RedHanded - Episode 40 - How Larry David Saved a Man From Death Row

Episode Date: April 5, 2018

What would you do if you were arrested for a crime you didn't commit? What would you say if the police told you they had definitive proof it was you? When 16 year old Martha Puebla was shot dead, Juan Catalan faced this exact nightmare situation - and his life seemed doomed - until he was saved in the most unexpected way... Audio mastered by Conrad Hughes.    See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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BetMGM operates pursuant to an operating agreement with iGaming Ontario. They say Hollywood is where dreams are made. A seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. I'm Hannah. I'm Saruti. And welcome to Red Handed. This week we are back in Los Angeles, but we're not spending this episode with the rich and famous. In this case, there are too many coincidences to count and I can't tell you how many times during the research I sat up in

bed and was just like, what are the chances? Prepare to have your minds blown because this is... It's insane. On August 12th 2003, Juan Catalan, who is 24, drove to work at his family machine shop in a suburb of LA. He arrived at about half past seven in the morning and as always his father was already there. But before Juan made it out of his car into the workshop, he was wrestled to the floor by police and placed under arrest on suspicion of the murder of 16-year-old Martha Puebla,

who had been shot to death outside her home in Sun Valley, Los Angeles, on the 12th of May, 2003. This was not the first time Juan Catalan had been in trouble with the law. A few years earlier, his older brother Mario had fallen in with the wrong crowd, and Juan, impressed by the stereos and car parts his brother kept bringing home, started to hang around with the same people. But this was very bad news because the wrong crowd that Mario had become a part of were known as the Vineland Boys, a gang that controlled the majority of illegal drugs trading in Sun Valley. And Juan started to drive cars that the gang would steal. This landed Juan in jail but he promised himself that this would be the last time he would be imprisoned and although he worked hard, he got himself back on the straight and narrow, his brother

Mario didn't. This is why it's so sad that Juan now ends up in jail again. And on the 12th of August 2003, Juan was taken to the police station by detectives Martin Pina and Juan Rodriguez, who immediately began to interrogate Juan Catalan about the murder of Martha Puebla. Juan insisted that he wasn't there and he certainly didn't kill her. Now, in order to understand how Pina and Rodriguez were sure that Juan Catalan was their man, we have to rewind a few months to another homicide outside the very same house being worked by the very same detectives. On the 27th of November 2002, at about 2am, a friend of Martha's pulled up outside her house with her boyfriend, Christian Vargas. Now the friend pulled up in Christian Vargas' car. She gets out of the car, leaving Christian there, and taps on Martha's window to ask if she wanted

to come out with them. 2am. Who are these people? I'd be like, no, I'm in bed. Yeah, but they're teenagers. They're running around causing trouble. I know, just pull up with your boyfriend, go knock on the window. Hey, you want to come out and hang? In my mind, that's what American teenagers do. I have this image.

Especially in like Sun Valley, Los Angeles. I feel like that's very fitting. Because they can all drive at like fucking 14 or some shit like we can't drive till we're 17 I still can't drive I'm 28 she wasn't driving her boyfriend Christian Vargas drove her back yeah that's true so she gets out the car knocks on Martha's window says hey you want to come out and hang with us I also assume that's how they speak I would never say that so Martha comes to the window to talk to her friend and both these young women, they're chatting when suddenly they hear several gunshots. It was Christian

Vargas. He'd been shot multiple times in his car. Literally the car is parked just outside the house. The friend gets out of the car, comes to Martha's window and in the time she's talking to Martha, her boyfriend in the car gets shot and he dies shortly afterwards and the shooting was quickly ruled by the LAPD to be gang affiliated and the police identified a prime suspect, Jose Ledesma, known to other members of the Vineyard Boys as Pep's. Police searched Ledesma's house and under his bed they found an assault rifle and letters from fellow gang members currently incarcerated but But Ledesma, or Pep's, himself was nowhere to be found. Hearing that he was wanted for the murder of Christian Vargas, he had run off to Mexico. But he had not gone alone. He took vineyard boy Mario Catalan with him. And yes, that is exactly

