November 23, 2022 • 51 mins
Maggie Freleng, Pulitzer prize winning host of Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freleng sits down for a Q&A with Gilbert King and Kelsey Decker from the new podcast Bone Valley. Listen in as Gilbert and Kelsey share with Maggie the answers to many questions from their listeners and reveal some of the details that went into creating one of the finest podcasts of the year.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hello, y'all. I'm Maggie Freeling, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and
the host of Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling, and this
is a bonus episode of Bone Valley. So I'm here
with Gilbert King and Kelsey Decker, and I'm going to
ask them some of my questions, some of your questions
all about the behind the scenes of Bone Valley. So,
(00:22):
Gilbert and Kelsey, Hello, Hey, Maggie, how are you doing.
I'm good. Are y'all good? Real good. So one of
my first questions is, as someone who has done projects
like this, it takes a lot of time. But you
guys started working on this quite a while ago. So
can you tell me when you started working on this
how much time you spent in Florida? What was that like? Yeah,
(00:44):
I'll say it took us over four years to do this.
So you know, obviously we worked through COVID and so
that that sort of slowed us down. There were a
few things that slowed us down. We were trying to
reach Jeremy Scott and he was constantly being put in
disciplinary confinement, and then with COVID, so we were a
lot of waiting around as well. But I would say
we kept ourselves pretty busy with this. We had the
(01:05):
extra time. We were a lot of waiting, so we
just tried to do more and more research and just
keep digging. And so that was our experience. Why it
took so long, right, and because I remember at one
point you said like, oh, this is a letter, you know,
from our first letter to Jeremy, and like, what was
it twenty nineteen you wrote him or twenty eighteen. Yeah,
I think it was like I think the first time
we wrote him was like early twenty twenty, like during
(01:26):
the pandemic, and he didn't respond for seven months, and
I think we sent out a bunch of letters finally
just started writing back to us. So and you guys
moved to Florida. Go ahead, Kelsey, you can tell about
the big move with your pickup truck. Yeah, yeah, I
mean we moved to Florida for about three months. It
was the summer of twenty nineteen. Yeah, I have, yeah,
(01:48):
summer of twenty nineteen, So we were there for a
few months. We are kind of like home based. There
was Saint Petersburg. We weren't entirely sure. We wanted to
spend all of our time Inland, but we were making
the drive back and forth quite a bit, but yeah,
it was it was an interesting start to like the
(02:08):
real reporting in the case, just you know, being down
there in the midst of it. So it's kind of
important to do that, you know. When I did my
podcast Murder and Alliance, which was investigating a wrongful conviction.
I pretty much lived in Ohio for a good year.
Did locals know you guys? Like, what was that like? Yeah,
we would run into the same people our home base
(02:30):
a lot of times we would we would drive it
was about forty five minutes from Saint Pete to Lakeland,
and our home base became the Lakeland Public Library and
they actually gave us a room in there that we
would use for interviews. So it worked out really well.
And there's also some a lot of research to do
in Lakeland from you know, historical research that was right
in the library. But I remember that as just being
a lot of fun and every morning like just getting
(02:51):
up and you know, drinking coffee on the way, going
across the Skyway bridge and just drive into Lakeland and
just like doing prep in the car for the interview
that we have to do that day. And uh, I
just it was really a fun like commute to actually
have to do that, and I think, yeah, we started
running into a lot of people that we'd known. There
was one point, I don't know if you remember this Kelsey,
(03:11):
where I was kind of not paying attention and I
almost ran over a guy around one of those lakes
and he was like, yeah, I just spoke. I did.
I did a talk down there, some legal talk, and
we had made eye contact that I knew, I knew
I know him, and I said him a little quick email,
I said, hey, sorry, I think I just tried to
run you over, and he was like, I knew that
was you don't worry about it. So listeners do want
(03:36):
to know, though, if Gilbert, your familiarity with Florida from
your other book, Devil in the Grove, if any of
those connections helped you with this case, Yeah, I would.
I would definitely say they did. You know, there's a
lot of people like I did two books down there,
so I've spent about fifteen years down there in this
part of central Florida, and so a lot of people
know me, and I think there's like a benefit to
(03:58):
having some connections, Like you know, sometimes we'll be writing
something and trying to figure out something in terms of
like a Supreme Court of Florida Supreme Court decision, and
I'm not really entirely sure what the you know, what
to make of the decision, And like there are I'm
friendly with some of the Florida Supreme Court justices, so
I can actually call them up and say, hey, can
you explain your opinion in that particular case. And so
(04:19):
there's a lot of that local stuff that I think
really paid off. And same with um, you know, just
having going down there and speaking all the time, I
run into a lot of people that I know, and
they seem more eager to help me. I think, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Um So, Kelsey, this was all really new to you.
You were pretty much just out of college and now
(04:40):
you're eyeballs deep in a really crazy wrongful conviction case,
murder case, another murder case. What was all this like
for you? Um? You know, I just kind of had
to take it a day at a time sometimes, because yeah,
every every phase of this project was something just entirely
(05:02):
new for me. But you know, having Gilbert there there
was always support. He was my cheerleader every step of
the way. So yeah, I mean, it was an amazing experience.
Like first job, I think this is you know, maybe
kind of a dream job for a lot of people,
and here I am, like right out of college, just
(05:25):
diving right into it. So I felt very lucky in
a lot of ways. But there were definitely moments where
I felt I was in a little over my head
having to kind of learn some of the stuff as
I went along. But here I am, I made it,
and I am, you know, really happy I've been able
to see it through to the end. And yeah, I
(05:47):
mean I just care so much about this story. It
was something I just you know, was very motivated to
continue learning and committing to and putting everything I could
into it. So how did you relationship the two of you?
How did it change over the course of four years?
I mean that's a long time. And Kelsey, again, like
(06:09):
you were very new, so I'm sure by the end
you were a rock star investigator. But so how did
it all change? Yeah? Well, I think, you know, part
of the thing with this is, like I have a
lot of researchers and they're based in New York and
they're actually guys who were older than me, and like
it just for them to just upend themselves and move
down to Florida was just not going to happen for them.
You know, they had families, they had commitments, and so
(06:31):
it really need somebody who has the flexibility to do
something like this, and so I think Kelsey came in
as a researcher. Basically, I had a couple of different
projects going, and I remember specifically I was trying to decide,
like there was a TV thing, a new book, and
I was trying to prioritize, and then Leo's case came
across my desk and Kelsey started looking into it, and
(06:52):
I remember there was a moment I said, well, Kelsey,
like what do you think I should prioritize what project?
And I remember her specifically saying like, well, it looks
like there's an innocent man in prison that one. And
it just like this moment of clarity, like yeah, of
course we have to do that one. And so that
was really the inspiration to get going. And you know,
Kelsey started as a researcher, but because like we decided
(07:14):
to pivot to a podcast while we were down there,
you know, she had to learn all the audio recording
and sort of it it was all self taught and so
like she's moving through this going from researcher to you know,
audio recordists to producer and all these different skills that
she had to learn for this job. So it really
needs somebody flexible and somebody who's not afraid of learning,
(07:35):
and she was it. Wow, would you agree with all that?
Kelsey goes, So yeah, I didn't. I didn't have much
to lose with up ending my entire life and going
down to Florida and learning everything on the job. Well,
were you nervous like to go down just like you
and Gilbert that he's a terrifying human, but like you know,
I'm you didn't know him that well, Like was that
(07:57):
weird to start off, just like the two of you, Yeah,
it was. It was a little weird, but we fell
into like a rhythm pretty quickly. I mean by that
time we'd already we were already both like very invested
in this case in the story. So um yeah, I
mean we were so obsessed with it at that point,
(08:18):
we were talking about it constantly. Um, and so like
it felt pretty natural after a little time passed, And um,
I'm actually I was born in Florida. So also, like
the landscape there was kind of familiar to me. I
have some family down there, so there was like a
little bit of familiarity in that aspect as well. Well,
(08:41):
that's what I was going to ask you. So where
were you both like coming from? You were coming from
New York? Gilbert, is that Are you from New York? Yeah,
I'm originally from upstate New York, but I've been in
I've been in New York for the last thirty something years,
so yeah, I'm a New Yorker. But yeah, you know,
and I'm really used to Florida. I think there was
some you know, weird things of like when we were
like basically roommates for a couple months, and like I
(09:03):
think Kelsey was like, am I supposed to cook? Because
that part of my job? Like realize, like he doesn't
look all the time. It's true. Yeah new Yorker, Yeah exactly,
but um but yeah, I just um, it was it
was it was an adjustment, especially but once we built
into the schedule and like we'd stay home, do all
(09:23):
the phone calls, do all the prep work there, and
then just go out in the field in Lakeland, And
it was really nice to be able to get away
from Polk County and just be working outside of Polk
County because I don't really like working in the counties that,
you know, because then people start snooping around and they
know where you are, and you see them around and
they know where you are. I didn't want to deal
with that, so right, right, So so getting to the case, Um,
(09:48):
did you go into this skeptical of his innocence? I mean,
I know this came across your desk from a very
reputable person, um, a former judge. You know, honestly, did
you go into it thinking, Okay, this is an innocent
man or how did you guys go into this? Were
you ever skeptical of his innocence? I'm always skeptical, And
even though that this came to me through a judge,
(10:08):
I just it's not that I don't trust anybody, but
I just have to like know for myself that I'm
going into something that I know enough about it. And
so there were months that went by where it was
just research and you know, it did it did help
that Judge Cupp was vouching for him. But I think
I try to put a timetable on this. I think
it was, you know, at least weeks before I said,
(10:31):
it really looks like this guy could really be innocent,
And you know, from reading from the transcript, it was
it was pretty obvious to me that he was not
rightfully convicted. But once we got down there and met
Leo and started doing our own real deep research on it,
it was pretty clear to us that we were dealing
with an innocent man. Kelsey, would you agree with that, Yeah, definitely.
(10:53):
I mean I think before we met Leo for the
very first time, we tried to read everything we could
get our hands on, and so we had a really
good understanding of yeah, of like how the trial went,
what evidence was there, but you know, you never you
never really know, like everything doesn't come out in court.
(11:13):
He could be wrongfully convicted and not necessarily be innocent.
I think there is a little bit of a distinction
there for listeners. Sure, yeah, Gilbert might be better at
explaining this. This is a distinction Judge Scott cup Drew,
you know, the very first time I met him, and
probably the first time Gilbert spoke to him as well,
(11:36):
that um, you know, stuff can stuff can go wrong
at trial, like prosecutors can do shady things, and it
can somebody can be convicted on bad evidence or I
don't know. Yeah, I mean, things can go wrong, but
maybe they actually did do the crime, or maybe they
(11:56):
had some knowledge of it or something like that. This.
