#365 Jason Flom with Clarence Jones - podcast episode cover

#365 Jason Flom with Clarence Jones

Jun 08, 202338 minEp. 365
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Episode description

On August 25, 1998, in Baltimore, MD, 2-month-old Collin began choking after being put down for a nap. Collin’s father, Clarence Jones, rushed Collin to the hospital when he realized he wasn’t breathing. Doctors became convinced he was a victim of Shaken Baby Syndrome due to evidence of brain swelling and bleeding. Collin died 6 days later. Despite the fact that Collin had a prior history of health problems that could’ve contributed to Collin's condition, Clarence was sentenced to 30 years in prison for second-degree murder and child abuse. Jason talks to Clarence Jones and Lauren Kelleher, Clarence's attorney.

To learn more and get involved, visit: 

https://exonerate.org/

https://cifsjustice.org/#/main

https://lavaforgood.com/podcast/172-wrongful-conviction-junk-science-shaken-baby-syndrome/

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

​​We have worked hard to ensure that all facts reported in this show are accurate. The views and opinions expressed by the individuals featured in this show are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Lava for Good.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Transcript

Speaker 1

On August twenty fifth, nineteen ninety eight, Clarence Jones was caring for his infant son, Colin. According to Clarence, he had fed Colin a bottle, laid him down for a nap, and later discovered him sputtering formula from his mouth. Clarence

rushed him to Sinai Hospital. Colin was in respiratory distress with an erratic heartbeat, and doctors concluded that the hemorrhages that were discovered in the coverings of Colin's brain and retina, coupled with no external injuries, could only mean that the nine week old infant was the victim of violence shaking. While Clarence denied the allegations, Colin succumbed to his complication

six days later, on August thirty first. At trial, medical experts testified that retinal hemorrhaging defined child abuse and that the bleeding in Colin's retinas were the most severe they had ever seen. These same experts confidently ruled out any other potential causes of Colin's death, placing the blame squarely on Clarence Jones.

Speaker 2

But this is wrongful conviction.

Speaker 1

Welcome back to wrongful conviction. I'm going to start this episode with a question, what would be the worst thing that you could imagine happening to you? Now, if you're a parent, and I am, it would probably be the

loss of a child. There's nothing worse than anybody can imagine, except there is what if you lost a child and then we're wrongfully accused of causing the death of your own child, and since the thirty years in prison for a crime that never even happened, Well, today we're covering the extraordinary saga of the man himself, Clarence Jones, the third who's with us right now. Clarence, welcome to the show.

Speaker 2

Thank you very much, thanks for having me.

Speaker 1

You're very welcome. And joining him today is his civil attorney who has joined his continued fight for justice, Lauren kellaher welcome, Thanks, Jason. So this case revolves around shaking baby syndrome, which is really, to me, one of the most sickening aspects of junk science, which leads to some of the most awful miscarriages of justice in our entire

criminal legal system. Claris, have you ever heard of shaking baby syndrome before this awful, awful day when your child was taken to the hospital.

Speaker 3

I had never heard of no such thing. In fact, when he was saying that, I had to look it up and find out actually what was the talking about. Then that day that the detectives had showed up to my door, then I said, Oh, they going to charge me with a crime, that's what they're trying to do.

Speaker 4

To be honest, before I worked on this case, I was not particularly familiar with the concept of shaking baby syndrome, although in nineteen ninety eight, my understanding is that there was quite a hysteria about shake and baby syndrome, and there was this idea that is exhausted and burnt out as they were parents of young babies were getting so frustrated to the point of injuring them in these severe ways.

But as the scientific understanding of SBS has progressed, there are all of these natural disease processes that occur very tragically in babies like Colin that fully explain the presentation with what folks in the SPS community will be familiar with as the triad, which is intercranial bleeding, brain smelling, and retinal hemorrhaging.

