This episode features Carl Williams, a man who, at the age of 17, was arrested for a murder he did not commit. After waiting in jail for 3 years pre-trial, Carl was ultimately sentenced to life without parole. For 23 years, Carl maintained his innocence in prison and fought for his life. Finally, in August of 2020 , Carl was released...into a global pandemic. This conversation touches on what it means to be free as a Black man in America, the importance of holding criminal justice agents accountable for "taking innocent lives," and the long-lasting impact of the prison experience.
If you have any questions or comments that you would like addressed in the YouTube series Office Hours with Abbie and Juwan please email ccofficehours@gmail.com
And, as always, please review, subscribe, and share with everyone you know :)
To stay up to date on all of the latest announcements, be sure to subscribe to the weekly newsletter!
Become a supporter of the show with a monthly subscription (amount of your choice) and get a shoutout in upcoming episodes!
This episode features Carl Williams, a man who, at the age of 17, was arrested for a murder he did not commit. After waiting in jail for 3 years pre-trial, Carl was ultimately sentenced to life without parole. For 23 years, Carl maintained his innocence in prison and fought for his life. Finally, in August of 2020 , Carl was released...into a global pandemic. This conversation touches on what it means to be free as a Black man in America, the importance of holding criminal justice agents accountable for "taking innocent lives," and the long-lasting impact of the prison experience.
If you have any questions or comments that you would like addressed in the YouTube series Office Hours with Abbie and Juwan please email ccofficehours@gmail.com
And, as always, please review, subscribe, and share with everyone you know :)
To stay up to date on all of the latest announcements, be sure to subscribe to the weekly newsletter!
Become a supporter of the show with a monthly subscription (amount of your choice) and get a shoutout in upcoming episodes!
Abbie Henson: [00:00:02] Welcome to critical conversations. My name is Abbyie Henson, and I'll be the one conversing with our guests. And I also serve as an assistant professor in the school of criminology and criminal justice at Arizona state university. After the killing of George Floyd, my social media blew up.
I kept seeing posts and reposts as stories, all about criminal and social justice issues. However, much of what I was seeing were just flat words that lacked voice and depth and nuance. And so I wanted to create a space where those words could come alive. I wanted to engage in dialogues with people who had actually been impacted by the criminal justice system, whether through their own experience research or both, I felt this was the moment to think critically to examine the complexities of our system in place today, and to figure out how to move forward in a way that allows for equity and true justice.
So I started hosting live webinars, both in an attempt to have the audience be active participants either by raising their hand and joining the conversation, or by contributing a question to the chat box and to also build a sense of community and togetherness in a time when we were so isolated through quarantine, but because of zoom fatigue, and with people starting to slowly move their lives beyond the home has places open up.
I wanted to figure out a way to keep these conversations going away from the screen. So I started this podcast in order to reach a broader audience and keep these issues, your ear, as you move throughout your day. And while it can be really overwhelming to think about how to change a massive system, that seems so ingrained in the fabric of our society by participating in these conversations.
And yes, You just listening to this podcast is participating. That is where we see true change beginning. Hey everyone. Thank you so much for joining me in this critical conversation with Carl Williams at the age of 17, Carl was arrested for a murder. He did not commit. He waited in jail three years, pretrial and was ultimately sentenced to life without the possibility of parole.
After 23 years in prison, maintaining his innocence and fighting for his life. Carl was released last August of 2020 into a global pandemic. In this episode, we speak about what it means to be free, the importance of accountability and the long lasting impact of the prison experience. I hope that you enjoy this episode, feeling engaged and please as always continue the conversation.
Once the episode is up.
Carl Williams: [00:03:04] Hello, my name is Carl Williams. I am talking to Abby today because, um, I am formerly incarcerated. I was wrongfully convicted at the age of 17 years old. I spent 26 years, eight months, four hours and 45 minutes and 32 seconds in prison for a crime that I did not commit. Currently. I am still fighting to be completely, completely exonerated because the only other rate it me and part currently before the courts, I'm still fighting for my freedom and my innocence.
Abbie Henson: [00:03:37] Let's start from the beginning. So tell us a little bit about. What your life was like prior to your incarceration. So leading up to 17, where were you living? What was your home life like your community school? Just briefly like walk us through a typical day in the life of Carl at 15, 16.
Carl Williams: [00:04:02] Well for me, I grew up, um, around the Lake front, um, neighborhood, what they would call the lakefront in Chicago.
It was a, it's a beautiful, uh, scene and atmosphere for me and always been, I remember just growing up as a kid there, riding my bike up and down the Lake front. Just enjoying my time as well with friends, uh, it was fishing, which I wasn't that great at, but I grew up in the community or what they will probably say is a tough neighborhood beyond that, that the people was definitely wonderful.
It was very polite, even though sometimes us as kids can get a little hard-headed and we can do shit for the most part. I remember fun times in my community full of laughter, full excitement, full of bullshit, full of great things, full of a lot of things like any other community started to get into hanging out with many other friends, some of the role crowd as well in my young youth, even though I was a person who continued to go to school who loved that education, but my associates was my associates.
And I think that because of that, people did have a misconception of who I am or who I was as a person.
Abbie Henson: [00:05:19] So were you involved in their activities or it was just the people you were hanging around?
