Something was off, I could sense it. It looked like Madear’s home, it just didn’t feel like her home. I could hear a familiar hymn being sung sotto voce towards the side of her home where her adjacent storage building was. She kept her washer and dryer there. She also had two extra freezers in there holding tons of assorted meats. Sodas were stacked to one side of the wall as high as five-feet, and gallons of assorted juices lined the floor. Madear loved buying in bulk because she loved to cook and feed others. There was an area opposite the beverages where all her holiday decorations were kept – including a unique white crystal four-foot holiday colored Christmas tree she proudly displayed in her window every year. To this day I’ve never seen anything like it. It was also the place I first kissed a girl, Carla Landry, and I liked it!
This area was not huge by any standard, but my little brother and some of my friends often used the wash-house, as we called it, as a club house. Madear would be there daily, putting loads of clothes in to wash, and once dried, she would fold and inspect to see if the whites were white enough or if the colored clothes were bright enough. She had no problem rewashing the clothes until they met her satisfaction.
So, it wasn’t odd to find her inside. I rushed through the door and saw her rocking away in her hand crafted wooden rocking chair that she used to find her Zen-moments in, relaxing or simply contemplating what she would do next. Madear didn’t speak much. I never heard her raise her voice, but she always evaluated any situation before acting, and when she did speak, her observations or opinions were always thought-out.
I could not see the features of her face, no eyes, mouth or lips – nothing. There was nothing but warm, blinding light. The rest of her body, from the neck down, was there. Even her favorite sundress graced the length of her body. She rocked away, faster than I recalled her doing. I tried to advance closer, but I could not move. It was as if I was stuck in cement that had long since dried, my feet buried.
“Don’t worry, Baby. Everything will be fine. You’ll see. You’ll be fine,” she repeated. Her voice sounded as if she was speaking to me from behind a waterfall… though soothing and comforting. I wanted to lay my head on her lap, allowing her to pat and massage me the way one would do a cat. Her voice brought about a sense of conviction to my soul. I could feel tears, hot tears, running down my cheeks. My heart started to beat more urgently. I blinked for a second and Madear and her rocking chair started fading away in the pasture behind her home. She faded the way a home run baseball floats away… and is gone.
“Chow time, maggots! Get your asses up if ya’ll wanta eats!” barked a guard.
‘Fuck!’ Steel gates crashed into more steel. ‘It was all a dream? A stupid, fucking dream!?!’ The mist of tears I had shed were still damp on my cheeks. My heart was still thumping. I turned over to see what time it was, fifteen minutes after three in the morning. I’m not a morning person and my weakness was affirmation of that as I turned on the cell’s light. I’m not a breakfast eater either, and I was going to refuse because it was too early to be eating, but the growling sounds coming from my empty stomach were the motivation I needed to eat something. I was hungry. No, I was starving, having eaten little to nothing my first few days on the famous Texas Death Row. Pancakes were served. They were not IHOP worthy, but I wasn’t going to be picky. I was also given an 8-ounce carton of milk, a 4-ounce carton of orange juice and four spoons of fruit cocktail. I ate everything before going back to sleep, hoping I wouldn’t dream again.
Around ten o-clock in the morning an officer opened the bean slot to the cell and threw a big commissary bag in, “Some of your fellow-condemned brothers put some things together for ya.”
I stared, my eyes fixed on him, wondering if he was joking. I don’t know if I expected a snake to crawl from the bag or a bomb to go off at any moment. Sure, I was paranoid. This wasn’t Kansas anymore. I didn’t know what ‘this’ was.
After some time, I got up, kicked the bag a little, and waited for a reaction. Nothing. I gently opened the bag to find a bunch of snacks, four writing tablets, envelopes, and over fifty bucks in stamps which, due to my naiveté, I used to tape photos of my children to the walls. I had no idea I was supposed to use stamps to write. No shit. I hadn’t written a letter to anyone at that point. I communicated through daily phone calls or visits. There were socks, a thermal top, and some much needed hygiene products, all of which I greatly appreciated. No note was given. No one shouted to get my attention. Nothing. The act of charity was empathetically done. Guys knew I was going through some things because they went through the same ‘new beginning’. It was an act of kindness I greatly appreciated even though I had no one to thank.
I walked to the front of the cell to look out. The place was teeming with sounds of existence, a farrago of inmate laughter, crashing steel, buzzing light fixtures that looked like something you’d expect to see in the beginning of the 20th century, as well as radios and multiple televisions that blared recklessly. This ‘new world’, was too much for me to embrace, so I returned and sat on my bunk. I grabbed photos of my children and their mothers, my mother and siblings, and I thought about what they were going through. I loved them all dearly, and the more I thought about them, the more I cried. I saw an unopened letter I had received the night before. It was from one of my children’s mothers. It started off like a Dear John letter. She was telling me she was getting married to a truck driver. A year earlier I shared a bed with her. I immediately thought, ‘Where the fuck did he come from?’ At that moment, I was certain. I was no longer dreaming.
ABOUT THE WRITER: Charles Mamou has been writing for WITS for quite some time and has always maintained his innocence. In the summer of 2019, it came to my attention Mr. Mamou had become very quiet. When I asked why, he explained he was out of appeals and awaiting an execution date. I asked to look at his documents. It didn’t take long to become very disturbed by what I saw. Some issues regarding Mr. Mamou’s case can be found here. Anyone with information regarding this case can contact me at contact@walkinthoseshoes.com.
There is also a facebook page dedicated to Charles Mamou’s troubling case.
The following is an excerpt from a poem written for his mother, a gift woven in words.
When I was but a little girl I made myself a promise, To rear my children with dignity, Teach them to be honest.
But first, I had to grow, Endure lots of pain, Survive the throes of ghetto woes Time and time again.
Things would not come easy, At times I felt like crying, Determined to gift-wrap the world Or willing to die trying.
Winter boots and Easter suits And summers filled with glee. Never mind if I was suffocating, As long as my kids could breathe.
So, I toiled by day and learned by night Lunched on rice and bread. Wore my children’s hand-me-downs Just to get ahead.
I cooked and cleaned and in between Encouraged my children to strive. I scraped and clawed but through it all, My eyes stayed on the prize.
Destiny for me was simply Duty without break. If asked to do it all over again, I would not hesitate.
See, all I ever wanted Was the life I never had Served to my babies In the absence of their dads.
I wanted to show them through persistence They could have it all, What matters most is how we rise, Not so much how we fall.
My kids are now grown with kids of their own, Some of those kids with child. Some day when my story is told, I hope I’ve made them proud.
All we have to offer the world, The legacy we leave behind. I pray all mothers love their children As much as I love mine.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Terry Robinson often writes under the pen name ‘Chanton’ and is a co-author of Crimson Letters, Voices From Death Row. The above is only an excerpt from a poem he wrote for his mother who has been his biggest supporter. Terry continues to work on his memoirs, as well as a book of fiction. He has always maintained his innocence, and hopes to one day prove that and walk free. Mr. Robinson can be contacted at: Terry Robinson #0349019 Central Prison 4285 Mail Service Center Raleigh, NC 27699-4285
A fax cover sheet addressed to Assistant District Attorney Lyn McClellan and dated September 24, 1999, along with an HPD officer’s handwritten caller ID records were seen for the first time by Charles Mamou in 2020, over twenty years after the Houston Police Department and District Attorney’s office had access to them. The cover sheet and phone records were not shared with Mamou at trial, and could have assisted in the investigation as well as discredited the testimony of two of the prosecution’s key witnesses. In a case without physical evidence, those witnesses were critical. The jury that found Charles Mamou guilty and sentenced him to death never saw the documents, and they were only recently obtained by Mamou’s advocates.
