This call is from a correction facility, and it's subject to monitoring and recording.
I ere and it hasn't been easy.
One hundred years.
That's man. I'm a kid.
I didn't do anything, you know, and uh, you know that was Ah, that was real painful, man, No, because my life was discarded as if you know, like I was a piece of trash or something, you know, one hundred years and I had dreams and I wanted to do things.
I wouldn't committing crimes. You know.
I was a very good young man.
That is what happens in so many cases. The cops have a hunch because they're so smart at the scene, they have a hunch, and once they act on that hunch, they sort of developed tunnel vision and they take off marching in the wrong direction. And that happens in so many of these wrongful convictions.
The opening.
To sell door and I'll walk down stave and I actually walked downstairs to be outside. It felt very strange to be, like I said, to be walking without no shackles on my feet. I thought it was a dream. But then again it wasn't a dream.
This is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to wrongful Conviction. Today's guest is Harold House and that's particularly exciting to me because not only does it mark the first time that we've had an actual movie star TV star who also was wrongfully convicted on the show, but Harold and I have become friends over the last several months, So I'm really excited to have you here. So Harold, welcome to Wrongful Conviction.
Thank you for having me.
And like I always say, I'm happy you're here, but I'm sorry you're.
Here before we start. Man, it's just a really say how much it means to have people like yourself that care, you know. So I'm really grateful for this opportunity in this platform to speak out about my situation.
Yeah, and this is the first time that you're speaking out publicly about this.
It should be my absolute first time ever speaking out about anything in regard to my case publicly.
I mean, you were more likely to win a damn Oscar or a Emmy or something than you were to end up in prison at the time that this all came down, and talk about that, because your acting career was taking off before this happened, right, I mean, which is why it must have been such a shock to so many people, everyone that knows you, and not only that, but you're a highly educated guy, more so than myself by far, and you're a person of faith and everything else.
That doesn't mean that you couldn't have done something wrong, but it makes it more. It should have been harder for a jury to believe. But anyway, we're going to get into that surreal. But talk about that for a minute. So your career was taken off. What were you doing professionally at the time?
Was in a great place career wise? I felt like I had, you know, kind of got to the point where my career was taken off. You know how they say you become an overnight success, But this was the culmination of all the hard work. I was promoting my first lead debut film and Secrets. At the time, we had a multiple city tour. I had just shot the Golden Globe Ammy nominated show Atlanta, where I was guaranteed
a season's two series regular. We had just wrapped a Tupac movie I had played doctor Dre and that, you know, a ton of offers were coming in for various projects, film projects, and it was a good time.
Man.
It was a time where all the work was really starting to pay off.
I mean, you were living a dream that millions of everyday Americans have and so many people try. So the facts, I mean of having that rug pulled out from under you, you had a long way to fall. And well, I'm not going to put words out. I'm gonna let you tell this.
I was accused of rape at the time by my fifteen year old step daughter.
Yes, right, what people think when they hear that word, people are thinking, wait, whoa what? But in this situation, you were set up.
It felt like it set up to some except at the time me and my son mother was going through kind of a mild separation because of disciplinary issues I was having at the time with my stepdaughter. There was one incident prior to where I had to kind of like discipline her for like cussing at me and being you know, very you know, belligerent and stuff like that.
And so she went to her father's house and even when the incident happened, I called him and said she was cussing, being extremely you know, belligerent, volatile and physical
and stuff like that. And it was more a comment like who you're talking to while you've been disrespectful type thing, and that's kind of where all of it started to, where you know, he had at that time went to the police and said I was beating her and choking her and throwing her and all these you know, crazy accusations, all this co the physical conduct, me biting her on
her neck. And it was actually police report where they took the young lady away from her father and she admitted that, you know, she had been talking back and that she had got in trouble and that she had caught her father to come and get her because she knew she was gonna be on punishment, and that the officer in the police report said, I took away from her father and told that Lion was against the law and I was here to help and only way I
can do that if you be honest. And she said, like I said, I knew I was gonna be in trouble. And she's asked her has she had any other further issues with More at the time.
So this is a report from the Gwennett County Police Department says at the conclusion of the interview, I asked the victim multiple times if there were any other problems she may be having with More, meaning you Harold house Moore. She never mentioned more touching her in an appropriate manner, or that he had been biting her on the neck, So that would directly contradict.
The allegation from the father, who the reason why going to the setup he made all these false accusations against me. I guess the separators. I don't know what ultimate agenda was, but I guess for us to separate or be back with my son's mom are just envy. But all the charge, the accusations of this physicality, the sexual stuff, all started from her father.
It's a very devastating accusation. And we know that once those meals are set in motion, it's sometimes hard to put him back on the car of the train because people get caught up in these lies and then they don't know when to stop and it becomes a very real problem.
I think in my case, where it wasn't just a lie, it was the fact that as a child, you wouldn't want your father to appear as a liar. And maybe she feared because he had a criminal history. You know, he had been in prison multiple times. He was known for doing I legal stuff. So I don't know if she felt because at the point they told her like, lying is against the law. So now if you go back and tell the truth, your father's a liar. And at the same time, he was constantly her with financial stuff,
you know, from purses to cars. I mean, I believe before it took us three and a half years to go to trial, I think she had four new vehicles before we want to trial. I mean cars that was newer than mine.
And I was on television and your case is terrifying because it's something that could have happened to anybody. And that's why I think it's so important that you're here. Well, let's go back to that.
