#458 Lauren Bright Pacheco with Alan Beaman - Part 1

Hey, it's Lauren Brei Pacheco. This new episode of Wrongful Conviction covers the unbelievable case of Alan Beeman. Such an epic story that we needed to release it as a two parter, Part one right now and part two coming next week. If you're listening in the Wrongful Conviction Feed,

Thank you for having us, Thanks Lauren for having us.

Now I want to take a step back and Alan, let's go back a bit. Just tell me how you would describe your upbringing and your family before all of this happened.

I grew up in a household that was very conservative and very involved in our community. I was raised to take the high road, to treat my neighbors with respect and dignity, and to withhold judgment until I've gotten to know a person.

And what were your passions growing up? What were you obsessed with?

We grew up out in the country, surrounded by pastures and cornfields. You know, you hear people talk about Generation X being the feral children, And I was exactly that left the house at seven in the morning and didn't come back until seven o'clock at night. And if my parents saw me in between, it was because I was either hungry or had to go to the bathroom or both. From the age of four, I was swinging a hammer.

Wow, I can't believe you guys built your house together. That is definition of a hands on family with a.

Lot of help from our friends and family and Barry.

I know that Carol was a teacher, But what was your profession by trade?

I started with a degree in physics from Illinois Wesleyan University, and that led me into the Air Force. After I got out of the Air Force, I ended up spending the rest of my career as a quality engineer, both in mechanical activities and in software.

So, Allen, you have an engineer for a father, teacher for a mother. How did you end up getting drawn to theatrical lighting design?

My mom told me that I was very dramatic, and I started getting involved with the drama club in middle school. I think getting involved in theater and just being naturally handy, I got appointed to do things. Oh you know how to do this? Okay, here you go. But as I got even older, going into college, I just lost interest in the performance side and really got sucked into the technical aspects, especially lighting.

I've read that you were able to combine your love of music with a vision you had for your ultimate career in terms of working on design for concerts.

Eventually, by the time I was in college, that's what I wanted to do. I wanted to do lighting design for rock bands. Not that I wouldn't want to do that for plays and other things as well, but I think I always verged on the motion of lighting, so I think I would have naturally gravitated towards lighting for music, a feature of that that.

Takes us really pretty much to write about. When your family was abruptly altered by what ended up befalling Alan, So you're twenty one years old and you're just weeks away from graduation, about to start your adult life. How prepared were you or your family for what you'd collectively go through for the decades that would follow.

We were not prepared at all to deal with the legal conundrums that came upon us at all. Growing up in that rural, conservative environment, I was raised to trust law enforcement. We did not ever perceive it as a hostile element that would overtake our lives and attempt to destroy us.

For me, my experience was just with the police officers that served in my school, and they were my helpers if I had difficulty in a classroom. It wasn't something that even entered my mind in terms of entanglement with the police.

So just to set then the stage, and just in terms of your relationship with Jennifer, how long had you guys dated? How long had you known each other? Were you in contact at the time of her murderer?

I met Jennifer, I want to say, in the spring of my sophomore year in college, when we were both going to Illinois Wesleyan and we were friends. Nothing romantic occurred until the summer after that school year, and we started dating later in that summer and then throughout my junior year. We dated for about a year and we broke up about a month before she was murdered.

So just that circumstance probably made you a little bit of an easy target in terms of a lazy investigation. But how would you categorize your relationship and the way it ended? Was it volatile or there was their animosity?

What you're asking there is speaking to the initial suspicion we had an on again off again. Relationship, we broke up several times. There were a lot of public conflicts that we had in front of other people, friends and even family, and so I think it was only natural for a police investigator to initially say, hey, we got to talk to this guy, and if that had been

Do you remember how you collectively found out as had happened in the first place.

At the time of the murder, how he found out? It started with a knock at the door. Alan had just left to go meet some friends at Denny's who were leaving for college the next day, and within the hour of that knock on the door, we received a phone call from the county jail, where they had Alan for questioning and Alan said he had been allowed to call us, and he told us he was being questioned about something and he didn't know where his car was

That was about two o'clock in the morning, as I recall, Yes, so.

