Chicago's Apartment 131 Murders | Author & Former Prosecutor Gregg Owen

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[SPEAKER_00]: Hi true crime fans, it's J.C. Nova.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Today on Death by Miss Adventure, I'm joined by Greg Owen, a former Cook County prosecutor who secured 62 murder convictions in his career and co-authored the new true crime book, Convergence.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Convergence tells the shocking story of a double murder that rocked a wealthy Chicago neighborhood and takes us behind the scenes of a justice system where trials can be one, lost, bought, or sold.

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[SPEAKER_00]: It exposed to some cases judges and lawyers would rather you never hear, and it's one story you won't want to miss.

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[SPEAKER_00]: Now, on with the show.

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[SPEAKER_01]: I'm excited today to have Greg Owens on the podcast today.

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[SPEAKER_01]: He's the co-author of the new book, Convergence.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Welcome to the show.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Thank you so much.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I can't wait to add just some questions and be talking with you.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Yeah, let's dive into it.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Before becoming a prosecutor, you were a musician playing keys with bands like Shady Days and the American breed, Sharon stages, with icons like Janice Chaplin, The Doors, and The Who.

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[SPEAKER_01]: What made you walk away from the stage to pursue law?

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[SPEAKER_02]: Well, it was one of these things.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I played music since, I don't know, I started to take a pedal lessons, I was forced to at nine.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And then by 12, my mother allowed me to not take them anymore.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But then a few years later, I see the Beatles and I go, hey, I know I want to play an instrument.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So my friend and I put the band together.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I played all through high school.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I played all through college.

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[SPEAKER_02]: In fact, I went to law school and played in the band tour it all through law school.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I got the dean allowed me to go and be other semester.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But when I was getting toward the end of law school, it was going to be taken to bar exam.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And some things that occurred in my music career, I mean, mid-70s and the late 70s were pretty dramatic.

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[SPEAKER_02]: A lot of drug use and a lot of other things that were just not very good.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And so I was starting a little depressed with the whole concept I was in a singer.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I started to think, well, what happens if we don't really make it real big?

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[SPEAKER_02]: What do I do?

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[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I can't sing, and I don't want to end up playing in a piano bar because I don't know, you can't sing well enough even for that.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So when the I was in Moscow, I was walking down stairs to the second floor and there was a big bulletin board and that all kinds of job opportunity.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Job notices all over the place.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But something drew my eye to a little four by six white index card that was at the

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[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know why.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it just was some of those things that happened to like, I was just about finished, but I wanted the education because as a musician, we got screwed so many times that, you know, somebody suggested, well, why don't you take some white classes, which was ridiculous, but I did it.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Then I saw this note, and I don't know what else to say.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, something inside me said, you better do that, you better do that, and then I looked again at the note, and I heard it again, and I never had anything

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I did as a strike that I went over to a paper and called my mother.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I said, Ma, could you get the guy to cut your hair to cut my hair to my teeth?

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[SPEAKER_02]: She says, are you okay?

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[SPEAKER_02]: What's wrong with you?

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[SPEAKER_02]: I'd know I'm fine.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I'd go with my mother's beauty salon person or hairdresser.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Cut my hair.

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[SPEAKER_02]: She took me to the mall, bought me a suit, and next day I showed up with his interview when the guy said he's your lucky day.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Supreme Court has just passed a new rule that said senior law students who have good enough grades and are supervised by a governmental agency, whether it be public defender, states, attorney, whatever.

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[SPEAKER_02]: If you're supervised, you would be allowed to try cases that really count as if you're an actual lawyer.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He's telling me all this, I don't even know what any, I'd never been in a court rule.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But something to get told me was just go along with the program.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So Monday I showed up to an office.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I met some supervisor for all these lawyers.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And he told me to go to this particular court room.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I got in a bus and I went there and I walked in and the place was just half just jam packed.

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[SPEAKER_02]: People smoke in, I could smoke hot dogs, there was people yelling and the judge was on the bench trying to case.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I walked up to the front and introduced myself to the person I was told to me.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He and me a stack of police files he says call out these names like what do you mean he goes like this?

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[SPEAKER_02]: He starts yelling like Jesus a judge trying to case made no difference And so I started doing it and I was still in the band I played the name before So I did what I was doing and after a few days I started like it.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I enjoyed and I enjoyed being in front of people and Actually using my leels skills and so two weeks later.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I quit the band

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[SPEAKER_02]: got my replacement and I never looked back.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I spent about six months as an intern and then I took the Illinois fire exam and I got hired immediately by the state's attorney's officer Chicago which is a prosecuting body and they put me in a position which is about two and a half years ahead of the normal entry level because I spent all that time in that other courtroom and I try to try to almost 300 misdemeanor cases before I even

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[SPEAKER_02]: took the buyer's hand.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So, so I was fortunate because within a year of being actually becoming a real lawyer, I was assigned a 26th of California at Chicago.

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[SPEAKER_02]: which is the Click County Criminal Corp Building where all the murder cases are held, all the big cases.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I didn't ask for it, but that's how it ended up.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And by the time this case that I is at the centerpiece of the book, by the time that case went down, I'd been in the office about four years, I'd already tried 41 murder jury trials in less than four years.

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[SPEAKER_02]: It wasn't even 30 years old as 29, and by that time there was so much crime in Chicago, so much crime corruption.

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[SPEAKER_02]: that we were in trial all the time.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, you just never got a break.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Do you remember the first case that you tried in front of a judge?

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[SPEAKER_02]: Well, the first case I tried was a misdemeanor, but that was when I was still an intern.

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[SPEAKER_02]: As far as the first jury trial, I mean, if you mean a real jury, it was a murder case.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I was the backup guide.

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[SPEAKER_02]: It was two of us, the first fear, and I was the other guy.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I gave an opening statement and I put out a couple of three witnesses.

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[SPEAKER_02]: It was a little daunting.

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[SPEAKER_02]: The first time you stand up a walk and approach a jury and tell them who you are and give them some idea of what this case is about.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But once I got through that first time, I never felt uncomfortable.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm like, at this point I'm about 26-27-28.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So we were really young.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we were handed huge responsibilities in very young age.

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[SPEAKER_01]: So let's talk about your book convergence.

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[SPEAKER_01]: It opens up one of the Chicago's wealthiest neighborhoods with a brutal scene.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Tony Messina finds his son in a son's girlfriend's stabbed to death.

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[SPEAKER_01]: What made this case stand out to you immediately?

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[SPEAKER_01]: And what is it about Tony himself that helped the case along?

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[SPEAKER_02]: Well, there's two things that occurred.

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[SPEAKER_02]: The day I took the Biring Sam, which was March 3rd of this particular year, I was in, you know, pretty thing up was the last two-day session, this was the second day.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So the next morning I was gonna be on a plane going to Los Angeles to hang out with my old band that we're getting ready to do what album because it takes two months to get the Biring results.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So as I'm taking that Biring Sam, there was a lunch break and when I went outside, there was a lot of silence, you know,

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[SPEAKER_02]: Well, later that day, I get that with the virus and I go home, we've got to pack my clothes.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I get in the house, but as they walk in the house, they see that afternoon newspaper truck shows up and they're putting papers in a paper box and they notice the front page said, contractor comma actress found slain.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I'm talking a big headline.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And then there was an article around the right side of the for page I had no money in my pocket I wanted to get a copy of it.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I had no money.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I just happened to notice it notice the headline I went in the house about half hour later.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He got a call from my brother Jay Dice the Jay what's that man?

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[SPEAKER_02]: He was Greg.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I'm so bummed out I said what's the matter he goes my friend and his girlfriend got murdered?

