I had the privilege of interviewing Jimmy Dennis on April one of two thousand nineteen, shortly after he was released from death row in Pennsylvania. He served twenty five and a half years and had two execution dates actually scheduled. I mean, I'm talking about they asked him what his last meal was gonna be, where he wanted his remains to be taken. It's unbelievable. Twenty five and a half years he lived in a tiny cell on death row with the lights on. They never turned him off, and yet he came out joyful, with a bounce in his step, ready to get back, you know, as much as he could have what he had lost. And here's the incredible thing. He was a singer when he was wrongfully arrested when he was eighteen years old. He was, you know, on the verge of getting a record deal with his group. And the good news is that a few months ago he made his on stage singing debut in New York City at the Church of Rock and Roll event. At Gospel he's saying Hallelujah, and he killed it. I gotta be honest with you. Now, he's in the process of launching a dog grooming business with his wife. The business plan is set and I think they're going to make it a real success. He's also been the subject of the first Now this video documentary of the Row of Conviction podcast and it is a beautiful, beautiful piece. He's a beautiful, beautiful guy. And Jimmy, if you're listening, I hope you're smiling and and sleeping well too, because you deserve nothing but the best of everything, and we're here to share your story. Please sit back and listen to Jimmy Dennis. This call is from a correction facility and it's subject to monitoring and recording. Nine day and a hundred years. That's man. I'm a kid. I didn't do anything, you know, and uh, you know that was that was real payingful man. No, because my life was discarded as if you know, like I was a piece of trash or something, you know, a hundred years. I had dreams and I wanted to do things I wouldn't committing crimes. You know. That was a very good young man. That is what happened. In so many cases. The cops have a hunch, because they're so smart at the scene, they have a hunch, and once they act on that hunch, they sort of developed tunnel vision, and they take off marching in the wrong direction. And that happens in so many of these wrongful convictions. Were opening the cell door and I locked downstairs, and I actually walked downstairs to be outside. It felt very strange to be, like I said, to be walking without no shackles on my feet. I thought it was a dream. But then again, it wasn't a dream. This is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to wrongful conviction. Today, I have a guest whose story has to be heard to be believed. It's a Philadelphia story. It's a death penalty story. And it's sort of a miracle actually that you're even here at all under the circumstances, much less with a smile in your face. So um, and he does have a big smile. So I want to welcome to wrongful conviction. Jimmy Dennis. Thank you so much, Jason, Jimmy, Oh, you're welcome. And like I always say, I'm I'm sorry you're here, but I'm glad you're here. Um. And I want to get right into it because I think it's super important to talk about this case, not only because it was a death penalty case. But also because of the fact of your case being so bizarre and that there was never anything to connect you to this crime, not that I know about it right now. The case happened October twenty second in the fern Rock station to Philadelphia. A young lady by the name Shadel Williams was really murdered for pair air rings about three men fifty dollar ear rings. Paer four hundred and fifty dollar air rings. Right, high school girl. When they say four and fifty dollar earrings, I'm assuming that's retails. Whoever whoever killed her for these earrings probably got maybe a hundred dollars for him at best. That's what her life was worth a high school girl. When this happens, it's a high profile case. The community is outraged by someone, and so forth. In Philadelphia, there's a lot of pressure in high profile cases for the cops to save crime. So you weren't there when it happened. No, I wasn't there. In fact, you weren't even close by. I wasn't even close by. Well, let's go back to that, because where were you and how did they end up? Like what I mean, it seems so random that you were several miles away, and then yet they end up picking you up, and then the whole thing goes sideways and backwards from there. So at the time of the crime, I was on a bus in Philadelphia called the K Bus, traveling to Abbeys food Projects, where I've seen someone familiar, you know what I mean, just acquaintance. I said hi to all. This was abstantiated right even the time I said that I got on the bus and got off the stop. The bus driver testified that that was correct. Right, So all these things were stantuated. So the police came around. They went to every neighborhood in the city of Philadelphia, and they started picking up stick up boys. And when they did that, a group of individuals lied and said my name for ungodly reasons of jealousy or whatever you might want to call it. And you were I was twenty one, I was barely I was a young man. I wasn't even a man. I had many aspirations of being in the music business. Um I would come up here to New York to the New Music Seminar every year. My group was one of the best amateur groups in Philadelphia, and we were receiving interests from you know, music people a sensation and uh, we didn't want many talent shows. What kind of style of music was R and B and you were the singer. I was the lead singer, and so yeah, who knows, we might have even cross past the music. But um, but then things obviously went took a terrible terror and then things just started to turn from there. You even seeing the statements that they all had talked on the phone or whatever, and then they just you know, made up this you know story Cory that I, you know, had on these clothes and that I was doing these things, and the police ran with it. But none of these people ever testified. I mean, were you caught up in the gang life. I wasn't caught up in any gang life anything like that. I wasn't, you know, in any type kind of gangs. It really not really gangs in Philadelphia like that at that time, you know what I mean. So this was just people in the neighborhood didn't like me, you