00:00:01
Speaker 1: On the night of March twenty fourth, nineteen ninety, Felix Costo Rico was walking down an alley in San Francisco's Mission District. Witnesses saw a man get out of a white money Carlo and confront Felix, and the two started argument. Suddenly, a shot rang out and Felix fell to the ground dead. The shooter jumped back into the car and sped away with another man at the wheel. By the next morning, rumors were flying around the streets that the shooter was a lifelong friend of Felix's, Joaquin Syria. They had grown up together in Cuba. Word was that the two were in a dispute over money. Joaquin had been out earlier that evening with a friend who drove a white money Carlo, but he claimed to be home with his wife and baby son for the night by the time the crime was committed. After viewing several lineups that included Joaquin's picture, two eyewitnesses id'd him as the man they seen. One witness claimed that she was eighty percent certain and that was close enough for the jury. But this is wrongful conviction. Welcome back to wrongful conviction. I'm Mariline Woods, co creator and co hosts of the Ear Hustle podcast, guest hosting for Jason Flummer Day, and I gotta tell you I served over twenty seven years in prison, and I used to always think about the people who were in here that were actually innocent, you know, dealing with the day to day grinding rigor of prison life. And that brings us to our guest today, Joaquin Sarah, Joaquin, Welcome to Wrongful Conviction.

00:01:42
Speaker 2: Thank you, thank you, cool cool.

00:01:45
Speaker 1: And here to help tell Joaquin's story is Paige Knap. She's the supervising attorney at the Northern California Innocent Project. Paige, thanks for being here.

00:01:55
Speaker 3: Yeah, I am super excited to meet you, Arline. I'm super happy to be with you. Morningquin.

00:02:01
Speaker 1: Joaquin, Can you tell me, like, since you from Cuba, what was your life like growing up.

00:02:07
Speaker 2: Growing now in Quwow? It was beautiful. It was beautiful, you know for me to be a child growing now in my country. You know, sorain them my family friend and kill what you do a lot of teams you know that you're not able to do in this country.

00:02:24
Speaker 4: You know, I remember you know that in kill what we who to play?

00:02:27
Speaker 2: You know in the three to one o'cloud two okline the morning and it was no danger. Everybody know everybody, you know, because it's an island. I had a royal beautiful shaohoo.

00:02:41
Speaker 1: Got you, got you, got you. So when you was a youngster, the US and Cuba was beefing. You know, they have a pretty fraud history, you know, the missile crisis, the Communist revolt and bargoes. Not really a free flowing dialogue. So I'm just curious, like, what were your impressions of the United States back thing.

00:03:00
Speaker 2: Well, let me let me tell you this. Everybody cu what the majority we grow out believing everything that we're watching the TV about the United States. We really believe that Superman really exists. Anything that you go out from United States, we really believe that. Brother, you know, you know in we watch so brainwatched, you know that when we're watching movie A Superman won the Woman.

00:03:28
Speaker 4: We really believe.

00:03:30
Speaker 2: That these type of people exist in the United States.

00:03:35
Speaker 4: You know, unbelievable. So this see how I grow.

00:03:39
Speaker 1: Out and and and and Joaquin, you knew the victim in this case, Phyllis Bastar Rica. When you were a kid back in Cuba.

00:03:47
Speaker 2: You know, a Phyllis. We all call hi calitles. He was close to my neighborhood, so mini mini minie time. We who to skate from the school to go swimming in the ocean.

00:04:00
Speaker 4: You know, go go eve some.

00:04:01
Speaker 2: Mango sugar cane. Everybody liked to be around Philly. You know, if you go into a party, you want him to be there. He was only laughing all the time, making a lot of joke. Definitely, he was a good friend, right.

00:04:19
Speaker 1: And I'm just curious. Did you come from like a political family over in Cuba.

00:04:25
Speaker 2: My father he was a revolutionary, you know, he was a Commonist. He fight with the Gostro you see, with the gost got the power way. My father was a part of that. Yeah, the majority of my family they really believe, you know, in the Commonies. And it was problem in the house, you know, because we all got different views. Since my ely age, I got really really big trouble to fit in the Commonist party. I got trouble with that. So you know, at the age of eighteen, I was called to be in the army. I was in high school at that time, but they don't care. That was a man that told it called you know a lot of young people escape because we don't want to do that, you know, to go fight to some other country, like a lot of joints in Cuba, they were saying to Angola to fight a lot of all these young people got killed, you know, so may and I say, oh, I don't want to do that. So when I was called to be in the army, I remember that I was there maybe for about sismon and I escape.

