Joy is essential and it's also elusive, but now there's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence. Joy 101, it's a new podcast hosted by me, Hota Kotby. If you're craving inspiration to maximize your joy, tune into these candid uplifting and moving on air chats. Open your free iHeartRadio app search, Joy 101 and listen now. Joy 101 with Hota Kotby is presented by CVS. It just came out. Jeremy, what did you just do? You just sit yourself up for the earlier. I've never heard you tell this story. I've never told this story. This must have been tucked deep deep into Jeremy Lin Files. My name is MC Jin. I'm excited to tell you about laugh but not least. I'll be chatting with guests from all walks of life about the power of humor when it comes to facing difficult times. These will be conversations that remind us all. Life is hard. Laugh harder. Listen, laugh but not least with MC Jin on the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. Hey, it's Alec Baldwin. This season on my podcast, here's the thing. I talk to composer Mark Shaman. It's about the hang. It's the pleasure of hanging out with the people that you're with. You know, Robin I was always a great hang and director Morgan Neville. Film school teaches you all the wrong things about making documentary. What do you want to say? Documentary is all about your ear. What do you hear? I feel like my job is listening really, really hard. Listen to here's the thing on the iHeartRadio app Apple Podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. On January 12, 2002, 16 year old Steve Thomas went to a crowded hip-hop club in Jefferson, Paris, Louisiana. Where a successful artist named Corey Miller was slated to introduce a new hip-hop room. But before they even took the stage of Fightbook Count and Steve Thomas was fatally shot. When the police arrived, it was allegedly rumored that Corey was involved, but when specifically asked about Corey, none of the witnesses substantiated that rumor until a week later, leading to his arrest, two trials, and ultimately, a non-unanimous jury verdict, all of which may well have been prejudiced by Corey's stage name, See Murder. This is wrongful conviction. You're listening to wrongful conviction. You can listen to this in all the Lava for Good Podcasts one week early and add free by subscribing to Lava for Good Plus on Apple Podcasts. Welcome back to wrongful conviction, where we've got a case out of Jefferson, Paris, Louisiana, involving a one celebrated hip-hop artist Corey Miller, also known as See Murder. Now, he and his brothers, Master P and Silk the Shocker, had a number of hits, collaborated with Snoop until his situation drastically changed, and here we are 23 years later, where he's grateful to have the support of one of his fear assist advocates, Kim Kardashian, Kim, welcome back to the show. Thank you for having me back on. Were you a fan of Corey's music before you knew about his case? I definitely was. I definitely knew about the no-limit soldiers, and I love New Orleans, but years later, the singer Monica called me and was like, "You have to help me with a dear friend of mine." Told me all about the case, and there's like a network of us, right? So it's like, "You and Scott Budnick and Jessica Jackson and Aaron Haney, and we've been working on it for a while." So I'm glad that we can be here to talk about Corey's case today. I'm calling in from a Louisiana penitentiary, the man himself, Corey Miller. Thank you all so much, Jeffery. And to help tell his story, Corey's a pellet attorney, Jane Hogan. Thanks for having me. This is a Louisiana story where we've seen so many, many, wrongful convictions marked by non-unanimous jury verdicts, which was a legal practice as late as 2018, when they could convict you with as few as 10 out of 12 jurors voting guilty. This was a practice that had its roots in the aftermath of the Civil War, where the 13th Amendment ended slavery, unless duly convicted of a felony. It also allowed black people to serve on juries. And in Louisiana, even if the defense managed to keep two black people on the jury, well, their votes could be ignored, and the person could effectively be re-inslaived. We've never learned how to have an economy that doesn't rely on forced labor. There's so many prisons here, and that is the economy. Like you go in the middle of Louisiana, they have nothing except like three private prisons. It's the local employer. So if you want to stop mass incarceration in Louisiana, if you were to pay people, at least minimum wage, for the labor that they perform while incarcerated, I think that there would be a real push to do sinencing reform immediately, because it's such a business. There was a 2022 ballot initiative in Louisiana, which would have ended the slavery loophole of the 13th Amendment, but it was voted down. Yeah, but certainly before that, as well as this incident, and even before Cory's music career, he was just another kid growing up in the New Orleans Caliope projects. Yeah, I was raised by a grandfather, a grandfather, a big mom, a big baby, a mother and father, a baby of her, when I was just a baby, and lived in the Caliope projects, my camp was there. We didn't have much, but big mom, she kept me out of trouble. She didn't steal me, that drug was bad, that school was important. So throughout my whole school, I was out of school because I just had to please big mom. The school was important. Cory and his brothers Percy and Vaishna also grew up loving hip-hop during its early years. We began a long time ago. This is a variety of scenes, people like Hager, so they had these 50s that we was in the wrong. And we were pleased