The Confession Tapes (2017) s01e05 Episode Script
8th and H
[detective.]
Now, tell me the truth.
Isn't it true or is it true that you went in that garage and saw what was going on? Isn't that the truth? No, I swear to God.
No.
I didn't go in there.
[detective.]
I want you to tell me if you recognize each person in these photographs and what that person did in this crime.
What part they played? Start right here.
[clears throat.]
[detective.]
Is there anything else you want to add to this that you have not told us? I didn't have anything to do with it and I don't want it all to fall down on me if they saying I did it.
I just want this thing to get over with so I can live my life like a free man.
This crime rocked the 8th and H Street neighborhood.
I've had many people tell me that on a certain level, it still does.
[newscaster.]
The gruesome discovery was made in a rain-soaked alley in the 800 block of H Street Northeast, an alley where junkies go to use drugs.
Inside a vacant dilapidated brick garage, the partly nude body of a young woman.
[man.]
This is not usually what goes on around this area.
It was crazy.
Everybody was curious and furious.
[newscaster.]
The victim has been identified as 48-year-old Catherine Fuller, of K Street Northeast.
She had been sexually assaulted and beaten to death.
[man.]
The detectives looked at this crime scene and the horrible circumstances of her death.
And I think they had this immediate idea a group must've done this.
[man 2.]
It's the first time ever in history that that many people were charged for one murder of one person, without it being a conspiracy.
You had to realize how the system worked in D.
C.
back in the '80s and '90s.
Back then, we had so many people getting killed in D.
C.
We were number one murder capital of the United States.
The homicide unit, it was 30 detectives and we had one too many cases.
This was a very brutal crime.
I mean, I handle lots and lots of cases, and this, one of the three gross crimes that I've ever seen.
Once they opened that body, you could see the damage they caused.
The pole that they put in her body all the way up.
This was too much.
It's kind of difficult to believe that a human being will inflict so much pain and so much brutality towards another human being.
[detective.]
This afternoon, homicide detectives returned to the alley, looking for evidence and talking with people who may have seen something.
[man.]
At approximately 4:30 p.
m.
on the day of the murder Mrs.
Fuller left to go shopping.
That's the best we know from the testimony of her husband and her son.
Mrs.
Fuller was 48 years old.
She was small.
She was 99 pounds.
She wasn't much taller than five feet tall.
She was a woman who took care of six kids and a husband who was on disability.
The forensic evidence is that she was beaten up on the 9th Street side of the alley.
The alley runs parallel to 8th Street.
Some of her possessions were found in that 9th Street portion of the alley.
And the perpetrator who decided to assault her dragged her body from that 9th Street side of the alley into the garage.
And based on the autopsy, some lengthy object had to be used to commit the sodomy.
[man.]
Departments are judged on their crime rates, especially on their homicide crime rates.
If you have a high homicide rate, you need to do something.
You need to bring it down.
And you need to show a high closure rate.
The pressure's on you and you want to close it.
You want to close it quick.
About six o'clock, a lady walking through the alley discovered the partially clothed body of an adult female.
On the night of the murder, somebody left an anonymous tip for the cops at I want to say, 2:30 in the morning, saying that there was this group called the 8th and H Crew that hung out in that alley.
And three young men in that group had bragged about dragging women into the alley to rape.
So they started hearing these rumors about this gang stuff.
It kind of fit what we thought was going on in the world at the time.
And they switched from gathering evidence to suddenly, "Oh, my God.
This must be it.
" So we're now suspect-based.
We're out to prove that these are the guys who did it.
[newsman.]
You ever heard of a gang by the name of the 8th and H Crew? - No, I haven't.
- Never heard of 'em? No, not a gang.
- [newsman.]
You live around here? - Yes.
- Never heard of them? - No.
Never heard of, never seen 'em either.
[man.]
8th and H was a park where buses and everyone transferred to go wherever they go.
And guys would go down 8th and H to see where guys, "Hey, what you doin', man? I'll meet you up at 8th and H" because it was convenient to meet up there.
And so dudes started referring to different guys as the 8th Street Crew.
We was basically like a family.
We all went to school together.
Different schools.
We all met up on the basketball courts.
We young, running around, having fun, going to the go-go.
[man 1.]
You had the go-go bands.
[man 2.]
It's pretty much our own sound.
It's D.
C.
sound.
And we, like, represented where we lived at.
And we may occasionally bump a couple people or something like that and And we started fighting.
Farthest someone would get is hit in the head with a bat.
Or you know, black eye.
Some stitches.
But we wasn't doing no killing.
[woman.]
And whenever the go-go bands were playing, they'd ask, you know, like who's in the house or, you know, is 8th and H Crew in the house? It just meant you lived in that neighborhood.
And as soon as I went out into the community, I became suspicious of the police story because people in the community said they weren't aware of a gang.
And police insisted there was a gang.
And a gang creates an image in the community, you know, panic.
It makes people angrier.
It's a gang.
It's, you know, it becomes vicious.
[pounding.]
[man.]
Open up the door.
[newscaster.]
Yesterday morning, D.
C.
Police fanned out to arrest six members of the crew on charges of murder.
They just started snatching everybody out of the neighborhood.
D.
C was going through a purge.
They startled my family.
Came in about 6:30, seven o'clock.
Flying-- Helicopters flying over.
Lights, police lights all outside.
Came in.
Took me out.
Put me in the back of the police car.
They would jump out and grab all of us.
Put us in the car and try to take us down.
Just to question us.
I was like, "Oh, this some This some bullshit.
" I mean, it was like, they were just kicking down doors.
[man.]
Sunday, December the 9th, 1984, they kicked my door in.
I had never been arrested.
I had finished high school when I was 17 years old.
I was gonna go in the military.
I was going to college.
Police drove us to 8th and H where they put is in the paddy wagon to make it look like these the guys that hang out there on 8th and H.
[newscaster.]
Police say these men are members of a gang which was known as the 8th and H Crew.
There are still other members of the gang and police say there may be other arrests.
[Trainum.]
Their approach was kind of like a shotgun approach.
You kind of round in all the usual suspects, start putting them in the box, squeezing them and see what comes out.
[Sinclair.]
You get a 15-year-old and they're telling him he going to jail, or this gonna happen to him, or this gonna happen to him, that's scary.
That's very scary.
You lie to say anything.
[woman.]
When they came to the house that Sunday morning, got him out of the bed, they said they was gonna talk to him.
They didn't tell me he was under arrest for murder or anything.
They did not request for his parents or attorney.
Clifton didn't have nobody to speak for him.
[detective.]
Do you have any objections to this videotaping taking place? No.
Have any promises been made to you in return for your statement? Excuse me.
Could you go by that one again? Sure.
Have any promises been made to you Have I promised you anything for talking to me today? No, you haven't.
[Williams.]
Cliff came up very high on the suggestibility scale.
His I.
Q.
was measured at 69.
