Oct. 17, 2024

10/6 Lifers

10/6 Lifers

In this episode of Bloody Angola, we investigate the plight of the "10-6 lifers," who were misled into believing they would serve only 10 years and six months but instead faced decades in prison.

Timestamps
04:26 The 10-6 Lifers' Forgotten Story...

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Season 6

In this episode of Bloody Angola, we investigate the plight of the "10-6 lifers," who were misled into believing they would serve only 10 years and six months but instead faced decades in prison.

Timestamps
04:26 The 10-6 Lifers' Forgotten Story
09:42 The Shift in Louisiana's Justice System
15:08 A Glimmer of Hope
20:18 The First Releases
26:13 A New District Attorney
29:18 The Path to Freedom
33:49 Resentencing Hearings Begin
37:55 Life After Angola
43:30 Montgomery's Release

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WEBVTT

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I walk straight line, shackle change, Oh someome gird.

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It's calling by the name. There is no Mercy and.

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It's been a tentery juice as the huge stream game

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Rango the three, I'm.

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Here be.

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By Meda dies inside these walls, inside the Wild and

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went the girl as I'm.

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Hey everyone, and welcome back to Bloody Angola, a podcast

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one d and forty two years in the making, the

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complete story of America's bloodiest prison. Jim Chapman and if

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you listen to Real Life, Real Crime Daily this week,

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I'm recording this on a Monday and what are you

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Everton unfortunately could not be with us today. He had

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some sort of family issue he had to deal with.

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So we're gonna move right on and look with this

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episode of Bloody and Goalie, y'all, I have a backstory

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on this I want to tell you, and it brings

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me all the way back to one of our first

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few seasons of Bloody and Golin.

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We had a guest on.

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A couple of episodes on those early releases and his

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name was Andrew Hundley and he was actually the first

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juvenile lifer released when Louisiana changed the law regarding inmates

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who were sentenced as juveniles to life in prison, and

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it offered them the opportunity to at least have a

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shot at parole. You weren't guaranteed to get your life

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sentence committed, but you had a shot at it. Before that,

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you had no parole opportunity, even as a juvenile. So

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he came on the show, and as he was leaving,

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we were discussing just ideas for future episodes. Obviously, with

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him being in Louisiana State Penitentiary, he had a lot

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of contacts and people that we may or may not

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want to talk to, and we were just discussing those

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ideas and he mentioned we ought to do one on

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the Ten six Lifers. And I looked at him with

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a really confused look, and I said, I've never heard

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of him. And y'all, I am a research freak. Y'all

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know that it's what I love to do. And I

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thought I knew everything there was to know about Louisiana

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State Penitentiary and in Gola, but I didn't know this story.

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I didn't know anything about.

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The Ten six Lifers. So what did I do? Well?

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I start digging, of course, and to my surprise, there

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was not much online regarding the Ten six Lifers and

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it kind of went in my back pocket, and as

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I was researching another episode, I came across what I

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think is probably one of the best article I've ever

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come across on any subject as it relates to prison.

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And surprisingly enough, it is on the Ten six Lifers.

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So I'm going to tell you all about them today.

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And what I'm gonna do is I'm going to reference

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that article. And it was put out by Jessica Sholberg

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of The Huffington Post on December thirtieth of twenty twenty one,

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and I promise you, when I'm done with this story,

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it is going to blow your mind. So here's how

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it reads. Lee Ry Grippin thought he was going to

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prison for ten years and six months. That's what his

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lawyer told him. And that's how it went. When you

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were sentenced to life in Louisiana, it didn't really mean

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life in prison with good behavior. Life sentences were almost

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always commuted after ten years in six months. Besides, it's

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not as if Griffin had much of a choice. It

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was nineteen seventy and as a young man facing charges

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of arm robbery and aggravated rape. In the South, he

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would almost certainly deal with a jury.

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That could convict him and sentence him to.

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Death by electrocution. So Grippin, who had just turned twenty three,

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did what his lawyer told him to do. He took

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a plea deal, and he went to Louisiana State Penitentiary,

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better known as Angola. There he started counting down the

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days until he expected to walk free sometime in the

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summer of nineteen eighty one. That day didn't come until

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October fifth of twenty twenty one. By then, he was

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seventy three and spent nearly seventy percent of his life

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in prison. By the time the summer of nineteen eighty

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one rolled around, Louisiana had changed the rules. The understanding

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that people wouldn't really spend their life in prison, which

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was common in many states at that time, had been

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supplanted by new tough on crime laws. Grippin was abandoned

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in prison, forgotten, along with the rest of the so

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called Ten six lifers. There's no record of how many

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Ten six lifers died in prison. Now, after spending decades

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longer in prison than they were told to do, some

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of them are finally getting out. Coming home from prison

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is supposed to be a joyous celebration. What's your first

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meal going to be?

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Like?

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People ask what are you most excited for? Wasn't it

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nice to sleep in a bed in your own room?

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Grippin was happy to be out of prison, and he

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was grateful to the people that made it happen. He

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had started to give up hope of ever leaving in.

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Goal In even contemplated suicide, but he didn't exactly feel

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free either. The family members he was close to before

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he got locked up are now dead. He has no

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friends except for those he made in prison, and after

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getting out, Grippin was supprise to learn that he was

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required to register as a sex offender. Louisiana's sex offender

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registry didn't exist when he was arrested. This was yet

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another punishment tacked onto his sentence years later. I still

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feel like they.

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Got me locked down.

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Grippin, one of the six ten six lifers I met

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with in Louisiana this fall. I ain't no I was

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gonna feel this way, but I do. I feel sometimes

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like I'm in a world all by myself. I don't

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know nobody, I don't know where to go. The practice

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of releasing people with life sentences after ten years was

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implemented informally by him Refuquaw and Golah's warden from nineteen

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sixteen to nineteen twenty four, who went on to become

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the state's governor. It was a way to save money,

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but his idea was that this kind of a contract,

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that good behavior and following what's expected of you should

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result in release. A historian Raik o' hillier, who was

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writing a book about the prison system has become more

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harsh over time. Louisiana's ten and a half year minimum

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for life sentences, which was enshrined into law in nineteen

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twenty six, wasn't uniquely lenient. It was common in every state,

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including the federal system, that people who were sentenced to

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life wouldn't serve more than fifteen years. According to a historian,

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everyone was aware of it. It was routine, said Hilton Butler,

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an associate warden. He told the prison newspaper The Ngolite

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in nineteen eighty if a lifer kept his nose clean,

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he got out of prison after ten and a half years.

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I'd say, amos, ninety nine percent of all the lifers

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got out but in nineteen seventy two, the US Supreme

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Court temporarily halted the death penalty. No longer able to

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sendence people to death, Louisiana decided life sentences need to

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be more punitive. In nineteen seventy three, the state legislature

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required life sentences for murder to carry a twenty year

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minimum before parole eligibility. In nineteen seventy six, a legislature

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amended the minimum to forty years, and in nineteen seventy nine,

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lawmakers abolish parole eligibility for anyone with a life sentence,

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with the minimum sentences for life terms being lengthened and

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then eliminated. The culture became more punitive, and commissions for

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the Ten six lifers abruptly vanished. Some were even asked

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to hand over their old rap sheets, which noted the

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exact date at which they would have completed ten years

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in six months becoming eligible for release, in exchange for

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a modified sheet. As release dates for the Ten six

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Lifers faded away, most of these individuals were forgotten by

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an outside world until a recent push to free them.

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Many of Louisiana's judges, lawyers, and criminal justice reform advocates

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were not aware of the state's broken promise to those

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that were sentenced to life before nineteen seventy three. By

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the time Gripping got to Angola, observers were describing condition

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that shocked the conscious of any right thinking person and

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flagrantly violate basic constitutional requirements. As one district judge wrote

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in nineteen seventy five, it was a dangerous place to

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be incarcerated. In the early nineteen seventies, a ten to

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six lifer named James Preston was sent to work in

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the fields with his co defendant Larry. Shortly after they arrived,

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Larry was run over by a tractor and killed. Preston

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told his lawyer years later, because so many courts were

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destroyed during Hurricane Katrina. Preston told his lawyer this years later,

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and y'all, they don't have Larry's last name because court

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records were destroyed during Hurricane Katrina, and Preston's lawyers were

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unable to confirm Larry's last name. One of the many

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men president in Gola during this time was Lewis Mitchell.

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In the summer of nineteen sixty six, police stopped the

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nineteen year old black man on his way home in

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New Orleans. They claim there have been a burglary nearby

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and that he looked familiar. They took him to the

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fifth Precinct and asked if he knew a woman named Cynthia. Yeah,

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that's the girl I go with. He said, we don't

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allow and they used the N word to go to

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know white girl in Louisiana, Mitchell recalls him telling him.

