker 1: First of all, I want to say to both of
Speaker 1: you guys that while I am obviously delighted to have
Speaker 1: you on the show, I'm sorry that you're here because
Speaker 1: of what you had to go through and it should
Speaker 1: have never happened. So let's go back to the beginning.
Speaker 1: I'm talking about how was childhood for you guys growing
Speaker 1: up together while you moved to Philly and seventy seven, right,
Speaker 1: but give us a quick look at what your childhood
Speaker 1: was like. So when we was young, growing up, we
Speaker 1: lived uneventful but a wonderful life. You know, my mom
Speaker 1: and my father was married in the early sixties. Four
Speaker 1: of us, four kids. We grew up in some of
Speaker 1: the roughest places in the city. But our family, my
Speaker 1: mom my grandmother. My father always instilled in us that
Speaker 1: you had to work for what you wanted in life,
Speaker 1: and so we started working at an early age. My
Speaker 1: mom and father. Unfortunately they split up in nineteen seventy two.
Speaker 1: My mom, she was trying to take care four kids
Speaker 1: on on. We wind up moving to the Projects, which
Speaker 1: was at the time East Falls Projects. I was around
Speaker 1: twelve years old, My brother was seven at the time.
Speaker 1: So the projects was a rough project. You know, you
Speaker 1: had to prove the people up there that you was
Speaker 1: willing to fight in order for you to be able
Speaker 1: to stay, or they chased you out the projects. That's
Speaker 1: how it was. And so I had got into a
Speaker 1: fight with an individual and I wanted to fight. That
Speaker 1: was a blessing to some degree, but it was also
Speaker 1: a curse because now I was at I with a
Speaker 1: lot of guys my age twelve and thirteen year olds
Speaker 1: in the projects, and one day I wound up on
Speaker 1: the wrong side of the projects when we was approached
Speaker 1: by a group of individuals and it was maybe about
Speaker 1: twenty something thirty guys, and they approached this and they
Speaker 1: wanted me to fight a guy. And you know that
Speaker 1: it was a bunch of guys that was about to
Speaker 1: jump us. And then these other guys came out of
Speaker 1: nowhere and came to our rescue. And it was only
Speaker 1: a few of them, but they were like the neighborhood
Speaker 1: tough guys to some degree. One of these guys who
Speaker 1: would become a really good friend of mine was an
Speaker 1: individual named Robert Leef, And so I fell in with
Speaker 1: these guys and we became really good friends. He came
Speaker 1: to my house, stayed at my house, slept in my house,
Speaker 1: ate at my house. My mom said somebody, we became
Speaker 1: his mom. And then we moved out of projects. By
Speaker 1: that time, we kind of veered off a little bit,
Speaker 1: although I would go see my friends who were still
Speaker 1: living in the products and some living in North Philadelphia,
Speaker 1: from town to town. And so now we move up
Speaker 1: towards the time of the actual crime, and I'm talking
Speaker 1: about Memorial Day weekend, May thirty first. So there was
Speaker 1: an arm robbery at Poldo's Bar. Now, initial descriptions say
Speaker 1: it was two men, but later it was changed to three.
Speaker 1: One man with a two caliber semi automatic rifle and
Speaker 1: another with a black pistol robbed the bar and its patrons.
Speaker 1: Samuel A. Limo six ft three and over two pounds,
Speaker 1: wrestled with the gunmen for the gun, but was overpowered
Speaker 1: and was shot and killed. Lose ar Cella and Lose
Speaker 1: Martinez were injured, but both were covered, and a witness
Speaker 1: described chasing after the pleaing assailants who saw them in
Speaker 1: a small blue car and supplied police with a partial
Speaker 1: license plate number. And again, remember this is Philadelphia in
Speaker 1: the nineties, So we'll get to the you know, myriad
Speaker 1: problems with the state story, but first let's hear your story.
