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Chapter 1: What news about Evaristo Salas Jr. is shared at the beginning of the episode?
He's exonerated No way!
Okay, what a morning it has been. Yes, I'm Jack. One minute remaining. You know the drill. Wow. So for those of you who may not be part of our Facebook group and haven't seen the news, Evaristo Salas Jr. has today been fully exonerated and is on his way home to his family. For those who don't know, Junior's been in trial all this week.
He's had his evidentiary hearing, basically all the evidence that didn't come up in his initial trial. These judges that said, yep, this needs to be looked at and we need to find out what's going on here. So that trial's been happening this week. They've had Ophelia Gonzalez, the partner of Jose Aurelio, has been on the stand. His mother was on the stand. That was a very emotional day, apparently.
This supposed snitch gave his testimony as to the fact that everything he said in the first place was false and was completely fabricated. Detective Jim Rivard, the detective behind this entire case, he's been up on the stand. So it's been a big week for the family, huge week.
And Junior said to me going into this, the best that he could hope for was the fact that they would eventually rule that with all this evidence that they're going to overturn the conviction and order a new trial. That was the best we could hope for. They could turn around and say, you know, give you a new trial.
There's no way, surely, the prosecution's going to come back and say, no, yeah, okay, we'll take this back to trial when you've got less than three years left, surely.
Yeah, and if they even decided that, most likely because the way he's been kind of operating across the attorney, he's just been dragging everything out and just kind of just letting it go as long as it can, which is horrible if you think about it. I mean, even on this sense, I got less than three years left, you know, but he's still...
dragging as much as he can because that's the only hand he has to play. So if they were to grab me to trial, I was going to sit back. As soon as they came to my conviction and grabbed me to trial, I would ask for a 60-day speedy trial just right off the bat. And the only option he can do is probably just drag it out until the day that we start that initial process of going to trial.
And that's when my lawyer thinks, well, he'd be foolish to even try because it's just There's so much that is so much wrong about this case. And even the judge might just dismiss it right off bat. But to take it to that point, I was like, the only thing he's going to do is just try to drag it up to that point, which is horrible. But that's what he's been doing since the get-go.
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Chapter 2: What evidence was presented during Junior's evidentiary hearing?
And so I hope not. I hope that once they vacate my conviction and we go back where they ran me for their trial, that right there he just says, you know what, done is done.
So when we say vacate your conviction, that's not an exoneration, is it? Can you explain the vacate conviction, what that would mean?
Yeah, the vacate my conviction is not an exoneration, which is horrible too. They're not saying by vacating my commission that, oh, you know, you're exonerated. They have to actually use that warning to exonerate you. So vacating my commission would mean that they vacate the decision of the jury and the trial. And pretty much the commission is gone. And then they remand for a new trial.
And so this is up to the prosecution. That's why I thought if they were to actually exonerate me, then I'd probably just...
be released and I don't know if they can even I don't think they can even do that their court kills can even do that I think the only option they have is to vacate the conviction and remand for a new trial because the whole system is based on your due process rights and all that kind of stuff you know and whether you had a
So, I mean, say, obviously, best case scenario, they come back and vacate the conviction and order for a new trial. You know, obviously, the prosecutor, we would hope, would turn around and say, well, you know, we're not going to retry this case. Obviously, that's brilliant. You get to go home. But obviously, ultimately, we need here an exoneration.
So then once that conviction's vacated and you're out of there, would your plan be then with your team to go for that exoneration?
Yeah, our next step would be somehow, some way, go for that exoneration in one form or another. That's what really matters to me. I mean, for them to just vacate my conviction, dismiss it, they're not...
taking any responsibility no it's just okay yeah yeah okay but you're out of here yeah 27 years gone i'll never get that back but just having it on record that i was exonerating them kind of that's that would be my ultimate goal right there
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Chapter 3: What does it mean to vacate a conviction versus being exonerated?
I was going to tell you about us going to court and how we felt about it.
Yeah.
And kind of an update.
Yeah.
And then all of a sudden, I'm like, okay, I need to call him because he needs to know that he got exonerated.
Oh, Debbie, that is just, that is, I am so, so beyond happy about that. It's just so amazing.
Yeah, sorry.
Yes. Yep. Yes. Thank you so much for letting me know.
Yeah, he, yeah, he wanted me to make sure to call you.
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