Carl Williams: [00:05:25] Uh, no, definitely have the cancer. Color involved in their activities and selling drugs at a young age. And Dylan amend my own community, which was a shock to the people in my community.
Uh, I think that, and living that lifestyle as a young, specific young kid, who it was very fast and quick money for you, it starts to derail you in your own ideals and your own dreams that your family and your loved ones has for you. Because you start to take on that identity of the quick, fast money. It gets you things, it gets your attention to get your girls that get you, that gets you.
Cause in fact, it opens any door and gate that you want to have open even at a young age.
Abbie Henson: [00:06:09] It's interesting you say that. It opens so many doors, but it also in our society has the potential to shut so many.
Carl Williams: [00:06:19] It does because I think that the missed education for the person who is the Diller is, is very critical for him in a way that he's unaware because for him he's captured by the lifestyle, but he doesn't understand, but he's not looking at tomorrow on how it affects his life and his community.
He thinks that there is a great benefit to his pockets of the American dream of cashflow. Um, for, for him, you know, he's like, Hey, I'm going to do what I have to do when necessary, but the person I have so much potential for this potential on the back on the back burner. So he could exploit his own community through these ideas of
Abbie Henson: [00:07:04] riches.
Do you feel like you or any of the dealers around you ever felt rich?
Carl Williams: [00:07:12] Uh, shit. I felt put rich because we have these ideals of ourselves. Who's like, we're like, Hey, we're making this money. When you're 14 years old or you're 13 years old and you're dealing or selling drugs and you're may gain $2,000 a day.
That's a lot of money. And if you work in seven days a week, that's $14,000 a week. But when you keep doing the math throughout the month, and then you add two, three, four months on it, and then when you add it up to a year, you probably make a, almost two points, but you spend it so fast. You have no aware of the money that you're bringing in, when it comes to your pockets, you spend it and you just burn through it and you give it away.
You're doing all of the things that you feel in life that you could do. So for me, when getting into that lifestyle, like I said, it did bring in a lot of attention and here's where it went wrong for me. They started to bring the unwanted attention. Naturally it will attract the, the, the police who sees you as a person who scores this kid with fancy cars or doing whatever it is he's doing with the less clothes, all Tyler's shoes and his jury.
What the hell does he's doing in this community? I know that there and his mother-in-law father and this just their, their way of thinking, isn't giving this kid all of these things. I just think this kid's driving a brand new, this type of car. This is an expensive car. So when you see a 13, 14 year old kid driving a $30,000 cars, you know, he's like you, like what two things.
He stole it and it's definitely not here, but what it does is it attract his attention and bringing that attention. And what I understand now is it has an effect on your life. So they began to have, uh, MBS or an idea of who they are. I think you are. And now you, they begin to engage you, which creates a conflict between yourself and them.
So when you're a kid coming from that neighborhood from Lowe's ideals that you've been established as being tough. And I said, all of those things, just to tie this in together, you take on that perspective of, of being fearless when they approach you. And then, you know, a little bit, I think just the tiniest bits of what you think are your rights or knowing your rights.
And you say, Hey, well, you can't do this or you can't do that. And. In my community, the police was, and I don't want to say all of the facts are not all level was assholes. Not all of them was attack dogs. Not all of them had the ideas of, to attack you with the energy of a, of a, uh, a ferocious Raven is BS, but then you had those who did and who was known in our communities for, Hey, they see a kid like me.
And the first thing they think is, Oh, well, there's a paycheck for us
Abbie Henson: [00:10:15] from the age of 13 to 17. Right? When you got arrested, how many times would you say you got stopped by the police
Carl Williams: [00:10:24] from 13 to 17? I would say, well, over 150, that's
Abbie Henson: [00:10:31] crazy. And I think this ties well into our conversation about freedom. So you feel like.
Your lifestyle is opening doors. You have this freedom because you have money to spend, but then you've been stopped over a hundred times. Do you feel free at this point in your life?
Carl Williams: [00:10:54] When I was a teenager, I thought that I had freedoms to be able to achieve and do and have any being in life that I wanted to, because that's what they teach you, your family.
They say, Hey, you know what? You can grow up to be anything that you want to be. You can be a doctor, you can be a lawyer, you can do this, you can do this. We fought for these ideas for you to be able to have that existence when it comes to freedom. But the other side of our family will always say, well, Hey, you know what?
Well, no matter how hard they fought form under the ideas of destruction, you would never be free. We'll only give you the illusion of the ideal of freedom, but the second day you try to walk or live in that so-called freedom. They would just say, Hey, white America would definitely let you know that. They still see you as a descendant of slaves as a kid who wants to hear that?
That's tough for me to hear. I think like at the age of 15, um, a person who was going to school doing good in school, I was still, I was still having struggles with depression and diabetes and selling drugs. And at 16 years old, uh, I knew that I wanted to break away from it. So I began to make those necessary
Abbie Henson: [00:12:15] steps.
Okay. So how did you know that you wanted to break away from it? I think
Carl Williams: [00:12:19] it was just something that I just knew in my spirit. I just knew what that time that I, that I was, that I wanted something different morally. I knew I was capable of something different because I, I understood how smart I
Abbie Henson: [00:12:31] was. And you had the support of your
Carl Williams: [00:12:33] family?