and instruments taped, and we played other tape recordings, and we have a record tape, and we played it too and right-rights. Now with tape recorded, soon turned into renting studio time, and eventually Percy Miller, better known as Master P, started his label, "No Limit Records" in 1991, with the founding group TRU, which featured himself, Cory, as Seamurter, his stage name, and Vaishna as Silk De Shocker, and they began to see big success in the mid-90s in early 2000s. Yeah, it was a good feeling to have that much momentum, without music. It was a wonderful journey, and it was all in the beginning. And I was still rolling in. I'm basically still in the wall, and I just moved my son to Bad Rouge in the Navy community, the country club. Cory has three kids who at the time lived in Bad Rouge, while he worked out of New Orleans, which is just across the Mississippi River from where this crime took place, in a more conservative white flight type of area called Jefferson Parish. You got to realize that Jefferson Parish went country ahead. There was some black people that trying to cross the bridge to get some food water and stuff like that. It was a British lady, couple of women, couple of guys that trying to cross the bridge. And police was protecting the bridge, not letting any of them train them. It's called Cross. It actually shot these sheep. It has a whole other story, but this is the name, maybe that I got caught up. And I hope that story might shed some light on why their police department might have hired to lead detective in this case, detective Cloger. After, well, they had found he wasn't a good fit for even Orleans Parish. We got Cloger's personnel record and Cloger was working in Orleans Parish that he went to Jefferson Parish. The superintendent of the New Orleans Police Department wrote this very scathing letter that's in his personnel file that said he has been messing up homicide investigations in Orleans Parish. So if you do hire him, he is more suited to be a guard at a correctional institution than on the streets, trying to solve murders. It appears Jefferson Parish heard this message as more of an endorsement than a condemnation. And that brings us to January 12, 2002, when a 16 year old kid named Steve Thomas was killed at a Jefferson Parish Music venue called the Pyramid Club. That night at the institute, a couple of guys out there were going to perform at that club. So like he had a savage audit and they know how we try to represent their love. The Hague needs to get to lose their. So he goes over to the platinum club in Harvey, Louisiana, January 12, 2002. And there were by different accounts, 300 to 500 people in a club, like way over fire marshal capacity. It's really a bonus. They're the bottom and the club of top to follow one way and one way of taking things. And it's 400 people and cool. Everybody there walked in and get carried out. So I was saying I was paying down my tears. And that security guard later testified that Corey was not armed, but somehow a gun got in obviously and as well as 16 year old Steve Thomas, who you know, he probably most of you is to fake ID to get in there. And they said the guy with the plan to find even created a vote is saying that I better wrap the guy that was still I guess they had a guy somebody to say something like that. I never better up and be up. I like we sort of tell them that thought he's going to East Coast and you know session that they can we know what better.
- That was, that whole night, I never guessed it, guys. That was cool. That was folks telling, that I had one worse with them. - After all, Cory was not in this stick crowd, but rather, as you might have expected, he was in a VIP area. - I was in there drinking, wasted in the tail meat, and go up to the stage and have to do it. Then I could leave, right? So I remember talking to a few girls, I've never had a chance to even introduce my crew. - Then at some point, during the night, a fight breaks out near the dance floor. Directly across from the DJ booth. Everybody describes just kind of this group of men surrounding and beating and kicking Steve, as he is curled up on the ground. And then at some point, a gunshot goes off. - I'm just surprised that everybody else went out here and shoot. And so, I'm actually anxious if it goes. - A bunch of people flee, including Cory and his friends, that goes from 500 people to about 100. And after this shot goes off, there was a really drunk woman who was in the bathroom at the time of the shooting. So she didn't see anything, but she was intoxicated and she starts hollering out. "See, murdered it, this, y'all see murdered it, this." And I think that probably is what began sort of the rumors and pretty quickly, the Jefferson Parish Sheriff's Office gets there. - They discovered Steve Thomas lying on his back, having been shot in the chest. And there was a chain here as body. - The police seal up the doors, basically with 100 people left inside. You know, they learned that Cory was there and they start interviewing people. And they were asking specifically, did you see Sea Burner do this? And nobody said yes. - None of them tell me the witness is called on that one. One, see see the shot goes, "Like, I'm six, five, six, six, five, can't." - Not only was it unlikely that a successful musician would put his career and its family at risk, but then the description wasn't even close. And not one eyewitness named him. And that included the security guard, the guy who had called 911, a man named Darnel Jordan. - The security guard spoke to the police that night and said that he hadn't seen anything. And then a couple days later, he gives an