Speaker 1

And you know, back when this case occurred in nineteen ninety eight. The only way people really looked at it was that violence shaking could be the only cause of this triad of findings. But they never tested it. They just assumed it. And I'm really glad we're here to talk about it. We're going to have later on the show. Kate Judson one of my personal heroes. She's the executive director of the Set for Integrity and Forensic Sciences, and

she'll dive deeper into this. So, Clarence, before your life got turned upside down by people who should have known better, What was it like. Did you grow up in Baltimore?

Speaker 3

Well, I did grow up in Baltimore, but I moved out into the county area.

Speaker 1

And how did you meet your wife Jennifer? Tell us a little about when things were better.

Speaker 3

I had met Jennifer doing one of the building that she had lived in. I was a security officer at the time, and basically that's how her and I got to know one another. And I've always been into security work, law enforcement work. In fact, I had my application trying to become a Baltimore County Police office at the time as it occurred.

Speaker 1

Wow, So if this could happen to you and you were working in and around law enforcement, a law abiding citizen. Then would you agree that this could happen to anybody.

Speaker 3

Yes, this could happen to anybody. You know the way it came upon me. I didn't know that they was trying to arrest me for something like this when I was a kid. Loving father, very supportive.

Speaker 1

So okay, So it seemed like he had everything going in a very positive direction. You're married to the love of your life, Jennifer, And was this your first child?

Speaker 3

No, I have three other children. This one my son, Colin. He was born with a condition called normalcytopenia PAPA or ITTP, and just like his mother, Jennifer, she would could bleed easily.

Speaker 2

Yeah.

Speaker 1

ITP is a blood disorder in which your immune system attacks to platelets, the red blood cells that are responsible for clotting. So the result is easy bruising, as well as potential internal bleeding and even intracranial hemorrhaging. One of the three findings, if not the main finding associated with sbs ITP, can be acute, clearing up spontaneously in six months or less, or chronic like your wife, Jennifers. Now, Colin had only lived to be just about ten weeks old.

It was such a short medical history, it's not clear which form he had. And this wasn't the only cause for concern. Upon Colin's birth, he had a pretty dramatic delivery, to say the least.

Speaker 3

Right, he had aspirated some maconium which his newborn stool. He was in respiratory distress, all these things and he had to stay and say you behind it. Then we picked them Colin up and he had another episode that occurred, which was July of ninety eight, which he had bleeding in the lungs. What they characterized and diagnosed was pneumonia at the time.

Speaker 4

The thing about the diagnosis of pneumonia is pneumonia was essentially the best guess about what was going on with Colin. During his July hospitalization, they gave him a pretty heavy duty course of antibiotics that they would have expected to clear up the pneumonia if it had been pneumonia in fact, and they didn't work within the timeframe, and Colin just sort of appeared to be getting better on his own.

Speaker 1

But unfortunately he was not actually getting better. Rather, his medical issues appear to have gone undiagnosed and improperly treated until it was just too late.

Speaker 4

When you look at Collins medical files, and even if you just look at his final hospitalization in August of nineteen ninety eight, immediately upon arrival, it was noted that he had symptoms that were consistent with sepsis and a

bleeding disorder, which includes bleeding around the brain. But I think the underlying thing here is like, no one can look at the fact that he spent more than twenty five percent of his short life in the hospital and conclude anything other than this was a really sick kid with a number of unresolved conditions that kept cropping back up.

Speaker 1

Yeah, this poor kid really didn't have a shot because with all those problems and such a little tiny body. You know, how does I mean anyway, So Clarence, this day, what time did you, Jennifer go to work that day? Because at the end of the day, you were targeted because you were the one that was home. And that's we see that again and again in these cases.

Speaker 3

Right Well, you know, being and I worked at night, I took care at Colin in the daytime, and Jennifer took care of them at night. Jennifer, she left about one point fifty two o'clock that.

