February 2, 2023 • 44 mins
In October 1997, Skip Clark was killed in York, PA. Police officers decided that the death was gang related, and that two gangs were out for each other after having a dispute. Tysheem Crocker was dragged into the conversation. The State argued that he and others plotted to retaliate against their rival gang, and that Skip was caught in the middle. Despite four witnesses testifying that they knew who the killer was and that it was not Tysheem, and despite the fact that his whereabouts were accounted for at the time of the crime, Tysheem was convicted and sentenced to life in prison.
To learn more and get involved, visit:
https://www.facebook.com/justuiceforTysheem/
https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B074SPJV6N/about
Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.
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 Lava for Good.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Listen
Watch
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
In October nineteen ninety seven, two overlapping groups of friends
from New York, one known as the Cream Team, the
other is the Gods, were living in York, Pennsylvania. Three
of these young men were Danny Steele, Melvin Bethune, and
Taysheen Crocker. On October fifth, nineteen ninety seven, at a
corner dice game, Melvin and Taisheim spoke to another New
York guy about a previous beef when gunshots rang out
(00:25):
and the crowd dispersed, but no one was hurt until
about five minutes later and two blocks away, when a
young man named Raymond Clark had been fatally shot. When
the investigation of the murder led to Danny Steele, he
told the police that Raymond's death was part of a
larger organized action involving a disagreement between rival New York gangs.
At the dice game, he alleged that Melvin and Taysheem
(00:47):
had rounded up some muscle from back in New York,
including Steel and three others, to confront the opposing gang,
the Gods. In the lead up to this confrontation, they
allegedly checked into a motel and hatched a plan that
allegedly was resulted in the death of Raymond Clark. Clearly,
local law enforcement had only one choice to believe Danny
Steele and do their part on the front lines of
(01:10):
America's war on drugs by taking as many of these
New York gangsters off their streets as they possibly could.
But this is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to ronful Conviction. Today,
(01:34):
we're going to cover a case in which the soul
assailant who is responsible for the murder got off with
less than three years for giving false testimony against two
innocent men. And I'm going to introduce one of those
men now. He's calling in from a maximum security prison
in Pennsylvania. Tayshim, Crocker, even though I hate the reason
why you're at where you're at, but I got to say,
(01:55):
I'm really happy and honored to have you.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
I'm glad i'm here. Thank you, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
You're most welcome. And with him is his post conviction
pro bono attorney, the Tsia Shaviz Free Latsia. Welcome to
the show.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Jason, You're also very welcome, so tayshim. This crime happened
in Pennsylvania, but you're not from there, originally from the Bronx, right,
So tell me a little bit about your childhood.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
I was born to a teenage mother. My mom was sixteen.
You know, she wasn't ready to be a mother yet,
so she picked me in, forced a kid, and I
spent my first four years out in Queens. It was
like eighty one. She decided she wanted to be back.
I moved back to the Bronx. It was rough, we
were poor. I was pretty much terrified at my mom.
(02:40):
That was like the only person I was scared of.
Around the ages twelve, I was back and forced to
kid and out of her presidence. I just became a.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Street kid, so tayshim. He had a pretty hard life
and was living in the Bronx. You know, this is
at the height of the epidemic. Friends of his are
literally dying.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
I went after Yo Kia because my best friend has
just got cute. I was fourteen, he was fifteen, and
he got cute. The next day, another one of my
closest friends got cute, and I was off for the
opportunity to go to York. So I jumped on the
bus and went out there.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
What did you do to support yourself to survive out there.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
I started hustling. I started taking pass from people older gous.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
So this is the sort of thing where you did
the dirty work for the older guys because in theory,
at least a miner wouldn't get into that much trouble, right.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
That's how it goes.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
So it's my understanding that's a pretty low level drug dealer.
Him and a lot of the kids. He also runs
with a group of young people known as like the
Cream Team. And you know, there's several groups, but two
of them are called the Gods and the other one's
the Cream Team. The District Attorney's office tried to paint
this as some gang, but really Cream just means cash
(03:57):
rules everything around me.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
So they were Wu Tang fans, yes, And I mean
anyone who's aware of Wu Tang Cash rules everything around
me is probably there could be their most iconic song
and terms like gods and earths. Some of the members
of Wu Tang are really into the theories of the
five percent nation where those terms come from. And we
could get into all of that on a totally different podcast.
But Wu Tang had just come out with their debut album,
(04:19):
entered the thirty six Chambers in nineteen ninety three. So
guys like Tayshim and Melbourne that was the soundtrack of
their childhood.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
The Cream Team and the guys were once of kids
from the Bronx. We was rolling up together. We went
to the same schools, Eat pautied together, and we ended
up in Pennsylvania hustling.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
So were you on the radar of the York Police
before all of this happened.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
I talked about a week in prison for a couple
backs in marijuana, and I was like eighteen up there.
It was like forty.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Grand, forty fucking grand for some weed. Jesus well, I
mean this was the nineties when the War on drugs
was in full swing. It still is, unfortunately with the
large ETI and if you're listening to us right now,
you might want to check out our new series called
The War on Drugs. We're gonna have it linked in
the bio. Check it out the War on Drugs podcast.
And back then, as we've seen time and again on
(05:10):
this program, even involving a low level drug deal and
could make that person a target for a wrongful conviction.
So let's get to early October nineteen ninety seven and
the lead up to this dice game and the shooting,
there was some actual beef that had started a few
days before between your co defendant, Melvin Bethune and a
friend of this guy can Do Smith, and this served
(05:30):
as an a legend motive for what happened later. But
this was kind of like a small time beef, right.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
There was no conflict that rose to the level of
want to take.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
A life right, and Kendo Smith wasn't the victim anyway,
but rather a guy named Raymond skip Clark, who I'm
guessing was one of the gods as well.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
No, he wasn't a member of the gods. He wasn't
even flims with Smith that I know of. Got night.
No guys were at this dice game except can Do Smith.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
So the states there about a beef between the Gods
and the Cream team is not holding up so far.
It's full of holes. But this beef, however, inconsequential, was
something you intended to bring up with Ken du Smith
when you saw him at the dice game. This was
October fifth, nineteen ninety seven, on the corner of Maple
and Duke in New York, Pennsylvania, where there was a
regular dice game. Kend Do Smith was there as well
(06:20):
as Melvin Bethune Danny Steele. You had just got back
from the Bronx and a bit before eleven pm you
arrived at the game and Raymond Clarke was there as well.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
I never saw Raymond Clark that man, but according to
court documents, he was at the dice game. He was
playing games. I got to the dice game and I
told the work I needed to talk to him. Before
we could talk, a shot was fired. He ran and
I ducked. No one knows who fired that shot. It
came from behind me. When I ducked and I land,
(06:52):
you know it was more shots fired. No one was injured.
Approximately five to ten minutes later and two blocks away,
according to shots Rush script, bore shots were fire. That
is who Raymond Clark was shot at out at the
dunt game.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
So not only had you not even seen the victim
at the dice game, but at this point you had
no idea that anyone had even gotten hurt. So shots
were fired, everyone scattered, total chaos. Did you have a clue?
Did anyone have a clue why this was even happening?
Speaker 3 (07:20):
There is essentially no serious beef at the time where
they feel like they should be targeted for any reason.
But they're taking off because there's gunfire and they know
what gunfire can do.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
So when they got a hotel.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
But according to the state's theory, you checked into the
hotel before going to the dice game before Raymond Clark's death,
sometime between like ten and eleven PM.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
That is what they wanted the jury in the court
to believe. I checked into the Super eight at about
twelve thirty one in the morning. I let Mel know
where I was going, I left there and even where
I was going, and they spent the night with me.
Speaker 1 (07:59):
And at that point, not only did you not know
that Skip Clark was dead, but you also didn't know
that your boy Danny Steele was about to use a
shared room at the Super eight as a premise for
a false statement, which really ends up being the basis
of the state's entire case. And we'll get to that
in a bit. But first, letitia, what do we know
about the initial investigation, Like how did they even end
(08:19):
up coming upon Danny?
Speaker 3 (08:21):
So we have no idea exactly what happened. Ty Shim's lawyer,
the person who would have gotten the box of evidence
or whatever he's passed. When we go to Melvin's attorney,
this is over twenty plus years ago.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
He doesn't have that box, so the usual trough of
information was not available. But what we do know about
this incident is that there were a thought of witnesses,
some of whom spoke with you and your lead investigator,
Kitty Haley way later in twenty twenty one.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Well, what we find out later is that Raymond Clark
he's found with drugs on his person, and it is
noted that he apparently owed Danny Steele some money.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Turns out maybe I think like a week after that,
Danny was interrogated, and.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
At least four people have testified both the trial and
in post conviction that Danny Steele was the shooter. So
that should have been it, but instead a story at
a strategy was being concocted with Danny Steele in order
to drag more people down the rabbit hole with him,
turning this tragedy into an opportunity for the authorities to
(09:26):
sweep the streets from those they considered undesirable, namely Melvin
and Taysheen, who for months went about their lives eventually
hearing about Raymond Clark's death and having no idea that
one of their friends, Danny, was saving himself from life
in prison at their expense by creating this phony narrative
in which members of the Cream team met at the
Super eight Motel and conspired to confront the Gods at
(09:47):
this dice game about the beef with Melvin. And this
group allegedly included Tayshim, Melvin, Danny, and three other men
from New York, one of whom was named Corleone.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Coleon was a made up figure Danny Steele made up
so he could tend this homicide on somebody he made
on a shooter.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
It's like they sat around and watched The Godfather and
then went and tried a case. That's how it feels.
