A night out in November 2002 turned deadly when Nicole Hubbard called for her protective older brother Cordell. Then, Ru-El Sailor took the fall for his best friend’s violence with the help of a vindictive vice detective.
Learn more and get involved at:
https://www.instagram.com/comma_club_clothing/?hl=en
https://www.gofundme.com/f/ruel-sailor039s-homecoming
https://www.wrongfulconvictionpodcast.com/with-jason-flom
Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava for Good™ Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1.
Best friends, Cordel Hubbard and Ruelle Sailor, were small time dealers on the East side of Cleveland. On November sixteenth, two thousand two, Cordell's sister Nicole was out partying with some friends. She fronted the group twenty bucks for drugs, but felt taken advantage of when she only got ten dollars back from the group of five. When she spoke up, a gun was pulled on her, so she called Cordel. While celebrating a birthday at a bar with a large group including will Sizemore and Rulle, Cordell answered the call from Nicole and took Sizemore along to confront the two men who had done her wrong, Omar Clark and Clark Lamar Williams. They pulled up on these men on a darkened street, and Sizemore initially got out of the pastures side and confronted them about his sister, leading witnesses to believe that the passenger was Cordell. Cordell got out of the driver's side. Omar Clark pulled a gun and Cordell shot him in self defense, while the other man, will Him's got caught with a bullet in his buttocks as he ran away. Ruell was clearly not involved, but his tight friendship with Cordell and his days in the streets would come back to haunt him. A corrupt vice detective who had once vowed to get Ruell would use this opportunity, claiming an informant had told him that Ruell was the other man with Cordell while threatening and coercing Ruelle's alibi witnesses into silence. Even with Cordell taking full responsibility and naming Will Sizemore as the other man before sentencing, Ruell still spent fifteen years behind bars. This is Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flom. Welcome back to Wrongful Conviction with Jason Flam. That's me. I'm your host, and today, if I was going to title this episode, I would call it Web of Lies, because this case was built on so many different layers of lies, so many different people had to tell in order to convict an innocent man named Ruel Sailor of murder and other charges. So we'll get right into it. First of all, I want to introduce the woman who was responsible for Ruele winning his freedom a couple of years ago. Jennifer Passion Bergeron, who is the deputy director of the Ohio Innocence Project. So, Jennifer, welcome to Ronfa Conviction. Thank you, it's good to be here. I would pretty remiss if I didn't give a shout out to to Kim Carral too, because she was in private attorney that worked with me on this case. Thank you for doing that. And without further Ado Ruel Sailor, welcome to ron Conviction. Thank you for having me. And let's start in the beginning. So did you grow up in Cleveland on the east side, the sank Clear area in east side of Cleveland. My mother, for as I remember, she always was a nurse. Sometimes you worked to three ships to day. My father was he was there, then he wasn't there. He was um in the streets. But then I had started get older, I had to be there to help out with my siblings. I have a younger brother and sister. So once my dad wasn't there, it was just us. And then as a teenager, I took more into the streets than school because I felt like I had to help my mom with my siblings. So I begin like to sell drugs at a young age, and I talked out of high school like temporary. Tell us about Cordel Hubbard because he really is a central figure and this really crazy crime. Well back history of Cordell Hubbard. Me and Cordell Hubbard met him third grade and for some reason we ended up in the same class every grade throughout our whole entire school year up to high school. So he was always best friends and Jennifer. This started from a drug deal gone bad, right, but a very minor drug deal at that And this goes back to the night of November sixteenth of two thousand two. One of the people that will be talking about is Clark Lamar Williams, and we'll just refer to him as Williams just to try to make it simpler. My understanding is Nicole Hubbard was with Omar Clark and Williams and a couple of her friends that night and they were driving. Omar Clark and Williams stood buy a wet cigarette, one cigarette with PCP and I guess it was twenty bucks and Nicole front of the twenty bucks. So when they stopped, I think it was Omar Clark that went in to get the money to pay her back, but didn't come back with twenty bucks, came back with only ten bucks, apparently because everyone had taken turned smoking, so I guess he figured he only needed to pay half of it. I don't know, but in any case, this did not go over well into Cole Hubbard. And my understanding is