Julie Baer

I went over to the jail, and Matt was in the cell, and we told him, you know, this is over. You know, you're going home. And, you know, I probably had the biggest hug from a man that I've ever had in my life.

Had they not been able to trace that ring to its owner in Wisconsin, I'm really afraid we'd have two guys sitting on death row or locked up for the rest of their lives for something they didn't do.

Right.

There was a portion of the questioning where they won't let him finish his sentence. They're belittling him. They're screaming at him. They're threatening him with a death penalty.

And he believed them when they said those things. Yes, very much so.

He takes them very literally and starts to rise up out of his chairs, you know, and... He's going to stand up? He's going to stand up.

If you look and start examining the case in context, how it happened, what took place, it's really a textbook false confession.

First thing he says is, look, I told them I did this, but I didn't do this. And you've got to believe me.

Right, right. You know, I've been lied to a lot as a defense lawyer. So the cynical side of me goes, uh-huh, right.