So my story real quick in the nutshell was that, you know, we had like an incident, the early incident I told you about it, cussing and talking back. That was in February. So between February and all the way to November, we barely had any inn action. When I would come home and see my child, like we would speak like hey, we was always cordially respectful, but there was kind of like something like hitting tensions. So on Thanksgiving, her mom was like, hey, you should come here for Thanksgiving,
you know, not be alone for Thanksgiving. In California, I was like, no, I'm cool. I'm gonna just stay. She's like, look, come and spend time with your son. You know she's doing good. Her attitude change, her demeanors change. You know, she's helping out with our sons, she's doing better at school, blah blah blah blah. So I'm like, all right, boom, I get on the plane. Fly in. That day, on the night that she made the accusation was the night that I took her and her sisters to the movies.
So after returning from the movies, they remained downstairs, the two girls next door that were twins that went to the movies with her sister while my stepdaughter went with her boyfriend. So after returning to the house, I left them all downstairs talking, having girl talk or what have you, and I went upstairs and I actually dozed off in my son's room. I played golf that day, so I ended up waking up around about two o'clock in the morning because I still had my golf clothes on from earlier.
So at that time I went to go use the bathroom that my son shared with his sisters. Two in the morning, my stepdaughter was on the phone and even at that point. Then I said, hey, it's kind of late, and just left it at that. So I goes downstairs to get ready to get in shower in the master bedroom. Come back upstairs. I'm getting some of my clothes that was in my son's room because, like I said, me and my mom had separated, and so I was like
sleep upstairs with my son in his room. The way it set up, it's just like this was her room bath from her sister. You can touch all everybody's rooms right here. You can touch everything. And when I came back upstairs, I her her still on the phone. So I yelled in the hall with like, hey, it's getting late. You need to get off the phone. And even in court, she said he was calling my name. I just ignored him. So I walk in the room calling her name. She's
not answering. So I tapped the bottom of the lake and she's fully covered under the cover, like fully covered.
She had the blankets on it, right, So you touch her on the top of the blanket like hey, like kind of hey, like you went through to make somebody up. So you literally touched a blanket that was covering her.
It was and it was like near the shen or the ankle. It wasn't. She said, I like rubbed on the inside of her thigh. That was in a police report, and then the court she says something totally different. So all of it was constantly contradicting each other. So I'm like, you know, calling her name, and she doesn't me spine, so tap her. Look, I said, hey, you know, I say her name. Take a step toward her head of
the bed where she was at. She turns and she's on the phone, and the phone says love like two hours, fifteen, twenty minutes. So I'm like, hey, man, it's getting late. You need to get off the phone. She say, oh, okay, walk out the room. And then too, when I walked out the room, I text you, and I had to text to prove she responded, I said your night. I was getting late. You need to get off the phone, and she responded okay. Next then you know, the neighbor
come knocking on the door. She screams her name. She just runs out the house. She never looks at me, never says nothing. So I goes and tell her mom, like, hey, you need to go check on her. She just, you know, ran out the house. She's on the phone with her boyfriend. I think he dumped her or she might be pregnant. I told her mor I was like, she had been kind of being busy, and you know, we knew that she was, you know, maybe sneaking around doing little sneaky stuff.
So my initial thought process was like, she pregnant. And so when I want to got her mom, her mom goes next door. I'm lay in the bed with my son. So like fifteen minutes go by and I look outside. I see like a whole lot of police cars. So I'm like, oh, what done happened? So I get dressed, get my son dressed, I go next door. I'm not gonna door. The police come like who are you? I say, my name's house. I'm coming to check on my family.
They just came over here. I'm trying to see what's going on, you know, everything okay at this timet, I don't know who was it? The girl's next door. Has something happen, something happened anywhere? They was like, oh, we need to talk to you. So I was like, talk to me for what. I'm trying to find answers, just like y'all. They was like, well, can we talk to you next door, and I was like, don't what can you talk to me about? I don't know. I'm trying
to figure out what's going on. And so they came to the house and they was like looking around, and he was like, what happened to night to her? And I was like, what happened when? What are you talking about? And I felt like, like, why are you questioning me about what happened about tonight? Whatever? And so eventually he ended up saying what she said, call the police house to try to rape me. So at that point I I snapped. I was like, yo, man, go get her,
Go get her mom. I'm not about to do this shit. Go get all them. Blah blah blah blah. Then my son mom comes walking in with the police with her. I was like, what's going on with me? She was like, I don't know, I don't know. I like, see, this is that shit. This is why I don't want to come here, Like I don't have time for the drama because when I separated, when we started separating February, I
don't have time to be interacting. I got too much going on to be interacting with, you know, your daughter and your ex husband and drama. You see what I'm saying. So my whole reason for even going back to California when we separated was to avoid the drama. You see what I'm saying. So it's like, how do I get back in this shit when I'm trying to avoid drama?
So anyway, long story short, my initial charge they said I tried to rape her because I tapped her on her leg, like where you can do a DNA test, Like where is any physical Then the thing that made me frustrated was because you see this girl, you don't see nothing physically done to her. You don't see nothing, no physical mark, Like what in your mind makes you think that I just try to rape her? You can look at her. And then another thing that and i'ma just wrap it up, was that she said I tried
to rape her. I was in charge with rape, so it's like, how was I not charged to rape? So then in Georgia they have this thing where if you touch somebody with attempt to arouse yourself, I'm like, how did I get aroused from touching her leg? Where is in the where's the indication that you was aroused? And they was like, oh, did he say something to no, I didn't say nothing to you remotely close to anything
sexual where but in Georgia. That's why I feel like it was a setup, because you didn't even charge me what she lied with. You put in charge me with something you can get me convicted on. There was never an investigation for rape. Anytime a minor makes any type of outcry some type of rape, even if she recann it, legally, you're supposed to report that to the child authorities, which never happened. You're supposed to do a DNA test, which
never happens. So the thing would be for you guys to do the test, but they never did the test. Because at the time she would sleep with her eighteen year old boyfriend, which is statutory.
