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1:50

capital is clothed in the

1:52

colors of Ukraine. And

1:54

Putin is reminded an international court

1:57

is waiting with his arrest warrant.

2:00

Since the 2022 invasion, Lithuania

2:03

has become a refuge

2:05

for Putin's fiercest critters.

2:08

You would be in a Russian prison just

2:10

for doing this interview. Oh,

2:12

for sure. For sure. Good

2:19

job. It's rare for 60 Minutes to

2:21

follow a story for 15 years. But

2:25

tonight you'll be reintroduced to

2:27

Jennifer Thompson, a rape victim

2:29

who mistakenly identified an innocent

2:31

man who was sent to

2:33

prison. And then I'm going

2:35

to tie my string. Jennifer

2:37

has created something called Healing

2:39

Justice, a program that brings

2:41

together crime victims, family members

2:43

and innocent men. Dear Chris,

2:45

you failed in life. Why

2:47

did you confess? I will never confess. Why

2:50

can't you just be quiet? You

2:52

are a angry black man.

2:54

You will never know love. You will

2:57

always be a prisoner. I'm

3:03

Leslie Stahl. I'm Bill Whittaker.

3:05

I'm Anderson Cooper. I'm Sharon Alfonsi.

3:07

I'm John Wertheim. I'm Cecilia

3:09

Vega. I'm Scott Pelli. Those

3:12

stories and more tonight on

3:14

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5:00

is Election Day in Russia, but

5:02

there's no suspense. 71 year old Vladimir

5:05

Putin will be named the winner

5:08

as he has been over the last 24 years.

5:12

This time, as often, his

5:14

challengers died. One after

5:17

an explosion on a plane and Alexei

5:20

Navalny, Putin's leading

5:22

rival who died last month in

5:24

an Arctic prison camp. Putin

5:27

has killed nearly all internal

5:29

opposition to his unprovoked war

5:31

in Ukraine, and yet many

5:34

courageous Russians continue the struggle

5:36

outside the country. We

5:39

met some of them in a city

5:41

you might think of as the capital

5:43

of free Russia. and

6:00

a NATO ally. Vilnius,

6:02

the capital, is clothed

6:04

in the colors of Ukraine. The

6:08

city changed the Russian embassy's

6:10

address to Heroes of

6:12

Ukraine Street, and Putin

6:14

is reminded the international court in The

6:17

Hague is waiting with his

6:19

arrest warrant. Since

6:21

Putin's 2022 invasion, Lithuania

6:24

has welcomed more than 2,500 Russian

6:26

exiles. It

6:30

is our policy to provide shelter

6:32

to all freedom fighters. Montas

6:35

Adiminas served as Lithuania's deputy

6:37

foreign minister from 2020 until

6:39

last August. I

6:44

haven't seen so many Ukrainian

6:46

flags since I was in Kiev. Why

6:50

do your people feel so strongly about this?

6:53

Our freedom, our independence,

6:55

our sort of security is

6:57

being defended in the battlefields in Ukraine.

6:59

Ukrainians are dying so that we can

7:01

be safe. There are many

7:04

more Russian dissidents who would

7:06

like to come to Lithuania. Can you

7:08

accept any more? Yes, I

7:10

think we can accept. Of course,

7:12

we will accommodate as many as needed

7:14

and to provide them with possibility to

7:17

work for the freedom

7:19

and democracy in Russia. One

7:22

of the Russian exiles in Lithuania

7:24

working for freedom and democracy is

7:27

a crusading mom. Two

7:29

years ago, Anastasia Shevchenko

7:31

fled Putin's regime. This

7:33

is a terrorist regime.

7:36

They are threatening other countries with

7:38

oil, gas, nuclear weapons and grain.

7:41

They are threatening us with our children,

7:43

with our parents, with our lives and

7:46

so on. More than

7:48

anything, it was her daughter,

7:50

Alina, severely disabled at birth,

7:53

that made Shevchenko an activist

7:55

against Putin. Back then,

7:57

the family was in southern Russia. and

8:00

Alina was in a Russian government

8:02

nursing home. Alina could

8:05

not speak, could not communicate. No.

8:08

She was like a

8:11

one-week child, like

8:15

a baby. She was 17, but

8:18

even, you know, to feed her, it was

8:20

a whole science because she

8:22

needed blended food. You

8:24

need to hold her in a special position. Shebchenko

8:27

cared for Alina much of

8:29

the time because the Russian

8:31

nursing facility was short on

8:34

staff and supplies. I

8:36

was struggling to get medication

8:38

for my daughter. Begging

8:40

in the pharmacy, she needed

8:42

it. It

8:45

was very important for her health.

