Who Killed Garrett Phillips? (2019) s01e02 Episode Script

1
Six months have passed
since 12-year-old Garrett Phillips
was killed.
Now, the family knows they can't get
their loved one back,
but all they want now is justice,
and they're saying it
through a new decoration
in their front lawn.
We just want justice
for Garrett where,
you know, somebody pays
for the crime that was committed.
They need to pan up.
I don't know how they can shut
their eyes at night.
And the investigation
into his murder hasn't stopped,
so they just have to wait.
It was just a way to try
to generate money to maybe
get somebody to come forward and say,
"I have some information."
We made 40,000 just like that.
That's a rather large amount
of money.
Then everybody and their brother
wanted them to show support.
Say you drive by this place,
they've got a sign.
This place is for Garrett,
this place for Garrett
Half the time we were waiting
for signs because we had,
you know, everybody and their brother
would be wanting them.
And we sold them for $7.
That $7 bought another sign.
So you make nothing off that.
But most people, "Okay, here's 10."
Okay, the other three
goes into his reward.
But it was a lot of work.
But being that I have two children,
I couldn't go and do something
just out of hate,
and then where would I be?
I felt the best thing for Nick
is to go to prison
and pay for his crime,
and maybe, you know, not have
another good day in his life.
In the beginning it seemed
like slam dunk, Hillary had done it.
And then all of a sudden
it's thrown out,
there's not enough evidence.
You kept hearing mixed stories.
"There is evidence,"
"There is no evidence."
"This is good evidence,"
"This is bad evidence."
"They have a great case,"
"They have nothing."
What little bit we were getting
seemed conflicting.
So it was we had no idea.
When I left Clarkson,
I went immediately to Buffalo
to start coaching there.
That was in May of 2012.
First day of preseason at Buffalo
on campus all those signs
started showing up.
You know, I was like,
oh, that's kind of messed up.
Like, and they're there for me.
I was the only one connected
to the case.
Buffalo is really far from Potsdam.
When he told us
that story it was, like,
there's a lot of forces at play here.
That symbolises
and tells me that, you know,
the Justice for Garrett signs
is one way of discreetly saying,
"Let's get Nick Hillary for this."
But then I stopped working
at Buffalo in January, 2013,
it was right at the turn of the year,
went back to my, lived
with my parents briefly in Owego.
Some small town far from Potsdam,
pulled onto his street, you know,
and there are Justice for Garrett
signs down the road.
Somebody doesn't necessarily like
what Ian Fairlie is saying.
You know, I think that's, like, kind
of an objective thing you can deduce.
Well, whatever you're trying to do,
you're really just making yourselves
look really, really creepy
and desperate.
- Later.
- All right. Have a good one, bud.
I could move, leave, but obviously,
I can't really do that
because my family
is still very much here.
One down, one to go.
The best way for me to put it,
it's like living on house arrest.
To have to calculate your every move
that you are going to make
within the community,
really takes a toll on you.
Nobody will ever look at you
the same way.
Nobody wants to interact
with you the same way.
Hi.
Hi, how are you? You want some milk?
Okay.
Here we go. Come on. Come, Lolo.
All right.
I think if my demeanour
was on the weaker side,
then I think they would suffer
a lot more.
What happened?
You know, hopefully, you know, God
will continue to keep them strong.
So when he left the police station
that day, it wasn't just,
"Oh, you know,
I was at the police station
- for a couple of hours."
- His life changed.
His life was completely destroyed.
Clarkson University didn't want him
back on campus.
The public had already said,
"Okay, well, this is their guy."
It was really the beginning
of the destruction of his life.
A Clarkson coach has filed
a notice of claim
against the Village of Potsdam,
and his attorney says a civil lawsuit
will follow in the near future.
He says the notice of claim is being
made for injuries and damages
sustained during the investigation,
including claims for false arrest,
illegal detention, illegal search
and seizure, emotional distress,
and defamation.
Hillary's attorney says
that his client
has handled the situation
the best he can.
Well, Mr. Hillary
has conducted himself
with extreme dignity
throughout this entire process.
And Mr. Hillary has faith in justice
and also the truth.
For us Nick's case
has always been bigger than Nick.
It's about our justice system
as a whole.
You want to do things that your kids
are going to be proud of,
and so I think that we've been
trying to fight the good fight.
Hey.
- Hello.
- Hi, guys! Hi five!
He goes to the ball,
he catches the ball
That's it.
You know it's not the first baby.
Kick to Nick. Kick it to Nick.
This is not one of those situations
wherein which you just
get up in the morning
and is able to say,
"Okay, you know,
that happened yesterday.
Let me forget it about it
and move forward."
The civil case
was the initial step for me
in starting the process
to slowly erase
what they had started in terms
of deconstructing, demolishing,
everything that I have earned
and built as a legacy
up until that point in time.
This was in early January of 2012,
and that's the first I'd heard of it.
I had no understanding of this
incident, the crime taking place,
or anything, until that day.
One of the things I typically do
when I first get a claim is
I do a Google search.
Holy smokes, this is a murder case.
If he goes forward with a civil suit,
my defence is going to be
an offense against him.
I'm going to go after him to show
that he committed this crime.
If that ends up benefiting the police
and the district attorney, fantastic.
They're somewhat stymied
in their investigation.
They're waiting
for something to come up.
They took Nick's DNA right away.
There was no match of the DNA,
no match of the fingerprints,
you know, nothing tying Nick
to the crime.
And that's obviously confirmed
because had there been a DNA match,
I'm sure Nicole Duve
would have brought an indictment
against him, right?
The district attorney will only say
it remains an open investigation.
Everybody associated with this case
continues to work very diligently,
following up every possible lead.
Unfortunately, sometimes these kinds
of cases take time.
This is one of those kinds of cases.
She knew there was nothing,
and therefore she did nothing.
Well, it's been nearly two years
since 12-year-old Garrett Phillips
was killed in Potsdam.
While no arrests have been made yet,
the family holds onto hope
that one day the person responsible
will be brought to justice.
He loved everybody.
He'd do anything for anybody.
He was a great kid.
All's I would really ask the people
is to still keep putting
little clips in the paper,
keeping the pressure on,
so that it's just not, you know,
left on somebody's desk.
Why is there no evidence?
Why was there no forensics,
no fingerprints, no anything?
And it really wasn't until Mary Rain,
when she ran for office,
she started really pushing for some
advancements in this case.
The unsolved murder of 12-year-old
Garrett Phillips taking centre stage
at a political rally
for GOP district attorney hopeful,
Mary Rain, Wednesday.
With Garrett's mother at her side,
Rain promised that if elected she
would work with police
to find Garrett's killer
and bring them to justice.
I explained to Tandy that if they
came to the campaign stop in Canton
that I would bring Garrett's case
to the forefront
to, again, give it more publicity
and keep it alive.
Garrett's murderer should be behind
bars at this point, but he's not.
And that's all because
of the ineffective,
incompetence
of our district attorney's office.
It is unfortunate and disheartening
that someone would play
on the emotions of a grieving family
during a political campaign.
Mary Rain has made two unsolved
murders the lynchpin of her campaign,
blaming Duve for not getting
convictions.
She's making a promise.
It just goes to show
what she was about,
and the situation
that I was up against.
People got up in arms, and people go
and vote for presidents,
and congress people,
and they don't understand
that the one position
that will affect your life,
that will possibly send you
to jail for the rest of your life,
even if you're innocent,
is that of a prosecutor.
And there's absolutely no checks on
power-hungry people
who are willing or who have
a willingness to destroy a man's life
to advance their careers.
If you don't have a plan you're
doomed to commit the same errors
over and over and over again.
And that includes dismissals,
grand jury dismissals,
acquittals at trial
Let me assure you
that there is no lack of vigour
in that investigation, okay?