Rape because she was fourteen, she was fifteen.
Her boyfriend was eighteen at the time, who you see in this picture. So even if she would have said this and took it back, Whosa said, she's not lying out of fear, and even during trial that's what I was saying. There was discipline and structure set up at my house, and you can see from this photo these were the things that were allowed at her father house.
You know where she's acknowledging doing drugs, she's drinking, she's posting stuff about you know all, you know, various things that indicate the freedoms that she would have in her father's house as opposed to mine. I believe it was just rewarded behavior for continuing to support the allegations in the lives that he made up.
And you can hear these papers shuffling around, but just can't see it. But the pictures that he's sharing, you know, are pictures of a young girl who is sort of almost looks like she's living the life of a hip hop star for Instagram or something like that, you know. So okay, so she was the painting a picture. She was able to live a life that she wanted to live, a you know, sort of unstructured, flamboyant life, so to speak, at.
The expense of staying with her father versus a household of structure. And I think a lot of time, when you deal with the addition of the step father or step mother, but primarily the step father, there's this disconnect between him and the children. And in our case, that wasn't it. Like even when I was working here from NYC twenty two, my stepdaughters came up here with their mom.
We went on multiple family trips. I was almost blindsided because I love this child as my own, and that was the hardest part for me to accept to care about somebody and you know, look at her as my own, especially like in my position. I had heard so many times where you know, people recommend you don't even date a woman with children, And for me, I'm not the type of person to allow people to dictate what I want to do with my life. I met their mom. We had great chemistry. I loved her. You know, I
still love her. We still have a great relationship to this day as you see we talk. You know today she just called while we were sitting on the area, So we have a great relationship. My son mom was actually my co defendant, her sister, who's her best friend. She also testified and said on the record in my transcript, my sister's telling a lie. No one believes her. Her stories kept changing, and it's in the transcripts. I understood very little about the law prior to They never read
my Miranda rights. I was falseter arrested at my house without probable calls the night that she lied. You know, and they say, oh, we wanted to take it down and speak to the investigators. And I was like, well i'll drive. Oh no, we'll drive you and you put me in handcuffs. I said, I said, Monday arrest. I ain't talked to my attorney, and they said, oh, no, no, you're not an arrest. But she had already arrested me,
So that is an arrest without probable calls. So then you violated my Fourth Amendment because you arrest me in my house without probable cause or warrant. And then I went down to the police station and it was crazy because my manager told me, he's like, house, don't say nothing. I was like, his name Anthony. I was like Antheony. I didn't do nothing. Why would I, you know, I said people, And I was like, black people shouldn't be afraid of the law. You know, I'm paying taxes, a
shitload of taxes at this time. So I felt like, look, these people are hired for public safety reassurance. And I was confident, like and even speaking to the detective. And so that night my manager said, your house, don't speak to nobody, don't ever say nothing. And you hear it all the time. I'll ever talk to the police. But I'm like, I'm not afraid of police. I'm not afraid of the circumstance, ar the situation. So I spoke and I got arrested that night. Damn. So I'll say that
right now in your podet. I don't care how innocent you are. And even after speaking to lawyers, more innocent people go to prison because of speaking. Whatever you can they will use against your court. You can say I love God and they gonna say you obsessed with God and God made you do some crazy stuff. Prosecutor job is to prosecute.
Yep, God made you go push that old lady. Also cliff in a wheelchair and throwing crutches down after you know what I mean. So yeah, and that's something I talk about in the podcast a lot is that if you do get picked up under these type of circumstances, don't say nothing. They say your name, and I want a lawyer.
I want a lawyer.
So you end up going to trial.
Here you go see one of my documents and I'll even let you just read the first sentence. And that's the email that my trial attorney sent to my family immediately following my trial. And if you could just read the first sentence out loud from the email.
Okay, so this is privilege and confidentially from your attorney. Know, leave his name out of it unless you tell me differently. And the email says, this was the most horribly biased corrupt trial you can ever imagine.
I mean, you can just stop there. Yeah, that in itself, I think speaks volume for the tone of my conviction.
It sounds like it was. It was a pretty big mess. I mean, but what was your experience of that situation. I mean, here you are, three and a half years have gone by, presumably you've gone on with your career, hoping to put this in the rearview mirror, and then the day comes and you go to trial, and then what's the paint that picture?
Well, up until, like I said, at the time, I was promoting my movie and I had like a lot of friends and you know, relationships with you know, so many people, and everybody was like, well, house, why do you say something. I honestly felt like the truth would prevail, And so I was never like even family and friends that were close to me, and it was like everybody, even my father in my rick, was like how you're really calm, are you know? Everybody's was wondering was I
taking it too light? And I was like, no, you can't make me. And this was always Jason has always been my mentality. You can't make me guilty of something I didn't do. And so on my mind going to trials, think there's no way twelve logical people, with all the evidence and documentation will find me guilty. But then now if you take away all of the evidence, all of the character evidence, all of the character witnesses, you take away everything, clean the table off. Now it's an emotional case.