Some guy named Corleone who's never been identified, and some
other guys from New York, they all go to the
Super eight Motel and they want blood for what happened
to Melvin yesterday. Melvin was disrespected or something, and they
want blood. So they're all going to get guns from
(10:26):
a friend's house and then they're going to go down
there and shoot up the Gods at a dice game.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Now, The theory continued that in order to arrive at
the Dice Game before the shootings took place around eleven
thirty pm, this alleged crew of Muscle from the Bronx
had to have checked into the Super eight Motel by
ten thirty PM or earlier in order to have time
for a thirty to sixty minute plotting session as well
as picking up the guns. But when they arrived at
the Dice Game, Tayshim allegedly pointed a gun to Kendu
(10:53):
Smith and tried to shoot him, but the gun allegedly
malfunctioned and didn't fire, so the rest of this alleged
team hit squad open fire and everyone at the Dice
Game ran for their lives. No one was hurt, and
Ken Dusmith has since gone on the record saying that
Tayshen never pulled a gun on him. Other eyewitnesses also
corroborated that the only evidence of this version events is
(11:13):
Danny Steele's statement, which continued saying that then he another
man and this fictitious guy named Corleone chased Raymond skip Clark,
and this fictional Corleone guy, not Danny Steele, allegedly shot
and killed Clark. So that's how Steele shifted total blame
from himself and alleged that he was just a co conspirator,
(11:34):
not the loan shooter.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
Now, Danny Steele, this is important. He has charged with
the exact same crimes as Melvin and Tysheen, so you
would think he'd get the exact same punishment or close
for murder. For conspiracy to commit murder, he did two
years in the county jail, presumably because he couldn't go
(11:56):
to state prison because you know, he was a known snip.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
From what I understand, he had also been convicted of
perjury twice before. So this is the guy on whom
the entirety of the state's case rests and what they
used to issue arrest warrants for both Melbourne and Taysheem.
And at the time, Melvin had just pled guilty to
some unrelated drug charges.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
Correct. He takes a plea and he's getting ready to
go to prison, and the police come to let him
know that he's been indicted on these charges, and he's
just shocked. There's no conversation. They don't take him down
to the police station and interview him.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
They had all the information they wanted from Danny Steele. Now, tyshim,
you were back in New York at the time, and
during a routine traffic stop, NYPD discovered that you were
wanted in New York, Pennsylvania.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
No Manchila got arrested, that I was a fugitive. I
got picked up January nineteen ninety eight and forty fifth
feet with twenty seventh and eighth Avenue. I was arrested
and I haven't been on a street service. And while
PD picks me up, I'm extradited down to York where
I was charged.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
When he gets to York and he's in the County jail,
there's no interview. The information and the story has already
been told by Danny Steele. But there's literally a fifteen
minute drive at one point from one drop off location
to the jail with a police officer.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
Dennis Williams was the arresting detective. While he's driving me
to the York County prison, he said, I know you
didn't kill Rainey Clock, but I do know you're part
of the Cream team. I can get you a deal
if you cooperate, And I told him I didn't know
nothing innocent. A few months after that, They offered me
(13:48):
another deal five to ten, and I turned that down.
The day trial started, they offered me another deal if
they were going to dismiss all degrees of homicide if
I played guilty's in aggravated, and so chunk that down.
Dennis Williams Bull should be the deal. A dandy deal
ended up kidting.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Danny Steele did less than three years in the county jail.
That's jail, right, not prison, And that was part of
his deal to avoid running into other people who he
had flipped on previously. And so no one was ever
charged with being skipped. Clark's shooter Corleone certainly wasn't. It's
hard to charge a ghost after all. And now all
three of you had been charged with murder, but only
(14:45):
by way of conspiracy and accomplished liability. And this is
why your arrival time at the Super eight motel is
so important to the state's theory, as is the part
of Danny Steele's testilize where he alleged that you drew
a gun on Kendo Smith that never did fire.
Speaker 3 (14:58):
So conspiracy liability requires proof of an agreement or a
common design to commit the lawful act for which the
person is convicted. So a person cannot be convicted of
conspiracy from merely being present during the commission of a crime.
There has to be some step taken, some proof of
the agreement, you know, and then obviously the crime. For
(15:22):
accomplass liability, it requires more than mere presence during the
commission of a criminal act, even if the accused knew
that the crime was to be committed. So we see
like accomplss liability like after the fact, you know, someone
who's helping to conceal or clean something up. So these
are really what tayshim as well as Melvin were convicted under. Also,
(15:45):
you know, a lot of that prosecutorial case led on
something called transferred intent, which basically means if I pull
out a gun and I'm trying to shoot you, but
I accidentally shoot your friend or someone's standing next to you,
you know, it would have been attempted murder because I
purposefully knowingly was aiming at you. But it's still first
(16:07):
degree murder even though I had no intention of killing
your friend, because the intention had already formed. And so
throughout the trial we'll hear of transferred intent in those transcripts.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
So because you were alleged to have met beforehand, establishing
the intent, and then followed through with your part of
the supposed conspiracy by allegedly pulling a gun on Ken
du Smith that then made you, in turn responsible in
some degree for the murder of Skip Clark, the alleged
end result of this alleged organized confrontation.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
I do, I end it. I didn't realize what conspiracy
laws accomplished liability was. I didn't realize when you moved
pieces on a chessboard to Atlanta, the way you want
it to be seen, you can make something look like
something that it wasn't. We were kids, you know, in
our adversary we used for chrome, men seasoned, you know,
politicians prosecuted. And I did not realize what was going
(17:03):
on until it was too.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
Late, that they had fabricated a narrative with Danny Steele
to convict you through these conspiracy and accomplished liability laws
that you were unaware of. So Melvin was already in
prison for the unrelated drug charges, so he didn't bond out,
but neither did you. You both were being held separately
from Danny Steele, but at this point you didn't even
know about what he had done. Right, So when did
(17:25):
you first realize what he was doing to you?
Speaker 2 (17:27):
The first time I see him is at my preliminary here,
and he's testifying against me. You know, he's saying that
I'm the leader of the Cream team that prior to
the Dice Game shooting, that we met at a motel
and agreed to kill someone. Actually at the preliminary here
when he said we agreed to step to these guys
to try to squash this beef. With the proceedings, his testimony,
(17:49):
you know, would constantly change and get more dramatic and
more incriminating.
Speaker 3 (17:54):
There were a lot of inconsistencies in the telling of
these various stories by Danny Steele, but there wasn't necessarily
a rigorous, vigorous defense from Taishim's counsel. Melvin's council, when
looking at the transcript, tended to do a better job right.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Both families had hired counsel prior to the January ninety
nine trial, but only Melvin's family was able to pay
and maintain counsel.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
So this attorney that was representing me at the time,
Allen Smith, you know, he was never paid him full
and he thought the motion to withdraws council. I didn't
know that. I could have still been getting counsel by
the state, which probably would have been a bad attorney anyway,
as bad as he was. But he never did nothing
after that, after the judge told him the motion was denied,
(18:43):
we countinue to proceed to trial without an investigation of
what going on.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
So it sounds like you didn't even have an attorney.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
Absolutely, I didn't have an attorney. I didn't have a suit,
I didn't have shoes, I didn't have family, I didn't
have an attorney.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
Tayshiem would come to the courthouse not a suit, but
in an orange jumpsuit. So this was not, you know,
someone being able to put forth their best defense, and.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
In order to combat the state, especially with what we
now know that they were willing to hide, you were
going to need a vigorous investigation from zealous attorneys and
a whole team that would have done things like carul
Ken do Smith to the stand. He has since gone
on the record that you did not, in fact point
to gun at him, which directly contradicts the state's narratives. Now,
how your counsel didn't at least contact can do is
(19:30):
just it's irresponsible and desire it. It's disgusting, actually. But
even more bizarre is how Danny Steele did something on
the stand that even I've never heard of before.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
Throughout the trial, he kept mentioning that, you know, he
was incentivized, that he's hoping, he's hoping that the prosecutors
do right by him and only give him two to
five years in the county. And that's exactly what they
give him.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
He literally told the judge and jury why his own
statement was unreliable. He's like, I'm receiving a benefit for
lying here. He's spelling it out. Now, how are they
supposed to trust anything he said? But they did. I
can't get over this, and we already went over what
Steele said before the shooting At the dice game, he
plays Taysheem Melvin, himself and three other guys, including this
(20:15):
Corleone character, at the Super eight motel between ten and
eleven PM for this conspiracy meeting, and the manager of
the Super eight guy named Alfred Milburn, corroborated this. Why
we're not sure because the clerk who actually checked Taysheim
into the hotel, the person who actually knew this information
was a woman named Terry Flinch boss Siler and what
(20:36):
she told police directly and totally contradicted Albert Milburn's phony narrative.
Speaker 3 (20:42):
She's the one who checks Tyshi Min. She knows this now.
Raymond Clark dies at eleven thirty pm that night, That's
when he's shot. We know this for a fact. She
doesn't come on until eleven pm.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Right. The state spoke to her, but they didn't want
to hear about how Tayshiim checked it at twelve thirty
one o'clock in the morning at this conspiracy meeting. In fact,
that never took place.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
She tried to offer help and they didn't want to
hear it. She had documents, you know, where he signed,
as well as any telephone calls he would have made
out of that room because it's the nineties, and they
could have turned that over to Tayshim's lawyers, and that
never happened.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
And perhaps these documents the telephone records may have also
been timestamped.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Miss Flinch boss Siler says that the records she maintained
for the hotel have a bottom section which indicates the
exact times the calls made from each room, So it's
not known if the police or prosecutors were in possession
of that part of the document, But the documents used
at trial were the only ones that she was asked
(21:46):
to review that she was asked to talk about. And
they don't have the exact times the calls made.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
And no one from the defense went looking for call logs.
It's totally irresponsible. I mean, have been helpful to know
what time the calls were made, but that specifically wasn't
in the documents used by the state of trial. And
from what I understand, they deliberately limited Terry Flinch boss
Siler's testimony.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
She was told by the prosecutors, you're not allowed to speak.
You're going to answer yes or no to my questions.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
Right. They were merely trying to establish that a phone
call had taken place, but they specifically did not want
to know when, and they definitely didn't want to know
when her shift started or when Tyshim, Melvin and Danny
would checked in because that would have blown up their case.
