I shall no longer tinker with the machinery of death. Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin bring us inside a decades-long fight for the truth. The story of Henry McCollum and Leon Brown is living proof that false confessions can send innocent people to death row. This update shares the fabulous news that in 2021, Henry and Leon were compensated $75 million dollars – the largest wrongful conviction verdict in history. To learn more and get involved, visit: https://www.centeronwrongfulconvictions.org/ W...
Jul 10, 2023•32 min•Ep. 374
On September 3, 1994, Rhoda Nathan was murdered in Room 237 of the Embassy Suites Hotel in Blue Ash, OH. Police focused on hotel employee Elwood Jones as a suspect after they saw an infected cut on his hand. There were no eyewitnesses nor was there DNA evidence linking Elwood to the crime, so the case against him relied heavily on hypothetical claims. The prosecution also failed to provide the defense with exculpatory evidence that would have affirmed Elwood’s innocence. Elwood was ultimately co...
Jul 06, 2023•48 min•Ep. 373
Have you heard about New Zealand's Brendan Dassey? Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin take us across the globe to New Zealand with a story that hits way too close to home: a sixteen-year-old boy confessed to a rape and murder he didn’t commit. His wrongful conviction allowed the real offender, a serial rapist, to assault dozens of other women -- while Teina Pora languished behind bars for 20 years. We are sharing this updated episode to announce that shortly after the original episode aired, New Zea...
Jul 03, 2023•31 min•Ep. 372
On March 24, 1990, Felix “Carlos” Bastarrica was shot and killed on the street in San Francisco, CA. Following the shooting, Candido “Peter” Diaz, started rumors that one of Felix’s friends, Joaquin Ciria, was responsible. Relying on the rumors, police immediately targeted Joaquin and coerced 18-year-old George Varela – the man who drove the actual shooter to the crime – to falsely implicate Joaquin. Based primarily on this, and despite the complete lack of physical evidence linking him to the c...
Jun 29, 2023•42 min•Ep. 371
The prisons are filled with people convicted of murder who never killed anyone. Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin take us to Dayton, Ohio where a young woman’s false confession to robbery gets turned into a false conviction for murder. There are two profound lies at work in the legal system here. This updated episode shares with listeners the incredible work Tyra has been doing in recent years. To learn more and get involved, visit: https://ohiojpc.org/staff/tyra-patterson/ https://www.representjus...
Jun 26, 2023•30 min•Ep. 370
On May 19, 1975, Harold Franks was confronted by two men as he left a grocery store in Cleveland, OH. The men demanded Franks’ briefcase and, when he resisted, hit him with a pipe and splashed acid in his face. One robber then started shooting – killing Franks and injuring Ann Robinson, co-owner of the store. The perpetrators then fled in a getaway car with Franks’ briefcase. Authorities soon obtained a witness statement from 12-year-old Eddie Vernon, who said that the perpetrators were 18-year-...
Jun 22, 2023•39 min•Ep. 369
The thing about torture is that it works, at least if your only goal is to find a scapegoat. Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin take us to Birmingham, England. In 1972, two pubs were bombed, and six innocent Irish men were tortured into giving false confessions. The Birmingham Six were freed in 1991, but the crime’s never been solved. To this day, the public demands to know who really planted those bombs. This update shares the March 2022 court decision protecting one of the key tenants of journalis...
Jun 19, 2023•33 min•Ep. 368
On June 19, 1988, 20-year-old Vincent Wright and 17-year-old Anissia Johnson were robbed at gunpoint by two men outside of a convenience store in Fort Lauderdale, FL. A third perpetrator also drove up to the scene in a brown car and instructed the gunmen to steal Wright’s car, which they did. 22-year-old Sidney Holmes came under police suspicion when they discovered that he drove a similar car to that of the third perpetrator – which happened to be one of the most popular cars at the time. Sidne...
Jun 15, 2023•40 min•Ep. 367
One woman was forced to talk. The other was forced to listen. Both were powerless. Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin tell us about a California man named Ricky Davis. In 1985, Ricky and his girlfriend, Connie, found their roommate brutally stabbed to death. Without any leads, the case went cold for 14 years until detectives convinced Connie that she had repressed memories of Ricky committing the crime. This updated episode shares the news that the actual murderer in Ricky's case was caught and sent...
Jun 12, 2023•34 min•Ep. 366
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 pr...
Jun 08, 2023•38 min•Ep. 365
Michael was serving a life sentence until one person came to his rescue: his mom. Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin bring us to Culpeper County, Virginia, to tell the story of teenage buddies Eric Weakley and Michael Hash. Local police solved a murder case by coercing Eric into falsely confessing and into falsely implicating his friend Michael as an accomplice. For years, lawyers couldn’t get justice for either of them -- until Michael’s mom found evidence that blew this case wide open. We are upda...