You thought your son was out with friends and he was a actually at the police station. Alan, how did you were just pulled over?

Yeah? I was about halfway to the city limits when I noticed that there was a squad car behind me. I tried very hard to make sure I drove exactly the speed limit while he was behind me, and then crossed over into the city limits and was immediately pulled over. So then I thought I have long hair, you know. I thought it was the typical stuff that I had

What was going through your head?

I was in shock. I really didn't have a coherent thought going on in my head, but when I was placed in the squad car, I finally gathered up my senses and I asked the officer, Hey, can you tell me what the is about? And he said, some detectives from Normal want to talk to you about a homicide. So I'm in shock, sitting in the squad car, thinking who do I know in Normal that could have possibly been involved in a homicide to where they want to talk to me? And I could think of a few people,

So you're handcuffed. They've not told you why, what You've been accused of? Nothing?

Nothing, I know. I'm in handcuffs and they want to talk to me about a homicide. And I guess if I were a little more street wise, I would have realized that I was a suspect. But I didn't grow up in the environment where I ever expected to be a suspect. I didn't know what was going on. I'm just supposed to speak when I'm spoken to, and respect the police officers who are doing their job.

But even though you had long hair, you didn't exactly have a long wrap sheet. In fact, you had no criminal history, that is correct. When did they tell you that Jennifer had been murdered? And how did they tell you?

When I got into the squad car with Tony Daniels, I asked him what is this about? And he simply said, well, Allen, we want to talk to you about your friend. And it seemed very cryptic to me. I felt like he did not really want to answer my question yet, and so I opted to be polite and again respect law enforcement, and I did not press the issue. We rode back to the police station in Rockford and I was placed in an interrogation room with a couple of chairs and.

Questioned for how long before you could call your parents?

I want to say it was about an hour and a half. And he gave me my Miranda rights and all that, and I probably could have walked out right then and there, but again, that's not something you do when you've grown up to respect law enforcement and you've got nothing to hide. And he started asking me questions and most of the questions were either about my whereabouts

So all of this at this point early morning drama. Did it ever occur to you, Barry or you Carol that this was anything other than a horrible event and a crazy misunderstanding. Did you think was it in terms of what Alan had just been through.

The next day, Alan was supposed to sing at church, and we asked him when we got him home, what are you going to do about that? And you want us to call and cancel? And he said no, he

Sunday afternoon, my father and I were trying to move a cabinet into the house that my parents had brought from their home to us, and these two huge men walked up and said, can we help you with that, and picked it up and moved it in forrest, set it in a corner, and then told us they'd like to talk to Alan. And I said, I got some concerns about this.

And you all knew that, Allan, you were what over one hundred and thirty miles closer to one hundred and forty miles away from the scene of where this tragedy occurred, and you're living at home for the summer, So I should think that you all just thought, obviously it was impossible that you were involved.

We all believed in my family that the detectives would do their job, investigate the case, and they are professionals and they know what they're doing, and that at a certain point they would realize, yeah, this is the wrong

Alan. You mentioned having long hair, and your sense of righteous indignation was also growing. How do you think that combination could have made things worse for you?

I was a dirty hippie in college, and I think, you know, it did probably add to the opportunity to make me a target. But I was also really frustrated that they were accusing me of something I didn't do, and I was very angry about that, and I reacted poorly, which should be understandable coming from an adolescent essentially who's being accused of something.

And dealing with grief.

Well, it was denied that I couldn't grieve because I learned about her death by being accused of murdering her, and I never had the opportunity to experience a neutral individual perception of her death, to say, you know, man, somebody that I cared about has died and I'm really grieving.

Which also played into the narrative exactly.

That was again further used against me, and so they had a lot of opportunity to say, Oh, he's really fishy, something's not right, and unfortunately, in the current state of our legal system, that is what passes for evidence.