know what I mean. I had no significant criminal history orsoever. I had a misdemeanor drug offense on my record. Uh, and that's all I've had on my record up until the time that I was arrested. So, going back from the misdemeanor, I had a picture, you know, mug shot that the police kept in the number one spot the entire time when they were showing witnesses the photo rays. So one witness said, I think so. They said, can you be sure? They said no yet, and still they ran with that. And what was the description of the subject of five ten to six ft tall, two hundred and eighty to two hundred pounds, dark skin complexion. Now when they say dark skin complexion, they're talking about Miles Davis and Wesley Snipes. You're sitting here before me. You know, I'm brown skin. I waved a hundred and twenty five pounds at the time. I had a diminutive frame and I'm filed four in height. There's no way you're gonna get five nine five ten six ft one to two hundred pounds from a hundred twenty five and you're not gonna ever mix me up with Wesley Snipes or Miles Davis. Yeah, I mean, that should have been a moment alone for everybody to go, well, okay, let's just look and see if he's got an alibi, and if he does, maybe it wouldn't even need that maybe would just say, well, okay, the description doesn't work. The one witness who at least is even saying anything still isn't sure. But that would have been inconvenient like this, right, because they would have had to go back to the drawing board. And we know how these things work, especially in Philly in the early nineties. I mean, it was a time where I would say that from what I know about the history of Philadelphia, it probably would have been a time when Philadelphia was probably the wrong for conviction capital of America. Um, they were arresting uh and beating up people of color and everybody. But it was it was basically a policy, and it came from the top. There was that infamous police chief Rizzo, who became the mayor, and he was a notoriously brutal, lawless type of a guy in the area that I grew up in the North Philadelphia Abbess four projects. There are five, literally five people that have been proven to be innocent, myself included, that have all come home. And Anthony Wright, who I believe you may have had on this show, was one of the guys that came from North Philadelphia. Him and I have the same police officers that worked on his case did the same thing to me. And there's an amazing I'm glad you brought that up because there's an incredible article that ran a Rolling Stone magazine about Tony Wright's case, and I'll never forget there was a pool quote in that article where it said that in whatever year that was nineteen ninety or something that he was convicted. Uh, it said a black man had a better chance of getting justice in Philadelphia, Mississippi than they did in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. That is that is so true. I mean, I'm happy to see that now we have a whole different situation in Philadelphia with Larry Krass getting much better with Mr Krasner. Yeah, and you know it had to change. But you were caught up in exactly the wrong place at the wasactly the wrong time. So at what point did they arrest you? Was it a day or two after there? So as soon as I heard like this is one thing, that one other thing that people don't know, um, I got arrested like a month later. But as soon as I heard any rumors in the neighborhoo my name being mentioned, actually went down to the police station and asked them that they want to speak to me, and stayed down there for over four hours, and they did not want to speak to me. Everybody has this thing about what innocent people should do. You don't run, you go to the police station, so on and so forth. So I get arrested November nine ninety one. So before I get arrested, I went down there, me and my father and my brother asked that they want to talk to him. I signed in the police law book. All this was said at trial they didn't want to talk to me. But two weeks later they came and arrested me. In a nightmare begin. I did everything you're supposed to do, and I still got my life stolen away. Until you go to trial. When you had a quarter point lawyer? No, actually, UM, my dad and I you know, pay for my first attorney. It wasn't quarter pointed we had. My dad was a um musician. He wasn't rich anything like that. We were poor. But my dad put the money together and he got me. Uh what we thought was a you know, decent enough lawyer to represent me, but he did not do his job. How much time did you get to spend with him before the trial? None? None, none, he never visited. You came to see me one time to tell me that they were charging me with more cases, and that's it. Left. I would call him all the time, no answer, so on and so forth. It was that bad. Wow, And then you go to trial. Then I go to trial with an attorney you don't even know, Yeah, who doesn't really know much about your case, right, who's really not investigating things like that? And you know, so on and so forth. It was. It was the typical nightmare that you have come to know with all the great work that you do. But it was the typical standard. Okay, I don't care. I mean he wasn't really then you are so much as processing you at the president there you go, And I mean was he alcoholic or drug No. There was an article at the time and said him and two other attorneys took on the most homicide cases in the city of Philadelphia. It kind of came out like in the mid nineties. But you know, so he was just thinking as many cases as he could get, to make as much money as he could, and not really worrying about the outcome. Yeah, that's how I feel. So it sounds like I I mean, when when you say they were trying to put other cases on you. What was charged with over nine other robbery cases. They tried to make it look like I was Jesse James, and I was nothing of the sort. If you go back in my community and you do your own type of investigation, which my lawyers and everybody do, everybody be like, yo, he was a good kid, you know what I mean. You know, nobody's perfect, but he ain't. No, you know, he ain't no robbery, no murdering, He no stick up, you know what I mean. So I was charged with nine of the cases that were later dropped, all except for one, all except for the one the original one, or except for another one