On October 27, 1997, a man was robbed and killed in Philadelphia, PA. Due to mistaken eyewitness identification, 19-year-old Tyree Wallace was implicated in the crime. Tyree was convicted of second-degree murder, robbery, conspiracy, and possession of an instrument of crime and sentenced to life in prison. To Learn more and get involved, visit: https://givebutter.com/tyree https://www.blankrome.com/ https://www.instagram.com/keirforpa/ Wrongful Conviction is a production of Lava for...

On Saturday, June 4, 1983, three members of the Ryen family, as well as their neighbor’s son, Christopher Hughes, were brutally murdered in the Ryen home. 8 year old Joshua Ryen survived horrifying injuries, including a hatchet wound to the head and a slashed throat. The San Bernardino County Sheriff's Office immediately targeted Kevin Cooper because he had recently fled from the California Institution for Men (CIM), a medium security facility just a few miles from the Ryen home. A botched...

On the night of August 2, 1996, Tom Rhodes and his wife Jane were on a boat ride on Green Lake, in Minnesota, when Jane fell overboard. Tom failed to find Jane, and her body was discovered the next day. Police suspected Tom from the get-go, focusing on previous marriage and financial troubles. This led the medical examiner to give his initial finding of undetermined cause of death a second look – working backwards from police suspicions, and eventually changing the cause of death to homicide....

Evelyn Malin was the 84-year-old owner of the Dollar Lake Store in tiny Shamrock Township, 130 miles north of Minneapolis. On the morning of February 24, 1998, she was found beaten and strangled to death in the living quarters that were connected to her convenience store. Over a year later, Brian Pippitt was charged with premeditated murder based primarily on the incentivized testimony of two witnesses who later admitted to fabricating their statements. Brian was found guilty and sentenced to...

On the morning of June 12, 1994, Belynda Goff woke up to find her husband Stephen bludgeoned to death in their Green Forest, AR, apartment. From the jump, investigators pegged Belynda’s reaction to the tragedy as suspicious. That initial hunch would set the course of the investigation and subsequent prosecution, leading law enforcement to ignore far more plausible leads and key witnesses, and imprison Belynda for 23 years. To learn more and get involved, visit:https://innocenceproject.org/ ...

On January 16, 2009, Linda Bonner found her husband Franklin duct-taped to a chair in their Chattanooga, TN home, with tape over his nose and mouth and signs of blunt force trauma. He was dead from suffocation. Police found fingerprints on the duct tape, but no matches were found. Nine years later, in 2019, 23-year-old Angel Bumpass was arrested after failing to appear in Kentucky court for a traffic ticket. Her fingerprints were taken upon her arrest and automatically searched against...

On January 8, 1993, seven employees at a Brown’s Chicken and Pasta in Palatine, IL. were brutally murdered. With no solid physical evidence, police unsuccessfully chased down hundreds of leads. Local officials established a $100,000 reward. Still, the case went cold for nine years. Then, in 2002, two of James Degorski’s ex-girlfriends came forward with a story implicating James, and what they said would land him in prison for life. He continues to claim his innocence. To learn more about...

January 18, 2006, 3-year-old Trustin Blue tumbled down his basement stairs in Cincinnati, OH, became unresponsive, and later brain dead. Trustin had been under the supervision of his mother’s boyfriend, Lamont Hunter, at the time of the incident. When Trustin was declared dead, the police began suspecting that Trustin had been raped and abused by Lamont, and had not actually fallen down the stairs as Lamont claimed. The case against Lamont was centered around allegations of prior abuse...

On the evening of March 22, 1987 a businessman and father were robbed and killed in Dallas, TX. Just a few days later, 22-year-old Benjamine Spencer, a newlywed with a child on the way, was arrested for the crime. A reward for any information on the killing would lead several eyewitnesses to fabricate a story implicating Ben. Despite the fact that he had an alibi and there was no physical evidence linking him to the crime, Ben was sentenced to life in prison. He fought for the next 37 years...

On the night of July 15, 2008, 22-year-old Moustapha Oumaria was shot and killed while hanging out with three friends outside his Crown Heights, NY home. The three friends described the shooter as a black male wearing a white t-shirt and dark pants. When shown a photographic lineup, they identified Arvell Marshall as the shooter. But police had in their possession video surveillance footage that clearly showed that someone else was responsible for the murder. Nevertheless, Arvell was...

In the winter of 1995, Joyce Dennis was killed during her closing shift at a laundromat in North Philadelphia, PA. Police then rounded up a group of teenagers and, over the course of several months, got them to implicate two of their friends for the crime, including Eddie Ramirez. Despite the fact that no physical evidence tied him to the murder scene, Eddie would spend 27 years in prison for a crime he’s always maintained he did not commit.  Click here to see the entire interview on our...

On the morning of December 9th, 1984, 19-year-old Christopher Turner woke up to the police breaking into his bedroom with guns drawn. He was arrested for the murder of Catherine Fuller, who was assaulted, robbed, and killed on the evening of October 1st, 1984. Based on testimonies delivered under coercion, Christopher was convicted of first degree murder, along with 8 other defendants, and sentenced to life in prison. It was later revealed that the prosecution withheld vital information,...