So now you have this young child in the midst of you know, the Bill Cosby situation, and why all this situation where you have these public figures taking advantage of women, and this is like the almost the pinnacle, and you know, you know, emotionally, societally, we were feeling a lot of compassion and simpathy towards any woman who made this type of outcry, regardless of it was true or not. It was just the tone of our nation
almost at that time. And so you go into a courtnor where you take away every single thing, every piece of paper, evidence, witness that can prove your innocence and now you have an emotional.
Case, and why was this stuff not allowed into evidence?
The judge and the prosecutor suppressed And I have the suppressions letter here where they intentionally put it on record to remove anything remotely that would do anything that would almost dampen her character or show to me motive if you take out the fact that she's allowed to drink, smoke, be around her boyfriend, her boyfriend spend a night even in the record on court the father committed perjury because they asked them, do you allow your daughter to spend
a night and have company? So, like I'm saying, when there's evidence to prove your innocence, and it's not allowed intentionally, and you see that one of the motions to suppress it, and it's another it's to motions.
I'm sitting here looking at this document from the Superior Court of Gwinnett where they in fact did exactly what you said. But this allowed any testimony says, including but not limited the references of alcohol and drug use by her skipping school, allegations of domestic violence between her and I guess.
Is that her dad, ye who had a history of abuse against her mom and they even had used HERKI studio interrogation video in mine. Mysteriously, the this didn't work, so the jury never seen my.
Side of that night of your interrogation.
Vient never seen it.
Yeah, it looks like it was almost a faded complete I hate to say it. You went through this trial, you knew that they had disallowed a lot of the evidence that would have almost certainly led to your aquitto. You still thought you were going to be acquitted, even though you hadn't been allowed to present evidence that was so favorable to your defense.
Because there were still things she said on stand that contradicted the truth. And then I actually took the stand and everything I said was genuine, It was the truth. I recorrected a lot of things that she said, but they didn't know the truth. So it still became an emotional thing.
So you were you were done. It was at that point. Really all you're doing is saying I didn't do it, that's it, and the jury is sitting there going, well, oh, I mean you know.
And another thing that happened was the prosecutor, in his old mistakements, say look he has all this, he has all he's a great man. He has a non profit. He's doing this stuff for HBCU. He has this amazing career. Everyone thinks he's perfect. And he kept like attacking my character. At one point, he was even referencing my character on Single Ladies, like what did he do for a living? What kind of job did Terrence have on Single Ladies? I'm like, what do Single Ladies have to do with this case?
So he's attacking your fictitious character.
He attacked anything fictationous that he can attack, he attacked. He's like, what does Terrence Frank do for a living? I was like, man, do you think Robert Donnie Junior leaves Iron Man and think he can fly? It's a profession. Nobody leaves set and think they're that person. I couldn't say nothing, you know, anything rebuttally close to anything other than what they want you to say. And they tell you they asked you a question. Is like that sets you up to fail. I mean that's the only thing
they had. That's the only thing they referenced to, like what I do on Single Ladies and some other character what did he do for a living? Like the two characters that were like somewhat urban two or three. It's like, oh, he did music videos and print jab. He just was just trying to present it to the jury like I thought I was above the law because I was successful, or because I was you know, an entertainer or an actor. And his closing statements, because you know, it goes to
prosecutor defense, then prosecutor. When he said he wants y'all to believe that he's such a disciplinarian that you know, the father just so lenient that she can go over there and just do whatever, and she wants that she can't do to his house, that she would make up accusations. Well, he has all this going on, he said, but the one thing that simply fails logic, where's the proof saying that if what proof do you have that she can do all these things at her father house versus your house?
Right, So what he was referencing was the evidence that he knew wouldn't be allowed in and he was actually turning that into a negative. I mean the record, Yeah, that's pretty And.
When he said that, I was like, and I still had hope, because again, when you're innocent, it just never resonated me going to prison. I had done everything at that point in my life to not go to prison. I had did everything I can degrees, educations, speaking out organizations, having my own nonprofit where you know, even a young lady who had survived cancer and all that stuff at Montgomery, Alabama, who I took to the prom She came down to testify.
Like I had a courtroom for the people and witnesses. All of their testimony was limited to how long do you know him, do you trust them? Tell the truth? And does he have good community standings? That was it. That was all they were allowed to say. They weren't able to say nothing. Far as my character interaction with the kids, I never I'm talking about when not saying, absolutely never resonated. I guess I was naive. I was in time promoting my movie. My kids were sitting in a rental car.
Wait wait wait, the kids are sitting in rental car. Where outside the courthouse?
Yeah?
My son mom was in the car with them. Okay, yeah, so they were sitting in the rental car and my son mom was right next to her. They were like playing on their iPads, you know, watching them play in the car waiting for me. They got the verdict, so I'm thinking I'm about to walk in, not guilty, Go celebrate. It's been three and a half years. I think I'm just walking and walk back out. I had just brought
like lately in their season passes. My kids were sitting in the car with swim trunks on, and I was like, hey, I'll be right back. Let me go in here and get this handled, this situation. I never came back out for two years.
So you went to prison and was it a medium maximum security prison?
Medium security prison?
And it was it as bad as it sounds as.
