The Cheat Sheet: Roulette and Retrials

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[00:03:16] [SPEAKER_00] I am Kevin, and as is our want on the cheat sheet, we will today be talking about a variety of cases from a variety of locales.

[00:03:27] [SPEAKER_02] Yes. Content warning. This episode contains discussion of murder, violence, and suicide.

[00:03:35] [SPEAKER_00] And I wanted to give credit where credit was due. You've been working very, very hard, so I did all of the cheat sheet cases this week. You weren't being lazy. You weren't being a slug of bed. You weren't being a ne'er-do-well.

[00:03:51] [SPEAKER_00] You weren't being a burden. You weren't being a disgrace. You weren't, like, stealing cereal. You weren't just hanging out being a lazy, no account, no good nink. We did an interview recently, and it was nobody's fault. Nobody did anything wrong, but the audio turned out awful. And I don't understand audio.

[00:04:20] [SPEAKER_02] The guy sounded like we threw him down a well.

[00:04:23] [SPEAKER_00] That's what it sounded like. We almost never do that to our guests.

[00:04:26] [SPEAKER_02] Well, you know, if they deserve it. But other than that, no.

[00:04:29] [SPEAKER_00] And you, I don't understand audio. I don't understand at all. There's like a button you can push, and sometimes that fixes things, and sometimes it doesn't. That's all I understand. But you said, Kevin, I can fix it. I just need plenty of time and dilithium crystals. Because you, for some reason, when it comes to audio, you're just like Scotty on Star Trek, the late Jimmy Doohan.

[00:04:53] [SPEAKER_02] Well, thank you. It's an honor. So I'm helping us escape the Klingons and whatnot.

[00:04:58] [SPEAKER_00] So you stepped up to the plate. You did things I don't understand, other than it involved you cursing under your breath and taking an awful lot of time.

[00:05:07] [SPEAKER_02] I don't even know if my time was well spent, if I even really fixed it. One person made my day on Patreon today by saying they didn't notice and thought it was great. So thank you to that person. But to everyone else, I hope you don't even know what episode we're talking about. But, I mean, maybe you will. It's just, it stinks because it's always a really good interview when this happens, when everything goes wrong.

[00:05:29] [SPEAKER_00] So did you mention that you were worried about the audio or did somebody just randomly say, hi, Anya, by the way, I didn't notice any problems in this week's audio?

[00:05:38] [SPEAKER_02] I think they're being sarcastic. I think I mentioned it in like a premium episode.

[00:05:45] [SPEAKER_00] Okay.

[00:05:46] [SPEAKER_02] I think I, or they read my mind or somehow they hacked us. But yeah, no, it was a great interview with a great, great, interesting guest. We normally don't imprison them in wells and it just sounds like that sometimes and don't ask too many questions. And I appreciate you comparing me to Scotty because I feel like I just didn't fix it as much as I wanted it to.

[00:06:07] [SPEAKER_02] But I don't know if you just, I think in the future, we're going to be really demanding that guests, you know, always wear headphones. I don't know if that's the problem. It's just, it's hard because we are not, we are self-taught. So we don't know what we're doing. And then we're trying to guide others through the process. And it's like, what are we doing? We don't know. And we really should know.

[00:06:30] [SPEAKER_00] And what's interesting is on last week's cheat sheet, you rather memorably compared yourself to Dr. McCoy. So are you basically a combination of Dr. McCoy and Scotty?

[00:06:42] [SPEAKER_02] I'd probably be like one of those red shirt people who gets killed. Let's be honest. Like I also, what am I going to do on a spaceship? My, I'm, I'm a humanities person. Okay. Like I, what would I be like? Do they have a newspaper on board? I mean, probably not.

[00:06:57] [SPEAKER_00] And then, uh, I once knew a woman who told me that I was a combination of Data and Picard.

[00:07:03] [SPEAKER_02] Ooh, that's kind of brutal.

[00:07:06] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:07:07] [SPEAKER_02] Isn't Data kind of annoying? I mean, sorry to all the Data heads out there. I can see Picard a little bit. I can see that. I think I'm more of a Kirk captain. I think I'd be like, hey, let's have fun. I'm so addicted to novelty. I'm going to be going out and fighting the Gorn. And you know what? People behind, like on the ship are going to be like, that's not a great management thing because if you get killed, then what are we going to do?

[00:07:33] [SPEAKER_02] You know, like now we don't have to cap it. Like maybe you should just not do that. People might say, I don't think I'd be very good in Starfleet. Um, on many levels, my lack of scientific knowledge, my lack of wanting to go to space, my fear of scary creatures. I think I would just end up causing a diplomatic incident and be like a less adept James Kirk.