5.
[Mary.]
Clifton not retarded.
Special needs.
Slow learner.
That was Clifton problem.
He was a slow learner.
Cliff didn't understand what he was being asked to sign.
- Do you remember signing the rights card? - Yes.
- Did you read the card? - Yes.
Back then, we were not videotaping interrogations from start to finish.
We were only doing what we call, the "recap video.
" We're here today to talk to you about the death of the lady in the alley at 8th and H Street.
Why don't you start, tell us everything that you know about that.
I came home from school.
I came across H Street up Ninth Street to the alley the end of the alley.
I seen Monk dragging the lady into the alley.
He slammed the lady.
Chrissy hit her.
Burt hit her.
He dragged her.
Snot Rag hit her and dragged her.
Derek stomped, Fella hit her.
Bobo hit her.
Levy was standing over top of her.
When you see these recap videos, a lot of times people will say, well, look, just the story flows, how cold they are.
That it's being factual.
They've rehearsed this again and again and again.
So all of the manipulation, the lies about the evidence, the promises of leniency, that's all off camera.
Snot Rag said, "Stop, Derek.
" So that's when Snot Rag and Burt pulled her to the cut of the alley.
Levy stuck a pole in her.
Where was she when he stuck the pole in her? Right at the cut of the alley.
[Trainum.]
He was getting critical facts wrong.
The crime scene analysis puts most of the assault inside of the garage.
Yarborough is saying that he's over on 9th Street watching the attack occur on the other end of the alley.
[detective.]
How far were you from exactly where they had the lady down? I can't recall it all from here.
Was it as long as a basketball court? - It was just about that length.
- Full court? Yeah.
Just like that.
At first, they put it at a distance of a basketball court.
They begin to challenge him and he begins to shorten the distance.
[detective 2.]
And tell me, what you could see at that distance? There was Not, not quite that far.
Not quite that far.
- Well, what could you see? - I could see what they was doing.
You watch the statement and you hear these things.
And you think Oh, boy, these are-- He's giving details.
This is uncomfortable.
But then, look at the big picture.
Look at the other things that he says.
We know those other things aren't true.
Who is this? Calvin.
[detective 1.]
All right.
And what did Calvin do? He was fighting.
He stomped her.
Would you describe what you mean by stomp her? He was [kicks chair.]
kicking, - putting his feet down on her.
- Okay.
[Williams.]
What he meant by a stomp, is somebody stepping hard down on somebody.
Kicking them but they're on the ground and you're putting full weight on them.
Stomping somebody leaves a distinct injury on the body.
Mrs.
Fuller didn't have any of those injuries.
Not one.
Certainly not the ten that Cliff described.
[Williams.]
Cliff also, at some point, in his statement, describes her blouse being ripped off of her.
And he doesn't only describe it, he gestures.
He goes like this.
It's kind of like Hulk Hogan in the '80s, you know, pulling off, you know, ripping open his shirt.
That didn't happen.
When Monk slammed her, Chrissy hit him hit her first.
And Derek was beating her with a stick.
Monk ripped her blouse off her.
[Williams.]
She was wearing a sweater.
And the sweater was pushed up her chest, not ripped off of her.
Part of what's interesting about Cliff making that gesture about it, having been ripped off like that, is that Detective Sanchez Serrano admits that in interrogating Cliff, he mimicked ripping off his shirt and feigned rage at Cliff for not telling what he knew.
[detective.]
Now tell me the truth.
Isn't it true or is it true that you went in that garage and saw what was going on? Isn't that the truth? No, I swear to God.
No.
I didn't go in there.
- Isn't it true? - No.
I swear.
People with low I.
Q.
's are particularly likely to give false confessions.
Which means that they are likely to defer to the opinion of another, and to tell somebody what they think that that other person wants to hear.
I never dreamed that I would be the living proof of someone that was being falsely accused of something they didn't do.
[detective.]
You gotta tell me, brother.
We want to hear it all.
Tell us exactly what-- - This shit give me nightmares.
- Okay.
Well [Willliams.]
The two most central witnesses for the government were Harry Bennett and Calvin Alston, who are young, vulnerable teenagers.
They just went and got the lady and took her back there.
Okay.
But what do you mean? To take her back there or In other words, they trying to say, go rob the lady.
- Go rob the lady? - Yeah.
Okay.
Who was in the alley? And we'll go to a book this time, okay? So you can identify the people for us.
Before we came into this interview room today you had a conversation with me in the room just beside this one.
- Correct? - Right.
- And did we draw a diagram at that time? - Yes, sir.
[Alston.]
They showed me the piece of paper.
It had names.
A lot of scribble on the paper.
But it had charts, pies drew on the paper.
They would tell me I was gonna either take a piece of the pie A slice of the pie, or take the whole pie and go down by myself.
At first, I thought they was joking.
To be honest, I thought they was joking.
The more I explained, they didn't want to hear.
When I told them I was at work, they didn't want to hear that.
They said, "No, he was with Cliff", that I was in the alley.
I was scared.
And I took a piece of the pie.
Now, you stated to me before that in the garage was Levy, Monk.
Now, who are these other people standing out here? - Would you tell me who was out there? - Sure.
What they were doing? Speak up, sir, please.
Burt was standing there.
Kelvin was standing out there.
Chrissy, Darryl, Ernest, Cliff Snot Rag and the Monk.
And me.
[detective.]
Do you feel better now that you've told us this on tape? - [Alston.]
Yeah, I feel much better.
- [detective.]
Why? Because I don't want-- I didn't have nothing to do with it.
I don't want it all to fall down on me if they saying I did it.
I just want the thing to get over with so I can live my life like a free man.
[Williams.]
These teenagers make a shortsighted decision to lie and say that they are witnesses to something they didn't actually see.
But we didn't have the full facts that would've helped tell a different account of this crime and would've helped show that Cliff's statement and the statement of Alston and the statement of Bennett those statements weren't true.
[Trainum.]
I had begun a project where we were going back and reviewing old homicide cases and trying to get information into searchable databases.
I was going through old files that involved unusual cases, sexual assaults, things like that.
And that's when I stumbled across the Catherine Fuller case.
And as I was going through it, I found this envelope in the very, very back part, and on the outside it said "suspects".
I opened up the envelope and was going through it.
And I had pictures of the people who had been arrested.
And then I came across this one picture.
And I recognized him as a guy named James McMillan.
And I thought, what the hell is his picture doing in with this group here? 'Cause I knew McMillan.
I knew him because I had participated in his arrest only a few years before that, actually back in 1992.
[Williams.]
James McMillan commits, essentially, the exact same murder as what happened to Catherine Fuller.
He grabs a woman off the street, he drags her through an alley.
He beats her up.
He sexually assaults her.
He sodomizes her.
Mrs.
Fuller was found naked from the waist down with her sweater bunched up around her breasts.
McMillan's 1992 victim is found naked from the waist down with her top, I believe it was also a sweater, bunched up around her breasts.