Absolutely. And not just my family, but also my community is well,
Abbie Henson: [00:12:39] you at 16, you're trying to break away. Did you F did you end up breaking away? I
Carl Williams: [00:12:46] did, but not completely. I kinda just passed it along for let somebody else do the work. And I just still generate a profit. In other words, one foot in one foot out really well.
Not really just out there
Abbie Henson: [00:13:03] myself. Okay. So you're kind of taking a step back still kind of in it, but not really then. You got arrested. Where were you when you got arrested for the crime that you ended up incarcerated for
Carl Williams: [00:13:17] friend's house? Um, that I was dating at the time came to knock on her door. I'm looking for somebody with my first name, um, a nickname, but with an incorrect description.
So the description, um, that we was looking for with someone who was 61 to 63, very thin bill, um, long hair, a beard and mustache at that time, I, I couldn't grow anything on my face, so, and I definitely didn't have long hair and I had never had long hair in my life and I definitely couldn't have passed for six.
One was 63. I think I can probably lie and say that now, but I definitely couldn't do a damn. And I had a stocky bill because I was a kid who not only was I active, but I also had worked out, I didn't fit the description. And they said he was very light-skinned no, I couldn't pass for that in my wildest dreams.
The first thing that they said was that's not who we looking for. So they asked me my name again. So I explained to them, and I said to them, my name was Carl Williams. One of the detectives says, wait a minute, went outside and spoke to another detective that detective Dan comes in and immediately they started talking.
They, in a sense like took me downstairs, was about to, I guess, release me until the, one of the other detectives comes into the neighborhood. I mean, it comes into the house and says, wait, we have a person that's in it. That's outside to identify him. They take me outside. And obviously that person said it wasn't me.
So they take me back in the house and I put my clothes and stuff on and they handcuff me to a chair. This is, wait a minute. They go back out and says, well, we got in the foreman and now the foreman is identifying, wait, you haven't got the same description from there for me. And I informed and said that the person was 61 to 63, a very thin bill.
Now, can you now say that it's me? So the person who they were saying it wasn't informative come to find out. He actually wasn't an informant. And he was arrested before with people, uh, with someone else that they had. And they had him at the police station. He clearly stated that he doesn't know me. He doesn't know who I am.
And that he knows, know somebody with the first name who was supposedly been involved in the class.
Abbie Henson: [00:15:54] Did they say what you were being arrested
Carl Williams: [00:15:56] for? They said it has been arrested for murder. So at this time I'm like, well, Hey, I have an alibi and it checks out and you could talk to whoever it's something that they never went to go follow up more so that to the police, they say that's when the police abuse continued because as they Barston to the house, uh, when I didn't tell you originally is, is that I was in a bedroom just laying, laying down in the bed.
They pulled me out of the bed, threw me onto the floor, put the gun in my face, asking me how do I feel, punch me in the face a few times. Um, slammed my face down until the, um, until the, um, to the floor, kept a gun to my head saying that if I moved that they would kill me. Imagine being a kid at that time, it's the
Abbie Henson: [00:16:49] 16,
Carl Williams: [00:16:51] I just turned 17.
It's the most nerve wracking time of your life because you come from a community to where you know that this happens all the time and they actually will shoot you. You know that they will shoot you, you know that they will do it and they will lie about it. I've watched them put cases on friends of mine, but never in my wildest dream.
Could you ever told me that it would happen to me? So from there, after taking me to the police station and bringing me outside in the dead of winter with no clothes on both, just my boxers and having me walk into walk outside and just your underwear, no shirt, no socks, no nothing. Just your underwear.
Handcuffs take you outside. So somebody to identify you and then that person saying no one, they keep you there and then go out and talk to that person and convince that person. What we know now is convinced that person to say, Hey, yeah, that was him. Was absurd to me for me. I still can't understand. Why would you do that to a person in their life instead of going after the correct person?
Abbie Henson: [00:18:00] So you get to the police station. How long are you in the cell before. Anything happens
Carl Williams: [00:18:10] when I get to the police station, what they did was paraded me around before those who they identify or said, that was my co-defendants. Co-defendant said, uh, they don't know who I am and they don't have a clue who each other is.
But then the, the, the abuse at 51st area to the 51st police station is just, was just brutal at that time. That's when they step up their aggression with me to punch me, to beat me, to threaten me, to choke me unconscious, to slam in my face down into the, um, concrete. Um, I'll say it's so hard to where I'm delusional for myself.
This is a 17 year old kid. If you do this to any other kid, if this was a white kid and I hate to always compare it, but it's necessary, that would probably be a criminal offense against a police officer because it's a crime. This went on for probably about 24 hours there. They kept me there the next day.
So the next day the process continued. So they've had people there at the police station who was saying, who they said was my co-defendants for days working on them to get them to finally agree to say that it was me. It was one of the most painful experiences for me. I felt like it puts you in a situation to where you feel, you feel anger, but you also feel hopeless.
You feel attacked and you feel alone. Definitely.