00:05:36
Speaker 4: A lot of Johns say do that.

00:05:37
Speaker 2: After I escape, I go to my fatherly house and I spend some time with my family. Into my father come, I'm told me, and he said, you know what, walking, I don't want no trouble with the government.

00:05:50
Speaker 4: You have to give it, you say, do the right thing, you know.

00:05:53
Speaker 2: And and I respect my family, you know, I love my father so most that they see how I end. And you know, in prison, you know in Cuba, it's not like right here, you know, right here out waiting something hoppy to your yoka crying right in two or three days they take.

00:06:10
Speaker 4: You to court your due process.

00:06:11
Speaker 2: Yeah, in kill white diffity in Cilbai, they directed you, Yeah you can be out there for one through three four. Yeah, I do never go to court. Yeah, they see how it is in Kiwa Damn.

00:06:25
Speaker 1: So in May of nineteen eighty, after spending some time in prison, you fled Cuba as a part of the Mario Boat left, which from my understanding was a mass migration of around one hundred and twenty five thousand Cubans that was sanctioned by both Jimmy Carter and Fidale Castro. You were still a teenager at that time, right, yeah, And I want to ask you what do you remember about the boat ride from Cuba to Florida? Because I used to always see it on the news, you know, individuals on floats and stuff like that coming from Cuba. What what do you remember about that boat ride?

00:07:00
Speaker 2: Well, Frosseto, to be honest with you, bro, I see a lot of ball when I was in the ocean, you know, and we're talking about a ball that you might can pull twenty authority people in that ball.

00:07:14
Speaker 4: So what the cube?

00:07:15
Speaker 2: What government was doing this instead? Or pull twenty authorty people? They who to put two hundred people in the bowl? So imagining And let me tell you, mane, I see with my own eyes how a lot of boat that's appeal, you know, in the ocean. One minute that was next to us, and when I look, it's not a te an no more. It is like it is gone. So it was really, really, really it was really ugly, you know, right.

00:07:50
Speaker 1: So fortunately for you you got here safely and you landed in Key West, Florida. Can you tell me what your feelings were when you first read the United States?

00:08:01
Speaker 2: At that moment, I feel, you know, I watched Happy. Yeah, yes, I will hoppy completely. You know that I fleck. I watched Happy. You know that I mean United State. That I don't have to live in a field no more. I don't have to water. You know about that. I go in and they killed Bidy Govin ain't on Sonky like that.

00:08:20
Speaker 4: I know.

00:08:21
Speaker 2: I wasched in the most power with fo Komi in the war. So that moment, anything that they told me will believe it.

00:08:32
Speaker 1: So over the next few years, you kind of skipped around to a few different cities and you finally ended up in San Francisco living with a woman named Nellie Hernandez. Nelly was a little older than you, and she had six kids. And back then you were hanging out with a couple of your partners from Cuba. Your childhood friend Felix Costa Rica who had also made it to the US. And a guy named Robert Socorro. And there was another cat from Cuba that was a hustling name Candido ds What did you know about him?

00:09:03
Speaker 2: You know, Candido dias A what I know about him? You know that he's a cube one.

00:09:08
Speaker 4: You know.

00:09:09
Speaker 2: He was living in San Francisco in the Sta Hotel, you know, in nineteen ninety. And I never think, you know, he had any type or bad feeling about me, a fat that I know. You know, we're talking sometimes and you know when you got the feeling that you don't click with the person, you know, that's the way I feel, that's the way he feel. But we never let it, you know, past to the level or having any type of problem with him.

00:09:42
Speaker 1: Okay, And when you was in San Francisco and me asked us, what was the San Francisco Police Department?

00:09:49
Speaker 2: Like, so in nineteen ninety in San Francisco Police Department, it was really really really I could root department. I already you know, listening in the three what they were doing, how they plan drag on people car you know, and and all that type of stuff. You know, of course not everybody. Not every police is doing you know, some really torig they've really got some a lot of bad apple, you know in the San Francis Complete department, my twenty four, nineteen ninety. You know, my personal life at that time it was changing, you know for the betro You know, I my baby's mama. You know, Johanna pays about almost about a jayago before my son was born. I was a happy man, you know at that time. I'm ah, my friend, Oh, my friend. What's happy with me too? You know, robto socorro he was happy if Phili they who took coming to my house. It was a happy time for me, right, you know at.