[Trainum.]
If Catherine Fuller's case was open right now, McMillan would be my number one suspect.
This guy has a vicious history.
McMillan, he has been institutionalized most of his life.
Since, like, age 13.
Any time he was involved in anything, he brutally beat women.
He was just out for a short while when this occurred.
[Trainum.]
He lived in that area.
In fact, he lived in a house that backed up to the alley where Catherine Fuller was found.
It turns out that he was robbing women in that area.
And when he robbed them, he would walk up to 'em and just pound the ever loving hell out of 'em.
Just viciously, you know, beat them.
[Williams.]
On the day of the murder, a street vendor saw McMillan in the alley acting suspiciously, hiding something under his coat, and remember, the object used to sexually assault Mrs.
Fuller has never been found.
The police showed the street vendor the photograph book of young men in the neighborhood.
And he identified McMillan and another guy.
But he didn't know their names.
He had just identified them based on their face.
The police knew their names.
By the time of defendant's trial, McMillan was in jail for having robbed and assaulted two other middle-aged women in that neighborhood.
Defendants were on trial for an alleged robbery and assault that spun out of control into this murder of a middle-aged woman in this neighborhood.
I mean, it's the most important evidence you can imagine.
And the defendants didn't know about it.
[newscaster.]
The victim, Catherine Fuller, 48 years old, mother of six.
The defendants, nine young men, a 17-year-old girl, members of the 8th and H Crew.
In December, several suspects were rounded up.
Today, they were together again for the start of their trial.
Anyone convicted will end up serving at least the prime of their adulthood, the next 20 years, in prison.
[Mary.]
At the trial, I was still thinking that he's coming home.
Still thinking that he's coming home.
[Turner.]
There was not a doubt of uncertainty in my mind.
When you're innocent, you know that, well, they got facts, then it's gonna prove that I'm not guilty.
That's what I was looking forward to.
Let's get to court.
Let's get this done so I can hurry up and get on with my life.
Sparks flew at the trial today of ten members of the 8th and H Crew gang.
News Seven's Gary Reals is at the trial now with a live report.
Gary.
This is the most publicized case in the history of Washington D.
C.
The Washington Post did stories about it.
The Nightly News did stories about it.
There were nine policemen who spent And they were reporting stuff that they heard from the prosecution.
[newsman.]
Assistant U.
S.
Attorney Jerry Goren beckoned the jurors to relive what happened in that alley that night.
He said it was a different world than the jurors might know.
A world where loyalty to comrades is so much greater than to community.
[Turner.]
The United States Attorney himself, Jerry Goren, he was putting on a smoke and mirrors for the public.
[newsman.]
Jerry Goren told the jury it all began with a song in a park.
A song about getting paid, and ended in a brutal, senseless murder.
I guess they were listening to the music and just kinda hanging out.
And I can remember the song just as if it was yesterday.
Talking about money, money, I gotta have some money.
[Turner.]
"A dollar bill is a friend of mine, I need some money.
" That just happened to be the top go-go rap song of that year.
[Williams.]
The prosecution made it sound like singing that song, that was the motivation for committing the crime.
They thought that they just wanted to rob somebody.
That's as close of a theory as you ever get from the prosecution.
[Turner.]
Back in 1984, we're talking about October the 1st, 1984.
It was the first of the month.
Everyone in this entire neighborhood is doing their shopping on the first of the month.
You get your deals.
You're getting your sales.
People are cashing checks constantly.
If there's 20 to 30 people back here in the alley behind 8th and H between four and six o'clock, rush hour, I'm sure it would sound almost like a football game in this little close proximity.
[Williams.]
At trial, there's no members of the community who say that they saw this rowdy group that crosses a street and then assaults a woman in the alley.
It's only these young, vulnerable teenagers who who are giving statements.
[newsman.]
Fourteen-year-old Maurice Thomas was an eyewitness to the murder of Catherine Fuller last year.
Two weeks ago, he testified for the government.
Maurice Thomas.
He testified against several of the defendants in the case.
He claimed to be in the alley across from the alley where Miss Fuller was assaulted.
[Gaines.]
These are very vulnerable young people.
One, for their age, and two, because of their circumstances.
[Williams.]
When people responded to a subpoena to come down and talk with detectives, they would receive a financial incentive for coming in.
I believe the testimony in our case was $35 each time they came down.
That's not an insignificant amount of money to a teenager in an impoverished area of Northeast D.
C.
in the 1980s.
[Turner.]
People knew that this was a hustle.
They found out that the way to get money was to just go down there, act like you knew something about the 8th and H Street case, they gonna pay you.
People found out fast.
They gonna pay you.
They paid Maurice.
That was the running rumor.
Anybody who took Maurice down there because he was a juvenile, so someone had to take him down there.
So then, it became a competition thing to take Maurice down there 'cause everybody know they could pick up a extra $30 each time you take Maurice down there.
Before trial, when I was locked up, the first couple of months, I was raped.
So, they knew this.
[Turner.]
I wanted out.
And I actually said what they wanted me to say.
That everything that they said that happened in that alley they had me say that in front of the court.
I had to say that in front of the court if I wanted a lesser sentence.
[newscaster.]
It was the moment that highlighted the government's case.
Twenty-year-old Calvin Alston squatted in front of the jury box with his two hands clenched as if holding a pipe, he reenacted how, he says, Levy Rouse assaulted Catherine Fuller with a foot long pipe.
Alston facing 20 years to life for his guilty plea to second-degree murder, admitted he was the one who first targeted Catherine Fuller for robbery, getting paid, as he put it.
For 11 months, I went over the testimony with the prosecution team and some of the witnesses in the case.
And they lined us up, they questioned us, they deleted this, added this, scratched this out, until they were satisfied with going forth with the testimony that they wanted.
[newscaster.]
By pleading guilty to second-degree murder, Calvin Alston faces the prospect of 15 years to life in prison instead of the possibility of 35 years to life if convicted at trial.
It was gut wrenching.
[newscaster.]
He testified that Charles Turner suddenly shoved her into an alley.
That Levy Rouse hit her over the head with a two by four.
Alston said he then walked up and punched Mrs.
Fuller and kicked her.
He said Monk Harris kicked her, Christopher Turner kicked her, Kelvin Smith kicked her, Levy Rouse kicked her and Charles Turner kicked her.
I told him, "If you had anything to do with it, tell the truth about it.
" They'll be lighter on you.
But he's told me up to the last minute I talked to him yesterday evening.
He say he didn't know anything about it.
[Turner.]
I knew that I have never killed no one in my life.
And I knew that they didn't kill no one in their life.
But no matter what we said, or what was said, we was gonna go down for their case.
Tomorrow, this case is expected to shift gears.
The prosecution is likely to rest and the defense will begin.
Some of the ten defendants say they have alibis.
It is unknown what the others will do.
[Williams.]
