June 2025:

Framed: Astonishing True Stories of Wrongful Convictions

by John Grisham and Jim McCloskey

Reading a book like " Framed" by John Grisham and Jim McCloskey is not an easy undertaking for me. The reason why is because I can't help but see the similarities in other wrongfully convicted individuals' stories and compare them to my case.

I am living what they have lived, experiencing what they've experienced, and I'm incurring the same kind traumatic experiences they've also incurred.

In the stories of every wrongfully convicted person there is always the same evil consistencies like investigators developing tunnel vision on the wrong person which allows the true culprit to get away. Police manufacturing "evidence" to convict when no real evidence can be found. Prosecutors making deals with the state's witnesses for lesser punishment if they help convict. Jail house snitches, and junk science galore to name a few. I've personally experienced these examples, that's how they sent me to DR.

As I read Framed I tried to wrap my mind around how the prosecutors and police could knowingly and intentionally set up innocent individuals, have them convicted, and sentenced to life or even DR. It's impossible for me, because these acts are not only evil, they are demonic. That is the only way for me to describe their actions because they are doing this over and over again. And my only response is that we have to pray for them.

I was sent to Texas DR in 1999. In 2000 I become friends with Cameron Todd Willingham. Todd was a good dude, funny, likable and a man of his word. He loved football and was an Oklahoma Sooners and Oakland Raiders fan. He reminded me of the kind guys I grew up with, cool guys who grew up ruff so you better think twice before you try them.

Everyone on Texas DR knew Todd was innocent and we thought he would prevail in proving he was wrongfully convicted and be exonerated.

A few things stand out in my memory of Todd. He would always go silent the week of Christmas where he wouldn't talk to anyone and stay in his cell. I remember being told that he lost his babies around this time of the year.

When I read about his story I was overwhelmed with sadness at what he endured. I was horrified at him losing his children then some quack arson investigator coming along looking for arson and finding "evidence" he needed to hang my friend.

Can you imagine what it was like to be reviled and hated by everyone in town after being accused of the most heinous crime imaginable, the burning of his children alive? Everyone turned against him and then he was convicted and sentenced to death.

I remember the day Todd was executed. I was listening to my radio all day long for updates about his situation. It was not to be, he was denied a reprieve by the governor and denied clemency.

That night I dreamed about Todd. In my dream me and three other friends were sitting around a table in a room waiting for word about Todd. When at 6pm, Todd burst through the door and we all jumped up and hugged him and were so happy he was still alive. I asked him how did he get away?

He replied that there was a new rule if you could fight them off for fifteen minutes they had to let you go. And of course, my friend who was a bad ass fought them off and got away. If I could, I would require every supporter of capital punishment to read this book so they would know innocent men are being murdered in the name of every United States citizen and thus, nobody could deny the truth. Framed is a book that must exist so the truth about wrongful convictions can be exposed!