Original subtitles

Topping the news, a brutal slaying

in Williamson County has investigators puzzled.

There should not be any opposition

to an honest search for truth.

It was beastly.

It wasn't fully human.

There's a lot of things at that scene

that makes an investigator wonder

is it someone close to them?

Austin wasn't the kind of place

you locked your doors and stuff.

The why and the who

were just big open-ended glaring questions.

You can't have two identical murders

and not see the relevance of one to the other.

One side wants to conceal the truth

and keep it in darkness.

The other side wants to reveal the truth

and bring it to light.

When God puts on your heart something that must be done,

it's often something you're not qualified for.

But sometimes we're given opportunities

to do things outside our comfort zone

and we should not be afraid.

Part of the reason I became a lawyer

was To Kill a Mockingbird.

Atticus Finch was one of my childhood heroes.

I thought if I could have a chance someday

to strike a blow for justice, I...

Wouldn't that be a great opportunity?

I worked for 20 years as a civil trial lawyer,

I did some good things that helped people.

But I'd never done anything in the criminal sphere.

I was completely unprepared for the height

and the depth of the power and the arrogance

of the district attorney's office

of Williamson County.

There is a strong political machine against us.

That I didn't see coming.

These... These cases changed me.

It changed everyone in... in my family.

On August 12th, 1986.

It was Michael Morton's 33rd birthday.

And, uh, he and his lovely wife Christine

lived in North Austin.

They had a little three-and-a-half year old boy

named Eric.

They had a little house.

They had a yard,

they had a little porch

that Michael built in the backyard.

They had a dog.

Just typical, good people.

That night, they celebrated Michael's birthday

by having dinner together in Austin.

Being his birthday,

he wanted to get amorous with, uh...

with Christine after Eric was put to bed.

She was very tired,

and she kissed him,

and said, "Tomorrow night, babe."

The next morning, Michael said,

He got up at 5:00 AM.

Showered, shaved,

he left a note on the bathroom mirror

for Christine.

And, um, then he clocked in at... at his job

at Safeway at 6:00 AM.

If we don't think

that our life could change like that,

we're wrong.

Later that morning,

a neighbor found Eric

walking by himself in the front yard.

Eric had a soiled diaper

and the neighbor picked up Eric

and walked him into the house

calling out for Christine.

Christine was not answering.

She walked around with Eric

looking for Christine in the house

and found Christine's body.

There was blood all over the walls, uh,

over the ceiling, bits of flesh.

The next door neighbor was extremely frightened,

immediately called the sheriff's department

who came straight over.

Sheriff John Boutwell came to the scene,

the Hazelhurst address of the Morton house.

Sheriff Boutwell was central casting

for a Western novel.

He had a Stetson hat, and boots,

and the tie tack on his tie were handcuffs.

And, uh, he proceeded to search the house.

Without calling Michael to tell him that

his wife was dead.

And he went back

and he found Christine's body.

The murderer covered her corpse

with a blue suitcase and a wicker basket.

Her face was... was no longer recognizable

as any sort of person.

Using probably a two-by-four

from the construction area out back, uh,

we know this because there were bits of

wood embedded in her brain.

Christine Morton was lying on her back.

The killer brought it down with full force

right on her face.

And again.

And again.

Nine or ten times.

She was dead after the second or, when, probably

if not the first.

Sheriff Boutwell didn't see signs of forced entry.

He didn't see very much was stolen.

And investigators determined that Christine Morton

was not sexually assaulted.

He found Michael's note to Christine.

And the note said,

"You know, I didn't want to have a fight with you about sex

but you left me hanging on my birthday.

And, um, I'll... I'll see you tonight."

Meanwhile, Michael Morton went to a daycare

to pick up his son Eric.

Eric was not at the daycare.

So Michael called home,

just see what was going on.

Sheriff Boutwell answered the phone.

Said, "You have to come home right now."

He answered all of their questions

and he told them, "I didn't do it.

I don't know who did, I was at work.

I found out about it later."

Topping the news, a brutal slaying

in Williamson County has investigators puzzled.

Sheriff's officers refused to talk in detail

about the slaying, but the possible suspect

is being questioned about the murder.

The first time I saw my brother Michael

after the murder, uh, was at the funeral.

He was a different person.

So we were we, so was I.

You know, our family was completely different

because when Chris died, it tore the family apart.

You know, part of us died.

As the criminal investigation began,

they interviewed my brother multiple times.

And they begin to interview the neighbors.

And his co-workers, and people that they knew,

asking them, you know, "What kind of person is he?"

And they looked at him as the prime suspect.

To think that he could do something like that,

to his own wife, or to anybody,

we were in a state of shock.

And then the nightmare went to a whole another level.

Not long after Christine's funeral...

...Michael heard the doorbell of his house.

And he picked up his son Eric

and they went to the door together.

And it was Sheriff Boutwell and several deputies.

They took his son out of his arms.

And handcuffed Michael.

And Michael looks back and sees Eric reaching out

and screaming, "Daddy, daddy, daddy."

And this little boy that had just lost his mother,

now is losing his father?

It affected me as a father

because I thought about my children.

And that's why I was haunted by this case.

I can't imagine how horrible that was

for the little three and half year old boy.

- No, I can't. - You can't.

None of us can. We can't grasp it.

Everything that happened to my brother

happened so fast.

I mean, right after the funeral

they zero in on him.

Less than six months after Michael was arrested

the case went to trial.

That is very fast for a murder trial.

Michael Morton sought and obtained

the very best lawyers that he could.

Bill Allison and Bill White.

Michael was...

a little overwhelmed by the situation

that he found himself in,

but he... but he was not very evocative.

He was the only suspect they had

and his... The only thing he had to say about it was,

"It was somebody else. I don't know who it was."