00:11:22
Speaker 1: That time until, of course, your good friend Felix Basto Rico was killed, which happened on the night of March twenty four of nineteen ninety. So Paige, can you can you walk us through what transpired that night?

00:11:35
Speaker 3: Yeah, So what we know is that Felix Pasta Rica was walking down the street with a plastic bag. We've since learned from Roberto SoCoRo that Roberto was in hidings. He had just killed someone and had asked Felix to bring him some clothes and toilet trees and stuff. So he's walking over to the bay Bridge Motel where Roberto is, and in Clara Alley, which is sort of perpendicular to the Baybridge Motel, there are people. There's a guy in a car, Kenneth stuff, and there's a woman up in the window, Kathleen Guovara, and they both hear this loud altercation, this loud argument in the alleyway, and describe these two people kind of walking back and forth interacting with each other. There's a white Monte Carlo that the guy with the gun gets out of and he shoots Felix Pastrica in the street and jumps back in the white Monte Carlo and drives off right.

00:12:29
Speaker 1: And that even in Joaquin, you were spending time with another friend, eighteen year old George Varilla, who was actually the son of your former girlfriend Nellie Hernandez.

00:12:39
Speaker 4: Yeah.

00:12:39
Speaker 2: Yeah, me and Joe Barrela. We who to be real close where he wasched, you know around a nine. Yeah. Oh, we who to go to the video a keda all the time we watch a DTA to play video. I'm to be honesty, I feel you know, even when I watched young I feel like he watch my son right. He gould to come to my house almost every two three days.

00:13:05
Speaker 1: Okay, so can you tell us like what you and you know George got into on the evening of March twenty fourth, before y'all parted ways.

00:13:15
Speaker 2: I remembered that nine that wasn't home with my family. You know, I expaid that, you know, to stay home. I was in May and I received a phone call from your So when I got the phone, your started told me and he said, hey, man, what you're doing?

00:13:31
Speaker 4: I said, man, I'm right here. You know. I spent some time with Johanna and with my son.

00:13:35
Speaker 1: Man.

00:13:35
Speaker 4: I bow, why we don't go to play video?

00:13:38
Speaker 2: So he conveys me and I go out with here and he come out to peep me out.

00:13:44
Speaker 4: It is white Monte Carlo.

00:13:46
Speaker 1: Oh, George Rilla drove a white money Carlo.

00:13:48
Speaker 4: He got a white Monte Carlo. He peeped me out.

00:13:52
Speaker 2: Almost around seven o'clock, we go to that CAA to play video. I remember that we got there almost around seven, saving Tody with what play video?

00:14:02
Speaker 4: Buado the Blue.

00:14:03
Speaker 2: He come out and told me and said, hey, what can't I have to go back to my house because my girlfriend she come out from Richmond. So to make this toy show, we leave.

00:14:11
Speaker 1: And when you left, you didn't go straight home. You enjoyed stopped by Gallon's Bar first, where a lot of Cubans and Puerto Ricans ain't got at to see if you might meet up with a friend of yours there, But instead you ran into another guy, Roberto Hernandez, who was not exactly a friend.

00:14:29
Speaker 2: We don't get along, you know me and he got a fire side. After I see my friend Manolo, I talking with Manolo for a little while, and after the fight, Joe Barrella take me home. I got to my house around a twenty five h a toty navid, I leave.

00:14:46
Speaker 4: My how a game And did you know what you was wearing that night? Yeah?

00:14:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's something that I never go and forget that Navy because at that time, I don't know if you remain me that a lot of young people Epecio, black people like me, we who to with that type post JACKI letter Jaki, you know that it was all colorful letter Jaki. So say command the squad, So go Wan said, how Roly so say Cobra got I don't think that I think that I even can sleep with that Jackey the how To Munch, I know, Michael Mama Squad. Yeah, and they see how I get out out of my house when yo body La piped me out.