Speaker 4

Day, Clarence and Colin had by all accounts, a pretty normal afternoon. Like Clarence mentioned, he worked at night. He'd come home in the morning, he'd sleep for a little bit because he was working all night. He'd get up when Jennifer had to go to work at the hair cuttery at the Rotunda Mall, I believe right, Clarence, like you just described, and then he'd be responsible for watching Colin for the rest of the afternoon. He'd feed him,

he'd burb him, he'd change his diaper. Colin had a little swing that he loved to spend time in that Clarence had set up for him, and he worked out that. Colin took a shower and then laid back down for more sleep. And when he woke up, he went to check on Colin and found him the state that costs to bring him to the hospital.

Speaker 2

That's correct.

Speaker 3

He was sputtering wing with formula coming out of aspirrating from his nose and mouth, and I immediately got my son, placed him in his car seat and rushed them to the hospital. And there being that this is inner city hospital with all this kind of negative stuff going on with parents that do do these child to be things, and they automatically looked at me and say, oh my god, he's a big guy. He had to have done this. And they just didn't even consider the history of what

my son was born with. They didn't even in fact, looked at it. They just looked at me as a person and went on and started making their assumptions about SBS.

Speaker 1

And we haven't mentioned this, but Clarence, you're a black man. Jennifer is white, and this is America, So who knows how race played into this whole scenario. And Lauren, did the investigation reveal anything unusual that could have corroborated those initial assumptions about SBS.

Speaker 4

Well, according to the prosecutor during the trial back in nineteen ninety nine, the fact that Clarence drank a protein shake, which, as she said, could have been laced with steroids was apparently something weird that could have been going on at that time.

Speaker 2

That's correct.

Speaker 3

You know, I'd got my own weight set so I could be home and work out and keep my eye on my son, and it just all of that backfire for me trying to be a healthy man. I mean, I never drank, smoke, did narcotics, No marijuana, none of those things. And for them to take something as healthy as working out with weights and said it was a

steroid drink or some things in that nature. And I'm saying, if that was true, everybody that you see in these health fitness clubs would be on steroids and they are not.

Speaker 4

But cynicism about that commentary aside. You know, if you look at collins medical files from when he was admitted to Sinai Hospital at seven forty five pm on August twenty fifth, nineteen ninety eight, in a matter of hours after he was admitted, Mind you, those hours included suctioning formula from his airways, getting him intubated because this was a baby in severe respiratory distress who was not able

to breathe on his own. After that was all done, not much more time elapsed, and you see the first reference to SBS shaken Baby syndrome in Colin's medical file based on the fact that at that point they had identified the presence of really just one symptom of the triad and the related symptom, which was the intracranial bleeding, based on the CT scan Colin received not long after he got to the hospital in that note, Interestingly, there's a reference to what else needs to be ruled out

as an alternate explanation for what Colin was presenting with, specifically a bleeding disorder, and blood studies were run for him, and actually in the admission note, I was looking through this just yesterday. The very first thing in Colin's file also says rule out sepsis, which, if you know anything about steps switch to be frank. I didn't know too much when I started working on this case, but it is a really common cause of death among infants in hospitals.

It wreaks havoc on the body, It destroys the organs, It causes respiratory distress what Colin was experiencing when he was hospitalized, and it also causes your blood clotting system to go haywire and for your body to bleed indiscriminately and in places it shouldn't, including around the brain.

Speaker 1

But instead of considering this confluence of medical issues, they just forged right ahead with their SBS diagnosis.

Speaker 4

I mean, Colin was labeled pretty early on as being a victim of SBS, and this sort of automatic diagnosis of SBS, there's no understating how much immediate and certain weight. It was given by the medical community and then as a result by the law enforcement who were investigating this case back in nineteen ninety eight.

Speaker 3

The detectives came to the hospital and the next day they got in touch with Jennifer and I. We was preparing to go up to see Colin. We were, in fact, we was gathering up a lot of materials that we need.

Speaker 2

Because we were going to camp up the hospital and stay there.