inculpatory statement against Cory. And so based really on that statement alone, they locate Cory at the house of blues four days later. He's not run. He's sending New Orleans and then he gets arrested. - Now according to Darnel Jordan's 2018 recantation, when asked by the police if Cory Miller had been the shooter, he said if that was the case, he would have said so on the 911 call. But then he went on to say, quote, "They got me to ID Sea Murder's Picture and sign it. They tricked me." I wasn't signing the picture to ID the shooter. I signed it because they told me to. I knew they wanted me to say Cory Miller did it because he's famous. End quote. Nevertheless, this interaction helped them get an arrest warrant for Cory Miller. - I actually had some kind of faith in the legal system at that time. I was like, "Well, they're gonna get arrested, talk to us." And then they got an emergency from this. - Go with my whole train of cell wildlife. - At this point, they continued to interview clubgoers. Meanwhile, they found two DNA profiles on the chain from the crime scene. And one was the victim. So they got a warrant for Cory's DNA and Kim, I mean, it seems reasonable, maybe not dispositive, but very reasonable that whoever's DNA was identified could well have been the shooter. Knowing that the necklace that was allegedly taken from the person that committed the crime. And obviously, if it was worn around someone's neck and pulled off of someone's neck, there would be DNA evidence on it. And then when it finally was DNA tested, it was not Cory's DNA. - And then suddenly the chain became unimportant. (gentle music) (gentle music) - Joy is essential and it's also elusive. You can't order it, you can't borrow it, or simply hope it into life, but now. There's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence. Joy 101. It's a new podcast hosted by me, Hota Kotby. Together, guys, we'll have meaningful conversations with the world's most fascinating people. Entertainment Legends, Sports Icons, Wellness Experts, and everyday people will share how they find, allow and experience joy. And I'll offer some of my own tips and takes on seeking a more balanced and harmonious life. If you're craving inspiration, support, and useful tools to maximize your joy, tune into these candid, uplifting, and moving on air chats. Joy after a breakup, Joy is an empty nester, Joy after a loss, Joy as a caretaker. This new podcast will speak to you. Listen to Joy 101 on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts. (upbeat music) - This is Michael Rappaport, and my podcast, the I Am Rappaport Stereo Podcast, is unlike anyone you've ever heard. We're a variety show, and if you're looking for strong opinions, funny opinions about sports, entertainment, politics, pop culture, and whatever else catches my attention, then subscribe now. This Kid Jafar Jackson is as good as Rami Malik as Freddie Mercury, and it's as good as Timothy Chamolay as Bob Dylan, and I say that with love and respect for both of those actors. And I don't know how many Oscar nominations they give out, and it's five, six for best actor. 150% this Kid Jafar Jackson should absolutely positively get nominated for his portrayal as Michael Jackson. Listen to I Am Rappaport on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcast. ♪ I Am Rappaport Podcast ♪ - Hi everyone, I'm Cheryl Stray, author of Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things. I'm excited to share that I have a new podcast called Mind Over Mountain. In each episode, I interview athletes, adventurers, and adrenaline seekers to discuss the inner landscapes and life experiences that informed and inspired their extraordinary feats. I also bring a bit of advice into the mix, so we too can better understand how to face our own seemingly insurmountable challenges. - Do you know what I'm gonna do? I'm gonna pull out what you already have inside. We coming into this world, fighting for our lives. All I'm gonna do is pull out what you already got inside. - We're there to support and celebrate each other, and that is not like your story versus my story. - You're gonna walk up and over that dang mountain. You're not just gonna put your mind over it. - Yeah, exactly. And if I can't walk up and over it, I'm gonna go through it. - Listen to Mind Over Mountain every Thursday on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. (dramatic music) - I never understood why someone wouldn't want to find the real killer, how our state can just be okay with convicting someone, not caring if that someone is actually the right person. If God forbid, a family member of mine or someone was harmed in a horrible crime, I would not be satisfied with just anyone being convicted. I would have to know, without a reasonable doubt that this person was the person that committed that crime. And since I started to get involved in this work, I was really hopeful at the beginning, and I still am and I always will be, but as you dig deeper and as you work on more cases and you figure out more, it just doesn't become overwhelming to understand how messed up our system is. - Case in point, despite the fact that every club gore initially denied Cory's involvement, Detective Kloger revisited them. And out of the hundreds Kloger found four, who were some degree of willing to implicate Cory, those four were Keisha Jones, Aisha Washington, Taneca Rankins and Eloise Matthews, and this trial approached in September 2003. Darnell Jordan had to be arrested on a material witness warrant. So he was locked up in a hotel where Kloger visited him with his alleged statement, which put the following words in his mouth. - As the