Law&Crime Sidebar - Top Times Defendants Took the Stand and Walked Free

Episode Date: November 24, 2022

Every defendant facing criminal charges has to make the decision about whether he or she will testify. Taking the stand can be risky as a defendant is open to extensive questioning by prosecutors. But, sometimes the gamble pays off. Law&Crime's Angenette Levy shows us how defendants Curtis Reeves, Kyle Rittenhouse, Danielle Redlick and Brett Hankison took the stand, told their stories, and walked free. LAW&CRIME SIDEBAR PRODUCTION:YouTube Management - Bobby SzokePodcasting - Sam GoldbergVideo Editing - Logan HarrisGuest Booking - Alyssa FisherSocial Media Management - Kiera BronsonSUBSCRIBE TO OUR OTHER PODCASTS:Court JunkieObjectionsThey Walk Among AmericaCoptales and CocktailsThe Disturbing TruthSpeaking FreelyLAW&CRIME NETWORK SOCIAL MEDIA:Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lawandcrime/Twitter: https://twitter.com/LawCrimeNetworkFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/lawandcrimeTwitch: https://www.twitch.tv/lawandcrimenetworkTikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@lawandcrimeSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Wondery Plus subscribers can binge all episodes of this Law and Crimes series ad-free right now. Join Wondry Plus in the Wondery app Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Agent Nate Russo returns in Oracle 3, Murder at the Grandview, the latest installment of the gripping Audible Original series. When a reunion at an abandoned island hotel turns deadly, Russo must untangle accident from murder. But beware, something sinister lurks in the grand. View Shadows. Joshua Jackson delivers a bone-chilling performance in this supernatural thriller that

will keep you on the edge of your seat. Don't let your fears take hold of you as you dive into this addictive series. Love thrillers with a paranormal twist? The entire Oracle trilogy is available on Audible. Listen now on Audible. You fired a shot from your from your pistol? One shot. Taking the stand. It's a decision every defendant has to make. Before August 25th of 2020, Had that gun ever left the state of Wisconsin? No. And for some defendants, it pays off. We take a look at those defendants who took the stand and were acquitted.

I'm Ann Jeanette Levy, and welcome to this special edition of Law and Crime's Sidebar podcast, where we are taking a look at those defendants who rolled the dice, took the stand, and were found not guilty. Now, testifying, as you know, can be a risky proposition. It gives you the opportunity when your lawyer, questions you to tell your story. But then you open yourself up to a lot of scrutiny under cross examination and a prosecutor can basically ask you almost anything, depending on whether or not the judge found it admissible or not. So we are going to take a look at some of these people over the last year or so who've taken the stand and were acquitted. One of those people is Curtis Reeves.

He was a retired police officer from Tampa, Florida. And he was charged with killing Chad Olson back in 2014. The two had a confrontation in a movie theater over Olson using his phone. Olson threw popcorn at Reeves, who then fired at Olson killing him. Here's some of Curtis Reeves's testimony. Curtis, let me ask you a question. Did you ever find the need while you were at law enforcement officer of TPD to have to use your weapon, fire your weapon? No, sir. No, sir. I did not. Did you ever find the need? Curtis, when you were working for 12 years for Bush entertainment with 40,000 people visiting that amusement park to ever have to pull your weapon and use your weapon.

No, sir, I did not. Now, it's important to point out that Curtis Reeves was a police officer for many, many years. He's retired. And so he's basically a professional witness. These police officers are trained about how they should testify and how to speak to a jury. You fired a shot from your pistol? One shot. What happens after you fire that shot?

As soon as he turns away, then he's no longer a threat. So I lay down the pistol, and then I try to determine how bad I'm hurt. And then I realize that my glasses, the reason that everything is blurry is because my glasses were kind of sideways. I'm going to call it a skew. This left piece here was down on my cheek and my glasses were kind of, I guess you could call it a skew. That's when I realized that the reason everything was so blurry was because my glasses had been knocked off. Well, were they knocked off or were they askew? A skew. Okay. Were those the glasses you were wearing? Yes, sir. And here's just a little bit of the cross-examination of Curtis Reeves. Isn't it true that if an ombrose,

a non-deadly object is throwing at you throwing at anybody you can't kill that person for throwing that object at them correct if it's that's kind of hard question to answer I'm gonna give you an example okay give you an example someone throws a plastic water bottle and another person it hits that person falls to the ground You can't kill that person for doing that, correct? That's the fact pattern. That's all it is. That's all I'm asking you. That went under those conditions, no, sir.