They knew about Terry and these phone records, so it
looks like they knew that they were presenting false testimony. Now,
the phone call was important to them because it corroborated
Melvin's presence at the alleged conspiracy meeting. It was alleged
(22:41):
that he had called his girlfriend at the time, Na've
Tucker Redmond, and told her what his intention was, which
was to go down to the dice game and shoot
up the gods. It was also alleged that a fourteen
year old girl named Nicky Rhodes overheard this conversation. The
state made a number of false statements during opening and
closing that they never backed up by calling these alleged
witnesses Tucker and Nicki.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
Our investigator was able to speak with Talker, so she
was dating Melvin. She did speak with him that night.
She never told the prosecutor or the police that Melvin
was interested in hurting or shooting up the young men
on the corner plane craps. When she discovered what the prosecutor,
specifically Prosecutor Kelly, had said in open court, she was
(23:26):
not present at the time, but she became incensed to
learn that he claimed she came to court willingly she
was subpoenaed to come to court, and that he had
lied about what she had heard and said that evening.
When she discovered that the prosecutor, during a Sidebar had
told the judge that her conversation was overheard and passed
(23:49):
along by Nicki Rhodes. She proclaimed that also to be alive.
Niki confirmed that she had no knowledge of the interaction
between Melvin Bethune and talker Redman on the of the
shooting of Skip Clark. She was adamant that she was
a younger at the time with no knowledge of anything
related to the crime. She did not testify, and she
was not asked to testify.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
I guess the state strategy was, if you're going to lie,
go big, and they were able to hide those lies
from these alleged witnesses because witnesses aren't typically allowed to
sit in court to watch the proceedings, but here it
seems this rule was a convenient way to hide them
from what was being said about them. Like Kalanda Chance,
who had told the police that she had been at
the scene earlier in the evening but left prior to
(24:32):
the shooting. I knew nothing about it. Now, what did
she tell your investigator? Kitty Hayley. In twenty twenty one.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Klanda Chance she was provided with a copy of the
trial transcript and was upset to read that the prosecutor
was attempting to tie her into a web of lies
about Melvin wanting to shoot up men on the corner.
She never knew about the plan to use her as
a link between Taker Redman's conversation and the actual shooting.
(24:58):
She further claimed that the prosecutors were trying to make
two groups of friends, the Cream Team and the Guards,
look like a hardened criminal gang, even though that was
not so.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
But even if you want to believe that these two
groups were hardened criminal organizations help ent on destroying the
otherwise decent, hardworking town of York, Pennsylvania, the evidence simply
doesn't support the state's theory. Terry flinch buss Siler was
the clerk who checked Taishim into the Super eight, and
her shift started at eleven PM, So even if he
was waiting there for her shift to start before he
checked in, there's just not enough time to check in.
(25:30):
The Cream Team have a thirty minute to an hour
long meeting to conspire about confronting the Gods. Go to
another dress to pick up the guns, go to the
dice game, shoot up the place, and then chase down
and kill Raven Skip Clark by eleven thirty do all
that shit in thirty minutes.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
It's impossible, and they knew it was impossible, but they
went with the dewy and the judge told the jilly
that is Ty wasn't at that motel prior to the shooting.
Toy couldnot be cal guilty as or a copysprumity in
this case. But while I was on trial, I didn't
have the information I'm in possession from now right.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
They did, though, and the state used testimony that they
knew was false in order to trick the jury into
believing that this alleged conspiracy meeting was both plausible and real,
and I'm sure Danny's admission to his involvement acted as
a stamp of legitimacy. Then they alluded to this alleged
phone confession from Melvin that was never actually confirmed or corroborated,
and the jury bought at Lockstock and Barrel. They convicted
(26:30):
you both and sentenced you to life in prison.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
I watched Melvin cry after we was convicted. I cried, didn't.
I couldn't believe it. I was in disbelief. I didn't
even know we could get life because we didn't kill anybody.
No I'm not telling this story yet. Living this story.
(27:06):
Prison there's something different than everybody. You know. It's like
a hospital, it's like a hotel. It's like a hideout.
It's like a hangout. It's like a hostage situation. It's
the word so being awfully convicted. It's about us fun.
It's falling off twenty story building. It's kind of struggle.
(27:27):
When I grew up in prison as a smarting little kid.
I hate to head today as much as I did
the first day. You never get used to it. There's
nothing more urgent than in freedom. You know what I'm saying.
I'm gonna look at myself like a hostage fighting give
back to my family.
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Well, then trying to make peace with the fact that
he has a son he'll never watch grow up, that
he's going to be spending the rest of his life
in a prison for a crime he didn't come. I
don't believe Melvin has ever received legal help. Maybe one
time for a post conviction relief. I don't know that
he learned to use the law library and advocate for
(28:10):
himself like tayshim did.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Every weeged moment. I'm fighting for my life and it
was giving me the worst attorneys. You know, my first
attorney was sleeping in the same prison I was in
for the US when he dropped the bull. They gave
me another lawyer. She was helpful, but she was in
over her hair because her expertise was social security claims,
so it was really me. I had to learn the
(28:34):
law myself.
Speaker 1 (28:35):
So you've taught yourself the law, as we often see
as absolutely necessary for our guests to do, and you
also saw it outside help like investigators and lawyers, and
you've been funding that by writing and selling books. Who
are you, dude? That's amazing. I mean, I see you've
written eight books.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
I've written fifteen books. I got eight published. They're all
available for purchase.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
I just received, by the way, your latest book. It's
called It Could Happen to any of Us, and that's
like a mantra of mine. So I'm really looking forward
to reading it, and we're gonna make sure to link
your books in the bio. This is how you've been
funding your fight for freedom, and I hope our audience
will show their support. So let's talk about that fight.
You mentioned that you had some Appella attorneys that were
about as useless as your original trialawyer, and in Pennsylvania
(29:20):
post conviction, I'm not so sure it matters if the
lawyers are bet or not, since the post conviction statutes
make the fight even more difficult than usual. Now, if
I understand this correctly, you can find new evidence, even
Brady material, But if that evidence could have possibly been found,
that means it was available to you, and therefore it
cannot be considered new evidence. For example, since the Super
(29:40):
eight clerk Terry Flinch Boss Siler was alive and available
to be questioned, what she has to say is not
considered new evidence, And the fact that the state didn't
share it doesn't make it a Brady violation because you
could have discovered it on your own or your lawyer
could have, which sounds fucking absurd. And then in this
case they were code defendants. If Melvin had an attorney
(30:02):
who litigated something already, the issue can't be raised. So
options run out very quickly, and doors keep closing, and
you've been met with denial after denial, even though you've
amassed a formidable case for actual incense.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
And in two thousand and three I found out that
Danny still had a secret deal with the Commonwealth. The
two and a half to five. So I found my
first PCRA on my own in two thousand and three.
I was unsuccessful because they said that this information was
in the public domain and that I could have voted
in the first pcl the council PCLA with the attorney
(30:39):
they gave me, who never read the record, never interviewed me,
never tried to interview anybody.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
See, this is the kind of bullshit I'm talking about.
Since the information was in the public domain, meaning that
it existed among all the information in the world and
wasn't being kept under lock and key, then it was
technically in the public domain during his first post conviction
motion and his counsel didn't find it and build a
motion around it. So then the issue cannot be raised again.
(31:06):
I don't even know what to say. And then there's
only a certain amount of time that it can be raised.
Speaker 2 (31:11):
The judge felt like this information was in the public
domain between the time of need filing it and whin
though close him on my first pc out right, and.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
In Pennsylvania back then, you'd only get sixty days since legislation.
Speaker 2 (31:26):
You know, it's three hundred and sixty five days now.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
Oh yeah, that's really fucking generous. I mean, who does
legislation like that serve or punished? Think about it. It's
not like people who are dead to rights guilty are
making credible cases for actual innocence, or at least not likely.
So shutting the door on these post conviction motions pretty
much solely kept the innocent incarcerated. Since that time, though
that legislation has changed.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
The presumption and knowledge is no longer a reason to
foreclose your post conviction motion twenty years ago it was.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
Today, it's not so much good it does for you though.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
Yeah, yeah, you can't go back retroactivity. You can't go
back and feature which already happened.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
So after appealing your denials in two thousand and three
in the state courts, you went federal.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
Got challenged my conviction on the federal level because of
our constitutional rights. I made, you know, the two major
issues was that the trial court gave the wrong jury
instruction as it applied to accomplished liability, and the second
issue was an effective assistic counsel for FAIE to investigate.
Those were my two strongest issues, and after two and
(32:29):
a half years, three years, I filed my own hate too.
But it was eventually denied.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
He then filed your fourth PCRA petition in twenty twelve
because Danny Steele recanted his trial testimony. Yeah, you heard
that right. Danny Steele was finally doing the right thing.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
He sent me an affter David stating that he had
been pressing to give false testimony that he had witnessed
need could have done to do work's head and pull
the trigger. He also testified about the fake motel meeting,
and he was ultimately found to be incredible because he
was no longer in jeopardy from the common Wealth, but
(33:07):
he was still allegedly in jeopardy from his co defendants.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
You and Melvin, who were both locked up for life
while he's out there doing whatever he's doing, living the dream.
You know what I find incredible, The fucking balls on
these judges, I mean, unfucking believable. The only evidence in
the case, besides the Super eight manager who we know
didn't know his ass from his elbow, the only evidence
is Danny Steele's word, which apparently no longer matters. I
guess if anyone could be a good judge of Danny's credibility, though,
(33:33):
it'd be the guys who cooked up the lines with
him to begin with.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
Both of the prosecutors also testified that they ain't seem
to stand that day. It said if he testified falsely,
it was something he chose to do. They didn't encourage
them to do it. So he found them to be
more credible than Danny Steal.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
So now you find a way to bolster the recantation.