fight was happening, Darnell saw 15 or 20 men beating Steve, and that Steve was lying on the ground in a defensive position, and that Cory wasn't participating in the fight with standing back. And then eventually at some point, he reaches his arm underneath the pile of bodies. Darnell doesn't see a gun, but he hears a pop, saw a flash and sparks from underneath the pile of people, which came from the direction of Cory's hand. - And for this alleged account to have been an accurate description of the murder, there would have had to have been stippling on the body. Those are the burns associated with close range gunshots, but there were none. And according to Darnell's 2018 Re-Cantation, despite Kloger's insistence, he told him, quote, "That's not what I said." End quote. Darnell claimed that since he had signed that picture, he was afraid of the police and went along with the narrative of a trial, along with three others, whose testimonies, by the way, varied wildly, starting with Taneca Rankins and Eloise Matthews. - What Taneca testified to at the first trial is that she was at the Platinum Club with Eloise,
Matthews, she saw Corey Burbly confront Steve. Then the fight broke out. Corey went underneath his shirt, raised his arm in Steve's direction. She never said that she saw Corey with the gun, but the shot was fired and Steve fell to the floor. And then what Eloise testified to was that she had gone to the club with Taneek Aranconz and when the fight started they both climbed up on a chair that she saw four or five people stopping and punching Steve who was lying on the floor on his back. And then after about 30 seconds she fell off the chair and then she heard a gunshot, but she didn't see a gun and she didn't see who shot Steve. She also testified that Taneek had not seen the shooting. To recap, Eloise said both she and Taneek didn't see the shooting. Taneek said she saw Corey shoot from a standing position while Darnell said the Corey reached under the pile of bodies before hearing a pop and seeing sparks. All of the witnesses statement, not bad. These people are blatantly lying. Our lawyers cross the examine and the states next witness Keisha and Jones wouldn't even look up when she testified that she saw Corey pull something from his waist and her to gunshot. The second she gets off the stand she runs up to the defense investigator in the courthouse for cancer entire statement. Said I'm only saying this because I am pressured into it by the sheriff's office and there's a recess she goes and she recants to the judge on the record. She said she didn't directly see what happened and had even told police that night that Corey was not involved but in the year following, detector Klogger threatened her with unrelated charges. She just basically confessed to telling everything I have provided the age forced of the ligage. She was crying. She was in distress. It's a total loss. That story of pressure from law enforcement to implicate Corey, it's a similar story told by multiple different people that aren't connected. So if another woman named Aisha Washington said that people were popping up at her mom's house following her issue, taken her children to school, trying to pressure her into making a statement against Corey. Aisha Washington was also being detained on a material witness warrant for trial. But after Keisha and Jones recanted, Aisha wasn't called to the stand. And then also Corey had four witnesses testify for the defense that they were there, that they know who Corey is that whenever the fight broke out, they saw Corey somewhere else that he was not engaged in the fight. But somehow the jury chose to believe the three wildly inconsistent stories over the defense's united front, which was supported by Keisha and Jones's recantation. Being in justice mode, not the place of something like you know, being to go to trial because I was basically, you know, standing eyes already dumped you know, old white men, this old white woman thing. It's like this got me with me and my persona at this time. The way that I look, like I go and teach, like my thing, you sometimes try to name it see murder. It wasn't a matter of what I had in a state. It was basically like look who you are, look how you look. And the jury returned a unanimous verdict at the first trial of guilty. And then that began the most extensive post trial litigation of any case of ever seen seven months, 13 different hearings. Corey's trial lawyer really did a phenomenal job. A lot of the allegations were that there was withholding of ex-sculptorian impeachment information and that Cloger was helping these witnesses that he was making convictions quickly get expunged. During the post trial hearing, they recalled Eloise and Tanika. It comes out that Tanika actually had felony theft convictions outstanding warrants, which the Sheriff's Office had arranged to have recalled. They basically set aside her felony convictions quickly and expunge them. Which gave the appearance that she had nothing to exchange for her testimony. And Eloise Matthews was no different. Eloise testified that she had met with Cloger multiple times. He had said he'd do anything to help her in Tanika that she had told Cloger that Corey didn't shoot Steve, but Cloger wasn't interested in the queues to have lying. There was also impeachment evidence that wasn't turned over about her. She had arrests for forgery. She was recommended for diversion, but she failed out of diversion, but they hadn't given notice of that. Then Aisha Washington and Keisha and Jones testified about their experiences. How they'd both been harassed and Keisha and had actually been detained three