Original subtitles

Peterson: Whenever I think of circumstantial evidence,

ladies and gentleman, I think of snow.

Think about this.

You're standing at your picture window. It's cold outside.

Low 30 degrees, typical winter evening.

Gray, overcast skies.

You're looking outside and it begins to snow,

and you watch it snow.

And it snows and snows and snows.

And it gets deeper. Four or five inches on the ground while you're standing there

and then quits.

Nobody has to tell you it's snowing.

Same circumstances.

Lookin' out your window, blustery, cold night...

gray, overcast skies, and you go to bed.

Next morning you wake up, and there's four or five inches of snow on the ground.

Nobody has to tell you it snowed.

It snowed!

But you didn't see it snow.

If you take...

the defendant's position...

"I plead not guilty...

I didn't do it..."

For that to be true, there would have to be two other males,

and they have both pubic and head hair

that are consistent with the defendants.

And that they got together in the early morning hours...

on December the 8th, 1982...

and ended up in Debbie Carter's...

apartment.

That's incredible.

Or...

there's a giant conspiracy going on...

between the OSBI...

witnesses...

and the District Attorney's office.

[series theme music playing]

[phone ringing]

This is Dawn.

Hey, Dawn. This is Christy Sheppard. How are you?

[Dawn] I'm fine. How are you?

I'm good. So, I just wanted to double-check. So...

Yep.

...um, just meet you at the storage then about 10:30?

[Dawn] Uh, yeah!

Okay, well, then I'll just meet you out front then.

-[Dawn] Okay. Thanks Christy. -Okay.

-Thank you. Bye. -[Dawn] Alright, bye bye.

Dawn Teal is the court reporter for the Pontotoc County Court.

She has possession of all the evidence

and the transcripts and everything that was in the case.

Um, and now she's retiring.

She had mentioned that she would like to return...

something that seemed really, really personal,

but had always been held...

as part of the evidence.

And, in one of the trials, it was actually labeled as the murder weapon.

[Dawn] It says that I am releasing the following exhibit.

And in this case to you.

And it's dated the 25th.

For the most part cases like this,

the stuff's not released.

But when you think of something that could actually mean something to a family,

you know, I think it's important to check it out anyway.

[Christy] Well, I really thank you so much.

This will mean a lot to her mother and, um...

That's the one piece that I thought probably...

would mean something to...

-her family. -Yeah.

[Dawn] Tell her mom I've been thinking about her.

I will. I sure will. Thank you so much. I really, really, really...

-thank you. -Tell her mom that.

-I will. Thank you. -Thanks, Christy.

There's days I wake up and it was like last week...

you know.

But the thing I miss the most...

I guess now is, I can't remember what her voice was like.

You know, I just... I can't remember it.

-[Christy] Knock, knock. -[Peggy] Come on in.

There's Christy.

-[Christy] Come here, baby. -There's Christy.

[Christy] Come here, baby. Oh, I know it.

What are you doing?

-I know it. -[Peggy] There's old Christy.

You know Christy.

[Christy] Well, I went and saw Miss Dawn this morning.

[Peggy] Who's that?

[Christy] Dawn, the court reporter.

-[Peggy] Oh, yes. -I went and saw her this morning.

[tsks] All right.

Oh, I'm proud to get that.

Yeah, she loved this belt.

I had her that made for her 21st birthday.

[Christy] Yeah. She was fixing to be 22.

-[dog whines] -A few months.

Yeah. [Peggy breathes heavily]

I was thinking it was blue. It's red.

But I'm proud to have this, boy, I tell ya.

[Peggy sniffles]

[sobs] I'm sorry.

You're fine.

[Peggy sighs]

-[dog whines] -[Peggy sniffles]

You're fine.

[Peggy sniffles and sighs]

-At least you know where it is now. -[Peggy] Yeah, I do.

[sniffles]

I know where it's going to stay. [sighs]

[whimpers and sniffles]

Oh, I'm proud to get it back.

-[Peggy exhales] -[dog whines]

[Peggy sniffles]

It's a bad deal to lose a child. It just...

It's a bad deal.

It'll be 35 years in December and it's still...

It's something you never get over.

You never get over it.

[Christy] Do you want to get around on the front side, Peppy?

[Peggy] Yeah.

I like to look at her.

[Peggy] I enjoy talking about Debbie. She was mine.

I just sit and talk to her and look at her picture.

And clean it all off.