On December 28, 2007, a young man was shot and killed outside an apartment complex in Cincinnati, Ohio. Ten days later, an eyewitness identified Marty Levingston as the gunman, and eventually, a jailhouse snitch would point to him too. Though the eyewitness expressed doubt at trial, Marty was sentenced to 15 to life for a murder he consistently maintained he did not commit. Click here to see the entire interview on our YouTube channel. Thank you to Ohio Supreme Court Justice Michael P....

On August 25, 1994, a woman found her boyfriend shot dead in his Louisiana apartment. His stolen car was found across from 16-year-old Eric Brown’s sister’s house. Without any DNA evidence, eyewitnesses, fingerprints, or murder weapon, the state took Eric to trial, and the jury found him guilty. That jury was composed of eleven white members and one black member. Two members of that jury also found him not guilty. Nevertheless, they sent Eric, a child, to prison for life without the...

Shortly after 18-year-old Tonia Miller brought her newborn home in Calhoun County, MI in 2001, she noticed something was off. Her baby wouldn’t eat much and she’d often gasp for air. Tonia asked doctors for help to no avail. “I don't know if it was because I was a young, unwed mother of two children on Medicaid,” Tonia says. “They didn’t take me serious at all.” Despite Tonia’s efforts to get her baby help, she would die at only 11-weeks-old, and Tonia would spend 18 years in prison for her...

Shortly before 3 a.m. on November 16, 1992, 16-year-old Shaharain Brandon was shot and killed in Chicago, IL. An eyewitness who was with Shaharain at the time of the shooting talked to police numerous times in hopes of identifying the gunman. Despite not mentioning him numerous times in her initial interviews, the eyewitness ended up identifying Roosevelt Myles in a photo lineup. Despite no physical evidence tying him to the crime, Roosevelt was sentenced to 60 years in prison for the...

In 2004, Marvin Haynes was a pretty average 16-year-old — watching Nickelodeon, chasing trends and girls, just having a good time. “I just couldn't wait for the weekends” Marvin says. Until he was picked up by police for a murder at a Minneapolis, MN flower shop. With no physical evidence tying Marvin to the scene, shaky witness IDs, and even a witness recanting at the stand, teenage Marvin was sentenced to life in prison. Click here to see the entire interview on our YouTube channel. Learn...

One morning in February of 1975, 17-year-old high school basketball star Leslie Vass was running an errand for his mother at the local pharmacy in Baltimore, MD when he was approached by a police officer. This was Vass’s first encounter with the police, and he was confused and frightened when they placed him under arrest at gunpoint. Four months prior, three men robbed a delivery man at this same pharmacy. The victim of this robbery happened to be there that day, and reported that Vass was...

On August 11, 1991, the body of a young woman was found outside an apartment building in Austin, TX. A bystander reported a black man rubbernecking at the incident, causing the police to question 26-year-old Allen Andre Causey for “suspicious behavior.”  After hours of interrogation police handed Andre a written statement claiming it was his alibi. Andre says only after signing did he learn it was a confession to murder that would land him in prison for three decades. On warm, sunny days,...

On January 31, 2002, Robert Roberson was awakened at his home in Palestine, TX by a cry and went to find his two year old daughter, Nikki Curtis, on the floor at the foot of the bed with a small amount of blood on her mouth. He cleaned up her mouth and kept her up for a while, then they both fell back to sleep.  A few hours later, Robert awoke up to find Nikki unconscious and turning blue. He tried to revive her but she was unresponsive.  Robert brought his daughter to the emergency room...

Pulitzer Prize winner and iHeartPodcast 2024 Social Impact Award Honoree Maggie Freleng brings compelling stories of redemption and justice with new episodes of Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freleng starting September 9, 2024. Wrongful Conviction with Maggie Freleng is a production of Lava for Good Podcasts in association with Signal Co. No1. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

In June 1986, Kevin Dykes witnessed the attempted murder of 2 people and the actual murder of a 3rd person in his neighborhood in Compton, CA. Kevin decided to go to the police, partly out of fear of reprisals by the killers who knew he witnessed the murder. The prosecutors then used his knowledge of the crimes that he witnessed against him and charged him with all 3 crimes.Learn more and get involved at:  https://www.change.org/free-kevin-dykes ...

After a short stint in prison, Stephen Carrington was a newlywed father, training to be an EMT and getting his life back on track. But when the police came looking for his brother at the same Brooklyn, NY address, the police mistakenly zeroed in on Stephen as the primary suspect of a felony murder at a Brooklyn lumber store. Stephen was convicted and sentence to 23 years to life.  Learn more and get involved at: ...

On June 14, 2007, 32-year-old Chris Vaughn was found limping on the side of the road near Joliet, IL, bleeding from two gunshot wounds. When police arrived on scene, they found the bodies of his wife and three children shot in the car. Chris is unable to recount the events of that early morning, and there are no other witnesses to the crime. Chris was subsequently convicted of 4 counts of first-degree murder. Although the state intended on imposing the death penalty, it was abolished four...