Jeff Deskovic: The Wrongfully Convicted Man Freeing Others Just Like Himself (Pt 2)

At 16 years old, Jeff was wrongfully convicted of raping and murdering a classmate. And after sixteen years in prison, he was finally exonerated. Rather than being dominated by victimhood that no one would have blamed him for, Jeff went to work fighting to free others who’ve been wrongly convicted and he's already freed 11 folks! 

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Hey, everybody, it's Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks.
And we continue now a part two of our conversation
with Jeff Jeskovic. Right after these brief messages from our
generals sponsors, is your mom and grandmother in the court?

Speaker 2 (00:30):
My mother and my aunt were.

Speaker 1 (00:34):
Were they beside themselves?

Speaker 2 (00:36):
They were?

Speaker 1 (00:36):
They had to have known you were getting realroaded and
watching every step other.

Speaker 2 (00:39):
Well, no, they were beside themselves at the verdict. But
prior to that, they believed the system worked and they
thought I was going to be found not guilty, as
did I And.

Speaker 1 (00:51):
Yeah, did you did you?

Speaker 2 (00:53):
Well? I didn't initially, and you know, as a result
of that, I did feel depressed. And you know, at
one point I'm made a suicide attempt, which resulted in
my being involuntarily hospitalized. But at some point after that.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
When did you make a suicide attempt?

Speaker 2 (01:08):
That was third So I was in accounted jail for
thirty five days and then I got bailed out, and
a few days later I made a suicide attempt. I
took an entire bottle of extra strength talent holes which
you know hadn't been opened, and I went to sleep
and I intended never to wake up again, and.

Speaker 1 (01:25):
I did they at sixteen years old.

Speaker 2 (01:27):
At sixteen years old, because I felt, Look, I thought
I was going back to my life, and there was
no going back to it. You know, I was a
hated figure in peak skill. Everybody presumed my guilt. I
wasn't allowed to go back to school, and none of
the kids parents were willing to let them play with me.
I felt it was dangerous just to be outside. So
I felt like my life was over. But at some point,

(01:49):
you know, I began to believe I would be found
not guilty, and you know, you start to hope that.
And when I would question my lawyer about well, what
are you doing, what's our strategy? How are we gonna
I mean, he said, look, you're a kid, I'm the lawyer. Right,
you already thought you were smarter than adults. Once look
at whether that ended up, Just sit back and let

(02:12):
me do my job with that argument. That's that's what
I did.

Speaker 1 (02:17):
So is it your belief that this attorney was a
jacket or just overworked.

Speaker 2 (02:25):
I it's my belief that he threw the case. Because
when I've met with many lawyers since I've been home,
and they were all curious who defended me, and when
I mentioned his name, they're all surprised because they said
that they've either tried cases with or against them, or
knew of his reputation, and he was good, a good
trial lawyer. So I think that he I think, but

(02:48):
can't prove that he threw the case because just the
deficiencies that I outlined already present, the alibi, emphasized, the DNA,
you have to challenge the confession. I mean, these are
all elementary things. A good third year law student would
know that.

Speaker 1 (03:06):
Do you think public defenders get overwhelmed?

Speaker 2 (03:10):
I do. I think that you know, they have way
too large a case slowed. It's not uncommon for one
public defender to have a one hundred case at the
same time.

Speaker 1 (03:18):
They that's too many. There's no way you can do
somebody justice.

Speaker 2 (03:21):
That way exactly, And it's a different the big budgetary
difference between the district attorney's office public defender's office, and
that translates into you know, less less manpower, less investigators,
less experts. You have to a lot of time, the
public defenders have to resort to ask the judge to
allocate discretionary funding for experts and a lot of times
those requests are denied because the judges are trying to

(03:43):
keep the cost of trials down.

Speaker 1 (03:49):
So now you're seventeen, I think one am.

Speaker 2 (03:52):
I'm seventeen at the trial and you know then I'm
convicted and I'm sentenced.

Speaker 1 (03:59):
And also murder rate stuff, and you're being tried as adult.
You're going to big boy prison.

Speaker 2 (04:04):
Correct, exactly right, Almyra crests aslutely been terrified.

Speaker 1 (04:10):
I was, and you're not a violent person, and I'm
not a violent person, and you're going to most violent
place on earth, that's right. What was the place Elmyra
Correctional Facility. There was three or four stabbings or cuttings
every day. There was a lot of violence that didn't
involve weapons, and there was gang activity and so collectively
there was a general environment of violence and adrealine that

(04:32):
permeated the air. I have a target on my back,
so I'm worried that people are going to discover that
I've incarcerated for a rape along with the murder. Because
there's a vigil antimantality wherech people convicted of sex offenses.
So yes, I really and my understanding is there's a
hierarchy in jail. But if you've heard a child or rape,

(04:52):
you're a target, correct, that's you had both? Yeah, right,
So how did you manage in jail?

Speaker 2 (05:02):
Well, it was I mean you learned certain survival tactics
and you know, I would study people for a couple
of months before I even said hello. And if something's happening,
you put your back to the wall, and you know,
just be quiet when you're in your cell and try
not to draw attention so you can, you know, and
people that are engaged in you know, gambling or other
high risk activity, try to stay far away from them.

(05:24):
But even with that, that's just things to minimize. But
even with that, I mean they were in the course
of my sixteen years, there were maybe maybe like sixty
eight times I was I was beat up. One time
I almost lost my life. I got hit on the
side of my head with ten pound weigh plates repeatedly.
Why they thought I was a rapist, So you'd just

(05:47):
be minding your own business. They just beat the hell
out of you because of what your charge was. Yeah,
that could, Yes, that could happen at any point a
few times a day.

Speaker 1 (05:56):
Is there any way a guy like you could find
safety in jail. Is there could you get go to work?
I mean, I don't know, but I mean, is there
any way.

Speaker 2 (06:07):
I mean, just the tactics that I mentioned to you.
When you get older and you get a little bit hardened,
and you know, as I got into my mid twenties,
I mean, you know, here and there, I wouldn't do
that bad, you know, in the in the fight, you know,
h yeah, that's that's kind of pretty much, you know it.
I mean, I mean, I do think that there were

(06:29):
some of a few older prisoners that you know, helped
me to avoid certain leave the kid alone or whatever.
You know, they had some street credit themselves, being you know,
someone that was an old timer, so I did get along.

Speaker 1 (06:41):
Why would they Why would they do that for you?

Speaker 2 (06:46):
I think that, I mean, I think that that was
almost like, I mean, there's a there's a certain amount
of gratification that's involved with putting someone under your wing,
like you feel like you're doing something good. I guess,
or I'm to the extent that there's any type of
fatherly instinct there. You know, this could have been my
kid or you know, they had some I mean that,

(07:08):
I mean, those are my theories you know, on it.
I mean, it wasn't like they ever asked me for anything.
They weren't trying to get any sexual favors for me.
They weren't asking for money, or they weren't extorting me.
It wasn't any of those things.

Speaker 1 (07:21):
Was there a single moment you weren't terrified on Joe?