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[SPEAKER_02]: I go wet Freddy tells me the name I didn't know I never heard of this guy

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[SPEAKER_02]: So he tells me a little bit about it, and I go, wait a second, was your friend like a building head director he says, well, no, but his father is.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I said, was the girlfriend an actress, he goes, yeah, she just graduated acting school, they were a Chicago.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I said, I just saw the headline, okay?

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[SPEAKER_02]: So the first unusual thing is my brother was the friend of one of the victims who's father found the bodies as I was taking the biorexam.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So at the moment, I'm sitting in her hearing service.

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[SPEAKER_02]: That's because Tony Messina who hadn't found couldn't hear from the sun for two straight days and there were no cell phones in those days.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He got concerned.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He went into Chicago from the suburbs.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He went to this girl's apartment in a very nice neighborhood.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He got the jitter to let him in and there they found his son in this girl both spent stabbed to death.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm finishing a bar exam and the way I ended up even taking the case.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I had already tried, like I said, over four to burning throughout, dirty trials.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And my brother calls me, I talked to him in between, but he called me in a particular day, November.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And he says, great, could you help me, honey?

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[SPEAKER_02]: I go straight to you.

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[SPEAKER_02]: What's up?

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[SPEAKER_02]: He goes, you know, my friend, they got murdered.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I go mad, I really remember.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He goes, well,

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[SPEAKER_02]: And my brother was friends of the family of the family.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He said the family is very upset because they got a call from somebody from Europe.

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[SPEAKER_02]: States attorneys office and said they're going to drop the charges.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I go mess and pass them.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Well, it's a double murder.

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[SPEAKER_02]: We don't drop charges.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He goes, that's what they're telling.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Could you just find out?

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I made some calls and I found out that the case which should have been assigned to the building where I was working 26th of California, because that's from the murder case trail.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But for some mysterious reason the case had been transferred to a court building, but normally had divorces, personal injury, contract law.

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[SPEAKER_02]: They had a couple of small criminal courts, but they didn't handle murders, but this case got sent there.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And then I find out that the killer is but I'm banned for four years almost.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I'm thinking, I'd have somebody to get a band and a double murder.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Well, then I find out further that not only did he get banned, but the case when he first got arrested, he was arrested within two days of the body's being discovered.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But shortly after he's arrested, he goes in front of a band,

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[SPEAKER_02]: but then two days later, his lawyers get the case to another judge who gives them a bond, which made a long story short.

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[SPEAKER_02]: That particular judge years later would go to prison and a big thing called Operation Greatheart.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So now there's all these crooked corrupt elements, but I still know nothing about the case.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I drive downtown to where the case is now going to sign and go up to their office or the prosecutor's there.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And nobody seems to confine the file.

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[SPEAKER_02]: One of the guys got in his hands and he's looked under a desk and there was the case file for this case.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And he says to me, Greg, if I was you, I wouldn't touch that case with the ten-foot pole.

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[SPEAKER_02]: You know, that case is like poison.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I was the problem.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He was the first of all.

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[SPEAKER_02]: There's only one witness.

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[SPEAKER_02]: We have no fingerprints.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Nothing.

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[SPEAKER_02]: Nothing.

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[SPEAKER_02]: All we have is one witness who was involved in the drug deal with these people.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And he's taken the fifth thou, which we as he won't testify at all.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He said not only that, there was some evidence seized at the defendant's home on a search warrant, but the judge in this particular courtroom war was decided and said that the state can't use the evidence because the search warrant was obtained, the information contained in the search warrant, the judge should not have allowed that judge, the original judge, to issue the war.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So this judge said, no, he can't use it even, it's stricken.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So they took that particular order by that judge denying them to use suppressing the evidence.

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[SPEAKER_02]: They took it to the Illinois Apollacord who reversed the judge a year later.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But between the time, the case, the evidence was secured and the time after the Apollacord reversed the judge, somehow the evidence which was in an evidence locker and the police department was missing.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So you have no physical evidence, you got a guy taking it, there's no case, I mean there's nothing you can do.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm looking at this thing and I pull some stuff out and I see a picture of this guy in his background.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He's extremely wealthy.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He was 24 years old the time of the murders.

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[SPEAKER_02]: His family is very well known in the community.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And I can see quite thoroughly, this is all, this is corruption.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, they bribe judges, people of the whole thing.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And there was so much corruption going on at that time around me.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I just said, that's it, man.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I said, I call my partner that I tried most of the cases with Mike, Mike David.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And I said, Mike, this case we're probably going to lose it.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But these guys here really want to try the case.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I said, at least we're going to try out.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So he agreed.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I was able to get the case transferred to 26th of California.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And then the book through he talks about what I went through to get witnesses to testify and the witnesses we found that the police had not found after.

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[SPEAKER_01]: Tell me about the two murder victims and tell me about the person who was arrested and his relationship with any in their name was the two victims were G.

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[SPEAKER_02]: There were 24 and 22 respectively, the jail was older, he was from a nice, very good family, well-to-do family in the North Shore of Chicago.

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[SPEAKER_02]: She had moved up her Florida with the active school when they met.

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[SPEAKER_02]: and she had an apartment in a very good neighborhood right up near the Lake Michigan, they had gone together for about three or four months only.

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[SPEAKER_02]: And the defendant was a unusual situation because at the time I sort of took the case, we couldn't tie them together.

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[SPEAKER_02]: While we had was and I witnessed who at the time was talking, we're told the police he was in this apartment

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[SPEAKER_02]: He was there with G. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E. E

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[SPEAKER_02]: So while Sedrick was there, they went into the bathroom and they apparently something happened.

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[SPEAKER_02]: But the defendant pulled out a butcher that had been stabbed, Cheo, right in the throat, and a couple more times in the chest.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So Sedrick, the hero he was, said, I'm out of here.

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[SPEAKER_02]: He runs out the door and takes up, leaves the girl alone, and she ends up getting murdered too.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So they were young people.

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[SPEAKER_02]: The killer was 24 years old.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, said Rick was the same age, 24, he had a new Porsche, G.O.

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[SPEAKER_02]: had a new brand of Lincoln Tottenham.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, these were rich young people.

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[SPEAKER_02]: They were all very wealthy, very wealthy.

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[SPEAKER_01]: But were they wealthy because as you're describing the story, the first thing I think is like, okay, they're making their money from drug deals, but I could be completely wrong.

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[SPEAKER_02]: No, no, their families were wealthy.

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[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it was from a very well-to-do family and an important export import company.

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[SPEAKER_02]: It lives in a real nice neighborhood, North of Chicago.

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[SPEAKER_02]: The time tractor, his, CEO, his father, was a very low-known building contractor.

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[SPEAKER_02]: So they were supplementing their income, but I mean, from what we knew and what we discovered.

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[SPEAKER_02]: It wasn't like a big time.

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[SPEAKER_02]: It was more they would buy drugs,

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[SPEAKER_02]: And then they would step on them or cut them and then they would sell half and then they would have the half of their own person So they were they were doing this so they could have their own drugs and not have the paperwork That's sort of what it was.

16:33.975 --> 16:35.055
[SPEAKER_02]: It wasn't a big business.

16:35.195 --> 16:48.998
[SPEAKER_01]: So let's be tell me about the person that was arrested for the murder because if someone's using a butcher knife to stab somebody that sounds like a crime of passion I mean did he actually have a relationship with Tinker?

16:49.779 --> 17:02.958
[SPEAKER_02]: It's interesting, you should say that, because that's the one thing we learned, and normally that knife is used either for reasons of style, like you know what, anybody is sneak up on somebody because you're in the military or whatever.

17:03.539 --> 17:04.140
[SPEAKER_02]: Or passion.

