#036 Jason Flom with Lorenzo Johnson

Published Oct 9, 2017, 11:10 AM

Lorenzo Johnson served 22 years of a life sentence after he was framed twice for a murder that happened in Pennsylvania while he was in New York. On December 15th, 1995, Tarajay Williams was murdered outside of a bar in Harrisburg, PA. For several months after the murder, police detectives threatened Lorenzo with a murder charge unless he falsely accused a friend of committing the murder and dealing drugs. When he refused, Lorenzo and his co-defendant Corey Walker were convicted of first-degree murder and criminal conspiracy to commit murder and were sentenced to mandatory life in prison on the murder conviction, and concurrent five to ten years on conspiracy conviction. Lorenzo won his freedom in an October 2011 federal court of appeals decision stating that his conviction was based on insufficient evidence and he was released on bond in 2012. However just four months later, the U.S. Supreme Court reversed and reinstated his murder conviction and Lorenzo Johnson voluntarily surrendered himself and was re-incarcerated. After Lorenzo’s re-incarceration, he and his legal team began investigating the police and prosecutorial misconduct that led to his wrongful conviction, and on July 11th, 2017, Lorenzo finally won his freedom. He has since been advocating for other wrongfully convicted prisoners.

https://www.wrongfulconvictionpodcast.com/with-jason-flom

Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava For Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.

I fell into the hands of corrupt detective. I was not eve enough to believe that I would be able to just present all of my proof of actual innocence, that they would investigate adequately and so that I wouldn't be going to prison because I was a good person. I hadn't anything wrong. In the back of your mind, you say, well, when we go to a hearing or we go to court, the truth will come out. The prosecution from day one knew I was innocent and let forced testimony go uncorrected from the lower courts all way up to the United States Supreme Court. You have someone with a badge with ultimate and really in that moment, unchecked the forty. Don't presume that people are guilty when you see him on TV, because it may just be a dirty d a that is trying to rise upward. This is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason flam I'm very excited to have as our guest today an extraordinary man, a gentle giant of a person, actually, Lorenzo Johnson. Lorenzo Johnson's life changed on December he and Corey Walker were charged with murdering to Rag Williams and Harrisburg twenty two years in prison for Lorenzo Johnson, a crime he says he didn't commit, and in two thousand and twelve, a federal appeals court released him from prison, saying there was insufficient evidence. He went home to New York for five months, but had to go back to prison after the Attorney General appealed. But for the first time in two decades, investigators have turned over the original police report, and it raises new questions. Johnson says it's key evidence he should have had at his trial. For the first time, he found out police took fingerprints at the crime scene. He also learned Carla Brown, a key witness against him during his trial, was once labeled a suspect. On top of that, a new witness has come forward saying he was with Johnson in New York the night of the murder. The Attorney General's office has been investigating the case all year. Now he walks free of courts agreeing with him. After a long battle, the judge accepted Johnson's no contest please to a lesser charge of third degree murder, and he now begins immediate parole. He's anxious to be free again, Lorenzo, thank you for coming on the show. Thank you for having me. Lorenzo. Your story is insane, I can say that, and you actually lived through it. You know, the more I've learned about you and your story, the more incredible I find it that you have this amazing spirit and this calm demeanor after having gone through this unimaginable nightmare. It's crazy. So let's let's go back to the beginning. You're New Yorker like me from Yonkers. What was life growing up like in Yonkers? A nice life for us, you know, as a kid, a box for the police. Athletically, I did that for a couple of years, you know, I want to kick loves the Junior Olympics in New York. So you grew up boxing, living a pretty normal life. You weren't like a hoodlum or anything. You can get any real trouble, no violent. Some people say, well, if he got caught up in the system, he must have been a bad guy in the first place. Now, you didn't have any kind of history like that whatsoever, and yet you end up getting caught up in this vicious machine, this criminal justice machine. So this case was a murder case to RAJ Williams was killed outside of bar in Harrisburg. Did you have any knowledge of this? Did you know to Roger Williams. I know him for seeing them around. We didn't know him as far as like to call my friend or anything like that. And I wasn't there when it happened, like I wasn't in the state, so I had no knowledge of what was going on and what took place. Oh, you were a couple hundred miles away in New York. And one of the crazy things is that you could have proven, if you had access to proper attorneys, that you had driven back from New York because you had to receive from the turnpike or even a camera right that a camera because still shot. If somebody would have just pulled that up, it would have proved that it was impossible for you to have committed this murder, because you know, you can't be in two places at one time. But that's not what happened. I mean, I'm sure people are scratching her head like I'm scratching my head saying okay, but how could