November 16, 2019 • 50 mins
Stacey Stites and Police Officer Jimmy Fennell were engaged, but Stacey was having an affair with Rodney Reed. On April 23rd, 1996, Stacey’s lifeless body was discovered, lying face up next to a dirt road near Bastrop, TX. Jimmy Fennell was a prime suspect until 3 spermatozoa found in Stacey’s body were matched to Rodney Reed. The state alleged that Rodney did not know Ms. Stites, intercepted her on her 3AM drive to work, raped and strangled her, and left her on the side of that dirt road, while abandoning the truck in a high school parking lot. With no other evidence of Rodney found in the truck, on the body, or at the scene; the state’s forensic experts incorrectly asserting that intact spermatozoa could not survive passed 24 hours; and Stacey’s whereabouts being known for the 24 hours prior to 3AM; Rodney Reed was found guilty and sentenced to death in 1998. The state’s forensic experts have since disavowed their testimony, and Rodney Reed continues to maintain that the presence of his semen was a result of consensual intercourse from late in the night of the 21st (early morning, 22nd). In this premiere episode of the 9th season of Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flom, we go to death row to speak with Rodney Reed. His attorney Bryce Benjet talks to us about the case. His brother Rodrick Reed tells us about his advocacy for his brother and the Reed Justice Initiative. And, forensic pathology legend Dr. Michael Baden retells his sworn testimony given at a hearing for a new trial in October 2017, disputing the time of death. The corrected time of death places Ms Stites in her apartment with Fennell when she died, according to his testimony at trial. When asked about this discrepancy, Mr. Fennell invoked his 5th amendment rights.
Rodney Reed was granted an indefinite stay of execution from the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, saving him from his November 20th, 2019 execution date, but his future is still in danger. He still needs our help.
This Episode of Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flom was produced in partnership with NowThis. https://nowthisnews.com/
Additional engineering for Dr Phil and Jason Flom’s interview by Freedom Wynn.
https://www.wrongfulconvictionpodcast.com/with-jason-flom
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.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:01):
Before we get into this episode, I have some breaking
news to share with you. Rodney Reid has been granted
a stay of execution, and I want to thank every
one of you who took action, who signed a petition,
who made phone calls, who wrote letters. Your actions matter,
and this is a good day. At least we have
(00:21):
a chance now to reopen this case and prove his
actual innocence once and for all. The year was nineteen
ninety six. Stacy Steitz and police officer Jimmy Fanell were
engaged to be married, but Stacy was having an affair
with a man named Rodney Reid. On April twenty third,
(00:42):
nineteen ninety six, Stacy's body was discovered strangled on the
side of a dirt road near Bastrip, Texas. Her fiancee,
Jimmy Fanell, was a prime suspect until three of Rodney
Reid's intact bermitdazoua were found inside her body. During trial,
the state alleged that Rodney intercepted miss Style on her
three am drive to work and proceeded to rape and
(01:03):
murder her, with no other physical evidence of Rodney in
the car or at the scene. The forensic science of
the time, incorrectly asserting that intact spermadzzoa could not survive
past twenty four hours, and Stacy's whereabouts being known within
the twenty four hours prior to her death. Rodney Reid
was sentenced to death in nineteen ninety eight. It is
(01:23):
now common knowledge that intact spermaizoa can be found at
least seventy two hours after release, and all of the
state's forensic expert witnesses have since disavowed their testimonies. Reid
continues to maintain that the spermadizoa that the investigation discovered
was the result of consensual intercourse that transpired well over
twenty four hours prior to her death. On this episode
(01:45):
of Wroeful Conviction with Jason Flahm, we go to death
Row to speak with Rodney Reid. Will also speak with
his attorney Bryce Benjett, his brother Roderick Reid, doctor Phil
and the world renowned forensic expert doctor Michael Bowden. Will
retell his compelling sworn testimony that rules out Rodney as
the potential perpetrator and disputes the time of death.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
This is wrongful conviction.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Senior staff attorney for the Innison's project in Rodney's legal council,
Bryce Benjett came by to tell us about Rodney's case,
and we know that on April twenty third, nineteen ninety six,
Stacy Stites was found strangled and killed in Bastro of Texas.
She was last seen, of course, with their fiance, Jimmy Fanel,
and the search for Stacy started when she failed to
(02:38):
report for her three thirty am shift at the grocery
store where she worked. Jimmy's truck, of course, which he
testified that she used to drive herself to work that morning,
was found in a high school parking lot at five
twenty three am, and Stacy's body was discovered later that
afternoon that same day, lying face up near an unpaved road.
So the state argued that Roddy didn't know her, but
(03:01):
rather that he intercepted her on her way to work,
gained entry somehow to her truck, sexually assaulted and strangled her,
and transported her to the remote unpaved road where her
body was discovered. All the while and this is key
not leaving any other evidence behind other than the sperm
in her body. And this theory was built importantly on
(03:21):
three pillars, the three sperms of the zoa that were
found right, the testimony for three forensic experts who maintained
that sperm does not stay intact for longer than twenty
four hours after intercourse, which of course we know that
it does, and that Stit's whereabouts were accounted for most
of the day before she was murdered, thereby ruling out
the consensual sex with Reed as an explanation for the
(03:42):
presence of his sperm. And of course the testimony from
Jimmy Fanell who said that she left at three am
for work in his truck. But take us back and
explain some of these circumstances and how the state developed
this narrative that we now know not only isn't true,
but couldn't possibly be true.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
Yeah, it's interesting because when you go back and you
look at how crimes ought to be investigated, there were
many sort of obvious errors that were done. Initially, Nobody
looked at the apartment that Stacey Stite shared with Jimmy Fanell,
even though that was the last place she was seeing.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
That is sort of police work.
Speaker 5 (04:22):
One oh one.
Speaker 3 (04:24):
There were not adequate notes taken of interviews of Jimmy Fanell,
who was later the key source of the timeline of
the state's case. But as the investigation actually progressed, Jimmy
Fanell soon emerged as the prime suspect in the case
and was investigated. He was aggressively interrogated, he was subjected
(04:46):
to polygraphs she failed, which he failed. And this took
place even after the police knew that it was not
his semen that was collected from Stacy's body, and so
the notion that the person who semen is in that
body must be a rapist and a murderer was not
(05:06):
the operating theory of the investigation until they matched that
semen to Rodney, a person of color. And so there
is where you have an investigation of the person who
looks like he had opportunity, motive, had a record consistent
with this kind of behavior. And as soon as Rodney
(05:29):
was identified as the source of that seamen, this suddenly
turned around to a sexual assault murder that had to
be committed by him.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
So now Rodney becomes the suspect. The state argued that
Rodney didn't know the victim. He did, in fact, he
was having a relationship, and we now have numerous witnesses
that have come forth who had no connection to Rodney, right,
not just the ones that did have a connection to Rodney.
His relatives knew he was seeing her, but now others
strangers to him.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Yeah, and this was a big issue at the trial.
Just to back up, I mean this rile was rushed
to say at the best. At the trial, the defense
lawyers were presenting what Rodney had told him, which he
could back up with witnesses. He said, I was seeing Stacy.
It was an occasional thing. It was casual. We were
(06:17):
with each other the night before her death, So not
the night of April twenty second, twenty third, but the
night of April twenty first, twenty second. So that was
the theory that was presented at the trial. But unfortunately,
the defense lawyers did not do the work or have
the time to do the work to actually present that
(06:38):
evidence to the jury. Even what little evidence that Rodney's
defense lawyers were able to present about this relationship about
the explanation was completely negated by the prosecution's experts, who
said that it was impossible for Rodney's seeming to be
(06:58):
there based on consensual sex because of this twenty four
hour timeframe.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
At that point right, any jury is going to go well,
that's I mean, you can't explain.
Speaker 4 (07:06):
That a way.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
And it was clearly important to the jury because they
asked about it during their deliberations, and the judge actually
read that invalid testimony back to them while they were
deciding whether or not to convict Rodney Reid.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
But now we know from the top experts in the field,
including doctor Baden, that in fact, the actual amount of
time that the spermatozoa can survive or that can be detected,
I guess up to seventy two hours.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
And all you need to do is open a forensic
pathology textbook.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Wow, and they don't need an expert.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
And so we've gone back now to the States Forensic Pathologist,
the person who did the autopsy, who has disclaimed the
testimony that was offered at the trial. We've gone back
to the Texas Department of Public Safety, who has clarified
that although their analysts said twenty four hours, the science
says seventy two. And we've gone back to the private
(08:05):
DNA lab, who their expert also testified about this twenty
four hour timeframe, and that private DNA lab has likewise
recanted that opinion said it was in error, and so
the foundation of the state's case, which completely negated Rodney's
ability to defend himself, is gone, and then in its place,
(08:30):
We've consulted with the leading forensic pathologists in the country,
Michael boden, Werner, spitz Leroy Riddick, and uniformly they have
said that when you look at this body, she had
been killed hours before the state alleged that she was killed,
which is a time that she, according to Jimmy Finnell,
(08:51):
was at home with him in her apartment.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
My production crew and I flew to Houston, Texas, drove
about an hour outside the city to the Polunsky Unit
where Texas Department of Criminal Justice houses death row inmates.
We were instructed to leave everything but are inspected and approved.
Production equipment in the car, went through security, and finally
reached Rodney Reid for our non contact interview through bulletproof
plexiglass on death row. Right, good afternoon, How are you doing.
(09:25):
I'm doing okay. I mean my heart is heavy, obviously,
but I want to talk about you. Thank you for
talking with me. First of all, how are you doing now?
I mean, you've been through this before, you had an
execution day in twenty fifteen, so this is the second
time around.
Speaker 6 (09:41):
Yes, well as well as to be expected. I mean,
you know, I have my days, but I'm good.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
You know.
Speaker 6 (09:50):
With meditation, reading, I tried to stay up on current events.