As long as I live, I'll still have

an mixed feelings about this case.

I became involved in Michael Morton

as a law student working

for Defense Attorney's Bill White and Bill Allison

who tried the case.

My first impressions of Michael

was he was very well-dressed articulate man.

He was not, uh, particularly emotional by nature.

A little bit stern at times, but very controlled.

Initially the lead up to the trial.

I was a little, uh, undecided

about whether or not he had committed this crime.

I was sent up to Georgetown

to pick up the crime scene photos.

And I saw the crime scene photos

for the first time.

It was a very, uh, sobering moment

for a twenty-something year old law student.

The courtroom where it was tried

was this big, very large courtroom

in the old Williamson County courthouse.

And it was a very old Southern atmosphere.

It was long church pew type sitting, old,

kind of wooden bannisters, and so it was, like,

very, uh, a made for movie trial.

The prosecutors were the elected

District Attorney Ken Anderson.

Ken Anderson, he was a very, uh, sarcastic,

aggressive, and smart prosecutor.

He was quite clever

in his playing on the emotions of the case,

and quite effective.

He was my meticulous.

He was very, very well-prepared.

So, they brought their A team for this trial.

The strategy they used in large part

was a character assassination of Michael.

The storyline was essentially, uh,

it was a unhappy marriage.

He was looking for a way out,

lost his temper that night,

and then tried to cover it all up.

The state's theory of the case at trial

was that Michael had killed Christine

in a sex-filled rage

because she didn't have sex with him on his birthday

and the note that was on the bathroom mirror,

"You left me hanging on my birthday."

It was the evidence they used,

but what... There was more evidence.

There was a hair in her hand.

There was testimony at trial

that it was consistent with Michael's hair.

In fact they said it was consistent

with, uh, a hair from his penis.

There was also a semen stain on the bed.

The State called a witness at trial to testify

that it was a neat stain containing only male cells.

Prosecutor asked the State's Pathologist Roberto Bayardo

to give an opinion on the time of death.

So, he examined Christine's stomach contents

and the rate of digestion.

And from that he deduced a theory

as to the time of death.

Uh, Doctor Bayardo testified that her time of death

was sometime before Michael had left for work.

Michael's defense was, "It wasn't me.

I don't know who it was. I was at work."

Plain and simple.

The only defense theory that we had

that this was the act of some... of some maniac

who had walked into your house and killed you.

Michael didn't make the best witness

from an emotional standpoint I didn't think,

but I didn't feel like they had, uh, proof

necessary for a conviction.

So, the prosecutor Ken Anderson

waited until rebuttal of closing argument,

when it was too late for the defense

to say anything in response.

In front of the judge, the jury, the media,

our family, and in front of my mother.

He stated that,

he felt that after my brother

brutally murdered my sister-in-law.

That he took her dead hand,

cupped it in his hand,

wrapped her hand around his penis,

and then masturbated himself to the point of ejaculation.

And that was just...

that was the lowest of the low,

that... that killed us all.

That... That almost finish us off.

And then he showed color photos of the murder scene

and the blood everywhere.

And said, "Don't let this monster get away.

We are not safe if we let him get away.

The jury didn't deliberate very long.

They had scientific proof of the time of death

from the stomach contents analysis,

then Michael Morton was convicted.

Michael Morton is taken prison for life.

I didn't do this.

- I'm sorry, what? - I did not do this.

District Attorney Anderson said a life sentence

is too good for Michael Morton.

He should have been given the death penalty.

It got sickening after a while to watch him cry

at the wrong times

and he seemed to only to cry for himself.

And then just months after Michael was convicted,

there was another woman

beaten in the face with a blunt instrument

while she was sleeping,

killed exactly the same way as Christine Morton.

Breaking news in North Austin this morning,

the body of a 32-year old resident

was found in her home on Thursday murdered

in what investigators called, a savage beating.

On the morning of January 13th of 1988,

Debra Jan Baker did not show up for work.

Her employer contacted Debra's mother

and asked that she check on Debra

because it was not customary for her not show up for work.

So, her mother made her way to the residence...

called out for Debra.

Was unable to gain a response,

so she made her way to the master bedroom.

And that's where she had the grizzly discovered.

My mom called me at work

and told me that Debbie was dead.

I get... I get, I don't know what to think.

I just thought, you know, this can't be, you know,

how can she be dead and she was, like,

"She was murdered."

By the time we got there,

they'd already set up the tape.

Um, I went under the tape running toward the house

and I just remembered, you know,

police stopping me, you know, "Wooh, wooh, wooh."

Backing me up who, you know,

"You can't be here. Who are you?"

Debra Jan Baker was lying

in a semi-prone position on the bed.

There was indication of a violent attack.

There are pillows over Debra Baker's head

and body.

There were a lot similarities to the Christine Morton case.

She was struck multiple times

across the head.

All of the blows to the head

were fatal in nature and fractured the skull.

The weapon was likely a thin linear object, uh,

heavy in weight.

And it was gruesome bloody scene

which makes you think about that poor mom

that had to find her daughter in that state.

There were other injuries into her hands

that were characteristic of defensive injuries

as if she was trying to fight off the attacker.

There's a lot of things at that scene

that makes the investigator wonder,

"Is it someone close to them?"

It just seemed personal because it was so violent.

There's also a pillow propped up underneath her

where she is on her side, kind of side and stomach,

and that sometimes is an indication of sexual assault.

But during the course of the autopsy examination,

uh, they were, uh, unable to locate

any evidence of seminal fluid.

Debra Jan Baker, uh, lived with her two children,

but on this particular evening, uh,

she was at the residence alone.

The sliding glass door on the rear

of the, uh residence was likely the entry point.