you get convicted of a crime when you weren't even in the same area code, I mean zip code nothing. You know, I fell into the hands of a corrupt detective. And the reason I fell into the hand of a corrupt detective the day at the muside took place. Me and a group of friends came to New York and we left Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, between three and four o'clock in the afternoon, and we didn't come back until four or five in the morning. This murder took place at twelve o'clock midnight in Harrisburg, So when I came out at eleven twelve o'clock later on noon, that would be December fifteenth, and I got arrested for unrelated charge that was later dismissed. But when I got arrested, I was told that you committed the murder last night, and I was like, I didn't know what you talked about. I wasn't even in the state last night, and being that I was from New York, I was targeted saying that you know, I got a witness that's gonna say, is you And if this witness come down here, and if he says as you, you're going to jail. So me knowing I didn't do not So when you get your witness and let him see me none. At the time, there was a lot of New York guys down there. So when this witness came in, he said it wasn't him. Refern to me, he said it wasn't him, but it was one of his friends. So him saying that, it's like a broad statement, like it was a lot of New York guys down there, you say, one of my friends, that could be anybody. So, to make a long story short, I went from the one that was supposed to commit to the murder to the one who knows something about a murder. So on the aspect of wanting me to lie on somebody, they said, will help us pen this murder on somebody, and I refused to cooperate with them. And when I refused to cooperate with them, they got hot headed with me, and I was supposed to be incarcerated for a fleeting loom from police. They gave me three counts of reckless endagement on each cop and gave me a five hundred thousand allar of cash bell and they sent me to the county prison for that. So basically they wanted to keep you where they could have leverage over you. Right because while you're in jail. They're gonna make you think, Ma'm maybe I should play ball with these guys exactly, And that didn't take place. When I went to my primary hemming, the case was dismissed. And you know, I didn't do no running because I was innocent. So like two weeks later, two three weeks later, they have rested me again. This time I was in the store and they came in. They locked me up, and I looked at wanted to come up to take that, said you're coming at me with this again. He said, no, it belongs to you now. And he had a fugitive warrant for me for conspiracy to commit murder. So at the time, you were working in the furniture store and just sort of going along with sort of a normal life, right, no ideas of anything that could this could possibly happen to you. Rights, Who would ever think that something like this could happen to you? And that's that's one of the reasons I'm so glad you're here and you haven't been out for that long. When did you get out? Two months July eleven, July eleven, two thousand seventeen. And I'm telling you, I want everyone to understand that if this could happen to you, it could happen to just about any would right, And so now this cop has a vendetta against you because you wouldn't wrongfully identify somebody that you know. They just wanted you to basically pull somebody out of here and solve their problem. And then they're gonna let you go. But then you're gonna have to walk around living for the rest of your life with the idea that you did to somebody what actually happened to you, and you ain't that guy exactly. So now they come back to the store and they arrest you again. And now they're now it's getting real serious because now they're like, you're our guy. We decided, right, But you still know you're innocent. It's like it's like unreal at first, because you believe in the system. In the back of your mind, you say, well, when we go to a hearing or we go to court, the truth will come out. That's what innocent prisoners think in our heads, like when stuff like this happened, And in my situation, every time I went to court, something different would take place, like, you know, one of my alibi wouldn't turn over and on, they'll be a witness for the prosecution. And I have no idea why did you know change the statement, because there's a lot of things going on behind the scenes that you can't possibly And you know, when I came to prison, I was a little education wise. You know, I achieved my g D while I was in prison. I got college credits while I was in prison, and I taught myself to law whi I was in prison because later on in my case, I wind up representing myself for three years. So now things are getting really squirrely because there was a witness who actually had been a suspect, right, and should have actually probably been, I mean, somebody that the cops took a much closer look at, but for some reason they decided to get off of her and put it all on you. And then there you would have somebody who's a very incentivized witness, right, I mean, she's trying to not go to prison for the rest of her life. From what I've read, it seems like that's a reasonable theory that she could have been the one who did it. So yeah, it's not hard to draw a line to see. Okay, well, why would she have said what she said about you, Well, she didn't want to take the blame herself. In my situation, I never had a statement from the chief witness. We was told that this witness never made a statement, so we never had access as win statement. We didn't get access to the witness statements. Eighteen and a half years later, and by this time I was remanded back from my freedom