Omar pulled a gun on her and that's when she called her brother and things escalated from there. Me and Rdio Hubbard he was happy to be out son of branding one of our friend's birthdays west of board and Cordell had received a phone call from his sister, the cod Hubbert, him and William Sizemore left the board if he was at and went to go to confront these guys about his sister, to go see about her well being, because he thought she was still there, and when he got there, she was gone. To my understanding from when I was told like old Mark Clark put a gun on Cordell Hubert twice and Cordell Hubbard shot open work Clark and self defense. Omar Clark was shot eleven times and Mr Williams was running away from the scene and was shot. He was lucky to be shot in the butt and and therefore not badly hurt. And the two men drove off afterwards, and so the witnesses that was on the scene had confused the driver and the passenger. William Sizemore was the passenger, Cordelle Hubbard was the driver, and William Sizemore got out and confronted the individuals saying, what y'all do to my sister? So the witnesses on that street automatically assumed that the brother was the passenger, and that's where the confusion came at. So they always had put Cordell on the passenger side, and they didn't know who the driver was. So when they arrested Cordell for this crime, they were charging him as accomplice because the driver was the shoot it and they didn't have a second person. And going back to my history in the streets, there was a vice cop from my neighborhood that particularly didn't get along with me per se, and he had planned drugs on me once before and I didn't go to prison, and he felt that I said went to prison. He told me that he would get me one day. And so when Cordell name came up in his crime, they automatically just assumed I was with Cordell because we've always been together for so many years and everyone knew that we was best friends. So this cop told the homicide detective that he had a complidicte your informant, which was never named, never brought up during our trial, just his word. He had to compldict. Your informant told him that I was the driver and that I was the shooter, and I was arrested based upon that, and then then went fast forward. Of course, the March twenty six, two thousand three, and a grand jury indicted you were well right on charges of murder, kidnapping, and assault. But I mean the alibi it's pretty strong in this case, right, I mean he was miles and miles away across town with lots of other people, right. Yes, we have several affidavits from different people later on who could have potentially testified at the trial, but they also said in their affidavits that they were threatened by the police if they did show up to testify. Now, the case went to trial in May of two thousand three, and all three of you were tried together. First of all, it seems like a very quick turnaround. And I can't leave out the fact that when I see that the words Cuyahoga County, I immediately get the chills because we keep hearing about cases from Cuyahoga County wrongful conviction one after the other. I was indicted more twenty six. I was arrested April Seco, where the Hubbard was already indicted and was out on bond and his court day prior to me being arrested. The state didn't have any witnesses to come to court. So the judge Nancy McDonald told were they all his lawyers and the prosecutors, That seems going to reschedule next court date for May nineteen. So my understanding that they didn't come May nineteenth with witnesses, that the capes would be thrown out. In the midst of that, I was arrested and they added Cordell in the code to my new indictment, but kept they saying court day May nineteenth was their original court date to start a trial or lawyers four separate trial. They denied it's a separate trial, and I had to nearly prepare for a murder trial from April second to May nineteenth. Jennifer, this is all sounds pretty irregular, even amongst the crazy ship we here a week to week on this podcast. Well, I can't imagine as an attorney trying to get ready for a murder case in basically a month. So I mean that set the whole stage for things to just go downhill, because there just wasn't time to do the type of investigation that would have been necessary to mount the proper defense. By the time I had put my witness list together, the detective on my case, before I can even make calls to get to these witnesses, he had already got to him. The board that I was at, he got to the owner and he told her that if she came to court in my defense, he would he would get her board rated, like raided for drugs and shut down like he would like planning drugs and her board, And he's known for this throughout our neighborhood, so she didn't want to jeopardize her business, which I understand. And then my other witnesses neighbors in the street life as well, and he went to them and threatened them with planning drugs on them and getting those guys cases, so