You know, in Leo's case, he wasn't there, he didn't
do it, he didn't know anything about it, which I
think is where at least Judge Scott Cup would draw
the line at like, you know, he's innocent, he didn't
know anything about it, he wasn't there. But yeah, so
we had all of that, all of the like documentation,
(12:17):
that information and going into meet Leo, and then I think,
you know that first meeting after hearing him speak, that
kind of really solidified things for us that it was
like it was really hard for us to kind of
wrap our head around how he could be guilty after
that first meeting. So, yeah, that's a really good point.
(12:41):
And I think sometimes you can get to a point
where the prosecutor just doesn't prove his case beyond a
reasonable doubt, but you know, a person can still be guilty.
And so that was one of the things that I
was trying to always consider. But I think what made
this case really interesting is you have this other person
involved in this who is actually confessed to the murder,
and so that the investigation starts to go to him too.
(13:03):
And I remember just specifically having a thought like, if Leo,
if I ever catch him lying to me, or if
he was trying to mislead me or being really not
transparent about certain things, that's going to lead to more skepticism.
And I just to to devote this much time and
energy to a case that could fall apart on me,
you know, I think back on the NAACP and the
(13:25):
and when they were doing these cases in the forties
and fifties, they couldn't afford a single loss. So when
they were going down there and defending innocent people, they
had to make sure that that person was innocent because
a loss would be too damaging, and you certainly don't
want that coming back on us. But you know, once
we were aware of who Jeremy Scott was and we
started investigating him, it became not only a problem, you know,
(13:47):
a situation where Leo is not only innocent, but it's
this guy. This guy did it, And that was what
was really intriguing to us. I'm Maggie Freeling checking in
with Gilbert King and Kelsey Decker from Bone Valley and
we will be right back. Hi. I'm Jason Flom, CEO
and founder of Lava for Good podcasts, home to Bone Valley,
(14:07):
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Valley is sponsored by Stand Together. Stand Together is a
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As a foster mom, Christina came into contact with the
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(15:57):
War on Drugs, listen to The War on Drugs podcast
on Apple Podcasts or wherever you get your podcasts. One
of the more powerful moments for a lot of listeners
was in chapter two when you go to the evidence
room together. What was that like and why was that
so emotional? Particularly for you? Kelsey. Yeah, so, I think
(16:19):
by the time we went and viewed those photos, we'd
already been down in Florida for a couple of months,
we'd spoken to Leo a number of times, we'd spoken
to you know, a lot of the people you hear
in the podcast already, So you know, by that point,
I was pretty deep into the story, and you know,
(16:43):
I felt like I did have kind of a sense
of who Michelle was, and you know she by that point,
you know, she really felt like somebody I knew to
some degree. And I think just going there, like I
knew some of what we were going to be seeing,
(17:04):
but I don't know, it's it's just it's hard to
be prepared for, you know, actually seeing the violence and um, yeah,
I don't know, just the the trauma and the violence
(17:26):
of all of it. Just really the brutality it just
I don't know, it really hit me, the brutality of it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And there's just also something about, you know, going through
and having this lead up to the evidence. They're showing
us all the physical evidence that the plywood that's resting
on her body, we're seeing the downy bottle that was
(17:47):
smeared with blood, and then you start seeing clothing to clothing. Yeah,
that starts when you start seeing all the bloodstains on
that and the and the tears and the rips from
the knife, and then you know, the finally they bring
out the pictures from the autopsy, and you know, it's
just you feel like you've seen pictures of her now,
you've talked to her family members, You've talked to Leo,
(18:09):
you talked to Michelle's brother, and it's just hard to
get that out of your head. And I think, you know,
we're always doing debriefings and just keeping the recorder going,
and I think just we got back to the car
and like Kelsey made it through all of that, the
whole evidence room, but I think it's just like sort
of snuck up on her and hit her. I don't know,
but you held off through the whole through the whole
(18:31):
evidence room, but it was just you know, you got
away from it, and that's where I hit you, I guess.
But I think sometimes it's the processing, you know, like
I tell our producers, like when I'm doing these interviews,
you know, as a journalist, Gilbert and Kelsey, now you'll
know too, like you just sometimes have this wall up
to get through it. And then it's after the fact
when I go back and I'm transcribing and I'm listening
(18:51):
to the interview that I'm like, oh, now I'm processing
it and it's really hitting what was said or what
you're looking at. Definitely, that's a really good point. That
happens to me a lot too. And I'm sort of
you know, you're in the moment, but you're asking questions,
you're thinking of things to ask, you're trying to get
into the flow of the internet, and you're in a
different space and then you go back and listen to it.
We had the same experience with Jeremy just going back
(19:13):
and listening to it. It sounded even more powerful than
it did when we were there in person, just hearing
his voice crack and the pain and torture that he
was feeling. It almost like flew by me a little
bit while we were in the room, but boy, well
sometimes it does. And that's like for listeners to know,
like when you're in that room, you're really like, well,
I gotta get this question, and is my tape recorder working?
(19:35):
Like it is very hard to do eighty thousand things
and focus on the interview and process it all at once.
So yeah, definitely what listeners are hearing is very crafted,
for sure. Yeah, And you know, we did so much
prep for that that interview just by the way, you know,
and it was I think it was clearly the best
interview we've ever done, like it was the last one
(19:56):
we did basically, but it was the best one. I
think we were so prepared for it and we were
just working off each other and he was being so
responsive to both of us. It was a really incredible
thing to go back and listen to that and think, Wow,
I cannot believe we got all that out of him.
Are you still in touch with Jeremy? Yeah, he's really
difficult to reach again. He wrote me a letter was
(20:17):
a couple of months ago. I hadn't heard from him
a long time. It was a really short message and
he said, you know, dear mister King, I don't hold
a grudge against you for doing this story. I wish
you the best, but the monster in me is coming
out and I'm going to be locked up for a
long time. And I was like, what is this? You know,
this was a short note that I got from him
and then found out like a couple days later he
(20:40):
was involved in some kind of altercation with a weapon
and he got moved to a different prison and put
in solitary confinement. Don't really know the details of it,
but he's locked up for a long time, so I
don't know. You know, that's kind of a life he's
led in prison. It's extraordinarily violent, extraordinarily impulsive, he gets
moved around constantly, there's psychiatric issues. But I do try
(21:01):
to stay in touch with him. And we just got
another letter from him last week and so he was
writing again. So I'm going to stay in touch with him.
I think I'm the only one who's writing to him. Well,
let me ask you about that, because I'm sure there's
a lot of listeners who are going to go, why
he's a violent, horrible, murderous person. Why stay in touch
(21:21):
with him? You know, I don't know a really great
answer to that, other than he is a human being,
and he exposed part of himself and it really came
clean about the nightmares that he has and the punishment
that he's feeling in the torture he's having. And I
do believe that he's trying to help himself by clearing
his conscience of this, and also I think he's trying
(21:42):
to help Leo, and I just see that as something admirable,
and Leo is thankful for it and basically we follow
Leo's lead on a lot of these kind of moral
and ethical decisions. Yeah, yeah, I mean it's definitely something
I care about, Like I don't I do want to
in touch with Jeremy, I know, Like I never want
(22:03):
to downplay all of the harm he has caused. But
I feel for Jeremy too, like he's he's had it
really rough. He he really never had a chance in life,
and as much harm as he's caused, I still feel like,
I don't know, he deserves a little compassion, And I
(22:26):
you know, yeah, I agree with Gilbert. He's he's trying
to tell the truth, I think, and I think he's
genuine and he's remorseful, and I don't know, I want
him to know that that's not going unnoticed. Like I
want him to know that he's doing a good thing
and he's doing the right thing, and and he should
(22:49):
be proud of that. I think, you know, that's probably
why all of us are on this network, because not
only are we journalists, but we're also humans and we
recognize is the humanity in people. And I think all
of us would agree that nobody is defined by the
worst day of their life and I think, you know,
I think that's really beautiful that you guys put in
(23:11):
Jeremy's story and took so much care to show that
he was once a kid, and you know, he became
a product of his environment, which is really really tragic,
and I really appreciate you guys putting that in there. Yeah,
and I think you know, he's taken responsibility for his acts.
He's confessed to all the murders he's committed. He knows
(23:32):
he's not ever getting out of prison. He really shouldn't
get out of prison. He's extraordinarily violent and impulsive. But
you know, it doesn't mean we still can't care for
him and wish for him the best in the rest
of his days. And the fact that he has nobody
to talk to, and you know I'm the only one
he's writing to. You know, that comes with some kind
of responsibility. You know, I'm I don't want to be
(23:53):
his best friend, but I do want to be there
and talk to him and listen to him, and you know,
who knows what else he'll say. Sure, speaking of probably
one of the craziest things besides the actual killer, confessating
to the murderer that someone else is in prison for
is that you come across another murder while investigating Michelle's murder?
(24:16):
Where is that investigation at? Will anyone Jeremy ever be
prosecuted for that? You know, this is maddening to me
because we went several times to the Ossiola County Sheriff's
office with our evidence and with our letters where Jeremy
started taking responsibility for killing this cab driver, Joseph Laverre.
It wasn't just his confession. We had other evidence that
(24:37):
we put together, stuff that didn't even make it into
the podcast because you know, we didn't really feel the
need to expand on this forever after he confessed. But
we've brought it in a couple times. We brought it
into the State Attorney's office, and they basically have just
refused to investigate it, which I just find flabbergasting. Actually,
it's clear evidence they have a confession and that they
(24:59):
basically doubled down in their response by saying that we
believe that we prosecuted the right guy in dan Odie,
but he wasn't convicted by the jury, but we still
think he's the murderer. And you know, for me, that's
annoying because these prosecutors are always talking about finality and
the justice system. You got to respect the jury's verdict.
(25:20):
But here they are smearing a man who's been quitted
and calling him a murderer because it doesn't fit their narrative.
I don't know why they're not investigating it. It's just
it's beyond me to understand why they're doing that. Have
you talked to Joseph Laver's family, You know, that's been
a really tricky thing. We've tried tracking him down. I've
sent messages. They're scattered all over. It was a broken family.
(25:42):
Joseph had gotten divorced about a year before he was murdered,
and so the family just kind of scattered. He had
a young son at the time who was maybe one
or two years old, and tried to find him, but
he's locked away in jail as well, and I just
haven't been able to reach him. So we haven't had
any luck trying to get Joseph Laver's family, and there's
some other reporters who have tried to and have not
(26:03):
been able to reach him. But that's definitely something we're
going to continue to pursue because I don't believe justice
has been served in that case. So, Kelsey, something listeners
want to know about is you were always asking Gilbert
about his feelings. Why did you do that? Was that
just instinctual? Like what was up with asking Gilbert about
(26:24):
feel Yeah? I suppose it was kind of instinctual, Like,
you know, I had a feeling that we were there
on the ground, we were doing the work, and you know,
in some ways the listener is going to look to
us to kind of interpret what's going on and what
we're seeing and finding out, and some of that is
(26:46):
sharing what we're feeling and how we're processing it. And yeah,
you know, Gilbert started to get the hang of it.
