May 16, 2024 • 36 mins
On April 28, 2001, two men attacked a woman as she returned home in Cleveland Heights, OH. The men sexually assaulted her and then left with various items, including her cell phone. In the following days, police traced the cell phone to 24-year-old Chris Miller. Chris said that he had just bought the cell phone from someone else, but despite no forensic evidence tying Chris to the crime, the victim identified him out of a photo lineup and he was sentenced to 40 years in prison.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
On the night of April twenty eighth, two thousand and one,
a young woman returned to her apartment in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.
When two men approached. She got a brief look at
one of their faces before being forced inside at gunpoint.
They covered her face and both men raped her. They
also stole her purse and cell phone before fleeing the scene.
(00:25):
A rape kit was performed and the victim described the
one assailant she had seen, as well as his clothing.
Two days later, investigators tracked down the cell phone to
a man named Chris Smith, who had clothing that was
similar to what the victim described. Even though Chris claimed
that he bought the phone second hand, he was arrested
and identified. But this is wrongful conviction. Wrongful conviction has
(00:54):
always given voice to innocent people in prison, and now
we're expanding that voice to you us at eight three, three,
two oh seven, four six sixty six, and tell us
how these stories make you feel and what you've done
to help the cause, even if it's something as simple
as telling a friend or sharing on social media. We've
really appreciated hearing from our audience so much so that
(01:16):
we've included one of the messages at the end of
this episode, So stick around for that, and if you
have something to say, we definitely want to hear it,
and you might just hear yourself in a future episode.
Call us eight three three, two oh seven four six
sixty six. Welcome back to Ronful Conviction, where we have
(01:43):
yet another case out of Cuyahoga County on the east
side of Cleveland, Ohio, where it appears that there was
evidence that should have kept our guest, Chris Miller, from
ever having been even brought to trial, much less convicted
and sentenced to sixty years. So Chris, first, let me
just say how glad I am that you're here with
us today rather than back inside where you never should
(02:06):
have been in the first place. Thank you and joining
him as a partner at FG and G and a
proud member of his legal team.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Jacke one Green, absolutely a proud member. Thanks for having
me here of course.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Now, Chris, let's talk about your life before prison. Where'd
you grow up, what was your family life like? Give
us the whole background.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
I grew up in the east side of Cleveland, Saint Claire.
I was raised ball women my great grandmother Auntie, my mom,
and my girl cousin. My grandfather dad when I was
ten years old, so he was the only man at
the house. So eleven years old, I was the man
at the house, you know, dealing with with women and boyfriend.
And I'm fighting grown me when I was eleven years old.
I had to grew up kind of fast because my
grandfather when he dad, everything got tight. No, he was
(02:46):
the money. My grandfather was a mechanic, you know. So
eleven years old, I was in the streets. Then I
was in the streets some drugs.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
Chris helped to keep the family afloat until about the
time of this crime. He was twenty four years old,
had two kids of his own and one on the way,
and he and his girlfriend needed a phone for the
new place they were moving into. And it appears that
a chance encounter one morning with a man named Dwayne
Collins had devastating effects on Chris's life. Collins approached Chris
and a man named Desmond Fletcher on a street corner
(03:13):
with a phone to trade for drugs.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
It was a Sunday morning that with Fletcher. He gave
him the drugs. I just gave him the money he
gave it. Due to drugs. I didn't know all this
was coming with it.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
By it, he means the phone which belonged to a
white woman who will refer to as LB. She had
survived the rape the previous night in Cleveland Heights.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
April twenty eight, two thousand and one.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
LB.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
She's out. She's returning home at the end of the night.
She's got a ground floor apartment in a building with
a number of units. It's a little after eleven o'clock.
She comes in through this exterior door. There's like a
half flight of stairs that goes down from kind of
a parking area, and you know, her doors down the
hall of it. So she goes to close the door
to apartment and she hears some voices like up, I
think on the flight of the stairs, and she turns.
(03:57):
She calls out. Two guys appear at the top the landing,
and of course she doesn't know who they are at
the time. One of them comes down, grabs her arm,
holds a gun to her neck, and they force her
into the apartment at gunpoint. They put something over her
face during these events, so she only really saw one
guy briefly of the two. Then they sectually assault her.
Both of them before leaving, one of them tells her,
(04:18):
you know, don't report the attack. They take her purse,
they take her cell phone, they take other items, and
they leave. That night. LB does go to the hospital.
There is an examination and a rape kit done, so
there are specimens obtained for the purpose later of testing
that is done. We end up learning there's a mixture.
There are two contributors, and she.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Did get a brief look at one of the assailants.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
There are a couple different early reports that came to light.
The first description from LB is quote first mail as
a black mail about five eleven, one hundred and fifty
to one hundred and seventy pounds, eighteen to twenty two
years old, no facial hair, wearing a white T shirt
possibly with a black circle on the chest, blue jeans
and a green coat.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
Six one. When I got arrested, I was like one.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
Night, so Chris is or now he's taller and he's
brought her right.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
I mean, it's hard to mix up one hundred and
fifty and one hundred and ninety pounds man. But then
somehow the clothing took on a more important role, especially
the circular pattern on his shirt and we'll get back
to that in a bit. As the investigators moved beyond
the victim and the crime.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Scene, Detective Mark shit Schmid, I'm gonna say that again.
Detective Mark Schmidt of the Cleveland Heights Police Department. He comes.
He's now the lead detective on this case. And Schmidt
focuses on this cell phone. And there had been some
calls made from the phone overnight and then earlier in
the morning to like a number stored in the phone,
to a number from LB's little date book that was
(05:40):
in her purse. And then round eight o'clock in the
morning or so, the phone starts getting used pretty steadily.
And this is when Chris has the phone.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
It's Sunday. I shouldn't even been on the corner anyway.
They guy walk up. You got then I got a phone.
I'm annoying. Hedn't found the phone down the street in
the field. So the dudes was after they did what
they Didaturday night, they rolled down through my neighborhood and
through the phone in the field. He was one in
the field to use the bathroom and heard the phone
ring it so he picked it up and came up
(06:08):
on nine nine Saint clar and sold it to me
for five dollars. So you know I was using the phone.
It was charged up, had the phone for probably a
day and a half.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
And sometime during that day and a half, Detective Schmidt
started visiting the people who had received calls from the phone,
including Chris's girlfriend.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
When I pull off for my mother apartment building, I
look at the riview she following me. I'm like, so
I pulled over. She said, the police came to my
house talking about you robbed somebody for a phone. She's like,
get rid of that phone. Now they don't say nothing
about the rape. Then they just sayd I robbed somebody.
When I got home, I just put it in sewer
right front the house when in the house.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
But by then, Detective Schmid had already figured out that
Chris was the person who had this phone, which was
enough for him to obtain an arrest warrant on April thirtieth.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
So I went home. I give my son in a bath,
I take a bath. I'll fall asleep a couple hours.
Dad here somebody just dog in my mother Doorbill. I
wake up on my sleep. I'm like, who is this?
I gown there. It's just like fifty cops. I'm like,
and my aunts was at the door with them and
was letting them in that I was coming to open
the door to see who they was. So they come
in the house. He like he had a warrant, so
(07:10):
I signed war let them search. I ain't got an
ass so I let him search. I was draws, no shirt,
no socks on.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
How'd you get the clothes to wear to go to
the police station.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
They dug him out the dirty clothes and made me
put them on.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
Who gave them to you?
Speaker 3 (07:20):
Schmidt?
Speaker 2 (07:21):
So Mark Schmitt himself is the one who gives these
clothing items to Chris to wear. Remember Mark Schmidt is
the person who had previously interviewed LB. We know about
that later on in the story, but at this time
Schmidt has information. He finds clothes for Chris to wear
out of the house for the arrest.
Speaker 3 (07:37):
She said, I had a white T shirt with Circle
of Emotions. They went there and took a white jersey
with pinky purple letters Toronto Raper's jersey, Vince Carter jersey. Yeah,
made me put it on and said that's that's what
I had on. Like, I ain't have on that, bro.
They just found anything and just tried to put it
on the Fifth Day theory.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
Since Chris didn't have a green jacket like LB had described,
they chose as black one. I guess they figured that's
close enough. Now they've got Chris dressed up prime for identification,
and they dragged him from his house for what he
believes was the stolen cell phone.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
At the martianistm take me out of the house and
put me in the car. I'm so half sleep, I
don't even know my mother and the man even in
the house. My mother and Shark my daughter and walked
to the corner store. So by the time they come
out of the store, I'm in the backseat of the
police car. The cop come to the car like, hey,
turn your legs out. He said, your daughter wants you.
She was five years old. I said, she comes, she
gets betray my legs and she said, Dad, what's going on? Said?
(08:31):
They said, I robbed somebody, so I shouldn't be back.