Speaker 2 (07:25):
No, No, there wasn't.

Speaker 1 (07:28):
What is that? Due to a psyche? You have?

Speaker 2 (07:32):
It make it makes you hyper, It makes you hyper vigilant.

Speaker 1 (07:38):
Do you think it's different for a person that knows
he's guilty versus a person that knows.

Speaker 2 (07:42):
He's innocent, Because somebody like I met a lot of
people that were guilty, and in conversation with them, they
would say, look, I did this to myself. I did
what I did, I got caught. I have to pay
for that. So I'm just I'm not going to cry
about it. I'm just gonna make the best of it
I that I can and try to go home as

(08:02):
quickly as I can. I could never get to that
place because I knew that I was innocent, and I
didn't know how long this was going to go on for.
I mean, I in a way, I kind of lived
from appeal to appeal in my mind. You know, I
thought I ignored that was only hope you had, right,
I ignored the fact that I had a fifteen life sentence.

(08:23):
I just thought, look, I just have to hold on
for a year or two, at which point the next
appeal is going to be decided, which I'm confident I'm
going to win and go home because I'm innocent and
I believe in the system.

Speaker 1 (08:37):
And you're never going to get parole because part of
the thing about parole is showing that you have serious
remars for a crime you committed and you're maintaining your innocence.
Of the pro boards looking at you like, well, this
guy had learned his lessons in the back. Correct I
bet that. I mean, I'm guessing.

Speaker 2 (08:54):
No, no, no, that's true. You're exactly right. I don't't
jump too far ahead. But I got denied parole for that.

Speaker 1 (09:00):
Very reasonable because so the thing is, if you are
innocent and in prison, if you want parole, you may
have to copy a second time to something you haven't
done just to get your freedom.

Speaker 2 (09:11):
Yeah, that's true.

Speaker 1 (09:12):
That's the irony of ironies.

Speaker 2 (09:14):
I agree.

Speaker 1 (09:16):
So you're in prison, and how's the I know you're appealing,
of course, So how does that who go? How take
me through that process?

Speaker 2 (09:27):
Sure? So I have a public defender, but not the
same person and not from the same agency. Thank god,
right exactly, this lawyer actually did a great job for me.
So she raised ten issues. She raised the issue by innocence.
That took the form of arguing that there was legally
insufficient evidence, that the prosecution hadn't proven guilt on a

(09:47):
reasonable doubt, and that the vertic was against the way
to the evidence. All of that centering around the DNA.
My Fifth Amendment rights being violated was argued by the
manner in which I had been question My right to confrontation.
Sixth Amendment was argued because of the judge allowing the
polygraphis to give his opinion while banning my lawyer from

(10:09):
cross examining him on his methods. The evidence being thrown
out was raised. The judge being biased against me was raised.
In total, ten issues of law were raised the appellate division.
They wrote that I was not in custody, that I
was free to come and go as I wanted, and
therefore they ruled the statements were admissible.

Speaker 1 (10:30):
But you weren't right. You were driven there by cops
and your parents weren't around, how were you free to
come and go?

Speaker 2 (10:37):
I completely agree with you. They wrote that there was
overwhelming evidence of guilt, which is kind of a head scratcher.
They have this confession obtained under questionable circumstances, no matching
DNA and no matching DNA, so I don't understand that,
and you wet your confession right, right, So those two rulings,
and then they they they rejected my argument on the polygraph.

(11:02):
They said, well, because I put the statements into question,
that that was not, you know, a reversible error. Then
they knocked out the rest of my arguments. In one sentence,
they wrote that they looked at my remaining contentions and
found them to either be without merit or else not
preserved for review. And they ruled against me five toughing

(11:22):
on that, and it was all downhill from there. Every
argument motion was denied, in one word, denied. The Court
of Appeals, New York's highest court. You have to get
permission from them before they'll agree to allow you to
appeal to them. So they declined to give me permission.
I lost in federal court because my attorney was given

(11:44):
the wrong information by the court clerk which resulted in
my habeas corpus petition arriving for four dys late, which
the then west Chester District Attorney, Jeanine Piro or she
oh who whoa whoa who Jeanine Piro, the Fox Newswoman.

Speaker 1 (11:58):
Yes, you went in front of her.

Speaker 2 (12:00):
No, if she was, she was the district attorney, so
she wasn't the DA when I was convicted, but she
took office before my first appeal, so she was the
one who kept the ball rolling against me. She's the
one that fought seven appeals. She's the one that repeatedly
blocked me from getting further DNA testing. She's the one
that got the federal court to rule that I was

(12:21):
my being late four days by the.

Speaker 1 (12:24):
Court because I think the show is called Justice with
Judy or something like that.

Speaker 2 (12:31):
Yeah, Justice with Jeanine Piro, Yeah Janine, Yeah right, Holy smokes.
So the court ruled that I was late, So I
lost that way. Now the case is no longer about
my issues. It's only about whether or not the federal
court ruling that I was late, whether that ruling was
correct or not. So I appeal that to the United States,

(12:52):
excuse me, to the to the Federal Court of Appeals,
I got permission to appeal to them, and my lawyer
are I have a different lawyer now? My lawyer argued
that this was not a lateness caused by me or
my attorney, but by the court clerk, that upholding a
ruling like that would cause a miscarriage of justice to continue,

(13:12):
and lastly, that overturning the procedure of ruling would open
the door for more sophisticated DNA. So, once again Pierro's
office opposed, and the Federal Court of Appeals, which included
future US Supreme Court Justice Sonya so to Mayor, they
upheld the court's ruling.

Speaker 1 (13:32):
Hold it come out. Now it goes to the Federal
court and I get time barred. And Sonya Mayor, yeah,
who is now on the United States Supreme Court. Right,
her office denied this too. Yes, okay, you know what
I found interesting. You've got ultra right and ultra left,

(13:52):
and they're both arriving the same conclusion to not give
you a chance. Right, It's not a political thing. It's
just a systematic quagmar of crop thing. Right, that is
unbelievable to me.

Speaker 2 (14:08):
And then my lawyer moved to reargue it in front
of Soda Mayora and her colleague, and she denied the reargument.

Speaker 1 (14:15):
Motion, so she wouldn't even hear it. Right.

Speaker 2 (14:18):
We asked, look, you got the decision wrong because of XYZ,
so we're not only asking you to reconsider it, but
we were requesting that all the judges on this circuit
hear the issue and vote. And they said, no, that's
not necessary. We're just upholding the decision we already made.

Speaker 1 (14:40):
I gotta believe. And there's a lot of legal stuff here,
and I mean, you know, we've all watched Law and Order,
so we think we know what we know, but it
means we don't know anything unless we're attorneys. Just layman's terms.
Why wouldn't they hear it? And even taking yourself out

(15:01):
of it, which has got to be very difficult, but
why wouldn't you hear that? Is it? Because you get
so many thousands appeals you can only hear so many
and it's a time thing. I mean, why wouldn't you
hear that? Why would she not hear it?

