#330 Jason Flom with Tysheem Crocker

In October nineteen ninety seven, two overlapping groups of friends from New York, one known as the Cream Team, the other is the Gods, were living in York, Pennsylvania. Three of these young men were Danny Steele, Melvin Bethune, and

I'm glad i'm here. Thank you, Thank you for having me.

You're most welcome. And with him is his post conviction pro bono attorney, the Tsia Shaviz Free Latsia. Welcome to the show.

Thank you for having me.

Jason, You're also very welcome, so tayshim. This crime happened in Pennsylvania, but you're not from there, originally from the Bronx, right, So tell me a little bit about your childhood.

I was born to a teenage mother. My mom was sixteen. You know, she wasn't ready to be a mother yet, so she picked me in, forced a kid, and I spent my first four years out in Queens. It was like eighty one. She decided she wanted to be back. I moved back to the Bronx. It was rough, we were poor. I was pretty much terrified at my mom. That was like the only person I was scared of. Around the ages twelve, I was back and forced to kid and out of her presidence. I just became a.

Street kid, so tayshim. He had a pretty hard life and was living in the Bronx. You know, this is at the height of the epidemic. Friends of his are literally dying.

I went after Yo Kia because my best friend has just got cute. I was fourteen, he was fifteen, and he got cute. The next day, another one of my closest friends got cute, and I was off for the opportunity to go to York. So I jumped on the bus and went out there.

What did you do to support yourself to survive out there.

I started hustling. I started taking pass from people older gous.

So this is the sort of thing where you did the dirty work for the older guys because in theory, at least a miner wouldn't get into that much trouble, right.

That's how it goes.

So it's my understanding that's a pretty low level drug dealer. Him and a lot of the kids. He also runs with a group of young people known as like the Cream Team. And you know, there's several groups, but two of them are called the Gods and the other one's the Cream Team. The District Attorney's office tried to paint this as some gang, but really Cream just means cash rules everything around me.

So they were Wu Tang fans, yes, And I mean anyone who's aware of Wu Tang Cash rules everything around me is probably there could be their most iconic song and terms like gods and earths. Some of the members of Wu Tang are really into the theories of the five percent nation where those terms come from. And we could get into all of that on a totally different podcast. But Wu Tang had just come out with their debut album,

The Cream Team and the guys were once of kids from the Bronx. We was rolling up together. We went to the same schools, Eat pautied together, and we ended up in Pennsylvania hustling.

So were you on the radar of the York Police before all of this happened.

I talked about a week in prison for a couple backs in marijuana, and I was like eighteen up there. It was like forty.

Grand, forty fucking grand for some weed. Jesus well, I mean this was the nineties when the War on drugs was in full swing. It still is, unfortunately with the large ETI and if you're listening to us right now, you might want to check out our new series called The War on Drugs. We're gonna have it linked in the bio. Check it out the War on Drugs podcast.

There was no conflict that rose to the level of want to take.

A life right, and Kendo Smith wasn't the victim anyway, but rather a guy named Raymond skip Clark, who I'm guessing was one of the gods as well.

No, he wasn't a member of the gods. He wasn't even flims with Smith that I know of. Got night. No guys were at this dice game except can Do Smith.

So the states there about a beef between the Gods and the Cream team is not holding up so far. It's full of holes. But this beef, however, inconsequential, was something you intended to bring up with Ken du Smith when you saw him at the dice game. This was October fifth, nineteen ninety seven, on the corner of Maple and Duke in New York, Pennsylvania, where there was a regular dice game. Kend Do Smith was there as well

I never saw Raymond Clark that man, but according to court documents, he was at the dice game. He was playing games. I got to the dice game and I told the work I needed to talk to him. Before we could talk, a shot was fired. He ran and I ducked. No one knows who fired that shot. It came from behind me. When I ducked and I land, you know it was more shots fired. No one was injured. Approximately five to ten minutes later and two blocks away,

So not only had you not even seen the victim at the dice game, but at this point you had no idea that anyone had even gotten hurt. So shots were fired, everyone scattered, total chaos. Did you have a clue? Did anyone have a clue why this was even happening?