You know, they figure out when me.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
You're listening to Ron for Conviction. You can listen to
this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one week
early and ed free by subscribing to Lava for Good
plus on Apple podcasts.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
The Night is to Happen, me and two of my
friends rolled to Harvard and Lee. There used to be
a restaurant there, a seafood restaurant called Dave Servant Turf.
We used to come all the way across down to
go there, and they had cameras in there. I got
to telling her, I said, man, do is go to
the day Turf. I'm on the cameras when you walk
in till the clock. I told him everything I ordered,
because I went in and ordered for all three of us.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
However, this camera footage from the time of the crime
never surfaced. Meanwhile, back at the police station, Chris was
photographed in the outfit they had chosen for him, and
his interrogation continued.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
This goes through the nighttime. Detective Schmidt keeps coming to you,
Chris right, and trying to question you, question you repeatedly
over the course of the night. Every time you told
me before right you were about to fall asleep, he'd
come back in and pull you out to question you
some more. You know, just trying to wear Chris down,
trying to get him to say something, you know, that
would implicate him.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
I didn't have no tell him I didn't do nothing
like a ball the phone.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
The following day, the victim came in to make an identification,
but curiously, instead of viewing a liveline, investigators chose to
show her a photo array.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
So the photo array contains a photograph of Chris from
his arrest, wearing this shirt that Schmidt has handed to
him that has this, you know, kind of design on it.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
But I also think everybody else in Atlanta had on
County orange.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
Yeah, you look different than the other pictures. So that's
another piece of the puzzle here, right. So LB looks
at this array of photos for like four or five minutes,
is what the record show. That's a while, you know,
to look and think. Eventually she ends up picking out Chris.
Chris is arrested based on the phone, but then on
the identification. This is what leads to him being charged
(10:40):
with multiple counts of rape, aggravated robbery, aggravated burglary, kidnapping,
intimidation of Filoniu's assault, the.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Saying they put me in a Cleveland Heights. It was
a board outside the window, so anytime I looked up
out the window, you got all my name and all
them charges. I'm like, when I see what I was
in there because they said robbery, I see the try
I'm like man with a rape and all that come.
Speaker 2 (10:59):
For this identification from Schmidt to LB is the through
line to how Chris then ends up wrapped up in
this criminal case he had nothing to do with.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
Not only was this a cross racial misidentification, which study
after study after study have shown are less accurate than
guessing yeah, you heard that right, but then further suggestion
was added through this careful selection of clothing by detective Shit.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
Don't please, don't put that on you. That was an accident?
Speaker 3 (11:28):
Was it?
Speaker 2 (11:29):
I can't help my subconscious, okay, but really accident.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
At this point, the case was as good as closed.
Except for the rape kit. So far, we just know
that there had been two contributors.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
At the time. They use what was new technology is
str DNA testing. That's primitive compared to what we've got
available as technology at the current. So they test the
samples in the rape kit. There's a mixture. There are
two contributors, and only one contributor could be identified at
the times with the str DNA testing. What we knew
(12:04):
is the contributor was a single mail profile. Chris was
excluded from being that particular contributor, so he's not that guy.
There is another contributor, though, right, and that second contributor
was determined to have been an azospermatic contributor.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
So the guy had a low sperm count.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Chris doesn't have that problem. Chris, you know, gave his
DNA to write for comparison.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
He was excluded from the spermatic contributor by the DNA
testing and then excluded as the other contributor by logic.
He didn't have a low sperm count, so this should
have ended the madness right then and there, but instead
they tried to square the circle.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Said they found DNA on my jersey didn't match her.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
They tried to test your clothes for cat hairs, hoping
they would match Elbie's cats.
Speaker 3 (12:48):
Right, because my mother had cats that didn't match. Dude,
I don't know this lady. He wasn't me.
Speaker 1 (12:55):
You can hear about hair comparison on Wrongful Conviction Junk
Science that'll be linked in the episode description. So while
they were tinkering around with fucking cat hair, Chris awaited
trial from jail for a year and a half and
then in Walks's public defender, who instead of trying to
track down the restaurant camera footage or hiring an expert
to explain that Chris was ruled out of being a
(13:17):
contributor in the rape kit, she relayed the prosecutions deal
cop out an idea, you're alleged accomplice.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
She just kept trying to give me to come out
to seven years. I'm like, I'm not coming on those
seven years. They only give a long time. I said, well,
they give me all of it. I ain't about just
scoping those seven years. I ain't do I said, man,
get out of here.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
You were not going to stand down. And at a
certain point, you know, before you're getting ready to go
to trial, your lawyer puts on the record she's told
you about the plea deal, right, and you've refused it.
You're continuing to say you're innocent. The court talked to
you right and wanted to make sure you understood the
risks to go into trial.
Speaker 3 (13:53):
I mean, they was trying to take my life for
somebody to do something. But I'm like, I got a fight.
I can't lay down like that. Man. I couldn't. Then
it was too much time. I'm like, hey, and I
didn't do nothing. Like, I'm not gonna see here, just
copp out to something. At least if I go to
trial Va Louse, I could still fight it. You know
what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
That's the fucked up math that Chris and so many
other men and women are forced to do. I mean,
deciding whether or not to roll the dice on what
could happen as a result of taking a case to trial.
And for Chris, this was a trial that should have
never even happened. If he was azospermatic, maybe they could
have said he was the second contributor, but he didn't
(14:28):
have a low sperm count. Nevertheless, trial began in January
two thousand and two, and this is what the state
had to present.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
It was made in the phone and the id ID
and that was it right.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
Everything they did. It wasn't nothing from my fingerprints. K here.
Speaker 1 (14:45):
I really can't with this. I mean the fucking cat
hair like.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
So no physical evidence connecting Chris to the crime whatsoever.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
Then it appears that maybe the prosecutor knew the case
was weak considering how he argued the case.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
I'm going to just read a quote from the prosecutor
from the opening statements. He goes several days later when
he's arrested with some of the same clothing on that
she had described to Detective Schmidt that he had on
that night. And listen carefully. She will describe for you
the clothing that he was wearing and some of that
same clothing he had on a couple days later when
he was arrested, and the prosecutor tells the jury that
LB will talk to you very specifically about what she
(15:20):
saw with regard to the clothing.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Up until this point, we've been referring to LB's initial
description of the clothes blue jeans, white T shirt with
a circular pattern in black, and a green jacket. However,
this initial description was not shared with the defense, so
they didn't have it in order to impeach her trial testimony.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
And so in the trial, LB identifies this black jean
jacket as the one that the perpetrator wore that night.
LB describes the attacker who had the gun right in
this duo. She describes him as having now a V
neck shirt with a half circle. The writing she testified
was his half circle, and it looked to be like
(15:58):
what she said was the state's exhibit, which was your
raptor's Jersey albeit admits that she's only seen one of
the attackers briefly, but she testified at the trial she
was confident that her identification of Chris was right.
Speaker 3 (16:11):
Yeah, she got up there and point me on. He
was on top of me. I'm like wow.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
But Chris was excluded by the DNA evidence as one contributor,
as well as the azospermatic designation of the second.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
So forensic asper testify there's no physical evidence, including Danna
or figure Prince, that specifically tie Chris to this crime.
Lena testifies she saw Chris at home that night.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
Lena was Chris's girlfriend, and then two more alibi witnesses
were presented, starting with the guy he was with when
he got the phone, Desnant Fletcher.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
But there were some little discrepancies in his story from
what really happened.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
He let the texts them scare him, like he don't
remember what due had on. He had them all black, dude,
you don't remember what he had on? They say that
he had MUNI already knew he gonna come in here
and say something like he messed up, like he don't
remember alright, knew that I said, yes him Munity Rustling
walked down the al I'm like, fuck, you got muney
phone five piece? What is gonna plump his stomach for
a five dollar piece? Of eighteen's ago.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Since the official story went that Fletcher sold Dwayne Collins
crack after Colin sold Chris the phone, it appears that
they were holding drug charges over Fletcher's head while he testified,
and who knows what effect that had on his truthfulness
or his appearance to the jury. However, they were able
to locate Dwayne Collins.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
I'll say, if I would have never met him, I
wouldn't be here. Man. He had to fall first, so
y'all should have him here. When they brought him in there,
Dwayne Kylis told him that he sold me the phone
and everything.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
I'm going home, And it appears the jury didn't have
an easy time with it. On one hand, you had
a definitive identification from the victim, who also said that
the clothes Chris was wearing when he was arrested with
a clothes worn by the assailant. But then there was
a plausible story about the phone as well as DNA
testing and the AZOS pramatic contributor that excluded Chris. But
(17:58):
maybe that was just about confusing enough for the jury
to totally misunderstand.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
The jury deliberated for three days in this case, it's
a long time. There was clearly a struggle to determine
what the outcome was going to be in this case.