Speaker 2 (15:17):
Well, there's two there's two tensions in the law which
played themselves out there. So one of them is what
I'll call proceduralism. Versus substance of justice, proceduralism, the court's
obsession at well, did we get the form right, not
the actual decision.

Speaker 1 (15:37):
So it gives a crap about a form when you're
talking about a person's life. And by the way, there
may be somebody out there who actually did kill and
rape somebody that could be doing it somebody else too.
If we did get it wrong, we need to go
back and do some police work. I mean, I don't
get it to make any sense.

Speaker 2 (15:54):
To me, completely agree. And the other thing is what
I'll call finality of conviction versus accuracy. In other words,
the competing ideas. On one hand, Look, you had your
day in court, you lost. You know how many times
are we going to keep going through? Is ever enough

(16:15):
enough that idea versus you know, accuracy? Who cares about
a final conclusion if your final conclusion is in error.
So those those two things I think play play a
big part and can run for convictions being uphold on it.
And it played a role in my losing in federal

(16:36):
court twice. And then I went to the US Supreme
Court and he declined to grant me permission. And so
now my appials are over that seven appeals have lost.
I'm eleven years in the only way back in the court,
So now you're twenty eight. Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 1 (16:52):
You've had your liberty stripped from you for eleven years. Yes,
because you were a kid from a poor mother in
an apartment who got railroad and couldn't defend yourself. Are
you at this point now out of this sixteen year
old fear factor and into just being angry as hell?

Speaker 2 (17:15):
No, I wouldn't describe myself as angry. I was still
I was still like fearful, like you know, what the
hell is going to happen to me?

Speaker 1 (17:22):
Now?

Speaker 2 (17:22):
Am I ever going to get out of here? So
the only way.

Speaker 1 (17:27):
Are you crying yourself to sleep at night? Yeah? On
some night? Sam?

Speaker 2 (17:32):
Sure? Now I have to hide it and make sure
that none of the other prisoners hear.

Speaker 1 (17:35):
That, though I get it. Weakness, sure exactly. Boy. I
wish everybody that was listening could have seen his face.
He's been so matter of fact until just then, because
then you just raise your eyebrows at me and look
down at me like, don't cry in prison, right, And

(17:56):
like a father would say to a child like you
on prison, You're going to pay for that cost the look. Yeah,
you're right, that's a scary look. Yeah, that's a look
of that'll get you killed or riped yourself.

Speaker 2 (18:13):
Yeah, I would agree.

Speaker 1 (18:17):
We'll be right back.

Speaker 2 (18:26):
So the only way back in a court is if
you can find some new evidence, or if the court
makes a ruling, you know, and applies it to old cases.
So I don't have any money, my family has no
money to hire a lawyer or an investigator, and obviously,
from behind bars, I wasn't going to be doing any
reinvestigating myself. Hence a letter writing campaign. For four years.

(18:51):
I wrote large firms, I wrote nonprofits, I wrote faith
based organizations. If I could come up with a line
of reasoning or action that somebody could take which could
set in motion a chain of events that culminated into
my getting the legal representation I needed, then I wrote letters.
I wrote an uncountable amount of letters for four years,

(19:13):
never getting responses other than the occasional no. And then
I went.

Speaker 1 (19:19):
To the people were kind enough to write you back
to say.

Speaker 2 (19:21):
Note most of the time no, but the few people
that there are a few places that did did write
me back and say no. A few of those were
law firms, and they said they didn't have time to
take my case for free, but they made sure that
I knew exactly how much money they wanted should I
be able to scrape it together. Then I went to

(19:44):
the parole board, where as we've went over, you know,
I maintained my innocence, and you know, their decision said,
you know that you have a great educational records, you
have a good disciplinary record, you got some letters of support,
including from a prison an employee, but nonetheless, you've been
found guilty of a brutal and senseless crime, and so

(20:07):
to release you would be to lessen as seriousness. And
they ordered me to appear in front of them two
years later. And at that point it seemed kind of
certain that I was going to die in prison for
a crime I didn't commit.

Speaker 1 (20:23):
Did you ever think I'm going to cop to this
to get out of here?

Speaker 2 (20:28):
No? No, I consider that. I considered that at two junctures.
I considered that when the prison authorities were pressuring me
to take and complete the sex offender Training program, which
they said, look, the parole board is going to want
to see that you took a program that addresses your crime.

(20:49):
That would be the sex Offender Training program. But the
problem with completing that was there was a guilted mission
requirement tied to it, kind of similar to like an
AA where if you don't admit you ever problem, you
can't begin to And so they wanted you to admit
you were guilty to the instructor, to the other prisoners.
They they wanted a description from beginning to end. They

(21:11):
wanted it all in writing, and so failure to complete
any element of that would result in being removed from
the program and deemed to have refused to complete. So
I did consider briefly to do that, but I decided
not to do that because, first of all, a cores
false confession was how I got there in the first place,

(21:32):
so I wasn't about to repeat that. It's again correct,
So I went the other way this time.

Speaker 1 (21:39):
But the thing is, you're literally willing to spend the
rest of your life in jail for claiming your own innocence. Yes,
what at catch twenty two? I mean, what do you do?
You have no help?

Speaker 2 (21:51):
Right, So I came up with this plan in my head,
which I attempted to carry out at the parole boards.
So I knew they were in the habit of rubbers
damp denying applications of anyone applying for parole that was
convicted of a violent crime. So I thought, look, I'm
gonna raise the issue of my innocence. I'm going to
cite the DNA. But you know, they didn't want to
hear that. You know, I did briefly consider, you know,

(22:15):
to express remorse and take responsibility. I did briefly consider
that at the board, but in the end I decided
not to do that. And part of that was not
just it was the same line of reasoning that I
had used in deciding not to take the sex Offender
Training program. Plus, you know I already decided this before
on the Sex Offender Training program to not take it.

(22:36):
So I so, I, you know, just held to my ground.

Speaker 1 (22:40):
Along the way, yeah, absent the judges and the prole
But along the way, did you win some believers?

Speaker 2 (22:50):
Yeah? I did that. They were there, Yes, I did.
They were In general. I didn't talk about my case
because I wouldn't want to attract attention, right, But there
were a couple of people I broke that role with
so they believed me. I had to count one of
my counselors believe me, you know.

Speaker 1 (23:08):
Not pacifying you, but really believed you.