8:48

They said, no, we just don't have

8:50

it because the ministry forgot to order

8:52

it this month, and he needed to

8:55

wait. I decided

8:57

I'm not going to keep silence,

8:59

and I'm going to stand out

9:01

and to speak out. She

9:04

spoke out through a Russian democracy

9:06

group called Open Russia. It

9:09

was tolerated 10 years ago, and

9:11

Shebchenko organized protests in her

9:13

hometown. But

9:16

in 2019, the Kremlin cracked

9:18

down. Shebchenko was arrested,

9:21

and her lawyer warned her she would

9:23

be shocked by what the

9:25

police had already done. He

9:28

showed me the screenshots of

9:30

me in my bed, and

9:33

I realized that they had installed

9:35

the video camera into the air

9:38

conditioning unit above my bed,

9:41

and they have been watching me for six

9:43

months in my bedroom. A

9:45

Russian court ordered Shebchenko into house

9:48

arrest. She couldn't visit

9:50

or care for Alina. It

9:52

wasn't long before her daughter developed pneumonia.

9:56

By the time a judge granted Shebchenko

9:58

a pass to the hospital, Alina

10:00

was unconscious. I

10:03

spent maybe 10 minutes holding her

10:05

hand because that's what I

10:07

do when my children are ill. When

10:09

you hold the hand, they feel better.

10:13

But this time, she was

10:15

cold. She didn't feel me. And

10:18

she died in an hour. In

10:21

2021, Shevchenko was

10:23

given a four-year suspended sentence.

10:26

But when Putin invaded Ukraine the

10:28

next year, she decided

10:31

to flee Russia. From

10:33

her southern city, she took her

10:35

two surviving children on an 1,100-mile

10:37

drive. A

10:40

U.S.-based democracy group arranged

10:43

Lithuanian visas. What

10:45

does this tell us about Russia today? It's

10:48

enough to write something on social

10:50

media. Just one sentence,

10:53

and you can be imprisoned for

10:55

years. They are listening

10:57

to your phone calls. They're watching you

10:59

in your bedroom. They are

11:01

controlling you. Breaking that

11:04

control is why Sergei Davidis

11:06

also left Russia for Lithuania

11:08

in 2022. You

11:11

would be in a Russian prison just for

11:13

doing this interview. Oh, for

11:15

sure. For sure. In

11:19

Moscow, Davidis helped lead one

11:21

of Russia's largest human rights

11:23

groups called Memorial. It

11:25

won the Nobel Peace Prize two years ago,

11:28

but now it's banned. He

11:30

told us, almost every day, there are more and more

11:33

arrests. We

11:37

hear news about new political arrests.

11:40

And apart from the legal side

11:42

of it, more often than before,

11:44

there's violence and torture. Davidis

11:49

heads Memorial's project to

11:51

support political prisoners. He

11:53

told us he has confirmed 680 in

11:55

prison today, believes

12:00

the actual number is multiples of that.

12:03

Since 2022, Russians can

12:05

be sentenced to 15 years just

12:09

for criticizing the war on

12:11

the street or in the media.

12:14

One of the consequences of the war, he says, was

12:19

a complete wipeout of independent

12:22

mass media, a

12:24

prohibition of any opinion that's

12:26

not under control of the government. Independent

12:30

newsrooms in Russia have been forced

12:32

to close. Government-controlled

12:35

newscasts report only the

12:37

absurd lie that

12:39

the war is self-defense against

12:42

Nazis. This host

12:44

says, we

12:47

are on the side of good against

12:49

the forces of absolute

12:51

evil embodied by

12:54

the Ukrainian Nazi battalions.

12:57

People are scared. So

13:00

they feel lonely. They

13:03

feel terribly lonely. Tatyana

13:06

Thagenhauer and Aleksandr Polushev were

13:08

talk radio hosts on a

13:11

prominent Moscow station. They

13:14

were allowed to speak their minds

13:16

until the day Putin launched his

13:18

war. It was my

13:20

morning show. I said,

13:22

it's half past six. Good

13:25

morning. War began. War

13:28

began, and within two weeks, their station

13:31

was forced to close. Now,

13:34

Polushev and Thagenhauer are

13:36

in Vilnius streaming daily

13:38

into Russia on YouTube.

13:41

Putin silenced Facebook, X,

13:44

and Instagram, but

13:46

YouTube may be too popular for

13:48

the Kremlin to block so far.