But eventually they came to a verdict aggravated burglary, two
counts of rape with a sexually violent predator specification, as
well as aggravated robbery, kidnapping flowing as salt intimidation along
with firearms specifications for all this stuff. And this too
(18:25):
is at a time in Ohio where you hit a
specific year's sentence, right, so you get what you get.
It's not like you serve ten and then you get
a chance to go to the parle board and see
if you serve the rest. It wasn't like that at
the time Chris was in prison on this sentencing regime
in Ohio.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Well, you know they came back in they made like guilty.
I'm like, mentally, I wasn't even there. It took me
months before and realize so much time I got man
forty years flet then sink in it won real to me.
(19:13):
I had to go through the sex program with all
the rapists and sex defenders all over Ohio. It was
some weird motherfucker said, hear me this guy next door.
I ain't no, but I kept asking the guy I
was the selling, like man, why that lady on? What
you going there and sell? A couple of days the
dude taught me said, just standing the door, y'alls to watch.
So I stood in the door while she tearing the
(19:34):
sail up she had was doing collides. I said, oh,
this dude tripping. He was cut pits as of girls.
He cut him off the paper and they underwear and
all that. After the shopping sparked making colligs. That was
a wake up call, cause it's a it's a dorm
for the sex offender. That's for real, That's all it is.
It was guys like my age, nineteen twenty years old.
It was fireman in there cocks. That was the weirdest
(19:57):
shit I ever went through my life.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Unfortunately, violence against women finds a home in seemingly every
walk of life. In fact, it turned out that the
pervasionists of violence against women even became an issue with
Chris's jury for post conviction.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Well, JEWR said, oh, he looked, he looked guilty. When
I came in, getting kind of found out she was
in the rape for Robert case herself, so she shouldn't
have been on the jury. So when they bring me
back from the EVERDJ here the prostitutent that got to
the lady. Now that they're told on everybody, they'll mess
with her. Now she don't even want to talk.
Speaker 1 (20:31):
And so that issue didn't pan out for Chris after
his initial denials. A bit of serendipity worked in Chris's favor.
In two thousand and four.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
So Ohio a Bureau of Criminal Investigation and Identification also
known as BCI. They have this database access to DNA profiles,
and they turn up a hit to one of the
male DNA profiles from the LB rape kit in the
Federal Code of database. It matches a guy named Richard
(21:01):
Marlin Stadmeire.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
Like with most of these cases, while the state is
busy prosecuting an innocent person, the actual assailants remained free
to commit more heinous acts. It's almost like the tax
dollars that we pay are funding a system that protects
the actual perpetrators while they go about framing innocent people.
So while Detective Schmidt was putting around with cat hairs.
(21:27):
Another rape and robbery happened in May two thousand and one.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Yeah, it was just about three weeks after the LB rape.
In May two thousand and one, Stadmeire and another guy
were arrested and charged with sexual assault and battery. Is
about only five miles away from where Elbe's apartment was
in Mayfield Hights, Ohio.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
And in that other case, the perpetrators ambush the victim,
held a gun to her neck, They forced her under
her car, and they sexually assaulted and robbed her. And
Stadmeyer was caught quickly for that case. He was convicted
in March of two thousand and two. The other man
involved turned out to Stadmeyer's friend and accomplice, Charles Boyd.
And Boyd in that case he pled guilty to the
(22:07):
Mayfield Heights attack.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
And he had to when they took the chick to
the ATM, the camera and the ATM called his tattoo.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
He got a lenient sentence in exchange for testifying against
Dadmire at trial in that.
Speaker 3 (22:17):
One serial predators man.
Speaker 2 (22:19):
Going back to Chris's case, remember there were two DNA profiles.
Stadmeire matched the one that Chris had already been excluded
from right, the azospomatic contributor still remains unidentified at that point. Now,
of course, Charles Boyd should have been the obvious person
to go test and compare and try to see if
he's that second person, given this other case from three
(22:41):
weeks later, five miles away.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
Instead, Detective Schmidt once again tried to fit that same
old square peg into the round hole.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Detective Schmidt goes and interviews Stadmeyre and Boyd.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
Right.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
Both guys were initially not cooperative. They denied involvement in
the LB attack. Schmidt shows both men pictures of Chris
Miller at the time Boyd was Mansfield. He confirmed at
that time that he didn't know Chris, he only recognized
him as another guy in the same prison. Stadmeyer also
looked at the photo array told Schmidt he couldn't identify anybody.
Several weeks later, Schmidt goes back and reinterviews Boyd, and
(23:17):
at this point in time, miraculously Boyd comes around. He
admits he's part of the attack against DELB. He can
describe LB's apartment with a lot of detail, but he's
adamant that he never actually went in the apartment and instead,
he was just the lookout guy while Stadmeyer and Chris
went in and Rade del B. Boyd claimed that he
had only met Chris a few hours before the attack
(23:38):
against Delb and that after the rape, he and stan
Meyer went up to a club to split the proceeds
from the robbery, and Chris simply disappeared on foot, you know,
miles away from where Chris lived.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Phantom. I'll want none of the money. I'm cool.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
Yeah, it makes no sense.
Speaker 3 (23:51):
He said, his friend brought me to him. You'll free
of bringing me to you. You just wanna go rob
somebody with me?
Speaker 2 (23:56):
You won't know me. Come on, that's crazy, right.
Speaker 1 (23:59):
We can only guess how Schmidt got Boyd to change
his story.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
Well, let me shed maybe a little bit of light
on that. You can make some inferences if you want.
This is something that came out in our subsequent civil case.
So again, even at the time of the exoneration, nobody
knew this yet. We in our civil case got an
affidavit from Richard Stadmeyer about when Schmidt came to see him,
and so I'm going to read you some of the
things that he says. At some point in two thousand
and four, two thousand and five, I met with Detecta
(24:26):
Schmidt in another officer. Detecta Schmidt showed me a card
with two rows of photographs. I told the Tectave Schmidt
that I did not know anyone in the photographs. Detective
Schmidt called me a smart ass and said, are you
sure you don't know C. Mills. Detective Schmidt then showed
me the photographs again and pointed out a photograph of
a man. I did not recognize the man in the photograph.
I later learned that the man in the photograph was
(24:46):
Christopher Miller. Detectave Schmidt told me to quote make this
easier on myself. I understood that Detective Schmidt was telling
me that if I identified Chris Miller from his photograph
as the rapist, then he would help me. Detective Schmidt
said he knew that Christopher Miller was the rapist and
asked if I was just to look out. I again
told him I do not know Christopher Miller. Detectave Schmidt
became angry and frustrated. Detecta Schmidt threatened me that he
(25:08):
was going to talk with Charles Boyd and say that
Boyd would be eager to give up information. So I
think there's some assumptions we could make about how his
conversation with Boyd went to that come out of that.
Sadmar's indicted rape, robbery, kidnapping, all of these things. He
pleads not guilty. He goes to trial. Of course, Chris
testifies at the Sammar trial, basically again asserting her innocence
and being like, I don't know anything about any of.
Speaker 3 (25:28):
This, right, well, I don't know them. Now he goat Stallmar,
he told him like, I don't know him. He went
with us, the prosecutor. You get to cussing me out,
like why am I trying to get you out? Why
are you trying to get you out? Saying, man, I
ain't Doue with bro. That's all I can tell you.
I didn't do it. I don't know. I don't know
them dues. And they just send me back to the pod.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Now, remember LB, and everything we've ever heard has always
been consistent. There are only two guys involved in this attack. Now,
Schmidt saying on the stand, even though he testified in
Chris's trial about her telling him about two attackers, now
it's sad Meireer's trial. He's saying, he told me there
were three guys, and he's pressed about this. He says
about LB quote, is not her responsibility to remember the
(26:08):
facts of the case, which is just wild.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
On June twelfth, two thousand and six, Dad Mayer got
an additional forty three years. Chris's conviction was strengthened by
what appears to have been perjured testimony, and Boyd took
a five year sentence for his alleged role as a lookout.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
And concurrent with the case he was already serving. Right. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
In two thousand and seven, Chris tried to get a
new trial on the Code has Hit, but the motion
was denied. Meanwhile, the Ohio in Thiss Project began investigating
Chris's innocence claims.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
Sometimes you can request a set of records from a
place and not get anything useful or new, and you
request the same set you know later on right, and
you're going to get different stuff. Sometimes that's what happens.
In twenty sixteen, though, when things really break, because that's
when they finally they get a response to a public
records request that they've sent. It includes new police reports,
new notes, handwritten notes from Schmidt written shortly after the
(26:57):
attack on LB being disclosed for the very first time.
These reports and these notes contained exculpatory evidence, and they
show that Schmidt has presented false and fabricated evidence to
the prosecutors and during the trial, and given false testimony
throughout the course of this case.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
This is when they discovered LB's initial description of the
attackers close and how that changed to align with what
Schmid had pulled from Chris's hamper and closet.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
And this now forms the basis for new post conviction
filings for Chris that his counsel, Brian Howe of the
Ohio Innocence Project filed for him, and that included an
application for DNA testing, a motion for new trial, and
a petition for post conviction relief.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
The latter two were stayed, while newer and more sensitive
DNA testing for the azosbramatic contributor moved forward.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
Neil Brien was just talking two or three times a week.