17:04.881 --> 17:26.261
[SPEAKER_02]: And so even though we were ever established a motive, we had a little information, but it seemed to us there had to be something going on between somebody, because said Rick said, at the time this guy came in, Tinker acted like she didn't know them, but then after they discovered there was a fight going on, and they pushed the door

17:32.405 --> 17:35.047
[SPEAKER_02]: Mitchell, Mitchell, get out, Mitchell, leave him alone, leave him alone.

17:35.527 --> 17:38.769
[SPEAKER_02]: And so then, the saidric eating is more concerned because what's going on here?

17:38.809 --> 17:43.311
[SPEAKER_02]: She ached like she didn't know him, now she does know him, who is going with this all about?

17:43.952 --> 17:47.634
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's why he took off, but he didn't know what to think.

17:48.234 --> 17:50.515
[SPEAKER_02]: But she definitely knew him, yeah.

17:50.735 --> 17:55.618
[SPEAKER_02]: She did, and she owned him, but this saidric, she all had a lot of friends.

17:55.958 --> 17:58.740
[SPEAKER_02]: But my brother included, now my brother never met saidric,

17:59.467 --> 18:02.230
[SPEAKER_02]: My brother never met Nuva at this guy, Mitchell.

18:02.770 --> 18:07.835
[SPEAKER_02]: So, Gio had friends in a different unique friendships, you know.

18:08.775 --> 18:18.264
[SPEAKER_02]: My brother was into cars and he was a very skilled marksman and he collected the guns when a young age usually 21 at the time.

18:19.165 --> 18:21.507
[SPEAKER_02]: So, they got to be friends because of that.

18:22.142 --> 18:27.225
[SPEAKER_02]: And then other people got to be president because of the drug business or something from high school or something.

18:27.245 --> 18:30.468
[SPEAKER_02]: So he had a different cadre of friends that didn't know each other.

18:31.088 --> 18:31.809
[SPEAKER_02]: Very unusual.

18:32.369 --> 18:33.470
[SPEAKER_01]: That's fascinating.

18:33.590 --> 18:48.840
[SPEAKER_01]: So as you took over the case, how long did it take you to build a case against the defendant to find witnesses and actually get the backstory to why these two were murdered?

18:49.568 --> 18:57.934
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, from the time I took that case, it took me about a month of meeting with this eyewitness four times.

18:58.655 --> 19:10.143
[SPEAKER_02]: At first, he was, you know, I got nothing to say, I got a lawyer by coincidence, he and I are like at the same age, you know, when I took the barracks, I was like 25 and when they were getting murdered, they're 24, 25.

19:10.183 --> 19:16.148
[SPEAKER_02]: So, now for years later, he's the same age as me, so we have certain things in common.

19:16.808 --> 19:18.790
[SPEAKER_02]: But he doesn't trust prosecutors.

19:18.830 --> 19:24.635
[SPEAKER_02]: He thought that because there was a drug deal going down, and there were drugs found in the new apartment.

19:25.458 --> 19:29.281
[SPEAKER_02]: that if something didn't go right, we would charge him with a crime.

19:29.541 --> 19:32.263
[SPEAKER_02]: We'd charge him with drug dealer, part of a murder.

19:33.043 --> 19:38.347
[SPEAKER_02]: So he was scared, even though he had told the police, at this point, he didn't want anything to do with it anymore.

19:38.427 --> 19:42.270
[SPEAKER_02]: So I had to talk him down, make him understand.

19:42.290 --> 19:43.891
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not about him.

19:44.671 --> 19:48.013
[SPEAKER_02]: So finally, after these three meetings, he's very obstinate.

19:48.194 --> 19:50.055
[SPEAKER_02]: He wants the immunity and this and that.

19:50.695 --> 19:54.198
[SPEAKER_02]: I said to him, listen, said, Rick, why don't we just meet that talk about the case?

19:54.278 --> 19:54.919
[SPEAKER_02]: Just hang out.

19:54.939 --> 19:56.661
[SPEAKER_02]: Because I knew he sort of liked me as a person.

19:57.621 --> 20:05.228
[SPEAKER_02]: So we did, so I met him at a club at Chicago that he was a member of very popular, big, big disco club at the time.

20:06.140 --> 20:06.821
[SPEAKER_02]: I go in.

20:06.861 --> 20:07.241
[SPEAKER_02]: He's there.

20:07.261 --> 20:08.562
[SPEAKER_02]: He's got his own booth and everything.

20:09.042 --> 20:14.766
[SPEAKER_02]: And we start talking, you know, and he says to me, you know, Greg, you just don't seem like a prosecutor.

20:14.966 --> 20:15.647
[SPEAKER_02]: What does that mean?

20:15.687 --> 20:16.367
[SPEAKER_02]: Because I don't know.

20:16.387 --> 20:18.168
[SPEAKER_02]: And you don't seem like the type.

20:18.208 --> 20:20.190
[SPEAKER_02]: He goes, I do ever get into this.

20:20.890 --> 20:23.572
[SPEAKER_02]: I said to myself, listen man, that's a long story.

20:23.732 --> 20:25.874
[SPEAKER_02]: He says to me, we got all night.

20:25.994 --> 20:27.355
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm like, oh, man,

20:28.015 --> 20:29.637
[SPEAKER_02]: I said, okay, well, let me start here.

20:29.938 --> 20:30.839
[SPEAKER_02]: I was in a band.

20:31.299 --> 20:32.120
[SPEAKER_02]: That's all I said.

20:32.200 --> 20:33.762
[SPEAKER_02]: He goes, you were in a lot.

20:34.423 --> 20:35.224
[SPEAKER_02]: So I was in a band.

20:35.284 --> 20:38.969
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm treated like I told you, you know, he goes, what band?

20:39.249 --> 20:42.333
[SPEAKER_02]: And the last band was called Jericho, which also was very, very well known.

20:43.053 --> 20:46.376
[SPEAKER_02]: And so he said to me, oh my God, I saw you a hundred times.

20:46.856 --> 20:49.158
[SPEAKER_02]: Because like I say, he's the same age as me now, right?

20:49.218 --> 20:56.263
[SPEAKER_02]: So when I'm 21, 19, 20, 20, 20, 20, I'm playing all over the place and he's in the audience why I never met him, I didn't know.

20:57.064 --> 21:07.351
[SPEAKER_02]: So because of that, his whole demeanor change, I mean, his whole present, everything about him change, he became very receptive and said, I will testify because I trust you.

21:08.072 --> 21:10.293
[SPEAKER_02]: He trust me because I had better musician.

21:12.928 --> 21:18.109
[SPEAKER_02]: But I had no idea that he would react that way because I had no intention of talking about it.

21:18.970 --> 21:25.331
[SPEAKER_02]: But once he realized that I was being honest and I wasn't just from prosecutor one to just nail somebody.

21:26.071 --> 21:27.732
[SPEAKER_02]: He agreed to tough out.

21:28.532 --> 21:30.212
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, that's not enough.

21:31.032 --> 21:32.973
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, this him alone would never be enough.

21:34.447 --> 21:45.859
[SPEAKER_02]: So we went about talking to him more intently and found out after the murders he had run out, trapped in his porch, went downtown, where his girlfriend was working at a club in the city.

21:46.650 --> 21:47.831
[SPEAKER_02]: He told her what happened.

21:47.911 --> 21:49.913
[SPEAKER_02]: She said to him, well, we got to call the police.

21:49.953 --> 21:51.055
[SPEAKER_02]: So they call the police.

21:51.115 --> 21:52.176
[SPEAKER_02]: They tell him what happened.

21:52.796 --> 21:55.519
[SPEAKER_02]: And then they get in his portion and drive back to the crime scene.

21:56.059 --> 21:57.461
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, there's no police here.

21:58.001 --> 22:00.003
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, they're both like freaking out.

