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The Case of Jerry Miller

📻 Episode #29
🎙️ Hosted by Jason Flom
📅 Jul 24, 2017

About This Episode

In 1981, a woman was brutally beaten, raped, robbed, and forced into the trunk of her car on the roof of a parking garage in Chicago. Two employees recognized her car as it was leaving the garage and attempted to stop the assailant from driving away, but the perpetrator escaped on foot, leaving the victim…

The Case

In 1981, a woman was brutally beaten, raped, robbed, and forced into the trunk of her car on the roof of a parking garage in Chicago. Two employees recognized her car as it was leaving the garage and attempted to stop the assailant from driving away, but the perpetrator escaped on foot, leaving the victim locked in the trunk. Based only on a composite drawing and description of the assailant, both of which were created based on the memory of the parking garage employees, a Chicago Police Department officer accused Jerry Miller of the crime, claiming that he had seen Jerry looking in a parked car’s window some days prior. The two garage employees both identified Jerry in a lineup, but the victim said that she couldn’t positively identify her assailant because he had threatened to kill her if she didn’t keep her eyes closed. Jerry and his father both testified that they were watching a pay-per-view boxing match at the time of the crime, but despite his alibi and the total lack of physical evidence connecting him to the crime, in 1982 Jerry Miller was convicted of rape, kidnapping, and robbery. It wasn’t until 2005, when the Innocence Project took on Jerry’s case, that the victim’s clothes were subjected to DNA testing, yielding a profile that excluded him. In 2007, Jerry Miller was exonerated, having spent 25 years in prison for a rape that he didn’t commit. He is joined by Maurice Possley, Senior Researcher at the National Registry of Exonerations and Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and *New York Times *bestselling author who has written about, investigated and consulted on issues involving criminal justice for more than 30 years.

https://www.wrongfulconvictionpodcast.com/with-jason-flom

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In Their Own Words — transcript excerpts

Short excerpts from the episode's official published transcript, with timestamps — listen from these moments, or read the full transcript via the podcast's own platforms.

00:06:29

“Speaker 10: and it's where a lot of people go, and so Speaker 10: there was a lot of pressure to solve this from Speaker 10: that perspective, Yes, and we. Speaker 5: See a lot of wrongful convictions happening in exactly those Speaker 5: type of circumstances, but there's a lot of pressure from”

00:25:26

“Speaker 2: can get it right now. I took that book and Speaker 2: I started reading. Speaker 4: What book was that? Speaker 2: I can't tell you what it was, just you know, Speaker 2: it was just a book. And you know I wasn't Speaker 2: I didn't read swell, you know, because I used to”

00:43:29

“Speaker 2: to prepare for it. I was going to church, you know, Speaker 2: I would go to church every Sunday, and that kind Speaker 2: of kept me. It gave me some strength through them Speaker 2: hard times of being on parole. But when by the Speaker 2: time I've done that first interview, man, look, I was prepared,”

Listen to the Episode

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Resources & links from the episode:

• lavaforgood.com
• omnystudio.com

← #28 Robert Jones #30 Angel Gonzalez →

Also on the podcast: #433 Carl Miller · #448 Chris Miller · #478 Tonia Miller