Uh, the jewelry boxes were opened,

however, it didn't look like there had been...

Any jewelry had actually been...

had been taken.

There's a blue towel

in the bathroom on the ground.

Which suggested that the assailant

may potentially had cleaned up after the fact

or in this case may have taken a shower.

There were hairs that were found

when investigators used a vacuum.

And vacuumed up a pink comforter,

and the bed, and sheets.

The only things missing from Debbie's house

were her VCR.

Some money from her purse and some clothes

which he probably used to wrap the VCR in.

In crimes, like this

it's typical that a suspect will sometimes

take an object usually not a VCR.

My mom died January 13th 1988,

and I turned four on January 16th of the same year.

So, as my grandmother put it, I was just a few days shy

of my fourth birthday,

so I don't know much about her, my mom,

except for what other people have told me.

But, um, I just spent my whole life

just living through other people's stories.

Debbie was, uh, my oldest sister.

Debbie was always everybody's big sister.

Debbie was very ambitious,

there was nothing she wouldn't tackle.

She was working in real estate, um,

property management.

Was very busy with very two small children.

We always, um, hung out at Debbie's a lot,

and on the night Debbie was murdered,

Debbie and I were just hanging out at her house.

Debbie didn't have the kids that night

and we just had kind of a normal evening

drinking coffee and chatting.

A big cold front was blowing in,

I remember that.

It was odd for Austin.

I heard a noise

and asked her about it, you know,

"What am I hearing?"

And she's, like, "A broken pane of glass."

And she put, uh, a trash bag over it

because of this cold front.

And she said, you know,

"That's probably what you're hearing."

And then I left about midnight.

I've always thought I was hearing him

in her closet.

I've always had that feeling

that he was... he was there

just waiting for me to leave.

Very early on in the investigation,

investigators were focused on individuals

that were close to Debra Baker.

They said we need you all, you know,

to all come down at the police station

and make a statement.

So, they, you know,

interviewed each of us separately.

They were trying to find out about her

and asked us questions,

if we knew anybody who had anything against her.

Who wanted to, uh... Who would wanna hurt her.

And then they started, uh, asking a lot questions

about the estranged husband, Phil.

Debbie and her husband were separated,

but they had joint custody.

Phil lived very close by.

And of course they were asking questions

if Phil was violent and, you know,

how their relationship was with the divorce.

And I remember just talking about, you know, them

just going separate ways,

and they had a lot of money problems

and, um, you know,

but the detectives they were so sure

it was Phil, you know,

it's, like, you never know.

You never know who's gonna go crazy

or who's gonna do this.

Over 50% of female homicides in the United States

are the result of family or, uh, dating relationships.

So, very early in the investigation,

the investigators had focused on

Debra Baker's, uh, ex-husband.

They went through and made sure

that they were thorough

with of course their interviews of the ex-husband.

They decided that he wanted the kids.

That was what they told us, oh, he wanted custody of kids.

So, during the interview, they were trying to come up

with scenarios of how he might

have been in her house.

He denied... He denied everything.

They were able to locate and lift, uh,

approximately fifteen of his fingertips

from the master bedroom and in the master bath.

And so they arranged for, uh, polygraph tests.

Phil passed the polygraphs fine.

I remember at that time not mentioning

the real reason for the separation.

I went back and said, look, I've got to say this,

"They separated because Phil was gay

and Phil had come out."

Debbie and Phil were separated,

but they had, um, very amicable relationship,

joint custody, um,

they switched the kids every week.

He lived very close by.

He had the kids that night when she was murdered.

And I mean, it's very... Respectfully for Phil,

but he didn't want the kids fulltime.

He was enjoying his life.

He was, you know, able to date and do things

that he hadn't been able to do,

which having two small children didn't make easier.

Um, and there was no evidence

that her ex-husband wanted to cause her,

um, this type of harm.

Debbie had no enemies.

She didn't piss people off.

She was everybody's friend.

I just never knew, really, never knew

anybody to say a bad word about her.

And that's not just remembering her saintly.

I mean, it's just the way she was.

You just couldn't imagine how anybody

could be that angry at her

because she was very, very violently killed.

Meanwhile, you know, the killer is out there,

somewhere.

And then they kind of, did start moving on,

and start checking out, you know, other people.

We wanted to explore any avenues

determine if she had any, other dating relationships.

She wasn't dating.

She was very busy with the new job,

and two small kids.

A canvass was conducted

of the neighborhood.

The officers also looked at any other

suspicious activity that may have been reported,

uh, even prior to the homicide.

There were checks of suspects in the area

who have had previous sexual assaults,

burglaries, peeping Toms, those types of things.

And I know initially there were 52 suspects

that they compared fingerprints

that they took from the scene.

That information can be loaded

to a national database

and can be shared with agencies,

uh, from the east coast to the west coast.

But they didn't have any matches.

Back in 1988, DNA technology was just in its infancy.

Uh, so it was a time where we didn't have

all the resources that we would...

we would necessarily have available to us today.

So having an electronic device like the VCR,

something that would be identifiable,

um, detectives were able to obtain the serial number.

So they posted flyers at various pawn shops

in the area indicating if any of the employees

would come across a 1984 Montgomery Ward VCR,

with that serial number that they were

to immediately notify homicide unit.

However, didn't have any matches.

This case was really a mystery.

We didn't have a lot to move on

at that point back in 1988.

Then we had the funeral.

And it was weird,

because we knew the police were there.

They told us they'd be there, um, you know,

watching to see who came to the funeral

and all that kind of stuff.

And then same thing we're looking around who's here,

who do we know who, you know.

And we called and like, "Hey,

did you get anywhere with that",

and you know,

just really would never tell us anything.

We just weren't able to develop any leads

at that point in time.

And eventually the case ended up going cold.