the same Mario Catalan, Juan's brother. The pair rented a hotel room in Tijuana to lay low, but this fell apart when the police were called due to Mario Catalan having a loud argument with a woman in his hotel room. So because of a domestic disturbance, they're found out. If you're on the run, like laying low, probably don't have a massive argument with somebody in the hotel you're laying low in. I think there'd been quite a lot of drinking involved. I think they'd done... Big day drinking will lead to arguments. And also, again, if you're on the lam,

probably don't do big day drinking. Maybe just have a milkshake and chill. Big day drinking is an activity for the innocent only. I couldn't find her name, which I feel bad about, and I feel like in a lot of newspaper articles, she's just described as Mario's girlfriend, and she's not really given her own identity i couldn't find her name anyway she's the one that dobs them in she says to mexican police mario catalan and jose ledesma they're on the run they're wanted in la

for murder so he must have sufficiently pissed her off catalan and ledesma are sent back to the united states to be interrogated by detectives Pina and Rodriguez on the 30th of November 2002. And this is when things start to get murky because the two detectives hone in on Ledesma telling him that they have multiple eyewitnesses who are willing to testify that Ledesma shot Vargas. In the car Mario Catalan and Ledesma had used to drive down to Mexico, the police found the firearm that would later be identified as the one used to kill Christian Vargas and also had been used in another gang-related murder that had taken place in Sun Valley on the 23rd of November 2002. In this case, a man named Enrique Acosta had been shot dead.

And this murder had happened just four days before the shooting of Christian Vargas. They've got the firearm, they've got the gun, they can link it to Christian Vargas' murder and to this other murder of Enrique Acosta. Things are not looking too good. Now during the investigation, Pinar and Rodriguez show Ledesma a sheet of paper with six mugshots on it. And one of these mugshots was Ledesma himself and Ledesma's picture had been circled and underneath it was written, this is the guy I saw shoot my friend's boyfriend and it was signed MP Martha Puebla. Ledesma claimed not to know Martha Puebla despite being shown pictures of her. Mario Catalan and Jose Ledesma were then placed in the same holding cell that

contained hidden mics. Mario was recorded telling Ledesma that the gun was in the car. Ledesma then used the jail payphone as soon as he could to call Vineyard Boys member Javier Covarrubias. He was recorded saying, do you know that slut that lives there by my house? Her name starts with an M. I need her to disappear. She's dropping dimes. So, Martha Puebla had now been outed as a snitch by two high-ranking homicide detectives in the LAPD to a gang member with access to a phone. We will see this throughout the case.

The complete lack of care about witnesses in a gang murder trial, it really is pretty shocking. And the worst part is Martha hadn't actually told the police anything and she had by no means been a willing witness. So what actually happened was that she had appeared as a witness in the pre-trial hearing of Mario Catalan on the 1st of May 2003. But she testified that she didn't see who the shooter was. She was asked to point out the shooter in the courtroom, but she refused to do it, saying she hadn't seen anything. Juan Catalan had been in the docks that day at the pre-trial hearing. Mario may have been a gang member charged with murder, but he was still his brother. I find this quite interesting. In all of the stuff that we've read

for this, the reason for Martha's murder is put as the call that Ledesma makes from jail to Javier and he calls out a hit on her. That happened in November. The pre-trial hearing isn't until May. So I don't understand why if you're calling out a hit on a person, why you're waiting till after they've testified. Surely that's what you want to stop them doing. So I don't think this bit of the story makes sense. Yeah, you're right. There's a six-month difference there from when the LAPD tell him, oh, she's the snitch,

which is weird enough as it is. But you're right. Why is she alive long enough to go to the pre-trial hearing? Once she testifies, she's dead snitch which is weird enough as it is but you're right why is she alive long enough to go to the pre-trial hearing once she testifies she's dead within days and also she didn't testify against them she just turned up it seems a bit odd that if the hit is actually placed before the pre-trial hearing why wait until the target has the opportunity to testify however this phone call is on camera it's on film so about 10 p.m on May the 12th, 2003, 16-year-old Martha Puebla was outside her house with her mates. How many of them were there? Ranges given different accounts. But the thing is, she wasn't alone. She had up to five friends with her. Neighbours reported seeing a black Chevy Malibu drive past the house slowly multiple times.