Speaker 1: So it's Memorial Day weekend. You had four kids, right,
Speaker 1: including a two week old baby, and at the time, Dennis,
Speaker 1: you were just recently engaged to be married and had
Speaker 1: also recently been badly injured at work and we're recovering, right,
Speaker 1: So you were in absolutely no condition to be engaging
Speaker 1: in hand to hand combat wrestling right with a very
Speaker 1: large man, right strong man. So can you take us
Speaker 1: through that day, that that day that this armed robbery
Speaker 1: and murder, this whole tragedy happened. So Lee and his
Speaker 1: wife invited me and fiance at the time over to
Speaker 1: his house. So of course I went to Lee's house,
Speaker 1: had a cook out, with him and his wife and
Speaker 1: his kids. And later on that evening we decided we
Speaker 1: was going to take a ride. You know, we've been
Speaker 1: in the house all day. Stopped by my father's house
Speaker 1: see him, and then Lee was gonna stop by just
Speaker 1: see a few guys that he knew, and we headed
Speaker 1: for North Philadelphia, when my father lived at the time,
Speaker 1: and we swung by his house, but his light was
Speaker 1: out so he would sleep. So Lee said, okay, let's
Speaker 1: stop around Leaf's house. So, you know, we drove around
Speaker 1: Leaf's house. He was standing out on the corner with
Speaker 1: some other guys and Lee beat the horn and Leif
Speaker 1: came over to the car and him and le talked
Speaker 1: for a little bit. So rob Leaf was supposed to
Speaker 1: come back to leave house. We're just gonna watch the
Speaker 1: basketball game. So Leaf said, pull up a block and
Speaker 1: I'll be there, and I got to just take care
Speaker 1: of something real quick. And we pulled up to the
Speaker 1: block and Leif came maybe about ten fifteen minutes later,
Speaker 1: got in the car, and then we pulled off, and
Speaker 1: about a couple of blocks later, we saw sirens and
Speaker 1: we pulled over and the police jumped out of their
Speaker 1: vans and cars were gunn drawn and told us to
Speaker 1: get out of the car. And we got out of
Speaker 1: the car and they handcuffed us and they put us
Speaker 1: into the patty wagon and they took us to the
Speaker 1: hospital when identification to take place, and all I remember
Speaker 1: is that the van doors opened up, and next thing
Speaker 1: you know, I've seen I think two ladies point to
Speaker 1: rob relief and said, yeah, that's the guy right there.
Speaker 1: And then they said, well, what about these other guys
Speaker 1: and they said, yeah, them too, they were with them too,
Speaker 1: And then they shut the doors back and then that
Speaker 1: was it. And next thing you know, we were down
Speaker 1: the roundhouse. Where did they charge you for a homicide?
Speaker 1: So okay, right away we see problems emerged with what
Speaker 1: the witnesses are describing. Right the alleged number of individuals
Speaker 1: involved in the robbery went from went up fifty, right
Speaker 1: from two to three. And when you're there at the
Speaker 1: hospital and the police patty wagon right outside the hospital
Speaker 1: with the witnesses saying yeah them too. Also, one of
Speaker 1: the witnesses described a blue car and gave a partial
Speaker 1: plate number, So did that match your own? Les? The
Speaker 1: only witness who claimed to see the car said it
Speaker 1: was a blue small car. It was supposed to a
Speaker 1: Chevy Svett. He said the name of the car in
Speaker 1: his statement. Now Lee's car is a Priest Classic, a
Speaker 1: four door large car, two tones, two different colors. But
Speaker 1: this witness, for some reason, we could never find him
Speaker 1: and never bring him to trial. The person the police
Speaker 1: put down giving out this partial plate number. When we
Speaker 1: got the witness on the stand, she said, right then there,
Speaker 1: I navi gave the police anything. I never saw a car,
Speaker 1: So how could I have ever given him Their name
Speaker 1: is on this paper though they said you gave it
Speaker 1: to him. She said, it's impossible. I didn't see a car.
Speaker 1: I didn't give him anything. And the thing about the
Speaker 1: officers who did this first thing, you gotta give you
Speaker 1: a context who these officers are. The first officer was
Speaker 1: somebody who had strangled a guy to death early on,
Speaker 1: and then later, right after he was arrested, he shot
Speaker 1: a guy unarmed in a car. The second officer, she
Speaker 1: was involved in internal fairs investigation about a large quantity
Speaker 1: of drugs being found in the police station and them
Speaker 1: suspecting it or connect did it to her. As you
Speaker 1: start ap peeling the layers away, you start seeing that
Speaker 1: it's more to this than just the police picking up
Speaker 1: some guys and they were involved. So I have to ask,
Speaker 1: do you think that they knew from the beginning that
Speaker 1: you guys had nothing to do with us. That's a
Speaker 1: really good question, and our heart of hearts, we believe
Speaker 1: in the beginning maybe they wasn't sure, but as things
Speaker 1: begin to unfold, they had to be clear that we
Speaker 1: weren't involved, just didn't care. And the reason why we
Speaker 1: know is because the prosecutor them came to us with
Speaker 1: a deal. It was like five to ten years, and
Speaker 1: we were like, we're innocent, We're not taking any deal.
Speaker 1: Why should we take any deal to go to jail
Speaker 1: for when we didn't do anything? And now it was
Speaker 1: sort of like, okay, you won't take the deal, all right, Well,
Speaker 1: the chip's gonna fall what they made, right, And it's
Speaker 1: very uncommon that in the crime as serious as this
Speaker 1: one armed robbery where someone was killed, right, that they're
Speaker 1: gonna offer someone two guys in this case five years. Right.