It was bad. I went to a private prison and down in the South, when you go to certain prison, they say you caught sweet because it's not as volatile, it's not as violent, but there was just as much violence. There was just as much drug. Man, there's more drug per quantity in prison than it is on the street. Like there was no drug that you couldn't get access to, whether it's weed, meth, cocaine, heroin, spice. So you know
that's the frustrating part. As somebody who pays taxes and who cares, I'm looking at the process, like, wait, you sending all these people to prison and you're basically babysitting grown me in because you're getting food, you getting shelter, they get you closed soap, you know, certain necessities, but at the same time, there is nothing rehabilitative about the process. They make you take some generic classes that if you want to take, you can take. But I'm looking like,
how are you trying to help these individuals? And so now it makes sense that probation. You hear meet meals talk about probation, because if there's no rehabilitation, then there's going to be a need for probation because they gonna lock your ass back up. If you're trying to prepare somebody properly, you don't worry about it. It's like your kids. You don't say, you know what, I'm gonna give my kids a full yet probationary period for them to go
to school to college. Oh, you prepared them up until eighteen to go out and be productive. And that's not what the penal system likes. So you get the private system where you get thirty six to thirty eight thousand per inmate, twenty eight hundred inmates.
We don't have to get a calculator. Calculator, but whatever it is, it's a big number.
Thirty eight thousand times twenty eight hundred.
What do we got I want you to Okay, you're gonna let me do the honors. Here there's another first unwrongful conviction. Yeah, you never use a calculator. Thirty eight thousand times twenty eight hundred equals So that's one hundred and six million, four hundred thousand dollars.
That's a lot of money.
Yeah, that's a crazy amount of money.
I mean, but anyway, it's a third amount of money, so you don't utilitate.
Listen, The very idea that there's a profit modeve in locking people up is insane, right, you know there's that There's that horrible movie Kids for Cash, which documented these cases in two thousand and five, I think it was or seven, where these judges in Pennsylvania were two judges were locking kids up for talking back to the teacher, for jaywalking, for posting one girl made a MySpace page which she said was a joke, just making fun of
her teacher, not threatening three months in jail. They were being paid by the private prisons to send kids to jail, little thirteen year old fourteen year olds, to like a real prison too. This was no I mean, they were locking kids up to. I mean, the one kid that haunts me. His name was Charlie. He a lot of them do. But you know, he was since the six
months for possession of stolen property. He had a scooter that his parents had given him for a present that they didn't know was stolen, and some other kid had you know, they had bought it in a flea market, whatever the hell they did, right, he had no idea. They had no idea, and they locked him up for six months. And then they keep extending it when you're in there, because then the kid ends up smoking the joint in there because he, like you said.
That's what they do. And if you don't get in trouble in prison, they call him manipulating the system.
Now, and this poor kid was in for most of his childhood. They managed to extend it and extend to keep penalizing him for different things. And I think he was only out for a year before his eighteenth birthday. I locked up him he was thirteen, and you know, it's just it's so tragic. It's just so damn tragic. But and he did touch on something else I want to talk about, which is incredible too, because I've been
working for over two decades. I've been on the board of the Drug Policy Alliance, which is working to you know, in the drug war, right, I call it the war against the war on drugs, right, and bring some sanity back to that all those crazy policies that we have in this country. And I've gotten to know Tony Papa very well works there now. And Tony was sentenced to fifteen the life for first defense cocaine charge, non violent. He was eventually granted clemency by the governor after twelve years.
He painted his way out of prison and then he did a self portrait that ended up in the Whitney. The guy's incredible anyway, so Tony Papa and he says he now does communications work for the Drug Policy Lines. And as he says, if you can't control the flow of drugs in a maximum security prison, how can you possibly hope to control it in the streets. And it makes perfect sense. But anyway, we don't want to make.
Speaking about the war on drugs. I believe it was nineteen sevent and I don't call me, but it was somewhere in that time frame that I read you know what the maximum amount you can get in the United States before the initial war on drugs was set for any amount of drugs.
No, tell me, I don't even know a year. Wow.
And then eighty two, I believe Reagan initiated the war on drugs, and.
Eighty five all major Nixon started it. When Nick Nixon started, Yeah, every president has taken a table.
But eighty five is when the influx started bombarding inner cities by Detroit, the Chicago's crack epidemic took over.
No, and Nixon's you know, his one of his chief aides hauled them and I forgot whether he was the chief of staff or whatever. He has admitted later years that Nixon didn't want to war on drugs. He wanted to war on black people and hippies, but he couldn't call it that. And at the time there was only two percent of American public identified drugs as a problem exactly. So he had to create a false crisis, which is what he did, and he declared this war on drugs.
And even then, the police departments didn't want to arrest people from drugs, so they created this new incentive where they would give the police departments all extraitaries even if they met quota quota of drug arrests because they didn't want to do it. You know, that's what's crazy. Back then, I think. You know, you're looking at a situation where police officers were going into the to the law, like I think a vast majority of them do, saying I want to protect people. I want to I grew up
thinking maybe I want to be a police officer. You know what I mean. You see the uniform, you respect it. Right. It's somehow or other got so twisted where and it's the government's fall by providing reverse incentives for persecuting regular people. Now you have these home invasion rays where they're kicking in the door and you know, and people are getting shot and wounded because they're looking for some drugs and sometimes they go to the wrong house. I mean, it
was that horrible case down south. It might even be in Georgia where they threw in the flash bang grenade and it landed in the baby's crib and the baby's now had thirty five operations and everything. I mean, it's madness, right, It's just looking for drugs which are going to be legal eventually. I mean, now, you know weed is on the way, but we still have people serving crazy amounts of time in prison.
