On April twenty fifth, nineteen ninety, Robert McLendon saw his biological daughter for the first time in five years, just walking down the street. They stopped and spoke. Later on that same day, the ten year old girl was allegedly abducted, blindfolded, driven to an abandoned house, and raped. According to the victim, she was later able to escape from the assailant's car
when he had stopped at a convenience store. The following day, the victim's mother noticed that she was acting and walking strangely. When asked, the victim alleged that her father, Robert McClendon, had attacked her. She was taken to the hospital where a rape kit was performed. Seamen was not detected, so for now no DNA testing was done, but her underwear
would later become a key piece of evidence. According to a polygraph examiner, the final test of five that were done was ruled to be inconclusive and could have been quote a deliberate attempt at deception. With this dubious result and the testimony of the ten year old victim, Robert
was ultimately confined. Nearly two decades passed while Roberts are fifteen to life for the kidnapping and rape of his biological daughter, before advances in DNA testing made it possible to develop a mail profile from the victims underwear, the Ohio Innocence Project, the Columbus Dispatch, and eventually the prosecutor's office worked diligently to ascertain the truth. This is wrongful conviction.
Welcome back to wrongful Conviction this episode. There's a lot of things in this case that are typical the state that had happened in Ohio, the crime that was committed. But there's a twist in this case. It's you're just going to be scratching your head like I am, because it's crazy. And to tell this story, we have Jennifer Berger on and name you'll recognize. She is a professor of clinical law and the director of operations at the
Ohiolo discens Project. And actually, this, Jennifer, this was your first case, right, it sure was, so I'm sure this is going to be exciting for you, and of course the man himself who lived through this nightmare, Robert McClendon. Robert, I had the pleasure of meeting you, yes recently, and listen, I'm sorry for what you went through. But I'm so glad that you're here to share your story.
Thank you, and I'm really glad to be here.
So before we even get into the actual crime itself, which is a horrific crime. Yes, sir, what was your life like growing up?
Well, I want to say it was a normal life. I didn't have a traditional mom. I come from a family of alcoholic drug apies, but my mom tried the best so she could raising three boys. We're kind of like stairstap kids, and me and my mother we had a lot of disagreements because I've never smoked rick or these drugs, and because I will speak up to my mom and asked her, why don't you cook like other moms and things like that, So my mother would get
on me and she would whoop me in. So I went on the left and I was stayed with my live with my aunt Martha, who basically raised me from a teenager.
All the way up. But I was very good at school, made good grades in school.
So you still managed to perform well in school despite everything else. And then I understand you had three daughters by three different mothers. Not too long after high school. There was Robin Nicole and then your youngest ended up being the victim in this case. But before we get into what happened to her, can you talk a little bit about your kids.
Yeah, I was young and I was there Robin and the cold Life. I didn't really get to know the victim in this case because me and her mom it broke up and I hadn't seen her since she was five years old up until the time, and I saw her when she was ten years old. The mom kept me away from her, and that's just how it was.
But there was a time before the mother ever became pregnant, before your relationship had gone south. Right.
Yeah, I had my own apartment, but I was found myself staying over there a lot with her, and she had two kids, two boys, and we were seeing each other and she, you know, she became pregnant.
And at some point during that pregnancy, she decided that she didn't want you in your daughter's life. And at that time, you were already helping to support your other two daughters while working for the Columbus Parks in a recreation department.
Yeah, City of Columbus, But.
You became a known entity the police with your side hustle, right, selling drugs to supplement your income. No judgment here.
Back then, that's what you did because the money was so good, good and fast, and I felt that because I wasn't using drugs, I was all in and I did very very well until I got caught. I was put on probation. I think the judge saw that I was not a bad person, but when he gave me that probation, there were certain people back then on the police department in the eighties that did not like me and like other guys that did what I did, and they made it very difficult for me and other guys.
And there was one officer in particular who played a pivotal role in your case.