If you're defending seven people who are on trial for their lives against a brutal attack, you can't just be pointing at some, you know, phantom in the air.
You gotta have something concrete.
But because the prosecution withheld the evidence tying McMillan to our crime scene, the defense was limited to what, I think of as a, "Not me, maybe them, defense.
" [newsman.]
Defense attorneys clamored to cut themselves away from Rouse who has been named by four different eyewitnesses as the one who so brutally assaulted Catherine Fuller last year.
We don't want to have any involvement with him.
STEVEN WEBB'S ATTORNEY We feel the evidence is not overwhelming against Steven Webb.
From my view of the jurors when they were told that, there was some concern.
And I feel that that concern is gonna overflow and may positively or negatively affect the outcome of the jury's verdict.
And I'm opposed to it.
I'm adamantly opposed to it at this late stage in the proceedings.
I really didn't like my lawyer because everything that came out of her mouth at the time was, "Take a deal".
I told her that I'm not taking a deal to a murder that I didn't commit.
And man, it was a frenzy.
All the lawyers was just like sharks in the water.
Instead of the lawyers getting together and try to figure out what was going on.
It was more like, "I'm defending-- This is my client and that's it.
And we don't care what they say about your client.
" The admission of one of the confessions, of one of the co-defendants which tended to corroborate the government witnesses.
There are numerous issues Because they didn't have any kind of unifying defense, that's the best they could do.
[newscaster.]
The seven women and five men of the jury were taken back to their hotel late today for the rest of the weekend.
After six days of deliberations, they still have not returned any of the 40 verdicts they must reach in the case.
Well, I know, in my case, I kind of really wanted to make sure that some of those kids didn't have to spend years and years in prison if they were innocent.
And I think we were really looking for that.
But as jury members, you can only really go by the evidence that's presented.
You know, you have no idea to thinking that there were some other alternative views as to what happened.
[newscaster.]
There weren't any smiles inside the well of the court as the verdicts were announced.
Behind the bulletproof shield, there were many stares and an occasional flinch.
Timothy "Snot Rag" Catlett.
Guilty.
Levy Rouse, guilty.
Kelvin "Hollywood" Smith, guilty.
Charles "Fella" Turner, guilty.
Steven Webb, guilty.
Twenty-six-year-old Russell Overton, known as "Bobo", guilty.
And 17-year-old Clifton Yarborough, guilty.
Yarborough's relatives left the courthouse in tears.
Clifton confessed on videotape the day of his arrest.
But still spurned a handsome government offer several months ago to plead guilty and probably end up with a light sentence.
I just don't understand it.
I just don't understand it.
How it go so far.
I remember, that even after the sentencing, that Clifton did not understand that he could not go home.
He thought it was all over now and he was free to go.
He just didn't get it.
I was mad because I know they had nothing to do with it.
I knew it in my heart.
It's not their character.
No.
[newscaster.]
Also convicted of murder was 19-year-old Christopher Turner.
As the guilty verdicts were announced, Christopher Turner slumped in his chair and cried.
They sold the public on this theory, the witch hunt, I would call it, that the government set out on, got the better of them and their judgments.
I know that I couldn't do 27 years, 28 years, after, you know I know I couldn't do it, you know.
[man.]
What are you going to do? Appeal, which basically is where all my faith is in.
[Turner.]
Almost 26 years in prison.
I was fortunate enough to convince the parole board to let me out.
This is the block that I grew up on right directly around the corner from Mrs.
Fuller's house.
I knew everyone on this block my entire life.
My grandmother, she bought this house, I think, in 1939 for 12,000.
All the way on the backside, my bedroom.
My father was born in this house.
My brothers and sisters.
Now, looking back I can only imagine what some of the things that they had to go through and put up with at that time.
[Turner.]
Police shattered this neighborhood because it divided so many friends, it divided family members.
It was just It was just the whole neighborhood just changed.
It crushed my family, literally.
I mean, my grandmother pretty much gave up her fight for cancer when it happened.
And eventually, my family lost the house.
So, uh [Carlos.]
It was just like, no more family.
I just be glad when it's over with, the truth come out, all the fellas get released.
It took a long time and a lot of investigation by a lot of people to put together all the evidence that we have now.
[man.]
go live in three to five minutes.
There's a line establishing right here.
If you want to try to get in for the second case, you can stay in this line.
Again, folks, the three to five-minute line is now being established for the first case.
There's no more general seating for the first case.
With me being out here six years before those guys, um Already it's been six years.
Doesn't seem like I've been home six years.
And the fact they still in and still serving time, I know it weighs on 'em.
[Williams.]
This is it.
As high as you can go.
I am hopeful.
I can't say that I think it's overwhelmingly likely.
I also don't think that, you know, our backs are against the wall either.
I'm hopeful.
[Gaines.]
I'm like, why am I so emotional? You Yeah.
I'll see you once you get in.
- Okay.
- [woman.]
Are you going inside? - Yeah.
Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
We're going in.
- [Gaines.]
How do we get in? - [woman.]
Are you nervous? - No.
Never.
[man.]
Mr.
Williams.
Thank you, Mr.
Chief Justice, and may it please the court.
In Brady v.
Maryland, this court established the now familiar principle that the prosecution must disclose to the defense all favorable and material information.
This case involves a clear violation of that principle.
Here, the prosecution suppressed information that a serial assaulter of women had been seen acting suspiciously at the crime scene before police arrived.
The question for this court is whether there is a reasonable probability that the jury would have reached a different verdict if it had had turned over the McMillan evidence to the court.
[Gaines.]
I've had so many hopes for them.
They just haven't turned out.
There's just a part of me that's just afraid to hope.
And yet, in spite of that, I know that I do hope.
I hope they see the case for what it - Really is.
- Really is.
Really was.
[man 1.]
All the lies they've been told and everything.
[man 2.]
We want them held accountable for what's going on.
Clifton was about 15 when he took this picture.
This is the way he looked when he got locked up.
That little baby face.
[man.]
He still got that same smile.
Do you ever notice? Cliff, that's one thing he loved to do is dress.
He outdress me.
He liked to impress the girls.
That's what he liked to do.
I think Clifton got over everything.
All he want to do is come home.
That's all he want.
He really want to come before something happen to his mother.
That's all he want.
[woman.]
This was kind of guaranteed to be bad for the defendants in the sense that without any alternative theory it was a circular firing squad.
And it was, you know, you should believe the guy who doesn't incriminate me.
But of course, you should believe him as to everybody else.
All ten of these people saying this, it created the worst of all possible worlds for the defendants.
Why is it, that in the end, the government's witnesses were two people who were charged and were making a deal with the government, and who had reasons to make a deal with the government, and a 14-year-old boy? The objective crime scene evidence, in addition to the alternative perpetrator theory, would have presented an overwhelmingly powerful case of innocence.
It certainly would've been enough to be a reasonable probability of the jury finding reasonable doubt.