Charles Mamou was sentenced to die in 1999, not long after this fax is dated, for the kidnapping and murder of Mary Carmouche. Mamou has always maintained his innocence and describes fleeing a drug deal gone wrong in a car that didn’t belong to him – Carmouche was in the backseat – and returning to an apartment complex in Houston, Texas, where he was staying. Mamou lived in Louisiana and was in Texas, in most part, for a drug deal. According to Mamou, he last saw Carmouche alive and in the parking lot of the apartment complex, along with several other individuals, two of whom would end up being key witnesses for the prosecution, claiming they were at home in bed, and never saw Mamou after the drug deal – also claiming they did not make or receive phone calls that night.
The phone records – one of two pieces of actual evidence in the case – were never shared with Mamou or the jury. The other piece of evidence that Mamou and the jury never heard about was a rape kit that was collected, which included the collection of ‘trace evidence’ and ‘hairs’. In a case with no fingerprints at the scene of the body, no footprints, no witnesses, no weapon – a rape kit and phone records are the next best thing. The prosecution knew about both. The jury and Mamou knew about neither. Not only did the prosecution know about the rape kit – they also told the jury Mamou sexually assaulted the victim.
The HPD investigator’s notes include identifying notations next to the phone numbers. The victim was last seen alive on the evening of December 6, 1998, early morning of December 7, 1998. The key witness, Howard Scott, lived at the apartment complex Mamou said he drove the car to. These are Scott’s caller ID records from that night, as written by an HPD investigator that went to Scott’s apartment on December 8, 1998.
11:19 p.m., Oretha Gray; 11:25 p.m., Sun Suites; 11:46 p.m., Emily Griggs; 11:48 p.m., Meri Eubanks; 12:14 a.m., payphone; 12:19 a.m., M.E. Brinson – Shawn’s mother; 1:54 a.m., Meri Eubanks; 2:37 a.m., wireless [WRITER’S NOTE: the phone number listed at 2:37 is identified in HPD’s file as belonging to another key witness, Samuel Johnson]; 3:12 a.m., M.E. Brinson – Shawn calls for Howard; 3:43 a.m., call notes.
Mamou could have used this information in his defense, and investigators may have had an opportunity to pursue the location of the wireless phone call made at 2:37 a.m. from a cell phone used by Samuel Johnson, a witness who testified he was home in bed and didn’t talk to anyone that night. Johnson’s contradicting statement and testimony are sufficient reason to pursue the origin and purpose of the 2:37 a.m. phone call for anyone trying to find answers in a murder investigation.
Charles Mamou did not live in Houston. All of the key witnesses did, and Samuel Johnson also worked for Orkin at the time, testifying that his area was in the southwest area of Houston. Although it was often reported that the victim was found near some abandoned houses, she was actually found in what detectives described as a hard to find location in a suburban neighborhood in the southwest area of Houston in the backyard of a house that was for sale – not some abandoned houses.
When the HPD investigator went to Howard Scott’s apartment on Tuesday, December 8, 1998, the investigator was actually hoping to arrest Mamou. They knew he was there that morning from Howard Scott’s wife, and they knew Mamou had been involved in the drug deal that Mary Carmouche had last been seen at. Investigators didn’t find Mamou, but they wrote down Scott’s caller ID records and transported Scott to HPD that day to make a written statement. Not only is that documented in HPD’s case file, Detective Novak also testified regarding Howard Scott’s written statement that day.
That original statement from Howard Scott is nowhere to be found. It is not in the HPD case file, and according to the District Attorney’s office, they don’t have it either. I was told by HPD, that ‘everything doesn’t always makes it into the file’. The following day, police brought Scott and his wife back to HPD and took written statements again on Wednesday, December 9, 1998. Both of Robin Scott’s statements are available, but Howard Scott’s original statement is missing.
I tried to speak to Scott in 2019, but he refused to talk to me. He has spoken to other people over the years, and his statements are inconsistent throughout. The most recent of which, in 2019, includes a physical description of Carmouche from that night, and seeing Samuel Johnson, Charles Mamou and Mary Carmouche all at the apartment complex at the same time – a complete reversal from his testimony, in which he claimed he was home in bed and did not see Samuel Johnson or Charles Mamou after the drug deal, and his phone did not ring. Howard Scott described seeing Samuel Johnson, Charles Mamou, Mary Carmouche, and Kenneth Duplechan all alive and at the apartment complex parking lot after the drug deal.
The jury never heard that. The prosecutor who, according to the the fax cover sheet, was sent Scott’s caller ID records on September 24, 1999, listened to his witness testify two weeks later on October 7, 1999, about going to bed between 11 and midnight, and about how the phone was ringing prior to that, as he sat with ‘Shawn’ and Ken. Scott told the jury there were ‘no more phone calls’ after he went to bed. Neither the jury nor Mamou are ever told ‘Shawn’, the man Scott said he was talking to in his apartment before he went to bed between 11 and 12, called Scott’s apartment at 12:19 a.m., and again at 3:12 a.m., and that Scott’s phone didn’t stop ringing until 3:43 a.m. Although Howard Scott has consistantly contradicted himself for twenty years, and his first statement is missing, he was a key witness in the case against Mamou.
Samuel Johnson, the driver in the drug deal gone wrong, who fled the alley without Mamou, testified he went straight home to bed and spoke to no one, never seeing Mamou or Carmouche again, not seeing or speaking to anyone that night. According to the HPD investigator’s notes, Samuel Johnson called Howard Scott’s apartment at 2:37 a.m., from a wireless phone. At that time in history, landlines were frequently used for phone calls made from a person’s residence, and wireless calls were more likely to be made when away from home. Mamou never had an opportunity to point out to the jury that Johnson’s phone made a call to Howard Scott’s apartment nor was he able to investigate the location of the call’s origin. The prosecution did not share the available information with the jury.
‘Ken’ who Howard Scott mentioned was sitting in his living room in his testimony, has since been interviewed, although there is nothing in HPD’s file to indicate that anyone involved in trying to find Carmouche’s killer ever interviewed him during HPD’s ‘investigation’. In 2019 Kenneth Duplechan told an investigator he saw Charles Mamou, Howard Scott, Samuel Johnson and Shawn Eaglin in the apartment complex parking lot that night – along with the blue Lexus Mamou fled the drug deal in. That statement contradicts everything the jury was told. Kenneth Duplechan also stated he stayed in the parking lot talking to Howard Scott and Charles Mamou after Samuel Johnson drove away. The jury never heard any of that, but the phone records reveal one name coming up twice on Scott’s phone that night – Meri Eubanks. Meri Eubanks does appear to know Kenneth Duplechan, but Eubanks and Duplechan will not respond to inquiries from me. Although the HPD investigator is the individual who wrote down the name Meri Eubanks in his notes as a caller to Scott’s apartment, there are no records of anyone at HPD interviewing Eubanks in their efforts to locate Carmouche’s killer.