from the United States Supreme Court. Right and and that's an important part of your story. One of the things that's so crazy and crazy is a mild word for it about your case is that, yeah, I mean you had a Brady violation. And people listen to the show know that the Brady violation means that the prosecution did not turn over evidence that they had that would have been favorable to your case to the defense, and that that's been outlawed by the Supreme Court in four Not only did they not turn over exculpatory ever since, they actually lied about the existence of it in the first place. And that's really a vicious thing to do to somebody that they knew that every reason to believe was innocent, which was you. Once I come back and they turned over this without information, we finally found out that the prosecution from day one knew I was innocent and let force testimony go uncorrected from the lower courts all the way up to the United States Supreme Court. In the United States Supreme Court and their decision to reinstate my conviction, they used this witness statement in the prosecution not once told the United States Supreme Court, listen, what's your quote in right here from this witness. Ain't what this witness said in the statement? Wow, then your situation that's crazier and crazier. You have been locked up for a total of how long by the time you were freed sixteen and a half years, it's now two thousand and twelve. You come out into a world that's changed a lot, and you're trying to figure out, I'm sure, how to get back on your feet and get started again having been through this incredible ordeal. But then you come out and an unbelievable thing happens, Right, and this is I mean, what we did to you shouldn't happen to anybody. But how is it possible that your conviction was overturned and the state had nothing better to do at the highest level? Right, the Attorney General of Pennsylvania decided, Nope, I'm going after this guy again. We haven't punished this guy enough yet for something we know he didn't do. While we let the real murderer go free, We're now going to go and take this case all the way to the Supreme Court of the Supreme but only here's one percent of criminal cases that come before them too. So the Attorney General of Pennsylvania, but like I said, you would think would have bigger things to worry about than reconvicting an innocent man. But he decides, in a very vindictive and terrible move, to take your case to the Supreme Court. And a hundred forty eight days after you were free, the Supreme Court reinstates your conviction and you got to go back to President. Yeah, it was. I came home on January eight, team Two Islands twelve and once i've you know, re integrated with my family, I began working and uh, Jeffrey Deesevich, you know, I met him right before I came home, and his foundation helped me with re entry and stuff like that, and you know, he was showing me, you know, he was bringing me with him on speaking engagements and things of that nature. And uh, we formed a nice bond. So one day I was at work and I never forget it was made twenty nine, two twelve and I worked for the same time I'm working for today. I got a call between like nine and ten o'clock in the morning. The voice was like muffled, but I knew it was my lead attorney. But I kind of saying nothing he said because he was crying on the phone, like he's very emotional. But what I remember what he says, that your conviction has been being stated. You canna have to go back to prison. And like when he said, I got numb because I was like, I know he's serious because he's just crying on the phone, But you know, I got numb because I have to go back to prison. It's eavy as one to be worse night man, you know, especially after going through the ordeal I went through the first time, and now you got to go back and fight again. So you know, all types of stuffage running through your head. But everything is not registering because you go number at first, like no, this is not true, Like it got to be something we could do that, you know, make them see you know, I'm innocent, and the grounds that I was released on was under insufficient evidence. That's equivalent to a not guilty verdict and bars a reach trout. It's basically a judicial generation. And there was no retrial. They had one appeal left, and I was in the United States Supreme Court and my case was relisted three times, and which is odd because you know, Supreme Court really they don't do that. So when my lawyer finished tent me what took place. The United States Supreme Court reinstated in my conviction all in one day with a per curring decision and didn't allow my legal team to brief our arguments or or argue our position, which is normal procedures for the United States Supreme Court when you take on the case. So you know, once again, I'm numbed to it, that the fact that I might work, and I go, I go drive down to Jeffrey Desipits Foundation in Midtown. I just drive down there and I had my future wife meet me out there. The low eas and stuff was down, and I went in and I was I was just numb because they knew what took place, like quota out there and I just sat there. You know, it was like I was in space. Somewhere for a little while. Like I sat in the back room for a minute. I was trying to gather myself because I was home for hunting for the eight days. No way in the world would I think that I would have to go back to prison for a crime I didn't commit for a second time. Oh, I mean, you've already been exonerated. It's it's just it sounds like double Jeopardy. It sounds like a nightmare that nobody who hasn't been through it could possibly understand. So let's talk for a minute about this crazy experience that you had as a person who had grown up ironically