times and threatened with unrelated charges to ensure her testimony. So Judge Martha Sasson simply couldn't ignore their claims. The judge tells Cloger like I want you to bring your file up here and show me what you've got. He said no, I destroy my file. Like the night after the conviction, I just went and shredded everything. And the judge is like why would you do that? Then it turns out later on in the seven months of post trial proceedings that he hadn't shredded his file. And so he brought it up there. And within his file, not only is there the impeachment evidence against the three witnesses, but there's also statements from a guy named Roger Lewis and Angela Kasten who were there at the club who had said they saw the fight. They knew that Corey wasn't involved in it. So the judge granted Corey a new trial. That was in April 2004 when Judge Sasson was up for reelection that November. I think that she was sort of painted as the judge who's trying to let see murder out of prison. And then she lost her bid for reelection. They still judge some kind of these people still stick together. They kicked the judge out. So then I'm at the mercy of these different people. And then the intermediate appellate court in Louisiana reversed a new trial. And then the Louisiana Supreme Court actually marched 10th of 2006. I know like she conducted a painstaking review of all of this. And she concluded that there were constitutional violations that mandated a new trial. So after two years of appeals, Corey was released on House arrest awaiting his new trial in 2009 giving him three years with his children. That was amazing. Good. It didn't have to go that way. And so I definitely hold on it as Jared Dory Hong and those three years and a lot of brothers closer. You know, because when I first got arrested, I just thought that they were so fragile and so young and small. I couldn't even tell that I was in jail. I just told them that I was the weak on business and on to. I kept thinking I was going to go to trial. I was going to give the least. So when the years started to bounce the action, when you come back up to it there, I didn't want to think that I worked with my voice. So I had to bring you down to them and started a company business. You know, I love staying up and even go to my holiday and tell myself, you know, come with us, leave with us, bring my heart. I'm going to process that myself for a minute. So during those three years, the state went back to the list of clubgoers, one of whom was Keishon Jones's half-brother Kenneth Jordan, whose newborn died in January 2003. At which time, it's believed that the child's mother bore responsibility, but they were both under investigation. So whenever they're questioning him about the death of his child, they realize that he's on the list of people that was at the platinum club that night. So they start talking to him about the case. According to Kenneth's 2018 recantation, he initially told them that the shooter was a dark skinned man in a hoodie and was definitely not Cory Miller. But quote, the officers pressured me to lie and say it was Cory Miller, all the while holding criminal charges over my head. End quote. So he gave a statement naming Cory and his charges. Yep. You guessed it. They went away while the child's mother got 35 years. But Kenneth was never called at the 2003 trial. So fast forward to after Cory was granted a new trial and the false statement resurfaced. In 2005 Kenneth Jordan gets arrested for possession of crack cocaine. He gets placed on probation. He obscains. And then in 2007, he is in prison facing revocation of his probation. And that's when the prosecutor comes and says, I will extend your probation and lieu of revocation. And then he signed a written agreement at that point that he would testify against Cory in exchange to get his probation extended. So now the state moved forward to trial in 2009 with two reluctant witnesses. And even in pre-trial, the debt looked stacked, starting with the new judge, a guy named Hans J. Lilljaburk. We're the first day he saw me in his coat. He told me you shouldn't be all by and you should be arrested. You're on a murder choice. I want to hit you convicted and I want to put this case on a shelf. We're kind of, should that hit the tail? So like, and then anything that we try to file or whatever the VA's wanted, they got whatever we export, did a motion to file for, we never got. Including the critical request from his higher attorney who hadn't been paid in years. At this point, Cory had been in prison since 2002, hadn't been able to earn an income. In April of 2009, his trial lawyer tries to withdraw from his case and says, I've not been paid in three years. I cannot do a second trial for Cory. And rather than permitting trial counsel to withdraw, the judge like kind of heckles Cory and was like, I'd feel a whole heck of a lot better if my lawyer was paid Cory. You know, I'm not going to let you withdraw. We've got a trial date in four months. So without being paid, the defense attorney, instead of physically calling Cory's alibi witnesses, he was allowed to just replay the recording of their testimonies from the first trial, which is not what the state did with Darnell and Kenneth Jordan. No relation by the way, those two guys, except perhaps for family histories that may have been intertwined with one of the