13:51

This is the only chance to

13:53

talk about the war honestly,

13:56

because the propaganda tries

13:58

to... create this

14:02

feeling that you are completely

14:04

alone if you

14:06

are against the war. Why

14:08

does this mean so much to you? Really,

14:11

I would hate myself if

14:15

I'm silent or pretending that

14:17

everything is okay. If

14:21

Russian radio and TV stations

14:23

are allowed only Kremlin talking

14:25

points, we

14:27

saw a Lithuanian station telling

14:29

the truth, not on

14:32

a channel, but on platform

14:34

number five to a captive

14:36

Russian audience. Because

14:39

part of Russia, Kaliningrad, on the

14:41

left, is separate, like Alaska from

14:43

the lower 48, the

14:46

Moscow Kaliningrad train must

14:49

travel through Lithuania. The

14:53

cars are sealed for the transit, but

14:55

at a stop in Vilnius, Russian

14:58

passengers were confronted by

15:00

posters of atrocities. Each

15:03

read, Putin is killing

15:05

civilians in Ukraine. Do

15:08

you agree with this? The

15:10

gallery testified as the train waited

15:12

half an hour. There's

15:14

no way to know how much

15:17

truth climbed aboard. And

15:20

no one is allowed off the train,

15:22

in part, because Lithuania

15:24

worries about Russian

15:27

agents. Putin

15:29

is infamous for attempting

15:31

to attack his enemies in

15:33

foreign countries. And

15:35

I wonder if the Russian

15:38

dissidents are safe here

15:40

in Lithuania. Of course, it

15:42

is a major concern for us. We spend

15:44

considerable efforts in making

15:46

sure that the dissidents are safe here

15:50

and safer than they would be in fact in

15:52

many other countries. Have there been attempts? Well,

15:55

I'm afraid I can't release that information

15:57

in more detail, but let's put this

15:59

one. that Russia is constantly probing

16:01

and constantly trying. And

16:04

this past week, Russia may have

16:06

gotten through. Leonid Volkov

16:09

was attacked with a hammer

16:11

outside Vilnius. Volkov, on

16:13

the right, was a top

16:16

aide to Putin's late rival,

16:18

Alexei Navalny. Volkov's

16:20

arm was broken. The attacker

16:22

fled. Vladimir

16:26

Putin's re-election this week will bring

16:28

him to his fifth term, which

16:30

will cover the next six years.

16:36

He enjoys support from nationalists

16:38

who want to believe that

16:40

today's Russia is an exceptional

16:42

nation. But Putin also

16:44

has weaknesses. It's

16:47

estimated he's lost 300,000

16:49

troops killed and wounded.

16:52

And Russia has a population less than half

16:54

that of the United States and

16:56

an economy about the size of

16:59

Italy's. My hope is

17:01

a country where government takes

17:03

care about citizens. Anastasia

17:05

Shevchenko is free in Vilnius,

17:07

but she's wanted in Russia

17:10

for breaking her probation. These

17:13

days, she's streaming her own YouTube

17:15

show and sends medicine,

17:17

food and letters to political

17:19

prisoners. She's become

17:21

another voice to the

17:23

isolated and the lonely and

17:26

those like her daughter, who will

17:28

never escape the new iron

17:30

curtain. She was alone. No

17:33

one next to her. I really feel very

17:35

guilty about it. But

17:39

I wouldn't change anything in my life,

17:41

I think. Why not? You

17:44

know, the society in Russia is

17:47

based on fakes. We

17:49

have fake democracy by

17:51

constitution. It is a democracy,

17:53

fake news, fake elections.

17:57

And I want to be the opposite.

18:00

I want to be open. I need Russia

18:02

to be open. How

18:08

safe are Russian dissidents in Lithuania? People

18:10

are saying, come on, are you actually

18:13

safe there? At

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audible.com/WonderyPod or text WonderyPod

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to 500-500. Fifteen

20:18

years ago, we reported on a

20:20

woman named Jennifer Thompson, a rape

20:23

victim who was devastated to learn,

20:26

years after her assault, that

20:29

she and the police had identified

20:31

an innocent man who

20:33

was convicted and sent to prison, while

20:36

the actual rapist had gone on

20:38

to attack several more women. Not

20:41

an uncommon story in this

20:43

era of DNA exonerations, and

20:46

Jennifer Thompson has tried for years

20:48

to do something about it. Thompson

20:51

knows firsthand that wrongful

20:54

convictions scar not just

20:56

the unjustly convicted, but

20:58

also the original crime victims who

21:01

are often overlooked. So

21:04

she's doing something no one else

21:06

has tried, and perhaps only she

21:08

could pull off, bringing

21:10

together crime victims and innocent

21:13

men from different cases for

21:16

what she calls healing justice.

21:20

What I'm going to ask you to do is turn

21:22

your bowl upside down. What

21:24

we saw on day one of

21:26

a multi-day group retreat Jennifer Thompson

21:28

is leading sure didn't look like

21:30

healing. Ten men

21:32

and women, plus an observer, smashing

21:40

bowls with a hammer. What

21:43

I'm going to ask you to do now is I'm going to ask you to repair

21:45

it. It was quite something to

21:48

realize that gluing pieces back together

21:50

at one table were two

21:52

women who had been raped at the ages of 15

21:54

and 12, sitting

21:57

across from two men who in

21:59

unrelated had

22:01

been wrongfully convicted of sexually assaulting

22:03

children and had each spent more

22:05

than two decades in prison. Anyone

22:08

need a little blob of glue? At the

22:10

next table, another woman who

22:12

survived a sexual assault sitting

22:14

beside a man exonerated for rape

22:17

and murder. And at

22:19

our table, the partner and daughter of a

22:21

murder victim. Everyone

22:23

here part of a case where the

22:25

wrong man was sent to prison for

22:27

years and years. You

22:30

have said that wrongful convictions aren't

22:32

a single bullet. You

22:35

said they're bombs. A wrongful conviction

22:37

doesn't hurt like a person.