And eventually this car pulled up and a man got out. According to eyewitnesses, Martha said, I'm Martha, you know me. The man said something to the effect of, no you don't, and pulled a gun from his sweatshirt pocket and shot Martha in the head. The bullet entered her skull, just beneath her left eye, and it was a shot from such close range that the skin on Martha's face was burned. Martha Puebla was shot at 10.32pm. However many friends were there becomes pretty irrelevant at this point because they all just ran away. It was Martha's mother who rang 911 at 10.42pm after finding her daughter dead on the pavement outside her house. One of the bystanders however managed

to drop his phone before running away to leave Martha to die on her own on the side of the road. The police quickly tracked him down and took him through mugshots of potential suspects. The phone dropper failed to identify any of them as the shooter, and in the end, the LAPD had to settle with a composite sketch and a description of the perpetrator. He was described as a Hispanic male, between 19 and 25, between 5 foot 9 and 5 foot 11 of a stocky build it was this composite sketch and his attendance at his brother's pre-trial hearing that pointed the police in juan catalan's direction i will admit it and we've spoken about this at length before composite sketches are always super generic but i have to say in this case it really really does look like Juan Catalan so if you couple the fact that the composite sketch is basically his face couple that with the fact Juan's gang member brother was on trial for murder

that Martha Puebla had been identified as a snitch and Juan had been in trouble for gang related activity before it does seem like Juan Catalan was their guy and Pina and Rodriguez were going to try their damnedest to keep it that way. Throughout questioning, Juan Catalan insisted over and over that he had nothing to do with the shooting, but he couldn't remember where he was on the 12th of May. He'd just been accused of shooting a teenage girl and dates were the least of his worries. Juan was also presented with a sheet of his worries. Juan was also

presented with a sheet of paper with six mugshots, including his own, printed on it. In the same way that his brother and Ledesma had been six months earlier, Juan Catalan's picture had been circled too. Pina and Rodriguez assured Catalan that he had been identified as the shooter by an eyewitness and that he would be convicted of Martha Puebla's murder. They say things to him like, it's you in the sketch, it's you in the pictures, don't lie, you can't deny it, the evidence is overwhelming, but it's not really, all they've got is the sketch. But having said that, things are looking pretty bleak for Catalan at this point because he does appear to have a motive and he hasn't been able to give a concrete alibi to the police. Any alibi at all, he can't remember, he doesn't have

one. So fortunately for him, one of his cousins worked for a hotshot criminal defense lawyer, Todd Milnick, and his cousin persuaded him to take the case. Girlfriend and mother of his two children, Alma Esuegra, also now had a sudden stroke of genius and remembered that Juan had been at a baseball game the night of the shooting. I'm going to say you should remember that sooner. This is pretty soon. He's only been in jail for a couple of days. So Juan had bought tickets to a Dodgers game as a Mother's Day present for his mum, knowing full well that she wouldn't want to go and that he'd basically be able to go himself. So he just bought these Dodgers tickets for himself

and managed to still get good son points on Mother's Day by giving his mum a present that he knew she wouldn't want. Good. Okay, we've got these tickets to a Dodgers game. Surely this is now enough to get Juan off the murder charge. Milnik just had to prove that Juan was actually at the Dodgers stadium and not in Sun Valley shooting Martha Puebla. Alma finds the tickets, but this alone

is not enough. Just because Catalan had four tickets to the Dodgers game on the 12th of May didn't mean that he was actually there. So Milnik contacted the Dodgers Stadium and asked if he could go through the footage from the game, captured by the Dodger Vision cameras. These cameras are in the stadium and they're recording throughout the game. It's how I assume people end up on the big screen in those stadiums. So Senior Vice President and General Counsel for the Dodgers, Sam Fernandez, agreed to Milnik trawling through the hours of footage. Milnik knew Juan was sitting with his six-year-old daughter, cousin Miguel, and friend Ruben,

and he knew which seats they were in. But even still, watching all the Dodger vision footage on super slow-mo was no small task. But his efforts were not in vain. Milnick found footage of Juan sitting in his assigned seat at the Dodger Stadium. But once it was zoomed in, the resolution was utter dogshit and there was no way it would be admissible proof in court. Can you imagine spending hours? Going through footage is so fucking boring.

