Since our initial release of Rodney Long's story, there have been some incredible developments, and this is a re release of that story with new content outlining the great news. At around nine forty five on the night of April twenty fifth, nineteen seventy six, the fifty four year old widow of a Cannon Mills executive was at her home and Conquered, North Carolina when a man grabbed her from behind.
She fought him, scratching her attackers so hard that her nails bent backwards, but ultimately he overpowered and raped her. She described her assailant as a light skinned black man with no mention of facial hair, wearing a dark leather coat and a beanie hat. A rape kit was done and the police carefully collected a mountain of forensic evidence. Meanwhile, across town, nineteen year old Ronnie Long was at home with his mother, on the phone with the mother of
his own two year old son till ten PM. A few days later, Ronnie received court summons for trespassing in a park after hours. He was wearing a dark leather coat at the time. Police would ask the rape victim to be present in court to see if her attacker was present on the day Ronnie, the owner of a dark leather coat, was scheduled to appear disguised. She sat in the gallery for two hours in Ronnie's presence, only to identify him as her attacker when his name was called.
The state would present a case without any of the collected forensic or biological evidence, solely resting their case upon this extremely unorthodox and totally unreliable cross racial identification and Ronnie's unscratched leather coat. For that, Ronnie has been in prison for forty four years. This is wrongful conviction with Jason Flatta, Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction. Today's case Will
It's going to upset you. I'm going to tell you right now this is a grotesque injustice that was inflicted and is still being inflicted on an amazing man named Ronnie Long. And we're hoping to hear from Ronnie during the recording. He'll be calling in from prison where he has been since nineteen seventy six for a crime he didn't commit. In this time of COVID, there's all sorts of complications, so we're going to try to make it work with us now as well. Is Jamie Lao Jamie
is an attorney at Duke University's Wrongful Convictions Clinic. And Jamie, thank you for joining us on the show.
Thank you for having me.
I'm going to do something unusual here. I actually want to start at the end. We almost know ever do that. But there's a quote from a judge named James Wynn, who's a circuit court judge in the fourth District Court. So this is a serious guy. And Judge Wynn said, and I quote, prosecutors clearly had evidence that any defense council in the world, not only in nineteen seventy six, but in the history of this country would have wanted or needed, and which should have been supplied, and yet
we did not provide it. He goes on to say, what is it about us that we want to prosecute and keep people in jail when we know evidence may exist that might lead to a different conclusion. Why is that so offensive to us now that we want to protect illegal activity from forty four years ago? What's the harm of looking at the new evidence? He said? When did justice leave the process? So we let our rules blind us to what we all can see. Wow.
Well, during the course of argument, it made us optimistic that after forty four years, an end may be near to the injustice that occurred in Ronnie's case. It's been an incredible difficult journey through the courts to get his
case to where it was. On May seventh of this year, you said we'll start at the end, and the end at this point in time was an argument on May seventh in front of the full Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals, which is fifteen active judges all have been appointed by a President judge when was making that quote in response to arguments from the State of North Carolina that more or less was asking the court to disregard all the evidence that is now known about in this case that
was hid from Ronnie at the time of his trial in nineteen seventy six. And Judge Winn also discussed sort of the circumstances of nineteen seventy six and the conditions of black mails, particularly in the South in nineteen seventy six,
and how they were wrongfully convicted in great numbers. So at the moment Judge Wynn offered his viewpoints during the course of the stakes argument, we knew that we had succeeded in conveying to the court, the seriousness and the magnitude of the injustice that occurred in Ronnie's case.
As promised, we got a phone call from Ronnie, and I must warn you that there was a poor connection with the prison. So Ronnie's a little hard to hear. But what he has to say needs to be heard, so please bear with us.
You have a pre paid call. You will not be charged for this call. This call is from an inmate Albemarle Correctional Institution. This call will be monitored and recorded. To accept this call, Prince, I've now to decline this call hang out. Thank you for using Global tail link.