Speaker 1: You know, you don't have to be a legal scholar
Speaker 1: to figure this one out. So now we get to
Speaker 1: the trial and all three of you, lead Dennis and
Speaker 1: Robert Leaf are tried together, and they have three witnesses.
Speaker 1: Now I'm gonna put witnesses and quotation marks here. Three
Speaker 1: of them came to trial and they eventually identified Dennis
Speaker 1: as the shooter. But did they have any physical evidence
Speaker 1: at all, any fingerprints, any security footage. There was no
Speaker 1: security footage. What they had was they actually had the gun,
Speaker 1: they said with the murdered weapon. They never actually could
Speaker 1: trace it to any bullets they got out of the body.
Speaker 1: They didn't match. But this is the gun that Leaf
Speaker 1: had on him. He left the gun in the car.
Speaker 1: The cops retrieved it and when they checked it, it it
Speaker 1: had fingerprints. But we've been always trying to get these
Speaker 1: fingerprints checked because they could never trace him to any
Speaker 1: of us, and they took all of our fingerprints. They
Speaker 1: didn't fit any of us. Now, the way that my
Speaker 1: brother got to become the shooter is a clear case
Speaker 1: of mistaken identification. Initially in the case, they all identified
Speaker 1: Robert Leaf at shoot her. And this is where the
Speaker 1: cold case turns. If this don't never happen, we probably
Speaker 1: would have walked. The one witness would identify different person
Speaker 1: every hearing. When she identified Robert Leave, Robert Leaves attorney,
Speaker 1: he would read in noose testimony of her identifying my
Speaker 1: brother and to it got to the point where when
Speaker 1: the judge asked her, who are you saying did this?
Speaker 1: She said, I'm gonna say it's the one right there,
Speaker 1: and she was identified me And we had already told
Speaker 1: the court that they was identified as based where we
Speaker 1: were sitting there, so we switched seats. So when we
Speaker 1: switched seats, she was identified based on who the witness
Speaker 1: before her told her to identify, and then she thought
Speaker 1: that the person was sitting in that seat, but it
Speaker 1: wound up being me Lee Horton. When she heard my name,
Speaker 1: she said, hold it, what's the name? And they just said,
Speaker 1: why do you want to know the name? Because Dennis
Speaker 1: did it. It's Dennis, He said Dennis, and then she said, yeah,
Speaker 1: I heard him. They was calling Dennis. And then after
Speaker 1: that we were in the case and they knew that
Speaker 1: this woman just had made this up out of the sky,
Speaker 1: just right then and there. Everybody refused to pull back,
Speaker 1: and they could have corrected that right then and there
Speaker 1: and said, well, hold up the honor, she's wrong. Mr
Speaker 1: Leaf was wearing a red jacket. We know that for sure.
Speaker 1: That's a fact. They identified him as a shooter. That's
Speaker 1: a fact. They didn't say any of that. They just
Speaker 1: let the witnesses go on and order or with these
Speaker 1: wrong identifications. And this woman had identified every last one
Speaker 1: of us has a shoot at one given time. This
Speaker 1: episode is underwritten by A i G, a leading global
Speaker 1: insurance company, and by Accenture, a global professional services company
Speaker 1: with leading capabilities in digital, cloud and security. Working to
Speaker 1: reform the criminal justice system is a key pillar of
Speaker 1: the A i G pro Bono Program, which provides free
Speaker 1: legal services and other support to many nonprofit organizations and
Speaker 1: individuals most in need as part of Accenture's commitment to
Speaker 1: racial and civil justice. Accenture's Legal Access Program provides pro
Speaker 1: bono legal services in partnership with more than forty organizations,
Speaker 1: bringing meaningful change to people and communities worldwide. Three weeks
Speaker 1: prior to our arrest, I had injured my leg on
Speaker 1: my job in such a fashion that I needed a
Speaker 1: c L repair. The holiday was on a Monday. I
Speaker 1: was supposed to go talk about the day that week
Speaker 1: I was going to have the surgery done. I just
Speaker 1: came off the crushes. So when we were arrested, it
Speaker 1: was impossible for me to be able to wrestle with
Speaker 1: this guy. I think they said he was like six
Speaker 1: four or six three, something like that. I was supposed
Speaker 1: that overpowered him, wrestled all way to the ground with
Speaker 1: this guy, overpowered the gun out of his hand, and
Speaker 1: then after I was supposed that shot him. I was
Speaker 1: supposed to that ran away as fast as I could.