I've done it myself. And to have done that, to have found the shot and then realise you can't even use it, must have been crushing. And it's not like in CSI where they just zoom in and it's like, zoom in, clear. And then it's like crystal clear resolution. That is the thing that infuriates me the most procedural

dramas on tv it's like that wouldn't happen if you zoomed in the resolution would be so poor and blurry you wouldn't be able to see anything they're just like swipe and it's suddenly crystal clear needless to say that is not what happened here and it just looks like a blurry person sat in his seat it's just a blob of a person it person. There's no way you can tell it's him. But all was not lost because Juan remembered that there had been a film crew at the stadium that day, which was out of the ordinary. He'd been to hundreds of Dodgers games and he'd never seen a film crew before. And this is where we start to see the series of coincidences that just seem absolutely impossible. Kwan specifically remembered the film crew and the security blocking the aisles,

and a man walking up and down the stairs, repeatedly shot after shot. So Milnick went back to the stadium to investigate, and sure enough, on the schedule for the 12th of May 2003 was a booking from an obscure production company that Milnick didn't recognise, but there was a phone number. So Milnick rang the number and much to his surprise, the company at the other end was none other than HBO. Milnick explained his situation to the producer, Tim Gibbons, who definitely thought Milnick was a certified loon and there was no way they would have the shot they needed. There were tens of thousands of people in the stadium that day. So what are the chances that he would even

be sitting anywhere near the film crew, let alone be in their shot? And even if they did have footage of Juan Catalan being at the Dodgers Stadium that day, it was policy to not release footage until after the show had aired. Tim Gibbons just tells Todd Milnick he's just going to have to wait. The show that had been filmed in the Dodgers Stadium that day was episode seven of season four of Curb Your Enthusiasm, written by and starring Hollywood comedy legend Larry David. And when they were shooting, Larry David was sitting maybe eight rows in front of Juan Catalan, like they were really, really close. In this particular episode, Larry David's character

picks up a sex worker so he can use the carpool lane to get to the Dodgers game on time. But after persistence from Milnick and the go-ahead from Larry David himself, Todd Milnik was allowed by HBO to go through all of the footage with a technician at the studio. Robert Gajic was a PA on the shoot and it was his job at the Dodgers Stadium to keep members of the public out of the shot, but they'd also paid to see the game. Having film crews at the Dodgers stadium is very rare, so he couldn't stop people from going past for too long. And at one point in the game,

Juan Catalan has taken his daughter to the concession stand, and on his way back, he is caught in the HBO footage clear as day. He's right at the front of the shot. He walks straight into it. Gajic has said in his own words that he had just been a shitty PA and he let Catalan walk right into the shot. The shot was fucked, but Juan Catalan's life was saved. Surely. But actually, it's not really that simple. Juan and his party are on two other of the HBO cassettes and the first of the time stamps

on the film is at 8.55 and the last shot showing Juan is at 9.15. So actually Milnick can only prove using the footage that Juan was at the stadium until 9.15, leaving him in theory time to drive to Sun Valley and kill Martha Puebla at 10.32. From the Dodgers Stadium to Sun Valley is just under 15 miles, which with no traffic takes half an hour. And I'm pretty sure that after a Dodgers game, there would have been awful traffic. And LA's famous for it anyway, so I find it difficult to believe that you would ever make it

from the Dodgers Stadium to Sun Valley at that time of night in half an hour or less. He was hip-hop's biggest mogul, the man who redefined fame, fortune, and the music industry. The first male rapper to be honored on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, Sean Diddy Cone. Diddy built an empire and lived a life most people only dream about. Everybody know ain't no party like a Diddy party, so...

Yeah, that's what you said. But just as quickly as his empire rose, it came crashing down. Today I'm announcing the unsealing of a three-count indictment, charging Sean Combs with racketeering conspiracy, sex trafficking, interstate transportation for prostitution. I was f***ed up. I hit rock bottom. But I made no excuses. I'm disgusted. I'm so sorry. Until you're wearing an orange jumpsuit, it's not real. Now it's real. From his meteoric rise to his shocking fall from grace, from law and crime, this is the rise and fall of Diddy.