We noticed just must that have administered drugs are just as harmful, of not more harmful than the none legalized drugs. But they give it to your quantity because they control the quantity. Because they control them output, they can control the money.
It's all money, man, Yeah, it's all money. I mean, that's money. But I just posted on my Instagram, which by the way, is at It's Jason Flomp for those of you who don't follow me. But I posted on my Instagram today, you know, because of this Manifhord thing. I mean, he got sentenced to yeah, Syria, what his white privilege, Paul Manifor forty seven months for you know, so many crimes you can't even count them over such
an extended period of time. And then my friend Bernard Noble was sence to thirteen years and four months for possession of two joints. Possession. What the hell? I mean, my head's exploding. But and he was a truck driver forty seven years old, seven kids, you know, hit two prior arrests for simple possession twenty something years earlier. He did clean all this time. Let's get to the to
the reversal, because the or the ultimate emotion for neutron freedom. Yeah, so how did you actually managed to get yourself out of this miserable predicament? That's what I want to know.
I had a motion for a new trial. I was cohersed, pretty much blackmail into taking what they call it alphrod plea. I have the documents if you see right here. I have on record multiple times where they try to offer me these please and I'm like, I'm not taking the plea for somebody to do. I'm not taking the plea. I probably had on record four different times where they say, if you don't take this plea, it's not coming back on the record. So how does this plea keep reappearing
if someone declines a plea? Where do you see so many times on record where it resurfaces? And so at the beginning of my most of a new trial they asked me to take a plea. My trial lawyer got up there and talk about the discrepancies and the things that violated my due process. And so when the most for newtrial is granted, it's based off of something that
violated your due process. Whether it's an effective sense of counsole, whether it's prosecutorial, whether it's judicial for some legal reason that violated your due process, which is your fourteenth Amendment, which is very important for people to understand. And you got to understand, you know. And I'm gonna say this and be real quick. Martin Luther King's death or his fight, the advocacy for civil rights is superseded just the right
to vote. It's for people, individuals to understand. As a citizen, you are given these rights to be an American citizen to where you don't have to fight for your rights if you understand what your rights are. See, we're fighting for something that's allocate, that's for us. When you're born an American citizen, you're giving these rights. So it's kind of like you know, you're going home and fighting for your bed, and it's already your bed. That's your bid.
You just have to know it's your bed. So you know, I say this, especially African Americans, know your rights, know your amendments. I didn't personally care about minds before prison. When I went back and I learned my first my fourth how important. The fourth was, the fifth against self incrimination, the sixth Amendment for a legal representation, the seventh, eighth against cruel and harsh punishment for a team due process.
So this was my most for a new trial was open on the grounds that I didn't get a fair trial, and at some point doing that process, I was basically pressured either do this or sit in prison two more years. And at that point, of how he been there a year and a half. So what they offered me was my lawyer told me at the time that I would get time served this thing called first offenders, and I
would get out and my record to be expunged. And you know, I didn't even want to take it, and I had to call like a removal of court and speed to my mom and my son's mom. They were like all crying, like please just get out your kids, miss you. I'm like, mom, I'm not taking a plea for somebody to do. And it was like it's an alpha plea which allows you to maintain your innocence, but it says you didn't want to go to court. I never mind, won't go on to trial. I know I
have enough proof to prove my ennocnce. That was never a case for me. It was never an issue by me not going to trial.
So you ultimately accepted the outf for play.
Yes, and they told me how to be released. Then I wasn't released. Then I went back to prison for like eight more months.
I've heard that story before too.
Yeah, they said. And then my lawyer was like, oh yeah, as soon as you get there, they're gonna process you out and I might take up to thirty days. Trial was November seventeenth. He said, you may be home before Thanksgiving, no later than Christmas. I didn't get out till July. So I said another eight months, and that was July of twenty eighteen.
So you've been home now for nine months. Yep. It seems like you hit the ground running, though I mean I didn't.
I thought I did too until I realized. Come in here, help me realize. I didn't like my probation. I still have a few years left for probation in Atlanta, and that's what I'm fighting for right now, my complete exoneration and expungement of my record. But I didn't.
I remember.
I woke up probably raised around about Christmas. I woke up just crying, man, just tears, because the psychological effect that this stuff has on you, it's just mind bog You wake up at one point and it blew my mind. At one point I thought about going back, and nobody in my family, this is my first time. Even at one point I thought about going back back to prison. That's the psychological effect that has on you. It's kind of like, I don't even know if you watch like Game of Thrones, like.
A couple of seasons theon.
Lovejoy where old Boy had broke them to a dog and even if you open they said, once you break a dog, you can open the cage and the dog won't leave out. And that's what prison do, and that's why they have these probationary priscause Psychologically, the impact that it has on you, it breaks you. And that's the
whole purpose of it is to break you. And that's why I have my book Never Broken, because despite this tragic, unfortunate, mundane, crazy, malicious to me situation, I feel like there's people that's
experienced worse than I have. I know that there are, and I feel like, you know, I have an obligation now with my situation and circumstances, to be a voice for a prison reform for the people that's maliciously prosecuted, falsely prosecuted, and they understand that, you know, just as many innocent people go to prison as guilty people get off. But it's not a justification. What we have to do is pay more attention to what you know, our judicial
system and the people we elect. So I encourage people to be aware of who your judges are, who your all your state representatives are, who all your local representatives are, and that's where the power of voting and being aware of what's going on plays its part. We can get out here in Kumbaya and you know, Raley all we want, but we need to put people in office and positions that care about the people.