Officer Nardella, that was a detective. He was what you call a dirty cop. He would arrest guys and take their money in their drugs, plant drugs, very corrupt.
And he took a very special interest in you, eventually arresting you while you were on probation, alleging that he had found drugs in your car. And this was in the lead up to your trial for the crime that we're here to discuss today.
But I also want to make a point out that once I was put on probation, I did not indulge in selling drugs anymore.
I think that's important, but it wasn't important to Nardella though, as we so often see, a prior connection to drug deal and can make someone a target for incarceration by any means necessary, even though that past does not make you in any way guilty of another crime like murder or in this case, a rape, and especially the rape of your own daughter. So let's get to the day
of the incident itself. Robert, after the birth of your youngest biological daughter, you had only seen her twice, once at age five, and then curiously, you saw her earlier in the day that this horrendous rape occurred, and it was April twenty fifth, nineteen ninety. Is that accurate?
That it is accurate?
I was going down Hudson Street, going over to a lady friend's house, and this young girl came up to me and said, are you Robert. I think you're my daddy, she says. She remembered me from the pictures of her mother had on her metal piece. So I said, well, tell your mama, said hi, and I asked her how she was doing in school. She said good, and I said, well, keep doing good. In school and till your mama said hi.
Two days later, my attorney called me and told me I needed to turn myself in because I was accused of raping a child.
And we don't know the exact machinations behind you being accused of this rape. Perhaps because you had seen her, maybe there were resentments, maybe her mother had something to do with the blame being placed, and you were really not sure. But we do know for a fact it was not you. I said it again, it was not you. And as we go along here, perhaps motivations become more clear. Now, make no mistake, this little girl absolutely did suffer a
horrible sexual assault that day. According to a statement, It wasn't until the next day, though, that her mother confronted her about how she was acting or walking strangely, and at that point she told her mother that her biological father, you, Robert, had abducted her from her backyard in Columbus, Ohio, tied a sock over her eyes, and drove her off to some abandoned house somewhere where you allegedly raped her on a couch inside the house, ejaculated on her, and then
drove to a convenience store and she was able to escape while you were allegedly inside this store. Now, the victim was taken to a hospital and a rape kit was performed and no seamen was identified on her underwear or on vaginal swamps, so no DNA testing was done as a result. But remember this is nineteen ninety and DNA testing approved over time, and this evidence became irrelevant
again later. However, back in nineteen ninety, when asked if she could identify the attacker, the victim said, quote, I think it was my dad, but I may be wrong because my eyes were covered. So at that point, things were not looking good for Robert.
Well, yes, I mean when we first looked at this case, it was very perplexing. I mean, Robert has been very steadfast in his innocence from day one, and you know, I wanted to believe what he was saying, but I was also kind of perplexed by why would this young girl make something up against her own father. It could have been something manufactured in her own head, maybe completely innocently, or it could have been something that was planted in her head by someone from her family. I don't know.
Then things take another tragic turn, right, which is that you Robert were arrested and charged with kidnapping and rape of this child. Yes, Robert, take us back to that awful day when you were arrested, did falsely accused and in fact charged with this horrendous crime.
My attorney didn't believe it. I thought it was some type of mistake. I was given a very low bond of one thousand dollars and was released.
Wait, a thousand dollars bond. That's like what they give somebody for like riding their bike on the sidewalk. I mean, this seems really way off for this horrible crime that we're discussing here. But we're going to come back to that now. Let's just say for now that it doesn't seem like your attorney was the only one who didn't believe these allegations.
This judge, Judge Johnson, what's the same judge that put me on probation for aggravated trafficking during the time when they were a war on drugs.
The police apartment would hate it by goods.
Okay, okay. So now you're out awaiting trial and some people in the police department feel some kind of way about that, and that's when Nardella pulled you over.
I had a beautiful red Mercedes that was customized, and there's a code.
When you are dealing drugs or selling.