You know, it didn't come incredibly natural for him, but um,
but we made some progress there, I think, And yeah,
it was it was a learning curve. Well yeah, I
(27:08):
mean I imagine Gilbert and your other reporting. No one's
usually putting a mic in your face and saying how
do you feel about this? No? I hate You know,
there's that line in The Departed where they say where
talking about Freud says that the Irish are immune to therapy.
It just doesn't work on the Irish. That's who I
feel is like, what are you asking me my feelings
for who cares. Yeah, it's it's an awkward thing. And
you know, there's also a lot of compartmentalization that I
(27:31):
try to do it in this kind of stuff. Like
if you get really emotional and thinking about the humanity
and the pain and all these waves of violence in
the story, it can really kind of paralyze you. And
so I always kind of put that stuff in the
back and just try to be in the moment with
this stuff. And so I think it was really kind
of funny when Kelsey's asking me these questions about my
feelings and I'm just you know, doing logistical stuff and
(27:55):
just yeah, I didn't really ever get the hang of it.
Just awful and the kind of stuff. Well, it's funny
because listeners seem to think you loved answering and talking
about your feelings. So surprise, listeners, you did not. So
people love Bone Valley and it's been my favorite podcast
(28:18):
of the year. Why do you think so many people
are responding to Bone Valley? You know, there's a million
podcasts out there about cases, murders, wrongful convictions. Why are
people resonating with Bone Valley? You know, I'll just take
a quick stab at it. But I think it comes
back to the work you did with Suave when it
has heart. Suave has heart. That story has a lot
(28:39):
of heart, and I think you know that was in
our heads too, like we wanted to tell a story
with heart, and we want it to be you know, emotional,
not just a true crime like procedural. We wanted you
to care about the people. And I think because we
spent so much time with our subjects and got to
know them so well and they were so comfortable talking,
that you begin to care about people like Chrissy, not
(29:01):
just Leo, but just people in the story. And I
don't know, I just think there's a there's a human
and emotional connection to this story that felt real while
we were working on at the whole time. Well, that
goes back to you know, the whole being compassionate to Jeremy.
You know, if you had just treated him like a
subject and not a human, I highly doubt we would
be where we are with any of the information you
(29:23):
got from him. Yeah, I think that's true. And I think,
you know, like it's just I don't think there's much
interesting in black and white good versus evil. There's a
lot of those gray areas, and you know, Leo has
his own gray areas, right. It's really in the beginning,
it's really hard to feel sympathetic for him when you
hear all this you know, bad character evidence coming in
and he's talking about, you know, his relationship with Michelle.
(29:44):
It's not not a perfect relationship. They're a young couple.
They have their issues. It gets a little volatile at times.
So Leo's not like the fuzzy bunny of wrongful convictions
and Jeremy. You know, Leo doesn't think Jeremy's the monster
he was looking for. And I think that's what really
makes it interest Hmmm, how do you how do you think,
you know, how does Leo feel about Jeremy now today? Um,
(30:08):
Leo is I think Leo is very grateful that Jeremy
is telling the truth and that Jeremy is trying to
do what he can to correct this injustice. And I think,
(30:30):
you know, Leo, Leo cares about Jeremy as another human being.
I think, you know, kind of like us. Leo sees
Jeremy as somebody who who deserves respect for for being
a human. And you know, despite all of the terrible
(30:52):
things he's done and I know that Leo still prays
for Jeremy and thinks about Jeremy, and yeah, I don't know,
I don't know what else to add to that. Yeah,
And I think it's just a testament to Leo's character.
And you know who he is as a person. You know,
(31:13):
in the prison, he's like extraordinarily educated. Now he's a
mentor to a lot of young inmates who come in
the jails. The prison looks to him to sort of
guide people who are having a difficult time, and he
served as a mentor. There's times when we've talked to
him and we talk about getting out and he'll say like,
I'm not sure I can actually leave this place because
there's so many people counting on me. It's like a family.
(31:35):
And we've talked to so many people that who who've
echoed that to us, and it's just so natural for
him to actually even care about Jeremy's mental well being
and spiritual health. Yeah. Absolutely so. Has Leo heard the podcast. No,
he's not able to hear the podcast, which is really
interesting to us because he's getting every day he gets
(32:00):
people coming into him like guards, administrators, outside contractors. He
works in maintenance at the prison he's at, and so
he has a lot of dealing with the outside world.
And you know, he I talked to him on the
phone just the other day, and you know, he said, Gilbert,
everybody I know is telling me they listen to the podcast,
and guards are coming up to me and they're saying,
(32:21):
you know, I always thought that you were someone who
didn't seem like they belonged here in prison. But now
that I know your story and I know that you're innocent,
I just want to hug you and tell you I'm sorry.
And you know that has meant so much to Leo
to get that kind of affirmation, because you know, these
guys don't talk about their cases, especially with outsiders. You know,
it's just like not done. And now these guys are
(32:41):
listening to this podcast and realizing, you know, that Leo's innocent,
and you know, he says he's been getting so many
updates from like on visitation days, like other inmates. Families
on the outside are listening and they want to meet
him and you know, tell him good luck, and they're
how sorry they are, and it's just really moving. I
think he's finally finally getting like the kind of feedback
that you know, he's always wanted that people believe in
(33:03):
his innocence. I think it's really validating for him, even
though he can't listen to it. It's kind of some
of the feedback is kind of trickling down to him,
and so he's able to, you know, feel some of that.
And we're glad he's he's able to feel a little
bit of it, because after all this time and all
he's put into it, it's kind of crazy he can't
(33:24):
actually listen to it. Yeah, it really is. I know
that his sister has been reading like the transcripts to
him from like the last episode, and he said he
got all choked up about the concert. You know, Gilbert
came to the concert and he had hurt never heard
that before, and I said, yeah, it's, um, it's one
thing on the page, but it's one thing to actually
(33:44):
hear it, you know. Like I think I read that
part four times and I couldn't get through it without
like breaking up. And I think on the fourth one,
I there's a little bit of a break in my voice.
And we said, oh, let's go with that one. It's
it's realistic. You can't you can't get through this. So
he might as well just be there. So it's all honest,
Gilbert Kelsey, I'm just going to pause you for a second.
(34:04):
I think we're going to take a quick break and
we will be back with more questions for you guys.
Do not go anywhere. Sounds good. Sounds good. So, Gilbert,
listeners want to know, are you going to write a
book about this, because they know how impactful Devil in
the Grove was and they want to know if you
plan to do something similar. Yeah, I mean, it's something
(34:25):
I think about. I'm a big believer in the power
of podcasts and what they can do to right or wrong.
And you know, a book, I've never gotten this kind
of reaction from many of my books before, Like this
kind of reaction I'm seeing from like all these people
writing me, and it's just it's just amplified and exponentially.
And so, you know, there's a lot of a lot
(34:46):
of material that we couldn't get into the podcast. You know.
One of the things is we were trying to do
this parallel narrative that I sort of fantasized about doing.
Is like Jeremy on one side, Leo and eventually they
you know, meet somewhere and yeah, but it just it
didn't work on the audio side. I think it could
work on the written side, but there's so much, so
many characters who didn't make it into the podcast, some detectives.
(35:08):
It just it just quite didn't quite fit. We had
a we have over nine hours, but still it was
it was a it was a labor to get that down.
I you know, I believe that and four years of work. Absolutely. Yeah,
And we went in some directions that you know, we
just like the conviction integutive review units we did. We
interviewed several conviction anddecator review units. We went in that direction,
(35:28):
what does it take to overturn it? And it just
sort of felt like we was taking us out of
the immediate story of Leo and Jeremy and Michelle's death.
So we just sort of put that stuff to the side.
But there's a lot more there that we didn't really
really need in the podcast or didn't seem to work.
But I think it would work in a book. So
it's something I'm thinking about, but I haven't decided. Am
I allowed to say that Leo is also contemplating doing
(35:53):
some writing. Yeah, he's talked about it. I am envisioning
some sort of collaboration between Gilbert and Leo. That's what
I'm That's what I'm hoping for. I would love something
like that. He's he's a he's a superb writer. I mean,
he can reduce you to tears, and with his emails
and letters, I mean, he's just such a thoughtful, emotional guy.
(36:13):
There's things that he says sometimes that you know, like
I don't really pick up until I hear it later
and go, Wow, did he just really say that? Like
he's just a really interesting storyteller, and it transfers to
the to the written page when he writes too. So
I would be honored to do something like that. Well,
we will hold our breath and and listeners also want
(36:35):
to know, is the gang getting back together for another podcast?
Another case? You know? We I don't know how to
answer that. We have a couple of cases that we're
really interested in. We haven't really had a chance to
explore them. I would love to. I think that this
team that I was working with, it just made this
podcast so much better. Everybody brought in their individual skills
(36:57):
and just raise the bar. When I look at some
of the original scripts that I wrote for this while
I was just waiting around for things. I said, Oh,
I might as well start writing. They are so bad
compared to what we had now. When we had collaboration,
like with Kara and Britt and Kelsey and Rucks, everyone
came together and just sort of made everything better and
it was honestly, it was a dream team. I don't
(37:17):
know if Kelsey was like you, your first time experiencing
any kind of collaboration, you must think it's always going
to be like this, But I'm telling you what we
had was really really special in everybody who's being on
the same page as I can recognize that. And yeah,
I would love for the team to come back together
for a second season or another story or something, so
(37:39):
certainly open to that. But if that happens, the plans
are still being worked out. So the ultimate question is
what is the status of Leo's case? Right now? People
are asking does he have appeals? Left? Someone else asked,
you know, the autopsy said that the killer was left hand.
(38:00):
Did is Jeremy left handed? Wouldn't that be important for
you know, some sort of appeal? What's going on? Yeah?