boxing in the police, athletically and everything else, and being sent to prison for life. Right, that's just surreal enough experience two years in jail waiting for your trial and then going to a maximum security prison and reading about your case. I know that you were in solitary confinement for extended periods of time. What was that like? And how did you survive that? How did you I mean, how does your brain still even like not not melt down? And I know you're you're a guy you're talking before about how you you you maintain a positive attitude and you don't carry around the bitterness and everything else. You got to explain how that's possible. It is very strangers. I I gotta say it. So that's slit. How you confinement well shadowed anybody's psyche. You're in the cell twenty three and one. The light doesn't go off and stays on all day. The walls is all white. You know, you start to see things after a while. A lot of people do do their time different me and myself. I was an avid reading writer once I got my education, So the majority of time that I'm in the cell, I'm either working out on writing, on reading something mail that I got, and I balanced my day. A lot of people, you know, don't have that balance, and they don't have things to do, so they sit there and then they start freaking out after a while. Or some guys, you know, they getting hooked on medication and they would never be the same person once they family see him again. And this could go on for long periods of time. And I want to bring this to the attention. In Pennsylvania, it's not like New York where you could go see the parole board. A life sensors in Pennsylvania is a life census, natural life is no in betweens, right, So you literally have nothing to look forward to except for more of this torture. But how did you end up in solitary confinement in the first place? Being from New York, I got a couple of tussles when I first got there, nothing major, with minor, and that led to me being sent to the rate you restrict the housing unit. Was this because people were picking a fight with you or try to attack you, or it's very geographical over there, and then being from a state and out of your own from New York, it's like it's on is more of that in the prison? Unfortunately? A lot of times, like if you let things go, you'll be preyed upon a lot, Right, you either have to stand up for yourself and then take the wrath of the authorities. We're gonna put you in this solitary confinement hole that you know you you may never recover from. But at the same time, you don't really have any choice, you know. So how long were you in solitary confinement? Four mispreads sometimes ninety days almost six months. Ninety days or six months is such a long time. When we think about ninety days and the outside right of doing anything ninety days or or six months in the tiny cell with white walls, like I said, And and the fact that the light doesn't go off like that's just torture, like that should be outlawed under the Geneva Convention. I mean that that's crazy. Why why is that next necessary? I mean? And do you even have a sense of time? And they do you have a clock? No clock? Basically once you did, you you could tell the time we shift change in recreation, what time they feeds you with time, the medication come on a block, so pretty much you know, you become in tune with your environment. Can you describe what a typical day is like in solitary confinement, because it's just it's unimaginable to me that I just I can't well this, paint your bathroom white and sitting side of it for twenty four hours and then you get a sense, right, except probably I'm guessing the typical person listening to that bathroom is probably nicer, right at least has a couple of maybe a little minis and compared to what's going on in there. And it's interesting too and sort of scary to note that one of the judges ruling on your appeal dissented, saying, this is a quote. I dissent from that portion of the majority's decision which upholsed the conviction of Lorenzo Johnson for a first degree murder and criminal conspiracy. The judge continued by saying, I believe there is no direct evidence nor can any be inferred linking defendant Johnson to the death of Taraga Williams, nor any agreement with defendant Walker which resulted in Williams's death. So that judge is saying you didn't do it. That judge is barely should And that decision came out in from the Pennsylvania Superior Court. He's now the federal judge. That decision he made. That was the first judge that ever made a rule in on my insufficient evidence claim in my whole appeal process. And so the federal court released me on that ground. All the other judge that was on the panel with him, all of them went with the trial judge. They believe they suck with the child judge decision. And it took from to two thousand and twelve for them to come up with this decision from the third Second Court of appeals. So it's amazing that in spite of the fact that it took two years for you to even get to trial, two years in the jail waiting for your trial, but then the trial, I mean, they didn't really take their time in convicting you, and the Supreme courts there certainly didn't take its time in reversing your exoneration. They did it in one day. If my trials only two and a half days, two and a half days for a lifetime in prison. They felt four people, the victim family never got justice. My family suffered injustice. Quait Walker family suffered injustice in society. He has a whole You got innocent people in prison. Why the person who did it is on the street. In this case, there was not only one piece of exculpatory evidence that was withheld from your defense, right, there was a lot. And I'm going to go through the