22:40

It's not just Raymond Tower

22:42

got hurt. His whole family got

22:44

shrapnel. And the victims

22:47

got shrapnel. And the community

22:50

received shrapnel because a child molester was

22:52

still in the community. There's just so

22:54

many people in a

22:56

wrongful conviction case. I

22:59

think it's hundreds of people for every

23:01

single wrongful conviction case that are hurt.

23:04

Jennifer Thompson was one of them. She

23:07

was a college student in 1984

23:09

when a man broke into her

23:12

off-campus apartment and raped her

23:14

at knife point. Jennifer

23:16

worked with police to create a composite

23:18

sketch, then identified a

23:20

man named Ronald Cotton in the

23:23

photo and physical lineups police showed

23:25

her. Jennifer testified in

23:27

court against Ronald Cotton and

23:30

was relieved when he received a

23:32

life sentence. But

23:37

after 11 years in prison,

23:39

DNA testing proved Cotton's innocence

23:42

and identified the actual rapist

23:44

whose photo had not been in

23:47

the lineup. Ronald

23:49

Cotton was exonerated and Jennifer

23:52

was wracked with guilt as

23:54

she told us in 2009. Shame.

23:58

Shame. Terrible shame. suffocating,

24:02

debilitating shame. Jennifer

24:05

turned that shame into action.

24:08

She apologized to Ronald Cotton in

24:10

person and then started

24:12

speaking around the country to

24:15

police and prosecutors, sometimes together

24:17

with Cotton, about how to

24:19

make wrongful convictions less likely.

24:23

But over the years, as

24:25

exonerations of the innocent have multiplied...

24:28

Finally, we freed. With nearly 3,500 freed so

24:30

far... I'm free!

24:33

Based on new evidence, including DNA,

24:36

Jennifer began focusing in on what

24:38

was being overlooked. What

24:41

do you think most people feel

24:43

and see when they see an innocent

24:45

man come out of prison? It's

24:48

the day that that man or

24:51

woman who's wrongfully incarcerated and their

24:53

families are rejoicing. I know you

24:55

didn't do it. I know. It's

24:57

the day they've been dreaming about,

25:00

they've prayed for. They're

25:03

on the court steps and their arms are

25:05

raised high. It's a day

25:07

of celebration, but for the crime victims, for

25:10

the murder victim family members, they're sitting back

25:12

here saying, hey, hold up a second. This

25:16

is another nightmare on top of a nightmare.

25:19

The victims have been forgotten. Victims,

25:23

she says, like Tamecia Carrington-Ardis,

25:25

who was 12 years old,

25:28

when a man broke into her bedroom

25:30

and raped her. He grabbed me

25:32

by my throat and put a knife to my throat

25:35

and said if I screamed, he was going to kill me

25:37

and my mom. Grabbed

25:39

me from behind, put me in a

25:42

chokehold, and... Penny Burnson, sexually assaulted at

25:44

age 36, as

25:46

she went for an afternoon run along the

25:48

shore of Lake Michigan. And

25:51

he said, now I'm going to kill you, now you're going to die. Ann

25:54

Loretta Zillinger-White, who was raped

25:56

at age 15 on the

25:58

way to school one morning, she'd

26:00

missed her bus. It's

26:02

hard. People expect you

26:04

to just put

26:06

it behind you and not think about it again and they

26:09

don't realize that it's gonna affect you for the rest

26:12

of your life. All

26:14

these women like Jennifer had identified

26:16

a suspect the police showed them

26:18

only to learn years later that

26:21

those men were innocent and

26:23

they were gripped by a whole

26:25

new nightmare. I felt

26:28

so bad for for him because I felt

26:30

like I sent this man to prison. That's

26:32

all I could think about. I got scared

26:34

I felt like that he was gonna try to

26:36

come out and kill me that I mean I just I

26:40

shut down. Did people

26:43

blame you? Oh absolutely. The first time

26:45

I went out in public a

26:49

friend came up to me and said I can't believe

26:51

you're showing your face. They

26:53

were saying that I needed to go to prison. That

26:55

I intentionally

26:59

sent the wrong man to prison. Oh

27:01

my gosh. Yeah it was bad.

27:04

Yeah. Memory experts

27:06

have long understood how crime

27:09

victims can get it wrong. In our

27:11

earlier story about Jennifer's case,

27:13

Professor Gary Wells showed us

27:16

a simulated crime scene and

27:18

then a lineup. Now you know

27:20

now after we've talked probably

27:22

not to pick anyone. No no actually

27:25

I know I actually know who it is because

27:28

if I had come upon that

27:30

I think it's this guy am I wrong? Yeah.

