Wrongful Conviction Lava for Good

On the night of May 10, 1985, a 35-year-old woman was attacked and sexually assaulted in her home in the Lower Garden District of New Orleans, LA. The victim worked with police to create a composite sketch of her rapist and a month later, 17-year-old Sullivan Walter was arrested for an unrelated burglary charge. A police officer believed that Sullivan resembled the rapist’s composite sketch and the victim later identified him as her rapist in a photo lineup. Sullivan’s trial lasted just one day, but due to to junk science, inadequate legal defense, and a mistaken eyewitness identification, he was convicted and sentenced to 35 years in prison. 

Jason Flom talks to Sullivan Walter and Emily Maw, his attorney. 

https://www.gofundme.com/f/sullivan-walters-freedom-fund

https://ip-no.org/

Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.

Even when examined under a microscope, the similarities that can be observed between two hairs are open to wide interpretation, there are no definitive traits that can prove with any scientific certainty that a suspect’s hair matches a hair found at a crime scene. Yet hair comparison analysis was still being used to falsely identify and convict innocent people up until the year 2000 and people are still incarcerated who were convicted based on this false evidence.

So how did this evidence get admitted into courts in the first place?

Josh Dubin speaks with Vanessa Antoun, Senior Resource Counsel at the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL) to learn about Hair Microscopy Evidence.

Kate Judson, Executive Director of the Center for Integrity in Forensic Sciences, updates Josh Dubin's Wrongful Conviction: Junk Science. 

To learn more and get involved, please visit:

https://cifsjustice.org/donate/

https://www.nacdl.org/

https://www.wrongfulconvictionpodcast.com/junk-science

Wrongful Conviction: Junk Science is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.

On February 21, 1994, in New Orleans, LA, a 6-year-old girl was taken to the hospital after complaining of pain and unusual vaginal discharge. The doctors concluded that the young girl had been raped after she tested positive for gonorrhea. The girl was interviewed by authorities without any guardian present, and ended up saying that a family member named Patrick had touched her genitals. Despite there being other probable suspects in the family, 20-year-old Patrick Brown was charged with, and ultimately convicted of aggravated rape, and sentenced to life without parole primarily based on this one interview. Over the next 30 years, the girl continuously contacted the prosecutor’s office stating that they had the wrong guy. Yet, Patrick remained in prison. 

Guest host, Tiffany Reese, talks to Patrick Brown and Kelly Orians, Patrick's attorney. 

To learn more and get involved, please visit: 

GoFundme.com - Patrick Brown

Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Built on a foundation of conjecture and best guesses that were never adequately tested according to any valid scientific principles, arson evidence experts have been telling juries for decades that one can definitively determine that a fire was intentionally set is completely wrong.

But why, after generations of experts have all been proven wrong, is there still an unwillingness to change? Barry Scheck, Co-Founder of the Innocence Project, discusses Arson Evidence with Josh.

Kate Judson, Executive Director of the Center for Integrity in Forensic Sciences, updates Josh Dubin's Wrongful Conviction: Junk Science. 

To learn more and get involved, please visit:

https://cifsjustice.org/donate/

2009 Article in The New Yorker by David Grann

https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2009/09/07/trial-by-fire

https://www.wrongfulconvictionpodcast.com/junk-science

Wrongful Conviction: Junk Science is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

On April 23, 1984 a couple was robbed at gunpoint by two perpetrators outside a convenience store in New Orleans, LA. The couple fought back, which resulted in one of the robbers – Eric Batiste – being accidentally shot and killed by his partner. An officer assumed that since Batiste and 17-year-old George Toca were best friends, that George was the other robber. The couple’s description of Batiste’s partner was nothing like George, but they still selected him from a photo lineup and he was ultimately convicted of second-degree murder and sentenced to life in prison without parole. 

To learn more and get involved, please visit:

https://ip-no.org/

https://everydropnola.com/gibusinesses

https://www.mightycause.com/story/Ow485g 

Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

From the production team that brought you the Wrongful Conviction series and Bone Valley, here is Episode 1 of our new podcast: Earwitness. If you like what you hear, you can listen to episode 2 right now wherever you get your podcasts or by clicking this link:

http://lavaforgood.com/earlanding

Journalist Beth Shelburne meets with former Alabama Attorney General Bill Baxley, who explains why he is deeply disturbed by the wrongful conviction of Toforest Johnson for the murder of Deputy Bill Hardy. Through her reporting on the case, Beth, like Baxley, is convinced that Toforest has no connection to the murder. She sets out to conduct an in-depth investigation into why detectives targeted him in the first place, how he was convicted, and why the State of Alabama is still seeking his execution today.

Earwitness will be available every Tuesday wherever you get your podcasts. To hear episodes a week early and ad free, subscribe to Lava for Good+ on Apple Podcasts.

Earwitness is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.