So I can promise you that.
I was just driving
in the North Country
these signs had begun
to pop up, "Justice for Garrett."
And I called Nicole because
the murder of this young boy
was becoming a political issue,
which can be a little distasteful.
So I called her and discussed
her political future,
and she sent me a bare-bones
summary of the case.
And I probably called her back,
you know, two days later,
and in words
or substance said, you know,
"Why isn't this guy in handcuffs?"
And I said, "This sounds like
something that would be amenable
for the Mutual Assistance Committee
of the State DAs Association"
which is a committee
that I had formed years earlier,
"and we'll put together a panel
of very, very experienced
homicide prosecutors."
And she did not avail herself of that
opportunity for whatever reason.
My understanding is that she thought
that she didn't have enough evidence,
and she declined their offer,
indicating that it would make her
look weak.
Mary Rain has
also had to defend her record.
She resigned as county public
defender in 2011,
citing an overwhelming caseload.
But that was after she was stripped
of operational oversight
of her office and put on
administrative leave.
If she couldn't handle the workload,
as she had said,
when she was
in the public defender's office,
how would she handle the workload
as the lead prosecutor in the county,
where there is plenty of crime?
Watching the results,
Nicole Duve the democrat
actually had a pretty big lead,
but that was
before a lot of the precincts
started reporting in.
And as we got closer to 100 percent,
the numbers flipped completely
and in fact, Nicole Duve
has been beat.
I have a lot of work ahead of me.
I can't wait to get started.
And I want to dive right in.
What I told Tandy
is that would be my top priority
when I came into office January 1st.
Actually, after I got elected
in November,
I contacted Bill Fitzpatrick,
who is the district
attorney of Onondaga County.
He's also the committee chair for the
Mutual Assistance Committee.
And he said he was very familiar
with the case already.
I'll put together five prosecutors
and we'll review it.
They don't have any smoking guns.
Perhaps the most important bit of
information
that the investigators
were looking at, at that time,
was the Potsdam High School
security camera video
that had a vehicle consistent
with Mr. Hillary's vehicle
coming into the
parking lot at Potsdam High School.
Investigator, like, Gary Snell,
who's the state trooper,
and Mark Murray.
So the two showed up at my door again
to check in on me, and they were,
like, "Can we come in?"
and I was, like, "No."
So they're just standing
in the doorway.
They pulled out this laptop
and they're, like, you know,
"We want to show you this video.
Please know it's,
the timeline isn't right.
It's just kind of unedited."
"Okay, let's see it."
So they're, you know, you see
this video of Nick's car pulling in.
They're, like,
"Do you recognize that car?"
"Yeah, that's Nick's car."
Then they split
to this different video
and it's Garrett, like,
skateboarding.
They're, like,
"Do you recognize that?"
I was, like, "It's Garrett."
And they're, like, "Great."
And then they kind of split
to this other video
and it's Nick leaving and kind
of always prefacing
that this is not,
this isn't the final cut.
And then, like, Nick leaves,
and they're, like,
"Well, what way
would he go to his house?"
I was, like,
"Well, he would take a right."
And they're, like,
"Well, he took a left."
"Okay."
"How does this make you feel?"
You know, "After seeing this does
anything make you think differently?
Does it change it?"
"Doesn't do anything."
And then he just
kind of stumbled and, like,
"What if he followed him
down this way? What if he did this?
What if he did that?"
I'm, like, "Guys, it just showed
him pulling into the school
and leaving the school,
and at one point Garrett."
And just, it didn't
make me feel anything.
For me that was kind of the clincher.
He followed Garrett Phillips home
that day.
I mean, that's my take on the video.
- That's how do you refute that?
- But we didn't have a license plate.
We didn't know
who was driving the car.
We didn't know who was in the car.
It's not like CSI.
It's not like the movies.
Let's zoom in on the license plate,
or better yet,
let's zoom in on the person
behind the wheel.
Oh, that's Nick Hillary, we got him.
Doesn't work that way.
The date is January 20th, 2014.
The time is 10.08.
Mani Tafari
for Mr. Oral Nicholas Hillary.
Thomas Mortati of Buke, Scolamiero,
Mortati, and Hurd,
for the defendants.
And I'm here with Amanda
of my office,
as well as defendants Edward Tischler
and Mark Murray.
The civil suit
is going to be a game-changer,
because the one person they really
wanted to speak to the most,
who basically said,
"I'm not talking to you anymore,"
on October 26th, is now
not only going to talk to them,
but he's going to do it under oath.
Good morning, Mr. Hillary.
As you know, my name is Tom Mortati
and I represent the defendants
in a lawsuit that you have brought.
And we're going to be here
doing your deposition today.
Just a couple of ground rules,
I know you and I
You can't make this stuff up.
I've been working in a civil career
as an attorney
doing defence work
of one kind or another.
I've never, ever come across anything
even remotely similar to this,
nor likely will I ever.
Monday, October 24, 2011,
I want to start
with the beginning of the day.
Do you recall
when you got up that day?
Objection, relevance.
I typically get up around 6.30
in the morning.
People object for the record.
If you look even at the other side's
deposition, Tom Mortati,
the attorney for the Village
is objecting also quite a lot.
- What vehicle were you driving, sir?
- Objection, relevance.
I was driving my vehicle.
- What vehicle is that?
- A Honda.
Can you tell me the make and model
or rather the model and year?
Objection, relevance.
It's a CRV, 2009.
I was, to be honest with you,
I was surprised
that he was even talking to me,
first of all,
about any of this stuff.
- 2009.
- Light blue?
That is correct.
I was pleased, obviously.
I mean, my job
is to defend the police.
And again, my defence
of the police is essentially
to investigate this crime
and prove that this guy did it.
This is great. And everyone's, like,
"Why is this great for you,
being sued?"
Well, they have to,
he finally has to answer questions.
Do you recall entering the Potsdam
High School parking lot with
in your vehicle that afternoon,
October 24th, 2011?
Objection, relevance.
- Yes.
- Okay.
Why were you going to Potsdam
High School that day?
- Objection, relevance.
- To watch a soccer game.
And what did you do while you were
in the parking spot?
Objection, relevance.
Waiting for the rain to break.
- Did it break?
- No.
- "And where did you go?"
- I went home.
- Need a break?
- Yeah.
And then we took a break
after about two hours,
and upstairs
in the Potsdam Police Department
are several members
of the New York State Police.
I went upstairs, walked in and said,
"Not only is he talking,
but he just put himself in that car
in that parking lot at that time,"
and they were all absolutely amazed.
And basically it was,
"Okay, get back down there.
Keep asking him more questions."
I have nothing to hide.
But me talking to you versus talking
to a group of police officers,
who's trying tricks and trades,
it's two total different things.
There's a stenographer
who is taking down what I'm saying.
There is an attorney who have
my best interest at hand,
who's here, and you're getting
to ask your questions.
Mr. Hillary, are you aware
that approximately seven seconds
before you left the Potsdam
High School parking lot
to Leroy Street, Garrett Phillips
left the Potsdam High School
- parking lot onto Leroy Street?
- Objection, relevance.
Calls for facts not yet in evidence.
No.
And you didn't see Garrett Phillips
at all in that parking lot, correct?
Objection, asked and answered,
relevance.
No.
Mr. Hillary, are you aware
that Garrett Phillips
turned left out of the Potsdam High
School parking lot
that afternoon
as he left Potsdam High School?
- Objection, relevance.
- No.
Are you aware, Mr. Hillary,
that there is security camera video
that shows you turning
left in the same direction
as Garrett Phillips
exiting Potsdam
High School parking lot
in your blue Honda
CRV that afternoon?
Objection, relevance, assumed facts
not yet in evidence.
- No.