Speaker 1: There was no way I could run on that leg
Speaker 1: at all. And my medical records and all that would
Speaker 1: have shown that would approve that, and this would have
Speaker 1: disqualified me from even remotely possibly being the shooter. And
Speaker 1: the thing is they knew this, but nobody cared. So
Speaker 1: you both had different lawyers. So two people who were
Speaker 1: supposed to be working on your behalf, what were they
Speaker 1: doing with all of this information? At trial, he made
Speaker 1: the mistake of a friend of my mom's told her
Speaker 1: that their son could be a good lawyer force and
Speaker 1: we accepted that, but he wasn't a criminal defense attorney.
Speaker 1: He had not tried one criminal case, and he wound
Speaker 1: up being a person putting our defense together. My lawyer
Speaker 1: had been retired, and he was kind of older, and
Speaker 1: he was a little out of step. We were just
Speaker 1: not prepared for a capital case. Now, the difference is
Speaker 1: Robert Leaf was prepared. He knew the system and he
Speaker 1: knew how to work the system. We was naive. We
Speaker 1: thought that we were innocent and it was gonna be
Speaker 1: shown and it never was. Like literally, if you put
Speaker 1: this in the movie, you say, well, one guy's represented
Speaker 1: by a friend of a friend who never tried a
Speaker 1: criminal case before this capital murder we're talking about, and
Speaker 1: the other guys tried by a guy that they literally
Speaker 1: pulled out a retirement and we ailed them into the courtroom.
Speaker 1: You guys didn't even know that you're doomed. You're thinking, hey,
Speaker 1: we go in and tell the truth. You were the
Speaker 1: only guys in the courtroom telling the truth. That's the
Speaker 1: only problem, right, and that doesn't work. And that's the
Speaker 1: thing that you know, even now gets to me a
Speaker 1: little bit because I spent twenty seven years in prison
Speaker 1: when this could have been nipping but early on and
Speaker 1: I didn't have to never go to prison. Back to
Speaker 1: twenty seven years. You know, sometimes in your mind you think,
Speaker 1: well you should have took there, but what would we
Speaker 1: just said, we didn't commit the crown, We didn't know
Speaker 1: anything about it. Took us twenty eight years to learn
Speaker 1: enough about this case to be able to talk about it.
Speaker 1: With that we knew some of the facts that happened,
Speaker 1: we had to find in the police file. They went
Speaker 1: to court knowing that these witnesses was identified my brother,
Speaker 1: but they had determined that with the shooter. The prosecutors
Speaker 1: new this, the detectives knew this. But this is the
Speaker 1: problem with the system. Nobody cared about the truth. It
Speaker 1: was about let's get the conviction at all costs. Okay.
Speaker 1: So they knew you weren't involved from the jump, but
Speaker 1: since you wouldn't please to lesser charges that you knew
Speaker 1: and I think they knew were false, they threw you
Speaker 1: into this kangaroo court situation, tied to Robert Leaf, who
Speaker 1: was the actual culprit here, and then let the chips
Speaker 1: fall where they may. That's how they put it, right.
Speaker 1: So then you were represented by people who had no
Speaker 1: business whatsoever really even being in this courtroom, right, I
Speaker 1: mean definitely not as lawyers in a capital murder case,
Speaker 1: and you're literally on trial for your lives. So what
Speaker 1: was that like? I canna tell you what it was like.
Speaker 1: Robert Leaf's attorney communicated with our attorneys, and they sumosely
Speaker 1: had a joint defense, and right towards the time the
Speaker 1: jury was going out to deliberation, I remember my attorney
Speaker 1: looking back and saying, I don't think that his attorney
Speaker 1: was with us, And I said, you think like he was.
Speaker 1: When everything in its power to get his client the
Speaker 1: best possible verdict he could get, he used the defense
Speaker 1: two playing a picture so that we would wind up
Speaker 1: with the most out of this and his client would,
Speaker 1: if not walk free, get the lease. So the jury
Speaker 1: goes out, they come back in four or five hours later.
Speaker 1: Did you guys have hope that they were going to
Speaker 1: actually see the light and that you were going to
Speaker 1: be vindicated. I mean, it was just a blurd of
Speaker 1: a moment. Of course, you hold out hope that the
Speaker 1: system is going to do the right thing. I mean
Speaker 1: we were raised like everybody else, watching police shows and
Speaker 1: court shows, and from what they show on TV, it
Speaker 1: always seemed like the system does the right thing, that
Speaker 1: everything would turn out right, even though everything was looking wrong.