Abbie Henson: [00:19:54] Right? So did you end up with the false confession after the 24 hours
Carl Williams: [00:20:02] after the 24 hours? Uh, what they said was that I agreed to sign the confession that I had, not as of the cry as this, let me say this real quick as a, as a young kid at that time, I think that what they put you through emotionally and when it comes to the abuse and just to complete beading and the, the feeling of like, man, they're going to kill me in here.
It's it was, it was the most trauma and traumatic way traumatic feeling in my life because I felt like they can kill me, actually get away with it. Whoa. Oh, we'll believe anything that, um, or any other story and they can seep in and frame it any way that they want.
Abbie Henson: [00:20:55] After 24 hours, you sign this paper because you had been brutalized to the point of delusion.
So after you signed the paper, where did they take you?
Carl Williams: [00:21:09] They kept me there for how long.
Abbie Henson: [00:21:14] And so you never had a lawyer at this point?
Carl Williams: [00:21:17] No. Never had a lawyer. Never was able to notify anybody. I don't even think anybody knew where I was at, except for the people, the person who house I was in.
Abbie Henson: [00:21:27] Did they even read you your Miranda rights?
They. Get you to sign this paper. They hold you for eight hours. It goes to trial because the story is so convoluted. How long between the day you signed and trial? Are you in jail?
Carl Williams: [00:21:46] Almost three years.
Abbie Henson: [00:21:47] Jesus. Okay. So you're in jail, awaiting trial for three years. And it goes to trial. How many days is the trial?
Carl Williams: [00:21:58] Like the last, almost about three weeks.
Abbie Henson: [00:22:02] Why is the conviction that you ended up getting?
Carl Williams: [00:22:04] I got charged with murder.
Abbie Henson: [00:22:06] So is it life without parole or was it 25? Uh,
Carl Williams: [00:22:10] it was life without parole. Okay.
Abbie Henson: [00:22:15] So was your family there when you got that? What was that feeling?
Carl Williams: [00:22:22] It was devastating for myself, for my family.
Because of the picture that they painted the rest was solely based off of, you said at first that I was, uh, the per se, uh, who was involved in the crimes, then you said, well, no, we always charged with accountability and not actually being a person who committed the crime or having knowledge that the crime was committed.
And, um,
Abbie Henson: [00:22:48] so is that then second degree? Absolutely. So accountability is first degree.
Carl Williams: [00:22:55] Absolutely. So that's just as guilty for anything that happens during the time of the crime from beginning to end, whether you was dead or left or had no involvement, or if you was just there for the shortest period of time, they saying that whatever took place you're accountable for that action.
Abbie Henson: [00:23:16] Crazy. So what was the jury makeup?
Carl Williams: [00:23:19] The jury makeup was of, there was mixed, it was white and black and they kept sending out notes. It took them a long time. When they come to the table, it was deliberating for about nine days or something went on. There was, I guess, was trying to decide they kept sending out notes and like, where can we charge them with a lesser charge or who charged her with, because you're saying that he committed the crime, you say had the knowledge of it and that he was the hand that he was there and that there's no physical evidence whatsoever that even links into a crime.
Not only is there no physical evidence, but then there's a, there's a question in the description. Not only that, there's a question, all of the evidence just involving him, period, nothing, nothing fits you coming into a place that you've never been before. So it makes you grow up fast. Now you're in a place to where your whole life is affected as a, just as a human being period.
So immediately there's a struggle. I don't know, no person in this life who can adapt and be okay with being in prison, especially for a crime that you didn't commit the toughest most difficult with this situation as well as environment. So just to deal with at every moment, for me every day, there was a definitely a suffering, maybe a pain because my mind could.
I couldn't even realize or understand that I was in this place and people say, well, if you didn't do anything, well, why would they put you in that place? And always say, is that, you know, it's one of the stupidest questions to ask the person to definitely ask
Abbie Henson: [00:25:17] me. Well, it's an incredibly privileged question to ask, right?
If you don't know that that can be a reality.
Carl Williams: [00:25:24] Absolutely.
Abbie Henson: [00:25:25] At what point of your sentence did you start actively getting into the legality of your case and building a case for yourself to get out
Carl Williams: [00:25:37] immediately? The day that I arrived was the day that I, the first day I asked for where's the law library
Abbie Henson: [00:25:44] in the 23 years that you were incarcerated, your learning, you're gaining the information, you are assisting the attorneys, but you're also.
Taking classes and engaging in prison programming. Absolutely. So was your mindset like, explain your mindset at what point were you like? Okay. I have to take advantage of what is offered here in the time that I'm here. I
Carl Williams: [00:26:15] used to say to myself, I'm not going to die in this place. Now that is coming from a kid who originally used to write some of the horrific horror reports of just the pain and the suffering that I was in during.
And, you know, we all think that it can never happen to you. And it happens when you've suffered and you've been attacked to where your life is in danger. You can say what you wouldn't do or how you would do things, but you never know until you, in that position,
Abbie Henson: [00:26:50] you have said that. Throughout your time in prison, you were afforded different freedoms.
So what does that look like in the most carceral prison? Right? Like be the antonym. The opposite of freedom is prison. And so what does freedom look like within prison? I
Carl Williams: [00:27:14] think just being able to move about throughout the prison as you wish, or as you will, being able to have access to things in prison. I mean, little simple things that other people don't have access to things that they would probably take away.