So then it was just down to us

suspecting everybody we knew.

We all spent years just,

you know, looking side-eye at people and wondering, hmm.

And you know, it was kind of poisonous in a way, um,

trying to think about people,

um, suspiciously.

I had people tell me

that when I was a kid,

that I was a young kid that I would start

crying for my mom.

I don't remember any of that.

Um, but it didn't really become real for me

until I was 18 and graduating from high school.

And for some reason, that graduation date

and I went, oh, my mom's not gonna be there.

And that's what hit me.

And, um, I... From there,

it was just a different story altogether.

But it wasn't until I was 18 that I, you know,

really started to think about what I was missing.

But it was definitely a cloud over the family,

it always had been.

She was murdered, but the why of it was...

The why and the who were just big open-ended,

glaring questions.

Yay.

Michael had been in prison for 14 years.

He'd lost appeal after appeal.

But in 2002, the Innocence Project

found out about his case from Bill Allison,

his lawyer at trial.

The Innocence Project is a group of lawyers

that are some of the best and brightest people

I've ever met,

who were among the very first to consider

how to use the new DNA technology,

which was revolutionizing science.

The focus is on freeing the innocent.

In 2004, the New York Innocence Project

called me and asked me to take the case.

It took me a minute to grasp it

because I thought, are you...

are you calling the right number?

I'd never had any kind of a criminal case before.

That argument could be made that I was the least

qualified lawyer in Texas

to take this level of a murder case.

But, um, they said that they wanted me.

I think that, uh,

my medical malpractice experience

and the stomach contents analysis

was what brought the end of the case.

Once in, I was in.

One of the first things that struck me

was the note he left for Christine.

And I thought, wait a minute,

if I was going to murder my wife,

the last thing I would do

is leave a note calling attention

to an argument with my wife.

It would make no sense.

As I read the file,

I found no real evidence of guilt,

no witness, no eye witness of any violence,

he had no record.

Mr. Morton passed two lie detector tests

at the time of his prosecution.

And the medical examiner,

he didn't see the body for a couple of days.

So he couldn't do the standard means

of timing death by Rigor mortis,

or liver mortis.

Um, he used an analysis of stomach contents solely

as his means of timing death,

which all of the medical literature says,

you can't do.

It should never have come into evidence at all.

And if that was the basis for the jury's finding,

then there's nothing.

So there's nothing really to convict the man at trial.

That doesn't mean he's innocent.

But I was determined to do

what I needed to do to find out.

John Raley was teaching me the ropes

as a law student and a law clerk.

I'd always been interested in Innocence Project cases,

and on Michael's case,

they needed boots on the ground in Texas.

So John Raley said,

"Hey, kiddo, let's go do this thing."

And it was kind of, you know,

to give me an opportunity to do something like that.

Jackie went with me to visit Michael

the first time in prison.

She was very excited about it.

I was skeptical that he was innocent,

to be honest with you.

But I was absolutely sure

that he did not get a fair trial.

And the investigation was not full and complete.

I knew that we needed to dig into this case

to get an analysis of what the facts were at the time

Michael was arrested at the time of his trial.

And then bring it forward to now.

We drove to,

I think it was called the Michael unit,

actually in East Texas in the middle of nowhere.

John and I got to go in and see Michael.

And we actually met with him in,

I think the family meeting area,

which we thought was odd because we were counsel.

I ask him what happened on August 12th and 13th, 1986?

Take me through those two days,

in as much detail as you can. And he did.

After one of the best days of my life,

5 o'clock next morning, the alarm went off.

And I showered, shaved, dressed.

And, uh, it's the last time I saw her alive.

It was exactly the same as he had said at trial

all of those years ago.

John, when we first met Michael,

he had no doubt that Michael was innocent.

I don't claim to have psychic powers,

but I cross examine people for a living

and I can usually tell if people are fibbing.

And there was nothing about this man

that did not speak from a place

of integrity and honesty.

At one point, John excused himself

to go the restroom and he'd left

his sports jacket folded up on the table.

It took every little bit of willpower I had

not to reach out and just kind of touch it

because it looks so soft and comfortable

and it looked so good.

The visit with Michael confirmed to me

that he was actually innocent and then upped the ante,

it is now no longer just a legal motion.

Now there's an innocent man in prison.

Now there's a brutal murderer maybe at large

maybe killing other people.

When John came home that night,

he just... Was...

He was excited and you could just tell

it was another level of,

um, intensity, you know, it just kind of like,

okay, this is... This is the real deal.

There's... I just met with a man

that has been sitting in prison all these years,

with this... He just lost everything.

He's lost everything and he's innocent.

He shouldn't be there. And he said, "Kelly, I...

we just... I've got to get him out,

and, we've got to do it. This has gotta happen."

And I just said, "Then do it. Do it John."

Kelly Raley is the smartest and best person I know.

She is brilliant. She's beautiful

and, um, she's good.

And I'm blessed to...

That she even wanted to go out with me,

let alone, marry me.

Kelly is a very good lawyer.

A very good investigator. A very good researcher.

So she researched Williamson County

and found out the political machinations

I was going to be up against, and understood

more than I did how hard it was going to be.

John loves challenges.

He's always loved challenges.

He still loves challenges.

And definitely,

he's not the kind of person that gonna turn

something down just because it might be

a little bit out of his comfort zone.

But, I don't want to call him naive because, you know,

but he was naive.

He really was.

They just... They just had a real strong familial,

political connection in that county for decades.

You're not going to get these folks' cooperation

because that puts a bad light on their mentors,

their friends, their colleagues

and they're...

They're going to protect each other,

so I said, "John, don't be, you know,

don't be fooled by these guys.

They're not going to play nice to you."

That was really hard for me to grasp.