Drugs, you never ever do it. When you're driving your prize car, you don't carry, you don't do anything wrong. Anybody's selling drugs. When you're driving your show car, you're not working. There's never nothing wrong. There's no drugs, there's no illegal activities, no guns or anything in these cars.
Well, that makes sense as a practical matter, because in theory, they could take the car.
Yeah, I mean, yeah, he arrested me and put drugs in my car because I was on probation, and he knew that I would go to jail and not be able to get out because I was on probation.
So now you're locked up for over a year awaiting trial, unable to fight the case from the outside, ineligible for bail, and now I need to go back to how bail was originally said at one thousand dollars. I mean, if they actually believed you to be the kind of sick bastard that would rape your own ten year old daughter, that just it doesn't add up. It makes no sense.
Yeah, I agree, What was.
The prosecutor did not want to take this case because he didn't think he could win. That's why he opted for me to take a polygraph test, and if I passed a polygraph test, would not even go to trial, Sir.
And the polygraph test, we know that they're not accurate. Even if the examiner is a true expert at reading the results, there's still only approximately seventy percent accurate. So it's a little better than guessing right.
My attorney gave me a pre polygraph test. I passed it with flying colors. They gave me four polygraph tests. We now know that the guy that did the polygraph test was corrupt. They were looking for a failed result and they got what I think was close to it when it came back inconclusive.
So a State Highway Patrol examiner found, which is again subjective, that your answers quote unquote, could be a deliberate attempt at deception. That could apply to any polygraph test. You could literally be you could have the best polygraph test in the history of the world. Right they equivalent of getting eight hundreds on your SATs. You could nail it right, and they could still go that it could be in them. I don't know, maybe I don't know, it could be
something looked like you might have tried to say. I mean, that's a ridiculous I have to laugh because if I don't, I'm going to cry or I'm going to break something. You know, yes, sir, oh, okay. So you've got this polygraphic examiner saying that this could be a deliberate attempt at deception, which could be something a corrupt polygraphic examiner would testify to. And then you've got the victim saying that it was you and you decided to go for a bench trial.
They chose to go with a bench trial because of the nature of this crime. It was such a horrendous crime, and there was going to be testimony from a ten year old girl. And I think it's very hard for nu juror to hear the testimony of a ten year old who went through this and a quit, even if it's the right thing to do.
My attorney said, a jury would think that if you're a drug dealer, that you're a child molestor. We opted for a trial with Judge Johnson because he felt that Judge Johnson would follow the law.
And that seems like a very rational decision. With the circumstances as you.
Described, every person knows why they were found guilty. There's two causes of why I was found guilty, the testimony of the child and the inconclusive results of the polygraph test that I believe the prosecutor sold to the judge more powerful than what my attorney did. If my attorney dropped the ball anytime it was with he did not convince the judge that inconclusive results of the polygraph test means you did not feel it and you did not pass it.
Yeah, they gave it to you four times. The probably would have given it to you forty times. And eventually, just because of that, you know, I mean, because they were you know, if you keept passing that, we're going to keep doing it. And because we know how inaccurate these things are. Eventually the law of averages says you're going to either fail one or be inconclusive or whatever
it is. So yeah, I mean this is important because as anyone in our audience could end up on a jury at a criminal trial, please be aware that these things, well he's not even allowed to be introduced as evidence. That's how that's how inaccurate these things are they're not even allowed to be introduced as evidence, right. But it's not like your lawyer did nothing. I mean, he did present alibi witnesses. I mean, there was a cable guy who would have no agenda.
I mean.
And then it was your friend Laverne, who you had been with all that day, and I understand that they were very rough with her. But like you said, your lawyer didn't do enough to combat the bogus polygraph evidence. And of course, what can be said to combat the tearful words of a ten year old victim.
There's nothing more powerful than a beautiful child on stand that points a finger at you and say that you did something. I had family members in the audience, and they told me that we are your family, we love you. But if we did not know you, and the way that girl pointed their finger at you and said you did it, we would believe it.