I mean, I'll just address the left handed thing because
it is interesting and Jeremy is left handed, and you know,
I think there's a case to be made, like how
do you stab in a car? The first we didn't
(38:20):
really try to speculate so much about what exactly happened
in the car because I think once once we believe
all the blood was found outside the car, that's where
her blood had pooled. I believe that she was killed
outside of the car. And you know, she was stabbed
in both the front and the back of her torso,
and so clearly, like you can't really tell where Jeremy
(38:43):
might have been kneeling or standing when he was doing this,
and so to speculate about his left handedness, I don't
think it's really relevant or even something that you could
prove in this particular case. Yeah, so we we've asked,
we asked the crime scene expert about that, and apparently,
like unless you know the exact position of how somebody
(39:04):
was standing or kneeling as this happened, it's hard for
that to be real evidence of anything. So unfortunately, even
though it is Jeremy is left handed, I'm not sure
that that really can prove anything. Yeah, and as far
as the case goes, I mean, he's literally legally out
of options. His last appeal had failed. They appealed it
(39:26):
to the Florida Supreme Court, which refused to hear it.
And so he's unless there's some discovery of new evidence,
which really seems kind of unlikely at this point because
you have physical evidence linking Jeremy to the scene, and
you have multiple confessions, detailed confessions. I'm not sure what
else can arise. You know, I think the crime scene
(39:48):
was gone over in such a sloppy manner. There was
evidence that was left behind that probably could have linked
Jeremy there as well. I'm thinking particularly this box of
cigarettes that was right not far from the bloodstains. Jeremy
said he was smoking afterwards before he moved the body.
We asked him what kind of cigarettes he smoked? Marlborough.
(40:09):
He would never have known that. Granted it's a common brand,
but there's only one pack of cigarettes near those bloodstains,
and the police photographed it as if it was evidence,
but apparently never collected it. Right, And so there's a
lot of evidence from the crime scene that you know,
Jeremy said, you know, he wrapped her in a plastic
tarp and dragged her down there. Well, if you look
(40:29):
at the crime scene photos. You can see several plastic
tarps right there in the bushes, in the garbage, and
they was never collected. So I don't know that you know,
you're ever going to get that again. And there's not
like some video camera in a tree back in nineteen
eighty seven, So I don't know where there's going to
be any new evidence that's going to be more significant
than having your fingerprints and multiple confessions linking you to
the crime. Yeah, but just to clarify, Leo's really his
(40:54):
only two options are being released on parole or some
clemency after and of course with parole that's not the
same as an exoneration. So even if he is released
on parole, he will still be considered a guilty man.
And does he have a parole date? I don't think
there's a date so far, but there should be a
(41:15):
hearing some time around March, right, and you know that's
going to be that's going to be an interesting hearing.
I'm curious if the state is going to show up
again because the last three times that Leo has had parole,
and you know he's he served his minimum sentence of
twenty five years. He's a model inmate, he's started programs,
(41:35):
he says to us, you know, I had to invent
programs to graduate from it. In prison, he has like
no disciplinary record. He's just he's the model inmate, right right.
I think it's been like sixteen seventeen years since he's
been written up for any sort of disciplinary thing. Yeah,
that's and all minors stuff that never happens in prison, right.
But his refusal to apologize and take responsibility for killing
(41:59):
Michelle is what's keeping him behind bars. And every time
he's up for parole, the parole commissioners seemed ready to
release him, but then the state attorney or assistant state
attorney shows up, throws out the autopsy pictures and says,
never apologize, never said I'm sorry, And the commissioners just
sort of flip and change their opinion and deny his parole,
And it's well, will this time be different? Now that
(42:22):
you know we have again Jeremy confessing on tape to
you guys, do you think this time could be different?
I think that the public awareness of Leo's case could
be different. I think there could be, you know, a
media scene at his parole, like expecting him to be paroled.
I think. I think I know a lot of people
in Florida who who's told me they want they plan
on attending that, And I wouldn't be surprised if there's
(42:44):
a large crowd there to see Leo get parole um.
But you know, it remains to be seen. Does the
State Attorney's office want to continue to resist this and
to fight this and to sort of double down on
Leo Um? I think that will be a really interesting
question because that parole is coming up in you know,
just a few months. Well, I was, I guess, you know,
(43:06):
one of the questions people keep asking is why is
the state's attorney office so adamant on keeping this person
in prison when we have someone confessing, we have the evidence,
you know everything you guys have said, What is going on?
You know, it's just I think it's just this culture
of protecting convictions and you know, this finality that's sort
(43:27):
of built into the system. There's political reasons for it.
They don't like to lose convictions sometimes. You know, in
this particular case, the assistant state attorney who prosecuted is
no longer alive. He was also Jeremy's prosecutor, and so
it's complicated you know, why is this guy going into
an office by himself without a tape recorder and a
witness and interviewing Jeremy about this particular crime. It's just like,
(43:50):
I think it's completely unethical and and so I think
they're not only having to defend the conviction of Leo,
but now they have to defend their office because we're
accusing their office of of certain unethical behaviors. And so
I think it's just sort of a way of doubling down.
Just Oh, it's just guys promoting a podcast. It's just
the you know, the media, don't listen to them. We
know what we're doing. They're completely opposed to conviction integatory
(44:13):
review units in Polk County. You know, they told Kelsey
in an interview that, you know, we get it right.
You know, we don't need the conviction integutor review unit
like they do in Tampa and Jacksonville. That is just
so arrogant. And just like anyone who says that, it's
like people who are like, I'm not racist, they're probably racist.
If you need to announce you're not racist, Like, we
don't get it, we don't get it wrong. You probably
(44:34):
are getting it wrong right, And one of Teresa Hall
we interviewed from the Conviction Integutor Review Unit in Hillsborough County,
and she was like, you know, if if a plane
falls out of the sky, there's going to be an
investigation because we don't want that to happen again. If
a doctor or surgeon loses a patient on the table
that shouldn't die, we want an investigation. We want to
make sure that that doesn't happen again. With lawyers who
(44:58):
are dealing with life and death issues for some reason,
lawyers who sue airlines and you know, sue doctors and hospitals,
but they don't want their own work looked at. It
doesn't make any sense. We know that they get cases wrong.
We have a very healthy record of exonerations in this
country of people who are wrongly convicted and released from
death row. So you are getting it wrong. Why are
(45:18):
you afraid of an investigation? Well, and to be clear
for listeners, it is particularly designed that way by prosecutorial
immunity qualified immunities. So just so listeners know, this isn't
a fluke. It is designed so they cannot be held accountable, right,
And that's to me is like the most disgusting part
of this thing is like, you know, we looked into
the history of the tenth State Attorney's Office, and you know,
(45:41):
we found some cases the wrongful convictions, and we found
evidence that state attorneys were hiding exculpatory evidence from the defense.
And I just thought about that, like if and these guys,
by the way, they get their name mentioned in a
far Supreme Court opinion, they don't lose their job. They
can continue to prosecute after doing this, and you know,
(46:02):
sending someone to prison for the rest of their life wrongfully,
there's no consequences. I was thinking if I was to say,
I'm writing a book like Devil in the Grove and
I find a legal document where all the Groveland boys
like confess to their lawyers and said, we did this,
you gotta get us off. And I said, well, that
doesn't fit my narrative. I'm hiding that. I'm gonna put
that in a box and never see it and not
(46:23):
have it affect my narrative. You know, if I got
caught doing that, my book would be pulled from the
shelves and I wouldn't get another publishing contract. Right, So
I have more accountability than the State Attorney's office. Does.
And so this whole thing about the integrity of the
courts being more important than you know, the court of
public opinion, I don't buy it. Yeah, So obviously this
(46:44):
podcast got a lot of people riled up. How can
they help Leo? Well, we do. We do have a
petition out there. I'm pretty sure it is on the
Lava for Good website. It is a change dot org
petition that is was put together by the Innocence Project
of Florida, who represent Leo. And so what you know
(47:07):
they're calling for, what we are supporting the call for
is a transfer of Leo's case to one of these
districts that has a conviction integrity review unit, because we
think if somebody is able to really take a look
at the full case, at all the evidence that, you know,
everything that's come forward over the years, they'll see exactly
(47:31):
what we know, which is that Leo is innocent and
that Jeremy Scott killed Michelle Scofield. And you know, we're
hoping that some sort of independent review can happen. And
so the petition signing the petition getting more attention for
that is kind of what we're we're putting our energy
towards right now. I don't know what else. Gilbert, you
(47:54):
you're a little more tuned into this at this point.
I mean, right now, that seems to be the thing.
The stage that we're working for is like we're just
sort of supporting the Florida Innocence Project's efforts to get
this petition signed. I believe it. There will be other
things that will come up as as this sort of
aftermath of Bone Valley sort of develops. I think, you know,
(48:14):
it could be in any direction, but we're waiting. There's
a lot of people listening to this in Florida, and
a lot of people who have reached out and said
they want to help and they want to do something
about this. And that was very much the feeling I
had with Devil in the Grove when people started coming
up to me saying, we're going to do something about this.
And suddenly this political movement began, and sure enough, then
it comes across the desk of the governor at the time,
(48:36):
and that's that's when the pardon started. So hopefully enough
people will listen and that kind of you know, grassroots
effort will begin again. I don't know if this will
surprise you guys, but a lot of people want to
help Jeremy as well. They want to send him stamps.
Will you be able to put out his mailing address
so people can do that, you know, we're working on
(48:56):
that right now. There's Jeremy's in a different situation than
Leo because in the solitary confinement and it's not allowed
to nobody's allowed to receive stamps anymore. They cut that
back at the at the Department of Corrections in Florida,
so all the mail has to go to this one
clearing house in Tampa and then it gets delivered to
the various prisons and Jeremy gets a copy of whatever
(49:17):
letter you send. We're trying to figure out a way
because I've had a lot of people contact me saying
they want to put some money in his canteen. They
heard about, you know, how broke he was and he
couldn't buy soap, and they just wanted to reach out
and help. And so we're trying to figure out a
way to have maybe a middle person be the collector
of this, and we just haven't been able to solve
it yet, but where we are working on it. So
(49:40):
if people want to stay updated on, you know, the
petition how to contact Jeremy where do they go. So
with the petition, if you sign the petition, you will
receive updates if you know, if there are any updates
posted to the petition, you will be notified that if
(50:00):
you sign it, So that is also motivation to sign
the petition so you can get those kind of updates.
But we're also Gilbert and I are both on Twitter
and are updating with whenever stuff comes through. Also Lava
for Good. If you follow Lava for Good on social media,
they're definitely going to be posting any updates related to this.