[00:07:58] [SPEAKER_02] You definitely have a Picard vibe. You'd be all like, ah, let's, let's be cerebral about this. You know, you'd be definitely good in Starfleet, I think. And that's a big compliment from me.

[00:08:09] [SPEAKER_00] Well, we hope you enjoyed this week's cheat sheet. What? I don't know. It's just suddenly we're talking about Star Trek.

[00:08:15] [SPEAKER_02] We're just, I also, I don't know. I mean, do you, who do you think I'm a combination of? You tell me, like, what do you think the combination of Anya's personality is in terms of two Star Trek, the original series characters?

[00:08:27] [SPEAKER_00] Two Star Trek. Well, I'm thinking it over. Who do you, do you agree with the Data and Picard for me?

[00:08:32] [SPEAKER_02] I don't think you're like Data so much, but definitely Picard. Picard. I think you're, I don't know, like, I see what they mean, but like, I think, I think definitely Picard's in there. I'm not sure who the other person is, but, you know, you're kind of wise. You're kind of like, oh, yeah. And honestly, if you got turned into a Borg, I think that would freak everybody out. Big cliffhanger. But yeah, I don't know. Sorry, we're being nerds right now. I don't know what's happening. Shall we move on to the murders?

[00:09:02] [SPEAKER_00] Let's move on.

[00:09:03] [SPEAKER_02] Yes. My name is Anya Kane. I'm a journalist.

[00:09:06] [SPEAKER_00] And I'm Kevin Greenlee. I'm an attorney. And this is The Murder Sheet. We're a true crime podcast focused on original reporting, interviews, and deep dives into murder cases. We're Murder Sheet.

[00:09:18] [SPEAKER_02] And this is The Cheat Sheet, roulette and retrials.

[00:10:06] [SPEAKER_00] So I didn't want to pick, like, happy cases. I didn't want to abuse my power. And I know you've taken an editorial position against happiness and joy. Is that fair to say? So what I tried to do is I tried to, like, sit down and work myself into an Anya frame of mind. Think as Anya. Do as Anya. Pick as Anya.

[00:10:29] [SPEAKER_00] And I know one of your trademarks when you look for cases is if one of our dear friends, the listeners, suggests a case, you, like, try to cover that. Yeah. And so a couple of our dear friends, the listeners, suggested cases. And so I picked those. Okay. So these are the pseudo Anya cases of the week. One comes from Joe. Thank you, Joe. Our source for this is KMBC. And this is a Kansas City, Missouri case.

[00:10:58] [SPEAKER_02] You're, like, naming the listeners. I never do that. I just say a listener.

[00:11:02] [SPEAKER_00] Well, I'm not giving his full— Doxing them. I'm not doxing the listeners. I'm just giving first names. I think you want to give people credit, right? Should I not give first names?

[00:11:12] [SPEAKER_02] No, I just—I'm just—I'm shocked.

[00:11:16] [SPEAKER_00] I'm not giving his Social Security number.

[00:11:18] [SPEAKER_02] That's next.

[00:11:19] [SPEAKER_00] Joe is a fine name. It's also a relatively common name. I'm sure if you traveled—I'm no Missouri expert. But I'm sure if you traveled to Missouri, you see plenty of people named Joe.

[00:11:30] [SPEAKER_02] Okay.

[00:11:31] [SPEAKER_00] Okay. So thank you, Joe. I hope I haven't violated your privacy. He wrote us about this case involving a woman named Katie Garcia. Ms. Garcia was found outside her home back on July 30th. She was not conscious. She was bruised. And she was nude below the waist.

[00:11:54] [SPEAKER_01] Oh, my gosh.

[00:11:55] [SPEAKER_00] She came home from work the night before. She works as a massage therapist. It looks like her security system indicated the back door of her residence was open a little bit after midnight. Her husband wakes up the next day. He finds her outside. She's bleeding from some sort of a wound or injury to the head. And again, she's nude from the waist down. She also has a pretty high blood alcohol content.

[00:12:24] [SPEAKER_00] They take her to the hospital where, after a period of time, she's taken off of life support and succumbed to her injuries. Her husband has indicated that he believes it was some sort of accident where she fell. And that explains the injuries. Other friends and families aren't quite so sure. It's really unclear what exactly happened to this poor woman.

[00:12:53] [SPEAKER_00] Some people are claiming that the scene of where she was discovered wasn't processed. There's claims that the police didn't treat it as a crime and didn't collect any evidence. So the family is very upset. They want answers as to what happened to this poor woman. And it's, yeah, I imagine I would be pretty upset in a similar situation.

[00:13:21] [SPEAKER_00] I would want to know exactly what happened. And I would want to know if anyone was responsible. What do you make of it all?