Speaker 1: We believe the system to the point where I had
Speaker 1: put an application to the police force, probably to being arrested,
Speaker 1: like round the time when I got convicted. My wife
Speaker 1: received the letter saying that I was accepted to go
Speaker 1: to the next phase. Jesus Christ. I mean, it's like
Speaker 1: you had this was like an alternate reality, the life
Speaker 1: that should have been right. But okay, so the jury
Speaker 1: comes back in and the verdict is guilty. I mean,
Speaker 1: can you tell us about that moment. It's I mean,
Speaker 1: it's obviously horrible for anyone who experiences it, but here
Speaker 1: it's worse because one brother had to hear the other
Speaker 1: brother being declared guilty, followed by being declared guilty himself.
Speaker 1: I canna tell you, being oldest, I'll probably with the weakest.
Speaker 1: When I heard the verdict, it was like I was
Speaker 1: in a state of shock and my legs buckled, and
Speaker 1: I remember I felt like I was going down to
Speaker 1: the floor, and I remember hearing my grandmom's voice in
Speaker 1: the back saying, stand up real loud, don't you fall
Speaker 1: on that ground. Stand up that part. I ain't never
Speaker 1: going to forgive. When they rented di verdict, I felt
Speaker 1: like I was in the twilight zone, like this wasn't happening,
Speaker 1: Like somebody's gonna come in and say, we're just kidding.
Speaker 1: This is not how it's supposed to end for us.
Speaker 1: I mean, we played by the rules. You know, we
Speaker 1: were taught to work hard for whatever we get in life,
Speaker 1: and that's what we did. We were taught to mind
Speaker 1: the people in the neighborhood, the elders, and respect people.
Speaker 1: You know that this don't happen to decent people. And
Speaker 1: it was crazy because he immediately sent as a life
Speaker 1: without the possibility for rule immediately. And you know, when
Speaker 1: our family got a chance to speak on our behalfs
Speaker 1: each one of our family members got up there, they
Speaker 1: said that we didn't commit the crime. And the judge
Speaker 1: got bad at some point, but I think he told
Speaker 1: my sister that if you want to say that they
Speaker 1: didn't commit this crime, then I don't need to get
Speaker 1: up here. Haven't heard enough of that. So, I mean,
Speaker 1: we were to describe beyond words can describe it. I
Speaker 1: became angry, angry at the system, angry at myself for
Speaker 1: allowing myself to even be in that situation around a
Speaker 1: guy like this. And as time went on, my grandmother
Speaker 1: came to see us. My grandmother my mother, and we
Speaker 1: would just complain and complain about everything that was going on.
Speaker 1: We was talking about how dark prison was you know
Speaker 1: how cold it always seems to be in there. You
Speaker 1: know how these folks around there they don't care about anything.
Speaker 1: And I remember my grandmother said, you know, if it's cold,
Speaker 1: they heat it up with love, and if it's dark,
Speaker 1: then light it up with hope. And my brother and
Speaker 1: I we looked at each other and said, Grandma, how
Speaker 1: must have lost her money? We're looking at each other
Speaker 1: like this lady for real? Like did she realize that
Speaker 1: we in the prison for a crow? We didn't commit
Speaker 1: and she telling us to do what? So the thing
Speaker 1: is didn't make sense to us at that time. But
Speaker 1: as the years would go by and we would begin
Speaker 1: in the process like reading you know, self help books,
Speaker 1: history books, it psych college you books, and we were
Speaker 1: beginning to taking the various programs that was available towards
Speaker 1: to educate ourselves. And we would go to the Law
Speaker 1: Liberated at least five days a week and we were
Speaker 1: just being in four hours reading this law, trying to
Speaker 1: decipher this law, these cases and figure out ways how
Speaker 1: to argue and plead because at some point we had
Speaker 1: to take our own representation because the lawyers they were
Speaker 1: assigned and that supposed to up to part and through
Speaker 1: that process more we became educated. The anger got directed
Speaker 1: in different directions, and that anger all of a sudden
Speaker 1: started becoming more about helping men in prison that was
Speaker 1: wrongfully convicted as well, men that got more time than
Speaker 1: they should have. The revenge was gonna be is to
Speaker 1: try to send as many guys home as we could
Speaker 1: that would not come back to prison. And he talks
Speaker 1: about the law library, and that law library, we had
Speaker 1: a couple of tables of men who are all home now,
Speaker 1: who have all been exonerated. All of us was at
Speaker 1: those tables in nine were all sitting around the table.
Speaker 1: And as the years were about, more and more men
Speaker 1: came into the institution and they would sit at those tables,
Speaker 1: and at the end of the day it was two
Speaker 1: of us is left. At the time, nobody was going home.