There were other phone calls made to the apartment that night that could have been investigated, but according to police files were not, and Mamou was not aware of them at the time, so he was unable to pursue them himself.
The prosecution also knew about actual physical evidence that was collected as part of a rape kit. They did not share what they learned with the jury or Mamou. That information has been kept from Mamou for over twenty years.
On July 8, 1999, two months before Mamou’s trial, an investigator for the District Attorney, Al Rodriguez, contacted HPD and asked them to process a rape kit.
On July 12, 1999, the results were back, indicating that no semen was detected, trace evidence and hairs existed and had been collected.
During the trial, the medical examiner testified at length about the procedures during an autopsy as well as reviewing the autopsy report itself. At no point throughout the entire trial, or in the twenty years since, was Charles Mamou or the jury told a rape kit existed. Quite the opposite. The rape kis was so well not documented, that in 2007 a private investigator looking for more evidence had to report back to Mamou that he could not find more evidence obtained by the medical examiner.
Last year, on October 30, 2019, after I had gone to HPD and the District Attorney’s office requesting the results of the rape kit and being told they don’t keep that kind of information, I contacted the Harris County Medical examiner looking for the information. It was confirmed for me at that time that the rape kit had been collected at the time of the autopsy in spite of the medical examiner neglecting to include that information in his autopsy report and testimony.
On November 19, 2019, I was able to obtain the results to the actual rape kit, noting no semen found and trace evidence collected.
The information wasn’t just kept from Mamou and the jury, the prosecutor also told the jury that a sexual assault took place, but failed to share with the jury or the defense that no semen was found .
A lot of things were told to the jury to steer them in the direction of a guilty verdict. The day after Carmouche went missing, Mamou was with his cousin when he picked up some sunglasses that he had dropped during his stay in Houston. Without surrounding information, the sunglasses became tied to the victim in the courtroom and later in news reports. It was never pointed out for the jury that the glasses were found approximately five miles from the body.
There were a lot of things not pointed out for the jury. Mamou never saw the original video statement of his cousin, Terrence Dodson, who told jurors that Mamou confessed to him. In 2019, I sent Mamou a transcript of the original statement. Although Dodson testified Mamou confessed to him over days, partially in person and partially over the phone, HPD investigators had recorded Dodson originally telling them Mamou called him from Louisiana ‘before day’ on Tuesday, December 8, 1998, and told him everything. Investigators knew, while they were listening to Dodson’s statement, Mamou had not left Houston until Tuesday at 1:30 p.m. on a bus. The interview took place on Wednesday, December 9, 1998.
Dodson’s testimony not only differed from his statement, but Mamou never saw Dodson again after the morning of Monday, December 7, 1998. He could not have confessed to him in person as he testified, nor could he have confessed in one phone call from Louisiana before day on December 8, 1998, as he said in his original statement because Mamou did not leave Houston on a bus headed to Louisiana until Tuesday afternoon at 1:30.
The jury also never saw a letter Terrence Dodson wrote to Mamou a month after Carmouche was murdered, stating he was glad Mamou didn’t tell him anything.
In 2019 it was noted in the HPD case files linked to Mamou’s case that biological evidence was signed out. I inquired at HPD, the Property Room, the Homicide Department, and the District Attorney’s office regarding why the evidence was signed out.
At the HPD Records Department, I was told they didn’t know the answer, and I should contact the Property Room, the District Attorney’s office, and the Medical Examiner.
At the District Attorney’s office, I was told the case was currently ‘closed’. There would be no current requests for evidence from them because no one was working it, and the files themselves were in storage – the case was inactive.
At the HPD Property Room, which was where the biological evidence was signed out from – I was told there is protocol in place, and in order to find out why the biological evidence was signed out, I would need to go to Homicide and speak with the investigator on the case.
At Homicide, I was told it was a ‘cold case’ and there was no active investigator on the case, I would need to talk to the person in charge of cold cases.
The cold case investigator wasn’t in and never returned my phone call.
I later received a phone call from D. Wilker in Homicide. I was told ‘only the Property Division could answer my questions’. Of note – the Property Division is where I had originally gone and was told that due to ‘protocol’, I would need to go to Homicide.
During that phone conversation, I was also told Ms. Wilker would reach out to the Property Division to see if she could get an answer for me, but she couldn’t make any promises. In addition, she informed me ‘we are mandated to test every piece of evidence’, suggesting that the evidence was taken out for testing. Ms. Wilker also suggested an investigator could have requested the material be checked out, but as I had already been told – there was no investigator on the case at that time. I was told she would get back in touch with me after she reached out to the Property Division.
After a couple weeks and no contact from Ms. Wilker – I called her. Ms. Wilker told me the rape kit results I was looking for at that time, which I later found without her assistance, were ‘irrelevant’. I was told the defense had every piece of evidence they needed to have. The ‘window of opportunity’ for finding out anything was closed. And, finally, yes, the evidence had been checked out in 2019 and had been in the possession of Mary K. Childs-Henry, but it was now back where it belonged. It had been checked out for ‘cataloging purposes’.
I then asked Ms. Wilker if she considered the matter closed, and she told me she did.
After that phone call I wrote a letter to Internal Affairs and the Chief of Police, as ‘cataloging’ two pieces of twenty year old biological evidence didn’t seem logical, and I had just been told the rape kit results that were never shared with Mamou were ‘irrelevant’, which also seemed illogical considering evidence was collected .
The Houston Police Department responded, telling me no one had done anything wrong. “In your letter, you inquired about procedures for removing evidence regarding Mr. Mamou’s case. The District Attorney is the only person that can authorize any type of evidence to be released for any reason. There are procedures in place for care, custody and control of evidence that is stored in the Property Room. You may reach the Harris County District Attorney’s Office at ….”
As of this date, it remains unclear why the biological evidence was signed out in 2019.
Charles Mamou has spent over two decades on death row and is awaiting an execution date. In a case without evidence shared with the jury, the prosecution painted a picture. In the painting, the jury was told Mamou sexually assaulted the victim and murdered individuals in previous unsolved murder cases. They were shown autopsy photos of another murder victim, from another crime, and heard the impact statements from the victim’s family in that crime.
One might argue with HPD that evidence is relevant. It’s relevant to victims and their families, and it is relevant to defendants. Charles Mamou’s little sister recently described the last Christmas Eve she shared with her brother over twenty years ago. She and her family spent the day at her Uncle White’s house in Lafayette. Their uncle had a house big enough for everybody, and his gumbo took all day and night to cook, but was worth the wait.
When the family got home that night, they could barely get through the living room because Mamou and his friends had been busy picking up gifts while everyone was gone. The kids weren’t allowed to open anything until morning, but their mom did allow them to set off the fireworks Mamou had brought home. There were so many, Mamou’s sister remembers the sky turning pink, and she remembers seeing two of Mamou’s children that night and the step kids he treated like his own.