[00:13:29] [SPEAKER_02] Well, yeah, no, I agree. And I think this is kind of underscores why it's important for law enforcement response to, you know, at least include the possibility that something is foul play until the evidence really is prevailing against that. I'd want to know, like, did she have a drinking problem or was she known to get extremely drunk? You know, that can happen with people who are not necessarily like always doing that.

[00:13:51] [SPEAKER_00] I would be curious if the husband had any interactions with her between the time she arrived home and the time the back door is known to be open and whether or not she seemed intoxicated during those interactions.

[00:14:03] [SPEAKER_02] It seems to me like with the drinking aspect, it's hard to imagine that, like, anyone would – it's hard to imagine a situation where someone's forcing her to drink that much. Like, that doesn't make any sense to me. But something happening with people who are drunk in the moment and someone gets injured and then is not taken care of, yeah, you could see that happening. So I can understand why they have questions.

[00:14:29] [SPEAKER_02] And I would hope that those questions would be addressed. And I feel like the statements from her family are reasonable in that they're saying we want to make sure there's nothing here. And I think that's a good attitude to have where you're not – you don't want to get into the point where you're, like, just saying, like, we're not going to be happy unless someone's held accountable because that's how you get situations where you're just –

[00:14:56] [SPEAKER_02] if no one did anything and this is an accident, then you're just not going to be happy. And it's better to just kind of, like, accept that, you know, it was an accident. But there's other situations that – where it's more nebulous. And I think further investigation is warranted. And I hope that family gets the answers that they want, like, in the sense that – I hope they get answers. I hope that it's not so compromised that we'll never know because that can happen too, right? Where it's just like, yeah, no one's going to talk.

[00:15:26] [SPEAKER_02] And the opportunity to get some evidence that may have existed at one time and no longer exists has fled.

[00:15:33] [SPEAKER_00] The level of intoxication is something that I find really striking because certainly there's some elements of this that don't seem to make a lot of sense. But, of course, when a person is really heavily intoxicated, they're not necessarily making the most logical or rational decisions. Sometimes a level of intoxication can explain some of those things.

[00:15:56] [SPEAKER_02] Oh, yeah. I mean, once someone's that drunk, I mean, let's – everything goes out the window. Ending up pantsless outside in your backyard isn't really that surprising to me if there's that much alcohol involved. Absolutely. And, you know – and again, like, she doesn't have to be someone who is constantly doing that for her to get really drunk. You know, it can happen. But that's certainly very, very, very intoxicated. So I would just be curious, like, did she have a history of substance abuse

[00:16:25] [SPEAKER_02] or anything like this or incidents where she would get blackout drunk? I don't know. But, yeah, it's troubling. And I hope that – again, I hope the family gets the support from law enforcement and the prosecutor that they want and kind of is able to kind of look at this. And also, I would wonder, like, what did the autopsy say? Like, you know, like, I know, like, they obviously – the blood content,

[00:16:53] [SPEAKER_02] they got that, the blood alcohol content, they got that she had a head injury. But, like, I think there would be a lot to be said in an autopsy. Like, are there defensive wounds? Is there – is this this angle that someone could have pushed her or something? Like, how did the actual injury occur? Like, I think that can tell us a lot, even if they didn't do the best job at the crime scene. So, yeah.

[00:17:22] [SPEAKER_00] Okay, the next pseudo-fake Anya case comes out of our home state of Indiana. Sources WTHR. Should I mention the first name of the listener? That seemed to throw you for a loop before.

[00:17:35] [SPEAKER_02] Do it. Do it. Blast him.

[00:17:36] [SPEAKER_00] Okay, this comes from a listener named Amy.

[00:17:39] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah.

[00:17:40] [SPEAKER_00] Not an unusual name, so I'm not doxing Amy.

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[00:20:59] [SPEAKER_00] Thank you, Amy. And this is the case out of Logansport, Indiana, involving a young man named Kason Schmidt, who passed away after a shooting that happened in August. He was shot in the head late at night or early in the morning, I guess, around 2 a.m. inside his grandfather's house.

[00:21:25] [SPEAKER_00] He was in the residence with a group of other teenagers. His mother believes that he and the other teenagers were actually playing Russian roulette. The day after this incident, Kason is declared brain dead and his organs are donated.

[00:21:48] [SPEAKER_00] Kason's mother indicates the family still wants more answers and information. There's apparently some sort of video, perhaps surveillance footage, outside the house, which shows these five other teenagers running away after this incident happens. Apparently, none of them called for help. None of them contacted emergency personnel.

[00:22:15] [SPEAKER_00] None of them stayed behind to try to help Kason. The extent of what they did was they told Kason's sister about it, and they were the ones that got help. Kason's mother is frustrated that no toxicology was done, that no gunshot residue testing was done on Kason.