You know, we've been waiting on the DNA.
Speaker 2 (27:52):
May thirty one, twenty eighteen, BCI issues that report. Lo
and Behold comes back. It's Charles Boyd.
Speaker 3 (27:58):
Sort of lose a full life news on. Everybody in
the dorm. Gonna wait me up, man, you're on a TV,
but I got my headphones on something like what he like,
stand up? So when I stood up, out my faces
on everybody TV in the door, I'm like, so he
turned my TV to try to wait on watching him
like man, I was he got a kicking and hind
the walls. I was like, whoa, that was real. Then
the CEOs like they were sitting in the dudes when
(28:21):
they blocks go get see meals, tell him come over here,
like I know you didn't do that. You ain't your character?
You know? Man? That was so surreal. Then Brian come
see me go in the room. Brian got his note
bad I'm reading upside down. He got his questious like
where I want to eat? Like I'm kind of like,
I mean tears now, like you know, yeah, that was awesome. Man.
(28:45):
That dude fought. He used to come see me on
the regular. Man, I got so much love for her, like,
ain't my family? You know that DNA coming back was
the best thing that ever happened to me.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
Amen to that. So where'd you go to eat?
Speaker 3 (28:59):
Real lobster? I met all the guys, all the other things.
Zanner reeves that day was like I can't believe that
I was out of to this day is still like
is emotional to me.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Chris was soon reunited with his children.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
You know, my oldest daughter, she stayed with me. My
three grandkids and my son stayed next door because I
bought my mother house next door to me, So my
mother and my son stayed next door, and me and
my daughter and my grandkid had stayed house next door.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
His eldest daughter was the five year old little girl
who had run to her father handcuffed in the back
of the squad car on April thirtieth, two thousand and one.
There's no amount of money that could make up for
that lost time, but at least the civil suit made
it possible to afford the house Chris just mentioned, but
not before he had to face Detective Schmidt.
Speaker 3 (29:44):
You know, I can't face the face with him. I
got he was in the room for two hours and
didn't even say nothing.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
Turn your deposition.
Speaker 3 (29:49):
He was in the room with me and Sarah for
two hours, shook my hand and anything. When I walked
in there, when his lawyer said, yeah, my client, Mark Smith.
When I heard that name, I said who, he said, Marshman,
I said, where he's ad He nodded his head doing
and when I looked at him, I looked at him
his head and I just everything came back. All I
remember he had he got the little psorias listing on
(30:09):
his elbows and all on his heads. But the whole
time in the room he looking out the window like this.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Yeah. And you know, and you you didn't recognize him
at first. So and it has a party to a lawsuit,
you have a right two at ten depositions. But you
also have a choice about whether you come to stuff
like that. And I got a lot of cases where
you know, those officers don't show up. Mark Sant. He
decided he was going to come to this one, you know,
the social path.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Well, at least he had the good sense to look away.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
I said, why you won't look at me? Dude? These
a piece of ship.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Going through these lawsuits is awful. I mean, it's obviously
fathomably awful to be in prison for a crime you
didn't commit and then seeking vindication through civil rights cases
in the aftermath. Is it keeps the wound open, and it's
like rubbing salt in the wound. And then you got
to sit in the room and be polite to these
people who took away years and years of your life.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
You know his lords won't be out of light.
Speaker 1 (31:04):
No, they're not. So is there anything you'd like to
ask from our audience.
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Just know that this could happen to anybody. Happening. Your brother's,
your sisters, your mom. You're happening, and they're you're not
going to stop. So the people's jail, you know, it's
still dues in there doing the rest of their life
from there.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Is there anyone in particular that's coming to mind right now?
Speaker 3 (31:26):
There's a lot of guys. The Anthony Johnson, he's still
in there. They stole all his evidence.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
Anthony Johnson. All right, well, let's talk after this about Anthony.
And with that we're gonna go to my favorite part
of the show. It's called closing arguments, where I first
thank you both from the bottom of my heart for
joining us, and then I'm just gonna kick back in
my chair, close my eyes, and listen to anything else
you feel is left to be said. So let's start
with Jacqueline and then Chris, you take us off into
(31:55):
the sunset.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
I think the conduct of Mark Schmidt in this case,
it's one of the worst kinds of police misconduct where
he was so hell bent on getting and then keeping
a conviction that he was willing to manipulate other people
and to lie on the stand. And there's no denying that,
because there's two sets of testimony that are totally different.
You know, we have these records in his own handwriting
that make that clear. And it just goes to I
(32:18):
think the really deeply rooted problems in our criminal legal
system where winning is so often more important than the
truth and what justice are we serving and how are
we in any way serving our communities or our societies
if that's what our legal system is set up to
do and the players in it are attempting to do.
I'm so glad that the truth came to light in
(32:40):
this case, but I'm also just so enraged and sad
that Chris had to live through this hell you know,
before that happened. You know, he's not the only one,
Like he just said, there are other people. There are
a lot of other people who've lived the same kind
of hell. We have to demand better, we have to
demand different, We have to radically change the way our
legal system works or this kind of thing is going
(33:00):
to keep happening. So I appreciate that we got here,
but we have hell a lot of work to do.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
It's been a hard fight. I ain't never really been
quitter never, so I don't I don't know about quitting.
You know that the prosecutors they need to start getting
some some you know, they need something need happen in
for just sending people to jail like that. It's like
just sending people jail with no evidence, no nothing, you know,
like people fucked my life up. Man. You know, even
though I'm finding not able to live, wonder, my life
(33:29):
still fucking. I got anxieties, other stuff, mental health, but
I'm able to deal with it. My man never raised
me later out so I can't take care of my
family and try to enjoy the rest of his life.
I got. You know, it's a free man, because I
wasn't living I was. I wasn't living in there. I
wasn't living.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Thank you for listening to Wrong for Conviction. You can
listen to this and all the Lava for Good podcast
us one week early by subscribing to Lava for Good
Plus on Apple Podcasts. I want to thank our production team,
Connor Hall and Kathleen Fink, as well as my fellow
executive producers Jeff Kempler, Kevin Wartis, and Jeff Cleiburn. The
music in this production was supplied by three time Oscar
(34:15):
nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us across
all social media platforms at Lava for Good and at
Wrongful Conviction. You can also follow me on Instagram at
It's Jason Flamm. Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava
for Good Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number One.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
My name is Laura Aisville. Your podcast has actually had
a profound impact on my life. I happened to pawn
your podcast about five years ago, and at that time,
I thought, like a lot of people, that if you
were in prison, you did something wrong and you're guilty.
I never, in a million years thought that prosecutors and
(35:00):
detective I just never thought they could get away with
all the stuff that they've gotten away with. And from
there I started getting interested in a lot of other
social issues because I think the criminal justice system really,
in my mind, is kind of a snapshot of racism
and classism and all those kinds of things. When I
(35:24):
started listening to your podcast, I would probably have labeled
myself a conservative. I am now a registered Democrat and
someone who is very active in my community. I volunteer
in the criminal justice system. I volunteer to help put
Democrat candidates in office. I don't think that anybody would
(35:46):
have had on my BINGO card that I would have
been a volunteer for any Democrat ever, and that my
politics would completely completely change and the way I thought
about a lot of things completely changed. So I want
to thank you for opening up my eyes. I want
to thank all your wonderful guests for sharing their stories
(36:09):
and being people who forced me to listen. Like I said,
my whole outlook and everything on the whole world our
country completely changed, and it started just by listening to
one episode of your podcast.
On the night of April twenty eighth, two thousand and one,
a young woman returned to her apartment in Cleveland Heights, Ohio.
When two men approached. She got a brief look at
one of their faces before being forced inside at gunpoint.
They covered her face and both men raped her. They
also stole her purse and cell phone before fleeing the scene.
(00:25):
A rape kit was performed and the victim described the
one assailant she had seen, as well as his clothing.
Two days later, investigators tracked down the cell phone to
a man named Chris Smith, who had clothing that was
similar to what the victim described. Even though Chris claimed
that he bought the phone second hand, he was arrested
and identified. But this is wrongful conviction. Wrongful conviction has
(00:54):
always given voice to innocent people in prison, and now
we're expanding that voice to you us at eight three, three,
two oh seven, four six sixty six, and tell us
how these stories make you feel and what you've done
to help the cause, even if it's something as simple
as telling a friend or sharing on social media. We've
really appreciated hearing from our audience so much so that
(01:16):
we've included one of the messages at the end of
this episode, So stick around for that, and if you
have something to say, we definitely want to hear it,
and you might just hear yourself in a future episode.