Speaker 2 (23:11):
I think that she did. I mean she would periodically
ask me, you know, how are my legal efforts going?
And you know, she let me make a few phone calls.
He you know, technically wasn't supposed to let me do so,
I mean, to the small extent she could do anything.
So those people, but most importantly, I continued the letter

(23:31):
writing campaign even you know, after I was denied parole,
and I ended up with the ultimate believer at that point.
So one of the letters that I wrote, which was
in care of a publishing I wrote a book author
in care of a publishing company, and the publishing company,
instead of forwarding it to the book author, sent it

(23:52):
to Claudia Whitman, who's an investigator. And when I sent her,
she wrote me, when I sent her the DNA tests off,
she instantly believed in me because she had never heard
of a case where the DNA excluded somebody and yet
a conviction took place. So she tried to get people
to take my case. She gave me ideas, and one

(24:13):
of her ideas was the winning one. She suggested that
I write the Innocence Project again, and I told her, well,
I've written them before when they got started back in
ninety two ninety three, and she said, yeah, but given
the DNA data Bank has been created, the prior denials
irrelevance to just write them. So I did. I filled

(24:35):
out their application. I forgot about it. I looked for
other ways to get representation, none of which worked. Simultaneous
to that, she was lobbying them from outside the organization.
She got other respected legal entities to lobby them to
take my case. And then I got lucky that one
of the intake workers, Maggie Taylor, when the lawyers didn't
want to take my case, she represented it again, and

(24:57):
when they didn't want to take it a second time,
she represented it a third time. Her winning idea, which
was one that I suggested to her, was what about
the DNA data Bank? So I got their representation. That
was the first of three keys. Second key was Piro
left office and her successor was not as dug in,
and she was willing to give me the test. As

(25:21):
I hear through the grapevine, they both hated each other
and Piero was in the middle of running for Attorney General.
So I think her successor let me get the testing,
hoping that I'd be exonerated so as to damage her
run for attorney to office political it was, but look,
you know what, So that was the two or three keys.

(25:43):
And the third key was they took the crime scene
DNA evidence which didn't match me, and put it in
the DNA data bank and it matched. It hit it
matched the actual perpetrator whose DNA was in that data bank.
Because left free when I was doing time for his crime,
he killed a second victim just three and a half

(26:06):
years later, who was a school teacher and had two children.

Speaker 1 (26:10):
So my career in peak skill the same city, Yes
he had, he'd lived amongst everybody. Yes, Yes, he did
the very thing we talked about happening, Yes, and which
is yes, by railroading you. They ignored that there was
a murder on the loose, and he did it again.
Oh my goodness.

Speaker 2 (26:29):
So on September twentieth, two thousand and six, the convictions
of returned I was released. I went back to court
November two, two thousand and six, at which point all
the charges were dismissed against me on actual innocence grounds,
and he was subsequently arrested and convicted of the crime.
Did he admit it he did. Confronted with the DNA,

(26:50):
he admitted that he was the person that did it.

Speaker 1 (26:53):
Why did he kill this fifteen year old good all
these years ago.

Speaker 2 (26:57):
Well, there's a video of him confessing to it on YouTube,
and in that video he says that he was in
the park. So there's Hillcrest condominiums, and then there's Hillcrest
to school and then there's like a thick woods with
a McCadam path in it. And she was there to
take pictures in connection with her photography class. The teacher

(27:20):
had assigned a male student to like a buddy system
to go with her. The male student played hooky on
the assignment. So she goes from the high school to
her home with her sister. Her sister goes to the restroom,
comes out and Angela's not there. She goes it, went
with her camera on her own to the park and

(27:43):
while taking pictures on that McCadam path, she had the
misfortune of coming across Cunningham, Stephen Cunningham, who was there
in the park and who was high, and he attacked,
murdered and raped her.

Speaker 1 (27:58):
Meanwhile, you're playing with feball right, and end up.

Speaker 2 (28:03):
Doing sixteen years from age seventeen to thirty two.

Speaker 1 (28:10):
Wow, Jeff, folks, there's redemption coming. I promise we'll be
right back. Something I learned and reading about your story.

(28:39):
The numbers say that there are probably one hundred and
twenty thousand people wrongfully convicted in the United States today,
right Who comes up with that number?

Speaker 2 (28:56):
Well, there's it's an estimation. There's a Wayne State University
study that essinaly meates ten thousand people are wrongfully convicted
each year.

Speaker 1 (29:07):
So when you're listening to Jeff's story before we go
on to the good that has come out of all
of this, you know, it's if you're hearing it, you've
got to be thinking, oh my gosh, it's terrible. Not
the way our so siety is supposed to work. This
is not the way our justice system is supposed to work.

(29:29):
You need to make it a little more personal. Jeff
could be your son, your nephew, your uncle, your brother,
It could be you, it could be your daughter. If
it can happen to Jeff, and it can happen to
the one hundred and twenty thousand people that are buried
in our prison system the United States that are in

(29:49):
fact innocent, and it happens all the time that we
see a news report of somebody who was who was
wrongfully convicted by some overzealous cops who were more worried
about the win than the justice. We see it all
the time, and sure we shake our heads and say

(30:09):
it's bad, but we need to put a face on it.
We live in this world and we're held accountable by
the same justice system, and this very thing could happen
to any of us or any of our loved ones,
and that needs to be I think starkly pointed out
that we need to care about this story not because

(30:30):
we get emotionally connected to the long explanation and the
long form explanation of the story, which is unbelievably gut
wrenching and interesting, but because it's the world we live
in and it could happen to us. Are you traumatized
from it?

Speaker 2 (30:48):
Sure? Of course. I mean I went for about six years.
I went four times a week with mets of mental
health professionals and helping them get over the trauma of
that and in difficulties in reintegrating and managing life. I'll say, now,
having been home for eighteen years, I mean I feel

(31:08):
like the symptoms are much more controlled. I won't say
that that there's no left over, but it's much more
minimized than before. There was also the social stigma. You
were in prison for sixteen years wrongfully, but you were
there for sixteen years, so how much of that rubbed
off on? It was safe to be alone someplace with you.

(31:31):
My extended family, which you know, overwhelming majority of whom
never came to see me. The few that did would come,
disappear for three years, come disappear for three years. My
mother was a consistent visitor, but then in the last
six years I was lucky if I saw her once
every six months. My brother came three times in sixteen years,

(31:51):
not at all in the last decade, and my grandmother
passed away six years in. So my point in giving
all those details is for most and purposes, I did
the time by myself, so my extended family became like
strangers to me, So that was awkward when I'd meet
up with them. Technology had passed me by cell phone, GPS,

(32:11):
Internet hadn't been created. Culture was different, cities looked just
familiar enough to feel like I was in a parallel world,
one that I had placed that I didn't belong in.
I was always passed over for gainful employment, my lack
stability of housing, at one point a couple of weeks
away from a homeless shelter, So it was a very

(32:33):
difficult initial five years of freedom. I think it was
particularly difficult for me because I had been in prison
from seventeen to thirty two, not like twenty five to
forty or thirty to forty five. So I had never
lived alone. I had never went shopping. I hadn't had
a driver's license.

Speaker 1 (32:51):
You never got to be an adult.

Speaker 2 (32:53):
I never got to be an adult, so I think
the transition was particularly difficult. I mean, I remember dean
of Mercy College, which I gave me a scholarship to
finish the bachelor's a great because I had gotten the
ged and associates another year towards the bachelors while in
prison at the time that funding was cut. So Mercy
College gave me a scholarship to finish the bachelors. And

(33:15):
one time the dean, who was the point person on campus,
took me shopping, and I remember in terms of like
the cleaning supplies and even the food items. I so
didn't know how to shop that I would save the
containers and bring them with me back to the supermarket

(33:36):
when I would go shopping, and just to buy the
same things all over again.