Speaker 1: Years later, everybody started trickling out. So eventually we would
Speaker 1: get transferred to another prison, which was a treatment facility
Speaker 1: more so get towards programming and things like that. And
Speaker 1: so this prison, which was at c I Chester, was
Speaker 1: kind of telling maybe for men like Lee and I.
Speaker 1: And one of the first things that we do is
Speaker 1: become a certified pair support specialists that means we work
Speaker 1: with people who struggle with mental health issues, struggle with
Speaker 1: all kinds of issues, addiction, struggle with anger issues, people
Speaker 1: who just having a hard time adjusting the prison life.
Speaker 1: And we went to work and they started seeing how
Speaker 1: the assault on officers, rate on staff started to drop.
Speaker 1: They started seeing the rate on prisoner on prisoner assaults
Speaker 1: to drop right ups started to drop. Everything in the
Speaker 1: prison started getting better. As a resulted to certified Pair
Speaker 1: Support Specialist program and from there we began to branch
Speaker 1: out into other areas. The warden, the superintendent, and the
Speaker 1: deputy superintendent allowed Lee and I to be able to
Speaker 1: facilitate many programs. You know. We facilitated programs like Thresholds,
Speaker 1: which was a six step decisional making program. We taught
Speaker 1: men how to make better decisions in their lives so
Speaker 1: that they can also get through prison much better, but
Speaker 1: not only get through prison, but go home to their
Speaker 1: families and do better in society. We facilitated a health
Speaker 1: and wellness program and through this program, we founded that
Speaker 1: their responsibility in that particular institution. What we did was
Speaker 1: we created a play, and the play would have areas
Speaker 1: and that we would talk about recentivism, the impact of crime, dysfunction, trauma.
Speaker 1: I think it took us like fifty five fifty seven
Speaker 1: people to put this play on, and it was like
Speaker 1: a full production. We put the roles out, flamented to
Speaker 1: sign up, and they had to try out for the parts.
Speaker 1: It was so widely successful that the administration said, well, hey, listen,
Speaker 1: why you guys didn't do this bigger. So we went
Speaker 1: on to do another three more plays within that institution,
Speaker 1: and we went from fifty seven people being involved in
Speaker 1: the year after that, a hundred of something people was
Speaker 1: involved the following year. We put workshops on right after
Speaker 1: the play, So not only did we do to play,
Speaker 1: but we also put together thy workshops where we would
Speaker 1: talk about these various things that were playing in our community.
Speaker 1: And then those workshops we would invite people from the community,
Speaker 1: organizations from the community that was involved in stopping violence
Speaker 1: like ceasefire, and universities to come in, students and professors,
Speaker 1: we would invite politicians to come in. So while you're
Speaker 1: doing this amazing work, you're also, of course, you know,
Speaker 1: simultaneously fighting to overturn your own wrong for convictions. But
Speaker 1: so much of the information that you were discovering exculpatory
Speaker 1: evidence right. Tons of it was time Bard, which means
Speaker 1: it was held back, you know, or Bard from being
Speaker 1: introduced because of procedural bullshit. I mean, it was a
Speaker 1: lot of things that we came like, you know, the
Speaker 1: police officer we found out about the internal fair investigation,
Speaker 1: they said that was public information that we should have
Speaker 1: known about it, even though we had no idea that
Speaker 1: she was going through this, so how would we even
Speaker 1: know to look for it? So that was time Bard.
Speaker 1: We had a witness individual we ran across who Robert
Speaker 1: Leaf had confessed to because he was also incarcerated. When
Speaker 1: we met him, they said that wasn't usable because he's
Speaker 1: a prisoner, so of course he would help you. They
Speaker 1: used confessions against you, but you can't use one from
Speaker 1: somebody to get out of prison. But he said clearly
Speaker 1: what happened. Robert Leaf made a statement, and in his
Speaker 1: statement he identified the person he was with as somebody
Speaker 1: named Eddie and in the state, and he said clearly
Speaker 1: when they said that this man died, and they believed
Speaker 1: he did it at the time because they took his
Speaker 1: jacket and they did paraffint tests on it, and they
Speaker 1: did nitrate tests on his hands and all this kind
Speaker 1: of stuff like this, and he said, if the man
Speaker 1: died it was his time to die, then if I
Speaker 1: got to do the time for it, then I'll do
Speaker 1: the time for it. That's what he said in his statement.
