Trail of Blood /// Part 2 /// 417 | Forensic Files

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chair grab a beer let's talk some true crime [Music] all right Captain what we have here and
I'm going to throw in a little criticism before we get going too far along because what has been the biggest part
of this case that has been criticized is that the Somerville Police Department that they locked on to to Eddie O'Brien
too early in their investigation as their number one suspect and not only did they not only did he become a
suspect too quickly for some people's liking but they locked in on him and failed to look elsewhere I'm going to
give my own criticism I agree with the the part of locking on to Edward O'Brien what I don't agree with is the
criticism that they that he became a suspect too quickly they had evidence that suggest he should be a suspect in
this case he had stab wounds or or defensive wounds or however you want to look at those cuts by a knife we have a
woman murdered by a knife we have an individual that has cuts by a knife that they call 911 and he is I think you said
half a mile away from the scene of the crime yeah you have a you have his fingerprint a bloody in blood in wet
blood at the the crime scene M you have what cannot be ruled out as the victim's
blood on his shin so there is evidence linking him to the crime scene then we have the issue of two weeks after his
arrest he says yes I was at the crime scene right and here's what really happened but before we get too far along
Captain what I want to mention is is the fact that they locked in on him and then
they failed to recognize the possibility of well do we have anybody else that could have done this I think they were
overtaken and blinded by what little evidence they had at the time where I want to go with this is there's two
other people that could be considered a suspect and I say two other people because really we know and I think you
will agree with me that regardless of this timestamp where the some sources say she was killed between 8:00 p.m. and
10: p.m. right that cannot be it it just cannot be okay maybe she was killed between 8 and
9:15 but that's as long as you can take this timeline out why because either one
of two stories is correct either Eddie O'Brien killed her and then fled the scene remember he he said to have been
seen by eyewitnesses leaving the area at 9:20 p.m. M or he didn't kill her and his story is
correct that he showed up went into the house and she was already dead when he got there around 9:15 so whatever
happened to Janet Downing whoever murdered her murdered her either Eddie did it when he got to the house or she
was already dead when he got there that leaves us with two other potential suspects in my mind yes there could have
been a whole heck of a lot of people that could have done this but I say two for this reason one we have Paul Downing
who by his own admission was in the home from approximately 8:15 to 8:30ish we know Janet Downing was alive
at 8:00 when the group of boys left her house but even with all of this evidence
against Eddie is it possible that we have a different suspect maybe even a better suspect right I'm going to bring
up a guy named Ry Ortiz Arty Ortiz is Janet downing's brother-in-law he is married to her sister he was kicked out
of the house he and his wife lived with the downings for over a year they were kicked out of the home in March of
1995 Janet Downing would tell friends that she kicked them out of her home because she believed that R Ortiz was
dealing selling drugs out of her house right okay we need to talk about a woman named Gina Mahoney Gina Mahoney is
arguably one of Janet downing's best friends leading up to her murder Janet Downing and Gina Mahoney spoke several
times at length the day of her murder Gina Mahoney says that on several occasions she saw Ry Ortiz's cab he was
a cab driver she saw his cab parked outside of the house the Downing house after he was kicked out of the home when
nobody was home when the kids weren't home when Janet was home well didn't also neighbors say that they saw his
vehicle there from time to time after the time period of him being kicked out yes the other thing that's interesting
is the the reason why this is very important to Gina Mahoney is because she's had conversations with Janet
Downing where Janet has told her are Ortiz still has keys to my home and refuses to give them back and refuses to
give them back and that's where Gina Mahone is saying well not only does he have those keys I've seen his vehicle
parked near your home when I know nobody is home now she's not saying I know he was going in your house or I know he was
doing anything weird she's just saying when you were not home and when the kids were not home I've seen on several
occasions his cab parked by your house that day Janet Downing tells Gina Mahoney
that she is afraid of Ry Ortiz and that she that he has been harassing her since
he she kicked him out of the house all right now that's suspicious that's heay whatever yeah but we also
don't have anybody in her life saying that she was fearful of this gentle giant that lived across the street yeah
a little more background on that on Eddie O'Brien his parents lived on Boston Street his entire life Janet
Downing knew Eddie O'Brien his entire life MH she had lived there since the the late 70s and you're right nobody
ever said that Janet Downing told them that she was afraid of this 15-year-old boy he he was over at the house all the
