February 10, 2021 • 34 mins
After a hot summer day - August 3rd, 1989, the DeLisle’s took their 4 children for ice cream along the Detroit River. A mechanical defect in their car caused the night to take a deadly turn that sent Larry DeLisle to prison for what should have been seen as a tragic accident.
Learn more and get involved at:
https://www.change.org/p/gretchen-whitmer-free-larry-he-lost-all-4-of-his-children-due-to-a-fatal-accident-is-falsely-in-prison
https://www.netflix.com/title/80161702
https://www.wrongfulconvictionpodcast.com/with-jason-flom
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
On August third, nine, after a long, hot summer day,
Larry at Sue Delisle took their four children out for
ice cream and to watch the boats passed by on
the Detroit River. When Larry pulled out on the street
that had ended at the river, a mechanical defect in
their station wagon caused the accelerated to stick. The car
sped off uncontrollably, and Larry and suss panicked. Efforts could
(00:25):
not save them from launching into the Detroit River. Larry
and Sue narrowly survived, but their children, Brian, Melissa, Kate,
and Emily tragically did not. When the water locked wreck
was pulled from the river, the accelerators stuck again during testing,
an issue raised by hundreds of others about that very
make and model station wagon. It was a tragic accident,
(00:48):
but that wasn't good enough for the police, the media,
or the people of down River, Michigan. After eighteen hours
of interrogation and the usual tricks, Larry tacitly agreed to
hypotheticals posed by the interrogator. This couldn't pass muster as
a confession for a court of law, but it was
quickly submitted to the court of public opinion when the
(01:10):
police chief went on TV and said that Larry Delisle
had confessed, effectively poisoning the entire jury pool. Larry was
convicted of four counts of murder and one count of
attempted murder, despite Sue Delile's unwavering account of his actual innocence.
This tragic accident stole their four children, and the state
(01:31):
compounded that loss by stealing what has become over three
long decades of Larry's life. This is wrongful Conviction with
Jason Flom. Welcome back to wrongful Conviction with Jason Flam.
(02:00):
That's me, of course, I'm your host, and today my
heart is heavy because of the story you're about to
hear and the man you're about to meet. I'm proud
to call him a friend, and I'm proud to be
part of the team that's helping to try to bring
justice long delayed to this awful, awful case. So, without
(02:21):
further ado, Larry Delisle, Welcome to rona Eviction. I'm sorry
you have to be here, but I'm glad you're here,
humble and honored to be here with you today. And
Larry is calling us from prison um in Michigan, where
where exactly are you, Larry. I'm in Coldwater, Michigan, which
(02:42):
is a Lakeland correctional facility. And what you've gone through
is surely unimaginable to almost anyone. UM. You know, the
multiple tragic aspects of this case include obviously the loss
of your family, UM, but also the persecution that was
wrongfully inflicted upon you by people that really should have
(03:06):
known better. UM. And of course you're wrongful incarceration now
for over three decades is another thing that nobody could
even begin to imagine. But I want to go back
to the beginning. Did you grow up in Michigan? If
my grandparents raised me from age two years old, I mean,
your childhood was haunted by a tragedy, A separate tragedy, right.
(03:30):
I mean, I don't know how much one person is
supposed to take in their life, and I don't even
know if you want to talk about that, but it
does come into focus with this case as this as
this goes on, you're talking about my father committing suicide. Yes,
of course, I got a call in the middle of
the night that my father had committed suicide. He drove
down somewhere by the river and put a gun to
(03:52):
his head, ironically in the same vehicle that ended up
being the central figure in this awful tragedy to be
felt your family. Most people would not have wanted to
drive the vehicle. I didn't want to drive the vehicle.
But my father's wife, she wanted to give us something
(04:13):
because my sister and I find away our rights to
his house, because we didn't want her to have to
remortgage or have to move, So she gave me the
car the option of keeping it or selling it. At
the time, we had a brand new Ford aero started.
We had just bought to go to Disneyland November seven,
(04:33):
when my father had committed suicide. We were talking about
getting rid of the aerostar, getting a cheaper vehicle so
we can knock our bills down to a point where
we can afford to buy a house. Well, when my
father committed suicide the place that I worked for retirement,
God bless him, they had taken the vehicle. They had
it completely cleaned on the inside. Now, when I went
(04:57):
there that night to drive the vehicle, I had mixed
in oceans. When I got in, I started crying right away,
but after a few minutes I felt calm. Because my
father had taken me everywhere with him when I was
younger and older in the station wagon. He loved station wagon.
I think that was the second or third one. So
(05:18):
when I drove the vehicle, I felt at peace. Now
it was up to my wife. She drove it. She
loved it because it had a lot of power. It
just happened to have an intrinsic value as far as
helping us to achieve our goals, which would have been
to get a house for our children, to get a
house for us. Right, well, with four kids, you have
(05:40):
obviously in your mechanic, and Larry is known in the
prison as someone who can fix basically anything. But even
still raising four kids on that salary, it can't be
an easy task. And this case was featured in the
Netflix documentary series of Confession Tapes by the wonderful Kelly Loudenberg,
and encourage everyone to watch that episode. But let's go
(06:02):
back to the night of this awful accident, and we're
talking about the evening of August third, ninety degree hot
summer day and the hottest part of the summer. This
this was a very very hot day and it was
a very busy day. I worked close to ten hours
that day running around on my feet. I got out
(06:23):
of there as quickly as I could, got the kids
in the car, and away we went. Larry and his
wife and the children, Brian, Melissa, Katie and Emily had
gone for ice cream, and we're watching the boats along
the Detroit River, which I know the kids enjoy doing that.
You had issues with your legs. I was just not
properly hydrated, and it caused my muscles to cramp up
(06:45):
at different points. I've had problems most of my youth
with cramping in my legs. It actually happened to me
in the gym this morning when I was stretching. So
it's not an uncommon thing, especially when you're dehydrated, like
on a hot summer day, which was what this situation
was with you. But there are a number of things
that played into this unspeakable disaster. And what really happened
(07:08):
was as you were leaving to go home, you were
on Eureka Road, which dead ends at the river. You
stepped on the gas, your leg cramped right up, the
car shot off in pain. You reached down to pull
your foot off the gas, but the car continued to accelerate. Now,
you didn't know it at the time, but there was
a defect that caused your accelerated to jam, propelling the
(07:33):
car with the six of you inside, terrified and screaming
through the barricade at the end of Eureka Road right
into the Detroit River. That mean must have relived that
thousands of times in your head now trying not to
still painful today. When the accelerator stuck, it threw me off.