list, okay, and you can jump in anytime you want, But this is some of the things that were not turned over that should have been turned over, that are required to be turned over by the law. A discrediting statement to the police by the one eye witness, Carla Brown, which you and your attorneys were told didn't exist, but it did, right there was withholding there and it was lying. Eight pages of the original police report were never turned over, and that police report investigating the murder showed that, among other things that it showed was that Carla Brown was a suspect in the murder. So the only witness, let's process this for a second, the only witness, the only thing that led to your conviction at all, because there was no physical evidence someone who was stone on crack high and crack who was a suspect in the murder. But they didn't bother to tell you, guys. The first eight pages of my discovery was missing, along with a couple of hundred other pages. And once we did get the first eight pages, we saw that their witness was labeled suspecting the same homicide. Okay, that's that's deep. That's deep. That's deep. But there's more. There were new statements by other witnesses that showed that miss Brown, Carla Brown, the same person we're talking about, the only person that matters in this particular situation. Here was an addict at the time of the murderer and may have been involved herself, which gave her, of course, the ultimate incentive to cooperate with the police. Right, you had two other witnesses that they had that put Hug in the alleyway when the shot was fired. Two of their witnesses said that they believe it was hut an alleuate with him. That strengthens their own case that you know that this person was a suspect, whereas you have one witness against me, but you have three witnesses. This pointed finger other way. And there were statements by witnesses who said that they did not see you there exactly. So I'm picturing the scales of justice right now, right, and and it seems like it's all tipped to one side, and that side is you go home while we go look for the person that did this. What happened was, like I told you earlier, every step of my case, things started changing, like my alibi witness one of the re candidate statement and turned into the motive witness for the case. My case was bound over because a jacket was supposed to be stolen from my co defendant. Now this is from the plintary hearing to trial. It was bound over because the deceased was supposed to stole the jacket for my co defendant once my alibi witness re candidate her statement, and now they became at trial over a drug debt. So it was a variance and indictment because they changed the reason why I was bound out for court and they brought a whole new theory. In listening to the story, sounds like something that could only happen in in the country where they really don't believe in the system of laws. It's hard when, like I said, when you're going against the prosecution, they got endless resources. It's like when you're innocence, like trying to breathe underwater. When you think they've done, they're not done. Something new comes up and well, and this is so crazy because they kept getting thrown more pieces of information, all of which led to the same conclusion, which is that you were innocent. And every time they got another one of these pieces of evidence, they had to come up with new lives in order to keep this case alive and in order to bury you in the way that they did. And it's crazy to me that everyone knows that you're not allowed to bribe a witness. You're not allowed to go to one of the witnesses and say I'm gonna give you fifty bucks. I'm gonna give you a thousand dollars whatever. It is. All I needed for you to say that I did blah blah blah, or that I was in such a You can't do that that you go to prison for that. But the government is allowed to make the most incredible deal with a witness, which is that they can say, listen with you know that little robbery thing God or the other things. God, We're gonna make that disappear. All you gotta do is participated in this murder. And that's another crazy thing. Right. Nobody ever said that you shot the shot, right, no one ever said you were the murderer. It was like you were there. You got I'm scratching my head again. You got sentenced to life in prison for allegedly being somewhere where a murder was committed. That whole thing is another outrage in this case. And there's still more to this, right, There's still the other thing, which was there was a statement by another man who knew that you were in New York at the time of the murder, and that guy the cops managed to figure out how to get him not to come forward by making up a story that you had snitched on him, right, And this is so much work, Right when these police officers could have been out catching a real rapist or solving a different kind of crime or whatever. The amount of time and effort that they had to put into framing you is absolutely bananas, I mean. And all of this goes back to the fact that you were convicted of a murder on the basis of one eyewitness who testified a trial right, no physical evidence, and you had your alibis and that was it, and that was enough to send you to prison for the rest of your life. When you tell the truth, you can stand on it. But when you're telling the lies, like when you pour water on dirt, he's just gonna turn the mud and you step wasn't gonna keep caving in, caving and caving in. And this is what please is still taking place. And it's terribly common what happened to you, I mean, as much as it's uncommon, because in your case you were wrongfully convicted twice. But what is not uncommon about your case is the incidence of prosecutorial suppression