27:33

Studies have shown again and

27:35

again when the actual perpetrator is not in the

27:42

lineup witnesses often pick the wrong

27:45

man who then comes to replace

27:47

the original offender in their memory

27:50

of the crime. In

27:52

Jennifer's case and to Misha

27:54

and Penny's the real

27:56

perpetrators revealed by DNA years

27:59

later had not been in

28:01

the original lineups. Twenty

28:03

years later when they come to

28:05

me and say, by the way,

28:07

the person who raped you never

28:10

went to prison. And the

28:12

person we thought is innocent.

28:15

See ya. And oh by

28:17

the way, it's all your fault. It's

28:19

not the system's fault. I mean, here was

28:21

my narrative. Rape

28:23

victim falsely accuses an

28:26

innocent man and sends him to

28:28

prison. Everything's wrong with that.

28:30

Because a false accusation denotes a lie.

28:33

Deliver it. Why would a crime survivor,

28:35

why would a victim want

28:38

the wrong person to go to prison? That doesn't

28:40

make any sense at all. You know,

28:42

when you hear what you're saying,

28:44

then we get it, but we don't hear

28:46

it. As you said, there's

28:48

a blazing headline. Man is freed.

28:50

Person who fingered him got

28:53

it wrong. That's it. And

28:55

the system now doesn't get

28:57

held accountable for how it

29:00

failed me. And it

29:02

failed my family. And it failed the

29:04

innocent person. It failed the innocent person's

29:06

family. And it failed everybody. That

29:09

failure, Jennifer told us, is

29:11

also devastating for families of

29:13

murder victims, even when

29:16

they played no role themselves in

29:18

identifying the wrongfully convicted person. That's

29:21

what happened to Andrea Harrison and

29:23

her father, Dwayne Jones.

29:26

Andrea's mother, Jacqueline, was raped and murdered

29:28

in 1987, when Andrea was just three

29:30

years old. It

29:34

was one of the most horrendous crimes. She

29:37

was brutally raped, tortured.

29:40

Someone found her body, lock on the dock.

29:43

A local man named Larry Peterson spent

29:45

more than 17 years

29:47

in prison for the crime before

29:50

DNA testing proved his innocence and

29:53

he was released. Did you know

29:55

that he was going to be released? Did they tell

29:57

you? No. No. No. many,

30:00

many years someone was tried,

30:02

convicted, and put away. Yes,

30:04

ma'am. And then you find

30:07

out that the DNA

30:09

doesn't match. I

30:11

mean, you go back into flight or flight. You

30:14

got scared. Absolutely. Absolutely

30:16

we did. Can you tell us of what? Who

30:19

the person, who hurt my mother? What happened to

30:21

Jackie? Who did it? Whoever

30:23

that person is, they're still out

30:25

there. But since Larry Peterson's exoneration,

30:28

with the case now cold,

30:30

they feel the original crime

30:32

and victim have become an

30:34

afterthought. It's always been, what do

30:36

you think about Mr. Peterson? That is not

30:38

my charge. I care about Jackie. I'm

30:40

worried about Jackie. What about Jackie? But

30:44

even while victims and their families

30:46

are left reeling in the wake

30:48

of wrongful convictions, Jennifer

30:50

knows from her friendship with Ronald

30:52

Cotton and her work with other

30:54

exonerees that heady, blissful

30:57

first day of freedom is

30:59

just the start of a

31:01

tough, years-long struggle to rebuild.

31:04

Only freedom. Raymond Tower exonerated after 29 years in prison, 29 years,

31:06

plays in a band with other exonerees,

31:16

and says he struggles with the

31:18

lingering stigma and hurt of being

31:20

charged with such a heinous crime.

31:23

Tell us, if it's not too painful, what the crime

31:25

was. It's painful. I know. I'm

31:27

laughing over it, but it is

31:30

painful. But it was rape of

31:32

11 and 12-year-old

31:34

kids. When Deanna

31:37

testing finally proved

31:39

Tower's innocence and won his

31:41

freedom, he says it

31:43

was thrilling, but also daunting.

31:47

The adjustment was difficult. Yeah. I

31:49

couldn't even really go out the door by myself. You

31:52

don't feel like you fit in anywhere. At

31:54

least I did. Exonerees'

31:57

stories are often filled with

31:59

egregious police. police and prosecutorial

32:01

misconduct. In Chris Ochoa's case,

32:04

abusive interrogations that led to

32:07

a false confession to rape

32:09

and murder. For Howard

32:11

Dudley, evidence withheld by prosecutors

32:14

that likely would have cleared

32:16

him of child sexual abuse, for

32:19

which he served more than 23 years. I

32:22

always dream of being there with my kids.