There is essentially no serious beef at the time where they feel like they should be targeted for any reason. But they're taking off because there's gunfire and they know what gunfire can do.

So when they got a hotel.

But according to the state's theory, you checked into the hotel before going to the dice game before Raymond Clark's death, sometime between like ten and eleven PM.

That is what they wanted the jury in the court to believe. I checked into the Super eight at about twelve thirty one in the morning. I let Mel know where I was going, I left there and even where I was going, and they spent the night with me.

And at that point, not only did you not know that Skip Clark was dead, but you also didn't know that your boy Danny Steele was about to use a shared room at the Super eight as a premise for a false statement, which really ends up being the basis of the state's entire case. And we'll get to that in a bit. But first, letitia, what do we know about the initial investigation, Like how did they even end up coming upon Danny?

So we have no idea exactly what happened. Ty Shim's lawyer, the person who would have gotten the box of evidence or whatever he's passed. When we go to Melvin's attorney, this is over twenty plus years ago.

He doesn't have that box, so the usual trough of information was not available. But what we do know about this incident is that there were a thought of witnesses, some of whom spoke with you and your lead investigator, Kitty Haley way later in twenty twenty one.

Well, what we find out later is that Raymond Clark he's found with drugs on his person, and it is noted that he apparently owed Danny Steele some money.

Turns out maybe I think like a week after that, Danny was interrogated, and.

At least four people have testified both the trial and

Coleon was a made up figure Danny Steele made up so he could tend this homicide on somebody he made on a shooter.

It's like they sat around and watched The Godfather and then went and tried a case. That's how it feels. Some guy named Corleone who's never been identified, and some other guys from New York, they all go to the Super eight Motel and they want blood for what happened to Melvin yesterday. Melvin was disrespected or something, and they want blood. So they're all going to get guns from a friend's house and then they're going to go down there and shoot up the Gods at a dice game.

Now, The theory continued that in order to arrive at the Dice Game before the shootings took place around eleven thirty pm, this alleged crew of Muscle from the Bronx had to have checked into the Super eight Motel by ten thirty PM or earlier in order to have time for a thirty to sixty minute plotting session as well

Now, Danny Steele, this is important. He has charged with the exact same crimes as Melvin and Tysheen, so you would think he'd get the exact same punishment or close for murder. For conspiracy to commit murder, he did two years in the county jail, presumably because he couldn't go to state prison because you know, he was a known snip.

From what I understand, he had also been convicted of perjury twice before. So this is the guy on whom the entirety of the state's case rests and what they used to issue arrest warrants for both Melbourne and Taysheem. And at the time, Melvin had just pled guilty to some unrelated drug charges.

Correct. He takes a plea and he's getting ready to go to prison, and the police come to let him know that he's been indicted on these charges, and he's just shocked. There's no conversation. They don't take him down to the police station and interview him.

They had all the information they wanted from Danny Steele. Now, tyshim, you were back in New York at the time, and during a routine traffic stop, NYPD discovered that you were wanted in New York, Pennsylvania.

No Manchila got arrested, that I was a fugitive. I got picked up January nineteen ninety eight and forty fifth feet with twenty seventh and eighth Avenue. I was arrested and I haven't been on a street service. And while PD picks me up, I'm extradited down to York where I was charged.

When he gets to York and he's in the County jail, there's no interview. The information and the story has already been told by Danny Steele. But there's literally a fifteen minute drive at one point from one drop off location to the jail with a police officer.

Dennis Williams was the arresting detective. While he's driving me to the York County prison, he said, I know you didn't kill Rainey Clock, but I do know you're part of the Cream team. I can get you a deal if you cooperate, And I told him I didn't know nothing innocent. A few months after that, They offered me another deal five to ten, and I turned that down.