Like later down the line, they started to take away. Long, two brushes in prison and give you a toothbrush about this big probably no more than two inches for you to brush your teeth
Abbie Henson: [00:27:41] so that it couldn't be made into like a shank or something.
Carl Williams: [00:27:44] Right. I still had the privilege of still having,
yeah, it is it's little things like that. That was in portal to you when it came to your survival, your wellbeing, and you felt like was good for your psyche and your health because of everything else was taken away from you and you already felt dehumanized and you already felt rejected. Now, here it is.
You are being able to have some of the things that, all of what I got out, he has a long to Russ. So do I. So it makes you feel connected to someone who has all of those things who are in what we call the free world outside of those walls of a prison, where we was held captive that Dan COVID hits and everything shuts down.
It's a culture shock. I started to develop anger of just being behind the door already. You was in prison and you're locked up all day every day, but now you have no movement and no access to
Abbie Henson: [00:28:58] anything. First of all, I think it's interesting that you said it's a culture shock because I think that people assume that everything is kind of the same within prison.
It's all kind of this very monotonous day-to-day, but it's still possible that there are different lifestyles within the prison. And so once COVID hits, what are you? You're in the cell 23 hours a day. And in that hour, that's the hour you have to wash up, go to rec, make your calls. So how long
Carl Williams: [00:29:35] gone and then you only coming out for 15 minutes, every mowing dancer go, you lose the phone.
And within that 15 minutes, you have to take a shower and use the phone to call your family. It was a Rudel, um, experience. And sometimes you may not even get to come out at all.
Abbie Henson: [00:29:51] Did you have a celly in that time? Yes. Okay. So you and one other person are in a cell, you have a shared toilet, a sink, a bunk bed.
Yes. Do you have control over the lights?
Carl Williams: [00:30:05] Yeah, but they cut them on every time they CA they count. So they cut them off at six in the morning. They cut them on at eight in the morning. I mean it's seven in the morning. They kind of mourn at four in the morning. And if your celly gets mad medication, they come on at three in the morning and they also kind of want at three 30, they come on at eight o'clock and then they cut them on an 11 o'clock and then they, you know, they cut home at three and they keep repeating that cycle.
So imagine them doing that, that breaks your sleep. It makes you sleep.
Abbie Henson: [00:30:44] So when did you return home or to the community
Carl Williams: [00:30:48] that was last year, August
Abbie Henson: [00:30:51] the 11th. Did it go into lockdown in March or April? March. So you had March, April, may, June, July. You had five full months of that. So did you know in those five months that, like, at what point did you know that you were getting
Carl Williams: [00:31:08] out?
Well, I had no clue because, uh, uh, the case had been overturned three times. Several times and every time it would be the judge who would stall it out. So the case was overturned in Oh six Oh nine and 2012. So from 2012, I was going to court all of that time. And then they finally decided to drop most of the charges and still have me going back and forth to court for a one murder charge.
Abbie Henson: [00:31:45] So you still have one murder charge?
Carl Williams: [00:31:47] Yes. Then I'm fighting to be, to kind of pisses me off because, uh, instead of just saying, Hey, you know what, we'll do the right thing. The man has served all that time, but you still want to leave a conviction. We want to have something on this background when you free, but we will let you out tomorrow.
It's like the shit's about your life after putting you through something that's so traumatic, so traumatizing, so demeaning, so dehumanizing, not only is it an attack on you as a tackling your family as it's actually a community as a tackle and your friends, everybody who loves you to kids, it has an effect on all of y'all because of my life, just my life.
It's a share
Abbie Henson: [00:32:32] life. Right? Right. Exactly. And I think that's such an important point because the way that you're describing how, if you were to be someone's neighbor and all they knew was that you were a convict or a felon or a criminal, they don't know that you're also are there. They are then immediately become blinded to the fact that you might also be a father that you might be a brother, a son, you know, a community member.
What you just said about it being a shared life and the secondary victimization and trauma that kind of unfolds and flows into the people that you touch and are touching throughout your life. How long was it between the time that they were dropping the charges and going to release you versus the day that you were released?
Carl Williams: [00:33:28] Well, the date changed a few times. They were supposed to do it before COVID, before COVID even happened. They were supposed to do it. And 2013, 2014, 2013, and then 2014, it was supposed to be done in 2016. They was, so-called investigating to do the conviction, integrity unit. Then that went on for a minute.
And then another state's attorney came in, which was chem five. So the process started all over again.
Abbie Henson: [00:33:59] Hmm. So like, how did you remain patient.
Carl Williams: [00:34:04] There are people in prison or what we call the old timers? Well, I say this about them who still love them. I used to feel like was that, so it was, it was pretty sweet.
So they had the most, they had the greatest information for you because of what they've had to endure. And they always wanted to tell you their story. So you won't be their story. They're saying, Hey, listen, you started out as my story, but your life don't have to continue as my story. Your story can take a different path.
And the reason why I'm talking to you, because the path that you're going to take, I am a part of that journey to help get you there. So here's this information. So I used to always think was powerful in itself, even though I used to be like, I don't want to hear it. Well, who gives what he has to say? I personally didn't because I used to feel like I got I'm struggling in my own mind and my own heart and my own spirit and my own energy and space.