There should not be any opposition

to an honest search for truth.

I had no idea,

going into this how extensive it would be

and how much work it would take."

We, uh, we got a little team together

and we started working.

When we got the list of evidence

that was still on file,

we saw this bandana that had blood on it.

There's a crime report from one of the deputy's,

that notices that there is the dirty bandana,

in this curb near a construction site

about a hundred yards behind the house.

He doesn't pick it up because he thinks...

It looks... That it's been there too long.

Christine Morton's brother,

unimpressed with the investigated detail

going into this case,

does his own search, finds this bandana,

picks it up,

brings it back to the house and they put it into a, uh,

a baggie and they bring it to the sheriff's office.

And practically, force them to take it into evidence.

It was noted to have blood on it.

There was no DNA testing available back then.

So, it was put in a bag

and it was stored and it was ignored.

Naturally, we wanted to try to do

DNA testing on the bandana,

uh, to see who's blood it was,

thinking it might be Christine's blood.

Intermingled with sweat,

uh, skin cells,

hair perhaps of the perpetuator.

If we could get a solid DNA sample of those things,

we could run it through the federal data bank

and maybe identify the murderer.

And so,

uh, the focus of the case

became the blue bandana.

And it was just like this little time capsule

waiting to be tested.

We sent Jackie kind as a stealth

to Williamson County.

I went and found the court clerk

and I looked for the friendliest lady

I could find in the bunch

and, um, asked if I can please

see the evidence in this case,

I needed to just have a look at it.

I remember they had just moved in to a new building

and everything was kind of in shambles,

but she took me to the basement

of that courthouse building

and, um, and pointed me toward a corner and said,

"It's probably over there."

And she left me there.

In a basement full of boxes.

But the blue bandana wasn't there.

So she went to the sheriff's department

and, um, they laughed at her face and told her,

"No, you cannot see it."

Now, why would they do that

unless, the bandana could be a problem for them?

In February of 2005,

we filed our motion for DNA testing

on the bloody bandana.

If we could get a motion approved,

that would force them to turn the bandana over for testing.

The district attorney didn't even respond

to our motion for 10 months.

They kept asking for extensions.

Which were inevitably granted.

While this was happening,

an innocent man was spending his life in a cage.

The district attorney had convinced

Christine's family that Michael was guilty

and so Eric was raised by Christine's sister

to believe that his father killed his mother.

There was court-ordered visitation.

Eric would have to be brought to me

every six months by my sister in law.

Visitation is like oxygen,

I would love seeing him,

but I could also see that he was becoming

more distant as Eric got a little bit older

and he started, you know, getting into puberty,

I got a letter from him that he said,

he would like to, uh, suspend the visits,

not do them anymore.

And I thought about it,

I kinda weighed the pros and cons

and I wrote him back, and I said,

"Well, I'll grant your wish

but you got to come here

and look me in the eye and tell me that."

We had our greetings and I asked him

if this was our last visit and he...

He wouldn't look me in the eye,

he told me that, "Yeah, it's the last one."

With all the bad things that had happened,

uh, my wife's murder, my arrest and conviction,

my life sentence, all of that,

um, didn't do me in,

I thought I was pretty tough and I could take it,

but, um, when I lost him,

that's what broke me.

My father, was at the time a retired prosecutor,

and he suggested I just call the district attorney

and try to talk to him and reason with him,

and so I did I called John Bradley,

he had been prosecutor of the year of Texas,

very powerful man.

And so,

I was negotiating with,

a district attorney John Bradley,

for a task that might reveal Ken Anderson,

his mentor, now a judge,

might have put an innocent person in prison

and let the murderer go free.

But and... I tried to, you know,

talk to him just...

On a normal level, and say, "Look,

all we want to know is the truth

and nothing bad can come from seeking truth.

You know, Michael is where he is supposed to be,

which is a good thing or he is innocent,

which means there may be a brutal murderer

at large killing other people.

Don't you want to find out?"

Um, and he said that, uh,

doing the test would muddy the waters.

He said doing the test would muddy the waters.

And I had no idea what he meant by that.

And I said Mr. Bradley, truth clarifies.

And, um, the battle was joined.

Kelly gave me a great analogy one time,

she said, it was like a split screen

and one side of the screen is Michael alone in a cage

and on the other side of the screen John and Kelly,

and they were having our children

and watching them grow

and doing school activities with them,

and girl scouts and boy scouts and sports.

And they go to middle school and high school

and off to college for that same time period.

And that's always kind of haunted me

and it was on my mind as we were fighting.

He's alone in a cage.

We have to keep fighting. We can't quit. We can't stop.

On march 7th, 2008,

we had our first hearing in the case.

This is over three years after we filed our motion.

And I just thought it would be a chance

to make a record about what was going on.

And here's what I said,

"Your honor, there's a bloodstained bandana

that was found at the crime scene.

This bandana may contain the blood of the victim,

Christine Morton,

but it may also contain

skin cells, saliva, sweat

that may contain the DNA of the murderer.

These have never been subjected to DNA testing.

There's no harm we believe in trying to seek the truth,

and we... We don't understand

why the state is resisting that.

They have fought us every step of the way.

If there is not enough DNA to do anything about it,

at least we'll know we tried.

Thank you, Judge."

Well, the judge wouldn't do it.

Because John Bradley didn't want him to do it,

it's that simple.

Mr. Bradley didn't even speak at the hearing.

The fix was already in.

John and I were sitting at the breakfast table,

reading the Houston newspaper at breakfast

and, we open up the... The newspaper

and I saw it first

and I almost had a heart attack.

I was like, "John,

Rick Perry just assigned a seat

on the forensic science commission to John Bradley."

I couldn't believe it.

I just could not believe it that...