00:15:26
Speaker 1: Okay, cool. So George dropped you off at around a thirty and you spent the rest of the evening at home with Johanna and your son. But by the next day there was already a rumor going around that it was you that killed Costa Rica, as you found out from your friend Manolo when you went to Gallon's bar the next.

00:15:44
Speaker 4: Day, Manolo and some other people wastch outside the bottom.

00:15:49
Speaker 2: When Manolo see me, Manolo approaching me, you know how, he said, hey, Waki, how you doing.

00:15:54
Speaker 4: My friend? You know, we brace and he said, man why you don't leave the city.

00:15:58
Speaker 2: And I look at here. I say, leady, CD, what are you talking about? Manolo?

00:16:03
Speaker 4: He said, Maine Calito. Last night? You know, I'm the rue noise that you beat it.

00:16:08
Speaker 2: And I say, hey, a stop playing like Tom made do you show? What are you talking about?

00:16:12
Speaker 4: He said, yeah.

00:16:13
Speaker 2: So when he told me now the Frost team that is coming, you know, in my mind, I just say, oh, Main's something Roman, and I just started to be afraid.

00:16:23
Speaker 1: And it came out later that Condido DZ was the likely instigator of that rumor. But however it got started. The two homicide detectives work in the case, Arc Gearns and James Crowley.

00:16:34
Speaker 3: Ran with that rumor, so Joaquin's name comes up really fast in the investigation, and from as soon as they get his name, he is the only person they ever look into. And so essentially what you can see in the police reports is the two homicide inspectors who have Joaquin as their one and only suspects, start showing his picture to the two eyewitnesses, neither of whom identify him. They ask her, well, who looks most like the shooter, and she says, well, she points to Joaquin's photo and says he looks most like the shooter, but she doesn't say it's him, and the guy in the car says he doesn't pick anybody out, but they still keep their focus entirely on Joaquin.

00:17:14
Speaker 1: But Joaquin didn't even match the descriptions that the two witnesses gave right, No.

00:17:17
Speaker 3: Yeah, so the police did get descriptions from the eyewitnesses of the shooter and the things they describe because they both sort of say they see him from a distance, kind of the silhouette. They say he's got an afro, and that he's wearing this long trench coat. And we know from independent witnesses, including the guy Joaquin got in a fight with, who you know, didn't like him and had no reason to lie for him, that Joaquin's hair is in a long Jerry curl, not in an afro, and he's wearing this short, short leather jacket and not a long trench coat. And in fact, no one had ever seen Joaquin ever in a trench coat, and he didn't even own a trench coat.

00:17:53
Speaker 2: You know, thank god that I just stopped at the gotta battle because you see everybody see me how I want the race, everybody, the people the same, the DeFi They've remained me how I watched the race.

00:18:06
Speaker 4: They've remained me that I got a Jerry krail.

00:18:09
Speaker 3: I mean, even when they search the house, they're never able to find anything to connect Joaquin, and and so you know, it doesn't match. He doesn't match the descriptions, and he's got an alibi. His his girlfriend and their roommate tell the police from the very beginning that he's home that night. By eight thirty.

00:18:26
Speaker 1: Nevertheless, Garan's and Crowdy stay focused on Joaquin as a suspect. And so at that point, Joaquin, you went to the police station on your own, correct.

00:18:36
Speaker 2: I cannot take a no moment. I cannot take a nomo. You watch some more rumo that I said, mag I have to go talk to with the homo side. I have to go talk to with the homo side, bolutality. I go with my loyo to speak to the homo side.

00:18:49
Speaker 3: About two and a half weeks after the shooting, and he tells them that he was with George Ferrella in the white Monte Carlo, and he tells them how to find George, says, I, you know, I dated it a his mother, Nellie Hernandez. They live at this address. Here's what he looks like. Here's the car he drives, I mean, basically everything they need and they pull in George Verilla and George is initially saying, well, I can tell you what happened up until the time Joaquin and I split up, and then he says he went home after and he says, well, I probably I probably went somewhere after though, and they never ask him where did you go? Instead, what they say, is we know Joaquin was the shooter. You're going to go down for this murder. He's you know, George is eighteen. They tell him, you're going to go down for this murder unless you stop lying and covering up for Joaquin, And they essentially tell him like, he's just got to say that Joaquin is the guy in the car with him at the time of the shooting, and that Joaquin is the shooter. And George Verilla literally says, Okay, whatever you said, and then he repeats the story that they have now fed to him, and that's it.