And just trying to deal with the fact that I'm in prison and people used to say, you know what it is in prison that you do when you go do that experience. And I told him, well, the one thing that I did was fought like, hell, I ain't know, no other way, because I kept saying to myself, I could work out. I could do all of these things, which I did, but those things was just so I could stay alive so I can fight that much more harder.
Abbie Henson: [00:35:34] Where, so you leave prison August 11th, where do you go
Carl Williams: [00:35:40] released and was supposed to be released until my family's home. But what happened was. They just abruptly just released me. So they didn't have no, they didn't have on file where I was supposed to go, so they didn't want to release me. So they did what they said was, is a violation and kept me there for another.
I think there too, you know, that day is coming, but it's heartbreaking that it takes that it took so long and you get no apology. They move on with their life without a care in the world. Okay. Yes. You just destroyed a man's life. Not only did you destroy, it was life. You destroyed the child's life, who was a whole different generation.
What that child grew up to grow to have to go have a child. Now you just destroyed that child's life. So you destroyed the life of not only the people of my generation for me, then my kid, and then a grandchild, and then not even counting my mother. And so you just, just disrupted an entire family, the, the, the family tree of, of an entire family based off the fact of your missed identification.
And, and it's not like the information wasn't there, that I was an innocent man, because you knew it
Abbie Henson: [00:37:08] all along. So you get no apology, you got released. Do you then go to your family's house or where do you start to live with my family. So you're living with your family and you still have this felony on your record?
Carl Williams: [00:37:27] Yes, then I still had to go to court to fight for.
Abbie Henson: [00:37:31] So you are by the criminal justice systems definition, you are free. But what we know is that when you're tied to a criminal history record, especially with a felony of murder, that freedom is tainted. How are you, how are you feeling right now? How do you feel like that label has affected your life on the outside?
Carl Williams: [00:38:01] It definitely had an effect on my life. I think that, uh, in just the way that I am as a person growing up, I told you that I was a kid who enjoyed, um, his community. Now I'm a person who's, who's very leery about a lot of things. The reality is, is that I've developed trust issues. And this is just real quick.
I went into a store. To go buy, just buy me something in going to this store because I've been so traumatized, not realizing it and the effects that it had on me until later down the line. I don't like people standing behind me for 45 minutes. I stood in that store telling people, no, no, no, no, you go, Oh no, no, no, you go.
They probably was like, who the fuck? Who the fuck is telling everybody to go? He got two items in his hand. Why not just go pay for the two items, whatever, know the trauma that I've faced. They don't know the pain that I've been doing. They don't know, um, the issues that I was faced with. And I didn't realize how heightened they were until I was actually in that moment until I just do the items down and just left out of the store.
I had to go take a breather and was like, damn. Looked at the time 45 minutes went by, I could have paid for those items and we'll get on about my damn business. The problem with that was, is that the post-traumatic stress, all that I've had some doulas suffered through the way that I live my life inside of the, those walls or that Cape to that box for so long.
My back was always up against the wall, even in the grocery store, even though there was no wall present, anyone standing behind me.
Abbie Henson: [00:39:51] So have you been able to seek counseling since you've been out?
Carl Williams: [00:39:56] So what I did was immediately started to, um, go to counseling upon my release and it definitely has helped me continue to grow and develop, but more importantly, um, be strong, uh, in my path and my direction as well to be okay with telling my story and sharing my story with others.
Because I think that for me, for a long time, I used to be like, I don't need to keep saying it. People know where I was at people know what I've had to suffer, but nobody, I don't think that they quite understand because they've been given an idea of what the institution looks like and crime and punishment, what it looks like and how it should be, but they don't tell you the other, the ugly side of it and what it does, the truth is what people don't realize.
It's probably 90, some percent of those people, that sort of person, I wouldn't be released. 95%, 95%. You can turn them into animals. They're being, they're coming into your neighborhoods. So you can either want a person who's restore reform and a person who adds to your community or.
Abbie Henson: [00:41:10] When you, as someone who has gone through the system, who has seen the mistreatment and the abuse, when you think about the future of the criminal justice system and the changes that we need in order to actually achieve justice, to actually hold people accountable and not just give them time to actually address the harms caused to the community and to not further harms by, as you're saying, traumatizing individuals and their families and their communities, how do we hold people accountable and address some of these issues?
Carl Williams: [00:41:50] When, when you think about a person like for me, they could come and arrest me tomorrow and put me in prison, takes me everywhere from eight years to 30 years to probably be released, fighting that crime, to prove my innocence. Why was that with no repercussion? The judge has no responsibility, even though it was the wrongful crime.
Neither does the police. Aren't held accountable, nor is the state's attorney's office who prosecute do persecute these crimes. They have no responsibility. I feel like if, if you're truly serious about criminal justice reform, then there should be, they should be held accountable. If you, if you won't fully convict, convict someone, then you should be responsible for that life.
You will hold me responsible for committing a crime against another human being. Well, that is a crime against another human being that you just committed. So you should be responsible for that life. So always say, I think that if those types of those things put into place, You wouldn't have so many products, persecutors, a movie to bring crimes against people without doing the proper research or having a proper evidence to show that this person has committed a crime.