(50:22):
So yeah, just you know, be on the lookout for
stuff on social media and with the petition. Hey, Maggie,
I have a question for you. What are you working
on right now? What do you have going on? Wow,
we are working on season two of Wrongful Conviction with
Me Maggie Freeling, and that is going to launch January ninth,
and you can find that in the regular Wrongful Conviction
(50:45):
feed with me and Jason And I'm very excited. This
season is just some of the most egregious cases. We're
really focusing on women, so everyone should listen. And yeah,
I can't wait. That's great. Gilbert Kelsey, thank you so
much for talking with me, Thank you for listening, thank
(51:07):
you for answering listeners questions, my questions. We've really appreciate it. Oh, Maggie,
thanks so much. It's such a pleasure to actually do
an interview with you and really talk to you. Well,
you interviewed me last time, so this has been
Hello, y'all. I'm Maggie Freeling, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist and
the host of Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freeling, and this
is a bonus episode of Bone Valley. So I'm here
with Gilbert King and Kelsey Decker, and I'm going to
ask them some of my questions, some of your questions
all about the behind the scenes of Bone Valley. So,
(00:22):
Gilbert and Kelsey, Hello, Hey, Maggie, how are you doing.
I'm good. Are y'all good? Real good. So one of
my first questions is, as someone who has done projects
like this, it takes a lot of time. But you
guys started working on this quite a while ago. So
can you tell me when you started working on this
how much time you spent in Florida? What was that like? Yeah,
(00:44):
I'll say it took us over four years to do this.
So you know, obviously we worked through COVID and so
that that sort of slowed us down. There were a
few things that slowed us down. We were trying to
reach Jeremy Scott and he was constantly being put in
disciplinary confinement, and then with COVID, so we were a
lot of waiting around as well. But I would say
we kept ourselves pretty busy with this. We had the
(01:05):
extra time. We were a lot of waiting, so we
just tried to do more and more research and just
keep digging. And so that was our experience. Why it
took so long, right, and because I remember at one
point you said like, oh, this is a letter, you know,
from our first letter to Jeremy, and like, what was
it twenty nineteen you wrote him or twenty eighteen. Yeah,
I think it was like I think the first time
we wrote him was like early twenty twenty, like during
(01:26):
the pandemic, and he didn't respond for seven months, and
I think we sent out a bunch of letters finally
just started writing back to us. So and you guys
moved to Florida. Go ahead, Kelsey, you can tell about
the big move with your pickup truck. Yeah, yeah, I
mean we moved to Florida for about three months. It
was the summer of twenty nineteen. Yeah, I have, yeah,
(01:48):
summer of twenty nineteen, So we were there for a
few months. We are kind of like home based. There
was Saint Petersburg. We weren't entirely sure. We wanted to
spend all of our time Inland, but we were making
the drive back and forth quite a bit, but yeah,
it was it was an interesting start to like the
(02:08):
real reporting in the case, just you know, being down
there in the midst of it. So it's kind of
important to do that, you know. When I did my
podcast Murder and Alliance, which was investigating a wrongful conviction.
I pretty much lived in Ohio for a good year.
Did locals know you guys? Like, what was that like? Yeah,
we would run into the same people our home base
(02:30):
a lot of times we would we would drive it
was about forty five minutes from Saint Pete to Lakeland,
and our home base became the Lakeland Public Library and
they actually gave us a room in there that we
would use for interviews. So it worked out really well.
And there's also some a lot of research to do
in Lakeland from you know, historical research that was right
in the library. But I remember that as just being
a lot of fun and every morning like just getting
(02:51):
up and you know, drinking coffee on the way, going
across the Skyway bridge and just drive into Lakeland and
just like doing prep in the car for the interview
that we have to do that day. And uh, I
just it was really a fun like commute to actually
have to do that, and I think, yeah, we started
running into a lot of people that we'd known. There
was one point, I don't know if you remember this Kelsey,
(03:11):
where I was kind of not paying attention and I
almost ran over a guy around one of those lakes
and he was like, yeah, I just spoke. I did.
I did a talk down there, some legal talk, and
we had made eye contact that I knew, I knew
I know him, and I said him a little quick email,
I said, hey, sorry, I think I just tried to
run you over, and he was like, I knew that
was you don't worry about it. So listeners do want
(03:36):
to know, though, if Gilbert, your familiarity with Florida from
your other book, Devil in the Grove, if any of
those connections helped you with this case, Yeah, I would.
I would definitely say they did. You know, there's a
lot of people like I did two books down there,
so I've spent about fifteen years down there in this
part of central Florida, and so a lot of people
know me, and I think there's like a benefit to
(03:58):
having some connections, Like you know, sometimes we'll be writing
something and trying to figure out something in terms of
like a Supreme Court of Florida Supreme Court decision, and
I'm not really entirely sure what the you know, what
to make of the decision, And like there are I'm
friendly with some of the Florida Supreme Court justices, so
I can actually call them up and say, hey, can
you explain your opinion in that particular case. And so
(04:19):
there's a lot of that local stuff that I think
really paid off. And same with um, you know, just
having going down there and speaking all the time, I
run into a lot of people that I know, and
they seem more eager to help me. I think, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Um So, Kelsey, this was all really new to you.
You were pretty much just out of college and now
(04:40):
you're eyeballs deep in a really crazy wrongful conviction case,
murder case, another murder case. What was all this like
for you? Um? You know, I just kind of had
to take it a day at a time sometimes, because yeah,
every every phase of this project was something just entirely
(05:02):
new for me. But you know, having Gilbert there there
was always support. He was my cheerleader every step of
the way. So yeah, I mean, it was an amazing experience.
Like first job, I think this is you know, maybe
kind of a dream job for a lot of people,
and here I am, like right out of college, just
(05:25):
diving right into it. So I felt very lucky in
a lot of ways. But there were definitely moments where
I felt I was in a little over my head
having to kind of learn some of the stuff as
I went along. But here I am, I made it,
and I am, you know, really happy I've been able
to see it through to the end. And yeah, I
(05:47):
mean I just care so much about this story. It
was something I just you know, was very motivated to
continue learning and committing to and putting everything I could
into it. So how did you relationship the two of you?
How did it change over the course of four years?
I mean that's a long time. And Kelsey, again, like
(06:09):
you were very new, so I'm sure by the end
you were a rock star investigator. But so how did
it all change? Yeah? Well, I think, you know, part
of the thing with this is, like I have a
lot of researchers and they're based in New York and
they're actually guys who were older than me, and like
it just for them to just upend themselves and move
down to Florida was just not going to happen for them.
You know, they had families, they had commitments, and so
(06:31):
it really need somebody who has the flexibility to do
something like this, and so I think Kelsey came in
as a researcher. Basically, I had a couple of different
projects going, and I remember specifically I was trying to decide,
like there was a TV thing, a new book, and
I was trying to prioritize, and then Leo's case came
across my desk and Kelsey started looking into it, and
(06:52):
I remember there was a moment I said, well, Kelsey,
like what do you think I should prioritize what project?
And I remember her specifically saying like, well, it looks
like there's an innocent man in prison that one. And
it just like this moment of clarity, like yeah, of
course we have to do that one. And so that
was really the inspiration to get going. And you know,
Kelsey started as a researcher, but because like we decided
(07:14):
to pivot to a podcast while we were down there,
you know, she had to learn all the audio recording
and sort of it it was all self taught and so
like she's moving through this going from researcher to you know,
audio recordists to producer and all these different skills that
she had to learn for this job. So it really
needs somebody flexible and somebody who's not afraid of learning,
(07:35):
and she was it. Wow, would you agree with all that?
Kelsey goes, So yeah, I didn't. I didn't have much
to lose with up ending my entire life and going
down to Florida and learning everything on the job. Well,
were you nervous like to go down just like you
and Gilbert that he's a terrifying human, but like you know,
I'm you didn't know him that well, Like was that
(07:57):
weird to start off, just like the two of you, Yeah,
it was. It was a little weird, but we fell
into like a rhythm pretty quickly. I mean by that
time we'd already we were already both like very invested
in this case in the story. So um yeah, I
mean we were so obsessed with it at that point,
(08:18):
we were talking about it constantly. Um, and so like
it felt pretty natural after a little time passed, And um,
I'm actually I was born in Florida. So also, like
the landscape there was kind of familiar to me. I
have some family down there, so there was like a
little bit of familiarity in that aspect as well. Well,
(08:41):
that's what I was going to ask you. So where
were you both like coming from? You were coming from
New York? Gilbert, is that Are you from New York? Yeah,
I'm originally from upstate New York, but I've been in
I've been in New York for the last thirty something years,
so yeah, I'm a New Yorker. But yeah, you know,
and I'm really used to Florida. I think there was
some you know, weird things of like when we were
like basically roommates for a couple months, and like I
(09:03):
think Kelsey was like, am I supposed to cook? Because
that part of my job? Like realize, like he doesn't
look all the time. It's true. Yeah new Yorker, Yeah exactly,
but um but yeah, I just um, it was it
was it was an adjustment, especially but once we built
into the schedule and like we'd stay home, do all
(09:23):
the phone calls, do all the prep work there, and
then just go out in the field in Lakeland, And
it was really nice to be able to get away
from Polk County and just be working outside of Polk
County because I don't really like working in the counties that,
you know, because then people start snooping around and they
know where you are, and you see them around and
they know where you are. I didn't want to deal
with that, so right, right, So so getting to the case, Um,
(09:48):
did you go into this skeptical of his innocence? I mean,
I know this came across your desk from a very
reputable person, um, a former judge. You know, honestly, did
you go into it thinking, Okay, this is an innocent
man or how did you guys go into this? Were
you ever skeptical of his innocence? I'm always skeptical, And
even though that this came to me through a judge,
(10:08):
I just it's not that I don't trust anybody, but
I just have to like know for myself that I'm
going into something that I know enough about it. And
so there were months that went by where it was
just research and you know, it did it did help
that Judge Cupp was vouching for him. But I think
I try to put a timetable on this. I think
it was, you know, at least weeks before I said,
(10:31):
it really looks like this guy could really be innocent,
And you know, from reading from the transcript, it was
it was pretty obvious to me that he was not
rightfully convicted. But once we got down there and met
Leo and started doing our own real deep research on it,
it was pretty clear to us that we were dealing
with an innocent man. Kelsey, would you agree with that, Yeah, definitely.
(10:53):
I mean I think before we met Leo for the
very first time, we tried to read everything we could
get our hands on, and so we had a really
good understanding of yeah, of like how the trial went,
what evidence was there, but you know, you never you
never really know, like everything doesn't come out in court.
(11:13):
He could be wrongfully convicted and not necessarily be innocent.
I think there is a little bit of a distinction
there for listeners. Sure, yeah, Gilbert might be better at
explaining this. This is a distinction Judge Scott cup Drew,
you know, the very first time I met him, and
probably the first time Gilbert spoke to him as well,
(11:36):
that um, you know, stuff can stuff can go wrong
at trial, like prosecutors can do shady things, and it
can somebody can be convicted on bad evidence or I
don't know. Yeah, I mean, things can go wrong, but
maybe they actually did do the crime, or maybe they
(11:56):
had some knowledge of it or something like that. This.