- During the deposition,
the civil attorney
Tom Mortati very masterfully
walked him through painstakingly slow
a fantastic cross examination
of exactly everything he did
on October 24th, 2011.
If you turned left out of the parking
lot to go home to your apartment,
what route did you take?
Through his masterful job,
along with the evidence that we had,
we were able to compile a case.
And I believe you testified
50-H examination
that you went straight home
after you left the Potsdam High
School that afternoon.
He added the word, "Oh, you said
you went straight home."
No, I didn't say
that I went straight home.
I said I went home.
Mr. Hillary, your apartment
was to the right
up Leroy Street from Potsdam
High School, correct?
Yes.
And you've told me under oath
two different occasions
that you went home that day,
leaving Potsdam High
School parking lot,
- correct?
- Yes.
And the fastest way for you
to get from your
from the Potsdam High School
parking lot
to your apartment
would be to turn right
out of the parking lot
onto Leroy Street
to go in the direction
of your apartment?
- Do that one again.
- Sure.
And the fastest way for you
to get to your apartment,
driving from Potsdam High School,
would be to exit the parking lot
and to turn right
onto Leroy Street, correct?
Yes.
And if you made a left
out of that parking lot,
and Garrett Phillips
was on the sidewalk on Leroy Street,
approximately seven to eight seconds
ahead of you,
is your testimony you never saw him
at any point
while you were doing that?
Objection, asked
and answered, compound.
That is correct.
They have made it seem
as if I lived 200 miles away,
I was not supposed
to be in that area
Typically if I make a left
out of the parking lot,
I would be checking in
with my assistant coach,
who lived on Garden Street,
which is what I would normally do,
- if I'm in the area.
- you did that afternoon?
I cannot recall.
You know, going to try and see if he
was home at that point in time
on my way home, it's normal.
You know, sometimes
we often do things
just because it's what we
consistently do.
You don't recall
whether or not you stopped
into Mr. Fairlie's apartment
on Garden Street that afternoon?
That is correct.
clear you left Potsdam High
School parking lot to go home, right?
- Yes.
- But you have no recollection
as to whether or not
The grand jury spent over a four-day
period looking at the evidence,
so there is a significant amount
of evidence.
Rain says they have both physical
and circumstantial evidence,
some that came out recently
during Hillary's deposition
from his civil suit against the
Village of Potsdam for defamation.
I'm 100 per cent innocent,
100 per cent innocent.
That's all I have to say.
Am I really living
in a dream right now,
or this is really happening?
Everything that could have been
done possible
to prevent me from getting my freedom
by the district attorney's
office was done.
For 70 days I was held in jail,
and every time there was a hearing,
something new would come
to the surface
that required more time to explore,
which means I get to put,
sent back to jail
while that get explored.
To have lived that for 70 days,
you know,
has definitely given me
a certain level of drive
to fight and do
whatever it is for me to do
not to see the walls
of those environments ever again.
Finally, the judge decided, okay,
pretty much enough was enough.
- Where did you put your belt?
- Right here.
Okay. Please walk.
Love you.
Good morning.
- Who's that?
- Shanna.
Yeah.
- Shanna is awake, huh?
- Yes.
Oh, we're grateful.
Before the whole thing I was, like,
friends with everybody,
you know, carefree.
Well, I'm from around the area,
and I know it's a fantastic school.
And I wanted to be part
of the community here.
And now you have to be,
like, vigilant,
and you have to pay attention
to everything.
You can't say the wrong things,
you can't talk to the wrong people,
you can't, like, go to, like,
certain places.
I'm part of his, like, "Where were
you when his whole thing went down?"
So I was with my dad at that time.
So they needed me to,
like, cement that,
that I was where I was with him
when whatever was happening. So
Just so I understand the chronology,
your daughter arrived home
from school at approximately 4.30,
is that correct?
Around 4.30.
Well, that day I had soccer practice,
so I came home from soccer
and my dad was there.
So if your daughter arrived home at
or about 4.30pm on that afternoon,
then you would've left for Potsdam
High School at approximately
- 4.35 to 4.40pm?
- Around there.
The last we see of Garrett
in the high school parking lot
is at 4.52.
And if we presume that he went
straight home afterwards it's about
a six-minute ride going at the speed
he was going on his Ripstik.
He passed by some hospital cameras.
Nick Hillary pulled out at 4.53.
The call came in to the Village of
Potsdam Police Department at 5.08.
Potsdam Police, Dispatcher Schneider.
Hi, my name is Marissa Vogel,
and I have
But you have
to backtrack a little bit
because it's at least two minutes
that Sean Hall and Marissa Vogel took
to stop, listen, and then determine
what they were going to do.
So a very conservative estimate
would be two minutes.
So now you're putting the time of
death at 5.06.
So you have a very tight timeline
of 4.53 when we last see Hillary
on the high school video, to 5.06
when we believe the murder occurred.
That would've given him enough time
to go down two blocks,
park the car
And you have to remember,
he's extremely fit.
He's not only got a six-pack,
he's got an eight-pack.
He's very, very fit, and to jog two
blocks to get to Garrett's home
wouldn't take but 45 seconds,
max, for him.
We believe he had a key.
We believe he opened the door,
Garrett recognized that it was him,
tried to push him back out,
and then tried to retreat,
and he was murdered.
And when you arrived home
at your apartment was anyone there?
Yes.
- Your daughter, Shanna-Kay?
- Objection, relevance.
Yes.
What time did you arrive back at
your apartment?
Objection, relevance.
A few minutes before 5.00.
How long did you remain at your
apartment?
I was there until shortly after 5.00.
Well, now, when you say "shortly
after 5.00" what do you mean?
5.15.
And when you say
"a few minutes before 5.00,"
in terms of when you arrived there,
- what time was that?
- I'd say about 5 to 5.00.
So you would've been
in your apartment
for an approximate 20-minute span
between 4.55pm and 5.15pm?
- Objection, relevance.
- That is correct.
Mary Rain was relentless during the
whole questioning part.
She would ask me the same question
more than once,
or try and word it
a little differently, or
At the end she would, like, ask the
same exact question, like, 10 times.
And I was, like, "I don't
I don't know what you want me to do.
I'm not changing anything."
Here's how it goes.
So they say to you, "I remember
what I had for dinner on June 30th,
two years ago." Okay.
"What did you have for dinner
on June 29th?" "I don't remember."
"What did you have
for dinner on June 28th?"
"I don't remember."
"What did you have for June 27th?"
"I don't remember."
"But you remember
what you had on June 30th?
Is that true?" "Yes."
The lawyer at the time
made sure that I,
like, had everything cemented
in my mind of,
like, what had happened
that day, because I felt like
he knew that eventually
I'd be brought in.
We call it "walking them
up and down the ladder,"
and that's what he chastised
me about.
She was looking, I don't know
what she was looking for,
but she was, like,
digging hard for something.
There's no defence attorney
in the grand jury,
so basically a DA can run rough-shot
over the proceedings,
which is what happened.
According to Judge
Richards we do know
that when the district attorney,
Mary Rain,
questioned Nick's daughter,
who is one of his alibis,
the judge had indicated
that she was badgering her,
and asking her inappropriate
questions.
Which is why it was dismissed.
With the case again in limbo,
the community keeps searching
for some resolution.
Natasha Haverty was at the
remembrance gathering and has more.
Justice for Garrett.
Justice for Garrett.
A lot has happened
with that first word,
"justice," in the past six months.
One suspect was finally arrested
and arraigned,
but the proceedings were mishandled
and charges were later dismissed.
But this evening people are here
to remember Garrett.
Are we ready? One, two, three.
- Garrett.
- Garrett.
Yes, we were working
on this big investigative story,
but we were also,
as reporters in the North Country,
going to the balloon
release ceremony,
you know, on the anniversary
of Garrett's death.