I tried to distract myself from what's going on, you know,
with other things. You know, it's for stimulating my mind.
I'll read magazine, read newspapers. I really like reading the
comments with my sporters. You know, they have comments that
(10:12):
that I'll read. They're inspiring to me.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
Well, you're inspiring to them. I mean they're writing to
the Governor's signing petitions that I'm putting out that this
is project is putting out and it's extraordinary, and it's
somewhat encouraging to see that, you know, and I think
it's going to make a difference, hope. So and so
I want to go back, if it's okay with you,
back to nineteen ninety six. You're a young man, good
(10:35):
looking guy when I was a young man. Yeah, you're
still a good looking guy, but you're a young guy
and you meet this woman, Stacy Stye. Is a romantic situation.
We know it was a consensual situation. You met her
at a.
Speaker 6 (10:52):
Doamind Shamrock was a it was a convenience store, gas station,
life type, but they had a game room and all that.
Speaker 7 (10:59):
And was it love and first sight? Was it like
a lightning bolt hit you or I. I wouldn't say
it like that, you know.
Speaker 6 (11:06):
I was just there. We were just hanging out. I'm
at a jukebox selecting songs and she walks in, you know,
And I wouldn't say it was no love at first sight,
you know, because we ended up playing pool, you know,
striking up conversation and it was just good.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
And then sometime after that, obviously there was chemistry there
and you started seeing each other.
Speaker 6 (11:26):
Yeah, yeah, discreet, you know.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
And then at some point she started seeing Jimmy finell.
Speaker 6 (11:34):
No, she was already seeing him, you know. I was
already seeing someone else.
Speaker 8 (11:38):
You know.
Speaker 6 (11:39):
That's what's part of the reason why we kind of
kept it discreet.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Did you think you were in love with her or
was it more just just young people having fun?
Speaker 6 (11:47):
We were having fun. There was chemistry there, but I
wouldn't I wouldn't say that I was in love with
her because I think if I would have been in
love with her, I had to cut everything else off,
you know, And I don't really think that she was
in love with me, because she would have been the
same way. She would cut everything off on that end.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
You know, how long had you been seeing Stacy when
when she was murdered.
Speaker 6 (12:07):
That I met her in late October, early in November
of ninety five. Her death was in April, so I
will table.
Speaker 7 (12:15):
Six months, six six months? And how did you find
out about on the news?
Speaker 6 (12:19):
Yeah? Yeah, when I heard it on the news, and
a talented athlete, I didn't want to believe it. This
is not the Stacy soul. Yeah I was. I was.
I was quite shocked her upcoming wedding when they when
they flashed her picture. I didn't want to believe it
(12:40):
because I was just with her. I didn't want to
believe it.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
You were just with her, like.
Speaker 6 (12:44):
Late night Sunday, early morning Monday, and she was murdered
on a Tuesday, the twenty third. All I can do
is tell you that I mentioned I had nothing to
do with that three sperms. I was with her the
night before. I mean, you learn that sim biology that
in a pinhead dropped you looking at millions. That's just
just a pinhead drop. I mean for the states on
(13:08):
experts to come back in recan't you know.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
All three of them? And then we know that Jimmy
was the original suspect. We know they kind of circled
up the wagons and you know, protected him or he
failed two polygraphs. We know all the fact that, Yeah,
what would you most want people to know about the
evidence if you were to say it's to a stranger
or somebody who's watching this right now, but well, I
(13:34):
don't know he's in there.
Speaker 6 (13:34):
It must be something that well the time of death.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
Doctor Michael Boden is about as decorated a forensic expert
as you can get, including having served as chairman of
the Forensic Pathology Panel for the House Select Committee on Assassinations,
investigating the assassinations of none less than President John F.
Kennedy and Martin Luther King Junior. He studied the evidence
Stacey Stitke's murder case and gave testimony at a hearing
(14:03):
back on October eleventh, twenty seventeen, when Rodney was seeking
a new trial.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
I think that my opinion is solid in this matter
and disagrees with the prosecutor's opinion.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
It disagrees on almost every important point that the prosecution
used to convict Rodney.
Speaker 4 (14:22):
Well, it disagrees on the time of death, the place
of death, and whether or not a sexual assault that occurred.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
Right, Well, those are pretty much it. And then there's
the issue of vividity, which plays into all of these things.
Speaker 4 (14:35):
Lividity is a measure of time of death. When we die,
certain processes in our bodies stop. The heart stops functioning,
blood stops moving around, and the blood itself. Similar to
when you give blood at a blood bank, the blood is
about forty five percent solid material red cells, white cells
(14:58):
and platelets and plasma on top of the yellow tinged
clear fluid. From the time of our birth to time
we die. The heart not only pumps blood around but
also churns it up. So when blood comes out, one
sees red blood. You don't see the separation when blood
goes into a bag and a blood bank. After a
few minutes, one sees the solid material settling down, so
(15:21):
you have all the red cells and the majority of
the slaw material coming to the bottom forty percent of
the volume. That's what happens after death. After we die,
the blood, instead of being well churned up starts settling
out with the red blood cells, white blood cells, and
platelets settling to the bottom gravity by gravity, So whatever
(15:44):
part of the body is downward against the ground will
get a bluish purple color of the settled red blood cells.
That's called lividity.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
And why is this so important in the case of
stacy states.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
Because it tells two things to the medical examine the
kirner coming to the scene. The first thing we look
for always is did the person die here or was
the body moved after death? Just an automatic initial impression.
When we see inappropriate liviidity that is lying on the
(16:21):
back as occurrent here, but the discoloration is in the front,
it means that individual, the decessent here was laying face
down for at least four or five hours for the
blood to settle, causing the bluish discoloration of libidity. She
(16:41):
could not have died in that position. If she had
died in that position, all the libidity would be near
the ground. And that's a certainty, that's a certain ring.
This is a change in the body that happens to
everybody after death. But just the laws of gravity. But
for the liviidity to settle and not turn. If a
body is moved within an hour after death, it's like
(17:04):
when the snow glow, that you let the snow settle
the bottom and you turn it over and it settles
in the other direction. If in an hour or two
one turns the body over, then all the blood goes
in the other direction. But after four or five hours,
the lividity becomes fixed because the red blood cells started
going out of the blood vessels and well, so that
(17:27):
if you turn it over after four or five hours,
the inappropriate lividity will remain and won't disappear. So in
order for us to see the lividity on the front,
not only was she laying face down, but she was
laying face down in the circumstances at least four or
five hours, So we could tell from that that she
(17:48):
was moved from a place that she was laying face down,
and that she had to be in one position for
at least four or five hours before she was moved.
Another thing that happens when we die is that the
tissues start to decompose because it's not getting the usual
oxygen supply. So the first tissues that decompose are the
lining cells of the mouth, the nose, and also the
(18:10):
intestine track. They just start dying in the nose and mouth.
The dying tissues mix up with whatever fluids are present
and a thick maroon type discharge will occur. She had
to be laying face forward and nose of mouth free
for fluids to leak out, and this would happen in
(18:33):
a car. The purge fluids were in the passenger side
and that would be coming out of her nose and mouth,
and the libidity would be developing to some extent on
the fact that she's leaning forward. In this case, since
the prosecution argument is that the defendant met her at
(18:55):
three am and she died after three am, laying in
one position for at least four or five hours until
eight am, and there's evidence that she was dead in
the car before five point thirty because in the car
one has purge fluids, so she's dead for at least
four hours before she's taken out of the car.
Speaker 1 (19:15):
And of course we know that the car was found
at five twenty three am, so it actually is not possible.
This scenario cannot have happened. You can't have five hours
and two hours, that's right.
Speaker 4 (19:24):
The lividity and the purge fluids of the car would
establish that she was dead laying face down closer to midnight,
but definitely before three o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
The fiance, Jimmy Fanel, and his own words under oath
a trial. He stated that he was home with her
from eight pm the night before until she left for
work around three in the morning the next day. And
I think you've made it very clear that it is
your expert opinion, to a degree of a very high
degree of certainty, that that was the time that she
(19:58):
was murdered.
Speaker 4 (19:58):
It is my opinion that she was murdered and strangled
well before three am, closer to midnight, and that mister
Fanel was there. Maybe somebody else came in and did it.
I can't say that he did it, except that he
was the only one there.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
How certain are you that Rodney could not have committed
this crime?
Speaker 4 (20:23):
I am certain beyond all reasonable doubts that she was
dead before she could possibly have met with Rodney, that
he could not possibly have strangled Stacy after three o'clock
in the morning. Two reasonable certainty, maybe after ninety eight
(20:44):
ninety nine percent. That as far as any testimony in
any trial in the standards used, he could not have.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
Committed the crime.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
If this execution goes forward, how are you going to
process that information?
Speaker 4 (21:00):
It would be terrible. Number ways. Number One, there are
people when executed who turn out to be innocent. Clearly,
even if he's exonerated, it's horrible that he's been in
prison for so long, during which time, whoever the real murderer,
is free to go about harming other people.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
I want to talk about the fact that this officer
had a very troubling history of this conduct, and that,
in fact, sometime after Rodney's arrest and conviction, Jimmy himself
was arrested and convicted.
Speaker 3 (21:49):
Yeah, and I think we need to go back and
just look at who Jimmy Fanel was at the time
and who he continues to be. Even before the time
of the murder, there were some that things weren't.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Right with Jimmy.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
In February of nineteen ninety six, so this is two
months a little more before the murder, There's an incident
in which he chases down a young Hispanic man in
the small town that he's a patrol officer.
Speaker 5 (22:16):
He's alleged to.
Speaker 3 (22:17):
Have beat him and put a gun to this kid's head.
He was sued for that, alleging police misconduct and police brutality.
That suit was settled, so he had a record of misconduct.