of selportory evidence. What we've been talking about the Brady violation. I did want to ask you to. One of the things, on top of all the other things that is so disturbing to me personally about your case is the fact that after twenty two years, two false convictions, all the lies and dirty tricks that the government could throw at you, twenty two years behind bars, solitary confinement, all the deprivations that go with all that stuff, and then finally they made you a deal that you really couldn't say no to, right, which which was that they made you plead down to a lesser charge in order to gain your freedom. Right is the shame in that, believe it or not, that's more and more bitter about that the time being incarcerated. And you know I'm bitter. I'm very bitter about that because basically my trust in judicial system been shattered ever since United States Supreme Court made that rule against me in two thousand and twelve. And uh, every time one of your pill gets denied as an innocent prisoner, and when you're serving the life censors of big numbers, a part of your family member dies because they feel that they're never gonna see you again. So my period of time twenty two years is like and then them getting a chance to be united with me after six and a half years, and then that's taken back from him. You can see your family's pain, and uh, how can I say? You want to bring it to end? And that's what they really forced my hand, because I could have went in one The only thing is the cross, the pill. Another three and a half the five years waiting and you're hoping that another judge don't do nothing crazy, which happened to me already. So you know, it's like should I put my faith back in them or should I just tuck and roll and had to live my life? And as my family is like the most part is like me myself as a man. I would rather be in prison right now than having a phony on my jacket or son. I ain't do but to stop my family's pain, I had to sacrifice myself. The prosecution, the whole thing is this. They want to maintain their conviction by any means, after all this evidence of police misconduct, prosecutions conduct. That same prosecutor I don't understand and said he felt strong in his evidence against me. How is this possible? I didn't mysteriously come to court. I'm down here because of misconduct and the judge or the evidentiary hammers. Because of that, you know, I'm sitting back on the screeks for a second time, coming from a natural life sentence. I'm not here for good behavior. I'm here because it was issues that had merit on them that I was innocent, but I was forced to take this polae bargain or gamble with the judicial system again. And how can I say, like it's better sweet? Like a lot of every day I wake up, I regret it. But at the same time, it's like people have been in my shoes. They know what it is. It's easy for somebody to say what they would do, what they won't do. But you know, like I said earlier, I went through every azonomy worst night man, you tell us on me. You got to go back to prison and do that time all over again. You're never getting out of prisoners is in the box. You see how the whole life just changes. So me my passion I always been to speak about wrong for convictions, but now with these, please, don't innocent person shot to spend a second in jail, take a plea bargain of anything to get out of prison when they innocent and the prosecution knows this well. They have so much power, and so it's so tilted, and and nobody can fault you for making the decision that you did when you know you were already framed twice. Why would you believe that the system is going to be fair the third time? You know? And again, I mean, you're somebody who cares deeply about your family and your community. You want to be out here for them. What the hell are you gonna do? I mean, it's hard for me to even hear this stuff because yeah, I don't even know. I'm I'm, I don't even know what to say. Is deep and like, you know, emotions, if they're here and there with people in my position, they don't get me wrong, Like, it doesn't stop me from doing what I gotta do. I don't look at so different. I'm just bitter that I had to go through that. And that's a big problem that's going on, that's being swept under the rugs. There's a lot of innocent people that's being forced to take please because okay, I've been forced to take a no contest plea to maintain my innocence. Back the end of the day, I still got a phoney on my jacket because this is a part of a police there. I didn't I didn't plead guilty, but you still got the conviction on me. It's like that they got their last little digging you after you know, they didn't like you proving them wrong basically, and they decided to take one more shot at you and being vocal like like I told you, in Pennsylvania, you don't have that. Besides, when we have bu Jamal, you won't hear a prison in Pennsylvania with tides of social media the way I had ties of social media of them coming to see me on the visit in prison, you know, and things of that nature. They you know, you can't bring a camera into prison in Pennsylvania, so they only you know, social media and people from Fox and ABC that was coming to see me. They had to come see me with the paper, right. But you know when they see stuff like, they don't like that. And my whole thing is why you don't like it, because they exploice what's going on. Yeah, exposes them for doing things that they've been getting away with for a long time that they can't get away with anymore, or they're gonna be They're gonna be more Lorenzo Johnson's and none of us want to see that. I would like to get your advice because many people who listen to this show want to know what they could do. Here you are out for two months