We were also covering
small-town events
that were each a tiny piece
of this bigger story.
Like, I can't emphasize that enough.
Like, you are in the checkout line
with the defence attorney.
That small-town thing is real.
Father God, we stand
in your presence, Father.
And as you gather here today,
remember this
through the power of prayer,
justice will be served.
The judge indicated that there was
sufficient evidence to indict him,
"I just think you did these things
wrong so I'm going to dismiss it."
So we basically provided the exact
same presentation the second time.
Now, this is the second time
Hillary has been indicted
for Phillips' death.
Oral Nick Hillary was back
in a St. Lawrence County
courtroom Monday.
Hillary was arraigned on a charge
of second-degree murder.
The DA's office has until 30 days
before trial to hand over all photo
and video evidence.
They're going to find what I found
the video inculpates.
That means it tends
to show that Nick,
Oral Nicholas Hillary
was at the crime scene,
was present near the
time of the murder,
and in fact is evidence
that he did murder Garrett Phillips.
Whatever videotape they could have
gotten their hands on,
the one thing
that I know deep inside,
that it was not going to reveal
what they are trying
to showcase to the public.
So they figure not having
what they need,
they're just going to manipulate
what they claim they have
to prove their theory.
Justice for Garrett
is justice for Nick.
But the prosecutors in this case
don't want to solve this case,
they want to get a conviction
from this case.
Nick is seeking the same truth
that will set Garrett's spirit free.
When we had stories about anything
to do with the Garrett Phillips case,
little ones; I'm talking about,
like, the bail hearing
is set for, you know, June 30th
we would have to shut down
our comments every time.
Every time.
Because within an hour
of the story going online,
to quote our web guy, like,
"abusive, vitriolic comments,"
the most hateful speech
people are capable of.
I remember leaving
one of the hearings
and a lot of Nick's supporters
were there.
And somebody yelled out, "Why haven't
we heard anything about John Jones?"
And that was the first time I had
heard the name "John Jones,"
and I didn't know who Jones was.
A much better case could have been
put together again John Jones
than was put together against Nick.
You know, we know that
his behaviour was volatile.
You know, Tandy knew that,
Nick knew that.
You know, was that a motivation
for killing a boy? I don't know.
But it shows that maybe you're
slightly unhinged.
There were allegations that he was
an angry man, a racist guy,
and that the love of his life
was now sleeping with a black man.
You know, listening to this and
trying to process this stuff, like,
why would this former boyfriend
go after, you know, this boy?
Talk about defamatory.
The defence team
had maligned John Jones for years,
years leading into this thing.
She actually wrote a complaint
10 months before Garrett died,
stating that,
"Because of Deputy John Jones,
I fear for the safety
of my children."
I didn't get the statement directly,
I got it indirectly from my boss.
And I read it, and I said to my boss,
I go, "That's not Tandy's writing."
And it was typed.
And he's, like,
"How do you know that?"
I go, "Because Tandy
doesn't know the definition
of some of these words in here,"
I go, "so there's no way
that she wrote this."
And he's, like,
"Well, that's interesting."
I said, I go, "We'll find out
someday who wrote this,"
I go, "because Tandy didn't."
If you write four different
letters, sign four different letters,
and send it to four different people
after getting it notarized,
that's the truth.
Within the body of the letter,
Tandy states that John Jones
sent her threatening text messages.
Tandy also says that Jones sued her
in small claims court
as retaliation for dating Nick.
The time, 6.16pm.
- Yeah.
- Okay.
They were together
from the beginning,
and then they spent
the night together,
and then at the police station
the next morning,
they said, "We're not speaking
to you guys without being together."
You have someone who now we know
was a suspect at some point,
John Jones,
holding the hand of Tandy Cyrus,
sitting across the desk
from his buddy, Mark Murray.
So, my thoughts are, like,
this is really messy.
When we learned about that,
reading those depositions,
it was just another kind of step
on this road of,
okay, we need
to talk about John Jones.
There's no denying that he
took part in the investigation.
He helped in the investigation.
There was nothing
that he hid from us,
or there's no level of cooperation
that he didn't go to
to try to help the investigation.
He cooperated 110 per cent,
provided his DNA sample,
fingerprints,
let us photograph his body.
So, the person of John Jones,
here we see no face shots,
no dehumanizing.
still has his tie on,
so nothing for anyone to look at
to even know
except it says the person of Jones.
So why bring in someone
if these are the pictures
you're going to take?
And if they're both suspects,
why is the person of Jones
so much different
from the person of Nick?
And what's the difference
besides skin colour?
A big treasure trove for us
as reporters is the civil case.
Because when Nick Hillary
filed that civil case,
not long
after the investigation began,
as for us reporters, that's all
public documents, you know?
So all those depositions,
all of the testimony of law
enforcement
saying, "We didn't have
physical evidence"
To be able to read a lot of officers
that were involved in the case,
to see Ed Tischler's remarks,
to see Mark Murray's remarks
answering, "No, we didn't have
any physical evidence"
I mean, it's interesting to think
that the first theory
before Nick Hillary even,
as we've heard in the calls,
is some kids were getting rowdy,
you know, and something
happened with kids.
Well, those kids' fingerprints aren't
in the database.
My last story for North Country
Public Radio was this story.
It sounds weird and paranoid,
but it wasn't a coincidence
that we aired it when I left town.
At the time it was a big thing to air
anything about John Jones.
John Jones is still a deputy sheriff,
and again, Jones was
at some point considered a suspect,
all of which raises big questions
about trust, about public safety,
about what it means
when a local police officer
was also a suspect in a
murder that's under investigation.
It was a big thing to kind of
uncover these declarative statements
from multiple people saying,
"We have no DNA evidence."
We kept thinking,
"How many other cases
are there like this
around the country?"
If anything, I think we thought,
"This must happen more than we know."
When national media
started paying attention
it was just really affirming
for us as journalists of,
wow, this thing
that we followed our curiosity on,
or that raised some big
questions for us in our community,
is somehow universal enough
that it applies
to big questions
the whole country might be facing.
If the facts had been exactly
as they are,
but Nick Hillary had been white,
would the New York Times be
covering this story as it has?
Well, I think you have to step back
a second and look at what's going on
in the country right now.
The issues of race
and law enforcement
is something
that people are talking about,
it's something people
are concerned about.
It is through the
information we got in the civil suit
that the media took
a real interest, before, right?
Most time media take interest
after someone's been wrongfully
convicted, right,
and the person's sitting there
for 25 years.
Hillary's been very fortunate
and very blessed
in not just having information
but in having friends.
A lot of people empathize with him.
Sarah Johnson and Greg
are perfect examples of that.
Hillary's new lead attorneys are
criminal defence lawyer,
Earl Ward, and civil rights lawyer
Norman Siegel
out of New York City.
The two have consulted in the case
since the fall.
How did I get involved?
The Amsterdam News owner
and publisher called me last summer
and said, "Please come.
I want you to hear about a case.
I'd like you to get involved."
I said that I would get involved.
My one condition was that Earl Ward
be co-counsel with me.
And then we made phone calls,
we talked to people.
Everything we've been told is totally
in opposite to what the prosecution
is trying to make Nick Hillary
out to be.
I think Pete has the same sort
of view here.
I've known Nick
for over two years now.
It's always been a calm conversation.
In fact, when you discuss how people
are vilifying him in social media,
how they're calling him names,
not once has he erupted in anger
like you'd expect.
He's just calmly said,
"The truth will come out.
I'm going to fight this,
and I'm not going to do I that way."
I know that there are some people
who are very charged about this case,
and people that were friends of mine
that don't really
talk to me right now.
You know,
and they may not ever again,
no matter how this case goes.