And that's just not even the half of it. Just
looking from the time around the murder, a woman that
Jimmy Fanell was dating in Gettings described him as emotionally abusive, possessive,
(22:44):
virulently racist, and when she broke off with him the relationship,
he stalked her. You know, I remember one day, you know,
open up the newspaper and reading about Fanel's rest for
a alleged sexual assault while on patrol, and he ultimately
pled guilty to related charges that arose from an incident
(23:07):
in which he was called out to assist a young
woman and instead of helping her, drove her out, kidnapped her,
raped her, and then dropped her back off in the
situation that he was supposed to protect her from. She
with just incredible bravery, calls nine one and reports it.
(23:27):
And what happens. Jimmy Finel comes back out, intercepts her,
arrests her, and thankfully of the police ultimately took this
seriously and Finel was prosecuted. I convicted and convicted, pled
guilty to charges, served essentially every day of a ten
year sentence.
Speaker 6 (23:50):
He was quote unquote one of the state's finest a
police officer, you know, and these things happen. You know,
you have police killings here, killing innocent people, you know,
unarmed people, and the first thing they say, they was
in fear for their lives. But then here you have
this police officers that's wasn't in fear for his life,
(24:10):
didn't give a damn about life, and up until the
time he got convicted of the crime he just got
released from I feel like the state enabled him that.
I mean, they should have been keeping an eye on it.
Speaker 1 (24:24):
When did you learn about Jimmy being arrested and charged
with kidnapping and rape, which happened about ten years after
you were convicted.
Speaker 6 (24:31):
Yeah, it was on TV. No. I was listening to
the radio. We don't have television here, you know. I
listened to it hour on the hour, you know, and
just so happened. I was and I heard them talking
about an officer being arrested for sexual assault and Williamson County,
and it was getting closing club and then when they
said Jimmy Fanel, I tried to kick the door off
(24:53):
the hinges. I was like, I was elated, you know,
I was kind of amped up.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Really, did you think they were victim?
Speaker 6 (25:04):
Yeah? It wasn't until later on to my attorneys within
this project really started digging into that and pulling up
the information, and I was like, well, okay, he's charged
with this. But then they found out that he was
under investigation in it. They found out about these other
(25:25):
cases that he had been charged with that his fellow
officers pushed on this rug for him. You know, I
was like, there's no way this can't be happening. So
even the law enforcement, the agency that he worked for,
was protecting him.
Speaker 1 (25:39):
Yeah, in your case, we know that it was his
best friend on the forest who was one of the
lead investigators.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
When you look at the police investigation, this was not
a one offense. Police reports indicate that he had credible
alligation of raping at least one other woman in his
custody and a pattern of abuse and sexual misconduct that
went back years. One of the police reports talking about
(26:13):
the rape allegations, where he was on patrol, he rapes
a woman and then gives her his card, saying, you
know you want to go on on another date. And
so this is not somebody who's at least the evidence
shows is tied to reality and somebody that we should
be concerned about.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
I read somewhere that Officer Fanel, then Officer Fanell, had
been overheard by a fellow officer bragging or exclaiming that
if he ever found Stacy cheating on him, he would
strangle her with a belt.
Speaker 4 (26:48):
Is that true?
Speaker 3 (26:49):
Yeah, So he was in a police training class. He
was a rookie cop when all this went down, and
a classmate of his was sort of in some sort
of an argument with him, and he said, well, you know,
if I ever catch my girlfriend cheating on me, me
I kill her. And she made some response about how
he would be you know, identified or something. He said, no,
(27:12):
they'll never get my fingerprints. I'll strangler with a belt,
which you know, obviously, where you have Stacy strangled with
a belt is just, you know, hard to understand. But
then you got to put that in the context of
everything that the police reports indicated about Jimmy and everything
we subsequently know. When he talked to the police about
(27:33):
this case early on, his statement was riddled with inconsistencies.
The morning she disappeared, but before her body was found,
took out all the money in his bank account.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
Then the fact that two eyewitnesses have recently come forward
and submitted signed affid David's, an insurance salesperson who said
that Vanell threatened to kill Stacy while a playing for
life insurance, a deputy in the Lee County Sheriff's office
at the time of the murder, who Finel made an
incriminating statement to at Stacy's funeral, and Finelle's best friend
(28:11):
at the time of the murder, Bastrip Sheriff's Deputy Curtis Davis,
has now revealed that Fanell gave an inconsistent account of
where he was on the night of the murder. He
claimed to Officer Davis that he was out late drinking,
and he later testified a triality spent a quiet evening
at home with Stites at their apartment during what we
now know to be the time of her death, based
(28:32):
on no less than doctor Michael Bodden's testimony. When asked
to explain this discrepancy, Fanell invoked his Fifth Amendment rights,
declining to testify to avoid possible self incrimination. So all
of this adds up to a mountain of shit. Also,
(28:58):
the breaking news is that there's a confession right that
someone who was in prison with him has now come
forward and signed to that of David saying that Jimmy
confessed to this fellow that he was in prison with
that he had actually strangled her. Many of you know
doctor Phil for his accomplishments his legendary career in TV
(29:22):
and entertainment, But what you may not know is that
he was the founder of Courtroom Sciences, the first organization
that made a science out of jury selection and other
courtroom practices that lead to the type of outcomes that
we all want, which is the right person getting convicted.
You have made a very conscious decision to use your
(29:44):
personal capital, your name value, your own financial resources, and
most of all, your time to fly around the country
to spend hours and hours helping someone who a few
weeks ago was a total stranger to you. What's going
on here? Why are you so passionately devoted to trying
to save Rodney Reid's life? Don't and that's not hyperbole.
Speaker 8 (30:06):
Well, I went down and spoke to the man, and
I did not go in there presuming he was innocent
or guilty. I went down to talk to him, and
I looked the man in the eye and ask him
a lot of in depth questions, ask him some questions
that there were right or wrong answers to in terms
(30:28):
of whether he was telling the truth or not. I
came away feeling like he was definitely a man of
integrity and was clearly being victimized here. And I really
tried to be empathetic and thought, if I was in
that situation, or one of my sons, which I have two,
(30:53):
we're in that situation, what would I hope and pray
someone would do. And so I came back and really
dove into the science and the evidence here, and I
was appalled at what I found. This man has not
had due process. I mean, he's not had a fair
(31:14):
trial yet, and they've taken twenty two and a half
years of this man's life. And who knows what he
would have done in those twenty two years. You know,
maybe he would have saved some people's lives. Maybe he
would have gone to a wrack. Maybe he would have
been a paramedic and save lives. Maybe he would have
been a thief and gotten shot. You don't know what
somebody would have done. But he had the right to
(31:35):
find out. He had the right to make those choices
and know and that was taken from him. And I, frankly,
don't think this was a close call. I don't you
know whether he did it or didn't do it. I
don't think it was a close call. And if you
watch the two hours that we devoted this on the air,
(31:56):
I brought on the defense lawyer or her fiance. I
brought him on, and I gave him a platform to
speak from. I spoke to him after the show, away
from the cameras, and he does believe Rodney Red is guilty.
And I let him speak, and he said every reason
that he thought I gave people. I did not bury
(32:19):
the negatives. I looked at both sides of this, and
then I looked at the science and it was very
clear to me he couldn't have done this. Even if
he was the kind of character that would have done this,
he couldn't have done this. And I don't believe he's
the kind of character that would have done this. I
didn't know him at the time, but I know him
(32:41):
now and I believe he is a good man that
would be a good addition to this world and this community,
and I just felt like, you know, I can't look
this man in the eye know what I know in
my heart from the training that I have, and go
home and go to dinner. How do you do that?
How do you know what you know and don't do
(33:05):
something about it.
Speaker 1 (33:07):
You can't unknow it, that's for sure.
Speaker 8 (33:09):
First, they cited some DNA evidence. They said there was
Rodney sperm found inside her body, and to me, that's
a lie biomission because supposedly a rape took place at
three am the morning.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
That she died.
Speaker 8 (33:26):
Now, they found her body at approximately three in the afternoon,
about twelve hours later. At that time, had he raped her,
there would have been million of spermtozoa still viable inside
her body. There were three sperm heads, which means they
had deteriorated to the point that the bodies had fallen
(33:47):
off the heads, and there were the three little microscopic
heads in there. So that's about, you know, anywhere between
three and ten million off of the count of what
it would be if he had had sex with her
at the time that she was supposedly raped and killed.
(34:08):
But they had been seeing each other and he said
he had sex with her before and was that relationship
real or did he just make that up? Well, people
he knows knew about it. People she knows knew about it.
People that he didn't know knew about it. So people
from both of their lives, they lived in two different worlds,
and people in both worlds that didn't know each other
(34:28):
both knew about their relationship. So the fact that they
had a relationship to me is confirmed by people who
don't know each other telling the same story. That explains
to me the sperm in her body. Then when they
found her body, the science of deterioration, lividity, the deterioration
of the skin, what they found in the truck, in
(34:51):
terms of bodily fluids that had come up, all the
things that you know were on a timeline from death
just simply didn't match. That she had been dead for
twelve hours when they found the body. It suggested she
had been dead a whole lot longer than that, And
she wasn't with Rodney during those earlier hours. She was
(35:12):
with someone else that is not contested. So if she
was killed hours before they say she was killed, which
the science says is true, he didn't do it. He
wasn't with her nobody says he was with her, then
she was with somebody else, and that is uncontested. There
(35:34):
were no fingerprints in the truck. They didn't test for DNA.
Of course we now can test for contact DNA et cetera,
et cetera. But they didn't find any evidence of him
being in that truck whatsoever. And there's just no evidence
that connects him with that crime. And there is evidence
that connects other people to that crime. So if you
(35:55):
believe these world class worldWe experts that have done thousands
and thousands of autopsies, they say it's not possible that
he did it. So given the science, he was not
with her when she was killed. Game over.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
Roderick Reid and his wife Juanna have put everything careers,
social lives, personal matters on hold to advocate for Rodney
and found time to sit down with me. Roderick, Welcome
to awful conviction. I'm sorry you're here, but hopefully we'll
be able to help make a difference together and get
the justice that we all want for Rodney. I wanted
(36:56):
to ask you about growing up with your older brother.