I've got a little brush I take with me.

And I told her one day...

I told her, I said, "Here I am, still cleaning your face off."

I used to do that when she was a little bitty thing,

you know, when she'd get through eating.

I still go out there and have to clean that face off.

Still clean off her face.

She's a mess.

Yep, she was something else.

[Glenna] I've known Bill Peterson a long time. I've not...

forgiven him, because he's never apologized to my sister.

I think that...

I think he should have done that.

Peterson: Well, I don't think I messed up. I don't think anybody messed up.

I think that...

Reporter: Two guys went to prison for 12 years.

Peterson: You're asking me to say...

"Gosh, I'm sorry, I convicted you

with evidence that was sufficient to convict you with."

So when you say they want an apology...

I'm to apologize to them for doing my job?

That's not going to happen.

[Grisham] December 4th, 2004, I was flipping through The New York Times

and I saw Ron's obituary.

And it was a picture of Ron...

in court that day on April the 15th, 1999,

when he was exonerated and set free.

And I was struck by the question,

"How could a guy like this, end up on death row,

and almost get executed for a murder he didn't commit?"

And, so I called New York to my editor,

and I said, "Well, read the obituaries...

and call me back.

I've found my next book."

[stutters] You know, If I wrote The Innocent Man as a novel,

folks probably wouldn't believe it.

And it was my only foray into non-fiction.

Every trip to Ada introduced me to more and more characters.

The documents, the paperwork itself, was overwhelming.

I had tons of sworn testimony.

So it made my job easier,

in that I didn't have to go chase witnesses around.

You know, I knew what...

every witness would say in the trial. They'd already said it once or twice...

under oath.

He's entitled to his opinion,

but he's done this community an-- an-- an unimaginable harm in his book.

Hoda Kotb: Pontotoc County district attorney,

Bill Peterson, grew up in Ada

and has been in office for 27 years.

If he wants to direct all his venom at me, that's fine.

But this is a very fine community.

[Grisham] I did not at first get an interview with Peterson.

But, later in the game, I did.

I was in his office

when they were trying Gore across the street.

And I asked him some questions

and, you know, it was not much of an interview...

because I'd already written most of the book.

What's he going to say?

He can't tell me, you know, "I didn't do that."

"Yes, you did. [mumbles] It's here in the transcript."

Somewhere along the way,

I think he got the idea that it was not going to be

a book that was going to be flattering to him.

Peterson: He had an agenda.

One is that he is-- wants to sell books.

And I don't fault him for that.

But the other part of his agenda is he's anti-death penalty.

Now I'm not pro-death penalty.

-I'm not anti-death penalty. -Uh-huh.

My job is to enforce the law.

When you look at tiny Ada...

Three books.

Wow.

All about the justice system, about the way you guys do business.

-What does that tell you? -It doesn't tell me anything.

Because they're not accurate. That's why it doesn't say anything.

-None of them? -No, ma'am.

-None of them are accurate? -No, ma'am.

I never wasted any time worrying about,

you know, what Bill Peterson thought of me or the book.

I ju-- I told the truth.

You know, show me-- he sued me, okay. He sued me after the book came out.

But I didn't... I didn't care. I mean, you know, I'm telling a story.

Sue me, let's go to court. Let's-- [stutters] I'll stand by my book,

by the facts, by the allegations.

You stand by what you did.

Let's talk ab-- Let's talk about what you did as a prosecutor,

you did as a cop, you did as the hair expert from the state.

You know, let's talk about what you did.

He never got halfway to first base with the lawsuit

because there was nothing there. So, the lawsuit was thrown out, you know.

Hoda: This book makes you angry, doesn't it?

Well, it's very unsettling.

It's an attack on my character

and my reputation that I've had for 27 years.

Mr. Grisham may call me arrogant.

I think I'm passionate about my job.

And I did what I'm paid to do.

I don't think these are people that are evil...

I don't think these are people that started out to frame someone.

But somewhere along the way,

they had to know that two plus two equals four and...

this case,

it was coming up three, or two, or one.

It wasn't adding up.

And when you get that far down the road...

you've got two choices.

You can either save face...

and continue on...

and pretend like, you believe what you're doing...

or, you can do the right thing.

And the-- doing the right thing's a whole lot harder.

[Cheryl] A conviction is like a wall of granite. It really is.

Once a conviction is in place,

they are terribly difficult to take down.