besides that, all except for another one besides that. So you go to trial and you charged with capital murder, which is murder in the act of committing another family, which was robbing or of the ear rings? Right? And so how long did the trial last? The trial went from September about October sixteenth. I was found guilty October nineteenth. That gave me the death penalty. Each part of that trial it was horrible. I still relive it even to this day, everything that I went through. Because you don't think that this is gonna happen to you. You think even then, you believe that the truth is going to come out, that you believe in the system, that everybody can see that I'm not five to two hundred pounds and dark skin complexion. But you had a prosecutor that was something of a theme on law and order, right. You had jury members going to sleep, literally going to sleep. No mistrial. It was just a nightmare from beginning to end. I mean that's a pretty long trial. And I'm assuming that your lawyer wasn't doing much. What was he doing just sitting there listening? No, he was he he was doing I guess you could say he was doing I don't know what he was doing. To be perfectly honest with you, James, I don't know what he was doing. All I know is that it was the entire thing was a nightmare from beginning and end. There's a part in the trial like if you go back and look at the transcripts, they even took my height, right, and they get out of tape measure and they take my height so they see then I'm actually you know, five four, and I'm only five five with this one and a half inch hill on right, yeah, mean none of that made a difference to the jury. The fact that this crime took place within seconds. And you know, um, Dr Elizabeth Loff and say, can nobody identify nobody in two minutes, let alone seconds? You know what I mean? This is a violent crime, you know what I mean. So you know, if somebody runs into the studio right here, you know, robs us right now. Nine times our tend were all gonna get it wrong when it comes to the physical description. Nobody paid attention to that. Right in this crime, this took place, there was a chase. The poor girl was after her her earrings were stolen. She was shot in the throat um. She was with a friend who was luckily not harm But we know also from decades of research that in cases in which someone is up close when a violent crime is being committed, we know that that person is much more likely to mistakenly identify someone because you're in makes sense if you think about it, right, Your adrenaline is going crazy, your own life is threatened. It's all that fight or flight and all those reflexes and impulses and all the nerve endings are going crazy. And they've been experiments where they they've actually staged the crime, and then they bring in people from the outside, and they found that that people who weren't there have a better chance of being right than people So actually those witnesses are not even as good as guessing. So in this case, you had all of those factors, right, Yeah, So you actually had three witnesses you know, that testify, but you actually had over now witnesses and the other six you know, didn't testify because they didn't say what the police wanted them to say. They actually said the opposite. What about the other evidence that showed that you were somewhere else? That evidence was with hell for over a decade, and which evidence was that? All right? So there was a welfare receipt from the young lady Oh that I've seen on the bus that stantuated my innocence as well, that the police went to her, threatened her and they took the welfare receipt from her. Now, welfare receipts are done in military time. She had picked up her welfare receipt and then she had got on the same k bus that I was on. So the receipts at three they told her that it said three or three pm because she couldn't tell military time. So when she takes the stand, she says exactly what they wanted her to say, that she seen me, you know, late on that day and not the actual time that she did see me. Right, So had they not lied about that, then you couldn't have been there because they know exactly so that that stayed hitting away. That was one thing. There were there other things that were with health as well. So the clothes that they said they took from my father's house that the police officers got on the stand and testified about and said they were the closed that was used at the crime. None of the witnesses ever seeing these clothes. They weren't cataloged and they suddenly poof disappeared, right, And all this stuff could have helped prove my innocence, you know, going back to other evidence, there still was never two other people locked up. It's supposed to be three people to the crime, but only one person was ever arrested, which was me. Right, So there's all these holes, you know, but it's all come from the same prosecutor and police officers and the and the very real consequence of this, aside from the obvious terrible injustice, that was done to you and your family is the fact that there's no justice for Schadel Williams. Not to mention that the citizens of Philadelphia remained in danger with these two or three guys, how many it was that actually committed this robbery and murder being out on the loose because you were in there instead of them. That's the hard or other situation that that family hasn't gotten justice. And when you lie about something to someone, you dishonored the victim and you dishonored their family as well. So let's go back to that day of the verdict. Can you give us a picture of the courtroom that day? I mean, you had now been in the system for almost a year, um, but you still said you had hope and you still believe that no one could possibly convict you because you knew that you weren't there, You knew that none of the evidence matched you, you had alibis, but you also knew that you know, this trial had been sort of a you know, for lack of a better world, I'll say, with a clusterfuck. And so but even with all of that that, you still have hope that the jury was gonna do the right thing. I still had hope that the jury was going to do the right thing because I always had faith, period, ever since I was a kid. I always had you know, faith and God that you know, I could get through anything. So I'm sitting there and I'm praying that