32:24

See the football game, see them on the

32:26

basketball court. Didn't

32:31

get a chance to see none of that. So I

32:33

would like for everybody to introduce themselves. So

32:35

Jennifer came up with a

32:37

novel idea. So I am

32:39

Jennifer Thompson. I am a

32:41

victim survivor. My name is

32:44

Raymond. Raymond Towner. I'm Exoneri. My

32:47

name is Loretta. She started

32:49

an organization called Healing Justice

32:51

that brings together Exoneris. My

32:55

name is Chris. I'm an Exoneri. And

32:57

crime victims. My name is Penny. All

33:00

from different cases. I am

33:02

Tamecia. As well as family

33:05

members. My brother was an Exoneri.

33:07

My name is Andrea. Healing

33:10

Justice paid to bring them from around the

33:12

country to this rented retreat

33:14

center in Virginia, where they will

33:16

spend three days sharing stories,

33:20

playing games, and

33:22

eating all

33:25

their meals together. This

33:27

is the 17th retreat Healing Justice

33:29

has done. How effective

33:31

is it when it's not the

33:34

same crime? Very effective. There's

33:36

something powerful and healing when

33:39

an Exoneri can hear what

33:41

the victim in their case must have

33:43

felt like. And for crime survivors, it's

33:45

really healing to also hear about the

33:48

experiences of Exoneris. The biggest

33:50

thing I lost was

33:52

trust. Three

33:55

days of emotional relief, rebuilding

33:58

trust, and healing. when

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34:44

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34:46

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34:48

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34:50

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35:01

is it simulates that exact muscle

35:03

memory that they need. Explore

35:05

more stories like Alex's at

35:08

meta.com slash Metaverse Impact. Jennifer

35:19

Thompson's goal when she

35:21

created the nonprofit organization

35:23

Healing Justice in 2015

35:26

was to help all groups harmed

35:28

by wrongful convictions. Healing

35:31

Justice now advises prosecutors' offices

35:33

around the country on

35:36

dealing more effectively and

35:38

empathetically with crime victims

35:40

in exoneration cases. And

35:43

they've recently gotten a grant from

35:45

the Justice Department to expand those

35:47

efforts. But it's what

35:49

they call the healing side of their

35:51

work that is most meaningful to Jennifer.

35:55

She did coursework and trauma

35:57

recovery and worked with

35:59

psychologists to design a

36:01

program to safely bring together

36:03

victims of crime and exonerees.

36:06

They work in small groups on

36:08

the wounds left behind when

36:11

the justice system gets it wrong. Remember

36:18

the breaking and gluing back together

36:20

of those bowls? Did anybody notice

36:22

how fast and easy it was

36:24

to break it and how hard

36:26

it is to put it back

36:28

together again? That was just

36:30

the start of this retreat's

36:32

opening exercise and perhaps a

36:34

metaphor for the whole endeavor. What I'm going to

36:36

ask you to do now is to

36:40

paint your broken places with

36:42

gold. This is actually 24 karat

36:44

gold paint. She told us

36:47

it's called kintsugi. Kintsugi.

36:49

Kintsugi? Mm-hmm. What is

36:51

that? It's the

36:53

Japanese concept that even in

36:56

our broken places we're

36:58

so beautiful. Because we're strong

37:01

at our broken places and we're not disposable.

37:04

But before they can paint their real wounds

37:06

with gold, they have to

37:08

look hard at the breaks that need

37:11

repair. I lost part

37:13

of my heart. So sitting

37:15

in a circle, using a rock to

37:17

give whoever holds it the floor, and

37:20

with a healing justice social worker

37:22

always present, they talked

37:24

about their losses. I

37:27

lost believing in myself. I had so

37:29

much confidence. I had so

37:31

much. That

37:34

first slam on

37:36

the doors, everything got real right then.

37:39

I seen people,

37:41

suicide, death by a cop,

37:44

just getting beat up, killed. The

37:47

talk comes back and I

37:49

have to keep reminding myself, right

37:53

here, I'm in prison right now. The

37:57

hardest part for me is hearing...

38:00

what the exoneries went through in

38:02

prison. It's so hard to

38:04

hear, but it's so necessary. So

38:07

what I want to do today is

38:09

to an entrance. On day two of

38:11

the retreat, Jennifer led an exercise on

38:13

how the harsh words used against each

38:15

of them end up becoming internalized. You

38:17

might have been called a liar. You

38:19

might have been called a rapist. And

38:21

those words really do take on a

38:23

life of their own. I'd like for

38:25

you to write a letter to yourself

38:28

from the space of the critical mind,

38:30

that loop that plays in your head

38:32

over and over again. You had

38:34

them write letters. What

38:36

was the purpose? I've done this

38:39

before. When they're writing it, they're

38:41

not happy. And then I had them read it

38:43

out loud at the circle. They

38:46

didn't like it. Dear Chris,

38:48

you failed in life. Why

38:50

did you confess? I will never confess. Why

38:53

can't you just be quiet? Dear

38:55

Raymond, you are a angry

38:58

black man. You will never

39:01

know love. You will always be

39:03

a prisoner. And

39:07

then there was Loretta.