they didn't come to court. So when it came time for trial, I didn't have any out about witnesses that was on my list to come to court because this detective had winness spoke to all of them and threatened them not to come to court. So you didn't have a shot hel when it really comes down to it, And I don't think the best lawyer in the world could have helped you out of that situation with what they were willing to do, the links they were willing to go to. So the trial, did you think, after having seen all the worst of what our quote unquote justice system has to offer, did you think that you still have a chance to be acquitted. I was skeptical because my jury wasn't of my peers. The majority of my jury were older, white people from suburban areas. And so the biggest thing in this case was identification. There was no physical evidence, no scientific evidence, no village casing is none of that. The witnesses in this case described the two individuals as to light skinned males that looked like brothers. Fordel Hubbard is the same skin complexion is Steph Curry, And you would put me it's the same complexion. Is maybe Lebron James were Dwyane Wade maybe And I'm sitting there and I'm like, these human beings in this jury box has to understand that me and Cordell Hubbard could never look alike, no scene, no setting, whatsoever, two different shades of color completely. But when you get a jury that's not from my culture and my background, they just see two African Americans, so it was a different I didn't I didn't know that, but I know now. I'm just thinking everybody knows about light skining and dark skin, and that's just common sense. I wasn't aware that there are people that live in this world that don't know that. So the jury comes back in what was that moment or those moments like for you, it was a moment of clarity, because before you go through those things, you feel like nobody goes to jail that didn't do anything unless you know somebody that's actually innocent. So I'm sitting there and I'm like, they just found me guilty of something I didn't even see. I wasn't even nowhere near the scene of the crame, hadn't been owhere near that side of town or anything. But to make it even worse that I'm being convicted of a crime that the man standing next to meet actually committed and here I am being found guilty of a crime I never saw. This episode is brought to you by Stand Together. Stand Together is a philanthropic community dedicated to helping people improve their lives. For more than twenty years, Stand Together and its partners have been on the front lines of criminal justice reform. By empowering people to take action, supporting nonprofits, and working with businesses, Stand Together tackles the root causes of problems in our communities and empowers those closest to the problems to drive solutions. Solutions like reducing unjust prison sentences through the First Step Act, empowering community based programs that help people re enter society, and now working to bridge divides in our communities. To learn how you may get involved, visit stand together dot org slash conviction. This episode is underwritten by the ai G pro Bono Program. A i G is a leading global ensure its company, and for over a decade, the a i G pro Bono Program has provided thousands of hours of free legal services and other support to nonprofit organizations and individuals most in need. More recently, the program added criminal and social justice reform as a key pillar of its mission. It was a even heavier blow between me being convicted and me going to prison, because Corel Hoeberd comes forward and he admits that he killed o'mar Clark, and he admitsed that William sizing World was with him and that I was nowhere near that, and that he played on my innocence to get free, and now he went to tell the truth. So when we get ready to go to Senson, the plan is he said his attorney that when we go to Censon, there were news cameras in their media and there, so he was saying, like, I'm going to speak the truth in front of the cameras and blow this whole thing up. So I don't know if he's a lawyer play both sides or what. But we go to since It and our judge she keeps the media out of the courtroom before court starts. Codill Steal confesses to the crime, and she still convicts me right here on the spot, sends me to twenty years to life. He's actually solving the case for them, right he's identified, which took some courage. I mean it was too it was too late as it turns out, but it did take some courage. Hubbard signed a swan statement right claiming that Roule was not with him at the crime scene, and he said it was quote unquote, it was a guy named Will and he meant by that Will size more. And it goes on to say, I didn't think it was gonna turn out like this. I didn't think my best friend would get convicted as a shooter. But he wasn't even there. So I had to follow a new trial motion based on cordials. After David meant to this crime, we sent subpoenas to William Sizemore. So