and already advocating and showing up and doing interviews like this, and you know, being an example and a role model. If somebody's listening right now and say this is outrageous, I'm angry. I don't want to ever see something like this happened to somebody again. What would be off the top of your head, Let's is say law students, you know, law students, they should review a wrongful conviction case just to get an idea of what's out there. And why I say that is like my trial. My trial attorney was fresh out of school and here it is represent me on a natural life sentence I was facing, was very green to what was going on, and everything literally flew over our head. Wrong fool convictions need to be paid heavily attention to. For the last few years that had record numbers of hissonerations and a lot of people acts. But why do guys spend so long in prison because they constantly fight you the average innocent prison that's fortunate to be exonerated spends between thirteen and a half to fifteen years in prison. Wrong food convictions need to be fought not only inside the courtroom, but outside of the courtroom, as far as what you could do, your vote counts. Pay attention to when someone is disonerated. Pay attention to why do disattorney still have their jobs after they was found liable of intentionvely convicting the innocent person? And I really think that's such an important message for our audience. And you have a website too, write what's your website is free? Lorenzo Johnson dot org. Lorenzo was talking earlier about how there were so many good people that got active and got involved, and it all starts with you, right because you had the energy and the sense and the and the and the you know, you educated yourself. You you created basically a movement that ended up involving people from all fifty states and fifty three countries who all wrote letters on your behalf. That's incredible. I mean, to be able to do that from inside of prison is nuts. I mean, that's an amazing accomplishment and it must feel good to know that there's that many good people out there who are on your side. It definitely gives you, you know, it gives you energy because you got people to take the time out they day to write you. You got people that fight for you that you never saw before in your life. You know, You've got people that a's that come to your rallies, you know, and they demand that you release and they never met you before. Lorenzo, this has been an extraordinary experience and uh, I can't thank you enough for sharing your story with with me and the audience. We have a tradition here at Wrong for Conviction, which is that I like to just turn it over to you in case there's anything else that you want to share, any thought at all about anything. I just turned the microphone over to you and let you go. I'm a firm believer now that you know. All I know is the fight injustice. So you know, when I meet other Azonorees such as Keian Anthony's, Jeffrey Desovitch, Derrick Cambelton's a lot of these people I never met before, but by reading the articles and things that I need to but we all share the same thing that we was in prison for something we didn't do and why I come in then it's because they're out here fighting on the front line. And that's where I need to be at. Because I was in prison between two years. It was so hard for me to get help. You know, I didn't get helping to the end of of my my times. Man Like I had to represent myself for three years straight. So I say for people to get involved with your local innocent projects, you know, get vib with pro bono lawyers who fight for innocent prisoners. Why should you elect an office? And if a district attorney has a checking past, why peniment office? That's like the fox gardener hens in the house. No, and I'm glad you mentioned that. It's it's so important to get out of voting your local district attorney's races. Your vote means a lot because most people don't vote in those races. And you can make such a difference just by taking out the corrupt characters and replacing them with people who actually believe in the rule of law and believe in in doing the right thing. Have you ever noticed like when you have a corrupt cop, you always see oh the screeze cops, such and such such says he's blasted all over the place, but when you see a district attorney who was found liable for wrongfully convicting someone, the story goes away. You're still in office. You don't hear anything else. And what else can I say, Lorenzo, I mean, this has really been an amazing experience to to be with you. UM so happy to see you here. I'm I'm here, I'll be back and once again it's free Lorenzo Johnson dot org. So as free Lorenzo Johnson dot org. Go to the website learn more about it, and thank you for listening to this extraordinary episode of wrongful conviction. Don't forget to give us a fantastic review wherever you get your podcasts. It really helps. And I'm a proud donor to the Ennisis Project, and I really hope you'll join me in supporting this very important cause and helping to prevent future wrongful convictions. Go to Innocence Project dot org to learn how to donate and get involved. I'd like to thank our production team, Connor Hall and Kevin Wardis. The music on the show is by three time OSCAR nominated composer Jay Ralph. Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction and on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction podcast. Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flam is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with Signal Company Number one

Wrongful Conviction

Hosted by celebrated criminal justice reform advocate and founding board member of the Innocence Pro 
Social links
Follow podcast
Recent clips
Browse 522 clip(s)