39:10

Dear Loretta, you

39:13

deserve to be raped and beaten. You

39:15

really don't deserve to be alive. You

39:20

aren't brave nor strong. You are

39:22

a failure as a woman and a mother. Loretta,

39:25

Jennifer told us, faces one

39:27

of the most excruciating situations

39:29

for a victim in an

39:31

exoneration case, when the

39:33

DNA clears one man but

39:35

doesn't identify who the actual

39:37

assailant was. I'm

39:39

stuck. She told us

39:42

she relives the assault daily and

39:45

can't get the exonerated man's face

39:47

out of her memory. So

39:49

even though he was cleared through

39:51

DNA, his face is still

39:53

there. Yes, the DNA said

39:55

it wasn't him. You

40:03

didn't believe it. No. I

40:06

feel guilty. Because

40:10

I feel like I

40:13

did something wrong. So you're

40:15

having both the feeling that he was the

40:17

one and that you did something wrong. Yes.

40:21

Oh my God, you really are stuck. I

40:24

don't know who did this. For

40:26

Andrea Harrison, whose mother's

40:28

killer also remains unknown,

40:31

it's a familiar struggle. What

40:33

was told to me was that he was the

40:35

person who murdered my mother. And so

40:38

that was a belief of mine for a lot

40:40

of years. I can't get that out of my

40:42

head. On his side of it,

40:45

I mean, that's sad. It is sad.

40:48

It is sad. The justice system

40:50

failed him just like it did us. Until

40:53

now, Andrea and her father had

40:55

not been willing to attend a

40:58

retreat with exonerees present. Do

41:00

you think that the exonerated person

41:03

and the victim are almost pitted

41:05

against each other when they shouldn't

41:07

be? They're both victims of

41:09

the same perpetrator who knows

41:12

someone sitting in jail for what he

41:14

or she did. That's right. At the

41:16

end of the day, when an innocent

41:18

person's in prison, a guilty person's not,

41:21

we should all be concerned about that. And

41:23

maybe they go off and do it many

41:25

more times. In my case, the

41:27

person who wasn't caught committed six more

41:29

first degree rapes before he

41:32

was ever apprehended. I

41:34

just love that we're here working on this. In

41:36

the circle, after reading the critical

41:38

letters, Jennifer turned the tables.

41:41

So I want you to write a

41:43

second letter now to yourself

41:46

from the self-compassioned voice, the

41:49

voice that you would use for the person you love

41:51

the most. So they rewrote it.

41:54

They did. They turned the... Oh, yeah. And then

41:56

they read that out loud in their faces. They

41:58

smiled when they read it. Dear

42:00

Raymond, you have a kind heart, you

42:03

are loved. Raymond, your

42:05

dreams have come true, and

42:07

you are free to dream more

42:09

and create. You are a

42:12

great mother, grandmother, wife, daughter, sister, friend,

42:14

and so on and on. Keep

42:16

going, you got this. I've

42:19

seen you stumble, and I've seen

42:21

you bounce right back. Dear

42:23

Loretta, you know that it's never

42:25

too late to follow your dreams. You

42:28

should never stop believing in yourself. You

42:30

didn't deserve to be hurt by anyone or

42:32

anything. I will always be

42:35

your biggest fan and supporter. I love you.

42:38

That was different. So

42:40

why is it that we speak to

42:43

ourselves in a way that we

42:45

would never speak to the people that we love? Something

42:47

that I need to change, you know, is

42:50

that it was actually harder to write the

42:53

happy letter for me. I do believe

42:55

the good things about myself, but

42:58

I don't think I really say them

43:01

to myself enough. And the

43:03

reality is, if we really want to

43:05

do good in the world, hating

43:08

ourselves serves nobody at

43:11

all. Who's writing? After

43:14

two emotion-filled days came a

43:16

scene we weren't expecting. Cut

43:19

it. The group gathered together

43:21

for improv games. Rivet, rivet.

43:24

Acting like animals. Ugh, ugh,

43:26

ugh. Smiling

43:29

and laughing. You

43:32

can pretend like you're a monkey. Ha, ha,

43:34

ha, ha. Ha, ha, ha. You

43:37

can do all kinds of ridiculous things, and

43:39

it's okay because everybody else is doing it

43:41

too. I know, but don't you

43:43

feel guilty? We noticed a

43:46

loosening and connecting. Later

43:48

that night over an art project, the

43:51

kind of impromptu conversation Jennifer

43:54

says this retreat is all

43:56

about. How can somebody look at

43:58

me and think that I would do? something so

44:00

heinous like that. That's part of

44:02

the trauma for me. When you

44:05

hear some of our stories,

44:07

do you ever like

44:10

blameless? Like

44:13

me, being an exoneree. Yeah.

