May 15, 2025 • 34 mins
On April 5, 1985, around 11 p.m., a woman exiting her car in her apartment complex parking lot just north of Atlanta, GA was approached by an African-American man. The man asked her if she could help him find "Paul." He then pulled out a gun and told her to move into the passenger seat. He drove to a nearby dead-end street where he raped the victim. After the attack, he drove her back to the parking lot and left on foot. She reported the attack to the police and helped them draw a composite sketch of the perpetrator.
Five days later, another woman exiting her car in her apartment complex was approached by an African-American man. This parking lot was on the same street in the same area as the other crime. The man asked her if she could help him find "Carol." He then put a razor blade to her throat and got in the car. He demanded sex and tried to pull off her clothes. She was able to talk the man into leaving her car. The police showed the second victim the first victim's composite sketch, and the second victim immediately identified the sketch as resembling her attacker.
Later that month, Willie “Pete” Williams, a 23-year-old part-time painter, was in a car pulled over for a traffic violation when police noted that he resembled the composite sketch of a serial rapist in a nearby neighborhood. The officers included Pete in a line-up, and two victims and a witness identified Pete as the perpetrator. The actual rapist was not included in the line-up.
Based solely on faulty eyewitness identification, and despite arguments Pete’s attorney made about an alternate suspect, a jury convicted Pete of rape, aggravated sodomy, and kidnapping. The judge sentenced him to 45 years in prison.
Learn more and get involved at:
https://www.georgiainnocenceproject.org/
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
Hey everyone, it's Ben Bollen again from the podcast Stuff
They Don't Want You to Know, and I'm back to
introduce another one of my favorite episodes of Wrongful Conviction. However,
before we do that, I'm here to tell you that
coming up next week, there are some truly exciting things
on the way from the Lava for Good team and myself,
so be sure to tune in for that now. This
(00:26):
week's release is another one that hits close to home
for me. This is a story about a serial rapist
that was perpetrating his crimes along a stretch of road
that runs through Atlanta into a separate jurisdiction just north
of the city, where only one of the police departments
got it right and the other well. Their district attorney
went to prison himself, so without any further ado, the
(00:48):
wrongful conviction of Willie Pete Williams.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
This episode was recorded pre COVID at the Atlanta Innocence
Network conference in twenty nineteen. On April fifth, nineteen eighty five,
a woman was exiting her car at a parking lot
just north of Atlanta when a man approached, asking about
a woman named Carol. When he got close enough, he
pulled a gun, forced her into the passenger seat, drove
(01:14):
to a dead end, and proceeded to rape her. After
the attack, the victim went to the hospital for a
rape kit. With a well lit parking lot and over
forty five minutes with her attacker, she was able to
put together a composite sketch. On April tenth, a near
identical incident occurred along the same stretch of road. A
man approached a woman in a parking lot asking for
(01:35):
carol before using a threat of violence to get her
back into the car. However, this time the victim was
able to talk the attacker into leaving.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
Before a rape occurred.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
The police showed this would be victim the composite sketch,
and it appeared there was a serial rapist operating in
the North Atlanta area. Then, on April twenty eighth, Willie
Pete Williams, along with two of his friends, were stopped
by police for suspicious behavior in the area of the attacks.
Police noticed that Pete resembled the sketch and came up
(02:07):
with a reason to arrest him, saying that he gave
them false information in order to bring him in to
be photographed. His photo was shown to both women for
a positive ID. While Pete was locked up, three more
attacks would occur with the same mom, but it was
already too late. Pete Williams spent nearly twenty two years
(02:28):
in prison before DNA testing proved that another man was
responsible for all five attacks. This is Wrongful Conviction with
Jason Plumm. You're listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen
to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one
(02:49):
week early and ad free by subscribing to Lava for
Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction.
This episode is going to be a very unique one.
(03:09):
We have with us Pete Williams, who served twenty two
years in Georgia prisons for a rape he did not commit.
Two rapes, actually they did not commit. And with him
is Drew Finling, who is a how can I say,
enigmatic character, famous for his work representing some of the
top hip hop artis in the world, and he's also
(03:31):
now the president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
He got involved in criminal defense work because of Pete's case,
but they never met it till today. Correct, So this
is going to be a fun ride and I'm excited
to be honest. So Pete, welcome, and the same to you, Drew. Absolutely,
And like I always say, Pete, I'm sorry you're here,
(03:51):
but I'm glad you're here. And I want to tell
your story because I think it's an important story for
a lot of reasons. I guess at the heart of
it is a mistaken witness identification more than one actually,
and it's a really important thing for us to talk
about because it's so common. But can you take us
back to I mean, this is a long time ago, right,
because you were exonerating in two thousand and seven, yes,
(04:13):
but the help of the Innocence Project. So this crime
goes all the way back to the mid eighties.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
Right, yeah, eighty five?
Speaker 2 (04:21):
And what were you up to back then? What was
your life like? What was going on in Pete's world?
Speaker 4 (04:28):
Most An was working, I had dropped out of school,
really didn't have much going on other than freedom.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
How old were you?
Speaker 3 (04:39):
I just had twenty three.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
So you're twenty three. You got charged with originally one.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
Rape, right, yeah, one way right at the time.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
And let's talk about this awful rape which occurred on
April fifth, nineteen eighty five, which is when a woman
arrived at her apartment complex parking lot along Roswell Road,
just north of Atlanta, got out, but she got out,
a man approached, pretending that he was looking for someone,
but when he got close, he pulled a gun and
forced her back into the car, then drove her at
gunpoint to a dead end street where he raped her.
(05:10):
Then he drove her back to her apartment complex, and
then he left on foot. So the victim then went
to the police and the hospital for a rape kit,
which means there was a sample of the rapist DNA,
And that becomes important later because after all, there was
no DNA testing back in nineteen eighty five anyway, So
later on though, we're going to get to that. So
(05:32):
by now, the victim had spent a considerable amount of
time with her attacker, and as a result, she was
able to help the police put together a composite sketch.
And this attacker had a particular mo too. Can you
talk about that, Drew.
Speaker 5 (05:46):
Yeah, So what had happened is Roswell Road is a
very long stretch of road in Atlanta. I want to
say it goes north and south, but I'm terrible with
things like that. But the real rapist was trolling up
and down and he would go to women and I
think they would kind of be in their twenties and
they would like blonde hair and blonde hair. And he
(06:06):
would say the same like have you seen and I
used to know the name Carol, Carol? Yeah, have you
seen Carol? And then he'd take him in the car.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Right. So, five days after the first rape, on April tenth,
nearly the same thing occurred along Roswell Road, although this
ended up being an attempted rape, but still the same, Hey,
do you know Carol or where's Carol? Accept his second
victim when he tried to get her to take off
her clothes. I don't know how, but she was able
to talk him out of raping her. She went to
(06:36):
the police. They hear this similar MO from just five
days before, and they show her the composite sketch and
she agreed that this sketch resembled her would be rapist. So, Pete,
you've got nothing to do with this. You had nothing
to do this, but you lived in the area, So
can you tell us how you were dragged into this?
When you and two friends got pulled over on Roswell
(06:58):
Road one night.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
I was riding out right on Roswell and it was
stopping my car. It was stopped.