(07:55):
I didn't know what was stuck. I got my foot
off the gas. My foot was off. My wife even
testified my foot was off. She saw that my foot
was off, but the car did not slow down. Before
I could even do anything further, she reached over in
an attempt to help me. It was an inadvertent act,
(08:18):
but it startled me for a second and I froze,
and before I could decide what I was going to do,
we ran out of street. The whole thing took seven
to ten seconds, according to officials. Seven to ten seconds.
We're talking about a section of the street that was long.
We've already talked about the fact that the car had
(08:38):
a powerful engine and it wouldn't take any car very
long to cover. It's basically just a little bit further
than a football field. So add to I mean, all
the other elements of pure panic and terror, the fact
that the kids are in the car. I'm sure they're screaming,
wife's grabbing the wheel, etcetera, etcetera. You're staring at the water,
and on top of that, you didn't know how to swim, right, No,
(09:01):
I can't. I can tread the water thanks to my
high school coach. But that's about it. But in the
impact itself, I was thrown forward, top of my head,
hit around the visor area. There was a bright light
shot of pain from my neck all the way down
my spine. So I was disoriented once I was in
(09:24):
the water. I don't even know how I got out
of the car. Well, I mean, you know, it's impossible
to probably imagine. And the fact is that this particular
vehicle had known issues. There were over a hundred people
who had reported the accelerator jamming on this exact make
(09:47):
and model station Wagon. It was a seventy seven Ford Ltd.
Station Wagon four six cube against four barrel carburetor. There
was the mechanic who examined the car, Jim Colquell, and
he had identified three separate defects, any one of which
could have caused this uncontrolled acceleration. One was a kink
in the accelerated cable that caused the cable to stick. Secondly,
(10:10):
the throttle plates could be heard scraping inside the carburetor.
And thirdly, the engine mount was broken in this vehicle,
which caused the tilt of the engine, and the tilting
pulled at the accelerator cable. So the combination of these
factors turned deadly. And as it turns out, they chose
(10:31):
to ignore their own tests because when they tested the
vehicle after it was pulled out of the river, in
one of the times when they test drove it, the
accelerator did in fact jam. Yes, when they were testing
the vehicle and the accelerator had stuck. You had two
mechanics there, one for the state who actually was just
a bus mechanic who couldn't even start the vehicle for testing.
(10:53):
We had an a s C certified master mechanic for
us who is the one who found all the problems
with the vehicle, had to start it for them before
they could even test it in an engineer. They were
all there to day to test. Happened when the accelerator stuck.
The arresting officer. He was sitting next to the State
trooper sergeant during their tests, and they're testing it with
(11:16):
his foot on the accelerator, testing the brakes to see
how long it would take to stop the vehicle. And
I imagine it would be quite a long ways with
only manual brakes work. And you don't have the power assist,
because when you're accelerating, you don't have power assist. Your
power brakes don't work. You have to stand on them
to get it to stop. Into the State trooper sergeant,
(11:38):
and he had to do that so hard they broke
the seat. Any case, the arresting officer, he's taking notes.
He wrote across the top of his notepad in bold letters,
accelerators sticking, then swore under oath when he was up
on the witness stand. He had no idea why. He
wrote that there was nothing wrong with the car when
the accelerator stuck. The mechanic to master mechanic and an engineer.
(12:03):
They came running over to the vehicle, according to my lawyer,
and the state trooper wave him away. He said, no, no,
the problems inside the car you have engineers and mechanics
there to confine it, get out of the car, let
him find out what's sticking right now, And he refused
to do it because the arresting officer probably didn't want
them to find it, because if they found a problem,
(12:24):
it would approve what I've been saying from the very
beginning and what my wife had been saying from the
very beginning. The accelerator stuck, because it did for you.
He shut it off. He testified that he shut it
off because it startled him. He's six four or three
pounds and it startled him. Do you expect it to
remain calm. Yes, I'm expected to remain calm. He said.
(12:46):
He was going to start the vehicle back up and
put it in gear and see how fast it would go.
At that point, all you have to do is put
it in gear. When he shut it off, avoided the test,
and they never got a chance to test it again
because by the time they gave it over to the
sense the engine had been sold roughly treated during their
acceleration test that the engine blew up. End of testing
(13:09):
them and of proving beyond reasonable doubt that there was
a problem with the station wagon. This episode is brought
to you by Stand Together. Stand Together is a philanthropic
community dedicated to helping people improve their lives. For more
(13:32):
than twenty years, Stand Together and its partners have been
on the front lines of criminal justice reform. By empowering
people to take action, supporting nonprofits, and working with businesses,
Stand Together tackles the root causes of problems in our
communities and empowers those closest to the problems to drive solutions.
Solutions like reducing unjust prison sentences through the First Step Act,
(13:54):
empowering community based programs and help people re enter society,
and now working to bridge divide in our communities. To
learn how you may get involved, visit stand together dot
org slash conviction. In a tragedy like this, community members
(14:19):
have a very difficult time reconciling the fact that these
type of tragic accidents happen. When a child is lost,
it's easier psychologically for people to assign blame to someone
because the randomness of it is too terrifying, especially for
people with children to imagine. And in this case, I
(14:42):
think that as well as other sort of confirmation biases
took hold. You were targeted by the media. They hounded
you and basically set up camp outside the house of
grieving parents until you agree to give an interview, and
then it becomes And we've seen this in so many cases,
whether it's Amanda Knots are so many others where the
(15:02):
media or the authorities feel you're either too sad or
not sad enough, or too hysterical or too calm. I
don't think that people are aware of the fact that
that first interview I did in the backyard, that I
had had a couple of volumes given to me by
a family member, and I don't even remember the interview.
All I remember was an airplane going over the top.
(15:24):
So if I didn't show emotion for people, uh, it
just makes me angry that they're going to point to
the fact that I'm not classical as far as how
I was supposed to react to losing my children being
hounded by the press. I'm sorry, it's just very upsetting. Well,
(15:48):
let's move on from there. This is a false confession
case that has all of the hall marks that we
see again and again. Just to paint a picture for everyone,
A week after this un imaginable loss, the police picked
you and sue your wife up at seven am and
incharrogated you till one in the morning, So that's eighteen hours.
(16:13):
And we know that when this process goes on interminably,
eventually everybody has a breaking point. And even though you
told him again and again, Larry, I didn't do this, etcetera, etcetera,
they just wouldn't listen. Is that right? The continue to
tell me that I wasn't telling him everything he wanted
to hear, and I didn't understand what he meant at
(16:35):
that point because I was answering all of his questions.