22:00.063 --> 22:00.264
[SPEAKER_02]: No.

22:00.784 --> 22:09.233
[SPEAKER_02]: What happened was when he called the police from the pay phone and we heard the tape, the police officer take it to call thought it was a prank.

22:10.083 --> 22:22.823
[SPEAKER_02]: So he didn't send any offers to respond and there's good evidence to believe that one of them might have survived if the police had got there at that moment, but they didn't that nobody showed up at all in fact the father Tony didn't find him for two days.

22:24.054 --> 22:31.677
[SPEAKER_02]: And of course, at this point, Cedric's really scared now, so he gets a lawyer in a lawyer, so don't say a word, don't, you know, nothing.

22:32.518 --> 22:45.943
[SPEAKER_02]: And so eventually, you know, the police find out that Cedric was Geo's friend, and he had called the night of the murders, looking for Geo, and so they go and bring him in, meaning Cedric to the interview.

22:46.587 --> 22:52.252
[SPEAKER_02]: And he's telling me, I know him, but then they say, well, where were you on the evening of March 1st?

22:52.833 --> 22:54.514
[SPEAKER_02]: His lawyer was a very bright sister.

22:54.794 --> 22:57.196
[SPEAKER_02]: He's got nothing to say about anything after February 29th.

22:57.276 --> 22:58.137
[SPEAKER_02]: It was a leap here.

22:58.898 --> 23:00.779
[SPEAKER_02]: So the police were going, what are you talking about?

23:00.799 --> 23:04.142
[SPEAKER_02]: Where you got, you get there the 29th, and now you don't know anything?

23:04.843 --> 23:05.624
[SPEAKER_02]: And he wouldn't talk.

23:06.464 --> 23:09.907
[SPEAKER_02]: But he sent something interesting when he was being interviewed as he was leaving.

23:10.868 --> 23:12.790
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, the apartment with this group of women lived.

23:13.564 --> 23:15.405
[SPEAKER_02]: departments are really close together.

23:15.486 --> 23:16.426
[SPEAKER_02]: It's an older building.

23:17.347 --> 23:25.113
[SPEAKER_02]: And he said to them, are you telling me that that woman got stabbed and nobody heard anything?

23:26.342 --> 23:30.686
[SPEAKER_02]: And the police had had interviewed some people, and they did say they did hear something.

23:31.266 --> 23:43.296
[SPEAKER_02]: But once he said that, the main detective, Tettel Carter, a light bulb, what I often he said to himself, let's go downtown in the next day and let's have them check all the tapes and see if somebody did call.

23:44.300 --> 23:45.400
[SPEAKER_02]: So they get downtown though.

23:45.420 --> 23:46.400
[SPEAKER_02]: He didn't say it was him.

23:46.420 --> 23:50.521
[SPEAKER_02]: He just said he just said Senator just said, somebody must have called.

23:51.161 --> 23:53.542
[SPEAKER_02]: So they go and they listen to all these tapes and they hear it.

23:53.582 --> 23:55.562
[SPEAKER_02]: They hear the tape and they can tell us his voice.

23:56.123 --> 23:59.403
[SPEAKER_02]: He calls us, I want to temporarily report a murder or an attempted murder.

23:59.863 --> 24:04.504
[SPEAKER_02]: It's a 29 70 shared and he gives him the address, the harbor number, just get there.

24:04.524 --> 24:07.025
[SPEAKER_02]: Get there in the police officer kept saying, well, who are you?

24:07.525 --> 24:08.765
[SPEAKER_02]: Don't worry about who he was.

24:08.945 --> 24:09.825
[SPEAKER_02]: What would you see?

24:09.865 --> 24:11.906
[SPEAKER_02]: So I told you what I saw and he's pleading with

24:13.027 --> 24:21.163
[SPEAKER_02]: So the police hear the tape now they know for sure that he knows something they bring it back in and at that point he breaks down it and tells him what happened

24:21.948 --> 24:26.249
[SPEAKER_02]: And his girlfriend is brought in and she says, yes, he came in and told me what happened.

24:26.269 --> 24:27.649
[SPEAKER_02]: I was with him when he called the police.

24:27.669 --> 24:29.169
[SPEAKER_02]: We drove back to the crime scene.

24:29.649 --> 24:30.290
[SPEAKER_02]: We got there.

24:30.330 --> 24:31.310
[SPEAKER_02]: He got out of the car.

24:31.710 --> 24:34.030
[SPEAKER_02]: He went up to the apartment, which was the first floor apartment.

24:34.430 --> 24:41.492
[SPEAKER_02]: And there was a standpipe, like when the fire department hooks up the holes, stick it out of the building right below her apartment window.

24:41.912 --> 24:43.332
[SPEAKER_02]: He got himself on the standpipe.

24:43.352 --> 24:44.972
[SPEAKER_02]: He looked in the night of the incident.

24:45.212 --> 24:48.733
[SPEAKER_02]: And now we see his tinker on the floor, the pool of blood.

24:49.433 --> 24:51.214
[SPEAKER_02]: He hasn't seen her get stamped.

24:51.394 --> 24:51.854
[SPEAKER_02]: He left.

24:52.594 --> 24:54.635
[SPEAKER_02]: Now we realize there's two people murdered.

24:55.275 --> 25:00.717
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's when he got a lawyer, but if she, we got the girlfriend, her name is Mickey.

25:01.377 --> 25:02.738
[SPEAKER_02]: She told her story.

25:03.778 --> 25:05.539
[SPEAKER_02]: And yet, that's what we had.

25:06.039 --> 25:06.999
[SPEAKER_02]: We had no fingerprints.

25:07.019 --> 25:08.320
[SPEAKER_02]: There were no DNA at the time.

25:08.360 --> 25:10.720
[SPEAKER_02]: No cell phone was no closer than that of this stuff.

25:10.981 --> 25:11.361
[SPEAKER_02]: Zero.

25:12.021 --> 25:14.962
[SPEAKER_02]: We had a witness who was in that clean himself

25:18.301 --> 25:23.885
[SPEAKER_02]: That took us on a whole another path that tried to find out that these people even know each other.

25:23.945 --> 25:28.188
[SPEAKER_02]: How can we prove they knew each other when this guy's suffix is he and never seen the guy before?

25:29.209 --> 25:35.293
[SPEAKER_02]: And that became probably the most monumental journey I've ever taken in my life because of that.

25:35.773 --> 25:40.356
[SPEAKER_02]: Him, us, me just thinking, I've gotta find some way to believe these people.

25:40.917 --> 25:42.658
[SPEAKER_02]: And at the time we couldn't, but we did.

25:43.298 --> 25:43.719
[SPEAKER_02]: We did.

25:43.899 --> 25:45.560
[SPEAKER_02]: And that was unbelievable all that happened.

25:46.016 --> 26:12.660
[SPEAKER_01]: So, when we're talking about Chicago at the time that the murder happened, people have their perception of Chicago from movies and television and which you read in the newspaper, how much does the city itself play a character in your book, and especially during that time period, when you're basically pulling back the curtain on dirty judges, compromise lawyers, background deals at that time.

26:13.682 --> 26:18.585
[SPEAKER_02]: People's perception of Chicago was bad, but what was really going on was even worse.

26:18.745 --> 26:22.127
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, people had no idea, the level of corruption.

26:22.148 --> 26:33.915
[SPEAKER_02]: Now, we as prosecutors, you know, we never saw somebody hand money to a judge, but it was very obvious when you have a case and you've got everything going for you and the guy was a bench trial.

26:33.935 --> 26:39.559
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, usually bench trials are when defendants have a strong case in the state as a band case, because

26:40.200 --> 26:46.832
[SPEAKER_02]: They can't pull the wool over a judge's eyes, so we had had cases where we had, we even missed them in their cases.