time it was his best friend's house so more importantly than this hearsay bit is this story Gina
Mahoney says that on the night of Janet downing's Murder She Was Out on her front porch she's watching what is going
on over at her friend's house Janet downings this is the the the police lights the ambulance sirens this is all
a big commotion she's out on her front porch now wondering what happened at her friend's house wondering if her friend
is okay and she's watching it from her front porch she says that at 10 p.m. she sees Ry Ortiz walking his hair is wet
and freshly combed Ry then engages in conversation with Gina he says that he is there
because his dispatcher told him that his sister-in-law Janet Downing has been murdered Gina finds this immediately
very off-putting finds it to be very strange considering that the EMTs and the police are still at the Downing
house Janet's still in the house right nobody really knows what's going on at this point but he's saying that his
dispatcher knows what's going on and told him that Janet Downing had been murdered little fishy right it's a
little fishy I I don't know little fishy you know I don't know if if the dispatcher would be you know listening
to police scanner or if or if that could explain it but gets a little more interesting than that because at the
same time that she's talking with Ry Ortiz she says that she spots his green taxi cab his cab is parked on Hamlet
Street this is this is the street that runs up the side of the along the side of the Downing house M she says that his
cab is parked on Hamlet Street and it's facing the wrong way his vehicle according to Gina is parked on the same
side of Hamlet Street as the Downing home but his cab is facing Highland Avenue it should be facing the other
direction which is Boston Street Gina says that Ortiz's cab is blocked in this is 10:00 they're having their
conversation she sees his cab it's blocked in by a fire Tru a police vehicle and an
ambulance well what would that tell us either or's vehicle dropped out of the sky and fell to that spot mhm or he was
parked there before emergency Personnel arrived responding to the scene mhm then
here is something very bizarre Ry Ortiz during his conversation with Gina he discovers
he can't find his keys in any of his pockets he tells Gina he can't find his keys he leaves
Gina's front yard and runs over to his cab where she says she can see him crawling around inside the vehicle and
very obviously looking for his keys mhm after several minutes he gets out of the
cab and steps foot onto the Downing property which of course is a crime scene by now so of course he is stopped
by an officer he asked the officer if he could be allowed to go into the backyard
and search for his keys why would his keys be there oh well oh how how astute of you to
contemplate that good job C fish fishy the officer told Ortiz that this would not be possible this is a crime
scene so then Ortiz goes back to Gina's front yard and again he's talking with her then he asked her if she thought
that the cops would be there much longer you think these cops are going to be here much longer hey you think
they're going to you think they're going to like take her dead body and move it real quick cuz I need to find my keys
she tells him yes I do think that they will be here for a while and then he goes on again and says that he needed to
get into the backyard so he could find his keys because he needed to return the cab back to his work eventually I don't
know if he grew tired or what but that same night he had the cab towed he never found the he didn't get the keys that
night he had the cab towed back to his work very interesting story well and look if somebody would have told the
police this this is some evidence they could have looked for inside the house which obviously they didn't look for and
then we have Eddie O'Brien's story that he was he says he was too afraid to tell
anybody because he was threatened by a man with dark hair Ry Ortiz has dark hair all right let's go to the trial
Captain so leading up to this trial We have basically is for two years they fight over the idea of should this boy
who was 15 at the time of the murder he's 15 and five months old at the time of the murder should he be tried as a
juvenile or as an adult and the whole purpose in reading that summary in our trailer of dulos's article and what he
called the coming of the juvenile super Predator was because at the time in our country several states were
battling with the idea because there was a rise in violent crime and murders committed by
juveniles the idea at the time was do we try these juveniles ages 14 to 17 as adults not only do we try them as adults
but can we sentence them to life in prison without the possib AB ility of parole because you have his article that
points out that hey a big batch of these dudes are just evil you cannot rehabilitate them and they are super
Predators they are monsters I don't want to fully condemn his article because what we have John dulio saying in that
article that I left out of the trailer he was saying that our parents and our communities need to be raising
these children and raising these boys better so that they grow up and they have feelings and empathy and they care
about each other and they care about others and they care about their neighborhoods and their communities or
they understand consequences right he was proposing to build more churches not prisons that sounds great to me help