You got in touch with Kendu Smith, like your trial
attorney should have done in the first place, and he
was finally ready to corroborate Thisanny Steele's recantation. So that
was the focus of your last of your PCRRA petitions
filed in August twenty fifteen, and evidentiary hearing was held
in August twenty seventeen.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
And at this evidence here Jim Delle Smith shows up
and he testifies on the oath that Chad never put
a machine gun in my head and pulled the trigger.
And I don't know why Danny Steel made that up.
Had it happened, I wouldn't be here to day saying
it didn't.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Happen, right, Why would he be standing up for his
attempted murderer in court. So this adds legitimacy to his testimony,
which transfers legitimacy to Danny Steele's recantation, and this would
qualify as new evidence in other states, but not in Pennsylvania.
This was denied as untimely because this witness was available
at the time of trial. It's like running into a
brick wall over and over again. Now, meanwhile, at this time,
(34:47):
a chain of events began evolving. Melbourne's son. Now this
must have been right after this evidentiary hearing, maybe twenty seventeen,
twenty eighteen, something really bad happened, and then that thing
was almost made even worse.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
Can you explain Guess who gets found shot multiple times
in his car? Danny Steele. I mean, he's just riddled
with bullets. York County decides that Melvin Bethune's own son,
who grew up without his father, was the person who
(35:20):
killed Danny Steele, that he was so angry about him
allegedly perjuring himself naming his father, that he decided to
lie in wait and kill Danny Steele. Well, Melvin Bethune's
son decided to take this thing to trial, and he prevailed.
(35:41):
He was found not guilty, and Danny Steele is dead.
Which is very sad, of course, but there are many
people who may have harbored very bad feelings towards Danny Steele.
Speaker 1 (35:55):
I mean, I wouldn't blame Melvin's son if he was
angry with Danny Steele. How I'm angry with Danny Stele
deal even posthumously. But that doesn't mean that Melvin's Sun
murdered anybody. I mean, I don't know all the details,
so I won't comment on the investigation of the prosecution.
I do hope that things have changed significantly in yourk
County since the time they wromply convicted Melbourne. But at
the very least, I'm glad one of the Bethunes appears
(36:16):
to have had a competent attorney which was also on
the horizon from Melvin and Taishim. One of your advocates,
Omar Jannette, was instrumental in getting you the competent attorney
who we have with us today, the Tsia Shaviz Free
and apparently it started off as a change dot org
petition that put you on the radar of the NS's
Project of Pennsylvania when Letsia just happened to be looking
(36:37):
for some pro bono work and reached out to them.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
And so I contacted Benison's Project and they gave me
this case. I collected every record I possibly could, and
of course I realized that Melvin Bethune was also behind
bars for the same crime as Taysheim. And that is
about the time where I hire Kitty Hayley. She went
back in time. Essentially, she spent weeks and weeks in
(37:01):
York and talked to you know, people who knew all
of the players involved Kendo. You know, Bethune's girlfriend, the victim,
Raymond Clark's mother, Katy Haley, went to New York and
went and sat with this woman on more than one
occasion and talked to her about her son and what
he meant to her. And we have an alpha David.
(37:22):
She literally said that the prosecutors and she named them,
told her that Danny Steele was responsible for the murder
of her son. But they won as many gang members
as possible off these streets, and so they're going to
get all three of them. And they're not given Danny
Steele a deal. They're not doing that. He's going to
(37:42):
get the same amount of time as the others. Well,
that's not what happened.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
You know, I didn't think there was room for these
prosecutors to get any less likable, but trust me, there
is even more room. And as we've already discussed, Kitty
Haley spoke to all the women who the prosecutors lied about,
a trial talker Redmond, Klonda Chance, and of course the
fourteen year old girl Nikki Rhodes. Then she spoke with
Terry Flinch boys Syler, and we know that she discovered
(38:07):
the Terry began her shift at eleven PM and checked
Taishim into the Super eight well after Skip Clark had
already died, which means this entire case just fell apart.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
So I meet Kitty Harley the beginning at twenty twenty one,
and it was feeling for me when she said, you know,
you've been telling the same story for twenty years. It
felt good. But Kitty Harley gets out there in the field.
She speaks to Terry and the motel clerk from the
Superley motel, and she adamantly states that she told the
(38:38):
prostitution that this theory was flawed, that I could not
have been there any time prior to eleven PM. They
said I was there at ten TM, but you know
where I was at at ten PM all my way
back from New York. I was on the highway at
tim TM and she also made one the same statement
and the feature she said that ever instant they presented
(39:01):
at my trial, something was missing and then it had
to be detached, that it was ripped off. The ripped
DOLF piece is called the bottom of a folio, a
folio that contains information they would have told whoever wanted
to see it, exactly what time the room was in it,
if and when any calls were made, how long the
(39:23):
calls were, and where they went to. The jury never
got an opportunity to see this. The defense was never
in the possession of this, and I didn't even know
it existed until Kitty Haley furnished the legal team with
her conclusions in these statements.
Speaker 3 (39:39):
And so presumably those documents are sitting in the District
Attorney's office today and that's what we're fighting for to get.
But also, this woman has signing out of David. She's
willing to come in. And this woman doesn't know anybody,
She has no skin in the game.
Speaker 2 (39:54):
If an uninterested objective party witness is telling you that
this serious flawed, and you decide to perpetuate this fraud
and allow for it to go uncorrected for twenty something years.
Based on my studies, this would be considered deliberate and
willful deception.
Speaker 1 (40:15):
No words could do this injustice, any justice. So now
that we've heard everything that Kitty dug up, you all
were able to petition the courts based on this evidence,
and they said that this was litigated by Melvin back
in two thousand and seven and it was denied back
then as untimely because Terry Flinchboss Silo was available to
testify at trial, so this couldn't be considered new evidence
(40:36):
and most certainly was past the deadline. And I mean
what we're seeing in this case over and over again
is ineffective assistance at trial.
Speaker 2 (40:43):
Absolutely, it all comes down to the beginning stages trial.
So at trial, I had a lawyer who had checked
out on me. But the beautiful thing is he did
file a Brady He wrote the action for everything that
was shoping. Soley we know today that they would have
some information that was requested.
Speaker 1 (41:03):
I mean, there's always been a solid case for Brady
violations and ineffective assistance here, but so far, I don't
think it's a stretch to say that you have been
failed not only by your attorneys along the way, but
by the entire judicial system. I understand you have plans
to file with the York County Conviction in Tegery Units,
so we hope that they will be able to provide
the relief that you have so rightfully deserved. But if not,
(41:23):
I'm afraid your only option might be clemency. You know
you have my full support, on the support of our
whole team, and right now I'm going to ask for
our audience to lend their support as well. So we're
going to have a lot of things linked in to bio,
but the number one call to action is to sign
the petition to support your release. I'm literally begging our
audience please join us on this one. Just go there
right now and sign the petition. I'll take you a
(41:45):
minute and a half. And now we go to my
favorite part of the show, which is called closing arguments,
where first I thank both of you incredible people for
being here, and now I'm just going to kick back
in my chair, turn my microphone off, and just listen
to any final thoughts that you may have. So let's
start with Altisia and then Taishim, please take us out
into the sunset for you and for Melvin.
Speaker 3 (42:09):
America as a country, and our court system has largely
been steeped like a tea bag in racism, and some
people are considered worthy and some people are not considered worthy.
And I would offer that back in the nineties, two
young black men from New York are really considered outsiders
(42:32):
and their lives were not worth a lot. I will
never know what the prosecutor was thinking. I don't know
the prosecutor, but I know that the hat was hung
on somebody who had multiple convictions for perjury, who was
highly incentivized, who pled guilty to the same crime, and
(42:54):
who served less than three years at a county jail.
You know that in and of itself is a crime.
We know that these two young men did not commit
this crime. And what I can say to Tayshim as
well as Melvin, is I'm not giving up until they
walk out.
Speaker 2 (43:12):
Just support this is a great cause. I fought hard
for my freedom for twenty plus years. I've been incarcerated
almost a quarter century. I'm innocent. I was awfully convicted.
You can go to change dot org and sign this
petition that was initiated by DJ Coco Chanel. You can
visit my website. I want my life back, I want
to be free. I want to turn my books into movies.
(43:34):
I want to help other people who awfully convicted. I
want to one day start my own innocence project and
be able to help people regain their freedom and their
voices back and returned to their families. That's all I want.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
Thank you for listening to Rabel Conviction. I'd like to
thank our production team Hall, Jeff Cliburn and Kevin Wartis,
with research by Lyla Robinson. The music in this production
was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction,
on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction podcast, and on Twitter at
(44:16):
wrong Conviction, as well as at Lava for Good. On
all three platforms, you can also follow me on both
TikTok and Instagram at It's Jason Flam. Wrongful Conviction is
the production of Lava for Good podcast and association with
Signal Company Number one
In October nineteen ninety seven, two overlapping groups of friends
from New York, one known as the Cream Team, the
other is the Gods, were living in York, Pennsylvania. Three
of these young men were Danny Steele, Melvin Bethune, and
Taysheen Crocker. On October fifth, nineteen ninety seven, at a
corner dice game, Melvin and Taisheim spoke to another New
York guy about a previous beef when gunshots rang out
(00:25):
and the crowd dispersed, but no one was hurt until
about five minutes later and two blocks away, when a
young man named Raymond Clark had been fatally shot. When
the investigation of the murder led to Danny Steele, he
told the police that Raymond's death was part of a
larger organized action involving a disagreement between rival New York gangs.
At the dice game, he alleged that Melvin and Taysheem
(00:47):
had rounded up some muscle from back in New York,
including Steel and three others, to confront the opposing gang,
the Gods. In the lead up to this confrontation, they
allegedly checked into a motel and hatched a plan that
allegedly was resulted in the death of Raymond Clark. Clearly,
local law enforcement had only one choice to believe Danny
Steele and do their part on the front lines of
(01:10):
America's war on drugs by taking as many of these
New York gangsters off their streets as they possibly could.