You know, in Leo's case, he wasn't there, he didn't
do it, he didn't know anything about it, which I
think is where at least Judge Scott Cup would draw
the line at like, you know, he's innocent, he didn't
know anything about it, he wasn't there. But yeah, so
we had all of that, all of the like documentation,
(12:17):
that information and going into meet Leo, and then I think,
you know that first meeting after hearing him speak, that
kind of really solidified things for us that it was
like it was really hard for us to kind of
wrap our head around how he could be guilty after
that first meeting. So, yeah, that's a really good point.
(12:41):
And I think sometimes you can get to a point
where the prosecutor just doesn't prove his case beyond a
reasonable doubt, but you know, a person can still be guilty.
And so that was one of the things that I
was trying to always consider. But I think what made
this case really interesting is you have this other person
involved in this who is actually confessed to the murder,
and so that the investigation starts to go to him too.
(13:03):
And I remember just specifically having a thought like, if Leo,
if I ever catch him lying to me, or if
he was trying to mislead me or being really not
transparent about certain things, that's going to lead to more skepticism.
And I just to to devote this much time and
energy to a case that could fall apart on me,
you know, I think back on the NAACP and the
(13:25):
and when they were doing these cases in the forties
and fifties, they couldn't afford a single loss. So when
they were going down there and defending innocent people, they
had to make sure that that person was innocent because
a loss would be too damaging, and you certainly don't
want that coming back on us. But you know, once
we were aware of who Jeremy Scott was and we
started investigating him, it became not only a problem, you know,
(13:47):
a situation where Leo is not only innocent, but it's
this guy. This guy did it, And that was what
was really intriguing to us. I'm Maggie Freeling checking in
with Gilbert King and Kelsey Decker from Bone Valley and
we will be right back. Hi. I'm Jason Flom, CEO
and founder of Lava for Good podcasts, home to Bone Valley,
(14:07):
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of the more powerful moments for a lot of listeners
was in chapter two when you go to the evidence
room together. What was that like and why was that
so emotional? Particularly for you? Kelsey. Yeah, so, I think
(16:19):
by the time we went and viewed those photos, we'd
already been down in Florida for a couple of months,
we'd spoken to Leo a number of times, we'd spoken
to you know, a lot of the people you hear
in the podcast already, So you know, by that point,
I was pretty deep into the story, and you know,
(16:43):
I felt like I did have kind of a sense
of who Michelle was, and you know she by that point,
you know, she really felt like somebody I knew to
some degree. And I think just going there, like I
knew some of what we were going to be seeing,
(17:04):
but I don't know, it's it's just it's hard to
be prepared for, you know, actually seeing the violence and um, yeah,
I don't know, just the the trauma and the violence
(17:26):
of all of it. Just really the brutality it just
I don't know, it really hit me, the brutality of it. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
And there's just also something about, you know, going through
and having this lead up to the evidence. They're showing
us all the physical evidence that the plywood that's resting
on her body, we're seeing the downy bottle that was
(17:47):
smeared with blood, and then you start seeing clothing to clothing. Yeah,
that starts when you start seeing all the bloodstains on
that and the and the tears and the rips from
the knife, and then you know, the finally they bring
out the pictures from the autopsy, and you know, it's
just you feel like you've seen pictures of her now,
you've talked to her family members, You've talked to Leo,
(18:09):
you talked to Michelle's brother, and it's just hard to
get that out of your head. And I think, you know,
we're always doing debriefings and just keeping the recorder going,
and I think just we got back to the car
and like Kelsey made it through all of that, the
whole evidence room, but I think it's just like sort
of snuck up on her and hit her. I don't know,
but you held off through the whole through the whole
(18:31):
evidence room, but it was just you know, you got
away from it, and that's where I hit you, I guess.
But I think sometimes it's the processing, you know, like
I tell our producers, like when I'm doing these interviews,
you know, as a journalist, Gilbert and Kelsey, now you'll
know too, like you just sometimes have this wall up
to get through it. And then it's after the fact
when I go back and I'm transcribing and I'm listening
(18:51):
to the interview that I'm like, oh, now I'm processing
it and it's really hitting what was said or what
you're looking at. Definitely, that's a really good point. That
happens to me a lot too. And I'm sort of
you know, you're in the moment, but you're asking questions,
you're thinking of things to ask, you're trying to get
into the flow of the internet, and you're in a
different space and then you go back and listen to it.
We had the same experience with Jeremy just going back
(19:13):
and listening to it. It sounded even more powerful than
it did when we were there in person, just hearing
his voice crack and the pain and torture that he
was feeling. It almost like flew by me a little
bit while we were in the room, but boy, well
sometimes it does. And that's like for listeners to know,
like when you're in that room, you're really like, well,
I gotta get this question, and is my tape recorder working?
(19:35):
Like it is very hard to do eighty thousand things
and focus on the interview and process it all at once.
So yeah, definitely what listeners are hearing is very crafted,
for sure. Yeah, And you know, we did so much
prep for that that interview just by the way, you know,
and it was I think it was clearly the best
interview we've ever done, like it was the last one
(19:56):
we did basically, but it was the best one. I
think we were so prepared for it and we were
just working off each other and he was being so
responsive to both of us. It was a really incredible
thing to go back and listen to that and think, Wow,
I cannot believe we got all that out of him.
Are you still in touch with Jeremy? Yeah, he's really
difficult to reach again. He wrote me a letter was
(20:17):
a couple of months ago. I hadn't heard from him
a long time. It was a really short message and
he said, you know, dear mister King, I don't hold
a grudge against you for doing this story. I wish
you the best, but the monster in me is coming
out and I'm going to be locked up for a
long time. And I was like, what is this? You know,
this was a short note that I got from him
and then found out like a couple days later he
(20:40):
was involved in some kind of altercation with a weapon
and he got moved to a different prison and put
in solitary confinement. Don't really know the details of it,
but he's locked up for a long time, so I
don't know. You know, that's kind of a life he's
led in prison. It's extraordinarily violent, extraordinarily impulsive, he gets
moved around constantly, there's psychiatric issues. But I do try
(21:01):
to stay in touch with him. And we just got
another letter from him last week and so he was
writing again. So I'm going to stay in touch with him.
I think I'm the only one who's writing to him. Well,
let me ask you about that, because I'm sure there's
a lot of listeners who are going to go, why
he's a violent, horrible, murderous person. Why stay in touch
(21:21):
with him? You know, I don't know a really great
answer to that, other than he is a human being,
and he exposed part of himself and it really came
clean about the nightmares that he has and the punishment
that he's feeling in the torture he's having. And I
do believe that he's trying to help himself by clearing
his conscience of this, and also I think he's trying
(21:42):
to help Leo, and I just see that as something admirable,
and Leo is thankful for it and basically we follow
Leo's lead on a lot of these kind of moral
and ethical decisions. Yeah, yeah, I mean it's definitely something
I care about, Like I don't I do want to
in touch with Jeremy, I know, Like I never want
(22:03):
to downplay all of the harm he has caused. But
I feel for Jeremy too, like he's he's had it
really rough. He he really never had a chance in life,
and as much harm as he's caused, I still feel like,
I don't know, he deserves a little compassion, And I
(22:26):
you know, yeah, I agree with Gilbert. He's he's trying
to tell the truth, I think, and I think he's
genuine and he's remorseful, and I don't know, I want
him to know that that's not going unnoticed. Like I
want him to know that he's doing a good thing
and he's doing the right thing, and and he should
(22:49):
be proud of that. I think, you know, that's probably
why all of us are on this network, because not
only are we journalists, but we're also humans and we
recognize is the humanity in people. And I think all
of us would agree that nobody is defined by the
worst day of their life and I think, you know,
I think that's really beautiful that you guys put in
(23:11):
Jeremy's story and took so much care to show that
he was once a kid, and you know, he became
a product of his environment, which is really really tragic,
and I really appreciate you guys putting that in there. Yeah,
and I think you know, he's taken responsibility for his acts.
He's confessed to all the murders he's committed. He knows
(23:32):
he's not ever getting out of prison. He really shouldn't
get out of prison. He's extraordinarily violent and impulsive. But
you know, it doesn't mean we still can't care for
him and wish for him the best in the rest
of his days. And the fact that he has nobody
to talk to, and you know I'm the only one
he's writing to. You know, that comes with some kind
of responsibility. You know, I'm I don't want to be
(23:53):
his best friend, but I do want to be there
and talk to him and listen to him, and you know,
who knows what else he'll say. Sure, speaking of probably
one of the craziest things besides the actual killer, confessating
to the murderer that someone else is in prison for
is that you come across another murder while investigating Michelle's murder?
(24:16):
Where is that investigation at? Will anyone Jeremy ever be
prosecuted for that? You know, this is maddening to me
because we went several times to the Ossiola County Sheriff's
office with our evidence and with our letters where Jeremy
started taking responsibility for killing this cab driver, Joseph Laverre.
It wasn't just his confession. We had other evidence that
(24:37):
we put together, stuff that didn't even make it into
the podcast because you know, we didn't really feel the
need to expand on this forever after he confessed. But
we've brought it in a couple times. We brought it
into the State Attorney's office, and they basically have just
refused to investigate it, which I just find flabbergasting. Actually,
it's clear evidence they have a confession and that they
(24:59):
basically doubled down in their response by saying that we
believe that we prosecuted the right guy in dan Odie,
but he wasn't convicted by the jury, but we still
think he's the murderer. And you know, for me, that's
annoying because these prosecutors are always talking about finality and
the justice system. You got to respect the jury's verdict.
(25:20):
But here they are smearing a man who's been quitted
and calling him a murderer because it doesn't fit their narrative.
I don't know why they're not investigating it. It's just
it's beyond me to understand why they're doing that. Have
you talked to Joseph Laver's family, You know, that's been
a really tricky thing. We've tried tracking him down. I've
sent messages. They're scattered all over. It was a broken family.
(25:42):
Joseph had gotten divorced about a year before he was murdered,
and so the family just kind of scattered. He had
a young son at the time who was maybe one
or two years old, and tried to find him, but
he's locked away in jail as well, and I just
haven't been able to reach him. So we haven't had
any luck trying to get Joseph Laver's family, and there's
some other reporters who have tried to and have not
(26:03):
been able to reach him. But that's definitely something we're
going to continue to pursue because I don't believe justice
has been served in that case. So, Kelsey, something listeners
want to know about is you were always asking Gilbert
about his feelings. Why did you do that? Was that
just instinctual? Like what was up with asking Gilbert about
(26:24):
feel Yeah? I suppose it was kind of instinctual, Like,
you know, I had a feeling that we were there
on the ground, we were doing the work, and you know,
in some ways the listener is going to look to
us to kind of interpret what's going on and what
we're seeing and finding out, and some of that is
(26:46):
sharing what we're feeling and how we're processing it. And yeah,
you know, Gilbert started to get the hang of it.