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Mitchell was beaten, arrested, and accused of raping Cynthia. He

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was also charged with raping Linda, a sixty six year

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old white female. Mitchell said he didn't know from Adam

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and Eve. The evidence against Mitchell was weak. A medical

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examination of Cynthia on the day the police said she

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was raped did not reveal any evidence of recent trauma.

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The second women did not identify Mitchell as her assailant

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in a lineup, even when the police specifically asked her

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if he was the perpetrator. Mitchell didn't know any of

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that at the time. What he eventually learned, he said,

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was that Cynthia's mother disapproved of her daughter dating a

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black man, and that she had connections in the police department.

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Mitchell wanted to fight the charges but quickly realized doing

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so could cost him his life. Prosecutors told his lawyers

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that the best option year client has is to enter

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a guilty police because if he fights, he's gonna get

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the death penalty. Mitchell's ten to sixth release date was

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August seventeenth of nineteen seventy seven, and he still has

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a copy of his rap sheet to prove it. As

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the prospect of life outside Angola faded, Mitchell channeled his

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frustration into physical activity. He boxed some of the best

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fighters in the prison. He lifted weights, and he was

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crowned Mister Angola. He won fifty dollars competing in the

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Angola Radio, an activity that cost him one of his teeth.

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It didn't bother him, he said he was numb to pain.

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Gripping got to Angola shortly after Mitchell, but he mostly

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kept to himself. Tall and gaunt, Gripping spoke in a soft,

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deep voice. He described even his most horrific experiences in

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an even steady tone. I was scared when I first

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got there, Gripping said, I seen a lot of people

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get killed. One time, Grippin said he had to jump

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in the toilet to avoid being burned when someone started

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a fire in his cell. When Grippin was a kid,

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the woman who raised him sat down and told him

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she wasn't his biological mother. She took him in, she said,

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because his biological mother didn't want him. They were real,

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real poor, and sometimes he stole food so they had

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something to eat. He struggled in school and was in

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and out of juvenile detention. Grippin's only sister was killed

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by an abusive boyfriend, he said, and before she died,

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she encouraged him to get to New Orleans because she

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knew he liked jazz. He followed her guidance, but he

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was arrested shortly after he got there. He claimed he

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never raped anyone, but that he pleaded guilty to avoid execution.

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After twenty years, Grippin was convinced he'd never get out

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of prison. He resolved to get in shape and try

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to escape eight their fences in Gola, but the real

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barriers of the lakes and the dense trees that surround

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the prison. Grippin wanted to make an attempt anyway, What

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did he have to lose. If they catch me and

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kill me, they just kill me. If they don't kill me,

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I get away. I might get away, Am I not?

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He thought?

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A friend eventually talked him out of it, urging him

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instead to seek release through the courts, and Grippin agreed

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to try the path out of prison for gripping in

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some of the other Ten six Lifers began in a

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surprising place inside in Gola itself in nineteen ninety nine,

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Andrew Hundley and that's the guy we had on letting

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in Gola that I was referencing at the beginning of

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this episode. Andrew Hunley was sentenced to life in prison

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for a homicide he committed when he was fifteen. Faced

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with the prospect of spending the rest of his natural

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life behind bars at such a young age, Hunley began

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studying the history of life sentences. Learning about the Ten

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six Lifers was a devastating revelationation if even those who

234
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weren't supposed to spend their lives in prison had wound

235
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up doing so, he was certain he would never go home.

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Hunley was transferred to a goal in twenty fourteen and

237
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assigned to Camp F, the same dorm as Mitchell. Hunley

238
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slept in the bunk bed above another Ten six lifer

239
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named Lester Pearson, who had got to prison in nineteen

240
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sixty five, more than sixteen years before Hunley was born.

241
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Hunley grew particularly friendly with a lifer by the name

242
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of Kenneth Womack. Hunley played basketball, and he was often

243
00:15:34.039 --> 00:15:37.039
the only white guy on the court. Womack, who was

244
00:15:37.120 --> 00:15:41.799
also white, liked watching him play, cheering Larry Bird whenever

245
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Hunley would score. The court system proved useless for most

246
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ten six lifers. Few lawyers knew they existed, so they

247
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were left to file litigation on their own, and even

248
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when ten six lifers got their cases in front of

249
00:15:56.279 --> 00:16:01.360
sympathetic judges, there was not an obvious legal fix. They

250
00:16:01.360 --> 00:16:04.559
were never guaranteed release after ten years and six months,

251
00:16:04.559 --> 00:16:09.519
so it wasn't explicitly illegal to stop granting it. When

252
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Judge Nandy Campbell of the Orleans Parish Criminal District Court

253
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took office in January of twenty twenty one, she used

254
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the pandemic related pause in jury trials to catch up

255
00:16:20.279 --> 00:16:24.720
on post conviction applications. Grippin's application, which he filed without

256
00:16:24.759 --> 00:16:26.600
the help of a lawyer, was one of the first

257
00:16:26.639 --> 00:16:30.320
she read. He asked the judge to withdraw his guilty plea,

258
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arguing the state had not held up its end of

259
00:16:33.120 --> 00:16:37.159
the deal. Campbell was stunned by the order. Grippin described

260
00:16:37.799 --> 00:16:41.200
during all her years as a practicing defense lawyer, she

261
00:16:41.240 --> 00:16:43.440
had never heard of this kind of situation.

262
00:16:44.120 --> 00:16:45.120
The nation these.

263
00:16:45.000 --> 00:16:48.879
Men were forgotten is really real, Campbell said in an interview.

264
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She denied the request, believing she didn't have the authority

265
00:16:52.720 --> 00:16:54.879
to change his sentence, but she held on to his

266
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application because there was something about it that was haunting me, said.

267
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There was a small subset of ten six lifers for

268
00:17:03.919 --> 00:17:08.000
whom the court offered a glimmer of hope. In twenty twelve,

269
00:17:08.039 --> 00:17:11.720
the U. S. Supreme Court prohibited mandatory life without parole

270
00:17:11.799 --> 00:17:14.720
for people who had committed the crime before they were eighteen.

271
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The court cited research showing how parts of the brain

272
00:17:18.519 --> 00:17:22.319
responsible for impulse control and risk avoidance are not yet

273
00:17:22.400 --> 00:17:26.759
fully developed in adolescents, making them less deserving of the

274
00:17:26.799 --> 00:17:31.480
most extreme punishments. Weeks later, a ten six lifer named

275
00:17:31.519 --> 00:17:35.400
Henry Montgomery filed a motion to correct his sentence, which

276
00:17:35.440 --> 00:17:38.319
he argued was illegal in light of the Supreme Court's

277
00:17:38.359 --> 00:17:42.480
decision in nineteen sixty three, when Montgomery was seventeen, he

278
00:17:42.599 --> 00:17:46.000
was arrested for killing Charles Hurt, a white plain Closed

279
00:17:46.000 --> 00:17:48.960
sheriff's deputy in East Baton Rouge. News coverage at the

280
00:17:49.000 --> 00:17:53.559
time described Montgomery as a Negro student known as the Wolfman.

281
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Montgomery was convicted and sentenced to death. The Louisiana Supreme

282
00:17:58.519 --> 00:18:03.079
Court later overturned the conviction, citing racial prejudice. The trial

283
00:18:03.279 --> 00:18:06.880
had started on the newly created Charles Hurt Day, and

284
00:18:06.920 --> 00:18:10.359
there had been KKK activity ahead of the court proceedings.

285
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The Louisiana Supreme Court noted in its decision Montgomery was

286
00:18:15.039 --> 00:18:18.359
retried and sentenced to life. If life sentence is commuted

287
00:18:18.400 --> 00:18:21.480
by the governor to ten years and six months, subjects

288
00:18:21.559 --> 00:18:25.000
discharged date will be nine nineteen seventy nine. An old

289
00:18:25.079 --> 00:18:30.160
copy of Montgomery's rap sheet read. But by nineteen seventy

290
00:18:30.240 --> 00:18:33.240
nine the ten six law was gone and Montgomery was

291
00:18:33.319 --> 00:18:37.079
facing the rest of his life behind bars. Even without

292
00:18:37.079 --> 00:18:39.799
a pathway to freedom, Montgomery tried to make the most

293
00:18:39.839 --> 00:18:42.720
of his time at Angola. He wrote letters for men

294
00:18:42.759 --> 00:18:46.240
who were illiterate, and he helped start an education program

295
00:18:46.319 --> 00:18:49.799
for those with less than an eighth grade education. He

296
00:18:49.839 --> 00:18:54.519
created the Angola Amateur Boxing Association, judging matches and training

297
00:18:54.559 --> 00:18:57.640
others to box. He went to church and worked for

298
00:18:57.960 --> 00:19:02.400
years in the prison's silkscreas shop. Both the District Court

299
00:19:02.480 --> 00:19:06.559
and the Louisiana Supreme Court denied Montgomery's request to correct

300
00:19:06.599 --> 00:19:10.440
his sentence, claiming that the US Supreme Court's prohibition on

301
00:19:10.519 --> 00:19:15.880
mandatory life without parole for juveniles did not apply retroactively.