Call us eight three three, two oh seven four six
sixty six. Welcome back to Ronful Conviction, where we have
(01:43):
yet another case out of Cuyahoga County on the east
side of Cleveland, Ohio, where it appears that there was
evidence that should have kept our guest, Chris Miller, from
ever having been even brought to trial, much less convicted
and sentenced to sixty years. So Chris, first, let me
just say how glad I am that you're here with
us today rather than back inside where you never should
(02:06):
have been in the first place. Thank you and joining
him as a partner at FG and G and a
proud member of his legal team.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Jacke one Green, absolutely a proud member. Thanks for having
me here of course.
Speaker 1 (02:17):
Now, Chris, let's talk about your life before prison. Where'd
you grow up, what was your family life like? Give
us the whole background.
Speaker 3 (02:24):
I grew up in the east side of Cleveland, Saint Claire.
I was raised ball women my great grandmother Auntie, my mom,
and my girl cousin. My grandfather dad when I was
ten years old, so he was the only man at
the house. So eleven years old, I was the man
at the house, you know, dealing with with women and boyfriend.
And I'm fighting grown me when I was eleven years old.
I had to grew up kind of fast because my
grandfather when he dad, everything got tight. No, he was
(02:46):
the money. My grandfather was a mechanic, you know. So
eleven years old, I was in the streets. Then I
was in the streets some drugs.
Speaker 1 (02:53):
Chris helped to keep the family afloat until about the
time of this crime. He was twenty four years old,
had two kids of his own and one on the way,
and he and his girlfriend needed a phone for the
new place they were moving into. And it appears that
a chance encounter one morning with a man named Dwayne
Collins had devastating effects on Chris's life. Collins approached Chris
and a man named Desmond Fletcher on a street corner
(03:13):
with a phone to trade for drugs.
Speaker 3 (03:16):
It was a Sunday morning that with Fletcher. He gave
him the drugs. I just gave him the money he
gave it. Due to drugs. I didn't know all this
was coming with it.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
By it, he means the phone which belonged to a
white woman who will refer to as LB. She had
survived the rape the previous night in Cleveland Heights.
Speaker 2 (03:33):
April twenty eight, two thousand and one.
Speaker 3 (03:35):
LB.
Speaker 2 (03:35):
She's out. She's returning home at the end of the night.
She's got a ground floor apartment in a building with
a number of units. It's a little after eleven o'clock.
She comes in through this exterior door. There's like a
half flight of stairs that goes down from kind of
a parking area, and you know, her doors down the
hall of it. So she goes to close the door
to apartment and she hears some voices like up, I
think on the flight of the stairs, and she turns.
(03:57):
She calls out. Two guys appear at the top the landing,
and of course she doesn't know who they are at
the time. One of them comes down, grabs her arm,
holds a gun to her neck, and they force her
into the apartment at gunpoint. They put something over her
face during these events, so she only really saw one
guy briefly of the two. Then they sectually assault her.
Both of them before leaving, one of them tells her,
(04:18):
you know, don't report the attack. They take her purse,
they take her cell phone, they take other items, and
they leave. That night. LB does go to the hospital.
There is an examination and a rape kit done, so
there are specimens obtained for the purpose later of testing
that is done. We end up learning there's a mixture.
There are two contributors, and she.
Speaker 1 (04:36):
Did get a brief look at one of the assailants.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
There are a couple different early reports that came to light.
The first description from LB is quote first mail as
a black mail about five eleven, one hundred and fifty
to one hundred and seventy pounds, eighteen to twenty two
years old, no facial hair, wearing a white T shirt
possibly with a black circle on the chest, blue jeans
and a green coat.
Speaker 3 (04:57):
Six one. When I got arrested, I was like one.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
Night, so Chris is or now he's taller and he's
brought her right.
Speaker 1 (05:02):
I mean, it's hard to mix up one hundred and
fifty and one hundred and ninety pounds man. But then
somehow the clothing took on a more important role, especially
the circular pattern on his shirt and we'll get back
to that in a bit. As the investigators moved beyond
the victim and the crime.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
Scene, Detective Mark shit Schmid, I'm gonna say that again.
Detective Mark Schmidt of the Cleveland Heights Police Department. He comes.
He's now the lead detective on this case. And Schmidt
focuses on this cell phone. And there had been some
calls made from the phone overnight and then earlier in
the morning to like a number stored in the phone,
to a number from LB's little date book that was
(05:40):
in her purse. And then round eight o'clock in the
morning or so, the phone starts getting used pretty steadily.
And this is when Chris has the phone.
Speaker 3 (05:48):
It's Sunday. I shouldn't even been on the corner anyway.
They guy walk up. You got then I got a phone.
I'm annoying. Hedn't found the phone down the street in
the field. So the dudes was after they did what
they Didaturday night, they rolled down through my neighborhood and
through the phone in the field. He was one in
the field to use the bathroom and heard the phone
ring it so he picked it up and came up
(06:08):
on nine nine Saint clar and sold it to me
for five dollars. So you know I was using the phone.
It was charged up, had the phone for probably a
day and a half.
Speaker 1 (06:17):
And sometime during that day and a half, Detective Schmidt
started visiting the people who had received calls from the phone,
including Chris's girlfriend.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
When I pull off for my mother apartment building, I
look at the riview she following me. I'm like, so
I pulled over. She said, the police came to my
house talking about you robbed somebody for a phone. She's like,
get rid of that phone. Now they don't say nothing
about the rape. Then they just sayd I robbed somebody.
When I got home, I just put it in sewer
right front the house when in the house.
Speaker 1 (06:39):
But by then, Detective Schmid had already figured out that
Chris was the person who had this phone, which was
enough for him to obtain an arrest warrant on April thirtieth.
Speaker 3 (06:49):
So I went home. I give my son in a bath,
I take a bath. I'll fall asleep a couple hours.
Dad here somebody just dog in my mother Doorbill. I
wake up on my sleep. I'm like, who is this?
I gown there. It's just like fifty cops. I'm like,
and my aunts was at the door with them and
was letting them in that I was coming to open
the door to see who they was. So they come
in the house. He like he had a warrant, so
(07:10):
I signed war let them search. I ain't got an
ass so I let him search. I was draws, no shirt,
no socks on.
Speaker 2 (07:15):
How'd you get the clothes to wear to go to
the police station.
Speaker 3 (07:17):
They dug him out the dirty clothes and made me
put them on.
Speaker 2 (07:20):
Who gave them to you?
Speaker 3 (07:20):
Schmidt?
Speaker 2 (07:21):
So Mark Schmitt himself is the one who gives these
clothing items to Chris to wear. Remember Mark Schmidt is
the person who had previously interviewed LB. We know about
that later on in the story, but at this time
Schmidt has information. He finds clothes for Chris to wear
out of the house for the arrest.
Speaker 3 (07:37):
She said, I had a white T shirt with Circle
of Emotions. They went there and took a white jersey
with pinky purple letters Toronto Raper's jersey, Vince Carter jersey. Yeah,
made me put it on and said that's that's what
I had on. Like, I ain't have on that, bro.
They just found anything and just tried to put it
on the Fifth Day theory.
Speaker 1 (07:54):
Since Chris didn't have a green jacket like LB had described,
they chose as black one. I guess they figured that's
close enough. Now they've got Chris dressed up prime for identification,
and they dragged him from his house for what he
believes was the stolen cell phone.
Speaker 3 (08:09):
At the martianistm take me out of the house and
put me in the car. I'm so half sleep, I
don't even know my mother and the man even in
the house. My mother and Shark my daughter and walked
to the corner store. So by the time they come
out of the store, I'm in the backseat of the
police car. The cop come to the car like, hey,
turn your legs out. He said, your daughter wants you.
She was five years old. I said, she comes, she
gets betray my legs and she said, Dad, what's going on? Said?
(08:31):
They said, I robbed somebody, so I shouldn't be back.
You know, they figure out when me.
Speaker 1 (08:46):
You're listening to Ron for Conviction. You can listen to
this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one week
early and ed free by subscribing to Lava for Good
plus on Apple podcasts.
Speaker 3 (09:02):
The Night is to Happen, me and two of my
friends rolled to Harvard and Lee. There used to be
a restaurant there, a seafood restaurant called Dave Servant Turf.
We used to come all the way across down to
go there, and they had cameras in there. I got
to telling her, I said, man, do is go to
the day Turf. I'm on the cameras when you walk
in till the clock. I told him everything I ordered,
because I went in and ordered for all three of us.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
However, this camera footage from the time of the crime
never surfaced. Meanwhile, back at the police station, Chris was
photographed in the outfit they had chosen for him, and
his interrogation continued.
Speaker 2 (09:33):
This goes through the nighttime. Detective Schmidt keeps coming to you,
Chris right, and trying to question you, question you repeatedly
over the course of the night. Every time you told
me before right you were about to fall asleep, he'd
come back in and pull you out to question you
some more. You know, just trying to wear Chris down,
trying to get him to say something, you know, that
would implicate him.