Listen to the rise and fall of Diddy exclusively with Wondery Plus. I'm Jake Warren, and in our first season of Finding, I set out on a very personal quest to find the woman who saved my mom's life. You can listen to Finding Natasha right now exclusively on Wondery Plus. In season two, I found myself caught up in a new journey to help someone I've never even met. But a couple of years ago, I came across a social media post by a person named Loti.

It read in part, Three years ago today that I attempted to jump off this bridge, but this wasn't my time to go. A gentleman named Andy saved my life. I still haven't found him. This is a story that I came across purely by chance, but it instantly moved me. And it's taken me to a place where I've had to consider some deeper issues around mental health. This is season two of Finding and this time, if all goes to plan, we'll be finding Andy. You can listen to Finding Andy and Finding Natasha exclusively and ad-free on Wondery Plus. Join Wondery Plus in the Wondery app, Apple Podcasts or Spotify.

They say Hollywood is where dreams are made, a seductive city where many flock to get rich, be adored, and capture America's heart. But when the spotlight turns off, fame, fortune, and lives can disappear in an instant. When TV producer Roy Radin was found dead in a canyon near LA.A. in 1983, there were many questions surrounding his death. The last person seen with him was Laney Jacobs, a seductive cocaine dealer who desperately wanted to be part of the Hollywood elite. Together, they were trying to break into the movie industry. But things took a dark turn when a million dollars worth of cocaine and cash went missing. From Wondery comes a new season

of the hit show Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder. Follow Hollywood and Crime, The Cotton Club Murder on the Wondery app or wherever you get your podcasts. You can binge all episodes of The Cotton Club Murder early and ad-free right now by joining Wondery Plus. When it came to Juan Catalan's preliminary hearing in January 2004, the prosecution attorney Beth Silverman seems pretty convinced that the timeline makes sense. The sketch is clearly Juan and that he had more than enough motive to kill Martha. Beth Silverman had never lost a murder case. She was nicknamed the sniper as she was famous for picking off defendants with

the death penalty. If Juan Catalan's case did go to a jury trial, it was very possible he would be facing the death penalty. As far as Beth Silverman was concerned, the footage of Juan Catalan at the stadium had simply been a waste of Milnik's time. It didn't prove anything. Milnik knew he needed to prove that Juan had been at the stadium past 10pm. Juan had bought baseball cards on the way out of the stadium, but because he hadn't used a credit card, this was just more useless information because it couldn't be proved that it was actually him. But then Milnik subpoenaed Juan's phone records and this is where we got our serial moment that we had been waiting for. Alma had called Juan from her friend's phone at 10.11pm to ask if the game had finished. Juan told her that he was on his way out and the phone

record showed that the cell phone tower this call pinged was opposite the Dodger Stadium. This particular tower has a radius of just one mile. Therefore, this placed Juan within one mile of the cell phone tower opposite the Dodger Stadium at 10.11pm. Do you know how long I have waited to find a case with a cell phone tower ping?

It's been 39 episodes, friends, and we finally got there. This proves that there was no way that Juan could have made it. Even with no traffic and a supercar, he couldn't have made it from the Dodger Stadium to Sun Valley before 10.30.

Judge Leslie Dunn, at Juan's preliminary hearing, stated she had no doubt the prosecution's witness who provided the composite sketch had the intention of being credible. But the fact is, he saw the shooting on a darkened street under an extremely high stress situation. And again, this coupled with everything we've ever spoken about, about how memory works, about eyewitnesses remember and report information. Eyewitness testimony, as we all know, is just too often a giant load of bollocks. And I do have a slight issue with Judge Dunn. This is very much the pot calling the kettle black because I am the most dramatic person on the face of the planet. But she is so is so dramatic in the documentary she gives this really long speech about how she took

the recording of juan's interrogation home with her and she listened to it over and over even making her children listen to it and asking them and herself repeatedly is this the voice of a guilty man that is so weird like for god's sake she's literally a judge this her job do you not think that you should be more concerned with the evidence than the tone of someone's voice like it really just struck me as such a weird is everyone in la just trying to get on tv because that's what it feels like it does but regardless of what i think of her all charges against juan catalan were dropped and he walked out of his preliminary hearing a free man after spending five months in jail later juan was awarded 320 000 in compensation for wrongful imprisonment and defamation of character