Hello, Hi Ronnie, thanks for calling me. I know we have limited time, so let's get right into it now. You grew up and conquered North Carolina, right, seven brothers and sisters. Can you tell me a little bit about your life before all of this horrible stuff happened.
I played sports when I was in high school. Right wait to call for I learned how to link with such songs. That's kind of of work I was doing with my dad. I'll go to work with him sometime, take money with him. I had a son. I spent a lot of time with my sons to cool in the game the game when I never streeted with three.
Now I read about this one time before you had your son, way before the incident that lands you in prison, there was an encounter that you once had with some police officers. They they pulled up on you, harassed you a bit, hey, you know what you're doing around here? Boy type of thing, and you responded, isn't this America? All night? I free to walk on this sidewalk?
That right, I was coming from a girl hell. I was coming from a girl house one night. The area that I was in, it was only this. I was coming home one night. The two white couple pull up behind me. That were you coming from? What are you doing in this area here? Did you walk home side here? They took me, took me downtown for me in a room. I stated a gave up too loud, but also came up, told me to go, you can leave. I just gotta walk up, went home.
And that's it seems to be how he got to be on the radar of the local authorities. And then on the Faithful Day of Sunday, a twenty fifth, nineteen seventy six, at around nine forty five pm, a wealthy, white, fifty four year old widow of a Cannon Mills executive was burglarized and raped an awful, awful crime, and Canon Mills was a major employer in the area, and that name's going to come to play a big role in this.
In this story, the victim said that while she was preparing food for a beach trip the following day, a black man snuck into her home and grabbed her from behind. She said the intruder told her that he only had fifteen minutes as his friends were waiting for him outside like a horror movie, and he proceeded to rape her. She later described her attacker as a quote yellow looking and quote again not blue black, maybe wearing gloves, a beanie hat, no mention of any facial hair, and a
dark leather coat. She also described the violent struggle where she scratched her attacker so hard that her fingernails bent backward, which would definitely have left the mark on that leather coat. The victim said that whenever she tried to move, he would slam her head against the ground. Then the phone rang, startling the attacker, who gathered his things and left through the front door. The victim then rushed over to her neighbors naked, where she was able to call the police,
and they arrived around ten pm. The victim has since passed away, but that being said, she was rushed to the hospital for a rape kit and the doctor performed all the tests and collected all the biological evidence and everything else. What happened next is that Detective Eisenhower of the Concord Police Department arrived at the victim's home around
ten thirty. He photographed the house and began collecting evidence, including latent fingerprints, carpet samples, suspect hair paint samples, as well as pieces of the victim's clothing and partially burned matches, and he later brought them to the State Bureau of Investigation office at Raleigh for examination. He also lifted a latent shoe print from a column near the porch. Now this is important. Later has nothing but the shoe print
was ever discussed at trial. And before we go any further, we need to state clearly that Ronnie had a solid alibi. And remember the crime took place at nine five. Ronnie, at around nine thirty, you were at home with your mother waiting on your father to get back with the car so you could head out to a party in Charlotte. You were on the phone with the mother of your child. Your mom hopped on the phone a few times to say hello to her grandson.
Right, Yeah, he on the phone too, but you can't all I understand what he's saying when he was trying to talk. He on the phone to my mom was on the phone, on the phone. I'm up on the phone and I'm waiting on my dad to come back with the card. One on to a party and shower.
So Jamie, can you take us back to how Ronnie came to be implicated in it and how he could have possibly been convicted in spite of no evidence at all, none zero.
Yeah. Ronnie, very much like other young black men in nineteen seventy six and still today, was harassed by law enforcement officers. That harassment directly led to what ultimately becomes this forty four year old wrongful conviction. On April twenty fifth,
the victim is assaulted and raped in her home. A few days after that, Ronnie receives a trespassing charge at the local park that was adjacent to his home when he shouldn't have been there, and during that time, it appears that he was observed wearing a black leather coat.