Speaker 1 (33:43):
Wow, your life was taken from me.

Speaker 2 (33:48):
Yeah, I missed births, deaths, weddings, rites of passage, finishing
my education at I at a normal age. I didn't
graduate high school. I didn't go to the high school prom.
I wasn't like well into a career, and you know,
I certainly wasn't married or have a family. So those
are all the concrete things that came with the loss.

(34:13):
How did you make it through it? While I was
in prison? So belief in God was one thing I mentioned.
I was just I was doing like maybe a year
or two to the next appeal. I used to go
to the law library and learn the law, and that
would give me a sense of comfort. I would collect
articles about other people who were exonerated and use that

(34:33):
as motivation and also study like what route did they
take and who helped them. You develop a little bit
of a routine. I engaged in an elaborate delusion when
I would when I would play basketball or ping pong
or chess, I would pretend like I was a professional player.
But it wasn't kids fooling around on a playground. This

(34:55):
was that I needed to leave the prison for a
couple of hours, and that was my way of doing that.
And I would cut out pictures of nature scenes and
hang them on the cell wall so I could look
at it and travel there mentally. There was another prisoner
there named Frank Sterling that once every six weeks we
would get together in the yard, and half the conversation

(35:17):
would be about trying to continue on morale wise, and
the second would be like a brainstorm session. And Frank
was eventually cleared a couple of years after me by DNA. Also,
so I wasn't naively believing that another prisoner was innocent
just because I was. And last thing was that I
placed an ad in a newspaper and this stranger wrote

(35:41):
wrote me. I was just desperate for outside contact. And
so this stranger wrote me and became my pen pal.
And I was literally asking him, you know, do you
think I should quit? Do you think I should just
give up? Should I just commit suicide? I'm never going
to get out of here. So I felt like he
like showed up in the nick of time.

Speaker 1 (36:03):
Wow, I'm going to read your words the actual percentage
of people who are wrongfully convicted. Considering that the National
Registry of Exonerated Documents wrongful Convictions is documented from nineteen
eighty nine to ford more than sixteen hundred wrongful convictions,
and that a Wayne State University study estimates ten thousand

(36:26):
new people wrongfully convicted each year, and there's articles to
say as many as one hundred and twenty thousand people
wrongfully convicted. And you said, I would say the wrongful
conviction percentage is between fifteen and twenty percent. You're saying
between one of six to one of five of people

(36:47):
sitting in jail today should not be in jail for
the crime that they've been put in jail for.

Speaker 2 (36:52):
Yeah, if that's what fifteen to twenty percent works out.
And I want to point out that at the time
I said that the numbers have moved on the registry.
The registry is now documented more than three thousand people
who have been exonerated since the time that I said that.
So my point is that the flow of anecdotal evidence
seems to be flowing my way on that.

Speaker 1 (37:15):
That is phenomenal to me. That is a huge number
of people that one are wrongfully convicted. That's a tragedy.
But when hearing the reality of you getting out of prison,
not only was your life stripped from you when you

(37:36):
were in prison, but then catching up on life, you
also have live strip for you when you're out of prison.
And Wow, So you decided I'm not gonna be a victim.
I'm not gonna cry, I'm not gonna whine about it.
I'm gonna tell my story because people need to hear it.

(38:00):
But I'm going to do something about it, which I think.
I mean, nobody could blame you for being jaded, angry
at the world, pissed off and screw everybody, system, screwed me,
screw them. I mean, I wouldn't blame you for filling
that way. But instead, for some reason, you do just opposite.

(38:24):
You don't want to be a victim of it. You
want to rise above it. And you started your organization,
which is the redemptive part of the story. Tell me
about the tell me about the foundation.

Speaker 2 (38:37):
Sure. So, while I was having that difficulty the first
five years, I was simultaneously doing advocacy work as an
individual advocate. I was speaking, I became a columnist for
a weekly paper. I was treating privacy for awareness by
doing media interviews, and I was meeting with elected officials.
I got the scholarship for Mercy College. I finished the bachelor's,

(38:58):
didn't get into law school, decided to go to grad school.
I got a master's degree because I figured having the
extra credential would make me a better advocate. My thesis
has written on lawful conviction, clause and reform. So I
graduated from John Jay. Five years after my release, I
was finally financially compensated, and I, you know, I got

(39:19):
to the point where so up into that.

Speaker 1 (39:22):
Let's be honest, but I mean, let's be clear about
what you sued the city or costs. I did all
of that. So I brought a law suit. I brought
Really am not one of these retigious guys. But in
this case, we're not going to talk about how much
you won. That's your personal business. But I hope you
won a boat loader.

Speaker 2 (39:39):
I did. I got compensated by the state, and I
brought a civil rights lawsuit. And I didn't let anyone
get away that had a hand in it, from from
Big Skill to the public defenders, to the county uh
and and to the Putnam County who supplied the polygraphics.
So everybody settled with me except the polygraphis. I went
to trial with him and I won for you, thank you.

(40:01):
So I took them and a half dollars from that
and I started the Jeffrey Dskovic Foundation for Justice. As
an individual, you could have taken the money and gone off.

Speaker 1 (40:10):
They said, screw everybody. Yes, but now you decide I'm
going to take some of this. I'm gonna start a
foundation because people who got screwed like me, I want
to help.

Speaker 2 (40:18):
Yes, Because as an individual advocate, I was only able
to nibble on the edges of helping the free people.
Meaning I could write about somebody's case, which I did
while the injustice was still afoot. I could show up
to the courtroom for the visual impact of the judges.
I could try to bring the media. I could help
to pack the courtroom. But that's just kind of nibbling

(40:38):
on the edges. I wanted to be more directly involved,
and hence starting the foundation named after me, intending that
to be a legacy that far survives me. And to
this point we've have gotten fourteen people home. We hold it.

Speaker 1 (40:56):
But you committed at one point five million of your own.

Speaker 2 (40:59):
Dollars, Yes, of my own dollars. Yes, keep going. It's
phenomenal job. I also beyond helping people what in the
same position I was once in, I wanted to help
prevent what happened to me from help happening to others.
Hence the policy side. So to date we've helped pass

(41:20):
six laws. And at some point I became not satisfied
with sitting in the front row of the courtroom. I
wanted to sit at the defense table. I wanted to
represent some of the clients. I wanted to make some
of the arguments. And so I went to law school
and I graduated from Paced Law School. And as we

(41:42):
sit here, you know, I've been an attorney for three
years and I have had my first success a year ago.
It was co counselor. We helped free Andre Brown after
twenty three years in prison as conviction was overturned.

Speaker 1 (41:55):
When you look in the mirror, how old are you know?

Speaker 2 (42:01):
Fifty? So I've been home for eighteen years.

Speaker 1 (42:07):
Who at forty five graduates law school?