the right thing is going to happen, that people sitting on this jury would be able to see through all the you know, the lies and things like that of that nature that went on in that courtroom. You know, when you look at the physical description, when you're seeing that, stuff just don't make sense, you know what I mean. And I had hope. So when they stood me up and then they read the verdict, it was like like somebody just knocked the wind out of me. It was like Tyson hitting somebody. You know. I immediately started crying. I remember my mom crying. I remember my sister rocking back and forth. I remember friends that I grew up with, men crying. Everybody broke down and just started crying because nobody could believe that this was happening. Because a lot of lives would destroyed on that day, a lot of dreams were destroyed. It was a horrible scene. You know, when you hear these cries and these wells, and you you like in this moment that's so sad and like out of body, like you don't want to be in here, and and you know when I'm shaking and I can't believe it. And then you said a few days later, you're sentence of death, which is the only thing worst that could happen, everything that's already happened. And then you get taken. I get taken to the greatest for a prison. From there you go to Camp Hill and then you get your destination. What prison that you go to? So I wound up at Huntington's death row after these other two stops of death row. You know what I mean, you get your first taste of death row. Um, can you explain what that's like for the audience, because that process, uh, going a death row is um your shackle, UM, your feet and your hands and shackle they got like a belt in a black box on you. You literally can't move and they basically strip your neck it, which is a very dehumanizing process. When you come, they got the cameras on you and all that stuff, and then they throw you on the shelf, you know, and then the nightmare. It's even worse if you can believe it, you know, um prison it's such a dehumanizing place. Prisoners meant to destroy families and relationships of everybody, and being on death row, you're considered the worst of the worst, less than human. And you get it from all sides, you know what I mean. Even though you've got people in general population that may have worst crimes, it's a perception about people on death row like they're the worst of the worst. You know, so you catch it, catch it from all sides. What you gotta understand. You can't be in prison for nothing like this. Is so when I say that I went through hell, it's actually an understatement to describe what I went through. I got it from every side, guards, prisoners. I was basically in a fight for my life just to be the whole period. And that is because the case was such a high profile case. It was a high profile case. But back then, you couldn't be in prison for nothing like this, anything that had to do with a woman or a child. You can't be in prison. This is real prison. I was in, you know, real situations where I was jumped. I was you know, I had to fight, you know what I mean. I had to defend myself, you know what I mean. I was jumped, I was set up by guards, I was rolled on, my prisoners, on and so forth. It was a living night man, something that you never recover from, something that that you never get over. I got teeth in my mouth right here that are broke and fix from stuff I went through imprison You know, the battle scars are still warm me and then my soul. My situation is just like what we all know that Kylief Browder went through. I went through a lot of that, and you're on death row for a quarter of a century. Yeah. I spent twenty five point five years in prison. Yeah, how did you maintain sanity? How did you maintain hope? I mean, you know, if someone wants to meet you now, they would have no idea that you've been through this. I mean, you know, there's that saying that everyone you meet is fighting the battle you know nothing about. Just be kind, But this is the extreme version of that. I mean, everyone's going through their stuff. You don't know what anyone's going through. It might be all heartbreak, might have just lost their job. Who knows what you have our stuff? But this is a different level. I mean, this is an extraordinary ordeal for anybody to go through and survive. And I'm sure there were a bunch of people that you met, a bunch of men you met on death throw who didn't survive. I mean that that is kind of trippy because when I was in there, Um, I've seen people kill theirselves. You see the body bags coming, and you see the ambulance coming. You see people died from natural causes or what have you, a deabilitating diseases. But how did you, like, what was it that that allowed you to you know, persevere and to not not take your own life and not go down this rabbit hole that so many of the guys went down. So you so when you in prison, For me to sit here and tell you that I never thought about suicide, that's a lie. Many times, even when I was in the county because like I told you, I was suffering so greatly, um and and nobody was hearing my cryd Like one time, I was literally gonna take my life because I just couldn't take it. You know what I mean, I'm innocent, and I'm not getting proper representation that you know, everything is going on. You know, the cops don't you know, Framie. Whatever the case may be. So for me, I once read this book by Victor E. Franko called a Man Search for Me No. And in this book he had this quote by Nicie. It said, he who he who has a wife, can bear with almost anyhow. And my wife has always been my daughter's and my mom, you know what I mean. Like, I literally connected with it so much because here it was they had no hope, and he created hope for himself and he didn't give up. You know, the stories he would tell the other people and the concentration camps about their family so that they could live and survive and have hope of some rival, you know. And for me, I would do the same thing. I would visualize myself home with my daughters someday. Let's talk about your daughters. What are their names. My oldest daughter's named for Team, and my youngest daughter's named ki Era. And when you went to prison, one of them wasn't even born yet. Kiara wasn't born. Um, she was born one week after I was stolen away. Yeah, so you never got