From the 60 Minutes archives: The true story behind “Just Mercy”

60 minutes rewind his name is Walter McMillian known to his friends as Johnny D and he's been on death row in Alabama's home in prison for almost six years was he in fact the man who walked into a dry-cleaning store in Monroeville Alabama in November of 1986 and robbed and murdered the clerk or did they get the wrong man and is the real murderer still out there somewhere a jury was convinced they got the right man but you may not be after you watch this story the clerk who was murdered was 18 year old Rhonda Morrison the only child of Charles and Bertha Mars and who have no doubt that Walter McMillian did it and want him executed as soon as possible Johnny D says they want to execute the wrong man you didn't kill Rhonda also I ain't never seen on a monster day in my life God knows I'm where were you on the day of the murder at my house did you ever go into Monroeville on the day of the no sir you never went in yeah well what the Munroe appeared McMillon is certainly not a typical death row inmate he had a good job in the logging business no prior felony convictions and lived with his family near Monroeville his entire life police didn't arrest McMillan until seven months after the Mars and murder a crime which had the police stumped they had no fingerprints no telltale ballistics tests no physical evidence of any kind linking McMillan or anyone else to the crime McMillan's friends and family testified he was at a fish fry at his house on the morning of the murder working on the pickup truck he supposedly drove to the cleaners we talked to his friend Jimmy hunter and that was the truck you were working on that explains the transmission was out of it he was out of the truck yeah I had to clean out get him out you couldn't have driven a truck anywhere Johnny D's attorney Brian Stevenson has appealed the cases of more than a hundred death row inmates I have never had a case where the state's only evidence of guilt comes from one person where there's no motive there's no physical evidence there's no corroborating circumstances there's nothing but the word of one person that one person is Ralph Myers career criminal who's now doing 30 years for another murder Myers testified he was in Johnny D's pickup truck outside the cleaners when McMillan went in to rob the store some point you heard gunshots right when you went inside what did you tell them you saw I told him that I had seen a young girl a notional other mouth open dead and what was he doing taking money from out of a paper sack put it into a briefcase do you have a gun you know I had told the court that yeah now that that testimony put him on death row right was it true no sir not at all nowhere near true so why did Ralph Myers testify against Macmillan at the time he was awaiting trial and facing a possible death sentence for murder he says an Alabama Bureau of Investigation agent used that to pressure him to lie about Macmillan so he tells me says we'll all you gotta do is is you go along with what we want you to go along with and and he says I promise you well he says I've done got it fixed with the DA I've done got it fixed with the judge and you won't get my 30 years so 30 years and you'd be eligible for parole after well more or less probably like 10 so you're looking at 10 years versus the electric chair right why should anyone believe you now when you're taking back what you said at the trial under oath well it's like this I don't know the words for that but I can tell you this much right is right and wrong was wrong and for a man to straighten his own life out he must tell the truth he must try to do what is right and that's what I'm trying to do district attorney Tommy Chapman wasn't involved in McMillan's original trial but is now handling the state's case let me ask you about Ralph Myers how would you characterize Ralph Myers Ralph's about as low as you can get he's a scum a liar yes right categorizing the large particularly now Chapman says he's going to indict Myers for perjury not for what he said at the trial but for what he's saying now I intend to ask the Baldwin County grand jury to indict him for perjury because of that because of his recantation now if he's convicted mm-hmm what happens to his shot at parole he'll probably get lie I hope he does so it seems to me that he's got more to lose by saying he's recanting than by saying he sticks - nope Kings lose his life by recanting he could lose his life for not changing his story you know the prison has his own way of dealing with people who are snitches Ralph Myers is a snitch I'm sure Ralph Myers would agree that any threat he was under in prison is nothing like the threat he's under now having recanted his testimony and opened himself back up to perjury charges to capital murder charges what Myers has done is take a pretty radical risk but district attorney Chapman says there were good reasons to believe what Myers said in court you said that there were details that he gave what were the details that no one else knew that her mouth was open the position of her body the way he what her clothes were those type things Ralph Myers in none of his trial testimony and nothing that has ever been presented in the court has ever said anything about the victim's body that is consistent with the way in which the victim's body was found Myers told police that Rhonda Morrison's body was lying face-up behind the cash register but the first police officer on the scene found the body lying face down behind a partition in another part of the cleaners we asked former police officer Woodrow Eichner exactly what he found I found a young lady and a northeast corner of this building lay him facedown is it possible that the body was dragged from the counter to the back where you saw and my opinion no there was a particular dose that was around this body and there was no evidence that the dust was a disturb you you think that the body was where it fell and she was shot yes sir but did the prosecutor talk to you at all about it yes sir the prosecutor did talk to me about it in fact he asked me to testify that the body had been drugged the prosecutor asked you to testify that the body had been dragged to the back McLain yes sir he did then what did you say I said no sir I will not testify because I saw no evidence that the body had been drugged the former prosecutor denies he ever asked Eichner to testify the body had been dragged still if Meyers really did see the body near the counter no one has been able to explain how it could have been dragged to where the police found it without leaving telltale signs including bloodstains on the floor what we now know is that the story that Myers told is simply not true in fact even before the trial Myers told four psychiatrists at Taylor Hardin an Alabama State Hospital that