That he was named to... To be the chair,

not only to throw him on the commission that we'd...

But then to name him as the chair of the commission.

See, this is the man that won't let DNA be tested,

won't... Won't allow a DNA test

and he's now the head of our State's forensic,

it just didn't make any sense to me

and then I knew how deep the politics

ran on this whole situation.

This is, you know, all this...

This political mishmash and gamesmanship

with people's lives at stake and truth at stake.

You know, there was a time,

I... I've never told anybody this

and I don't know that I should now,

there was a time in the middle of this

that the civil work was drying up

and we were struggling financially.

And there was a real temptation to focus

on work that would bill,

that I could make money for the family

and not spend so much time on this pro bono case

where we're up against it

with these power structures and it's not working out,

nothing good is happening.

And, uh, that was a temptation,

but I was also praying for guidance

and direction and the answer was always,

"keep going."

I tried talking to District Attorney John Bradley again.

He said he would allow us to test the hair

that was on Christine's hand

if we backed off on everything else,

including the bloody bandana.

And I looked back at District Attorney Bradley

and I said, "No,

how stupid do you think we are?

The hair is probably Michael's.

The two of them slept in that bed.

More likely than not, it's one of their hairs.

But this is a case about the bloody bandana.

If you're not gonna let us test the bloody bandana,

we have nothing else to say."

And he said, "Well, then we're done."

And maybe it's because I had driven all the way

from Houston to Georgetown and maybe

it's because I was tired and maybe it's frustrating.

But I said it loud enough that everybody

in his office could hear,

"What are you afraid of?

Let me turn it on you Mr. Bradley,

because what would you do if the test results

exonerated him and identified someone else

as the murderer of his wife,

because I don't want to go all Jack Nicholson on you,

but I can handle the truth.

Can you, sir?"

And then, I left.

He was afraid of the truth.

He feared truth.

I was seriously concerned that day that...

That he might actually have a stroke or something.

It was that bad. I mean, his...

His blood pressure was so elevated

and he was so intensely angry and I...

I just remember there was that turning point where it was,

like this is gonna kill my husband.

A few days later, it's a Saturday morning.

I got a call.

It was Michael.

He said, "Well...

I'm up for parole again."

And I said, "That's great."

He says, "There's just one catch."

"What?" I said, "What's the... What's the catch?"

He says, "I have to confess that I'm guilty of murder."

He's been in 22 years, his parents were elderly.

He didn't know where his son was.

Who would have really blamed him if he'd said,

"Yeah, I'm guilty. I'm really sorry, let me go."

He said...

"All I have left is my actual innocence.

And if I have to be in prison the rest of my life...

I'm not giving that up."

I didn't really necessarily...

make a deal with God, I wasn't gonna lie to get out.

But...

there was that, um...

That was there, I wasn't gonna lie.

When he said this, I just felt a rush of...

emotion.

And I said...

"I will never quit...

as long as I'm...

breathing air.

I'm fighting to get you out of prison."

I was getting ready to go into a hearing

against John Bradley.

And I call my pastor.

And I said,

"I don't think I have a chance."

He said, "He's on it."

And he called me back and he said,

"I have dozens of people that are going to pray for you...

right now and at the moment

of the beginning of the hearing.

It's all organized."

He told me, "This is the most important thing

you'll ever do as a lawyer."

We've been fighting this fight for six years now.

We went to Federal Court once.

We've been to the Court of Appeals twice.

So Nina Morrison, my co-counsel

with the Innocence Project and I

appear before the third Court of Appeals

to make oral argument.

And it was a conservative Court of Appeals...

was also a very intelligent Court of Appeals,

and a fair-minded Court of Appeals.

And it was so refreshing

to have fresh eyes on the case.

I said, "This bloody bandanna

was the be all and end all about the case.

And there was no legal basis to deny

testing of the bloody bandana.

None whatsoever."

They asked the question that everybody seems to ask.

What if the DNA testing comes out

against your client?

And I said, "There's only one way to find out,

do the test."

While their deliberation was pending,

John Bradley took to the media

and gave an interview.

And he said,

"If Michael Morton will promise...

that if the DNA results are inconclusive...

he will confess guilt..."

That I will agree now to a DNA test.

Saying that if Michael agree in advance to confess guilt,

if the DNA results are inconclusive,

that's just playing with people's futures.

Tyrants do that.

I thought we have fought too hard

and we've come too far to get to this moment

and have it taken away.

And I said, "Judge, we're paying for this.

All we want to know is the truth.

And so despite DA Bradley's efforts,

the Court of Appeals ruled that we could do DNA testing

on the bloody bandanna.

June of 2011,

the first set of test results came in...

and they revealed that the blood on the bandanna

was Christine Morton's...

intermingled with the sweat and the skin cells

of a man who was not Michael Morton.

My phone rang while I was on a bus,

and John was just elated.

He was shouting, "They got a hit."

After... When we got the first set of results,

I drove to visit Michael in prison.

John Raley told me about the hit

and...

didn't have any specifics or any names yet.

But bingo.

I bounced off the walls a couple of times.

I stood up, I sat down, and finally the told me,

"Okay. Take a breath."

I didn't know how long things were gonna take

is probably gonna be six, nine months something.

Now, we have to run the DNA results

on the man through the federal CODIS databank

to see if we get a hit on a known perpetrator.

The hit came in.

The DNA of the man on the bandanna

is Mark Alan Norwood.

Who had been in and out of prison for years.

So an innocent man is in prison

and a murderer is out there.

And District Attorney, John Bradley,

is still fighting against the release of Michael Morton

saying the bandanna doesn't matter

thinking of goofy theories.

Like maybe Michael killed Christine

and then went out and found a bandanna out back,

and then brought it in and dipped

Christine's blood in it,

and then maybe wearing gloves at the time,

and then took it back and dropped it again,

or maybe aliens abducted him.