This is news from North Country
Public Radio.
Thanks very much.
We're sorting out the latest turn
in the Garrett Phillips murder case.
District Attorney Mary Rain
says DNA evidence points the finger
directly at accused killer,
Nick Hillary.
Mark Murray, who's lead
investigator, testified under oath
there was no fingerprints match,
there was no DNA match,
there was no eyewitnesses.
They basically had no case.
And then all of a sudden,
years and years later,
Fitzpatrick comes on the case, is,
you know, takes a lead role,
and all of a sudden
they have this DNA match.
The STRmix concluded very,
very simply
that the DNA mixture
under Garrett Phillips' fingernails,
one of them was Garrett Phillips,
and the other was a partial profile
of an individual
who in likelihood ratio terms
was millions of times more likely
to be Nick Hillary
than a random stranger.
We knew that something was
so suspicious with it
because we knew it had been tested
at the lab.
We knew they had 100-and-something
samples, nothing matched.
Now, how all of a sudden they got
this match?
I think that they pounded
and pounded and pounded
until they got that square peg
in the round hole.
The last physical act the kid does
is try to tell us who did it,
scratch Hillary's face somewhere.
Not deep enough to cause scratches.
You know, he's not thinking,
"I'm going to leave
this guy's DNA under fingernails,"
but I'm speaking metaphorically.
We've all heard the phrase
that DNA is the finger of God
pointing at the accused.
This is not that case.
This is the finger of a statistician
pointing at Nick Hillary,
and that is not what DNA
should be all about.
What we're talking about is a very,
very, very small amount of DNA.
DNA has this mythology
of being infallible.
If you watch CSI, you know,
it is that thing.
It is, "Oh, well,
we've got the evidence.
It's right here on the DNA."
And I think particularly for jurors
who are probably not accustomed
to kind of high-scientific theory,
this is a smoking gun.
If the jury has to hear it,
I mean, I
I mean, to sit here
and tell you I'm scared
would be an understatement.
I mean, some of the lawyers
don't even understand,
much less a lay jury.
Hillary's trial is scheduled
to start September 6th in Canton.
What was already considered
a tough case
for the prosecution to prove
just got even tougher.
Some very complex DNA test results
will not be allowed.
It might've been key evidence in the
upcoming Nick Hillary murder trial.
Now a judge
has tossed it out of court.
We find the DNA, not find,
but find an expert
that can testify as to the
significance of the DNA evidence,
and it winds up getting thrown out.
You know, Nick is really excited,
but he's also worried
because we still have a trial date.
Having done over 100 trials,
I know one thing,
is that anything can happen
in front of a jury.
Shanna-Kay, my name's Norman Siegel.
You know me, Earl Ward.
- And we know this guy, right?
- Yep.
This is all in preparation
for the trial.
And we are giving
serious consideration
to calling you
as one of our witnesses.
So you've been
through this before a little,
- right?
- Yes.
You testified in the grand jury on
two occasions, right?
- Yes.
- Told the truth.
All we were just looking for
is the truth from you.
And again, I think you're going
to make a terrific witness, so,
you know, just don't be nervous
as we, you know, go through this.
- Okay.
- All right?
- Okay.
- You look nervous.
I'm just a little nervous.
- Why are you a little
- I'm just nervous.
I don't really have, like, a reason,
it's just what happens every time.
- I just get a little nervous.
- Okay.
They have no idea, truly no idea,
the negative impact
they have imposed
and put upon my kids.
My two oldest are good
with their knowledge
of what's going on.
So, you know, with me saying,
"Hey, I'm going off.
I'm going to address this situation
once and for all," they're good.
The two youngest,
they're still not as cognitive
to understand the big picture.
- Not too hard.
- Hey!
- Let me see. Yeah?
- What else?
You know, but for Elijah,
he's really at that stage where,
you know, he needs answers,
and he will ask questions.
Yeah, exactly.
You know what I'm saying, you know,
I mean,
that's all we need is just
good eyes,
you know, to look over
all the necessary moving parts
and see where I'm going.
- Yeah, man.
- And see, yeah.
- Yeah, man.
- Yeah.
It looks good to me, bro.
Yes, starting to look good, starting
to look good, you know?
- See?
- Yes, man.
- All right, one love. Yes.
- Yeah, man.
Yeah, so, you know, back again.
All right. All right, come on.
Elijah, let's go.
- Are you leaving tomorrow?
- No.
Why?
Yeah, you know I gotta go back up
in a couple days, right?
Why? Why?
Up back to the North Country,
you know, I've got to have
some stuff to finish up
- Wait, can I come?
- If you could come?
- Yeah.
- Well
maybe on the weekends when you
don't have school you could come,
you know, or I will come down,
you know?
No need to worry, okay?
- Yeah. Can I come?
- No, because you've got to be here
- to go to school.
- Yeah, I know.
But a day before the school starts
can we come with you?
That's not going to be feasible,
okay?
-Feasible?
- I want to be a machine!
- Okay?
- Daddy!
- You are just really
- I want to be a machine!
It's not going to be possible
for that to work out.
Oh, okay.
- Okay?
- Yeah.
- All right.
- You'll see?
Yeah, I'll see.
Goodnight.
Goodnight.
- Yeah.
- Daddy, can you go get the towel?
- Yes.
- Go get it.
Okay.
All right. Love you.
Maybe, okay? Love you.
Okay, I'll come back later.
I think having
all of this drawn out for so long
has affected us in that
it feels like a book
that needs to be closed,
and you can't close it yet
because you haven't read
that last page.
It feels unfinished,
and it's just hung there over us.
Everybody is upset about this.
The poor child's family
has gone through a lot.
The community is in turmoil.
It just needs to be taken care of.
I mean, the evidence
is probably good,
it's just that they don't like
the way it was handled, yeah.
Well, it can't be used now.
With Hillary's two-hour deposition,
I think things were looking good.
You could ask everybody in the world
where they were on the 24th of,
that night that Garrett was taken.
They're not going to lie.
They're not going to need
to lawyer up.
They're going to not hide DNA.
One person killed him.
The family has kept it in front
of all of us
which they should
for the last five years.
I'm hoping, as everyone else is,
that this is resolved
and that they do have proof,
and that there is
something that comes out,
a conviction comes out,
whether it's Nick or whomever,
but that they,
so they can put this to rest.
I'll feel awful if anything
that I've done,
you know, ends up hurting,
you know what I mean?
I don't know how that works
in the court or the law.
You know, you can twist things
however you want.
I'm just an average person,
I'm just in it.
This case has been adjudicated
on the streets,
and in the Price Choppers,
and in the parking lots, for years.
Now this is a real trial.
This is really happening.
We were really worried
going into the jury process
that we were going
to run into a roadblock.
The commissioner of jurors told me
that 1,000 people
from St. Lawrence County
have been summoned for jury duty,
and that's four times
as many as usual.
We were worried
that we were going to have
some very opinionated people
on the jury.
And we were worried that
there wasn't going to be one juror
in the courtroom who didn't know
anything about this case.
- Turn around for me, please.
- Oh, one second.
Thank you, sir.
Everyone says
they're going to be fair,
you've just got to sit back
and decide
if this is the person
who really can be.
I thought voir dire went excellent.
We got 10 jurors the first pass.
One of the jurors I knew, and I felt
that he would do a very fair job.
He would give both sides
a fair shake.
So I was very confident
that we had good 10 jurors.
I drove all the way home,
I live about an hour away
from where the trial's happening,
I got home and I got the call
from Norm, and Earl, and Kate.
They said,
"God, you've got to come back.
We've got to talk
about this some more."
So dropped whatever I was doing,
hopped in my car, and I drove back,
and we talked about it
for another three or four hours.
The defence came into chambers
looking like somebody just kicked
their puppy in front of them.