Take us back to that moment, that awful, awful moment when the judge declared you incorrectly declared you guilty of this rape and kidnapping and sentence you to fifteen years of life in prison.
I remember Judge Johnson even to this day. He said, the testimony of the child was powerful.
I believe that you're guilty.
And I shook my head and I said, Judge Johnson, I did not do this. He shook his head and he looked down and he said, Son, I think you're guilty.
Never forget it.
When I walked into that sale, it was like I was being closed out of the whole world, Like the whole world was over.
No.
Prison is a nice place. I think you have to be adaptable to it. I adapted to it. I helped a young guys, gang beggars get their GEDs. I'm very proud of that. And I did most of my time at ROSS. In the last year I was transferred to Chillicoty.
And Jennifer, how did Roberts case become the first case that you ever worked on and how did you end up prevailing against all odds?
Yeah. So I came here almost fifteen years ago, and there was a project underway already that the High Winnescence Project was doing with the Columbus Dispatch newspaper, and the reporters had realized that prisoners across the state of Ohio had been asking for post conviction DNA testing in Ohio and the vast, vast majority of times they asked for testing, it was just either summarily denied or in a lot of cases, the judges never even ruled on the applications.
So they teamed up with us and reviewed the several hundred cases where individuals had asked for post conviction DNA testing and had been denied or nothing had happened, and they ended up choosing thirty cases, and Roberts was one of those. There was a whole series of articles in the Columbus Dispatch that came out in two thousand and eight called test of Convictions. So the Ohio Innocence Project and the Ohio Public Defender did a few of the thirty cases. So I had a handful of those, and
Roberts was one of them. We filed for DNA testing in I think February of two thousand and eight, and much to my surprise, the Franklin County Prosecutor's office actually agreed to do the testing, which, based on the responses we were getting from others across the state, was shocking. I always theorized that at the time they did it because they were so convinced he was guilty that it would just come back and prove it and that would be fine, which is fine with me because then it
would show the system worked. I didn't care why they were deciding to agree. I was just glad they were, but that was my theory. So as a result of that, we ended up entering in agreed order to have the items tested. The rape kit was searched for, but that was long since gone. But fortunately they had the victims underwear still in storage at the prosecutor's office.
When I fouled for DNA testing three times, they said the underwear was missing or they couldn't find them. But when the Ohio Innocent Project and the Columbus Patch got involved, voila the underwear.
That reminds me of the Allen Newton case in New York, where for over twenty years they were denying the existence of the evidence. They said it had been lost, and when the Innocence Project got involved, they found it in exactly the place where it was supposed to be and a ile with his name on it. And it's like Jesus Christ, like this sounds like some banana Republic, third world country type of stuff. And this was New York City.
So it's a miracle. I mean, you know that there was evidence left to test, and it's a travesty that there isn't a national standard for the preservation of this type of evidence that literally turns out to be the difference between dying in prison, quite possibly, and living life.
Yeah, that was one of the unfortunate discoveries from thirty cases. There were several where I mean, I can think of one person in particular where I do believe they're innocent, but all of the evidence was gone.
And who's that This.
Was for Marion Reynolds, Yes, someone I know.
Yeah, his wasn't the only case, but yeah, there was just a complete lack of any sort of uniform standards anywhere across the state. Fortunately, due to legislation that came into effect. I believe in twenty ten that's changed in Ohio by statute, although unfortunately I don't think all of the law enforcement agencies are following it at this point, but theoretically they should be now maintaining evidence in a more uniform way. But fortunately for Robert, at least they
had the underwear. It had been looked at way back at the time of trial, and they had determined that there wasn't any ceman or sperm on it, which is partially why I thought they figured either they weren't going to get any results, or if they did, it would
come back and show Robert. But in any case, they agreed, which was great, and we wanted to do YSTR testing on it because at this time that was the best way to find any male DNA, since we figured most of the DNA would be from the victim who was female.