Danny Steele did less than three years in the county jail. That's jail, right, not prison, And that was part of his deal to avoid running into other people who he had flipped on previously. And so no one was ever charged with being skipped. Clark's shooter Corleone certainly wasn't. It's hard to charge a ghost after all. And now all three of you had been charged with murder, but only

So conspiracy liability requires proof of an agreement or a common design to commit the lawful act for which the person is convicted. So a person cannot be convicted of conspiracy from merely being present during the commission of a crime. There has to be some step taken, some proof of the agreement, you know, and then obviously the crime. For accomplass liability, it requires more than mere presence during the commission of a criminal act, even if the accused knew

So because you were alleged to have met beforehand, establishing the intent, and then followed through with your part of the supposed conspiracy by allegedly pulling a gun on Ken du Smith that then made you, in turn responsible in some degree for the murder of Skip Clark, the alleged end result of this alleged organized confrontation.

I do, I end it. I didn't realize what conspiracy laws accomplished liability was. I didn't realize when you moved pieces on a chessboard to Atlanta, the way you want it to be seen, you can make something look like something that it wasn't. We were kids, you know, in our adversary we used for chrome, men seasoned, you know, politicians prosecuted. And I did not realize what was going on until it was too.

Late, that they had fabricated a narrative with Danny Steele to convict you through these conspiracy and accomplished liability laws that you were unaware of. So Melvin was already in prison for the unrelated drug charges, so he didn't bond out, but neither did you. You both were being held separately from Danny Steele, but at this point you didn't even know about what he had done. Right, So when did you first realize what he was doing to you?

The first time I see him is at my preliminary here, and he's testifying against me. You know, he's saying that I'm the leader of the Cream team that prior to the Dice Game shooting, that we met at a motel and agreed to kill someone. Actually at the preliminary here when he said we agreed to step to these guys to try to squash this beef. With the proceedings, his testimony, you know, would constantly change and get more dramatic and more incriminating.

There were a lot of inconsistencies in the telling of these various stories by Danny Steele, but there wasn't necessarily a rigorous, vigorous defense from Taishim's counsel. Melvin's council, when looking at the transcript, tended to do a better job right.

Both families had hired counsel prior to the January ninety nine trial, but only Melvin's family was able to pay and maintain counsel.

So this attorney that was representing me at the time, Allen Smith, you know, he was never paid him full and he thought the motion to withdraws council. I didn't know that. I could have still been getting counsel by the state, which probably would have been a bad attorney anyway, as bad as he was. But he never did nothing after that, after the judge told him the motion was denied, we countinue to proceed to trial without an investigation of what going on.

So it sounds like you didn't even have an attorney.

Absolutely, I didn't have an attorney. I didn't have a suit, I didn't have shoes, I didn't have family, I didn't have an attorney.

Tayshiem would come to the courthouse not a suit, but in an orange jumpsuit. So this was not, you know, someone being able to put forth their best defense, and.

In order to combat the state, especially with what we now know that they were willing to hide, you were going to need a vigorous investigation from zealous attorneys and a whole team that would have done things like carul Ken do Smith to the stand. He has since gone on the record that you did not, in fact point to gun at him, which directly contradicts the state's narratives. Now, how your counsel didn't at least contact can do is

Throughout the trial, he kept mentioning that, you know, he was incentivized, that he's hoping, he's hoping that the prosecutors do right by him and only give him two to five years in the county. And that's exactly what they give him.

He literally told the judge and jury why his own statement was unreliable. He's like, I'm receiving a benefit for lying here. He's spelling it out. Now, how are they

She's the one who checks Tyshi Min. She knows this now. Raymond Clark dies at eleven thirty pm that night, That's when he's shot. We know this for a fact. She doesn't come on until eleven pm.

Right. The state spoke to her, but they didn't want to hear about how Tayshiim checked it at twelve thirty one o'clock in the morning at this conspiracy meeting. In fact, that never took place.