But this is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to ronful Conviction. Today,
(01:34):
we're going to cover a case in which the soul
assailant who is responsible for the murder got off with
less than three years for giving false testimony against two
innocent men. And I'm going to introduce one of those
men now. He's calling in from a maximum security prison
in Pennsylvania. Tayshim, Crocker, even though I hate the reason
why you're at where you're at, but I got to say,
(01:55):
I'm really happy and honored to have you.
Speaker 2 (01:57):
I'm glad i'm here. Thank you, Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:00):
You're most welcome. And with him is his post conviction
pro bono attorney, the Tsia Shaviz Free Latsia. Welcome to
the show.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:09):
Jason, You're also very welcome, so tayshim. This crime happened
in Pennsylvania, but you're not from there, originally from the Bronx, right,
So tell me a little bit about your childhood.
Speaker 2 (02:18):
I was born to a teenage mother. My mom was sixteen.
You know, she wasn't ready to be a mother yet,
so she picked me in, forced a kid, and I
spent my first four years out in Queens. It was
like eighty one. She decided she wanted to be back.
I moved back to the Bronx. It was rough, we
were poor. I was pretty much terrified at my mom.
(02:40):
That was like the only person I was scared of.
Around the ages twelve, I was back and forced to
kid and out of her presidence. I just became a.
Speaker 3 (02:50):
Street kid, so tayshim. He had a pretty hard life
and was living in the Bronx. You know, this is
at the height of the epidemic. Friends of his are
literally dying.
Speaker 2 (03:02):
I went after Yo Kia because my best friend has
just got cute. I was fourteen, he was fifteen, and
he got cute. The next day, another one of my
closest friends got cute, and I was off for the
opportunity to go to York. So I jumped on the
bus and went out there.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
What did you do to support yourself to survive out there.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
I started hustling. I started taking pass from people older gous.
Speaker 1 (03:26):
So this is the sort of thing where you did
the dirty work for the older guys because in theory,
at least a miner wouldn't get into that much trouble, right.
Speaker 2 (03:32):
That's how it goes.
Speaker 3 (03:34):
So it's my understanding that's a pretty low level drug dealer.
Him and a lot of the kids. He also runs
with a group of young people known as like the
Cream Team. And you know, there's several groups, but two
of them are called the Gods and the other one's
the Cream Team. The District Attorney's office tried to paint
this as some gang, but really Cream just means cash
(03:57):
rules everything around me.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
So they were Wu Tang fans, yes, And I mean
anyone who's aware of Wu Tang Cash rules everything around
me is probably there could be their most iconic song
and terms like gods and earths. Some of the members
of Wu Tang are really into the theories of the
five percent nation where those terms come from. And we
could get into all of that on a totally different podcast.
But Wu Tang had just come out with their debut album,
(04:19):
entered the thirty six Chambers in nineteen ninety three. So
guys like Tayshim and Melbourne that was the soundtrack of
their childhood.
Speaker 2 (04:26):
The Cream Team and the guys were once of kids
from the Bronx. We was rolling up together. We went
to the same schools, Eat pautied together, and we ended
up in Pennsylvania hustling.
Speaker 1 (04:38):
So were you on the radar of the York Police
before all of this happened.
Speaker 2 (04:42):
I talked about a week in prison for a couple
backs in marijuana, and I was like eighteen up there.
It was like forty.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Grand, forty fucking grand for some weed. Jesus well, I
mean this was the nineties when the War on drugs
was in full swing. It still is, unfortunately with the
large ETI and if you're listening to us right now,
you might want to check out our new series called
The War on Drugs. We're gonna have it linked in
the bio. Check it out the War on Drugs podcast.
And back then, as we've seen time and again on
(05:10):
this program, even involving a low level drug deal and
could make that person a target for a wrongful conviction.
So let's get to early October nineteen ninety seven and
the lead up to this dice game and the shooting,
there was some actual beef that had started a few
days before between your co defendant, Melvin Bethune and a
friend of this guy can Do Smith, and this served
(05:30):
as an a legend motive for what happened later. But
this was kind of like a small time beef, right.
Speaker 2 (05:36):
There was no conflict that rose to the level of
want to take.
Speaker 1 (05:39):
A life right, and Kendo Smith wasn't the victim anyway,
but rather a guy named Raymond skip Clark, who I'm
guessing was one of the gods as well.
Speaker 2 (05:48):
No, he wasn't a member of the gods. He wasn't
even flims with Smith that I know of. Got night.
No guys were at this dice game except can Do Smith.
Speaker 1 (05:59):
So the states there about a beef between the Gods
and the Cream team is not holding up so far.
It's full of holes. But this beef, however, inconsequential, was
something you intended to bring up with Ken du Smith
when you saw him at the dice game. This was
October fifth, nineteen ninety seven, on the corner of Maple
and Duke in New York, Pennsylvania, where there was a
regular dice game. Kend Do Smith was there as well
(06:20):
as Melvin Bethune Danny Steele. You had just got back
from the Bronx and a bit before eleven pm you
arrived at the game and Raymond Clarke was there as well.
Speaker 2 (06:29):
I never saw Raymond Clark that man, but according to
court documents, he was at the dice game. He was
playing games. I got to the dice game and I
told the work I needed to talk to him. Before
we could talk, a shot was fired. He ran and
I ducked. No one knows who fired that shot. It
came from behind me. When I ducked and I land,
(06:52):
you know it was more shots fired. No one was injured.
Approximately five to ten minutes later and two blocks away,
according to shots Rush script, bore shots were fire. That
is who Raymond Clark was shot at out at the
dunt game.
Speaker 1 (07:06):
So not only had you not even seen the victim
at the dice game, but at this point you had
no idea that anyone had even gotten hurt. So shots
were fired, everyone scattered, total chaos. Did you have a clue?
Did anyone have a clue why this was even happening?
Speaker 3 (07:20):
There is essentially no serious beef at the time where
they feel like they should be targeted for any reason.
But they're taking off because there's gunfire and they know
what gunfire can do.
Speaker 2 (07:32):
So when they got a hotel.
Speaker 1 (07:34):
But according to the state's theory, you checked into the
hotel before going to the dice game before Raymond Clark's death,
sometime between like ten and eleven PM.
Speaker 2 (07:44):
That is what they wanted the jury in the court
to believe. I checked into the Super eight at about
twelve thirty one in the morning. I let Mel know
where I was going, I left there and even where
I was going, and they spent the night with me.
Speaker 1 (07:59):
And at that point, not only did you not know
that Skip Clark was dead, but you also didn't know
that your boy Danny Steele was about to use a
shared room at the Super eight as a premise for
a false statement, which really ends up being the basis
of the state's entire case. And we'll get to that
in a bit. But first, letitia, what do we know
about the initial investigation, Like how did they even end
(08:19):
up coming upon Danny?
Speaker 3 (08:21):
So we have no idea exactly what happened. Ty Shim's lawyer,
the person who would have gotten the box of evidence
or whatever he's passed. When we go to Melvin's attorney,
this is over twenty plus years ago.
Speaker 1 (08:35):
He doesn't have that box, so the usual trough of
information was not available. But what we do know about
this incident is that there were a thought of witnesses,
some of whom spoke with you and your lead investigator,
Kitty Haley way later in twenty twenty one.
Speaker 3 (08:49):
Well, what we find out later is that Raymond Clark
he's found with drugs on his person, and it is
noted that he apparently owed Danny Steele some money.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Turns out maybe I think like a week after that,
Danny was interrogated, and.
Speaker 1 (09:05):
At least four people have testified both the trial and
in post conviction that Danny Steele was the shooter. So
that should have been it, but instead a story at
a strategy was being concocted with Danny Steele in order
to drag more people down the rabbit hole with him,
turning this tragedy into an opportunity for the authorities to
(09:26):
sweep the streets from those they considered undesirable, namely Melvin
and Taysheen, who for months went about their lives eventually
hearing about Raymond Clark's death and having no idea that
one of their friends, Danny, was saving himself from life
in prison at their expense by creating this phony narrative
in which members of the Cream team met at the
Super eight Motel and conspired to confront the Gods at
(09:47):
this dice game about the beef with Melvin. And this
group allegedly included Tayshim, Melvin, Danny, and three other men
from New York, one of whom was named Corleone.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
Coleon was a made up figure Danny Steele made up
so he could tend this homicide on somebody he made
on a shooter.
Speaker 3 (10:06):
It's like they sat around and watched The Godfather and
then went and tried a case. That's how it feels.
Some guy named Corleone who's never been identified, and some
other guys from New York, they all go to the
Super eight Motel and they want blood for what happened
to Melvin yesterday. Melvin was disrespected or something, and they
want blood. So they're all going to get guns from
(10:26):
a friend's house and then they're going to go down
there and shoot up the Gods at a dice game.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Now, The theory continued that in order to arrive at
the Dice Game before the shootings took place around eleven
thirty pm, this alleged crew of Muscle from the Bronx
had to have checked into the Super eight Motel by
ten thirty PM or earlier in order to have time
for a thirty to sixty minute plotting session as well
as picking up the guns. But when they arrived at
the Dice Game, Tayshim allegedly pointed a gun to Kendu
(10:53):
Smith and tried to shoot him, but the gun allegedly
malfunctioned and didn't fire, so the rest of this alleged
team hit squad open fire and everyone at the Dice
Game ran for their lives. No one was hurt, and
Ken Dusmith has since gone on the record saying that
Tayshen never pulled a gun on him. Other eyewitnesses also
corroborated that the only evidence of this version events is
(11:13):
Danny Steele's statement, which continued saying that then he another
man and this fictitious guy named Corleone chased Raymond skip Clark,
and this fictional Corleone guy, not Danny Steele, allegedly shot
and killed Clark. So that's how Steele shifted total blame
from himself and alleged that he was just a co conspirator,
(11:34):
not the loan shooter.