And if you cannot get a grip on the wall of granite, or a foothold,

or see a chip or a crack,

I mean, you can be in a very difficult situation.

[Shilton] The appeal process isn't like a jury trial.

You don't need reasonable doubt...

to pull somebody out of jail.

You need...

really specific...

you know, violations of the law, like Brady.

And you need to be able to say, "Somebody's rights were violated."

My major complaint in reference to...

Brady and, and receiving information from the District Attorney's office...

has been that we...

may not get everything.

Male Lawyer: Donna Haraway had been receiving

obscene and harassing phone calls at McAnally's.

Did you disclose that testimony to George Butner?

Peterson: I have no idea.

Lawyer: Is that the type of material that you would disclose to Mr. Butner?

Peterson: I can't say that I would, I can't say that I wouldn't.

[stutters] At this point in time, I-- I don't know.

The District Attorney's Office only knows

what law enforcement and the agencies that report to them know.

And, so, that's where I think my problem arises

in reference to what I got and what I didn't get.

Lawyer: Did the defense attorney have full access to the prosecutorial?

Peterson: I can't answer that.

He did not have access to my prosecutorial.

Lawyer: Did you provide him a copy of the prosecutorial?

Peterson: I have no recollection of doing that one way or another.

-Lawyer: As a matter of policy, did you-- -Peterson: No, I did not.

Well, this, obviously, is a very common practice

[stutters] of the OSBI or the Ada police

to curate and winnow down, uh, the information they get

and to give to the prosecutor only that which they want the prosecutor see.

And that is not only a bad practice,

it's an unconstitutional practice.

If the police don't turn over everything,

they are not following what is required of them.

and they should all be trained in turning over everything.

But, if they don't, the prosecutor has an obligation at the same time

to learn of all material exculpatory evidence

in the possession of the police

and ensure that, that evidence is turned over to the defense.

Law enforcement turned over a large number of pages.

There were at least double that number of pages

that didn't even get turned over to the prosecutors.

And, and that is a major part of our application for post-conviction relief.

So we somehow went from 800 pages to 146 pages, uh,

and a lot gets lost there.

In a number of these rural counties...

we do things like we have done them for 100 years.

And the constitutional safeguards have not been...

properly branded...

on the posteriors of those that have that responsibility.

Peterson: We had an open file policy.

If it was in my office, they could come and access it.

I felt no obligation...

to dig through the files for the defense attorney...

to determine what is or what is not exculpatory.

My opinion of what might be exculpatory

may be totally different fr--, or not, from the defense attorney's.

[male interviewer] I've read your depositions

and a lot of it deals

with the flow of information between the cops and the DA.

And it reads a little bit like a system of plausible deniability.

[whispers] I know.

I know.

[Grisham] Jurors always want to believe the--

the people who we want to believe.

The police.

You know, we just don't expect the police to...

play dirty...

in criminal trials. To...

hide evidence, to manufacture evidence.

You know, we don't expect the police to do that. And it happens all the time.

[interviewer] Uh, do you think it was a-- it was a big cover-up, Tommy?

[Tommy] I--I think so, yes.

Dennis Smith, for instance, you know, he was the main ringleader.

And Dennis, you know, he was coming up for retirement, and things,

and, uh, here he had the Haraway case, uh...

the Carter case, and he'd not been able to solve nothing.

And he wanted a name for himself before he retired.

[wind whooshes]

[Carl Allen] I read that when it first came out.

It basically accused law enforcement of still having...

collusion and backroom deals, and-- and criminal behavior going on.

So I wrote a letter to the author, who I'm a fan of, um,

John Grisham.

I wanted him to give me that information

because I was one of the administrators with the PD,

so that I could take care of it,

because I was in a position that I could stop that kind of thing.

And, um,� his response was fairly generic.

He offered no pointed evidence of any type.

I have never seen anything that makes me believe

that Dennis Smith or Gary Rogers or Bill Peterson got together

and decided at some point

to wrongly convict people on purpose.

Cops are humans.

They are humans.

There may be some vindictive ones,

but I promise you there is no consolidation or consortium of officers

looking to go out and get anybody.

There's no power structure in this town...

[breathes deeply] ...that has the capability of mobilizing this town

and pulling anything so nefarious off.

It's-- It's my nature, It's probably your nature,

it's certainly some of these folks in town's nature

to-- to want to build up the bad guys into boogie bears

and nefarious folks there.