She tried to offer help and they didn't want to hear it. She had documents, you know, where he signed, as well as any telephone calls he would have made out of that room because it's the nineties, and they could have turned that over to Tayshim's lawyers, and that never happened.

And perhaps these documents the telephone records may have also been timestamped.

Miss Flinch boss Siler says that the records she maintained for the hotel have a bottom section which indicates the exact times the calls made from each room, So it's not known if the police or prosecutors were in possession of that part of the document, But the documents used at trial were the only ones that she was asked to review that she was asked to talk about. And they don't have the exact times the calls made.

And no one from the defense went looking for call logs. It's totally irresponsible. I mean, have been helpful to know what time the calls were made, but that specifically wasn't in the documents used by the state of trial. And from what I understand, they deliberately limited Terry Flinch boss Siler's testimony.

She was told by the prosecutors, you're not allowed to speak. You're going to answer yes or no to my questions.

Right. They were merely trying to establish that a phone call had taken place, but they specifically did not want to know when, and they definitely didn't want to know when her shift started or when Tyshim, Melvin and Danny would checked in because that would have blown up their case. They knew about Terry and these phone records, so it looks like they knew that they were presenting false testimony. Now, the phone call was important to them because it corroborated

Our investigator was able to speak with Talker, so she was dating Melvin. She did speak with him that night. She never told the prosecutor or the police that Melvin was interested in hurting or shooting up the young men

I guess the state strategy was, if you're going to lie, go big, and they were able to hide those lies from these alleged witnesses because witnesses aren't typically allowed to sit in court to watch the proceedings, but here it seems this rule was a convenient way to hide them from what was being said about them. Like Kalanda Chance, who had told the police that she had been at the scene earlier in the evening but left prior to the shooting. I knew nothing about it. Now, what did

Klanda Chance she was provided with a copy of the trial transcript and was upset to read that the prosecutor was attempting to tie her into a web of lies about Melvin wanting to shoot up men on the corner. She never knew about the plan to use her as a link between Taker Redman's conversation and the actual shooting. She further claimed that the prosecutors were trying to make two groups of friends, the Cream Team and the Guards, look like a hardened criminal gang, even though that was not so.

But even if you want to believe that these two groups were hardened criminal organizations help ent on destroying the otherwise decent, hardworking town of York, Pennsylvania, the evidence simply doesn't support the state's theory. Terry flinch buss Siler was the clerk who checked Taishim into the Super eight, and her shift started at eleven PM, So even if he was waiting there for her shift to start before he checked in, there's just not enough time to check in.

It's impossible, and they knew it was impossible, but they went with the dewy and the judge told the jilly that is Ty wasn't at that motel prior to the shooting. Toy couldnot be cal guilty as or a copysprumity in this case. But while I was on trial, I didn't have the information I'm in possession from now right.

They did, though, and the state used testimony that they knew was false in order to trick the jury into believing that this alleged conspiracy meeting was both plausible and real, and I'm sure Danny's admission to his involvement acted as a stamp of legitimacy. Then they alluded to this alleged phone confession from Melvin that was never actually confirmed or corroborated, and the jury bought at Lockstock and Barrel. They convicted you both and sentenced you to life in prison.

I watched Melvin cry after we was convicted. I cried, didn't. I couldn't believe it. I was in disbelief. I didn't even know we could get life because we didn't kill anybody. No I'm not telling this story yet. Living this story. Prison there's something different than everybody. You know. It's like a hospital, it's like a hotel. It's like a hideout. It's like a hangout. It's like a hostage situation. It's the word so being awfully convicted. It's about us fun.

Well, then trying to make peace with the fact that he has a son he'll never watch grow up, that he's going to be spending the rest of his life in a prison for a crime he didn't come. I don't believe Melvin has ever received legal help. Maybe one time for a post conviction relief. I don't know that he learned to use the law library and advocate for himself like tayshim did.