[00:22:41] [SPEAKER_00] And no detectives came to see Kason when he was in the hospital. I think she raises some legitimate points there. If that was my son in that situation, I would want there to be gunshot residue testing done to confirm that he was the one that pulled the trigger.

[00:23:02] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah.

[00:23:02] [SPEAKER_00] What are your thoughts on all this?

[00:23:04] [SPEAKER_02] I think that's reasonable. I mean, you want to make sure that it doesn't even sound like she's accusing anyone of shooting him. But wouldn't you want to at least rule that out?

[00:23:13] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:23:14] [SPEAKER_02] And yeah, that sounds troubling. And the fact they left. I mean, again, are kids doing Russian roulette? Like, is that a thing? I don't even know. If they were, that's terrifying. But yeah, you would expect that, you know, friends would stick around. Again, like when people are drunk or whatever, like I get they're teenagers, but it just, it's troubling.

[00:23:36] [SPEAKER_00] It happened at 2 a.m. And there's a cliche that good decisions aren't always made at 2 a.m.

[00:23:41] [SPEAKER_02] No, but like you'd think you'd want to make sure your friend was okay. It's troubling. I, again, I don't know. I find it bizarre. I guess my question would be, like, if they were playing Russian roulette and he wasn't being coerced in any way and he was just doing it, would there be culpability or would that just be sort of in the eyes of the law on him for making that decision?

[00:24:02] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah, it would depend on quite a lot whether or not he was pressured into it, whether or not someone knew there was definitely a live round in there and tricked him. But yeah, there's potential culpability.

[00:24:15] [SPEAKER_02] I guess there's potential culpability, but it doesn't really sound like that clear cut of a legal case against anybody else unless there's other factors in there. And those are other factors that could be uncovered through investigation. So I think it's very reasonable for this family to be wanting to know more.

[00:24:31] [SPEAKER_02] But at the same time, this is another one of those cases where, like, the answers may be elusive and there may not be any, like, punishment to meet out as far as a court case or, like, a cause of action. Kids don't play Russian roulette, obviously. But if he was intoxicated and perhaps, like, people are kind of putting it in his hand and like, oh, do it, do it, do it. Like, you know, you can maybe see it kind of getting to the point where people are morally responsible for him dying.

[00:25:01] [SPEAKER_00] So now, Anya, let's go to the Cayman Islands. My source for this is caymanmarlroad.com. And, Anya, this isn't going to be a fun trip to the Cayman Islands. And it might poke the cane bear a little bit.

[00:25:16] [SPEAKER_01] Oh, no.

[00:25:17] [SPEAKER_00] Because your family, you come from a family who is currently there's a doctor and there's other people in your family who are studying to become doctors. So you come from a medical family.

[00:25:28] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. And I became a podcaster.

[00:25:30] [SPEAKER_00] So I was curious how you react to this story. Apparently, the law is a little bit different there. And I'm not sure this is a case that would come to trial in the United States. This involves a man named Dr. Paul Anthony Taganides, who has been charged with manslaughter in the death of a man named Travis Ebanks, who was shot.

[00:25:56] [SPEAKER_00] Mr. Ebanks is taken into the hospital. And Mr. Taganides is the senior trauma surgeon. So he is in charge. And apparently, at some point, a breathing tube that is supposed to be inserted into the victim's windpipe goes into his food pipe. And that is an error that is not noticed.

[00:26:26] [SPEAKER_00] And the man, Mr. Ebanks, dies because his stomach becomes distended with gas, which impacted his ability to breathe. And the crown, which is the government there, says he should have known that the doctor should have known that the tube was inserted improperly. He should have collected. He should have corrected that.

[00:26:53] [SPEAKER_00] And under their penal code, this is the sort of unlawful omission, which amounts to negligence. And so they are charging him with manslaughter. The doctor is saying, you know, I believe that the tube was correctly inserted. But and I confirmed that it was correctly inserted because I listen for sounds.

[00:27:22] [SPEAKER_00] Sometimes the tube can get moved after a person dies or while his body is being handled. So it's not clear in his mind if it was definitely inserted improperly. And also the guy had a gunshot wound. So it's not clear if he would have died if not for this. Maybe the gunshot wound itself was fatal.

[00:27:50] [SPEAKER_00] And yeah, so that's basically the gist of it. And I wonder, Anya, is the representative of a family of doctors? What's your take on all this?

[00:28:03] [SPEAKER_02] I mean, it troubles me. I don't I'm not a medical person, so I don't know if what he's saying it's accurate if the tube can indeed migrate. I'm sure I'll get a show. I'll get some text about this. But I I don't know if that's true and it can migrate. Then I think it's appalling that they even brought this case. Because that to me is reasonable doubt. If it can migrate.

[00:28:30] [SPEAKER_00] If the tube can migrate. Right. If the tube could have been moved after death or while his body is being handled. That's something I find pretty problematic.