And ultimately they agreed to that, so we ended up sending it to private lab here in Fairfield that is certified by the state of Ohio and DDC, the private company, in cooperation with the Columbus Dispatch, had agreed to do the testing in all of these cases, all thirty of them for free, and Robert's happened to be the first one.
The results come back, and sure enough it proves that what Robert had been saying from was true. He had nothing to do with this. Jennifer, what was that moment? Like, you must have been ecstatic.
Yeah.
I happened to be on vacation at the beach when the results came in, and you know, I was trying not to think about work, but then I get the information about this and it just blew my mind. I mean it was amazing. I remember we went out to dinner that night. I was out with my family and I was just kind of like in a daze of like, wow, this this really happened and it's not him. And then you know, this was the first case I had worked,
so the first time, you know, i'd received results. So then my head was spending with Okay, now what do we do? Of course, you know Robert didn't know.
Right, So that's the thing I'm dying to know. So there you are at the beach, you're celebrating. You're probably almost in a state of shaka like I was. I loved my job. You're like, I can all the emotions, right, How did you communicate this to Robert? And then I want to get to Robert's reaction. I got to know everything.
Tell me well, because the Dispatch was involved, the two reporters, Jeffutt and Mike Wagner, really wanted to be there to document us giving the results to Robert. And I can let him tell the story about meeting these two requires, but he knew them and they kind of had a good relationship going, so they definitely wanted to be there. So they worked it out with the prison, so they
had a camera crew there. I mean, I felt bad for Robert having not told him ahead of time, but I promised the reporters I wouldn't and also obviously we knew it was good news.
They have alerted my people that the results were in, but they never said anything about what the results was.
My people are going crazy, well, what is it? What?
So I'm in the hallway and the attorneys are walking by and no one's looking at me at all. It makes me think about you knowing the jury. The jury comes in, they say, if they don't look at you, you're guilty. So I'm looking at the body language. I'm looking for eye contact. Okay, what Jennifer walks in. I'm looking at Jennifer. She don't look at me.
I think. A couple of the students walk by.
I'm looking at them.
They don't look at me.
Now, I remember a conversation that me and Mike Wagner had because he played basketball, and he said if I ever got out that we was going to go to the y and play basketball together. So then he walks by, and I'm looking for some type of reaction from him. He's looking straight on the floor, but he says, you ready for that basketball game, and I just say that's when I knew.
Otherwise what was going on. So they mustn't came back inconclusive. You know, inconclusive haven't worked out too well for me.
Everyone's keeping a poker face and he spills to be I guess he could have resisted. I mean, and then I read that you said, hello, truth, I never ever raped anyone? Is that an accurate quote?
The first words I said after Jennifer gave me the results was hello Truth.
I have a card.
My business card is a picture of me receiving my DNA results from Jennifer.
My favorite picture.
So seventeen almost seventeen years in prison, you were freed. Tell us about that day when you finally came home.
When I got out.
When I first got out, I went out and I said Hello Truth and hello freedom. They had a camera crew there and they asked me what I wanted to eat, and of course I said wings and the not old pizza. They brought stacks of pizza and stacks of wings over to my daughter's mom's house, and I was just like,
in a day, it's still surreal. So many people are talking to you and everything, and you just realized you just walked out of hell into heaven basically, and you're in a zone where you're there, but you're not there. It was special being around loved ones and friends and people that had been there with me through the journey that Ohio, an Innocent Project and the Columbus Dispatch were there for hours, all the way up until nighttime. It was wonderful. One of the best days of my life.
It is wonderful, and it's actually really important that we not leave out the fact that for those seventeen years of your wrongful incarceration, no one was looking for the guy that actually did this. And we owe it to ourselves as a society to make the system better and fairer for everyone, you know, to get justice for the victims and justice for the innocent person, and to get
the real perpetrator off the streets. So, Robert, did they ever find out who the real perpetrator was in this particular case.
Yes, yes.
Ron O'Brien the prosecutor is the county prosecutor in Columbus, Ohio, who has work very closely with the Innocent Project where he wanted to do his own DNA tests.