Now, tell me the truth.
Isn't it true or is it true that you went in that garage and saw what was going on? Isn't that the truth? No, I swear to God.
No.
I didn't go in there.
[detective.]
I want you to tell me if you recognize each person in these photographs and what that person did in this crime.
What part they played? Start right here.
[clears throat.]
[detective.]
Is there anything else you want to add to this that you have not told us? I didn't have anything to do with it and I don't want it all to fall down on me if they saying I did it.
I just want this thing to get over with so I can live my life like a free man.
This crime rocked the 8th and H Street neighborhood.
I've had many people tell me that on a certain level, it still does.
[newscaster.]
The gruesome discovery was made in a rain-soaked alley in the 800 block of H Street Northeast, an alley where junkies go to use drugs.
Inside a vacant dilapidated brick garage, the partly nude body of a young woman.
[man.]
This is not usually what goes on around this area.
It was crazy.
Everybody was curious and furious.
[newscaster.]
The victim has been identified as 48-year-old Catherine Fuller, of K Street Northeast.
She had been sexually assaulted and beaten to death.
[man.]
The detectives looked at this crime scene and the horrible circumstances of her death.
And I think they had this immediate idea a group must've done this.
[man 2.]
It's the first time ever in history that that many people were charged for one murder of one person, without it being a conspiracy.
You had to realize how the system worked in D.
C.
back in the '80s and '90s.
Back then, we had so many people getting killed in D.
C.
We were number one murder capital of the United States.
The homicide unit, it was 30 detectives and we had one too many cases.
This was a very brutal crime.
I mean, I handle lots and lots of cases, and this, one of the three gross crimes that I've ever seen.
Once they opened that body, you could see the damage they caused.
The pole that they put in her body all the way up.
This was too much.
It's kind of difficult to believe that a human being will inflict so much pain and so much brutality towards another human being.
[detective.]
This afternoon, homicide detectives returned to the alley, looking for evidence and talking with people who may have seen something.
[man.]
At approximately 4:30 p.
m.
on the day of the murder Mrs.
Fuller left to go shopping.
That's the best we know from the testimony of her husband and her son.
Mrs.
Fuller was 48 years old.
She was small.
She was 99 pounds.
She wasn't much taller than five feet tall.
She was a woman who took care of six kids and a husband who was on disability.
The forensic evidence is that she was beaten up on the 9th Street side of the alley.
The alley runs parallel to 8th Street.
Some of her possessions were found in that 9th Street portion of the alley.
And the perpetrator who decided to assault her dragged her body from that 9th Street side of the alley into the garage.
And based on the autopsy, some lengthy object had to be used to commit the sodomy.
[man.]
Departments are judged on their crime rates, especially on their homicide crime rates.
If you have a high homicide rate, you need to do something.
You need to bring it down.
And you need to show a high closure rate.
The pressure's on you and you want to close it.
You want to close it quick.
About six o'clock, a lady walking through the alley discovered the partially clothed body of an adult female.
On the night of the murder, somebody left an anonymous tip for the cops at I want to say, 2:30 in the morning, saying that there was this group called the 8th and H Crew that hung out in that alley.
And three young men in that group had bragged about dragging women into the alley to rape.
So they started hearing these rumors about this gang stuff.
It kind of fit what we thought was going on in the world at the time.
And they switched from gathering evidence to suddenly, "Oh, my God.
This must be it.
" So we're now suspect-based.
We're out to prove that these are the guys who did it.
[newsman.]
You ever heard of a gang by the name of the 8th and H Crew? - No, I haven't.
- Never heard of 'em? No, not a gang.
- [newsman.]
You live around here? - Yes.
- Never heard of them? - No.
Never heard of, never seen 'em either.
[man.]
8th and H was a park where buses and everyone transferred to go wherever they go.
And guys would go down 8th and H to see where guys, "Hey, what you doin', man? I'll meet you up at 8th and H" because it was convenient to meet up there.
And so dudes started referring to different guys as the 8th Street Crew.
We was basically like a family.
We all went to school together.
Different schools.
We all met up on the basketball courts.
We young, running around, having fun, going to the go-go.
[man 1.]
You had the go-go bands.
[man 2.]
It's pretty much our own sound.
It's D.
C.
sound.
And we, like, represented where we lived at.
And we may occasionally bump a couple people or something like that and And we started fighting.
Farthest someone would get is hit in the head with a bat.
Or you know, black eye.
Some stitches.
But we wasn't doing no killing.
[woman.]
And whenever the go-go bands were playing, they'd ask, you know, like who's in the house or, you know, is 8th and H Crew in the house? It just meant you lived in that neighborhood.
And as soon as I went out into the community, I became suspicious of the police story because people in the community said they weren't aware of a gang.
And police insisted there was a gang.
And a gang creates an image in the community, you know, panic.
It makes people angrier.
It's a gang.
It's, you know, it becomes vicious.
[pounding.]
[man.]
Open up the door.
[newscaster.]
Yesterday morning, D.
C.
Police fanned out to arrest six members of the crew on charges of murder.
They just started snatching everybody out of the neighborhood.
D.
C was going through a purge.
They startled my family.
Came in about 6:30, seven o'clock.
Flying-- Helicopters flying over.
Lights, police lights all outside.
Came in.
Took me out.
Put me in the back of the police car.
They would jump out and grab all of us.
Put us in the car and try to take us down.
Just to question us.
I was like, "Oh, this some This some bullshit.
" I mean, it was like, they were just kicking down doors.
[man.]
Sunday, December the 9th, 1984, they kicked my door in.
I had never been arrested.
I had finished high school when I was 17 years old.
I was gonna go in the military.
I was going to college.
Police drove us to 8th and H where they put is in the paddy wagon to make it look like these the guys that hang out there on 8th and H.
[newscaster.]
Police say these men are members of a gang which was known as the 8th and H Crew.
There are still other members of the gang and police say there may be other arrests.
[Trainum.]
Their approach was kind of like a shotgun approach.
You kind of round in all the usual suspects, start putting them in the box, squeezing them and see what comes out.
[Sinclair.]
You get a 15-year-old and they're telling him he going to jail, or this gonna happen to him, or this gonna happen to him, that's scary.
That's very scary.
You lie to say anything.
[woman.]
When they came to the house that Sunday morning, got him out of the bed, they said they was gonna talk to him.
They didn't tell me he was under arrest for murder or anything.
They did not request for his parents or attorney.
Clifton didn't have nobody to speak for him.
[detective.]
Do you have any objections to this videotaping taking place? No.
Have any promises been made to you in return for your statement? Excuse me.
Could you go by that one again? Sure.
Have any promises been made to you Have I promised you anything for talking to me today? No, you haven't.
[Williams.]
Cliff came up very high on the suggestibility scale.
His I.
Q.
was measured at 69.
5.
[Mary.]
Clifton not retarded.
Special needs.