The officer who stopped him recalled that the person who was described by the victim had been wearing a dark leather coat on the night of April twenty fifth when she gave a description to law enforcement, and despite Ronnie not matching other very prominent features that were included in her description, the officer decided that perhaps he was the individual who had assaulted the victim. I mean it was significant the disparities between her description of her assailant and Ronnie.
She described her assailant as a yellow black male. In the South at the time, to describe somebody as a yellow black male meant a light skinned black person of mixed origin. She never mentioned her assailant having facial hair. Ronnie had facial hair, and disputed that he had facial hair on April twenty fifth, nineteen seventy six, when she was assaulted. So despite him having a different complexion having facial hair, where she never described facial hair, he becomes
a suspect. Officers then go to her home and says, we have reason to believe that the individual who had assaulted you will be in the courtroom on this date fifteen days later, May tenth, nineteen seventy six, and we'd like you to come down to the courtroom to see if you can identify the person who attacked you there. So immediately in her mind she thinks they've done some
investigation and have identified a likely suspect. But all they had done is made the connect to the fact that Ronnie had a black leather coat similar to what she described.
The real curious thing with respect to law enforcement asking the victim to go to the courthouse to try and make an identification is they had a picture of long that they could have shown her when they went to her and asked her to come to the courthouse, And they could have did it in a fair procedure, or as fair as these identification procedures can be, with the inclusion of fillers to ensure that she's selecting him from memory and not because he looks most like the attacker
or because she's being presented a suspect in a very suggestive way. They elected to forego that. So she's the courthouse dressed in a disguise because she's fearful that if her attacker was there, he'd recognize her. She describes during her testimony being terrified. She sits in the courtroom for an hour and a half Inglong's presence and fails to identify him. And only when his name is called and he walks up to resolve the trespassing charge, which was
dismissed that day, did she say he's the one. But it's telling because we later learned during her testimony at trial that there were only twelve black males in the courtroom. She quickly eliminated several of them because they had afros where they were older. She described one as being old and hunched over, and she says that he was the
only one that looked remotely similar to her attacker. And identification evidence is already flawed and highly unreliable, but here you can just take her words that she's just picking the person looks most likely to be her attacker that's president in the courtroom, so she can end the experience where she's traumatized and terrified, so that in essence becomes the only evidence against law. And here we are, forty four years later, trying to undo that identification.
And I'm glad you brought that up, Jamie, because we know the most unreliable eyewitness identification is cross racial. This fits exactly into that category, and then, of course there's still room for it to get worse. So Ronnie, take us back to the day that you were in court for the misdemeanor trespassing charge, when you had no idea. You couldn't have had any idea that there was a rape victim in the gallery who was being led to believe that her attacker was in the courtroom that day.
And the craziest thing is that you two were in each other's presence for nearly two hours before she idd you.
Right, yeah, there, misdemeanors just passed downtown. Now, I'm sitting there for nine o'clock. When she called my name, I stood up and we walked down front of me and my dad. This is when the police said. This is when they say that she had the same two detectives that was on this case, that been on this cape the whole time they were sitting in the Cury Fox. She testified that it was it got me twelve black in the courtroom. He's not any people in here looking
like me. She's supposed to be looking far a young black man that assaulted her but she distinctly stated she's looked around and looked around and looked around into the trans trip, and I didn't see nobody. I want you, I want you to think about this. She said. She sitting in the courtroom man for over an hour and a half, looking around, and she never didn't see anyone. The people. Why she didn't see anyone else said because of this special that she gave the police for the
light skinned black man with no hound in the face. I'm sitting up in there, and you understanding saying God's skin would hang on my favor, So I didn't ask another the description. You understudstand that she was looking for her. That's why I come. She couldn't pick me out, but she picked me out. Here, says say, when they called my name and run along, go to the front, run along. If you ain't court I said, yeah, we come down front. That's why she said she recognized. She ain't recognized me.