we have this retrial here where we present order to the courts. Cordell takes the stand at the retrial here me steady killed Omark. Clark described the whole night in detail, how it happened, how we left, everything that happens. Before Cordell can make it back to his seat, she denies me a new trial. The sence be the prison. Jennifer, help us out here. What was going on here that they were so actively disinterested in knowing what really happened. I don't have an answer for that. I don't know how you could hear that testimony and not try to fix this wrong. So I mean years go by, and we're all the way to two thousand and thirteen when you filed another petition asking for a new trial based on another sworn AFFI, David, right, do you want to walk us through that you weren't Clark the victim's brother. Omark Clark's brother. He was heavily involved in the whole entire investigation. And that's how a lot of things worked out on the Cordell and the Cold Hobbs side, because you work. Clark would go talk to the witnesses, he would go talk to Williams, and he go relay everything he found out in the streets to the police, and that's how they called out Cordill and the co Herbert even was fast forward. You Mark Carker's in prison. I write him a letter and he writes me back. He tells me that days after trial he knew the truth. William size Moore had came forward to him and told him that he was with Cordell the nighted to shoot in that Cordill killed his brother. He said, Man, send a lawyer at me, or send an investigator at me. I'll do it after David. So I'm thinking this was the mother load right here, so I'll get the After David and I found me a new trial motion again this newly discovered evidence. The same judge, Nancy McDonald. I feel like it would be a more objective process if it was a different judge, but she denied that petition without a hearing. The petitions dispenso was up held on a pel in two thousand and fourteen. And then how did you end up contacting the Ohio Innocence Project. I had wrote to the Ohio Instance Project. They never to now in my case, they just at the times that I wrote them, they responded and they had a heavy caseload. So I understood that I'm gonna keep fighting to keep building evidence as I go, so they do come along, I'll have enough. And in the midst of that, I had retained attorney, amazing attorney Kimberly Cruel, my wife, Amy Sailor, my family. They was out here and it was be Downdoors having rallies. And then Kyle Swinton from the same magazine had did an article on me and I had like a tempay spread and the Ohio Entesce Project and then they had contacted me because they had seemed the traction I have with my case. It was going they looked into it, and Jennifer and just student Andrew and Ruby, they came to see me. I was in Ohio State Penitentiary and we went over my case, and I just I just knew right then and there, like I was about to go home. So, Jennifer, how did you crack this case? There was really nothing to crack. I mean, by the time we got the case, we knew exactly what had happened because everybody had already explained that Cordell admitted he was the shooter, knew William Sizemore had admitted he was the second person there, and so there really wasn't anything to solve. We knew from the get go that Ruelle wasn't there and had nothing to do with it. The challenge was to convince the prosecutor in the court to let him out of prison since he was innocent, and that's what took a long time. So in the spring of sen I think his other attorney, Kim, we started working cooperatively together to try to figure out a plan to get Roulet out and then we were kind of working with the additional investigation to try to find anything else we could, and that's where we got additional affidavits from some of the alibi witnesses and from Nicole Hubbard. And because he had already filed as we were talking about, before these new trial motions that had been denied, it looked like the best path for him was to try the conviction Integrity Unit that had opened in Cuyahoga County. My whole time at prison, every attorney, every investigator, everybody always told me, like, if William Sizemore was to ever come forward until the truth, that should go to keep you walking out of prison. So I'm in Lucasville and I get a phone called and Kim is crying, who's our called? Well, why why? Why is she crying? And She's like, William Sizemore just went to the prosecutor's office and told the truth. So in my mind, they're about to come pop my door the next five minutes and I'm about to walk out of here. It didn't happen like that, though, Like I still sat in prison for like almost eight nine months after William Sizemore caming forward and told the truth, and the prosecutors from the c i U. Russell tied him and Kim came to see me and he's like, well, we gotta do some more investigating. And at this point, William Sizemore has admitted that he was with Cordial Hubbard and that Cordial Hubbard shot old Mark Clark in self defense and said that