For over three years I’ve been writing for Walk In Those Shoes, a sounding board for prisoners whose voices would otherwise be muffled behind prison walls, as well as a call to action for readers. In a world of social statuses, cultural practices and racial characteristics that serve to divide us, we remain connected through our human experiences. We’ve all lost a loved one. We’ve all dreamed. We’ve all had childhood crushes for that special someone that turned our words to mush. We’ve all done something we wish we could take back, and we all have something yet to attain. Our experiences link us in a way that voids our differences, the fabric of our worldly relationships woven in our stories.
It was after reading personal and thought-provoking essays by writers like John Green and Charles Mamou, that I recognized the importance of Walk In Those Shoes. Each piece was thoughtfully edited and kept true to its writer while providing a visual nexus that was soulful, stories not told with rhetoric but the realism of childhood abandonment, abuse and regrets. There were also tales of familial joys, kindness and compassion. I could hardly wait to join such an astonishing cast of writers whom I’d come to admire through their shared vulnerability.
On October 5, 2017, Walk In Those Shoes featured a piece titled I’m Still Breathing, an homage to Dr. Maya Angelou. In addition to the message, there was an image of a rusted manacle laid bare on granite siding. This visual selection was a symbol of empathy meant to resonate with my words. It was my first writing to be published on Walk In Those Shoes, my induction into a brotherhood of writers and one of my proudest moments.
Simply put, Walk In Those Shoes is a proverbial reminder that we are not without empathy. It is a platform for writers with broken pasts to make whole their productive future. I’m grateful for my fellow contributors for their courage to share their experiences. Our stories are not meant to suffer in silence, our stories are meant to heal.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Terry Robinson often writes under the pen name ‘Chanton’, and his creative resume is rapidly growing. His is a co-author of Crimson Letters, Voices From Death Row, a book banned from prisons in North Carolina; he is an active board member of Walk In Those Shoes as well as one of several frequent contest judges; and he continues to work on his memoir, as well as a book of fiction. His writing abilities are amazingly far reaching, and we are fortunate to have his voice and input in the direction of WITS. Terry Robinson has always maintained his innocence, and after studying his case file and transcripts WITS also believes in that innocence. Mr. Robinson can be contacted at: Terry Robinson #0349019 Central Prison 4285 Mail Service Center Raleigh, NC 27699-4285
Suicides, assaults, perpetuated acts of nonsense, exonerations, relationships severed and put back together – I thought I’d experienced all there was on Death Row. I’ve seen mild, treatable medical conditions fester and decline, often turning fatal due to inadequate healthcare. And I’ve seen the dismal look in a man’s eyes, helpless and void, moments away from being executed – yet even after twenty years, nothing could’ve prepared me for today.
For over six months now, due to global restrictions imposed to prevent the spread of COVID-19, all weekly in-person Death Row visitation has been suspended. As an alternative, online video visitation was implemented, which was a welcome remedy to the growing concerns of our loved ones for our well-being. For men decades removed from society, video visits ignited Death Row with an ever burning anticipation to view our family in the comforts of their homes as opposed to a concrete booth with reinforced glass and steel bars. Appointments were made faster than a sweepstakes giveaway and everyone that returned from a visit had a tale to tell, some recounted with exuberant smiles, some with heavy hearts.
In the following weeks, as per safety regulations, the site for Death Row video visits was moved to another area in the prison. Many of us know the new location as the ‘Death Watch’. It’s where capital punishment is performed. Few men here have suffered the Death Watch prior to having their scheduled executions vacated, one in particular describing the most dreadful night ever with a broken voice to match. More often, the men who’d been hauled off to the Death Watch would not return. It was a wasteland that was now being assigned familial merit and a path on which I would walk.
Friday, September 18, 2020, at 9:03 a.m., a call blared over the P/A system, one that came expectedly as I had awaited the sound since the night before. It would be my first video visit with my family, whom I hadn’t seen in months. The anticipation of it all elevated my mood beyond the reach of my daily struggles. I hopped into the standard Death Row uniform, one meant to evoke guilt – a hot red jumper that draws heavy around the shoulders in a color scheme that clashes with one’s dignity. With nothing left to do but settle my eagerness, I strapped on my face mask and headed on my way.
I joined the company of two other inmates, also with scheduled visits, as they shuffled slightly on their heels, anxious to be off. One guy, like myself, was a first-timer; I surmised he was equally as nervous. The other inmate had attended video visits prior and schooled me on what was to come.
With the arrival of the escorting officer, we set out on our trip from the Death Row facility down to an area usually reserved for visitation, nothing to heighten the excitement along the way, yet nothing to diminish it. We then discontinued the familiar route and veered down a flight of stairs, a control station identical to the one above at the bottom. We crossed the lobby to a sliding glass door that held beyond its threshold something menacing – the very path condemned men had journeyed before as they faced a despicable end.
The door cranked open with a woeful whine, like a symphony of restless souls. I followed the group as they seemingly proceeded with no ills for our whereabouts. What looked to be a short distance to the other end of the hallway became a faraway stretch of land, my steps laden with the realization that, for some, this was their final walk.
Rows of windows, made murky and distorted to deny one last peaceful look at nature, lined the passageway. Here, nothing would be offered to soothe the spirit of the wretched, though in a failed act of humanity, sedatives would be used to ease their pain. At the midway point was a sally port with its inner workings obscured as it sprang into view like a childhood boogeyman, chasing away my sense of security. I needn’t inquire of anyone to know this was the Death Watch. It appeared nothing like the horror I’d dreamed of, yet it incited the same despair. I was standing in the final resting place of a friend of mine named Joe who was executed in ’03 by lethal injection. Longing for his company, I whispered to myself and hoped he could hear me.
We made our way to a waiting area, each taking up a station as the first of us was ushered away to begin his scheduled visit. It would be some twenty minutes later before he returned, talkative and rather giddy as the next guy hurried off in his place. I sat and thought of all the laws passed over the years that would’ve prevented some executions, like the Mental Retardation bill that would’ve saved a man named Perry, or the Racial Justice act for another guy, Insane. One law that was enacted excluded defendants under eighteen years of age from being eligible to receive the death penalty, an amendment that would’ve kept two other men, Hassan and J-Rock, alive today.
The second inmate emerged with a smile so bright I soaked up a bit of his joy. I was sure that I’d seen the worst of the Death Watch. I couldn’t have been more wrong.
I stepped around the corner to what I thought would be a cozy, makeshift cubicle with a monitor on which the faces of my loved ones awaited. Instead, I happened onto an arching hallway with blinding lights at the far-end and a metal tank made obvious by the gear-wheel bolted to the door. I was told it was the crank that released the gasses into the chamber during executions. Beside the Death Tank was the viewing area, where the deaths have actually been watched by those who would champion vengeance while holding others to a different standard. I cringed at the thought of such an immoral practice and the historical transgressions. I’ve often wondered if my friends felt alone when they were executed – part of me now prays that they did.