Speaker 3 (09:51):
I didn't have no tell him I didn't do nothing
like a ball the phone.
Speaker 1 (09:54):
The following day, the victim came in to make an identification,
but curiously, instead of viewing a liveline, investigators chose to
show her a photo array.
Speaker 2 (10:03):
So the photo array contains a photograph of Chris from
his arrest, wearing this shirt that Schmidt has handed to
him that has this, you know, kind of design on it.
Speaker 3 (10:13):
But I also think everybody else in Atlanta had on
County orange.
Speaker 2 (10:17):
Yeah, you look different than the other pictures. So that's
another piece of the puzzle here, right. So LB looks
at this array of photos for like four or five minutes,
is what the record show. That's a while, you know,
to look and think. Eventually she ends up picking out Chris.
Chris is arrested based on the phone, but then on
the identification. This is what leads to him being charged
(10:40):
with multiple counts of rape, aggravated robbery, aggravated burglary, kidnapping,
intimidation of Filoniu's assault, the.
Speaker 3 (10:46):
Saying they put me in a Cleveland Heights. It was
a board outside the window, so anytime I looked up
out the window, you got all my name and all
them charges. I'm like, when I see what I was
in there because they said robbery, I see the try
I'm like man with a rape and all that come.
Speaker 2 (10:59):
For this identification from Schmidt to LB is the through
line to how Chris then ends up wrapped up in
this criminal case he had nothing to do with.
Speaker 1 (11:08):
Not only was this a cross racial misidentification, which study
after study after study have shown are less accurate than
guessing yeah, you heard that right, but then further suggestion
was added through this careful selection of clothing by detective Shit.
Speaker 2 (11:26):
Don't please, don't put that on you. That was an accident?
Speaker 3 (11:28):
Was it?
Speaker 2 (11:29):
I can't help my subconscious, okay, but really accident.
Speaker 1 (11:34):
At this point, the case was as good as closed.
Except for the rape kit. So far, we just know
that there had been two contributors.
Speaker 2 (11:43):
At the time. They use what was new technology is
str DNA testing. That's primitive compared to what we've got
available as technology at the current. So they test the
samples in the rape kit. There's a mixture. There are
two contributors, and only one contributor could be identified at
the times with the str DNA testing. What we knew
(12:04):
is the contributor was a single mail profile. Chris was
excluded from being that particular contributor, so he's not that guy.
There is another contributor, though, right, and that second contributor
was determined to have been an azospermatic contributor.
Speaker 1 (12:18):
So the guy had a low sperm count.
Speaker 2 (12:20):
Chris doesn't have that problem. Chris, you know, gave his
DNA to write for comparison.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
He was excluded from the spermatic contributor by the DNA
testing and then excluded as the other contributor by logic.
He didn't have a low sperm count, so this should
have ended the madness right then and there, but instead
they tried to square the circle.
Speaker 3 (12:42):
Said they found DNA on my jersey didn't match her.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
They tried to test your clothes for cat hairs, hoping
they would match Elbie's cats.
Speaker 3 (12:48):
Right, because my mother had cats that didn't match. Dude,
I don't know this lady. He wasn't me.
Speaker 1 (12:55):
You can hear about hair comparison on Wrongful Conviction Junk
Science that'll be linked in the episode description. So while
they were tinkering around with fucking cat hair, Chris awaited
trial from jail for a year and a half and
then in Walks's public defender, who instead of trying to
track down the restaurant camera footage or hiring an expert
to explain that Chris was ruled out of being a
(13:17):
contributor in the rape kit, she relayed the prosecutions deal
cop out an idea, you're alleged accomplice.
Speaker 3 (13:26):
She just kept trying to give me to come out
to seven years. I'm like, I'm not coming on those
seven years. They only give a long time. I said, well,
they give me all of it. I ain't about just
scoping those seven years. I ain't do I said, man,
get out of here.
Speaker 2 (13:35):
You were not going to stand down. And at a
certain point, you know, before you're getting ready to go
to trial, your lawyer puts on the record she's told
you about the plea deal, right, and you've refused it.
You're continuing to say you're innocent. The court talked to
you right and wanted to make sure you understood the
risks to go into trial.
Speaker 3 (13:53):
I mean, they was trying to take my life for
somebody to do something. But I'm like, I got a fight.
I can't lay down like that. Man. I couldn't. Then
it was too much time. I'm like, hey, and I
didn't do nothing. Like, I'm not gonna see here, just
copp out to something. At least if I go to
trial Va Louse, I could still fight it. You know
what I'm saying.
Speaker 1 (14:08):
That's the fucked up math that Chris and so many
other men and women are forced to do. I mean,
deciding whether or not to roll the dice on what
could happen as a result of taking a case to trial.
And for Chris, this was a trial that should have
never even happened. If he was azospermatic, maybe they could
have said he was the second contributor, but he didn't
(14:28):
have a low sperm count. Nevertheless, trial began in January
two thousand and two, and this is what the state
had to present.
Speaker 2 (14:37):
It was made in the phone and the id ID
and that was it right.
Speaker 3 (14:41):
Everything they did. It wasn't nothing from my fingerprints. K here.
Speaker 1 (14:45):
I really can't with this. I mean the fucking cat
hair like.
Speaker 2 (14:48):
So no physical evidence connecting Chris to the crime whatsoever.
Speaker 1 (14:52):
Then it appears that maybe the prosecutor knew the case
was weak considering how he argued the case.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
I'm going to just read a quote from the prosecutor
from the opening statements. He goes several days later when
he's arrested with some of the same clothing on that
she had described to Detective Schmidt that he had on
that night. And listen carefully. She will describe for you
the clothing that he was wearing and some of that
same clothing he had on a couple days later when
he was arrested, and the prosecutor tells the jury that
LB will talk to you very specifically about what she
(15:20):
saw with regard to the clothing.
Speaker 1 (15:22):
Up until this point, we've been referring to LB's initial
description of the clothes blue jeans, white T shirt with
a circular pattern in black, and a green jacket. However,
this initial description was not shared with the defense, so
they didn't have it in order to impeach her trial testimony.
Speaker 2 (15:38):
And so in the trial, LB identifies this black jean
jacket as the one that the perpetrator wore that night.
LB describes the attacker who had the gun right in
this duo. She describes him as having now a V
neck shirt with a half circle. The writing she testified
was his half circle, and it looked to be like
(15:58):
what she said was the state's exhibit, which was your
raptor's Jersey albeit admits that she's only seen one of
the attackers briefly, but she testified at the trial she
was confident that her identification of Chris was right.
Speaker 3 (16:11):
Yeah, she got up there and point me on. He
was on top of me. I'm like wow.
Speaker 1 (16:15):
But Chris was excluded by the DNA evidence as one contributor,
as well as the azospermatic designation of the second.
Speaker 2 (16:23):
So forensic asper testify there's no physical evidence, including Danna
or figure Prince, that specifically tie Chris to this crime.
Lena testifies she saw Chris at home that night.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
Lena was Chris's girlfriend, and then two more alibi witnesses
were presented, starting with the guy he was with when
he got the phone, Desnant Fletcher.
Speaker 2 (16:42):
But there were some little discrepancies in his story from
what really happened.
Speaker 3 (16:46):
He let the texts them scare him, like he don't
remember what due had on. He had them all black, dude,
you don't remember what he had on? They say that
he had MUNI already knew he gonna come in here
and say something like he messed up, like he don't
remember alright, knew that I said, yes him Munity Rustling
walked down the al I'm like, fuck, you got muney
phone five piece? What is gonna plump his stomach for
a five dollar piece? Of eighteen's ago.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Since the official story went that Fletcher sold Dwayne Collins
crack after Colin sold Chris the phone, it appears that
they were holding drug charges over Fletcher's head while he testified,
and who knows what effect that had on his truthfulness
or his appearance to the jury. However, they were able
to locate Dwayne Collins.
Speaker 3 (17:27):
I'll say, if I would have never met him, I
wouldn't be here. Man. He had to fall first, so
y'all should have him here. When they brought him in there,
Dwayne Kylis told him that he sold me the phone
and everything.
Speaker 1 (17:37):
I'm going home, And it appears the jury didn't have
an easy time with it. On one hand, you had
a definitive identification from the victim, who also said that
the clothes Chris was wearing when he was arrested with
a clothes worn by the assailant. But then there was
a plausible story about the phone as well as DNA
testing and the AZOS pramatic contributor that excluded Chris. But
(17:58):
maybe that was just about confusing enough for the jury
to totally misunderstand.
Speaker 2 (18:04):
The jury deliberated for three days in this case, it's
a long time. There was clearly a struggle to determine
what the outcome was going to be in this case.