Jun 05, 2023•34 min•Ep. 364
On October 18, 1996, 15-year-old Brian Bowling and his friend, 17-year-old Cain Storey, were in Brian’s bedroom in Silver Creek, GA when a gun went off and shot Bowling in the head, ultimately killing him. Storey initially claimed that Bowling shot himself while playing a game, however, he later falsely confessed to shooting Bowling, and was subsequently convicted of his murder. During the investigation, 17-year-old Daryl “Lee” Clark also became a suspect as the state believed that he acted as a...
Jun 01, 2023•42 min•Ep. 363
How could a layperson see all the problems with this interrogation when the police couldn’t? Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin tell us about Chris Tapp, just 20 when he endured a mind-bending, 25-hour interrogation that transformed him from an innocent man into a confessed murderer. Fortunately for Chris, he found an indomitable champion... in the victim’s mother, Carol Dodge. Carol convinced police to use a revolutionary new method of DNA identification to exonerate Chris and find her own daughter...
May 29, 2023•31 min•Ep. 362
On October 16, 1995, in Waunakee, WI, 34-year-old Audrey Edmunds, a stay-at-home mother who often babysat for neighborhood families, was watching a neighbor’s 7-month-old daughter, Natalie, when Natalie became unresponsive. Audrey immediately ran to her neighbor’s house and called 911. The paramedics found Natalie with fixed and dilated pupils and taking short breaths. She passed away at the hospital that night. Natalie’s autopsy revealed extensive brain damage and a forensic pathologist determi...
May 25, 2023•40 min•Ep. 361
In Chicago, old habits die hard. Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin bring us inside one of the worst police abuse scandals in U.S. history. For decades on the southside of Chicago, a group of white cops turned the interrogation room into a torture chamber for Black men. Those cops called themselves the Midnight Crew. We are releasing this updated episode to share that even though the city passed a reparations bill that will compensate Jon Burge's victims and their families, the promise has yet to be...
May 22, 2023•32 min•Ep. 360
On November 17, 1990, Doug Estes and Jim Bennett, who were separately out hunting, were found together, shot and killed at the Fulton State Game Area in Kalamazoo, MI. 38-year-old Jeff Titus had a farm near the scene and found one of the hunter’s missing weapons. Because of this, Jeff soon came under suspicion. However, Jeff had a solid alibi and was immediately cleared as a suspect – the case went cold for ten years. In 2000, Kalamazoo County Sheriff’s Office Cold Case Unit reopened the case an...
May 18, 2023•42 min•Ep. 359
So their theory is that a wandering necrophiliac comes across the body and defiles it? Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin tell the story of how five Chicago teens were wrongly convicted of the rape and murder of their classmate - and how prosecutors tried to explain away the DNA that proved them innocent. This case happened during the early 1990s, when the media was saturated with misleading stories about youth of color committing violent crimes in groups. This "superpredator" narrative drove the wr...
May 15, 2023•32 min•Ep. 358
In December of 2002, a mother dropped off her 3 month old daughter, I.Z., at daycare in Romeoville, IL. Jennifer Del Prete was working at the daycare center and later that day, Jennifer noticed that the girl was not breathing so she called 911. I.Z. died almost a full year later. The state hypothesized that I.Z. died of Shaken Baby Syndrome (SBS). Since Jennifer was providing care for I.Z. on the day she initially showed medical issues, Jennifer was charged and convicted of murder. Since Jennife...
May 11, 2023•43 min•Ep. 357
Why do we tell these stories? Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin tell us the story of Peter Reilly, one of the first modern-day false confessors. In 1973, police continued to interrogate 18-year-old Peter until he started to believe he was actually guilty of murdering his own mother. But Peter’s friends and neighbors believed in his innocence. Their small-town campaign for Peter’s freedom was eventually joined by a host of big name celebrities. This episode was originally the finale of Wrongful Conv...
May 08, 2023•33 min•Ep. 356
On September 13, 1983, Delbert Baker was found dead – shot and with his throat slashed – in Auburndale, FL. Witnesses gave the police a lead on two suspects but they quickly dismissed it since one of the suspects was working as a police informant. A few months later, after a $5,000 reward was offered for information, another individual came forward and said that Juan Roberto Melendez was responsible. This person was known to dislike Juan, and on more than one occasion declared that he would “get...
May 04, 2023•44 min•Ep. 355
He thought the police would recognize this was just a dream, not reality. Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin bring us a story from Ada, OK where a young woman went missing. A few months after her disappearance, a man named Tommy Ward told police that he’d had a bad dream about her murder. Incredibly, the police took that dream and turned it into a false confession... and into a prison sentence that continues to this day, 35 years later. Since this episode's original release, in January 2021, a Distr...