seems pretty light for five months in jail i think think I'd want a bit more than that. Even still, we have a win for Juan Catalan, a win for his lawyer, Todd Milnick, and Larry David gets to tell this story at showbiz parties for the rest of his life. But our story doesn't stop here because Martha Puebla is still dead. So since the case, Juan's trial detectives, Pina and Rodriguez, have admitted that the circled mugshots they showed Ledesma and the Catalans were both fabricated. Fabricating evidence and lying whilst interrogating a suspect is unbelievably not illegal in the US. This means that the piece of evidence that drove Ledesma to call out a hit on Martha Pueblo was not real. Martha Pueblo was never a snitch.

Her death was collateral damage as a result of dirty police tactics. And it's not even like lying while interrogating a person is one of those things that's kind of legal and is a bit of a loophole. No, it's been defended time and again as a right that the police have while interrogating suspects. In this case, it's incredibly tragic because she wasn't even a snitch. She never testified against them. And they just casually,

without any regard for her safety, named her in a fucking gangland murder that she was a snitch against them and gave him access to a phone. And he immediately obviously called out a hit on her. But even if she had snitched, that's your fucking informant. What are you doing? Calling her out, naming her.

They showed photos of her to them to be like, do you know this woman? Oh, MP. He just went out and put out a hit on her. It's unbelievable. Even if she had been a snitch, it's crazy that they were just doing this. In April 2010, Martha Puebla's family filed a suit against the LAPD, claiming that they had endangered Martha's life and violated her constitutional rights. The LAPD testified that Puebla and her family were advised by a prosecutor

of the danger that she faced and offered a witness relocation program, but that they had turned it down. The family's attorney contended that the family was not offered any protection or relocation. Surely if the police are going to throw informants names around to gang members, they have a duty to protect the people they are throwing under the bus. Even then though, she wasn't a snitch, she wasn't an informant. They just pulled her into this case unnecessarily dragged her into this mess and then to come and say oh but we'll give you witness relocation that's a huge impact on your life you have to move away from your friends your family completely change your name live a totally different life

that's like an extreme resort if you are tied up in something that is a mess and you need to be safe they pulled her into this unnecessarily and then they're like oh well we'll put you in witness relocation yeah they're just trying to damage control that's all it is even if they did if they did offer her protection and for whatever reason it was turned down too little too late like she's already fucked they're not giving her a choice who asked you exactly who asked you to pull me into this case and then give me witness relocation i don't fucking want to go anywhere you pulled me into this when i had no business being involved. So a federal jury found the detectives were negligent and violated Martha's constitutional rights. But jurors said that Puebla and her parents were 80% responsible for her death

and the detectives were 20% responsible. How? I don't understand that at all. How Martha and her parents can, even if they were offered witness protection and turned it down, even if that is the case, which I don't know, 80% their fault.

Fuck off. No, it's not. And to make things even worse, just to rub salt in the wound, US District Judge Christina Schneider no it's not and to make things even worse just to rub salt in the wound u.s district judge christina schneider awarded one dollar in nominal damages to the family for constitutional violations their daughter is dead how fucking insulting is that and you know what's even worse i was thinking about this it's not even the money because they've technically won the case because they've won once so the attorney gets to be like i won that one and they get to be like oh we there's

justice for martha puebla but actually it isn't at all she was 16 as well don't forget that she was 16 and she watched a guy be gunned down in front of her and then she gets shot and she did nothing wrong in any of this it's so important to remember and it's just this whole thing of the police being allowed to lie and fabricate evidence when they're interrogating a suspect just seems to me so horribly horribly wrong and in the uk you can't do that in the uk UK, since the Guildford Four and the Birmingham Six, police are not allowed to use false evidence during interrogations. So the Guildford Four and the Birmingham Six were all convicted of terrorism charges. They were thought to be members of the IRA who orchestrated pub bombings in Guildford and in Birmingham in the 70s in the UK, which was huge.