00:19:52
Speaker 1: M So I guess subsequently later you end up getting arrested Joaquin, Yes, and you end up getting arrested based on a confession from George.

00:20:01
Speaker 3: Or at least from George saying exactly what the police told them to say.

00:20:05
Speaker 1: Okay, so he was he fabricated her from the offices Garren's and Crowley.

00:20:10
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean, they tell him he's got to say it's Joaquin. That's like. Then they keep going back to the eyewitnesses. Basically, the witnesses make positive ideas only after they're repeatedly shown Joaquin, and for one of them, she doesn't even make a first positive Ida until the preliminary hearing when he's literally sitting in a red jumpsuit at the defense table, and then she's like, oh, I'm sure that's the guy. And she says it's based on his attitude that she can see is how she's identifying. I mean, there's a lot of racism all through this trial, Like she even says, I think they were speaking African.

00:20:42
Speaker 1: So on April nineteen, nineteen ninety, Joaquin, you were arrested in charged with first degree murder. Bro what was going through your head? I mean, did you even think this shit was real?

00:20:54
Speaker 4: Do you know what?

00:20:56
Speaker 2: Let me tell you these woop not even when I washed my are you I really believe that everything worth real? I was thinking that I was in I can't the camera show looking all these people coming and poilem me with a finger. Yeah, that the main And in my mind I said main, I know, I know the camera is going come o and they go and say a smile you in camera, you know, because that was a famite show at the time. I go to watch that show tomorrow, you know, and I and I say, you know what, I mean, what happened to me? I cannot believe it you. You cannot, being innocent, believe that what is happening to you is real. You cannot, you know, and that's what happened to me. And you know, to respond to your question, no, you know, I steel, don't get it, I steal. You don't even get it. Main you're being charged with frost the good morning.

00:22:01
Speaker 4: How you feel them getting so?

00:22:03
Speaker 3: George had actually kind of disappeared, George Urella, he'd not shown up for the prelim, he was missing leading up to the trial. I honestly believe Joaquin's attorney just didn't think he was even going to have to deal with George. It was just going to be this eyewitness I D case. And so he did I think a fairly good job, you know, showing all these discrepancies between the descriptions and what Joaquin actually looked like, their own inconsistent statements and kind of the evolution of their ideas. He did a nice job of showing that George Verrella's timeline didn't make any sense, that there was this like big gap in between the way he says what they did that night and how he drove Joaquin home. His timelines that lines up with Joaquines that Joaquin is home long before the murder happens. But what he missed, what he didn't manage to do. And one of the things I really respect about him is that he actually gave us a declaration saying he was ineffective because he didn't present to the jury. The jury never heard that Joaquin's name came from the homicide inspectors first, and that they told Verrella essentially that he had to identify Joaquin, so the jury just never heard that. What they heard instead was this guy who knows Joaquin, who'd grown up with him around is saying he's the guy who was with me in my car and who got out and shot him. And then he hears that corroborated by these two independent eyewitnesses, and Joaquin's attorney presented witnesses who describe what Joaquin looked like that night, how he had Jerry Curl in the short jacket, but he never presented the alibi witnesses. So they also didn't hear that Joaquin was at home with his one month old son and that they had a good reason to remember that night because they were going to celebrate the one month anniversary of his birth the next day, So you know, they knew that George Verrella was incentivized, they knew he got immunity, they knew he was in and out of trouble. So it wasn't a super strong case even with what they heard. But what they never heard was anything else about someone else actually did it, or that Joaquin had this really credible alibi, and so they end up convicting him.

00:24:09
Speaker 2: It don't matter if I'm trying to explain to you a thousand times, I cannot even feeling close to really really tell you how I feel when they come out with a guilty verity. You know, everything inside me stopped, everything, I stop breeding, my heart stopped.

00:24:38
Speaker 4: It is a feeling that that you can never you can never explain how it is.

00:24:50
Speaker 2: That they find you guilty, especial find me guilty or the moory of my bed frameming that's what really killed me. How can I be doing time for the money of my beayfriend made somebody that I love Even to today, I ain't the almost opened Pelican by presume in what the more tough prisum in the Californias sisting at the time. I see people when they told these people you go into Pelican Bay, I see grown Maine crumbled in the floor and crying when I was in some queen, you know. And I ask the people. I say, hey, man, why he crying? I said, man, you don't know where we're going. He said, we're going to Pelican be And I say, say what a body? I said, Cuba. Let me tell you man, it is no joke. He said, may wait util you get there.