What was your childhood like? Was it a happy childhood?
Speaker 2 (37:03):
Oh?
Speaker 5 (37:04):
Yeah, we had a good childhood. Matter of fact, I
come from a large family. I got five brothers. Wow,
the five brothers, Rodney is the fourth and nine, I'm
the fifth. He always want a little brother, and when
I came along, he had one, and he doted over me.
He's been there every part of my life since I
can remember, up until.
Speaker 2 (37:25):
Nineteen ninety eight when they convicted them of this crime.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
And when did you find out about Stacy's murder?
Speaker 5 (37:33):
We found about it out about it over the news,
and me and Rodney talked about it, and his assumption was,
I bet you I know that Jimmy Fanill did this,
you know.
Speaker 2 (37:45):
And that's when I said, man, say, I told you
you know. That's when I told your souls started. But
at that.
Speaker 5 (37:51):
Time we had no idea. We never dreamed Rodney would
be charged for Stacy's murder.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
What was that saying that your cousin that you almost
poortends this horrible scenario.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
It's never good to know a dead white woman, something
to that effect.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
It's profound and chilling when you think about how it
actually played out in real life. Knowing the history of
how many black men were lynched for allegedly having sex,
whether they did or didn't with a white woman, And
those weren't even cases in which an officer of the
(38:31):
law was involved as a fiance or anything else. And
in fact, I can't help saying this. It feels like
we're doing everything we can to prevent it. But if
the State of Texas goes forward this execution, it's hard
to call it anything other than a modern day lynching.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
That's exactly what it is. It's murder.
Speaker 5 (38:51):
In my eyes, they committed crimes when they convicted my
brother by withholding evidence, by not giving them trial, by
and not testing all the dinner. And now they said
their site's on taking his life. And that is something
that I cannot just sit back and say nothing or
do nothing about. That is something that I have to
(39:15):
with every fiber in my body, stand up against and
just get a story out here, to do all.
Speaker 2 (39:22):
That I can do.
Speaker 5 (39:23):
You know, That's what me and my family, that's what
we're striving to do all that we can do.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
And you are doing all that you can do. And
it's become a major national news story and a major
cause as more and more people have become aware that
this is such a not only tragic mischaracter justice, but
also such an obvious mischaracter justice. Yes, you've been out there,
You've been meeting with everybody, You've been on TV shows,
(39:50):
you've been with sister Helen, you've been criss crossing the
country dropping everything else that's important to you to fight
this fight. Yeah, and my hat's off to you. How
much hope do you have that justice will be delayed
but not denied in this case.
Speaker 5 (40:08):
I'm very confident that after the world sees this, because
I'm the backup my mom. Quote my mom, when they
convicted my brother on that day, she said, y'all may
do what every other going to try to do to
(40:29):
my baby, but I guarantee you the whole world will
know about it. And when she said that, I didn't
realize that that's what's really what it was going to take.
So I have great hope, in faith and confidence that
(40:51):
my brother will be vindicated and.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
He is going to come home alive and well. I
believe that. I have to believe that.
Speaker 5 (40:58):
I can't put nothing negative in my mind, I can't
use my energy in that way.
Speaker 4 (41:06):
I believe it too.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
And we're you know, there's there's so many good people
involved in this fight. Now, Yes it is, and it's
growing every day.
Speaker 2 (41:12):
It's growing every day every.
Speaker 1 (41:14):
Day, and credit to you for driving that forward. So Roger,
people are listening. Now, what can somebody saying, hollio, what
can I do?
Speaker 2 (41:25):
First off?
Speaker 5 (41:26):
I tell everybody Contact Governor Greg Abbott, okay, call his office,
writer's office. Do the same with Ken Paxton, the Board
of Pardons and Paroles. Contact them, Contact even Brian Gertz
bashtop County District Attorney's office. Pass the word. Tell everybody.
(41:47):
Tag everybody on your social media sites. Help us get
this word out, tell the story, Tell the story. Refer
people to our website Facebook Forward slash read just his initiative.
That's the family's website. My mom Sandra Reid as a
president with us.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
So once again, that's Facebook dot com slash read Justice initiative.
That's Facebook dot com slash read Justice initiative. Go to
Innocenceproject dot org. Follow at Innocence Project on Instagram posting
about Rodney every day. I'm posting about him just about
every day on my Instagram at It's Jason Flomm. I
(42:26):
appreciate you being here to, you know, to shed light
on this terrible injustice and to try to, you know,
raise more awareness maybe there's someone listening who knows the
governor or who has outreach. Uh, someone who's listening who
can write an article or blog or do whatever it is,
or raise attention, raise hell, because if not, it's going
(42:50):
to be a very bad day in Texas and in America.
At this point, we have a feature in this show.
It's my favorite part of the show, and this is
the part of the show that I call closing arguments.
It's where, first of all, I thank you Roger for
coming to New York, being here in the studio with us,
doing everything that you're doing. And now I get to
(43:13):
kick back and turn my microphone off and leave it
up to you for what I call closing arguments.
Speaker 5 (43:21):
What I want everybody to know is that Read Justice Initiative,
it's not just about Rodney. It's about other people that
find themselves in a similar situation. We're about getting justice
for not just for Rodney, but for Stacy, and we
want to help anybody out there that we can help
along the way. But just know that right now, after
(43:43):
we get Ridney home, we're going to be there to
help anybody that needs help in the capacity that we can.
When we first started this thing, it was all about Rodney.
Now we see that, Hey, there's a million other Rodney
reads out there, and with the firing tenacity that we
have and bringing Rodney home, we're going to have the
same to Nasty seeking justice and abolishing the death pildy,
(44:04):
that's what we're want to.
Speaker 1 (44:05):
Do, hey Man, once again, closing arguments with Bryce Benjett,
We at.
Speaker 3 (44:10):
The Innocence Project are continuing to work on this case. Literally,
we will be filing appeals in every court available, and
we will investigate leads. So if there are folks out
there who may know something who have not come forward,
please reach out at the Innocenceproject dot org and there
(44:32):
is a petition that you can sign up for, but
you can also send an email generally which will ultimately
get to me about any information that you have. Again,
this is an active investigation.
Speaker 1 (44:44):
Www. Dot Innocence Project dot org. Put Rodney Reid in
the subject line. Bryce Benjett as our guest and is
Rodney's lead attorney.
Speaker 3 (44:53):
We will investigate information that we get. And obviously this
is a concern for everybody in our society because when
we enforce a judgment like this, it is in the
name of the people and so if this is something
that you are not comfortable with, and I don't think
you should be, you should make your voice hurt and
(45:17):
stand up for what's right in a case like this,
Doctor Phil.
Speaker 8 (45:21):
You know, we're sitting here in November, and twenty two
Thanksgivings and twenty two Christmases have gone by with Rodney
Reid not being able to touch a member of his family.
(45:41):
And twenty two Thanksgivings and twenty two Christmases have gone
by with him thinking that all the people that he
does see are there to kill him. They're just waiting
for a green light to take his life. And I
am convinced that he's there with the full knowledge that
(46:02):
he did not do the crime that he's in there for.
And we have an opportunity to mark this holiday season
by giving him the gift of his life back. And
you know, sometimes we think that in this world we're born,
live and die and never make a difference. This is
(46:25):
one of those times that you can make a difference.
It doesn't take money, it doesn't take time. It just
takes your presence and you stepping up and saying I
stand with Rodney Reid and all the other people that
want him out of prison, and that includes law enforcement officers,
(46:46):
state and federal legislators, people from all walks of life.
Let's do a good thing. The governor of Texas is
a former judge, and I think he's a fair man,
and I think if he hears enough of us speak
in a respectful way. I haven't gone to Austin and
made a big grand stand show running up the steps
(47:08):
of the Capitol with my hair on fire, trying to
embarrass the governor and all that. I haven't done that.
I've been very respectful in the way that we've gone
about this, and I intend to continue to do so
if we keep making progress here and now is the
time to step up and make a difference. We're coming
(47:29):
up on three million signatures for this petition for clemency.
I would sure like to see that at ten million,
there's a point at which they simply cannot ignore the outcry.
Let's take this time to give him the gift of
his life back.
Speaker 1 (47:45):
And now, with a heavy heart, but with optimism, I
am going to introduce our featured guest, Rodney Reid.
Speaker 6 (47:56):
One thing that I really missed was really being a
father to my kids, you know, and and really they
have an opportunity to be the grandfather to my grandchildren.
You know, I just look forward to being out there
with my family, with my friends, with my loved one,
(48:17):
with my supporters. I would really love to meet all
my supporters because I feel that the support that has
been generated behind me, and that's been a real push
be to keep me going. You know, when I when
I read their mail, read their letters. A lot of
them I don't respond to, you know, but then there's
(48:38):
a there's so much mail. I really don't have time
to respond to all of them because then I have
to I do have to get sleep, trying to get
some sleep. But knowing that the people that are behind me,
that are advocating for me, you know, I can name
them all, Julie, Judy, Tiffany, Mary Bath. Yeah, they're are
(49:03):
my real push and my mom, my brothers, and my daughter,
my granddaughter's beautiful smile. You know that that that keeps me,
that inspires me when I see a beautiful smile. I
look forward to holding them before they get too damn big.
(49:25):
It's just so much, so much State of Texas is
trying to take my life, trying to excute me, drive me,
to a table and inject my body with poisons. Don't
sit back and just let this happen. Just stay out,
stay involved.
Speaker 1 (49:48):
Don't forget to give us a fantastic review wherever you
get your podcasts.
Speaker 4 (49:52):
It really helps.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
And I'm a proud donor to the NSCIS project, and
I really hope you'll join me in supporting this very
import and cause and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions.