I can't leave alone the idea that they were expecting
you to recite over and over again exactly what happened
when you didn't actually know what happened. In fact, you
could not have known that this car was defective, or
you wouldn't have been driving the damn thing. He was
asking what could have happened? Why the accelerator had stuck?
(16:58):
And I didn't know. I had my shoes off to
the shoe gets stuck in there was the accelerator sticking.
Why wasn't it slowing down? Would you take your foot off?
The guest? But it's supposed to slow down, period, Let's
face it. There was no explanation that you could have
provided that would have satisfied them. Because this is a
very high profile case. The media is all over it,
(17:19):
and everyone had already come to their own conclusions that
you must have done this. So then it gets to
the point where they give you a polygraph. And polygraphs
are wildly inaccurate anyway, but they're effective in terms of
getting people to false the confess I'm Dr Michael Abramsky.
I am a clinical and forensic psychologist. At the time
(17:41):
of the Wild case, I was studying false confessions and
I was retained by the court to examine the confession.
So I was provided with the video tape of the
entire interrogation, the first half an hour to forty five minutes.
The police officer, Pommitteer built himself as as an expert
(18:01):
and infallible, and he also did the same thing with
a polygraph. He said the polygraph could read minds. It
was infallible, it's never wrong. It gives Delial the test,
which only consists of a few questions, and he leaves
the room and he comes back with his head shaking
and says to Delile, you know you failed the polygraph.
(18:22):
You're lying The technique is to make the defendant feel
that their situation is totally hopeless. So basically, you set
up a dilemma. Since the polygraph is infallible, you think
you're telling the truth. It puts you into a state
of cognitive dissonance. You have to find an explanation that
entails both of those things. So Pomitteer spends hours pumping him,
(18:48):
and largely it's not asking questions, it's telling him scenarios,
telling him why he did this, That you're tired and
families are a burden, and I know how hard your
life is. So he is empathic with him, tells him
he understands, implies that you know you're not a bad
person for this. Lots of people are under stress, they
(19:10):
do something rash, and the people will be understanding. Basically,
what he's trying to do is get Larry to make
incriminating statements, and the implication is always that you know
you're not going to suffer bad punishment for this. Some
of the things that this man was saying we're actually
disturbing to hear. He would try to convince me that
(19:34):
he liked to scare his wife. He said he'd drive
up really fast behind parked cars and flam on the
brakes just to scare her. And he asked me if
I ever wanted to do that. He even talked about
he gets so mad at his kids, he'd want to
stick him in a garbage big and throw him in
a closets, that you ever want to do that? And
I got angry at him for even the suggesting something
that heinous to be done to any child. I never
(19:57):
said I wanted to do that. But then later on
and interrogation, somehow he had me parriting him. But they
were not confessions. They were brought about by this man
instilling guilt in me. Made me feel that I was
responsible above and beyond the mechanical problems on there. Palmitt
(20:19):
He keeps on trying scenarios where Larry will implicate himself
and he doesn't, And finally he tries out of scenario
that makes Larry bite. He basically says to Larry, do
you know about the unconscious? And Larry does not. He
tells him that unconscious means that we do certain things
that we don't really know that we've done them. You know,
(20:41):
even though you did it, you're not really responsible. Is
your unconscious that did it, and that starts getting in
Larry an explanation, and so at some point he makes
an equivocal statement such as you think that could have happened,
or he starts questioning pommits here, and he never says
that he did it, but he starts questions mean and
implying that maybe that did happen. And then the interrogation
(21:04):
is over because what he's done is accepted committeers theory
that he did drive the car into the river and
that he did want to hurt someone. He just didn't
know it at the time. But you know, under the law,
that doesn't make any difference. The police chief himself went
on the news and proclaimed that Larry Delisle has confessed.
(21:26):
At that point they almost really needed trial. To his credit,
the judge did actually suppress the confession, and people are
probably hearing that saying, oh good. But the fact that
it didn't matter at that point because they refused to
change the venue. So it's very important to understand the
psychological atmosphere was occurring. First, the news stations had a
(21:46):
stock shot of the car being lifted out of the
river by a crane, and everybody knew there were four
dead children in there, and night after night that was playing.
People then started gathering down by the river, demanding justice
for these four kids. And then after he was questioned,
they announced that he had confessed to the crime, which
(22:09):
of course he had not, but you put that in
the crowd's mind, it's almost impossible to reverse. The next
thing that happened was, of course, the suppression hearing, and
that's where I testified that the confession was involuntary. I
described the techniques that were used and why what he
said was not voluntary. Judge Colombo ruled in Delisle's favor,
(22:32):
and he throughout the confession, except the problem was that
it had already been in the newspaper, and the retractions
from the newspaper said things like Lawrence Delisle's statements that
he intentionally killed his family cannot be used in court
against them. And when you try to tell people that
it's invalid, they believe, oh no, the guy just just
(22:52):
realized that he got himself into trouble. He's just denying
it now. So they never believe the confession is false.
They believe the denial of confession as false. I mean,
I don't know if they have caves in why I
thought that you could have found someone who didn't own
a TV or read the newspaper. But short of that,
you're looking at jurors who are unaware of the tactics
(23:13):
that we used to elicit that confession, and who can't
reconcile the idea that anyone we confess to kind and commit.
But it happens all the damn time, and they charged
you with four counts of murder one kind of attempt
at murder. Prosecutor was a guy named Kevin Samowski. He
painted you as a guy who was overwhelmed by debt.
The fact of the matter is I was not overwhelmed
with debt. I owned less than thirteen five and made
(23:35):
over thirty tho dollars a year. I just got a
house that they didn't have to make any payments on
for an entire year. And I take great offense every
time they keep trying to bring up, oh, hen was
deeply in debt. As a matter of fact, the headlines
wanted to point out, oh, he was trying to get
rid of his burdens. Well, the police were trying to say,
my debt was my burdens, but the people looked at
(23:57):
it as my children with my burdens. That's how we're
trying to convict me. And here's a very very important
thing to me. Your wife, Sue. Now she's gone through
the same horrendous loss that you have. And I think
it's fair to say that maybe went in her position.
(24:18):
If they had even a sneaking suspicion that you might
have done it on purpose, she would have been the
number one witness for the prosecution. She in fact, was
the only witness to the crime except for some woman
that was out in her balcony on the eleventh floor
across the street. Let's not even go there. But she
didn't turn on you. She was there, she knows exactly
what happened. She saw my foot off there. She tried
(24:42):
to help. She was actually demonized by the public for years.
She had to move away from down River because they
were harassing her. Somebody tried to break into the house.
