The Innocence Files Season 1, Episode 5 recap: The Trials of Franky Carrillo

Episode 5 of Netflix series The Innocence Files: Franky Carrillo

Episode 5 of The Innocence Files starts with Gary L. Wells, an Eyewitness Identification Expert, comparing witness creation to sausages. He suggests that, if the Jury actually saw the process, it might lead to disillusionment. In this case, Franky Carrillo received 2 life sentences for the 1991 drive-by shooting death of Donald Sarpy. The conviction first had the stumbling block of a mistrial, caused by a case that relied on shoddy, unreliable eyewitness evidence.

Prosecutor Mary Ann Escalante kept pursuing the case, even with a lack of evidence and sufficient cause for reasonable doubt. Also, while already incarcerated, Franky’s father died, which got rid of his alibi witness. In 1994, the state of California denied Carrillo’s appeal. By this time, Franky Carrillo had already attained a confession letter from Oscar Rodriguez — which, apparently, never found its way before a Jury’s eyes.

The Innocence Files: Ignored confession, changed testimony.

According to The Innocence Files, the community of Lynwood, California in general knew Franky wasn’t the shooter. While that alone probably should not hold up in court, a truly jarring moment in the case is that the Judge denied the testimony of Oscar Rodriguez, who could have potentially cleared Franky Carrillo’s name! It really wasn’t until 2006 that things finally started changing for Franky.

That’s when Ellen Eggers, from Carrillo’s legal team, began “pestering” Deputy District Attorney Brentford Ferreira about a Habeas Corpus petition based on 4 witnesses who recanted their testimony.

For example, James Munnerly admitted that, rather than clearly witnessing the crime, he was at his mom’s house across the street. Montrai Mitchell says he was coerced into his testimony, Marcus Stewart said it was actually too dark to see anything that night, and Munnerly was apparently also influenced by Scotty Turner revealing who he picked out of the lineup photo (and Turner himself recanted his eyewitness testimony).

Under pressure?

The Innocence Files suggests that the LASD’s Craig Ditsch pressured Scotty Turner into picking Franky Carrillo out of the photo lineup. The series also doubles down on questioning the reliability of eyewitness testimony. Jennifer Dysart, another Eyewitness Identification Expert, mentions staged experiments where eyewitnesses pick suspects that weren’t even there. As if to directly nourish such doubts, we see archival footage of Craig Ditsch admitting he wasn’t even trained regarding eyewitness testimony!

Getting Franky Carrillo’s case reassessment wasn’t easy. Dameon Sarpy didn’t want to meet with Ellen Eggers in 2010, as he still thought Franky killed his father. However, when he saw Oscar’s handwritten confession note and all the recanted testimonies, his opinion started changing. According to Eggers, though, the LA Sherriff’s Department actually started harassing relevant people about the Innocence Project and the case, trying to apply pressure to dodge any lawsuits.

The hearing

Franky missed much of his son’s childhood by the time the Innocence Project got his Habeas Corpus hearing in 2011. Ultimately it ended up freeing Carrillo, but the case illustrated some shifty things about police investigations used to wrongfully convict people.

In this case, there seemingly was little investigation at all, as well as bizarrely unreliable eyewitness testimony that still managed to land a conviction. On top of all that, even deputy Craig Ditsch himself admits to an affiliation with the Lynwood Vikings, a white supremacist gang within the LASD!

Scotty Turner says Ditsch manipulated the photo lineup. It didn’t all hinge on Ditsch, however. Franky’s legal team even returned to the original crime scene at night, re-enacting the shooting under similar conditions to reveal how difficult it would be for reliable eyewitness identification. It turns out the night-time conditions and distances involved make for less-than-ideal vision. This surely figured into all of those recanted testimonies.

Set free

After decades in prison, Franky Carrillo was set free after Brentford Ferreira himself announced it was his duty to grant the petition. Now, Franky Carrillo has a family and works to help others who were wrongly incarcerated.

Of course, Ditsch still insists they let a guilty person go — despite The Innocence Files showing us mounds of evidence that, yes, they most certainly went after any suspect they wanted, based solely on his affiliation with a street gang (however tight or loose the affiliation ultimately was). In 2016, Franky won a 10 million settlement over his wrongful conviction.

What are your thoughts on The Innocence Files and this case? Let us know in the comments!