She's recognized my name. You go, number one, How are you gonna sit in the courtroom ere stairs for a whole hour and a half. Ain't eleven it ain't but twelve blacks in them? You gonna sitting there for a whole hour and a half. You don't see this young black man that you're looking for. The reason you don't see it because she's not Yeah, he got, he got on his face. The court asked this woman, could the police department got told you to pick run alone? She said,
they could have. I don't know. That's in the transition. They could have.
I don't know. The Pacers Foundation is a proud supporter of this episode of Rafel Convision with Jason Flahm, and of the Last Mile organization, which provides business and tech training to help incarcerated individuals successfully and permanently re enter the workforce. The Pacers Foundation is committed to improving the lives of Hoosiers across Indiana, supporting organizations that are dedicated
primarily to helping young people and students. For more information on the work of the Pacers Foundation or the Last Mile program, please visit Pacers Foundation dot org or the Lastmile dot org. This episode is underwritten by Paul Weiss, Rifkin,
Orton and Garrison, a leading international law firm. Paul Weiss has long had an unwavering commitment to providing impactful, pro bono legal assistance to the most vulnerable members of our society and in support of the public interest, including extensive work in the criminal justice area. So the victim makes this shaky identification, tells the detectives, but you've got no idea that any of this is going on. You're there for this misdemeanor charge, which gets dismissed, and then you
go home. But that was not the last you'd see of law enforcement that day.
Went home with thee I'll wake up a few whiles later, my mom Jelly.
When Ronnie was picked up, he was not told that he was suspected of this raid. Instead, he arrived at the station at six forty five pm, was read as rights and the police claimed that they asked permission to search his car, but they hadn't, and then they testified to finding gloves, matchbooks, and a beanie in the car. Ronnie maintains that the gloves or head but the beamie was not.
I followed the police downtown. I used to drive with gloves on, but when I get out of the car, I take my gloves off. I speak of my home, my son's value. I tried the car, I locked the door, I got on the black the other jacket. Yeah, I'll go up there, they kill me. I'm a suspecting a rapron kay, I'll take my keys up. They take my keys up the front out of the door with the same to the ticket that was in the courtroom that morning. Yo, man, without going with my keys, bring my keys back.
Kill.
They're just going to look in your car. You ain't got nothing to high here now, but yu, I ain't gave you permission to look at my car either. So they go down look at my car. They come back in and they got my She took another jacket off of me as a back gas, just some mother stuff. They had my gloves, They had lime green to bark that I had never seen a dead in my life.
And for anyone who doesn't know, it's a boggle. And I didn't know if Toboggan is a hat like the one described by the victim in this case. So the police come back with what they claim to have found in your car. Go ahead, Ronnie, say God just.
Got your car. If you won't beat hide them back when we think them investigations. Signed your name my hands. You gotta look on the people for me to study, said, sign your name my hand. You won't beat him Okay, I want my jacket, want my glove, but I don't know who. But I don't know. I want my glue. So I sent on the people time to sign out as a consci cop.
So they tricked you in order to make it seem like you consented, and that way it would have made the search technically legal. They planted the lime green hatter toboggan.
Now the police gotta line lead the bog and saying this is to happen in the perpetrator. I'm getting how long? Then I don't go where the man I ain't never heard of how longest hand side out? It's redish looking at.
It his head.
You got a line we had with red areas when I had definitely I got black hand long you see the red hair this man. This man as not. Yeah, I don't know what's going to be. The state would never let me DNA test that had I won't have a hand day did they would do.
