Blind Plea - An End In Sight

Episode Date: July 5, 2023

Episode 9: In October 2022, Deven was given an eight-hour notice that she would be leaving Tutwiler. She was transferred to a temporary facility to prepare for her upcoming release. Five years after John’s death, she's finally able to start looking towards the future – but first, she needs to reckon with the ghosts of her past. Resources: If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic abuse, use a safe computer and contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at www.thehotline.org or call 1-800-799-7233. You can also search for a local domestic violence shelter at www.domesticshelters.org/. If you have experienced sexual assault and need support, visit the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN) at www.rainn.org or call 1-800-656-HOPE Have questions about consent? Take a look at this guide from RAINN at www.rainn.org/articles/what-is-consent  Learn more about criminalized survival https://survivedandpunished.org/  This series is created with Evoke Media, a woman-founded company devoted to harnessing the power of storytelling to drive social change. https://weareevokemedia.com  This series is presented by Marguerite Casey Foundation. MCF supports leaders who work to shift the balance of power in their communities toward working people and families, and who have the vision and capacity for building a truly representative economy. Learn more at caseygrants.org or visit on social media @caseygrants. Follow host Liz Flock on Twitter @lizflock. For more stories of women and self-defense, check out her book “The Furies” from Harper Books, available for pre-order now. https://www.harpercollins.com/products/the-furies-elizabeth-flock Interested in bonus content and behind the scenes material? Subscribe to Lemonada Premium right now in the Apple Podcasts app by clicking on our podcast logo and the "subscribe” button. Click this link for a list of current sponsors and discount codes for this and all other Lemonada series: lemonadamedia.com/sponsors.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

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We're going to decide what's worthy investment, be it money or emotions. Attacarte from Lemonada Media has new episodes out on Tuesdays wherever you get your podcasts. Lemanada. This show contains violent content and scenes of domestic abuse. show contains violent content and scenes of domestic abuse. How are you?

Hi, kids! Oh, don't get emotional, sweetie. I'm just glad we had a chance to see you. I talked to you, honey. You've heard Devon talk to our family members before, but this video call is different. Because Devon is no longer at Julia Tuttweiler Prison. She's at a correctional center called the Alabama Therapeutic Education Facility, and she thinks she's close to getting released.

For good. She's talking to her dad, Jean, and stepmom Joan, and they're all emotional as they think about finally getting to see each other in real life. We love you so much. You getting close. I know. We miss you back. You're pretty soon.

You're near the finish line sweetie. Think about that. You're near the finish line. The finish line, her release. One evening in October 2022, Devin was given an eight hour heads-up that she'd be leaving Tut Wiler behind. This was a big surprise and pretty upsetting

for her at the time, because she had built a support system with the women inside that prison. But she was also excited about what this transfer meant for her. So how's your mental doing? Doing okay? Yeah.

I'm doing much better now. Alright, that's good to know. Good to know. Makes me feel good. I'll tell you. I'll tell you. Well, let me ask you this. What's the process like why are you there? We're just in a bunch of classes all day, getting ready to get out. Okay. And get ready for the real world as opposed to...

Oh yeah, you'll be ready. The Alabama Department of Corrections created the Alabama therapeutic education facility or ATF to provide classes and counseling for men and women ahead of their reentry to society. I know of a couple women who killed their abusers and were transferred to ATF for the last part of their incarceration. Because of this transfer, Devon thought she was getting out soon. Soon was relative, though. It's supposed to be a six-month program, but sometimes people stay at ATF for years. You'd think something as important as a release date would be set in stone, but there's never a lot of clarity when you're dealing with

the Alabama Department of Corrections. So as Devon got classes and counseling ahead of her uncertain release. I went on the hunt to find out when she would finally see freedom. This is Blind Plea, and I'm your host, Liz Flak. After Devon lost her parole hearing, she had a projected release date of April 2024. Her sentence had been reduced because of her good behavior in prison. It's called, good time. And that new release date was her North Star. But then she got that transfer to ATEF and thought maybe she'd get out even sooner. At ATEF, Devon had a bit more freedom. There, she took courses on life skills and relapse prevention, went

to Bible study, and was enrolled in the trade school for carpentry. And we talked more often since it was easier for her to get a tablet for messaging and calls. And this facility is where Devon started to really heal. It's where the gravity of her past and future began to sink in. A-Teph is far from the ideal place to process trauma. It is still a state correctional facility with monitored calls and inmate counts. But it is all Devon had.