26:46.872 --> 26:48.775
[SPEAKER_02]: They're dead bang winners and we lose.

26:49.423 --> 26:54.066
[SPEAKER_02]: And we lose it as same lawyers for the same judges over and over and over.

26:54.647 --> 26:56.268
[SPEAKER_02]: And it got to be almost ridiculous.

26:56.308 --> 27:03.133
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we had to go about preparing cases, assuming assuming that somebody took someone.

27:03.914 --> 27:06.295
[SPEAKER_02]: And then we had to worry about where jurors be in bright.

27:06.436 --> 27:07.596
[SPEAKER_02]: Did the judge take up hand?

27:07.977 --> 27:10.579
[SPEAKER_02]: Police officers, I had cases one or one were a police officer.

27:10.599 --> 27:12.220
[SPEAKER_02]: I know for sure he took money.

27:12.753 --> 27:14.715
[SPEAKER_02]: He changes testimony in the middle of the trial.

27:15.115 --> 27:19.879
[SPEAKER_02]: So we had to learn to be lawyers and try cases of beastly successful.

27:20.520 --> 27:25.664
[SPEAKER_02]: At the same time, figuring out how to get around everything because of corruption.

27:25.864 --> 27:27.365
[SPEAKER_02]: It was, it was the worst.

27:27.926 --> 27:32.890
[SPEAKER_02]: To this day, I would say, in the history of America, nothing was worse than what was going on right then.

27:33.591 --> 27:33.891
[SPEAKER_02]: Nothing.

27:34.590 --> 27:38.011
[SPEAKER_01]: How many cases did you try in your first one?

27:38.071 --> 27:39.531
[SPEAKER_01]: How long were you a prosecutor?

27:39.951 --> 27:43.432
[SPEAKER_01]: And then how many murder cases did you try during that time period?

27:43.472 --> 27:45.653
[SPEAKER_01]: And why did this one stand out?

27:46.253 --> 27:49.414
[SPEAKER_02]: I was a prosecutor for just a little less than nine years.

27:50.114 --> 27:53.955
[SPEAKER_02]: I tried 64 jury trails, 61 of them were murder cases.

27:54.535 --> 27:58.877
[SPEAKER_02]: So I mean, when you think about it, when you're doing 10 murders a year, that's a lot.

27:58.997 --> 28:00.217
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, that's almost one a month.

28:01.070 --> 28:01.972
[SPEAKER_02]: and he have no breaks.

28:02.172 --> 28:12.410
[SPEAKER_02]: But reason this case stood out is because number one, Tony Biscena, Geosfather, he and I became extremely close because of this case.

28:12.490 --> 28:13.312
[SPEAKER_02]: I had never become

28:14.043 --> 28:17.324
[SPEAKER_02]: that really emotionally involved to this level with the family.

28:17.404 --> 28:22.345
[SPEAKER_02]: Of course, I felt bad for everybody in the court, but not to this extent.

28:23.285 --> 28:30.247
[SPEAKER_02]: And it became so intense that for about 35 years after this, Tony became like my surrogate father.

28:30.547 --> 28:34.068
[SPEAKER_02]: My father had disappeared from my life years ago for that.

28:34.748 --> 28:39.169
[SPEAKER_02]: And here was Tony, who lost his son, and he almost became like my dad.

28:44.276 --> 29:05.686
[SPEAKER_02]: So the relationship became very, very tight, very close, and the things that occurred, you know, years later, as I look back and I just, you know, sort of retired from doing the different businesses I've been in, I thought to myself, I just thought about five cases that in and by themselves should be books.

29:06.930 --> 29:18.903
[SPEAKER_02]: And the first one I thought should be this one, converges because when I look back in it years later, all the things that came together, I mean, there are a myriad of these coincidences that are beyond belief.

29:19.504 --> 29:25.471
[SPEAKER_02]: There's so unreal and there's many that I haven't brought up that it's almost hard to believe, but no one would make this up.

29:26.244 --> 29:32.350
[SPEAKER_02]: It was the first time as a prosecutor as a lawyer that I just decided I'm done with these crooked people.

29:32.410 --> 29:33.151
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I don't care.

29:33.191 --> 29:35.333
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not going to sit back and let this happen.

29:35.413 --> 29:37.555
[SPEAKER_02]: So, you know, what's the point?

29:37.575 --> 29:39.417
[SPEAKER_02]: The point is obstacles don't mean defeat.

29:39.437 --> 29:40.338
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's what I learned.

29:40.478 --> 29:43.441
[SPEAKER_02]: And perseverance and integrity is a big thing.

29:43.501 --> 29:47.585
[SPEAKER_02]: And, you know, they see character isn't revealed when life is good.

29:48.306 --> 29:51.569
[SPEAKER_02]: It's really revealed when doing the right thing in class there.

29:52.070 --> 29:56.614
[SPEAKER_02]: And so, you know, Mike and I, my partner, that was sort of how we handled things.

29:56.714 --> 30:01.458
[SPEAKER_02]: And this was, this was a big thing because we could see how this guy was trying to buy his way out of it.

30:01.938 --> 30:06.302
[SPEAKER_02]: Our attitude was, that's enough is enough for drawing the lane right here, no more.

30:06.863 --> 30:08.004
[SPEAKER_02]: They were going to just throw it out.

30:09.265 --> 30:10.926
[SPEAKER_02]: And then we said, no, we're not going to throw it out.

30:10.946 --> 30:13.228
[SPEAKER_02]: We're going to get, we're going to do whatever we have to.

30:13.308 --> 30:13.789
[SPEAKER_02]: If we can,

30:14.545 --> 30:20.387
[SPEAKER_02]: to get this guy to testify and find some more witnesses and build the case that nobody cared about.

30:21.107 --> 30:22.148
[SPEAKER_02]: And we did it.

30:23.128 --> 30:24.028
[SPEAKER_02]: Then we were successful.

30:24.949 --> 30:28.770
[SPEAKER_01]: So the defendant, you said his name was Mitchell or Mitch?

30:29.130 --> 30:29.870
[SPEAKER_02]: Mitch Mitchell.

30:29.910 --> 30:30.090
[SPEAKER_02]: Yep.

30:30.570 --> 30:34.012
[SPEAKER_01]: Was he found guilty and and how many years in prison did he get?

30:34.672 --> 30:37.053
[SPEAKER_02]: He had three of the best criminal defense attorneys.

30:38.073 --> 30:40.774
[SPEAKER_02]: The city ever went one, one defense attorney

30:45.293 --> 30:54.062
[SPEAKER_02]: One guy represented Jimmy Hoffa, the lady, was probably one of the top five female criminal attorneys in America that time she was on the cover of People Magazine.

30:54.602 --> 31:00.668
[SPEAKER_02]: That was a defense team together collectively, they had, but 98 years of experience.

31:00.788 --> 31:05.112
[SPEAKER_02]: My partner Mike and I, we had nine years, nine or ten years at the most, between us.

31:06.233 --> 31:10.017
[SPEAKER_02]: So we were up against some very high-powered high-priced lawyers.

31:11.021 --> 31:12.522
[SPEAKER_02]: And you know, it did bother us.

31:12.562 --> 31:14.283
[SPEAKER_02]: We had tried so many cases by that time.

31:14.323 --> 31:19.606
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think they underestimated our ability and resourcefulness in perseverance.

31:20.527 --> 31:23.588
[SPEAKER_02]: So there's another one that you might fight in music.

31:23.648 --> 31:26.230
[SPEAKER_02]: So when I was in law school, I saw it long here.