Speaker 3

And this is early in the morning. The detective had not on our door. I let him in, of course, and I didn't even know what it was about. I didn't had no clue. And they said, we wanted to talk to you about your son.

Speaker 2

You know.

Speaker 3

I was saying, please to myself, I hope my son ain't passed, and they said, no, can you follow us to the station. So we followed them all the way down to the station, and they put Jennifer in one room and put myself in another room, and they used Jennifer as a witness and used me as a suspect.

Speaker 4

And in the course of questioning him, as Clarence has recounted for us multiple times, they kept saying to him and Claren's correct me if I'm getting this wrong. But the doctors aren't lying.

Speaker 5

The doctors aren't lying.

Speaker 4

This is what the doctors are saying.

Speaker 3

They just kept asking me, did I drop my son? Did I hit my son in the head? And they was getting to the point they was getting so upset. They were saying, Clarence, sometimes I.

Speaker 2

Get so mad.

Speaker 3

Did I want to grant my child? And I want to say, I say, that's what you would do to your child. I said, not me, I wouldn't do. I love my I was telling them. It was just a back and forth thing. And then at the end, ultimately they said, well you under rest for child abuse.

Speaker 1

This episode is underwritten by global law firm Greenberg Tryig through its pro bono program. Greenberg Tryig leverages it's more than twenty six hundred lawyers across forty four offices. To serve the greater good of our communities and provide equal

access to justice for all. In the field of criminal justice, greenbrog Triwity attorneys have exonerated and freedomanded Philadelphia represent numerous individuals previously sentenced to life for crimes committed as juveniles and resentencing hearings, and receive the American Bar Association's twenty twenty one Exceptional Service Award for Death Penalty Representation for their work on five death penalty cases. GT is reimagining what big law can be because of a more just world.

Only happens by design.

Speaker 3

And they took me out in handcuffs. Jennifer comes running up to me trying to hug me. They didn't even want Jennifer near me, and they took me to the Baltimore County's Attention Center from net where I had to see a commissioner to make bail. In fact, Jennifer's mom, Missus Crocker, Oh, she was like a mother in itself to me. Also, she had putting up her property, her home for me to get out on bail.

Speaker 1

And let's pause on that for a second. This was your mother in law, right who was grieving with her daughter over Colin, her nine week old grandson, who was struggling in the hospital to survive. And in spite of all that, neither her nor your wife Jennifer ever wavered in their support, their steadfast belief that you could never and would have never done anything to hurt this little child. But their grief was just about to multiply in more

ways than one. Six days after Colin had been admitted to the hospital.

Speaker 3

That's right, Colin, my dear son, had passed on the thirty first of that August nineteen ninety eight, and they upgraded the charges to homicide.

Speaker 1

So not only had they lost Colin, but now you're facing trial for murder as.

Speaker 3

Well, and you don't get a bail on murder. But she, miss Crocker, she came to court and she told the judge why I should have bail, And she asked the judge because she put the same deed her property up to reinstate my bail, and the judge went for it, and he gave me bail, and I went.

Speaker 2

Right back to work.

Speaker 3

In fact, my boss, they was all at that hearing, telling them what kind of employee I was pending that hearing that I would always have a job. So they gave me my job back and I went back to work after all.

Speaker 1

Of that on bail, and missus Crocker's generosity didn't stop there. She and Jennifer hired your attorney, Donald Diaman as well, and this went to trial on March first, nineteen ninety nine. And was this a jury or a bench trial.

Speaker 4

It was a bench trial. It lasted just a few days this state. The prosecutor was Susan has for the Baltimore County State's Attorney's Office, and the testifying experts were one of collins doctors who treated him at the hospital, and the medical examiner and the detectives in the case.

Speaker 1

And to get a clearer picture of what was being presented against Clarence back in nineteen ninety nine, I reached out to the executive director of the Center for Integrity and Forensic Sciences, none other than Kate Judson.