302
00:19:16.119 --> 00:19:18.920
Henry was kind of heartbroken when he first got denied,

303
00:19:19.079 --> 00:19:22.640
said Preston, the ten six lifer whose codefendant was killed

304
00:19:22.680 --> 00:19:25.920
shortly after he got to Angola. Remember he got ran

305
00:19:25.960 --> 00:19:29.440
over by the tractor. Preston, who was arrested at sixteen,

306
00:19:29.559 --> 00:19:32.599
went on to work at the prison's law library and

307
00:19:32.640 --> 00:19:36.839
followed Montgomery's case closely. Henry, this is not the end,

308
00:19:36.920 --> 00:19:40.039
Preston told Montgomery at the time. You got a chance.

309
00:19:40.119 --> 00:19:41.920
All you got to do is just hang in there.

310
00:19:42.519 --> 00:19:45.279
Montgomery challenged his sentence all the way up to the

311
00:19:45.359 --> 00:19:49.799
US Supreme Court, and in twenty sixteen he won. The

312
00:19:49.839 --> 00:19:53.240
court ruled that its prior ban on mandatory life without

313
00:19:53.240 --> 00:19:58.160
parole for juveniles applied retroactively. I can't even explain to

314
00:19:58.200 --> 00:20:01.200
you how happy a lot lot of cats was when

315
00:20:01.240 --> 00:20:05.559
they found out this case was retroactive, said Preston, I

316
00:20:05.720 --> 00:20:09.640
must jumped through the ceiling. Montgomery Supreme Court victory didn't

317
00:20:09.680 --> 00:20:12.480
guarantee his release, but it did mean that he, in

318
00:20:12.559 --> 00:20:15.720
thousands of others who had expected to die in prison,

319
00:20:15.759 --> 00:20:18.720
would get the chance to go before the parole board.

320
00:20:19.000 --> 00:20:22.400
In June of twenty sixteen, Hunley became the first juvenile

321
00:20:22.519 --> 00:20:25.920
lifer in Louisiana to be released as a result of

322
00:20:25.960 --> 00:20:29.200
the Montgomery decision. I got a break for a lack

323
00:20:29.240 --> 00:20:31.960
of a better term, he said. He applied for parole

324
00:20:32.000 --> 00:20:35.559
with the help of a skilled parole lawyer, almost immediately

325
00:20:35.680 --> 00:20:40.519
after the Supreme Court news. The Parole board unanimously voted

326
00:20:40.519 --> 00:20:43.119
to release him, and he walked out of Angola after

327
00:20:43.240 --> 00:20:47.039
nineteen years in prison. The following year, the state passed

328
00:20:47.079 --> 00:20:50.319
a law creating a twenty five year minimum before any

329
00:20:50.400 --> 00:20:54.160
juvenile lifer could go before the parole board. Once released,

330
00:20:54.240 --> 00:20:57.359
Hunley was free to leave Angola behind and never return,

331
00:20:57.720 --> 00:21:01.240
but he thought of Pierson, his former bunkman. Certainly he

332
00:21:01.319 --> 00:21:03.960
watched me go home and had to wonder to himself,

333
00:21:04.400 --> 00:21:06.640
how is this guy going home and I'm still here.

334
00:21:07.519 --> 00:21:10.319
So he made it his job to go back for

335
00:21:10.400 --> 00:21:14.240
those he left behind. Hunley is the first to point

336
00:21:14.279 --> 00:21:17.400
out the unfairness of him getting out before others who

337
00:21:17.400 --> 00:21:19.680
have been locked up for much longer, and I concur

338
00:21:19.759 --> 00:21:22.759
with that. He said that on our show he has

339
00:21:23.200 --> 00:21:28.200
a very guilty conscious about He just can't make sense

340
00:21:28.200 --> 00:21:29.799
of the fact that he was the first one to

341
00:21:29.799 --> 00:21:33.400
get out of there Moss. After his release, he helped

342
00:21:33.440 --> 00:21:37.279
start the Louisiana Parole Project, a nonprofit that works to

343
00:21:37.359 --> 00:21:40.359
free people who have been incarcerated for twenty plus years

344
00:21:40.759 --> 00:21:45.240
and have demonstrated their rehabilitation. In the past five years,

345
00:21:45.319 --> 00:21:47.960
the nonprofit has helped get more than two hundred and

346
00:21:48.000 --> 00:21:51.680
thirty people out of prison in parole hearings. Hunley commits

347
00:21:51.759 --> 00:21:55.839
to providing long term support to anyone granted release by

348
00:21:55.839 --> 00:22:00.440
the Parole Board. Hunley's post prison life makes this case

349
00:22:00.480 --> 00:22:04.400
for second chances. Since his release, he earned his bachelor's

350
00:22:04.400 --> 00:22:08.519
degree and master's degree, helped start a nonprofit, got married,

351
00:22:08.559 --> 00:22:11.240
and bought a house. He and his wife have two

352
00:22:11.319 --> 00:22:15.119
pugs and are expecting their first child. He speaks fast

353
00:22:15.200 --> 00:22:18.799
and works long hours as if making up for lost time.

354
00:22:18.839 --> 00:22:22.480
And y'all, that's a total fact that guy has sat

355
00:22:22.519 --> 00:22:25.119
across from me where I'm recording right now, and I

356
00:22:25.160 --> 00:22:28.720
will tell you, you would never know that guy spent

357
00:22:28.960 --> 00:22:32.079
twenty years in prison, one of the sharpest individuals I've

358
00:22:32.079 --> 00:22:37.839
probably ever met, and looks like a bank executive. You

359
00:22:37.920 --> 00:22:42.319
would never know. The Parole Board is mostly staffed by

360
00:22:42.359 --> 00:22:45.279
people who have been incarcerated. Several of them are the

361
00:22:45.319 --> 00:22:49.720
group's of former clients. Then in firsthand the unexpected challenges

362
00:22:49.759 --> 00:22:52.640
of re entering society after a long stint in prison,

363
00:22:53.279 --> 00:22:55.640
and they applied those lessons to their work. One of

364
00:22:55.640 --> 00:22:59.279
the first things the Parole Project staffers do after picking

365
00:22:59.319 --> 00:23:03.519
someone up from Angola is take them shopping for clothing groceries.

366
00:23:03.960 --> 00:23:07.000
The idea is to make sure they have the basic necessities,

367
00:23:07.119 --> 00:23:11.000
but also to help them get comfortable with being around others,

368
00:23:11.559 --> 00:23:17.319
choosing between infinite brands of toothpaste, and navigating the checkout process.

369
00:23:17.920 --> 00:23:21.680
The Parole Project owns eight properties that can provide free

370
00:23:21.680 --> 00:23:25.559
transitional housing to twenty seven people. It also has nine

371
00:23:25.759 --> 00:23:28.480
one bedroom condos that it rents to people who can

372
00:23:28.519 --> 00:23:31.319
afford housing but struggle to find a landlord who will

373
00:23:31.359 --> 00:23:35.480
rent to someone with felony convictions. The group offers classes

374
00:23:35.519 --> 00:23:38.680
on life skills their clients may have missed by spending

375
00:23:38.720 --> 00:23:42.519
so long in prisent financial literacy, social norms, how to

376
00:23:42.519 --> 00:23:44.480
get a job, how to use the cell phone, and

377
00:23:44.559 --> 00:23:48.440
how to avoid online scams. There's also a class on

378
00:23:48.559 --> 00:23:53.160
how to interact with the police. For many formerly incarceorted people,

379
00:23:53.640 --> 00:23:57.720
their last experience with the police wasn't that good. And

380
00:23:57.839 --> 00:24:01.279
let me say this, y'all, a very important program. Look,

381
00:24:01.319 --> 00:24:04.559
these people, you know, people get out of prison. The

382
00:24:04.640 --> 00:24:08.359
recidivism rate is much lower when they know how to

383
00:24:08.440 --> 00:24:11.279
deal with life on the outside. And that is what

384
00:24:11.720 --> 00:24:15.519
the Louisiana Parole Project figured out. And they're just they're

385
00:24:15.559 --> 00:24:20.279
just basically teaching them how to acclimate back into society.

386
00:24:20.839 --> 00:24:24.240
And let me tell you, the recidivism rate for someone

387
00:24:24.279 --> 00:24:29.079
that goes through the Parole Project is like two percent.