Speaker 4 (07:05):
I was passing on the car, So it was a
compositive skates going around in that area. So the way
that they arrested me, they told that I gave them
false information. That's just to get me there and get
my photograph, my picture to show the witness because I
gave them information while I was staying everything adequate.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Oh, you gave them accurate information.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
Yes, of course, yeah, And they said yeah, they said
it was false. So you know, I couldn't all get
the police. So you're stop by the police.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
They have this composite sketch in the back of their
minds and they come up with a reason. They said
that you gave them false information, which wasn't true, but
they wanted an excuse to get your photograph to share
with these two women because they thought that you looked
enough like the sketch, so they arrested you.
Speaker 3 (07:56):
Then what I was there for a while.
Speaker 4 (07:58):
Wait, I was there maybe about four or five hours,
but it was a relative cheap.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
Bomb, you know.
Speaker 4 (08:03):
So I was born out maybe three to four hours
after I was arrested, and two weeks later I was
truble was rape, accuvate uselt and accovate us solomy, and
I was arrested and.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
I didn't know what they was talking about.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Had you even heard about these?
Speaker 3 (08:19):
I didn't have the slightest idea.
Speaker 4 (08:21):
They said it was from POSSI circuling of rape was
out in that area, and I resembled it.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Now did that sketch actually resemble you? Yeah, it actually did, right,
So so you resembled the sketch.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
So that was dead.
Speaker 4 (08:36):
I didn't, you know, I didn't. I haven't raped anybody.
I just resembled it on positive sketch.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
The sketch resembled you. And then I'm presuming you were
identified as well in the lineup on court.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
Oh, it was a lineup, and I was identified doing
the trial as well.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
I mean, we know that I witness misidentification is the
leading cause of runful convictions.
Speaker 5 (08:59):
And look, I'm just not the biggest believer in the
composite sketch because the composite sketch becomes the perpetrator, not
the perpetrator, and so it just happened to have favored him.
And then it's the composite sketch and anybody that looks
like them that replaces who the actual perpetrator is. So
(09:19):
I'm just not a believer in the whole composite sketch thing.
I just don't like where they lead, as in convictions
of innocent people in cases like this.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
So the charges were rape, aggravated assault, and aggravated sod
of me and true this is where you first entered
the picture. He became aware of Pete's case, and this
is at his trial where you were just a young
man just out of law school pretty much right at.
Speaker 5 (09:44):
The time, I was twenty five years old. I was
fresh out of law school, and I was an assistant
public defender assigned to mister William's courtroom where his case
took place. And I made it my practice then that
was just watch every case I could. I got it
up and I loved my job as a public defender,
and I just had him to watch his case and
(10:04):
then really started learning about it, and I watched the trial.
So what had happened is Roswell Road is a very
long stretch of road in Atlanta, but at some point
along the road it is the city of Atlanta, and
then it's no longer the city of Atlanta. Well, the
real rapist because it wasn't mister Williams. Anybody that watched
(10:25):
the trial would realize that because I watched the trial
and I'll talk about that later, and it was obvious
he was innocent. So, Jason, here's the crazy thing. One
jurisdiction handling it was City of Atlanta police. On the
other part of the road was Fulton County police. To
this day, I don't know if anybody's looked into did
they ever talk to one another? And in fact, if
(10:47):
you remember, on the City of Atlanta side, the City
of Atlanta police called the person the Roswell Road rapist.
But yet on the other side of the sign was
this case involving mister Williams. And I've apparently he got
arrested and then eventually they arrested the other guy who
I think pled out. Your case was on the ninth floor,
(11:08):
His case was on the seventh floor. Was on the seven, Yeah,
he was on seventh, on the eighth You're right, yeah,
And he pled out during his trial and I went
and watched his also, because the Public Defender's office did
that case.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Wait, how far apart were the two difference?
Speaker 5 (11:26):
I can't remember the dates they weren't too far apart.
But I watched his and I read up on his
and I was like, well, this guy did it, and
it was astonishing, And.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
Let's go back to the pattern, right, because for whatever reason,
the attacker always did the same damn thing. Maybe he
thought that this was an effective way of him grabbing
these women, was by asking about this other woman, Carol
or Carolyn. Why he was fixating on that, Yeah, but
that was his thing. And he also had this car
(11:56):
that broke down a lot because a number of the
women and reported that. And what's crazy is that after
Pete was arrested, and three more attacks happened with the
same damn mL right, with exactly the same pattern, the
exact same pattern. And in fact, this man was responsible
clearly for all five attacks, but he only face charges
(12:19):
related to those three, And so the other two attacks
repined on you Pete and this other guy, Kenneth Wicker.
He finally got caught because his last victim heroically was
able to take down her attacker's license plate number. And
it turned out that Wicker lived right along Roswell Road
where all of these attacks were taking place, So it
(12:41):
would seem obvious to the casual observer that the DA
would hear about these other cases and this other arrest
and immediately stopped focusing on you, Pete. But that's not
what happened. And later all of this was brought up
in Europe, and I'm talking as early as nineteen eighty six,
(13:04):
but the DA just didn't fucking care about it then
or while he was prosecuting you in the first place.
Speaker 5 (13:12):
Sir Jason, Pete and I we just met downstairs and
we immediately engaged in a conversation about what I'm about
to bring up which has bothered him to this day,
and I'm going to tell it to you. And that
is our system, right relies on ethical prosecutors. Unfortunately, for
Pete Williams, his prosecutor turned out to be not so ethical,
(13:33):
as we know from several things, including the fact that
he's serving a life sentence in his own murder case
right now.
Speaker 2 (13:38):
The prosecutor.
Speaker 5 (13:39):
The prosecutor, oh blot twist, yes, I mean yeah, and
was also eventually charged not only with that murder, which
he was found guilty of, but being the lawyer for
a drug operation when he was in private practice. So
not the best guy in the world. And I bring
that up only because you would fathom that a decent,
(14:00):
ethical prosecutor, which there are many of out there, would
have realized this having been the lead prosecutor mister Williams case,
and said, uh, oh, we got problems. And that never happened.
He never had the ethics of a prosecutor that realized
what you just said and wanted to put an end
to his illegal incarceration. It just didn't happen, and there
(14:22):
was a real breakdown.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Yeah, I'm still trying to process this. This is a story.
I've heard a lot of stories and you know, doing
this since the early nineties.
Speaker 5 (14:32):
The irony is Pete said to me outside we agreed.
How come that didn't become the biggest part of the
story of Pete Williams's illegal conviction and incarceration. As he said,
I was serving my sentence and my prosecutor was hearting
his sentence at the exact same time.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
Oh so he went to prison while you were in this.
Well this is not the same.
Speaker 4 (14:53):
Prison, not the same prison, but he went doing mind cusurrection.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Did you know that at the time?
Speaker 3 (14:59):
Yeah, I probably it.
Speaker 5 (15:00):
Is on Tell me Jason was one of the biggest
cases in the history of Atlanta. Yeah, yeah, I can't
even think in my thirty plus years of practice of
a federal case that they changed venue. It was such
a big case. But they actually had to change venue
to Birmingham in his federal case, his murder case, they
changed venue as well, and did it somewhere in the woods.