You know, it didn't come incredibly natural for him, but um,
but we made some progress there, I think, And yeah,
it was it was a learning curve. Well yeah, I
(27:08):
mean I imagine Gilbert and your other reporting. No one's
usually putting a mic in your face and saying how
do you feel about this? No? I hate You know,
there's that line in The Departed where they say where
talking about Freud says that the Irish are immune to therapy.
It just doesn't work on the Irish. That's who I
feel is like, what are you asking me my feelings
for who cares. Yeah, it's it's an awkward thing. And
you know, there's also a lot of compartmentalization that I
(27:31):
try to do it in this kind of stuff. Like
if you get really emotional and thinking about the humanity
and the pain and all these waves of violence in
the story, it can really kind of paralyze you. And
so I always kind of put that stuff in the
back and just try to be in the moment with
this stuff. And so I think it was really kind
of funny when Kelsey's asking me these questions about my
feelings and I'm just you know, doing logistical stuff and
(27:55):
just yeah, I didn't really ever get the hang of it.
Just awful and the kind of stuff. Well, it's funny
because listeners seem to think you loved answering and talking
about your feelings. So surprise, listeners, you did not. So
people love Bone Valley and it's been my favorite podcast
(28:18):
of the year. Why do you think so many people
are responding to Bone Valley? You know, there's a million
podcasts out there about cases, murders, wrongful convictions. Why are
people resonating with Bone Valley? You know, I'll just take
a quick stab at it. But I think it comes
back to the work you did with Suave when it
has heart. Suave has heart. That story has a lot
(28:39):
of heart, and I think you know that was in
our heads too, like we wanted to tell a story
with heart, and we want it to be you know, emotional,
not just a true crime like procedural. We wanted you
to care about the people. And I think because we
spent so much time with our subjects and got to
know them so well and they were so comfortable talking,
that you begin to care about people like Chrissy, not
(29:01):
just Leo, but just people in the story. And I
don't know, I just think there's a there's a human
and emotional connection to this story that felt real while
we were working on at the whole time. Well, that
goes back to you know, the whole being compassionate to Jeremy.
You know, if you had just treated him like a
subject and not a human, I highly doubt we would
be where we are with any of the information you
(29:23):
got from him. Yeah, I think that's true. And I think,
you know, like it's just I don't think there's much
interesting in black and white good versus evil. There's a
lot of those gray areas, and you know, Leo has
his own gray areas, right. It's really in the beginning,
it's really hard to feel sympathetic for him when you
hear all this you know, bad character evidence coming in
and he's talking about, you know, his relationship with Michelle.
(29:44):
It's not not a perfect relationship. They're a young couple.
They have their issues. It gets a little volatile at times.
So Leo's not like the fuzzy bunny of wrongful convictions
and Jeremy. You know, Leo doesn't think Jeremy's the monster
he was looking for. And I think that's what really
makes it interest Hmmm, how do you how do you think,
you know, how does Leo feel about Jeremy now today? Um,
(30:08):
Leo is I think Leo is very grateful that Jeremy
is telling the truth and that Jeremy is trying to
do what he can to correct this injustice. And I think,
(30:30):
you know, Leo, Leo cares about Jeremy as another human being.
I think, you know, kind of like us. Leo sees
Jeremy as somebody who who deserves respect for for being
a human. And you know, despite all of the terrible
(30:52):
things he's done and I know that Leo still prays
for Jeremy and thinks about Jeremy, and yeah, I don't know,
I don't know what else to add to that. Yeah,
And I think it's just a testament to Leo's character.
And you know who he is as a person. You know,
(31:13):
in the prison, he's like extraordinarily educated. Now he's a
mentor to a lot of young inmates who come in
the jails. The prison looks to him to sort of
guide people who are having a difficult time, and he
served as a mentor. There's times when we've talked to
him and we talk about getting out and he'll say like,
I'm not sure I can actually leave this place because
there's so many people counting on me. It's like a family.
(31:35):
And we've talked to so many people that who who've
echoed that to us, and it's just so natural for
him to actually even care about Jeremy's mental well being
and spiritual health. Yeah. Absolutely so. Has Leo heard the podcast. No,
he's not able to hear the podcast, which is really
interesting to us because he's getting every day he gets
(32:00):
people coming into him like guards, administrators, outside contractors. He
works in maintenance at the prison he's at, and so
he has a lot of dealing with the outside world.
And you know, he I talked to him on the
phone just the other day, and you know, he said, Gilbert,
everybody I know is telling me they listen to the podcast,
and guards are coming up to me and they're saying,
(32:21):
you know, I always thought that you were someone who
didn't seem like they belonged here in prison. But now
that I know your story and I know that you're innocent,
I just want to hug you and tell you I'm sorry.
And you know that has meant so much to Leo
to get that kind of affirmation, because you know, these
guys don't talk about their cases, especially with outsiders. You know,
it's just like not done. And now these guys are
(32:41):
listening to this podcast and realizing, you know, that Leo's innocent,
and you know, he says he's been getting so many
updates from like on visitation days, like other inmates. Families
on the outside are listening and they want to meet
him and you know, tell him good luck, and they're
how sorry they are, and it's just really moving. I
think he's finally finally getting like the kind of feedback
that you know, he's always wanted that people believe in
(33:03):
his innocence. I think it's really validating for him, even
though he can't listen to it. It's kind of some
of the feedback is kind of trickling down to him,
and so he's able to, you know, feel some of that.
And we're glad he's he's able to feel a little
bit of it, because after all this time and all
he's put into it, it's kind of crazy he can't
(33:24):
actually listen to it. Yeah, it really is. I know
that his sister has been reading like the transcripts to
him from like the last episode, and he said he
got all choked up about the concert. You know, Gilbert
came to the concert and he had hurt never heard
that before, and I said, yeah, it's, um, it's one
thing on the page, but it's one thing to actually
(33:44):
hear it, you know. Like I think I read that
part four times and I couldn't get through it without
like breaking up. And I think on the fourth one,
I there's a little bit of a break in my voice.
And we said, oh, let's go with that one. It's
it's realistic. You can't you can't get through this. So
he might as well just be there. So it's all honest,
Gilbert Kelsey, I'm just going to pause you for a second.
(34:04):
I think we're going to take a quick break and
we will be back with more questions for you guys.
Do not go anywhere. Sounds good. Sounds good. So, Gilbert,
listeners want to know, are you going to write a
book about this, because they know how impactful Devil in
the Grove was and they want to know if you
plan to do something similar. Yeah, I mean, it's something
(34:25):
I think about. I'm a big believer in the power
of podcasts and what they can do to right or wrong.
And you know, a book, I've never gotten this kind
of reaction from many of my books before, Like this
kind of reaction I'm seeing from like all these people
writing me, and it's just it's just amplified and exponentially.
And so, you know, there's a lot of a lot
(34:46):
of material that we couldn't get into the podcast. You know.
One of the things is we were trying to do
this parallel narrative that I sort of fantasized about doing.
Is like Jeremy on one side, Leo and eventually they
you know, meet somewhere and yeah, but it just it
didn't work on the audio side. I think it could
work on the written side, but there's so much, so
many characters who didn't make it into the podcast, some detectives.
(35:08):
It just it just quite didn't quite fit. We had
a we have over nine hours, but still it was
it was a it was a labor to get that down.
I you know, I believe that and four years of work. Absolutely. Yeah,
And we went in some directions that you know, we
just like the conviction integutive review units we did. We
interviewed several conviction anddecator review units. We went in that direction,
(35:28):
what does it take to overturn it? And it just
sort of felt like we was taking us out of
the immediate story of Leo and Jeremy and Michelle's death.
So we just sort of put that stuff to the side.
But there's a lot more there that we didn't really
really need in the podcast or didn't seem to work.
But I think it would work in a book. So
it's something I'm thinking about, but I haven't decided. Am
I allowed to say that Leo is also contemplating doing
(35:53):
some writing. Yeah, he's talked about it. I am envisioning
some sort of collaboration between Gilbert and Leo. That's what
I'm That's what I'm hoping for. I would love something
like that. He's he's a he's a superb writer. I mean,
he can reduce you to tears, and with his emails
and letters, I mean, he's just such a thoughtful, emotional guy.
(36:13):
There's things that he says sometimes that you know, like
I don't really pick up until I hear it later
and go, Wow, did he just really say that? Like
he's just a really interesting storyteller, and it transfers to
the to the written page when he writes too. So
I would be honored to do something like that. Well,
we will hold our breath and and listeners also want
(36:35):
to know, is the gang getting back together for another podcast?
Another case? You know? We I don't know how to
answer that. We have a couple of cases that we're
really interested in. We haven't really had a chance to
explore them. I would love to. I think that this
team that I was working with, it just made this
podcast so much better. Everybody brought in their individual skills
(36:57):
and just raise the bar. When I look at some
of the original scripts that I wrote for this while
I was just waiting around for things. I said, Oh,
I might as well start writing. They are so bad
compared to what we had now. When we had collaboration,
like with Kara and Britt and Kelsey and Rucks, everyone
came together and just sort of made everything better and
it was honestly, it was a dream team. I don't
(37:17):
know if Kelsey was like you, your first time experiencing
any kind of collaboration, you must think it's always going
to be like this, But I'm telling you what we
had was really really special in everybody who's being on
the same page as I can recognize that. And yeah,
I would love for the team to come back together
for a second season or another story or something, so
(37:39):
certainly open to that. But if that happens, the plans
are still being worked out. So the ultimate question is
what is the status of Leo's case? Right now? People
are asking does he have appeals? Left? Someone else asked,
you know, the autopsy said that the killer was left hand.
(38:00):
Did is Jeremy left handed? Wouldn't that be important for
you know, some sort of appeal? What's going on? Yeah?
I mean, I'll just address the left handed thing because
it is interesting and Jeremy is left handed, and you know,
I think there's a case to be made, like how
do you stab in a car? The first we didn't
(38:20):
really try to speculate so much about what exactly happened
in the car because I think once once we believe
all the blood was found outside the car, that's where
her blood had pooled. I believe that she was killed
outside of the car. And you know, she was stabbed
in both the front and the back of her torso,
and so clearly, like you can't really tell where Jeremy
(38:43):
might have been kneeling or standing when he was doing this,
and so to speculate about his left handedness, I don't
think it's really relevant or even something that you could
prove in this particular case. Yeah, so we we've asked,
we asked the crime scene expert about that, and apparently,
like unless you know the exact position of how somebody
(39:04):
was standing or kneeling as this happened, it's hard for
that to be real evidence of anything. So unfortunately, even
though it is Jeremy is left handed, I'm not sure
that that really can prove anything. Yeah, and as far
as the case goes, I mean, he's literally legally out
of options. His last appeal had failed. They appealed it
(39:26):
to the Florida Supreme Court, which refused to hear it.