Slow learner.
That was Clifton problem.
He was a slow learner.
Cliff didn't understand what he was being asked to sign.
- Do you remember signing the rights card? - Yes.
- Did you read the card? - Yes.
Back then, we were not videotaping interrogations from start to finish.
We were only doing what we call, the "recap video.
" We're here today to talk to you about the death of the lady in the alley at 8th and H Street.
Why don't you start, tell us everything that you know about that.
I came home from school.
I came across H Street up Ninth Street to the alley the end of the alley.
I seen Monk dragging the lady into the alley.
He slammed the lady.
Chrissy hit her.
Burt hit her.
He dragged her.
Snot Rag hit her and dragged her.
Derek stomped, Fella hit her.
Bobo hit her.
Levy was standing over top of her.
When you see these recap videos, a lot of times people will say, well, look, just the story flows, how cold they are.
That it's being factual.
They've rehearsed this again and again and again.
So all of the manipulation, the lies about the evidence, the promises of leniency, that's all off camera.
Snot Rag said, "Stop, Derek.
" So that's when Snot Rag and Burt pulled her to the cut of the alley.
Levy stuck a pole in her.
Where was she when he stuck the pole in her? Right at the cut of the alley.
[Trainum.]
He was getting critical facts wrong.
The crime scene analysis puts most of the assault inside of the garage.
Yarborough is saying that he's over on 9th Street watching the attack occur on the other end of the alley.
[detective.]
How far were you from exactly where they had the lady down? I can't recall it all from here.
Was it as long as a basketball court? - It was just about that length.
- Full court? Yeah.
Just like that.
At first, they put it at a distance of a basketball court.
They begin to challenge him and he begins to shorten the distance.
[detective 2.]
And tell me, what you could see at that distance? There was Not, not quite that far.
Not quite that far.
- Well, what could you see? - I could see what they was doing.
You watch the statement and you hear these things.
And you think Oh, boy, these are-- He's giving details.
This is uncomfortable.
But then, look at the big picture.
Look at the other things that he says.
We know those other things aren't true.
Who is this? Calvin.
[detective 1.]
All right.
And what did Calvin do? He was fighting.
He stomped her.
Would you describe what you mean by stomp her? He was [kicks chair.]
kicking, - putting his feet down on her.
- Okay.
[Williams.]
What he meant by a stomp, is somebody stepping hard down on somebody.
Kicking them but they're on the ground and you're putting full weight on them.
Stomping somebody leaves a distinct injury on the body.
Mrs.
Fuller didn't have any of those injuries.
Not one.
Certainly not the ten that Cliff described.
[Williams.]
Cliff also, at some point, in his statement, describes her blouse being ripped off of her.
And he doesn't only describe it, he gestures.
He goes like this.
It's kind of like Hulk Hogan in the '80s, you know, pulling off, you know, ripping open his shirt.
That didn't happen.
When Monk slammed her, Chrissy hit him hit her first.
And Derek was beating her with a stick.
Monk ripped her blouse off her.
[Williams.]
She was wearing a sweater.
And the sweater was pushed up her chest, not ripped off of her.
Part of what's interesting about Cliff making that gesture about it, having been ripped off like that, is that Detective Sanchez Serrano admits that in interrogating Cliff, he mimicked ripping off his shirt and feigned rage at Cliff for not telling what he knew.
[detective.]
Now tell me the truth.
Isn't it true or is it true that you went in that garage and saw what was going on? Isn't that the truth? No, I swear to God.
No.
I didn't go in there.
- Isn't it true? - No.
I swear.
People with low I.
Q.
's are particularly likely to give false confessions.
Which means that they are likely to defer to the opinion of another, and to tell somebody what they think that that other person wants to hear.
I never dreamed that I would be the living proof of someone that was being falsely accused of something they didn't do.
[detective.]
You gotta tell me, brother.
We want to hear it all.
Tell us exactly what-- - This shit give me nightmares.
- Okay.
Well [Willliams.]
The two most central witnesses for the government were Harry Bennett and Calvin Alston, who are young, vulnerable teenagers.
They just went and got the lady and took her back there.
Okay.
But what do you mean? To take her back there or In other words, they trying to say, go rob the lady.
- Go rob the lady? - Yeah.
Okay.
Who was in the alley? And we'll go to a book this time, okay? So you can identify the people for us.
Before we came into this interview room today you had a conversation with me in the room just beside this one.
- Correct? - Right.
- And did we draw a diagram at that time? - Yes, sir.
[Alston.]
They showed me the piece of paper.
It had names.
A lot of scribble on the paper.
But it had charts, pies drew on the paper.
They would tell me I was gonna either take a piece of the pie A slice of the pie, or take the whole pie and go down by myself.
At first, I thought they was joking.
To be honest, I thought they was joking.
The more I explained, they didn't want to hear.
When I told them I was at work, they didn't want to hear that.
They said, "No, he was with Cliff", that I was in the alley.
I was scared.
And I took a piece of the pie.
Now, you stated to me before that in the garage was Levy, Monk.
Now, who are these other people standing out here? - Would you tell me who was out there? - Sure.
What they were doing? Speak up, sir, please.
Burt was standing there.
Kelvin was standing out there.
Chrissy, Darryl, Ernest, Cliff Snot Rag and the Monk.
And me.
[detective.]
Do you feel better now that you've told us this on tape? - [Alston.]
Yeah, I feel much better.
- [detective.]
Why? Because I don't want-- I didn't have nothing to do with it.
I don't want it all to fall down on me if they saying I did it.
I just want the thing to get over with so I can live my life like a free man.
[Williams.]
These teenagers make a shortsighted decision to lie and say that they are witnesses to something they didn't actually see.
But we didn't have the full facts that would've helped tell a different account of this crime and would've helped show that Cliff's statement and the statement of Alston and the statement of Bennett those statements weren't true.
[Trainum.]
I had begun a project where we were going back and reviewing old homicide cases and trying to get information into searchable databases.
I was going through old files that involved unusual cases, sexual assaults, things like that.
And that's when I stumbled across the Catherine Fuller case.
And as I was going through it, I found this envelope in the very, very back part, and on the outside it said "suspects".
I opened up the envelope and was going through it.
And I had pictures of the people who had been arrested.
And then I came across this one picture.
And I recognized him as a guy named James McMillan.
And I thought, what the hell is his picture doing in with this group here? 'Cause I knew McMillan.
I knew him because I had participated in his arrest only a few years before that, actually back in 1992.
[Williams.]
James McMillan commits, essentially, the exact same murder as what happened to Catherine Fuller.
He grabs a woman off the street, he drags her through an alley.
He beats her up.
He sexually assaults her.
He sodomizes her.
Mrs.
Fuller was found naked from the waist down with her sweater bunched up around her breasts.
McMillan's 1992 victim is found naked from the waist down with her top, I believe it was also a sweater, bunched up around her breasts.