After visitation, I passed by the infamous Death Chamber once more and peered into the darkened sarcophagus. I had hoped to get a feel for my friend, Joe, but all I got was a question of fate.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Terry Robinson often writes under the pen name ‘Chanton’, and this year he and others co-authored Crimson Letters, Voices From Death Row. He continues to work on his memoirs, as well as a book of fiction. Terry Robinson has always maintained his innocence, and hopes to one day prove that and walk free. Mr. Robinson can be contacted at: Terry Robinson #0349019 Central Prison 4285 Mail Service Center Raleigh, NC 27699-4285
I am change in progress, striving not so much to be rid of my adverse circumstances, but to die a better person than I lived, and the last twenty years have taught me a lot. It wasn’t long ago I faced my greatest fear and stepped onto the set of a live production of Reginald Rose’s ‘Twelve Angry Men’ to perform before a swell of doubtful prison administrators. Just this year, I made a goal to start a college fund for grandchildren I’ve yet to meet. And probably the most life-changing thing I’ve done is fully accept myself and taken accountability for the wrongs I’ve done in my life.
My wrongs aren’t what landed me on Death Row though. A verdict doesn’t change the truth. I wasn’t in the Pizza Inn the night its manager got shot and killed, and for over two decades I’ve wondered why my cousin would testify I told him I did. I knew he must have a good reason. Fear, maybe, is one thing I came up with, fear of what the system might do to him if he told the truth, whatever that might be. Since my trial, I have learned his dreadlocks were at the scene of the crime. The jury never heard that. Maybe I wouldn’t be here if they had. Maybe he thought we’d have to trade places if he told whatever he really knows. At least that’s what I told myself for twenty years.
That was before I saw what he told an investigator who sought him out in an attempt to help me. Jesse Hill made it clear he was only interested in keeping me right here.
Far from helping me, my cousin implicated another member of my family as a possible accomplice to the crime, and time and again brought my mother into the conversation, “His momma know he did it. She know how that boy is.” “My aunt did this.” “My aunt should have gave it to you,” when asked his middle name. “Why does my aunt keep doing this shit.” “She need to talk to her son. He done what he did and bragged about it.”
Hill blamed the bad blood between us on me choosing to confess to him – but the truth is, I never did that, because the truth is – I had nothing to confess. I never saw Jesse Hill that night, and I never confessed to him that night. Jesse Hill and Ronald Bullock both know that. Truth doesn’t change.
For all Hill’s fierce condemnation of me, it was a bizarre contradiction when he wanted it on record that his feelings had been hurt. “That’s my family, it hurt me even to go in there. I ain’t see you wrote that down.” I guess he didn’t see the irony in what he was saying.
As much as my cousin wanted to be portrayed as hurt by our familial bonds and clamored for sympathy, his defamation of my character was limitless, his agenda clear. “I know he did it.”
When I was a kid, I looked up to my cousin. I looked up to him when I was a man too, and for over twenty years, I wondered ‘why?’ I still don’t know ‘why’, but it cleared up a lot when my cousin told the interviewer, “I regret even knowin’ ‘em.”
It used to be that the most meaningful word I knew was ‘family’. The term denoted loyalty, safety, honor and trust. It was the highest respect one could pay another. But when a person you once admired says they regret knowing you… what’s left to say? We aren’t family – just people who share an insignificant past. Jesse Hill contends his version of the events on May 16, 1999, are true. I maintain he is a liar. Those who really know who I am – know the truth. And my truth says a lot more about Jesse Hill than he could ever say about me.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Terry Robinson often writes under the pen name ‘Chanton’, and this year he co-authored Crimson Letters, Voices From Death Row. He continues to work on his memoirs, as well as a book of fiction. Terry Robinson has always maintained his innocence, and hopes to one day prove that and walk free. Mr. Robinson can be contacted at: Terry Robinson #0349019 Central Prison 4285 Mail Service Center Raleigh, NC 27699-4285
NOTE TO READER. Please contact kimberleycarter@verizon.net if you saw Terry Robinson in Wilson, NC, any time of the day or night on May 16, 1999 – or his accusers, who claimed Robinson was with them for most of the day and night. What may seem irrelevant – is often the most helpful. Details of this case will be shared at https://walkinthoseshoes.com/category/terry-robinson/
“The State has proved it beyond a reasonable doubt, and presented evidence that puts him there, puts him telling people what he did. And that is enough.”
That was the prosecution during the closing argument that sent Terry Robinson to death row for a crime he has always maintained he knew nothing about. There wasn’t any physical evidence in the case that could tie Robinson to the murder.
We don’t have to have DNA. We have to present enough evidence so you know in your heart that he was involved, and he did this. The State has done that.
“So, convict this man. Don’t let him out.”
The jury did just that.
Robinson was in the area of the murder that night. It was normal for him to be in the area. Robinson lived in Wilson, North Carolina, and he had a girlfriend who lived across the street from the Pizza Inn, where a murder occurred, not to mention friends and relatives in the surrounding area.
DNA exists in connection to the crime, but it does not point to Terry Robinson.
There are also two latent fingerprints and one palm print available, but they do not point to Terry Robinson. According to the testimony of Special Agent Navarro of the NC State Bureau of Investigation, “Terry Lamont Robinson did not make any of the latent fingerprints that were of value for identification purposes.”
When asked, “The long and the short of it is, palm prints or other kinds of prints, nothing matched?”
Agent Navarro responded, “That is correct.”
There were hairs collected. They weren’t hairs that matched Ronald Bullock, the one man who said he was involved in the crime. They weren’t Terry Robinson’s. According to Special Agent James Gregory, assigned to the Trace Evidence Section, when asked if he was able to find a match between what was collected at the crime scene and samples from Ronald Bullock and Terry Robinson, “I did not find any hairs that had a root attached to them that were consistent with the known head hair standards collected from the – from Terry Robinson, or Ronald Bullock.”
There was a gun associated with Terry Robinson, which Robinson doesn’t deny being connected to. But when asked specifically if the bullets used in the murder were from the gun associated with Robinson, Special Agent Marrs responded, “It could not have been fired from that .380 pistol, State’s Exhibit Number Two.”
Terry Robinson was not an angel. He had a criminal record and sold drugs for a living, but the gun associated with him was not the gun used in the crime.
The case rested with two men who accused Terry Robinson of murder. Both of those two individuals have since contradicted their own testimony. According to the testimony of Ronald Bullock, who accused Terry Robinson of hatching the plot to rob the Pizza Inn, pulling him into it, and eventually murdering a man in front of him, they stopped by Jesse Hill’s home before the crime. Bullock testified that Robinson asked Jesse Hill to participate in the crime as well.
“He said he didn’t want to be part of it. We were crazy.” Bullock then testified he and Robinson dropped Jesse Hill off at his mother’s home.
After Robinson’s conviction and sentence to death, Bullock had something different to say – things he didn’t share with the jury. “Jed (Jesse Hill) gave me his dreadlocks and a headband to wear as a disguise. Jed rode with us to the Pizza Inn and to ride behind the Pizza Inn at the apartment complex.”
Bullock went on to say that Jesse Hill, “was going to get some money for his part for the help.” Bullock, in a written statement then described the robbery which differed from how he described it in his original testimony, and he also stated Jed said, “I want my dreadlocks back.”
That written statement, made in 2003, was how Terry Robinson first learned the dreadlocks he had heard about at his trial – belonged to Jesse Hill. The dreadlocks used as the murderer’s disguise, were actually made of hair that belonged to one of his accusers. A jury never heard that. They actually heard Jesse Hill described by the prosecution as an innocent ‘hero’ who received nothing for his help with the case. That turned out not to be true as well.