00:26:10
Speaker 4: You know it was true.

00:26:12
Speaker 2: You know when I gotta tell you, Maine, every time that you heal alarm sound in that prison, it was not a first alarm. It was somebody got killed, you know. And I said, man, how did I ain't in there? But my mind is still do not stopping play some trick on me? I remember, you know. I who to weigh into my said go to sleep. And I had to cover my head with the blanket reyal tie and I had to close my eyes royal tie. And I had to say, Maine, when I open my eyes, now, when I open my eyes, now, I know this.

00:26:56
Speaker 4: Is a three. This is a three. I go and being home, we might sign with my baby's mama. This is a three. Man, this is a three. I went, I got Cobby might sell. I need to sell.

00:27:12
Speaker 2: You know, I say, wow, man, this is real mm hm.

00:27:20
Speaker 1: So I gotta ask you, man, like, how did you hold on to hope so much for all those years? Because I always always say, you know, for a person that committed crime, it's hard, you know, to deal with the time, But for an innocent person sitting there, it's a whole different level because you're going through everything, whether it's the violence in the prison, the abuse from the cops.

00:27:41
Speaker 2: Whatever it is, the CEOs, whatever it is.

00:27:43
Speaker 1: So how did you hold on the hope that you would get out?

00:27:48
Speaker 4: You know why?

00:27:50
Speaker 2: In the beginning I watched completely ain't good with God? Everything that I got in my mayis how did I go and prove that I don't do.

00:28:01
Speaker 4: What I can do? You know?

00:28:03
Speaker 2: And the good thing about it is and thank God, you know, to all the emails, you know, in every priest that I be, brother, in every priest that I be, every email, believe on me, hm, they can see through into my heart. They can see through into the type of man that I was. You know, this call it homies, homeboy. They're asking me working and why are you here for?

00:28:35
Speaker 4: Man?

00:28:36
Speaker 2: And I say, man, brother, they give me totally one year to life. Or a model that I not comke. I'm taking God. They say, hey, man, you know what I mean, I believe you? What can I believe you? And I say thank you man. And I received so much respect. I receive the respect that the systems don't give it to me. I got an e all these email the respect that deceasedent denight to me. I got in it from all these people.

00:29:07
Speaker 1: And page can you can you walk us through the post conviction litigation? I mean didn't evidently nothing worked for him.

00:29:15
Speaker 3: Yeah, I mean you got to give Jaquen credit like he litigated his case to the nines, like he got himself into federal court. I know you had helped from jail health lawyers. Have a lot of respect for jail health lawyers. And I mean, unfortunately the courts just refused to look at it and refuse to listen. But what eventually happened was Joaquin had earned the respect not only of other incarcerated folks, but also some of the free staff. And we were contacted by this guy, Ray Leonardini, who ran a meditation circle that Joaquin was a part of, and also Ellen Egger's pro bono attorney who have partnered with in a few cases, was helping another guy with parole who told her, you have to meet Joaquin, like he's actually innocent and you need to help them. And so Ellen went and met Joaquin. He told her everything. She like everybody, found him very compelling and believable, and so she The first thing asked her to do was go talk to George Verilla's sister, Denise Courcier, and Allan did that and Denise told her, my brother told me that Joaquin is innocent, that it was another Cuban man, and that the police really wanted Joaquin, and George was scared of them, and so he went along with what they wanted. But what really turned the case around was when Roberto Scoro got out of prison. He went to Cuba and he tracked down Joaquin's family and told them that he personally knew that Joaquin was innocent because he had actually seen the whole thing from his motel room.

00:30:46
Speaker 1: And listeners, remember, Roberto Cicoro was another friend of Joaquin's. The day before all of this happened, Roberto had killed this other guy named Ruben Alfonso, and he was hiding out at the Bay Bridge motel, waiting on Phoenix to bring up some clothes when he heard Felix southside argon with Candido Diaz.