Go to Innison's project dot org to learn how to
donate and get involved. I'd like to thank our production team,
Connor Hall and Kevin Wartis. The music in the show
is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be
(50:16):
sure to follow us on Instagram at Rowful Conviction and
on Facebook at Rowful Conviction podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason
Flamm is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in
association with Signal Company Number one
Before we get into this episode, I have some breaking
news to share with you. Rodney Reid has been granted
a stay of execution, and I want to thank every
one of you who took action, who signed a petition,
who made phone calls, who wrote letters. Your actions matter,
and this is a good day. At least we have
(00:21):
a chance now to reopen this case and prove his
actual innocence once and for all. The year was nineteen
ninety six. Stacy Steitz and police officer Jimmy Fanell were
engaged to be married, but Stacy was having an affair
with a man named Rodney Reid. On April twenty third,
(00:42):
nineteen ninety six, Stacy's body was discovered strangled on the
side of a dirt road near Bastrip, Texas. Her fiancee,
Jimmy Fanell, was a prime suspect until three of Rodney
Reid's intact bermitdazoua were found inside her body. During trial,
the state alleged that Rodney intercepted miss Style on her
three am drive to work and proceeded to rape and
(01:03):
murder her, with no other physical evidence of Rodney in
the car or at the scene. The forensic science of
the time, incorrectly asserting that intact spermadzzoa could not survive
past twenty four hours, and Stacy's whereabouts being known within
the twenty four hours prior to her death. Rodney Reid
was sentenced to death in nineteen ninety eight. It is
(01:23):
now common knowledge that intact spermaizoa can be found at
least seventy two hours after release, and all of the
state's forensic expert witnesses have since disavowed their testimonies. Reid
continues to maintain that the spermadizoa that the investigation discovered
was the result of consensual intercourse that transpired well over
twenty four hours prior to her death. On this episode
(01:45):
of Wroeful Conviction with Jason Flahm, we go to death
Row to speak with Rodney Reid. Will also speak with
his attorney Bryce Benjett, his brother Roderick Reid, doctor Phil
and the world renowned forensic expert doctor Michael Bowden. Will
retell his compelling sworn testimony that rules out Rodney as
the potential perpetrator and disputes the time of death.
Speaker 2 (02:06):
This is wrongful conviction.
Speaker 1 (02:16):
Senior staff attorney for the Innison's project in Rodney's legal council,
Bryce Benjett came by to tell us about Rodney's case,
and we know that on April twenty third, nineteen ninety six,
Stacy Stites was found strangled and killed in Bastro of Texas.
She was last seen, of course, with their fiance, Jimmy Fanel,
and the search for Stacy started when she failed to
(02:38):
report for her three thirty am shift at the grocery
store where she worked. Jimmy's truck, of course, which he
testified that she used to drive herself to work that morning,
was found in a high school parking lot at five
twenty three am, and Stacy's body was discovered later that
afternoon that same day, lying face up near an unpaved road.
So the state argued that Roddy didn't know her, but
(03:01):
rather that he intercepted her on her way to work,
gained entry somehow to her truck, sexually assaulted and strangled her,
and transported her to the remote unpaved road where her
body was discovered. All the while and this is key
not leaving any other evidence behind other than the sperm
in her body. And this theory was built importantly on
(03:21):
three pillars, the three sperms of the zoa that were
found right, the testimony for three forensic experts who maintained
that sperm does not stay intact for longer than twenty
four hours after intercourse, which of course we know that
it does, and that Stit's whereabouts were accounted for most
of the day before she was murdered, thereby ruling out
the consensual sex with Reed as an explanation for the
(03:42):
presence of his sperm. And of course the testimony from
Jimmy Fanell who said that she left at three am
for work in his truck. But take us back and
explain some of these circumstances and how the state developed
this narrative that we now know not only isn't true,
but couldn't possibly be true.
Speaker 3 (04:01):
Yeah, it's interesting because when you go back and you
look at how crimes ought to be investigated, there were
many sort of obvious errors that were done. Initially, Nobody
looked at the apartment that Stacey Stite shared with Jimmy Fanell,
even though that was the last place she was seeing.
Speaker 4 (04:21):
That is sort of police work.
Speaker 5 (04:22):
One oh one.
Speaker 3 (04:24):
There were not adequate notes taken of interviews of Jimmy Fanell,
who was later the key source of the timeline of
the state's case. But as the investigation actually progressed, Jimmy
Fanell soon emerged as the prime suspect in the case
and was investigated. He was aggressively interrogated, he was subjected
(04:46):
to polygraphs she failed, which he failed. And this took
place even after the police knew that it was not
his semen that was collected from Stacy's body, and so
the notion that the person who semen is in that
body must be a rapist and a murderer was not
(05:06):
the operating theory of the investigation until they matched that
semen to Rodney, a person of color. And so there
is where you have an investigation of the person who
looks like he had opportunity, motive, had a record consistent
with this kind of behavior. And as soon as Rodney
(05:29):
was identified as the source of that seamen, this suddenly
turned around to a sexual assault murder that had to
be committed by him.
Speaker 1 (05:38):
So now Rodney becomes the suspect. The state argued that
Rodney didn't know the victim. He did, in fact, he
was having a relationship, and we now have numerous witnesses
that have come forth who had no connection to Rodney, right,
not just the ones that did have a connection to Rodney.
His relatives knew he was seeing her, but now others
strangers to him.
Speaker 3 (05:55):
Yeah, and this was a big issue at the trial.
Just to back up, I mean this rile was rushed
to say at the best. At the trial, the defense
lawyers were presenting what Rodney had told him, which he
could back up with witnesses. He said, I was seeing Stacy.
It was an occasional thing. It was casual. We were
(06:17):
with each other the night before her death, So not
the night of April twenty second, twenty third, but the
night of April twenty first, twenty second. So that was
the theory that was presented at the trial. But unfortunately,
the defense lawyers did not do the work or have
the time to do the work to actually present that
(06:38):
evidence to the jury. Even what little evidence that Rodney's
defense lawyers were able to present about this relationship about
the explanation was completely negated by the prosecution's experts, who
said that it was impossible for Rodney's seeming to be
(06:58):
there based on consensual sex because of this twenty four
hour timeframe.
Speaker 1 (07:03):
At that point right, any jury is going to go well,
that's I mean, you can't explain.
Speaker 4 (07:06):
That a way.
Speaker 3 (07:07):
And it was clearly important to the jury because they
asked about it during their deliberations, and the judge actually
read that invalid testimony back to them while they were
deciding whether or not to convict Rodney Reid.
Speaker 1 (07:21):
But now we know from the top experts in the field,
including doctor Baden, that in fact, the actual amount of
time that the spermatozoa can survive or that can be detected,
I guess up to seventy two hours.
Speaker 3 (07:38):
And all you need to do is open a forensic
pathology textbook.
Speaker 1 (07:41):
Wow, and they don't need an expert.
Speaker 3 (07:43):
And so we've gone back now to the States Forensic Pathologist,
the person who did the autopsy, who has disclaimed the
testimony that was offered at the trial. We've gone back
to the Texas Department of Public Safety, who has clarified
that although their analysts said twenty four hours, the science
says seventy two. And we've gone back to the private
(08:05):
DNA lab, who their expert also testified about this twenty
four hour timeframe, and that private DNA lab has likewise
recanted that opinion said it was in error, and so
the foundation of the state's case, which completely negated Rodney's
ability to defend himself, is gone, and then in its place,
(08:30):
We've consulted with the leading forensic pathologists in the country,
Michael boden, Werner, spitz Leroy Riddick, and uniformly they have
said that when you look at this body, she had
been killed hours before the state alleged that she was killed,
which is a time that she, according to Jimmy Finnell,
(08:51):
was at home with him in her apartment.
Speaker 1 (08:57):
My production crew and I flew to Houston, Texas, drove
about an hour outside the city to the Polunsky Unit
where Texas Department of Criminal Justice houses death row inmates.
We were instructed to leave everything but are inspected and approved.
Production equipment in the car, went through security, and finally
reached Rodney Reid for our non contact interview through bulletproof
plexiglass on death row. Right, good afternoon, How are you doing.
(09:25):
I'm doing okay. I mean my heart is heavy, obviously,
but I want to talk about you. Thank you for
talking with me. First of all, how are you doing now?
I mean, you've been through this before, you had an
execution day in twenty fifteen, so this is the second
time around.
Speaker 6 (09:41):
Yes, well as well as to be expected. I mean,
you know, I have my days, but I'm good.
Speaker 2 (09:50):
You know.
Speaker 6 (09:50):
With meditation, reading, I tried to stay up on current events.
I tried to distract myself from what's going on, you know,
with other things. You know, it's for stimulating my mind.
I'll read magazine, read newspapers. I really like reading the
comments with my sporters. You know, they have comments that
(10:12):
that I'll read. They're inspiring to me.
Speaker 1 (10:15):
Well, you're inspiring to them. I mean they're writing to
the Governor's signing petitions that I'm putting out that this
is project is putting out and it's extraordinary, and it's
somewhat encouraging to see that, you know, and I think
it's going to make a difference, hope. So and so
I want to go back, if it's okay with you,
back to nineteen ninety six. You're a young man, good
(10:35):
looking guy when I was a young man. Yeah, you're
still a good looking guy, but you're a young guy
and you meet this woman, Stacy Stye. Is a romantic situation.
We know it was a consensual situation. You met her
at a.
Speaker 6 (10:52):
Doamind Shamrock was a it was a convenience store, gas station,
life type, but they had a game room and all that.
Speaker 7 (10:59):
And was it love and first sight? Was it like
a lightning bolt hit you or I. I wouldn't say
it like that, you know.
Speaker 6 (11:06):
I was just there. We were just hanging out. I'm
at a jukebox selecting songs and she walks in, you know,
And I wouldn't say it was no love at first sight,
you know, because we ended up playing pool, you know,
striking up conversation and it was just good.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
And then sometime after that, obviously there was chemistry there
and you started seeing each other.
