Introducing: Earwitness

Introducing: Earwitness

From Earwitness by Lava for Good Podcasts

September 12, 2023 · 3 min · Season 1

About this episode

The episode introduces the case of Toforest Johnson, who was wrongfully convicted and sentenced to death for a crime he did not commit.

One July night in 1995, Deputy Sheriff William G. Hardy was shot behind the Crown Sterling Suites hotel in Birmingham, Alabama. At the same time as the murder, at least ten people saw Toforest Johnson four miles away, at a popular nightclub called Tee's Place. But detectives zeroed in on him as a main suspect in Deputy Hardy’s murder anyway, ultimately resulting in Toforest being tried, convicted, and sentenced to death. For over a quarter century, Toforest has been confined to a 5’ by 8’ cell on Alabama’s death row. In 2019, investigative journalist Beth Shelburne began covering the case, going down a disturbing rabbit hole revealing many unsettling facts that cast grave doubts about Toforest’s guilt. The facts she found tear at the very foundation of the American criminal justice system: No eyewitnesses or physical evidence tied Toforest to the murder; the state tried to convict a different man for the same crime; and perhaps most disturbing of all, Toforest’s conviction relied on an ‘earwitness’ – a woman who claimed to have eavesdropped on an incriminating phone call, a woman whom prosecutors paid for her testimony, in…

People in this episode

Host: Beth Shelburne

Topics covered

  • true crime
  • wrongful conviction
  • death row
  • investigative journalism
  • criminal justice system
  • eyewitness testimony
  • American society

Keywords

  • Toforest Johnson
  • William G. Hardy
  • Beth Shelburne
  • wrongful conviction
  • death row
  • eyewitness
  • criminal justice
  • Alabama

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Lava for Good Podcasts

Books & works: Earwitness, Bone Valley

Places: Birmingham, Alabama, Tee's Place

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