00:31:04
Speaker 3: They had been fighting over over a gun and not paying for the gun, and so he recognized their voices and they start coming in and out of his view, and you know, he hears the gunshot and he runs out and he sees Candido get into the white Monte Carlo and drive away, and he basically broke down and apologized to Joaquin's family and explained that while he was in he'd been a shot caller initially, and so he felt like, you know, in addition to the normal amount of trouble you can get in in prison for snitching, that he, especially as someone who'd sort of enforced those rules, would be even more in danger. And for a long time he'd hope to be able to get his own revenge, that at some point Candido would get locked up and he would be able to avenge Felix's death, and in some ways, fortunately that never happened, and instead he gets out and tells the truth, and that really broke open the case.

00:31:58
Speaker 1: And Ellen also tracked down a couple of people that George Varilla had talked to and had told them Joaquin was innocent. One was Joaquin's sister Denise, and the other was a woman named Katie dad Gonzales.

00:32:10
Speaker 3: She was friends with Nellie Hernandez, George's mother, and also knew Joaquin through Nelly and through the Cuban community. George tells her also, so it's very similar to what he said to Denise that he knows Joaquin is innocent and didn't do this. And so we had these two statements from George Verilla to two different people saying that Joaquin was innocent and also saying that it was another Cuban man. And so Candye Rodez is not only Cuban but also matches the original description. He was always had his hair in an afro. He was known to wear long trench coats. And it turns out he'd had this, you know, ongoing and escalating feud with Felix Pasta Rica right before the murder, and it all started over the weapon that may actually have been used, A forty four, which was actually the weapon they said was used to kill Felix Basta Rica. So Ellen had done most of the investigation by the time she came to me, and it was only the Roberto piece that came afterwards, but we really felt like that pushed it over the top. And then the Innocence Commission also got an eyewitness ID expert to look at the eyewitnesses and just really explain and under the social science that we now know even more why all of those all the reasons eyewitness identifications are unreliable, but were especially so in this case.

00:33:24
Speaker 1: Well not just unreliable, I believe one of the witnesses, Kathleen Gavada, had another reason to identify Joaquin.

00:33:31
Speaker 2: You know, the same woman I say from the Beginni, now that I hold the po say SHOLDI DMin I only atey poucing and lao you know CHI give it defending change and watch you see well Chila.

00:33:47
Speaker 1: So Paige, after all this new information you put in front of them, did the courts quickly agree that Joaquin was innocent?

00:33:54
Speaker 3: I mean we expected them to, especially because the DA's office was on board, and.

00:33:59
Speaker 1: That was District Ernie chesso Bodin, who was repeatedly under fire from the police union and adversaries. There were I think like two recall elections, so his political foot and was never secure and he was the one that was making the recommendation based on the Innocence Commission findings.

00:34:15
Speaker 3: They had this separate Innocence Commission, right, that was supposed to be this independent body. It had DA's public defenders, experts, law professors, you know, like this whole commission of different stakeholders who all agreed Joaquin is fully innocent. And in my experience, usually when that happens, the courts are pretty willing to go along pretty quickly, right, But unfortunately we had the exact opposite experience here, and I can only imagine some of that was the politics going on in San Francisco. The court essentially just the first thing they did was ask us to do another round of briefing, and they invited the Attorney General's office, in which you know doesn't generally happen in superior court. But here's the court saying, you know, District Attorney, I don't trust what you have to say, and so Attorney General, I'm inviting you in to tell me something different. Fortunately, the AG's office also saw that this wasn't a case to oppose. Everything pointed to Jaquin's innocence. There's no reliable evidence of guilt anywhere. But even after you know, a second round of briefing in the AG's office, refusing to come in. They still had us have an evident you're hearing, And so here we are both sides arguing for the same thing. So we're both presenting opening statements on Joaquin being innocent, and then we're both doing closing arguments about how he's entitled to relief and how we all believe he's innocent and the judge should reverse his conviction. Luckily, by then we'd been switched to a different judge, was a really good, experienced judge and just saw all the problems with the case. And then finally, on April eighteenth, the court reversed Joaquin's conviction and the district attorneys again announced he was innocent. They dismissed all of the charges.

00:35:52
Speaker 4: Man, I almost fail to be fluw.

00:35:55
Speaker 2: Yes to go out to the freedom that I want deny for almost thirty two years, and I don't even know how to make it all the way to the door, you know, And I keep walking. I'm walking on imagin you know, when when they open the door to me and I see, you know, I see pay ailing, my son and my baby's mama, I see everybody. Man, it was too much for me. I say, my god, it was a day unbelievable, this type of feeling. You have to really go through that for you can really have the thing what I'm talking about.