(15:20):
I don't know, rural Georgia, somewhere, but they actually moved
his federal case to Birmingham because they just couldn't get
a jury in Atlanta. Fred Tokars is his name. It
was one of the biggest cases in the history of Atlanta.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
So I took a second to look up Fred Tokars
and what I found out was batshit crazy, crazier than
what Pete and Drew had said. This Georgia prosecutor went
on to become a private attorney to some big time
drug dealers, but besides representing them, he was also helping
them hide their money in nightclubs, and eventually his wife, Sarah,
(15:55):
threatened to blow the whistle on his illegal and the
various activities, but instead of turning his life around, he
plotted to have her kidnapped and killed in front of
their four and six year old boys. Ricky and Mike.
I mean, what the actual buck. He was convicted of
(16:15):
racketeering in nineteen ninety four and eventually also convicted for
Sarah's murder, receiving a life sentence without the possibility of parole.
He was held in secret custody as a marked man,
and since this interview is recorded, despite his more treacherous
than usual situation in prison, Fred Tokers died in May
of twenty twenty in a Pennsylvania prison hospital due to
(16:40):
complications related to a neurological disorder.
Speaker 5 (16:44):
And that was the prosecutor that put mister Williams away.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
So, I mean, it's just an unbelievable twist of fate,
right that the guy who was responsible for ruining your
life ends up in May. The Pacers Foundation is a
proud supporter of this episode and of the Last Mile organization,
(17:11):
which provides business and tech training to help incarcerated individuals
successfully and permanently re enter the workforce. The Pacers Foundation
is committed to improving the lives of Hoosiers across Indiana,
supporting organizations dedicated primarily to helping young people and students.
For more information on the work of the Pacers Foundation
(17:32):
or the Last Mile program visit Pacersfoundation dot org or
the Lastmile dot org. This episode is sponsored by AIG,
a leading global insurance company, and Paul Weiss Rifkin, Wharton
and Garrison, a leading international law firm. The AIG pro
Bono Program provides free legal services and other support to
(17:54):
many nonprofit organizations and individuals most in need, and recently
they announced that work to reform the criminal justice system
will become a key pillar of the program's mission. Paul
Weiss has long had an unwavering commitment to providing impactful
pro bono legal assistance to the most vulnerable members of
our society and in support of the public interest, including
(18:15):
extensive work in the criminal justice area. You end up
getting sentenced to basically a life sentence. Yeah, forty five
years to life. And you were twenty four at the time. Yeah,
so forty five to life. And of course what I
(18:36):
five the life really means life because ultimately it'd be
sixty eight years old and they'd be asking you to
lead guilty.
Speaker 4 (18:42):
Yeah, and the way to ad my sonos lined up
fifteen teen and twenty do to fifteen one, I do
to fifteen do to team finish the team do to twining.
Speaker 5 (18:52):
It was consecutive sentences.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
So how did you deal with this? I mean, you're
behind bars, convicted rapist, looking at spending your the rest
of your life there? How did you find the strength
to even continue on and ultimately contact and reach out
and get this incredible team behind you that led to
your exoneration and you know, vindication.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
Mm. Well, my first ten year of priism, man, I
was stayed in the whole segregation of fault all the time,
in subordination because I felt like there was no hope,
so I might as well be part of the prism,
you know. And I met this guy after ten years.
(19:36):
He's sung gospel and he always went to church, and
he would always happen, you know, and he had more
time than that. He had a life sent and some time,
but he never showed it. He never showed it. And
I wanted to know why, you know why. It wasn't
about it, he said the church, Man, I seen in
the gospel. It makes me feel better. So I used
to go out and saying it first, because I really
(19:56):
didn't know any gospels, you know what I mean. But
once I got to going and listening to gospel, a
few gospel songs, and I started liking it when I
became part or choir for about five years, and that's
where a guy was in there. He had a booklet
concerning MCENT projects. So I got it and I started
writing him and told him that it was I had
(20:18):
some evidence.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Was this Georgia and is project or New York and.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Georgia and Georgia.
Speaker 4 (20:22):
Yeah, And they got concerned to what kind of evidence
you had? So I was writing 'em and I told 'em,
and some way they got a hold of it. They
said they had destroyed it here and what eighty seven?
They said they destroyed all that.
Speaker 3 (20:34):
But Cliff.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
Some way, Cliff had talked to some at the GBI,
being some female, and she allowed him.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Back there and lo and behold, that was my uh evidence.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
And the evidence at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation that
Pete is referring to is the real rapist DNA sample
from the rape kit, and they were finally able to
test it to not only exclude Pete, but they also
tested against the DNA of the man who had pleaded
guilty to those other rapes that had happened during the
same time period. A long roswell road and sure enough, Bengo,
(21:07):
it's him. But of course this incredible revelation did not
come without roadblocks and even being told that the evidence
was destroyed, which we hear a lot when fighting cases
like these, And Drew, let's go back to you on this.
It's I mean, it's just nuts that we don't have
a nationwide standard for maintaining evidence. In fact, practices are
(21:31):
different all over. Some are good and some are, like,
let's face it, like a third world country.
Speaker 5 (21:37):
There's really no national consistency. And so you know when
you say earlier, which I completely agree with, that we
probably have well over one hundred thousand innocent people in
our prison systems, and that's probably a low number. We
think about if we had consistency in the preservation of evidence,
what would we'd be able to do. It's really going
(21:59):
to require a coordinated effort. But it's the only right
thing to do.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
There's just absolutely no argument against it. There's nothing bad
about preserving evidence.
Speaker 5 (22:08):
Well, there's nothing bad about preserving evidence. But then you
hear about the Georgia Innocence Project. I went down to
making on behalf of them and argued about just having
somebody's testing done and prosecutors objected to testing being done.
Why would you ever object to testing being done? Why
would you ever object to being able to check off
(22:31):
the list the possibility that somebody innocent is in jail
for many years, if not their life. And it's that
same type of flawed logic that would have some say, well,
we don't need to take up the room, We don't
need to do the logistics aren't there for storage. You
could just fathom the arguments that are coming, you know,
because prosecutors want to believe and law enforcement want to
(22:51):
believe that once they have a conviction, it's the right conviction,
and so you can always deal with that sentiment, which
is wrong. Yeah, that's the sentiment. It's the same sentiment
that dictates around the country when good folks are fighting
a behalf of the innocents project to have testing done
and they're in courtrooms at the podium facing prosecutors that
don't want testing to be done.
Speaker 4 (23:14):
To me, why would you want to destroy ivernandek trio person.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
And identify the actual perpetrator like it does.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
I don't even know what to think of that. I
don't Thank.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
God they hadn't actually destroyed the evidence from your case
because they actually exculpated you, and it ended up causing
you to be released from prison on January twenty third,
two thousand and seven. And subsequently it matched up to
Kenneth Wicker, who had already pleaded guilty all those years ago.
(23:48):
He was then arrested on February ninth, two thousand and
seven for the April fifth and tenth incidents. Then four
days later, you were granted a new trial on February
thith thirteenth, and the DA subsequently dropped all charges.
Speaker 4 (24:04):
Dropped all the charge you know, they took the rape
and everything away from my report.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
So you were in court when.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
All the charges were actually dropped.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
And what was that like?
Speaker 3 (24:15):
How?
Speaker 2 (24:15):
Who was there? A lot of family? Was it a
hot Yeah?
Speaker 4 (24:18):
My family, My family there, and there was a lot
of people, you know, they was happy for me, you know,
even people I didn't know, you know, like even the
police is. And as a matter of fact, one of
the police that was used to take me back and forth,
the colt, and she came down and said, I always
knew you was innocent.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Wow, how'd that feel?