31:27.110 --> 31:33.134
[SPEAKER_02]: And I was my second year, end of the second year, I took me four and a half years because I don't even want to be a little semester.

31:34.600 --> 31:38.023
[SPEAKER_02]: So one of my classmates said, hey, Greg, what are you taking for your elected?

31:38.443 --> 31:39.524
[SPEAKER_02]: I said, I'm not sure.

31:39.564 --> 31:40.525
[SPEAKER_02]: I got a one elective.

31:40.565 --> 31:41.326
[SPEAKER_02]: I don't know what to take.

31:41.346 --> 31:42.527
[SPEAKER_02]: He goes, I'll tell you what to take.

31:42.587 --> 31:43.988
[SPEAKER_02]: Take trial advocacy.

31:44.248 --> 31:47.050
[SPEAKER_02]: The teacher is again, he's sure my man is saying, I heard of you.

31:47.150 --> 31:48.552
[SPEAKER_02]: He was a well-known criminal lawyer.

31:49.272 --> 31:51.414
[SPEAKER_02]: And he says, he gives everybody at least to be.

31:51.534 --> 31:53.135
[SPEAKER_02]: I go, that sounds right up my alley.

31:53.155 --> 31:54.737
[SPEAKER_02]: At least just to be for sure.

31:55.457 --> 31:56.858
[SPEAKER_02]: So I take the class, you know?

31:57.239 --> 31:58.400
[SPEAKER_02]: And I thought I did good.

31:59.501 --> 32:05.564
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, the last day of class, he has sheets of paper with people's names, I don't know, he folds it over and incites the grade.

32:06.164 --> 32:09.225
[SPEAKER_02]: So he goes around, and everybody there's sheet, he said, don't open it now.

32:09.765 --> 32:13.327
[SPEAKER_02]: Just see it next fall, and everybody leaves.

32:13.367 --> 32:17.889
[SPEAKER_02]: But he says to me, he doesn't give me a sheet, he says, Greg, could you wait for me?

32:17.929 --> 32:19.549
[SPEAKER_02]: I said, sure, so I stay at my seat.

32:19.749 --> 32:22.170
[SPEAKER_02]: He brings a desk right up almost to my knees.

32:23.051 --> 32:26.272
[SPEAKER_02]: And he's got the sheet of paper apparently with my grade in it.

32:29.025 --> 32:30.027
[SPEAKER_02]: He goes, great.

32:30.207 --> 32:31.389
[SPEAKER_02]: I've got your great right here.

32:32.931 --> 32:33.813
[SPEAKER_02]: I want to tell you something.

32:34.714 --> 32:36.697
[SPEAKER_02]: It's the lowest screen I've ever given.

32:37.753 --> 33:00.358
[SPEAKER_02]: He said, you should have received a D, but I gave you a C-minus, I'm like, I didn't think he goes, I'm going to give you some advice, he puts his hand on my shoulder, lean so forward he's just, you don't have what it takes to be a trial lawyer, and best you should work in an office with a corporation, do kind of, you don't have the personality, you don't have the charisma, you don't have the stomach, you just, you know, you're going to have

33:01.018 --> 33:04.520
[SPEAKER_02]: Be rated me, you know, and at that point I think I don't care.

33:04.540 --> 33:12.423
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm not going to be a lawyer anyway, but it's still hard, you know, and seven years later, he was the lead defense attorney on that case with that we tried.

33:12.964 --> 33:18.266
[SPEAKER_02]: And that jury was out two hours and found this guy guilty, you know, after he was on bond for four years.

33:19.126 --> 33:24.629
[SPEAKER_02]: And after the trial, he was coming off from the lock-up with the defendant was after he was taken to the custody.

33:25.369 --> 33:28.811
[SPEAKER_02]: And there was some news for paper reporters that I didn't even realize for staying in nearest

33:29.853 --> 33:33.414
[SPEAKER_02]: And I said to them, and I still call them Mr. because you know, I'm even still my girlfriend.

33:33.734 --> 33:38.156
[SPEAKER_02]: I said Mr. Magnuson, he goes, yeah, I go, not bad for a C-minus student, huh?

33:39.036 --> 33:42.177
[SPEAKER_02]: Just to rub it in a little bit, that there's another convertors.

33:42.317 --> 33:45.758
[SPEAKER_02]: He tells me I should never be a trial lawyer to look what happened.

33:46.657 --> 33:48.839
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, that's that's crazy.

33:48.859 --> 33:55.325
[SPEAKER_01]: And he remembered you when you were, when you, he remembered me about halfway through the case.

33:55.685 --> 33:58.588
[SPEAKER_02]: That it for, you know, but he did after a while.

33:58.808 --> 34:00.169
[SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, but I didn't bring it up.

34:00.209 --> 34:00.850
[SPEAKER_02]: She I didn't.

34:01.702 --> 34:07.068
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I still call the Mr. Baguetson because to me, that was your teacher, you know, I mean, off through all those years.

34:07.869 --> 34:16.578
[SPEAKER_02]: And, you know, that ended up being in this next day, a reporter, they making daily, who was a sometimes newspaper column that's syndicated.

34:17.319 --> 34:21.003
[SPEAKER_02]: If you were a little article about the case in about how I beat my professor in law school.

34:21.787 --> 34:22.788
[SPEAKER_01]: that's crazy.

34:23.428 --> 34:27.831
[SPEAKER_01]: How did you connect with Jonathan Dixon who co-wrote convergence with you?

34:27.951 --> 34:34.315
[SPEAKER_01]: How did you guys collaborate and how did you turn all your legal files into a narrative?

34:34.895 --> 34:39.458
[SPEAKER_01]: Did you use your legal files or was it just based on your personal memory and interviews?

34:40.556 --> 34:44.057
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, Jonathan, I was online, because I'm a storyteller.

34:44.097 --> 34:46.078
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, I'm not trying to kidnap anybody.

34:46.538 --> 34:48.478
[SPEAKER_02]: I could write, but I'm not that kind of writer.

34:48.498 --> 34:50.279
[SPEAKER_02]: It's not a real professional.

34:51.159 --> 34:57.981
[SPEAKER_02]: So I went online if I was some different services, and I interviewed a number of people to be a deroghost writer or co-author.

34:58.942 --> 35:01.262
[SPEAKER_02]: And I just didn't know me sent me some writing.

35:01.282 --> 35:02.043
[SPEAKER_02]: He had done it like that.

35:02.083 --> 35:04.023
[SPEAKER_02]: Oh, this guy seems like, you know, he knows

35:10.957 --> 35:15.632
[SPEAKER_02]: And we started talking, and then I said to him, let me send you a do a voice memo.

35:16.492 --> 35:21.834
[SPEAKER_02]: about a one portion of this story and then give me something back and he did I said that's it man, you're the guy.

35:22.474 --> 35:23.674
[SPEAKER_02]: So that's how we started.

35:24.034 --> 35:25.095
[SPEAKER_02]: It was four years ago.

35:25.935 --> 35:28.096
[SPEAKER_02]: He's come to Chicago five or six times.

35:28.136 --> 35:29.896
[SPEAKER_02]: I've gone in New York three or four times.

35:30.896 --> 35:32.157
[SPEAKER_02]: Most of it is done with me.

35:32.857 --> 35:33.697
[SPEAKER_02]: I'm voicemembles.

35:33.817 --> 35:36.818
[SPEAKER_02]: I say, okay, let's talk about what happened this and I say now.

35:37.318 --> 35:44.080
[SPEAKER_02]: And this day I was doing this and I felt like this, you know, I sort of get my picture because I pretty much know what he wants.

35:44.121 --> 35:44.921
[SPEAKER_02]: He wants to set the

35:46.181 --> 35:59.784
[SPEAKER_02]: So, I give him, you know, my partner, my guy going to just pass the way when we started, the main police officer, Tettel Connor, the detective, he was still around, so I don't know, John, they probably spent 60, 70 hours talking to him.