Speaker 3 (11:35):
Now, Danny Steele, this is important. He has charged with
the exact same crimes as Melvin and Tysheen, so you
would think he'd get the exact same punishment or close
for murder. For conspiracy to commit murder, he did two
years in the county jail, presumably because he couldn't go
(11:56):
to state prison because you know, he was a known snip.
Speaker 1 (12:00):
From what I understand, he had also been convicted of
perjury twice before. So this is the guy on whom
the entirety of the state's case rests and what they
used to issue arrest warrants for both Melbourne and Taysheem.
And at the time, Melvin had just pled guilty to
some unrelated drug charges.
Speaker 3 (12:16):
Correct. He takes a plea and he's getting ready to
go to prison, and the police come to let him
know that he's been indicted on these charges, and he's
just shocked. There's no conversation. They don't take him down
to the police station and interview him.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
They had all the information they wanted from Danny Steele. Now, tyshim,
you were back in New York at the time, and
during a routine traffic stop, NYPD discovered that you were
wanted in New York, Pennsylvania.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
No Manchila got arrested, that I was a fugitive. I
got picked up January nineteen ninety eight and forty fifth
feet with twenty seventh and eighth Avenue. I was arrested
and I haven't been on a street service. And while
PD picks me up, I'm extradited down to York where
I was charged.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
When he gets to York and he's in the County jail,
there's no interview. The information and the story has already
been told by Danny Steele. But there's literally a fifteen
minute drive at one point from one drop off location
to the jail with a police officer.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
Dennis Williams was the arresting detective. While he's driving me
to the York County prison, he said, I know you
didn't kill Rainey Clock, but I do know you're part
of the Cream team. I can get you a deal
if you cooperate, And I told him I didn't know
nothing innocent. A few months after that, They offered me
(13:48):
another deal five to ten, and I turned that down.
The day trial started, they offered me another deal if
they were going to dismiss all degrees of homicide if
I played guilty's in aggravated, and so chunk that down.
Dennis Williams Bull should be the deal. A dandy deal
ended up kidting.
Speaker 1 (14:23):
Danny Steele did less than three years in the county jail.
That's jail, right, not prison, And that was part of
his deal to avoid running into other people who he
had flipped on previously. And so no one was ever
charged with being skipped. Clark's shooter Corleone certainly wasn't. It's
hard to charge a ghost after all. And now all
three of you had been charged with murder, but only
(14:45):
by way of conspiracy and accomplished liability. And this is
why your arrival time at the Super eight motel is
so important to the state's theory, as is the part
of Danny Steele's testilize where he alleged that you drew
a gun on Kendo Smith that never did fire.
Speaker 3 (14:58):
So conspiracy liability requires proof of an agreement or a
common design to commit the lawful act for which the
person is convicted. So a person cannot be convicted of
conspiracy from merely being present during the commission of a crime.
There has to be some step taken, some proof of
the agreement, you know, and then obviously the crime. For
(15:22):
accomplass liability, it requires more than mere presence during the
commission of a criminal act, even if the accused knew
that the crime was to be committed. So we see
like accomplss liability like after the fact, you know, someone
who's helping to conceal or clean something up. So these
are really what tayshim as well as Melvin were convicted under. Also,
(15:45):
you know, a lot of that prosecutorial case led on
something called transferred intent, which basically means if I pull
out a gun and I'm trying to shoot you, but
I accidentally shoot your friend or someone's standing next to you,
you know, it would have been attempted murder because I
purposefully knowingly was aiming at you. But it's still first
(16:07):
degree murder even though I had no intention of killing
your friend, because the intention had already formed. And so
throughout the trial we'll hear of transferred intent in those transcripts.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
So because you were alleged to have met beforehand, establishing
the intent, and then followed through with your part of
the supposed conspiracy by allegedly pulling a gun on Ken
du Smith that then made you, in turn responsible in
some degree for the murder of Skip Clark, the alleged
end result of this alleged organized confrontation.
Speaker 2 (16:38):
I do, I end it. I didn't realize what conspiracy
laws accomplished liability was. I didn't realize when you moved
pieces on a chessboard to Atlanta, the way you want
it to be seen, you can make something look like
something that it wasn't. We were kids, you know, in
our adversary we used for chrome, men seasoned, you know,
politicians prosecuted. And I did not realize what was going
(17:03):
on until it was too.
Speaker 1 (17:04):
Late, that they had fabricated a narrative with Danny Steele
to convict you through these conspiracy and accomplished liability laws
that you were unaware of. So Melvin was already in
prison for the unrelated drug charges, so he didn't bond out,
but neither did you. You both were being held separately
from Danny Steele, but at this point you didn't even
know about what he had done. Right, So when did
(17:25):
you first realize what he was doing to you?
Speaker 2 (17:27):
The first time I see him is at my preliminary here,
and he's testifying against me. You know, he's saying that
I'm the leader of the Cream team that prior to
the Dice Game shooting, that we met at a motel
and agreed to kill someone. Actually at the preliminary here
when he said we agreed to step to these guys
to try to squash this beef. With the proceedings, his testimony,
(17:49):
you know, would constantly change and get more dramatic and
more incriminating.
Speaker 3 (17:54):
There were a lot of inconsistencies in the telling of
these various stories by Danny Steele, but there wasn't necessarily
a rigorous, vigorous defense from Taishim's counsel. Melvin's council, when
looking at the transcript, tended to do a better job right.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
Both families had hired counsel prior to the January ninety
nine trial, but only Melvin's family was able to pay
and maintain counsel.
Speaker 2 (18:21):
So this attorney that was representing me at the time,
Allen Smith, you know, he was never paid him full
and he thought the motion to withdraws council. I didn't
know that. I could have still been getting counsel by
the state, which probably would have been a bad attorney anyway,
as bad as he was. But he never did nothing
after that, after the judge told him the motion was denied,
(18:43):
we countinue to proceed to trial without an investigation of
what going on.
Speaker 1 (18:49):
So it sounds like you didn't even have an attorney.
Speaker 2 (18:51):
Absolutely, I didn't have an attorney. I didn't have a suit,
I didn't have shoes, I didn't have family, I didn't
have an attorney.
Speaker 3 (18:57):
Tayshiem would come to the courthouse not a suit, but
in an orange jumpsuit. So this was not, you know,
someone being able to put forth their best defense, and.
Speaker 1 (19:08):
In order to combat the state, especially with what we
now know that they were willing to hide, you were
going to need a vigorous investigation from zealous attorneys and
a whole team that would have done things like carul
Ken do Smith to the stand. He has since gone
on the record that you did not, in fact point
to gun at him, which directly contradicts the state's narratives. Now,
how your counsel didn't at least contact can do is
(19:30):
just it's irresponsible and desire it. It's disgusting, actually. But
even more bizarre is how Danny Steele did something on
the stand that even I've never heard of before.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
Throughout the trial, he kept mentioning that, you know, he
was incentivized, that he's hoping, he's hoping that the prosecutors
do right by him and only give him two to
five years in the county. And that's exactly what they
give him.
Speaker 1 (19:55):
He literally told the judge and jury why his own
statement was unreliable. He's like, I'm receiving a benefit for
lying here. He's spelling it out. Now, how are they
supposed to trust anything he said? But they did. I
can't get over this, and we already went over what
Steele said before the shooting At the dice game, he
plays Taysheem Melvin, himself and three other guys, including this
(20:15):
Corleone character, at the Super eight motel between ten and
eleven PM for this conspiracy meeting, and the manager of
the Super eight guy named Alfred Milburn, corroborated this. Why
we're not sure because the clerk who actually checked Taysheim
into the hotel, the person who actually knew this information
was a woman named Terry Flinch boss Siler and what
(20:36):
she told police directly and totally contradicted Albert Milburn's phony narrative.
Speaker 3 (20:42):
She's the one who checks Tyshi Min. She knows this now.
Raymond Clark dies at eleven thirty pm that night, That's
when he's shot. We know this for a fact. She
doesn't come on until eleven pm.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
Right. The state spoke to her, but they didn't want
to hear about how Tayshiim checked it at twelve thirty
one o'clock in the morning at this conspiracy meeting. In fact,
that never took place.
Speaker 3 (21:03):
She tried to offer help and they didn't want to
hear it. She had documents, you know, where he signed,
as well as any telephone calls he would have made
out of that room because it's the nineties, and they
could have turned that over to Tayshim's lawyers, and that
never happened.
Speaker 1 (21:20):
And perhaps these documents the telephone records may have also
been timestamped.
Speaker 3 (21:25):
Miss Flinch boss Siler says that the records she maintained
for the hotel have a bottom section which indicates the
exact times the calls made from each room, So it's
not known if the police or prosecutors were in possession
of that part of the document, But the documents used
at trial were the only ones that she was asked
(21:46):
to review that she was asked to talk about. And
they don't have the exact times the calls made.
Speaker 1 (21:54):
And no one from the defense went looking for call logs.
It's totally irresponsible. I mean, have been helpful to know
what time the calls were made, but that specifically wasn't
in the documents used by the state of trial. And
from what I understand, they deliberately limited Terry Flinch boss
Siler's testimony.
Speaker 3 (22:12):
She was told by the prosecutors, you're not allowed to speak.
You're going to answer yes or no to my questions.
Speaker 1 (22:18):
Right. They were merely trying to establish that a phone
call had taken place, but they specifically did not want
to know when, and they definitely didn't want to know
when her shift started or when Tyshim, Melvin and Danny
would checked in because that would have blown up their case.
They knew about Terry and these phone records, so it
looks like they knew that they were presenting false testimony. Now,
the phone call was important to them because it corroborated
Melvin's presence at the alleged conspiracy meeting. It was alleged
(22:41):
that he had called his girlfriend at the time, Na've
Tucker Redmond, and told her what his intention was, which
was to go down to the dice game and shoot
up the gods. It was also alleged that a fourteen
year old girl named Nicky Rhodes overheard this conversation. The
state made a number of false statements during opening and
closing that they never backed up by calling these alleged
witnesses Tucker and Nicki.
Speaker 3 (23:03):
Our investigator was able to speak with Talker, so she
was dating Melvin. She did speak with him that night.