old Mark Clark had a good Williams had came forward and recan it and said he never saw me a day of this life, and that they made him say that I was the shooter. My witnesses, Body Nettles, Anthony Mackenzie, they've came forward and told the truth that they was threatened. Korell has admitted, So I have all this evidence mountain with me saying that I'm innocent, and the prosecutor told me that he had to go do more investigation. It was gonna leave me in prison. So I had to ask, but where is the William size board And he told me William Sizemore was at home because he didn't see him as a suspect. The system is not built right at all. Was there a worst moment in that fifteen years, in that very very dark place where you almost gave up, or where it's just a moment of absolute despair and and at the same time, what was the happiest moment were the happiest moment would be They told me I was going home, but just a quick how I went from Dirk to light. I was in Lucasville and it's like the worst prison in Ohio, hands down. And I was I was on a straight path, I'll stay out of trouble. And I was trying to get my status dropped so I can go to a lower level prison. And right before I went up for to get up my status dropped for a lower level prison, I was a porter and a dust pan had came up missing. Now a dust pan any other prison or any other times, it's a minor, minor thing, they don't make a big deal about it and that. But this particular time they made the biggest deal about this dust pan. And they tried to give me like ALC which is like CT days in the hole segregation, and they tried to take my my status being lord away from me and all these things and my phone privileges and my visit privileges, and it was like it just came out of nowhere, and it was like I didn't even do nothing. It was like this is the story of my life. And so they put me in the hole and they weren't trying to hear me out. They weren't trying to watch the camera to see. They have these high tech cameras, and I just keep saying, watch the camera. It's just something simple. Watch the camera. You will see I didn't touch the dust pan. They refused to watch the camera. So it was like, this is it set up for something? And I got to the whole. I just went on a hunger strike because I had to fight for my my way without being violent or being rude or anything like that. So I just refused to eat me refusing to eat being the person I was in prison, I was had a little bit about of respect. A lot of other guys follow suit, and they refused their trades on the counter what they was doing to me because everybody knew they never did it. A lot of dust spans so long, stretty short. I went to do like seven eight I think like ten days on hunger strike in solitary confinement, not a soul around me and about myself, and it's like I'm just feeling like this, damn you're eat. I'm feeling like I'm about to die. In the seal. I ain't eight, I'm not feeling good, and they come give me. So I had a lowyeral phone call and I came got the phone. It was Jennifer Kim and the Channel five news from my city, Joe paging Nagger is all on three way on the phone with me, and I'm like, what's going on? What's going on? And they was like this sick like you're coming home. You'll be all a couple of days, he went from like the worst time in prison, two the best time in prison, one site for the literal depths of despair, starving alone in solitary confinement for another crime you didn't commit, and they finally decided to watch the camera and another quarterhead through the dustband in the trash by mistake. Ultimately, you obviously were freed. And when I say freed, I chose that word carefully because even after all of this, they still weren't done messing with you, right, Because what I'm referring to is in March two thousand and eighteen, the prosecutor Andrew Wells team filed the joint motion vacating conviction all the convictions and dismissing all the charges But there was another little dirty trick, right, which is that the prosecution and had a caveat, and they said to you, well that you had to plead guilty to perjury and obstruction of justice, saying that you had falsely testified at trial that Cordell was not involved in the shooting, and in exchange for this, they were willing to re sentence you to ten years, which obviously you had already served a lot longer than that, and you could go home. I never disclosed that Portill and William Size worn up the board and I stayed. I never really lied, just we were together all that night, which I didn't find out he left the board so after the fact, and so they told me that I I understand I committed perjury, perjury, and I'm streuss in the justice. They gave me five years maximum, each one equal to ten years. And at this point they hold it in front of me like, you can go home right now. If you agree it is, you can go home. You don't agree it is, you know telling how long it might take us to get you a new trial story. It might take a year, it might take two years, who