But eventually they came to a verdict aggravated burglary, two
counts of rape with a sexually violent predator specification, as
well as aggravated robbery, kidnapping flowing as salt intimidation along
with firearms specifications for all this stuff. And this too
(18:25):
is at a time in Ohio where you hit a
specific year's sentence, right, so you get what you get.
It's not like you serve ten and then you get
a chance to go to the parle board and see
if you serve the rest. It wasn't like that at
the time Chris was in prison on this sentencing regime
in Ohio.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Well, you know they came back in they made like guilty.
I'm like, mentally, I wasn't even there. It took me
months before and realize so much time I got man
forty years flet then sink in it won real to me.
(19:13):
I had to go through the sex program with all
the rapists and sex defenders all over Ohio. It was
some weird motherfucker said, hear me this guy next door.
I ain't no, but I kept asking the guy I
was the selling, like man, why that lady on? What
you going there and sell? A couple of days the
dude taught me said, just standing the door, y'alls to watch.
So I stood in the door while she tearing the
(19:34):
sail up she had was doing collides. I said, oh,
this dude tripping. He was cut pits as of girls.
He cut him off the paper and they underwear and
all that. After the shopping sparked making colligs. That was
a wake up call, cause it's a it's a dorm
for the sex offender. That's for real, That's all it is.
It was guys like my age, nineteen twenty years old.
It was fireman in there cocks. That was the weirdest
(19:57):
shit I ever went through my life.
Speaker 1 (20:00):
Unfortunately, violence against women finds a home in seemingly every
walk of life. In fact, it turned out that the
pervasionists of violence against women even became an issue with
Chris's jury for post conviction.
Speaker 3 (20:15):
Well, JEWR said, oh, he looked, he looked guilty. When
I came in, getting kind of found out she was
in the rape for Robert case herself, so she shouldn't
have been on the jury. So when they bring me
back from the EVERDJ here the prostitutent that got to
the lady. Now that they're told on everybody, they'll mess
with her. Now she don't even want to talk.
Speaker 1 (20:31):
And so that issue didn't pan out for Chris after
his initial denials. A bit of serendipity worked in Chris's favor.
In two thousand and four.
Speaker 2 (20:40):
So Ohio a Bureau of Criminal Investigation and Identification also
known as BCI. They have this database access to DNA profiles,
and they turn up a hit to one of the
male DNA profiles from the LB rape kit in the
Federal Code of database. It matches a guy named Richard
(21:01):
Marlin Stadmeire.
Speaker 1 (21:03):
Like with most of these cases, while the state is
busy prosecuting an innocent person, the actual assailants remained free
to commit more heinous acts. It's almost like the tax
dollars that we pay are funding a system that protects
the actual perpetrators while they go about framing innocent people.
So while Detective Schmidt was putting around with cat hairs.
(21:27):
Another rape and robbery happened in May two thousand and one.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
Yeah, it was just about three weeks after the LB rape.
In May two thousand and one, Stadmeire and another guy
were arrested and charged with sexual assault and battery. Is
about only five miles away from where Elbe's apartment was
in Mayfield Hights, Ohio.
Speaker 3 (21:44):
Wow.
Speaker 2 (21:45):
And in that other case, the perpetrators ambush the victim,
held a gun to her neck, They forced her under
her car, and they sexually assaulted and robbed her. And
Stadmeyer was caught quickly for that case. He was convicted
in March of two thousand and two. The other man
involved turned out to Stadmeyer's friend and accomplice, Charles Boyd.
And Boyd in that case he pled guilty to the
(22:07):
Mayfield Heights attack.
Speaker 3 (22:08):
And he had to when they took the chick to
the ATM, the camera and the ATM called his tattoo.
Speaker 2 (22:12):
He got a lenient sentence in exchange for testifying against
Dadmire at trial in that.
Speaker 3 (22:17):
One serial predators man.
Speaker 2 (22:19):
Going back to Chris's case, remember there were two DNA profiles.
Stadmeire matched the one that Chris had already been excluded
from right, the azospomatic contributor still remains unidentified at that point. Now,
of course, Charles Boyd should have been the obvious person
to go test and compare and try to see if
he's that second person, given this other case from three
(22:41):
weeks later, five miles away.
Speaker 1 (22:43):
Instead, Detective Schmidt once again tried to fit that same
old square peg into the round hole.
Speaker 2 (22:50):
Detective Schmidt goes and interviews Stadmeyre and Boyd.
Speaker 3 (22:53):
Right.
Speaker 2 (22:54):
Both guys were initially not cooperative. They denied involvement in
the LB attack. Schmidt shows both men pictures of Chris
Miller at the time Boyd was Mansfield. He confirmed at
that time that he didn't know Chris, he only recognized
him as another guy in the same prison. Stadmeyer also
looked at the photo array told Schmidt he couldn't identify anybody.
Several weeks later, Schmidt goes back and reinterviews Boyd, and
(23:17):
at this point in time, miraculously Boyd comes around. He
admits he's part of the attack against DELB. He can
describe LB's apartment with a lot of detail, but he's
adamant that he never actually went in the apartment and instead,
he was just the lookout guy while Stadmeyer and Chris
went in and Rade del B. Boyd claimed that he
had only met Chris a few hours before the attack
(23:38):
against Delb and that after the rape, he and stan
Meyer went up to a club to split the proceeds
from the robbery, and Chris simply disappeared on foot, you know,
miles away from where Chris lived.
Speaker 3 (23:48):
Phantom. I'll want none of the money. I'm cool.
Speaker 2 (23:50):
Yeah, it makes no sense.
Speaker 3 (23:51):
He said, his friend brought me to him. You'll free
of bringing me to you. You just wanna go rob
somebody with me?
Speaker 2 (23:56):
You won't know me. Come on, that's crazy, right.
Speaker 1 (23:59):
We can only guess how Schmidt got Boyd to change
his story.
Speaker 2 (24:04):
Well, let me shed maybe a little bit of light
on that. You can make some inferences if you want.
This is something that came out in our subsequent civil case.
So again, even at the time of the exoneration, nobody
knew this yet. We in our civil case got an
affidavit from Richard Stadmeyer about when Schmidt came to see him,
and so I'm going to read you some of the
things that he says. At some point in two thousand
and four, two thousand and five, I met with Detecta
(24:26):
Schmidt in another officer. Detecta Schmidt showed me a card
with two rows of photographs. I told the Tectave Schmidt
that I did not know anyone in the photographs. Detective
Schmidt called me a smart ass and said, are you
sure you don't know C. Mills. Detective Schmidt then showed
me the photographs again and pointed out a photograph of
a man. I did not recognize the man in the photograph.
I later learned that the man in the photograph was
(24:46):
Christopher Miller. Detectave Schmidt told me to quote make this
easier on myself. I understood that Detective Schmidt was telling
me that if I identified Chris Miller from his photograph
as the rapist, then he would help me. Detective Schmidt
said he knew that Christopher Miller was the rapist and
asked if I was just to look out. I again
told him I do not know Christopher Miller. Detectave Schmidt
became angry and frustrated. Detecta Schmidt threatened me that he
(25:08):
was going to talk with Charles Boyd and say that
Boyd would be eager to give up information. So I
think there's some assumptions we could make about how his
conversation with Boyd went to that come out of that.
Sadmar's indicted rape, robbery, kidnapping, all of these things. He
pleads not guilty. He goes to trial. Of course, Chris
testifies at the Sammar trial, basically again asserting her innocence
and being like, I don't know anything about any of.
Speaker 3 (25:28):
This, right, well, I don't know them. Now he goat Stallmar,
he told him like, I don't know him. He went
with us, the prosecutor. You get to cussing me out,
like why am I trying to get you out? Why
are you trying to get you out? Saying, man, I
ain't Doue with bro. That's all I can tell you.
I didn't do it. I don't know. I don't know
them dues. And they just send me back to the pod.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
Now, remember LB, and everything we've ever heard has always
been consistent. There are only two guys involved in this attack. Now,
Schmidt saying on the stand, even though he testified in
Chris's trial about her telling him about two attackers, now
it's sad Meireer's trial. He's saying, he told me there
were three guys, and he's pressed about this. He says
about LB quote, is not her responsibility to remember the
(26:08):
facts of the case, which is just wild.
Speaker 1 (26:10):
On June twelfth, two thousand and six, Dad Mayer got
an additional forty three years. Chris's conviction was strengthened by
what appears to have been perjured testimony, and Boyd took
a five year sentence for his alleged role as a lookout.
Speaker 2 (26:23):
And concurrent with the case he was already serving. Right. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (26:25):
In two thousand and seven, Chris tried to get a
new trial on the Code has Hit, but the motion
was denied. Meanwhile, the Ohio in Thiss Project began investigating
Chris's innocence claims.
Speaker 2 (26:35):
Sometimes you can request a set of records from a
place and not get anything useful or new, and you
request the same set you know later on right, and
you're going to get different stuff. Sometimes that's what happens.