388
00:24:29.200 --> 00:24:33.200
It's extremely low. And there's a reason for that. It's

389
00:24:33.240 --> 00:24:38.000
because these people help them assimilate back into society. But

390
00:24:38.079 --> 00:24:41.119
even as the Parole Project has helped hundreds of people

391
00:24:41.119 --> 00:24:43.599
get out of prison, most of the ten six lifers

392
00:24:43.720 --> 00:24:47.319
remain out of reach. The only ones eligible for parole

393
00:24:47.400 --> 00:24:50.079
were a handful who were younger than eighteen at the

394
00:24:50.119 --> 00:24:53.880
time of the offense. Even Montgomery, whose landmark Supreme Court

395
00:24:53.920 --> 00:24:58.000
case provided second chances to so many others, was repeatedly

396
00:24:58.279 --> 00:25:02.599
denied parole. But in December of twenty twenty, Jason Williams

397
00:25:02.640 --> 00:25:06.240
won the Orleans Parish District Attorney race with a decisive

398
00:25:06.319 --> 00:25:11.079
fifteen percentage point lead. Williams, a former criminal defense lawyer

399
00:25:11.119 --> 00:25:14.599
and city councilman, ran as a progressive prosecutor and promised

400
00:25:14.640 --> 00:25:18.519
to create civil rights divisions to review old cases involving

401
00:25:18.559 --> 00:25:23.920
misconduct over harsh sentences. He recruited his longtime friend Emily

402
00:25:24.079 --> 00:25:27.240
mal from the Innocence Project in New Orleans to head

403
00:25:27.279 --> 00:25:31.039
that division. Maul agreed to it on the condition that

404
00:25:31.119 --> 00:25:33.920
she would have the resources and encouragement to look in

405
00:25:34.079 --> 00:25:37.400
every vestige of the astrocities and harms that were caused

406
00:25:37.440 --> 00:25:39.680
by the DA's office to the people of the city.

407
00:25:39.880 --> 00:25:42.519
Williams said in an interview, it wouldn't be enough to

408
00:25:42.599 --> 00:25:45.839
promise to do better going forward. They needed to be

409
00:25:46.279 --> 00:25:50.319
thorough reckoning with the sins of the past. Williams wasn't

410
00:25:50.359 --> 00:25:53.640
familiar with the ten six Lifers when he was first elected,

411
00:25:53.880 --> 00:25:57.200
but Mall was. Back in two thousand and six, Innocence

412
00:25:57.240 --> 00:26:00.400
Project New Orleans helped to exonerate a black ten six

413
00:26:00.599 --> 00:26:04.240
lifer who was wrongfully convicted of raping a white teenager

414
00:26:04.319 --> 00:26:06.519
when he was also a teen It's the kind of

415
00:26:06.519 --> 00:26:09.519
thing that when you learn about it in the context

416
00:26:09.519 --> 00:26:12.920
of somebody telling you I was promised this thing and

417
00:26:12.960 --> 00:26:16.559
then they changed it, it forever affected me, Maul said

418
00:26:16.759 --> 00:26:19.359
in an interview. Hunley was selected to be part of

419
00:26:19.400 --> 00:26:23.319
a transition Team working group for the incoming DA. We

420
00:26:23.440 --> 00:26:28.039
can't have a conversation in Louisiana about mass incarceration without

421
00:26:28.079 --> 00:26:30.920
talking about the ten six lifers, he said. During the

422
00:26:31.000 --> 00:26:35.119
first meeting, everyone said, what's a ten six lifer? Hunley

423
00:26:35.400 --> 00:26:38.720
later recalled, y'all I was one of those people, right.

424
00:26:39.640 --> 00:26:43.160
Hunley explained the history and talked about the ten six lifers.

425
00:26:43.200 --> 00:26:47.640
He knew Williams had jurisdiction over only about eighteen of

426
00:26:47.680 --> 00:26:51.319
those who had been sentenced in that system in New Orleans,

427
00:26:51.960 --> 00:26:55.759
but by early twenty twenty one, his office has committed

428
00:26:55.839 --> 00:26:59.240
to taking a look at each of those cases. Grippin

429
00:26:59.279 --> 00:27:01.839
didn't know about the new DA's plans, and he was

430
00:27:01.960 --> 00:27:05.480
losing hope. He prayed every night and sometimes during the

431
00:27:05.519 --> 00:27:09.599
day too, for a way out of Angola. The things

432
00:27:09.640 --> 00:27:12.440
I've seen over the years, it spooped me, he said.

433
00:27:12.680 --> 00:27:15.759
I had nightmares about it, hollering in my sleep, waking

434
00:27:15.759 --> 00:27:20.319
people up in the dorms, but they understood why. Last spring,

435
00:27:20.359 --> 00:27:22.319
a staffer at the prison told him to go to

436
00:27:22.359 --> 00:27:25.400
the office because he had a phone call. Griffin was

437
00:27:25.440 --> 00:27:28.960
taken Aback. I got a phone call. I ain't know

438
00:27:29.160 --> 00:27:32.640
I was that popular, he said, wondering who could possibly

439
00:27:32.680 --> 00:27:35.519
be trying to reach him. When he picked up the phone,

440
00:27:35.680 --> 00:27:39.720
Hunley was waiting on the other end of the line. Leroy,

441
00:27:39.839 --> 00:27:42.640
I know you don't know me, Hunley said, but I

442
00:27:42.720 --> 00:27:46.039
want to help you. Soon after that call, Hunley and

443
00:27:46.160 --> 00:27:48.839
several of his colleagues went to Angola to meet with

444
00:27:48.880 --> 00:27:51.680
about a dozen of the ten six lifers who were

445
00:27:51.680 --> 00:27:56.640
convicted in Orleans Parish and were under Williams's jurisdiction. They

446
00:27:56.680 --> 00:27:59.359
met at the prison chapel, where the ten six lifers

447
00:27:59.400 --> 00:28:02.400
filled the pees and Hunley stood at the pulpit. There

448
00:28:02.440 --> 00:28:05.440
was a new district attorney, Hunley explained, and he was

449
00:28:05.519 --> 00:28:10.440
interested in reviewing their sentences. Hunley spoke deliberately, being careful

450
00:28:10.480 --> 00:28:14.319
not to overpromise. Nothing was guaranteed. He said, there would

451
00:28:14.359 --> 00:28:17.319
be victim outreach and a judge would have to sign

452
00:28:17.319 --> 00:28:21.119
off on any resentencing agreements. But for the first time

453
00:28:21.200 --> 00:28:24.559
in decades, there was cause for hope to gripping. This

454
00:28:24.720 --> 00:28:28.279
news was nothing short of divine intervention. Out of all

455
00:28:28.400 --> 00:28:30.680
the people in the prison, they found his name and

456
00:28:30.759 --> 00:28:34.240
chose to help. God went to them to come to me,

457
00:28:34.640 --> 00:28:38.319
he said. I appreciate it from my heart, he told

458
00:28:38.319 --> 00:28:41.400
the staff at the Parole Project, because if it wasn't

459
00:28:41.440 --> 00:28:44.480
for y'all, if I didn't run away from here, I

460
00:28:44.519 --> 00:28:47.400
would have committed suicide. I would have hung myself. The

461
00:28:47.480 --> 00:28:51.559
process for freeing ten six lifers was straightforward. Their lawyer

462
00:28:51.599 --> 00:28:54.839
at the Parole Project and the DA's office would sign

463
00:28:54.880 --> 00:28:57.839
on to a joint post conviction plea agreement asking you

464
00:28:57.960 --> 00:29:00.960
judge to vacate the existing life's sentence and replace it

465
00:29:01.000 --> 00:29:04.119
with the Senate shorter than the amount of time already served.

466
00:29:04.160 --> 00:29:06.920
Grippin will be the first test case of this process,

467
00:29:07.119 --> 00:29:09.400
along with Mitchell, who was still hanging on to his

468
00:29:09.440 --> 00:29:12.440
old rap sheet with that original promise from the state

469
00:29:12.640 --> 00:29:16.640
for an orderly release. Days before the hearing, Hunley ran

470
00:29:16.839 --> 00:29:20.640
into an unexpected hurdle. Staff and in Gola couldn't find

471
00:29:20.839 --> 00:29:25.279
a birth certificate for Leroy Griffin or any indication that

472
00:29:25.359 --> 00:29:29.400
he existed before he was arrested. When Hunley called to

473
00:29:29.440 --> 00:29:34.599
talk about it, Griffin offered a matter of fact explanation, Oh, well,

474
00:29:35.240 --> 00:29:38.599
my name is not Leroy Grippin. My name is Willie Ingram.

475
00:29:38.839 --> 00:29:42.359
As it turned out, when he was arrested in nineteen seventy,

476
00:29:42.400 --> 00:29:46.440
he gave the cops a fake name, Leroy Griffin, hoping

477
00:29:46.480 --> 00:29:49.839
they wouldn't find his record of stealing in Florida, where

478
00:29:49.880 --> 00:29:50.440
he grew up.

479
00:29:50.480 --> 00:29:50.759
Poor.