Speaker 6 (11:26):
Yeah, yeah, discreet, you know.
Speaker 1 (11:29):
And then at some point she started seeing Jimmy finell.
Speaker 6 (11:34):
No, she was already seeing him, you know. I was
already seeing someone else.
Speaker 8 (11:38):
You know.
Speaker 6 (11:39):
That's what's part of the reason why we kind of
kept it discreet.
Speaker 1 (11:42):
Did you think you were in love with her or
was it more just just young people having fun?
Speaker 6 (11:47):
We were having fun. There was chemistry there, but I
wouldn't I wouldn't say that I was in love with
her because I think if I would have been in
love with her, I had to cut everything else off,
you know, And I don't really think that she was
in love with me, because she would have been the
same way. She would cut everything off on that end.
Speaker 1 (12:02):
You know, how long had you been seeing Stacy when
when she was murdered.
Speaker 6 (12:07):
That I met her in late October, early in November
of ninety five. Her death was in April, so I
will table.
Speaker 7 (12:15):
Six months, six six months? And how did you find
out about on the news?
Speaker 6 (12:19):
Yeah? Yeah, when I heard it on the news, and
a talented athlete, I didn't want to believe it. This
is not the Stacy soul. Yeah I was. I was.
I was quite shocked her upcoming wedding when they when
they flashed her picture. I didn't want to believe it
(12:40):
because I was just with her. I didn't want to
believe it.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
You were just with her, like.
Speaker 6 (12:44):
Late night Sunday, early morning Monday, and she was murdered
on a Tuesday, the twenty third. All I can do
is tell you that I mentioned I had nothing to
do with that three sperms. I was with her the
night before. I mean, you learn that sim biology that
in a pinhead dropped you looking at millions. That's just
just a pinhead drop. I mean for the states on
(13:08):
experts to come back in recan't you know.
Speaker 1 (13:12):
All three of them? And then we know that Jimmy
was the original suspect. We know they kind of circled
up the wagons and you know, protected him or he
failed two polygraphs. We know all the fact that, Yeah,
what would you most want people to know about the
evidence if you were to say it's to a stranger
or somebody who's watching this right now, but well, I
(13:34):
don't know he's in there.
Speaker 6 (13:34):
It must be something that well the time of death.
Speaker 1 (13:41):
Doctor Michael Boden is about as decorated a forensic expert
as you can get, including having served as chairman of
the Forensic Pathology Panel for the House Select Committee on Assassinations,
investigating the assassinations of none less than President John F.
Kennedy and Martin Luther King Junior. He studied the evidence
Stacey Stitke's murder case and gave testimony at a hearing
(14:03):
back on October eleventh, twenty seventeen, when Rodney was seeking
a new trial.
Speaker 4 (14:08):
I think that my opinion is solid in this matter
and disagrees with the prosecutor's opinion.
Speaker 1 (14:15):
It disagrees on almost every important point that the prosecution
used to convict Rodney.
Speaker 4 (14:22):
Well, it disagrees on the time of death, the place
of death, and whether or not a sexual assault that occurred.
Speaker 1 (14:30):
Right, Well, those are pretty much it. And then there's
the issue of vividity, which plays into all of these things.
Speaker 4 (14:35):
Lividity is a measure of time of death. When we die,
certain processes in our bodies stop. The heart stops functioning,
blood stops moving around, and the blood itself. Similar to
when you give blood at a blood bank, the blood is
about forty five percent solid material red cells, white cells
(14:58):
and platelets and plasma on top of the yellow tinged
clear fluid. From the time of our birth to time
we die. The heart not only pumps blood around but
also churns it up. So when blood comes out, one
sees red blood. You don't see the separation when blood
goes into a bag and a blood bank. After a
few minutes, one sees the solid material settling down, so
(15:21):
you have all the red cells and the majority of
the slaw material coming to the bottom forty percent of
the volume. That's what happens after death. After we die,
the blood, instead of being well churned up starts settling
out with the red blood cells, white blood cells, and
platelets settling to the bottom gravity by gravity, So whatever
(15:44):
part of the body is downward against the ground will
get a bluish purple color of the settled red blood cells.
That's called lividity.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
And why is this so important in the case of
stacy states.
Speaker 4 (16:01):
Because it tells two things to the medical examine the
kirner coming to the scene. The first thing we look
for always is did the person die here or was
the body moved after death? Just an automatic initial impression.
When we see inappropriate liviidity that is lying on the
(16:21):
back as occurrent here, but the discoloration is in the front,
it means that individual, the decessent here was laying face
down for at least four or five hours for the
blood to settle, causing the bluish discoloration of libidity. She
(16:41):
could not have died in that position. If she had
died in that position, all the libidity would be near
the ground. And that's a certainty, that's a certain ring.
This is a change in the body that happens to
everybody after death. But just the laws of gravity. But
for the liviidity to settle and not turn. If a
body is moved within an hour after death, it's like
(17:04):
when the snow glow, that you let the snow settle
the bottom and you turn it over and it settles
in the other direction. If in an hour or two
one turns the body over, then all the blood goes
in the other direction. But after four or five hours,
the lividity becomes fixed because the red blood cells started
going out of the blood vessels and well, so that
(17:27):
if you turn it over after four or five hours,
the inappropriate lividity will remain and won't disappear. So in
order for us to see the lividity on the front,
not only was she laying face down, but she was
laying face down in the circumstances at least four or
five hours, So we could tell from that that she
(17:48):
was moved from a place that she was laying face down,
and that she had to be in one position for
at least four or five hours before she was moved.
Another thing that happens when we die is that the
tissues start to decompose because it's not getting the usual
oxygen supply. So the first tissues that decompose are the
lining cells of the mouth, the nose, and also the
(18:10):
intestine track. They just start dying in the nose and mouth.
The dying tissues mix up with whatever fluids are present
and a thick maroon type discharge will occur. She had
to be laying face forward and nose of mouth free
for fluids to leak out, and this would happen in
(18:33):
a car. The purge fluids were in the passenger side
and that would be coming out of her nose and mouth,
and the libidity would be developing to some extent on
the fact that she's leaning forward. In this case, since
the prosecution argument is that the defendant met her at
(18:55):
three am and she died after three am, laying in
one position for at least four or five hours until
eight am, and there's evidence that she was dead in
the car before five point thirty because in the car
one has purge fluids, so she's dead for at least
four hours before she's taken out of the car.
Speaker 1 (19:15):
And of course we know that the car was found
at five twenty three am, so it actually is not possible.
This scenario cannot have happened. You can't have five hours
and two hours, that's right.
Speaker 4 (19:24):
The lividity and the purge fluids of the car would
establish that she was dead laying face down closer to midnight,
but definitely before three o'clock in the morning.
Speaker 1 (19:36):
The fiance, Jimmy Fanel, and his own words under oath
a trial. He stated that he was home with her
from eight pm the night before until she left for
work around three in the morning the next day. And
I think you've made it very clear that it is
your expert opinion, to a degree of a very high
degree of certainty, that that was the time that she
(19:58):
was murdered.
Speaker 4 (19:58):
It is my opinion that she was murdered and strangled
well before three am, closer to midnight, and that mister
Fanel was there. Maybe somebody else came in and did it.
I can't say that he did it, except that he
was the only one there.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
How certain are you that Rodney could not have committed
this crime?
Speaker 4 (20:23):
I am certain beyond all reasonable doubts that she was
dead before she could possibly have met with Rodney, that
he could not possibly have strangled Stacy after three o'clock
in the morning. Two reasonable certainty, maybe after ninety eight
(20:44):
ninety nine percent. That as far as any testimony in
any trial in the standards used, he could not have.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
Committed the crime.
Speaker 1 (20:54):
If this execution goes forward, how are you going to
process that information?
Speaker 4 (21:00):
It would be terrible. Number ways. Number One, there are
people when executed who turn out to be innocent. Clearly,
even if he's exonerated, it's horrible that he's been in
prison for so long, during which time, whoever the real murderer,
is free to go about harming other people.
Speaker 1 (21:31):
I want to talk about the fact that this officer
had a very troubling history of this conduct, and that,
in fact, sometime after Rodney's arrest and conviction, Jimmy himself
was arrested and convicted.
Speaker 3 (21:49):
Yeah, and I think we need to go back and
just look at who Jimmy Fanel was at the time
and who he continues to be. Even before the time
of the murder, there were some that things weren't.
Speaker 2 (22:01):
Right with Jimmy.
Speaker 3 (22:04):
In February of nineteen ninety six, so this is two
months a little more before the murder, There's an incident
in which he chases down a young Hispanic man in
the small town that he's a patrol officer.
Speaker 5 (22:16):
He's alleged to.
Speaker 3 (22:17):
Have beat him and put a gun to this kid's head.
He was sued for that, alleging police misconduct and police brutality.
That suit was settled, so he had a record of misconduct.
And that's just not even the half of it. Just
looking from the time around the murder, a woman that
Jimmy Fanell was dating in Gettings described him as emotionally abusive, possessive,
(22:44):
virulently racist, and when she broke off with him the relationship,
he stalked her. You know, I remember one day, you know,
open up the newspaper and reading about Fanel's rest for
a alleged sexual assault while on patrol, and he ultimately
pled guilty to related charges that arose from an incident
(23:07):
in which he was called out to assist a young
woman and instead of helping her, drove her out, kidnapped her,
raped her, and then dropped her back off in the
situation that he was supposed to protect her from. She
with just incredible bravery, calls nine one and reports it.
(23:27):
And what happens. Jimmy Finel comes back out, intercepts her,
arrests her, and thankfully of the police ultimately took this
seriously and Finel was prosecuted. I convicted and convicted, pled
guilty to charges, served essentially every day of a ten
year sentence.
