get more involved in duckett s case. so i go to florida and i poured over the reports. and i began to see flaws. this young woman, her name was gwen, she says she saw the child get into the police car. marshal discovered there was more to gwen gurley, the only eyewitness, than jurors had been led to believe. i just wanted to know how it came about that she would testify against duckett. gwen gurley was always getting involved in disturbances, and then all of a sudden she becomes a star witness with the worst credibility you could ever have. let s see, i was 16, i was a typical teenager, you could say, except i was getting in a little trouble. three counts of grand theft. and the news report of
miami herald, the courts are reading it. everybody reads it. people always want to believe somebody is innocent. but it is really dangerous years after the new fact to get a new trial for somebody, you know, for some legal flaw like maybe his lawyer didn t work hard enough or maybe some witness was unreliable. in fact, gwen gurley who recanted her original testimony against duckett now claims she was coerced into recanting by an investigator working for the duckett family. this man was at my house, if i was hanging up clothes he was always around, he never let my life at peace. so i just told him what he wanted to hear to leave me alone. what he told me happened, i said okay it happened. and the only reason i even agreed to do this interview was just to let it on record to let it be known that the last time i saw teresa mcabee, she was in
what kind of system is that? while duckett s appeal was severely weakened without gurley s recanted testimony, beth wells was still able to attack the prosecution s case, starting with the tire tracks found near teresa s body. the little dirt road had the tire tracks by it, which was a pretty good find by the detective. they preserved the tracks, did a mold of it, everything else. sure enough the tire tracks had the same tread pattern that the police cars had. but just because somebody had the tire tread with the same basic pattern doesn t mean it was that car. duckett s former boss, police chief michael brady was also suspicious of the evidence. soon after the investigators left the crime scene, he made a discovery that convinced him the evidence was flawed. we went out and could find no evidence that the investigators had lifted any kind of tire
duckett s indictment came on the news. james duckett in connection with the killing. and she saw that, and she called a female corrections officer over. and told her i was there, i know something about that case. the sheriff s department of lake county come talk to me. the inference was, we can give you a break if you saw something that we should know about. hint, hint. lin testigwen testified agai duckett and was let out of jail after serving two years. but a year after the sentencing, gurley recanted her testimony. she claimed she had been induced into testifying against duckett by investigator rocky harris. rocky harris took me in and out of the jail, asked a lot of questions. lot of questions.
coerce, coe nine years after james duckett had been sentenced to death, the key witness in his prosecution, gwen gurley, was prepared to testify that she had lied at his original trial. but the presiding judge put a stop to gwen s admission, warning her of perjure charges. the judge said i would be sentenced to the maximum, i think it was seven years for each perjury, so i pled the fifth. we asked the judge to grant immunity and he just didn t do it. how can you kill somebody, how can you execute somebody and you have a state s key witness that wants to tell the truth, and yet because it is not what the state wants they re going to threaten her with perjury and send her back to prison?