Speaker 3 (24:39):
Wonderful man, wonderful.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
And it's worth noting that in about fifty percent of
the instance project cases where DNA has has exculpated an
exonerate led to the exoneration of an innocent person. It
has also led to the identification of the guilty person.
That's absolutely right, and in those cases, of course, that
person has gone on to have committed other heinous crimes.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
Yes, when you.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Lock up the wrong person, you stop looking for the
right person, and then that person that's out there is
most likely going to go and do what they did again.
It's just a practical issue of we should all want
to clean up these systems as best we can so
that ourselves and our families are safe.
Speaker 5 (25:24):
I mean, well, you know, look, Jason, I think it's
it's symptomatic of a larger issue. It's a symptomatic of
our problem with mass incarceration of this country. I think
it's all that is really tied in. We don't as
defense attorneys and accuse citizens. You know, we don't control
the fact that, as you well know, we represent five
(25:46):
percent of the world's population, but closing in on twenty
five percent of the world's incarcerated population. We don't dictate that.
And I don't want this to be a session where
I'm kind of talking about prosecutors, but they control so much.
Pete's case is emblematic of the problem. You had a
prosecutor with an antisocial disorder that went on to be
involved in a murder himself, and as a twenty five
(26:07):
year old, fresh out of law school kid, I watched
what I thought was an unethical prosecution, and I watched
a man lose his freedom because to this prosecutor, it
was a game. It wasn't about justice, and that's why Peede,
I made a decision that I was going to spend
the rest of my life defending people because of your case.
It was just a job. At that point. I didn't
know anything about a public defender. I never even met
(26:29):
a lawyer until my first law school class. I have
humble beginnings, but your case dictated to me what I
wanted to spend the rest of my life doing. I
watched that prosecutor game the system. It was just a
(26:51):
game to him, and unfortunately, the power that being a
prosecutor brings is often results in misguided prosecutions because they
have the ability, if they handle ethically, to make sure
to the best of their ability, that just doesn't happen
to make sure that evidence is preserved, to make sure
(27:11):
that there is proper identification procedures, and they have the
ability to be that wall, that last wall of justice
to say, you know, I don't I don't need a
motion to suppress identification because as the prosecutor, I don't
like the way this went down. We talk so much
about ourselves as defense attorneys and what our job is,
but we need to be spending a lot of time
(27:32):
looking at the other side of the courtroom. And I
get that there's integrity units closing up, but it needs
to be a lot greater than that. It needs to
be a lot better than just every once in a
while a progressive prosecutor running for office. It needs to
be all over the country because he has the benefit
of this happening in Atlanta, But when we go to
the rural South, the smaller communities in Mississippi and Alabama
(27:58):
and Tennessee, sadly so a lot of Pete Williams that
are serving life sentences from prosecutors that were as misguided
and as corrupt as the one in his case.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
And that's why it's so important for people to get
out and vote in prosecutor races because most people don't.
The number of people that vote in these races is
so small that if you don't think your vote makes
a difference, it does. I mean we've seen races that
ended up in a dead heat like Tiede. You know,
like your vote is important. And if your one of
these people think, oh, I'm not going to vote in
the psidential election, it doesn't matter. Yes it does. It
(28:32):
matters in the presidentialism, but it matters a lot more
in your local elections where your your DA is running
and you know, and electing a progressive prosecutor, which that's
not even the right word, a fair prosecutor could affect
your life as well, because this could happen to you,
It could happen to Pete, it could happen to anybody.
We see it over and over again on this show.
(28:52):
And then let's even talk about it from a purely
fiscal level, you know, for any conservatives that are listening,
When we think about the amount of money that the
tax of Georgia paid well upwards of a million dollars,
probably closer to two million dollars to keep Pete locked up,
and then any other income that he would have been
able to earn and pay taxes on and you know
all the rest of this stuff. That's a pretty big
(29:14):
thing too. I just learned the other day on a
tangential note, that we spend forty million dollars a day
in America on pre trial detention, right just because people
can't post bail. Forty million a day to lock people
up who haven't been convicted of anything. That's a day.
That's your tax dollars at work and mine, by the way,
(29:34):
and whoever's listening, it's nuts. I mean, we lock up
more people than Russia and China combined. Back to your
previous point, we locked black people up at six times
the rate of South Africa at the height of apartheid.
And if you're a woman listening, then you should just
process this for a second, because while you know what
Drew said is certainly scary and true about us having
(29:55):
twenty five percent of the world's prison population, we have
thirty three percent of the world's female prison population. That
means one out of every three women in prison in
the world is in America, which is such a small
country when you look at the vast world that's out there,
and the more we can do to get out there
and spread the message. And the more you do to
get out there and vote and get active and volunteer,
(30:16):
go to Georgia Innis's project a website, you know, learn more.
Contact NACDL. What is it, NACDL dot org exactly, NACDL
dot org. That's National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers dot org.
Speaker 5 (30:28):
So I'm glad you brought up kind of where people
fall on the political continuum. You should know that the
term just finished and there's a new governor here. But
our last governor, Nathan dial As a Republican, two term Republican,
and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers gave him
a Champion I gave him a Champion of Justice Award
for his work on criminal justice reform. And so you
(30:48):
hit on it. No matter where you are, left wing,
right wing, no wing, we are any period of time
right now where people are really focusing on criminal justice reform.
And I think that you bring up all the numbers,
they're startling and it can impact anybody, you know, whether
it's the fact that our prison systems are warehousing the
mentally ill an adult autistic population. There's so many things
(31:13):
that attract people. The National Association of Criminal Defense lawyers.
As you know, we have our foundation for criminal justice
and we really embrace non lawyers to be part of it.
Our long term goal is to get non lawyers into
our leadership track. Let them be trustees. We need people
to reach out to us. We just want everyday citizens
(31:34):
to be involved, come to our meetings, and Jason's right,
there may not be an election that may impact your
life more than who your local district attorney is. Have
them answer to your questions. Folks need to take these
stories to heart, and which is why this podcast is
so important. They need to understand that not everybody is
(31:56):
going to be blessed with the opportunity to connect up
with the Innocence Project. So listen to podcasts like this
and get involved the most you can.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
And that is once again an ACDL dot org National
Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. Now we have this tradition
at Wrongful Conviction, which is my favorite part of the show,
which is where I get to just sit back and
listen and I leave the microphones on for you guys
for any closing thoughts that you want to share. And
(32:29):
because Pete is the honored guest here, not that you're not,
but you know, he's the star of the show. I'm
going to let him go last, and so drew any
parting shots.
Speaker 5 (32:40):
Pete. I just want to wish you the best and
let you know that the tragedy that occurred to you
influence the course of my existence. So my family, all
my clients, I want to hug you.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
Pete.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
Oh.
Speaker 4 (33:05):
I'm glad y'all had it broadcast to let people know
that things like that actually happen. People do go to
jail wrong for their convicted, and I'm just glad you
all been a publan note that these things actually happen.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen
to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one
week early and ad free 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 Clibern.
The music in this production was supplied by three time
(33:46):
OSCAR 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 podcast and association with Signal Company Number One.