A follow up.
Of course, I was going crazy Kogle for cocoaps.
Okay, yeah, this is while you were still in, before you got it.
While I was still in because I thought there was a fix in. I thought there was something going on. They're getting ready to undo this somehow the Ohio Instant Project and told me that the science is a science. Robbert's gonna come up the same. So the results come back again. It was not me, but this time, sir, they came back with a hit. A known suspect, the seventeen year old son, had molested her at the age
of ten years old. They continue to have a consential relationship while she was a teenager, and then continue to have a consential relationship into their adult life. Ronald Ryan told me when he presented the evidence to the mom, she did not even seem surprised. I asked, ron can we take this guy to court to prosecute him? He said, Robert, we can't do it because during the consential relationship, she would never take the stand against Now, how wicked is that?
Guys.
I'm rarely at a loss for words, but I don't have any words to say. It's going to take me a minute. Sorry, I'm to apologizing to the audience. This is the first I learned of this. Yeah, did they not know this before the DNA proved it? Or was this known to some people in positions of authority at the time of your wrong for conviction.
I'm not sure.
Everything that happened to this child. I always empathized, guys. I always empathized with this child because I knew and believed that something happened to this child, and I was very empathetic as a result of that. It just was not me, And I was even empathetic until we always thought.
It might have been a family member.
But I stopped being empathetic to this child when I found out that they was in a relationship while I was sitting in jail righting all this time, knowing that I was in prison, and her mother coerced her into saying all that stuff on the stand.
Her mother knew all along.
There's a layer of evil in that that.
Is really there.
Is her.
I'm glad you said that were because that's exactly how I feel.
A sir. I've been hearing a lot of amazing things that you've been engaged in on behalf of other axigneries and the community and I would love to hear about that.
I've been an advocate for the Ohio interc Project since I've been out doing speaking engagement schools, colleges, universities, getting the word out, talking about what happened to me and what happened to others. We all go to court and when some of the other designeries are out to be of support for their families and the other exigneries. There's nothing more powerful than being there for one of your own when they get out to the free world. And then once they're out in the free world.
They need help. We all need help.
Some of these guys come out with issues as myself PTSD and such financial problems. Me and Dean were kind of like the ogs of the O High Innocent Project, and you guys should talk to him. His story is powerful to that lawyers can't talk about the things that me and Dean can talk to to other dexigneries that you well know, Me and Dean were there to talk to these guys. We're on call twenty four to seven to these guys when they have problems.
We're real with it, you know. They tell us everything they come to us. We have a lady by the name of Dona Mayerson.
Who does a lot of work in regards to our counseling, mental health and things like that. Somebody that we trust who's there for us. It's just giving back.
That's a really beautiful thing. And you mentioned Dean. That's Dean Gillespie and I remember meeting him at the Innocents Network conference this year. I met him several times before in the past, and it sounds like the work you're doing just keeps the spirit of the conference, you know, the camaraderie alive all year and just being a witness being a part of that incredible energy. I wish I could bottle it and share it with people and just take a sip of it whenever I need the inspiration
because it's it's almost impossible to describe it. Anyone who's been there knows what I'm talking about, and you're doing that every day, So kudos to you. So I also understand that you've been active in getting so much needed legislation passed, which is incredible. I mean, can you fill us in on what you've been up.
To House Bill seventy seven. I was there, we helped do that.
I'm going to let Jennifer talk about the four part deal or she can describe it there at the media.
Boy, you're putting me on the spot for the four parts. But basically those the last big overhaul of the Ohio DNA post Conviction Statute, and it did things like put in the statute the right to have codis upload of any DNA results, and it also it addressed recording of
interrogations and preservation of evidence. It was for the first time put in state wide standards on what evidence and what crimes needs to be kept and for how long, so that we could stop running into the issues of not being able to do testing because it was gone up. Oh yes, thank you, and changing the way photo lineups are supposed to be done in Ohio so that it's not the six packs, but is done with what they called a folder method, so it's done one at a
time to try to decrease the amount of mistaken identity. Yes, so Robert was very helpful with going around and meeting with a bunch of legislators to just tell them his story firsthand, and I think, you know, hearing from him and others who'd been through similar situations really helped the legislators understand why the legislation was important.