build more McDonald's and Burger Kings too he is just saying that that punishment isn't the key raising these
kids properly to be good citizens and good adults will help mold them into not being killers and not being criminals M
what some states decided the solution was try them as adults lock them up with a life sentence without the possibility
of parole basically lock them up and throw away the key and then let everybody know this is what happens to
you if you commit murder right so for two years they fought over the idea should could Eddie O'Brien be tried as a
juvenile or as an adult and he was arrested as we said in Late July of 1995 he was indicted on August 2nd of
that same year what we have in 1996 we have judge Paul heffernon orders O'Brien who's now 16 to be tried as a
juvenile if convicted he would face a maximum of a 20 year sentence mhm in July of that same year the governor of
Massachusetts signs into law a bill that would require juveniles over age of 14 accused of first or second degree murder
to be tried as adults so then the sup Supreme Judicial Court decides that the judge that said O'Brien should be
charged as a juvenile well we're going to toss that out right we're going to toss that out and on May 9th of 19
1997 so we're now at a over a year and a half after this kid was first locked up
it was decided that O'Brien who is 17 at this time would be ordered to face murder charges in the adult court system
whatever happened to the right the right to a speedy trial what did we say in that one show you have the right to a
speedy trial you just may not get one right and because they're fighting over laws it seems like a lot of our laws
lately or a lot of these cases where you go we know that the person has the right
to they just never they never gave him the opportunity to well and Eddie O'Brien whether he killed Janet down
Downing or not fell into a very bad he had very bad luck on on many levels but on this level where at the
time where some of these states were considering combating juvenile violence and murders committed by juveniles by
locking them up and throwing away the key as we just said the the people that were opposed to that
were pointing out that hey that kind of setup is aimed at locking up African-American black youth children
and throwing away the key and so some people were pointing out that they thought it was you know it was racially
biased to do this and it does make sense because at the time there it was everybody that wanted to attack the rise
in gang juvenile gang violence in the country in the inner cities right and so Eddie O'Brien then
became well we got this white kid who lives near Boston and he stabbed this woman across the street 98
times so what better way to go no we this is not racially biased this is against the board across the board which
it was but now you can point to this exact incident this exact situation and go this is what we're going after this
sexual sadist who grew up across the street from these nice people so what we have here Captain is once we are at
trial you have the prosecution who's going to have to present the theory to the jury and walk the jury hand inand
along the way down the path and point to evidence that convinces them of their theory that says you know what we
believe this happened because we have this piece of evidence to support that portion of our Theory and we're going to
walk you all the way from Step a all the way to step Z and then you're going to give us a guilty conviction afterwards
they say that Eddie O'Brien was obsessed with Janet Downing that he became obsessed with her that he was watching
her and he was asking unusual questions about Janet Downing and that was proof that he was sexually obsessed with this
woman one of the questions that he asked was he asked Janet's son his best friend
Ryan why does your mother sit in the driveway she would pull up and sit in her car for a very long time often after
arriving home I believe she was a smoker I've seen some people say that she was a
smoker so that would make some sense what the prosecution did to support this he's obsessed with her is
they had four different people testify that Eddie obrien asked why does she sit in the driveway for a long period of
time in her car the problem with that is it paints a picture that he was asking multiple people this question the truth
of it is he asked this question to Ryan in front of a group of people right so you have this you have multiple people
testifying over and over again to the same thing but really it it's only from one incident he didn't ask multiple
people multiple times it happened once and further it's not that weird of a question well there were other people
that testified that they had they had disc had the same discussion with other people other neighbors wondered why she
sat in the driveway yeah for a long period of time sometimes back in the day I'd be listening to NPR and I'd get home
and NPR would have another 10 15 minutes left and it's like well I'll just sit here finish the show Howard Stern has
made me a victim of sitting in a parking spot or in my driveway for years now I got to I got to stay on until the
commercial break yeah so hold up a sign that says no flicky flicky and you'll be
fine what what they think is going on th this is this is interesting too is did he ask any other questions there yes he
did ask if Ryan he asked Ryan if if Janet was a lesbian and that seems like a very bizarre question to ask I think