And I had no idea
why they had such long faces.
And they were kind of hemming
and hawing, saying,
"We were up all night
talking to the defendant,"
and I thought,
"Is he going to plead?"
You know, I didn't have any idea
what was going on.
You know, "He wants to do this,"
and I'm like,
"What is this? What is this?
Tell us."
Hillary chose himself to go bench.
I would never classify myself
as a risk-taker, you know,
but after the first round of seating
and there was just no one
who I can say
with great sense of comfort,
would be unprejudiced.
We'd actually found out
after the fact that one of the jurors
was actually friends with,
that they had picked,
was friends with the Phillips family.
It's too connected up there.
Everyone's too close with the family.
And I think five years of poisoning
turned Justice for Garrett
into "Lynch Nick Hillary."
The trial will be trial by a judge.
We understand the enormity
of what Nick is charged with,
and we take
that responsibility seriously.
You can hear my voice
sort of crackling there,
which indicates
it's not just my brain
my whole body recognizing
what I just said. So
- Can I ask how Nick's feeling?
- I'm feeling very well, thank you.
Okay.
When we actually had a trial date
and we were all
sitting in court together,
it just seemed like some
kind of weird, surreal dream
that this was actually taking place.
All rise.
St. Lawrence County Court
is now in session.
The Honourable Felix Catena
presiding.
Good morning, everybody.
Please be seated.
We're on the record.
This is the People
of the State of New York
against Oral Nicholas Hillary.
Mr. Fitzpatrick, your
opening statement.
Thank you very much, Your Honour.
It is it's normally at this point,
Judge, where either you
or some of the litigants would say
to a jury to keep an open mind.
And I don't think, Judge,
I've ever beseeched someone more
in a criminal case
to keep an open mind than I would
in this matter right now.
Because the narrative of this case
up to this point has been very,
very simple.
A group of bungling, incompetent cops
from a small town
in upstate New York
Okay, these guys,
very experienced lawyers,
just selected this individual
to decide this case.
And I wanted to disavow him
of the narrative
the narrative which has been
established at this point
for four and a half years,
that this case is razor-thin,
that this case is nothing
but a bunch of, you know,
upstate hicks that want to grab
the only black guy in town
and put him on trial.
None of that stuff is true.
From day one,
the murder investigation
focused almost exclusively
on Nick Hillary.
You will learn that
after a thorough inspection
of the deceased's apartment
at 100 Market Street,
the police found no fingerprints,
no hairs,
or no fibres linking Nick Hillary
to this crime.
Let's examine in what is
the most conclusive piece of guilt
against this man,
at the exact instant
Garrett reaches Leroy Street,
the defendant backs up,
K-turns out of the parking lot,
and according to him,
at least a dozen times under oath,
"I went straight home,
back to my daughter."
Except the camera doesn't lie.
Mr. Hillary doesn't turn right,
he turns left, because he's hunting
Garrett Phillips.
This is all the video will show you.
But the prosecution wants you
to jump to conclusions.
You will not see or hear
any credible evidence
of Nick or Nick's car
approaching, at, or leaving 100
Market Street
during the critical time
from when Nick exits the parking lot
until Officer Mark Wentworth
found the deceased.
And why? Because he wasn't there.
Now, meanwhile, Judge, just outside
in the back of Market Street,
there's a young man
by the name of Andrew Carranza
and his then-girlfriend
Shannon Harris,
and they're in the process
of changing a flat tire
on Carranza's truck.
Andrew's now deployed with
the United States Marine Corps,
but he'll be here to describe
what he saw and what he heard.
- Meanwhile
- When Nick came to the trial,
I was hired by Nick's attorneys
to locate and interview witnesses
to find out what they would know
and say at the trial.
I learned that the DA's office was
going to fly Andrew back from Hawaii,
and he was a vital witness
in this case.
So I called him.
And he apparently jumped
to the conclusion that I was working
for the DA's office, quite quickly.
I didn't tell him any different.
I didn't feel I had a responsibility
to tell him that.
He said, "They're flying me from
Hawaii to testify in this.
I'll be showing up Monday in Canton."
"Fine. What are you
going to testify to?"
"Well, I saw a black guy
on the second floor,
a silhouette of somebody
that fits Nick's"
Talked with him
as much as I could, went on,
and the other witnesses
that I was trying to locate
was Andrew's girlfriend, Shannon.
Don Tracy called me,
told me he was an investigator.
He stopped over.
He questioned me
about what I was doing that day,
what I heard, what I saw.
We were changing his tire,
and we kept hearing
this ripping noise. And
The decision was made by me
to fly Andrew Carranza in.
It was my judgment
that Andrew described
the noises that he heard
a little bit better.
Police asked both of us if we had
seen anybody in the window,
any movement, anything like that,
and we both said no.
This window right here
on the top, on the outside,
was the window
that had the screen forced out.
So these parking spots right here
would've been occupied
by the Carranzas,
this being Andrew's.
Would've been very hard to see
a body standing in that window.
And if there was, it certainly
would've been a time
to say it at that time.
And they did state
they didn't see anything.
Their statements indicate that.
We went over the statements
multiple times,
and nothing was different.
Afterward, he told me Andrew
had an opposing story.
I told Don Andrew
was trying to get a hold of me,
and I had called him anyway,
and I did record the entire
conversation with Andrew,
just in case he said
he was making it up.
Now I feel like you're changing
your story or something,
and I don't know, Andrew,
but I am not going to go to court
and, like, lie for something
about you, if that makes sense.
If they question me on it I'm going
to have to be honest and tell them
I think I would remember
because it would be in my statement.
Yeah, well, you saw somebody
but you didn't necessarily
see Hillary.
So I don't understand how,
even if you did,
that would be substantial evidence.
Andrew, come on.
Andrew clearly knew what had
to be said in that trial
to make a difference.
And he was willing to step up
and do it.
Wow
So is she willing to testify?
Is Shannon Harris
on the witness list? No, right?
Don spoke to,
the investigator spoke to her.
- And?
- Thinks, she says
Carranza's full of shit.
Yeah, this is crazy.
- That's a big one.
- That's it.
Don, thank you very much.
I'll fill the team in on what's going
on here, but that's big.
Thank you. Okay, cool.
- Okay. All right.
- We have enough plates?
- Yeah.
- Good.
- Yeah.
- Plenty of everything.
Okay, great. All right, Don.
Thank you. Bye-bye.
Don spoke to the girlfriend
of their star witness,
and she says he's full of shit.
- Who did?
- Awesome.
- All right.
- That's great.
- Okay, who's saying this?
- Shannon Harris.
The girlfriend who was there,
who was present.
Oh, the girl changing the tire?
- Yep.
- Yeah.
- Super.
- Super, good win.
Good morning, everybody.
- Good morning.
- Good morning.
The next day when the trial
had resumed I happened to bump
into Dan Manor from the DA's office,
and Dan knew what I knew.
Because he looked at me, he says,
"What are you doing
talking to my witness?"
And I said, "Dan, how could
you bring him all the way from Hawaii
to testify to something that you knew
was not the truth?"
And he said, "I have rules to follow.
I have people I'm responsible to."
Dan Manor would've spoken to Carranza
to logistically get him flown in.
Nobody interviewed him
prior to flying him in.
I had no knowledge
that he was going to say,
"It was a black male at the window"
until I spoke to him
the day before he testified.
Why didn't anybody ask Mr. Carranza
about the colour the man
who was looking out that window?
They said he was looking out the
window, but no one asked
the description of the man.
Was there
If there was a person looking out
that window and there was a,
that was an African-American person,
he would've said it.
There was no way we could ethically
allow Andrew Carranza
to now say suddenly
four years later that,
"Oh, yeah, it was a black male."