And Mark because of that legislation, Mark has me talking to someone here in New York when your guys in about social security because as you will know, when you're in prison, you don't get to pay in social security or retirement or nothing. And when you get out the conversation that they give you, trust me, after you've become a victim of being used by your family like I did, it's just not enough. Some exigneries end up with nothing.
Some exigneries end up being in financial tragedies, financial straits. Is say it because we just don't have the income to make it, and social Security would help out here that some people. We could probably get it under PTSD because all of us suffer from some forms of PTSD when we get out.
But we need powerful people.
That's going to get together and put their heads and their efforts together to make this happen.
You know, this idea has been floating around in the Zeitgeis lately, and I feel like it's finally starting to grow some wings. So let's work together. Let's amend the thirteenth Amendment or make a new amendment to the Constitution that closes the slavery loophole in the thirteenth Amendment, and by the way, it's on the ballot this November twenty twenty two in five states Louisiana, Alabama, Oregon, Tennessee, and Vermont.
So again, Louisiana, Alabama, Oregon, Tennessee, and Vermont. If you live in one of those five states, you have an opportunity to make your voice heard and to help abolish slavery once and for all, and eventually we get all fifty states. I mean, if you think it would be a no brainer that there would be no slavery anywhere regardless of your legal status, but who knows in our
current political climate, I shudder to think anyway. With all of that said, I want to thank both of you for joining us here today and sharing this incredible story and just for being.
Who you are and thank you for having us. Yeah, thank you, Jennifer. I want to say thank you again. I don't know if how many times I can.
I'll never get tired of saying, but you're welcome. It was privileged to work with you.
Wow.
And of course, please support the Ohio Innocence Project. Their work is saving lives to this very day and they need all of our support. We'll put a link in the bio, and of course that brings us to closing arguments, where I just turn my microphone off, kick back in my chair and listen for whatever you feel is left to be said. So Jennifer please go first, and then Robert close it out for us.
Well, I just want to say thank you again for having me on and for putting a spotlight on these stories that are important and need to be shared. And I also want to thank Robert. It's the fourteenth anniversary of the day I was there with you when you were able to walk out of jail, and it was one of the most memorable days of my life. And I've just enjoyed watching you over these last fourteen years and seeing all the good that you've been doing to pay it forward to all the other men and women
who've been in situations similar to you. So thank you for your work with them and also for helping us out over time.
Appreciate it.
I just want to say that the worst day of my life was when I was wrongfully convicted and sentenced to fifteen years of life for raping kidnapping, But the happiest day on my life was when I was free to help the Ohio Interstry Project and Columbus Dispatch because it's freed me to where I'm.
At now, where I've been able to be there.
For other people to, as you say, pay it forward with the Ohio Interstry Project. I think it's important that I don't regrets no one who gets out that want to just go their own way and do their own thing.
And they have people do that. But I feel like I've.
Never had a job since I've been out because I feel like this is my job. This is my job, and I'm on board. I'm serious about it, and it means it means the world to me because I noticed there's other people in there that should be out and I'm just doing my part to just help and bring the attention to me. So I want to thank you all. I want to thank you Jennifer, I want to thank you Jason. Want to thank Connor for the opportunity.
Thank you for listening to Rafel Conviction. I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Cliburn, and Kevin Wartis. With research by Lyla Robinson. The music in this production was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction podcast, and on Twitter at wrong Conviction, as well as at Lava for Good. On all three platforms, you can also follow me on both
TikTok and Instagram at it's Jason Flam. Wrongful Conviction is the production of Lava for Good podcasts and association with Signal Company Number one