prosecutors Roger Jordan, a powerful Louisiana white man who also happens to share the same last name. And it appears that their relationship was not so different from their ancestors. Prior to the second trial, Darnal and Kenneth do not want to come and testify. They are arrested on material witness warrants. They're held in Communicato, leading up to the trial. And then they're brought to court in chains to testify against Cory. And Kenneth, his statement is different than even Darnal's, right? So he says that he sees the fight and that after the fight is over and everybody walks away, he sees Cory walk up stand over to even shoot him. So was he standing over the body or was he reaching underneath the pylon? It can't be both. It appears that these inconsistencies gave at least three of the jurors some really serious reservations. This is the poster child for non-unionist verdicts because it wasn't even 10 to it was 9 to 3. There were three African Americans on the jury, the rest were white people. And there was one young black woman on the jury who was getting attacked by the white members of the jury. They were saying very horrible things to her like your mother should have aborted you, you're just as dumb as he is, you're not doing your job. They kept on reporting to the judge that like the jurors were losing it, the young woman was so stressed out, she was throwing up. The jurors came back and said as they can't come up with a 30's, we'll defer see if we're going to come up with help. So the judge is like I'm going to sequester you guys in a hotel overnight so he does that, they come back the next day, the abuse continues. Meanwhile, because they clearly must have been unsure of the outcome, the attorneys were discussing the offer that they'd made to Cory before trial 20 years. At this point, he almost served half, but still Cory maintained his innocence. And then the jury came back with their first 10 to 2 vote for guilty. They pull the jurors and two African Americans say not guilty. One woman, a white lady writes guilty under duress. And they're like, oh no, this won't do. So then they send everybody back. And then she comes back and she's changed her vote at this point from guilty under duress to just guilty. And that's enough, right? Then the next day she gives an interview to the Times Picky Un and she describes the scene in deliberations. And she just says, I didn't vote guilty because I thought the state proved its case. I voted guilty to end deliberations because the mama bear instinct in me came out and I was afraid for the sanity of this young girl. Yeah, and I could see how distrught she was. She tried to be on her eyes and stuff like that. So I know something's going on in the back. And there's been time I was two years later she describes a total lynch going on back to who was unfair. I don't know how they go through that. There was a person either had this be found guilty by a nervous state basically. But I'm not in the room. It's just hard recabit all of those times. This is take your back to that place. I wish this all my words in the future. Joy is essential and it's also elusive. You can't order it, you can't borrow it or simply hope it into life. But now there's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence. Joy 101. Together, guys, we'll have meaningful conversations with the world's most fascinating people, entertainment legends, sports icons, wellness experts, and everyday people will share how they find, allow, and experience joy. If you're craving inspiration, support, and useful tools to maximize your joy, tune into these candid uplifting and moving on air chats. This is Michael Rappaport and my podcast, the iAm Rappaport Stereo podcast is unlike anyone you've ever heard. We're a variety show and if you're looking for strong opinions, funny opinions about sports, entertainment, politics, pop culture, whatever else catches my attention, then subscribe now. This kid, Jeff Farr Jackson is as good as Rami Malik as Freddie Mercury and it's as good as Timothy Chamolay as Bob Dylan and I say that with love and respect for both of those actors. And I don't know how many Oscar nominations they give out. And it's five six for best actor. 150% this kid, Jeff Farr Jackson should absolutely positively get nominated for his portrayal as Michael Jackson. Listen to iAm Rappaport on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcast. Hi everyone, I'm Cheryl Strait, author of Wild and Tiny Beautiful Things. I also bring a bit of advice into the mix so we too can better understand how to face our own seemingly insurmountable challenges. Do you know what I'm gonna do? We're coming into this world, fighting for our lives. We're there to support and celebrate each other and not not like a your story versus my story. You're gonna walk up and over that dang mountain. Yeah, exactly. Listen to Mind Over Mountain every Thursday on the iHeart Radio app, Apple podcast or wherever you get your podcasts. I lost 22 years of my life so far. Both me and Ava to raise my kids' properties because I was raised by my father, my father, I was given my grandparents and I was always bound to break their cycles. The most important thing in a world of he was to be a father and be there for the throughout his life. My youngest daughter was two years old and she graduated elementary. So I was an alpha-ner because of the heart of men. Political figures, discontented, checked his and poached. So then in the day all these people knew and they chanted upgraded this and somebody like me come along. We just like that. We go all out. It's all helpers. It's all built up and out. It's platform. But I thought I did change it. Just make my heart cold. I still believe that my faith that God had the weight and I'm very happy. All of them are going real well going to college when God is successful. They could have turned out much worse for them. So I hold on to that. I can see the pain in that. I can