to see her until you got out of prison. My dad would bring her to see me a lot. Did the family would bring them to see me, but I never literally spent a day with them with her until I got out. So everything I went through was for them and my father, you know. And then I wanted to restore my family name back, you know. And for me, faith, faith and guy was the key and music. And so every day I would wake up, I would hear these songs in my mind. Literally, because it didn't have a good radio station up there, couldn't listen to the music I wanted to listen to. But every day I would hear the Wanning's Trusting God, John Coltrane, Their Lord, and then I would hear Bruce Springsteen in the Eastreet Band, Bruce Springsteen, as you know, he has all these wonderful ad libs. All right, come on, you know, and I would play Hungry Hard or Born and Run in my head, you know what I mean. And then it would go to Stevie Wonder if It's Magic and Fleetwood Mac Don't Stop. And every day those songs would play in secession in my head, and then I would get up. I would work on the Justice for Jimmy campaign. I would work on legal work. I would call my lawyers, I would discuss law when I'm legal issues, How did you know proceed and what we should do and things like that, And I just I think everybody has it in them, you know, to make it out of any situation if they believe. And I just knew and believe that my dead truth was going to come. On every single letter, if you would have received a letter from me in prison, and you would have opened it up, on the top head of the paper said praying for the truth. And that was my motto, praying for the truth. And I always believe that my dead truth was gonna come. And I see you have a bracelet on it says in big letters, never ever give up, ever ever give up, and this one say not throwing away my shot. My lawyers from Arnold and Porter um, who are like my family, UM, gave me these when when I came home. Now we understand how you found this extra gear, this extra this extraordinary otherworldly grace or whatever it is that allowed you to maintain yourself and maintain your sanity in an in an insane situation. Um, how did you end up getting out? How did that work? You know? For so long I labored just trying to yell out that I was innocent over and over again, and the system felt me horribly over and over again until I got the Federal court on auguste. The Honorable Judge Needed Brody gave this forty six page legal opinion that breaks down the truth about what happens to me. And the part that met everything to me was the first paragraph. If you read that opinion, it says James Dennis was wrongfully convicted of this crime. And she called it a quote grave miscarriage of justice. And she's she wrote that police and prosecutors ignored, lost, or covered up evidence that was favorable to you, and then came three years later, because nothing happens that quick. The Third Circuit, the entire panel ruled and a majority decision vote. You know that it was a great mischaracter of justice that started the will's rolling to me getting home. So you know, the d A offered a deal to get me out, and it was something that I didn't want to do, and um something that bothers me to this day. But sometimes you gotta make decisions that's best for your family and not so much um you, or just to get you out, you know what I mean, because you might be in there another five years and you don't know what's going to happen because I was um literally at the end of my role. So if they appeal this decision, you go to the U. S. Supreme Court, and most people asked me that aren't familiar with this work. How could it be that that's what Judge need the Brodie called this a great mischaracter. Justice said you were innocent. Then the Third Circuit Court rules, I think it was four strong majority, strong majority, and it's a very scathing legal opinion. Quote evidence suppressed by the prosecution or received corroborating Dennis's alibi, an inconsistent statement by the Commonwealth, key eye witness, and documents indicating that another individual committed the murderer effectively gutted the Commonwealth's case against Dennis. And she finishes by saying, I'm getting the chilled. The withholding of these pieces of evidence denied Dennis of fair trial and state court. So they ruled that you were innocent. And then people say, well, doesn't that mean in America you go home when you're innocent. But that's not the way it works sometimes, No, that's not the way we're um. They were going to appeal to the U. S. Supreme Court, because no one's really trying to say we made a mistake, we did anything wrong. So that would have took more years out of my life. If you look and just ask comparison, If you look at the Anthony Right case, it took him three years to go to trial after the DNA you evidence proved him indicine, then he still had to go to trial. Why do you have to go to trial and the DNA have been So this is Philadelphia. This is not where people are gonna do the right thing. With Lorenzo Johnson and you go, and I can name other cases, William niaz On and so forth, and the list goes on where they don't want to do the right thing. So I would have spent another three to five years or more in prison, and we wouldn't even be sitting here talking. And you could have died in there too, from I mean just from deprivation. You could die in there. But and then I want to go back to the you know said it was a scathing opinion. How did it feel to hear those words? So I'm sitting there in prison, so I just want to take you back to when the first one happened. Every day I used to walk back and forth and I'm looking for a sign for unit man your account. So that runs the block to come and say you gotta call your lawyers because your lawyers called up here good news or whatever. You don't know, or it might be a family emergency. This particular day, it didn't even click in. I'm thinking something bad had happened with my mom because I had already lost my dad very tragically. You know, Um he died from all Thomas and didn't even remember who I was. But just to let you know, when my dad found out that I was actually going to trial back in two he had a stroke sitting at the table and he never was the same again. So this is the kind of stuff that I endured. So um, that day they come to sell, they said, you gotta