You know, one of the things we can do in this show. If you're listening, whether you live in Georgia or Alaska, it doesn't really matter. Everybody at some point gets a jury duty notice and when you serve on a jury, which I encourage people to do, especially people that are listening to show, who are woke right because they're listening to this show. So you know, if you do get all for jury duty, it's super annoying, Like nobody wants to go. You know, you got to miss
out on work and things and whatever. Everybody's busy, but go because go and go, then stay woke, because when you're there, recognize that there's stuff going on that you don't know and you can't see.
We have to become more educated, just in general about the judicial process. The jury concept. The way it was founded was, you know, back I believe in the early thirteen hundred or something like that, fourteen hundred. It was early, and they were just sentencing gods just like guilty, guilty, And it got one guy said, wait a minute, you guys don't even know me, like, give me a chance to show you my innocent. Let my peers judge who I am. And so then that's how the jury situation
came about. So it's important for you to understand that the whole purpose of the jury duty and the jury selection is for you to recognize this individual as you're a peer. Is it somebody you want in your community, It's somebody you trust. The whole purpose the judicial system is for public reassurance. To make us feel safe, is to know that our government is working adamantly to secure our safety, whether it's offshores, are on shores of you know,
of American soil. So it's very important for people to understand, like you said, how I know it's boring. I know you don't want to be there. You can't just go in there and say, well, I don't want to be here there. I gotta go to work tomorrow because this is somebody's life.
And then there's that you know, famous quote that it's better that one hundred guilty men should go free than that one incent should suffer. I'm pretty sure that was Benjamin Franklin or the legendary Supreme Court justice Learning Hand who said that our justice system is haunted by the ghost of the innocent man convicted. You know that quote gives me chills, and yet it happens all day, every
day and twice on Sunday. And you know, there's that saying that everyone you meet is fighting a battle you know nothing about, so be kind, right, And I know so many of the different people that I interviewed on this show been through these horrendous situations. I mean, some of them in prison for thirty forty years for things
they didn't do. And they all have different ways of explaining how they found this extra gear, this this strength, this grace I call it right where they're able to get up every day and project a positive influence onto the world. And you certainly seem like that guy as well. You know, and I know I've spoken to you about this before, so I wanted to ask you and then I'll have one more question after this, But are you bitter?
No, sir.
And it's interesting because so many people that I talked to civilians about this issue all the time. People have listened to the show. Other people they say, but I don't understand how how can anybody who's been through what.
Because that's not the answer. Frustration, hate, anger is not the answer. I love to judge. I love my stepdaughter, I love her father. I love it prosecute. I even love the jury. If I had to do one thing, I would want to sit down like this and just ask them why. And I would want them to just hang out. Just spend one day with me, Spend an hour with me, watch me interact with my kids. Watch me go to a facility or a place and you know, car wash and see a young lady with her daughters.
And watch how I tell my sons to go over there and vacuum that car, or go pump that lady's gas, or go grab that lady's groceries. Watch how I'm in a restaurant, I see lady with kids, I pay for her food. You know, it's so many things that I do that the people who know me immediately will go, Man, you're different.
It's remarkable, and there's so much to be learned for people who are going through their day to day struggles and may find, you know, aggravations in daily life.
But once everything is taken from you, especially abruptly, and then you're broken down to the bare minimum. That's why they say some homeless people are the happiest. They have no worries and so just nothing to cut you off. But to answer that question, we say, how to each and every want to rive at this same place because you've been stripped of everything that the pressures of society that man has. So now when you just have to bear you, you just have your connection with God or
whatever you believe in. And so the strength and your relationship with a higher call and the higher being is indicated by how you conduct yourself and how you respond. I know that God has all my steps number and whatever they meant for evil, God meant for good. I wouldn't have been here two years ago. I wouldn't even thought about prison reform two years ago. I will probably be probably with my kids on some island or somewhere
kicking it. But my point is this, I've always been aware, but this gave me another fight, you know what I because I'm huge on youth advocacy, and now was the hardest part about this allegation against a child. I have a history in proof and I'll show you documents even after we get off air, where I'm speaking to young women, young men empowering them. So that was the hardest part because my degree is an education from Alabama State University.
So when you take away my core, which is the love for advocacy for youth and empowering young men and women in low economic environments, that's what hurt. And in fact that they took me from my kids, Like the hardest part was walking away and knowing that my kids were outside.
You know, certainly meeting you when I did. You know, like I said, you still seem like that guy who would be more likely to be on stage accepting an award than then you were to end up in prison.
And I mean, I guess for me. And in addition, I think one of the hardest and the craziest situation just being in there. Jay was the fact that like I would look up and I will see myself on television. You know, some of the other guys would kind of be looking like you know that that looks just.
Like you know.
And when they finally figured it out, it was crazy.
That's totally surreal. So you're in prison looking at the TV seeing yourself, watching your previous life literally flashing in front.