May 01, 2023•25 min•Ep. 353
No body, no bones, no motive. Just a decades long nightmare that has not ended. For the final episode of Season 2 Laura Nirider and Steve Drizin take us back to Ada, OK, for the second half of the story of Tommy Ward and Karl Fontenot. When we left off last week, Tommy and Karl were sitting on death row, after police turned Tommy’s bad dream into a murder confession. This week, we hear about some serious twists in the case, from the discovery of the victim’s body to the revelation of hidden evid...
May 01, 2023•24 min•Ep. 354
On October 3, 2004, in Port Huron, MI, Terry Ceasor was at home alone with his girlfriend Cheryl’s 1 year old son, Brenden. Terry and Brenden had been playing a game that consisted of Terry chasing Brenden behind the couch when Terry briefly stepped away from the room to use the bathroom. After he left the room, Terry heard a loud thud and found Brenden unconscious on the living room floor. The medical professionals at the hospital believed that Brenden was a victim of Shaken Baby Syndrome and T...
Apr 27, 2023•36 min•Ep. 352
On New Year’s Eve in 1993, Hank Skinner fell asleep early on his couch after being rendered comatose from a cocktail of vodka, xanax and codeine. His girlfriend, Twila Busby, left for a party, and when she returned, she and her two sons were brutally murdered. Pampa, TX law enforcement knew Hank from previous charges and he was the sole survivor of the attack, so he soon became the prime suspect. Despite evidence that Hank was incapable of committing these murders, Hank faced 27 years on Texas d...
Apr 24, 2023•40 min•Ep. 351
On the evening of October 30, 1994, Marcus Boyd and Greg Elking were sitting on Marcus’s front porch in St. Louis, MO when two men, wearing ski masks and armed with guns, ambushed them and shot Marcus several times leading to his death. Police gathered that 20 year old Lamar Johnson may have had a conflict with Marcus, so Lamar became a prime suspect. Based on fabricated identifications and the word of a jailhouse snitch, Lamar was convicted and sentenced to life without parole. Lauren Bright Pa...
Apr 20, 2023•44 min•Ep. 350
In 1987, five elderly women passed away at a nursing home in Grand Rapids, MI. Gwen Graham and Cathy Wood both worked at this nursing home, and the pair had been in a brief relationship at the time. Months later, when Gwen broke up with Cathy and started seeing someone new, Cathy became angry and told her ex-husband that the five women did not die naturally, but that she and Gwen had smothered them as part of a lover’s pact that would bind them together for life. Shocked, he reported this to aut...
Apr 17, 2023•38 min•Ep. 349
In November of 2001, in Sacramento, CA, four month old Nadia was declared brain dead after being rushed to the hospital the day prior. Nadia’s father, Zavion Johnson, eventually told authorities that he had dropped Nadia by accident when giving her a bath on November 24th and that she was unusually sleepy and ultimately stopped breathing following the accident. But authorities believed that Nadia died from Shaken Baby Syndrome and the prosecution presented three witnesses to attest to this in co...
Apr 13, 2023•34 min•Ep. 348
In May 2001, Talalelei “TJ” Edwards, his wife and son were sharing an Anchorage, AK apartment with a woman named Melissa along with Melissa’s 1 year old son, Derrick. Talalelei often watched the boys on the days when other sitters were not available. On the morning of May 8, Derrick slept for a few hours until Talalelei noticed his odd breathing. Trained in child caregiving, Talalelei responded by blowing air on the child’s face, and performing CPR. When he did not respond, Talalelei took Derric...
Apr 10, 2023•34 min•Ep. 347
From an extremely young age, Amanda Busse endured severe physical and sexual abuse, not only by her father, but also by her father’s friends, who were all feared by much of the community as they were rumoured to control the local drug trade. After her mother passed, Amanda’s father sold her to a 36 year old acquaintance of his, to be his wife. Amanda was 17 at the time. On November 15, 1997, a local woman was found brutally murdered in the Meramec River in MO. Amanda’s father, husband, and 3 oth...
Apr 03, 2023•37 min•Ep. 346
On June 29, 2009, and into the following morning, James Richardson was out at The Other Place nightclub in Greenville, NC. James and another club goer exchanged words and were escorted out of the club. Shortly thereafter, a white BMW came barreling down the street, as someone in the car opened fire, killing two individuals standing outside of the club. None of the eyewitnesses identified James as the shooter, but police, prosecutors, and the media pursued him as the sole suspect. James was convi...
Mar 27, 2023•36 min•Ep. 345