Because in America, we don't know how to treat survivors of domestic violence who have defended themselves. We don't have a space for them to be understood, to go unpunished, and to heal. And yet, in true Devon fashion, she looked on the bright side. She took the transfer as a glimmer of hope and a way forward. While Devon was still in Tutwiler, she heard a lot of other women inside talking about something called a mandatory release. It's an early supervised release program meant to reduce overcrowding in Alabama prisons. And the hushed excitement spreading across the cell blocks was infectious.

I got on the phone with Devon and our senior producer Kristen to learn more. By the way Kristen, Devon clarified that in April is what did you call it? Devon, you're in the Tory. It's our mandatory. Mandatory, so people have been getting out on their mandatory date. Not there. What's the other one called? Do you know what? Our end of sentence. You know what? Okay.

You said everyone else that you know what the prison has been getting out on their mandatory. Yeah. Then that's like six months or something. Yeah. Get a little, a little over six months. Not that you're counting. And that's it I that counting or anything. So if Devon got out on mandatory, that would mean a release date of April 2023, not 2024.

A year ahead of schedule. That's huge. I looked up this mandatory program and found out that while it had been on the books for years, it was just starting to take effect for the entire prison population. And I heard that some law-and-order conservatives were actually okay with the program, because anyone getting released early would have to wear an ankle bracelet. Alternatively, if Devon served until the end of her sentence, she wouldn't be supervised at all. No ankle bracelets, parole officers, nothing. Devon seemed pretty confident about getting out early on mandatory

because she said prison administration had told her so and updated her time sheet. But I knew Alabama and I feared that any program that involved releasing incarcerated people early would eventually see a backlash. I was worried she was getting her hopes up over something that wouldn't come to pass. Especially since nowhere online did it specifically say Devon was getting out then. On the Department of Corrections look up page for Devon, I only saw her release date

stated as 2024. You might think something called a mandatory release date would be mandatory, but like most things in the criminal legal system, it was up in the air. As Devon waited for more clarity on her release, she was spending more time writing. A huge milestone was approaching, the five-year anniversary of the shooting, and it hit her like a ton of bricks. She kept thinking about the fact that she could be out of prison soon, but without John, left alone to pick up the pieces. I talked to Simone yesterday and I was told that I really miss this kind of a strong word, but I don't know how I'm going to be able to deal with it and not being around when I get out. I don't know how I wasn't able to really process like

being out in the world without him. And I don't know how I'm going to react. I don't know how I'm going to respond in that scary. Devon knows that she can live in a world without John, but the reality is he was a big part of her life. And at a certain point, he was her life. For over five years, he had cut her off from her family and friends, and she had stuck by him throughout all that time, hoping her love would somehow be enough to stop the

violence. As Devon continued to share her feelings with me on the phone that day, her emotions shifted. I'm just angry. I'm just angry because like I did not want to have to do that to him. I didn't want to do that to us. But I get mad at him because it's like why did why did you I feel like like why did you force me to do that? Why did you make like that? Like why did you have to put me in a position where I had to do that to you? I did do that to us, you know, to our daughter, you know,

because it's just like I loved him so much and I know that sounds crazy, but I did, I loved him so much. Did it hurt my feelings and I have to do that, you know? Devon is angry that she felt she had to kill him to protect herself, but at the same time, she also misses him. That's why domestic abuse is so complicated. Years after leaving, survivors often still miss their abusers. It's part of their coercive control that can linger for so long. John was violent and controlling, but also caring and kind. And he's the father of her daughter.