Speaker 5

When Clarence Jones went to trial in nineteen ninety nine, most of the challenges to SBS had only just begun, so the medical establishment was firmly behind the faulty SPS hypothesis, and the state's panel of five experts, which included Maryland's chief medical examiner, doctor Dennis Chute, were no exception. Doctor Shute performed Colin's autopsy and testified to the presence of the findings associated with SBS, as well as a lack

of external or spinal injuries. Biomechanical studies have since shown that without those injuries, shaking is an unlikely cause for the injuries often associated with it. Additionally, Colin's treating physicians at the hospital, doctor Aaron Zuckerberg and doctor Timothy Polk, testified that retinal hemorrhaging defines child abuse and acceleration deceleration injuries, and doctor Polk said that the retinal hemorrhaging in this

case was the most severe he had ever seen. Then, doctor Polk ignored Colin's bleeding disorder history and ruled out sepsis as the cause of the retinal hemorrhaging. His reasoning was that sepsis would cause more quote moderate and localized bleeding.

You know, even setting aside Colin's previous bleeding disorder throm beside apenia, we know that sepsis can lead to another bleeding disorder, disseminated intravascular coagulation or DC, which initially consumes all the blood's clotting factors and results in not only potential inappropriate clotting, but also uncontrolled internal bleeding. Doctor Poke's conclusory claimed that the bleeding from sepsis would be moderate and localized. It's just not something he could accurately predict,

which then sheds dout and everything. Poke believed logically followed that he could quote imagine no possible cause of Colin's injuries other than violent shaking, and that's what the judge heard, not knowing that Pok had ignored sepsis and the bleeding disorder DIC for the speculative conclusion that this had been violent shaking.

Speaker 4

Quite honestly, reading through the transcript, it's so clear the thing was a moving train from the start, this moving train of SBS, and it was impossible to get off of and everyone had bought into it, hook line and sinker, and given sort of the understanding of the medical evidence at the time, you know, Clarence's defense was just kind

of nibbling around the edges of it. It was really really hard, if not altogether impossible in nineteen ninety nine when the trial took place to really take on SBS, you know, head on, because it was it was so widely understood and accepted as a cause for these types of injuries and babies.

Speaker 1

Right, it appears that even the defense's medical expert conceded that SBS had some part in Colin's death, saying, quote, I thought it was shaking baby syndrome. But looking over the history there are so many other medical problems that I began to wonder if I could really separate the medical problems from the pure traumatic part. And I don't think I can. Unquote wow, So not even your own

expert was ready to competently defend you. Then the detective Philip Marl testified about how upset you got when pressed about hurting Colin when he said to you, the doctors aren't lying, they're not making this up. I mean, you never really had a chance, let's face it. So how long did this awful sinister charade go on for?

Speaker 3

The trial was three days? The fourth day I was found guilty March nineteen ninety nine. The state's attorney, Susan Haslet she was going on in her closing testimony being really harsh. She don't even know me, was saying things

that didn't make any sense. And then the judge went on and when the case was rested, Judge Grayson Turnbull, he said that the eye doctor, doctor Timothy Pope, that his testimony had the greatest amount of significance to it, and he wrote those words down and that's what inflamed him the most to make him come up with his decision. Then he convicted me right then and there.

Speaker 1

Now, the conviction was for both child abuse and murder. And I understand that the state's attorney, Susan Haslet she wanted to throw the book at you.

Speaker 3

She wanted twenty years for the child abuse, and the judge said, wait, Manue, it's not twenty years, it's fifteen for that. They were just writing these numbers down like it was just a yo. This man could do. This is nothing I'm going to give. Okay, I'm going to take the first degree and drop it to second degree murder. So I'm going to sentence him to thirty years for the murder and fifteen years for the child of you that I'm going to run that concurrently. And I'm looking

at this and my family is in the courtroom. My mom is in there, and my mom is wild. It's falling apart, and she wasn't in the best of health. And he just sentenced me to all that time. And it's like it was like.