Honestly, there's probably a doubt in my mind

as to whether Tommy and Karl did it.

Because of the background that I have

in police work and life...

uh, you're gonna draw conclusions...

uh, without facts in some cases.

Human nature, you're looking for patterns where there may not be any.

You're gonna have some opinions on situations.

Your gut's gonna tell you certain things.

And in police investigations that's-- it's the same way. We're human.

All police officers are human.

Some are�much better than others, some are much worse than others.

Um, you know, I played the cards that were dealt me

and a jury of 12 people...

found them guilty.

I didn't have a magic wand. I'm-- I'm not that good.

[chuckles]

[Allen] I don't believe, in my wildest dreams,

that, that, um...

that the officers that were involved in it

are capable of purposefully putting innocent people in jail.

I just don't believe that.

I'm not telling you

that they're not capable of making mistakes.

And, obviously, we know that they made some mistakes in the Carter case.

I mean, that's on record.

Everybody's fessed up and said, "Yeah, we-- we made mistakes."

But so the distinction is, did they do it with purpose and evil intent?

And I just don't believe that they did.

Police often pressure and persuade...

individuals who confess to tell a plausible story.

They pressure and persuade the confessor

to insert details to...

to show remorse,

to tell a story that coheres and logically fits, uh...

that contains a motive,

uh, and makes sense as a story.

It has a beginning, a middle, and an end.

And, so, confessions are often stories that are directed

by the police and the prosecutors.

And, if they're false confessions, they may be every bit as detailed

and facially plausible, if you don't think about them critically and analytically.

Let's talk a little bit about the blouse, because I feel like, um...

this was really exciting for me,

because I had started to zero in on the blouse too,

so when I saw your filing, I was really excited.

So, let's talk a little bit about how that came to your attention

as, you know, something that really was worth spending some time on.

The jury was led to believe

that there was important information that Tommy had said

in his alleged confession

that could be corroborated.

That turned out to be most likely a bogus claim,

based on new documents we discovered.

Featherstone: Can you tell me

what her blouse looked like that she was wearing?

It was, uh... white with little blue, uh... roses on it.

They described that blouse as a lavender blouse

with little blue flowers

and ruffles around the sleeve and collar etc.

Detective: Did it have any lace around the collar?

Yes, it had ruffles around the collar, like the front.

The important thing about that evidence...

was that, that was alleged to be

the only major detail in Tommy's statement that was accurate.

Everything else was-- could be proven to be inaccurate,

but there was this one thing...

that the prosecution could point to and say,

"Hey, he mentioned this lavender blouse with flowers on

and the police didn't even know about that at the time."

And the prosecution even said in the closing argument,

"This weighs around Tommy Ward like an anchor."

The shirt that Denice Haraway was wearing

was described by both men...

in their scenario.

The police did not know what she had on.

There were documents

that tended to show...

that authorities

already knew about this lavender blouse with flowers on it

that Tommy had mentioned in his confession.

And it meshed with Tommy's claim

that... Detective Dennis Smith

in fact fed him the information about what the blouse looked like.

[Shilton] Here is the prosecutorial report.

"Janet Lyons Weldon told Detective Mike Baskin

that Donna Haraway was Janet's sister

and she had given Donna a light lavender-colored blouse

with small blue flowers on the sleeves and buttoned down the front."

But, conveniently,

it is the only interview that is mentioned without a date next to it.

Not dated, uh...

But when you go back into the entire OSBI file,

which was not made available until 2011,

you see the original interview with Janet Weldon,

which was done August of 1984,

which is before Tommy and Karl were brought in for questioning.

And she says...

Literally the first sentence of this

is, "Janet said she gave Donna a light lavender-colored blouse."

So, as of August 1984,

the investigators knew,

you know, what shirt she was most likely wearing,

and they therefore could have very easily fed it to Tommy and Karl, uh,

during this confession.

Even though they claim they didn't.

This is really important to me because...

the Fritz and Williamson case also has an undated police report

which turns out to be the most important, which is Glen Gore.

It's 100% sure that the case was bogus,

because the one main thing they corroborated it with

was no corroboration at all.

The lavender blouse almost certainly was known about forever.

So the whole idea that this was new information

that Tommy couldn't have possibly known unless he did it was just bogus,

and that was the one physical fact

that the prosecution had.

Of course, even with that, the blouse fabric found at the crime scene

didn't match the description at all.