Speaker 5 (34:02):
We have worked hard to ensure that all facts reported
in this show are accurate. The views and opinions expressed
by the individuals featured in this show are their own
and do not necessarily reflect those of love of for
Good
Hey everyone, it's Ben Bollen again from the podcast Stuff
They Don't Want You to Know, and I'm back to
introduce another one of my favorite episodes of Wrongful Conviction. However,
before we do that, I'm here to tell you that
coming up next week, there are some truly exciting things
on the way from the Lava for Good team and myself,
so be sure to tune in for that now. This
(00:26):
week's release is another one that hits close to home
for me. This is a story about a serial rapist
that was perpetrating his crimes along a stretch of road
that runs through Atlanta into a separate jurisdiction just north
of the city, where only one of the police departments
got it right and the other well. Their district attorney
went to prison himself, so without any further ado, the
(00:48):
wrongful conviction of Willie Pete Williams.
Speaker 2 (00:52):
This episode was recorded pre COVID at the Atlanta Innocence
Network conference in twenty nineteen. On April fifth, nineteen eighty five,
a woman was exiting her car at a parking lot
just north of Atlanta when a man approached, asking about
a woman named Carol. When he got close enough, he
pulled a gun, forced her into the passenger seat, drove
(01:14):
to a dead end, and proceeded to rape her. After
the attack, the victim went to the hospital for a
rape kit. With a well lit parking lot and over
forty five minutes with her attacker, she was able to
put together a composite sketch. On April tenth, a near
identical incident occurred along the same stretch of road. A
man approached a woman in a parking lot asking for
(01:35):
carol before using a threat of violence to get her
back into the car. However, this time the victim was
able to talk the attacker into leaving.
Speaker 3 (01:44):
Before a rape occurred.
Speaker 2 (01:46):
The police showed this would be victim the composite sketch,
and it appeared there was a serial rapist operating in
the North Atlanta area. Then, on April twenty eighth, Willie
Pete Williams, along with two of his friends, were stopped
by police for suspicious behavior in the area of the attacks.
Police noticed that Pete resembled the sketch and came up
(02:07):
with a reason to arrest him, saying that he gave
them false information in order to bring him in to
be photographed. His photo was shown to both women for
a positive ID. While Pete was locked up, three more
attacks would occur with the same mom, but it was
already too late. Pete Williams spent nearly twenty two years
(02:28):
in prison before DNA testing proved that another man was
responsible for all five attacks. This is Wrongful Conviction with
Jason Plumm. You're listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen
to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one
(02:49):
week early and ad free by subscribing to Lava for
Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction.
This episode is going to be a very unique one.
(03:09):
We have with us Pete Williams, who served twenty two
years in Georgia prisons for a rape he did not commit.
Two rapes, actually they did not commit. And with him
is Drew Finling, who is a how can I say,
enigmatic character, famous for his work representing some of the
top hip hop artis in the world, and he's also
(03:31):
now the president of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers.
He got involved in criminal defense work because of Pete's case,
but they never met it till today. Correct, So this
is going to be a fun ride and I'm excited
to be honest. So Pete, welcome, and the same to you, Drew. Absolutely,
And like I always say, Pete, I'm sorry you're here,
(03:51):
but I'm glad you're here. And I want to tell
your story because I think it's an important story for
a lot of reasons. I guess at the heart of
it is a mistaken witness identification more than one actually,
and it's a really important thing for us to talk
about because it's so common. But can you take us
back to I mean, this is a long time ago, right,
because you were exonerating in two thousand and seven, yes,
(04:13):
but the help of the Innocence Project. So this crime
goes all the way back to the mid eighties.
Speaker 3 (04:18):
Right, yeah, eighty five?
Speaker 2 (04:21):
And what were you up to back then? What was
your life like? What was going on in Pete's world?
Speaker 4 (04:28):
Most An was working, I had dropped out of school,
really didn't have much going on other than freedom.
Speaker 2 (04:38):
How old were you?
Speaker 3 (04:39):
I just had twenty three.
Speaker 2 (04:40):
So you're twenty three. You got charged with originally one.
Speaker 3 (04:44):
Rape, right, yeah, one way right at the time.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
And let's talk about this awful rape which occurred on
April fifth, nineteen eighty five, which is when a woman
arrived at her apartment complex parking lot along Roswell Road,
just north of Atlanta, got out, but she got out,
a man approached, pretending that he was looking for someone,
but when he got close, he pulled a gun and
forced her back into the car, then drove her at
gunpoint to a dead end street where he raped her.
(05:10):
Then he drove her back to her apartment complex, and
then he left on foot. So the victim then went
to the police and the hospital for a rape kit,
which means there was a sample of the rapist DNA,
And that becomes important later because after all, there was
no DNA testing back in nineteen eighty five anyway, So
later on though, we're going to get to that. So
(05:32):
by now, the victim had spent a considerable amount of
time with her attacker, and as a result, she was
able to help the police put together a composite sketch.
And this attacker had a particular mo too. Can you
talk about that, Drew.
Speaker 5 (05:46):
Yeah, So what had happened is Roswell Road is a
very long stretch of road in Atlanta. I want to
say it goes north and south, but I'm terrible with
things like that. But the real rapist was trolling up
and down and he would go to women and I
think they would kind of be in their twenties and
they would like blonde hair and blonde hair. And he
(06:06):
would say the same like have you seen and I
used to know the name Carol, Carol? Yeah, have you
seen Carol? And then he'd take him in the car.
Speaker 2 (06:15):
Right. So, five days after the first rape, on April tenth,
nearly the same thing occurred along Roswell Road, although this
ended up being an attempted rape, but still the same, Hey,
do you know Carol or where's Carol? Accept his second
victim when he tried to get her to take off
her clothes. I don't know how, but she was able
to talk him out of raping her. She went to
(06:36):
the police. They hear this similar MO from just five
days before, and they show her the composite sketch and
she agreed that this sketch resembled her would be rapist. So, Pete,
you've got nothing to do with this. You had nothing
to do this, but you lived in the area, So
can you tell us how you were dragged into this?
When you and two friends got pulled over on Roswell
(06:58):
Road one night.
Speaker 3 (07:00):
I was riding out right on Roswell and it was
stopping my car. It was stopped.
Speaker 4 (07:05):
I was passing on the car, So it was a
compositive skates going around in that area. So the way
that they arrested me, they told that I gave them
false information. That's just to get me there and get
my photograph, my picture to show the witness because I
gave them information while I was staying everything adequate.
Speaker 2 (07:26):
Oh, you gave them accurate information.
Speaker 4 (07:28):
Yes, of course, yeah, And they said yeah, they said
it was false. So you know, I couldn't all get
the police. So you're stop by the police.
Speaker 2 (07:36):
They have this composite sketch in the back of their
minds and they come up with a reason. They said
that you gave them false information, which wasn't true, but
they wanted an excuse to get your photograph to share
with these two women because they thought that you looked
enough like the sketch, so they arrested you.
Speaker 3 (07:56):
Then what I was there for a while.
Speaker 4 (07:58):
Wait, I was there maybe about four or five hours,
but it was a relative cheap.
Speaker 3 (08:02):
Bomb, you know.
Speaker 4 (08:03):
So I was born out maybe three to four hours
after I was arrested, and two weeks later I was
truble was rape, accuvate uselt and accovate us solomy, and
I was arrested and.
Speaker 3 (08:15):
I didn't know what they was talking about.
Speaker 2 (08:17):
Had you even heard about these?
Speaker 3 (08:19):
I didn't have the slightest idea.
Speaker 4 (08:21):
They said it was from POSSI circuling of rape was
out in that area, and I resembled it.