Speaker 1: And he said something in the statement referring to us
Speaker 1: that took us not even with him, So everything that
Speaker 1: we would get would be time barn. So we spent
Speaker 1: twenty years pretty much fighting to overcome procedural hurdles. When
Speaker 1: we was transferred to see our chester, a staff member
Speaker 1: who was watching us at the time, he was a counselor,
Speaker 1: and he started talking to us in general conversation and
Speaker 1: then Monday he called us and then and he asked
Speaker 1: what was we doing to get out of prison, And
Speaker 1: we told him about our fight in the courts and
Speaker 1: about our innocence and everything like this, and he said,
Speaker 1: you know, I believe y'all, and I really believe everything
Speaker 1: you've been telling me. And he is the one that
Speaker 1: suggested to us that we filed for commutation, and at
Speaker 1: the time we told him that we were actually innocent
Speaker 1: and that wasn't the venue for commutation. And he spent
Speaker 1: months trying to convince us to file for commutation and
Speaker 1: just to give in and just to agree with him.
Speaker 1: We said okay, And he introduced us to a professor
Speaker 1: whose name is Kathleen Brown, who helped a lot of
Speaker 1: other guys with commutation applications. And she came to see
Speaker 1: us and we told her our story and she said, well,
Speaker 1: won't you follow actual innocence application. She said it would
Speaker 1: be the first one, but just right, and just tell
Speaker 1: him what you told me. And that's what we did.
Speaker 1: And the first time we went before the board and
Speaker 1: wis we was denied and we were distraught. And around
Speaker 1: that time, my mom was sick and she passed away
Speaker 1: not too long after that, and she was so supported.
Speaker 1: We didn't talk a lot about her, but she was
Speaker 1: the person that was fueling our fight for all those years.
Speaker 1: You know. My grandma's bird just kept bringing in our
Speaker 1: ears that keep fighting. And we had developed the philosophy
Speaker 1: of free men have freed themselves. So we went back
Speaker 1: to the courts and then we filed for reconsideration and
Speaker 1: that was denied. And then we came back and filed
Speaker 1: for reconsideration again, and they granted the reconsideration based on
Speaker 1: some other stuff. But right before that that, Lieutenant Governor
Speaker 1: John Federman started taking up our calls. He looked at
Speaker 1: the application, he's seen everything in it, and he just
Speaker 1: started doing what it was the right thing to do.
Speaker 1: He started fighting for us and the rest of his history.
Speaker 1: I am a Lieutenant Governor John Federman of Pennsylvania and
Speaker 1: I also chair of the Board of Pardons and Commutations
Speaker 1: here and I became acquainted with Dennis and Lee's case
Speaker 1: during one of their react like nations for commutation, and
Speaker 1: when I read through it, I was blown away that
Speaker 1: these men were ever in prison, let alone struggling to
Speaker 1: be sent home. It's their background is astonishing. In Pennsylvania,
Speaker 1: the Board of Pardons requires a unanimous vote of five members.
Speaker 1: It has to be unanimous. If you don't get that threshold,
Speaker 1: that person is going to die in prison. And that,
Speaker 1: to me triggered campaign to make sure that Lee and
Speaker 1: Dennis would be able to return to their families, because
Speaker 1: this is a gross miscarriage of justice. Not only are
Speaker 1: they profoundly deserving that they have always maintained their innocence.
Speaker 1: Everyone believes that these men, including the warden and the
Speaker 1: Department of Corrections, that they have no business being in prison,
Speaker 1: and I'm so grateful that they're out on so many levels.
Speaker 1: In fact, I actually hired them to work on our campaign.
Speaker 1: They are far better a person and stronger person than
Speaker 1: I could ever be. For what they went through to
Speaker 1: have emerged with the kind of humanity that they just
Speaker 1: radiate is nothing short of remarkable. So paint a picture
Speaker 1: for me. It's February twelve, just two days before Valentine's Day.
Speaker 1: Governor Wolf signs of papers and you're about to see
Speaker 1: your wife again. I would tell you honestly, it was
Speaker 1: extremely amazing and difficult at the same time. It was
Speaker 1: like a miracle. It brought a sense of anxiety, but
Speaker 1: also it was a great feeling of hope. Prison For
Speaker 1: me it was darkness I was in and when I
Speaker 1: walked out of seeing like everything was bright, everything was beautiful.
Speaker 1: I could see everything, Dennis, how about for you? And
Speaker 1: for me? It was bitter sweet at the same time
Speaker 1: because my mother was no longer there. She never gave
Speaker 1: up with fighting with us, and to come home and
Speaker 1: for her not to be here, I mean, it was
Speaker 1: just so painful, but it felt good. To be free
Speaker 1: was just unbelievable. I felt like I can breathe again.