There was also, ding, ding, ding, the Maguire Seven, who, again, wrongfully accused. They were accused of having explosives in their house. And this is all over the space of a few years. So we're looking at 17 people in the UK who are wrongfully imprisoned on terrorism charges because the police extracted false confessions from them because they used psychological and physical torture and false evidence in their interrogation. All of these defendants were compensated years later, but they all did hard time in jail for terrorism charges that they didn't commit. After the Guildford Four, the Birmingham Six and the Maguire 7. This clearly points out that the British police, their interrogation system is woefully broken because 17 people are being imprisoned wrongfully.

I can understand why there would be a government level reluctance to say that police can't use fake evidence because then you're saying you can't trust the police and that's in no government's interest to instill that in their people so i understand why a government would be reluctant to do it but it happened in the uk it should happen in the us because you want to believe if the police are using fake evidence it's for a good reason and if you're saying they can't do it you're also admitting they might be doing it for the wrong reasons i'd say it's a a good reason and if you're saying they can't do it you're also admitting they might be doing it for the wrong reasons i'd say it's a good thing i don't think it it's a good thing but like i can understand why the government wouldn't want to do it wouldn't want to do what they wouldn't

want to say you can't use fake evidence that's why it's being defended in america as a right of the police because they're saying the police would never use it in the wrong way but then it's kind of like isn't using it at all using it for the wrong way i think they're doing it because it's like the ends justify the means yeah it's more important that we if you're innocent you wouldn't confess to it anyway but we know false confessions happen all the time but what i think they're saying is it doesn't matter if they say to you hannah mcguire i have eyewitnesses that say that you shot this person and that's a lie and i'm the police officer saying that to you i think the way a lie and I'm the police officer saying

that to you. I think the way they're defending it in the US is saying it's irrelevant if the police officer lies and says that to you because if you didn't do it, you wouldn't admit to it anyway and it shouldn't bother you at all that the police officer is telling you that because you'll know it's not true. But what they're not taking into account is what we see in so many of these false confession cases is that after hours of interrogation, people break down. They'll say whatever they think they have to say to get out of that situation. And it's a head fuck. Lying to people who are under severe duress, being interrogated, potentially their lives are on the line. You shouldn't be lying to them. And I think in the US, it's being justified because they're

saying it shouldn't impact you if you're truly innocent but with the the gilford four and the birmingham six and the mcguire seven it was physical violence they were physically being tortured oh absolutely that's a completely different thing we're just talking about lying and the psychological and how police extract false confessions out of people and this is one of those one of those avenues you have the psychological torture you have the physical torture and this is another prong in that attack, which confuses people. And under duress, they will say things that aren't true, because you're telling them things that aren't true. Yes, I absolutely think it's the right decision and the right thing that in this country, we don't allow police officers

to use false evidence in interrogations. After the Guildford Fort and the Birmingham Six, senior police officers devised a program called PEACE with the help of psychologists. This included different interview techniques that weren't simply just fucking lying. And Dr. Andy Griffiths, detective superintendent for the Sussex Police, states that when a suspect knows that I can't lie and my job is on the line if I do, I get more information. The detectives, Pinner and Rodriguez, no longer work together or on homicide cases, thankfully, because they've had the book thrown at them. They didn't actually do anything illegal,

so they're still employed by the police force. But I think given how things turned out, there's no questioning, surely, that what they did was unethical. This is the thing, when you see them being questioned, they admit to making fake evidence and circling the pictures themselves and stuff. And the interviewer just says, so you admit that that was dishonest. They sort of just don't really say anything. Of course it was unethical, but I just wonder, the thing is,

because it was exactly the same piece of evidence that they fabricated for Ledesma and for Juan Catalan, how many times have they done this? It feels like it was their go-to thing to do. Absolutely. And I think that's why you can see that even though it wasn't illegal, which is why they didn't lose their jobs, that there is discomfort around these practices and which is why they're no longer working homicide cases. The FBI did finally discover that four other men were responsible for Martha Puebla's murder and they all got life in prison without parole. The shooter was Vineland boy Raul Rabledo. He pled guilty to Martha's murder. Jose Ledesma confessed to the murders of Enrique Acosta and Christian Vargas. Mario Catalan was also convicted in connection to the murder of Enrique Acosta. And Javier, the man you'll remember that Ledesma called from the prison payphone,