I... You know, it was just crazy stuff.

Amazing, isn't it?

But the momentum increased.

Our freedom of information act

request for the district attorney's complete file

was a game-changer.

It changed everything.

When I was able to finally get my hands on the file,

I saw that the evidence of Michael's innocence

was in the district attorney's file

and had been concealed.

There was a big footprint in the mud there

that nobody had ever done a plaster cast of later.

There were strange fingerprints

on the sliding glass door.

Nobody ever ran those prints.

There was a sighting of a strange man

in a green van during the days

before the murder,

in the area where the bloody bandanna was found,

and they don't follow the lead?

Another piece of evidence that was concealed

and this is crucial and absolutely heartbreaking.

Eric talked to his maternal grandmother,

Christine's mother,

on the day of Christine's funeral.

She wrote down verbatim what Eric told her.

And then the key portion.

This was in their file.

And they concealed it...

from the defense, from the court,

and from the jury.

They knew, they knew he was innocent.

And they sent an innocent man to prison for life...

and they let the monster who killed his wife

go free to kill again.

We have a tiny little law firm

and everybody was involved in the case

in one way or another trying to help.

We'd been investigating Mark Alan Norwood.

We are not law enforcement, but we're finding ourselves

kind of being like law enforcement.

We wanted to see if there were other cold cases

that lined up with Christine Morton's.

There's a cold case website for unsolved murders.

My wife, Kelly, had found it a couple of years earlier.

A couple of paralegals from our firm,

Cynthia Martinez and Kay Canobie

were playing around with this website.

Well, I feel like

I've always had some sort of like...

private investigator-ish type of personality

and my parents always just said that I was nosy.

We were searching cold cases in Travis County

and just scrolling through the pages

and then we came across a lady that looked

very similar to Christine Morton

and her name was Debra Jan Baker.

Debra Jean Baker had been bludgeoned to death

in her home in a very similar way to Christine Morton.

And we found out where Mark Alan Norwood

was living in Austin at the time

of Christine Morton's murder.

So I thought let's compare Ms. Baker's address

to Mr. Norwood's address

and see how far apart their houses are.

And in turned out,

their houses were one street apart.

And their... The backs of their houses

kind of faced to each other, they were just kind of like

diagonally across from each other.

So they were very close.

I mean that kind of, was like, you know,

that was big for us.

We felt like it was big.

We didn't know at that time

how big it was gonna be but...

And we thought, "Oh, my God.

We have to... We have to tell someone.

We have to tell law enforcement."

And so we found that...

that Debra Jan Baker was killed in Travis County.

We didn't trust the District Attorney

of Williamson County, but maybe we can tell

the District Attorney of Travis County.

Nina Morrison and I went together

to the District Attorney and, uh,

I remember it was a very hot day

and we had to walk about a half a mile

before we got there.

We came in drenched with sweat.

And all these nice people were waiting for us

in this conference room.

John was very passionate.

You could tell that he...

he knew...

that Michael Morton was innocent.

And it made me sick to my stomach.

So my primary goal

was to solve the Debra Baker case.

We were able to go back,

comb through the evidence we had

in the Debra Baker case

and we had identified pubic hairs

that were found on the pink comforter...

and the blue towel from the bathroom.

And had them sent off to the laboratory,

which revealed that...

we definitively had identified Mark Alan Norwood

as being the perpetrator

in the death of Debra Baker.

I remember saying...

"Oh, wow, this is it."

An innocent man in prison,

a murderer out there.

There's no feeling like that.

Norwood lived with his mom,

we figured out where he lived,

and we informed the detectives

who paid him a visit.

Today, the Williamson County Sheriff's office has arrested

Mark Alan Norwood for the murder

of Christine Morton,

which occurred on August 13th, 1986.

There's so much... so much joy

and so much peace that comes over you,

that they had found the other killer,

that proved to me that day

that there is a God and a Holy Spirit

looking down over us.

We were very happy about that,

but the Baker family deserved justice.

This is about them too.

That was it. It's finally like, okay.

They're actually looking at this again,

they're actually got do something about this.

We got word that Ken Anderson

was gonna do a press conference.

I went, "Oh, gotta go... gotta go to this thing,"

and we booked it up to Georgetown

and my aunt met me there.

And, it was just a small crowd,

it was mostly just reporters and Ken Anderson said,

"The system got it wrong."

In my heart,

I know there was no misconduct whatsoever.

I believe that the prosecutors

fully complied with all the orders of the court.

When Ken went inside, he didn't take any questions

that I remember, but I looked up for my phone,

,

I'm surrounded and cornered...

Literally cornered by reporters

and I feel like being in a zombie movie

when they've just crawling on top of me.

He's not holding himself accountable.

He's making a lot of excuses.

The fact that he let a man

go to kill my mother is... more than enough reason.

I mean, if he really feels bad, he should resign.

Prove it and resign

and retire to Florida somewhere.

Everything we do has consequences

and that's one of the consequences of what he did

was that a killer was out there.

You can't play the what-if game forever,

but if I'm gonna play it right there if...

What if Michael had not been the prime suspect

and the only suspect that we know of.

Mom could've still been alive

if he hadn't done some of the things he'd done.

So I do still, to this day,

hold Ken Anderson was responsible for that.

Yes.

Yes. I do believe that.

I think if they had followed their leads,

they would've had Norwood within a few weeks.

After the Baker case, and that hit,

the state had no place else to maneuver.

The court of public opinion

is becoming squarely against them.

The news media is picking up that...

There are these DNA hits and people were asking

why is Michael Morton still in prison?

On Monday, Bradley, who was not

the original prosecuting attorney,

dodged questions about why?