But you did that same, took that same attitude with judges. So if you're serious about criminal justice reform and you definitely have to take all a lot of the power from out of the state's attorney's office, as well as the police officers have, that should be accountability and oversight that States this, this accountability and this responsibility that, that the police officers, the state's attorney's office, the judges and the criminal justice system, and those who are a part of it too, who brings crimes in cases against us citizens.
That should be a responsibility to them when it comes to them to be held accountable. Because if you don't, this cycle will continue, there will be no true, uh, reform. When you have laws this on the books that, uh, allows them to continue to persecute you for crimes that you did not commit.
Abbie Henson: [00:44:02] That's such a good point about accountability because when the question is often framed, and even when I was just saying it, I was thinking people.
And that's the issue, right? Like we have these images of, and crimes that we consider criminal and who we consider criminal. And those are the people that we're thinking need to be held accountable, but that's the way the system has functioned. Those are the social constructs it's created, where we don't look at the prosecutor, the police, the judge, as someone to be held accountable as someone committing a crime, even though it very much is the case.
And I, I absolutely agree with you. And I think it's a great point that if you, Carl Williams are going to be potentially held responsible for taking a life, then this other person who has taken a life needs to as well. And I think that's a, that's a great point. Why I love this podcast so much is because I think it really challenges people to reconsider or just to consider.
Who and what they see as criminal, because it's so deeply rooted in racism and white supremacy and these social hierarchies that allow crime at the top to be excused and even accepted and crime at the bottom, which is often a result of racist policies and practices to be then demonized. So I really appreciate you sharing your story.
I think the way is that you have described the actions of the criminal justice system is something that people need to hear. And I think the fact that we need to really understand the complexity of these terms, like freedom, where. You are free on the outside as a youth. And yet you are constrained by this criminal label that is getting you stopped by police constantly.
And then you're incarcerated, which is the ultimate removal of freedom. But then you have these strange layers of freedom that they're giving you to feel somewhat human in an incredibly dehumanizing setting. And then you are released into the community to supposedly be free and reclaim your freedom.
But now you're tied to a felony that you didn't even commit. And it's just so complicated. And people have to realize that it's not this black and white free prison free. There are levels to this that are deeply racialized and location-based specifically, right. Like it wasn't just that you're. Black kid living like living it's that it's contextual, it's this black kid living in this quote unquote tough community that then brings in.
So it's, it's layered stigmas, right? It's the intersection of your maleness, your race, your community, and everything that has informed these narratives.
Carl Williams: [00:47:31] So if I said to you, well, this is a tough community. Well, you only come in their community and police that community that much more harder just based off the ideas of what you think tough is.
So you feel like, Hey, well we have to be this much more tough. So you beause its citizens and the community for its core.
Abbie Henson: [00:47:52] The other thing too is when we, when we think about why a neighborhood is considered tough, we have to think that it's poverty, which is a structural issue. It's. Lack of jobs and opportunity, which is a structural issue.
It's underfunded schools, which is a structural issue. It's all of these structural issues that we then put on the individuals within that community and define them as tough or think about this neighborhood filled with these people as tough, but it's the toughness is imposed. It's not that these people are born tough.
It's that there's an imposition of structural inequality and oppression that creates contentious environments and being tough in that neighborhood is truly an understandable and. Almost a strength, a strength based outcome, right? Like you have to, if you're going to survive, like if, if we're thinking of resilience as just acts that perpetuate survivability in that environment, when you are experiencing compounded trauma and oppression and hyper surveillance to be tough would be inevitable.
Right. And if you're not, then you're kind of screwed, right? Like, and your toughness, the toughness that is demonized and criminalized is likely the thing that has made you fight for 26 years for your freedom. So when we think about these things, we have to also reframe it to be less deficits based in way more strengths, based to understand that these outcomes that we demonize and criminalize can also be like, yes, there's a shadow side and yes, harm should not be caused to other people, but there are also positive outcomes to this.
And not that it, it shouldn't be a requirement. You shouldn't be required to be tough, right? Like
Carl Williams: [00:50:01] that's very true. No one should be definitely be required to be tough. The sad part is, is that you become trained and I'm using this word purposely trained in a way that you think that that's how you have to be in order to just be.
So what it does is though it hardens your way of thinking and your way of moving more importantly, it hardens your way of living and it hardens your way of when it comes to creating and building your way out of that situation. You're stuck in the ideal of, of tough. What you don't realize is, is that it is affecting the beauty of who you truly are.
When it comes to your own development, it's, it's removing features from your spirit, from your energy of who you are as a person. So I will no longer see shit. I see Abbie G now. And they're like, who is that? Abbie G be in your face. You get what I'm saying? So it's not because that's who you are, but it's the nature of what you had to develop in order for Abbie to even survive.
It's the shield or to even maintain. Absolutely. You couldn't have said that better to sum that up. That's
Abbie Henson: [00:51:29] for sure. If we're going to go with that metaphor, right? Like there are all these daggers flying at you and you have to wear the shield, but then the people throwing the daggers demonize you for wearing the shield.
Carl Williams: [00:51:43] There you go. That is very true. Oh,
Abbie Henson: [00:51:46] well, I think I really appreciate your perspective. I think that when we think about transforming the system, it's not necessarily about lessening crime in communities. It's, it's, it's about these systems and these structures and turning the gaze to those who are creating further harm.