call your lawyers. I called my lawyers. A guy yells out the door. That's not bad news. Suty is what they call me. Yeah, I mean, shorty, do what because of the music thing? So they said, that's not a bad call. So I pick up the phone and my lawyers say James A. Dennis and they never set my you know, my entire name, said James A. Dennis, And he said innocence has been proven. My two lawyers on the phone, Amy and Ryan, who are like brothers and sister to me, and they were telling me like I kept saying it, but I didn't really fully get the full magnitude of it. And then when I got off the phone, I put my toel up to the window and I broke down and cried because for me, everything that I went through in prison, I've been waiting for that. So when you read the legal opinion and you see the first words were say James A. Dennis was wrongly, that meant everything to me. That's what I waited for, period. And you don't know that you're going to get that, but that's what I waited for my entire life that I was in Carceret. So when the second decision come, it's the same thing. I put the towel up, I put my head into the pillow and I cried. Guy never cried before. I didn't know what was gonna happen. I'm hoping and praying that they're going to do the right thing. And so when it came, it was like you know, and the lawyers came up there and we talked and what does this mean? And it's a real emotional roller coaster where you know, did y'all call my mom, did y'all tell my mom? Did y'all tell my daughters? Did you you know what I mean? Do all these people know what just happened? So it's an emotional roller coaster. It's the best way I can explain it. I don't think anyone can possibly begin to understand that that hasn't been through it. And and let's talk about the day you got out. May thirteenth, seventeen. I was released from s c I Green Prison. Corby was there, My lawyers were there. Um, a cool guy by the name of Dan was there, and they were waiting outside for me in the van, you know. But my lawyer Ryan came in to get me and give me a suit. And I hadn't had on a suit and twenty five years, you know, since I've been the church. Oddly enough to last night that I was home, I was in church. You know, I went to church and did not get arrested that morning. So it had been a long time since I put on a suit. So I put on this suit this time, and we walk out. There's hugs, things like that, and then we get on this van, and then we're going and everything seems surreal. And I started making phone calls to my mom, to my daughters, to my supporters, you know, thanking everybody. And I'm on my way to Philadelphia and we're playing Boys and Men, were playing Meek Mills, We're playing Elton John Philadelphia Freedom. Where we were were, you know, as we come into city, you know, we were playing Pagla Bell. We're playing you know, all my favorites. As we're on the highway, you know, driving John Coltrane, you know, the boss in the East Street band is up in there where we just grooving down the highway. Me I'm sitting there. There's a lot of laughter going back and forth, and I'm in the moment. I don't know what to eat. When we get to a rest stop by I can tell you that my first meal was like some French fries with some onions on it and the milkshake with some sunfly seeds. I I don't know what to eat. I didn't know, you know what I mean. I I've never seen a convenience story where McDonald's and a gas station all that was in one now, you know, stuff like that. So when we get to Philadelphia. After we get down the highway, you know, my mom and daughters are at the hotel and we have this there's this moment with me and my mom. It's it's a beautiful moment. What we just sit there and we just hold their hands and you know that it's emotional, you know. And and now I'm back home, And how did you meet your beautiful wife who I've just recently met myself. She's my childhood sweetheart. We actually met at Girls High Um High School in Philadelphia and we were singing on the District six Festival choiring. Back then. She was an auto, I was a soprano. And uh we had met on the choir at eleven and twelve years old, but there was twenty five and a half year gap in there. So there was a petition that was started by my supporters to save my life on change dot org. So my supporters would send me in the mail the actual petition to see how it was growing. And I was going through the names and then they were in like alphabetic order, and then when it got to see I've seen Corby, and it was like, oh, whoa know, It's like that moment when you're like Okay, Okay, that's my childhood sweetheart, right, you know what I mean? And you're like okay. So then I had asked my sister Hope to ask her, you know, did she believe in my innocence? And my sister Hope asked her and she said yeah. And it was like, okay, good because you're looking for a silver lining for anybody to believe in you, but for anybody to know the truth. You want everybody, every single person that ever cared about you, to know the truth about the situation. And did she read about it? And you know, and how did she find me? Basically? You know what I mean, because I basically like it's almost like I fell off the face of the earth for so many years and we didn't have any contact. So when I seen her name on the petition, I was like blown away. So I eventually called home and my mother says, somebody's here, and I said, and she don't tell me. It's like a little game. Then she gets on the phone and we start talking. I'm still not thinking that another I don't want to Maybe she just came to see my mother and check on me, you know. But the next Sunday I called she's there again and again, and so then you start to feel like okay, maybe, and then eventually she wanted to come see me, but I had shut down. I was on some I stopped having visits for a number of years, For over at least eight years or so, I stopped having visits. I stopped going the yard, the library. I built a library and mysell the lawyers that sent me books, and all I was doing was getting up every day, study and working on the Justicer Jimmy campaign because I was already suffering from the panic in the anxiety text and didn't know that I had to PTSD. Anyway, she came five years prior to me being released, before any of the good stuff started to happen, And it just seemed like when she came, all the good