But now, Devon is a single mom. But also seeing my daughter, seeing her and it's going to be great, I'm this for so much, but like she's a reminder too, you know, and it's not her fault and I'm not blaming her. And no means, she's a blessing. But it's just another level of me and Don could be together with her and having the life that we should have had in like being around her and she's doing so good and she's just made such progress and stuff and it's like I would have loved for it and see how good you have one minute remaining. See how good she's doing and see how

awesome she is now. I got off this call with Devon, feeling like she was finally opening up about her true feelings about John. The messy, complicated, fucked up parts. When we first started talking, we just covered the basics on our calls. How her day was going, how her daughter was doing, her prospects at parole. We didn't even talk about the details of the shooting until a year after we met. But now she trusted me enough, and she had processed enough to share that she missed her abuser. And I got it, because I knew what that was like.

After I left my abusive relationship, I still missed him for years, despite being fully aware of how harmful the relationship had been. It was confusing as hell, but acknowledging those feelings was a step toward healing. In a perfect world though, Devon wouldn't be processing her fears with me. Devon says the mental health counseling available at ATF is pretty basic. Nothing beyond the surface. But she takes a lot of medication. Pills for anxiety, depression, PTSD, and migraines. She told me there were only six counselors for the 150 women incarcerated there. So she didn't get the time or space to let out all of the feelings she had brewing inside. She was struggling. So I worried about Devon returning home.

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That's SimplySafe.com slash BlindPlee That's simplysafe.com slash blind plea. There's no safe like simply safe. I'm MSNBC's Ali Velshi. A book banning epidemic is infiltrating our classrooms with 1,500 titles banned last year alone. Each week on my podcast, Velshi Band Book Club, a different author joins me to discuss their banned book, like Margaret Atwood, Laurie Hals Anderson, and many more.

Using books, that's how we share our wisdom, our values, that's how we take our country to the place it should be in. Listen to Velshi Band Book Club now, wherever you get your podcasts, new episodes Thursdays. The holiday season passed painfully. Devon used to celebrate Thanksgiving in a big way with her family. They would always watch the Thanksgiving day parade and dog show, so Devon found a TV to do that inside.

Atef also made the women a special meal for Thanksgiving and Christmas, but Devon just wanted to get home. Meanwhile, I was nervous about the lack of updates we were getting from the Alabama Department of Corrections, or ADOC, about Devon's paperwork for her supposed mandatory release. The website still showed her getting out in 2024. Amid my anxiety over that, a pretty scary update came down the pipeline. The governor of Alabama signed a new act into law. It stated that incarcerated people who used the deadly weapon to kill someone would be ineligible for good time, meaning much longer sentences for a lot of people convicted of

manslaughter, like Devon. The ADOC was rather secretive about if the law was retroactive, so I called Devon's former lawyer Dan. Hey Dan. How are you? Good. I just wanted to follow up with you about that law about manslaughter. So, did you get any more clarity on if that would affect Devon's case? No, because I don't know how to get any clarity. I mean, I think, you know, there was nothing in the face of the wall when I glance through it, which seemed to make it retroactive,

but at DOC, you can kind of do whatever they want. So that's kind of what I didn't want to bring it to anybody's attention down there. So the law says that alabamians like Devon who are convicted of manslaughter may become ineligible for good time and good time. If you're convicted of manslaughter and it involves a deadly weapon, she's a coarse guy jail credit plus a bunch of good time they've already given her credit for. So I don't think it should be a retroactively because that's just stupid, but the way we do things around here, it wouldn't surprise me if they tried to buy a retro. Was the law just for newly incarcerated people going forward, or did it also apply to people already in prison?

Dan didn't have the answer, so I imagine the worst for Devon. Good time often cuts people's sentences in half. Without her good time accrued, could Devon spend an extra 11 years behind bars? Because she'd only served a little over 4 years of her 15-year sentence so far. If this law was, in fact, applied retroactively, she might not be out until 2036. After months of following all the changes in Alabama's laws on mandatory releases and then on good time, I talked to Devon about my concerns. Dan was saying he thought before that it could have affected you. You don't think that right? No, I don't really, I don't really think how, because the big size to you, I don't know

what I'm thinking. After I got out, I don't know. When I called Dan, he was like, he was like, this is a new law that will basically mean that anyone who is convicted of manslaughter, they're good, they're good time, doesn't count toward their sentence. And he was like, I don't, he basically said,