Every weeged moment. I'm fighting for my life and it was giving me the worst attorneys. You know, my first attorney was sleeping in the same prison I was in for the US when he dropped the bull. They gave me another lawyer. She was helpful, but she was in over her hair because her expertise was social security claims, so it was really me. I had to learn the law myself.

So you've taught yourself the law, as we often see as absolutely necessary for our guests to do, and you also saw it outside help like investigators and lawyers, and you've been funding that by writing and selling books. Who are you, dude? That's amazing. I mean, I see you've written eight books.

I've written fifteen books. I got eight published. They're all available for purchase.

I just received, by the way, your latest book. It's called It Could Happen to any of Us, and that's like a mantra of mine. So I'm really looking forward to reading it, and we're gonna make sure to link your books in the bio. This is how you've been funding your fight for freedom, and I hope our audience will show their support. So let's talk about that fight.

And in two thousand and three I found out that Danny still had a secret deal with the Commonwealth. The two and a half to five. So I found my first PCRA on my own in two thousand and three. I was unsuccessful because they said that this information was in the public domain and that I could have voted in the first pcl the council PCLA with the attorney they gave me, who never read the record, never interviewed me, never tried to interview anybody.

See, this is the kind of bullshit I'm talking about. Since the information was in the public domain, meaning that it existed among all the information in the world and wasn't being kept under lock and key, then it was technically in the public domain during his first post conviction motion and his counsel didn't find it and build a motion around it. So then the issue cannot be raised again. I don't even know what to say. And then there's only a certain amount of time that it can be raised.

The judge felt like this information was in the public domain between the time of need filing it and whin though close him on my first pc out right, and.

In Pennsylvania back then, you'd only get sixty days since legislation.

You know, it's three hundred and sixty five days now.

Oh yeah, that's really fucking generous. I mean, who does legislation like that serve or punished? Think about it. It's not like people who are dead to rights guilty are making credible cases for actual innocence, or at least not likely. So shutting the door on these post conviction motions pretty much solely kept the innocent incarcerated. Since that time, though that legislation has changed.

The presumption and knowledge is no longer a reason to foreclose your post conviction motion twenty years ago it was.

Today, it's not so much good it does for you though.

Yeah, yeah, you can't go back retroactivity. You can't go back and feature which already happened.

So after appealing your denials in two thousand and three in the state courts, you went federal.

Got challenged my conviction on the federal level because of our constitutional rights. I made, you know, the two major issues was that the trial court gave the wrong jury instruction as it applied to accomplished liability, and the second issue was an effective assistic counsel for FAIE to investigate. Those were my two strongest issues, and after two and a half years, three years, I filed my own hate too. But it was eventually denied.

He then filed your fourth PCRA petition in twenty twelve because Danny Steele recanted his trial testimony. Yeah, you heard that right. Danny Steele was finally doing the right thing.

He sent me an affter David stating that he had been pressing to give false testimony that he had witnessed need could have done to do work's head and pull the trigger. He also testified about the fake motel meeting, and he was ultimately found to be incredible because he was no longer in jeopardy from the common Wealth, but he was still allegedly in jeopardy from his co defendants.

You and Melvin, who were both locked up for life while he's out there doing whatever he's doing, living the dream. You know what I find incredible, The fucking balls on these judges, I mean, unfucking believable. The only evidence in the case, besides the Super eight manager who we know didn't know his ass from his elbow, the only evidence

Both of the prosecutors also testified that they ain't seem to stand that day. It said if he testified falsely, it was something he chose to do. They didn't encourage them to do it. So he found them to be more credible than Danny Steal.

So now you find a way to bolster the recantation. You got in touch with Kendu Smith, like your trial attorney should have done in the first place, and he was finally ready to corroborate Thisanny Steele's recantation. So that was the focus of your last of your PCRRA petitions filed in August twenty fifteen, and evidentiary hearing was held in August twenty seventeen.