hear the pain what we speak. And I know that this under that pain that can never be given back to them. The best thing that I can do for them is get my freedom. He had his direct appeal and then he filed for his initial state habeas or state post conviction. And it was timely and that was denied without a hearing. That's a shame because what the law says is that there's any contested factual issue. You cannot just resolve that on inspection of the pleading. So you have to have a hearing. And there's a lot of contested factual issues in this case. So there was never a hearing on his initial timely post-comiction application. Then in 2018, both the state's witnesses recanted. In 2018, both men independently fully were candid to their trial testimony. Both of them said I didn't see Cory. Kenneth actually said that he saw a shorter darker skin person. And they both described similar coercion by the sheriff's office. They both said what I said at trial was not true. So the evidence against Cory is gone. In addition, Jane hired a crime scene reconstruction expert. We had a crime scene reconstruction expert. And basically the trajectory of the bullet because it's got a slightly upward angle. There were either on the same plane or the shooter was standing up. Steve was laying down and the shooter had an unobstructed path from at least three feet away because there was no stippling. So we know that it came from at least three feet away. So the idea that the shooter sticks his hand in a pile of people fighting and shoots, that clearly didn't happen. And now was alleged by the only person who appeared in both trials, Darnell Jordan. At least Kenneth Jordan's version of events was physically possible. Yet the post-conviction filing was denied. Ruling that the recantations were suspect and not reliable, even though these recantations were in part supported by the crime scene reconstruction and in total by detective cloagers pattern of coercion. There's corroboration that this is kind of the pattern and practice of what the Sheriff's Office was doing in this case. And then subsequently in the most recent filing.
that we did. We got Cloagor's personnel record and within it there was this letter from the superintendent of the New Orleans Police Department that said this guy has been messing up how much said investigations in Orleans Parish. So if you do hire him, he is more suited to be a guard at a correctional institution. Nevertheless, the motion was denied without a hearing. So he's never had a hearing. They've never let him come back to court for anything even the new evidence. Now around this time there was a ballot initiative in Louisiana that ended the practice of non-unanimous jury verdicts. We even did an episode about it in October 2018. It's linked in the episode description. In fact, that was only about a month after Kim's first appearance on this show. Thankfully, that November, Louisiana finally did the right thing, at least for cases going forward. But everyone that had been convicted on that system, they didn't retroactively let them out. Not changing laws retroactively is something that really bothers me. I can't understand how that makes sense to lawmakers and how people are comfortable with that. And you know, the reason Kim that's cited by the powers that be in Louisiana that they aren't changing this law is because it would clog up the court system with all these people who would need to come home. I know. I know. Isn't that the most ridiculous thing ever? I really can't wrap my head around it. We certainly can't either. So even though people like Corey didn't benefit from that new law, since then Louisiana has passed other promising legislation. Louisiana enacted a provision of law that is meant to provide people like Corey Miller with a pathway to prove their innocence. And what would otherwise be considered untimely filing that says they can file a factual innocence petition before December 31st of 2022. So that's what we did. Allegeing everything, showing everything, and we didn't get a hearing on it. What they did was the trial judge relied on previous decisions. So he said like because I made the call in 2018 that Darnell and Kenneth's recantations are suspicious. I don't think that this qualifies as evidence to support a factual innocence filing. But in every case dealing with recantations, there's a hearing to determine the veracity of the recantation. Darnell and Kenneth have never been called to court to testify under oath. So like the veracity of the evidence has never been tested. And we took it to the Supreme Court and the two of the justices voted in our favor, but we needed four. And so that avenue is closed. His federal habeas was also denied, but considering that there's literally no evidence left that implicates Corey Miller, it's really hard to understand how he hasn't seen relief after all these long years. So he said all around the four. It was a big problem. It was always that one victim. And this because I've been saying my innocence is they want it. I know that this D.A. and I know that the state knows that I'm innocent. And I know that when Jane went business and they know that I'm innocent, they just don't know what to do with this. I have spoken several times to the district attorney's office and said, you know, Corey, he's not interested in spending the rest of his life in prison trying to get exonerated. He offered him 20 years and he served that. It's like all the judges are free to grant you a grant of vote. And the D.A. is free to only get my case and give me my freedom because they feel like they're going to be able to bring to the beach. Going to the right