00:36:40
Speaker 4: It is unbelievable. It is unbelievable. Yeah, I'm with you on that.

00:36:45
Speaker 1: And of course we're all super grateful to the Northern California Innocent Project and the fantastic work that they do because it's through them that people like Joaquin can you know, have a chance to get back to this free world. So if anyone want to show the Northern California Innocent Projects some love, we'll have the link in the bios so you can do that. So we've got to the point of the show where we do this thing called closing arguments. And first I want to thank you all for being here, and I also want to ask y'all to share your final thoughts for the listeners, you know, anything that you want to say, any takeaway you may have, and page I want to first start with you and then we can close with Joaquin.

00:37:32
Speaker 3: So the thing that I think we haven't done a great job of yet, especially in San Francisco, is like we know, there was this era in which they were treating especially young black men terribly and saw themselves as like cleaning up the streets by somehow getting people involved in homicides and throwing them away for life. And there are six people who've been exonerated out of San Francisco, all of them are black men, and five of them are from this nineteen ninety era. They all have incredible story. You should look into all of them. Joaquin, Maurice Caldwell, Antoine Goff, John Tennyson, and Kara mad Conley, who I know you've already interviewed, But what we haven't done is look back at what else went wrong there. So it shouldn't be luck of the draw, right whose cases get looked at and who gets picked up? And so Headjoaquin not you know, convinced other incarcerated folks that he was innocent and then one of them meeting Allen like you know, this luck of the draw thing. It's not okay for justice to be that arbitrary with what little justice exists in our system. And so my hope and listeners, I'd love for you to encourage this is that we actually look back. There's four homicide investigators who were involved in all of these cases, we could look at their cases, we could look at all cases from this era. You know, cdcr's budget for this year is over fourteen billion dollars. Just imagine what would happen if we just spent a tiny fraction of that on actually looking for where things went wrong, starting with the places we already know things went Everybody should have a chance to prove themselves nons as bad as the worst thing they've ever done. And you know, these guys who have done all this time like you are, Land, like Kyuki, and who have come out and shown like I mean, one of the things I just love also about what you've been doing is just highlighting the humanity of people right whether they're incarcerated or not. We are all have this huge amount to offer and give, and I just would love for us to stop leaving so many people behind and really start focusing on using our resources in better ways.

00:39:33
Speaker 4: What I want to say, you know, to all be listening.

00:39:36
Speaker 2: I want to leave everybody know that what happened to me is continually happening right now, and the only way it can be at top we all have to come out together and do something about it. I always say, if we're capable to go to the moon, we have to be capable to prevent the anal.

00:39:59
Speaker 4: Same pace go to prison. Simple like that.

00:40:02
Speaker 2: How can you go to the moon but you cannot prebay in one person to go to prison. It saying I know right now, at this moment, in some part of the country in a court house, somebody's going to prison right now being INNO say it is no doubt in my mind. And he going through for the same thing that I go through when I was in that position. I know we can stop it. I know we can do so anything about it because I know Number one is we need to make the dis Ratney accountable for any wrong doing that they do. And I said the every dish Ratney. No, we got some really good dist rattorney that they do their job. They go by the law and they honesty people, how walking people. But we got some other one that they don't care, they don't get They want to wing our case O this face it or the ego same people.

00:41:07
Speaker 4: We have to stop dot.

00:41:14
Speaker 1: Thanks for listening to Wrongful Conviction. I'm your guest host Erline Woods. I like to thank executive producers Jason Flumm and Kevin Waters for inviting me to be here good Looking Special thanks to our wonderful production team Connor Hall, Annie Chelsea, Lila Robinson and Jeff Clyburn. The music in this production comes from three time Oscar Numbernee Jay Raff. Be sure to follow us on Instagram at Wrongful Conviction, on Facebook at Wrongful Conviction Podcast, and on Twitter at Rome Conviction, as well as Lava for Good. On all three platforms. You can find me online at Erline Woods, and you can find my podcast ear Hustle wherever you listen to podcasts. Wrongful Conviction is a producttion to Blober for Good Podcasts in association with Signal Company Number one