And at this evidence here Jim Delle Smith shows up and he testifies on the oath that Chad never put a machine gun in my head and pulled the trigger. And I don't know why Danny Steel made that up. Had it happened, I wouldn't be here to day saying it didn't.

Happen, right, Why would he be standing up for his attempted murderer in court. So this adds legitimacy to his testimony, which transfers legitimacy to Danny Steele's recantation, and this would qualify as new evidence in other states, but not in Pennsylvania. This was denied as untimely because this witness was available at the time of trial. It's like running into a brick wall over and over again. Now, meanwhile, at this time,

Can you explain Guess who gets found shot multiple times in his car? Danny Steele. I mean, he's just riddled with bullets. York County decides that Melvin Bethune's own son, who grew up without his father, was the person who killed Danny Steele, that he was so angry about him allegedly perjuring himself naming his father, that he decided to lie in wait and kill Danny Steele. Well, Melvin Bethune's son decided to take this thing to trial, and he prevailed.

I mean, I wouldn't blame Melvin's son if he was angry with Danny Steele. How I'm angry with Danny Stele deal even posthumously. But that doesn't mean that Melvin's Sun murdered anybody. I mean, I don't know all the details, so I won't comment on the investigation of the prosecution. I do hope that things have changed significantly in yourk

And so I contacted Benison's Project and they gave me this case. I collected every record I possibly could, and of course I realized that Melvin Bethune was also behind bars for the same crime as Taysheim. And that is about the time where I hire Kitty Hayley. She went back in time. Essentially, she spent weeks and weeks in York and talked to you know, people who knew all

You know, I didn't think there was room for these prosecutors to get any less likable, but trust me, there is even more room. And as we've already discussed, Kitty Haley spoke to all the women who the prosecutors lied about, a trial talker Redmond, Klonda Chance, and of course the

So I meet Kitty Harley the beginning at twenty twenty one, and it was feeling for me when she said, you know, you've been telling the same story for twenty years. It felt good. But Kitty Harley gets out there in the field. She speaks to Terry and the motel clerk from the Superley motel, and she adamantly states that she told the prostitution that this theory was flawed, that I could not

And so presumably those documents are sitting in the District Attorney's office today and that's what we're fighting for to get. But also, this woman has signing out of David. She's willing to come in. And this woman doesn't know anybody, She has no skin in the game.

If an uninterested objective party witness is telling you that this serious flawed, and you decide to perpetuate this fraud and allow for it to go uncorrected for twenty something years. Based on my studies, this would be considered deliberate and willful deception.

No words could do this injustice, any justice. So now that we've heard everything that Kitty dug up, you all were able to petition the courts based on this evidence, and they said that this was litigated by Melvin back in two thousand and seven and it was denied back then as untimely because Terry Flinchboss Silo was available to testify at trial, so this couldn't be considered new evidence

Absolutely, it all comes down to the beginning stages trial. So at trial, I had a lawyer who had checked out on me. But the beautiful thing is he did file a Brady He wrote the action for everything that was shoping. Soley we know today that they would have some information that was requested.

I mean, there's always been a solid case for Brady violations and ineffective assistance here, but so far, I don't think it's a stretch to say that you have been failed not only by your attorneys along the way, but by the entire judicial system. I understand you have plans to file with the York County Conviction in Tegery Units, so we hope that they will be able to provide the relief that you have so rightfully deserved. But if not,

America as a country, and our court system has largely been steeped like a tea bag in racism, and some people are considered worthy and some people are not considered worthy. And I would offer that back in the nineties, two young black men from New York are really considered outsiders and their lives were not worth a lot. I will

Just support this is a great cause. I fought hard for my freedom for twenty plus years. I've been incarcerated almost a quarter century. I'm innocent. I was awfully convicted. You can go to change dot org and sign this petition that was initiated by DJ Coco Chanel. You can visit my website. I want my life back, I want to be free. I want to turn my books into movies.

Thank you for listening to Rabel Conviction. I'd like to thank our production team 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