Speaker 6 (23:50):
He was quote unquote one of the state's finest a
police officer, you know, and these things happen. You know,
you have police killings here, killing innocent people, you know,
unarmed people, and the first thing they say, they was
in fear for their lives. But then here you have
this police officers that's wasn't in fear for his life,
(24:10):
didn't give a damn about life, and up until the
time he got convicted of the crime he just got
released from I feel like the state enabled him that.
I mean, they should have been keeping an eye on it.
Speaker 1 (24:24):
When did you learn about Jimmy being arrested and charged
with kidnapping and rape, which happened about ten years after
you were convicted.
Speaker 6 (24:31):
Yeah, it was on TV. No. I was listening to
the radio. We don't have television here, you know. I
listened to it hour on the hour, you know, and
just so happened. I was and I heard them talking
about an officer being arrested for sexual assault and Williamson County,
and it was getting closing club and then when they
said Jimmy Fanel, I tried to kick the door off
(24:53):
the hinges. I was like, I was elated, you know,
I was kind of amped up.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Really, did you think they were victim?
Speaker 6 (25:04):
Yeah? It wasn't until later on to my attorneys within
this project really started digging into that and pulling up
the information, and I was like, well, okay, he's charged
with this. But then they found out that he was
under investigation in it. They found out about these other
(25:25):
cases that he had been charged with that his fellow
officers pushed on this rug for him. You know, I
was like, there's no way this can't be happening. So
even the law enforcement, the agency that he worked for,
was protecting him.
Speaker 1 (25:39):
Yeah, in your case, we know that it was his
best friend on the forest who was one of the
lead investigators.
Speaker 3 (25:49):
When you look at the police investigation, this was not
a one offense. Police reports indicate that he had credible
alligation of raping at least one other woman in his
custody and a pattern of abuse and sexual misconduct that
went back years. One of the police reports talking about
(26:13):
the rape allegations, where he was on patrol, he rapes
a woman and then gives her his card, saying, you
know you want to go on on another date. And
so this is not somebody who's at least the evidence
shows is tied to reality and somebody that we should
be concerned about.
Speaker 1 (26:32):
I read somewhere that Officer Fanel, then Officer Fanell, had
been overheard by a fellow officer bragging or exclaiming that
if he ever found Stacy cheating on him, he would
strangle her with a belt.
Speaker 4 (26:48):
Is that true?
Speaker 3 (26:49):
Yeah, So he was in a police training class. He
was a rookie cop when all this went down, and
a classmate of his was sort of in some sort
of an argument with him, and he said, well, you know,
if I ever catch my girlfriend cheating on me, me
I kill her. And she made some response about how
he would be you know, identified or something. He said, no,
(27:12):
they'll never get my fingerprints. I'll strangler with a belt,
which you know, obviously, where you have Stacy strangled with
a belt is just, you know, hard to understand. But
then you got to put that in the context of
everything that the police reports indicated about Jimmy and everything
we subsequently know. When he talked to the police about
(27:33):
this case early on, his statement was riddled with inconsistencies.
The morning she disappeared, but before her body was found,
took out all the money in his bank account.
Speaker 1 (27:46):
Then the fact that two eyewitnesses have recently come forward
and submitted signed affid David's, an insurance salesperson who said
that Vanell threatened to kill Stacy while a playing for
life insurance, a deputy in the Lee County Sheriff's office
at the time of the murder, who Finel made an
incriminating statement to at Stacy's funeral, and Finelle's best friend
(28:11):
at the time of the murder, Bastrip Sheriff's Deputy Curtis Davis,
has now revealed that Fanell gave an inconsistent account of
where he was on the night of the murder. He
claimed to Officer Davis that he was out late drinking,
and he later testified a triality spent a quiet evening
at home with Stites at their apartment during what we
now know to be the time of her death, based
(28:32):
on no less than doctor Michael Bodden's testimony. When asked
to explain this discrepancy, Fanell invoked his Fifth Amendment rights,
declining to testify to avoid possible self incrimination. So all
of this adds up to a mountain of shit. Also,
(28:58):
the breaking news is that there's a confession right that
someone who was in prison with him has now come
forward and signed to that of David saying that Jimmy
confessed to this fellow that he was in prison with
that he had actually strangled her. Many of you know
doctor Phil for his accomplishments his legendary career in TV
(29:22):
and entertainment, But what you may not know is that
he was the founder of Courtroom Sciences, the first organization
that made a science out of jury selection and other
courtroom practices that lead to the type of outcomes that
we all want, which is the right person getting convicted.
You have made a very conscious decision to use your
(29:44):
personal capital, your name value, your own financial resources, and
most of all, your time to fly around the country
to spend hours and hours helping someone who a few
weeks ago was a total stranger to you. What's going
on here? Why are you so passionately devoted to trying
to save Rodney Reid's life? Don't and that's not hyperbole.
Speaker 8 (30:06):
Well, I went down and spoke to the man, and
I did not go in there presuming he was innocent
or guilty. I went down to talk to him, and
I looked the man in the eye and ask him
a lot of in depth questions, ask him some questions
that there were right or wrong answers to in terms
(30:28):
of whether he was telling the truth or not. I
came away feeling like he was definitely a man of
integrity and was clearly being victimized here. And I really
tried to be empathetic and thought, if I was in
that situation, or one of my sons, which I have two,
(30:53):
we're in that situation, what would I hope and pray
someone would do. And so I came back and really
dove into the science and the evidence here, and I
was appalled at what I found. This man has not
had due process. I mean, he's not had a fair
(31:14):
trial yet, and they've taken twenty two and a half
years of this man's life. And who knows what he
would have done in those twenty two years. You know,
maybe he would have saved some people's lives. Maybe he
would have gone to a wrack. Maybe he would have
been a paramedic and save lives. Maybe he would have
been a thief and gotten shot. You don't know what
somebody would have done. But he had the right to
(31:35):
find out. He had the right to make those choices
and know and that was taken from him. And I, frankly,
don't think this was a close call. I don't you
know whether he did it or didn't do it. I
don't think it was a close call. And if you
watch the two hours that we devoted this on the air,
(31:56):
I brought on the defense lawyer or her fiance. I
brought him on, and I gave him a platform to
speak from. I spoke to him after the show, away
from the cameras, and he does believe Rodney Red is guilty.
And I let him speak, and he said every reason
that he thought I gave people. I did not bury
(32:19):
the negatives. I looked at both sides of this, and
then I looked at the science and it was very
clear to me he couldn't have done this. Even if
he was the kind of character that would have done this,
he couldn't have done this. And I don't believe he's
the kind of character that would have done this. I
didn't know him at the time, but I know him
(32:41):
now and I believe he is a good man that
would be a good addition to this world and this community,
and I just felt like, you know, I can't look
this man in the eye know what I know in
my heart from the training that I have, and go
home and go to dinner. How do you do that?
How do you know what you know and don't do
(33:05):
something about it.
Speaker 1 (33:07):
You can't unknow it, that's for sure.
Speaker 8 (33:09):
First, they cited some DNA evidence. They said there was
Rodney sperm found inside her body, and to me, that's
a lie biomission because supposedly a rape took place at
three am the morning.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
That she died.
Speaker 8 (33:26):
Now, they found her body at approximately three in the afternoon,
about twelve hours later. At that time, had he raped her,
there would have been million of spermtozoa still viable inside
her body. There were three sperm heads, which means they
had deteriorated to the point that the bodies had fallen
(33:47):
off the heads, and there were the three little microscopic
heads in there. So that's about, you know, anywhere between
three and ten million off of the count of what
it would be if he had had sex with her
at the time that she was supposedly raped and killed.
(34:08):
But they had been seeing each other and he said
he had sex with her before and was that relationship
real or did he just make that up? Well, people
he knows knew about it. People she knows knew about it.
People that he didn't know knew about it. So people
from both of their lives, they lived in two different worlds,
and people in both worlds that didn't know each other
(34:28):
both knew about their relationship. So the fact that they
had a relationship to me is confirmed by people who
don't know each other telling the same story. That explains
to me the sperm in her body. Then when they
found her body, the science of deterioration, lividity, the deterioration
of the skin, what they found in the truck, in
(34:51):
terms of bodily fluids that had come up, all the
things that you know were on a timeline from death
just simply didn't match. That she had been dead for
twelve hours when they found the body. It suggested she
had been dead a whole lot longer than that, And
she wasn't with Rodney during those earlier hours. She was
(35:12):
with someone else that is not contested. So if she
was killed hours before they say she was killed, which
the science says is true, he didn't do it. He
wasn't with her nobody says he was with her, then
she was with somebody else, and that is uncontested. There
(35:34):
were no fingerprints in the truck. They didn't test for DNA.
Of course we now can test for contact DNA et cetera,
et cetera. But they didn't find any evidence of him
being in that truck whatsoever. And there's just no evidence
that connects him with that crime. And there is evidence
that connects other people to that crime. So if you
(35:55):
believe these world class worldWe experts that have done thousands
and thousands of autopsies, they say it's not possible that
he did it. So given the science, he was not
with her when she was killed. Game over.
Speaker 1 (36:33):
Roderick Reid and his wife Juanna have put everything careers,
social lives, personal matters on hold to advocate for Rodney
and found time to sit down with me. Roderick, Welcome
to awful conviction. I'm sorry you're here, but hopefully we'll
be able to help make a difference together and get
the justice that we all want for Rodney. I wanted
(36:56):
to ask you about growing up with your older brother.
What was your childhood like? Was it a happy childhood?
Speaker 2 (37:03):
Oh?
Speaker 5 (37:04):
Yeah, we had a good childhood. Matter of fact, I
come from a large family. I got five brothers. Wow,
the five brothers, Rodney is the fourth and nine, I'm
the fifth. He always want a little brother, and when
I came along, he had one, and he doted over me.
He's been there every part of my life since I
can remember, up until.
Speaker 2 (37:25):
Nineteen ninety eight when they convicted them of this crime.