Somebody would call on the phone and leaving threatening messages.
She couldn't get a job anywhere because of her last name. Oh,
because she wouldn't turn on you, even though she was
(25:04):
doing the right thing. So the jury deliberated for nine
hours over two days. They came back originally tended to.
The judge sent them back. They came back the next day,
even one he threatened to keep them through the weekend
if they didn't come back with a decision. We know
that in those jury rooms extreme pressure is exerted by
(25:28):
people who want to go home. But you can send
a note to the judge. You're allowed to do that
and just say, your honor, I'm not budging. I'm done here.
I'd say, people serving juries don't even know you can
do that. You just send a note to the judge
and say I'm done, I'm not voting to convict, and
then the judge has the decision to make the idea
that so many people like you, Larry, are spending the
(25:50):
rest of their lives in prison because somebody needed to
get home, back to their job. This is not a
unique thing, and it's something that needs to be addressed.
When they filed back in, what were your thought? I
could tell when they came in. Some of them were smiling,
but some of them had their arms crossed and I
stood up, and when they said guilty, I I couldn't
(26:13):
stand anymore. I had to sit down or I would
just pass out. I was just so much shock. If
this were a boxing match. We won every single day.
To prosecutor helped prove our case, even when the accelerators
stuck and the police officers waived the mechanics away, saying,
oh no, the problems in the car. He had a
(26:34):
problem was sitting next to you taking notes. He wrote,
specifically across the top of his notepad, accelerators sticking. Then
swore under oath, I had no idea why I wrote
that there was nothing wrong with the car. Bullshit. You
knew that if mechanics an engineer that was there, would
have found the problem, it would have proved that I
(26:54):
was innocent. The big mistake to me, among all the
other mistakes, was the judge not allowing a change of avenue,
because you know, maybe you could have gotten a fair trial.
But what was disheartening too, is that there was a
problem with that vehicle. That Ford did recall that engine,
but only on the pickup trucks, not on our station wagon.
For that year. My lawyer tried to enter it into
(27:15):
trial at the time, and to judge said that because
it was not the pickup truck recalled, he wouldn't allow
him to enter in evidence until the trial was over
with so the jury never got to hear it. MM.
(27:38):
So you've been in prison of for thirty years. I
know you recently survived COVID on top of everything else,
but can you explain that the prison experience, Wow, that
wasn't there for my wife at a funeral for our children.
My grandparents who raised me passed away while I was
(27:58):
in here. These are just the emotional ones there. This
has nothing to do with the pain that I went
through dealing with all these people in the beginning that
I could tell you that the first hang years were horrible.
A matter of fact, the first five I have had
more death threats, evil stairs, things thrown at me every day,
(28:23):
NonStop for five years. I'm surprised I even survived it.
And then the next five years, instead of being daily,
it would be once or twice a week, and then
eventually once or twice a month, and then finally down
to once or twice a year. Now I can go
several years before I hear a discouraging word from somebody.
(28:43):
But I have, over the last two decades made a
lot of good friends in here. You are the company
you keep, so I try to keep company with people
I would have as my friends. And neighbors out in
the world. Can you describe, you know, a ray of
light that you know you can identify five. The best
thing that's ever happened to me was getting on maintenance
(29:03):
twenty two years ago. I've had the opportunity to learn
so much about things that I never knew before, so
much about repairing buildings, clients, repair heating, air conditioning, electrical
I spent hundreds of dollars on books and thousands of
hours studying to get as good as I am now.
I'm very good at what I do today. You've had
(29:24):
appeals over the years, but it hasn't resulted in any relief.
Can you explain why that process is dragged on for
so long? Well, my lawyer, Frank Eamon, did an excellent
job throughout the entire process. I owe him everything. The
system itself is very slow. The courts don't care if
(29:46):
you're innocent or not. They just care. Didn't get a
fair trial. I didn't get a fair trial, and I
went through the federal courts where they split politically eight
to seven. I don't remember for his Democrats Republicans Republicans Democrats.
Years is to be impartial. You're supposed to vote your
conscious what you see. You're like a referee in a
football game. You're supposed to judge everything by what you
(30:09):
have before you. Every one of the judges said that
they are disappointed in the state of Michigan for allowing
suppressed evidence to be released to the media before trial.
You would think that would get you to the United
States Supreme Court, but it didn't. I guess some clerk
putting in there in my case doesn't warrant going before
(30:29):
the highest court in the land. My life, my constitutional
rights violated, and that doesn't go before the highest court
in the land. There's still one remedy left for clemency
from Governor Whitmer. You've recently submitted your clemency petition. You know,
clemency is to me something that I've been telling anyone
(30:52):
who would listen, including people in power, that this is
an underused power that is given very deliberately to governors
and presidents because they are meant to serve as the
last sort of stop gap to prevent injustices from being
allowed to stand. And your case cries out for it,
(31:14):
as I think anyone who's just listened to this podcast agrees.
So is there anything people can do to help generate
momentum for your clemency petition. You could write the pro board,
try to contact the governor. I've got thousands of signatures
on this petition begging her to hear my case to
(31:35):
show clemency. Visit the petition website sign a petition. If
she can hear that people are concerned, she may do something.
We're going to put a link to the petition in
the show notes. Please use your voice. Let's help bring
Larry home together. This nightmare has gone on for far
(31:55):
too long. Larry. We have a section of the show
that is my favorite part each episode. First of all,
I thank you for being here and for your courage
and for sharing your story. So thank you, Larry Delisle.
You know our thoughts are with you, and we're gonna
build momentum for you with this podcast. This actually the
show is called Closing Arguments, and this is where I
(32:18):
turn my microphone off. I'm going to kick back, close
my eyes and just listen to your words. First off,
I would like to say that I am so proud
of so many activists out there who are protesting both
social and racial injustice, the protesting against wrongful convictions. You
(32:38):
have to salute our heroes on the front line in
healthcare who are taking everyone who has COVID nineteen. All
these tragic deaths that are happening in everyone's family. My
heart goes out to you. I would like to thank
Ashley Ross and Carla Beck for everything they've done to
(33:01):
get to this point. They have been very staunch supporters.
They started the petition, they've supported the petition, and I
love them to death. There are so many people that
have written me since the Netflix documentary came out. Bless
you all. Thank you very much. Please please stay safe
(33:21):
out there. Don't forget to give us a fantastic review
wherever you get your podcasts. It really helps. And I'm
a proud donor to the Innocence Project and I really
hope you'll join me in supporting this very important cause
and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions. Go to Innocence
(33:43):
Project dot org to learn how to donate and get involved.