I don't wanna call the parole office because I'm scared that then they would remember Devon's case and try to apply this law retroactively, meaning like backwards. Changing the terms of someone's freedom at the drop of a hat sure does feel like it should be illegal, but it's not. After our conversation, I was still unsettled, but Devon didn't seem worried. She told me that she had a meeting with her parole officer in a couple of weeks, and that that had to mean something. That ADOC seemed to be sticking to the plan to release her with her good time applied, and maybe even earlier, on mandatory release. Over the next couple of weeks,

I waited to hear about Devon's meeting with her parole officer and whether or not she had gotten any news about a finalized release date. At the same time, I kept refreshing Devon's ADOC page. One day, I noticed that there was a new entry. It stated that Devon's mandatory release was scheduled for April 2023. The date Devon said prison administration had told her. The date she had been hoping for and depending on.

And it was in just over a month. I know I asked you before, but I just want to buy a plane to get if it's okay. Yeah, of course. I will buy a plane. Yay, in real life. It's so crazy. Yeah, I'm a AI robot, actually. We're going to have to tell you. In a modern imagination, you're not some M-night semelun movies that I've been in.

Oh my god, that'd be crazy. Devon told me she had received official paperwork for her release. They planned to give her an ankle monitor like they did for everyone on mandatory and she would get assigned a parole officer in Baltimore, where she planned to return to live with her dad and stepmom Joan and her daughter. Over the next few weeks, she formulated more of a plan. John's Anciela would pick her up from prison, and because it was in the middle of a work week, her aunt Leslie bought her an overnight train ticket from Alabama to Baltimore.

We're all of her family would meet her at the station. It was all suddenly very real. So what date are you getting out now? Now it's going to be the 25th. April 25th. Yeah. Okay. Devon was scheduled to be released from prison on Tuesday, April 25, 2023.

My engineer, Andy, and I booked our plane tickets to Alabama to meet Devon when she got out. To be honest, I was still skeptical. I think it's all of my years of covering the criminal legal system. I just didn't trust it. I didn't want to get too excited for her and her family, but I held out hope it would all work out. I was angry my whole life. The spiraling, like there was no way out on my own.

I'm Dr. Monica Band, a trauma therapist and host of this new podcast I need to my whole life. The spiraling. Like there was no way out on my own. I'm Dr. Monica Banned, a trauma therapist and host of this new podcast. I need to ask you something. Each week, also down with a young person, as they ask a parent, friend, or partner that one question they can no longer ignore. Why did you guys wait till I was 18 and your guys' relationship? Why does my mom still love me after everything I've gone through? I need to ask you something, premiere September 6, wherever you get your podcasts.

Hey, it's me, Sam Beep, and it's no secret, I'm pro-choice. Yes, that one, but also others. Because I'm not just pro-choice, I'm pro-choice-says. Those crazy, life-altering decisions that shift our life path and bring us to where we are today. My next choice, starting this new podcast with Lemonada Media, called Choice Words, where I interview people I admire about the biggest decisions they've made in their lives.

Choice Words is out now, wherever you get your podcasts. As Devon prepared for her release and was left to supposedly rehabilitate during her final days at ATF, I was left with these questions. What do we tell ourselves prisons are actually for? And should Devon have ever been in there in the first place? I mean, certainly for Devon's sake, prison isn't the place that she should have ever been. She needed to fight back and defend herself to survive. We should have taken that up and taken her up and taken her up with her family and provided

them the therapy and counseling that they probably wanted and needed. That's activist and prison abolitionist Miriam Kaba who you heard from earlier in this series She's helped lots of people in devin situation through her organization survived and punished She says we're not going to solve the crisis of domestic abuse or get people the help they need through a system that punishes survivors of trauma, a system that doesn't recognize them as survivors in the first place. Interpersonal violence in our country is mirrored by structural and systemic violence. These things are, they're co-constitutive in some ways

of each other. And unless we address it as a holistic, cultural, societal, individual way, we're not going to get at it. And we are not going to resolve it through the criminal punishment system, which is itself violent. Instead, Miriam says, people like you and I have to make the change to protect, empathize with, and create spaces for survivors. If you wake up and you think, hmm,

in just in my little world, how might I lessen suffering today by paying attention to dynamics that happen in my own family and my own community around abuse and violence? How do I lessen suffering there? If you spend your time doing that, that, you will see change.