And so he's unless there's some discovery of new evidence,
which really seems kind of unlikely at this point because
you have physical evidence linking Jeremy to the scene, and
you have multiple confessions, detailed confessions. I'm not sure what
else can arise. You know, I think the crime scene
(39:48):
was gone over in such a sloppy manner. There was
evidence that was left behind that probably could have linked
Jeremy there as well. I'm thinking particularly this box of
cigarettes that was right not far from the bloodstains. Jeremy
said he was smoking afterwards before he moved the body.
We asked him what kind of cigarettes he smoked? Marlborough.
(40:09):
He would never have known that. Granted it's a common brand,
but there's only one pack of cigarettes near those bloodstains,
and the police photographed it as if it was evidence,
but apparently never collected it. Right, And so there's a
lot of evidence from the crime scene that you know,
Jeremy said, you know, he wrapped her in a plastic
tarp and dragged her down there. Well, if you look
(40:29):
at the crime scene photos. You can see several plastic
tarps right there in the bushes, in the garbage, and
they was never collected. So I don't know that you know,
you're ever going to get that again. And there's not
like some video camera in a tree back in nineteen
eighty seven, So I don't know where there's going to
be any new evidence that's going to be more significant
than having your fingerprints and multiple confessions linking you to
the crime. Yeah, but just to clarify, Leo's really his
(40:54):
only two options are being released on parole or some
clemency after and of course with parole that's not the
same as an exoneration. So even if he is released
on parole, he will still be considered a guilty man.
And does he have a parole date? I don't think
there's a date so far, but there should be a
(41:15):
hearing some time around March, right, and you know that's
going to be that's going to be an interesting hearing.
I'm curious if the state is going to show up
again because the last three times that Leo has had parole,
and you know he's he served his minimum sentence of
twenty five years. He's a model inmate, he's started programs,
(41:35):
he says to us, you know, I had to invent
programs to graduate from it. In prison, he has like
no disciplinary record. He's just he's the model inmate, right right.
I think it's been like sixteen seventeen years since he's
been written up for any sort of disciplinary thing. Yeah,
that's and all minors stuff that never happens in prison, right.
But his refusal to apologize and take responsibility for killing
(41:59):
Michelle is what's keeping him behind bars. And every time
he's up for parole, the parole commissioners seemed ready to
release him, but then the state attorney or assistant state
attorney shows up, throws out the autopsy pictures and says,
never apologize, never said I'm sorry, And the commissioners just
sort of flip and change their opinion and deny his parole,
And it's well, will this time be different? Now that
(42:22):
you know we have again Jeremy confessing on tape to
you guys, do you think this time could be different?
I think that the public awareness of Leo's case could
be different. I think there could be, you know, a
media scene at his parole, like expecting him to be paroled.
I think. I think I know a lot of people
in Florida who who's told me they want they plan
on attending that, And I wouldn't be surprised if there's
(42:44):
a large crowd there to see Leo get parole um.
But you know, it remains to be seen. Does the
State Attorney's office want to continue to resist this and
to fight this and to sort of double down on
Leo Um? I think that will be a really interesting
question because that parole is coming up in you know,
just a few months. Well, I was, I guess, you know,
(43:06):
one of the questions people keep asking is why is
the state's attorney office so adamant on keeping this person
in prison when we have someone confessing, we have the evidence,
you know everything you guys have said, What is going on?
You know, it's just I think it's just this culture
of protecting convictions and you know, this finality that's sort
(43:27):
of built into the system. There's political reasons for it.
They don't like to lose convictions sometimes. You know, in
this particular case, the assistant state attorney who prosecuted is
no longer alive. He was also Jeremy's prosecutor, and so
it's complicated you know, why is this guy going into
an office by himself without a tape recorder and a
witness and interviewing Jeremy about this particular crime. It's just like,
(43:50):
I think it's completely unethical and and so I think
they're not only having to defend the conviction of Leo,
but now they have to defend their office because we're
accusing their office of of certain unethical behaviors. And so
I think it's just sort of a way of doubling down.
Just Oh, it's just guys promoting a podcast. It's just
the you know, the media, don't listen to them. We
know what we're doing. They're completely opposed to conviction integatory
(44:13):
review units in Polk County. You know, they told Kelsey
in an interview that, you know, we get it right.
You know, we don't need the conviction integutor review unit
like they do in Tampa and Jacksonville. That is just
so arrogant. And just like anyone who says that, it's
like people who are like, I'm not racist, they're probably racist.
If you need to announce you're not racist, Like, we
don't get it, we don't get it wrong. You probably
(44:34):
are getting it wrong right, And one of Teresa Hall
we interviewed from the Conviction Integutor Review Unit in Hillsborough County,
and she was like, you know, if if a plane
falls out of the sky, there's going to be an
investigation because we don't want that to happen again. If
a doctor or surgeon loses a patient on the table
that shouldn't die, we want an investigation. We want to
make sure that that doesn't happen again. With lawyers who
(44:58):
are dealing with life and death issues for some reason,
lawyers who sue airlines and you know, sue doctors and hospitals,
but they don't want their own work looked at. It
doesn't make any sense. We know that they get cases wrong.
We have a very healthy record of exonerations in this
country of people who are wrongly convicted and released from
death row. So you are getting it wrong. Why are
(45:18):
you afraid of an investigation? Well, and to be clear
for listeners, it is particularly designed that way by prosecutorial
immunity qualified immunities. So just so listeners know, this isn't
a fluke. It is designed so they cannot be held accountable, right,
And that's to me is like the most disgusting part
of this thing is like, you know, we looked into
the history of the tenth State Attorney's Office, and you know,
(45:41):
we found some cases the wrongful convictions, and we found
evidence that state attorneys were hiding exculpatory evidence from the defense.
And I just thought about that, like if and these guys,
by the way, they get their name mentioned in a
far Supreme Court opinion, they don't lose their job. They
can continue to prosecute after doing this, and you know,
(46:02):
sending someone to prison for the rest of their life wrongfully,
there's no consequences. I was thinking if I was to say,
I'm writing a book like Devil in the Grove and
I find a legal document where all the Groveland boys
like confess to their lawyers and said, we did this,
you gotta get us off. And I said, well, that
doesn't fit my narrative. I'm hiding that. I'm gonna put
that in a box and never see it and not
(46:23):
have it affect my narrative. You know, if I got
caught doing that, my book would be pulled from the
shelves and I wouldn't get another publishing contract. Right, So
I have more accountability than the State Attorney's office. Does.
And so this whole thing about the integrity of the
courts being more important than you know, the court of
public opinion, I don't buy it. Yeah, So obviously this
(46:44):
podcast got a lot of people riled up. How can
they help Leo? Well, we do. We do have a
petition out there. I'm pretty sure it is on the
Lava for Good website. It is a change dot org
petition that is was put together by the Innocence Project
of Florida, who represent Leo. And so what you know
(47:07):
they're calling for, what we are supporting the call for
is a transfer of Leo's case to one of these
districts that has a conviction integrity review unit, because we
think if somebody is able to really take a look
at the full case, at all the evidence that, you know,
everything that's come forward over the years, they'll see exactly
(47:31):
what we know, which is that Leo is innocent and
that Jeremy Scott killed Michelle Scofield. And you know, we're
hoping that some sort of independent review can happen. And
so the petition signing the petition getting more attention for
that is kind of what we're we're putting our energy
towards right now. I don't know what else. Gilbert, you
(47:54):
you're a little more tuned into this at this point.
I mean, right now, that seems to be the thing.
The stage that we're working for is like we're just
sort of supporting the Florida Innocence Project's efforts to get
this petition signed. I believe it. There will be other
things that will come up as as this sort of
aftermath of Bone Valley sort of develops. I think, you know,
(48:14):
it could be in any direction, but we're waiting. There's
a lot of people listening to this in Florida, and
a lot of people who have reached out and said
they want to help and they want to do something
about this. And that was very much the feeling I
had with Devil in the Grove when people started coming
up to me saying, we're going to do something about this.
And suddenly this political movement began, and sure enough, then
it comes across the desk of the governor at the time,
(48:36):
and that's that's when the pardon started. So hopefully enough
people will listen and that kind of you know, grassroots
effort will begin again. I don't know if this will
surprise you guys, but a lot of people want to
help Jeremy as well. They want to send him stamps.
Will you be able to put out his mailing address
so people can do that, you know, we're working on
(48:56):
that right now. There's Jeremy's in a different situation than
Leo because in the solitary confinement and it's not allowed
to nobody's allowed to receive stamps anymore. They cut that
back at the at the Department of Corrections in Florida,
so all the mail has to go to this one
clearing house in Tampa and then it gets delivered to
the various prisons and Jeremy gets a copy of whatever
(49:17):
letter you send. We're trying to figure out a way
because I've had a lot of people contact me saying
they want to put some money in his canteen. They
heard about, you know, how broke he was and he
couldn't buy soap, and they just wanted to reach out
and help. And so we're trying to figure out a
way to have maybe a middle person be the collector
of this, and we just haven't been able to solve
it yet, but where we are working on it. So
(49:40):
if people want to stay updated on, you know, the
petition how to contact Jeremy where do they go. So
with the petition, if you sign the petition, you will
receive updates if you know, if there are any updates
posted to the petition, you will be notified that if
(50:00):
you sign it, So that is also motivation to sign
the petition so you can get those kind of updates.
But we're also Gilbert and I are both on Twitter
and are updating with whenever stuff comes through. Also Lava
for Good. If you follow Lava for Good on social media,
they're definitely going to be posting any updates related to this.
(50:22):
So yeah, just you know, be on the lookout for
stuff on social media and with the petition. Hey, Maggie,
I have a question for you. What are you working
on right now? What do you have going on? Wow,
we are working on season two of Wrongful Conviction with
Me Maggie Freeling, and that is going to launch January ninth,
and you can find that in the regular Wrongful Conviction
(50:45):
feed with me and Jason And I'm very excited. This
season is just some of the most egregious cases. We're
really focusing on women, so everyone should listen. And yeah,
I can't wait. That's great. Gilbert Kelsey, thank you so
much for talking with me, Thank you for listening, thank
(51:07):
you for answering listeners questions, my questions. We've really appreciate it. Oh, Maggie,
thanks so much. It's such a pleasure to actually do
an interview with you and really talk to you. Well,
you interviewed me last time, so this has been
Host
Gilbert King
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