his statements implicating Macmillan were bogus and were coerced out of him by the police specifically by an agent of the ABI the Alabama Bureau of Investigation why Matt Taylor Hardin I tell the state doctors up there hey look this is what the ABI officer is wanting me to do he's want me to sit this man up to tell lies on this man to get this man put on death row he says what man are you talking about I'm talking about Johnny D Matt Miller a man who lives in Monroeville Alabama the jury should have known that a month before the trial took place in this case Myers had gone to the State Hospital and told four separate doctors that this is all a lie what Rob Myers may have told those people up there Taylor Hardin would have been no concern to stay of Alabama and I'm confident that there was no willful intent on the part of the state of Alabama to withhold those records Johnny D McMillan wouldn't be on death row today if it were just Ralph Myers word against his by law the state needed a corroborating witness to back up at least some of what Myers said bill hooks a former inmate was that witness he said he saw McMillan's truck parked at the cleaners bill hooks testified in court that as he was driving down the highway that Saturday morning he saw Johnny D McMillan leave the cleaners walk over to his pickup truck and get in on the passenger side and with Ralph Myers at the wheel pull off down the highway in court hooks who worked as an auto mechanic said he knew it was McMillan's truck because it was a lowrider a truck that's been customized to sit low to the ground McMillan's lowrider was also placed at the cleaners by another witness but clay cast the mechanic who converted McMillan's truck told us he did that work six months after Rhonda Morrison was murdered sure it was she got murdered in November of 86 and that's what we're talking May of 87 so if Billy hook says he drove by there and saw Johnny D's truck and it was a lowrider then what you're saying is it hooks as a liar yeah if he drove by there and when they're on the Morrison was murdered and he said it was a lowrider he's lying you build hooks I made Bradley in 60 minutes I just want to ask you a couple questions okay we're hoax was in jail awaiting a trial for burglary when he gave police a statement identifying McMillan's truck as a lowrider that last night man laughing but you said that you saw him with that lowrider truck yeah right but that's what you said in the statement you said he had that lowrider truck if you're in a statement yesterday in a statement nope so if it's in the statement that you said a lowrider truck and it is in the statement that's in if in the statement I see any better shape yeah I didn't see it yeah that's true we have in a statement he did have the lowrider truck if it isn't on my statement it's true if it ain't on my statement it ain't did billhooks really see Johnny D McMillan at the cleaners the morning Rhonda Morrison was killed Darnell Houston who was working with hooks that a used-car lot says no way because both of them were still at work that morning when Morrison's body was discovered at a quarter to 11 and he was there until what time did you leave around 11:00 left 11 that he had not left it and left and sent him left cuz ain't but one way to go out the parking lot and he didn't go out of that no sorry you sure though positive does it bother you that a man may go to the electric chair based on dubious testimony well I wouldn't call it devious testimony you've got a man who love hooks hooks truly is a very believable witness when you could look at the fact that he has no reason no axe to grind with any of these people no reason to say these things that says Bryan Stevenson is nonsense he's benefited quite significantly and based on his cooperation with the state in this case he's gotten at least $5,000 in reward money they dismissed fines against him are you saying that the cops offered hooks a deal and then he testifies oh there's no question that hooks got assistance from the cops in exchange for his testimony in this case the day that he gave the incriminating statement the complete incriminating statement against a Walter McMillian is the day that they let him out of jail things got pretty good for you after you told her story from the network well you got out of jail charges against you were dropped I did I did my time you got about five thousand dollars in reward money that's pretty good we go to somebody finding that time huh but ain't that pretty good yeah yeah don't you ever the story will continue after this during the trial the jury learned that McMillan was not a model husband he ran around with other women one of them was Karen Kelly who's now doing time for aggravated assault in a case in a nearby County did any law-enforcement officer ever threaten you or make threatening remarks about your relationship with Johnny D yes sir What did he say they told me that I was going to prison because of that [ __ ] and they didn't understand why I wanted to mess with [ __ ] you're very clear that that's what he said yes sir why are you reluctant to say I just rather not say for my own best interest I don't know why anybody would care about who slept with Karen Kelly black white has nothing to do with I would not think so did the relationship between Johnny D and Karen Kelly ever come up during the trial yes quite unusually I might add you know the end of Meyers testimony the state prosecutor stands up and asks Meyers or do you know who Karen Kelly is and he says yes and does she know Walter McMillian he says well yes and then the prosecutor asked what were they good friends he says well yes would you describe him as boyfriend and girlfriend yes well would you describe Karen Kelly for the jury well yes she's a white woman no more questions what's wrong with our criminal justice system is the fact that people want to come back sometime and second-guess juries I don't believe they've been in law enforcement misconduct in this case I don't think anyone's proved it prosecutors job is not to obtain a conviction it's to achieve justice and one of the greatest tragedies about this case is that somebody in Monroe County has literally gotten away with murder if an execution date is set for McMillan and that day comes in it's time for him to go to the electric chair will you be comfortable yes I'll be comfortable with it do you think it's fair just he had his day his day in court he was tried by jury and they heard the testimony and they believed it McMillan's fate is now in the hands of the Alabama Supreme Court which is expected to decide soon if he's entitled to a new trial

Channel: 60 Minutes

Views: 2,717,222

Keywords: 60 Minutes, CBS News, just mercy, ed bradley, alabama, jamie fox, Michael B. Jordan

Id: 1VFtzfnbmvs

Length: 15min 10sec (910 seconds)

Published: Thu Jan 09 2020