And yeah, it's also complicated, but it's, it's also so simple to some degree,
Carl Williams: [00:52:16] just real quick. And in alignment, we're freedom. You had asked me, what do I see? What do I see as freedom now? Being in prison? I was in Pontiac. I couldn't have been no more than like 22, 21, 22, like, yeah, like 22, somewhere in there.
This was considered one of the roughest toughest prisons. I used to be standing outside on yard. And I was a young guy who's strong and healthy. And I was just out there just breaking off these branches off to this little Bush. So this man comes out and he says to me, what the fuck do you think you're doing?
And I'm like, wait, could this old man or this person, he has no chance with going up against me. Here was my mind thinking something else. But here's his mind was like, what the fuck do you think you do? I'm using the exact terminology that he said to me, this is what the fuck do you think you doing? Why the fuck are you killing that tree?
I said that he was crazy. This was before I had the knowledge that trees and grass and all this stuff is alive. He says, you come to destroy that tree to prevent that tree from growing. As free and wild as it want to be without any interruption. So my ideals of what I think freedom should be now is the same way that he's seeing how that Bush should grow tall, growing strong without any interruptions.
Having the life that it wants to have and grow as it wants to grow without anybody destroying his
Abbie Henson: [00:54:03] beauty. I think that's a great place to end
Carl Williams: [00:54:14] man. I really had a blast. I truly appreciate it. I thank you also for your attentive ear, actually for your laughter as well. I know, you know, I was like, she's going to be a little stiff, but
I thought this was pretty cool. And, um, anytime
Abbie Henson: [00:54:33] cool. I really, really appreciate you talking with me and sharing your story. I know that it's important and I think people will really appreciate your vulnerability. So I really. All I wish is that you gain that freedom that you want.
Thank you so much for participating in my critical conversation with Carl Williams. There is a lot to unpack from this episode. First. I think his point on accountability is really important. When we think about and speak about reform and abolition, there's such a concern for how to hold individuals accountable who have committed harm to others.
Yet in these conversations, we really consider the police prosecutors and judges who have committed harm. According to the national registry of exonerations, there have been 2,775 exonerations since 1989. That means that over. 2,500 people were incarcerated for a wrongful conviction and then found innocent and released 50% of all of these cases were black with only 36% white.
Each exonerated person spent on average, more than eight years and 10 months in prison for crimes. They did not commit that amounts to more than 24,840 years lost Illinois, where Carl is from has the highest number of wrongful conviction, exonerations following Texas at number one. In all of these exonerations, the national registry of exonerations found that 54% of those defendants were victimized by official misconduct with police involved in 34% of cases, prosecutors in 30% of cases and some cases involving both police and prosecutors, yet only 4% of prosecutors involved in those convictions were disciplined, but the penalties were quote unquote, comparatively mild and only three were disbarred.
Police officers. And I'm reading this from the website. Police officers were disciplined in 19% of cases leading to wrongful convictions. And in 80% of those cases, officers were convicted of crimes, such as Chicago police, Sergeant Ronald Watts, who led a group of officers who planted drug and gun evidence leading to 66 false convictions, 29% of these exonerations involved, false confessions, like Carl and of those who confessed.
Almost 50% were younger than 21 at the age of arrest. When we hold individuals accountable for quote unquote, taking an innocent life, we also have to hold criminal justice agents accountable as well. Carl was released without so much as an apology, and he's still fighting to be completely freed from his conviction while those who have been exonerated are lucky enough to be living and in the community life, as they knew it before is gone.
As Carla explained, you enter endless trauma inside and are forever changed by the carceral experience. I thought Carl's story about the checkout line was so impactful and illuminates the lingering effects of prison. 95% of incarcerated individuals return home. And if we know that harm is circuitous in that those harmed tend to harm others, then what are we thinking by inflicting harm on those we're expecting to desist from harm upon release?
I think another salient point from the episode was the discussion on freedom and the fact that this is not a dichotomous definition with free on one side and incarcerated on the other freedom is a much more complex concept than we may think for black men living in what Carl calls, tough communities, specifically freedom is an unattainable luxury.
As they are subjected to hyper surveillance and limited in their social mobility for Carl freedom was complicated because he felt he never really had it at a young age. He was reminded by family members of the persistent oppression that he would face in American society. Then as an adult, he's incarcerated for a crime.
He never committed. And now he remains shackled not only to his false criminal record, but also to the trauma of prison that permeates most of his social experiences and interactions, and considering how to create a more just and safe society we should borrow from Carl's parable shared at the end and ask what resources and supports must be in place to allow everybody's beauty to flourish, to end the cycle of violence, to enable all citizens in the quote unquote, land of the free to feel free.
Free from oppression free from criminalization free from demonization free, from stigma and free to grow. Next episode, I'll be speaking with Dr. Monica bell, a Yale professor of law and sociology. We'll be speaking on ways to reduce harm while on the path to abolition through efforts such as racism, response funds and anti segregation policing.
I hope you'll tune in, expect new episodes every other Monday. And don't forget to subscribe rate, and please leave a review. I really want to read your feedback. I'm Abbie Henson, and this was critical conversations.