Speaker 1 (37:29):
And when did you find out about Stacy's murder?
Speaker 5 (37:33):
We found about it out about it over the news,
and me and Rodney talked about it, and his assumption was,
I bet you I know that Jimmy Fanill did this,
you know.
Speaker 2 (37:45):
And that's when I said, man, say, I told you
you know. That's when I told your souls started. But
at that.
Speaker 5 (37:51):
Time we had no idea. We never dreamed Rodney would
be charged for Stacy's murder.
Speaker 1 (37:58):
What was that saying that your cousin that you almost
poortends this horrible scenario.
Speaker 2 (38:04):
It's never good to know a dead white woman, something
to that effect.
Speaker 1 (38:09):
It's profound and chilling when you think about how it
actually played out in real life. Knowing the history of
how many black men were lynched for allegedly having sex,
whether they did or didn't with a white woman, And
those weren't even cases in which an officer of the
(38:31):
law was involved as a fiance or anything else. And
in fact, I can't help saying this. It feels like
we're doing everything we can to prevent it. But if
the State of Texas goes forward this execution, it's hard
to call it anything other than a modern day lynching.
Speaker 2 (38:48):
That's exactly what it is. It's murder.
Speaker 5 (38:51):
In my eyes, they committed crimes when they convicted my
brother by withholding evidence, by not giving them trial, by
and not testing all the dinner. And now they said
their site's on taking his life. And that is something
that I cannot just sit back and say nothing or
do nothing about. That is something that I have to
(39:15):
with every fiber in my body, stand up against and
just get a story out here, to do all.
Speaker 2 (39:22):
That I can do.
Speaker 5 (39:23):
You know, That's what me and my family, that's what
we're striving to do all that we can do.
Speaker 1 (39:28):
And you are doing all that you can do. And
it's become a major national news story and a major
cause as more and more people have become aware that
this is such a not only tragic mischaracter justice, but
also such an obvious mischaracter justice. Yes, you've been out there,
You've been meeting with everybody, You've been on TV shows,
(39:50):
you've been with sister Helen, you've been criss crossing the
country dropping everything else that's important to you to fight
this fight. Yeah, and my hat's off to you. How
much hope do you have that justice will be delayed
but not denied in this case.
Speaker 5 (40:08):
I'm very confident that after the world sees this, because
I'm the backup my mom. Quote my mom, when they
convicted my brother on that day, she said, y'all may
do what every other going to try to do to
(40:29):
my baby, but I guarantee you the whole world will
know about it. And when she said that, I didn't
realize that that's what's really what it was going to take.
So I have great hope, in faith and confidence that
(40:51):
my brother will be vindicated and.
Speaker 2 (40:54):
He is going to come home alive and well. I
believe that. I have to believe that.
Speaker 5 (40:58):
I can't put nothing negative in my mind, I can't
use my energy in that way.
Speaker 4 (41:06):
I believe it too.
Speaker 1 (41:06):
And we're you know, there's there's so many good people
involved in this fight. Now, Yes it is, and it's
growing every day.
Speaker 2 (41:12):
It's growing every day every.
Speaker 1 (41:14):
Day, and credit to you for driving that forward. So Roger,
people are listening. Now, what can somebody saying, hollio, what
can I do?
Speaker 2 (41:25):
First off?
Speaker 5 (41:26):
I tell everybody Contact Governor Greg Abbott, okay, call his office,
writer's office. Do the same with Ken Paxton, the Board
of Pardons and Paroles. Contact them, Contact even Brian Gertz
bashtop County District Attorney's office. Pass the word. Tell everybody.
(41:47):
Tag everybody on your social media sites. Help us get
this word out, tell the story, Tell the story. Refer
people to our website Facebook Forward slash read just his initiative.
That's the family's website. My mom Sandra Reid as a
president with us.
Speaker 1 (42:05):
So once again, that's Facebook dot com slash read Justice initiative.
That's Facebook dot com slash read Justice initiative. Go to
Innocenceproject dot org. Follow at Innocence Project on Instagram posting
about Rodney every day. I'm posting about him just about
every day on my Instagram at It's Jason Flomm. I
(42:26):
appreciate you being here to, you know, to shed light
on this terrible injustice and to try to, you know,
raise more awareness maybe there's someone listening who knows the
governor or who has outreach. Uh, someone who's listening who
can write an article or blog or do whatever it is,
or raise attention, raise hell, because if not, it's going
(42:50):
to be a very bad day in Texas and in America.
At this point, we have a feature in this show.
It's my favorite part of the show, and this is
the part of the show that I call closing arguments.
It's where, first of all, I thank you Roger for
coming to New York, being here in the studio with us,
doing everything that you're doing. And now I get to
(43:13):
kick back and turn my microphone off and leave it
up to you for what I call closing arguments.
Speaker 5 (43:21):
What I want everybody to know is that Read Justice Initiative,
it's not just about Rodney. It's about other people that
find themselves in a similar situation. We're about getting justice
for not just for Rodney, but for Stacy, and we
want to help anybody out there that we can help
along the way. But just know that right now, after
(43:43):
we get Ridney home, we're going to be there to
help anybody that needs help in the capacity that we can.
When we first started this thing, it was all about Rodney.
Now we see that, Hey, there's a million other Rodney
reads out there, and with the firing tenacity that we
have and bringing Rodney home, we're going to have the
same to Nasty seeking justice and abolishing the death pildy,
(44:04):
that's what we're want to.
Speaker 1 (44:05):
Do, hey Man, once again, closing arguments with Bryce Benjett,
We at.
Speaker 3 (44:10):
The Innocence Project are continuing to work on this case. Literally,
we will be filing appeals in every court available, and
we will investigate leads. So if there are folks out
there who may know something who have not come forward,
please reach out at the Innocenceproject dot org and there
(44:32):
is a petition that you can sign up for, but
you can also send an email generally which will ultimately
get to me about any information that you have. Again,
this is an active investigation.
Speaker 1 (44:44):
Www. Dot Innocence Project dot org. Put Rodney Reid in
the subject line. Bryce Benjett as our guest and is
Rodney's lead attorney.
Speaker 3 (44:53):
We will investigate information that we get. And obviously this
is a concern for everybody in our society because when
we enforce a judgment like this, it is in the
name of the people and so if this is something
that you are not comfortable with, and I don't think
you should be, you should make your voice hurt and
(45:17):
stand up for what's right in a case like this,
Doctor Phil.
Speaker 8 (45:21):
You know, we're sitting here in November, and twenty two
Thanksgivings and twenty two Christmases have gone by with Rodney
Reid not being able to touch a member of his family.
(45:41):
And twenty two Thanksgivings and twenty two Christmases have gone
by with him thinking that all the people that he
does see are there to kill him. They're just waiting
for a green light to take his life. And I
am convinced that he's there with the full knowledge that
(46:02):
he did not do the crime that he's in there for.
And we have an opportunity to mark this holiday season
by giving him the gift of his life back. And
you know, sometimes we think that in this world we're born,
live and die and never make a difference. This is
(46:25):
one of those times that you can make a difference.
It doesn't take money, it doesn't take time. It just
takes your presence and you stepping up and saying I
stand with Rodney Reid and all the other people that
want him out of prison, and that includes law enforcement officers,
(46:46):
state and federal legislators, people from all walks of life.
Let's do a good thing. The governor of Texas is
a former judge, and I think he's a fair man,
and I think if he hears enough of us speak
in a respectful way. I haven't gone to Austin and
made a big grand stand show running up the steps
(47:08):
of the Capitol with my hair on fire, trying to
embarrass the governor and all that. I haven't done that.
I've been very respectful in the way that we've gone
about this, and I intend to continue to do so
if we keep making progress here and now is the
time to step up and make a difference. We're coming
(47:29):
up on three million signatures for this petition for clemency.
I would sure like to see that at ten million,
there's a point at which they simply cannot ignore the outcry.
Let's take this time to give him the gift of
his life back.
Speaker 1 (47:45):
And now, with a heavy heart, but with optimism, I
am going to introduce our featured guest, Rodney Reid.
Speaker 6 (47:56):
One thing that I really missed was really being a
father to my kids, you know, and and really they
have an opportunity to be the grandfather to my grandchildren.
You know, I just look forward to being out there
with my family, with my friends, with my loved one,
(48:17):
with my supporters. I would really love to meet all
my supporters because I feel that the support that has
been generated behind me, and that's been a real push
be to keep me going. You know, when I when
I read their mail, read their letters. A lot of
them I don't respond to, you know, but then there's
(48:38):
a there's so much mail. I really don't have time
to respond to all of them because then I have
to I do have to get sleep, trying to get
some sleep. But knowing that the people that are behind me,
that are advocating for me, you know, I can name
them all, Julie, Judy, Tiffany, Mary Bath. Yeah, they're are
(49:03):
my real push and my mom, my brothers, and my daughter,
my granddaughter's beautiful smile. You know that that that keeps me,
that inspires me when I see a beautiful smile. I
look forward to holding them before they get too damn big.
(49:25):
It's just so much, so much State of Texas is
trying to take my life, trying to excute me, drive me,
to a table and inject my body with poisons. Don't
sit back and just let this happen. Just stay out,
stay involved.
Speaker 1 (49:48):
Don't forget to give us a fantastic review wherever you
get your podcasts.
Speaker 4 (49:52):
It really helps.
Speaker 1 (49:54):
And I'm a proud donor to the NSCIS project, and
I really hope you'll join me in supporting this very
import and cause and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions.
Go to Innison's project dot org to learn how to
donate and get involved. I'd like to thank our production team,
Connor Hall and Kevin Wartis. The music in the show
is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be
(50:16):
sure to follow us on Instagram at Rowful Conviction and
on Facebook at Rowful Conviction podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason
Flamm is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in
association with Signal Company Number one
Hosts And Creators
Lauren Bright Pacheco
Maggie Freleng
Jason Flom
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