thing would be the wrong move for anybody to try and assert that they could real. Doing the right thing would be the wrong move for anybody trying to further their career. I think that's the best. And maybe the only explanation for where Corey finds himself today. I mean, he's just had every roadblock that you could possibly imagine and everyone screw him over every which way. And it's just I definitely won't stop fighting for him. That's why I want to be loud about him and keep his case alive. Unfortunately, nothing has happened. He keeps getting blocked at every motion, every step of the way. Corey needs all the help he can get. And I'm asking each and every one of you to not only share his story, but also to please sign the petition to free Corey Miller based on his actual innocence. And beyond that, we all need to sign a petition to apply the unanimous verdict standard retroactively in Louisiana. Both will be linked in the episode description. Plus, new evidence is another way Corey could get back into court and write this wrong. If you have any information about Corey's case, please contact me. My email address is jane
[email protected]. And we'll have James contact info as well as other action steps linked in the episode description. And with that, we're going to go to closing arguments starting with Kim, then Jane, and then Corey will take us off into the sunset. If you really think about it, that your family member or your loved one or your friends or someone close to you could be in the same exact situations as so many of these people that are locked up for life, it really opens up my heart to just want to help people and do whatever we can. So specifically with Corey Miller, someone who has no evidence that he was involved in this crime. His DNA was not on the evidence. And I don't know why our system cannot take accountability of the wrongs and let people out that have been proven innocent. I believe in Corey Miller 100%, I really want him to come home. I think he would be such an asset to our society. And I really hope that Louisiana strongly considers changing the law retroactively and letting those people out because it would change so many people's lives and families. I would just like to thank you for your interest in it. I would also of course like to thank Kim and her team for their interest in it and for using her platform to shed some light on this case. I mean this is not a verdict which should inspire confidence in the system. If you look at it, it's it was a house of cards to begin with, it collapsed and unfortunately there is a human being who is still sitting in prison for something that he didn't do and that there is no evidence that he did and he has now lost over two decades of his life to this. And so that is an injustice. It's also an injustice of course that Steve Thomas was shot and killed. So there's a lot of injustice here but the one injustice that can be remedied is for Corey to get some relief somewhere and I believe that one day that will happen. And I will continue to work on this case until hopefully one day he can come home. I think what everybody did to get the force or because once everybody is aware of everything that went on I think it would be at easiest way to proper officials to make the right decision and not feel like being on a beach. But it's a huge issue that he can't. For making the right decision and relief. So I do want everybody to get the story out. We tried everything out. I worked the pattern of how great a field is all in how great words and the people of Jesus ever gonna be. I would like to retire not for what I've done but only because of Jesus' decision. I just love me because I was in love and released. That's a little sabotaged but I got to keep going. We go on right now to try and put a awareness to my situation. It was a pretty bad idea. I have been having this event for 23 years. Thank you for listening to Ronfell Conviction. I want to thank our production team Connor Hall and Kathleen Fink as well as my fellow executive producers Jeff Campler Kevin Wartis and Jeff Clyburn. The music in this production was supplied by three-time Oscar nominated composer Jay Rouse. Be sure to follow us across all social media platforms at Lava For Good and at Ronfell Conviction. You can also follow me on Instagram at its Jason Flom. Ronfell Conviction is a production of Lava For Good Podcasts and association with signal company number one. We have worked hard to ensure that all facts reported in this show are accurate. The views and opinions expressed by the individuals featured in this show are their own and do not necessarily reflect those of Lava For Good. Joy is essential and it's also elusive but now there's a new and exciting way to start your journey toward a more joyful existence. Joy 101. It's a new podcast hosted by me, Houda Kotby. Open your free iHeartRadio app search Joy 101 and listen now. Joy 101 with Houda Kotby is presented by CVS. Hey it's Alec Baldwin. It's about the hang. You know, Robin Ive is always a great hang and director Morgan Neville. What do you hear? I feel like my job is listening.
Really, really hard. Listen to "Here's the Thing" on the iHeart Radio app Apple podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts. It just came out. You just sit yourself up for the failure. This must have been tucked deep, deep in the "Germy Lin" file. My name is MC Jin. I'm excited to tell you about "Left" but not "Lease". These will be conversations that remind us all life is hard. "Laf Harder". Listen to "Laf" but not "Lease" with MC Jin on the iHeart Radio app Apple Podcast, or wherever you get your podcasts.
PodcastTranscript AI