Of your eyes. Initially, when I first I saw myself, Atlanta was on and they watched it because it's Atlanta Bay Show and I'm in Georgia. You know, a lot of guys have been locked up for so long. They couldn't affiliate me with the character. And then most of them are so negative almost that they don't they wouldn't believe that someone they watched no television would be locked
up with them. So that was the first thing. And then when I got to the facility, I was at down in coffee with this ring came on and one of the officers walked in was like, hey, gg, building wants you. So I look up and all the dudes in the wind they're like, yo, coach, because they call me coach. They actually called me coach in prison because I used to help a lot of guys with like basketball and boxing, and you know, with that illegal work because I started doing a lot of legal research and
stuff like that. So they all started calling me coach, but they was like, yo, coach. And then after that I was so much love man, Like I never had any incidents where gangs or none of that stuff. Man, you know, the top dogs, I was always cool with, you know what I mean. So I don't know if it was gonna get around, but shout out to you know, everybody that's right now that's still in cars. You're ready to keep your head up, man, and your time in the sun is coming.
Man.
But yeah, it's be crazy, yee. I see myself and multiple television shows, my movies was airing, and a lot of them ironically was happy to be almost locked up with somebody that was successful. And it was crazy because I got so much love and support. So it was they were all rooting for me to get out. I never hit my story. You know, a lot of time when you go to prison, they tell you, man, you're going there on some sex storr they gonna do blah blah blahlah blah. But the guys all knew me as
a man first, and everyone was frustrated. A lot of inmates was pissed, like, man, man, you got to get out, You got to tell your case, you got to tell your story. I was got so much support and encouragement from the guys in there because they met me and as a man, they can tell that, you know, I was innocent and so and I mean it was just crazy.
Man, that's just an outer body, a trippy, crazy experience that I hope nobody else has to go through. But man, what a what a life.
Thank you to all the supporter I got, because I know at one point distribution company had hesitation about my roles like in say, for instance, Tupac. But shout out to Benny Boom and Hutting for supporting me and rioting with me by keeping my parts. Shout out to the producers and Donald and all the guys with Atlanta for keeping my parts. Shout out to you know, Tresa Mega
mind for continue to push our project secrets. Shout out to you know, Robbie Reid and you know Tracy and all the people that looked out from BT who initially you know, as soon as I got out, we're trying to put me in projects and working to put me in projects to regain you know, my stature in the game. So thank you all for the support and everyone else and got some real big projects on the way.
This has been an extraordinary interview. I appreciate you coming in and sharing your story and everything that you're doing to try to make a difference. I know that this will ultimately work itself out. I hope it will, and then everything will get cleared up, and I know the best is yet to come for you. So you know, I wish you well. We have a traditional wrong for conviction, which is that at the end of the show, my favorite part, I think everybody's favorite part, the producers.
Audience, is that it's gone to hear people.
I get to actually, just like I said, thank you for being here, and then turn over for the last brief closing thoughts for anything you want to say about anything.
Oh just love man. Like I said event yesterday earlier this week with Andrew, one of the owners at the Red Rooster, and they were doing something for Outreach, which is an urban program are for low income families. There are so many organizations, there's so many groups, there's so many entities or organizations that's trying to put it together. I just and close when I'm trying to say, we
have to find a way to unify this. You know what I mean, because there's a lot of people doing things all across the nation, the world, and I think we just got to find a way to unify it. We need to get past racial bearers, stigmas and stuff like that. We need to try to stop pointing a finger. I said, I don't have no maliciousness toward anybody. I know there's a bigger purpose. I just want people to become aware. Don't just grow. Evolve and growth us is
a part of the human condition. That's something that naturally we all do. We grow, it's aging. But evolved is when you as a person, you see stuff, you see the bigger picture, you know what I mean, Like a caterpillar and I feel like a lot of people just caterpillaring alone. But the purpose is to turn into that butterfly.
I know it's a slow journey. It feels like the process of being a caterpillar, and it's you know, whether you're trying to get to this goal, this destiny, this journey, just know that that process is a part of your journey. But the evolution into the butterfly is when you grow as a person and you see that the most important thing that we have that God has given us is each other. Everything that was created other than the earth was made by man, whether it's the iPhone, whether it's
the car, whether it's bloonney sandwich. So God, it gives us each other to live abundantly happy with one another, but we take it for granted, you know, be more collectively aware of one another and just try to love. When people say that shit and they be like, oh, yeah, I love each other sounds great, but that's what it's about, man,
So I love you. I appreciate you having me. It feels good to kind of get this initially off my chest because I've been holding it out for over two and a half going on three years, if not actually longer than that, because it took three and a half years to go to trial. So like this is my
first time speaking out publicly. I'm grateful that we had the opportunity to meet, you know, thank you Fie out in Los Angeles and they sign They're also doing phenomenal work at the Mayor's office and it's a lot of prison reform organizations. At the end of the day, what prison reform means is for us to have a society where our judicial system works fairly for all of us.
The domino effect the prison reform helps us with health care by taking money out of these prisons and put them to the healthcare sector, by taking them out of these press and put them to the educational sector. And that's what's most important. So the reason why our prison reform is important because we have to be where our tax dollars and where our money's being allocated, you know what I'm saying. So it's deeper than that. It's a domino effect, and the domino effect is love and it's
educating each other. Understand this. You are your own individual. Don't let no entity or individuals stop you from doing what you love.
It's a wrap. Thank you Harold House Moore, Harold House being here and sharing your story, and thank you everyone for listening to Wrongful Conviction. We'll see you next week. Don't forget to give us a fantastic review wherever you get your podcasts. It really helps. And I'm a proud donor to the Enesis Project, and I really hope you'll join me in supporting this very important cause and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions. Go to innocensproject dot org
to learn how to donate and get involved. I'd like to thank our production team, Connor Hall and Kevin Wartis. The music in the show is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flamm is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with Signal Company Number one