Speaker 1: At the same time, I'm still like bewildered because some
Speaker 1: may not even get this chance, and I want to
Speaker 1: see others that are deserving of the same opportunity to
Speaker 1: get it. We found our sense of purpose while we
Speaker 1: were in prison, and that purpose was helping others, helping
Speaker 1: others to know that prison, you may be here, but
Speaker 1: this is not who you are, and this is not
Speaker 1: who you have to be. And we did that by leading,
Speaker 1: by showing people we cared about them, and through that
Speaker 1: care and through that love, we begin to inspire men
Speaker 1: to be more hopeful about and more optimistic about their future.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's really just an amazing, amazing story of
Speaker 1: perseverance and triumph over struggle and tragedy. And you know
Speaker 1: the fact that you, guys, with the inspiration and the
Speaker 1: support of your families and other people, were able to
Speaker 1: take this unimaginable burden and rise above it and turn
Speaker 1: it into something that enabled you to transform the lives
Speaker 1: of so many other people, and that you're still doing
Speaker 1: it today. It's nothing short. It's magical. Really, it's incredible.
Speaker 1: And for the people who are listening right now, who
Speaker 1: are inspired and who are going to want to take
Speaker 1: action and make a difference because of what you guys
Speaker 1: have been able to accomplish. Is there anything you guys
Speaker 1: want to suggest? What I just would say my call
Speaker 1: action would be to pay attention to what's going on
Speaker 1: out in society and to support criminal justice before. Every
Speaker 1: innocent man is not going to make it out of prison,
Speaker 1: and it's a lot left behind, so we need some
Speaker 1: sort of criminal justice before to make a way for
Speaker 1: others to be able to come out. Now we've come
Speaker 1: to the part of the show that's well, it's the
Speaker 1: closing of the show, but it's become my favorite part
Speaker 1: of the show. And of course it's called closing arguments.
Speaker 1: And I want to say, first of all, I appreciate
Speaker 1: you guys tremendously just for being here and and sharing
Speaker 1: your story. You know, you guys are heroes to me
Speaker 1: and so many other people, and I'm excited to get
Speaker 1: this out there and get this story out in a
Speaker 1: way in the way that it should have been told
Speaker 1: from the very beginning. And so closing arguments what we
Speaker 1: do here, how this works is I'm just gonna turn
Speaker 1: my microphone off and leave both of yours on and
Speaker 1: I'm going to just sit back in my chair and
Speaker 1: listen to anything that you feel has been left unsaid.
Speaker 1: So Dennis, how about you go first and then Lee
Speaker 1: you'll be bad and clean up. So, folks, first of all,
Speaker 1: thank you for tuning in, Thank you for listening to
Speaker 1: my brother and I. We count our story. The thing
Speaker 1: is this, at the end of the day, the people
Speaker 1: control the system. The system don't control you. But we've
Speaker 1: gotten to a place where we allowed the system to
Speaker 1: control us. This is supposed to be our system, and
Speaker 1: we're supposed to hold people accountable for the decisions they
Speaker 1: make on our behalfs. So the only thing I would
Speaker 1: say is please get involved and know with the prosecutors,
Speaker 1: know what the district attorney, know what the police are
Speaker 1: doing on your dime, because we pay the taxes that
Speaker 1: pay their salaries, and if this is how they're doing business,
Speaker 1: then we need to make sure we hold them accountable.
Speaker 1: My brother not with free, but there are countless others
Speaker 1: that are not sure. My grandma once told us that
Speaker 1: life gives you what life gives you, and it's up
Speaker 1: to you to make something out of it. So when
Speaker 1: we went to prison, that wasn't the end of our story.
Speaker 1: That was just another leg in our journey. The next
Speaker 1: part of our journey, we hope, is the spectacular. We
Speaker 1: want to do a lot of things out here in society.
Speaker 1: We did a lot of positive working inside, and we'll
Speaker 1: do a lot of positive work out here. And so
Speaker 1: what I would say is make sure you pay attention
Speaker 1: to what's going on, and when somebody say they've been
Speaker 1: wrongfully convicted, try to give them the benefit of the doubt.
Speaker 1: I think it would be just like us, two individuals
Speaker 1: who just took a ride and wind up being arrested
Speaker 1: and sent away and spent twenty eight years trying to
Speaker 1: come back home. Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction.
Speaker 1: I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Justin Golden,
Speaker 1: Jeff Claver, and Kevin Wardis. With research by Lila Robinson.
Speaker 1: The music in this production was supplied by three time
Speaker 1: OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us
Speaker 1: on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast,
Speaker 1: and on Twitter at wrong Conviction, as well as at
Speaker 1: Lava for Good. On all three platforms, you can also
Speaker 1: follow me on both TikTok and Instagram at it's Jason
Speaker 1: flop Ronvul Conviction is the production of Lava for Good
Speaker 1: podcasts and association with Signal Company Number one