also pled guilty to his role in the murder of Martha Puebla, and all four men received life imprisonment. I guess the incredibly insulting and horrifying $1 nominal compensation the family were given for their daughter being murdered. It's sick, but at least these men were caught and put in jail. Exactly. What is very interesting, though, is the Netflix documentary really skirts over the fact that it is actually Juan Catalan's brother that's murdering people. Yeah, there's no denying that. The thing is, Mario Catalan was involved with this gang, the Vineland Boys, there is no denying that. He was deep in with them. He fucking ran off with Ledesma to Mexico

after he was being hunted for the murder of Christian Vargas. There's the thing, I think no one is innocent in this case apart from Martha, who just happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and get fucked over by two LAPD homicide detectives. Of what he was being convicted of, Juan Catalan was innocent. 100%. And that's the key thing. Absolutely. His only crime that I could see was stealing cars when he was a teenager. That is the story of Juan Catalan. That's how curb your enthusiasm got someone that is pretty impressive i would like to hear larry david tell that story but also what are the

chances if his mum had actually gone to the dodgers game and his girlfriend alma says in the documentary he's like if he hadn't have been at the game what would have happened they wouldn't have believed me if i said oh he was with me they wouldn't have believed anyone the only reason he got off was this footage that was pure chance absolutely it's incredible and also the credit card thing oh my god guys wherever you go use your card don't use cash so they can track unless you're doing something illegal in which case use cash if you're doing something legit use your card so that they can always tell where you are I don't carry cash anymore i'm like the queen that's because the queen is broke as fuck we don't even get a day off for the stupid royal wedding did you know that i also know that it's on fa cup final day and prince william is the

president of the fa who the fuck planned that who did that who was going to be watching this wedding if it's on the same day as the FA Cup final? Someone I work with was like, oh no, but it's good because the girls can watch the wedding and the boys can watch the football. And I was like, I will skin you alive. Oh, you stupid. Was it a woman? No. Honestly, picked up the paper the other day and there was like a big article in there about how the wedding invitations are in the post and how the paper is English, but the ink is American. I don't care. Oh, and definitely can't have any homeless people in Windsor anymore, can we? This is what they won't tell you.

All you people obsessing about the fact that Meryl Markle is marrying into the royal family. They're trying to get rid of all the homeless people outside all of the places where the wedding parade will go. And they're not giving them houses. They're moving them on. Yeah. Move along, please.

Go be homeless somewhere else there's loads of places for you to be homeless this is their home this is where the parade route is thanks they're the biggest scroungers in the world she's the queen is so broke they've got no money and yet here we are anyway this has taken a turn for the odd we started off talking about gangland murders in gangland gangland murders in la and and I ended up yelling about the royal family. Never takes too long to get onto the royal family though, does it? No, not too long. And I haven't even had a beer yet. Before any royalists tweet at me and tell me, oh, but they bring in so much tourism.

No, they don't. No one sees the queen. They come to look at the palace. The palace is still going to be there. But anyway, that is that. So finally, like to do some Patreon thank yous for our new patrons this week. We have Dan Robinson. Thank you, Dan. We have Tracy Boissot, Tony Kornkeff, Josie Rosie. Is that your name? Josie Rosie. Maybe it's Josie and Rosie. Maybe. So thank you, Josie Rosie, or thank you, Josie and Rosie. Amy Goodman Goldberg, Ashley Wilson, Catherine McAllister, and Stephanie Sabin. Thank you, guys. Thanks, guys. Don't forget, if you haven't already, please leave us a lovely five-star review. It really helps us. If you would like to give us some money, please go to Patreon forward slash Red Handed. And don't forget to tell your mates.

Follow us on all the social medias at Red Handed, the pod. And we'll see you next time. Bye. See you next week. Hi, I'm Lindsey Graham, the host of Wondery Show American Scandal. We bring to light some of the biggest controversies in U.S. history. Presidential lies, environmental disasters, corporate fraud. In our latest series, NASA embarks on an ambitious program to reinvent space exploration with the launch of its first reusable vehicle, the Space Shuttle. And in 1985, they announced they're sending teacher Krista McAuliffe into space

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