Speaker 2 (08:26):
Now did that sketch actually resemble you? Yeah, it actually did, right,
So so you resembled the sketch.
Speaker 3 (08:35):
So that was dead.
Speaker 4 (08:36):
I didn't, you know, I didn't. I haven't raped anybody.
I just resembled it on positive sketch.
Speaker 2 (08:42):
The sketch resembled you. And then I'm presuming you were
identified as well in the lineup on court.
Speaker 4 (08:49):
Oh, it was a lineup, and I was identified doing
the trial as well.
Speaker 2 (08:54):
I mean, we know that I witness misidentification is the
leading cause of runful convictions.
Speaker 5 (08:59):
And look, I'm just not the biggest believer in the
composite sketch because the composite sketch becomes the perpetrator, not
the perpetrator, and so it just happened to have favored him.
And then it's the composite sketch and anybody that looks
like them that replaces who the actual perpetrator is. So
(09:19):
I'm just not a believer in the whole composite sketch thing.
I just don't like where they lead, as in convictions
of innocent people in cases like this.
Speaker 2 (09:28):
So the charges were rape, aggravated assault, and aggravated sod
of me and true this is where you first entered
the picture. He became aware of Pete's case, and this
is at his trial where you were just a young
man just out of law school pretty much right at.
Speaker 5 (09:44):
The time, I was twenty five years old. I was
fresh out of law school, and I was an assistant
public defender assigned to mister William's courtroom where his case
took place. And I made it my practice then that
was just watch every case I could. I got it
up and I loved my job as a public defender,
and I just had him to watch his case and
(10:04):
then really started learning about it, and I watched the trial.
So what had happened is Roswell Road is a very
long stretch of road in Atlanta, but at some point
along the road it is the city of Atlanta, and
then it's no longer the city of Atlanta. Well, the
real rapist because it wasn't mister Williams. Anybody that watched
(10:25):
the trial would realize that because I watched the trial
and I'll talk about that later, and it was obvious
he was innocent. So, Jason, here's the crazy thing. One
jurisdiction handling it was City of Atlanta police. On the
other part of the road was Fulton County police. To
this day, I don't know if anybody's looked into did
they ever talk to one another? And in fact, if
(10:47):
you remember, on the City of Atlanta side, the City
of Atlanta police called the person the Roswell Road rapist.
But yet on the other side of the sign was
this case involving mister Williams. And I've apparently he got
arrested and then eventually they arrested the other guy who
I think pled out. Your case was on the ninth floor,
(11:08):
His case was on the seventh floor. Was on the seven, Yeah,
he was on seventh, on the eighth You're right, yeah,
And he pled out during his trial and I went
and watched his also, because the Public Defender's office did
that case.
Speaker 2 (11:24):
Wait, how far apart were the two difference?
Speaker 5 (11:26):
I can't remember the dates they weren't too far apart.
But I watched his and I read up on his
and I was like, well, this guy did it, and
it was astonishing, And.
Speaker 2 (11:35):
Let's go back to the pattern, right, because for whatever reason,
the attacker always did the same damn thing. Maybe he
thought that this was an effective way of him grabbing
these women, was by asking about this other woman, Carol
or Carolyn. Why he was fixating on that, Yeah, but
that was his thing. And he also had this car
(11:56):
that broke down a lot because a number of the
women and reported that. And what's crazy is that after
Pete was arrested, and three more attacks happened with the
same damn mL right, with exactly the same pattern, the
exact same pattern. And in fact, this man was responsible
clearly for all five attacks, but he only face charges
(12:19):
related to those three, And so the other two attacks
repined on you Pete and this other guy, Kenneth Wicker.
He finally got caught because his last victim heroically was
able to take down her attacker's license plate number. And
it turned out that Wicker lived right along Roswell Road
where all of these attacks were taking place, So it
(12:41):
would seem obvious to the casual observer that the DA
would hear about these other cases and this other arrest
and immediately stopped focusing on you, Pete. But that's not
what happened. And later all of this was brought up
in Europe, and I'm talking as early as nineteen eighty six,
(13:04):
but the DA just didn't fucking care about it then
or while he was prosecuting you in the first place.
Speaker 5 (13:12):
Sir Jason, Pete and I we just met downstairs and
we immediately engaged in a conversation about what I'm about
to bring up which has bothered him to this day,
and I'm going to tell it to you. And that
is our system, right relies on ethical prosecutors. Unfortunately, for
Pete Williams, his prosecutor turned out to be not so ethical,
(13:33):
as we know from several things, including the fact that
he's serving a life sentence in his own murder case
right now.
Speaker 2 (13:38):
The prosecutor.
Speaker 5 (13:39):
The prosecutor, oh blot twist, yes, I mean yeah, and
was also eventually charged not only with that murder, which
he was found guilty of, but being the lawyer for
a drug operation when he was in private practice. So
not the best guy in the world. And I bring
that up only because you would fathom that a decent,
(14:00):
ethical prosecutor, which there are many of out there, would
have realized this having been the lead prosecutor mister Williams case,
and said, uh, oh, we got problems. And that never happened.
He never had the ethics of a prosecutor that realized
what you just said and wanted to put an end
to his illegal incarceration. It just didn't happen, and there
(14:22):
was a real breakdown.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Yeah, I'm still trying to process this. This is a story.
I've heard a lot of stories and you know, doing
this since the early nineties.
Speaker 5 (14:32):
The irony is Pete said to me outside we agreed.
How come that didn't become the biggest part of the
story of Pete Williams's illegal conviction and incarceration. As he said,
I was serving my sentence and my prosecutor was hearting
his sentence at the exact same time.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
Oh so he went to prison while you were in this.
Well this is not the same.
Speaker 4 (14:53):
Prison, not the same prison, but he went doing mind cusurrection.
Speaker 2 (14:57):
Did you know that at the time?
Speaker 3 (14:59):
Yeah, I probably it.
Speaker 5 (15:00):
Is on Tell me Jason was one of the biggest
cases in the history of Atlanta. Yeah, yeah, I can't
even think in my thirty plus years of practice of
a federal case that they changed venue. It was such
a big case. But they actually had to change venue
to Birmingham in his federal case, his murder case, they
changed venue as well, and did it somewhere in the woods.
(15:20):
I don't know, rural Georgia, somewhere, but they actually moved
his federal case to Birmingham because they just couldn't get
a jury in Atlanta. Fred Tokars is his name. It
was one of the biggest cases in the history of Atlanta.
Speaker 2 (15:33):
So I took a second to look up Fred Tokars
and what I found out was batshit crazy, crazier than
what Pete and Drew had said. This Georgia prosecutor went
on to become a private attorney to some big time
drug dealers, but besides representing them, he was also helping
them hide their money in nightclubs, and eventually his wife, Sarah,
(15:55):
threatened to blow the whistle on his illegal and the
various activities, but instead of turning his life around, he
plotted to have her kidnapped and killed in front of
their four and six year old boys. Ricky and Mike.
I mean, what the actual buck. He was convicted of
(16:15):
racketeering in nineteen ninety four and eventually also convicted for
Sarah's murder, receiving a life sentence without the possibility of parole.
He was held in secret custody as a marked man,
and since this interview is recorded, despite his more treacherous
than usual situation in prison, Fred Tokers died in May
of twenty twenty in a Pennsylvania prison hospital due to
(16:40):
complications related to a neurological disorder.