it sounds like an immature question he's 15 yeah and we did have a person who testified that said she had a discussion
with big Ed with Eddie's father and they were talking about Janet Downing mind you these people they
practically live on their front porches in the summertime they're all friends they all know each other mhm they can
all see each other's business and these two people were saying you know Big Ed and this this
woman were were commenting on how Janet had not had a male companion since the divorce between her and her husband yeah
some but one of the adults posed the question to the other maybe she's a lesbian yeah or maybe it just takes her
some time maybe she's raising these four kids by herself and she just doesn't have the time to go try to find some but
where this plays into look the the prosecution's going to point out that this is a big deal that Eddie O'Brien
asked this question it's not it's not a big it's not a big deal because of the testimony of this woman who says Eddie
O'Brien was in the room and overheard this conversation between two adults so him being a kid a child probably thought
well maybe there's some Merit to it and he asked his friend who happens to to be
the son of this woman is your mother a lesbian it's one of those things that on the surface it seems bizarre when you
read it that in the paper it seems bizarre that Eddie O'Brien would ask this but then when you get the full
story his dad and other people saying some stuff and maybe some rumors around town and he said I'm going to ask my
friend ask my friend so that day the day that Janet Downing was murdered the prosecution points out one thing that
Eddie is at the home and he learns that the the kitchen door to the home is broken the way that this works is that
if you were to turn the door knob on either side either on the outside or the inside it does not operate the door his
friend explains to Eddie that because of you know the purpose of security we added a deadbolt to this door that same
day Eddie remember he goes into the den and sees Janet Downing sleeping on the couch we then have the boys agree that
they're going to go swimming and the prosecution would point out that Eddie didn't want to go swimming because once
he learned of the broken door to the house and saw Janet Downing sleeping on the couch that his obsession kicked in
oh yeah and that he figured out you know what I'm not going to go swimming with these guys I'm going to come back in
here access the house through the broken door and I can get to her while she's sleeping on the
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plan offered by T-Mobile in Verizon May [Music] 2023 all right cheers crispy cabin yeah all right so let's get into
some of the facts or some of what the prosecution says is evidence against Eddie O'Brien in this case remember the
newspaper said that they have three separate eyewitnesses who saw Eddie O'Brien fleeing from the Downey House
fleeing the scene and technically that's not the case nobody saw him running from the house what they
see is is two of the witnesses anyway see him running from the backyard area or the bushes that are near the Downing
home MH where the problem comes in for the prosecution at trial is that one of the persons that
says that they saw Eddie O'Brien says under o oath I don't know for certain that it was Eddie O'Brien that it was a
tall person that was about the same size as Eddie but I'm not 100 % convinced that it was Eddie because when I saw
this person I said I called out to him by name to which he didn't turn around and he didn't respond right the other
witness their story changed three times before it was Eddie O'Brien that they saw running from that area well that's a
strong witness yeah it it was I don't know who it was I couldn't see who it was and then the final story was he
turned and looked at me and kind of smiled and it was Eddie O'Brien you pointed out something interesting
earlier about Eddie's clothes and they're remarkably clean for having just stabbed someone 98 times mhm the third
witness offers up a little bit of reasoning as to why Eddie O'Brien might have appeared to be clean or at least
his clothes appeared to be clean after having attacked This Woman This witness says that in their yard something
startled them so looked out the window and they saw Eddie O'Brien jump a fence in their yard fleeing from the area
Eddie O'Brien at this time according to this witness was wearing a black shirt and when he went up and over the fence
he could see a white shirt underneath the black shirt okay well there's your solution Eddie O'Brien was wearing a
black shirt he murdered this woman fled the area took off the black shirt had the white shirt underneath dumped the
black shirt somewhere right and none of the blood soaked through none of it soaked through but here's some problems
with this eyewitness's testimony first of all they don't outwardly say 100% it was Eddie O'Brien
it was saying somebody that said Eddie lived in my neighborhood his whole life I know who Eddie is the person I saw was
about the same height and had the same body type as Eddie O'Brien what I'm pointing out here is there's a chance
that this eyewitness saw somebody jump their fence right it just might not have been Eddie O'Brien now you've seen the
size and the stature of this boy it would be difficult to confuse him with somebody else right can we agree on that
yeah but the other problem is I think he stated that Eddie was 250 lbs there's no