It was like a reddish brown, flannel piece of fabric

and there was nothing like what Tommy described found at the crime scene.

How do you explain that...

these two people just happened to come up with the same story?

It tends to reinforce Tommy's statement

that Dennis Smith fed him�information.

They used the same snitch to solve two sensational murders.

At the same time,

Ron Williamson and Dennis Fritz were in jail for one murder

and Tommy Ward and Karl Fontenot were in jail for another.

Miraculously, she went to the police and told them,

"Oh, I heard Ron Williamson make a full confession for-- to one murder

and I heard Karl Fontenot make a confession to the other murder."

So the-- the exact same snitch...

was a snitch in both of these murder cases?

One woman?

-Grisham: Yes, ma'am. Think about that. -Mhm.

He said that he tried to go with Debbie Carter...

[clears throat]

and she wouldn't have nothing to do with him.

And he said that

if she'd have just went ahead and went with him,

he wouldn't have killed her.

[man clears throat and coughs]

Lawyer: Did you ever hear him describe

or talk about any of the details of Debbie Carter's death?

He said he shoved a Coke bottle up her ass and her panties down her throat.

Ron Williamson: You are lying!

[shouting]

I ain't ever said anything like that in my life!

I did not kill this girl

and I call you a liar!

And I'm reading from Dan Clark's summary of the Terri Holland interview.

"Holland related that she was abused in the Pontotoc jail.

She had sex with Paul Harbin and was videotaped.

Also had sex with Denise Greenley and others.

Videos were kept in Peterson's office,

bottom drawer of the file cabinet next to the bookcase."

[Cheryl] The story that was told to us...

was that women in the jail

had been taped having sexual relations

with...

people who were employed in law enforcement.

And she felt that those tapes

put pressure on her to conform to

law enforcement's view of what they wanted her to testify to.

I mean, imagine you are a poor and drug-addicted woman

and you're terrified of these people.

-[Shilton] Absolutely. -What are you gonna do?

You know, we've seen all of these women who are educated,

have money, have access to power...

um, now coming out and talking about how they have been victimized

by very powerful people in-- in politics, in entertainment, in the media.

Why would we not think...

the very same thing, and even a degree worse...

would happen to the most powerless women of all in society?

Hoda: The same jailhouse informant hears two confessions.

She was just to be in the jail at the same time it all took place.

So It didn't strike you as odd or suspicious?

No, ma'am.

I already cared for her,

but I grew to love her more than I ever loved anybody.

-[Shilton] Yeah. -She was, uh, my soulmate.

-[takes a deep breath] -Now she's been gone.

[Shilton] Do you know Tommy and Karl?

-Yes, I do. I was in the tank with them. -[Shilton] Were you?

Yeah, Tommy was across from me in the bullpen

and Karl was in there with me.

And, uh, this... Terri's...

You c--�You can say, yes, she might have testified

against Tommy and Karl, and here's the kicker.

It kept me from getting 40 years.

I only received a seven-year sentence.

Yeah.

And I had already been convicted of three or four felonies.

But she was saving you, right?

She was saving me.

Yeah.

I, in my hea-- I do not believe

that either one of them had anything to do with the Denice Haraway case.

How do you convict somebody of stabbing somebody to death

and, when they find the bones,

there's a bullet hole in the brain or whatever?

From what I hear. I don't know, I haven't researched it.

There-- There's-- I mean... But that's... That's Ada.

-[Son] It's Ada. -[Randall] That's Ada.

You know, the money's the power.

Who has the smartest lawyer, whoever's the best storyteller...

is going to be the winner.

And we will never-- We're not ever gonna overcome the corruption as we know it,

I don't think.

[sniffs] Not in my lifetime.

So there's an investigator who works on this case, um,

and he and another lawyer, uh, went to interview Terri.

So, she said that she was afraid of Peterson,

and that Peterson, possibly, had some incriminating tapes of Terri?

Terri ain't afraid of nobody.

-Yeah, I mean in this affidavit, you kno-- -No.

She tells this story of being afraid of him.

Especially if she ain't signed it, nah.

If she'd signed it, I might say, "Well, could be."

-Okay. -No, I don't believe a word of it.

-Really? -No.

-You've never heard anything about tapes? -Not ever.

-Okay. Okay. -I would like to use the restroom,

if I could.

-Yeah, there's a... Take a little break. -I've got to take a little break.