Speaker 5 (16:44):
And that was the prosecutor that put mister Williams away.
Speaker 2 (16:48):
So, I mean, it's just an unbelievable twist of fate,
right that the guy who was responsible for ruining your
life ends up in May. The Pacers Foundation is a
proud supporter of this episode and of the Last Mile organization,
(17:11):
which provides business and tech training to help incarcerated individuals
successfully and permanently re enter the workforce. The Pacers Foundation
is committed to improving the lives of Hoosiers across Indiana,
supporting organizations dedicated primarily to helping young people and students.
For more information on the work of the Pacers Foundation
(17:32):
or the Last Mile program visit Pacersfoundation dot org or
the Lastmile dot org. This episode is sponsored by AIG,
a leading global insurance company, and Paul Weiss Rifkin, Wharton
and Garrison, a leading international law firm. The AIG pro
Bono Program provides free legal services and other support to
(17:54):
many nonprofit organizations and individuals most in need, and recently
they announced that work to reform the criminal justice system
will become a key pillar of the program's mission. Paul
Weiss has long had an unwavering commitment to providing impactful
pro bono legal assistance to the most vulnerable members of
our society and in support of the public interest, including
(18:15):
extensive work in the criminal justice area. You end up
getting sentenced to basically a life sentence. Yeah, forty five
years to life. And you were twenty four at the time. Yeah,
so forty five to life. And of course what I
(18:36):
five the life really means life because ultimately it'd be
sixty eight years old and they'd be asking you to
lead guilty.
Speaker 4 (18:42):
Yeah, and the way to ad my sonos lined up
fifteen teen and twenty do to fifteen one, I do
to fifteen do to team finish the team do to twining.
Speaker 5 (18:52):
It was consecutive sentences.
Speaker 2 (18:55):
So how did you deal with this? I mean, you're
behind bars, convicted rapist, looking at spending your the rest
of your life there? How did you find the strength
to even continue on and ultimately contact and reach out
and get this incredible team behind you that led to
your exoneration and you know, vindication.
Speaker 4 (19:16):
Mm. Well, my first ten year of priism, man, I
was stayed in the whole segregation of fault all the time,
in subordination because I felt like there was no hope,
so I might as well be part of the prism,
you know. And I met this guy after ten years.
(19:36):
He's sung gospel and he always went to church, and
he would always happen, you know, and he had more
time than that. He had a life sent and some time,
but he never showed it. He never showed it. And
I wanted to know why, you know why. It wasn't
about it, he said the church, Man, I seen in
the gospel. It makes me feel better. So I used
to go out and saying it first, because I really
(19:56):
didn't know any gospels, you know what I mean. But
once I got to going and listening to gospel, a
few gospel songs, and I started liking it when I
became part or choir for about five years, and that's
where a guy was in there. He had a booklet
concerning MCENT projects. So I got it and I started
writing him and told him that it was I had
(20:18):
some evidence.
Speaker 2 (20:19):
Was this Georgia and is project or New York and.
Speaker 3 (20:21):
Georgia and Georgia.
Speaker 4 (20:22):
Yeah, And they got concerned to what kind of evidence
you had? So I was writing 'em and I told 'em,
and some way they got a hold of it. They
said they had destroyed it here and what eighty seven?
They said they destroyed all that.
Speaker 3 (20:34):
But Cliff.
Speaker 4 (20:34):
Some way, Cliff had talked to some at the GBI,
being some female, and she allowed him.
Speaker 3 (20:39):
Back there and lo and behold, that was my uh evidence.
Speaker 2 (20:46):
And the evidence at the Georgia Bureau of Investigation that
Pete is referring to is the real rapist DNA sample
from the rape kit, and they were finally able to
test it to not only exclude Pete, but they also
tested against the DNA of the man who had pleaded
guilty to those other rapes that had happened during the
same time period. A long roswell road and sure enough, Bengo,
(21:07):
it's him. But of course this incredible revelation did not
come without roadblocks and even being told that the evidence
was destroyed, which we hear a lot when fighting cases
like these, And Drew, let's go back to you on this.
It's I mean, it's just nuts that we don't have
a nationwide standard for maintaining evidence. In fact, practices are
(21:31):
different all over. Some are good and some are, like,
let's face it, like a third world country.
Speaker 5 (21:37):
There's really no national consistency. And so you know when
you say earlier, which I completely agree with, that we
probably have well over one hundred thousand innocent people in
our prison systems, and that's probably a low number. We
think about if we had consistency in the preservation of evidence,
what would we'd be able to do. It's really going
(21:59):
to require a coordinated effort. But it's the only right
thing to do.
Speaker 2 (22:03):
There's just absolutely no argument against it. There's nothing bad
about preserving evidence.
Speaker 5 (22:08):
Well, there's nothing bad about preserving evidence. But then you
hear about the Georgia Innocence Project. I went down to
making on behalf of them and argued about just having
somebody's testing done and prosecutors objected to testing being done.
Why would you ever object to testing being done? Why
would you ever object to being able to check off
(22:31):
the list the possibility that somebody innocent is in jail
for many years, if not their life. And it's that
same type of flawed logic that would have some say, well,
we don't need to take up the room, We don't
need to do the logistics aren't there for storage. You
could just fathom the arguments that are coming, you know,
because prosecutors want to believe and law enforcement want to
(22:51):
believe that once they have a conviction, it's the right conviction,
and so you can always deal with that sentiment, which
is wrong. Yeah, that's the sentiment. It's the same sentiment
that dictates around the country when good folks are fighting
a behalf of the innocents project to have testing done
and they're in courtrooms at the podium facing prosecutors that
don't want testing to be done.
Speaker 4 (23:14):
To me, why would you want to destroy ivernandek trio person.
Speaker 2 (23:20):
And identify the actual perpetrator like it does.
Speaker 3 (23:22):
I don't even know what to think of that. I
don't Thank.
Speaker 2 (23:26):
God they hadn't actually destroyed the evidence from your case
because they actually exculpated you, and it ended up causing
you to be released from prison on January twenty third,
two thousand and seven. And subsequently it matched up to
Kenneth Wicker, who had already pleaded guilty all those years ago.
(23:48):
He was then arrested on February ninth, two thousand and
seven for the April fifth and tenth incidents. Then four
days later, you were granted a new trial on February
thith thirteenth, and the DA subsequently dropped all charges.
Speaker 4 (24:04):
Dropped all the charge you know, they took the rape
and everything away from my report.
Speaker 2 (24:10):
So you were in court when.
Speaker 3 (24:12):
All the charges were actually dropped.
Speaker 2 (24:14):
And what was that like?
Speaker 3 (24:15):
How?
Speaker 2 (24:15):
Who was there? A lot of family? Was it a
hot Yeah?
Speaker 4 (24:18):
My family, My family there, and there was a lot
of people, you know, they was happy for me, you know,
even people I didn't know, you know, like even the
police is. And as a matter of fact, one of
the police that was used to take me back and forth,
the colt, and she came down and said, I always
knew you was innocent.
Speaker 2 (24:36):
Wow, how'd that feel?
Speaker 3 (24:39):
Wonderful man, wonderful.
Speaker 2 (24:41):
And it's worth noting that in about fifty percent of
the instance project cases where DNA has has exculpated an
exonerate led to the exoneration of an innocent person. It
has also led to the identification of the guilty person.
That's absolutely right, and in those cases, of course, that
person has gone on to have committed other heinous crimes.