Curtis Reeves' attorneys argued that he acted in self-defense. And in Florida, they have really, really strong self-defense laws. He was 73 years old at the time, and his defense attorneys argued that he felt threatened by Chad Olson, who was a large man just like Reeves was. The jury found Reeves not guilty of second-degree murder. Another case that we've covered here on law and crime where a defendant was acquitted and took the stand, Kyle Rittenhouse. That happened just over a year ago. He was 17 years old back in August of 2020 when he went to downtown Kenosha following unrest in the city after Jacob Blake was shot seven times by Kenosha police. Rittenhouse and his best friend, Dominic Black, who lived in Kenosha, were guarding a car lot. Rittenhouse also said he was working as a medic that night. Rittenhouse was armed with an AR-15,

that Black bought for him earlier that year, since Rittenhouse wasn't old enough to buy it for himself. Kyle Rittenhouse ended up shooting three people that night, killing two of them. They were Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber. Rittenhouse wounded a third man. His name was Gage Groskroits, a man who tried to disarm him, but was armed with a pistol. Rittenhouse claimed self-defense. He described his first encounter for the jury with a man named Joseph Rosenbaum, who was unarmed. That shooting started the entire chain of events that night. When you step back from Mr. Ziminski, what's your plan?

My plan is to get out of that situation and go back north down Sheridan Road to where the car store slot number two was. And did you get back? Were you able to go in a northerly direction? I wasn't. Describe what happens. I, once I take that, step back, I look over my shoulder and Mr. Rosenbaum, Mr. Rosenbaum was now running from my right side.

And I was cornered from in front of me with Mr. Ziminski. and there were people people right there were people who saw Kyle Rittenhouse crying and felt really a lot of sympathy for him and then there were a lot of other people who believed he was faking. The assistant district attorney prosecuting this case was Tom Binger and he questioned Kyle Rittenhouse for several hours. He portrayed Kyle Rittenhouse as a wannabe cop, a kid who was playing video games and came to Kenosha to stir up trouble. As I'm running in that southwest direction, Mr. Rosenbaum throws, at the time, I know it's a bag now, but when he threw it at me with the light, it looked silver and it looked like the chain.

when he threw it i mean i and then i continue i i turn around for for about a second while continuing to run and i point my gun at mr rosenbaum does that stop him from chasing you it does not okay after you turn around and you had your hands up kind of in a low ready position yes and you see mr rosenbaum coming at you yes and what do you do that After he throws the bag and he continues to run, he's gaining speed on me. A gunshot is fired from behind me, directly behind me. And I take a few steps and that's when I turn around. And as I'm turning around, Mr. Rosenbaum is, I would say,

from me to where the judge is, of coming at me, with his arms on in front of him, I remember his hand on the barrel of my gun. And why didn't you just keep running? When I was over there, there were about 100 people surrounding those cars, and there was no space for me to continue to run to. And so you turned around? Yes. And as you see him lunging at you,

what do you do? I shoot him. Now, I covered the deliberations in this case and the closing arguments. And I thought that Binger's closing argument was pretty good. Although there was a lot of the testimony in the state's case that really helped Kyle Rittenhouse, which was somewhat surprising. The jury deliberated for a little more than three days and found Kyle Rittenhouse not guilty of all charges that he faced. It was the week before Thanksgiving in 2021. Earlier this year, Danielle Redlick was tried for the murder of her husband and her former stepfather, one in the same, Michael Redlick. Danielle claimed self-defense after she claimed Michael tried to hurt her during an argument at their home in January of 2019. This all happened in Florida.

How many times did you stab him? Once. After you stab him, do you take the knife with you or something else? No. What happens with the knife? I don't know I guess it dropped I don't know

You run away You go to the bathroom Yes What do you do when you get to the bathroom I run into the bathroom And the bathroom's doors broke So I ran to the toilet closet And lock myself in there

I sat up against the toilet closet And I was just hoping and praying He wasn't coming in there but also thinking to myself, what am I going to do? This is crazy. I got to get out of here. Why do you go to the bathroom instead of running out the door, something else?

I don't know. I guess I just always run there. It was just instinct. I don't know that I was completely thinking at that point. I thought he was coming after me. And so do you hear him at some point? Yes. When is this?

Is this right after you've gone into the bathroom? Yes. What do you hear? I hear him yelling. I can't quite make out what he's saying. I heard my name, but I don't know what he's saying. Prosecutors claim that Danielle Redlich let Michael Redlich bleed to death and that she was doing things like she was on her computer, looking at dating sites and things like that, and that she actually spent some time cleaning up the crime scene before a call to 911 was placed.

So let's listen to a little bit of that cross-examination. But you're not saying he didn't use an extraordinary amount of force to sort of push you back against that island, correct? He absolutely used force to push my head back, yes. And it's in that moment that you take the knife and you jab it into his shoulder. Right. But that doesn't stop him. That doesn't dissuade him, correct? After he stabbed, yes, after he was stabbed.

Well, yesterday you said that he still kind of kept coming after he was stabbed. I don't know that I said that. You said there wasn't an immediate reaction to him being stabbed and that he sort of continued to force himself on. When I grabbed the knife and I held it toward him, he did not stop. So he stopped when he gets stabbed. That's your testimony today. Yes, I mean, yes. So you're able to go from sort of this position.

now more upright? Yes. You sort of feel the release of pressure off your back. Yes? I feel the release and pressure of him off of me. You feel the his hand, which had been forced to under face, correct? Yes.