I'd like to thank our production team, Connor Hall and
Kevin Wardis. The music on the show is by three
time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow
us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on Facebook at
Wrongful Action podcast Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flom is a
production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with Signal
(34:07):
Company Number one
On August third, nine, after a long, hot summer day,
Larry at Sue Delisle took their four children out for
ice cream and to watch the boats passed by on
the Detroit River. When Larry pulled out on the street
that had ended at the river, a mechanical defect in
their station wagon caused the accelerated to stick. The car
sped off uncontrollably, and Larry and suss panicked. Efforts could
(00:25):
not save them from launching into the Detroit River. Larry
and Sue narrowly survived, but their children, Brian, Melissa, Kate,
and Emily tragically did not. When the water locked wreck
was pulled from the river, the accelerators stuck again during testing,
an issue raised by hundreds of others about that very
make and model station wagon. It was a tragic accident,
(00:48):
but that wasn't good enough for the police, the media,
or the people of down River, Michigan. After eighteen hours
of interrogation and the usual tricks, Larry tacitly agreed to
hypotheticals posed by the interrogator. This couldn't pass muster as
a confession for a court of law, but it was
quickly submitted to the court of public opinion when the
(01:10):
police chief went on TV and said that Larry Delisle
had confessed, effectively poisoning the entire jury pool. Larry was
convicted of four counts of murder and one count of
attempted murder, despite Sue Delile's unwavering account of his actual innocence.
This tragic accident stole their four children, and the state
(01:31):
compounded that loss by stealing what has become over three
long decades of Larry's life. This is wrongful Conviction with
Jason Flom. Welcome back to wrongful Conviction with Jason Flam.
(02:00):
That's me, of course, I'm your host, and today my
heart is heavy because of the story you're about to
hear and the man you're about to meet. I'm proud
to call him a friend, and I'm proud to be
part of the team that's helping to try to bring
justice long delayed to this awful, awful case. So, without
(02:21):
further ado, Larry Delisle, Welcome to rona Eviction. I'm sorry
you have to be here, but I'm glad you're here,
humble and honored to be here with you today. And
Larry is calling us from prison um in Michigan, where
where exactly are you, Larry. I'm in Coldwater, Michigan, which
(02:42):
is a Lakeland correctional facility. And what you've gone through
is surely unimaginable to almost anyone. UM. You know, the
multiple tragic aspects of this case include obviously the loss
of your family, UM, but also the persecution that was
wrongfully inflicted upon you by people that really should have
(03:06):
known better. UM. And of course you're wrongful incarceration now
for over three decades is another thing that nobody could
even begin to imagine. But I want to go back
to the beginning. Did you grow up in Michigan? If
my grandparents raised me from age two years old, I mean,
your childhood was haunted by a tragedy, A separate tragedy, right.
(03:30):
I mean, I don't know how much one person is
supposed to take in their life, and I don't even
know if you want to talk about that, but it
does come into focus with this case as this as
this goes on, you're talking about my father committing suicide. Yes,
of course, I got a call in the middle of
the night that my father had committed suicide. He drove
down somewhere by the river and put a gun to
(03:52):
his head, ironically in the same vehicle that ended up
being the central figure in this awful tragedy to be
felt your family. Most people would not have wanted to
drive the vehicle. I didn't want to drive the vehicle.
But my father's wife, she wanted to give us something
(04:13):
because my sister and I find away our rights to
his house, because we didn't want her to have to
remortgage or have to move, So she gave me the
car the option of keeping it or selling it. At
the time, we had a brand new Ford aero started.
We had just bought to go to Disneyland November seven,
(04:33):
when my father had committed suicide. We were talking about
getting rid of the aerostar, getting a cheaper vehicle so
we can knock our bills down to a point where
we can afford to buy a house. Well, when my
father committed suicide the place that I worked for retirement,
God bless him, they had taken the vehicle. They had
it completely cleaned on the inside. Now, when I went
(04:57):
there that night to drive the vehicle, I had mixed
in oceans. When I got in, I started crying right away,
but after a few minutes I felt calm. Because my
father had taken me everywhere with him when I was
younger and older in the station wagon. He loved station wagon.
I think that was the second or third one. So
(05:18):
when I drove the vehicle, I felt at peace. Now
it was up to my wife. She drove it. She
loved it because it had a lot of power. It
just happened to have an intrinsic value as far as
helping us to achieve our goals, which would have been
to get a house for our children, to get a
house for us. Right, well, with four kids, you have
(05:40):
obviously in your mechanic, and Larry is known in the
prison as someone who can fix basically anything. But even
still raising four kids on that salary, it can't be
an easy task. And this case was featured in the
Netflix documentary series of Confession Tapes by the wonderful Kelly Loudenberg,
and encourage everyone to watch that episode. But let's go
(06:02):
back to the night of this awful accident, and we're
talking about the evening of August third, ninety degree hot
summer day and the hottest part of the summer. This
this was a very very hot day and it was
a very busy day. I worked close to ten hours
that day running around on my feet. I got out
(06:23):
of there as quickly as I could, got the kids
in the car, and away we went. Larry and his
wife and the children, Brian, Melissa, Katie and Emily had
gone for ice cream, and we're watching the boats along
the Detroit River, which I know the kids enjoy doing that.
You had issues with your legs. I was just not
properly hydrated, and it caused my muscles to cramp up
(06:45):
at different points. I've had problems most of my youth
with cramping in my legs. It actually happened to me
in the gym this morning when I was stretching. So
it's not an uncommon thing, especially when you're dehydrated, like
on a hot summer day, which was what this situation
was with you. But there are a number of things
that played into this unspeakable disaster. And what really happened
(07:08):
was as you were leaving to go home, you were
on Eureka Road, which dead ends at the river. You
stepped on the gas, your leg cramped right up, the
car shot off in pain. You reached down to pull
your foot off the gas, but the car continued to accelerate. Now,
you didn't know it at the time, but there was
a defect that caused your accelerated to jam, propelling the
(07:33):
car with the six of you inside, terrified and screaming
through the barricade at the end of Eureka Road right
into the Detroit River. That mean must have relived that
thousands of times in your head now trying not to
still painful today. When the accelerator stuck, it threw me off.
(07:55):
I didn't know what was stuck. I got my foot
off the gas. My foot was off. My wife even
testified my foot was off. She saw that my foot
was off, but the car did not slow down. Before
I could even do anything further, she reached over in
an attempt to help me. It was an inadvertent act,
(08:18):
but it startled me for a second and I froze,
and before I could decide what I was going to do,
we ran out of street. The whole thing took seven
to ten seconds, according to officials. Seven to ten seconds.