way by looking at Eddie being 6'4 was he 250 lb he was probably closer to 300 lb
that's a lot of man meat to try to get over a fence depending on how big the defenses well this looks good for the
prosecution because it explains away the lack of blood on Eddie's shirt what looks really bad for the
prosecution is the eyewitness's testimony that says he saw this person who he believes to be Eddie O'Brien
jumping the fence this was at 10:15 p.m. we know that is impossible as Eddie O'Brien was at the midnight convenience
store being interviewed by police and examined by EMT workers at that time so this eyewitness testimony you just have
to toss it completely out that kind of go yeah if you saw somebody man it was not Eddie O'Brien because I have police
and EMTs that will say he was down at Union Square in this convenience store yeah but all these changing stories of
the eyewitnesses it would have to make a a jury or a judge start thinking that the
the prosecution is finding people that are just willing to say anything yeah but what I like about this testimony by
two of the eyewitnesses the ones that it could be possibly Eddie Eddie O'Brien that they saw is this actually in my
mind works out in Eddie's favor it doesn't work out in the prosecution's favor because Eddie O'Brien has already
said yes I was at the scene that night right I went into the home and then I fled out the back door at the Cellar
Door I crashed into the bushes and then I ran down Hamlet Street where it looks good for Eddie O'Brien is these w
Witnesses say that it was at 9:20 p.m. Eddie O'Brien and three Witnesses say that he was at his home at 9:15 and went
across the street immediately to the Downing home and then saw what was going on his life was threatened and then he
left the area why that looks good for him you mean to tell me that in the course of Simply five minutes just five
minutes Eddie O'Brien managed to somehow get into the home leave no sign of of a
forced entry brutally attack Janet Downing drag her from the den where she's sleeping or believed to have been
sleeping into the living room and during all of this stabbing her 98 times yeah it seems a little difficult
for that to be done and then on top of that if if he's not covered in blood did he did he wash up before leaving the
Downing house again we're adding time to this it's just getting more improvable by you know by the testimony but she
was she able to defend herself at all like being able to scratch up this individual or well that's where we get
into some of the blood evidence there is certainly blood evidence that points to
Eddie O'Brien having been at the scene which makes him look very guilty we got the we got the fingerprint in in the wet
Blood on the uh beam going down the stairs to The Cellar right that matches his fingerprints we have a drop of blood
that is later found on his shin that is type A and a very small percentage of people have type A blood so it's not
100% that it's Janet downings but it looks very likely that it is right if that's her blood and he's also stayed in
he was there at the scene he says he touched her he rolled her over it's possible he got some of her blood on him
and he didn't kill her if we believe his story and some of the blood he would have got off when he went to the store
and cleaned himself off there's the problem though Captain they found other blood evidence at the scene it's labeled
as identifiable meaning that the sample's good enough to find a match to it m it's
identifiable but it has not been matched to anybody it's not been tested against
anybody other than Eddie O'Brien right it's not like they rounded up 10 12 15 suspects and tested all their blood and
said uh we we've cleared you well that goes back to people's complaints about this case of law enforcement locking
into him too early or too quickly I think I think the issue is not so much too early it's it it's well it's it's
the wording that I struggle with because you're absolutely right it's it is locking in on him not only is he our
number one suspect but nobody else could have possibly have done this we're only
going to look for evidence to build our case against Eddie O'Brien and I'll tell
you what man I don't really fault the police I don't fault the Somerville police for that I
fault the prosecution because the police their job is to collect evidence to collect facts
make an arrest hand it off to the prosecutor and then the prosecutor decides do we take this to court do we
convict this man and then the prosecutor didn't at no point looked back and say well wait a second we have we have a a
third type of blood found at the scene that has we've been told it's not Eddie O'Brian's right can we test this against
any other suspects right we're not going to round up any other people in this this whole big mess and and test it
against their blood so that that's where it gets to be to be very difficult and then what gets
to be extremely difficult for Eddie for today because what we have here captain is he will be found guilty of murdering
Janet Downey the the trial lasted roughly about two weeks it started on September 17th and
on September 30th the defense rest now the defense only presented for two days during this trial and after 9 hours of
deliberation Eddie O'Brien was found guilty on first-degree murder so he's sentenced to life and in prison without
the possibility of parole this is the mandatory uh sentence under state law after that was signed signed into effect