She never told the prosecutor or the police that Melvin
was interested in hurting or shooting up the young men
on the corner plane craps. When she discovered what the prosecutor,
specifically Prosecutor Kelly, had said in open court, she was
(23:26):
not present at the time, but she became incensed to
learn that he claimed she came to court willingly she
was subpoenaed to come to court, and that he had
lied about what she had heard and said that evening.
When she discovered that the prosecutor, during a Sidebar had
told the judge that her conversation was overheard and passed
(23:49):
along by Nicki Rhodes. She proclaimed that also to be alive.
Niki confirmed that she had no knowledge of the interaction
between Melvin Bethune and talker Redman on the of the
shooting of Skip Clark. She was adamant that she was
a younger at the time with no knowledge of anything
related to the crime. She did not testify, and she
was not asked to testify.
Speaker 1 (24:10):
I guess the state strategy was, if you're going to lie,
go big, and they were able to hide those lies
from these alleged witnesses because witnesses aren't typically allowed to
sit in court to watch the proceedings, but here it
seems this rule was a convenient way to hide them
from what was being said about them. Like Kalanda Chance,
who had told the police that she had been at
the scene earlier in the evening but left prior to
(24:32):
the shooting. I knew nothing about it. Now, what did
she tell your investigator? Kitty Hayley. In twenty twenty one.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Klanda Chance she was provided with a copy of the
trial transcript and was upset to read that the prosecutor
was attempting to tie her into a web of lies
about Melvin wanting to shoot up men on the corner.
She never knew about the plan to use her as
a link between Taker Redman's conversation and the actual shooting.
(24:58):
She further claimed that the prosecutors were trying to make
two groups of friends, the Cream Team and the Guards,
look like a hardened criminal gang, even though that was
not so.
Speaker 1 (25:09):
But even if you want to believe that these two
groups were hardened criminal organizations help ent on destroying the
otherwise decent, hardworking town of York, Pennsylvania, the evidence simply
doesn't support the state's theory. Terry flinch buss Siler was
the clerk who checked Taishim into the Super eight, and
her shift started at eleven PM, So even if he
was waiting there for her shift to start before he
checked in, there's just not enough time to check in.
(25:30):
The Cream Team have a thirty minute to an hour
long meeting to conspire about confronting the Gods. Go to
another dress to pick up the guns, go to the
dice game, shoot up the place, and then chase down
and kill Raven Skip Clark by eleven thirty do all
that shit in thirty minutes.
Speaker 2 (25:45):
It's impossible, and they knew it was impossible, but they
went with the dewy and the judge told the jilly
that is Ty wasn't at that motel prior to the shooting.
Toy couldnot be cal guilty as or a copysprumity in
this case. But while I was on trial, I didn't
have the information I'm in possession from now right.
Speaker 1 (26:07):
They did, though, and the state used testimony that they
knew was false in order to trick the jury into
believing that this alleged conspiracy meeting was both plausible and real,
and I'm sure Danny's admission to his involvement acted as
a stamp of legitimacy. Then they alluded to this alleged
phone confession from Melvin that was never actually confirmed or corroborated,
and the jury bought at Lockstock and Barrel. They convicted
(26:30):
you both and sentenced you to life in prison.
Speaker 2 (26:33):
I watched Melvin cry after we was convicted. I cried, didn't.
I couldn't believe it. I was in disbelief. I didn't
even know we could get life because we didn't kill anybody.
No I'm not telling this story yet. Living this story.
(27:06):
Prison there's something different than everybody. You know. It's like
a hospital, it's like a hotel. It's like a hideout.
It's like a hangout. It's like a hostage situation. It's
the word so being awfully convicted. It's about us fun.
It's falling off twenty story building. It's kind of struggle.
(27:27):
When I grew up in prison as a smarting little kid.
I hate to head today as much as I did
the first day. You never get used to it. There's
nothing more urgent than in freedom. You know what I'm saying.
I'm gonna look at myself like a hostage fighting give
back to my family.
Speaker 3 (27:48):
Well, then trying to make peace with the fact that
he has a son he'll never watch grow up, that
he's going to be spending the rest of his life
in a prison for a crime he didn't come. I
don't believe Melvin has ever received legal help. Maybe one
time for a post conviction relief. I don't know that
he learned to use the law library and advocate for
(28:10):
himself like tayshim did.
Speaker 2 (28:13):
Every weeged moment. I'm fighting for my life and it
was giving me the worst attorneys. You know, my first
attorney was sleeping in the same prison I was in
for the US when he dropped the bull. They gave
me another lawyer. She was helpful, but she was in
over her hair because her expertise was social security claims,
so it was really me. I had to learn the
(28:34):
law myself.
Speaker 1 (28:35):
So you've taught yourself the law, as we often see
as absolutely necessary for our guests to do, and you
also saw it outside help like investigators and lawyers, and
you've been funding that by writing and selling books. Who
are you, dude? That's amazing. I mean, I see you've
written eight books.
Speaker 2 (28:51):
I've written fifteen books. I got eight published. They're all
available for purchase.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
I just received, by the way, your latest book. It's
called It Could Happen to any of Us, and that's
like a mantra of mine. So I'm really looking forward
to reading it, and we're gonna make sure to link
your books in the bio. This is how you've been
funding your fight for freedom, and I hope our audience
will show their support. So let's talk about that fight.
You mentioned that you had some Appella attorneys that were
about as useless as your original trialawyer, and in Pennsylvania
(29:20):
post conviction, I'm not so sure it matters if the
lawyers are bet or not, since the post conviction statutes
make the fight even more difficult than usual. Now, if
I understand this correctly, you can find new evidence, even
Brady material, But if that evidence could have possibly been found,
that means it was available to you, and therefore it
cannot be considered new evidence. For example, since the Super
(29:40):
eight clerk Terry Flinch Boss Siler was alive and available
to be questioned, what she has to say is not
considered new evidence, And the fact that the state didn't
share it doesn't make it a Brady violation because you
could have discovered it on your own or your lawyer
could have, which sounds fucking absurd. And then in this
case they were code defendants. If Melvin had an attorney
(30:02):
who litigated something already, the issue can't be raised. So
options run out very quickly, and doors keep closing, and
you've been met with denial after denial, even though you've
amassed a formidable case for actual incense.
Speaker 2 (30:15):
And in two thousand and three I found out that
Danny still had a secret deal with the Commonwealth. The
two and a half to five. So I found my
first PCRA on my own in two thousand and three.
I was unsuccessful because they said that this information was
in the public domain and that I could have voted
in the first pcl the council PCLA with the attorney
(30:39):
they gave me, who never read the record, never interviewed me,
never tried to interview anybody.
Speaker 1 (30:45):
See, this is the kind of bullshit I'm talking about.
Since the information was in the public domain, meaning that
it existed among all the information in the world and
wasn't being kept under lock and key, then it was
technically in the public domain during his first post conviction
motion and his counsel didn't find it and build a
motion around it. So then the issue cannot be raised again.
(31:06):
I don't even know what to say. And then there's
only a certain amount of time that it can be raised.
Speaker 2 (31:11):
The judge felt like this information was in the public
domain between the time of need filing it and whin
though close him on my first pc out right, and.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
In Pennsylvania back then, you'd only get sixty days since legislation.
Speaker 2 (31:26):
You know, it's three hundred and sixty five days now.
Speaker 1 (31:29):
Oh yeah, that's really fucking generous. I mean, who does
legislation like that serve or punished? Think about it. It's
not like people who are dead to rights guilty are
making credible cases for actual innocence, or at least not likely.
So shutting the door on these post conviction motions pretty
much solely kept the innocent incarcerated. Since that time, though
that legislation has changed.
Speaker 2 (31:48):
The presumption and knowledge is no longer a reason to
foreclose your post conviction motion twenty years ago it was.
Speaker 1 (31:55):
Today, it's not so much good it does for you though.
Speaker 2 (31:58):
Yeah, yeah, you can't go back retroactivity. You can't go
back and feature which already happened.
Speaker 1 (32:03):
So after appealing your denials in two thousand and three
in the state courts, you went federal.
Speaker 2 (32:08):
Got challenged my conviction on the federal level because of
our constitutional rights. I made, you know, the two major
issues was that the trial court gave the wrong jury
instruction as it applied to accomplished liability, and the second
issue was an effective assistic counsel for FAIE to investigate.
Those were my two strongest issues, and after two and
(32:29):
a half years, three years, I filed my own hate too.
But it was eventually denied.
Speaker 1 (32:34):
He then filed your fourth PCRA petition in twenty twelve
because Danny Steele recanted his trial testimony. Yeah, you heard
that right. Danny Steele was finally doing the right thing.
Speaker 2 (32:44):
He sent me an affter David stating that he had
been pressing to give false testimony that he had witnessed
need could have done to do work's head and pull
the trigger. He also testified about the fake motel meeting,
and he was ultimately found to be incredible because he
was no longer in jeopardy from the common Wealth, but
(33:07):
he was still allegedly in jeopardy from his co defendants.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
You and Melvin, who were both locked up for life
while he's out there doing whatever he's doing, living the dream.
You know what I find incredible, The fucking balls on
these judges, I mean, unfucking believable. The only evidence in
the case, besides the Super eight manager who we know
didn't know his ass from his elbow, the only evidence
is Danny Steele's word, which apparently no longer matters. I
guess if anyone could be a good judge of Danny's credibility, though,
(33:33):
it'd be the guys who cooked up the lines with
him to begin with.
Speaker 2 (33:36):
Both of the prosecutors also testified that they ain't seem
to stand that day. It said if he testified falsely,
it was something he chose to do. They didn't encourage
them to do it. So he found them to be
more credible than Danny Steal.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
So now you find a way to bolster the recantation.
You got in touch with Kendu Smith, like your trial
attorney should have done in the first place, and he
was finally ready to corroborate Thisanny Steele's recantation. So that
was the focus of your last of your PCRRA petitions
filed in August twenty fifteen, and evidentiary hearing was held
in August twenty seventeen.