[00:28:42] [SPEAKER_02] That's reasonable doubt.

[00:28:43] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah.

[00:28:43] [SPEAKER_02] That's you shouldn't even bring that case. If people want to sue this guy in civil court because, you know, whatever. I mean, that happens. Right. Malpractice suits happen.

[00:28:52] [SPEAKER_00] But apparently in the Cayman Islands, you don't even have to prove that this was the cause of the death. You just have to prove where this contributed to the death.

[00:29:00] [SPEAKER_02] That's that's I that really troubles me. And this is why, like. I feel like I'm in a weird place because I often find like I think a lot of cases that are talked about where it's like, oh, these people are innocent or this guy's innocent or this, you know, this guy was railroaded. I often end up disagreeing with that based on looking at the case in a deeper fashion. At the same time, I often find the cases like a lot of cases where people are just being accused or whatever.

[00:29:30] [SPEAKER_02] I'm like, that's really weak. You know what I mean? Like, I'm like, I wouldn't I wouldn't expect that to be charged. This just sounds like there's some again, if that's not possible, if there's no migration that would be possible or whatever, then like, OK, well, I don't know. It still seems pretty harsh to me to be charging this guy with manslaughter. And it surprises me if he was like getting drunk. Listen, the situations like he's getting drunk before surgery or whatever, then yeah. But like, I don't know. It seems I think there's like I don't know.

[00:29:59] [SPEAKER_02] I think like I encounter this sometimes. I've encountered this in life. But like I think there's people who hate physicians and like there's a there's like like let's get them. Like and I think it's part of it's like. I think it's anti intellectual intellectualism. And I think it's also like class resentment sometimes. But it's like, you know, oh, you think you're so great. Like, oh, if you if something goes wrong, you're going to be blamed for it.

[00:30:26] [SPEAKER_02] It's kind of it's I think it's a very ugly thing, honestly. And again, I'm all for if someone like kill somebody like in surgery because they were being negligent, throw the book at them. You know what I mean? Like, absolutely. Like you are like you're being.

[00:30:39] [SPEAKER_00] We're all we're all entitled to terrific medical care that that goes without saying. But I also think we need to realize we live in a world of human beings and sometimes in a stressful trauma room situation. A lot is going on. People are going to make mistakes and maybe some of those mistakes aren't caught as quickly as you would like them to be. And again, I don't know. I'm not speaking to this situation in particular.

[00:31:08] [SPEAKER_00] I'm just talking more generally. I think if you're in a situation where if something does not go perfectly in the ER, then whoever is the doctor in charge could potentially be charged with manslaughter. If that's something that's going to happen, at least in the Cayman Islands, I think you're going to end up in a situation where people aren't going to want to step into the ER.

[00:31:35] [SPEAKER_00] People aren't going to want to take charge in that situation because it seems the penalty for making a mistake is really, really steep.

[00:31:43] [SPEAKER_02] We saw this in the Lindsay Clancy case recently. I feel like people were like burn the witch about the various psychiatrists and nurses and professionals who treated her. And I just I find it very ugly. And I think it's it's it's channeling real frustration with medical systems. That's understandable. But it's I don't think it's helpful. And I also just don't think it's usually accurate. My very brief foray into looking this up just now is that it can migrate.

[00:32:14] [SPEAKER_02] So I think if that's true. These these this crown, these prosecutors are basically overzealously persecuting somebody because doing their job.

[00:32:26] [SPEAKER_00] If the tube can move from one. If the tube can move from the food pipe to the windpipe or vice versa, then it becomes very difficult to prove it was originally inserted incorrectly.

[00:32:38] [SPEAKER_02] Then we don't even know if he did anything wrong. And if this is a situation where like he's blackout drunk doing it and yells out here goes nothing with this tube. I hope I get it right. Then, yeah, maybe there's indications that he did do it wrong. But I I find it. I find it appalling. I think this I mean, this if that can migrate, then there's reasonable doubt there. Now, this is a different system, right?

[00:33:06] [SPEAKER_02] So I don't know what their burden of proof in the Cayman Islands would be. But frankly, this is the kind of thing with why you want to have the burden of proof beyond the prosecutor and you want it to be beyond a reasonable doubt, because I feel like if this got brought in front of a jury, at least in the United States. And the defense opens with, well, we can't even know if it was inserted incorrectly. I would hope that a jury.

[00:33:33] [SPEAKER_02] Would throw that out so quickly, the prosecutor's head would spin. Again, that's what I would hope, because I again, like you're we're not again, if somebody wants to make these allegations in a malpractice suit or like a civil suit or whatever, like I'm not I'm not I'm not saying that that can't be adjudicated. But I think there's a really like I think there's a threshold for something like criminal case and something like manslaughter.