[sighs heavily]

Okay, [sighs] so, these things that I'm asking about exist.

-It's just he can't talk about them. -No, uh, he-- no, he can't.

Okay.

He's doing the prison thing where he, you know,

chest out, chin up, you know, and he's... he's trying to buck you.

I-- I don't know.

Do you think he would tell me if all the cameras were turned off and...

No, because he'll-- he'll go...

He might go to prison still at this point, you know.

-So I don't think he'll tell you anything. -Okay. Okay.

But they were meth cooks.

-Okay? -Okay.

And that was their job.

Were they selling to the police?

Um...

I can't tell you that for certain,

but I-- I think so, yeah.

-Yeah. -My mom was in this biker gang.

[Shilton] Okay.

And she was third from the top, hierarchy.

-Okay. -Okay.

Um... They did a lot of dealings with the police.

-Right. -They were told to just slip out of town

whenever the Ron Williamson stuff happened.

I hate this town.

I hate-- It's...

Mm, done nothing but destroy...

everybody's life.

Like, you grow up poor here and you're done.

[Johnny] I've been real good friends

with Gene�Whelchel's family and stuff over the years

and he absolutely will not talk to me about it.

[door bells jingle]

-[car door closes] -[engine ignites]

And he told me he told the police they had the wrong people.

He admitted to me and my friend...

openly, that... they had the wr--

He told them they had the wrong guys and...

And that's the end of it. He did.

He has nothing else to say. He won't even talk about that anymore.

What's likely, I could put it to him,

"Gene, it's Johnny Daniels. Are you going to open the door?"

I'll say "I've got a reporter with me," he's probably going to shut the door.

It won't be the first door that's ever been slammed in my face, so...

-I'm sure. -[Shilton laughs]

[Johnny] I didn't much tell anybody

about you guys until the last couple of days,

just in-- for fear of my own safety.

You know, like I said, I-- I've known these people a lot of years.

They're scared.

[Johnny] If you want to walk up with me, that's cool.

[Shilton] Yeah, let's try it.

-[door knocking] -[Johnny] Oh!

Mr. Gene, it's Johnny Daniels. How are you doing?

-How are you doing, man? -Doing good, sir.

[Shilton] Is there any chance you'd be willing to talk to me a little bit

about what happened that night?

[indistinct chattering]

[Shilton] Yeah?

[Johnny] I know my friend is innocent.

I will never stop.

I think it's like anything else. If one...

If the right little bitty stone gets turned over,

I think it'll blast wide open.

So, can you tell me about, you know, that night?

Where were you guys coming from? Because you were with your nephews, right?

We were headed to my house to play poker.

And we needed change...

so we stopped at McAnally's to get change for the poker game.

I pulled up with my...

I was in my pickup.

My older nephew, Lenny, went inside the store.

As he went in, a couple came out.

Didn't appear to be any struggle or anything like that.

[Shilton] Tell me a little bit about, um, They had you go and do a line-up,

-right? -[Gene] Yes.

[Shilton] So talk to me a little bit about how that went.

[Gene] Well, I'd already seen... [stutters]

They'd shown me a picture right after they just arrested him.

I said, "Well, that looks like the guy."

I said, "If I see him in�person, I could probably say for sure."

So, they went over to the jail...

and had the jailer to bring him out.

And as soon as I saw Tommy come out...

it hit me that, you know, that's him.

And then, after that...

they told me they were going to have a line-up.

And they asked me to pick out the one that...

So, I picked out Tommy Ward.

-But you had already seen Tommy Ward? -Yes.

Yes, okay.

It tainted the line-up.

[Shilton] Yeah, that's not standard procedure at all.

Everyone deserves a good defense and a fair trial.

And I-- I don't really feel like he had a fair trial,

and I wanted to do more than I could do.

I didn't have any...

insight...

into the situation.

I'd hate to think that I had a...

um...

Contributed to putting an innocent man in jail.

The whole system's broken. They all work together.

The District Attorney's Office is the hub.

[takes a deep breath]

I think the police overstepped their bounds.

Right.

Just a lot of things that were wrong.

Yeah, okay.

I have no belief

that God intervenes every time there's a problem.

I have some belief that he might have intervened

in some instances,

and have no understanding of why

that might sometimes�happen and sometimes not.

And I have a firm belief

that if it were about what kind of person somebody was...

if that's what-- what it were all about...

from a spiritual standpoint...

especially because Tommy is a very spiritual person...

that Tommy would be toward the top of the list of getting consideration.