Speaker 2 (42:12):
That's true, that's true, you're right, But look, but here's
the deal.

Speaker 1 (42:17):
I mean, the pro pressors had to have known your story.

Speaker 2 (42:20):
No, it was a big media thing. Of course they did.

Speaker 1 (42:22):
They had to have loved you.

Speaker 2 (42:23):
They did. They law school, they did love me.

Speaker 1 (42:26):
You are walking case study.

Speaker 2 (42:29):
It's very true. And I was big on class participation,
and they would start asking me questions and sometimes call
me up to help teach the class and certain topics.
So yeah, and plus I facilitated a lot of wrongful
conviction events on campus. So yes, they all knew who
I was, and I you know, shared and educated you know,

(42:50):
as much as I much as I could.

Speaker 1 (42:56):
We'll be right back. So you said, the first thing
you did was you sat on who is the.

Speaker 2 (43:16):
Gentleman Andre Brown? I was brought in a co counsel
to tell me history. Yeah, so Andre did twenty three
years in prison for a double attempted murder. His trial
attorney did not introduce medical evidence that showed that, you know,
Andre had been shot in an unrelated incident a year

(43:38):
before that, so he could not have descended the subway
in the Bronx, ran four or five blocks, gunned down
one person, and then turned and ran another four or
five blocks after somebody else and gunned them down too.
So his lawyers never his lawyer.

Speaker 1 (43:54):
He was physically unable.

Speaker 2 (43:55):
He was physically unable, but his lawyer never presented that.

Speaker 1 (44:00):
Was that.

Speaker 2 (44:00):
And then we found an alternative suspect who was the
spinning image of him. That person was identified by two
other witnesses as having committed the crime and it was
all corroborated by ballistics evidence.

Speaker 1 (44:15):
Wow, and twenty three years this man lost.

Speaker 2 (44:19):
Twenty three years, he lost, and the decision overturning his
conviction came two weeks into December, so he was able
to spend Christmas with his wife's son and daughter.

Speaker 1 (44:32):
Andrew Kreevac, Yeah, saying that right.

Speaker 2 (44:35):
You are Andrew Creevac. Yes, So that case so Andy
was exonerated. He did twenty three and a half years
in prison. He did three years on house arrests with
an ankle monitor. The same polygraphis who did what he
did to me, did the same thing to Andy. So
he was a foundation client. We we screened the case,

(44:55):
we brought lawyers in, we got his conviction overturned, brought
in our scram michelin to represent him at the at
the retrial, and it was another co counsel that joined Oscar.
I wasn't technically allowed to represent him because my case
was how we were going to impeach this polygraphis so
I could right, right, right, But I did everything short

(45:17):
of that. I was knee deep in everything. And you
know he was, he was. He was exonerated. Also William
Howe Hawhey, Yes, so the William hawk So William Hawhee
rest in peace as he he died after six years
of being home. He did eight years and four months
on an arson case that actually was an electrical fire,

(45:41):
and we got the Putnam keunty just so could turn
I to agree with us that he was innocent. And
William Lopez, William Lopez, Bill, I miss him the most man.
So Bill did twenty three and a half years. He passed,
He did, He passed after year and a half of
being home. So he was in for twenty three and

(46:03):
a half years on a shotgun murder that started out
as a two witness case and one of the witnesses
could not identify him in court, so now it's a
one witness case. This one witness had been up for
twenty four hours priorless shotgun murder, having done twelve miles
of crack, and she claimed that she was testifying because

(46:26):
it was the right thing to do nothing, that there
was no better, but she.

Speaker 3 (46:30):
Twelve holes of cracked but wanted to do the right
thing right. Well, well, but what gets a little bit better?
You know, the day after he was found guilty, she
miraculously was let out of the county jail where she
had her own her own case case problem. Yeah it
was a drug case, yes, and then on top of
that Bills.

Speaker 1 (46:49):
But she was doing the right thing.

Speaker 2 (46:51):
So she says, yeah, well, we can all laugh. We
know she wasn't. But also Bill's trial lawyer talked him
out of presenting his two alibi witnesses. So he had
a pre existing legal team that had been with him
for a decade before we got involved. So it's kind
of like a building was built but was missing a section.

(47:13):
So we did some investigative work, including finding a witness
that had been deported into the Dominican Republic, And so
his conviction was his conviction was overturned, and we helped
him reintegrate, and you know, he passed after a year
and a half. I like to tell myself, I like
to think that that year and a half was the

(47:37):
best year and a half of his life. But at
least he died free. Unless he died knowing that, you know,
his name was cleared. And you know, one more thing
on Bill. You know, he went away his daughter forwarding
fathers out there. His daughter was a year and a
half when he went away. He came back she was
twenty five, and they were never really able to re connect.

Speaker 1 (48:01):
Yeah, you got emotional when you said you miss him
the most, right, I did? Why? Why? What about him?

Speaker 2 (48:10):
So we became really close friends when he was released.
So sometimes he would show up at my house unannounced
and I knock on the door and I opened the
door and Bill, what are you doing here? And he
walks right past me, walks in. He's got a suitcase
and toe willing it and he says, I'm staying for
the weekend. Well, all right, Bill, you know where your

(48:31):
bedroom's at, you know. Uh so, Yeah, So he used
to come up. That was an example of how close
we we were. And you know, I went to a
lot of first with him. You know, we went to
playland first, this first experience with that. We did a
lot of things together. We socialized a lot together. We
played some games of chess together, and we really kind

(48:54):
of commiserated, you know together. He was the first person
that the foundation exonerated. So uh, I think that he
meant the most to me sentimentally. You know, all these
cases are important, They're all people I'll never forget, but
I feel like being his being the first, and then
the depth of our friendship was much deeper than with

(49:14):
any of the other people. And you know, I, you know,
I remember, I want to digress for a half second,
you know, I remember when we got him out. I mean,
you know, I had had the staff there, you know,
different people than what are involved now. And I remember
I kind of took some flak from them, and you know,

(49:34):
they said, you know, you have to maintain these boundaries.
You have to maintain these lines. This is your client,
this isn't your friend. And you know, and as Bill said, look, man,
I don't want to be a client. I just want
to be a friend. You know. You guys have meant
what you've meant, You do what you do, you know,
But I like the friendship, and you know I listened
to him rather than them, and I'm glad there there's this.

(49:58):
You know, when it comes to put for a fighting
wrong for conviction, you know, I kind of I only
know one way, which is forward and there's never an
off button. So I remember probably one of my worst
successes in that area, which tie into Bill is a
week we can laugh at craziness in a minute. Okay,

(50:19):
I let the media come into my house on Christmas
Eve because it was his first Christmas home and it
was also my first Christmas since purchasing a house. Wow,
and I'm glad I did. Is a wonderful clip. I
play it every now and then because you know he's gone.

(50:42):
You can see him talking, alive and everything. And that
was his first and only Christmas as it as it
unfortunately turned out to be.

Speaker 1 (50:53):
I mean, on the one hand, the twenty three or
however many years he.