And in fact I'm fairly certain
he was prepared
to say that it was Nick Hillary
at the window.
If we had not had Shannon Harris
to come and testify,
or not planned on calling her
after he testified,
who would know the difference?
And knowing that we had witnesses
who would contradict
their statements in real time
and blow this up in their faces,
they did not know that
when they booked his flight
from Hawaii
- Right.
- to come up.
They found that out
after he was in Potsdam.
- Yes. It's very on.
- Is it on?
Mr. Dumas?
Judge, I didn't take Mr. Dumas'
remarks as accusatory,
but essentially,
it's being suggested
that I'm withholding
exculpatory evidence
regarding a witness
I've never heard of.
So I will go through our archives
and talk to the investigators
on the case
in an attempt to identify Mr. Brown.
And obviously,
if there's anything exculpatory
I full, know my obligations.
DA Fitzpatrick has said,
"Well, who's Gregory Brown?"
I said, "I don't know
who Gregory Brown is."
And then as he started explaining
that he was an inmate,
I was, like, "Oh, yes, I do remember
something about the state police
going out and interviewing
this person at Attica."
Can I see counsel
in chambers, please?
We got into chambers
and they handed us two pages.
And we looked at it, and we all
just kind of jaw-dropped.
Because this piece of paper
said that John Jones
entered 100 Market Street
approximately 15 minutes
before Garrett Phillips
entered 100 Market Street.
So my question is, how would he
even know who John Jones is?
And John says
that he knows Greg Brown
from having played football with him.
You know, he's, like, "I didn't know
him by name, but I knew who he was."
"You know G-Money?" I go,
"Who's G-Money?"
And I'm not trying to stereotype it,
but I assumed it was a black man.
And I said, "No, I don't hang around
with a lot of black people,
so no I don't know who he is."
And he goes,
"You don't know Greg Brown?"
I said, "No." I go,
"Help me out with this."
And he goes, "You used to bounce
at this local establishment."
And I go,
"Oh, yeah, yeah, I know him."
I go, "Why?" He goes,
"Apparently he saw you come out of,
or go into Tandy's house that day."
I go, "Seriously?"
I thought it was a joke.
He goes, "Yeah."
When they handed us that document,
I took one look at it
and that was probably the
one instance in my whole career
of the clearest-cut Brady material
I've ever seen.
Brady material is material
that's favourable to the defence,
something that might show that
Nick Hillary didn't commit the crime.
And it's one of those things that
you take a step back
as a defence attorney
and you're working late at night,
and you say to yourself,
"Wait a minute.
If this is just coming out now,
what else is there?
What else don't we know?"
That's why these rules
are in place
they're to protect
someone like Nick Hillary.
They're to protect
his constitutional rights.
Here's the problem. Okay.
Should it have been disclosed?
Absolutely.
Inexcusable that it wasn't disclosed.
In Mary's mind,
there's irrefutable proof
that John Jones
did not commit the crime,
ergo someone alleging that John Jones
did commit the crime is lying.
So in her mind it went from
potentially exculpatory
to just total BS.
Can't make that decision
as a prosecutor.
All I have is my reputation
when I'm appearing in court.
And I thought about, you know,
just packing it up and leaving,
but I couldn't do that to Tandy
and the Phillips family.
the prosecution's witnesses today,
but instead the defence got up
and asked Judge Felix Catena
for a dismissal.
Now, that's an extreme remedy
to the situation,
but this is an extreme case.
You know, we've got a man
who's on trial for his life here.
This is a murder in the second,
and they're hiding this.
I think that it should be
an extreme remedy.
The judge is the judge and the jury.
He is the man.
He will decide Nick Hillary's fate.
And so for him to sit in a courtroom
and someone say,
"Oh, by the way,
we forgot to give some information
to the defence team,"
I'm sure that that must've set off
some alarm bells for him
in his brain, where he was, like,
"What's the prosecution doing here?"
And I think that that probably
was part of the defence's strategy
as well.
Earl, can you say where you're going
now and then we'll let you go?
We are headed over to the jail
to speak to Gregory Brown.
They brought him down
fairly quickly, huh?
Yes, fairly quickly. Rapid speed.
I'm sure some of you are thinking,
"Well, they didn't use Gregory Brown.
He must be a whack-job."
Gregory Brown is not a whack-job.
He's not a whacko.
He was very credible, and he didn't
remember everything
in part because
there's been a passage of time.
The idea that somehow John Jones
was at that building,
did you find it credible
or was it the case
of there being too many holes
in his account to use it in court?
The fact that John Jones
was not only there
but went into 100 Market
which I thought was important
I found that credible.
There is no way in hell John Jones,
the guy is on video
walking his dog
at the time the murder takes place.
You can't have better evidence.
And his DNA didn't match the DNA
profile under the fingernails.
It wasn't John Jones because,
you know, as I've said before,
who brings their dog
to a murder? Nobody.
Coincidences happen.
Twenty-nine seconds after John Jones
pulled into his driveway,
Garrett rode by on his Ripstik.
Now, I think the prosecution would
clearly say, "That's a coincidence."
There's a camera on the side
of Canton-Potsdam Hospital,
and among other things,
it just coincidentally
also captures John Jones' house
because he happened to live
on Cottage Street at that time.
Two different cameras.
You see Garrett coming down the
northside sidewalk of Cottage.
He gets to the driveway
that you would turn right
to go towards the ER.
The second camera from the ER
that shows the parking lot
shows Garrett
basically passing from left to right
as he's traveling
down Cottage Street.
They don't pass each other waving
or anything like,
you don't see that on camera.
It's a coincidence with John Jones,
but it's not a coincidence
with Nick Hillary.
John Jones, who was the former
boyfriend of Tandy Collins.
John Jones,
who didn't like Nick Hillary.
John Jones,
who once pushed Tandy Collins.
John Jones,
who had sued Tandy Collins.
Nick being in the parking lot,
in their view, is evidence of murder.
I submit to you, Judge, it is not.
What we now have to do is weave
together all of the depositions,
the grand jury testimony,
the transcripts of the days
of testimony so far of 28 witnesses,
and put together a concise,
powerful statement.
There's always pressure
when someone's life is on the line.
I mean, Nick loses,
he's going, we lose,
he's going away
for the rest of his life.
He has two young kids,
two young boys,
really cute little boys who love him.
And last time I saw him,
kids was holding onto him and saying,
"Don't go."
And so it was really heart-warming
and at the same time scary.
And we've got Fitzpatrick
in there also?
Yes.
I'll double-check on that.
I think, yep.
- Great.
- Yeah, and so too page 76.
I've seen a lot of injustices,
and I just hope
that this is not one of them.
And we're hoping
that we can win this case for him
so that he can get back to his life.
The prosecution has pieced together,
they've cobbled together
fabrics of so-called "evidence."
And they've given you, Judge,
a torn and tattered quilt.
And they have given this torn and
tattered quilt to you,
and they've called it
"circumstantial evidence."
They're trying to paint
this picture of Nick
as an obsessed psychopath who,
unable to get the love of his life,
kills her child.
Does that make sense?
I submit to you it makes
absolutely no sense.
It's not the type of theory you bring
into a courtroom and ask a judge
to find a man guilty of murder,
guilty of murder
in the second degree.
What they're trying to do here,
Your Honour,
what they're trying to do here
is to demonize
is to demonize this man.
I know the prosecutor's
going to stand up here,
and he's going to say
to you, in the loudest voice
as he can,
"You have to convict Nick Hillary."
And he will say to you,
"I have proven my case
beyond a reasonable doubt."
Judge, this case
is riddled with doubt.
I can't emphasize enough, Judge,
how in this case,
there's two possible explanations.
You have to give the benefit of the
doubt to the defendant.