I have seen so many people who have been in violent situations, who have gotten out of those situations. I have helped with others coming together to help free people from prison. I have helped with others to help prevent people from going in in the first place. That's a life. That's living. So I hope people do that.

And I hope people hear this story and think not like, I'm going to change the legislation and what I, but they hear the story of Devon. And they look for the devins in their own community and they try to lessen suffering. If you can help make that happen that will have been a victory. Miriam is saying look around your community for a story like this because they do exist. Don't just walk away from the show.

Don't just pick up Devon's story and put it back on the shelf. This is not a true crime thing. This is a story of a person and their struggle and I want you to like to understand that this isn't a story for you to consume, but rather this is a journey for you to take alongside this person. Whether it's Devon or someone else you know, organizers like Miriam Kaba are trying to imagine a better world for domestic violence survivors. When were they are supported so they can stand on their own two feet with the help of their community.

And that's exactly what Devon was doing in her final days incarcerated. She was trying to imagine a future where she would fit in. When Devon was in college, she majored in communications and wanted to be a journalist. Now she's thinking about writing a book. It shouldn't take women like me that are behind bars to solve a problem. It should be brought to people's attention. And it should be something that people really understand.

It's real. It's not just like in release. But I have scary men and then brave men come safe today. Like that's not how that works. You know, it's like, brittle, you know. I wanna be able to give people like a voice. We just don't always pick the right person to love. Not choosing the right person to love.

It happens more often than you might think. One in three women and one in four men will experience some form of physical violence by an intimate partner in their lifetime. If you include emotional abuse, it's even more prevalent. Those stats were on my mind all throughout my reporting on this story. So many people related to this case

had been touched by domestic abuse. Like John's mom, I was scared to death that this man was going to come kill me. And Alexis's mom, Darla. He had picked up a chevy, but he had smashed it on my head. And all I kept thinking, everything was black, and I kept thinking, just stay on your feet. Just stay on your feet. Just stay on your feet. I didn't have any resources.

I didn't have any help. I had nobody. I had nobody to call. We're desi, John's friend. My ex would throw things through the wall. He would never physically hurt me, but he would just hurt everything around me. Even Detective Melhoff, who hadn't believed Evan.

I mean, I grew up in domestic violence. I understand domestic violence, probably from, you know, watching my mother get beat, I think it was her second husband. He chased me down with a knife. I was eight years old, you know. And of course, John. Why do you think he acted the way he did?

Like, what do you think he was violent? How do you make sense of that? He had like a, he had a shitty childhood, you know what I mean? Like, he really did. I know that the men that came after Henry were abusive because John used to tell me that he would be scared to even go use the bathroom and he would end up being the bed because he'd be so scared to leave the room because these men were beaten up on his mom.

You know, before me, all the women that he cared for and loved kind of just, you know, let him down. A lot of people let John down. He went in his so much violence growing up and then he let Devon down too. It made me think of a line Miriam Kaba said in our interview quoting the criminal justice reformer Danielle Serred that no one enters violence for the first time

by committing it. If that's true, violence is always perpetrated against us first, and then hurt people, hurt people. Devon remained conflicted about how she saw John as both a victim and someone who deeply hurt her as a perpetrator. Like you know that it was wrong, you know that it was bad. You know the way that you fell after those things happened to you. What would you want me to feel those things? You know? Yeah. But John is no longer here.

And Devon would be getting out of prison very soon. To help her come to terms with John's abuse, she needs support. She needs her community, her family. She needs access to affordable resources like housing and counseling for her and her daughter, especially as she works out her own feelings of guilt. I mean, I definitely have more because I never wanted to do that. You know, I took his life. That's not something that you can just, you know, replace. I hate that.

It got to that point. And I don't know what I would say to his daughters. I really don't, I don't really know anything else I could say. I am, I am apologetic and I am sorry and I hate that it happened. About a month before her release in 2023, Devon turned 31. When she walked into the Shelby County Jail, she was only 25.