In twenty sixteen, though, when things really break, because that's
when they finally they get a response to a public
records request that they've sent. It includes new police reports,
new notes, handwritten notes from Schmidt written shortly after the
(26:57):
attack on LB being disclosed for the very first time.
These reports and these notes contained exculpatory evidence, and they
show that Schmidt has presented false and fabricated evidence to
the prosecutors and during the trial, and given false testimony
throughout the course of this case.
Speaker 1 (27:15):
This is when they discovered LB's initial description of the
attackers close and how that changed to align with what
Schmid had pulled from Chris's hamper and closet.
Speaker 2 (27:25):
And this now forms the basis for new post conviction
filings for Chris that his counsel, Brian Howe of the
Ohio Innocence Project filed for him, and that included an
application for DNA testing, a motion for new trial, and
a petition for post conviction relief.
Speaker 1 (27:41):
The latter two were stayed, while newer and more sensitive
DNA testing for the azosbramatic contributor moved forward.
Speaker 3 (27:47):
Neil Brien was just talking two or three times a week.
You know, we've been waiting on the DNA.
Speaker 2 (27:52):
May thirty one, twenty eighteen, BCI issues that report. Lo
and Behold comes back. It's Charles Boyd.
Speaker 3 (27:58):
Sort of lose a full life news on. Everybody in
the dorm. Gonna wait me up, man, you're on a TV,
but I got my headphones on something like what he like,
stand up? So when I stood up, out my faces
on everybody TV in the door, I'm like, so he
turned my TV to try to wait on watching him
like man, I was he got a kicking and hind
the walls. I was like, whoa, that was real. Then
the CEOs like they were sitting in the dudes when
(28:21):
they blocks go get see meals, tell him come over here,
like I know you didn't do that. You ain't your character?
You know? Man? That was so surreal. Then Brian come
see me go in the room. Brian got his note
bad I'm reading upside down. He got his questious like
where I want to eat? Like I'm kind of like,
I mean tears now, like you know, yeah, that was awesome. Man.
(28:45):
That dude fought. He used to come see me on
the regular. Man, I got so much love for her, like,
ain't my family? You know that DNA coming back was
the best thing that ever happened to me.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
Amen to that. So where'd you go to eat?
Speaker 3 (28:59):
Real lobster? I met all the guys, all the other things.
Zanner reeves that day was like I can't believe that
I was out of to this day is still like
is emotional to me.
Speaker 1 (29:08):
Chris was soon reunited with his children.
Speaker 3 (29:11):
You know, my oldest daughter, she stayed with me. My
three grandkids and my son stayed next door because I
bought my mother house next door to me, So my
mother and my son stayed next door, and me and
my daughter and my grandkid had stayed house next door.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
His eldest daughter was the five year old little girl
who had run to her father handcuffed in the back
of the squad car on April thirtieth, two thousand and one.
There's no amount of money that could make up for
that lost time, but at least the civil suit made
it possible to afford the house Chris just mentioned, but
not before he had to face Detective Schmidt.
Speaker 3 (29:44):
You know, I can't face the face with him. I
got he was in the room for two hours and
didn't even say nothing.
Speaker 2 (29:48):
Turn your deposition.
Speaker 3 (29:49):
He was in the room with me and Sarah for
two hours, shook my hand and anything. When I walked
in there, when his lawyer said, yeah, my client, Mark Smith.
When I heard that name, I said who, he said, Marshman,
I said, where he's ad He nodded his head doing
and when I looked at him, I looked at him
his head and I just everything came back. All I
remember he had he got the little psorias listing on
(30:09):
his elbows and all on his heads. But the whole
time in the room he looking out the window like this.
Speaker 2 (30:14):
Yeah. And you know, and you you didn't recognize him
at first. So and it has a party to a lawsuit,
you have a right two at ten depositions. But you
also have a choice about whether you come to stuff
like that. And I got a lot of cases where
you know, those officers don't show up. Mark Sant. He
decided he was going to come to this one, you know,
the social path.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
Well, at least he had the good sense to look away.
Speaker 3 (30:38):
I said, why you won't look at me? Dude? These
a piece of ship.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Going through these lawsuits is awful. I mean, it's obviously
fathomably awful to be in prison for a crime you
didn't commit and then seeking vindication through civil rights cases
in the aftermath. Is it keeps the wound open, and it's
like rubbing salt in the wound. And then you got
to sit in the room and be polite to these
people who took away years and years of your life.
Speaker 3 (31:01):
You know his lords won't be out of light.
Speaker 1 (31:04):
No, they're not. So is there anything you'd like to
ask from our audience.
Speaker 3 (31:09):
Just know that this could happen to anybody. Happening. Your brother's,
your sisters, your mom. You're happening, and they're you're not
going to stop. So the people's jail, you know, it's
still dues in there doing the rest of their life
from there.
Speaker 1 (31:23):
Is there anyone in particular that's coming to mind right now?
Speaker 3 (31:26):
There's a lot of guys. The Anthony Johnson, he's still
in there. They stole all his evidence.
Speaker 1 (31:32):
Anthony Johnson. All right, well, let's talk after this about Anthony.
And with that we're gonna go to my favorite part
of the show. It's called closing arguments, where I first
thank you both from the bottom of my heart for
joining us, and then I'm just gonna kick back in
my chair, close my eyes, and listen to anything else
you feel is left to be said. So let's start
with Jacqueline and then Chris, you take us off into
(31:55):
the sunset.
Speaker 2 (31:57):
I think the conduct of Mark Schmidt in this case,
it's one of the worst kinds of police misconduct where
he was so hell bent on getting and then keeping
a conviction that he was willing to manipulate other people
and to lie on the stand. And there's no denying that,
because there's two sets of testimony that are totally different.
You know, we have these records in his own handwriting
that make that clear. And it just goes to I
(32:18):
think the really deeply rooted problems in our criminal legal
system where winning is so often more important than the
truth and what justice are we serving and how are
we in any way serving our communities or our societies
if that's what our legal system is set up to
do and the players in it are attempting to do.
I'm so glad that the truth came to light in
(32:40):
this case, but I'm also just so enraged and sad
that Chris had to live through this hell you know,
before that happened. You know, he's not the only one,
Like he just said, there are other people. There are
a lot of other people who've lived the same kind
of hell. We have to demand better, we have to
demand different, We have to radically change the way our
legal system works or this kind of thing is going
(33:00):
to keep happening. So I appreciate that we got here,
but we have hell a lot of work to do.
Speaker 3 (33:07):
It's been a hard fight. I ain't never really been
quitter never, so I don't I don't know about quitting.
You know that the prosecutors they need to start getting
some some you know, they need something need happen in
for just sending people to jail like that. It's like
just sending people jail with no evidence, no nothing, you know,
like people fucked my life up. Man. You know, even
though I'm finding not able to live, wonder, my life
(33:29):
still fucking. I got anxieties, other stuff, mental health, but
I'm able to deal with it. My man never raised
me later out so I can't take care of my
family and try to enjoy the rest of his life.
I got. You know, it's a free man, because I
wasn't living I was. I wasn't living in there. I
wasn't living.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
Thank you for listening to Wrong for Conviction. You can
listen to this and all the Lava for Good podcast
us one week early by subscribing to Lava for Good
Plus on Apple Podcasts. I want to thank our production team,
Connor Hall and Kathleen Fink, as well as my fellow
executive producers Jeff Kempler, Kevin Wartis, and Jeff Cleiburn. The
music in this production was supplied by three time Oscar
(34:15):
nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us across
all social media platforms at Lava for Good and at
Wrongful Conviction. You can also follow me on Instagram at
It's Jason Flamm. Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava
for Good Podcasts and association with Signal Company Number One.
Speaker 4 (34:37):
My name is Laura Aisville. Your podcast has actually had
a profound impact on my life. I happened to pawn
your podcast about five years ago, and at that time,
I thought, like a lot of people, that if you
were in prison, you did something wrong and you're guilty.
I never, in a million years thought that prosecutors and
(35:00):
detective I just never thought they could get away with
all the stuff that they've gotten away with. And from
there I started getting interested in a lot of other
social issues because I think the criminal justice system really,
in my mind, is kind of a snapshot of racism
and classism and all those kinds of things. When I
(35:24):
started listening to your podcast, I would probably have labeled
myself a conservative. I am now a registered Democrat and
someone who is very active in my community. I volunteer
in the criminal justice system. I volunteer to help put
Democrat candidates in office. I don't think that anybody would
(35:46):
have had on my BINGO card that I would have
been a volunteer for any Democrat ever, and that my
politics would completely completely change and the way I thought
about a lot of things completely changed. So I want
to thank you for opening up my eyes. I want
to thank all your wonderful guests for sharing their stories
(36:09):
and being people who forced me to listen. Like I said,
my whole outlook and everything on the whole world our
country completely changed, and it started just by listening to
one episode of your podcast.
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If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!