44:17

Do you ever see yourself blaming

44:19

the victims for... You

44:22

didn't do anything wrong. It's

44:24

not your fault. The

44:28

next morning, as they gathered in

44:30

the circle for the third and final day...

44:33

I feel blessed. I feel light

44:35

as a feather. The mood had shifted dramatically.

44:38

I feel open. I

44:44

feel courageous. I

44:47

feel nurtured, even though it's painful to let

44:49

it out. I think

44:51

you guys do it because you know it's going to

44:53

help the next person. And it has. So

44:57

how did the retreat go? Very

44:59

enlightening. Very powerful.

45:02

We took off the mask that everybody sees. What

45:05

questions did you

45:07

ask each other? Exonerees to

45:10

crime victims and back around. I

45:13

asked what happened to you. When everyone

45:15

was honest... When everybody was honest, I asked

45:17

right away, I shook Mr. Howard's

45:19

hand. And I feel for

45:21

this man and my other two

45:23

friends back there that are exonerees. I

45:26

see it now because we only looked from our

45:28

side of the table. We never

45:30

seen it from their side. I had that

45:32

fear. Even when I came

45:35

here, I didn't know if I would be

45:37

coming into hate because I was exoneree. Because,

45:39

you know, nobody believed me for, you know,

45:41

30 years. I think we

45:43

believe it. Thank you. I

45:47

had questions myself for

45:50

an exoneree. And I was able to

45:52

build up the courage to even ask

45:54

Raymond because I still hold

45:56

this guilt. And I was finally able

45:59

to let it go. after talking to

46:01

him. I knew he was speaking from

46:03

his heart. And it

46:05

took 30 years for

46:08

him to let me get that guilt off of me.

46:11

Wow. I thank you.

46:17

Do you have any guilt for

46:20

what happened to Ronald? No, not anymore.

46:23

I feel so sad that

46:27

for 11 years he was in prison for something he

46:29

didn't do, but I'm also really sad that I got

46:31

raped at knife point, chased around,

46:33

you know, neighborhood in the dark

46:35

while I didn't have any clothes on. I feel

46:37

deep amount of sadness for these cases

46:40

and for everybody who's impacted by them.

46:43

May you keep spreading your love to everyone

46:45

that needs it. So as the retreat drew

46:48

to a close, they

46:50

clasped hands and shared wishes

46:52

for one another. Honey, may

46:55

you continue on your journey of

46:57

healing. What happened in

46:59

your case that allowed

47:02

you to heal? I

47:05

think I'll always be healing. But

47:07

I think what has helped me

47:09

more than anything is the

47:12

relationships I've built along the way with

47:14

people that have

47:16

been harmed and hurt just like me because

47:18

you're helping other people. Senator

47:22

Furb, may you always be in our

47:25

lives and may you always

47:27

be courageous. I'm helping

47:29

other people, but what they

47:32

don't realize is they're also helping me.

47:36

Wow. I

47:38

didn't know that movie. They're healing.

47:40

They are healing. And

47:43

I want to walk with them on that journey. Whoo-wee!

47:48

Thank you. their

48:00

skills. There's a big learning

48:02

curve with welding. Virtual reality simulates

48:04

that exact muscle memory that they

48:06

need. Learn more at meta.com/metaverse impact.

48:10

Have you heard you can listen to

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To catch up on the

48:34

latest episodes without the ads.

48:38

Now, an update of our story

48:41

Agency in Crisis about the Federal

48:43

Bureau of Prisons, particularly its women's

48:45

prisons. This past Monday,

48:48

FBI agents raided one of

48:50

them, FCI Dublin in Northern

48:52

California. So notorious for

48:54

sexual abuse and retaliation against those

48:56

who speak up, it is known

48:58

as the Rape Club. We

49:00

asked Bureau of Prisons director Colette Peters

49:03

if the government owes the inmates more

49:05

than a safe environment. Is

49:07

your job to apologize for what happened in Dublin?

49:10

I don't know that my job is

49:12

to apologize. Is it heartbreaking and horrendous

49:14

to have something like that happen when

49:17

you are proud of your profession as

49:19

a corrections professional? Absolutely.

49:22

The Bureau of Prisons still hasn't publicly

49:24

apologized for the abuse at Dublin, but

49:27

it has removed the latest warden and

49:29

three top administrators. I'm

49:31

Cecilia Vega. We'll be back next week

49:33

with another edition of 60 Minutes. Prime

49:39

members, you can listen to 60 Minutes

49:41

ad free on Amazon Music. Download

49:44

the Amazon Music app today or

49:46

you can listen ad-free with

49:49

Wondry Plus and Apple Podcasts. Before

49:51

you go, tell us about yourself

49:53

by completing a short survey at

49:56

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Don't miss True Crime anytime you

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