Devon got a cake from the other inmates. They sang to her and gave her presence with handmade cards. She says she made everyone prison teriyaki and nachos. We talked about our March birthdays, me being in aries and Devon, a dreamy, temperamental Pisces. This was going to be Devon's last birthday in jail. She started counting down the weeks, then the days. She told me ADOC would transfer her from the therapeutic facility to Tutweiler Prison and release her from there. Devon had a full itinerary. Ant Sheila would pick her up from the prison, then weed meet up with her for an in-person interview. Then she planned to return to the Vance Family

property to get her things and to say a final goodbye to the trailer and This chapter of her life From there she'd board a train to Baltimore to go home to her daughter and family Only one week left We go yeah Yeah I'm so ready. It's ridiculous. I'm so ready. It's ridiculous.

I'm so ready. Gosh. It's no long gone, God. Yeah. I guess I'll see you in a week. In the meantime, just let me know if anything changes. I sent you the info on our hotel for where she could drop you off, so just let me know if that works for her.

OK. I couldn't believe that I was actually finally going to meet Devon in person. For the last three years, I spoke to Devon every month, then every week, and at some points every day. Mostly, she told me about her life, but occasionally I told her about mine too. Like when my niece was born,

when I wasn't feeling well enough to call, and even when... I want to tell you that I'm actually pregnant. So... I'm so sick. It was moments like this that had taken us past the standard relationship between a journalist and their source. But this wasn't your standard story.

When interviewing someone for this long, something shifts, and it's not just about the facts anymore, it's about a person who you just want to be okay. I got to really know Devon and she got to really know me. I regularly worried about her, I cared about her, and I was excited for her future. And the talked to Devon? Have I talked to her now, have you? No, because I'm here as she's still in prison. Next time on Blind Plei, how Devon's release didn't go as planned. Because there's no paperwork or anything that says she's supposed to get out today. It didn't send anything over to release her,

so she's still incarcerated. If you or someone you know is experiencing domestic abuse, use a safe computer and contact the National Domestic Violence Hotline at thehotline.org or call 1-800-799-7233. There's more Blind Plei with Lemonada Premium. Subscribers get exclusive access to bonus content like an interview with Veronica Johnson from the Alabama Justice Initiative

about race and mass incarceration in the South. Subscribe now in Apple Podcasts. Blind Plei is a production of Lemonade Media. I'm your host, Liz Flock. This episode was produced by Rachel Pilgrim. Hannah Boomer-Shine is also our producer. Kristen LaPore is our senior producer. Tony Williams is our associate producer.

Story editing by Martina Abraham's Alunga. Mix, music, and sound design by Andrea Christensdatter with additional mixing and engineering from Ivan Kuraiv. Naomi Bar is our fact checker. Jala Everett is our production intern. Jackie Danseger is our vice president of narrative content. Executive producers are Stephanie Whittles-Wax, Jessica Cordova-Cramer, evoke media, and Sabrina Mirage Naim, and myself Liz Flock. This series was co-created with evoke media and presented by Margaret Casey Foundation. Help others find our show by leaving us a rating and writing a review.

Follow me at Liz Vlock and for more stories of women and self-defense, check out my book, The Furies from Harper Books, available for pre-order now. Find Lamanada at Lamanada Media across all social platforms and follow Blind Plea wherever you get your podcasts or listen ad-free on Amazon Music with your Prime Membership. Thanks so much for listening. This message is brought to you by MakerSmart. Hey everyone, I'm Sam B. You might know me from the Daily Show, from Full Frontal with Samantha B. Or maybe from my new podcast Choice Words, which is another Lemonada Media show as well.

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comedian and I swear this is real, a world champion foosball player. On our podcast, Self Help List, we dig into everything from heartbreak, to career burnout, to the wild stories from our 20s, and the many anxieties we've experienced along the way. We're often joined by guests who range from celebrities to renowned health experts, and together we'll unpack big topics like deciding whether or not we want kids building your dream career, strengthening self trust, and much much more. So join us every Monday for an unfiltered, entertaining, and honest conversation with friends where you don't even have to leave your house.

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