480
00:29:51.519 --> 00:29:56.279
The cops mishurt him and wrote Leroy Griffin that name

481
00:29:56.440 --> 00:29:59.960
following him through the courts and into Angola.

482
00:30:00.039 --> 00:30:01.720
That is absolutely crazy, y'all.

483
00:30:02.559 --> 00:30:05.839
On a Tuesday morning in early October, about a dozen

484
00:30:05.880 --> 00:30:09.319
of Mitchell's family members filed into the New Orleans courtroom.

485
00:30:09.680 --> 00:30:13.640
Because of COVID nineteen restrictions, Mitchell would participate by a

486
00:30:13.720 --> 00:30:16.880
video conference, but his family still wanted to come to

487
00:30:17.000 --> 00:30:20.359
court as a show of support. One of the relatives

488
00:30:20.519 --> 00:30:24.160
in the courtroom was Mitchell's niece, Lucille Johnson, who was

489
00:30:24.200 --> 00:30:28.079
a toddler when he was arrested. She had no memories

490
00:30:28.119 --> 00:30:30.759
of her uncle outside of prison, but she doesn't remember

491
00:30:30.799 --> 00:30:34.079
the day of his arrest, specifically how hard it was

492
00:30:34.119 --> 00:30:37.119
to see her mother in so much pain. Growing up.

493
00:30:37.240 --> 00:30:41.400
Johnson's mom and grandmother held a community supper fundraiser to

494
00:30:41.480 --> 00:30:44.680
hire a lawyer, but nothing in the lawyers did work.

495
00:30:45.000 --> 00:30:48.440
In a joint plea agreement, Mitchell's lawyer, Jane Hogan and

496
00:30:48.559 --> 00:30:52.519
assistant da Buildish Sarma, asked Campbell to resent it to

497
00:30:52.559 --> 00:30:55.200
him to forty years. It was less time than he

498
00:30:55.240 --> 00:30:57.440
had already served, so he would be able to get

499
00:30:57.480 --> 00:31:01.160
out immediately, but under the condemnt that he forfeited his

500
00:31:01.279 --> 00:31:04.680
right to seek additional relief In court, they cited the

501
00:31:04.680 --> 00:31:08.359
state's betrayal of the ten six promise and Mitchell's good

502
00:31:08.400 --> 00:31:12.960
conduct while incarcerated, his comprehensive reentry plan. Studies showed that

503
00:31:13.000 --> 00:31:16.319
people typically age out of crime, and the cost of

504
00:31:16.359 --> 00:31:21.720
imprisoning someone his age more than seventy seven thousand.

505
00:31:21.200 --> 00:31:22.039
Dollars a year.

506
00:31:23.000 --> 00:31:25.880
It had taken Mitchell decades just to get someone in

507
00:31:26.000 --> 00:31:29.519
a position of power to recognize his existence. Now Here,

508
00:31:29.559 --> 00:31:33.160
in court, a prosecutor was arguing for his freedom and

509
00:31:33.240 --> 00:31:35.920
a judge was tearing up listening to what he had

510
00:31:35.960 --> 00:31:40.319
been through. Then the judge ruled Campbell agreed to the

511
00:31:40.359 --> 00:31:44.559
plea agreement, and he was free. The hearing was mostly procedural,

512
00:31:44.920 --> 00:31:47.359
and the whole event took about a half an hour,

513
00:31:47.960 --> 00:31:51.880
but for Mitchell, the experience was profound. It seemed to

514
00:31:51.920 --> 00:31:56.240
me like she seen my innocence. Mitchell said, I feel

515
00:31:56.279 --> 00:31:59.799
like she knew it was Joyfully said, I never thought

516
00:32:00.160 --> 00:32:04.720
nobody gonna see my innocence. Ingram, whose resentencing paperwork still

517
00:32:04.839 --> 00:32:09.240
named him as Leroy Grippin, went next. The courtroom emptied

518
00:32:09.240 --> 00:32:12.640
out except for the Parole Project's staff. It went from

519
00:32:12.680 --> 00:32:16.480
a celebration to this more I don't want to say somber,

520
00:32:16.559 --> 00:32:18.480
but it was sort of matter of fact, and then

521
00:32:18.519 --> 00:32:22.880
it was over. Hunley said. Ingram was free too. Hunley

522
00:32:22.920 --> 00:32:26.559
in the Parole Project Deputy director Carrie Myers picked Mitchell

523
00:32:26.599 --> 00:32:29.359
and Ingram up that afternoon took them to Baton Ridge,

524
00:32:29.400 --> 00:32:33.400
where they would live in one of the Parole Project's townhomes.

525
00:32:35.119 --> 00:32:38.200
This is just something you can't describe in words. Words

526
00:32:38.240 --> 00:32:41.200
can't fit it, Mitchell said during a fun interview in

527
00:32:41.279 --> 00:32:43.960
the car that day. You look back at so many

528
00:32:44.119 --> 00:32:46.960
that deserve an opportunity like this and can't get it,

529
00:32:47.319 --> 00:32:51.079
so you got bittersweet and happiness all together. So you're

530
00:32:51.079 --> 00:32:55.599
only sitting in a conglomeration of feelings. They've done a

531
00:32:55.640 --> 00:32:58.519
wonderful job getting me out of Angola. I'm not going

532
00:32:58.599 --> 00:33:02.160
to mess up their reputation through stupidity. If anything, I'm

533
00:33:02.200 --> 00:33:05.720
going to help their cause. Even after watching Mitchell and

534
00:33:05.920 --> 00:33:09.200
Ingram leave Angola, Lester Pearson didn't think his day would

535
00:33:09.240 --> 00:33:12.400
ever come. He knew better than to get his hopes up.

536
00:33:12.480 --> 00:33:15.519
Spending that many years in prison had taught him the

537
00:33:15.559 --> 00:33:19.799
precariousness of things that were supposed to be near certain.

538
00:33:20.279 --> 00:33:23.559
His life had been dictated by the whims and inclinations

539
00:33:23.559 --> 00:33:26.640
of people more powerful than him, who were motivated by

540
00:33:26.680 --> 00:33:32.240
factors outside of his control. On Tuesday, October nineteenth, that

541
00:33:32.319 --> 00:33:36.880
person was Robin Pittman, the Orleans Parish Criminal District judge

542
00:33:36.920 --> 00:33:41.440
presiding over his resentencing hearing. Pearson, who was eighty four,

543
00:33:41.920 --> 00:33:45.599
participated in the hearing through a video conference from Angola.

544
00:33:45.839 --> 00:33:50.680
He had been in prison for nearly fifty seven years. Hogan,

545
00:33:50.720 --> 00:33:53.599
the Parole Project lawyer, had briefed him on the joint

546
00:33:53.599 --> 00:33:56.559
Plea agreement, so he knew what to expect, but he

547
00:33:56.599 --> 00:33:59.799
couldn't make out every word. In the hearing, Pittman announced

548
00:33:59.839 --> 00:34:03.279
her decision to vacate Pearson's life sentence and then resentenced

549
00:34:03.319 --> 00:34:06.400
him to fifty five years, which was two years fewer

550
00:34:06.400 --> 00:34:10.280
than he had already completed. She wished him good luck

551
00:34:10.280 --> 00:34:12.760
and encouraged him to make use of what he learned

552
00:34:12.800 --> 00:34:17.199
during his time in prison. Yes, ma'am, Pearson responded, thank you, ma'am.

553
00:34:17.920 --> 00:34:21.840
As a formality, she asked Pierson to raise his right

554
00:34:21.880 --> 00:34:24.760
hand and confirm he understood the terms of the agreement.

555
00:34:25.360 --> 00:34:29.199
At one point, Pearson said he wasn't following, so Pittman

556
00:34:29.320 --> 00:34:32.440
repeated the terms of the agreement. The judge asked him

557
00:34:32.440 --> 00:34:35.760
if he understood, Yes, ma'am. He said, I understood some

558
00:34:35.920 --> 00:34:40.159
of it. Hogan interjected, explaining to him that he had

559
00:34:40.239 --> 00:34:47.000
to agree he wouldn't file anything in court. No, Pearson exclaimed,

560
00:34:47.280 --> 00:34:50.960
I understand. How many years did I give you? Pittman asked,

561
00:34:51.679 --> 00:34:55.239
I believe you said forty, Pierson said, citing the number

562
00:34:55.280 --> 00:34:58.320
Hogan and Sarma had proposed in the joint plea agreement

563
00:34:58.760 --> 00:35:02.159
he had reviewed a the hearing. He wasn't positive what

564
00:35:02.360 --> 00:35:04.719
number the judge landed on. He just knew it was

565
00:35:04.840 --> 00:35:08.639
less than the time he had already done. Pittman told

566
00:35:08.719 --> 00:35:11.400
him she didn't say anything close to forty and then

567
00:35:11.480 --> 00:35:14.920
she didn't like to repeat herself. I'm getting frustrated, she said,

568
00:35:14.960 --> 00:35:17.840
and suggested they push the hearing to the next day.