knows, But you can go home right now. You said you take these teen years time, sir, so I agreed to it, even though I know it wasn't right. I agreed to it because I wanted to go home. Don't want to go home after being in jail f eighteen years. What primary didn't commit. It's an unreal story. And of course, now fast forward to March of you file the federal civil rights lawsuit against the Cleveland Police Department and nine officers seeking damages for the wrongful conviction, and your team also filed a separate complaint in the Kuyahoga Court of Climate Police to have you declared wrongfully in prison and therefore eligible for state compensation or actually innocent, however you want to look at it. So we don't need to get into that now. But I just want to say that all of us in the family, the wrong conviction family, and in this community are all rotten for you. I can't let this platform go without share where I met currently since being released, I married my wife on my one year anniversary, Mark Squinty. As recently, I just had a daughter, my Yale's later. She was born on the twelfth of October. I started a business when I came home from prison. I still a clothing line or a comic club clothing. The Comma means continuation. The Montrose, My story is not over. No one's story is ever over. As long as you get up and continue to fight which you want in life, your story is never over. I've done speaking of gazements. I go to high schools, colleges and tell my story and you can find me on Instagram at Comma Underscore Club Understore Clothing. Thank you. That's Comma Underscore Club Underscore Clothing. Followed well, the clothes are great. I've seen them and they're comfortable too. So I'm giving up. I'm giving my plug. So now this is the part of the podcast, which is my favorite part. I always say that because this is the part where I get to First of all, I thank both of you for coming and taking your time and sharing your story and just for being freedom fighters that you are. And so Jennifer Passion Vergeuron, thank you again for being on the show today. It's been my pleasure. Thank you, and Rull you know, once again you're a hero to to me and so many others. And I'm just so thrilled that we got to talk today. And you know we're going to be friends for a long time. So thanks again for sharing your your strength and your spirit with the audience. Thank you for having me. So now what happens is I turned my microphone off, kick back, close my eyes and just listen to closing arguments. Jennifer you first, please, and then you can just hand it off to Reuel. I just want to say thank you to everyone for listening and being interested in these issues because they are pervasive throughout the country and they need to be heard. The stories and the exonorees and just the awareness in general. And if you get the chance to work on a jury, please do so and just be skeptical and look for the truth. Jennifer, I love you, Thank you for all you've done. And I can't leave this podcast without giving my wife, Andy Sailor her roses, as well as Kim Carrell and Time pablished Andrew and Ruby and work at the o I P. I wouldn't be seeing her having this conversation. It went for these people because they fought for me on the outside. Like Kim Carrell was my attorney. She did ten times more than what I paid her for. Leave that and she's been a friend from their own out and the O I P has become a family. They don't just get you out of prison, but they're stick with you the whole time while you're out. I just want to just giving all of them their flowers. Now I get a joy just sharing my story. It's about the awareness of what's going on in our world, our country for us, our legal system, and how our courts, police officers, things of that nature and juries handled themselves. Because I was once that person that didn't believe these things happened. So the more we share stories like mines and others, we wake up more people than know that these things actually happen. If you know someone in prison, please contact them, Please be coming gays in your cases. Just just be there for those guys that are in prison. There are a lot more guys in prison that are innocent. I say that over and over again. There are so many more. I'm just I'm just one of many that happen to make it out. There's so many more in there. Or encourage people to be on the jury listen, be attentive, studies cases to do in the jury, and just help people that you know us already carcerated. Write them, send them a letter, give him a phone call or anything like that, because it means a lot. It means a lot more than you may think. Thank you for listening to Wrong for Conviction with Jason Flam. Please support your local innocence projects and go to the link in our bio to see how you can help. I'd like to thank our production team Connor Hall, Jeff Clyburne and Kevin warnas the music on the show. As always, it's by three time OSCAR nominated compos Thozer j 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