So, we were able to negotiate...

his release.

It was, uh, somewhat chaotic.

There was a precession, cameras were everywhere,

people, I didn't know which way we were going.

Fortunately the sun was beaming down right there

and it was just beautiful, kind of fall day.

The sun felt so good on my face.

I kinda tilt my head back like of getting a sun tan

or something trying to just drink it in.

And he said the colors were so bright.

And it was so beautiful.

It was one of those lifetime moments

that you cherish, forever.

He's not on anybody's payroll.

I had no money to give him

to publicly broadcast good things about you that say

you know, this is a...

To this day...

He's my friend...

and he's my brother.

So we made arrangements to meet for dinner later...

and we sat over dinner, we had... He had a steak.

And I remember that he was having his knife and fork,

and he was kind of, like...

And I said, "You okay, man?"

He was, "I'm trying to remember how to do this.

I haven't held a knife and a fork for 25 years."

Reagan was president when he went in,

he'd never held a cell phone.

And we're telling him about cell phones, like...

He goes, "I heard about these.

I heard you can send a picture."

And he said, "A picture?"

They go, "Michael, you can send a movie."

Can you imagine?

My role in this case was that, um,

I'm an Assistant Attorney General

for the state of Texas

and so I was brought in to prosecute

the Mark Norwood case.

When all of this began...

there was the investigation into Christine's murder.

Separate and apart from that was the realization

that there was another murder, Debra Baker's murder,

that bore striking similarities

that may very well be connected.

I didn't know at that point in time

whether or not Debra's case would be tried.

When we met with the DA's office

and they said,

"You know, we don't think we necessarily wanna do this.

Just be taxpayer paying for another trial.

I was livid

and we all made it very clear

that this was not gonna fly.

This is not gonna happen because we wanted mom

to have her own story that she was...

she was not just a murder victim.

And one of my classes that was taught

by Travis County Sheriff, he kept...

He was talking about it and he kept saying,

"There's this other woman."

I was like, "No. Her name was Debra."

And he said, "Who cares?"

I do. I do.

I am her daughter, I care.

We can't stop what happened

and the only thing you can do for someone at that point

is to keep fighting for them

to get what they deserve in the end,

which in this case is a... is a trial and a conviction.

I don't see evil very much in my life.

When Mark Alan Norwood walked into the courtroom,

I saw him and I realized...

that's what it looks like.

That's evil.

The ironies are so vast in this case

that the first time Michael was in a courtroom,

he was the guy on trial,

and the second time he was in the courtroom,

he was my first witness.

It was very, very surreal.

As you might imagine.

It was no secret that whoever was gonna try Mark Norwood

for one of the murders would probably want

to let the jury know about the other murder

just because it helps you know that it is the right guy.

We had to basically prove up

the entire Debra Baker murder case

during our trials,

we essentially had two trials altogether.

The similarities between the two cases were striking.

And I believe I listed 16 different similarities.

Debra Baker and Christine Morton

were both 33-year-old women with long dark hair

who had children, who were at home in bed.

They were both in water beds, which seemed odd.

They were both murdered on the 13th of the month.

They were both murdered on a Wednesday,

they were both murdered in the early morning

or late hours.

Both of their homes, there was evidence

that showed that a perpetrator

had come over a back fence.

They were both struck by a blunt object in the head

multiple times.

They both had items piled on the top of their heads

after they were murdered as if to hide their faces.

Both houses had...

valuable jewelry out in plain view

that was not disturbed.

I mean it goes on and on, the two crime scenes

were remarkably similar.

But the biggest thing was is that Mark Norwood's DNA

was at both of those two scenes.

We've never afforded an opportunity

to sit down with Mark Alan Norwood

to determine why he had committed

this brutal murders.

I believe Mark Norwood is a serial killer

and there are probably other crimes

that he committed that we just,

as investigators have not connected him to yet.

Mark Alan Norwood was convicted of the murder

of Michael Morton's wife Christine

and Debra Jan Baker.

Two convictions.

Two life sentences.

And it was...

I don't even wanna say it was a relief,

because it just... It...

I don't know that there's an emotion

you can assign to it.

I was holding hands with my husband,

I hugged my brother, hugged my dad...

and I don't know.

It's an end to something

that had just always been there for me

so I don't know how to describe it really.

I am sitting outside on the steps,

crying and releasing that, you know,

finally realizing that we had done

everything we could do for Debbie.

It was a great sense of relief,

a great sense of justice.

You know, for so many years,

our family was completely broken.

And we'd go through the motions but, you know,

we were all broken inside.

I can't tell you.

I can't put into words what that day was like.

It was like, finally, some satisfaction

knowing that he's gonna spend

the rest of his life in prison.

And we actually, actually began to heal.

It took 25 years

for the arc of the moral universe

to bend toward justice.

In fighting to free Michael Morton,

we felt that we were part of a tradition

of lawyers in America

who stood for justice against strong forces.

We spoke truth to power...

and we were honored to do so.

This story is not over.

The investigation is continuing

about the concealing of this evidence

that should have exonerated Michael

almost 25 years ago.

There are many happy moments for me in this case.

For me, personally.

The reunion of Michael and Eric was in my house.

I noticed that our shoes

were disturbingly similar.

We both had on new blue jeans.

When we held our heads, our gates as we walked

were eerily similar and...

The genes are there.

There was this longest silence...

The longest silence and then I kept listening

like because... I was within ear-shot

and I kept thinking, "What? Are they whispering?"

We shook hands immediately,

but that morphed into a hug.

It was like this melding, we just came back.

It's just as natural as that,

and I couldn't have planned it any better.

And Michael said, "Son."

And Eric said, "Dad."

And I think just for a second...

I got a glimpse of what heaven must be like.