569
00:35:18.719 --> 00:35:22.559
Hugan told the judge she believed her client understood the

570
00:35:22.679 --> 00:35:25.039
terms of the deal. He was just having a hard

571
00:35:25.039 --> 00:35:29.199
time hearing. But Pittman wasn't obligated to ensure that Pearson

572
00:35:29.360 --> 00:35:32.280
was aware of what he was green to, and she

573
00:35:32.480 --> 00:35:37.159
was losing patience At that moment. It seemed to Pearson,

574
00:35:37.239 --> 00:35:40.280
who had refused to get his hopes up, he would

575
00:35:40.280 --> 00:35:44.960
not be leaving Angola that day after all. Hugan requested

576
00:35:45.000 --> 00:35:49.079
a moment for a private call with Pearson. When they returned,

577
00:35:49.199 --> 00:35:52.679
Pierson carefully recited the terms of the plea deal. Well,

578
00:35:52.920 --> 00:35:57.159
Pittman said, I guess that's it. Peerson would walk free

579
00:35:57.559 --> 00:36:01.719
later that day. The week before Thanksgiving, the five ten

580
00:36:01.800 --> 00:36:04.199
six lifers who had got out of prison agreed to

581
00:36:04.199 --> 00:36:07.800
meet with me. They were staying in Baton Rouge and

582
00:36:07.920 --> 00:36:10.880
y'all way. When I say me, I mean the person

583
00:36:10.920 --> 00:36:13.480
that wrote this article that I referenced at the beginning,

584
00:36:14.199 --> 00:36:17.000
they were staying in Baton Roudge in two townhomes owned

585
00:36:17.039 --> 00:36:19.840
by the Parole Project about a half mile from each other.

586
00:36:20.400 --> 00:36:23.800
There are weekly house meetings where they were debriefed by

587
00:36:23.880 --> 00:36:27.800
adjusting to their new situation. They were welcome to stay

588
00:36:27.840 --> 00:36:30.480
in the townhomes for as long as they wanted, Hunley

589
00:36:30.559 --> 00:36:33.159
told them, but some were eager to move on and

590
00:36:33.199 --> 00:36:36.920
settled down closer to their families. The ease of their

591
00:36:36.960 --> 00:36:41.199
transitions varied depending on their ties to the outside world.

592
00:36:42.079 --> 00:36:45.079
Womac was already part of a tight knit church community,

593
00:36:45.760 --> 00:36:48.400
and during his first several weeks in freedom, members of

594
00:36:48.400 --> 00:36:51.000
the church took him fishing into shop for a suit

595
00:36:51.119 --> 00:36:54.679
and dress clothes. They offered to host him for Thanksgiving dinner.

596
00:36:54.760 --> 00:36:57.599
He was looking forward to moving into the spare room

597
00:36:57.719 --> 00:37:01.280
in his brother's house in Tennessee. The speed of modern

598
00:37:01.360 --> 00:37:04.760
vehicles scared Womack, though, and he was still figuring out

599
00:37:04.840 --> 00:37:08.199
how to use a smartphone, but overall things were good.

600
00:37:08.920 --> 00:37:12.360
It's sensational, Womack set of being out of prison. Every day,

601
00:37:12.400 --> 00:37:16.000
I'm overjoyed and really taking it in and enjoying it.

602
00:37:16.719 --> 00:37:21.360
For Mitchell, every weekend was a family rein after everything

603
00:37:21.400 --> 00:37:24.800
he still smiled easily and was quick to crack a joke.

604
00:37:25.599 --> 00:37:28.639
In November, his family rented a banquet halt and threw

605
00:37:28.679 --> 00:37:32.639
a surprise birthday party. For his seventy fifth birthday, they

606
00:37:32.679 --> 00:37:35.599
pinned cash through the lapel of his suit jacket, a

607
00:37:35.599 --> 00:37:41.000
New Orleans tradition, and surprised him with a car. My family,

608
00:37:41.239 --> 00:37:43.199
I didn't know they had so much love for me,

609
00:37:43.360 --> 00:37:46.480
Mitchell said. It's like the time they wanted to see me,

610
00:37:46.719 --> 00:37:49.719
they couldn't see me, and they see me now they're

611
00:37:49.800 --> 00:37:53.320
pouring it all on me. They're throwing me all the

612
00:37:53.400 --> 00:37:56.920
love they had pin up on me. Things were harder

613
00:37:56.920 --> 00:37:59.519
for Ingram. When he walked out of Ingola, he had

614
00:37:59.559 --> 00:38:02.800
no offense record of existence. It had been more than

615
00:38:02.840 --> 00:38:05.960
a month since his release, and the Parole Project staffer

616
00:38:06.079 --> 00:38:10.159
still hadn't been able to track down any identifying documentation.

617
00:38:10.559 --> 00:38:13.679
They had applied for birth certificate records in Louisiana and

618
00:38:13.679 --> 00:38:17.280
Florida under different variations of the name Willie Ingram, but

619
00:38:17.400 --> 00:38:20.559
hadn't been able to get a response. It's like screaming

620
00:38:20.599 --> 00:38:25.679
into outer space, Hundley said. It seemed possible that after

621
00:38:25.800 --> 00:38:29.519
experiencing so much trauma in living under a false name

622
00:38:29.559 --> 00:38:32.440
for so long in his life, Ingram might not actually

623
00:38:32.480 --> 00:38:35.559
know his birth name. Without a birth certificate, Ingram couldn't

624
00:38:35.559 --> 00:38:38.440
get an ID card a security number, which meant he

625
00:38:38.440 --> 00:38:41.559
couldn't apply for food stamps or housing assistance. He even

626
00:38:41.639 --> 00:38:43.920
risk being turned away at a pharmacy if he went

627
00:38:44.000 --> 00:38:47.280
to pick up medication. He tried to stay busy to

628
00:38:47.360 --> 00:38:49.920
keep his mind from wandering, but he felt limited in

629
00:38:50.039 --> 00:38:52.360
what he could do. He wanted to go see a movie.

630
00:38:52.400 --> 00:38:54.559
He wanted to go to a restaurant, but he didn't

631
00:38:54.559 --> 00:38:57.519
have any money. He got lost trying to go for

632
00:38:57.559 --> 00:39:00.000
a run, and he didn't know how to use it

633
00:39:00.199 --> 00:39:03.559
navigation app on his phone. He ended up walking into

634
00:39:03.599 --> 00:39:06.360
a restaurant, explaining that he just got out of prison

635
00:39:06.480 --> 00:39:07.760
and needed to find.

636
00:39:07.480 --> 00:39:09.360
His way home. Oh my gosh.

637
00:39:09.639 --> 00:39:12.639
He wanted a friend, someone he didn't know from prison,

638
00:39:12.719 --> 00:39:14.719
but he doesn't know how to meet one. He wants

639
00:39:14.760 --> 00:39:16.840
to get his high school diploma and maybe even go

640
00:39:16.960 --> 00:39:19.199
to college, but he doesn't know where to start as

641
00:39:19.239 --> 00:39:22.039
a registered sex offender. He's worried he might get in

642
00:39:22.199 --> 00:39:24.039
trouble if he goes to the library.

643
00:39:24.559 --> 00:39:25.320
What can I do?

644
00:39:26.360 --> 00:39:30.039
What do they want from me? Mitchell also had to

645
00:39:30.079 --> 00:39:33.199
register as a sex offender, a painful reminder that although

646
00:39:33.239 --> 00:39:36.679
he was no longer in prison, he was not officially vindicated.

647
00:39:37.119 --> 00:39:39.960
The only way for him to attain formal recognition of

648
00:39:40.000 --> 00:39:43.519
his innocence would be through an executive pardon. It's like

649
00:39:43.719 --> 00:39:47.000
kidnapping me, Mitchell said of the registry. I'm free one way,

650
00:39:47.239 --> 00:39:50.960
but I'm not really free. Hunley usually commutes between the

651
00:39:51.000 --> 00:39:53.840
Parole Project office in Baton Rege and his home in

652
00:39:53.880 --> 00:39:57.159
New Orleans, but on November sixteenth, he spent the night

653
00:39:57.280 --> 00:39:59.679
in a vacant room in one of the Parole Projects

654
00:39:59.719 --> 00:40:03.239
trans positional houses in Baton Ridge. The next day was

655
00:40:03.239 --> 00:40:05.760
an important one and he couldn't rest a traffic jam

656
00:40:05.920 --> 00:40:08.480
making him late. By then, he had helped get five

657
00:40:08.679 --> 00:40:11.880
ten six lifers out of prison and had assurances that

658
00:40:12.039 --> 00:40:15.599
more were on the way home. But Montgomery, the man

659
00:40:15.639 --> 00:40:18.800
who made huntleyes for it impossible, was still at Angola.