So we now come to the conclusion that the police planted this beanie in the car so that they could have another you know, well really now that there is no other evidence, so that they could have something that they could use against him. And I say, something they could use against him, because remember all that evidence Detective
Eisenhower collected from the crime scene. Well if the red hairs that they found in the beanie that are clearly not Ronnie's hair, bother, you just wait, because it's about to get way worse again. The crime scene evidence comes back from the stapue of investigation in Raleigh, and none
of it matches Ronnie. But since the rich white widow of an executive of one of the biggest employers in town just idd him as her rapist rather than just doing the right thing, the just thing, the evidence never even made it to the prosecutor's office, let alone the defense. So the police withheld the evidence from both the defense
and the prosecution. Let me just repeat that the police withheld the evidence not just from the defense, but from the prosecution, just in case the prosecution might have decided, hey, wait a minute, we got the wrong guy. That the police decided to play judge jury, and I mean they might as well played executioner, because poor Ronnie's been in prison for four for fucking years. I mean, this is yeah, I mean, just when I think I've heard it all,
and Jamie, you're living this day in and day out. Now, I mean, what can you add to that, because it gets worse from there.
Right, So, they not only tested this evidence and it didn't match long. When it didn't match long, they made the decision that they wouldn't turn it over to the defense or the prosecution, which we contending. We argued this at the May seventh hearing that we had in this case, that there's a possibility that the prosecutor could have decided not to go forward with this case at all had he known that all the forensic test results pointed away
from Ronnie and towards another suspect. There was suspect hair collected brought to Raleigh, examined by the crime lab, determined by the crime lab to be in the parlance of the lab report of Negroid or Mongolian origin, meaning that it came from a person who was either Asian or black. And we know that that hair that was collected that was suspect hair, didn't match long. If it didn't match long, then the suspect, the person who should have been incarcerated
for forty four years. There's the evidence of who that person's identity is. And it's remarkable in the fact that they believe this would be probative. They collected because they thought it would be probative. All indications are that it did come from the suspect, but when it didn't match Long, they kept it from everybody so the prosecutor would go forward on the basis of this completely unheard of identification procedure.
And I have to tell you, Jason, I'm very skeptical whenever any client offers a suggestion that evidence may be planted. But as you look at this case and what officers did keeping evidence away from the prosecutor, it really makes you stop and say, oh, my goodness, this is completely consistent with the behaviors of the officers in this case. And then when Long says those are my gloves, but I've never seen that beanie in my life, you think why would he acknowledge owning one but not the other.
And the only explanation is because the officers in this case set out to ensure Long was convicted. That included lying, hiding, and with the beanie, manufacturing evidence to ensure that he would spend the rest of his life incarcerating convicted for this crime. And for whatever reason, the state of North Carolina is just willing to ignore that altogether and continue to argue that Long is guilty of this crime.
It's crazy, right, And there's no evidence that he ever owned a beanie. There's no photographs of him at a beanie. There's nobody knew about any beanie. There's also the fact that the victim had fought her attacker with all of her strength, and she had scraped the attacker so hard that her own nails bent back.
You know, you take a leaven check. Did you spreached? Did you look at my mom a microscope? Ain't no where in the world you can have that splits. That's media. Yea, my coat, look up the microscope data on my coat. But yet still she's saying, that's the coat, that's the tacking, that's the perpetrator.
Wolf.
They won those clutches on me. They won no sludge o sircuit.
Well, there's a good explanation for there being no scratches on you, your face, your leather coat. It's painfully simple. It's because you weren't there that night. But she i d'd you. They were trying to make the square fit the circle, and they were willing to bend the rules, bend break the rules. They planted evidence in your car and tried everything they could to make sure that they got a conviction in this case. And people were out in the street protesting as well.
Right.
So, but when they arrested you, they offered you a plea deal so they can make all of that public outcry just go away.
No, they lock me when they love me, or they offered me a seven year treatment. They offered me a seven year of treaty, told me that I would be back home in three years, and they made it explicitly clear that if I didn't take the treat if it was charming for my life. So, I mean, I got people in the street industry, I got my family, I did in the street. I got people in the street. Dealer says that it's support me. I knew exactly what they wanted.
Man.
They wanted to me the pe feed out to that charge so they could put it on front pains two old letters long. Tea was a great job. So alway, y'all, I got holler together and throwing things and then you're going home. But I knew I couldn't do that because number one, my dad said, I didn't really. So so you did something, you didn't do it. I turned down the tea, so I will face it too, Yester. God was a mysterious leading to it. Took me cool the same year, stayed in North Carolina.