Speaker 2 (50:56):
Spent twenty three and as he might say, don't forget the.

Speaker 1 (51:01):
Yeah, I guarantee he felt that half, right of course,
Mark Douglas.

Speaker 2 (51:09):
Yes, so Mars case is definitely a special one as well,
because you know Mark's case was that was another peak
skill case. No kidding, Yeah, that was another. That was
another peak skill case.

Speaker 1 (51:23):
Yes, that police department has some cleaning up today.

Speaker 2 (51:28):
I would agree with you on that. Yes, So you know,
we have thirteen active cases we're working on now. I'm
involved in nine of them, mostly as co counseil supporting
the lead attorney, but a few were the lead and
I got the more experienced guy you know, there for
the experience, but I wanted the you know, experience of

(51:50):
being the lead. And so those are nine of the thirteen.
The other other the other other four I just generally
get update from, and you know, we're trying to free
as many people as we can. We're doing policy work
with the Coalition group. It could happen to you in
New York, Pennsylvania, and California. So that's that's what my

(52:13):
life is about.

Speaker 1 (52:14):
The Innocence Project, who without you wouldn't be here with
me today. Correct But one of their things is there
you if I understand it correctly. They they specifically deal
in reversals based on solely on DNA.

Speaker 2 (52:33):
Correct, Yes, which is why I have my entity.

Speaker 1 (52:36):
What do you do?

Speaker 2 (52:38):
Which is why I Yeah, we do both DNA and
non DNA, So there's got to.

Speaker 1 (52:42):
Believe the non DNA is really hard to get done.

Speaker 2 (52:45):
It is, and it's more it's more labor intensive. At
the same time, there's four times as many non DNAX
honerations as there are DNAX honerations. So the case, yes,
so the cases are winnable, and so far none of
the none of the people that we've helped free their cases,
have it involved DNA.

Speaker 1 (53:08):
We'll be right back. I think better to let one
hundred guilty go people go free than to have one
and sent man locked up. But society exists provided that

(53:30):
we have accountability to a standard of laws that make
society livable for all of us. Sure, there are bad
people in the world, Yes there are, I agree, and
you know I don't want to get into the political
political argument at all, but I think net in the

(53:51):
first reader, it's an army of normal folks. I think
normal people would agree there are bad people in the
world that do really horrific things that need to go
to jail. Surety there for the betterment of society as
a whole.

Speaker 2 (54:04):
I agree, but caveat I think it's a lot less
than what we think. I do believe in redemptive and
second chance for me, I also agree. I have interviewed
too many people on this show who were bank robbers
and now change people lives, who were arrested seventeen times
for drugs and now figure out ways to have returning

(54:28):
citizens have a life. So I also believe once you've
paid your debt society, it's paid right, right, And if
you don't want to reoffend and you want to try
to make it, we've got to figure that out, all right. So,
and the whole criminal justice thing is a hot topic

(54:49):
and culture and everything else, but specific to this conversation,
how do you make sure you're not freeing and working
on or get them Devil's advocate? Sure, how do you
make sure you're not working to free somebody who's claiming

(55:10):
innocence but actually perpetrated a horrific crime against a against
an innocent person. So, firstly, we don't like we know,
we're not naive. We know that there are people that
claim innocence and apply for our help but are.

Speaker 1 (55:23):
Not giving you an I'm throwing you a saltball here
to answer the question for all the people, regardless of
the whole story. There's people listening to us. Now, it's
like this has to be done. It's not fair to
but with all our facings citing culture today, I don't
want to let out a guilty person. I agree, So

(55:44):
tell us how you safeguard that make us feel good
about that too? Sure?

Speaker 2 (55:49):
Okay, So we ask ourselves two questions, do we believe
the innocence claim? And the standard we use is is
it at least plausible, is at least colorable based on
something objective? And part of our answering that question is
we look at what was actually used as evidence of guilt.
So we know from the DNA exonerations what the red

(56:09):
flags are that an identification might be mistaken, that an
informant could be lying, or that a confession could be false.
So we're analyzing that do we believe the innocence claim? Secondly,
do we see a potential route to victory? So we
might be convinced of somebody's innocence, and that's what motivates
us to take the case. You're not going to win

(56:31):
based on that. The court will not allow you to
relitigate the case. You have to come up with something new,
so we look for something. We look for new evidence. Obviously,
if there's some testable material seamen, saliva, a blood, a
clothing item of someone sweated in that would be how

(56:52):
we would check the box in a DNA case. In
an odd DNA case, we would look for an alternative
suspect little crime in a nearby area. We would file
a freedom of information law request, and sometimes documents surface
that we're supposed to have been turned over before but weren't,
and that might either be evidence or it might furnish

(57:13):
a new lead. If we think that somebody lied to
a trial, we would reinterview them. Sometimes a new witness
bubbles to the surface, sometimes an actor in a case
like say a forensic scientist, or a dirty cop whose
misconduct has bubbled to the surface in some other case.
You know, we look for all of those things, and

(57:34):
so in terms of safeguarding, you know, the burden of
proof is not on the government, it's on the defendant.
Once you've been found guilty, now you have to prove
you're innocent. So this legal standard for newly discovered evidence
is would this new evidence probably have led to a
different outcome? Or if you're going to argue actual innocence,

(57:56):
the legal standard is, you know, have you proven by
clear and convince and evidence. So, coming to my point,
if I have to find evidence of someone's innocence, where
am I going to find that at? If someone is
actually guilty.

Speaker 1 (58:14):
That makes sense. So you go through all those machinations
before you even say I'm going to work hard for
this person.

Speaker 2 (58:24):
Yes, we have our vetting, a screening process, and then
once that happens, our working hard is going to get
even more intense, and we're going to review the whole record.
We're going to go through all those steps, and then
we're going to do the field investigation, and if we
come up with nothing, then there's not going to be
anything to bring the case back to court with.

Speaker 1 (58:44):
You know what I think is an interesting proof of
the pudding. Tell me, given that the recidivism right in
the United States is somewhere around eighty seven percent, how
many people that you have gotten free have quote offended
after their freedom? None?

Speaker 2 (58:59):
Knock on what?

Speaker 1 (59:00):
Yeah? Because you know what, they're not criminals. That to
me is the number that vet's out your process, which
is given that criminals re offend eighty seven percent of

(59:21):
the time and zero percent of the people that you've
gotten out of prison have offended. The mouth is on
your side, my friend. Quick question. Do you fear the cops?

Speaker 2 (59:36):
I used to.

Speaker 1 (59:37):
I bet when you first got out of jail you
had to have been petrified when a cop came anywhere
near you. I did, and you don't anymore. I feel
a slight twinge but overall, no, but that small amount.

Speaker 2 (59:55):
So the last so up until a year ago, for
eight years prior to that, like twice a year, I
was brought in to co teach ethics to the police cadets.

Speaker 1 (01:00:08):
Holy crap, that's crazy.