Speaker 2 (34:09):
And at this evidence here Jim Delle Smith shows up
and he testifies on the oath that Chad never put
a machine gun in my head and pulled the trigger.
And I don't know why Danny Steel made that up.
Had it happened, I wouldn't be here to day saying
it didn't.
Speaker 1 (34:24):
Happen, right, Why would he be standing up for his
attempted murderer in court. So this adds legitimacy to his testimony,
which transfers legitimacy to Danny Steele's recantation, and this would
qualify as new evidence in other states, but not in Pennsylvania.
This was denied as untimely because this witness was available
at the time of trial. It's like running into a
brick wall over and over again. Now, meanwhile, at this time,
(34:47):
a chain of events began evolving. Melbourne's son. Now this
must have been right after this evidentiary hearing, maybe twenty seventeen,
twenty eighteen, something really bad happened, and then that thing
was almost made even worse.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
Can you explain Guess who gets found shot multiple times
in his car? Danny Steele. I mean, he's just riddled
with bullets. York County decides that Melvin Bethune's own son,
who grew up without his father, was the person who
(35:20):
killed Danny Steele, that he was so angry about him
allegedly perjuring himself naming his father, that he decided to
lie in wait and kill Danny Steele. Well, Melvin Bethune's
son decided to take this thing to trial, and he prevailed.
(35:41):
He was found not guilty, and Danny Steele is dead.
Which is very sad, of course, but there are many
people who may have harbored very bad feelings towards Danny Steele.
Speaker 1 (35:55):
I mean, I wouldn't blame Melvin's son if he was
angry with Danny Steele. How I'm angry with Danny Stele
deal even posthumously. But that doesn't mean that Melvin's Sun
murdered anybody. I mean, I don't know all the details,
so I won't comment on the investigation of the prosecution.
I do hope that things have changed significantly in yourk
County since the time they wromply convicted Melbourne. But at
the very least, I'm glad one of the Bethunes appears
(36:16):
to have had a competent attorney which was also on
the horizon from Melvin and Taishim. One of your advocates,
Omar Jannette, was instrumental in getting you the competent attorney
who we have with us today, the Tsia Shaviz Free
and apparently it started off as a change dot org
petition that put you on the radar of the NS's
Project of Pennsylvania when Letsia just happened to be looking
(36:37):
for some pro bono work and reached out to them.
Speaker 3 (36:39):
And so I contacted Benison's Project and they gave me
this case. I collected every record I possibly could, and
of course I realized that Melvin Bethune was also behind
bars for the same crime as Taysheim. And that is
about the time where I hire Kitty Hayley. She went
back in time. Essentially, she spent weeks and weeks in
(37:01):
York and talked to you know, people who knew all
of the players involved Kendo. You know, Bethune's girlfriend, the victim,
Raymond Clark's mother, Katy Haley, went to New York and
went and sat with this woman on more than one
occasion and talked to her about her son and what
he meant to her. And we have an alpha David.
(37:22):
She literally said that the prosecutors and she named them,
told her that Danny Steele was responsible for the murder
of her son. But they won as many gang members
as possible off these streets, and so they're going to
get all three of them. And they're not given Danny
Steele a deal. They're not doing that. He's going to
(37:42):
get the same amount of time as the others. Well,
that's not what happened.
Speaker 1 (37:47):
You know, I didn't think there was room for these
prosecutors to get any less likable, but trust me, there
is even more room. And as we've already discussed, Kitty
Haley spoke to all the women who the prosecutors lied about,
a trial talker Redmond, Klonda Chance, and of course the
fourteen year old girl Nikki Rhodes. Then she spoke with
Terry Flinch boys Syler, and we know that she discovered
(38:07):
the Terry began her shift at eleven PM and checked
Taishim into the Super eight well after Skip Clark had
already died, which means this entire case just fell apart.
Speaker 2 (38:16):
So I meet Kitty Harley the beginning at twenty twenty one,
and it was feeling for me when she said, you know,
you've been telling the same story for twenty years. It
felt good. But Kitty Harley gets out there in the field.
She speaks to Terry and the motel clerk from the
Superley motel, and she adamantly states that she told the
(38:38):
prostitution that this theory was flawed, that I could not
have been there any time prior to eleven PM. They
said I was there at ten TM, but you know
where I was at at ten PM all my way
back from New York. I was on the highway at
tim TM and she also made one the same statement
and the feature she said that ever instant they presented
(39:01):
at my trial, something was missing and then it had
to be detached, that it was ripped off. The ripped
DOLF piece is called the bottom of a folio, a
folio that contains information they would have told whoever wanted
to see it, exactly what time the room was in it,
if and when any calls were made, how long the
(39:23):
calls were, and where they went to. The jury never
got an opportunity to see this. The defense was never
in the possession of this, and I didn't even know
it existed until Kitty Haley furnished the legal team with
her conclusions in these statements.
Speaker 3 (39:39):
And so presumably those documents are sitting in the District
Attorney's office today and that's what we're fighting for to get.
But also, this woman has signing out of David. She's
willing to come in. And this woman doesn't know anybody,
She has no skin in the game.
Speaker 2 (39:54):
If an uninterested objective party witness is telling you that
this serious flawed, and you decide to perpetuate this fraud
and allow for it to go uncorrected for twenty something years.
Based on my studies, this would be considered deliberate and
willful deception.
Speaker 1 (40:15):
No words could do this injustice, any justice. So now
that we've heard everything that Kitty dug up, you all
were able to petition the courts based on this evidence,
and they said that this was litigated by Melvin back
in two thousand and seven and it was denied back
then as untimely because Terry Flinchboss Silo was available to
testify at trial, so this couldn't be considered new evidence
(40:36):
and most certainly was past the deadline. And I mean
what we're seeing in this case over and over again
is ineffective assistance at trial.
Speaker 2 (40:43):
Absolutely, it all comes down to the beginning stages trial.
So at trial, I had a lawyer who had checked
out on me. But the beautiful thing is he did
file a Brady He wrote the action for everything that
was shoping. Soley we know today that they would have
some information that was requested.
Speaker 1 (41:03):
I mean, there's always been a solid case for Brady
violations and ineffective assistance here, but so far, I don't
think it's a stretch to say that you have been
failed not only by your attorneys along the way, but
by the entire judicial system. I understand you have plans
to file with the York County Conviction in Tegery Units,
so we hope that they will be able to provide
the relief that you have so rightfully deserved. But if not,
(41:23):
I'm afraid your only option might be clemency. You know
you have my full support, on the support of our
whole team, and right now I'm going to ask for
our audience to lend their support as well. So we're
going to have a lot of things linked in to bio,
but the number one call to action is to sign
the petition to support your release. I'm literally begging our
audience please join us on this one. Just go there
right now and sign the petition. I'll take you a
(41:45):
minute and a half. And now we go to my
favorite part of the show, which is called closing arguments,
where first I thank both of you incredible people for
being here, and now I'm just going to kick back
in my chair, turn my microphone off, and just listen
to any final thoughts that you may have. So let's
start with Altisia and then Taishim, please take us out
into the sunset for you and for Melvin.
Speaker 3 (42:09):
America as a country, and our court system has largely
been steeped like a tea bag in racism, and some
people are considered worthy and some people are not considered worthy.
And I would offer that back in the nineties, two
young black men from New York are really considered outsiders
(42:32):
and their lives were not worth a lot. I will
never know what the prosecutor was thinking. I don't know
the prosecutor, but I know that the hat was hung
on somebody who had multiple convictions for perjury, who was
highly incentivized, who pled guilty to the same crime, and
(42:54):
who served less than three years at a county jail.
You know that in and of itself is a crime.
We know that these two young men did not commit
this crime. And what I can say to Tayshim as
well as Melvin, is I'm not giving up until they
walk out.
Speaker 2 (43:12):
Just support this is a great cause. I fought hard
for my freedom for twenty plus years. I've been incarcerated
almost a quarter century. I'm innocent. I was awfully convicted.
You can go to change dot org and sign this
petition that was initiated by DJ Coco Chanel. You can
visit my website. I want my life back, I want
to be free. I want to turn my books into movies.
(43:34):
I want to help other people who awfully convicted. I
want to one day start my own innocence project and
be able to help people regain their freedom and their
voices back and returned to their families. That's all I want.
Speaker 1 (43:55):
Thank you for listening to Rabel Conviction. I'd like to
thank our production team Hall, Jeff Cliburn and Kevin Wartis,
with research by Lyla Robinson. The music in this production
was supplied by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph.
Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction,
on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction podcast, and on Twitter at
(44:16):
wrong Conviction, as well as at Lava for Good. On
all three platforms, you can also follow me on both
TikTok and Instagram at It's Jason Flam. Wrongful Conviction is
the production of Lava for Good podcast and association with
Signal Company Number one
Hosts And Creators
Lauren Bright Pacheco
Maggie Freleng
Jason Flom
Popular Podcasts
Stuff You Should Know
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
Betrayal Weekly
Betrayal Weekly is back for a new season. Every Thursday, Betrayal Weekly shares first-hand accounts of broken trust, shocking deceptions, and the trail of destruction they leave behind. Hosted by Andrea Gunning, this weekly ongoing series digs into real-life stories of betrayal and the aftermath. From stories of double lives to dark discoveries, these are cautionary tales and accounts of resilience against all odds. From the producers of the critically acclaimed Betrayal series, Betrayal Weekly drops new episodes every Thursday. If you would like to share your story, you can reach out to the Betrayal Team by emailing them at betrayalpod@gmail.com and follow us on Instagram at @betrayalpod and @glasspodcasts. Please join our Substack for additional exclusive content, curated book recommendations, and community discussions. Sign up FREE by clicking this link Beyond Betrayal Substack. Join our community dedicated to truth, resilience, and healing. Your voice matters! Be a part of our Betrayal journey on Substack.