We're talking about a section of the street that was long.
We've already talked about the fact that the car had
(08:38):
a powerful engine and it wouldn't take any car very
long to cover. It's basically just a little bit further
than a football field. So add to I mean, all
the other elements of pure panic and terror, the fact
that the kids are in the car. I'm sure they're screaming,
wife's grabbing the wheel, etcetera, etcetera. You're staring at the water,
and on top of that, you didn't know how to swim, right, No,
(09:01):
I can't. I can tread the water thanks to my
high school coach. But that's about it. But in the
impact itself, I was thrown forward, top of my head,
hit around the visor area. There was a bright light
shot of pain from my neck all the way down
my spine. So I was disoriented once I was in
(09:24):
the water. I don't even know how I got out
of the car. Well, I mean, you know, it's impossible
to probably imagine. And the fact is that this particular
vehicle had known issues. There were over a hundred people
who had reported the accelerator jamming on this exact make
(09:47):
and model station Wagon. It was a seventy seven Ford Ltd.
Station Wagon four six cube against four barrel carburetor. There
was the mechanic who examined the car, Jim Colquell, and
he had identified three separate defects, any one of which
could have caused this uncontrolled acceleration. One was a kink
in the accelerated cable that caused the cable to stick. Secondly,
(10:10):
the throttle plates could be heard scraping inside the carburetor.
And thirdly, the engine mount was broken in this vehicle,
which caused the tilt of the engine, and the tilting
pulled at the accelerator cable. So the combination of these
factors turned deadly. And as it turns out, they chose
(10:31):
to ignore their own tests because when they tested the
vehicle after it was pulled out of the river, in
one of the times when they test drove it, the
accelerator did in fact jam. Yes, when they were testing
the vehicle and the accelerator had stuck. You had two
mechanics there, one for the state who actually was just
a bus mechanic who couldn't even start the vehicle for testing.
(10:53):
We had an a s C certified master mechanic for
us who is the one who found all the problems
with the vehicle, had to start it for them before
they could even test it in an engineer. They were
all there to day to test. Happened when the accelerator stuck.
The arresting officer. He was sitting next to the State
trooper sergeant during their tests, and they're testing it with
(11:16):
his foot on the accelerator, testing the brakes to see
how long it would take to stop the vehicle. And
I imagine it would be quite a long ways with
only manual brakes work. And you don't have the power assist,
because when you're accelerating, you don't have power assist. Your
power brakes don't work. You have to stand on them
to get it to stop. Into the State trooper sergeant,
(11:38):
and he had to do that so hard they broke
the seat. Any case, the arresting officer, he's taking notes.
He wrote across the top of his notepad in bold letters,
accelerators sticking, then swore under oath when he was up
on the witness stand. He had no idea why. He
wrote that there was nothing wrong with the car when
the accelerator stuck. The mechanic to master mechanic and an engineer.
(12:03):
They came running over to the vehicle, according to my lawyer,
and the state trooper wave him away. He said, no, no,
the problems inside the car you have engineers and mechanics
there to confine it, get out of the car, let
him find out what's sticking right now, And he refused
to do it because the arresting officer probably didn't want
them to find it, because if they found a problem,
(12:24):
it would approve what I've been saying from the very
beginning and what my wife had been saying from the
very beginning. The accelerator stuck, because it did for you.
He shut it off. He testified that he shut it
off because it startled him. He's six four or three
pounds and it startled him. Do you expect it to
remain calm. Yes, I'm expected to remain calm. He said.
(12:46):
He was going to start the vehicle back up and
put it in gear and see how fast it would go.
At that point, all you have to do is put
it in gear. When he shut it off, avoided the test,
and they never got a chance to test it again
because by the time they gave it over to the
sense the engine had been sold roughly treated during their
acceleration test that the engine blew up. End of testing
(13:09):
them and of proving beyond reasonable doubt that there was
a problem with the station wagon. This episode is brought
to you by Stand Together. Stand Together is a philanthropic
community dedicated to helping people improve their lives. For more
(13:32):
than twenty years, Stand Together and its partners have been
on the front lines of criminal justice reform. By empowering
people to take action, supporting nonprofits, and working with businesses,
Stand Together tackles the root causes of problems in our
communities and empowers those closest to the problems to drive solutions.
Solutions like reducing unjust prison sentences through the First Step Act,
(13:54):
empowering community based programs and help people re enter society,
and now working to bridge divide in our communities. To
learn how you may get involved, visit stand together dot
org slash conviction. In a tragedy like this, community members
(14:19):
have a very difficult time reconciling the fact that these
type of tragic accidents happen. When a child is lost,
it's easier psychologically for people to assign blame to someone
because the randomness of it is too terrifying, especially for
people with children to imagine. And in this case, I
(14:42):
think that as well as other sort of confirmation biases
took hold. You were targeted by the media. They hounded
you and basically set up camp outside the house of
grieving parents until you agree to give an interview, and
then it becomes And we've seen this in so many cases,
whether it's Amanda Knots are so many others where the
(15:02):
media or the authorities feel you're either too sad or
not sad enough, or too hysterical or too calm. I
don't think that people are aware of the fact that
that first interview I did in the backyard, that I
had had a couple of volumes given to me by
a family member, and I don't even remember the interview.
All I remember was an airplane going over the top.
(15:24):
So if I didn't show emotion for people, uh, it
just makes me angry that they're going to point to
the fact that I'm not classical as far as how
I was supposed to react to losing my children being
hounded by the press. I'm sorry, it's just very upsetting. Well,
(15:48):
let's move on from there. This is a false confession
case that has all of the hall marks that we
see again and again. Just to paint a picture for everyone,
A week after this un imaginable loss, the police picked
you and sue your wife up at seven am and
incharrogated you till one in the morning, So that's eighteen hours.
(16:13):
And we know that when this process goes on interminably,
eventually everybody has a breaking point. And even though you
told him again and again, Larry, I didn't do this, etcetera, etcetera,
they just wouldn't listen. Is that right? The continue to
tell me that I wasn't telling him everything he wanted
to hear, and I didn't understand what he meant at
(16:35):
that point because I was answering all of his questions.
I can't leave alone the idea that they were expecting
you to recite over and over again exactly what happened
when you didn't actually know what happened. In fact, you
could not have known that this car was defective, or
you wouldn't have been driving the damn thing. He was
asking what could have happened? Why the accelerator had stuck?
(16:58):
And I didn't know. I had my shoes off to
the shoe gets stuck in there was the accelerator sticking.