stuff started happening again, you know what I mean. You got the legal decision after that, you know, the one from the honorable judge and the brody, and she insisted on coming to see me, and it just went from there. Yeah, it just went from there and got lucky. Yeah, yeah, you did. You know, you're a remarkable guy. I mean, I'm always just totally in awe of people like yourself. Who I get the privilege of being around on a very frequent basis. It's almost a daily basis. Actually, Um, having dinner tonight with John Huffington, who was in on death row for thirty two years in Maryland, and um, you know, I was with Damian Nichols this weekend, and U of course, you know, there's so many incredible human beings and one more so then the next. And I'm always like, every time I meet somebody like you, I always feel like I've heard everything there is to hear. And then i hear a story like yours, and I'm like, my head is just exploding again. But UM, I have to ask, are you better? I guess for me is what I want to tell you is that nobody comes through the prison system unscathed. For me, I'm in therapy. I go to therapy every week. I suffer from post traumatic stress disorder, panic and anxiety attacks. My life was destroyed for something I didn't do, and it's something that when I hear sirens, I just shook up. You know, I literally don't go nowhere. You know, me coming here was a was a thing. You know. It took a lot of courage for me just to come here. So there's a lot of bitterness inside of me. To say that there's I would be lying. I'm hurt by what has happened to me, you know, and I'm hurt that is still happening to other people, like I know, other innocent men and women that are in prison. What I try to do with that bitterness and that hurt that I feel, I try to channel with and to doing productive things like my music or champion other people calls. It's like, um Ralph Stokes, who's an innocent man in prison at s CI Green, Willie VESSI who's locked up, who had the same police detectives and digit attorney and he's locked up. And I go to theirherents and try to be supportive to their families and stuff like that. And when I have an opportunity to speak out, I speak out, you know. So there's a lot of hurt and me. You know, um, what my daughters went through while I was out of their life. So yeah, it's it's yeah, yeah, I mean, let's not forget them and all of this too, right, I Mean, then talk about the innocent victim. They were baked, well, one wasn't even born yet, the other one, and you have to understand the ripple effects of that, you know what I mean. The last and ripple effects are not having your father and your life for twenty five point five years. You know. When the decision was made to get me out and I was on the phone with her, you know, one of the things that she said to me was, I used to sit by um She said, I used to sit by the door every day and look out the window and wait for you to come home. That's that's something hard to swallow. And she said, oh, I want you to do is to come home and have a relationship with your granddaughter. And the ripple effects are very lasting on anybody who has been in prison, None of us, no matter how good it seems everyone is doing. No one comes through the system unscared. Me having nightmares all the time, struggling out here in the world. It's it's real. It's not easy, you know, because oftentimes when I hear siren, I think that they're coming back to still my life. I made sure that there's a locator on my phone at all times where I'm at. You know, when I first came home, I was literally calling the lawyers like every hour on an hour calling other people just so my whereabouts are always known. It's that deep. People that are listening, I'm sure they're thinking, what could I do to help right some of these guys that you left behind, who are innocent and stuck in a situation that you were in. What could they do to possibly help you? Um? Do you have any kind of social media? Do you do speaking? Do you have a page where people could donate um to to help you with your transition? If that's even something that interests you. I don't know. I don't want to make any assumptions. But what can people do to help either the people that you left behind? UM, let's start with that. Ralph Stokes, he has a Facebook page in the website Ralph Stokes dot org. Get in touch with his supporters. Did for Willie Vessy. You can look up his case and get in touch with his supporters and you can write these men. They are still in prison, Willie VESSI is doing life v E A s E way and Ralph Stokes has death at s CI Green and any one of you listening can make a difference. You can help by writing them and reaching out to them and then just start champion their calls like I'm trying to do, get involved on their support team and you know, help get them some type kind of justice, you know what I mean, Because everybody can make a difference, even when they think they can't. They could use their voice to make a difference through social media, through other outlets. What about what about you? Is? What do you need? What? What? What's I don't? I don't necessarily I'm not looking for a hand out, you know what I mean. I don't even want to say it that way. Maybe that's wrong enough, you know they say it. But there is a trust fund that my lawyer, Amy Rose set up Amy Row of Washington, d C. Merlin, and you can look it up on Facebook page where people could donate if they wanted to. But I have a social media Instagram, Um Jimmy Underscore, Dennis Underscore music. I just like for people to listen to my song. You said, if give a listen, if you like it, you like it, you know, hopefully you'll like it. Hea know what I mean. And I just really want to be a part of the music fraternity, you know, earn my keep that way. You know, It's always been my dream too being a business since I was a kid, and for me, I used to see my musical heroes Gladys Night, Bruce Springs staining all on the Grammys. And even when I was on death row. That was the one time on death row anybody could tell you that know me, you could not call me. When the Grammys on I disappeared. I would put on my headphones and I would watch the Grammys, and I was in New Yorker l a all the time. I would not respond to anybody. I was there watching, you know, and rooting and charing everybody on what's your favorite