Speaker 2

The Twilight he zon like, you know, am I hearing this?

Speaker 3

They took me way up to the first institution, which was w CI Western Correctional Institution up in Western Maryland.

Speaker 2

The end of the stop you call it uh and it was horrible from me.

Speaker 3

It was just a bad experience to go and live in such a small cell. It was hot, it was dingy, dirty fights, arguments that you know, you got to remember from being married from a I'm living with a nice wife femininity and then moving into a high testisal of guys wanting to fight, stealing from each other, all types of gang members, something that I wasn't used to.

Speaker 2

It was a hard show, you.

Speaker 3

Know, because it's times I wanted I thought of suicide. I said, wait a minute, I can't. You know, my grandmother raised me up in church and you you know, to my understanding, the Lord don't forgive you for suicide. I was saying, Wow, this is a nightmare. That's what kept me from wanting to be that type of person to kill yourself. You know, I said, Wow, this is really happening, and I had to.

Speaker 2

Get with the program. I had to toughen up and just keep studying.

Speaker 3

When I found out that they had a law library, that they had all medical books, then that's when I started doing my research.

Speaker 1

And this was at a time when the challenges to SBS. The studies were just being done. The papers were just being written at that time, and in two thousand euro appeal was denied, as was a petition for post conviction relief eight years later in two thousand and eight. So then you reached out to the mid Atlantic Innocence Project.

Speaker 3

I told them to look up my transcripts and I started corresponding back and forth, sending them different information about my son, what it happened. And they went deep and deep and deep in than they knew they had wronged me. But you know, I did, Innocence projects strengthened me. They were sending constantly. I was getting legal mail mostly every month. They was like they was in it with me, and they had different law students coming in. But in twenty thirteen, this is when I met Francis.

Speaker 1

And by Francis, you mean Francis Walter is one of the attorneys at the mid Atlantic Iainists Project.

Speaker 3

Right, that's correct, Francis. That come up of October twenty thirteen. And matter of fact, I was in the gym in the prison, working out and they.

Speaker 2

Jones, report to your housing units.

Speaker 3

And I goes up to the visiting room and little Francis she's standing there, and Francis looked at me and she said, mister Jones, I'm gonna get you out. We know what's going on. I'm gonna stay with you from this time all the way till you get home.

Speaker 1

And she did, Yes, she did, and she fought for you in two different ways, both to clear your name as well as with the parole board where you had been repeatedly denied. And we know that they usually are almost always wanted admission of guilt.

Speaker 3

I went up, must have went up for parole about five times, and every time they wanted me to milk guilt. I said, I'm not gonna I said, I'll die. I'll die in here because I said, I'm not going to tell you I didn't do. I say, well, I mean, where's the that's I can't live with myself. I'm telling you only the truth. So they denied me parole. I come up again, and I told them again and again,

and it kept denying me. But with Francis through the mid Atlantic Innocent Project, had wrote them telling them that they represented me, sent them medical reports, all these things in the nature about my son, and they kind of believed it. At the time, I had taken up a trade to become an electrician, graduated and then got my NCCI card. They were just telling all good things that the parole hearing about me, But I still didn't omit any guilt to them, and they just gave me a parole date.

Speaker 2

What was that?

Speaker 3

I told her the eleventh, twenty seventeen when they released me.

Speaker 2

That felt so good.

Speaker 3

That was a real, real good high day for me being released out in the public.

Speaker 2

And then but the bad was where do I go from here? What do I do? When they paroleed me.

Speaker 3

I didn't have no Social Security card, I didn't have a birth certificate card, I didn't have a driver's license, I didn't have no money in my pocket.

Speaker 2

They just threw me out.