But then we get to the trial itself, and this is going to shock exactly no one. This is an all white jury conquered North Carolina nineteen seventy six. The jury was handpicked by the Cabres County sheriff. And get this, three of the members of the jury worked for Cannon Mills. And you'll remember that the victim's husband worked at Canon Mills as well.
So the jury chairperson at the time created a master list of jurors. To get us summings for jury duty, you had to be on that list. And prior to Long's trial, he brought that list of mess their jurors first to the sheriff and allowed the sheriff to strike through any person on that list that the sheriff deemed unfit for jury duty. He then brought the list to the conquered police department, and testimony is that the chief of police and some of his deputies sat there and
did the same. So law enforcement, the very people who investigated this case, ended up lying about this case, about the evidence collected in this case played a role in the selection of the jurors who ultimately found mister Long guilty. And in this trial, every single witness that testified for
the State of North Carolina was white. Every single witness that testified on behalf of Ronnie Long to demonstrate his innocence, to prove his alibi, to show that he was nowhere near the victim's home on the night this attack occurred,
was black. And by selecting an all white jury in segregated Concord, North Carolina, in nineteen seventy six, ultimately what we had was a circumstance where the jurors were being asked to decide between finding their neighbors truthful or finding the people from the other side of the tracks, the black side of town. They would have had to find them truthful over the officers who were their neighbors, who were the people who lived in their community, their side
of town. That's what it would have taken to find Long not guilty. And of course we all know how it played out.
And this courtroom, it was a racially divided court with blacks on one side and whites on the other. And of course, now the really awful result, a predictable result of this sham trial, was that on October first, nineteen seventy six, with his whole life in front of him, Ronnie Long was convicted and sentenced to two life terms. His mother fainted and a riot nearly ensued. Long himself has called his conviction a quote modernized lynching sanctioned by law.
When they found me guilty, they just started fighting in the courtroom.
I started.
My mom stopped, she said, behind me, grabbing afield. She said, Jillie Holbs, love that fills right there.
Get that, Megan.
I won't even rally the night.
And listen to this. So after Long's conviction, concord bubbled over with fury. The next day, hundreds of protesters descended on the cities downtown, staging a demonstration in front of the courthouse, and for days fifty or more police officers in full riot gear stationed themselves at a nearby park, and the police chief warned protesters violence would be met
with force. So I mean nothing has changed. And the bravery, the courage of these people who protested, putting themselves in grave danger from the same police force that had just framed, their friend, their neighbor, their fellow human.
I had spoke with his trial counsel, Jim Fuller prior to the May seventh arguments, and he said, Jamie, I've only been maced one time in my life. And it was after the verdict when outbursts occurred in the courtroom and law enforcement decided to clear out all the supporters of LNG. And he said officers were beating a young man and he tried to pull the officers away, and they turned and sprayed him Long's trial attorney in the face with mace.
Nothing has changed. It's really it's really hard to you know. I mean, I'm trying to be optimistic, and you know, I think we are on the verge of change. But it's remarkable how much things are as they were forty four years later. The post conviction litigation history. Can you walk us through that, Jamie, because it's quite extraordinary in and of itself.
It's been a long process. So it began in the nineties. After he was convicted. He filed his first what we
call here in North Carolina Emotions for Appropriate Relief. They're the post conviction review petitions that initiate post conviction proceedings, and it was related to the jury he was ruled against or in the course of those proceedings that was then appealed in federal court, arguing the same things, that he didn't commit the crime and that his trial was unfair in part because of the way in which the jury was seated, and he was ruled against sing federal court.