But possibility number one
is either Nick Hillary
is the victim of the most bizarre
convergence of coincidences
since man first learned to write
and record history,
and he sits there an innocent man,
or, on October the 24th, 2011,
obsessed by his breakup
with Tandy Cyrus,
enraged that it came down
to the needs of the 12-year-old boy,
as if there was some moral confluence
between his needs
and the needs of a 12-year-old boy,
he entered that boy's apartment,
he chased him down,
he dragged him into a bedroom,
and he spent 90 seconds
choking the life out of him.
And he's been lying
about it ever since!
What kind of mind can orchestrate
something like that, Judge?
The same type of mind that can look
you right in the eye and say that,
"When I leave the Potsdam parking
high school parking lot,
and my apartment
is four-tenths of a mile
in a straight line to the right,
sometimes I go left, and it doesn't
make any difference to me."
That's the type of mind
that we're dealing with.
"And of course you've got
to believe me,
because I'm Nick Hillary,
and I said it.
And that's good enough,
should be good enough for you."
And we're here, Your Honour,
because of tapes,
but frankly none more important
than Exhibit 71.
And there's the last time we ever see
Garrett Phillips alive.
Garrett Phillips wasn't killed by
someone passing through town
who hates little boys,
he was killed by Nick Hillary.
He wanted to be with his friends.
He wanted to occasionally
watch TV, Judge.
He wanted to play on his Ripstik.
He wanted to be 12 years old,
not be dictated to,
and that cost him his life.
Now Garrett belongs to the ages.
He's forever 12.
I wish you Godspeed, Judge.
I pray to God you've seen this
defendant for what he truly is
a person who with premeditation,
murdered a beautiful
12-year-old little boy.
And he did it so arrogantly
and stupidly,
that he can now finally
be brought to justice.
Thank you, Your Honour.
With regard to the Court's decision,
the Court's verdict,
I anticipate Wednesday or Thursday
of next week
that we'll stand in recess
to await the court's verdict.
Thank you, everybody.
A verdict is expected
at some point this week
in the Nick Hillary murder trial.
The former Clarkson University
soccer coach
is facing a second-degree
murder charge
for the 2011 death
of his ex-girlfriend's son.
He'll be back in the courtroom as
soon as a verdict is reached.
- Hi, Daddy.
- Look at what I got right here.
- I want hot dogs.
- It is.
It's a special kind of hot dog.
- Just trust me, okay?
- No, that's not a hot dog.
- It's not a hot dog?
- No, it's pepperoni.
- That's pepperonis?
- Yes.
No, this is better
than pepperonis, man.
Good job, Jojo.
Good job, Jojo.
Good job to me!
Wake up every day and you're trying
to enjoy every second,
every minute with your kids,
all the while trying to protect them
and shelter them from the unknown.
I need food, I need all the Sriracha.
I need all the Sriracha.
- Okay.
- All the it.
All right.
- Come on, boys. Yeah.
- Daddy.
Hey, wait, listen.
Okay. All right. Let's say bye.
- Give me beso.
- But why?
Give me beso. I love you.
I'll see you in a few, okay?
- One more beso.
- One more beso.
All right.
Give daddy beso now, Jojo.
Give me beso.
Dad, how are you going
to work this out?
One more.
- All right.
- Daddy
I'll give you, son, I love you, okay?
- Yeah.
- Remember the promise.
- What's the promise?
- Don't cry.
Okay, good.
- It's gonna be okay.
- Yeah, remember what I told you.
- Yeah.
- Okay, good job.
- I'm good. Okay.
- All right.
All right.
All right, Jojo. Give me five, man.
All right.
Good night. Bye-bye. Time to go!
Perfect.
Be strong now, okay, buddy?
All right?
Things are going
to be all right, okay?
Praying continuously that the correct
decision will come down,
and I will have to get down
on my hands and my knees
and start rebuilding, you know?
Because everything
I have built up until this point
has been totally destroyed.
No matter what happens, you know,
there's no real, like, reparations
that are going to go back to Nick's
family for all the
the fact that he lost his job,
for the debt
that his family went into.
His name is kind of ruined.
Google "Nick Hillary," his name
is next to the word "murder."
And even if it's that he's innocent,
that's, he's stuck with that
for the rest of his life.
In the news today, Judge Felix Catena
will hand down his verdict
in the Nick Hillary murder trial.
We'll bring that to you live
at 10.00am.
One or two more words,
"guilty" or "not guilty."
Nick, how you feeling today?
Confident?
You can look at it one of two ways.
You can look at it
that Nick Hillary did this,
that he strangled a 12-year-old,
either out of rage
or to punish Tandy,
and then clambered
out that back window
and has managed
since then to convey himself
as an innocent victim,
which would be an
act of true pathology.
Or that someone else did this,
and somehow entered that apartment,
strangled this little boy
for reasons unknown,
then clambered out that apartment
and escaped into the night,
and has never been heard from again.
Either one of those options
are frightening.
Please be seated,
ladies and gentlemen.
Good morning and welcome back
to St. Lawrence County Court.
This is a continuation
of the People, the State of New York,
against Oral Nicholas Hillary,
indictment number 2015-015.
The matter was scheduled this morning
for the Court to deliver its verdict.
Mr. Hillary, if you'll please rise.
Defendant was indicted
on January 19, 2015
for the October 24, 2011 murder
of Garrett Phillips.
A trial was had before this court
sitting without a jury
over the course of three weeks.
The case against the defendant
is entirely based
upon circumstantial evidence.
Because of this the Court must review
the evidence in this case
under a rigorous standard.
Accordingly, it is the judgment
of this court
that as to the charge of murder
in the second degree
as charged in the indictment,
the defendant,
Oral Nicholas Hillary
is found not guilty.
There having been an acquittal,
the court shall enter an order
pursuant to section 160-50
of the criminal procedural law.
Bail is exonerated,
and the defendant is released.
Ladies and gentlemen, this court is
adjourned, thank you.
Someone killed Garrett Phillips,
but it wasn't Nick Hillary.
The families
were extremely distraught.
They've lost a 12-year-old boy,
and now they see their,
the murderer of that 12-year-old boy
walking out of the courtroom, free.
The criminal justice system
worked here.
It is important that the public
fully understand
how our criminal justice system
is intended to work,
and that sometimes,
sometimes it actually does work.
I'm 100 per cent certain
that Nick Hillary was the man.
There will be no search
for anybody else.
He was the only person
that committed this crime,
I'm 100 per cent certain of that.
Conversation that you might've had
with Tandy
Tandy is a very private person.
I just simply
expressed my condolences,
and that was about it.
And she said,
"I know you guys tried."
So I just want to say that this team,
this legal team,
is not oblivious to the fact
that there is a family
that even after five years
still grieves.
And I think the judge,
despite all of that emotion
that was exhibited in that courtroom,
despite all the pain
that he saw from that family,
he had the courage
and he had the strength
to apply the law to the facts,
and after doing so he determined
that Nick Hillary was not guilty.
Welcome back.
you serve a living God.
It was the second time, you know,
some of my teammates
have seen me crying.
What was the other time?
It was when we won
the national championship, yeah.
So that was the first time.
Are you going to go back to coaching?
I mean, I've never ruled it out,
but at the same token, you know,
the focus right now at this moment
is to get back with my family,
and try to get back as best
sense of normalcy within their life,
and then start to explore
the possibility going forward.
- Brother Norm.
- Thank you.
- You take care.
- Yes, will do, will do.
- Be careful.
- Yes.
Even though it's over, it ain't over.
- Exactly.
- It's never over.
It's never over, exactly.
Thank you so much. Yep. All right.
Hey, buddy.
What's going on?
Yeah.
Hey.
Why are you still dressed up
from the meeting?
Well, you know, I didn't have time
to change.
- Let's go.
- All right. Here we go.