So you end up going back to school and Carol and Barry, you have been staunch defenders of your son and supporters of him and adamant believers in his enna sence. Did the police ever try to manipulate your opinion of your son or try to cast out on him or his character.

No, they did not. Lieutenant Daniels, who was the was the lead detective coming to Rockford to talk to Alan, concluded by the time he left Rockford that Allan probably didn't do it, and he held that belief throughout the trial as well. Wow and eventually through depositions and things like that. Became one of Allan's top cheerleaders.

So the nightmare certainly didn't end when you went back for your senior year. You go back and you're trying to focus on finishing up your degree and the police are continuing to pop in. How and when did they show up and how invasive was it in terms of your ability to be a student.

It was always a surprise when they showed up. They occasionally would have somebody from campus security with them, sanctioning and supervisoring their visit to the campus. But I think the first time I met Tim Freiesmeyer was outside the theater, and I think he kind of was lying in wait for me to come out a door that I typically used. So the first time I met him, he served a warrant to collect biological samples from me. And my thought was,

So are you looping your parents in about the frequent visitors in your life at that point? Are you trying to protect them?

Yeah, I'm just trying to protect not loop.

Yes to protecting. I didn't believe it was really a big problem because I was so confident that they were going to to rule me out and move on.

Did you guys, though, pick up on the fact that it was impacting Alan emotionally?

We did not. However, we went down to campus one weekend to see the show that he had been working on. He wasn't there. He was over in Peoria at a friend's wedding that weekend, and we went to the show and one of Alan's faculty advisors said, do you realize how often he's being questioned? And that's the first we

And then you get arrested. Can you tell me how? And when that went down?

It was on my life last day, my last final exam for my theater history class. And when I left the final exam, I went to the dining hall and while I was sitting eating my dinner, Tim Freiesmeyer came into the dining hall, walked up to me and said, Hey, can I talk to you for a minute, And so I was like, fine, let's let's go talk. And so I walked out of the dining hall with him, and I was walking towards a door that I typically used that would get us outside, and he was like, no,

Tell me about that phone call, You guys who answered the phone Carol or Barry, as Carol did I did.

I had just gotten home from my last graduate class and found out that my thesis had been accepted. And I honestly can't tell you right at this point whether we spoke in person or whether you had left a message on the phone, but it was get in touch with Bill, my lawyer. I've been arrested. And that was the end of my celebration of graduation. And Barry was

That point, In that moment of finding out that your son had been arrested, when you got in the car and you drove there, what was that reality like for you, that kind of sense of helplessness to realize that you can't just say you've made a mistake. He's my son and he's coming home with us. What was that helplessness like for you?

Guys?

How would you explain it?

Total frustration determination on my part. There had to be a way.

How long did they hold you there before I assume that you posted bond.

I was in the county jail. I want to say, maybe ten.

Days, yeah, probably until the arraignment.

There was a bond hearing and several of my classmates were called and some of my family members were called to testify about what sort of person I was, to help the court determine I guess, whether I was a flight risk, or whether there was some risk that I might harm some other person if I were out on bond, and those sorts of things. The state's attorney, of course, tried to get it to where there was no bond, and my attorney asked for a bond, but the judge

It's the ripple effect of these injustices, how they impact.

The uncle Alan was talking about as my brother. I'm the baby sister. He's ninety three now. But he was determined that he was going to help us whatever way he could, And so I guess I knew family sticks together, and if it's in God's will, it will happen. And it takes a long time sometimes, but but yeah, a lot of frustration and a lot of concern, but always determination that this was going to be taken care of.

What was the transition like for you, Alan, in those ten days before you bonded out, What was it like being held?

I reacted very irrationally to the confinement and probably rationally to the injustice. I was very angry and terrified. At the same time. I was desperately pleaded with anybody that walked past my cell that there had been a terrible mistake and that they had the wrong guy. I was going through nicotine withdrawal and just absolutely beside myself about the wrongness of my circumstances. I just panicked. Whenever I talked to my parents on the phone. I was not

Understandably, he was angry, he was scared, and we were scared for him.