Over the years, he tried to get people to help him, and then in two thousand and five, the Innocence Project that the University of North Carolina took interest in the case, and the present litigation began. They found an attorney to
work with Ronnie. That attorney did all the work necessary to uncover not just the lies, but the evidence that was withheld from long at the time of his trial, and they went into state court and held an evidentiary hearing where the judge heard testimony related to the withholding of this evidence. That's a real interesting proceeding because the prosecutor, the individual who tried Ronnie along back in nineteen seventy six, took the stand in testified for long that he didn't
have copies of these reports. He didn't know that this testing was done. Had he known that it was done, he would have required that it been turned over. He also talked about a sexual assault kit that we haven't even talked about, that they collected one from the victim and then it subsequently disappeared.
Jesus Yeah.
So he testified for long, but despite all that, the judging State court ruled against long and found that he hadn't proven that his ranks were violated. The case then went to the North Carolina Supreme Court. There are seven justices on the North Carolina Supreme Court. One set out the decision, and as a result, the Supreme Court split three to three. So Tye went to the state. Ronnie's
conviction was upheld and he was still incarcerated. It then went to an organization in North Carolina called the North Carolina Innocents Inquiry Commission. They reviewed the case and their focus was trying to find the sexual assault kit that was collected and disappeared. They did not find it, but they actually discovered that in two thousand and eight. During the course of those proceedings, officers lied again by saying that they had no physical evidence remaining in the case
in their custody. Winning fact, they had all the latent fingerprints that had been collected from the crime scene. That's when I got involved and the other attorneys I work with at the Wrongful Convictions Clinic, we worked to file another Habeast petition on Ronnie's behalf. It was dismissed because the district Court said that we had failed to bring the fingerprint related evidence in state court prior to filing
our Habeast petition. Of course, it would have been brought in state court had it not been hid during the time that the state post conviction litigation was ongoing. We appealed that dismissal. The Fourth Circuit reversed and sent it back to the district Court. Then the district Court once
again granted a dismissal on behalf of the state. The district court said that while we had shown that evidence was withheld that it was favorable to Long, but that the state court was reasonable in determining that the evidence was immaterial to the outcome of his trial. So it was dismissed again, and we appealed that decision, which came in July of twenty eighteen. The Fourth Circuit Court of
Appeals heard oral arguments. In May of twenty nineteen. A panel entered a decision two to one, saying that Long had failed to demonstrate the materiality of the evidence since the State Court again was reasonable. That decision came down in January of twenty twenty. We then asked for full court review, called a petition for rehearing in Bank. And what that triggers is that full fifteen judge review of the case. The court agreed to hear it while sitting in Bank and next to the argument we had in
on May seventh of twenty twenty. So it's been a long fight to get to the point where we know that the judges are at least, you know, seeing the injustices here that we saw as evidence by the statement of Judge Win during the course of those oral arguments.
Judge Winn said, quote, prosecutors clearly had evidence that any defense council in the world, not only in nineteen seventy six, but in the history of this country would have wanted or needed, and which should have been supplied, and yet we did not provide it. What is it about us that we want to prosecute and keep people in jail when we know evidence may exist that might lead to a different outcome. Why is that so offensive to us now that we want to protect illegal activity from forty
four years ago end quote. And of course he was referring to the illegal activity on the part of law enforcement in this case. So the fifteen judge panel for the enbuank Herring in the Fourth Circuit heard Ronney's case in May twenty twenty, and finally in August, they voted nine to six in Ronnie's favor to reverse the dismissal
of his petition. Then the US District Court granted Ronnie's habeas write, setting him free on August twenty seventh, twenty twenty, after forty four long years, and the very next day, the Cabrest County District Attorney dismissed the charges. I mean, I will never forget watching the live stream of your release. It was really emotional for me, so I can't imagine what it must have been like for you.
I'm sitting on my bunk side come to meet Tim to say, yeah, hurry up. They brought to them clothed right now. I said, man, what's this, Wh'm going to court? He said, nah, Man, they told me release you.
Just that quick.
When that man told me.
There your clothes right there. The wife is out there waiting on you.
I come out.