Jesse Hill has had a few things to say since the trial also, much of which contradicts what the jury heard.
Following is more of the closing argument from the prosecutor when he described Jesse Hill – at length.
“Now, Jesse Hill. If you ever wondered why people don’t want to come forward and testify in cases when they witness things, or they know things in a crime? If you ever wondered why? Because this man gets up there and he is trying to tell you the truth. And all the defense can do is malign him, to go on and try to trip him up on times, which don’t matter, because he said it was light or dark or whatever, and then act like, ‘You’ve got worthless check convictions?’ as if that would somehow equate with what happened in Boulder, Colorado when the Ramsey girl disappeared. Or, maybe a Bosnian war criminal.”
“He knew about something that happened that was terrible, and he could not live with the fact that they had told him about it, he knew about it, and he knew it was wrong.”
“This man is a hero.”
“He testified against his cousin, and he’s getting nothing out of it. And, don’t you know that if he was getting something out of it, both of these men would have brought it up. But, no, they want you to become cynical. They want you to look at everything, even when a man is trying to do the right thing, they want you to look at it like, ‘Well, what’s he getting out of it?’”
“Did Bullock ever come forward and say, ‘Well, yeah, Hill was involved, too. He did so-and-so.’ Which they’re going to try and make you believe, which isn’t true.”
It turns out… the prosecution was mistaken. Ronald Bullock has since stated Jesse Hill was involved, from the planning, to supplying a disguise, to being promised a cut, only the jury never heard that part.
If Terry Robinson had known anything about the murder at the Pizza Inn on May 16, 1999, if he had gone to Jesse Hill’s home prior to the crime, taken Jesse Hill’s dreadlocks and worn them in the Pizza Inn while he murdered somebody – it stands to reason he would have nudged his attorney when the dreadlocks were submitted as evidence at his trial. It stands to reason he would have said, “Hey, that hair right there belonged to Jesse Hill.” It stands to reason, facing a death sentence, Robinson would have indicated the man being hailed as a ‘hero’ was involved in the crime and his hair was found at the crime scene. It also stands to reason – Terry Robinson didn’t say anything because he didn’t know where the dreadlocks came from at that point in time.
In 2003, eight days after Ronald Bullock told an investigator the dreadlocks belonged to Jesse Hill, Hill confirmed the dreads where his, saying he supplied the dreadlocks to Ronald Bullock for a disguise, and that they were his hair. He also told the investigator he had told the police and the prosecutors about supplying the dreadlocks, but he didn’t remember when he told them. In addition, Jesse Hill said he received $5,000 for his help in the case.
Over the years, Jesse Hill, has been interviewed on a couple occasions. According to the original case file in 1999, Hill initially called police and told them Ronald Bullock and Terry Robinson were responsible for what took place at the Pizza Inn, and after sharing that information with police, Hill then drove with them to show them where Bullock lived. More recently he remembers it differently, saying Bullock turned himself in, “I heard he called the police while I was at my sister’s house.” “I heard he called them, they came down there and they locked him up.”
In contrast to Bullock’s 2003 statement regarding Hill’s involvement, Jesse Hill is adamant he had nothing to do with what took place that night in spite of his own 2003 interview with an investigator in which he admitted supplying the disguise. “That man had a family. You don’t do stuff like that. Get a job. I had a job. They coulda had a job, they coulda worked. They didn’t have to do what they did. Come on, man.”
When asked about Bullock’s statement regarding a cut of the money from the planned robbery, “No! I don’t know nothin’ about no money. Come on, man.”
Although they don’t agree on a lot there is one thing the two agree on. Jesse Hill and Ronald Bullock both agree Terry Robinson shot and killed a man on May 16, 1999.
Several years ago, when asked if he would have testified in court about the dreads if he had been asked, Jesse Hill responded, “Sure, if he asked me, yeah.”
But – neither attorney did ask him. So, the jury never heard Jesse Hill, the ‘hero’, was involved in the crime.
Jesse Hill, in contrast to what he said years earlier when he admitted to supplying a disguise for the crime, later said, “They did it them self, they need to handle it.” “They robbed that place because they want to. I ain’t got nothing to do with that.”
He even seems to have a different perspective of who went to the police, “Montrel was with him. Montrel the one told people what happened. That’s why they had so much on him. Cause he was with him. Shit, it ain’t got nothin’ to do with me and nobody else.”
I have reached out to Ronald Bullock and Jesse Hill for a response, but have not heard back. I’ve also reached out to the public, and I am doing so again. If you saw Terry Robinson at any time during the day or night of May 16, 1999, please contact me at kimberleycarter@verizon.net. According to Robinson’s accusers, he was with them the entire day from midday through approximately midnight.
The above photograph was shared with me by Terry Robinson’s mother, who has quietly stood by her son’s side for over two decades. She told me Robinson was about fifteen years old in the photograph. He is second from the left with the white hat on, and had been working in the tobacco field that day. Although not asked, Jesse Hill also spoke of Terry Robinson’s mother several times.
“His mama know how that boy is. I don’t know why she’s trippin’.” “She know how her son was.”
Terry Robinson writes for WITS when he is not working on other various projects. You can read some of his work here. He has also co-authored Crimson Letters, available on Amazon. Details of his case can be found here. Mr. Robinson can be contacted at:
Terry Robinson #0349019 Central Prison 4285 Mail Service Center Raleigh, NC 27699-4285
For two years, WITS has shared the story of Charles Mamou, two decades on death row and awaiting an execution date. In those two years, this site has shared a letter written by the key witness that the jury never saw, rape kit results the DA had that Mamou never knew existed, phone records the DA had that Mamou never knew existed, documentation of biological evidence being signed out in the case with no explanation or accountability, missing statements and/or interviews, witness interviews from 2019 indicating Mamou was exactly where he said he was twenty years ago when he last saw Mary Carmouche and more. Yet – he awaits execution. I recently asked him, ‘How has it impacted you, knowing the lengths Harris County went to in order to sentence you to die?’
Since I’ve been on Texas’ Death Row, where reading is the only natural form of entertainment, I have read a lot of history books. When I think of my situation, there is little difference between 1898 and 1998 – I was just a young, dumb, poor black kid who stood alone. I wasn’t the first, and I wasn’t the last. It was the norm. Racist and overzealous prosecutors saw me and those that look like me the same, ‘a menace to society’, deplorable and judicially dispensable, while off-colored jokes were made in the locker room, no one having the gumption to tell them in public.
Here’s what I want people to know. Even after I was convicted and sentence to die by a jury that looked nothing like me, I still blew it off. ‘I’ll win on appeal, cause there is no way I won’t get action’. I didn’t know an appeal is just a maze of malleable interpretations of laws, many not even heard on appeal, getting ‘procedurally barred’. The system only works if you have the money to move it in your favor.
I knew one thing in 1998. I didn’t bring Mary to that night. I didn’t kidnap Mary. I didn’t kill Mary. And I sure as hell didn’t rape her. My lawyers didn’t care about me at all, told me that in five years I would win my case on appeal. I believed what I was told. Then five turned to ten and ten to twenty, and I realized America wasn’t about the truth. The D.A. had evidence during trial that their own witness’ were lying – but said nothing. Phone records show phone calls were being made all night, but both men claimed they were asleep.