Why wasn't it slowing down? Would you take your foot off?
The guest? But it's supposed to slow down, period, Let's
face it. There was no explanation that you could have
provided that would have satisfied them. Because this is a
very high profile case. The media is all over it,
(17:19):
and everyone had already come to their own conclusions that
you must have done this. So then it gets to
the point where they give you a polygraph. And polygraphs
are wildly inaccurate anyway, but they're effective in terms of
getting people to false the confess I'm Dr Michael Abramsky.
I am a clinical and forensic psychologist. At the time
(17:41):
of the Wild case, I was studying false confessions and
I was retained by the court to examine the confession.
So I was provided with the video tape of the
entire interrogation, the first half an hour to forty five minutes.
The police officer, Pommitteer built himself as as an expert
(18:01):
and infallible, and he also did the same thing with
a polygraph. He said the polygraph could read minds. It
was infallible, it's never wrong. It gives Delial the test,
which only consists of a few questions, and he leaves
the room and he comes back with his head shaking
and says to Delile, you know you failed the polygraph.
(18:22):
You're lying The technique is to make the defendant feel
that their situation is totally hopeless. So basically, you set
up a dilemma. Since the polygraph is infallible, you think
you're telling the truth. It puts you into a state
of cognitive dissonance. You have to find an explanation that
entails both of those things. So Pomitteer spends hours pumping him,
(18:48):
and largely it's not asking questions, it's telling him scenarios,
telling him why he did this, That you're tired and
families are a burden, and I know how hard your
life is. So he is empathic with him, tells him
he understands, implies that you know you're not a bad
person for this. Lots of people are under stress, they
(19:10):
do something rash, and the people will be understanding. Basically,
what he's trying to do is get Larry to make
incriminating statements, and the implication is always that you know
you're not going to suffer bad punishment for this. Some
of the things that this man was saying we're actually
disturbing to hear. He would try to convince me that
(19:34):
he liked to scare his wife. He said he'd drive
up really fast behind parked cars and flam on the
brakes just to scare her. And he asked me if
I ever wanted to do that. He even talked about
he gets so mad at his kids, he'd want to
stick him in a garbage big and throw him in
a closets, that you ever want to do that? And
I got angry at him for even the suggesting something
that heinous to be done to any child. I never
(19:57):
said I wanted to do that. But then later on
and interrogation, somehow he had me parriting him. But they
were not confessions. They were brought about by this man
instilling guilt in me. Made me feel that I was
responsible above and beyond the mechanical problems on there. Palmitt
(20:19):
He keeps on trying scenarios where Larry will implicate himself
and he doesn't, And finally he tries out of scenario
that makes Larry bite. He basically says to Larry, do
you know about the unconscious? And Larry does not. He
tells him that unconscious means that we do certain things
that we don't really know that we've done them. You know,
(20:41):
even though you did it, you're not really responsible. Is
your unconscious that did it, and that starts getting in
Larry an explanation, and so at some point he makes
an equivocal statement such as you think that could have happened,
or he starts questioning pommits here, and he never says
that he did it, but he starts questions mean and
implying that maybe that did happen. And then the interrogation
(21:04):
is over because what he's done is accepted committeers theory
that he did drive the car into the river and
that he did want to hurt someone. He just didn't
know it at the time. But you know, under the law,
that doesn't make any difference. The police chief himself went
on the news and proclaimed that Larry Delisle has confessed.
(21:26):
At that point they almost really needed trial. To his credit,
the judge did actually suppress the confession, and people are
probably hearing that saying, oh good. But the fact that
it didn't matter at that point because they refused to
change the venue. So it's very important to understand the
psychological atmosphere was occurring. First, the news stations had a
(21:46):
stock shot of the car being lifted out of the
river by a crane, and everybody knew there were four
dead children in there, and night after night that was playing.
People then started gathering down by the river, demanding justice
for these four kids. And then after he was questioned,
they announced that he had confessed to the crime, which
(22:09):
of course he had not, but you put that in
the crowd's mind, it's almost impossible to reverse. The next
thing that happened was, of course, the suppression hearing, and
that's where I testified that the confession was involuntary. I
described the techniques that were used and why what he
said was not voluntary. Judge Colombo ruled in Delisle's favor,
(22:32):
and he throughout the confession, except the problem was that
it had already been in the newspaper, and the retractions
from the newspaper said things like Lawrence Delisle's statements that
he intentionally killed his family cannot be used in court
against them. And when you try to tell people that
it's invalid, they believe, oh no, the guy just just
(22:52):
realized that he got himself into trouble. He's just denying
it now. So they never believe the confession is false.
They believe the denial of confession as false. I mean,
I don't know if they have caves in why I
thought that you could have found someone who didn't own
a TV or read the newspaper. But short of that,
you're looking at jurors who are unaware of the tactics
(23:13):
that we used to elicit that confession, and who can't
reconcile the idea that anyone we confess to kind and commit.
But it happens all the damn time, and they charged
you with four counts of murder one kind of attempt
at murder. Prosecutor was a guy named Kevin Samowski. He
painted you as a guy who was overwhelmed by debt.
The fact of the matter is I was not overwhelmed
with debt. I owned less than thirteen five and made
(23:35):
over thirty tho dollars a year. I just got a
house that they didn't have to make any payments on
for an entire year. And I take great offense every
time they keep trying to bring up, oh, hen was
deeply in debt. As a matter of fact, the headlines
wanted to point out, oh, he was trying to get
rid of his burdens. Well, the police were trying to say,
my debt was my burdens, but the people looked at
(23:57):
it as my children with my burdens. That's how we're
trying to convict me. And here's a very very important
thing to me. Your wife, Sue. Now she's gone through
the same horrendous loss that you have. And I think
it's fair to say that maybe went in her position.
(24:18):
If they had even a sneaking suspicion that you might
have done it on purpose, she would have been the
number one witness for the prosecution. She in fact, was
the only witness to the crime except for some woman
that was out in her balcony on the eleventh floor
across the street. Let's not even go there. But she
didn't turn on you. She was there, she knows exactly
what happened. She saw my foot off there. She tried
(24:42):
to help. She was actually demonized by the public for years.
She had to move away from down River because they
were harassing her. Somebody tried to break into the house.
Somebody would call on the phone and leaving threatening messages.
She couldn't get a job anywhere because of her last name. Oh,
because she wouldn't turn on you, even though she was
(25:04):
doing the right thing. So the jury deliberated for nine
hours over two days. They came back originally tended to.