Speaker 1

Yeah, It's something that I've been deeply concerned with and involved in, is trying to figure out how to establish

better ways to help people coming home. I mean, obviously we want to stop them from going in in the first place, but let's face it, we probably have one hundred and fifty thousand or more Clarence Jones in this country right now that are serving time for crimes that didn't commit and they have to We really should be building ramps for people, and instead it seems like we put up walls for people coming home and it's in

or guilty and it doesn't make any sense. It's not good for them, it's not good for their families, it's not good for their communities, it's not good for society.

Speaker 3

And luckily I had my sister, Lynette. My sister has been really strong in my life, coming to see me every week, along with.

Speaker 2

Her girlfriend who we fell in love, Peggy Peggy, between Peggy and Linnet.

Speaker 3

They took care of me because I had nothing, Just like you dropped me off on a planet and I'm with aliens.

Speaker 2

That's how I feel.

Speaker 1

Yeah, it's a completely different world from nineteen ninety nine, and clearing your name could go a long way to helping you reacclimate. So, Lauren, what did Francis Walters and the mid Atlantic Innocescet Project do next?

Speaker 4

So, the mid Atlantic Innocence Project file this petition for rid of actual innocence in Baltimore City Circuit Court, which is essentially trial court in Maryland State court system, with the assistance of.

Speaker 1

Don Saltzman, the Great Don Salzman, who is the senior roboo partner and attorney at the Law Great Law Firm of Skadnarp, slat Mar and Flom. And if that name sounds familiar, it's because it was a firm that my dad, rest in peace, was the senior partner of for many many years, and the pro bono program was one of his one of the things he was most proud of. And so I know that Dad is viling down on us from somewhere and is so happy that you're home.

So Dad, I guess we're going to dedicate this episode to you, if that's okay with you, guys, And of course to the Mid Atlanta A Gainnis's project, and all the other lawyers who worked such long hours. They worked hard, and they worked smart on your case, or you wouldn't be here with us on the microphone today.

Speaker 4

I mean, it's kind of crazy to think about how quickly Colin was diagnosed and how much longer it took to know how many minds had to be brought to bear on a decision that was made relatively quickly so many years ago in this case, So they filed this petition for rid of actual innocence based on this theory that you had. The court had all the medical evidence of today to look at and to consider back when Clarence was convicted, there's a substantial possibility that things would

have gone the other way. The team amassed all of these doctors, these specialists, these forensic pathologists. They had like a biomechanical engineer who explained how the forces of shaking could not feasibly be possible for presentation of these types of injuries. They had a pediatric infectious disease specialist to talk about all the bacterial infections that Colin had when he came into the hospital that caused the sepsis that

ultimately killed him. The trial court initially denied Clarence's petition.

Speaker 1

Now it appears that Judge Turnbull had moved on to be the Circuit and County administrative judge by twenty nineteen, so this decision came from Judge Colleen Cavanaugh. Judge Kavanaugh ruled that the defense hadn't even presented new evidence and that there was a low likelihood of acquittal upon retrial. Now I'm not sure how that's possible, but okay, so you appeal that up to the Maryland Court of Special Appeals. What happened there?

Speaker 4

The Court of Special Appeals in this case, and I think in most cases it was a three judge panel, and they reversed Judge Kavanaugh and remanded with instructions for her to grant Clarence the rid of actual innocence, which she did on June twenty fifth, twenty twenty one.

Speaker 2

Right, CJ, that's correct, that's correct.

Speaker 1

So CJ, let's talk about that, because we've talked about a lot of miserable stuff that happened that day. What do you remember about that day.

Speaker 3

In the courtroom when she granted me the petition for the rid of actual innocence and setting aside the convictions.

Speaker 2

Oh, I felt. So it was a big relief, a big relief for me.

Speaker 3

They ended up even going back acting what they reconsider but they said no and they kept them mat at the same and then Judge Colleen did it and signed it and said this court has done So that was a real, real, big happy moment of my life.