Speaker 3 (25:05):
Yes, when you.
Speaker 2 (25:06):
Lock up the wrong person, you stop looking for the
right person, and then that person that's out there is
most likely going to go and do what they did again.
It's just a practical issue of we should all want
to clean up these systems as best we can so
that ourselves and our families are safe.
Speaker 5 (25:24):
I mean, well, you know, look, Jason, I think it's
it's symptomatic of a larger issue. It's a symptomatic of
our problem with mass incarceration of this country. I think
it's all that is really tied in. We don't as
defense attorneys and accuse citizens. You know, we don't control
the fact that, as you well know, we represent five
(25:46):
percent of the world's population, but closing in on twenty
five percent of the world's incarcerated population. We don't dictate that.
And I don't want this to be a session where
I'm kind of talking about prosecutors, but they control so much.
Pete's case is emblematic of the problem. You had a
prosecutor with an antisocial disorder that went on to be
involved in a murder himself, and as a twenty five
(26:07):
year old, fresh out of law school kid, I watched
what I thought was an unethical prosecution, and I watched
a man lose his freedom because to this prosecutor, it
was a game. It wasn't about justice, and that's why Peede,
I made a decision that I was going to spend
the rest of my life defending people because of your case.
It was just a job. At that point. I didn't
know anything about a public defender. I never even met
(26:29):
a lawyer until my first law school class. I have
humble beginnings, but your case dictated to me what I
wanted to spend the rest of my life doing. I
watched that prosecutor game the system. It was just a
(26:51):
game to him, and unfortunately, the power that being a
prosecutor brings is often results in misguided prosecutions because they
have the ability, if they handle ethically, to make sure
to the best of their ability, that just doesn't happen
to make sure that evidence is preserved, to make sure
(27:11):
that there is proper identification procedures, and they have the
ability to be that wall, that last wall of justice
to say, you know, I don't I don't need a
motion to suppress identification because as the prosecutor, I don't
like the way this went down. We talk so much
about ourselves as defense attorneys and what our job is,
but we need to be spending a lot of time
(27:32):
looking at the other side of the courtroom. And I
get that there's integrity units closing up, but it needs
to be a lot greater than that. It needs to
be a lot better than just every once in a
while a progressive prosecutor running for office. It needs to
be all over the country because he has the benefit
of this happening in Atlanta, But when we go to
the rural South, the smaller communities in Mississippi and Alabama
(27:58):
and Tennessee, sadly so a lot of Pete Williams that
are serving life sentences from prosecutors that were as misguided
and as corrupt as the one in his case.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
And that's why it's so important for people to get
out and vote in prosecutor races because most people don't.
The number of people that vote in these races is
so small that if you don't think your vote makes
a difference, it does. I mean we've seen races that
ended up in a dead heat like Tiede. You know,
like your vote is important. And if your one of
these people think, oh, I'm not going to vote in
the psidential election, it doesn't matter. Yes it does. It
(28:32):
matters in the presidentialism, but it matters a lot more
in your local elections where your your DA is running
and you know, and electing a progressive prosecutor, which that's
not even the right word, a fair prosecutor could affect
your life as well, because this could happen to you,
It could happen to Pete, it could happen to anybody.
We see it over and over again on this show.
(28:52):
And then let's even talk about it from a purely
fiscal level, you know, for any conservatives that are listening,
When we think about the amount of money that the
tax of Georgia paid well upwards of a million dollars,
probably closer to two million dollars to keep Pete locked up,
and then any other income that he would have been
able to earn and pay taxes on and you know
all the rest of this stuff. That's a pretty big
(29:14):
thing too. I just learned the other day on a
tangential note, that we spend forty million dollars a day
in America on pre trial detention, right just because people
can't post bail. Forty million a day to lock people
up who haven't been convicted of anything. That's a day.
That's your tax dollars at work and mine, by the way,
(29:34):
and whoever's listening, it's nuts. I mean, we lock up
more people than Russia and China combined. Back to your
previous point, we locked black people up at six times
the rate of South Africa at the height of apartheid.
And if you're a woman listening, then you should just
process this for a second, because while you know what
Drew said is certainly scary and true about us having
(29:55):
twenty five percent of the world's prison population, we have
thirty three percent of the world's female prison population. That
means one out of every three women in prison in
the world is in America, which is such a small
country when you look at the vast world that's out there,
and the more we can do to get out there
and spread the message. And the more you do to
get out there and vote and get active and volunteer,
(30:16):
go to Georgia Innis's project a website, you know, learn more.
Contact NACDL. What is it, NACDL dot org exactly, NACDL
dot org. That's National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers dot org.
Speaker 5 (30:28):
So I'm glad you brought up kind of where people
fall on the political continuum. You should know that the
term just finished and there's a new governor here. But
our last governor, Nathan dial As a Republican, two term Republican,
and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers gave him
a Champion I gave him a Champion of Justice Award
for his work on criminal justice reform. And so you
(30:48):
hit on it. No matter where you are, left wing,
right wing, no wing, we are any period of time
right now where people are really focusing on criminal justice reform.
And I think that you bring up all the numbers,
they're startling and it can impact anybody, you know, whether
it's the fact that our prison systems are warehousing the
mentally ill an adult autistic population. There's so many things
(31:13):
that attract people. The National Association of Criminal Defense lawyers.
As you know, we have our foundation for criminal justice
and we really embrace non lawyers to be part of it.
Our long term goal is to get non lawyers into
our leadership track. Let them be trustees. We need people
to reach out to us. We just want everyday citizens
(31:34):
to be involved, come to our meetings, and Jason's right,
there may not be an election that may impact your
life more than who your local district attorney is. Have
them answer to your questions. Folks need to take these
stories to heart, and which is why this podcast is
so important. They need to understand that not everybody is
(31:56):
going to be blessed with the opportunity to connect up
with the Innocence Project. So listen to podcasts like this
and get involved the most you can.
Speaker 2 (32:05):
And that is once again an ACDL dot org National
Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers. Now we have this tradition
at Wrongful Conviction, which is my favorite part of the show,
which is where I get to just sit back and
listen and I leave the microphones on for you guys
for any closing thoughts that you want to share. And
(32:29):
because Pete is the honored guest here, not that you're not,
but you know, he's the star of the show. I'm
going to let him go last, and so drew any
parting shots.
Speaker 5 (32:40):
Pete. I just want to wish you the best and
let you know that the tragedy that occurred to you
influence the course of my existence. So my family, all
my clients, I want to hug you.
Speaker 2 (33:02):
Pete.
Speaker 3 (33:04):
Oh.
Speaker 4 (33:05):
I'm glad y'all had it broadcast to let people know
that things like that actually happen. People do go to
jail wrong for their convicted, and I'm just glad you
all been a publan note that these things actually happen.
Speaker 2 (33:26):
Thank you for listening to Wrongful Conviction. You can listen
to this and all the Lava for Good podcasts one
week early and ad free 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 Clibern.
The music in this production was supplied by three time
(33:46):
OSCAR 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 podcast and association with Signal Company Number One.
Speaker 5 (34:02):
We have worked hard to ensure that all facts reported
in this show are accurate. The views and opinions expressed
by the individuals featured in this show are their own
and do not necessarily reflect those of love of for
Good
Hosts And Creators
Lauren Bright Pacheco
Maggie Freleng
Jason Flom
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