I’m not the first man to sit innocent on Death Row. I know the real meaning of HATE and what it feels and tastes like to be hated. The difference between me and them – I don’t hide from who I was and who I am. And in case anyone wants to know – you’re damn right, I’m mad.
All posts and details of this case, including phone records that were not shared with the defense, a letter from the ‘key witness’ stating he didn’t know anything, and how Mamou was even accused of an unsolved murder during his trial can be found here. Anyone with information regarding this case can contact me at kimberleycarter@verizon.net. There is also a facebook page dedicated to sharing the truth. Share his story.
TO CONTACT CHARLES MAMOU: Charles Mamou #999333 Polunsky Unit 12-CD-53 3872 South FM 350 Livingston, TX 77351 Mamou can also be contacted through JPay via email, but please include your mailing address if you contact him this way, as he can only respond through the mail.
He was called Little Tee – befitting since he stood no taller than the BMX bicycle he struggled to mount, eager to tag along with the older kids to the mall. His cheeks flushed, absorbing the praise, while my friends boasted over his skill for thieving. I knew they were manipulating him, but I didn’t speak up – being equally manipulative in my silence. I hoped he would grow tired on our trail and turn back, but he didn’t, determination cascading from his forehead with each trickle of sweat. We arrived at the mall and did wheelies in the parking lot as Little Tee vanished inside. By the time we later headed for home, we all sported new gold chains.
That was the first day I met Little Tee, a burgeoning menace with an unwavering desire to prove himself. He stole anything that wasn’t nailed down, his confidence like silk in his veins. Thievery was only a fragment of his willingness to fit in; one simply had to dare Little Tee. He hung out all hours of the night, putting doubts to rest with a fearlessness inspiring to watch.
Nights at my house were sometimes spent with Little Tee sprawled out on the sofa or scoffing cold-cuts and gawking at video vixens. I wondered about his family and whether his whereabouts were anyone’s concern. He was no more than eight or nine, and yet no one ever came looking for him. I didn’t mind that he showed up unexpectedly and seemed to never want to leave; I liked having him around. He had a timely sense of humor and dreams of the future big enough to lend me some. He gave unsparingly and never asked for anything in return. To him, charity was synonymous to wealth. Little Tee was a joy, but he did have a mean-streak and fought with other kids all over town like it was the latest craze. The bane of his freedom, it would earn him some stints in juvenile detention where he ultimately grew more devious.
A few years later, Little Tee transitioned from thieving to dope dealing. He hopped into cars haggling crack rocks and turned profits with the best of ‘em. He smoked cigarettes and weed, drank beers and cussed. No one seemed bothered by his youthfulness, instead they encouraged him. The more his behavior worsened, the more popular he became. By twelve years old, he had as much clientele as dealers twice his age. He was always the smallest guy on the block, but nobody had more heart.
One night Little Tee was at a local hangout when a scuffle broke out between two men with their pride at sake, one of whom had a shotgun. Scorching iron-pellets ruptured Little Tee’s flesh as he was inadvertently shot in the face. It would be months before he healed from his physical injuries, but his psyche hardly recovered. Suddenly, he was torn between upholding his image and breaking free from his notoriety. He had grown weary of his terrible ways, yet he couldn’t break character. The truth was, the shooting ordeal changed Little Tee and heightened his conscience in a way others could never understand. He wanted so much to be done with the streets… but the streets don’t always let go.
On Christmas day, December 25, 1997, I was posted up on the block when Little Tee strolled through. We greeted one another and shared some laughs before his eyes took on a piercing glare. He then let on about his dissension with rival dealers in a nearby neighborhood and asked for my help. By then, Little Tee was like a brother to me – it was all the answer he needed. Apparently, he had rented a car and parked it on Gay Street. He said he would swing by and pick me up later. Little Tee disappeared up the street. Some minutes later, gunshots devoured the joyous holiday evening. Gossip raced along the streets on the lips of hearsayers – Little Tee was just killed by the police!
I bolted heedlessly for Gay Street while at the same time down a road in my head that had no end. I kept thinking that if I got there quick enough, maybe I could save him. I prayed the whispers were wrong but the look of despair on the faces of the spectators confirmed my worst realty. Someone was dead. “Please, God, don’t let it be Little Tee.”
The shooting had taken place in the backyard which obscured my view of the body. Rumors of what happened ran rampant among those gathered, igniting a bon-fire of tempers. The ambulance arrived and carted out a body partially covered under a blood soaked sheet. I recognized the sneakers and fell to the ground wailing… Little Tee really was gone.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Terry Robinson often writes under the pen name ‘Chanton’, and this year he co-authored Crimson Letters, Voices From Death Row. He continues to work on his memoirs, as well as a book of fiction. Terry Robinson has always maintained his innocence, and hopes to one day prove that and walk free. Mr. Robinson can be contacted at: Terry Robinson #0349019 Central Prison 4285 Mail Service Center Raleigh, NC 27699-4285
NOTE TO READER. Please contact kimberleycarter@verizon.net if you saw Terry Robinson in Wilson, NC, any time of the day or night on May 16, 1999 – or his accusers, who claimed Robinson was with them for most of the day. What may seem irrelevant – is often the most helpful. Details of this case will be shared at https://walkinthoseshoes.com/category/terry-robinson/
Houston’s Police Chief, Art Acevedo, recently received cheers from protestors, “We will march as a department with everybody in this community. I will march until I can’t stand no more.”
Charles Mamou has lived on Death Row for over twenty years for a case built by the Houston Police Department and prosecuted by Harris County, Texas. Mamou is out of appeals, and despite what that means for a man on death row, the Houston Police Department is not interested in addressing any mishandling of his case. A few short months ago, I was ‘dismissed’ by the Houston Police Department when I tried to obtain answers. I was told by Ms. Wilker at HPD that what I was looking for was ‘irrelevant’ and the ‘window of opportunity’ to obtain the information was ‘closed’.
I tried to explain to Ms. Wilker during our several conversations that it was relevant and what I was looking for, rape kit results, were significant because the prosecutor told the jury Charles Mamou sexually assaulted the victim. Ms. Wilker wouldn’t acknowledge the importance of the information.
I was able to obtain the rape kit results without the help of HPD or the Harris County District Attorney’s office. As it turns out, the results revealed the D.A. knew prior to trial that while they were accusing Mamou of sexual assault, there was no semen found. They also learned before the trial and from those results that trace evidence existed in the case. They never told Mamou, and they didn’t tell him a few months ago when I was requesting their help in the matter. Again, HPD’s position, according to Ms. Wilker, the rape kit results are irrelevant and the window of opportunity to obtain that information is closed.
Legally, Mamou’s case has been rubber-stamped and through the Texas process – he will be executed in the near future. But this is what people should know when the execution takes place. I didn’t just go to HPD looking for rape kit results. There is a lot more the jury never knew in the Mamou case in addition to a rape kit and the results from it.