[00:33:57] [SPEAKER_02] And it should be reserved for cases where you feel like you can actually prove that wrongdoing even occurred, which it really sounds like they can't. And what they have to prove is his failures went beyond an ordinary medical mistake. And to me, it's like, can we even be certain that a mistake was made? So, yeah, this troubles me.

[00:34:22] [SPEAKER_00] So, in other words, if one of your sisters who's studying to become a doctor were to come to you and say, Anya, I just got a great job offer in the Cayman Islands. You'd say absolutely not.

[00:34:36] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. I mean, if this is how they're treating.

[00:34:40] [SPEAKER_00] Come to Indiana instead.

[00:34:42] [SPEAKER_02] In the chaos of like an emergency medical setting, too. It's just it's disgusting to me and it just makes me question what these prosecutors are even trying to do here.

[00:34:52] [SPEAKER_00] We always use more doctors in Indiana. Come to Indiana.

[00:34:55] [SPEAKER_02] Right. I mean, I again, I'm not like I'm not going to ever defend bad doctors. There's doctors who there's doctors who are serial killers. Right. Like there's I'm not just like reflexively saying that, but I'm just saying like I just I just think there should be standards. You know, I think there should be standards. And I it to me, like on the surface here now, there might be more information that they're going to unroll in the trial. That's like, oh, wait, yeah, this was definitely negligence. Absolutely.

[00:35:24] [SPEAKER_02] But I don't know. Sounds pretty sketchy to me.

[00:35:29] [SPEAKER_00] OK, with all that said, let's move on to Alabama, Alabama. What's Alabama's nickname? Is that the Roll Tide state?

[00:35:38] [SPEAKER_02] I don't know. I mean, they do say Roll Tide, though.

[00:35:41] [SPEAKER_00] So let's let's roll that tide in Alabama. We're going to visit a case involving a district attorney named Champ Crocker, which I confided in you before the show. I said, I don't think I'm going to mention this on the show, but that's a really good name. This is an amazing name.

[00:36:02] [SPEAKER_02] Champ Crocker. A champ for justice.

[00:36:05] [SPEAKER_00] Yes.

[00:36:05] [SPEAKER_02] Is that his?

[00:36:06] [SPEAKER_00] Well, maybe.

[00:36:08] [SPEAKER_02] Oh, no, no. No, no.

[00:36:14] [SPEAKER_00] So I am going to have to read a little bit between the lines here. My source for this is the Coleman Tribune and Coleman is spelled C-U-L-L-M-A-N, not the way you would expect Coleman to be spelled traditionally. Additionally, this involves a case where, again, I'm probably going to butcher this name.

[00:36:40] [SPEAKER_00] Jamarion Allen Harrison has been charged with murder in the death of Dylan Bombary Wright. And there was recently a mistrial declared in that, which I will discuss. So apparently there is a witness in this case, a young witness in this case, who is also a figure in a related case.

[00:37:07] [SPEAKER_00] And in that related case, she was given the adjudication of a youthful offender.

[00:37:16] [SPEAKER_01] All right.

[00:37:16] [SPEAKER_00] We don't need to go in the details of what that means, but basically if you get adjudicated as a youthful offender, that's good news for you because you're not going to be treated as harshly. And this woman who got, I guess, girl who got that youthful offender adjudication in a related case is going to be a witness in this particular murder case.

[00:37:41] [SPEAKER_00] Now, she did not see the murder, but apparently she's had some interactions with the people involved not long before the murder. And those interactions are of a nature that the man charged with the murder, Mr. Harrison. He thought that if the jury heard about that, it would really, really help him.

[00:38:05] [SPEAKER_00] And apparently reading between the lines, Champ Crocker and his guys were worried that she might lie in order to help Mr. Harrison. And so they basically, shortly before she is to testify for the defense, she is told, well, you know, you might lose your youthful offender status.

[00:38:31] [SPEAKER_00] And so at that point, her lawyer advises her, don't testify. Oh, geez. And that kind of creates a huge problem for the defense attorneys who really wanted to rely on whatever it was she had to say. They say that her testimony, in fact, was essential to what they had to say. And so because of the way this played out, a mistrial is declared.

[00:39:00] [SPEAKER_00] And now the defense attorneys are saying they were basically threatening her not to offer the testimony that we needed. They're saying that they were worried that she might lie because she's in danger from this person, but there's no indication that's true. And the dirty dealing in our mind is of such a nature that the case should just be thrown out and he should not be tried again. I'm curious.

[00:39:29] [SPEAKER_00] What do you think?

[00:39:33] [SPEAKER_02] I find it extremely troubling that there could have been this essentially quid pro quo. And I find it kind of shocking, to be honest. Maybe I'm being naive, but it it seems like and I'm not accusing the prosecution side of necessarily like I don't know enough about this case to know this is a fair picture of like, oh, yeah, that's definitely what happened versus like other stuff going on.