And he is standing there and he begins to bleed. Yes? I don't know. I ran. Now, I remember when we were covering this case here on law and crime, and a lot of people felt that Danielle Redlick really held up pretty well on the stand and they felt like the prosecutor who was questioning her was kind of rude to her and really beat up on her when she was claiming that she acted in self-defense. So

maybe that played a part in her being acquitted because she was acquitted of that murder charge, but she was also found guilty of cleaning up the crime scene. So she was sentenced to one year probation for that along with time served. Another case we followed gavel to gavel here on law and crime was the case of Brett Hankison. He was was a former Louisville Metro police officer, and he was involved in that botched raid on the apartment of Brianna Taylor. Now, Taylor died after her boyfriend, Kenneth Walker, and officers conducting the raid fired at one another. Kenneth Walker said he didn't realize that these were police officers executing a search warrant. He just heard noise and felt like somebody was breaking into the apartment.

One of the officers, Sergeant John Mattingly, was wounded, but thankfully survived. Hankison fired into the apartment through a sliding glass door because he believed he was trying to stop the threat. And he actually testified to this on the stand. And was it your perception that that muzzle flash was coming from your brother officers? Yes, sir. What did you think? I knew Sergeant, excuse me, I knew Sergeant Maddenly was down. And I knew, I knew they were trying to get to him.

And it appeared to me that they were being executed with this rifle. So what did you do? I returned fire through, excuse me, through the sliding glass door. And that did not stop the threat. What were you firing at? The muzzle flashes that I could see in the apartment. that were illuminated by the, that illuminated that sunning glass door. And did you continue fire?

Do you know how many rounds you discharged? At that time, no, sir. And did you continue firing? I fired, and then I assessed after firing through that sunning glass door, I assessed, and the firing continued. And what did you do? I moved from my left to my right from the breezeway towards the bedroom window that was now being illuminated by that muzzle flash, okay? It's been testified to numerous times that there was a drape or blinds there, and that's accurate.

But that was still lighting up that bedroom, the bedroom, both bedroom windows were still being lit up. So in my mind, I perceived that threat, which I clearly identified as a threat, an active threat, I thought that if I could get to that bedroom window, I could put rounds through that bedroom window and stop the shooter, who, from the last place, I had eyes on them, which was seconds before that. How long does this go on, if you can estimate? From the first shot? Yes. Did you fire the last shot? After I shot return fire through that bedroom window, the threat stopped.

All firing ceased at that time, and in my mind, the threat was stopped or eliminated. And are you able to estimate how long it was from the time of the first shot that struck Sergeant Mattingly till your last shot? I would say somewhere between five and ten seconds. now the position of the prosecution in this case was that brett hankison basically kind of freaked out and ran around the side of the apartment building and fired without shooting at a target they claimed he didn't have any type of target meanwhile he says that he saw some type of flash and was trying to stop the threat not only to himself but to his fellow officers but on cross examination the prosecutor questioned him about a similar incident he was involved with earlier in his

career. Who is the author, well, who is the memorandum, written to? It's written to me. And at the time, where, uh, what division were you a part of? It's underneath your name. Sorry. Charlie District. And who is the memorandum from? Colonel Robert White. And this is regarding letter of appreciation. Yes, ma'am. And go ahead and read the content of this memorandum. Yes, ma'am. Recently, I received a letter condemning,

commending, sorry, commending you for your professionalism and outstanding performance in your assistance in an incident occurring at 7-919 Ivory Court. I understand the subject to this location had barricaded himself in the house with several weapons and ammunition. In a timely fashion, you are able to step an inner perimeter and make contact with the subject, as well as gather other critical information from the subject's family.

Teamwork and patience from all units involved in this incident allowed for the situation to be resolved without this with the subject to surrendering. I appreciate your willingness to put forth extra effort in doing your job. You have helped showcase professionalism and dedication of the Little Metro Police Department. So in this situation, the subject was barricaded in the house with several weapons and ammunition. and you made contact with the subject and the situation was resolved that's what the letter says, yes ma'am.

That's what the letter says. Do you recall this incident? I do not. You do not. It's important to point out that Brett Hankison was not charged with the death of Brianna Taylor. None of the officers were, and it wasn't Hankison's bullet or gun that fired the shot that killed Brianna Taylor. Hankison was acquitted of these three wanton endangerment charges, but he now faces a federal civil rights charge for firing into Brianna Taylor's apartment.

And that's it for this edition of Law and Crime Sidebar podcast, where we looked back on some of the defendants who took the stand and were acquitted. Sidebar is produced by Sam Goldberg and Logan Harris. Bobby Zoki is our YouTube manager. Alyssa Fisher handles our bookings and Kiera Bronson does our social media. You can download and listen to Sidebar. on Apple, Spotify, Google, and wherever else you get your podcasts. And of course, you can always watch it on Law and Crimes YouTube channel.

I'm Ann Jeanette Levy, and we will see you next time. You can binge all episodes of this Law and Crime series, ad free right now on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts, or Spotify.