in uh 19 what did we say 1996 MH one of the big problems for Eddie O'Brien is this story about R Ortiz and being
parked near the home on the night in question it never comes up during trial his defense at attorney didn't
bring it up that's whiffing it his his because his defense attorney didn't want to the the problem with presenting Eddie
side of the story is it places him at the crime scene that's what his his defense attorney thought right where I
say I say the opposite you need to explain why some physical evidence puts him at the crime
scene right there's only reasonable doubt if we hear that side of the story there's only reasonable doubt if Eddie
does Place himself at the crime scene and then we have alternative suspects because what the jury gets told the
story they get told is we have proof that he was there and when he was first asked if he was there he said
no well that makes him look awfully guilty yeah or it makes him look like an immature scared 15-year-old well and
that's why I went through that whole bit of the the life sentence without the possib ility of parole the kid was 15
years and 5 months old now yes this is a a horrific crime if you're ever going to
get life without the possibility of parole to me it's justified in a case like this the problem is if you're going
to take a 15-year-old and lock them up and throw away the key you better be damn sure you got the right
15-year-old you better be sure you got the right guy and I think there's questions about
if he even did this I I don't think his size helps well here's here's the other thing too I
think asking a group of people asking a room of people to believe that we have this physical evidence we have this kid
who later says yeah I was there but this is what happened oh and by the way not only did I find a victim who was just
murdered fled her home and then within minutes I was attacked and stabbed myself asking a room of people to
believe that what are the chances right you no one's going to believe that and to be honest
with you I'm not sure that I believe it I'm not saying that this is a wrongful conviction because I believe Eddie
O'Brien I'm saying that I question the conviction Beyond A Reasonable Doubt because I don't think that any
alternative was explored no alternative was even presented at the trial and also frankly I believe the
story against Ry Ortiz why was his cab parked there right why didn't he have his keys right why
did he need to go into the backyard to look for him exactly why wouldn't he give the
keys over in the first place why was he visiting her house without her knowledge
or her not being there so what do you think Captain do you think Eddie did it or well Eddie has also um not Eddie
but Arty Arty has a possible more more likely of a motive you'd be mad because she kicked
you out there's and that she also is they have bad blood between them right and she's telling people that she's
afraid of him Eddie I just don't understand the motive if it's sexual in nature why wasn't there any sexual
assault not saying that every murder that is sexual in nature has any type of assault but but I also don't see a
history of this gentle giant which everybody called a gentle giant they they call him the monster the monster
15-year-old right they called him a gentle giant so the motive doesn't make a lot of sense to me as far as Eddie's
concerned they also make it seem like oh now he is here was his big opportunity I I don't see that as being
such I don't know and there's just no history he has no history well and that's why they need for the general
public us to believe you know the the Commonwealth's argument inside of the story is that this was a monster in the
making he's a sadistic killer and this is the there's no proof of that this is the first that we're
seeing of it because he was so young stabing somebody 98 times that's that's the first of it there there's normally
some kind of progression we've see this time and time again um violence towards animals no I agree but but violence
towards family MERS teachers it would not be impossible for this to be bubbling up under the surface without
anybody knowing that that's what I have a problem with right right I think if he was
obsessed with her on some level maybe making some in inappropriate sexual advancement to her or something like
that would make a lot more sense but this idea that oh he was so obsessed with her with with no evidence of that
zero evidence of that that he was somehow obsessed with her and that caused him to stab her 98 times it's
just and that's what I mean we're making big leaps here that's and that's what I'm I'm getting at that that it's these
are these are leaps that are being made to put someone behind bars for the rest of their it's not there's no question
about it it's the rest of his life it's life without the possibility of parole and then I could see somebody's argument
going well look he lied okay but we don't have to make this giant leap of why why would a 15-year-old lie because
they were scared because they're immature because they don't know how to handle these things that's not that big
of a leap to to or that big of a excuse of why he lied but like these other things like like we talked about before
the taxi cab why was it parked there where were your keys to explain those things away you
have to make bigger leaps mhm and um and I I also don't think he passes the eye test for me I don't think Eddie
passes the eye test I don't see this a coldblooded killer I see a kid that um seems very