In 2019, twenty years after Mamou’s death sentence began, the case file states ‘biological evidence’ was signed out on two different occasions. Mamou, who has always maintained his innocence, is going to be executed so it seems reasonable he should know why biological evidence was being signed out in his case. Coincidentally or not, the employee who signed for both items has been written about on several occasions in the Houston Chronicle for issues related to mishandling of evidence. The employee also worked in the HPD lab back in 1998 when the crime occurred, and it appears someone that looks strikingly like that employee is in Mamou evidence photographs from the time. For all those reason, I also inquired at HPD as to why the evidence was signed out.
I was told by HPD to ask the District Attorney’s office and the HPD Property Room, which I did. The District Attorney’s office told me they had not requested any evidence to be tested, the file was not active. The Property Room told me to go to Homicide and ask the investigator working the case. Homicide told me no one was working the case. My question came full circle back to HPD, and I was told by Ms. Wilker in a phone conversation that the evidence was signed out and in the possession of Mary K. Childs-Henry at one time, but it was ‘now back where it belonged’. Not satisfied, I asked if she considered the matter closed – she responded she did.
After that phone call, I wrote to Internal Affairs and copied Chief Art Acevedo, hoping to address why evidence in the Mamou case would be signed for if there was no detective working the case and the District Attorney did not request it. HPD responded via a letter dated December 17, 2019. “The incident described by you does not support an allegation of misconduct on the part of a member of the Houston Police Department. There is no allegation described by you that would initiate an investigation.” It went on to say, “The District Attorney is the only person that can authorize any type of evidence to be released for any reason.”
And so – no one needs to explain why biological evidence in a capital murder case gets signed out.
It doesn’t end with an undisclosed rape kit, or undisclosed trace evidence or having to not account for removing evidence in a capital murder that resulted in a death sentence.
The case was built from the ground up on a one-time suspect telling police that Mamou confessed to him. HPD investigators were aware when they were recording that suspect’s statement that what he was describing couldn’t have taken place the way described. The witness, Terrence Dodson, said Mamou confessed to him in a one phone call ‘confession’ from Louisiana on the previous day, Tuesday morning ‘before day’. The police didn’t stop him at that point. At the very time he was making this statement, police were taking a statement in another room from a man who said Mamou was in Houston, Texas, on Tuesday morning, and that man drove Mamou to the bus stop on Tuesday in the afternoon, around 1:30.
Mamou and Terrence Dodson, the witness who testified Mamou confessed to him.
That wasn’t all. Police knew Mamou was in Houston on Tuesday because the man who was recording the statement, Det. Novak, had actually spoken to the woman whose apartment Mamou had slept in on Monday night and that detective also obtained a warrant in Houston on Tuesday morning as police tried to arrest Mamou at that apartment located in Houston. They missed Mamou, who was later dropped off at the bus stop by the witness in the other room at HPD. The HPD interviewer, Novak, also notarized the statement of the man in the next room who said he drove Mamou to the bus stop. Novak was also the one who spoke to the woman whose apartment Mamou slept at and where he was located on Tuesday morning.
If that wasn’t enough, the ‘star’ witness also clearly told police Mamou was planning on taking a bus from Louisiana to Houston on Tuesday and had asked the witness to pick him up at the bus station. Again – detectives knew Mamou was not in Louisaina on Tuesday morning and they also knew he actually took a bus from Houston to Louisiana on Tuesday – the exact opposite of what the witness was describing.
That witness’ testimony later changed at trial, and he described a confession that took place over days, over the phone and in person, even though Mamou never saw that man again after Monday morning. Mamou never saw the interview, and was unaware of the discrepancies until last year.
There is more.
Investigators, when they went to the apartment that Tuesday morning to talk to the resident there, Howard Scott, they wrote down every single one of the phone calls on his caller I.D. from the night of the crime. That information was never shared with Mamou, but would have discredited two of the state’s witnesses who testified they were in bed sleeping and not using their phones. Howard Scott said his phone simply stopped ringing between 11 and 12 when he went to bed. When asked on the stand if it was because it was unplugged, he said no. It was because it simply stopped ringing.
An HPD investigator faxed the phone records to the District Attorney during the trial and before that testimony. The District Attorney didn’t pull his witness to the side during his testimony or in any way indicate the witness was lying. There was also at least one phone call that went out of the apartment that night according to the caller I.D. of Yellow Cab.
Included in the fax HPD sent to the D.A. were the phone calls placed to the apartment by another suspect, Samuel Johnson. Samuel Johnson also testified he was in bed sleeping and had not contacted anyone or made any calls to Howard Scott – whose caller ID said he did. Again, the District Attorney did not ask his witness to tell the truth, or ask for an opportunity to speak to his witness on the side and explain to him that he needed to tell the truth on the stand.
What’s even more important about Samuel Johnson’s phone call – it was made from a cell phone. In 1998, it would be common for people to use their landline for phone calls from their residence and a cell phone if they were not at home. Unfortunately, those phone records were never shared with Mamou, and he didn’t know they existed until recently. The opportunity to trace that phone call is gone.
There is more about that Tuesday and the police talking to Howard and Robin Scott. Police drove them both to HPD to get their statements. Robin Scott’s statement from that day is in the file, Howard Scott’s is not – even though it is well documented that Howard Scott was taken to HPD on Tuesday, December 8, 1998, for a statement. In addition, Detective Novak testified he took a written statement from Scott when he went to HPD that day, and Howard himself has since told an investigator that HPD would not let him and his wife leave the police department that day until their statements matched.
As if that wasn’t enough. Detective Novak reopened an investigation into an unsolved murder in Houston from months earlier during the trial. What’s found in that file, isn’t much, but there is a witness statement in there that describes an individual in a bar, even describes how he was dressed, who left the bar with the victim. He also describes someone coming in a short time later saying the victim had been shot. That statement was never shared with the jury. Rather – the ‘man in the bar’, Joseph Melancon, testified at Mamou’s trial. His testimony did not match any of his earlier recorded accounts, but the jury didn’t know that, and Mamou got accused of the unsolved crime. The jury never heard the witness statement describing Melancon leaving with the victim, nor did they get to hear any defense from Mamou. Mamou was not charged with that crime, although he is listed as charged. The jury got to see the dead man’s autopsy photos and hear from his grieving family members though.
That is what took place in the hands of Harris County and the Houston Police Department. If you try to inquire with them regarding what took place, you may be told what you want to know is “irrelevant” and “the window of opportunity is closed”, but I would be happy to share with you what I have.
When Charles Mamou gets executed, his parents will most likely be offered the opportunity to watch, but it won’t be on camera for the world to see.
Chief Acevedo and the Harris County prosecutors always have the power to do the right thing and the window of opportunity is never closed. It is more open now than it has ever been.
“Compassion takes courage,” Mamou wrote me recently. Will the powers that be have the courage to do the right thing – or keep insisting some window is closed?
All posts and details of this case, including phone records that were not shared with the defense, a letter from the ‘key witness’ stating he didn’t know anything, and how Mamou was even accused of an unsolved murder during his trial can be found here. Anyone with information regarding this case can contact me at kimberleycarter@verizon.net. There is also a facebook page dedicated to sharing the truth. Share his story.
TO CONTACT CHARLES MAMOU: Charles Mamou #999333 Polunsky Unit 12-CD-53 3872 South FM 350 Livingston, TX 77351 Mamou can also be contacted through JPay via email, but please include your mailing address if you contact him this way, as he can only respond through the mail.