song to sing? Oh, I don't necessarily have a favorite song, and saying I just like, you know, whatever comes to my heart. You know what, what's your What do you want to sing right now? You want to sing something right now? Yeah? The first time on anybody, I'm saying you said, I saying you said, if you don't mind, do it? Okay, okay, bull through the hurricane, We're through fire, rank filled door, last, pain, crazy, the end, sane for you, Woo for you, woo nothing ever writ bounce always there too, but found never once let's shut down. I was there for you. Woo for you, woo who hoo you said you love me, and true you said the sad you said, you love me, I'll be there for you. What's it? What's it? Address? Jimmy Dennis dot net. You can find a single you said, you said, what do you? And then the words said? Okay? Last question? So what would you tell people? Because everyone that's listening right now someday is going to get a jury dooty notice and you went through a really crazy situation, people sleeping through a death penalty case. I mean, the word disrespect doesn't even come to mind. I mean that's not strong enough. Um, it's it's reprehensible, It's it's fucking terrible. But that's beside the point. What would you tell people they get called to jury duty and they end up on a criminal trial. What advice could you give people? People listening saying I don't ever want to make a mistake like that. I don't ever want to send an innocent man to jail? What what would they look out for? What would be the tips that you could give them. The first thing you shouldn't do is worry about making a mistake. You should go in there and it has to be like twelve angry men in that room. If you take jury duty, somebody has to be Jack Lemmon or Henry Fonder, right. You have to pay attention to every single thing going on. Don't be biased, sit back and pay close attention to the evidence and wait it. It is a large responsibility for anybody to take on jury duty, and you should want to because you could be the reason that somebody doesn't get real roaded like me, and that an innocent man and woman comes home. We don't need more Jimmy didn't, Damian Echoes, William Niez, jeffs Licks, and the man the Knox and so on and so forth. We have to stop it somewhere, and by you sitting on a jury, paying attention to all the evidence and then weighing it properly, you can be the one voice that says this doesn't make any sense, or pay attention to this facts and not the theatrics of it all that the other side is trying to do. Because that's what happened here. A lot of theatrics from the parties that be, the d A and the police, a lot of theatrics and lies. And there was no way that anybody said on that jury and shouldn't have been paying attention to the facts. You have to pay attention to the facts. Facts matters. That's good advice and I'm sure it's going to help people as they go into, uh, into that situation, which a difficult situation for anybody. I think, you know, being in the courtroom and it's uncomfortable all it can take a long time, but it's a responsibility we all have to each other. I mean, because this could really happen to anybody, and you're living proof. You're just just a regular person. So okay, then I guess the last part now is just anybody that you want to think that maybe we haven't thought about already, and then um, any closing words that you have. This is a tradition that we have on wrongful conviction. At the end of the episode, I get to just sit and listen, which is what I like to do. And first I want to thank you Jimmy. It's very courageous of you to come up here. I know it wasn't easy and to share your thoughts and your experience with the audience, So thank you so much for being here. And I'm looking forward. I'm looking forward to maintaining a friendship and I have some ideas and you know you were talking before about how how comfortable the bed is at the Western New York. Well, wrongful conviction is going to get you that bed. So you'll you'll you'll sleep good. You know, maybe you'll all asleep listening to your old show anyway. So so we got that covered. But Um, anyway, so now, like I said, I get to I get to shut down my microphone and just put my headphones, kick back and listen. So it's all up to you. I want to first thank you Jason for having me. You encountered mean as the world to me. The hospitality is greatly appreciated, and I just want to commend you for the work you're doing in the innocence community. It takes a lot of courage to do what you do. I want to thank Jennifer Thompson. She's been one of my biggest supporters and she's a herod mine. I call him my she ro, you know what I mean. She's been there for me, Um from day one, champion my calls. I like to thank all my supporters, um, you know around the country. Um that's been there for me when I was in prison and since I came home. Um, Jeff uh Melanie, Uh, Kathy and Ron and everybody. Um. I want to thank my friend and my friends have been an instrumental support for me. You know, when you get get out, you need support. You know, your family and your friends. I want to just want to think my friends and my wife, Corby and my friend Cosin quite their ski and that dude all for supporting me an ad Imported Law firm, um Amy, Ryan, Rebecca, Meghan, Melanie, Kitty Being and James. They did a wonderful job and it's because of them that I'm sitting here there like family to me and I love him dearly. And I just want to tell people listening that if you do your due diligence and you read the case and you want to get involved, don't be scared to get involved. Reach out to that person in prison. Become their supporter and become their champion, become their voice because a lot of people in prison have no voice. And to everybody on death row, to every man and woman in prison, never give up and never give up on a dream, no matter what your dreams are. For everybody in the innocent community, I don't care if you wanted to be a fisherman or a Carpenter, go for it and don't give up. Never give up, never ever give up. This has been an extraordinary episode of Wrongful Conviction with death Row Ex, Honoree, Jimmy, Dennis, Jimmy, thank you, thank you, 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 Innocence 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 thow 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