We're filing an application for post-conviction relief,

which Tommy signed on last Friday.

And we're filing a 60-page brief in support of the application

for post-conviction relief.

Then six volumes of appendices,

which are exhibits that illustrate points we've made in the brief.

There have been more hours than I can count spent on this

for a lot of years by me,

several different investigators,

and still it took us forever.

[Cheryl] These are very, very difficult cases.

When someone is convicted on skinny evidence,

you have an even more difficult time

because, if they're convicted on very little evidence,

then there's very little evidence to take apart.

[Stacy] He got really angry, then he said,

"You're not leaving here until you get back on the stand."

[Shilton] But you had already seen Tommy Ward?

I did the line-up.

Yeah, she might have testified against Tommy and Karl,

and it kept me from getting 40 years.

[Allen] I can certainly understand how somebody looking into this would say,

"Hey, this is... It looks bad."

Because, I mean, it obviously does look a little bad.

I think it's absolutely crystal clear.

These were innocent man who were coerced to make false confessions.

Interrogator: And you said Titsdale?

-Titsworth. -Okay.

-Interrogator: Odell? -Odell.

They also claim police and prosecutors withheld over 800 pages of records

from Haraway's disappearance and death.

[Barrett] The two major groups of contentions

are that there is newly-discovered evidence

that was kept hidden.

The second major group of contentions

is that there were constitutional violations,

and that those violations resulted in the jury

not having all the facts before it that it should have had.

Murphy: During the course of our investigation,

we uncovered numerous suspects,

many of whom were

police initial suspects,

and we're not quite clear why they stopped pursuing...

those suspects.

Lawyer: You don't believe that, that is any...

modicum, scintilla of an alternate suspect?

Bill Peterson: No.

Lawyer: It's your testimony that you do not know who Floyd Degraw is?

Peterson: I have no idea.

Then that's Billy Charley.

The time within which the judge would make a decision

on the case is...

not set forth in the law with any specificity.

So, uh...

it's hard to know how soon there'll be a decision.

[cell phone ringing]

Thomas Ward.

Hello.

Oh, hi. Is this Tommy?

[Tommy laughs] How are you doing?

Good. How are you?

[Tommy] Oh, okay. Hanging in there.

-Yeah? -Yeah.

Have you read, uh, Mark's filing?

[Tommy] Yeah. Yeah, I have been going over everything

and, well, everything, to my knowledge, you know, sounds really good.

You know, that-- He did an outstanding job on it, you know.

I just keep saying my prayers, you know, that something will come through,

you know, to reveal my innocence, you know.

There's so many people out there, you know, that believe in me and care...

and pray that something positive comes out in the end, you know.

I'd like to get out of here and be able to be with my family...

and enjoy the remainder of my life that I have left anyway, you know.

[police woman announces]

You have 30 seconds remaining.

[Tommy] Take care. It's sure good to hear your voice.

-You take care. -Take care. Many blessings.

Bye.

[cell phone beeps]

[sighs] Yeah, I don't-- I don't understand how that man is in prison, um...

Yeah.

Leaning

Leaning

Safe and secure...�

[thunder rumbling]

...from all alarms

Leaning

Leaning...

[Grisham]In small towns like Ada...

the prosecutors and the police...

are under enormous pressure.

Winning means justice. Winning means... everything.

And along the way...

if the truth gets blurred...

or forgotten...

or twisted...

or manipulated...

that's too bad.

And that's how we get wrongful convictions.

That's how you get Ron Williamson and Dennis Fritz...

Tommy Ward and Karl Fontenot.

And that's what happens so often in...

in criminal prosecutions.

It's all about winning.

Safe and secure from all alarms

[country music playing]

Rogers: Everything that has to be said or needs to be said,

I'm sure it's documented�somewhere.

They just keep dragging it back up and dragging it back up

and dragging it back up.

So, now, depending what side of the fence you're on,

you're either the hero or the goat.

And, uh, like I said, I'm just tired.

...Lord help me, Jesus, I've wasted...

[Tommy] You know, whenever you see, like, a movie on the television,

they always get the right guy.

And if they've mistakenly got the wrong guy,

it winds up at the end, you know, they-- they get the right guy, you know.

It's not like in the movies, you know.

You know, in this field, you know, they get the wrong guy

and it's just never-- [stutters] never-ending.

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