Listen if you look down and and shoe, my shoes ain't tired. My socks is in my back.
I walked out on my wife birthday you're talking about. I mean elatement to walk out that gate after forty four years and turn around and look at it. I told myself when I looked at it, I would never ever go behind another bar, another locking key. They would never ever locked me up again.
Yeah, you're fucking ay right about that. I mean, so, what did you do with the rest of the day. I mean, it was your wife, Ashley's birthday, as fate would have it, on top of everything else. So pretty nice gift for her, was you? I mean, can you walk us through that magical day?
Doctor? The media who kissed my missus nephew kissed my wife. It had been about ninety days since I seen because of the COVID thing. Man, So me and my lawyer, my wife, a couple of friends with the restaurant state Bucaron and cheese, wasn't champagne and anything? Man, dam and man all yes, man were sitting around me talking man a duilation, being able man to.
Breathe.
Yeah, breathing free air after an amount of time that is incomprehensible to any of us. Roddie, I can't express how happy I am for you. And not long after your release, you filed for a pardon of innocence from Governor Cooper, who agreed to it in December twenty twenty and in March twenty twenty one you receive state compensation, which amounts to it's actually shockingly low, but nothing and
nothing would ever be enough. It works out to about seventeen thousand dollars a year, which feels like a bit of a slap in the face, but there's really nothing. There's no amount that could replace all of that lost time. You can't get it back.
Shit, I can't go back to May ten moncon simancy.
So I mean, what can they give me? I would, though, like understand why, I mean, what type of person, what type of mentality you have when you know you send an innocent person to the gas tang.
Yeah, there's there's no answer to how someone could do that and just go home and sleep at night. And I mean, it doesn't make any sense to me and never will. Is there anything, though, that our audience can do to help you or any of the things you're trying to achieve.
Yeah. Yeah, every day since I've been out. Man, it's a struggle. I gotta go fundme paid. Man, whatever it is you can help me with. I want you to know that I appreciate this.
Yeah. Well, we'll definitely have that link to our bios, so please if you can scroll down and click the link and get involved.
Hey, Jason, listen, I won't let you know man that I appreciate you having a platform for me to speak phone. So Jason, I won't thank you and your network man, stand and say for what you did for me and my calls.
Yeah, Ronnie, look, I mean when I heard about your situation, all of us here at ron Ful Conviction Podcast we had to do whatever we could. You know, there's a lot of people that helped. I'm honored that we were a part of helping you to win your freedom, and I hope we stay friends for a long long time.
I know we will.
So now we turn to the closing of our show. First of all, I just want to thank you, Ronnie for your courage, your strength, your grace. And now I'm gonna turn my microphone off, leave my headphones on. Kick back in my chair, close my eyes, and just listen to whatever you want to share with me at our audience.
Man, it's little look at what they first put me in that seal, and my mind started racing. And the only thing that I could keep telling myself was you got.
To be strong.
You got to be strong.
You got it strong, got you strong.
I took and built on the fact that, Man, I knew I didn't have know been to Dell. I built on the fact that, man, they were scandalizing my family name.
They was scandalized in my name.
It alied on me. When I say that alied on me, man, I'm talking about corruption. Corruption unlied on me. Man, don't put me in the penitentiary. And I knew that I could not let them get away with this shit. Be strong, be strong, be strong, health faith, health, faith, and know that you can overcome any obstacle, any barrier, any hurds in life if you apply yourself.
The mind.
When they say the mind is a terrible thing in the way, bain bullshit. It is you sit around for firsty four years and not do anything to utilize your medical capacity. Next thing, you know, man, you understand saying you walk around on psychotic drugs and everything because you cannot.
Deal with the tension and the stress. It's helped. It's hard, I'm telling you, but your mind is the key, in your heart.
Is your determination.
Thank you for listening to Ronful with Jason Flamm. Please support your local innocence projects and go to the link in our bio to see how you can help. I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Clyburn and Kevin Warnis. The music on the show, as always, 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