The judge sent them back. They came back the next day,
even one he threatened to keep them through the weekend
if they didn't come back with a decision. We know
that in those jury rooms extreme pressure is exerted by
(25:28):
people who want to go home. But you can send
a note to the judge. You're allowed to do that
and just say, your honor, I'm not budging. I'm done here.
I'd say, people serving juries don't even know you can
do that. You just send a note to the judge
and say I'm done, I'm not voting to convict, and
then the judge has the decision to make the idea
that so many people like you, Larry, are spending the
(25:50):
rest of their lives in prison because somebody needed to
get home, back to their job. This is not a
unique thing, and it's something that needs to be addressed.
When they filed back in, what were your thought? I
could tell when they came in. Some of them were smiling,
but some of them had their arms crossed and I
stood up, and when they said guilty, I I couldn't
(26:13):
stand anymore. I had to sit down or I would
just pass out. I was just so much shock. If
this were a boxing match. We won every single day.
To prosecutor helped prove our case, even when the accelerators
stuck and the police officers waived the mechanics away, saying,
oh no, the problems in the car. He had a
(26:34):
problem was sitting next to you taking notes. He wrote,
specifically across the top of his notepad, accelerators sticking. Then
swore under oath, I had no idea why I wrote
that there was nothing wrong with the car. Bullshit. You
knew that if mechanics an engineer that was there, would
have found the problem, it would have proved that I
(26:54):
was innocent. The big mistake to me, among all the
other mistakes, was the judge not allowing a change of avenue,
because you know, maybe you could have gotten a fair trial.
But what was disheartening too, is that there was a
problem with that vehicle. That Ford did recall that engine,
but only on the pickup trucks, not on our station wagon.
For that year. My lawyer tried to enter it into
(27:15):
trial at the time, and to judge said that because
it was not the pickup truck recalled, he wouldn't allow
him to enter in evidence until the trial was over
with so the jury never got to hear it. MM.
(27:38):
So you've been in prison of for thirty years. I
know you recently survived COVID on top of everything else,
but can you explain that the prison experience, Wow, that
wasn't there for my wife at a funeral for our children.
My grandparents who raised me passed away while I was
(27:58):
in here. These are just the emotional ones there. This
has nothing to do with the pain that I went
through dealing with all these people in the beginning that
I could tell you that the first hang years were horrible.
A matter of fact, the first five I have had
more death threats, evil stairs, things thrown at me every day,
(28:23):
NonStop for five years. I'm surprised I even survived it.
And then the next five years, instead of being daily,
it would be once or twice a week, and then
eventually once or twice a month, and then finally down
to once or twice a year. Now I can go
several years before I hear a discouraging word from somebody.
(28:43):
But I have, over the last two decades made a
lot of good friends in here. You are the company
you keep, so I try to keep company with people
I would have as my friends. And neighbors out in
the world. Can you describe, you know, a ray of
light that you know you can identify five. The best
thing that's ever happened to me was getting on maintenance
(29:03):
twenty two years ago. I've had the opportunity to learn
so much about things that I never knew before, so
much about repairing buildings, clients, repair heating, air conditioning, electrical
I spent hundreds of dollars on books and thousands of
hours studying to get as good as I am now.
I'm very good at what I do today. You've had
(29:24):
appeals over the years, but it hasn't resulted in any relief.
Can you explain why that process is dragged on for
so long? Well, my lawyer, Frank Eamon, did an excellent
job throughout the entire process. I owe him everything. The
system itself is very slow. The courts don't care if
(29:46):
you're innocent or not. They just care. Didn't get a
fair trial. I didn't get a fair trial, and I
went through the federal courts where they split politically eight
to seven. I don't remember for his Democrats Republicans Republicans Democrats.
Years is to be impartial. You're supposed to vote your
conscious what you see. You're like a referee in a
football game. You're supposed to judge everything by what you
(30:09):
have before you. Every one of the judges said that
they are disappointed in the state of Michigan for allowing
suppressed evidence to be released to the media before trial.
You would think that would get you to the United
States Supreme Court, but it didn't. I guess some clerk
putting in there in my case doesn't warrant going before
(30:29):
the highest court in the land. My life, my constitutional
rights violated, and that doesn't go before the highest court
in the land. There's still one remedy left for clemency
from Governor Whitmer. You've recently submitted your clemency petition. You know,
clemency is to me something that I've been telling anyone
(30:52):
who would listen, including people in power, that this is
an underused power that is given very deliberately to governors
and presidents because they are meant to serve as the
last sort of stop gap to prevent injustices from being
allowed to stand. And your case cries out for it,
(31:14):
as I think anyone who's just listened to this podcast agrees.
So is there anything people can do to help generate
momentum for your clemency petition. You could write the pro board,
try to contact the governor. I've got thousands of signatures
on this petition begging her to hear my case to
(31:35):
show clemency. Visit the petition website sign a petition. If
she can hear that people are concerned, she may do something.
We're going to put a link to the petition in
the show notes. Please use your voice. Let's help bring
Larry home together. This nightmare has gone on for far
(31:55):
too long. Larry. We have a section of the show
that is my favorite part each episode. First of all,
I thank you for being here and for your courage
and for sharing your story. So thank you, Larry Delisle.
You know our thoughts are with you, and we're gonna
build momentum for you with this podcast. This actually the
show is called Closing Arguments, and this is where I
(32:18):
turn my microphone off. I'm going to kick back, close
my eyes and just listen to your words. First off,
I would like to say that I am so proud
of so many activists out there who are protesting both
social and racial injustice, the protesting against wrongful convictions. You
(32:38):
have to salute our heroes on the front line in
healthcare who are taking everyone who has COVID nineteen. All
these tragic deaths that are happening in everyone's family. My
heart goes out to you. I would like to thank
Ashley Ross and Carla Beck for everything they've done to
(33:01):
get to this point. They have been very staunch supporters.
They started the petition, they've supported the petition, and I
love them to death. There are so many people that
have written me since the Netflix documentary came out. Bless
you all. Thank you very much. Please please stay safe
(33:21):
out there. Don't forget to give us a fantastic review
wherever you get your podcasts. It really helps. And I'm
a proud donor to the Innocence Project and I really
hope you'll join me in supporting this very important cause
and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions. Go to Innocence
(33:43):
Project dot org to learn how to donate and get involved.
I'd like to thank our production team, Connor Hall and
Kevin Wardis. The music on the show is by three
time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow
us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on Facebook at
Wrongful Action podcast Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flom is a
production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with Signal
(34:07):
Company Number one
Hosts And Creators
Lauren Bright Pacheco
Maggie Freleng
Jason Flom
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