660
00:40:19.400 --> 00:40:23.159
Because he was convicted in East Batonrige Parish, Williams couldn't

661
00:40:23.239 --> 00:40:27.800
touch his case since his Supreme Court victory. Montgomery had

662
00:40:27.800 --> 00:40:31.400
gone before the three member Parole Board twice to request

663
00:40:31.440 --> 00:40:34.599
a second chance, but failed to get the required unanimous

664
00:40:34.679 --> 00:40:38.599
vote both times. The first time in twenty eighteen, one

665
00:40:38.639 --> 00:40:41.760
board member voted in his favor, but two others claimed

666
00:40:42.199 --> 00:40:46.800
he hadn't taken enough classes to deserve release. This was

667
00:40:46.880 --> 00:40:52.519
a nonsensical rationale. Montgomery had completed the requisite one hundred

668
00:40:52.559 --> 00:40:55.800
hours of programming, even though Angola didn't offer classes for

669
00:40:55.840 --> 00:40:59.760
the first thirty years of imprisonment. Still, Montgomery looked for

670
00:40:59.760 --> 00:41:02.320
more classes to take and stay out of trouble. But

671
00:41:02.440 --> 00:41:05.880
in twenty nineteen, the Parole Board denied him a second time,

672
00:41:06.000 --> 00:41:09.519
this time with only one descenting vote. He still hadn't

673
00:41:09.559 --> 00:41:13.760
taken enough classes, claimed Brennan Kelsey, the lone no vote.

674
00:41:13.920 --> 00:41:17.400
I think that's a lack of maturity, Kelsey told Montgomery,

675
00:41:17.400 --> 00:41:23.199
who was then seventy two. Montgomery's third parole Board hearing

676
00:41:23.280 --> 00:41:26.079
was on November seventeenth, and this time Hunley had a

677
00:41:26.079 --> 00:41:29.639
good feeling about it. Montgomery had completed more classes and

678
00:41:29.760 --> 00:41:33.280
the optics of continuing to imprison this aging man were

679
00:41:33.320 --> 00:41:38.440
becoming increasingly untenable. By then, roughly eight hundred juvenile lifers

680
00:41:38.440 --> 00:41:41.000
had been released from prison as the result of the

681
00:41:41.000 --> 00:41:45.239
Montgomery decision. Hunley had spoken at hundreds of parole hearings,

682
00:41:45.639 --> 00:41:49.239
but still he stayed up until two am preparing for Montgomery's.

683
00:41:50.079 --> 00:41:52.639
Just before nine am, Hunley sat down in front of

684
00:41:52.639 --> 00:41:55.880
his laptop at a granite table in the Parole Project

685
00:41:55.920 --> 00:41:59.079
conference room, wearing a gray suit and a purple tie.

686
00:41:59.239 --> 00:42:03.119
The walls are decked created with portraits of formerly incarcerated

687
00:42:03.159 --> 00:42:06.119
Parole Project clients and a hand painted sign by the

688
00:42:06.119 --> 00:42:11.199
New Orleans Artists that said believe in Second Chances. Behind

689
00:42:11.280 --> 00:42:15.079
Hunley sat several former juvenile lifers who were also free

690
00:42:15.280 --> 00:42:19.440
by Montgomery's case. This was so deeply personal for all

691
00:42:19.480 --> 00:42:22.679
of them. Hunley joined the video call for the hearing,

692
00:42:22.800 --> 00:42:25.840
and the room fell silent, with all eyes locked on

693
00:42:25.880 --> 00:42:30.440
the laptop screen. Montgomery, who participated from Angola, is hard

694
00:42:30.440 --> 00:42:33.119
of hearing, and at times he appeared to struggle to

695
00:42:33.199 --> 00:42:37.320
follow the discussion that would determine his freedom. Asked if

696
00:42:37.320 --> 00:42:40.199
he had changed in the year since his crime, Montgomery

697
00:42:40.199 --> 00:42:43.000
said he had learned about helping others in the importance

698
00:42:43.039 --> 00:42:46.920
of thinking ahead. He apologized to the Hurts he had

699
00:42:46.960 --> 00:42:49.719
destroyed their family. He said, something he would carry with

700
00:42:49.840 --> 00:42:52.199
him for the rest of his life. When it was

701
00:42:52.280 --> 00:42:55.800
Hunley's turn to speak, he began by acknowledging the depth

702
00:42:56.000 --> 00:42:59.440
of the loss experienced by the Hurt family. We are

703
00:42:59.480 --> 00:43:04.199
not here to defend Henry's actions from fifty seven years ago. Rather,

704
00:43:04.239 --> 00:43:08.000
we're here to speak about who Henry is today, Huntley started.

705
00:43:08.119 --> 00:43:10.360
The day I was born, Henry had already been in

706
00:43:10.400 --> 00:43:13.880
prison eighteen years. I came home from Angola five and

707
00:43:13.920 --> 00:43:17.880
a half years ago, and Henry is still there, Hunley said.

708
00:43:18.360 --> 00:43:18.760
Today.

709
00:43:18.800 --> 00:43:21.360
There are about twelve of us in this very room

710
00:43:21.360 --> 00:43:24.320
who benefited from a court ruling that bears Henry's name,

711
00:43:24.519 --> 00:43:26.920
and we submit to you that Henry is no less

712
00:43:26.920 --> 00:43:30.119
worthy of this opportunity than any of us who came

713
00:43:30.199 --> 00:43:33.800
home before him. The family of Charles Hurt appeared at

714
00:43:33.840 --> 00:43:38.280
each of Montgomery's parole hearings to oppose his release. At

715
00:43:38.280 --> 00:43:41.599
this third meeting, Linda hurt Wood, the daughter of Charles Hurt,

716
00:43:41.920 --> 00:43:45.719
suggested that Montgomery was feinning his self problems releasing him,

717
00:43:45.719 --> 00:43:48.320
which showed great disrespect to law enforcement.

718
00:43:48.480 --> 00:43:49.159
She said.

719
00:43:49.440 --> 00:43:52.559
One by one, each of the three Parole Board panel

720
00:43:52.800 --> 00:43:56.480
members voted to grant Montgomery's release. The crowd and the

721
00:43:56.519 --> 00:43:59.920
Parole Project office burst into applause, jumping out of their

722
00:44:00.079 --> 00:44:04.719
seats for a group embrace. They continued celebrating in another room,

723
00:44:04.760 --> 00:44:08.400
but Hunley stayed behind. He still had two more juvenile

724
00:44:08.440 --> 00:44:11.880
life or parole hearings to speak at. One was granted,

725
00:44:12.119 --> 00:44:16.079
the other denied. Around eleven am, Hunley got a call

726
00:44:16.119 --> 00:44:20.159
from Angola. Montgomery was ready to be picked up. As

727
00:44:20.159 --> 00:44:22.639
he made the familiar drive to prison, he filled it

728
00:44:22.719 --> 00:44:26.639
the near constant calls and texts from other clients. If

729
00:44:26.719 --> 00:44:31.679
juggling the bureaucratic and logistical challenge of multiple cases that

730
00:44:31.760 --> 00:44:35.440
once frazled him, it didn't show. Everyone has their talents

731
00:44:35.480 --> 00:44:38.440
and Hunley, he told me, is that he knows how

732
00:44:38.480 --> 00:44:42.920
to get things done. Louisiana's Highway sixty six, the road

733
00:44:42.960 --> 00:44:46.239
that takes you the last twenty miles to Angola, is scenic,

734
00:44:46.800 --> 00:44:50.320
lined with lush, green trees, but to anyone who's spent

735
00:44:50.360 --> 00:44:53.159
time in Angola, the trees are part of the prison,

736
00:44:53.239 --> 00:44:56.599
a key part of the barrier that separates the incarcerated

737
00:44:57.079 --> 00:45:02.199
from the rest of society. Just before twelve thirty pm,

738
00:45:02.280 --> 00:45:05.519
Montgomery walks through the gates at Ngola, carrying a small

739
00:45:05.639 --> 00:45:09.039
sack with a few belongings. He and Hunley hugged off

740
00:45:09.079 --> 00:45:12.239
to the side before facing the reporters and camera crews

741
00:45:12.239 --> 00:45:15.679
that had come to document the high profile release. Seeing

742
00:45:15.679 --> 00:45:18.559
Montgomery in person, it was clear that he had a

743
00:45:18.599 --> 00:45:22.360
hard time following the parole hearing. His hearing aids consisted

744
00:45:22.360 --> 00:45:24.800
of over the year headphones that wrapped around the back

745
00:45:24.880 --> 00:45:27.039
of his head and hooked up to a small box

746
00:45:27.119 --> 00:45:30.159
with a microphone that dangled around his neck from a lanyard.