I was feeling like a failure as a father. I couldn't do anything to get him out of there.

I do remember that we were told we could bring him some clothes, long underwear. You remember that we wanted to make sure he was warm because he said it was cold in the cell. Other than that's one of those odd things you remember.

Yeah, no, because you want to provide whatever comfort in a situation like that you can. What were some of the realizations, the realities you had to come to terms with as you headed into trial. What most surprised you about that process? And Carol, why don't you start.

I'm not sure anything really surprised us, other than I couldn't figure out why the logic of everything didn't make sense to the jurors.

It has been professionally compared to the Trial of the Knave from Lewis Carroll, where everything that came up was obviously suspicious. This is suspicious, and that is suspicious. And oh my gosh, he's defending himself that is suspicious. And he's angry about being accused. That is suspicious. And there was a very a consistent pattern throughout the entire trial that there was no evidence. It was entirely made up

Terms of how how Alan was then portrayed. Am I write in recalling that they actually compared you to Adolph Hitler in the closing statements.

You are correct?

Oh, yes.

During the closing arguments, Jim Suke not only compared me to add Off Hitler, but also quoted scripture from the Bible about how the devil is a roaring lion going about to seek whomever he may be may destroy. There's so much theater involved in the way this case was prosecuted, and probably most cases involve some level of that, and

Doubt, because then it becomes emotional.

I did not expect that. I genuinely walked into this trial believing that I was going to be vindicated because the evidence did not point to me.

You're listening to Wrongful Conviction with Lauren Bright Pacheco. You can listen to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one week early and ad free by subscribing to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. So take me to the moment of the verdict.

The trial was about three weeks and the jury deliberate, deliberated for more than a couple of days, and I think we were going into the Final four tournament.

It was the weekend of the Final four tournament, April.

First, and on April Fool's Day. I was a real April fool for believing that our justice system was going to vindicate me.

Wow.

When the verdict was read, I mouthed to the state's attorney, which I should not have done. It's a wonder I didn't get reprimited for it. How do you sleep at night? But that's as they were handcuffing Alan back and taking him out to where we would not see him again for a long time.

What went through your body, Barry, when you heard a guilty verdict?

I heard the judge reading it, and I could swear to this day that as he started to read that, he said this says guilty, as if to say, I didn't expect that. And I will also point out that all the women on that jury, we're crying is that verdict was read. What's that tell you?

I do remember after the verdict was read, there was an audible gasp in the room collectively, and then it was pretty quickly chaos after that, where bailiffs were moving through the room towards me and people were standing up, and I looked behind me, after collecting myself to encourage

Immediately immediately, you're seen as an entirely different.

Human, not human.

I was in just a state of disbelief at that point. But and I do remember walking out of there. We'd been fairly willing to talk to the press during a lot of this. We didn't say a lot, but we talked with them, and they're standing there with their microphones and everything, and they just wave and say, no, not now, we can't talk now, and we walked on out.

You were sentenced to fifty years, yes, to life, which at that point in your lives, Carolin Barry, was very much a life sentence for both of you. Yes, I can't even imagine how you processed that.

I just felt my life's over. I have no right to go, do anything or be anything from this point on.

And I can very much understand the struggle because, as another mother told me, she served every single day with her daughter in a different way, her life stopped.

Now for me, it was a little different. I got my dander up at that point. I got angry, and I was determined that I was going to do whatever I could to help defend Alan and to get him out.

And eventually they did, but it would take more than a decade. Coming up on part two of Alan Beeman's Unbelievable Wrongful Conviction, Alan's case attracts the attention of a very famous criminal defense attorney.

Jeffer Dangen called my mom and told her I don't like him, but I believe him.

Which leads to an equal the incredible opportunity to enlist law students on his behalf.

Said, I've got a chance to go to Northwestern and I can take along a case.

But even with all that help, Alan Beeman would still sit in prison for thirteen years and fight for decades more to clear his name, all ending in a headline making settlement but not necessarily justice. Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. I'm Lauren Bright Pacheco. Please support your local innocence organizations and go to the links in the