[00:39:58] [SPEAKER_02] But like if it's true that they threatened a witness in order to get them not to testify, that seems really bad. That seems like misconduct. I mean, what do you think?

[00:40:12] [SPEAKER_00] A quote from this article, the defense motion alleges that immediately before the examination, Crocker announced in the witness's presence of the state intended to seek withdrawal of her useful offender disposition and reinstatement of her original murder charge because she allegedly had failed to cooperate with prosecutors.

[00:40:36] [SPEAKER_00] When the court asked how the witness had failed to cooperate, the motion says Crocker declined to identify the factual basis. OK, like then her attorney tells her, don't testify for either side. I find that troubling. I acknowledge at this point, basically, we are hearing things from the defense point of view. It is possible, at least in theory, that there is some information out there that the prosecution could provide that could make this all make sense and be OK.

[00:41:07] [SPEAKER_00] But what I'm hearing now really causes me a great deal of concern.

[00:41:13] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah, that's where I that's where I am. I'm not willing to say, oh, yeah, that's definitely what it is. But I think they need to explain themselves because. The idea that you're basically going to threaten somebody into not being a that's a huge violation of a defendant's constitutional right. Like it's also like you shouldn't need to do that. Like I feel like the prosecutors must hold themselves to a higher standard.

[00:41:38] [SPEAKER_02] They have to be the good guys, you know, and that means like you don't do sketchy stuff that. It's trying to like for like just deal with the witness, like, you know what I mean? Like like impeach her on the stand, cross examiner. Why are you why are you like doing this if this is what's happening?

[00:42:02] [SPEAKER_02] Again, I'm not I'm not accusing anybody because as you said, like, you know, we've been in too many situations where something is described to sound really badly bad for one side. And then you look at and you're like, OK, it's more more complicated than that. But if that is what is happening, it just feels like that's really not appropriate at all.

[00:42:20] [SPEAKER_00] Yeah. And they're suggesting that Harrison had previously harmed her. So I think there's an implication. I don't know that maybe. She's afraid of him, but that timing of all of this is really problematic to me. I have a great deal of concern about this and it's certainly something that we'll be keeping an eye on in the future.

[00:42:45] [SPEAKER_02] Yeah. Wow. I hope I hope it's not what it sounds like, I guess.

[00:42:49] [SPEAKER_00] Doesn't sound good.

[00:42:50] [SPEAKER_02] No, no, it doesn't. No, it doesn't. And, you know, again, we should want. We should we should want prosecutors as much as possible to be above reproach with stuff like this. And I think it's important for them to consider, like, what does something look like? Right.

[00:43:08] [SPEAKER_00] And we have to keep in mind, we want the violent people to be taken off the street and we want them to pay the price for their for their misdeeds. But we want that done in a way that's fair and respects their rights because it's a cliche, but it's true, because if the government can violate a person's rights just because they don't like him or think he is violent, then basically what's to stop the government from saying, oh, I don't like Anya Cain. I think she might be violent. Let's violate her rights, too.

[00:43:38] [SPEAKER_00] So the way to protect all of our rights is to protect everyone's rights.

[00:43:42] [SPEAKER_02] I think the government would love me if they got to know me. So I don't think they would do that to me. But I agree with you. It's it's one of those things. It's it's just it's it's not about going easy on criminals. It's about going easy on everybody. It's good. It's about us living in a free society.

[00:43:58] [SPEAKER_00] Yes.

[00:43:59] [SPEAKER_02] And I'm concerned about this one.

[00:44:02] [SPEAKER_00] One of the pleasures of living in a free society is if you want, you can support a show like this via premium. Well, what do I mean?

[00:44:11] [SPEAKER_02] Why don't you tell? Because I said last time.

[00:44:17] [SPEAKER_00] If you love the show, if you like the show, you want to see it keep going. Basically, we need your support. And how can you support us? Well, other than listening, you can join us on Patreon or Apple. You get early episodes. You get ad free episodes. You get extra episodes. We've been doing, I think, an average of one extra episode a week. We have a lot of fun and we really appreciate your support.

[00:44:38] [SPEAKER_01] We really do. Anything else going on in the Greenlee Cain household?

[00:44:46] [SPEAKER_00] We overreact to things sometimes. I remember the other day, Nick seemed to have trouble getting up in the morning.

[00:44:52] [SPEAKER_02] Oh, we were terrified. We were freaking out.

[00:44:55] [SPEAKER_00] Because we lost our dog Lanny not too long ago. And oh my God, this is the beginning of the end for Nick. This is his tragic young demise.

[00:45:03] [SPEAKER_02] Even though he's like two.