747
00:45:31.039 --> 00:45:35.119
We're gonna get you better, ones, Hunley promised. After answering

748
00:45:35.159 --> 00:45:38.880
a few questions from reporters, Montgomery climbed into the front

749
00:45:38.880 --> 00:45:41.760
seat of Hunley's suv and headed home to Batonury, a

750
00:45:41.800 --> 00:45:46.679
city he hadn't seen in nearly sixty years. Here, let

751
00:45:46.719 --> 00:45:50.480
me do something, Henry Hunley said, leaning over to buckle

752
00:45:50.679 --> 00:45:53.920
montgomery seat belt, a practice that wasn't yet mandatory the

753
00:45:54.000 --> 00:45:57.239
last time Montgomery was a free man. Seven of the

754
00:45:57.320 --> 00:46:00.079
ten six lifers have now been freed from ingald Well.

755
00:46:00.119 --> 00:46:03.119
What Williams has committed to try to bring home the

756
00:46:03.199 --> 00:46:07.000
remaining twelve who were convicted in Orleans Parish. That leaves

757
00:46:07.119 --> 00:46:11.079
dozens of others. Mitchell is friends with one of them,

758
00:46:11.119 --> 00:46:14.360
and he's hanging on to his old friend's rap sheet.

759
00:46:14.800 --> 00:46:17.000
It shows that he was supposed to be eligible for

760
00:46:17.079 --> 00:46:20.920
release in nineteen eighty three. Wo Mac didn't end up

761
00:46:20.960 --> 00:46:24.119
moving in with his brother in Tennessee. After a brief visit,

762
00:46:24.239 --> 00:46:27.079
his brother's wife told him she didn't want him to

763
00:46:27.280 --> 00:46:31.079
live with them. After all. It wasn't personal, she said,

764
00:46:31.159 --> 00:46:34.280
she just wasn't used to living with other people. What

765
00:46:34.440 --> 00:46:37.800
Mac understood. But he's still trying to figure out what's next.

766
00:46:38.119 --> 00:46:41.079
The guys who knew Ingram and Angola still call him Grippin,

767
00:46:41.599 --> 00:46:45.039
but he's getting closer to having proof of his real identity.

768
00:46:45.519 --> 00:46:48.760
After he got out of Angola, the Parole Project asked

769
00:46:48.880 --> 00:46:53.440
the al Chehua County Public Schools to search for Ingram's record.

770
00:46:53.480 --> 00:46:56.400
There are port cards they found for William Willie Ingram

771
00:46:56.480 --> 00:46:59.039
shows a boy who struggled in school and who teachers

772
00:46:59.119 --> 00:47:03.360
judged him harshly. He has made very little progress, several

773
00:47:03.400 --> 00:47:07.760
teachers wrote in the comments. But there it was, finally

774
00:47:07.800 --> 00:47:12.559
on paper, Willie Ingram is a real person. Shortly after

775
00:47:12.639 --> 00:47:15.639
Hunley updated me about the progress on Ingram's case, he

776
00:47:15.719 --> 00:47:18.280
mentioned there had been a similar issue with another client.

777
00:47:18.880 --> 00:47:21.480
The record's staff and Angola had been unable to find

778
00:47:21.519 --> 00:47:24.559
a birth certificate for Henry Montgomery, a name that has

779
00:47:24.599 --> 00:47:28.800
been synonymous with juvenile justice reform in the United States.

780
00:47:29.000 --> 00:47:33.159
Using Montgomery's mother's name, record staffers eventually were able to

781
00:47:33.199 --> 00:47:37.039
locate his birth certificate, and it revealed that his first

782
00:47:37.159 --> 00:47:40.800
name is not Henry and his last name is not Montgomery.

783
00:47:41.719 --> 00:47:45.320
Hunley asked that Montgomery's legal name be kept private to

784
00:47:45.400 --> 00:47:50.079
afford him some level of animinity, but best guest at

785
00:47:50.159 --> 00:47:53.400
the reason for his name discrepancy is that Montgomery assumed

786
00:47:53.400 --> 00:47:56.400
his last name of his grandparents when he moved in

787
00:47:56.719 --> 00:47:59.119
with them as a boy. The first and middle names

788
00:47:59.119 --> 00:48:02.079
of his birth certificate could appear with an unusual spelling,

789
00:48:02.239 --> 00:48:05.000
suggesting that his mother may have been illiterate or was

790
00:48:05.079 --> 00:48:08.920
misunderstood by the person who wrote down the name. Either way,

791
00:48:09.159 --> 00:48:12.480
the man whose name bears a landmark Supreme Court case

792
00:48:12.559 --> 00:48:15.679
plans to keep going by Henry Montgomery, even.

793
00:48:15.519 --> 00:48:17.360
If his ID card says otherwise.

794
00:48:18.239 --> 00:48:20.440
In mid December, he got a call from a New

795
00:48:20.519 --> 00:48:24.000
Orleans number he didn't recognize. You know who this is,

796
00:48:24.559 --> 00:48:28.840
A familiar voice, asked his grant apparent, even through the phone.

797
00:48:29.039 --> 00:48:32.440
Is this Lewis? I asked, Yes, it is, he said,

798
00:48:32.599 --> 00:48:35.519
with a laugh. In the weeks since I had visited,

799
00:48:35.599 --> 00:48:38.760
Mitchell had moved out of his transitional housing in Baton

800
00:48:38.840 --> 00:48:41.719
Ridge and into his niece's home in a town outside

801
00:48:41.800 --> 00:48:45.679
New Orleans. They were still having family reunions each weekend,

802
00:48:45.679 --> 00:48:48.920
he said, and he was invited to multiple Christmas parties.

803
00:48:49.320 --> 00:48:51.519
He was still in touch with his roommates from Baton

804
00:48:51.559 --> 00:48:55.519
Ridge and planned to visit them soon. Campbell, the judge

805
00:48:55.519 --> 00:48:59.880
from his resentencing hearing, teaches criminal law seminars at Loyola

806
00:49:00.639 --> 00:49:04.320
University School of Law, and she invited Mitchell and Ingram

807
00:49:04.360 --> 00:49:09.199
to speak at her students end of semester dinner. It

808
00:49:09.360 --> 00:49:12.960
was the most emotional, powerful evening that I've ever had

809
00:49:13.000 --> 00:49:16.559
since I started practicing law, Campbell said. There wasn't a

810
00:49:16.639 --> 00:49:20.159
dry eye in the house. One person at the dinner

811
00:49:20.239 --> 00:49:22.440
asked Mitchell if he was mad about what he had

812
00:49:22.480 --> 00:49:26.840
been through. No, he said, I felt that Once upon

813
00:49:26.880 --> 00:49:28.760
a time I used to lay in bed and cry.

814
00:49:29.440 --> 00:49:33.280
Why am I here? I've been hurt too long to cry.

815
00:49:33.639 --> 00:49:36.719
The pain got me numb, he said. When I talk

816
00:49:36.760 --> 00:49:39.880
about it, you will cry, but I won't feel a

817
00:49:39.920 --> 00:49:45.440
thing because I'm numb from crying. I'm numb from hurting

818
00:49:45.519 --> 00:49:50.679
and y'all. That is the story of the ten six

819
00:49:51.039 --> 00:49:52.719
Lifers of Angola.

820
00:49:54.039 --> 00:49:56.639
Crazy stuff.

821
00:49:57.440 --> 00:50:01.920
I'll tell you what hard to research, but what a

822
00:50:02.199 --> 00:50:05.280
well written article. And I want to credit her again,

823
00:50:05.480 --> 00:50:12.519
Jessica Scholberg of the Huffington Post for that. And I

824
00:50:12.559 --> 00:50:16.079
hope you enjoyed that, a little bit of history into

825
00:50:16.239 --> 00:50:21.440
the ten six Lifers. And until next time, I'm Jim

826
00:50:21.519 --> 00:50:24.280
Chapman for what do you Everton, We are your host

827
00:50:24.360 --> 00:50:28.000
of Bloody Angola, a podcast one hundred and forty two

828
00:50:28.079 --> 00:50:32.119
years in the making, the complete story of America's bloodies.

829
00:50:32.199 --> 00:50:49.840
Present peace, a.

830
00:50:50.039 --> 00:50:54.079
Wall Street line, shackle.

831
00:50:54.320 --> 00:51:06.119
Chains, it's calling my name, there is no mercy and

832
00:51:06.280 --> 00:51:12.320
this being a tentery juice as the huge stream game

833
00:51:13.519 --> 00:51:25.400
Rango three, I'm here by me to die inside these walls,

834
00:51:27.119 --> 00:51:35.039
inside the wild and when mores I know it's a

835
00:51:40.480 --> 00:51:49.360
bloody anglebody angle.

836
00:52:00.840 --> 00:52:01.280
A p.

837
00:52:01.599 --> 00:52:02.079
Don B.