Speaker 2 (01:00:12):
So I know that there are good cops out there,
just like I know there's bad cops out there. One
of the things that offends me the most, and I
think is counterproductive, is when a cop gets caught breaking
the law, you know, or or otherwise doing something unethical,
you know, the attempt to minimize that it is just
a few bad apples. No, it's not, because we wouldn't

(01:00:38):
have the more than three thousand X honorations, we wouldn't
have police brutality, wouldn't have unjustifiable deadly police killings often
caught on camera. So no, it's not a few bad apples.
It's a hell of a lot more than that. At
the same time, you know, it's not not all the
cops are bad. There's quite a bit of cops that
are that are good.

Speaker 1 (01:00:59):
You know.

Speaker 2 (01:00:59):
To take a half foot into maybe a controversial thing
is you know, I think the world would be scary.
I think the country would be scary if we were
to defund the police and suddenly disband law enforcement, and
we're going to have a return to the wild wild West.
Even I wouldn't advocate for that. So I do think

(01:01:20):
the pensulum is a little bit extreme also, you know,
and I think I.

Speaker 1 (01:01:24):
Think some municipalities are reversing their thought process on that
that have actually tried to go too far that way.
We got to have law and order. To have law
and order, you have to have someone enforce it, right.
The problem is when you give that much power, when
you give enough power to a human being to take
away somebody's liberty, we have to hold those people to account.

(01:01:48):
And the vast majority of them, I think, get into
law enforcement because they want to be a part of
the solution. I do think the power in corrupt, and
I do think there are some bad apples out there
because the facts and the numbers and the truth bears

(01:02:08):
it out. But I really respect you, especially given your
particular and very unique circumstances, to say, let's not go
too far with this. We can't defund the cops. We
just got to hold them accountable.

Speaker 2 (01:02:22):
Right exactly, And that's what this whole fight about. Wrongful
convictions about it's about justice, it's about accuracy. You know,
I look at my life in a kaleidoscopic type of way,
no meaning. I think that I went through all that
I went through in order to do the work that

(01:02:44):
I'm doing. And so with that acceptance, you know, I
feel like a inner piece within me. You know, I'm
not angry person. I have several lines of reasoning on that.
I mean, I want to enjoy my life as much
as I can, and I don't think I could do
that if I'm angry or bitter. I feel like I've

(01:03:07):
lost so much already as is much less to in
effect lose the rest of my life by being angry,
perhaps less nobly. It's if I was to be angry
or bitter, it's not like I would be impacting the
people that had a hand in what happened to me.
It's I would really be the only loser in that scenario.

Speaker 1 (01:03:30):
There's a difference in forgiveness and a pardon, right, I agree?
Can you forgive those that wronged you?

Speaker 2 (01:03:41):
I don't know, but I'll share with you that like
I don't feel like I hate for them. I don't
think about them.

Speaker 1 (01:03:53):
That's the most powerful party. If you don't think about them, right,
if they're not, if they don't don't own your brain,
they don't own you, right.

Speaker 2 (01:04:04):
I'm just living my own life, focusing in on me
and just trying to address this issue that you know,
I'm trying to address the bigger issue, you know what,
the problem of wrongful conviction and just do the best
that I can and you know, my life today and
going forward, and I'm not really thinking, you know about
them anymore. I'm just trying to live my best life

(01:04:25):
and try to, you know, make the difference I can
that I can make, and you know, make my suffering
count for something, and that's it. I'm just focusing on
those things.

Speaker 1 (01:04:36):
If somebody wants to support your foundation, because I imagine it
takes a lot of money to do this investigative work
and everything else, yes, or they'd like you to speak
to their organization, or maybe they have a family member
that they know is wrongfully convicted and need help. How
do they reach you?

Speaker 2 (01:04:56):
So there's definitely the website www dot Deskovic d E
s kov I see.

Speaker 1 (01:05:02):
You better say that one more time.

Speaker 2 (01:05:04):
D E s Yeah. Www dot d E s ko
v I c dot org that you can email me
through the site. Also on social media, so people can
contact that way, you know, we do have uh yeah,
So on Facebook it is Jeffreydskovic. I have a personal

(01:05:24):
page which is public. I have my public profile and
Jeffrey Dskovic Foundation is also a Facebook page. On Instagram,
it's just called Deskovic Foundation. I'm on LinkedIn as well,
just my name Jeffreydskovic. So the website and the social
media how people can reach me in terms of donating

(01:05:44):
several methods. You can go to the website. We have
a you can go through PayPal. We have a crowdfunding
page called on a Patreon website, which you know. The
theory on Patreon which differentiates that from other websites is
that's for people that are willing to make a recurring
monthly donation. What if twenty five thousand people were willing

(01:06:07):
to sacrifice three to five dollars a month on a
recurring basis, Who would miss that from their pocket? But
if you had that many people, that would give close
to like a million dollars a year, which would mean
we could work on more freeing more people and do
more policies.

Speaker 1 (01:06:24):
How many people who are wrongfully convicted that need help,
that are languishing in prison unjustly right now. With a
million dollars a year helpful.

Speaker 2 (01:06:36):
I think that. I think between ten and twenty.

Speaker 1 (01:06:45):
If every one of you did it, you could help
people languishing in prison unjustly right now. Have a Christmas.
But that's the work you do, That's the work I do.
Not bad from a no father, middle aged kid who
got wrongly convicted of a murderer at seventeen years old,

(01:07:08):
railroaded by a bunch of cops and poorly defended by
a guy who didn't care.

Speaker 2 (01:07:16):
I want to add, just people thinking about the appeal
you made.

Speaker 1 (01:07:20):
You know that.

Speaker 2 (01:07:22):
You know I work fifty to sixty hours a week.
I don't get paid for it. So anything that people contributed,
one hundred percent of it would go towards freeing people.
None of it would make its way into my pocket.
Under any philosophy or line of.

Speaker 1 (01:07:38):
Reasoning, You're spending all of it to help people that
are in the same situation you were. Yeah, how could
you not expect these people to get out of jail
and want to be your friend? Pretty amazing story, Jeff.
I cannot tell you how much I've enjoyed speaking with you,

(01:08:00):
and how much I appreciate you coming down from the
Brox to Memphis and spending time with me. An amazing
story and amazing work you're doing, and a really societal
cultural thing that I don't think has talked about enough
and you sharing it in such a depth with us.

(01:08:22):
I can't tell you how much I appreciate it. Thanks
for being with me, thank you for having me on,
and thank you for joining us this week. If Jeff
or other guests have inspired you in general, or better yet,
inspired you to take action by donating to the Jeffrey
Deskovic Foundation, taking on pro bono cases, if you're an attorney,

(01:08:45):
or something else entirely, please let me know. I'd love
to hear about it. You can write me anytime at
Bill at normalfolks dot us, and guys, I will respond.
If you enjoyed this episode, please share it with friends,
share it on social, subscribe to the podcast, rate and
review it, Become a premium member at normalfolks dot us,

(01:09:09):
any and all of these things that will help us
grow an army of normal folks. I'm Bill Courtney. I'll
see you next week.