[00:45:05] [SPEAKER_00] He's two.

[00:45:06] [SPEAKER_02] We were so upset. He seemed to be like he normally he gets out of his crate. He sleeps in his crate and he gets out of the crate and he's bounding around and being very badly behaved. So the fact that he was respectful and slow to get out of bed, we knew something was wrong immediately. And we were like, I thought like, oh my God, did he get a spinal injury somehow? So we rushed him to the vet and they said he maybe was goofing around and pulled like a hip muscle. And so it was not a big deal.

[00:45:34] [SPEAKER_00] And also they gave us some painkillers. But also it was one of those things where he was like really struggling to get around. Then we take him to the vet and even before he sees the vet, he's acting normally. He's bounding around. We looked foolish.

[00:45:50] [SPEAKER_02] We looked to the fool in front of the vet.

[00:45:53] [SPEAKER_00] Yes.

[00:45:54] [SPEAKER_02] But, you know, we love him very much. We love him and Nora. Poor Nora we had to leave behind because, you know, it just, it's there.

[00:46:02] [SPEAKER_00] Because the day before, I'll tell this story. Nora had a routine checkup. And Anya, being a tenderhearted person, said, I hate to leave Nick at home by himself without his friend. Why don't we take Nick to the vet too just to keep Nora company? And that turned out disastrously.

[00:46:23] [SPEAKER_02] It was a bad idea. Nick's screaming. Have you ever heard a dog scream? Nick doesn't have like a husky howl. Nick sounds, I don't know how to describe it. Nick sounds like a chimpanzee. Nick sounds like a chimpanzee. It's just squeaking, like weird, weird cries. Like I've never heard a dog sound like him before. He can bark, but when he's upset, he's like doing this cry thing and it sounds weird.

[00:46:48] [SPEAKER_02] So, I mean, he's just rabble rousing in the lobby and I took him outside and then he's freaking out because Kevin's not there and he's obsessed with Kevin.

[00:46:57] [SPEAKER_00] As everyone should be.

[00:46:58] [SPEAKER_02] And then, you know, eventually we got in our own room. But then he was crying because they took Nora out and it was awful because they took Nora out. Nora howls more. You know, she has more of the husky howl, would you say? Not quite husky howl, but like she howls a bit when she's upset. And she starts howling outside and he's crying that everyone's freaking out. And with her howling, they came in and they're like, you know, like she was howling before we even touched her, by the way.

[00:47:28] [SPEAKER_02] Like we weren't doing anything to her. I think they were worried that we thought she was like we're torturing her. She's like, oh, she's like screaming. And they were just like, she's very dramatic, apparently. Because they were like, we didn't like we just we just had her there and she just starts freaking out. I'm kind of like that. I can't I don't like shots. So I can understand where she's coming from.

[00:47:50] [SPEAKER_00] You often howling for a shot.

[00:47:51] [SPEAKER_02] I do often howling. I'm very dramatic. Apparently, when I was like a kid after a shot, I would leave holding my arm dramatically and be crying and saying my poor little arm or something.

[00:48:01] [SPEAKER_00] So and often as we drive around on the weekends, you're sick, your head out the window and just howl it passerby.

[00:48:07] [SPEAKER_02] As I want to do. But they're really great dogs. If anyone's looking for if you want to change your life for the better, adopt some lovable but mischievous husky mixes. Because everyone who told us, hey, don't get a husky mix or don't get a husky. They're nuts. You were right. But I'm glad we did it because there are a lot of fun.

[00:48:28] [SPEAKER_00] And they made us exercise more. That's true. They don't like it when we eat snacks. We eat fewer snacks. I've lost, I think, what, 70 or 80 pounds at this point.

[00:48:39] [SPEAKER_02] You lost so much weight that some of our friends at CrimeCon were like, is he OK? And, you know, I mean, like health wise, I think we're probably in better shape than we've been in a long time. So God bless them. That's because we have they're making us go through this boot camp every day. But they're really fun. And they're just it's fun to see them interact. I think Nick's a lot more attached to Nora than she is to him. I think sometimes she's kind of but she's very patient with him. Like she'll let him he'll be kind of bugging her and licking her face and jumping around on her.

[00:49:08] [SPEAKER_02] And she'll just kind of be sitting there like, all right. So they're great. But anyways, I guess we'll let you go. But have a great weekend and take care.

[00:49:20] [SPEAKER_00] Thanks so much for listening to the Murder Sheet. If you have a tip concerning one of the cases we cover, please email us at murdersheet at gmail dot com. If you have actionable information about an unsolved crime, please report it to the appropriate authorities.

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[00:50:04] [SPEAKER_00] Special thanks to Kevin Tyler Greenlee, who composed the music for The Murder Sheet, and who you can find on the web at kevintg.com.

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