[Trainum.]
If Catherine Fuller's case was open right now, McMillan would be my number one suspect.
This guy has a vicious history.
McMillan, he has been institutionalized most of his life.
Since, like, age 13.
Any time he was involved in anything, he brutally beat women.
He was just out for a short while when this occurred.
[Trainum.]
He lived in that area.
In fact, he lived in a house that backed up to the alley where Catherine Fuller was found.
It turns out that he was robbing women in that area.
And when he robbed them, he would walk up to 'em and just pound the ever loving hell out of 'em.
Just viciously, you know, beat them.
[Williams.]
On the day of the murder, a street vendor saw McMillan in the alley acting suspiciously, hiding something under his coat, and remember, the object used to sexually assault Mrs.
Fuller has never been found.
The police showed the street vendor the photograph book of young men in the neighborhood.
And he identified McMillan and another guy.
But he didn't know their names.
He had just identified them based on their face.
The police knew their names.
By the time of defendant's trial, McMillan was in jail for having robbed and assaulted two other middle-aged women in that neighborhood.
Defendants were on trial for an alleged robbery and assault that spun out of control into this murder of a middle-aged woman in this neighborhood.
I mean, it's the most important evidence you can imagine.
And the defendants didn't know about it.
[newscaster.]
The victim, Catherine Fuller, 48 years old, mother of six.
The defendants, nine young men, a 17-year-old girl, members of the 8th and H Crew.
In December, several suspects were rounded up.
Today, they were together again for the start of their trial.
Anyone convicted will end up serving at least the prime of their adulthood, the next 20 years, in prison.
[Mary.]
At the trial, I was still thinking that he's coming home.
Still thinking that he's coming home.
[Turner.]
There was not a doubt of uncertainty in my mind.
When you're innocent, you know that, well, they got facts, then it's gonna prove that I'm not guilty.
That's what I was looking forward to.
Let's get to court.
Let's get this done so I can hurry up and get on with my life.
Sparks flew at the trial today of ten members of the 8th and H Crew gang.
News Seven's Gary Reals is at the trial now with a live report.
Gary.
This is the most publicized case in the history of Washington D.
C.
The Washington Post did stories about it.
The Nightly News did stories about it.
There were nine policemen who spent And they were reporting stuff that they heard from the prosecution.
[newsman.]
Assistant U.
S.
Attorney Jerry Goren beckoned the jurors to relive what happened in that alley that night.
He said it was a different world than the jurors might know.
A world where loyalty to comrades is so much greater than to community.
[Turner.]
The United States Attorney himself, Jerry Goren, he was putting on a smoke and mirrors for the public.
[newsman.]
Jerry Goren told the jury it all began with a song in a park.
A song about getting paid, and ended in a brutal, senseless murder.
I guess they were listening to the music and just kinda hanging out.
And I can remember the song just as if it was yesterday.
Talking about money, money, I gotta have some money.
[Turner.]
"A dollar bill is a friend of mine, I need some money.
" That just happened to be the top go-go rap song of that year.
[Williams.]
The prosecution made it sound like singing that song, that was the motivation for committing the crime.
They thought that they just wanted to rob somebody.
That's as close of a theory as you ever get from the prosecution.
[Turner.]
Back in 1984, we're talking about October the 1st, 1984.
It was the first of the month.
Everyone in this entire neighborhood is doing their shopping on the first of the month.
You get your deals.
You're getting your sales.
People are cashing checks constantly.
If there's 20 to 30 people back here in the alley behind 8th and H between four and six o'clock, rush hour, I'm sure it would sound almost like a football game in this little close proximity.
[Williams.]
At trial, there's no members of the community who say that they saw this rowdy group that crosses a street and then assaults a woman in the alley.
It's only these young, vulnerable teenagers who who are giving statements.
[newsman.]
Fourteen-year-old Maurice Thomas was an eyewitness to the murder of Catherine Fuller last year.
Two weeks ago, he testified for the government.
Maurice Thomas.
He testified against several of the defendants in the case.
He claimed to be in the alley across from the alley where Miss Fuller was assaulted.
[Gaines.]
These are very vulnerable young people.
One, for their age, and two, because of their circumstances.
[Williams.]
When people responded to a subpoena to come down and talk with detectives, they would receive a financial incentive for coming in.
I believe the testimony in our case was $35 each time they came down.
That's not an insignificant amount of money to a teenager in an impoverished area of Northeast D.
C.
in the 1980s.
[Turner.]
People knew that this was a hustle.
They found out that the way to get money was to just go down there, act like you knew something about the 8th and H Street case, they gonna pay you.
People found out fast.
They gonna pay you.
They paid Maurice.
That was the running rumor.
Anybody who took Maurice down there because he was a juvenile, so someone had to take him down there.
So then, it became a competition thing to take Maurice down there 'cause everybody know they could pick up a extra $30 each time you take Maurice down there.
Before trial, when I was locked up, the first couple of months, I was raped.
So, they knew this.
[Turner.]
I wanted out.
And I actually said what they wanted me to say.
That everything that they said that happened in that alley they had me say that in front of the court.
I had to say that in front of the court if I wanted a lesser sentence.
[newscaster.]
It was the moment that highlighted the government's case.
Twenty-year-old Calvin Alston squatted in front of the jury box with his two hands clenched as if holding a pipe, he reenacted how, he says, Levy Rouse assaulted Catherine Fuller with a foot long pipe.
Alston facing 20 years to life for his guilty plea to second-degree murder, admitted he was the one who first targeted Catherine Fuller for robbery, getting paid, as he put it.
For 11 months, I went over the testimony with the prosecution team and some of the witnesses in the case.
And they lined us up, they questioned us, they deleted this, added this, scratched this out, until they were satisfied with going forth with the testimony that they wanted.
[newscaster.]
By pleading guilty to second-degree murder, Calvin Alston faces the prospect of 15 years to life in prison instead of the possibility of 35 years to life if convicted at trial.
It was gut wrenching.
[newscaster.]
He testified that Charles Turner suddenly shoved her into an alley.
That Levy Rouse hit her over the head with a two by four.
Alston said he then walked up and punched Mrs.
Fuller and kicked her.
He said Monk Harris kicked her, Christopher Turner kicked her, Kelvin Smith kicked her, Levy Rouse kicked her and Charles Turner kicked her.
I told him, "If you had anything to do with it, tell the truth about it.
" They'll be lighter on you.
But he's told me up to the last minute I talked to him yesterday evening.
He say he didn't know anything about it.
[Turner.]
I knew that I have never killed no one in my life.
And I knew that they didn't kill no one in their life.
But no matter what we said, or what was said, we was gonna go down for their case.
Tomorrow, this case is expected to shift gears.
The prosecution is likely to rest and the defense will begin.
Some of the ten defendants say they have alibis.
It is unknown what the others will do.
[Williams.]