36:00.424 --> 36:12.307
[SPEAKER_02]: So we had both the main detective and the prosecutor, and most of the people for whatever reason the judge had passed away, all the defense attorneys had passed away, and my

36:14.171 --> 36:25.805
[SPEAKER_02]: But like I said, the lead detective and myself, and when I did as a order to transcript of the entire trial, so in the book, when we get to the trial, it's literally word for word.

36:26.606 --> 36:32.853
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like you're in the courtroom, and one of the things I said, I want to get people with perspective what it's like for a prosecutor.

36:33.519 --> 36:43.141
[SPEAKER_02]: I was at the field because a lot of these books are defense attorneys or defendants or police officer or somebody, but this is the first hand perspective because it's me.

36:43.341 --> 36:47.682
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, I'm talking about what I did and what we did and how we went about it.

36:48.342 --> 36:53.444
[SPEAKER_02]: You know, some of those any prosecutors get a bad bad image like the bad guys that they're fired from it.

36:54.204 --> 36:55.944
[SPEAKER_02]: And so that was the other thing.

36:56.364 --> 36:58.725
[SPEAKER_02]: And another thing we did, a lot of people I

37:00.454 --> 37:04.762
[SPEAKER_02]: life, you know, cameras in a coral and light streaming TV trials.

37:05.985 --> 37:06.966
[SPEAKER_02]: And one of the things that

37:08.063 --> 37:36.415
[SPEAKER_02]: Probably press-phrase people was the judge say can I speak to the attorneys could we have a sidebar And then the camera goes to a fan and a ceiling or image on the wall and you don't know what's going on Well, we didn't convert us we put every because sidebar is a court report because it's still legal arguments And we put every sidebar we had in the trial in the book and I could tell you this The sidebars are more interesting than the trial most of the time

37:37.389 --> 37:38.750
[SPEAKER_02]: That's where lawyers see it.

37:38.770 --> 37:41.191
[SPEAKER_02]: You don't have to act in a certain way because there's no jury.

37:41.891 --> 37:43.952
[SPEAKER_02]: So lawyers really get down on each other.

37:43.972 --> 37:46.473
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's what the battles are fought in the sidebar.

37:47.274 --> 37:48.914
[SPEAKER_02]: And the judges like them referee.

37:49.955 --> 37:58.319
[SPEAKER_02]: And you'll learn more about the tactics of why people do what they do and what the attorneys are trying to do when they're objecting it.

37:58.819 --> 38:01.060
[SPEAKER_02]: And you can feel it because they're both sides.

38:01.080 --> 38:02.781
[SPEAKER_02]: You're talking, oh, I know what you're trying to do.

38:03.181 --> 38:04.182
[SPEAKER_02]: You don't want to sue do this.

38:07.712 --> 38:09.453
[SPEAKER_02]: And you're going to read all that in the book.

38:09.833 --> 38:13.654
[SPEAKER_02]: And there were some heated exchanges and we put it that way, very heated.

38:14.214 --> 38:15.454
[SPEAKER_01]: That sounds fascinating.

38:16.014 --> 38:19.855
[SPEAKER_01]: So what is the main thing that you want readers to take away from convergence?

38:20.215 --> 38:21.496
[SPEAKER_02]: What's the true crime story?

38:21.516 --> 38:21.896
[SPEAKER_02]: It is.

38:22.876 --> 38:25.997
[SPEAKER_02]: But I think it's more of a book about perseverance.

38:26.017 --> 38:33.679
[SPEAKER_02]: It's about, you know, like Mike and I, when we took this case, we had no witness, no evidence,

38:37.612 --> 38:38.993
[SPEAKER_02]: and yet we didn't give up.

38:39.113 --> 38:40.314
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, we said, no, I don't care.

38:40.334 --> 38:41.335
[SPEAKER_02]: We're going to figure this out.

38:41.875 --> 38:45.198
[SPEAKER_02]: And you know, it's the idea that justice isn't automatic.

38:46.018 --> 38:47.760
[SPEAKER_02]: System is failed, but you've got to fight for it.

38:47.840 --> 38:49.861
[SPEAKER_02]: And you have to believe in the cause.

38:50.502 --> 38:55.906
[SPEAKER_02]: And like I said before, you know, character is revealed, whatever the thing is going great, integrity isn't.

38:56.266 --> 38:57.627
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it's about integrity too.

38:58.187 --> 39:01.908
[SPEAKER_02]: It's like, Mike and I were given the opportunity to compromise that we believed it.

39:02.228 --> 39:02.928
[SPEAKER_02]: We definitely were.

39:02.948 --> 39:04.069
[SPEAKER_02]: We can walk away from this.

39:04.929 --> 39:06.830
[SPEAKER_02]: But we said, no, no, we're not doing that.

39:06.970 --> 39:11.231
[SPEAKER_02]: We're going to stand up and fight because it's the right thing to do regardless.

39:11.271 --> 39:14.452
[SPEAKER_02]: So our attitude was we probably aren't going to win the case.

39:15.503 --> 39:17.546
[SPEAKER_02]: but we're going to give these victims a voice.

39:18.307 --> 39:22.813
[SPEAKER_02]: People should realize and their everyday lives, you know, obstacles don't mean defeat.

39:23.594 --> 39:27.619
[SPEAKER_02]: You've got to look at life differently than just, oh, I'm at over.

39:27.639 --> 39:28.600
[SPEAKER_02]: So, no, it's not.

39:28.740 --> 39:33.266
[SPEAKER_02]: You just have to think differently, work harder, and refuse to quit.

39:33.887 --> 39:41.736
[SPEAKER_02]: And I think that's the overall theme that I was hoping that would come through, is it's more than just a crime story.

39:41.796 --> 39:50.806
[SPEAKER_02]: It's about what your people were doing, like two guys that had nine ten years experience versus three guys that were famous at 99 and we won.

39:51.667 --> 39:52.648
[SPEAKER_02]: Because we didn't give up.

39:53.272 --> 39:57.737
[SPEAKER_02]: And we believed in what we were doing and it was our job to give those victims of voice.

39:57.858 --> 39:58.698
[SPEAKER_02]: And that's what we did.

39:59.600 --> 40:00.601
[SPEAKER_02]: We gave them a voice.

40:01.001 --> 40:06.648
[SPEAKER_02]: Because nobody else was, you know, and all they were doing drugs, who cares.

40:06.828 --> 40:08.390
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, I came from a band.

40:10.200 --> 40:13.921
[SPEAKER_02]: And I'll tell you right now that you shouldn't be executed.

40:14.321 --> 40:19.602
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, the fact that somebody did some drugs or party and isn't a reason to be burdened.

40:20.242 --> 40:22.062
[SPEAKER_02]: I want people to walk away realising them.

40:22.482 --> 40:29.124
[SPEAKER_02]: One time they're stationed, one chance in town or one something that happens that you can't even imagine could literally change a life.

40:29.884 --> 40:31.944
[SPEAKER_02]: We were just doing the right thing and we didn't care.

40:32.264 --> 40:33.684
[SPEAKER_02]: We were going to do what we have to do.

40:34.304 --> 40:36.825
[SPEAKER_02]: And as we said, that the shit's slower they may.

40:38.120 --> 40:42.742
[SPEAKER_02]: We were done dealing with corruption and if we had to lose a case, that's why it was.

40:43.382 --> 40:44.382
[SPEAKER_02]: We're going to fight for it.

40:45.003 --> 40:46.883
[SPEAKER_01]: What is next on the horizon?