Speaker 1

Yeah, amen to that. And you know, fortunately you'll now be entitled to compensation. Even that takes too long, you know, it's it's sort of cold comfort, but it's certainly better that we do compensate you. It's the least we as a society can do. And there are too many men and women like yourself who've suffered this unimaginable you know, fate and come home and get nothing, and that's just adding insult to injury.

Speaker 3

But you know, nothing ever, ever could replace I look at my son and I train a lot of guys would have been his age twenty four in a gym today, and a lot of them are biracial kids. And I look, and I'd be wondering saying, Wow, my son would have looked like that or whatever.

Speaker 2

You know, it just it. It's so hard.

Speaker 3

No amount of compensation and all this could fix that with the death of losing the child, my son.

Speaker 2

It's a hard thing.

Speaker 1

You know, It's something that no one can No one can fathom unless they've walked a mile in your shoes. And to hear from you makes me want to work harder and smarter for you and everyone who's been through similar hardships, as I'm sure it does for the lawyers work at the mid Atlantic and It's is Project and other great organizations like it. They need our support, so we'll have them linked in the bio. And now this brings us to my favorite part of the show, closing arguments.

I'm going to turn my microphone off, kick back in my chair with my headphones on, and just listen. Lauren. Let's let you start. You could say anything that you think has been left unsaid. Then just hand the mic off to mister Clarence Jones the third and Clarence, you take us off into the sunset. I think one thing.

Speaker 4

You know what you said at the outset Jason about imagining the worst thing that could possibly ever happen to you. I'm a parent of a little baby too, and it's funny you said that because exactly how I describe this case to anyone I tell about it. Imagine the worst thing that could happen to you, And now imagine that everyone is saying it's your fault, and you have to sit in a courtroom and listen to them say terrible things about you and what kind of person you are

and what kind of father you were. And then imagine spending eighteen years in prison. Imagine not only that, but you're not able to see your baby for a large portion of the time he's in the hospital for the last time because the police have told you you're not allowed to go there. And then after your kid has taken off life support, you're given a couple moments and then you're handcuffed and you're taken away. And that's what

happened to Clarence. Here and here he is all these years on, and he is still in the process of fighting, and we're still in the process of fighting to get him compensation, to get just a little bit of acknowledgment from the state that what happened to him was wrong and that he deserves some more relief and remedy for it. But Clarence, as you can see, is an amazing and inspiring person. He's an incredibly good man with a very

big heart. So thank you for the opportunity to share his story, and I'll let him take it away from here.

Speaker 3

Okay, listeners, You know it frightens me that any parents today's up and coming parent that does something happened to your child, that when you go into a medical facility to get treatment or whatever.

Speaker 2

It is a scary thing for me. Anyway.

Speaker 3

You know, I have grandchildren that and my fiance her grandsons, four of them. They love me and I wouldn't want to be around them by myself at all because little boys play rough and if I per se us out playing with one of them and say one of them would by theirselves and they fell off a swing or got hit by a baseball in their head. What am I to do go over the same scenario. Doctors need to consider the medical.

Speaker 2

History examine instead of rushing to judgment.

Speaker 3

You got to look at all the different facets of how they fit together before you can just go out and just accuse someone just because it happens. And I'm just a person trying to pick up and keep my head above water, doing the right things as I always and like I say, I uphold the lot. I try to live in the boundaries of doing the right things. Just watch your children, love them, kiss them, be with them at all times.

Speaker 2

Make sure you have people.

Speaker 3

Around you at all times, knowing where you're going, because once you get caught up in something like this, the other side never retreats. So it's a hurtful thing. If it happened to me, it can happen to you. Say your prayers, be true to your family. God bless everyone. That's my word to you.

Speaker 1

Thank you for listening to wrongful conviction. I want to thank our production team, Connor Hall, Anni, Chelsea, Lyla Robinson, Jeff Clyburn, and Kevin Wats. 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 Instagram

at it's Jason flam Ravel. Conviction is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number one

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