Meek was the word I'd use I mean he really looks like a big version of Ralphie from the Christmas story well
what we do end up with Captain is I believe it was in 2014 that the state of Massachusetts they
overturned that what might be a flawed idea and I think that it is of of trying 14y olds and 15y olds and then
sentencing them to life without the possibility of parole they overt that there they they will not be convicting
juveniles of life without the possibility of parole now for Eddie to apply for parole
he has to be willing to show remorse and fess up to what he has been convicted of
this is the the kind of stuff that drives me insan insane it drives me absolutely insane because that's we're
supposed to be adults here but that's the circle that's the vicious circle of it is that you for for one to be
rehabilitated for a horrible act and a horrible time in their life to be rehabilitated from that and from that
person you then must be willing to accept what you did and show that you want forgiveness and that you are
remorseful for what you did and that you are a different person now than when you
were placed into the system back then the problem with that is it only works out you only need to be
rehabilitated if you were in fact a bad guy back then if you were wrongfully convicted then you weren't a bad guy
back then right but that's why this nation and this world feels like it's on fire lately because people just can't be
adults about things Okay so we have a system that is created by man we know that there's some flaws to the system
right we also know that there's innocent people that are convicted of crimes so if we know all that there are
going to be times where somebody can get paroled we should allow the parole hearing to happen even if the guy went
on trial claimed he was innocent was victed claims he's innocent when when the parole comes up still
claims that he's innocent let him go in front of the the PE board and let the parole board
decide because to me if I'm going to has the guy ever admitted that he did it no
he's always claimed that he's innocent again like you were saying how do you have to be rehabilitated I if you never
admit that you did the crime clear to be clear the parole board is the one that does decide that um um but again it's
it's it's the way that it's that it's he doesn't even but he doesn't even get to
go in front of the pro board until he admits that he did this that doesn't make any sense to me like that shouldn't
make much sense to any adult what we do have though too is we do have the Innocence Project has taken at least a
review of Eddie's case which I don't know if through the appeals process or what will happen here
again I'm not saying with 100% certainty that this kid didn't do it I'm just saying it looks to me I think it's very
confusing case and I think there's just missteps and there's I really don't think there's enough
evidence um and again it goes back to did they lock on to him to long I whatever we're going to
figure out the terminology I think they they latched on him very quickly like they should have
because he's half a mile away from the crime scene and there's physical EV evidence putting him there knife wounds
and all by the way you got some blood on your shin didn't clean that up so there's some reason to be looking
towards him but you always have to then you know go back to the drawing board try to prove yourself wrong you know if
you think he's 100% guilty then try to prove that he's innocent and then look look at you know don't don't let any
Rock go unturned because this this is a 15-year-old boy's life at stake which you know I think we can do
[Music] better a little recommended listening for you if you need to get caught up on
our old episodes download the Stitcher app it's free and if you want to check out our other show called off the Record
we do a lot of case updates and you can find that on Stitcher premium do we have
any recommended reading this week this week we are recommending the politics of murder the power and ambition behind the
alter boy murder case by Margo Nash this is a fantastic read and it really details the trial and Court proceedings
in the Eddie O'Brien and Janet Downing case that's the politics of Murder By Margot Nash you can find that title and
others on our website True Crime garage click on the recommended page and until next week be good be kind and don't
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Brief Summary

The episode analyzes the murder of Janet Downing, focusing on suspect Eddie O'Brien and alternative suspects, including Ry Ortiz, and the trial's implications.

Key points

True Crime Garage Introduction. Hosts welcome listeners and introduce the show with humor and camaraderie.
Suspicious Behavior of Ry Ortiz. Gina Mahoney observes Ortiz's strange actions on the night of Janet Downing's murder.
Eddie O'Brien's Trial Debate. Discussion on whether Eddie O'Brien should be tried as a juvenile or an adult.
Eyewitness Testimony Issues. Conflicting eyewitness accounts raise doubts about Eddie's guilt.
Eddie O'Brien's Conviction. Eddie O'Brien was found guilty of first-degree murder after a brief trial.
Life Without Parole for a Minor. Eddie, only 15, receives a life sentence without parole, raising ethical concerns.

Episode highlights

Episode quotes

It's good to be seen and good to see you.

Host greeting listeners

2:01WatchNov 16, 2023

Tension

65/ 100Some tension

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