40:47.003 --> 40:49.985
[SPEAKER_01]: Are you planning on writing a second book on another case?

40:50.105 --> 40:50.665
[SPEAKER_01]: You tried?

40:51.366 --> 40:52.066
[SPEAKER_02]: Absolutely.

40:52.226 --> 40:54.887
[SPEAKER_02]: And we're, well, I'd say two thirds of the way through it.

40:55.367 --> 40:58.208
[SPEAKER_02]: The book is going to be called, it is called pursuing kings.

40:59.369 --> 41:03.530
[SPEAKER_02]: Surely after this case, this case ended in May of the 1980.

41:04.210 --> 41:09.592
[SPEAKER_02]: There was a election for the president and also for the state's attorney, our boss.

41:10.432 --> 41:16.254
[SPEAKER_02]: And the person who had originally been the state's attorney when I was hired was the guy named Bernie Kerry.

41:16.274 --> 41:19.495
[SPEAKER_02]: He lost the election to reach her daily who ultimately would become the mayor.

41:20.523 --> 41:29.536
[SPEAKER_02]: Well, when Daly ran for office, he made a big pledge that if he became a state attorney, he would create a specialized unit to fight street gangs.

41:30.307 --> 41:33.489
[SPEAKER_02]: because the street gang, the violence was so out of control.

41:33.529 --> 41:40.572
[SPEAKER_02]: Chicago had 900 murders this went 90-E. And it was almost, I'd say, three quarters and we're gang related.

41:41.113 --> 41:45.215
[SPEAKER_02]: And what was happening was these gang members are getting the shootouts, and they'd kill innocent people.

41:45.255 --> 41:47.616
[SPEAKER_02]: We caught the crossfire, a lot, a lot of times.

41:48.016 --> 41:49.297
[SPEAKER_02]: Their public was scared.

41:50.317 --> 41:55.840
[SPEAKER_02]: And so daily hit, when he was primus in this gang unit, he had a core with people.

41:55.900 --> 41:57.381
[SPEAKER_02]: They went in something that, in fact, they

42:00.300 --> 42:06.448
[SPEAKER_02]: So here's me thinking, well, I was ranked at the top prosecutor in the office as far as experience.

42:06.989 --> 42:10.574
[SPEAKER_02]: So I thought, well, once he gets in, I'm going to get fired, because I was hired by the other guy.

42:10.634 --> 42:10.874
[SPEAKER_02]: Well,

42:11.813 --> 42:16.834
[SPEAKER_02]: He was in about a month and they called me down to the office and he said, Greg, and I'm thinking, well, I'm down here to get fired.

42:16.934 --> 42:18.935
[SPEAKER_02]: This is sort of weird, why don't you just send me a note?

42:19.895 --> 42:31.539
[SPEAKER_02]: So he's sitting there with a bunch of his big bosses and he says to me, you know, did you think that was a good idea that I had to create a gang and I said, oh, actually, I had tried three or four gang murder cases.

42:31.959 --> 42:35.300
[SPEAKER_02]: So I had gained a look, there was no unit, I just I gained that expertise.

42:36.060 --> 42:39.901
[SPEAKER_02]: So he says to me, well, what would you think about becoming the first chief of gang prosecutions?

42:40.945 --> 42:42.665
[SPEAKER_02]: I thought I was having a lot of body experience.

42:42.705 --> 42:43.906
[SPEAKER_02]: I thought he was there to fire me.

42:44.366 --> 42:51.907
[SPEAKER_02]: And now he's going to put me in a position which was I was on TV every week, every week for almost three years.

42:52.147 --> 42:56.268
[SPEAKER_02]: I mean, it was such a, because he was always going to run for mayor and everybody knew it.

42:56.929 --> 42:58.769
[SPEAKER_02]: They knew that was his lunchy pan.

42:59.569 --> 43:05.810
[SPEAKER_02]: So I get in charge of the ship and the days of the phone announcement.

43:06.851 --> 43:07.971
[SPEAKER_02]: I get a call on a weekend.

43:08.934 --> 43:13.617
[SPEAKER_02]: about triple murder that happened at Chicago and they arrested what they thought were the killers.

43:14.558 --> 43:16.239
[SPEAKER_02]: And the police officer and the police is great.

43:16.259 --> 43:31.008
[SPEAKER_02]: This is the royal family on the royal family, but said he was well, they're a bunch of informery gang members who in prison got together and created a new gang called the royal family and they were hired by the mob at Chicago to go out throughout the country to catch their killings.

43:32.269 --> 43:33.670
[SPEAKER_02]: So I'm thinking, oh my God, he goes, yeah,

43:37.646 --> 43:43.910
[SPEAKER_02]: So I show up and with in days there was a big article and it's tribute and full page is said.

43:44.511 --> 43:53.257
[SPEAKER_02]: The royal family are the kings of killing because their leader was named Cochise, like the Indian chief or the patchy chief.

43:53.997 --> 43:55.378
[SPEAKER_02]: And so these guys were serious.

43:55.398 --> 43:57.319
[SPEAKER_02]: They were like 35 to 40 years old.

43:57.339 --> 43:58.220
[SPEAKER_02]: They weren't young kids.

43:58.980 --> 44:02.603
[SPEAKER_02]: But the police estimated over a hundred, at least a hundred people have been murdered.

44:03.653 --> 44:10.095
[SPEAKER_02]: So here I am, brand new unit, now we got this case, which to this day is the biggest case they ever had, they came to it.

44:10.775 --> 44:25.118
[SPEAKER_02]: So we call the book pursuing Kings because it was now my job to get a conviction of these guys for this tripal murder, because they also committed a double murder in Phoenix, Arizona, of a family, and New Year's Eve.

44:26.688 --> 44:48.845
[SPEAKER_02]: So there's different jurisdictions and what these guys and so that taste and how that unfolded and again stuck with one witness to was part of it and what we did to keep him alive so they didn't kill him and at the same time work with the authorities in Arizona but the other case it was gratifying you know that we were able to pull it off.

44:49.530 --> 44:56.716
[SPEAKER_01]: I love true crime and just fascinated by the story and all the different cases that you've worked on.

44:57.156 --> 44:59.458
[SPEAKER_01]: Well, thank you so much for being on the show.

44:59.478 --> 45:02.100
[SPEAKER_01]: Can you share with listeners where they can buy your book?

45:03.144 --> 45:17.592
[SPEAKER_02]: Sure, at Amazon, Byron's in Noble, any of the major book resellers, as well as on audible the audio book and Apple books, the interesting thing about the audio book is this, when we get to the tour of the end, where we're given the closing arguments.

45:18.313 --> 45:21.855
[SPEAKER_02]: My partner, Mike, I said he passed away, but I got his brother was in attorney.

45:22.375 --> 45:27.938
[SPEAKER_02]: He gave, right for the transcripts, he gave his argument for the book for the audio book and the closing argument.

45:28.479 --> 45:31.000
[SPEAKER_02]: It's actually me reading the transcript

45:33.290 --> 45:35.952
[SPEAKER_02]: So it's pretty interesting to weigh where we're able to pull that off.

45:36.853 --> 45:43.638
[SPEAKER_01]: So my last question is the defendant still in prison, is he alive, is he dead, what happened to him?

45:44.319 --> 45:51.945
[SPEAKER_02]: The judge gave him a rather late sentence, 30 to 40 years, but which means he served at Illinois 15.

45:52.605 --> 45:56.468
[SPEAKER_02]: The rather circumstances he ended up serving maybe 19 years only.

45:57.229 --> 46:01.052
[SPEAKER_02]: He passed away when he was 58, he ended up getting stomach cancer.

46:01.766 --> 46:05.548
[SPEAKER_01]: Thank you so much for for talking to me about the book Convergence.