If you're defending seven people who are on trial for their lives against a brutal attack, you can't just be pointing at some, you know, phantom in the air.
You gotta have something concrete.
But because the prosecution withheld the evidence tying McMillan to our crime scene, the defense was limited to what, I think of as a, "Not me, maybe them, defense.
" [newsman.]
Defense attorneys clamored to cut themselves away from Rouse who has been named by four different eyewitnesses as the one who so brutally assaulted Catherine Fuller last year.
We don't want to have any involvement with him.
STEVEN WEBB'S ATTORNEY We feel the evidence is not overwhelming against Steven Webb.
From my view of the jurors when they were told that, there was some concern.
And I feel that that concern is gonna overflow and may positively or negatively affect the outcome of the jury's verdict.
And I'm opposed to it.
I'm adamantly opposed to it at this late stage in the proceedings.
I really didn't like my lawyer because everything that came out of her mouth at the time was, "Take a deal".
I told her that I'm not taking a deal to a murder that I didn't commit.
And man, it was a frenzy.
All the lawyers was just like sharks in the water.
Instead of the lawyers getting together and try to figure out what was going on.
It was more like, "I'm defending-- This is my client and that's it.
And we don't care what they say about your client.
" The admission of one of the confessions, of one of the co-defendants which tended to corroborate the government witnesses.
There are numerous issues Because they didn't have any kind of unifying defense, that's the best they could do.
[newscaster.]
The seven women and five men of the jury were taken back to their hotel late today for the rest of the weekend.
After six days of deliberations, they still have not returned any of the 40 verdicts they must reach in the case.
Well, I know, in my case, I kind of really wanted to make sure that some of those kids didn't have to spend years and years in prison if they were innocent.
And I think we were really looking for that.
But as jury members, you can only really go by the evidence that's presented.
You know, you have no idea to thinking that there were some other alternative views as to what happened.
[newscaster.]
There weren't any smiles inside the well of the court as the verdicts were announced.
Behind the bulletproof shield, there were many stares and an occasional flinch.
Timothy "Snot Rag" Catlett.
Guilty.
Levy Rouse, guilty.
Kelvin "Hollywood" Smith, guilty.
Charles "Fella" Turner, guilty.
Steven Webb, guilty.
Twenty-six-year-old Russell Overton, known as "Bobo", guilty.
And 17-year-old Clifton Yarborough, guilty.
Yarborough's relatives left the courthouse in tears.
Clifton confessed on videotape the day of his arrest.
But still spurned a handsome government offer several months ago to plead guilty and probably end up with a light sentence.
I just don't understand it.
I just don't understand it.
How it go so far.
I remember, that even after the sentencing, that Clifton did not understand that he could not go home.
He thought it was all over now and he was free to go.
He just didn't get it.
I was mad because I know they had nothing to do with it.
I knew it in my heart.
It's not their character.
No.
[newscaster.]
Also convicted of murder was 19-year-old Christopher Turner.
As the guilty verdicts were announced, Christopher Turner slumped in his chair and cried.
They sold the public on this theory, the witch hunt, I would call it, that the government set out on, got the better of them and their judgments.
I know that I couldn't do 27 years, 28 years, after, you know I know I couldn't do it, you know.
[man.]
What are you going to do? Appeal, which basically is where all my faith is in.
[Turner.]
Almost 26 years in prison.
I was fortunate enough to convince the parole board to let me out.
This is the block that I grew up on right directly around the corner from Mrs.
Fuller's house.
I knew everyone on this block my entire life.
My grandmother, she bought this house, I think, in 1939 for 12,000.
All the way on the backside, my bedroom.
My father was born in this house.
My brothers and sisters.
Now, looking back I can only imagine what some of the things that they had to go through and put up with at that time.
[Turner.]
Police shattered this neighborhood because it divided so many friends, it divided family members.
It was just It was just the whole neighborhood just changed.
It crushed my family, literally.
I mean, my grandmother pretty much gave up her fight for cancer when it happened.
And eventually, my family lost the house.
So, uh [Carlos.]
It was just like, no more family.
I just be glad when it's over with, the truth come out, all the fellas get released.
It took a long time and a lot of investigation by a lot of people to put together all the evidence that we have now.
[man.]
go live in three to five minutes.
There's a line establishing right here.
If you want to try to get in for the second case, you can stay in this line.
Again, folks, the three to five-minute line is now being established for the first case.
There's no more general seating for the first case.
With me being out here six years before those guys, um Already it's been six years.
Doesn't seem like I've been home six years.
And the fact they still in and still serving time, I know it weighs on 'em.
[Williams.]
This is it.
As high as you can go.
I am hopeful.
I can't say that I think it's overwhelmingly likely.
I also don't think that, you know, our backs are against the wall either.
I'm hopeful.
[Gaines.]
I'm like, why am I so emotional? You Yeah.
I'll see you once you get in.
- Okay.
- [woman.]
Are you going inside? - Yeah.
Yeah.
- Yeah.
- Yeah.
We're going in.
- [Gaines.]
How do we get in? - [woman.]
Are you nervous? - No.
Never.
[man.]
Mr.
Williams.
Thank you, Mr.
Chief Justice, and may it please the court.
In Brady v.
Maryland, this court established the now familiar principle that the prosecution must disclose to the defense all favorable and material information.
This case involves a clear violation of that principle.
Here, the prosecution suppressed information that a serial assaulter of women had been seen acting suspiciously at the crime scene before police arrived.
The question for this court is whether there is a reasonable probability that the jury would have reached a different verdict if it had had turned over the McMillan evidence to the court.
[Gaines.]
I've had so many hopes for them.
They just haven't turned out.
There's just a part of me that's just afraid to hope.
And yet, in spite of that, I know that I do hope.
I hope they see the case for what it - Really is.
- Really is.
Really was.
[man 1.]
All the lies they've been told and everything.
[man 2.]
We want them held accountable for what's going on.
Clifton was about 15 when he took this picture.
This is the way he looked when he got locked up.
That little baby face.
[man.]
He still got that same smile.
Do you ever notice? Cliff, that's one thing he loved to do is dress.
He outdress me.
He liked to impress the girls.
That's what he liked to do.
I think Clifton got over everything.
All he want to do is come home.
That's all he want.
He really want to come before something happen to his mother.
That's all he want.
[woman.]
This was kind of guaranteed to be bad for the defendants in the sense that without any alternative theory it was a circular firing squad.
And it was, you know, you should believe the guy who doesn't incriminate me.
But of course, you should believe him as to everybody else.
All ten of these people saying this, it created the worst of all possible worlds for the defendants.
Why is it, that in the end, the government's witnesses were two people who were charged and were making a deal with the government, and who had reasons to make a deal with the government, and a 14-year-old boy? The objective crime scene evidence, in addition to the alternative perpetrator theory, would have presented an overwhelmingly powerful case of innocence.
It certainly would've been enough to be a reasonable probability of the jury finding reasonable doubt.